Career Crossroads: Finding the Right Path Forward
Questioner: A lot of students that I talk to, it’ s the fear of the society, it’ s the fear of the unknown, it’ s fear of the expectations that they are carrying, that pushes them to become an engineer and then they figure out that probably this is not something that they wanted to be. And that is the reality of a lot of individuals and not just engineers.
Probably, here is something that is stopping me from taking a plunge of starting something of myself, right? Here is something that is stopping somebody who is in a relationship for ten years to take that step to get married. Where does this fear come from?
Acharya Prashant: Lack of love, which comes from lack of self-knowledge. You see, when I tie my sense of existence, my very identity, to something that is unreliable, I will have to be afraid.
It’ s like putting my heart on this table. Now, how can I live in security? The heart is out there on the table, anybody can take it away, anything can happen to it. Or the heart might grow legs and walk away on its own.
My very existence has been subjected to something that is not in my control. Something that is definitely going to deceive me at some point, that is fear. My sense of self-worth comes from my monies, my bank account, I will be afraid. That bank account can be closed anytime, anything can happen.
My sense of self-worth comes from my physical appearance. I very well know, time will take it away, I will be afraid. Right? Who am I? I am the one who is praised or worshipped by the society. Oh! I will be so afraid, so afraid!
You talked of people working for their images, they would be living a cursed life. Because, their heart is out there in the hands of strangers. Their entire identity is tied to their image and the image is in the eyes of other people.
Questioner: Correct.
Acharya Prashant: So, the image can be distorted or can disappear any moment. Just imagine, how afraid they would be all the time. That’s with the ego. Because, the ego as I said, “Is a fundamental sense of incompleteness.” Therefore, to complete itself, it just associates itself to anything possible.
And the things that you are associating yourself with, they are not reliable. They belong to the world and the world can take them away. They belong to time. They came with time and with time all those things will disappear.
And you have tied your identity to those things. Now how can you rest in peace? That’s fear. If you do not have self-knowledge, you will always be afraid.
My identity is linked to my husband’s identity. Now the husband has two legs. And the husband has a brain, a mind of his own. If your identity comes from your husband’s name, as happens in India at least, you would always be afraid as a wife.
The husband can change his mind any day. You would always be, you know, having one eye on his secretary, and the other eye in his email and mobile phone. What’s he getting into? Who’s texting him? Why is he on the phone so late in the night?
Because you are afraid if husband goes away, what happens to you? Your very existence depends on the husband. That’s fear.
When you operate from the ego centre and make something very, very important for yourself and that something belongs to the world, it can go away anytime, and you are afraid.
And in that fear, there can never be love, never be love. If you are afraid of losing something, you will be very violent towards it. Nobody lets his money go and have a walk down the road. What you do? You lock up your money. That’s violence.
When something starts becoming very meaningful to you, you lock it up. You don’t want it to have freedom. And that’s violence. So, love and fear just cannot go together. If you are dependent on something or somebody, you will be afraid. And that dependence cannot be called love.
And that is a confusion, we often get into it. Just because you depend on somebody and somebody depends on you, you start feeling as if it is love, it is not.
Questioner: Just like the way political parties think that people love them but it actually is fear.
Acharya Prashant: Exactly! Love is a rare quantity and rarer in politics.
Questioner: So, if I am interested in a particular profession, do I not pursue it whole heartedly? Do I pursue it wholeheartedly knowing very well that the results can either be zero or one?
Acharya Prashant: One has to go into the very nature of interest. Aren’t we interested in cricket? Aren’t we interested in seeing songs in movies? Practically, everybody in India is interested in cricket, nobody in Brazil is. And nobody in India is interested in ice hockey. So, that’s how flimsy the whole thing about interest is.
In India, if you don’ t get a movie with songs, you say, “I am disinterested.” The movie would bomb. In Hollywood, if you have a movie with songs, that would raise eyebrows, what’s going on? Occasionally, you have an OD song but typically there is no song.
Questioner: Right.
Acharya Prashant: So, that is the nature of interest. It is never something of the heart. Love and interest are not the same thing. Interest is something that is given to you by your body, by your environment, by random chance, your circumstances and all these. So that’s how your interests come to you.
So, if you are interested in a vocation, first of all, you have to ask yourself, “Just two years back, I was interested in something else and two years before I was interested in that and when I was four years old, I was interested in becoming a fighter pilot. What happened to all those interests?”
Today, I smile at those things and just shrug them off, “I don’t want to be a fighter pilot.” What you want to be today? Oh! I want to be an investment banker. What happened to the fighter pilot? You were so interested in that. And how do you know, tomorrow you will not be looking at this I-banker, just the way today you are looking at the fighter pilot.
The self of a five-year old appears so naive and immature when you are twenty-five. How do you know that at thirty-five, you will not look back at this twenty-five, year old self and say, “What the hell! how was I taking this fellow so seriously?”
So, interest is something that you must look at with healthy contempt. Interest, mind you, can even be induced in you. Interest can be aroused in you. That’s what the entire advertising industry is about. They can make you feel Interested in things that is intrinsically worthless to you.
Questioner: Correct.
Acharya Prashant: So, of what value is this thing called interest? But, then in today’ s world, we place so much premium on this word interest. Do what interests you, this, that. Whereas, it is wisdom to realize that interest is the last thing that you should ever go after.
Then people come up and say, “No, should we do things that we are not interested in? No. Figure out what you can love, figure out what you can love, and you will never be able to transcend into love if you remain stuck with interests.
Questioner: It might sound repetitive, how do I find love?
Acharya Prashant: No, you can never find love. You can only rid yourself of all that which blocks love. All that which is just needlessly and coincidentally present in your mental space. Love is like an honoured guest. They say, “Love arrives only when the right space has been prepared and maintained for it — Right and clean and honoured space.
You prepare that space and you leave that space empty and they say, “Love arrives.” You cannot predict in what way, in what form love would arrive. But you can do your homework. And your homework is to clear the clutter.
You cannot have garbage all over your place and yet wish for that esteemed guest to honour your insights with his presence. He won’t come. So, we keep looking for love all our lives and then we complain, “No, there is no love.”
There is no love because you haven’t prepared the right space for it. Love is not something reclusive. Love is not something exceptional either. And love is not something that is meant for just holy few.
If you are human, love is a possibility. But if you are stuck with your interests and greed and your ignorance, your delusions and all your nonsense, where is the space for love? And love is not obviously something about the man-woman relationship. Obviously, we are not talking in that context. Love is something you can give your life to.
Questioner: correct.
Acharya Prashant: The work I do, that’s my love, that’s my love. I am not there to consume it. I can finish myself off for that.
Questioner: Right. You spoke about clutter and that probably is the worst thing possible for the generation of today and I remember, we started this conversation with your journey and how it was a assorted set of knowledge that was present in front of you.
Right now, what we are dealing with is a scattered set of knowledge that we are trying really hard to make sense of and that probably is resulting in a lot of clutter because we are seeing certain people, we are tracking their lives; we are feeling that, this is what I can be Or I want to be Or I will be.
Acharya Prashant: Seeing people and following their lives is not always something harmful. It’s
just that you need to have the right people to look upto.
Questioner: Just like the right books?
Acharya Prashant: The right books obviously. All these people masquerading as influencers and biggies today, most of them are intrinsically very worthless. It’s a very hopeless lot that youngsters are looking upto. So, that’s the problem.
Somebody has lots of money, somebody is heading a tech firm, somebody is all over the social media or somebody is politically very dominant and he becomes a role model. Well, that fellow is a garbage.
And you have so much in human history to be inspired from. Why not go and read about the really worthy people? Why must you be limited to all these flash in the pans? They are today, they will disappear tomorrow. They don’t mean a thing.
It is just like that, “When that spectacle is in front of you, it captivates your senses.”
Questioner: Right.
Acharya Prashant: And you fall for it. That has to be avoided. And we cannot entirely blame the youngsters for it. The guidance, the protection has to come from those who pose as guardians and teachers in the society. Otherwise, extremely unworthy people will become role models, they have become.
