Wonderful deeds get done in non-doing || (2016)

EXCERPT: Before doing anything we always and usually ask, “What will happen if I do this?” - That is our worldly practice, and even in the domain of Truth, we try that. We say, “What will happen if I get to the Truth?” and the answer comes—All the falseness will be burnt down. Now, you are living in falseness. Everything around us is false and if falseness is burnt down then our whole world is burnt down. We are attached to the world, if this world would be burnt down due to the Truth then let the Truth keep waiting, “I will remain the seeker of the Truth.”

Questioner: The observation is that if the desire is dropped, if the intensity, the act is dropped, then it results in a certain dullness.

Acharya Prashant: Yes, of course, it does. It results in dullness because desire led action is the only thing that we have known so far. For us, that is our universe. Whenever we have acted, we have acted from the center of the ego—the desire. So, when that goes, it does appear to us that everything is gone because that has been everything for us till now. We feel dull, we even feel afraid, we feel as if a vacuum has come up —an emptiness.

Two things:

Firstly, it is not as if action stops if the desire is not there; it’s a great misconception.

In fact, action born out of desire looks intense but is not, it carries only limited energy. There is another center from which energy can arise and from there arises really powerful action with limitless energy.

But we do not know that center, we have not seen that kind of action, so we feel apprehensive, we say “I have this, if I give this up then what is left with me?” I can only assure you that the Real would be left with you. Right now, that which you are accustomed to is so pale, so stale, so small.

Great actions happen in non-acting. Wonderful deeds get done in non-doing.

Without desire, you find that your ultimate desire is fulfilled. That is the first thing.

Second thing, after the rubbish is cleared away, what you have is the peaceful emptiness of the mind. This emptiness is scary only to the cluttered mind. Sitting where you are if you think of emptiness, you will become afraid because where are we sitting? We are sitting as a clutter and the clutter wants to preserve itself and continue as clutter. So, when clutter will think of emptiness, emptiness will appear to it as its death. So obviously, it will be afraid, it will not like it. Hence you should never try to think in advance.

That is one reason why most people remain stuck in their particular positions, in their predicament as the ego because even when the obvious opportunity for liberation comes, which is always there, they start thinking, "What will happen after liberation!" We start thinking, "What will happen if I do this?" And what you think of is so scary and immediately you say, “No, I don’t want that to happen.”

“Yes, the teacher said wonderful things—He said to drop this identity, he said this is wonderful, that is wonderful, now before I do any of that let me just check up what will happen if I do that.” We are accustomed to ascertaining the result before doing anything, right? That is a part of our general practice.

Before doing anything we always and usually ask, “What will happen if I do this?” - That is our worldly practice, and even in the domain of Truth, we try that. We say, “What will happen if I get to the Truth?” and the answer comes — All the falseness will be burnt down. Now, you are living in falseness. Everything around us is false and if falseness is burnt down then our whole world is burnt down.

We are attached to the world, if this world would be burnt down due to the Truth then let the Truth keep waiting, “I will remain the seeker of the Truth.”

Who am I? A seeker of the Truth.

Why am I a seeker of the Truth? So that I may never get the Truth.

Who am I? The one who wants Peace.

Why do I want Peace? So that I may never get Peace.

If peace comes, then what will happen to noise? It will die and my wife is so noisy, peace would mean that my relationship with my wife has to change. Now that is a horror. I don’t have the guts to let that happen so peace can wait so that my noisy wife can survive, and the noisy car and the noisy office and the noisy markets and the noisy vacation and the noisy ashrams and the rest of it.

Peace can wait and even as peace is waiting, I will maintain my respectability by saying “Who am I? The seeker of peace. No! It is not as if I abhor peace, I am a lover of peace, I am a lover of peace!” By doing this I say, ‘Peace, you keep away.’

Can we pay attention to these internal games, these subtle conspiracies?

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