Ideas are never new; Intelligence is now and new || Acharya Prashant, with youth (2013)
Speaker: The question can be broadly put as, ‘What is place of new ideas when the external is never really going to accept them?’
What do you mean by a new idea? Can an idea ever be really new? An idea is a thought and thought will necessary come from the past. There are new ideas ever. Nobody can ever have a new idea. Yes, understanding is always new. Understanding is always fresh but ideas can never be new because idea is a thought, dependent upon the past. Are you getting it?
The brain is terribly afraid of the new. You know what is the logic of the brain. It says that ‘I have traveled so far in time and I have survived. Because I have survived, I must repeat the journey. You see, had the journey not been good, I would not have survived. It is because of what the journey has given me that I still exist. It makes it a point to just repeat that journey’. It is like an afraid man who goes to the jungle and he knows not anyway. Randomly he starts walking on a certain path. It is all random. But that path brings the man to a particular point. There are seven different types of path that are possible. He had chosen any one and the path brought him to a particular point outside the jungle. Next time when he again goes to the jungle, what will he do? Will he will try a new path? What will he do? He would want to repeat that path of which he already has an experience because he finds it secure. He says, ‘Last time I walked on it, I survived. So let me move on this again, I will survive’.
That is the logic of the brain. It says, ‘This is the past and I have survived. Let me repeat it’. So, the moment the new comes, of which it has no experience, it becomes very afraid. That is why the society is afraid of those who are new. Because in the past there is a repetition, there is an experience, there is a great sense of security, and the new makes you highly insecure. The new makes you very, very afraid. But life is always in the new. It is such a strange situation that we are afraid of life then. You see, we are afraid of the new, life is forever new, life is this moment. This means that brain is afraid of life itself.
A man who is not intelligent, a man who is brain-driven, is mechanical, is actually afraid of life. He wants to by-pass life. He wants to live in memories. He wants to leave in the past, in identities. He does not want to stand up to life and be into it fully. He does not want that. You see only such people around you. Ninety-nine percent people are those who want to by-pass life. They live a life of memory, hope and desires. They are either in hopes or memories. And in living such a life, they miss Life itself.
Excerpted from a ‘Shabd-Yog’ session. Edited for clarity.
