Goal

Questioner: Acharya Ji, which direction to take in life?

Acharya Prashant: What is it, that matters to you?

The direction in which you must go is determined by where you will feel the pain.

And if you feel no pain, no discomfort, why must you go in any direction?

You … read_more

What is the punishment of having a wrong goal? What is the punishment? You will suffer. And if you keep having one wrong goal after the other, your suffering will keep compounding, so you will be forced to give up your false goals.

And if you are not forced to… read_more

Questioner: I want everything that I do to be perfect. Because of this, I end up procrastinating a lot of things and focus only on the minor ones that I can do almost perfectly and feel satisfied about. I am not happy about this tendency. How should I get out… read_more

Questioner: Acharyaji, my question is that the greed of getting more and more pleasure is increasing with time, and finally I’m finding myself getting stuck in the vicious circle of getting more and more pleasure. Sir, what are the ways that you could suggest to me to get out of… read_more

Acharya Prashant: If I am incomplete, then sitting where I am, what would be the quality of my actions, thoughts, and imagination? They, too, would be of an incomplete nature.

So, incompleteness is projecting more incompleteness for itself and then trying with all its might to reach more incompleteness. How… read_more

Acharya Prashant: Whatever you are doing, there has to be honesty in that. What is important is that you do not say one thing and do another thing. If you look at the great scientific discoveries or inventions, the scientist or the explorer would be busy in his chosen area… read_more

Questioner: Sir, I am pursuing MSc in physics. After watching your videos and reading the Bhagavat Gita, I understand that whatever in this world we achieve to please ourselves does not really give us peace. I also find that doing science might be just pleasing myself or my ego. It… read_more

Acharya Prashant: How to get success in whatever I do? The questioner says, “How do I get success in whatever I do?” Success does not lie in doing any random thing. That’s the first, the most important and, probably, the last thing. The game is not at all about picking… read_more

Acharya Prashant: Desire means that you are not alright with yourself and you want something else to happen, correct? So, we are anyway not living for ourselves. We are rather living to change ourselves. And are these not two very different things? If you are living for yourself as you… read_more

Questioner: Good afternoon and Jai Hind sir. My question to you is that people define success by different terms like influence, happiness, fame, name, etc. So, sir when did you start considering yourself success?

Acharya Prashant: First of all, thanks for inviting me here. I don't consider myself a success… read_more

Questioner: Acharya Ji, today I am listening to you from my workplace, so, I have a question related to work.

You shared an inspiring story of Kabir and his profession, I want to have the same level of inspiration and energy in my profession. Your teaching has helped me to… read_more

Question : There is a state the other is in, there is a state that I think the other is in, there is a state the other thinks that I am in. What is then an appropriate action?

Speaker : When one is in a mental state, it is never… read_more

Question: Sir, there is a common notion that if I go about consuming things, then there would be a time when I will see the uselessness of these things. And ultimately this would help me to go to the other center, the immensity. I have a strong belief in that,… read_more

Question : You said that we all have either same or similar kind of goals. But we are deciding our goals on our own. How can they be similar?

Speaker : How is it possible that two-hundred students sitting here, two hundred individuals sitting here, have the same goal in… read_more

Questioner (Q): My question is related to failures. I’ve been a very positive-minded person, and I’ve been trying my best to do everything that I can, give my best in everything; but I’m disappointed with myself - not disappointed with others - but with myself. Now, I feel that there’ve… read_more

Before you excel, ask yourself, “What must I excel in? What is worth it?” Before you speed down a road, ask yourself, “Which road to take?” Speed comes later; choice of the right road comes first.

It is far better to be slow on the right road than to be… read_more

Questioner (Q): Acharya Ji, you often talk about the importance of time, and that is something that bothers me in the context of my career. I don’t know if I should continue in my current job or not. I took the job for very ordinary reasons: money and position in… read_more

Questioner: Acharya Ji, it is a question about selfless goals. I have not understood ‘goals’ yet. The freedom fighters, social workers, humanitarians are all working tirelessly to achieve something. What’s my responsibility towards country, people, and religion? For example, our culture and tradition need to be preserved. Is it not… read_more

Intention, goal, purpose, desire, clinging, attachment, attraction—none of these are bad, provided they are towards the right object, right end. Please be attached, please be greatly attached, please be desirous, please feel the attraction, the pull towards liberation, towards Truth.

It is not for nothing that your mind is vested… read_more

All the expanse of discipline is built upon the foundation of the goal. The goal comes first.

I might be a very violent man, and my goal is to blast a building off. To learn how to do it, I will have to live through stern discipline. I will have… read_more

Question: Sir, I want to know what does the word ‘Hard Work’ mean? Does it mean studying 16-18 hours a day?

Speaker: I go jogging in the morning and I don’t really enjoy it. It is lot of hard work for me. There is a colleague who goes along with… read_more

Don’t take life advice from uncles and aunts and models and celebrities. Don’t let cricketers tell you what kind of house to live in.

Your mom is beautiful, great, good, lovely. Is she the right person to tell you of so many other things in life? Please avoid. Does your… read_more

What is the nature of a gymnasium? The gymnasium only gives you obstacles. Have you ever noticed? You want to raise something—what is the gymnasium giving you? Weights, and weights are obstacles against the rise. The gymnasium really does not support you, it actually obstructs you.

The world is anyway… read_more

Acharya Prashant (AP): The questioner is asking how to be a good entrepreneur?

Entrepreneurship is about initiating something, right? Doing something, beginning something. Before you become a good entrepreneur, must you not ask what is worth doing? Or is entrepreneurship merely about collecting profits rather than salaries? To many people,… read_more

Questioner: I would like to join the army, but my family and friends are not very supportive. They say that when I could easily get a good job in Delhi or Bangalore, what is the point in risking my life as a soldier? What should I reply to them?

Acharya … read_more

Acharya Prashant (AP): Please see, there appears a very difficult task in front of us.

One approach is, the task is so difficult that I leave it to be handled by time. The task is so difficult that being with what I am today, with my energy, my resources, my… read_more

Every young person who is about to choose a career, decide on work in life, must keep this in mind, my humble advice: See what is it that really, really troubles you, and then work should be the medicine for your trouble. That’s the way you must choose work.

Therefore,… read_more

Question: Sir, after completing B.Tech, should I go for higher studies or a high paying job? How can I decide that?

Speaker: What’s your name?

Listener 1: Sonu Singh, 3rd year B.Tech.

Speaker: After completing B.Tech I do not know that I should go for the job, or for higher… read_more

Questioner (Q): Namaste, sir. My question is, in these teenage years, how do we avoid social evils like bad addiction and bad activities which exist in society and just focus on our goal?

Acharya Prashant (AP): For that, the goal has to be alluring enough. The goal has to be… read_more

Going from class six to class seven in three attempts, having been kicked out of four schools, you manage to find some kind of a fraudulent certificate from one of those shady institutions that say, “Even if you are class seven fail, we will still give you a high school… read_more

As long as the goal is not tremendously big, life has no real purpose. If your goals are small, they are no goals. You will be frustrated if you don’t achieve them, and you will be doubly frustrated if you achieve them. Having achieved them, you will find that the… read_more

Questioner (Q): Good evening, Sir! My question is, how do I face the fear of physical or psychological pain when I am trying to level-up my efforts? So, it’s in the context of putting-out a great effort and maintaining consistency in putting great efforts.

Acharya Prashant (AP): Great efforts towards… read_more

When you are serious about victory, you do not strike at the enemy without being fully prepared. Those who just plunge themselves into battles without having checked their preparedness are the ones who don’t love victory too much. Because this battle is important, and because this battle must be won,… read_more

Questioner (Q): We are too considered or concerned about our society or the people around ourselves. So, whatever they say, like, a particular thing is the best, so, we start thinking in that direction. We get so-called motivated by them to achieve that thing. So, I guess ‘A,’ make targets… read_more

If you choose a goal that is not worthy enough, you will try a lot to concentrate on your goal but you will find that invariably you get distracted after a while. That is not because the distractions are powerful; that is because your goal is powerless.

The goal itself… read_more

Are you suffering, are you burning? Is there something that is eating you out?

Want to know the reason?

You have an ideal. You have a set idea of how things should be. You want existence to conform to your idea of things. You are so arrogant that you will… read_more

Questioner: Pranaam Acharya Ji. My question is about suffering.

With your guidance, I have to come to see that my life is nothing but a big lump of suffering. It includes the whole swing of pain and pleasure, attachment and aversion, and my role in them as the ‘I’.

Even… read_more

Questioner (Q): Sir, you said that in life don’t plan for a thing, just let it happen. But how to get what we want without planning? When I was sitting in the class sometime before you said, “Take your time, write, think about the question.” This is also planning.

Acharya … read_more

Question: As the years go by many of us remain confused about the ‘Goals of Life.’ I would like to be guided about the ‘Ultimate purpose of Life.’

~ Colonel S. D. Joshi

Acharya Prashant: But we have had purposes throughout our Life. Is there ever a purposeless moment… read_more

Choose the right thing to do, and in that lies success. In that lies immediate success. Immediate success implies that you have been successful right in the moment of the choice itself; you don’t have to wait for the outcome. In fact, if you have to wait for the outcome… read_more

Questioner (Q): Sir my question is, whenever we take decisions in life, we tend to take the easier path despite it not being beneficial to us. We like to stay in our comfort zone. So how do we come out of this? How do we push ourselves to take the… read_more

There is no success in chasing a stupid goal and managing to attain it. If the goal in the first place is unworthy, what glory is there in attaining it more speedily than others?

So do not ask, “How do I get success in whatever I do?” You are trivializing… read_more

If you have to invest your hours, your months, your years, invest them on a cause. The cause could be your own development, or general development, social welfare, whatever. But let it be a cause, not a person. Let the cause occupy you fully.

This applies to both men and… read_more

Questioner (Q): I have heard you say that life should be purposeless and aimless. But if we do not aim for anything, then how will we crack our exams? When you were our age, you too prepared for exams like MBA, IIT-JEE, civil services, etc. But now you say having… read_more

When you say that you go to your workplace for a purpose, the purpose is never work, or is it? The purpose is the salary cheque. In fact, if work could be bypassed and you could straight away reach the salary cheque, then who would want to work? Now, why… read_more

You are not under any obligation to be perfect. Alright!

Your incompetencies, your deficiencies are all welcome. They are the part of the game. Just be alive and alert.

And then even out of your own botched up action, something auspicious will happen. Like Shabri, she doesn’t know how to… read_more