Acharya Prashant explains that Hinduism, in its true essence, is not a religion in the same way that Christianity or Islam are. He argues that no religion can truly accept non-believers because a non-believer is someone who lives in the essence of the self rather than in mental beliefs. He asserts that the more Hinduism is treated as a formal religion, the more its real essence is destroyed. The Upanishads and other spiritual texts like the Ribhu Gita do not propagate a religion but rather a state of religion-less-ness. A real Hindu, according to him, is one who has gone beyond all religions and lives in Sanatana Dharma, which he defines as eternal religiousness or timelessness. He describes Sanatana Dharma as awakened intelligence or swa-dharma, where one acts out of self-knowledge rather than following a frozen pattern of thought. He illustrates this with the example of tribal people who could not be converted to Christianity because they lacked a rigid religious identity; they simply added Jesus to their existing spiritual practice without changing their essence. He equates Sanatana Dharma with Jiddu Krishnamurti's concept of truth as a pathless land, emphasizing that figures like Buddha and Mahavir did not provide religions but offered liberation from religion. Finally, he defines India not as a geographical location but as a state of mind that rejects matter as the ultimate reality, suggesting that anyone who prioritizes spiritual essence over materialism is truly Indian.