Humanity Should Take A 3-Week Break Every Year - With Sadhguru In Challenging Times - 11 April

Don't miss this rare opportunity to join Sadhguru Darshan, live from Isha Yoga Center held last 11 April, 2020. Sadhguru offers daily practices and sadhana support to help us tide through these unusually challenging times.

Transcript

Pshh.

Namaskaram,

Everybody.

How are you today?

All of you on the web,

You must tell me how are you today?

Pshh.

It's important that you're alive and you're well,

That you must respond to that and always be grateful because the sky need not open up,

Just a virus can kill you,

Just a microorganism.

Why I'm saying this is,

Unfortunately,

Human beings have developed such a sense of entitlement.

There are many reasons.

One is that we're endowed with little more intellectual capability.

I wouldn't say intelligence,

Intellectual capability than all the other creatures.

We have technologies which give us enormous prowess.

You don't need to be a very brave man to go and kill a tiger.

From a kilometer away,

You can shoot him dead and feel great about it.

So these things and above all,

I think religions of the world have put this wrong idea into human head that all the other creatures are here to serve you,

At least in some parts of religions.

Some aspects of religion has put this idea into human mind.

Every other creature wants to serve you,

He's here to serve you.

You are made in God's own image,

All of them are just creatures who are here to serve you.

Just go to an ant and ask him,

Is he interested in serving you?

Well,

If you're not getting the point,

Go and ask the elephant.

You will get the point very well.

Nobody is here to serve you,

For them,

Their life means a lot.

For an ant,

Ant's life is everything,

For a grasshopper,

Grasshopper's life is everything,

For a tree,

Its life is everything.

For every creature,

Its life is important.

This is how life is enshrined in every one of them,

Including ourselves,

Of course.

Well,

The nature of life is such,

If one has to live,

Another has to die.

It's the only way.

If the virus has to live,

We have to die.

If we have to live,

They have to die.

This is how it is.

Everything is enmeshed into each other.

The whole food cycle in the world is made in such a way,

If one animal has to live,

It has to eat something else,

Plant or animal.

And if that.

.

.

Another animal has to live,

It has to eat that one and it's a chain.

So this is a sustainable chain of food cycle.

Forever you can carry on like this.

But now we have skewed it very strongly.

We think in our favour,

But may not work in our favour long term,

If we go like this.

This stupid sense of entitlement that every other creature is here to serve us,

This must be banished out of human mind,

It's very important.

If we want to dwell in future,

It's very important to understand that every creature has its rightful place in creation.

And all of them are very vital for our survival and well-being.

There is a lot of research showing this,

That.

.

.

They're saying that if all the worms disappear,

The world will end in about one-and-a-half years' time.

In eighteen months' time,

All life on this planet will end if all the worms disappear right now.

If all the insects disappear,

In four to four-and-a-half years' time,

The world will end as we know it.

If all the microbes disappear right now,

Right now we're fighting the virus,

But let's say all the microorganisms disappear right now,

Everything will die right now,

Including us.

But if all the human beings disappear,

The world will flourish.

So,

We must understand what is the significance of our existence on this planet.

Unfortunately,

This has been hugely exaggerated in human minds.

God made us in His own image.

He looks just like us.

Because of that,

We have an entitlement that we can do what we want with every other creature.

Well,

For the sake of survival,

If we did kill something,

That's a different matter.

But we've been killing for this.

.

.

For the.

.

.

For our pleasure.

Probably or really,

The only creature on this planet who kills for pleasure is the human being.

None of the others kill for pleasure,

They kill for survival.

So,

This sense of entitlement has cost us.

.

.

Cost the life on this planet enormously.

As it costs other life a lot,

Our lives will slowly become miserable.

Well,

I was just now talking to a group of over nearly 100,

000 doctors online.

And I was.

.

.

They asked me,

Sadhguru,

What is your perspective of this virus?

Why do you think it's come?

Has it come to teach us a lesson?

Well,

I.

.

.

I'm not made like this when somebody is suffering,

Ah,

This is a lesson for you.

Right now,

You're either infected or you lost somebody who's dear to you.

And there are so many other kinds of losses.

This is not the time to tell you,

This is a lesson,

God is teaching you a lesson.

All the religious nuts are already on saying,

God is teaching us a lesson.

No,

Nobody is teaching us a lesson.

It is very natural that in a seesaw,

If you go down like this out of your weight,

After some time,

Somebody will press it that side and it will go back like this.

There is always a seesaw of life happening.

Nature has always maintained its balance.

Sometimes it gets skewed,

But again it tries to bounce back.

Now,

Suppose you were a virus,

Okay?

I want you to just imagine.

It's a very empowering thought.

Suppose you were the virus,

And let's say you were living in all wild animals,

Pangolins and bats and whatever else.

The population of wild animals has come down significantly.

In the last fifty years,

Seventy percent drop in the mammals,

In the vertebrates rather,

Not even mammals,

In the vertebrate population of wild creatures has come down by seventy percent.

When our population has gone up in a crazy way.

So suppose you were a virus living in pangolins and they're dying and dying,

Your territory or your terrain or habitat is shrinking,

Would you not enterprise yourself,

Venture yourself to find a new creature to inhabit?

Would you not?

I'm asking you.

Definitely you would.

Maybe that's all they're doing.

They were happy with their pangolins for many centuries or millions of years,

I don't know how long.

But now there's no habitat,

It's going away.

They have to adapt.

They have to find new territory.

When life in Europe and UK became very crushed at one time,

They became desperate to find new lands.

They found America,

Australia,

Whatever else.

Well,

Going to new territory could mean death.

A whole lot of people lost their lives just trying to get there.

And many,

Many other people died after getting there.

But still people kept going because finding new habitat became very important because where you were it was overcrowded and no place to live,

No opportunity.

So even risking your life you went there.

That is all in a way virus is doing.

I'm not talking about virology.

I'm talking the simple sense of any life.

Any life will operate like this,

That if its habitat is taken away,

It will try to encroach into new habitat.

So right now we are just new habitat.

I know in the social media a whole lot of people went crazy when I said,

The virus has no intention of killing you.

It's trying to make a living,

All right?

But he lives with full force.

Because he lives with such force,

You die.

If you were as strong as a pangolin or at least if you were a bat,

Then you would be happy,

Virus would be happy.

But you are not built like the other creatures,

So it's hitting you in a certain way.

Well,

If there were some other population other than human populations,

Maybe they would have gone there.

But in their wisdom,

They have understood the only thriving population right now is human population constantly expanding.

So they have made the right choice.

Well,

This may sound insulting to you,

But this is how life functions.

This is how even we function when our survival is threatened,

Isn't it?

So facing the present situation with social distancing,

With medical care,

All this is fine.

But long-term existence on this planet,

We have to come to terms with this,

That this planet was made for all the creatures,

All the life.

And they were here before us,

And they will be here after us.

Yes.

So they have as much right to exist here.

See,

They're all agreeing with me.

They have as much right to be here as you have.

Of course,

You also have a right to be here,

But not above them.

You're not entitled in such a way that God has given you such a position that you,

Every other creature is here to serve you.

Then such a God has no clue about how this planet works.

He must choose another planet to be a god there.

On this planet,

This is how life is structured.

It is all enmeshed into each other,

Only in the well-being of all life there is well-being for everybody.

If we remove any one dimension of life,

Then there will be a serious collapse of life on all levels.

So this entitlement or sense of entitlement must go.

Maybe God looks like a grasshopper.

How do you know?

Why not?

Just has to be big,

I'm saying.

So in this culture,

We gave all kinds of shapes and forms to what we consider as divine,

Just to bring this home to you.

Even a mouse is worshipped,

A snake is worshipped.

Very important,

Very important because if you do not understand the significance of a mouse and a snake and a bird and an animal and a tree,

Well,

You're heading for a disaster.

There's no question about it.

But this sense of being I'm super life over every other life,

This sense of entitlement has to go.

This is a good time for realization.

This is very funny,

The world works like this.

This happened.

A Russian man came to California and he met a foreman.

You know,

He looked for a job and he got into a construction site.

And the foreman asked him,

In Russia,

How many hours a week do you work?

He said,

We work seventy hours a week.

Oh,

Really?

Here we work only forty hours.

But why is it why you guys can't work seventy hours,

He asked.

I'm willing to work seventy hours,

Why can't you guys work?

Oh,

Here all the labor,

They're bloody communists.

In a communist country they will work.

Everywhere else the same people will always fight to work less and less and less.

Suddenly they will get entitled always,

Trying to take advantage of everything.

This has become the human way.

Now,

By being the most evolved creature,

We must be a little more magnanimous to every other life.

See,

If you are positioned in a place of height of some altitude,

You must have a different sense of dignity and concern for everything.

You don't expect an ant to be concerned about all life,

You expect a human being to be.

But because this kind of rubbish has been taught to them,

That every other life is here to serve you,

You can kill anything and wantonly do whatever you want.

Because of this,

We will get a certain amount of pain and it's come,

Unfortunately,

In this form.

But this also,

Do not take me wrong,

This is a bad thing because of its speed of contagiousness.

It spreads very quickly,

But fortunately,

Its ability to kill is low compared to the things we've seen in the past.

The bubonic plagues used to just clean out whole villages and towns at one time.

The Spanish flu killed over fifty million people across the world.

Fifty million,

Nearly infected one-third of the world's population at that time,

Over five hundred million people.

But at that time there was no air travel,

People were not this mobile.

In spite of that,

It happened like that.

Compared to those things,

This is a good virus.

I know I'm going to be in a lot of trouble calling the virus a good virus.

Compared to the virulence of those things,

This is a mild one.

But it spreads quickly.

But the advantage is,

We are the carriers.

If we want,

We can stop it.

If something else was the carrier,

If the ants were carrying it,

If the mice were carrying it,

If the birds were carrying it,

You couldn't stop them.

But we are the carriers,

So we can stop them.

But the human beings are in such a state of confusion,

Slowly they're getting a little more organized.

Fortunately,

In India,

Both the citizenship,

The administration and the medical fraternity is responding in a fantastic manner except a few idiots who are there.

Most of the population,

Medical fraternity and administration,

The political leadership,

Everybody,

Boom.

I think if we have to rate nations in terms of response,

In a democratic nation where you cannot use too much force,

I think we've done the best in the world right now.

For 1.

4 billion people,

Less than three hundred fatalities is a fantastic report card.

But it could rise in the next one or two weeks.

So,

It's almost certain the lockdown will continue for another two weeks.

So,

Those of you who are in the yoga center and those of you who are on the.

.

.

Online with us for the darshan,

We are all now humtum.

Another two weeks.

So,

This is.

.

.

This is a time for us to show what kind of human beings we are.

This is a time that we can enhance ourselves as individual human beings.

Because there is no such thing as enhancing a society,

Because society is just a word,

Nation is just a word,

World is just a word,

It is just individual human beings.

Without transforming individual human beings,

There is no transformation in the world.

So,

Right now there is a break like this.

This is the time all of you,

At least focus on this much,

Every one of you,

And tell everybody else that you know,

Ten percent improvement.

Okay,

I'm not asking you to suddenly become something else and grow a halo around your head.

Ten percent improvement,

Just list out your physical fitness,

Where are you.

Ten percent improvement must happen by the end of April.

Your mental capabilities,

Where are you,

Ten percent improvement.

Whatever work you're doing in your life,

You're cooking,

You're making tea,

You're running the country,

You're doing whatever,

Ten percent improvement.

If you're.

.

.

If you're running just a tea shop,

If your tea becomes ten percent better than the way it is right now,

Oh,

You will do very well post-virus.

Ten percent better in everything,

Physically,

Mentally,

Emotionally,

And in terms of your competence of whatever you're doing,

Every one of you,

Just do this because you'll never again get this in your lifetime.

But I would recommend,

I would recommend that like all the schools break,

For six weeks in summer or eight weeks or whatever,

I think the entire humanity should take a break for three weeks every year.

No.

.

.

No machines,

No industry,

No cars and no automobiles on the road,

If you want you can cycle,

You can walk,

You can trek,

But no technology.

Non-polluting technology you can use,

Computers and stuff,

But no smoke,

Spooing machines,

Industry,

Nothing,

Just for three weeks.

I think after a few years of knowing the benefit of that,

People will vote for six weeks.

They will.

We should think about it.

Why should virus force us to do it?

This time around,

Well,

We got the bright idea from them.

But I think we should do it.

Everybody,

The entire humanity focuses on how to enhance themselves at least ten percent.

Just imagine every year if everybody upgrades themselves ten percent,

In ten years time,

What kind of world we will be living in?

We'll be living in a fantastic world,

Really enhanced human beings,

Physically,

Mentally,

Emotionally,

You must write down,

All of you do this.

Physically,

Where is your,

You know,

Parameters?

What is it that you can do?

Ten percent increase,

What does it mean?

Your mental state,

Where are you?

Describe yourself.

You don't have to show it to anybody.

And say ten percent increase,

Upgrade,

What does it mean?

Emotionally,

Where are you?

How much sweetness do you have in you or how much bitterness you have in you?

How to make a ten percent positive upgrade?

In terms of your work,

Where are you in terms of your capabilities?

How to enhance yourself ten percent?

Oh,

In ten years time,

What a wonderful world we'll have.

We should do this.

In the.

.

.

In the yoga center,

We always have this for people,

That people.

.

.

Brahmacharis are going into sixty days of silence in a year.

Sixty days.

This is for enhancement of the individual person.

Because if you are not enhanced,

How will your work be enhanced?

How will the world be enhanced?

People are always asking me this question,

Sadhguru,

How is it without any qualifications,

Without any.

.

.

Any kind of thing,

Everything runs so smoothly in Isha,

How is it that they're performing like this?

Your events are,

You know,

Top of the line.

How does this happen?

Because we are focusing on individual human beings and their enhancement.

This is what the world needs to do,

This is what the country needs to do.

This is a viral lesson,

It must go viral.

But people are doing,

You know,

Please look at your lives and see,

How much of it is precise?

Your thought,

Your emotion,

Your action,

To what extent is it precise and purposeful?

It's all over the place,

You know.

And still you're managing to do something wonderful in your life.

That is why everybody keeps looking up,

Because they know they're an accidental success.

This has become common everywhere,

Everybody,

Tch,

Like this,

Because they're an accident.

No,

It's very important human beings are a conscious and precise and purposeful existence.

This happened.

A young woman was driving and the car went like this,

Like that,

Like that.

Another man who was driving did everything possible to dodge that car,

But it came and rammed into him.

Well,

Fortunately,

Both were not injured in any big way.

So he got down,

Went to her and said,

Whatever you wanted to do,

You could have at least indicated,

You know.

You could have given some kind of a signal,

What is it that you are planning to do?

She said,

There is no signal for what I wanted to do.

For a lot of people it's like this,

There is no signal for what they want to do,

Because they don't know what the hell they want to do.

It's time to figure this out.

Three weeks a year should be good enough time to figure this out.

We can chart out a kind of a process,

You know.

One-hundred-and-twelve different processes for one-hundred-and-twelve different types of people on the planet.

What is the simple things you can do in three weeks?

To enhance yourself physically,

Mentally,

Emotionally,

Spiritually,

And in terms of your competence of whatever you're doing.

People are telling me,

Sadhguru,

You know,

People who ate what I cooked,

They're saying,

Sadhguru,

You must run cooking lessons in this break.

I'm also thinking but.

.

.

Time wise,

It'll take too much time.

Let's make this happen.

Well,

We got three more weeks now,

Almost,

At least.

So use this time,

Let's use this time to really enhance ourselves at least ten percent on all levels of our life.

Let's make this happen.

Questions,

Please.

Questioner 1 – This question is from Ashwin.

Namaskaram,

Sadhguru.

You had mentioned in one of the darshan that Isha volunteers are going out to nearby villages and spreading awareness about coronavirus.

I'm based out of Mumbai and I cannot come there,

But I really want to contribute in ensuring that our rural villages stay safe.

Please let me know how I can help from home.

See,

Right now,

The number of people that we have to serve is just increasing.

Especially with this extended lockdown,

I think the number of people who will become vulnerable and helpless to help themselves in lockdown period is going to increase significantly.

Right now,

Our volunteers in the region are serving a certain number of people cooked meals.

So this cooked meal requirement may increase quite significantly in the next week to two weeks' time.

As you know,

We can postpone everything,

But we can't postpone our lunch and dinner.

We may not be able to provide them what they would normally eat,

At least two meals a day we are seeing how to provide.

For this,

The necessary infrastructure and physical infrastructure,

Human infrastructure,

And the groceries needed,

Vegetables needed,

This procurement is happening and a war footing.

And I've already appealed to you,

I don't want to appeal to you every day,

But we need money.

Unfortunately,

We need a lot of money because only then we can serve lots of people.

As I announced yesterday,

The number of,

You know,

Whatever,

N95 masks and gloves and those UV sanitization lights,

All these things are landing here,

I think today they've already come.

Plus more things are coming from China for that.

I think that part is reasonably well taken care of,

At least for this region,

Because we are seeing how to be active in this region,

So that we are an effective force rather than spreading ourselves all over.

At the same time,

In the television show,

With the Times Now,

I have announced a help.

.

.

A number that they can call,

83000,

83000 is a number,

Which is Isha helpline,

That people can send messages if they see anybody moving towards starvation,

That their basic nourishment is in question,

Wherever it is in this country,

They can send a message and within twenty-four hours we will respond,

Activating the volunteers in that region.

All.

.

.

All this needs,

You know,

A certain amount of financial support to make this happen.

My painting is almost complete.

I think tomorrow the photographs of it should come out.

And if you.

.

.

If you have the money to buy a painting,

You can buy it.

We will also.

.

.

We'll sell the original and we will also sell the copies.

Because the original is five by five,

Everybody may not have that much wall in their house.

So we will sell the copies which are little smaller also.

So.

.

.

And we hope to do more,

If necessary I will teach you some cooking,

I will do any damn thing.

All our volunteers are working at various levels within the limitations of social distancing.

So because of this we cannot really go out and do what we would have done otherwise,

Because we want to respect the laws and above all to be an inspiration for everybody to respect that,

In that sense,

But we want to create various things through which funds can be raised.

We are looking at other projects through which funds can be raised,

So that in this period it's my commitment that people should not die of starvation.

The virus is taking its toll.

That is not in our hands,

That is in the hands of the medical personnel.

Not making.

.

.

Not inundating medical infrastructure with too many infected people is the responsibility of every citizen and administration is enforcing it.

And largely they're following these rules and it's going well.

But now in the next two weeks it may ramp up a little bit,

We need to take care of it.

One negative in all this is,

Which is of a serious concern,

In South Korea and also probably in China,

People who got infected and got recovered and came negative about few weeks ago are again testing positive now.

This is a serious concern.

This is unforeseen or did not.

.

.

We hoped that this won't happen.

Largely people believed once you're infected you would have the antibodies to fight this and you will become kind of immune.

Your immune system will take care of you.

But secondary infection is happening in people,

Which is a serious,

Serious concern.

So when will this cycle stop?

We thought it will go up at a certain level of infection and then it'll go down.

But now the same people who came out of infection are going back into it.

Now this is a very serious complication because we don't know where this will lead.

So how to get back the economic activity in the country,

That work is going on.

We are seeing how to involve ourselves with the local farming community to see how to put them back on rails.

I don't know what was announced,

I think by now Prime Minister should be announcing,

Those of you who have televisions you may be seeing it,

That there may be some relaxation in the lockdown.

One important relaxation,

Which is a submission that I had also made during our conversation with him,

That agriculture sector must be relaxed with the necessary instructions for social distancing.

Generally agriculture activity,

The nature of it itself,

There is a social distancing.

There is no crowding of people,

Except for a few activities,

Which can be easily spaced out.

Agriculture activity must get into action because that is sixty percent of the population in the country,

Plus it is the food security for the nation for the next one year.

So that has to get back.

Maybe they will relax some other essential services also,

Making a few more supply chains little more efficient.

I think that's going to happen too.

But the railways and airlines are not going to function for sure for the next.

.

.

Till the end of this month,

One hundred percent.

That's not going to happen because they are the main carriers to long distance spreading.

So travel will be restricted.

Maybe they will do taluk level restrictions,

District level restrictions,

So that people don't move geographically,

They stay within their terrain if they get it.

If they get infected,

It stays in the localized way so that it can be treated better rather than people traveling freely all over the place.

So all these things are being done.

Citizens must cooperate and for you to contribute.

Right now,

If you're in Mumbai,

You don't have to travel and come here to serve.

The best thing is to contribute in whichever way possible.

Otherwise,

Many of you can set up your own platforms of contributions.

And if you collect that and send it to us,

This will be put to good use hundred percent.

We will assure you every rupee that you send will be put to good use.

And that's all we can do right now.

I think we've gone over the time.

Thank you very much and this is the time because now the extension of lockdown has happened,

Which is another twenty-one days.

Or yeah,

Still twenty-one days more from today or twenty days more probably.

Conducting this time responsibly for the well-being of everybody around us,

Protecting that vulnerable group,

Protecting the aged people,

Ensuring that everybody who is over sixty-five,

Seventy years of age must live through this virus.

This commitment all of us should take,

Behaving responsibly,

Ensuring their safety and well-being,

And infants below one year of age,

And those other people who are vulnerable for different medical reasons also.

And ensuring this doesn't become a great calamity,

But just an aberration in our lives which we successfully came out of.

Let's be the virus successfully.

Sadhguru chants Yoga Yoga Yogeshwaraya Sadhguru chants Shiva Shiva Sarveshwaraya

Reviews

Such a wonderful model for being human within the world at this time!

Beautiful speech... Responding your call 🙏🏻🙋🏼‍♂️

Thank you very much for this Sadguru. I have started my own 10 pct enhancement and hope to inspire people around me to do the same.

Amazing talk! Us humans need to change what we have been doing on the beautiful planet and to it's occupants

Wisdom. Put this man at the heart of the UN and let those listen to his wise words. Thank you for sharing 🙏

Wow, this is a message offering absolute clarity and direction that everyone would benefit from hearing. You are a true blessing to us all ♥️🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻

Perspective, prescription & practical steps we can apply to these times without getting caught in fear. Thank you 🙏

Of all that I’ve ever absorbed from this mystic, this talk is by far my favorite. The first 10-12 minutes - highlighting the folly of imagined human superiority and its malignant anthropocentrism - is the very basis for deep ecology as a key response to humanity-as-virus. It espouses a sage mandate for enabling nature to bring balance back to itself that is stunning in its coherency, timeliness, urgency and wisdom.
The second half - recommendations for a regularized, disciplined, individual “ten-percent upgrade” initiative? Simple.
Brilliant. Doable. And what we - and all of life with which we share existence - so deeply need. This is a profoundly important 30 minutes of keen diagnoses and critically-needed proscriptions. Wow. Repeat!