Writings

शिव भी, शंकर भी, शक्ति भी .. शिव के सहस्रों नाम
शिव भी, शंकर भी, शक्ति भी .. शिव के सहस्रों नाम
6 min

जनमानस में तो शिव और शंकर एक ही हैं, जिनके सहस्रों नाम हैं। सब नाम सुंदर हैं। पर अध्यात्म की सूक्ष्मताओं में जाकर अगर हम इन नामों का अभिप्राय समझें तो उनका सौंदर्य और बढ़ जाएगा। ‘शिव’ अर्थात आत्मा, सत्य मात्र। आप कहते हैं ‘शिवोहम्’, ठीक जैसे उपनिषद कहते हैं,

साहब, नज़र रखना
साहब, नज़र रखना
3 min

साहब नज़र रखना, मौला नज़र रखना तेरा करम सबको मिले, सबकी फ़िक्र रखना न आदमी की आदमी झेले गुलामियाँ, न आदमी से आदमी मांगे सलामियाँ जो फ़र्क पैदा हो रहे, वो फ़र्क गर्क हों सबको बराबर बाँट, ये धरती ये आसमान कोई भी न हो दर्द में, सबकी ख़बर रखना

भूले मन..!
भूले मन..!
2 min

*भूले मन..!समझ के लाग लदनियां..! थोड़ा लाद..अधिक मत लादे.. टूट जाये तेरी गर्दनिया..!..*

*भूले मन…भूखा हो तो भोजन पा ले.. आगे हात न बनिया…!*

*भूले मन….प्यासा हो तो पानी पि ले.. आगे घात न पनियां…*

*भूले मन….कहे कबीर सुनो भाई साधो.. काल के हाथ कमनियां…*

निश्छलता
निश्छलता
1 min

मैं छुपाना जानता तो जग मुझे साधु समझता।

शत्रु मेरा बन गया है छल रहित व्यवहार मेरा।।

प्रश्न: सर, क्या यह पंक्तियाँ सही कह रही हैं?

उत्तर: विवेक,

छल रहित होना कभी कमज़ोरी नहीं होती।

निश्छलता आती है इस गहरी आश्वस्ति के साथ कि मुझे छल, धोखा, चालाकी की ज़रुरत

बेमतलब, निरुद्देश्य जियो
बेमतलब, निरुद्देश्य जियो
2 min

प्रश्न: मनुष्य ‘स्वार्थी’ है या ‘मतलबी’?

उत्तर: तुमने ‘स्वार्थ, मतलब’ के बारे में जानना चाहा है।

अर्थ माने कुछ ऐसा जो तुम्हें लुभावना, प्रिय लगता हो।

(यहां पर) ‘स्व’ माने अहंकार।

स्वार्थ माने वो जो अहंकार को प्यारा लगे।और मतलब माने भी अर्थ।

सत्य मात्र ‘होता है’, और उसका ‘मतलब’

धागा प्रेम का
धागा प्रेम का
4 min

रहिमन धागा प्रेम का मत तोड़ो चटकाय।

टूटे से फिर ना जुड़े, जुड़े गाँठ परि जाय।।

धागा क्या है? जिसके दो छोर हैं, दो सिरे हैं। दो दूरियों के मध्य जो है, सो धागा।

एक ही दूरी है जीवन में, बाकी सारी दूरियां इस एक दूरी से निकलती हैं। स्वयं

How to Correct a Bad Decision?
How to Correct a Bad Decision?
1 min
Do not focus on the decision. Rather, look at the decision-maker. The decision is not bad, humbly accept that the decision-maker is bad. Without this acceptance, the series of bad decisions will continue. When one realizes that the decision-makers' mind has been full of beliefs, past, and fear, then there is radical transformation in one’s being. The old, frozen, conditioned decision-maker simply evaporates.
Why Do We Crave Holidays?
Why Do We Crave Holidays?
5 min
The mind is fed up of its daily, boring, routine, fettered and frustrated life. But it has no faith or courage to break away from this life. It is very necessary for it to keep looking towards the future. Some special day must always lie ahead: New Year, Valentine’s, Holi, your birthday, Diwali and so on. This cycle keeps up the illusion that something great is coming.
What is Spirituality?
What is Spirituality?
3 min
Being spiritual is simply about not being stupid. Spirituality is not at all organised religion. It is not about customs or rituals or beliefs. Spirituality is an awakened state of mind in which the mind really understands. So, mind has only two options: spirituality or stupidity.The mind when conditioned and away from origin (essence), is bound to be stupid. Only a spiritual man really lives, loves and enjoys. Others die without living.
Acharya Prashant on Osho
Acharya Prashant on Osho
19 min
Osho’s defining characteristic was courage. He was a man of deep intellect, prolifically well-read, a genius in devising new methods of meditation, yet above all his other qualities, his courage is his hallmark. Born in a middle-class family in a small city in the deprivation and resourcelessness of pre-independence India, he built himself up all on his own. Books would be his companions. Even as a teenager, he would travel across cities, to various libraries and sources, to look for books and knowledge.
To What Extent Is Education Important?
To What Extent Is Education Important?
4 min
Formal education is important to the extent the body is important. The less the body-identification, the less is the importance of object-centric education. A person's attachment to material possessions, driven by societal values, leads to poverty and duality. Poverty, unlike the natural world, is man-made and rooted in the desire to accumulate. While education enables material progress, it doesn’t address deeper issues of self-identity and existence.
Let Life Be a Celebration of Intelligence
Let Life Be a Celebration of Intelligence
5 min
Eating, walking, sleeping, working, dying – these alone surely cannot mean being alive. Life is much more than the physical and mental processes. Machines can walk, eat, work. The programmed analysis that computers do is no different from what we call thinking. Machines have no role in their formation, just as we have no role in our birth. And machines can be programmed to self-terminate after a certain time, just as we die.
How can enlightenment be one objective thing?
How can enlightenment be one objective thing?
5 min

Question: Sir, how does a mind that is enlightened look at life? What happens to its thoughts? Does its wiring change in response to fear? Does it change its response to emotions?

Answer: Assuming sufficiently good understanding of the brain and sufficiently developed scientific processes, anything can surely be done

Meditativeness is a way of being
Meditativeness is a way of being
3 min

Question: Dear Sir, we have been talking about how to use the ‘higher’ desire of brahman as a broom to clean up all the desires and then to burn the broom itself. Do you think I should simply sit back and read without this burning desire, this lust for knowledge,

Anything done in awareness is good
Anything done in awareness is good
2 min

Question: Dear Sir, when I review the discussions that take place in the clarity sessions, most of them are beyond my ordinary imaginations. The experiences or the words mentioned in these sessions sound very pure and pious but very difficult to attain. Why is it so?

Answer: The Sunday discussions

To know what you already know
To know what you already know
2 min

Question: I read somewhere that when a person dies, the stream, of which it was a manifestation, still goes on. What is the process of this stream and how does it manifest itself?

Sir, is there life after death? What sort of knowledge passes on at the time of enlightenment?

Can there be a method to attain enlightenment?
Can there be a method to attain enlightenment?
3 min

Question: I have been reading Buddha and Kabir for long, and both are my favorite. While reading them I realized that both had different methods to get enlightenment.

Buddha said, “Renounce the world and be a monk.”

While Kabir said, “Don’t renounce the world, be in this world, face

Spirituality- the ability to see the One in all
Spirituality- the ability to see the One in all
5 min

Question: Sir, when all men are equal, then why are some people given extra importance and addressed with words like Mr. President etc.?

Answer: All men are equal only at the level of their core, center, essence. Otherwise, people are very different and unequal.

At the core, not only are

The Teacher must be a Nobody || Acharya Prashant (2011)
The Teacher must be a Nobody || Acharya Prashant (2011)
4 min

*Question: Sir, what does it mean to be a Teacher?*

Answer: Going through Shankar’s works and then a few Upanishads, I am humbled by the pain these teachers have taken to bring the concept to the student.

Shankar announces, even before the beginning, that only the most deserving and

What is absent mindedness?
What is absent mindedness?
1 min

Question: What is absent mindedness?Answer: Absent mindedness is mind being anywhere. Whenever you are occupied with anything, it is absent mindedness. Any act of focus, concentration, having ‘something’ as important in mind, becoming a subject,all these are acts of absent-mindedness. Mind busy with any object is absent-mindedness.

Mind busy

The Truth stands before me ~Rumi
The Truth stands before me ~Rumi
1 min

*The Truth stands before me,On my left is a blazing fire, and On my right, a cool flowing stream.*

*One group of people walk toward the fire, into the fire,And the other towards the cool flowing waters. No one knows which is blessed and which is not.*

*But

Importance of regularity
Importance of regularity
3 min

Question: Sir, I would want to seek clarification on the requirement of regularity in life. In being regular we would be stressed to do things even when we aren’t feeling good about it on some days. For example, if we pray to God everyday and don’t feel like doing it

The question of sensitivity
The question of sensitivity
2 min

Questioner: Dear Sir,

My silly questions aside, I wanted to know your perspective on this one issue:

How can a sensitive man survive in the world as it is? I mean, an artist, or for that matter, anyone who draws from the springs of his inner depths will be sensitive.

Pure Self reveals itself to the fragments only as fragments
Pure Self reveals itself to the fragments only as fragments
4 min

Questioner: Dear Sir,I have been following Nisargadatta Maharaj. I have read all his dialogues, books, and watched most of his videos. But I feel I have been just sticking his words as knowledge in my mind. What you bring to me is something alive, I ‘see’ and I ‘feel’ whatever

Change of profession or change of mind?
Change of profession or change of mind?
2 min

Question: Dear Sir,

All desires, all wants are motivated by the ego and hence desire too is an extension of the self. Now my question is that if we are our thoughts only, then how does one move from what one does not like, let us say his present occupation,

Who is an honorable man?
Who is an honorable man?
3 min

Question: What is the definition of ‘an honorable man’? Is being honorable good or bad?

Speaker: सम्मान=सम्यक्+मान

सम्यक मानने का अर्थ है समझना ।

तो जो समझ सकता है, वो सम्माननीय। जो नासमझ है उसका कोई सम्मान नहीं।

तुम भी यदि किसी का सम्मान करना चाहो, तो उसे समझो। यही

Ideals and Intelligence
Ideals and Intelligence
8 min

Student: Sir, what is an Ideal?

Acharya Prashant: You tell me. What is Idealism?

S: It is a prescription by the society in regard to how we should be.

AP: For an idealism to exist there must be an ideal and for an ideal, there should be an idea. Let’s

When the mind is not burning, that is enlightenment.
When the mind is not burning, that is enlightenment.
2 min

Question: Today I saw some children roaming outside my hostel. They were trying to get some money or food but no one came out to help them. In what ways can we help others?

Speaker: Helping others is great. But to help others, we must first be free of our

Action is born out of nothingness
Action is born out of nothingness
2 min

Question: Dear Sir,

There is one question on the ‘action’ that has been playing on my mind since you sent me the mail about the desireless action.

You said when there is no self, there is purity in being and hence the desireless action takes place. By this do you

Which meditation technique should I practice? || Acharya Prashant (2011)
Which meditation technique should I practice? || Acharya Prashant (2011)
4 min

Question: I have been reading Osho’s book ‘Vigyan Bhairav’ and in this book Lord Shiva explained 112 meditation techniques to keep the mind in present. However, Osho has also said that, “meditation is a quality of being that you bring to the act”.

I am confused as Osho has

The old is going, but where is the New?
The old is going, but where is the New?
4 min

Question: Sir, I am awake almost 14-16 hours a day. I have been feeling that I have just been wasting away this time. Nothing is getting done. Nothing is being accomplished. There is so much I can do, but I avoid it because I have a doubt that may be

Time spent joyfully is not at all wasted time
Time spent joyfully is not at all wasted time
3 min

Question: Sir, many a times it happens that we ask a question to ourselves and then we are also able to answer it on our own. Moreover, this is what forms the basis of so many assumptions that we take. Is this an appropriate method or should verification also be

Understand Love
Understand Love
2 min

To understand Love, consider a triangle ABC. A is the vertex, and BC the base.

There are an infinite number of points on base BC.

A represents the individuality-the one, common, impersonal individuality.

All points on BC represent persons i.e. personal, differentiated minds.

Love is the rising of the base

The mind is your best friend
The mind is your best friend
1 min

Question: Dear Sir,

Why does it happen that on particular nights, despite my head heavy with knowledge of the outside, reading a scripture or listening to Osho or JK is so clear to me?

Answer: It often appears as if we have met some new ‘experience’.

Remember, all that is

The price you pay for helping others
The price you pay for helping others
3 min

Questioner: Dear Sir,

You once told me that teaching was the ability to see shit. I dare say it is more. It is not just the ability to see shit but to swim in it and come out clean on the other side and taking a few people out along

Spirituality is not delinking yourself from the world || Acharya Prashant(2018)
Spirituality is not delinking yourself from the world || Acharya Prashant(2018)
5 min

Question: Given that all our relationships seem to be arising purely out of a sense of imagined need, is it possible to have any other kind of relationship?

Acharya Prashant Ji:

Those who are free of the world, are free to relate with the world in a healthy way. And

The real being stands behind the duality
The real being stands behind the duality
2 min

Question: How does one deal with orthodoxy, stupidity and foolishness? How does one deal with orthodox parents and spouses?

The foolish will always hunt the wise. If the wise recede to the forest, the foolish will condemn them for that. If the wise stay and fight, they shall be condemned

Does God exist?
Does God exist?
2 min

Question: What is God? Is it imagination or observation?

Answer: There was a group of people A who deeply believed in white. They worshipped white and denied black. They forgot the black background the white is written on. They declared that white is the absolute Truth.

There was a group

How should one meditate?
How should one meditate?
2 min

Question: Dear Sir, how should one meditate? I don’t even know where and how to start?

Answer: Let me answer in a few ways.

The very question you are asking is a step in that direction. This question is a result of an acceptance of the limitation of mind; otherwise

All inner development is just a process of re-remembering
All inner development is just a process of re-remembering
5 min

Question: Dear Sir, I want to inquire about a couple of perspectives that seem to be troubling me to some extent.

The first one is based on an earlier conversation I had with you: when there is action without the self, is that action marked by compassion?

The second doubt

Who is a Guru? || Acharya Prashant (2014)
Who is a Guru? || Acharya Prashant (2014)
4 min

Question: Sir, what is the role of a teacher in the life of a student? Whatever syllabus we are prescribed as of now can be possibly dealt by us to a decent level. Then why a teacher? Isn’t there something more than just teaching?

Answer: There is something called knowledge-

To identify with an object is to give it control over you
To identify with an object is to give it control over you
2 min

Question: One of your quote says, “If you are identified with an object, you have given it control over yourself. This control itself will prevent you from being free from identification.”

Does it mean that once you are identified with an object you can’t be free from this identification ?

How does one play a game that he knows he is bound to lose? || (2015)
How does one play a game that he knows he is bound to lose? || (2015)
4 min

Questioner: Dear Sir, I am writing this mail with a very heavy heart. It is on account of my affection for my father, that I had to get into the filth of society and family. But now that I am into it, I find myself unable to be a part

Existence is not obliged to follow your ideals
Existence is not obliged to follow your ideals
1 min

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

Role of character in awakening
Role of character in awakening
1 min

Question: Sir, does character play any role in awakening of inner potential?

Answer: Is character about sticking to certain norms of behaviour? Is character about following the patterns of society or religion? Then character is just dead conditioning. Your reaction, behaviour, and life will be predictable, like a puppet-show.

Rather,

Conditioned behaviour is not love
Conditioned behaviour is not love
4 min

Question: Sir, even if I find the falseness of happiness, I will not leave seeking for happiness because it is given to us by nature. It is our natural behaviour. If we call happiness as false, then are we not challenging our human nature.

Answer: What we call as nature

Thought is hardly a problem, the quality of thought is || Acharya Prashant (2011)
Thought is hardly a problem, the quality of thought is || Acharya Prashant (2011)
4 min

Question: I am a little confused with the statement by Shankar. He says, “Thought is the only means to knowledge.” Is there not a difference between thought and realization? What I mean is that is it not true that realization comes first and thought picks up the realization as an

The loving way of life || Acharya Prashant(2019)
The loving way of life || Acharya Prashant(2019)
4 min

Question: Acharya Ji, why do we procrastinate?

Acharya Prashant Ji: When we love what we do, procrastination is out of the question.

Procrastination is a challenge we have all faced at some point in time. If you find yourself procrastinating a lot, if you find that you have fixed a

Saint Ravidas: Highness and Humility
Saint Ravidas: Highness and Humility
5 min

“Lord, if you are sandalwood, I am water; with the fragrance in all parts of my body.

Lord, if you are a cloud, I am a peacock; looking for you like the Chakor bird for the moon.

Lord, if you are a lamp, I am the wick; with the light

Why am I worried about the future?
Why am I worried about the future?
1 min

Question: Sir, there is a fear in my mind regarding future, and it constantly hampers my present. What to do?

Answer: Ashish,

You are not worried about the future.

You are worried that whether you are capable enough to meet the future.

Understand the difference between these two: You have