Questioner (Q): Sir, in a lot of your talks you redirect our focus towards ourselves. As living beings, all of us seek contentment and happiness. So, my question to you is, how can one be content without being complacent? How does one achieve that?
Acharya Prashant (AP): See, complacency can… read_more
Question: Sir, we have learned that we should not have ego, as it is conditioning. Ego arises because I feel incomplete within. But to fill this incompleteness is what I want in life. It gives me satisfaction in life. So, shouldn’t we be egoistic?
Speaker: What exactly is the logic?… read_more
Immersion is not in itself a virtue. You have to find out what you are immersing yourself in. The wrong kind of immersion is like anaesthesia: you will feel no worries because you are rendered unconscious. The wrong kind of business or immersion operates by lowering your consciousness. And when… read_more
Strength is your nature. If you have managed to remain so weak, so fragile, so brittle for so long, it is only because you have been defending your weaknesses. You have been arguing in favor of your weaknesses; you have been reasoning out your weaknesses. You have simply not been… read_more
There are people who indeed say that, “No, everything is fine with us.” They are not lying. It’s just that their fineness is superficial.Yes, there is fineness in your life, but that fineness is just this deep: scratch the surface and the fineness will evaporate. A little tragedy hits you… read_more
The more smart you are, the more clever you are, the more are the chances that your own smartness will destroy you.
It is very important to see when cleverness turns into cunningness—and that happens very frequently, very easily, very unnoticeably. You do not even know when you have turned… read_more
A strange situation is that a beautiful woman’s life is perhaps more complex than an average-looking woman’s life, because a beautiful looking woman has a lot of men eyeing upon her, and she can get whatever she wants. And what you will get for your beauty, that is the real… read_more
Life will certainly teach you, but at the cost of great suffering. And there is no guarantee you will be able to learn in a lifetime, because when your life teaches you then life has no conscious agenda to teach you. Life just operates on the principle of result of… read_more
It is very common that you go to a doctor and if you are a vegetarian, he kind of scoffs at you. It’s a very disdainful glance he throws at you: “Vegetarian?!” And that too, you see, is a relic of the fifties, sixties, seventies. It has gotten into the… read_more
Does the person you are with encourage you to read? You have to ask, “What does he bring for me, roses or books?”
Be very cautious of those who bring roses for you, especially red roses. Books are what we all need, and books are dangerous. Books are dangerous because… read_more
Giving birth is not for kids. Law just says that there is a legal age—eighteen, twenty-one and such things. First of all, giving birth requires that there has to be mental maturity. Unfortunately, 99% of the world’s population is not at all mentally mature enough to be parents. The funny… read_more
Revenge is a mistake built upon another mistake. The first mistake was, “He took it from me—my peace, my pride, my respectability.” That was the first mistake to think that way. And the second mistake is, “I can get peace back by snatching it away from him.”
Revenge is: thinking… read_more
Treat the body as a companion, and see how this companion behaves when you fulfill its demands, and how it behaves when you do something that is for your own welfare. This companion is very, very selfish, very greedy. It cares only about itself; it has no respect for what… read_more
What do you call as beautiful in a woman? Her curvature, her hips, her breasts—all of that just makes her conducive for bearing a child. Exactly that which qualifies her to bear a child is taken as beautiful by you.
So, all that you are looking for is someone who… read_more
Why do you call a theft a theft only when one is taking away something from others? Is it not theft when you take away your greatest possibility and potential from yourself? Is it not theft? Are we not criminals against ourselves, first of all?
If I deprive you of… read_more
Acharya Prashant (AP): Abhay said that there is a feeling, a strange feeling, he does not probably know the origin of it. But the feeling nevertheless is, and the feeling says, ‘I am the best, Abhay is the best’, that's what the feeling says. And because of what the feeling… read_more
Questioner (Dev Ji from US): He is saying that a sense of hurt seems to arise when the sense of who we are? This notion we have about what I am is challenged and the smallness of the person I come to the fore. Put another way when one ego… read_more
A celebrity couple gives birth. Now, rabbits give birth. Same thing. But the media keeps splashing the face of this kid, this baby incessantly—incessantly! A thousand more women are then influenced, rather compelled to give birth. The media is constantly telling you, “Look at this baby. This is what you… read_more
Look at a river, or look at a tree; both have life cycles. Once the tree was tender and young, there was a particular way it responded to the wind. And now the tree is getting old, now there is another way it responds to the wind. Both are beautiful.… read_more
There might be people around you who make it compulsory for you to smoke, not because they urge you to smoke, but because they put you in so much of tension that you will need to smoke. But you are deriving some benefits from those people, so you will never… read_more
“I am pious and I have holy intentions”—this was the first piece of fake news invented by man. All attempts, all intentions, all likes and dislikes, all decisions ultimately boil down to just the prakritik narrative—food, comfort and sex. That’s what we live for, that’s what we act for, and… read_more
Silicone implants, false bras, false eyebrows—what else is there? That thing that removes the wrinkles, botox. The entire time is being spent in this nonsense. I don’t know the details, but there is so much. You can read all that on the menus of the saloons—this treatment, that treatment, and… read_more
Acharya Prashant (AP): The words our friend is referring to read "Remain untouched. Remain unshakeable. Remain untouched and remain firm centered undisplaced." Those words make sense only in the context of our present condition.
What is our condition? Everything touches us. It touches us and puts its imprints upon us.… read_more
Desire is the great evil that defeats all the petty evils. For the sake of desire, you can shake hands with your worst enemy. Everything has been consumed by desire. Everything.
A point comes, you know, when it doesn’t hurt to pay any price to fulfill your desire. It just… read_more
Every animal in the universe has only its designated period of mating; some mate in the winter, some mate in the summer, some mate only in the rainy season. Dogs mate only in their designated months. Man is the only creature that fucks the entire year-round. That is the quality… read_more
“I will beat him!”
“I will destroy her!”
“Did you just insult me? Did you?”
Four hours forty-eight minutes of deep intellectual perspiration!
“Did she? Did she not?”
Have some mercy upon yourself. Learn to ignore, please. Bypass the small issues. Learn to ignore the small for the big, would… read_more
The little man is not to be blamed for being little. He is to be blamed for remaining little. The great man is nothing but the little man who at some point says, “It’s no fun remaining little”—and he is born exactly similar to the little man.
Now, that puts… read_more
When life teaches you, life has no conscious agenda to teach you. Life just operates on the principle of result of action. You do something foolish, you get hit in the teeth. That’s how life teaches you.
When there is a teacher, the teacher has a conscious agenda to uplift… read_more
Questioner (Q): Jealousy stops us from achieving our own goal, instead we try to think that what others are achieving, that’s not us. What about that jealousy?
Acharya Prashant (AP): What’s your name?
Q: Nikhil.
AP: Nikhil has spoken about jealousy. Very honestly , how many of us have experienced… read_more
Question: Pranaam Acharya Ji. Why do I get nervous in situations where I have to express myself, or when I have to talk to people?
Acharya Prashant(AP): What do you talk to people about?
Questioner(Q): (Questioner is a student of class 6) Anything, most of the times related to my… read_more
You are drunk and driving towards north. There is some probability of an accident, and you are warned of that. So, you take a U-turn and start driving towards south. Now you say, “I was doing the wrong thing; now I am doing exactly the opposite of the wrong thing,… read_more
When you are feeling depressed, ask yourself: “What do I really want? What is the problem?” And it will irritate you no end, because you seek pleasure in depression; because your depression, your bad mood is self-verified and sanctified and certified.
You tell yourself that you have the right to… read_more
Have you ever wondered what kind of perverse pleasure people find in denigrating Gods? The pleasure is, “If I am not high, why should I allow you to remain high? You must be pulled down because, as far as I am concerned, I refuse to rise up. I refuse to… read_more
The politician, we very well know, is a criminal and yet we belong to his fan club. So, who is it who is promoting crime, then? Look at the parliament of the country. I suppose half the parliamentarians have criminal cases against them, close to half. And they didn’t muscle… read_more
Not only do we know what would excite us, the entire market knows what would excite us. It is so very programmed and programmable.
Every advertiser knows how you can be brought to feel excited. They know how to make you feel excited about a certain thing that they want… 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
Man must observe animals, and whatever you see the animal exhibiting is something that you should be very cautious of. Whatsoever it is that you find common between yourself and animals is the stuff that you should be very cautious of.
Animals have a lot of jealousy. Jealousy is a… read_more
Acharya Prashant (AP): There is a person who is dreaming about betterment and sitting at her place, she is visualizing how things would be after betterment. And she says that the visualization energizes her, and fantasizing about the endpoint makes her happy. This is the situation. Let’s go into it.… read_more
To be a lion does not mean that you are violent. To be a rat is not necessarily to be violent. In fact, the word ‘violence’ does not apply to the lion or to the rat; it applies only to the human being. The lion kills all his life but… read_more
Who are the ones who always keep salivating? The singles. But meet someone who is in a relationship—he won’t want to look at girls, or boys for that matter. He would say, “One is more than enough. Can’t handle one! Who wants two, three, or six?”
Once you come close… read_more
Fearlessness helps. Confidence does not help. Confidence is like a pill that you are trying to take when you are already sick. Avoid sickness. The pill cannot be your food, the substance of your life.
I am giving you a mantra: Whenever you feel scared, trembling, or even hopeful in… read_more
Often in the past, and even today, sex has been used to humiliate the other. When an army would win over a country, then to stamp its authority, the soldiers would go and rape the women in the newly won territory. It was to show to them that “Now we… read_more
The question is not one partner versus multiple partners. The question is whether any of these partnerships are any good.
If one person or a group of persons is really able to give you that which would fulfill your life, then you just cannot be stopped; you would say, “I… read_more
“I love my Xbox”—and it’s not illegal. But it is performing much the same function as banned narcotics. If we were a conscious society, then we would see that.
All kinds of substance abuse, psychedelics—that’s a temporary relief that returns with vengeance. It hits you, bites you, and makes you… read_more
Do two things: One, start talking real stuff; secondly, start blocking the nonsense. And then you will see who stays with you and who does not. Do both of these two things, concurrently. Start talking the real things with all those you consider close to yourself, and start blocking all… read_more
Questioner (Q): Good afternoon, sir. There are many instances where we feel that we are not the best in the room, or we feel inferior to our peers. So, my question is, is insecurity even any different from fear? And how can we deal with insecurities?
Acharya Prashant (AP): You… read_more
I have seen women in sub-zero temperatures—the temperature is minus four, and she is wearing almost nothing. That does not provoke a reaction from me but basic, simple curiosity. Are you cold-proof? Are you weather and climate-proof? Do you have some kind of divine heating mechanism inside you that men… read_more
