Full Video: The importance of going against nature || Acharya Prashant, at SPIT Mumbai (2022)
Link: https://youtu.be/bImMVoQBMHU
Video Information: 9.12.22, SPIT-College, Mumbai
Context:
~ How to overcome fear?
~ How are humans different from other animals?
~ Who am I?
~ What makes humans special?
~ How to not be scared?
~ When humans fall madly in love
~ Is falling in love important for us?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~
Link: https://youtu.be/bImMVoQBMHU
Video Information: 9.12.22, SPIT-College, Mumbai
Context:
~ How to overcome fear?
~ How are humans different from other animals?
~ Who am I?
~ What makes humans special?
~ How to not be scared?
~ When humans fall madly in love
~ Is falling in love important for us?
Music Credits: Milind Date
~~~~~
Category
📚
LearningTranscript
00:00Hello sir, today's session is on Fearless Living.
00:27So with respect to this topic, I would like to ask you, aren't we going against the nature
00:35if we try to be fearless?
00:37Because in the course of evolution, the emotion of fear has never been eliminated.
00:44Also, it helps many species in the race of survival.
00:48Also it plays a huge role in avoiding wars and conflicts, not only among humans, but
00:54also among other species.
00:57So it's the nature which favors, which has planted the emotion of fear in all of us.
01:06So it will be in some sense we are going against the nature.
01:10Very, very good question.
01:12Lovely.
01:13Great one to begin with.
01:16Fear is an evolutionary tool embedded within us.
01:24So you are talking about the self.
01:27You are saying, within me, nature, Mother Nature, Prakriti has embedded this thing called fear
01:39to help us in some way.
01:41Who are you?
01:44Who are you?
01:45Who is being talked of here?
01:48Remember you are not one but two.
01:52One of you two is the body.
01:59The body.
02:01And whatsoever Prakriti or Mother Nature has given you pertains to the body.
02:11The other you is consciousness.
02:18The body as birthed by, as controlled and programmed and conditioned by Prakriti demands survival,
02:30demands security, demands pleasure and demands reproduction.
02:37That's what the body wants.
02:42The body of the human being as well as the body of the animal, irrespective of whose body
02:48it is.
02:50The bodily needs are the same.
02:52The animal wants sleep, you too want sleep.
02:56The animal wants food, you too want food.
02:58We are talking at the level of the body.
03:02The animal wants bodily security, comfort, you too want that.
03:10And the animal's body reproduces, your body too reproduces.
03:17So whatsoever is there as a bodily mechanism is something animalistic.
03:26It helps.
03:28But it helps only one of you two.
03:31Who are the two first of all?
03:35I said we are two.
03:36One is body, the other is?
03:40So fear helps.
03:42But helps only the?
03:45Only the?
03:46You'll have to be with me.
03:48Only the?
03:49Body.
03:50Fear is indeed great.
03:52But for whom?
03:54For the body.
03:55So that's the reason why all these things we find shared amongst humans and the other
04:04sentient beings, animals, flies, mosquitoes, birds, fish, all experience fear.
04:13Fear is something animeristic.
04:15And that does not take away from the fact that fear helps.
04:20Fear helps but it helps the survival of the body.
04:26But who are you?
04:28If I tell you, for example, Lokesh, right?
04:34If I tell you, you look ugly and I tell you, you are simply mad, which of these two
04:43is a bigger insult?
04:45If I say you are dumb, stupid and if I say, oh, you look ugly, which of these two is a bigger
04:53insult?
04:54Stupid, right?
04:56If I say, your looks are outright bad and I say your IQ is 8.8, which of these two is
05:06a bigger humiliation?
05:07IQ.
05:08The IQ part.
05:09The IQ part.
05:10So what are you?
05:11Consciousness or body?
05:12Consciousness.
05:13Anything that relates to the body is important but far less important than anything that relates
05:20to your consciousness.
05:23So even you make this choice without any teaching, without any guidance, even you daily make this
05:30choice that between the body and consciousness you are actually the consciousness, not the
05:34body.
05:34So we said first of all, we are not one but two.
05:39Two.
05:40The body and the body.
05:42Next, we have said that between the body and the consciousness all human beings prefer
05:49to be the consciousness.
05:51What do animals prefer?
05:52Body.
05:53Body.
05:54Body.
05:55In animals, consciousness is not that greatly developed.
05:59And when you go down to plants, their consciousness is even more limited.
06:02Are you getting it?
06:05So who are we?
06:06We are consciousness.
06:08Of course, we are the body as well.
06:10But between these two, which one is more important?
06:15Consciousness is more important.
06:16Now, so we are two.
06:17Out of these, one is higher.
06:20Now, can we allow the lower one to dominate the higher?
06:25Please tell me, if something helps the lower one, but hurts the higher one, would you allow
06:34it?
06:35Please tell me.
06:37Okay.
06:37You have exams tomorrow morning.
06:40Right?
06:41You set up the alarm.
06:43The alarm for 5 a.m.
06:45The consciousness is saying you must get up and study.
06:49And the body is saying you must keep sleeping.
06:53Which one do you prefer?
06:54Consciousness.
06:55Consciousness.
06:56And if you side with the body, then you regret.
06:59Right?
07:00Don't you?
07:01You don't feel good.
07:02You say, oh, something bad I have done.
07:05The alarm rang.
07:06And I still put it down.
07:08And then you wake up an hour later and you say, why did I do that?
07:15Good for the body, bad for consciousness, you don't like it.
07:19Do you agree?
07:21Something good for the body and bad for the consciousness, you don't like it.
07:25Though it is good for the body.
07:27You got an extra hour of sleep, the body is happy.
07:30Very happy.
07:31Had you actually woken up at 5 a.m.
07:34The face would have been a bit swollen and the eyes would have been a bit red.
07:40And people would have asked you, oh, are you short of sleep?
07:43It shows on the face, right?
07:44So the body would have felt bad had you woken up in time.
07:48But the consciousness would have felt great.
07:51And that would have shown up on your mark sheet.
07:58So what is good for the body but bad for consciousness is not acceptable.
08:02Do you get this?
08:04What is good for the body but bad for consciousness is not acceptable.
08:09Fear is that.
08:12Fear is something that is good for your physical survival.
08:16Fear is an evolutionary tool.
08:17Fear is an evolutionary tool helps you live a longer life.
08:22But it is not good for your consciousness.
08:25What's the point in living a long life if life is full of fear?
08:30Please tell me.
08:32What would you prefer?
08:34Living for a hundred years, all afraid and insecure, doubtful,
08:39shivering or living for just let's say like Bhagat Singh only 23 years
08:52but bravely, stoutly, like a man.
08:56What would you prefer?
08:59That's what.
09:00Because we are not animals.
09:02No animal ever prefers to be martyred.
09:05No animal would ever say I want a short but meaningful life.
09:11For animals, body is everything.
09:13You are human beings precisely because for you body is not everything.
09:17You can overrule your body.
09:18You can dictate your body.
09:20For you body is just an instrument.
09:21You can use your body towards a higher purpose.
09:24That's why you are human beings.
09:26And that's why fear is such an obnoxious thing.
09:29Fear lowers consciousness and protects just the body.
09:37Fear says the body is everything.
09:41Please, please, please, save yourself.
09:42Save yourself.
09:44That's the reason why courage is such a high quality.
09:50Because courage enables you to go against your physical nature.
09:55Remember, again and again, we are not animals.
10:00So, we should not do the stuff that Prakriti designs us to do if that stuff lowers our consciousness.
10:14You say, you know, that we are products of nature.
10:19So, we should follow what nature tells us.
10:23Does nature tell you to wear clothes?
10:27Does nature tell you to wear clothes?
10:29Does nature tell you to wear these specs?
10:33Or use Twitter?
10:35Or use mobile phone?
10:37Or study engineering?
10:39Does nature tell you any of these things?
10:41Nature will be very happy.
10:43You just go and roam about in a jungle.
10:46Nature is very happy.
10:47And find a mate there and procreate.
10:49Like animals.
10:49That's all that nature wants from you.
10:51Live and produce more beings that would live.
10:55That's all that Prakriti wants from you.
10:58Prakriti does not want you to know, be enlightened, be liberated.
11:02Prakriti has no such objective for you.
11:04In fact, when you try for realization, for knowledge, for freedom,
11:09Prakriti is not very happy then.
11:11Don't you see how your body rebels against you when you sit down to do something important?
11:20Have you seen that?
11:22You are okay.
11:23The moment you sit down to study, you start feeling drowsy.
11:26How many of you have experienced that?
11:27There was no sleepiness at all.
11:30But the moment you open the book, you feel like crashing on the bed.
11:37Experience that.
11:38That's what Prakriti wants you to do.
11:42Just sleep and protect the body and keep the body happy.