Consciousness: The Ultimate Intelligence (Full Talk)

Yogi, mystic and visionary, Sadhguru is a spiritual master with a difference. Sadhguru speaks at an event organized by Visionary Women, a non-profit organization dedicated to advancing the status of women. In this insightful talk, Sadhguru delves into consciousness, and defines what he perceives as the 'ultimate intelligence'. This talk was part of the Visionary Women Salon Series; a series that focused on women’s causes and initiatives.

Note: This is a live recording.

Transcript

Good evening,

Good evening everyone.

I said good evening.

I thought you're not in talking terms with me already.

Good evening everyone.

Welcome to Visionary Women.

You probably know and most of you know that Sadhguru is known as being a mystic and a humanitarian and now you see by the video that he's known for his mountain biking… This humanitarian doesn't concern with my diet.

Well and he's also known for his incredible sense of humor,

His warmth.

Like a vegetarian,

Non-vegetarian,

Humanitarian.

I hope people don't misunderstand that.

But most impressive I have to say is my husband and I were at your ashram probably two years ago and we got a first glimpse at what you do in rural areas by uplifting them from poverty,

From the huge schools that you run.

And we at Visionary Women feel that it's a huge honor to have you here tonight so we can discuss a few things that is of importance to us as well.

So welcome to our community at Visionary Women.

And the purpose,

I'm so sorry I feel that maybe I'm looking back at people,

But the purpose of our salon series is to create experiences of learning,

Meaning and belonging for our members and for those who soon will be our members,

Right?

And as I was talking to you just a little bit earlier before the event,

What we see in the national conversation this past year is that people are trying to re-figure how men and women should interact with each other.

And I thought that it would be very appropriate for tonight to also invite men in our forum,

Given that we're a women's organization,

We're very well aware,

Not only our board but our whole membership,

That in order to have true understanding we need to be talking about these conversations aloud collectively and most importantly with an open heart.

And men are our partners,

Our brothers,

Our fathers,

Our husbands and our allies.

And we wanted to start off first really talking about maybe the whole idea of consciousness,

What it means.

For those of you who haven't watched Sadhguru,

There are hundreds of YouTube videos of his teachings.

And there was one at MIT that you were talking about consciousness that I thought would be very interesting for our audience to… to really get the definition of what it means.

See,

What is a man and what is a woman is a small difference that nature has introduced into a species.

Just to address a certain aspect of our life,

Essentially to address the reproductive aspect – when I say reproductive aspect,

We all exist because somebody reproduced.

Hello?

You're okay?

If nobody was drawn to anybody,

If nobody felt a bit horny,

We wouldn't exist.

Participant – Is this a guru speaking?

Sadhguru – We wouldn't exist,

Isn't it?

Participant – Yes.

Sadhguru – Let's come to terms with this.

We don't exist because out of the love for children they produce,

No.

They felt horny and here we are.

There's no need to make our biology either filthy or raise it to another level.

We just have to look at it for what it is.

We have to come to terms with our biology,

First of all.

It's the most rudimentary thing but unfortunately that's not happened to most human societies that we have not come to terms with our biology.

Body parts are ruling our minds.

Yes?

So,

It's from that context that you see this problem evolving,

How to work together.

I'm saying… Please,

If you… if you find some gap in what I'm saying because in a brief little bit of time we're trying to say some profound things,

If you find a gap you must ask a question,

You must not conclude against me,

Okay?

I can fill those gaps but I'll create some gaps because to go quickly.

Essentially why should it matter to you whether you… right now you're a man or a woman,

Why should it matter to me?

These things matter only in bathrooms and bedrooms.

Why right now it should matter to me whether you're a man or a woman?

Why can't I just treat you as just one more person?

Hello?

This is not against anybody because we have made human biology so big in our minds.

It's become so big because we have not accepted the fundamental biological difference.

Yes?

Because for thousands of years religions and philosophies have been telling you what's wrong about your biology,

How the fundamentals of your biology is not okay,

How the fundamentals of your biology is sin.

Because of this we came to a certain level of resistance about human biology,

Particularly a woman's biology.

Because of this these things have become big because the nature of human mind is such,

Whatever you resist becomes the biggest thing in your mind.

Right now if I tell you as an experiment,

Next ten seconds nobody should think of monkeys.

Try please.

You will only be thinking of monkeys.

So this has become a crazy thing in the world.

We have made human biology into such a big thing,

A small difference between man and woman,

We made it into such a big thing in our minds,

We can't keep it down for a moment.

Everywhere,

Wherever you are,

You have to be conscious about somebody's body parts.

Why?

I can understand a fourteen… thirteen,

Fourteen,

Fifteen year old boy when you know,

When you were ten,

Eleven,

Everything was fine,

Suddenly a little bit of hormone,

Your hormones hijacked your intelligence and after that you just look like this,

Every little bump on somebody's body looked like a word by itself.

Till then you were quite okay.

I think that happens at a certain point but at least by twenty you must fix yourself.

Again you must become normal,

You must be able to look at a human body just as it is without giving it all kinds of meanings.

This is what consciousness means because consciousness is an intelligence beyond your physiological and psychological structure.

See when we sit here,

Your body is your body,

My body is my body.

No way these two things can be one.

People try hard but it never becomes one.

Only when we are buried we become one.

In the soil we become one but as long as you and me exist here,

That's your body,

This is my body,

Very clear.

That's your mind,

This is my mind,

Very clear.

These things will never become one.

We can agree on a few things but my mind is my mind,

Your mind is your mind,

Isn't it?

But there is no such thing as my life and your life.

This is a living cosmos.

You have captured some,

I have captured some,

That's about it.

If you depending upon how much you capture,

That will be the scale and scope of your life.

This got nothing to do with anybody's biology.

Biology is just a small physical difference just to facilitate one aspect,

Continuation of human race,

Isn't it?

Otherwise we could all be made one way.

If there was no need,

If some seeds fell out of your ears and children would come out,

Then we wouldn't need this difference.

So this difference is to accommodate one aspect of life.

If you and me are not connected in that aspect of life,

I have no business what you got on your body.

Yes?

You have no business what is me and I have no business what is you.

The question is if we're doing something together,

Well,

Do you make sense or do I make sense to you?

That's about it.

But biology has become a very big thing.

One reason in the work… working spaces and you know,

Work areas,

I think this is only in America,

Maybe this is the second generation of women or really I can say this is really the first generation of women who really stepped out to work in every arena of life.

That's so almost everywhere in the world.

In India also it's very new which in the last twenty-five years that women are really stepping out to work.

This has happened not because of some liberal revolution that happened.

This has happened simply because of technology.

Technology has taken out the significance of man's brawn.

When there was no technology,

Almost everything was done with human muscle.

When that was so naturally man dominated because of the muscular force.

Women also was only in the survival aspects of life.

There were other aspects of life where the women always played a significant role.

We were not born to men.

I was not at least.

So they always played a significant role but roles were divided because economic aspect of life was largely muscle-powered.

So men dominated,

Now with technology muscle is of no great significance in today's world.

So naturally women are coming into this space.

This should happen very as simple evolution.

No fight is needed,

No revolution is needed.

Once you see muscle is not significant,

Women will fill those spaces.

It's anyway happening.

There is no need to make a big thing about it.

Exploitation,

If you're talking about exploitation,

I want you to understand,

Still we are in… as a civilization,

We are still in that level of crudeness of mind is not just women,

Anything weaker than us we exploit.

Yes or no?

Every creature on the planet we're exploiting,

Aren't we?

Hello?

Not just women,

Children are beaten.

Why?

Just because they're small.

Hello?

Why do you think children are beaten by a lot of people?

Simply because they're smaller than you.

If your children were bigger than you,

Would you go and beat them?

So exploitative nature of who we are exists in all aspects of life.

When it comes to women,

Probably that exploitation turns into a sexual… takes on a sexual tone.

But fundamentally what needs to go is this urge to exploit anything and everything which is little weaker than me.

That should go.

If that doesn't go,

People will find devious ways to do the same damn thing.

You can do as much as you want,

You can fight as much as you want,

But people will find devious ways to do the same thing,

Isn't it?

So this urge,

If somebody is little less stronger than me,

I have to mess them in some way.

This has to go.

If this has to go,

The most fundamental thing is just this.

Because today it's about consciousness.

What consciousness means is,

See you have a body.

Your body is just a heap of food that you've gathered over a period of time.

Yes?

What was soil became food,

What was food became flesh and blood,

Here we are.

Most people don't get this till you bury them.

If you get it now,

You can transform your life.

Other… otherwise one day anyway we'll get it from the maggots,

But that's late.

So what you accumulate can be yours,

Cannot be you,

Isn't it?

Hello?

Whatever we accumulate,

We can say this belongs to me.

You cannot say it's me,

Isn't it?

So similarly whatever the content of your mind is also accumulated from the impressions that we have taken in.

So this is also an accumulation,

This is also an accumulation.

These things are two basic faculties we have.

Right now unfortunately we are so barely identified with these two things that we can't use them as we should,

But they are the source of a lot of mess in the world.

So when you say consciousness,

You're talking about a dimension of intelligence which is neither of the body,

Which is neither of your mind,

But it is the source of both the body and the mind.

You just eat a piece of bread and it becomes human body.

Hello?

Happening,

Right?

If I… if I take a piece of bread in my hands right here and turn it into a human body,

Who do you think I am?

Hmm?

Magician.

Did you see a magician making a baby?

Who do you think I am?

Creator himself,

Isn't it?

But every day you are doing this,

You eat a piece of bread or a carrot or a whatever,

Within a few hours you make it into human body.

The most complex machine on the planet you manufacture with all kinds of trash in Los Angeles.

Aren't you doing it?

So when this dimension of intelligence exists within you,

If you touch the dimension,

Naturally your identity will be with that dimension.

Right now,

The only problem is human experience is limited to their biology and their psychological structure.

Physiological and psychological structures are the only two things you have experienced.

Because of this,

Your identities are there.

Because of this,

This body part difference between the same species has become such a big deal.

But do you feel that men and women have different essences?

Do they have… there's a… you've talked about the masculine and the feminine principle.

Could you tell us a little bit about that?

See,

We should not misunderstand masculine with male and feminine with female.

Female and male is a manifestation.

Man and feminine are two fundamental qualities in nature.

Because physical nature in the universe happens between polarities.

So one dimension of polarity is masculine and feminine.

You may be a woman,

But you may have more masculine in you than a man.

You may be a man,

You may have much more feminine in you than most women.

So the question is not about being male or female.

Being male or female is just a biological manifestation.

Masculine and feminine is the basic polarities,

Which is the basis of physical creation here.

So if you want to be a complete human being,

It is very important both masculine and feminine are there within you in equal proportion.

Only then you are a full-fledged human being,

Otherwise you're a skewed human being.

In this skew,

You will misunderstand everything.

In this skew,

You will become a very limited possibility of life.

If you… you might have seen these images probably because of the yoga studios and other things in California.

You will see in India Adiyogi or he is known as Shiva,

He is seen as ultimate man.

He is the ultimate man not because he is a super meso.

He is ultimate man because one-half of him is a woman.

Have you seen these images?

One-half is a very athletic man,

Another-half is a full-fledged woman.

So his body itself is one-half man and one-half woman.

In yoga,

This is called as Pingala and Ida,

Two dimensions of your energy within you.

Only when these two things are in balance,

You have a proper perspective of life.

Otherwise you have become a very biological entity.

Biology is a basis.

Biology cannot be the peak of who we are.

So,

I do know that you have a quote that says that whether you're male or female,

If you're not in touch with the feminine,

You don't enjoy the finer things in life.

So is the feminine principle things that are more receptive?

See,

When we say masculine,

This is… there are two fundamental forces working within us all the time.

One is our instinct of survival.

We want to survive.

We can take survival to different levels but essentially the instinct of survival is this one wants to… this limited entity wants to survive and do well.

This instinct is there in all of us,

It's there in every creature in the world.

Another dimension is there is something within you which always wants to expand.

When you are in a survival mode,

You want to build walls around yourself.

Boundaries are important.

If you let your dog loose on the street,

You will see he goes on peeing all over the place.

Not because he has some urinary problem,

I'm sorry I'm not able to look at you.

Not because he has some urinary problem,

He's building his pee kingdom.

He's setting his boundaries.

It's a natural instinct.

He is trying to set his own boundary all the time.

This is survival instinct in all of us that we want to build a wall,

Protection,

Self-reservation.

But there's another dimension which wants to expand.

If you don't empower that,

If you just empower only your instinct of survival,

Then you will build a wall of self-preservation and after some time you realize walls of self-preservation are also of self-imprisonment after some time.

Yes?

If you build a wall today,

Today you see an enemy outside and you build a wall,

Tomorrow you are in your own prison.

Somebody else put you into prison,

That's bad.

But you yourself put you into a prison,

That's horror.

Yes?

So the instinct of self-preservation has to be consciously balanced,

Otherwise we'll build a… we'll end up building walls and walls.

Oh,

I'm in California.

This is so funny.

No,

No,

I was not making a political statement.

So inevitably when we feel unsafe,

We'll build a wall.

So the instinct of self-preservation cannot be ignored.

It is there obviously,

Isn't it?

Obviously it is there in all of us.

Walls are not always of brick and mortar,

There are variety of walls we set up.

But the longing to expand is also there.

How much expansion do you want if you sincerely look at this?

Today if you're here,

You want to be little bigger,

If you are there,

You want to be little bigger.

But suppose I make you the queen of this planet.

Hello?

Don't look at me hopefully,

Hmm?

Why will I commit such a blunder?

Suppose I make you the queen of this planet,

Will you be fulfilled?

No.

You will look at the moon.

Why not that?

If I give you the moon,

Will you keep quiet?

You will look at the next galaxy.

If I give you one galaxy,

Will you keep quiet?

You will look at the other galaxies.

So there is something within you which wants to expand.

How much expansion do you believe will settle you?

If you really look at it,

You want to expand boundlessly.

There is something within you which does not like boundaries,

Please look at this.

If I imprison you right now in a five-by-five cubicle,

You will feel horrible.

So tomorrow we'll announce your liberation and liberate you into a ten-by-ten cubicle.

No,

You will feel wonderful for a day and then you will feel horrible in the ten-by-ten cubicle.

We will liberate you into a hundred-by-hundred cubicle,

You will feel really great for three days.

Again you will feel the same thing.

It doesn't matter where I set the boundary,

The moment you can feel the boundary,

You want to break it,

Isn't it?

So there is something within you which does not like boundaries.

So if there is something within you which does not like boundaries,

It simply means it is longing to become boundless.

You cannot become boundless through physical means,

Isn't it?

Physicality means… the fundamentals of physicality is a defined boundary.

Without a defined boundary,

There is no physical body.

Suppose there were no boundaries to my body,

Where would I be?

Where or there or where?

Only because this is… has a boundary,

It is here.

Your body has a boundary,

So it's there.

But there is something within us which longs to be boundless.

If we do not empower this,

There will be no balance between masculine and feminine.

That is why ultimate liberation,

Both for men and women,

It's not… see one cannot be liberated from the other,

Both have to be liberated from what?

From this bondage of being stuck in our own bodies and identified with little bodily changes that we have between us and go on endlessly about the same debate.

No,

Unless we become free from the identification of our own physical form,

There is really no freedom.

This is what consciousness means,

An intelligence which creates this body.

Today,

There's a whole lot of interest in the Western world about the brain.

In the yogic sciences,

We do not attach much significance to the brain because we think through the entire body.

This is the way of women for a long time,

They thought with their body.

They did not have all those complicated thoughts that men were struggling with,

But they simply knew what to do,

What not to do,

Because they thought with their entire body because their body was doing things which no brain can do.

Even now,

If I ask you,

What you call as intelligence in modern terms,

In today's educated world,

What people think is mind is a combination of memory and intelligence,

Isn't it so?

Memory and your ability to concoct something out of what you remember,

The data that you have and what you make out of it and use it,

Now you're considered smart,

Isn't it?

Let's start with memory.

See if I ask you ten generations ago how your grandmothers looked like,

Do you remember?

No.

Do you remember?

No.

But your great-great-great-grandmother's nose is sitting on your face right now.

Your body remembers or no?

Your body remembers or no?

How your skin tone was a million years ago for your forefathers,

Your body still remembers,

Yes or no?

So in terms of memory,

What your body carries is trillions of times more than what your brain can ever carry,

Yes or no?

The complexity of activity that are happening in a single molecule of DNA,

With all your brains you can't figure it,

Yes or no?

More complicated activity is happening here than here,

Yes?

So this is a body of intelligence.

The question is,

Can you employ it or do you just run on one thing?

In the yogic sciences we look at human intelligence as sixteen parts.

So this is like a sixteen-wheeled truck but you choose to drive it on one wheel,

Very strenuous.

So you will see educated people are the most stressful people on the planet because they are driving a sixteen-wheeled truck on one wheel,

Very difficult.

Their intellect,

Their thought is the only damn thing they're trying to use and it's very difficult.

You don't have to think through everything.

You know my… Can I tell a small story?

Yes,

Please.

My great-grandmother lived to be one-one-three,

Okay?

That's not the only achievement she had.

She got married when she was fourteen and those days in India,

An unmarried girl cannot use tobacco but once she is married,

She is free to use tobacco.

So on the first day she exercised her right to use tobacco and she lived in a certain way.

People started saying she's a devil of a woman,

Not because she did any harm to anybody,

Simply because if she laughed the whole street shook.

Like that she laughed.

Those days in those societies,

Women were not supposed to laugh loudly.

They're supposed to laugh in a controlled way.

Only street woman laughed loudly,

Family woman laughed very… At least when men were there,

They did not laugh because there was nothing to laugh about but she laughed in such a way that the whole street would shake if she laughed.

So people said she laughed like a devil.

Always unfortunately,

This is the whole thing,

The devil is a laughing one,

God is a dead serious one.

It's your choice.

So she lived wild.

Wild means at the age of sixty-seven or sixty-eight she lost her husband and then she decided this is a very large land owning family.

So she moved out from the family and built a small temple with her own hands in somebody else's land.

Somebody else means another family's land,

Not without permission,

With their permission but she was family's disgrace because this family owns hundreds and hundreds of acres of land and she sets up her stupid temple in somebody else's land,

The whole family,

Oh my God,

She's a shame.

And she built a temple,

Not for any god,

She sat there.

She's the main piece.

No god,

She just sat there and people started visiting her and slowly,

You know,

This following grew for her and she'll just live there.

Even we went there for vacation,

She would come to see us.

She was an incredible woman.

She just captured me in a certain way simply because one thing she laughed,

Another thing,

When I met her she was over hundred years of age and her hair,

Full hair below her knees,

You know,

She would leave her hair loose and dense like that.

So I just like… she was freaky.

With her you could do anything,

Nothing was wrong.

With everybody else is constantly trying to tell you what's right,

What's wrong,

What's right,

What's wrong.

With this one woman you could do what you want and she was fine.

And sometimes,

You know,

She would… she would be crying and laughing at the same time.

I was… what's happening with you?

Are you crazy?

Everybody says you're crazy.

Why are you crying and laughing at the same time?

She would just burst into a hoot of laughter and say,

Someday you will know and she would laugh.

And I would see her like this.

If they give her breakfast,

She first goes and feeds the ants,

Then the sparrows,

Then the squirrels.

Most of her breakfast is over in this.

And people,

Self-appointed advisors,

They come and say,

You old woman,

You just don't eat anything,

You will die like this.

All these advisors died,

But she lived and lived.

She buried her husband,

Her children,

Her grandchildren,

Some of her great-grandchildren,

But she lived on.

And many times I've seen her,

After having fed the ants and everything,

She would simply sit there,

Not even eating this little breakfast she has,

Tears flowing down her cheeks.

And I would ask her,

What's wrong with you,

Because you know,

I thought she's very emotional about the ants,

Because I was five,

Six years of age,

I was going stamping the ants and she was so emotional.

She never stopped me from even killing the ants,

Though she was feeding them.

And then I asked,

What's wrong with you,

Why?

She said… she would say,

I'm full.

I don't know what the hell she was talking.

It took me another twenty years to realize what she was talking about.

So for me,

She became the symbol of feminism for me.

She was the ultimate woman,

Because she fulfilled everything that she's expected to fulfill,

But she was never a part of that nonsense.

She was always beyond that.

And this is… this is because not you have great thoughts.

Thoughts are very rudimentary stuff in human life.

This must be understood,

I'm sorry.

Because I'm being introduced as a thought leader,

I'm getting scared of that.

See,

Thought is happening only from the limited data that you have gathered in your head,

Isn't it so?

But there is something more phenomenal happening all across,

Isn't it?

Hello?

The intelligence of the creation is functioning right now here,

Is it or not?

If you can transform a piece of bread into a human being,

That means the very intelligence of the source of creation is throbbing within you right now.

Instead of identifying with that,

We're unfortunately getting identified with what we accumulate,

With the car we have,

With the house we have,

With the relationships we have,

With the body we have,

With the accumulated knowledge that we have.

We have gotten identified with things that we have acquired,

Rather than being identified with the source of who we are.

So this is what consciousness means.

But this will not come by thinking differently.

You must touch that dimension beyond physiological and psychological process.

This is something that must happen.

When that happens,

There will be no problem about who is a man,

Who is a woman.

Could you please tell us how we can touch that dimension?

We can start with a very simple process,

Which today tens of millions of people are practicing across the world.

I brought this out because,

You know,

When I was just about maybe two-and-a-half or yeah,

Around two-and-a-half years of age,

My mother,

Her health was not good.

So they sent me to my aunt's place,

Who lived in my grandfather's house.

My aunt was just married and she was only eighteen years of age.

She was that bubbly,

Joyful,

Loving human being that you can't stop her for a moment.

And she took me in as her own and we became great friends.

I was there for nearly two years maybe,

But after that I came back to my parents,

But I always developed that close relationship with her,

Not of an aunt,

But we became buddies right through our life.

Then a time came and her life went on like normal,

You know,

Marriage good,

Children cute and the boy got educated and went somewhere and the girl got married as she wished and grandchildren came,

Everything wonderful.

Then she got some ailment.

Then she knew in the next two years she's going to die,

Max two years.

Then I saw this wonderful human being deteriorating into nothing.

Total mess she became.

This such a loving,

Joyful,

Exuberant human being that nobody could stop,

Suddenly became a wreck.

I just looked at her.

I was into too much travels here and there,

I tried to catch up with her,

But nothing much could be done with her because she just shattered.

I just looked at her and saw the only problem with her is she knew two things,

Her physiological structure and her psychological structure.

She managed it well and kept her… kept herself loving,

Joyful,

Wonderful,

Everything.

The moment she realized these two things are going to end,

She's finished.

She's just finished,

You can't believe such a wonderful human being became so nasty and miserable and broken.

At that time I thought this is something that needs to happen.

So we started what is called as in Tamil Nadu we started this vursuttaan mikam,

This means one drop spirituality.

You must have at least a drop,

A drop of something which is beyond your body,

Which is beyond your mind,

Something within you which is not a concoction of your mind.

A place to stand beyond physiological and psychological process must be there in every life.

As a part of this we launched what is called today being practiced by many people.

Is anybody practicing Isha Kriya?

Yes.

This is a simple process.

Maybe it looks like a psychological process because people can't keep their mind aside,

They have to use it in some way.

So we are going through the psychological process but if you go deep enough into it,

If you sit here,

Your body will be here,

Your mind will be there,

What is you is little away from that.

Once there is a little distance between you and your body,

Between you and your mind,

This is the end of suffering because human suffering happens only on two different levels – physiological suffering,

Psychological suffering.

Do you know any other kind of suffering?

Hello?

Physical suffering,

Mental suffering,

This is all.

Once there is a distance between you and your body,

Between you and your mind,

This is the end of suffering.

This must happen to you not at the end of your life,

At the very beginning of your life because the fear of suffering is what has crippled humanity.

A human being has not explored the full depth and dimension of who they are,

Simply because of fear of suffering,

What will happen to me,

What will happen to me is always the concern,

Isn't it?

Suppose you came to this kind of ease that if you sit here,

Whatever the hell happens to me,

This is how I will be.

If this assurance and ease came into your life,

Then you would explore life in many more ways than you are doing it right now,

Isn't it so?

This needs to happen.

If we want to unleash human genius on this planet,

The fear of suffering has to go.

For that to go,

You must know something beyond your physiological and psychological structures.

Absolutely.

What is the difference between meditation and prayer?

You're trying to get me into trouble.

Yes.

No,

Because some people say my prayer is like meditation.

It could be.

It could be,

But probably meditation is more of a form of listening,

I would imagine.

See there is something called as organized prayer and there is something that all of us may experience at some point,

You don't have to be religious for this.

Sometimes you become prayerful.

You saw a glorious sunset,

You just sat there without knowing why.

You're not saying anything to the sun,

After all he's going.

Simply just the beauty and the magnificent nature of what it is,

Maybe your hands came together like this,

Like this,

Something you did.

It happens,

Right?

So you are prayerful.

To be prayerful is a fantastic place to be.

Now somebody created systems to make you prayerful,

But unfortunately that just became prayer for lot of people.

Prayer means you're talking to somebody,

A long distance talk.

And unfortunately if you look at the prayers on the planet,

I would say ninety-five percent of the prayers on the planet,

Whatever kind of religion they belong to,

Is just about dear God,

Give me this,

Give me that,

Save me,

Protect me.

Is that so?

So give me this,

Give me that,

Save me,

Protect me.

Does it seem like a divine process to you or does it seem like survival process outsourced?

Yes,

It's so true,

It's very true.

So outsourcing your survival is not an efficient way to survive.

To survive on this planet you don't need any divine help.

You just need four limbs and a few brain cells that work.

That's all you need to survive.

You don't need any other forces to come and cooperate with you for survival.

Only when your life is beyond survival,

You're looking for other dimensions of existence,

Then you may need the cooperation of other forces.

For survival,

When a worm can survive,

An insect can survive,

A bird can survive,

An animal can survive,

With such a big brain you cannot survive,

What is this?

The only problem may be you want to survive like somebody else.

That is a problem.

That's not going to be ever achieved because somebody else will always be doing something different or better or whatever you think it is.

So prayer as a process unfortunately has become talking process.

If you are prayerful,

It's fantastic.

So being in meditation… see the English word meditation is not specific to anything.

It's a general term.

If somebody sits here with eyes closed,

We say they are meditating.

But with eyes closed you can do many things.

You can do japa,

Tapa,

Dharana,

Dhyana,

Samadhi,

Shunya,

Samyama.

There are many,

Many things you can do.

Or you might have just mastered the art of sleeping in vertical postures.

That is also an art.

So the word… English word meditation is not describing anything specific.

But as you said one word,

Listening.

Listening is a dangerous thing because if you start listening,

People will think,

Listen to what?

Listen to God.

All those people,

I'm saying with all due respect,

Those who are devout,

Those who are prayerful,

That's a different matter.

But people who claimed they heard God speaking,

They did the most terrible things on this planet.

Yes or no?

Because they said,

God told me this,

God told me that,

It gave them license to do all kinds of horrors on this planet.

And especially as women,

You should not subscribe to this because millions of women have been burnt alive because God told something,

Okay?

So listening is a dangerous word.

The moment you say listen,

People will start listening to all kinds of conversations that are happening.

But to become listening is a wonderful thing.

If you take these words literally,

Prayer,

Listening,

All these things can become ugly because people always have this thing about,

What is my experience of life?

I translate everything according to that,

Isn't it?

Whatever is told to me,

I will translate it within to… within the limitations of my experience of life.

With this if you say listen,

They must listen to somebody,

Whom should I listen to,

God or devil?

Please listen to God.

Then he starts talking.

So listening is a quality.

In yoga,

We call this being a sati.

Oh,

That's very wonderful because sati also means a woman.

Sati also means a wife.

So we call this satipatthana.

Have you heard this word?

Anaprana satiyoga.

This means just to wait upon something because they saw in ancient societies,

Women had a certain quality of waiting which made them very special.

Because it's not like today if a man goes out,

Every seven minutes you can keep track of him,

You can put a GPS tag on him,

Where is he going,

What is he doing?

Every seven minutes he has to message back where he is.

Those days either on business or war or expedition,

They went out.

You never know whether they're going to come back or not come back.

You're holding children and sitting here with all kinds of forces around you and everybody knows your man may not come back.

It's always possible he won't come back.

But they waited.

That waiting had a very special quality because in waiting there is an eternal quality.

In doing,

All doing has a beginning and an end,

Isn't it?

Waiting has an eternal quality.

So this quality in the yoga we refer to as sati.

Sati means wife and a woman.

The feminine is called sati and this is the quality of waiting.

In a way it's listening.

You just willing to be with life,

Now you understand it's not all about messing with it.

There are some things we do and rest we wait.

It's like pregnancy.

Some things you did,

Rest you wait.

Life happens.

I'm going to ask one last question and I'll turn it over to our audience for questions.

But you were talking about willingness and Visionary Women is a volunteer run organization and I know that every single person who is here is giving their time to one organization or another and the fact that you have 9 million volunteers and you were talking about the relationship between volunteerism and willingness and that it's through willingness that you uplift your consciousness if I'm quoting you correctly or I'm understanding it.

In some ways talking about how it could be a doorway to becoming a bigger person than who you are.

See before we come to women,

First thing is visionary.

What a vision… vision means is,

See everybody has desires.

Desire is an incremental way of enhancing our life.

Today you desire I must have a home,

Tomorrow you desire I must have this money,

Tomorrow you desire something else.

These are incremental ways of arranging and rearranging our lives which are needed to do a few things.

When you say I'm a visionary,

What you're saying is,

I have a larger desire which is not about just incremental improvement of my life.

Desire is about me always.

Vision is an all in… all inclusive process.

So this itself is a phenomenal thing if people instead of having desires,

If they have a vision,

Vision is always all inclusive.

Desire is personal.

Desire leads to incremental changes and improvements.

Vision can transform the whole situation.

I like music.

So about willingness,

Because you said you're a volunteer,

To be a volunteer.

A volunteer means somebody who is doing something willingly,

Right?

There's no other compulsion.

There are no financial compulsions,

There are no social compulsions,

There is no something else.

You want to do something willingly.

So when you're a willing participant,

Right now you're a volunteer.

I'm asking all of you,

Right now are you compelled to be here or are you here voluntarily?

Oh,

Thank you.

Because I've spoken to conscripted people also,

I've spoken in the prisons,

I've spoken in many places.

So you're here willingly,

You're doing something willingly is the fundamental of your joy,

Isn't it so?

Hello?

However simple or stupid or idiotic activity it is,

I'm doing something willingly makes a world of difference,

Isn't it so?

Hello?

The difference between heaven and hell is just this,

You're doing something willingly,

That's your heaven.

You're doing something unwillingly,

That's your hell.

Hmm?

We have already taken on attitudes,

What we like and what we don't like,

I like this person,

I don't like this person.

Now with this person I will do things willingly,

With this person I'll do things unwillingly.

This may be to people,

To aspects of life,

To communities,

To nations,

To many things.

This I will do willingly,

This I do unwillingly.

This means I've decided in my mind this is good,

This is bad.

When I hear even on national news channels,

Good guys and bad guys,

It just… once you have this kind of thing,

You are going to be disastrous to the planet,

It's just a question of time.

The moment you decide this is a good person,

This is a bad person,

This has gone deep into American society,

No.

There are no good people and bad people.

Everybody is oscillating between the two.

If you create a very pleasant,

Wonderful atmosphere,

Everybody behaves wonderfully.

If you create an unpleasant atmosphere,

A whole lot of people act nasty.

Yes or no?

There are joyful people and miserable people,

But there are no good people and bad people.

The… the moment we think we are good,

We are entitled to destroy the bad,

Isn't it?

Oh,

We've been destroying a lot of people for a long time.

Time to stop that because human beings are in different levels of experience and understanding,

Variety of people.

Anybody who is not like you is obviously bad,

Isn't it?

Isn't it so?

Those who are not like me must be bad people because the basis of goodness and what you think is goodness is decided by you.

No,

You have no business to do that.

Willing means this,

I'm just willing.

I'm a hundred percent yes to life.

I am not yes to this one,

No to this one,

No.

I'm just yes and yes to life.

If you are a hundred percent yes to life,

You are a volunteer.

You have become a willing life.

You have become so willing that you have no will of your own.

You will ask me,

Sadhguru,

How do you operate with all these people?

All kinds of horrible questions they're asking,

They're doing this,

They're doing that.

I said my life is not about them,

It's about me.

It's about how I am.

It's about me.

It doesn't matter how they are,

That's their choice.

But how I am is my choice.

This is my way.

No matter what they do,

I'm like this because I have not given that freedom to anybody that somebody can freak me,

Somebody can make me angry,

Somebody can make me happy,

Somebody can make me unhappy.

These privileges I kept to myself.

It's time you do that too because if somebody else can decide what can happen within you right now,

Isn't this the ultimate slavery?

Huh?

Isn't this?

Someone else can decide what should happen within you.

What happens around you,

Of course so many people decide.

Hmm?

What happens around us is not hundred percent ours,

But what happens within me must be my making,

Isn't it?

Right now just about anybody can freak anybody because they're not volunteers,

They're unwilling.

Volunteering means you have no will of your own.

You can do whatever is needed.

You know we are a volunteer organization.

This means all kinds of people.

Most of them are not qualified for the jobs that they're doing and I cannot fire them because they're volunteers.

Daily basis,

The Sadhguru,

I can't work with this person,

She's so horrible,

I can't do it.

I tell them,

See in this world this is the sort of people who exist,

Like this,

Like this,

Like this,

Like this,

This is the kind of people there are.

But if you want to work with ideal people,

You must go to heaven and today.

But if you think what you're doing is very significant,

You must learn to work with all these horrible people.

This is how the world is.

If you think what you're doing is very significant,

You learn to work with all kinds of people.

You will see horrible people will do wonderful things.

Yes?

But if you want to work with ideal people,

You won't find any.

I haven't found one yet.

All kinds of mixed bags.

But if you are willing that you are not yes and no,

Yes to one,

No to another,

You're simply one big yes,

You will find a way.

Thank you so much,

I always say that it's the resistance to life.

Since the early 20th century,

Physicists have been,

Like Max Planck and Einstein and any number of physicists have been positing that consciousness is causative of physical reality.

That consciousness comes first before physical reality has been manifested.

I'd like to hear if you have any comment about that.

I need a few minutes for this question.

I'm sure at least when you were in school,

You blew some soap bubbles,

Did you?

So bubbles?

Somebody got this big bubble,

Somebody got that big bubble,

Somebody got this big bubble.

Same soap if you give it to two people,

One person blows that big bubble,

Another person gets only this big bubble.

Hasn't it happened?

Yes.

Because something so simple as blowing a bubble needs a certain dimension of attention.

Those who have the necessary attention can blow that big bubble.

Those who don't have,

They get these tiny bubbles going.

Something's that simple,

Same soap.

So when my bubble is floating and your bubble is floating,

That's my bubble,

This is your bubble,

Clearly there.

Then of course after some time it goes poop.

When it goes poop,

There is no such thing as my air and your air.

But when it was encased in the bubble,

One-hundred percent my bubble and your bubble.

Just like that,

This bubble and that bubble.

Now whether you got to blow a big bubble or a small bubble determines many things.

The scale,

Scope and profoundness of your life simply depends on how much life you captured.

You can call it life or you can call it consciousness.

Consciousness is a highly corrupted word,

Particularly in California because people are using that for just about everything.

But they will continue to use that word because I'm trying to reclaim it.

We can call it life also because the only reason,

Right now… Are you alive?

Hello,

All of you?

Some of you are not saying anything,

I'm asking you.

Are you alive?

Yes.

How do you know you're alive?

Stop your breath for a minute,

Are you still alive?

So how do you know you're alive?

You're conscious,

Isn't it?

Suppose you became unconscious,

Would you know you're alive?

No.

So the only reason that you know you're alive and you're alive is because you're conscious.

So what you call as consciousness or what you call as life are not two separate things.

So I did not know about physics talking about consciousness,

I knew Einstein said something vaguely,

Because I'm… you know,

As you see I'm unschooled.

So I did not go as far as Einstein to study physics,

But I paid attention to this piece of life.

I paid attention in such a way as I paid more and more attention,

I realized that the problem is in the nature of our faculties.

See,

Right now,

If I show you my hand,

If you see this part of my hand,

You cannot see this part of my hand,

Isn't it so?

If you're hearing sound,

You cannot sense the silence.

If you're in silence,

You cannot feel the sound.

If you're in light,

You cannot feel the darkness.

If you're in darkness,

You cannot feel the light.

The human faculty of sense perception of seeing,

Hearing,

Smelling,

Tasting and touching,

This is how you know life.

All these things are always happening in comparison with something else.

Comparison means what you know by comparison is good enough for survival,

But not good enough for knowing the nature of what it is.

This is the problem that modern science is struggling with and will continue to struggle with unless… I'm very glad to hear that early twentieth century,

They said consciousness is the basis,

But still we're in early twenty-first century,

But still we have not moved towards consciousness,

We're still studying physical things forever.

People are studying the brain.

I was with that European project called Blue Brain and I was… they were still… they're studying a huge massive computer brain,

Which is like about three times this hall full of computers and they had built some eighteen percent of the human brain.

I said,

See I got all packed here.

You guys… Such a big thing.

No,

We're studying.

That is fine.

You are very excited about the intelligence and the million functions that are happening in your brain.

That even the brain was created from within,

From the bread that you eat,

Isn't it so?

Hello?

Even the brain.

Why are you not interested in that which creates the body and the brain?

Definitely it's more intelligent than the brain,

Isn't it?

So if you want to put a label on that,

We can call it consciousness,

I generally just call it life or if you want to call it God,

You can call it,

You want to call it the creator,

You can call it because today there are gender issues,

We will stick to life.

So life is not as I already… we went through this.

There's… when it comes to body and mind,

There is you and me.

When it comes to life,

There is no you and me.

This is a living space.

We just captured a little bit.

So this is going on.

If we lose this ability to hold it,

Even if everything,

All the organs in your body are functioning still you will not live,

Isn't it?

People do die of old age even if they don't have any disease or ailment because life chooses to leave for whatever reason.

So what you're referring to as consciousness is definitely the basis of all physical existence.

All modern physicists have gone on to say that over 99.

999 whatever number of nines in an atom is empty.

It's empty space.

Only a minuscule is physical.

This is the same proportion approximately even in the cosmos that over ninety-nine percent plus is empty,

Only physical manifestation is very small.

If you look up in the sky in the night,

Because your visual apparatus are in a certain way which are very deceptive,

It makes you think,

Oh my god,

Millions of stars.

But actually the largest thing out there is empty space,

Isn't it?

Most people will never see that because our visual apparatus are tuned to see physical matter.

You can only see that which stops light.

Please look at this carefully.

You can see my hand right now only because it stops light,

Isn't it?

If my hand allowed light to pass through,

You wouldn't see.

Right now there is something here very vital for your life that you're not seeing which is the air that you breathe.

You cannot see.

But isn't that more important than my hand?

Hello?

So there is a living cosmos which is the basis of everything.

It's just thrown out a little bit of physical matter including your little body.

But we have gotten so identified with this physicality,

Its form and its shape and now the gender of it has become a big deal.

Because of that,

We are seeing life in a very small way.

The 99.

9% is that life or the 0.

1% is life,

Please tell me.

The bigger thing,

Isn't it?

This is just a small manifestation but we are still very juvenile as a species.

In the sense,

We are still… when I say juvenile,

When we are what adolescent,

Body parts are important.

Yes or no?

We are still as a humanity,

We are still in that condition,

Body parts are super important.

This is why spiritual process is important.

When I say spiritual,

Once again this is another most corrupted word on the planet.

If I say spiritual,

People are thinking looking up,

Looking down,

Looking at heaven,

Whatever,

No.

Spiritual means your experience of life has transcended the limitations of physiological and psychological process,

Which is what you are saying the physicists also said.

That's very wise of them that without experience,

With inference they are saying that we acknowledge their intelligence but after one century,

We are still not there as a race,

As a human species.

But one thing I must share with you here is,

I was just telling Nicholas,

Which came back to me because you asked some question.

See when I started doing this work thirty-six,

Thirty-seven years ago,

What I found was when I conducted events and programs,

Over eighty-two to eighty-five percent of the people came because of physical ailments,

Because they knew this will give relief.

Only twelve to fifteen percent of the people came there,

Want to know something,

Experience something.

But today,

Over eighty-seven,

Eighty-eight percent of the people come because they want to know something,

Experience something.

Only ten to twelve percent of the people come for ailments,

Which is a phenomenal shift in the human society.

Can we have one question from that side of the room?

Good evening.

Welcome to Los Angeles.

Thank you for your time.

The question I had was,

You mentioned to be free,

You have to be stepping outside of the body and the consciousness.

How do you achieve that,

To have that freedom?

That was my question.

But how do you achieve that separation when you step out of the basically physical body and the consciousness?

If you want to make a small attempt,

There is IshaKriya,

You can just download this app,

Free… it's a free app,

You can download this.

With headphones you can daily practice this for some time.

If you do it for thirty,

Forty days,

Then you can do it without any headphone,

Just by yourself.

Initially you take support,

After that you do it by yourself.

This is a simple way to do it.

If you are willing to commit thirty to thirty-two hours,

About thirty-two hours of focused time,

Then we have a more powerful and effective process,

Which is called as Inner Engineering,

Which is offered in daily classes or also preparatory part of it as online and the final part of finishing part of it,

Which is direct.

It is a transmission of a certain dimension of practice.

We must understand this because with all due respect they have done what they have done.

But the way yoga is happening generally,

Not everybody,

Generally the way it's happening,

It's a bit scary to me.

Because when you… when you make a very profound process into just an exercise mechanism or just a breathing exercise,

You want to exercise your body,

Exercise your breathing,

Exercise everything,

That's not the way it works.

Even the physical dimension of yoga,

See of over two hundred sutras that Patanjali gave,

Only one sutra talks about the physicality of yoga – tiram sukham asana.

This means a posture which is comfortable and stable is your asana.

To get to this people do many twists and turns,

That's okay.

But only one,

Nobody bothers what is the remaining two hundred and odd things that he has spoken.

So the physical aspect has come to the West and that's become big,

It's good,

It creates health,

Well-being.

But I want you to understand there are more people on this planet who are healthy and miserable than unhealthy and miserable.

Those who have ill health,

At least they have a good reason,

They have a good excuse.

Healthy and miserable,

You have no reason,

No excuse to fall back on.

So it is important that you understand yogic practices are not practices.

They are live forms that it is made into a seed form and given to you.

You're supposed to hold it that way so that the seed sprouts and grows and becomes something phenomenal within you.

It just takes away your backache,

Your headache,

Your something else.

This is not of great significance.

Why understand if your backache is aching right now,

That is the biggest thing in the universe.

Yes or no?

Right now you have a headache.

If God appeared,

What would you ask?

Headache must go.

That looks like the biggest thing,

Isn't it?

So I understand when body is in trouble,

Keeping the body's well is important because even if your little finger is hurting right now,

This little finger will become the center of the universe.

Yes or no?

When it is fine,

You can just ignore this body and simply sit here and talk about other things.

Little finger is feeling like hell,

Little finger will become the center of the universe.

So keeping the body well is important for that reason so that you can keep it aside.

If it's very well and no issue,

You can just keep it aside and look at other dimensions of life.

If this is trouble,

Our entire focus will remain on this,

Isn't it?

So Inner Engineering is that kind of a process.

There is a powerful system called Shambhavi where it is given in a seed form.

It is a planting that you do and slowly evolves within you.

Millions of people,

This is something… this is one thing I'm proud of in my life is today there are millions of people,

Men and women.

In the morning if they close their eyes,

Tears of ecstasy are flowing.

I think this is fantastic.

People ask me,

Sadhguru,

What's the greatest thing you've done?

I said tears.

Tears of love and ecstasy are flowing.

That's a great word.

Thank you so much.

I think our time is up but Sadhguru,

We want to thank you for this evening.

On behalf of Visionary Women,

We also want to donate to the Girl Child Project of Isha Foundation.

And if you have two minutes to talk about what you're doing to help the status of girls,

Young girls in India,

We would very much appreciate it.

And Shelly,

I'm going to put my shoes on and please join us.

I think a small… A little bit of video was there in the introductory video about the rural India,

The programs that are happening.

I don't know if you saw that,

Like a seventy-year-old woman is playing a game.

You saw that she's throwing a ball at something.

So this is a movement we started about seventeen,

Eighteen years ago.

And today the next event is coming on ninth of December.

I'm there for that event and over 10,

636 men and women are participating in the event,

That is as players.

Over 150 to 200,

000 people will be there as spectators.

The people who are playing are just ordinary men and women,

Especially women in rural India have never played a game in their life.

After they're probably seven,

Eight years of age,

They never played a game.

But now they're coming out and participating in a public tournament in front of everybody,

It's on the television and ministers and celebrities are coming there to give prizes for them.

It's an exhilarating experience for them.

One thing it did was it leveled out many differences of lines of religion,

Caste,

Creed,

Kind of we leveled it out with these simple games.

And in our schools in rural India,

In very remote places,

We have schools where at least 43,

44% of the students are first generation going to school.

In this… Right now the average school going children about sixty-one percent are girls.

Because in our schools we have made sure the girls are safe,

There are proper bathrooms for them and there is a culture where they are respected and not made fun of and you know,

There are small things about biology which are… which is the basis of our birth but unfortunately we think it's some kind of funny thing.

These things we have leveled out,

We have created different culture in the schools.

So people feel… the parents feel very comfortable,

They're grown-up girls going to school.

In this kind of school where the atmosphere is healthy.

So this we are trying to bring and we've created twelve schools where we incubate teachers and we've adopted over 4600 schools,

Government schools and we are operating in them.

This is making a big difference for the girl child because one first thing I do is we make our people committed volunteers to go and visit the bathrooms.

How are the bathrooms kept?

Because bathroom decides whether the girl goes to school on particular days of the month or not.

You know,

The… the quality of the bathroom decides whether she goes to school or not and if she doesn't go to school on those few days,

Next day when she goes,

It's a kind of a joke all over the place.

It's like… it's very unfortunate but this happens.

So first thing is,

When we adopt a school,

First thing is I send most important people in the organization to go visit the bathroom.

I don't care how the classroom is,

How is the bathroom?

It is important.

It's as simple as it seems.

When you don't have it,

It becomes so important,

You know.

These are simple things but when they… when they don't exist,

How significant they become.

Whether that particular girl goes far in her life or just gets trapped in some limited situation is determined by the quality of the bathroom we provide there.

So this is the kind of change.

There's a lot more to be done but with whatever resources we have,

I'm keeping the volunteers.

I'm… I'm not just a guru,

I'm a slave driver because… Dr.

Nancy Lee-Malcom-Babich We've… We've been delighted and honored to have you with us this evening and we want everyone in the audience to know that the proceeds from tonight's event are going to the Girl Child Program that we are delighted to be able to support.

Dr.

Jayaprakash Narayanan Hi.

Could you give me a minute?

See,

We must understand this.

What we call as human life is just a certain amount of time and energy.

As we sit here,

Since the time you came in,

All of us are two hours closer to our graves.

Yes,

Time is… It's not time ticking away,

It's our life ticking away.

Yes?

We are mortal life,

Limited amount of time.

This is our time on this planet.

We are a generation of people who are empowered like never before.

No generation ever in the history of humanity was empowered the way we are empowered.

Our ability to communicate,

Our ability to do things in the world.

So we have the possibility that we could become the greatest generation ever or we just sit by and let it flow because if you sit also time goes,

If you sleep also time goes,

If you create something wonderful time goes,

If you don't do anything time goes.

Yes?

Time is not stopping nor can we roll it back nor can we slow it down,

Nothing.

Our life is just going away.

This is our time on the planet.

We must make this the best generation ever.

For this we need consciousness.

We need to identify with something bigger than our body and our brains.

Only then we will do something fantastic because we have the necessary tools of technology in our hands.

Today if we speak here we can speak to the entire world which was never before possible.

Please let's make it happen.

Reviews

I am always filled with joy when listening to Sadhguru.

Absolutely has been amazing to my soul since I started this app. Thank you.

I learn so much everytime I listen to this wise man.☺️🙏🏽☺️

One of the most beautiful and inspiring talks I’ve ever heard. Thank you so much!

Very helpful and great talk! Many life-changing concepts.
Thank you very much 🙏🏻

A lot of good and wise questions got a wise answer. Thank you for sharing this event with us all
🙏Namaste🙏

A wonderful talk on so many issues. Understandable and enlightening! Thank you Sadhguru. 🙏

Excellent! Thank you Sadhguru ❤️
Namaste 🙏🏽

I always learn something with Sadghuru's talks. Excellent speaker and motivator.

Always a pleasure 🙏🏽

Thank you for sharing all of those wise findings you have gained. 😊Let‘s make the world a better place all together 🕊

Is ha Krya simple daily practice

Thank you so much. Simple, beautiful, profound.

Incredibly thought provoking! Truly enjoyable.

E X C E L L E N T 👍👍
HIGHLY RECOMMENDED
... And he has thought worthy humor to many of his topics.

Thank you! Grateful for this talk! 💜