What if your work fails?
Questioner: Good evening, sir. So you are in IIT and I am an alumnus, then an ex-civil servant, and then Vedanta scholar. you are investing some years of your life, you are investing some part of your life to these things, to these achievements. So then this question comes to your mind, like it could be a failure also. Is it worth doing these achievements? Like in our field, after doing MBBS, people get stressed out, like for doing PG and then for super specialization. So didn't you get this question?
Acharya Prashant: If I'm alive, how can my work fail? No. Failure is a full stop. If I'm alive, I'm going to try again. Then how have I failed?
You fail not when the results are adverse. You fail when you call it a day. "I'm done." That's the point of failure. If you love something deeply enough, you're never going to stop trying.
So how have I failed? There can be setbacks, there can be bad days, and I have had plenty of them. But there is nothing called a failure. There can be a course correction. There can be introspection. You can make the next attempt in a different way, in a modified way. But what do you mean by failure?
You know, you fail because you set limits. You say, "I'm going to invest only this much in this particular project, and having invested this much, if this project gives me what I desire, then I'll call it a success. Otherwise, I'll quit the project." That's what you call failure.
Why do you ever quit the project? Tell me. If the project is worthy enough, stay put. Don't leave.
I've had so many setbacks. I could have quit maybe 100 times. You need that love. You need to have something worthwhile to do in life, and then thoughts of success and failure do not matter so much. Obviously, you want to succeed, but success then does not remain the central determinant. The central determinant is love.
Irrespective of success, I will do this because I am choiceless. I have nothing else to do. Vedanta calls it nirvikalpata. There is nothing else, no vikalp. Only this is there. No Plan B. And when there is no Plan B, then by hook or by crook, you make Plan A succeed. There is nothing else to do.
Questioner: Good evening, sir. Being a good philosopher and IIT, IIM alumnus, if you have to give any advice to your 20-year-old self, what would it be?
Acharya Prashant: Why do you want to ask me this question? It's a very smart-sounding question, but how is it related to you? Ask something from your own life. I do not give any advice to my old self.
Questioner: If you have to give any advice to me, what would it be?
Acharya Prashant: Who are you? Please tell me about yourself. Only then I can advise you.
Questioner: I am a first-year student.
Acharya Prashant: Tell me more about yourself. When somebody comes to you, you know, you are a wannabe doctor. A patient comes to you and says, "Give me medicines." What will you say? What do you say? "Show me your reports. Get yourself checked. Tell me your story."
You will ask for the story of his body. I ask for the story of your mind. And only when you show me your diagnosis, the mental diagnosis, can I then suggest you some treatment. No?
Often it happens that the diagnosis itself is the treatment. Once you know what is going on, the treatment is done because lack of knowledge itself was the disease. You didn't know what was going on in the mind. Therefore, you were diseased. The moment you know what is going on, the problem is solved.
Questioner: What if a patient comes to me and he's healthy, but he's asking for some advice so he does not get in any trouble in future?
Acharya Prashant: Send the fresher to me. Are you the best person to give him advice? So if a fresher comes to you asking for life advice, I'm at your service.
Let's not deal in hypothesis. Reality is what we need. We anyway live in a lot of assumptions. We need to touch base with reality.
Questioner: Good evening, sir. I would like to ask, how can we regain and rebound after having a certain bout of regrets in our lives?
Acharya Prashant: Is it necessary to rebound?
Questioner: Sir, obviously, we need to regain our life. We cannot be keeping ourselves sad for our whole life.
Acharya Prashant: That's all right, not to be sad the entire life. But is it really important to bounce back and continue doing the same thing?
Questioner: Sir, I'm not talking about doing the same thing. I am talking about coming back to life.
Acharya Prashant: What do you mean by coming back to life? The same kind of life that led to the fall?
Questioner: I'm saying that if we are getting certain setbacks.
Acharya Prashant: Setbacks in doing what?
Questioner: Any certain things.
Acharya Prashant: No, it's not "anything." Wait. You get a setback doing something. What is it that you were doing and didn't materialize? Who were you when you were attempting a certain task?
There is a difference between setback and setback. If most of the things that we do are done in ignorance, then those setbacks are indeed good for us. Think of the catastrophe in case you had succeeded.
I am blindly rushing towards the well. I stumble and fall. Is this setback really an unfortunate thing?
There is a well, 500 meters ahead of me, and I'm rushing towards it in my blindness. Somebody has motivated me, "Rush! Reach there!" But because I'm in such a hurry to reach, I fail to see that there is a stone. And what happens? I stumble over it and I fall. What do I do?
We are asking as if it is guaranteed that everything that we do is worth doing. First of all, in humility, let's accept that most of the things that we do are anyway not worth doing. So if we get a setback, it's actually good news. Good news. That will give you time to pause and reflect. And when you get a setback, don't just blindly get up and resume your journey, your rush. No. See what you're doing and why you must do it. Is it necessary? It's a good opportunity.
Questioner: Good evening, sir. How do we get rid of the guilt of wrongdoing?
Acharya Prashant: Guilt of wrongdoing remains only with the one who is still the wrongdoer. Had guilt been real, it would have destroyed the wrongdoer and transformed you into somebody else. You would not have remained to repent over your wrongdoing.
If you do something wrong and you are still repenting over it six months down the line, it means you have not changed. Your repentance is false. Had you been really repentant, you would no more remain the same person who did something wrong.
Guilt has a very important role to play in life. You know what guilt means? Guilt is acceptance that I am not right. I am guilty. Guilt is an indictment: "I am not right." Guilt is a recognition that I am not right. So guilt is useful because most of us are indeed not right. We need guilt. We need loads of guilt. But we need honest guilt.
What is honest guilt?
That transforms us, not the kind of guilt that shields us.
What is dishonest guilt?
Dishonest guilt is when you say, "Oh, I accidentally made a mistake. Oh, I accidentally made a mistake. Why did I make that mistake?" This is dishonest guilt.
No mistake is accidental. No wrongdoing is accidental. You are just doing what you are. But we like to say, "Oh, it happened. I didn't do it. It just happened. You know, it was a thing of chance. It happened randomly." Nothing happens randomly. We want to shield ourselves by saying that I accidentally made a mistake. Nobody accidentally makes a mistake. The action is the actor. The deed is the doer.
If you have done something wrong, then you are wrong. Therefore, guilt is useful. You realize that you are wrong, and then you honestly challenge and change yourself.
When that happens, then you are free of repentance. Then there is no need to be sorrowful. The one who was sorrowful, he himself has gone, finished. He was the guilty one, and you have sent him away. So who's then left to be guilty? Right? So when you feel guilty, feel fully guilty. And what does full guilt mean? I will no more remain the person who did this thing. I'll ensure in all ways that this thing is not repeated.
How?
By not allowing the offender to continue. The offender lives here within me, and if he continues to live within me, then I'll repeat this act again. So I'll not allow him to live here. Throw him out. It's your own sacred space. Evict this mischief-maker.
Questioner: Vedanta is only about spirituality, or how is it more relevant in the modern world?
Acharya Prashant: Vedanta is life. I don't know, what is spirituality? Life. Vedanta is life. And if you are living without knowing, then you are not even living.
So Vedanta brings life into this human body. Without Vedanta, we are just sitting, walking, eating, sleeping like machines. There is no real life. Life is consciousness. Vedanta is consciousness. Vedanta is life.
