How SMP* Are Crushing Your Soul [*Small-Minded People]

Acharya Prashant : If it was possible for one man to move toward greatness, it was possible for everybody. Even if you have collected great numbers, all those numbers mean nothing in front of the one person who is demonstrating that something could have been done. So, they get hurt.

They do not get hurt because of you Ankit (questioner); they get hurt because of their own insistence on remaining small. Why do you want to blame yourself? In fact, that which makes you blame yourself is the smallness present in you. If you move towards Greatness or aspire for it, and that hurts people around you; that only means that the people around you are insistent on remaining small. Further, it also means that the people around you do not love you at all. Not only do they not love you, they are also actually actively vicious towards you. Not only do they not want to accompany you to the right place—well, again, the rightness of that place is my subjective interjection—but they want to actually stop you from moving in that direction.

In love, you want the best for the other one, right? Without caring for yourself. And if someone close to you is moving towards liberation, and you start feeling hurt or shedding tears, then it only means that you are probably that person's worst enemy. Who else can be called an enemy? The one who wants to keep you in bondage.

You say people around the aspirant of Greatness get hurt because they have their expectations from him. What are these expectations exactly? The fellow is moving towards Greatness, and they are saying, “Oh, you are not fulfilling our expectations.” So, surely their expectations are? If I want you to be great, and you move towards greatness, then I will say, “Thank you so much. You are fulfilling my expectations,” correct? Now if you move towards greatness and I say, “Oh, you are not meeting my expectations,” then that surely implies that my expectation was that you must remain small. You want to honor such an expectation? You want to honor such an expectation? Please tell me.