When the mind is a faithful servant, it needs no proofs and feels no fear || Acharya Prashant (2014)
Speaker: If you are suspicious about everything, then you are living in a hell. I am not talking of a blind belief. I am saying that there must be something which must be beyond suspicion, where the doubt does not even reach, where the thought of suspicion, the thought of scrutiny does not even reach. It has to be something and that is your only engine. Without that nothing can happen. Without that you will keep on coming up with questions like these, ‘What is the proof that there is anything called core? What is the proof that there is anything called the individuality? What is the proof that there is anything called the other world?’
How can I give a proof? Faith is the proof. If you don’t have it, then I am very sorry for you. There is no proof. Every proof can be cut down. Whatever proof I will give you, you will shoot it down. Because every proof is in the domain of the mind and arguments can cut it down. So how do I prove it to you? And how do I prove to you that you must have faith? These things cannot be proven, they can only be lived, and one can only pray that you see light. What else proof can be offered? ‘So how do you know that there is a source? How do you know that there is a witnessing?’ When witnessing is not personal, then ‘I’ do not witness, then nobody witnesses. ‘You said that I do not witness. Then who witnesses? Do you witness?’ No, It is not even me. ‘Somebody else? Your neighbor?’ No, not even they. ‘Then nobody witnesses. Right?’ Yes. ‘So, Sir there is no witnessing’. Of course you are logically correct. If nobody is witnessing, then there is no witnessing. Now it is here that you require faith, and if you don’t have faith then go to hell. You are already in hell. Enjoy your hell.
A faithless man has ‘fear’ written all over his face. All over his face only one thing will be written. ‘I am scared. I am not living. I am just suffering in life’. And he would be compromising on daily basis. If that is not sufficient to show you the light, what else can be done? That only means that your time has not come. Just keep praying, ‘Can you give me some tatkaal moment. I am too tired waiting in the queue. My wait-list will never get cleared. Is there some tatkaal window?’
You put your thought on anything, and you will be scared. You know this thing can collapse (pointing at the floor on which everybody is sitting). Think about it. ‘I will have to run away. This thing can collapse’. Do you know what kind of grave risk you are running into your life?
Listener 1: So, mind is a barrier to faith.
Speaker: Not a barrier always.You see, the same mind is like a faithful servant. It is not a barrier, it is a faithful servant. Faithful mind, faithful servant. Let the mind be faithful. You will still be eating the same stuff, speaking the same words, but now it is a faithful mind. Not a mind that is suspecting all the time, not a mind that is cunning, not a mind that is calculative. It is just faithful. Simple. There was a song that we sang last Sunday. ‘Mein itnaa kaahe ko sochoon, tu jaane tera kaam’. ‘Your game, you play it. I am a servant, I am relaxing’. But I am not, I am not the servant. You must be the master and that too a very shrewd master, a very lewd master.
Listener 2: And loud also.
Speaker: Loud, lewd everything. You cannot prove through arguments. You can only create situations where the mind becomes calm. That has to be the quality of your presence. Nothing else can work. You cannot just go and start arguing with them. Arguments can be a part of the package but a very small part of the package.Your presence is the larger part. If they look into your eyes and see somebody who is afraid all the time, how can you inspire faith in them? You stand in front of them and your eyes are crying aloud, ‘Fear,fear,fear’ , how will you inspire faith? And also remember that these are the things that are inessential. Fear is inessential. Confusion is inessential. When you are standing in front of them and saying that I am afraid, you are essentially somebody who is a mad man. You are holding on to something that is not needed, not to be hold on to. You are essentially mad. You are essentially somebody who is holding a piece of burning coal and saying, ‘ It is hurting, it is hurting’. That is what is the case with the man who is afraid. Why are you afraid? Why are you afraid? Throw the coal away. But you will not throw it away. You are so deeply conditioned. You will not throw it away. You will just keep crying.
(Sarcastically) ‘I am always so afraid’. Is it something to be boastful of? Is it a qualification? But will you do? You will frantically run up to your husbands and scream, ‘I am so afraid. I am so scared’ and he will also embrace you with open arms. He will not say that you are diseased, you are unhealthy, your mind is rotten. A rotten apple is very injurious to its neighbors. Do you know that? What does it do to its neighbors?
Listeners(everyone): It spoils others.
Speaker: But you find a great pride in being a rotten apple. So the rotten husband will rot the wife. The rotten wife will rot the husband and the kids, and so on and so forth. Absence of faith cannot be a qualification. You come and start ill-mouthing somebody. General criticism.You know this is that and that is that. And this is the basis of their relationship. Have you seen those relationships where two people meet and all they do is criticize everybody else? That cements their bond. ‘We have similar thoughts.You criticize the entire world, I criticize the entire world. And that’s what it is. When you meet somebody what do you say, ‘You trust’. What do you do when you trust? You reveal all your stink to him or her. That’s what you call as trust. ‘I trust him so much’.
(Silence)
There are only two kinds of minds. One, immersed in faith and second, not immersed in faith. This is the first thing and everything else is secondary. Ego is secondary, fear is secondary, personality and individuality is secondary. Everything is secondary. Primary thing is that the mind is at the right place. The right place of the mind is the immersion of the heart and that is what is the right mind; immersed in heart. When the mind is immersed in the heart, everything just falls into place. Let the mind be at the right place like a faithful servant. If the mind is a faithful servant, the life will anyway be proper.
-Excerpts from Clarity session held at Advait office. Edited for clarity.
