The only honest answer is "I do not know" || Acharya Prashant, with youth (2013)
Question: What am I?
Speaker: Being a fairly well read person I am feeling a temptation to start answering it on the basis of what I have read so far. And there are books and books, entire libraries on these questions:
Who am I? What am I? Where do I come from? What am I here for? What is the purpose of life?
There are entire libraries devoted to this question. I have read a little bit so I feel the temptation to start answering but as soon as I want to answer you, something within me reminds that ‘you’ already know the answer. When you already know the answer, what is the point in me answering? Then there is even more wise voice that comes to me and tells me that you not only know one answer, you in fact more than one answer. You know two answers at least. How can I tell something to somebody who already has an answer, even two answers. I cannot. I must not. If I do that it will be injustice. So, how do I answer you? I will answer you by asking you that don’t you already have a lot of notions about who you are. Don’t you already have a lot of beliefs about who you are?
Speaker: (Starts addressing another person with name Rishabh as Kunal). Kunal, Kunal! (The particular person named Kumal does not respond).You already know that you are not Kunal. How were you feeling when I was calling Rishabh as Kunal? Were you feeling good or awkward? Kunal already knows that he is Kunal and he is asking me, “Who am I?” You already know that you are Kunal. Kunal is a 60 kg. thing sitting in that corner. That is why when I do not look at that corner but look at this corner, it does not appear to be right. You already know that I am this body. Kunal already knows that he is a 60 kgs body sitting in that corner. When he already knows so much, how can I answer? See how much he knows;
He already knows that he is the body.
He also knows that he is the name.
You know at least two things about yourself. When you already know this much, how can I tell you anything further? You are not only Kunal, you must be having a surname as well. What is your surname?
Listener: Kumar
Speaker: Kunal Kumar and not Kunal Khare or Kunal Jindal, etc. Are you understanding what I am trying to say? Your surname is the entire history of your clan. You are carrying so much with you. It is very difficult to tell you anything further when you already know so much. When you already know so much, it becomes difficult to tell you any further. I challenge you. I ask you right now to write 20 sentences beginning with ‘I am…’ and you will have no problems. Most of you will have no problem in writing down 20 sentences beginning with ‘I am…’ Let’s start.
What all will you write? I am…
Listener 1: An AKGECian
Speaker: I am….
Listener 2: Going to be a civil engineer.
Speaker: I am….
Listener 3: A good boy.
Speaker: I am….
Listener 4: A human being.
Speaker: I am….
Listener 5: A student.
Speaker: I am….
Listener 6: A college girl.
Speaker: I am….
Listener 7: A scholar.
Speaker: I am….
Listener 8: A good sportsperson.
Speaker: It won’t stop. Twenty is a small number. You won’t stop at two-hundred. A son, a daughter, an Indian, a Punjabi, handsome, beautiful, powerful, muscular, intelligent, smart and what not. You won’t stop at two-hundred. You have two-hundred or more answers for ‘Who am I?’
Who am I?
I am a smart boy.
Who am I?
I am a student.
Who am I?
I am a Hindu.
Who am I?
I am a daughter.
You already have so many answers. Who can answer you Kunal? Are you getting me? Do you see the number of identities you are carrying with yourself. And, you take these identities very seriously.
I am a Brahmin and you dare not say anything against Brahmins.
I am a Jaat and how dare you insult a Jaat.
I am a Muslim and how dare you talk about my religion.
You take all these identities very seriously. You can say anything to me but you dare not say anything about my father.
India is the best country. Why? Because I am an Indian. I must be the best so India has to be the best.
Speaker: We take our identities very seriously. And we have already answered ‘who am I?’. I said we have not one but two answers. All these are a part of the first answer. Now you tell me. Where have all these answers of ‘who am I?’ come from. Where have they come from?
Who told you that you are from the Gupta family?
Were you born with knowledge that ‘I am a Gupta’?
Who told you that you are a Jain and you must not eat such and such things?
Who told you that you must look in a certain way? Who told you that you must be fair, especially if you are a girl?
Who told you that your complexion must be fair?
Somebody told you for sure. All these answers of ‘who am I?’ are coming from?
Listeners(everyone): Society.
Speaker: And what have you done? You have sucked in those answers and today you are attached to those answers. Today if you say I am a Punjabi and I say all Punjabis are idiots, you would ask me to come close and give me ‘One tight slap’. Punjabis are not idiots, they are warriors. Today when any identity is shaken, you feel your very identity is shaken. You are an engineer. Today if you are expelled from engineering college you will feel like committing suicide.No more an Engineer?Because you have tied your very being to being an engineer. No more an engineer, now nothing.
Who am I? A wife. Now if the husband goes away, the wife collapses. Because her entire life is about being a wife. Now the wife obviously needs a husband because there can be no wife without a husband. If the husband goes away, what will happen to the wife? Collapsed!The wife already knows ‘who am I?’
Its obvious Kunal, all these are false answers. What is false?
That which comes to you from somebody else is obviously false. It has no life in it. It has no permanency. It has no strength in it. It can collapse. Its nature is to finish off. Die down one day.
So an intelligent man, first thing, rejects all answers of ‘Who am I?’ that have been given to him by the society, the books, religion, media and the teachers. He will not believe in any of those answers. He will say, fine all these are alright. They are useful answers but they are not correct. They are not absolutely right.
I said in the beginning that you know both the answers. You know both the answers. You know the false answer and at the same time, now, I claim that you also know the right answer. Do you all see that you know the false answers.
Listeners(everyone): Yes.
Speaker: You provided all the false answers. Right? Now I am telling you that you also know the right answer. That too you will provide to me. It will take some effort. It will take some digging but it is already there with you, it will come out. Should we try knowing the right answer? You want to try or should we stop at the false answer.
Listeners(everyone): We should try for the right answer.
Speaker: You all were a small child once?
Listeners(everyone): Yes, we were.
Speaker: Where is the child?
Listener 4: The child is gone.
Speaker: Yes, there is no child. Child is gone. And if there is a child, show him to me. Is there a child anywhere? The child is gone. Today you are a young man or a young woman. At some point you would no more be young. Where will this young man and young woman disappear? He too is gone, somewhere. No more! But still, throughout your life you will continuously keep saying, ‘I am there.’ The child will go but you will say, ‘I am there.’ The young man will go but you will say, ‘I am there’. The middle-aged man will also go but you will say, ‘I am there.’ Everything is going away and you are still saying, ‘I am there.’ Did you die with the child? Or, are you still there?
I am sitting;
The child is coming and going.
The young is coming and going.
The middle-aged man is also coming and going.
Days are coming going, nights are coming and going, events are coming and going, objects are coming and going, and what am I doing?
Listeners(everyone): Still there.
Speaker: Still there but what am I doing?
Listeners(everyone): Changing.
Speaker: Whatever is changing is coming in front of me and going away. I am seeing that the child is going away, the young man is going away. What am I doing?
Listener 7: Living with the time.
Speaker: Time is in front of me. The schedule is coming and going. There is day then there is afternoon. From one role play you are changing to another. Right now you are playing the role of?
Listener 5: Student.
Speaker: After sometime when you go home you will role-play as?
Listener 9: A son.
Speaker: In the evening when you are with your friends, you will role-play as?
Listener 10: A friend.
Speaker: The role plays are changing but there is somebody who is not changing. What is he doing? If I were changing with the role then I would never know that I am changing. The role is finished, I am also finished. But I am able to understand that the roles are changing one after the other. That means I am…
Listener 2: Thoughts.
Speaker: Correct, and thoughts are changing. Are the thoughts same all the time? Thoughts are changing but yet there is something that is not changing. You see this board here? So much is being written on this board. Somebody comes and writes one thing. Next one comes and writes another thing. What is being written on it is constantly changing yet there is something that is not changing.
Listener 3: The board.
Speaker: Oh! The board itself! But the board is blank in itself. Board in itself is nothing. The board does not have an identity, identities are coming and going. You write here, ‘I am an Indian’. You can write here, ‘I am the most intelligent man’. You can write here, ‘I am a beautiful girl’. You can write it and wipe it. Everything will change, this board will not change. This board just keeps watching. Unchangeably it is just watching and having fun.
You are that Watcher! You are that unchangeable entity. You are that nothingness.
This board is nothing. Blank! You are that blankness. You are that blankness on which everything can be written. You are that blankness which gives birth to everything. You are that nothing which produces everything. Quite funny, isn’t it? You are that which never comes and goes.
You are Intelligence! That which just understands.
My words are coming and going and you are listening. That’s your nature.
To listen is to understand. You are understanding. You are pure intelligence. You are the ability to understand. No identity is applicable to you. You are the one whose nature is to know and understand. That is what is called as Intelligence.
Intelligence is to Understand.
So, who am I? The one who can understand! But we don’t necessarily understand. Do we always understand?
Listener 6: No.
Speaker: So, I am alive only when I understand. Otherwise I am not.. I am not means I am dead. Look at the flow of the answers that I am giving.
Kunal asks, ‘Who am I?’.
I say, ‘Who am I?’ has two possible answers and both of which are already known to you. The first is a set of identities. Twenty or two-hundred statements beginning with ‘I am..’ and we said that all these identities are false. Then we say there must be something true as well and we want to explore it.
And then what we find is, that beyond all these identities there is something that never changes, that just watches and understands. That you are. But that you are only when you understand. When you don’t understand, you are nothing. You are just dead. You are a machine. A Robot.
How many of us want to be really alive?
Everyone in the audience raises their hand.
And to be really alive one must really understand. To understand is to pay attention. To understand is not to be distracted. Then you really are. Then the question ‘Who am I?’ dissolves.
But do not rush to the first part of the question. Remain with the first part. Keep looking at all your identities. The more you look at them, the easier will it be to reject them.
What does it mean to reject an identity? To see that it is a borrowed thing. This is not what I really am. This is what others have made me believe. That would be interesting. That is great freedom. Great liberty! How many of you want that freedom?
(All raise their hands)
Speaker: And how many want to live like slaves?
(Silence)
Speaker: Then why do we live like slaves? If you want freedom, if you must be free, why do you live like slaves? It’s not a fault of yours. When you were a child people were too eager to give you an identity. You are 2 years old and the parents already know what the child will become. If a girl is born, doctor and if a boy is born, engineer. Now there is no fault. Two grown up, so-called adults are already eager to give you an identity.
The day you are born, you are given a religion. The fellow is one day old, one hour old and he is already a Hindu or Muslim. The child doesn’t know anything and you have made him a Hindu. And all his life he will carry this religion. A religion that was given to him with zero participation of his. You are three years old and you have already been told what it means to be a good girl. Good boys play with guns and good girls play with dolls! And if you are a girl and carrying a gun then you have had it.
How many of you have felt the pressure of identities? That identities have been given to me and I can see that. That these things were given to me some point in my life.
(All raise their hands)
Listener 3: Sir, I did not want to pursue Engineering. My parents forced me to come here.
Speaker: It is not just your story. It is everybody’s story. How many of you, honestly, chose Engineering out of their own sweet will with no influence and no pressure from anyone?
(Only one-fourth of the audience raises hands).
Speaker: Even in these cases, if we investigate closely it may turn out that there was an influence, if not direct, then indirect. You may not even know that there was an influence. The others already know. There is hardly anything in our life which is happening out of our intelligence. Most of our lives is a story of the influences working on us. Not a good story. Isn’t it? You want to live like this? Continue?
(Everyone nods their heads in a ‘No’)
Speaker: I do not want to live like this. How many of you want to join me in this?
(All raise their hands)
Speaker : I am so glad. I have so many more friends today. That’s my job. To create more and more friends out of breakaway.
So, Good afternoon Friends! Welcome to the breakaway club. That’s all your entire HIDP is about, breaking away from your chains. And all chains are in the mind. If the chains are in the hand then it is easier to breakaway because they are visible and you will be irritated that why am I being enslaved? You will want to cut down your chains.
But because the chains are in the mind so you can’t see them. They are much more dangerous if they are in the mind.
Your chains restrict you to fully express yourself in role plays.
Your chains prevent you from understand your mind.
Your chains prevent you from enjoying life.
You want to cut them down. That should be fun. Huh!?
Kunal, so who am I?
Listener 5(named Kunal): I am God.
Speaker: Were you born saying God, God & God? What does God look like? A Hindu you are. What does God look like?
Listener 5(named Kunal): I am a part of God.
Speaker: You are saying that you are a part of God. Now God must be a bigger entity. What does it look like?
The Krishna worshiper will say that God looks like ‘Krishna’ with a sweet flute, a few Gopis around him and Morpankh.
The Christ worshiper will say that God looks like a grand old father because that’s what Christ used to call him.
The Muslim will say God has no shape or form.
The atheist will say that there is no God.
Your God has been given to you by?
Listener: (Everyone)Society.
Speaker: Now that is very disturbing. Society is creating a God and giving it to me. God did not create society? We thought God created everything. Sorry Boss! Your God did not create anything. We created him. As far as our God goes, we created him. So, after all this discussion, who are you?
Listener 5(named Kunal): Pure soul.
Speaker: I only know one sole, the one which is found in my shoe. Which other soul are you referring to? Pure soul. That means soul can be impure as well. Anybody else here who sees souls etc? Anybody who can see ghost and such things? Anybody who can see aatma etc? Pure soul, God! Did you really find out that there is something called the soul? I am not affirming it, I am not denying it. I am asking you, have you really found out on your own? You have just heard from someone that there is something called a Soul.
Listener 5(named Kunal): Many believe in it.
Speaker: If we keep believing, will we ever know? He believes that he is a part of God, he believes that he is a pure soul. That’s the entire thing. We believe too soon. Must I believe or must I know?
Listener 5(named Kunal): Its obvious. I must know.
Speaker: Should I believe that there are two doors on two sides or can I just find out? Is there a need to believe? If I am blind, do I need to believe in what you tell me?If I am blind and ask you which side are the doors and you say, one to the left and one to the right. I will have to believe you. But if I have eyes,I can open my eyes. Do I need to believe or do I need to find out?
So, find out. And you are capable of finding out. The breakaway club is a club of finders who have the potential and who will find out on their own, who will help each other find out. You help me find out and I will help you find out. But we will not ask each other to just believe. At no point will we ask each other to believe. Yes?
We will help each other. I will say something to you but whenever I say something to you, it will be to enable all of us to ‘find out’. Whenever I say something to you or give a handout, the one who had today or you had last Saturday, it will be to enable you to find out. I am saying something to you just as an enabler. Just not the last word. Please do not start believing in what is written in your handouts. Your handouts are meant to stimulate you. So that you can become active and find out. Do not just believe in them. So, who are you Kunal?
Kunal speaks nothing.
Speaker: That’s the most honest answer you can give. Silence! Do you know what is he saying?
Listener 6: He is saying ‘I do not know’.
Speaker: Yes, I do not know. And this is the most honest thing one can say. And that’s a beautiful and neat point to start from. Can I know if I already know? Will I ever know anything if I believe that I already know? So, it’s the best place to start from.
That I do not know. Do not be afraid of saying ‘I do not know’. Promise you, when I won’t know I will say I do not know but I am open to finding out.
Let’s have this attitude. “I do not know.”
And then you will know a lot. It’s a funny thing. That those who say, ‘I do not know’, actually come to know a lot. Those who say, “I already know”. They only don’t know, they also don’t get to know.
So, I do not know is a very good answer and thank you Kunal for giving all of us this beautiful answer. Let this stay with you.
All of you write this down in bold,
I DO NOT KNOW.
Who am I? I DO NOT KNOW.
-Excerpts from a Samvaad session. Edited for clarity.
