Clarity

I had to unlearn a lot of things, and I am grateful to all the sources—the books, the people and the experiences that helped me unlearn. And I am grateful to that within me that had the courage to unlearn.

A lot of unlearning is needed. I often say you… read_more

I had to unlearn a lot of things, and I am grateful to all the sources—the books, the people and the experiences that helped me unlearn. And I am grateful to that within me that had the courage to unlearn.

A lot of unlearning is needed. I often say you… read_more

Whenever you will give a lot of importance to what others give you, you will be afraid, and then you will want to play safe. Make a list of all that others give you—company, attachment, reputation, and these are the things that are at the core of your fear.

Whenever… read_more

Simple living is: when I look at somebody, I do not look at the makeup, I do not look at the brand of the clothes, I do not look at the expression the fellow is wearing; I look at the essence of the person. Direct and simple.

I do not… read_more

“You know what, I lost money in stocks and I still didn’t get a heart attack!” Why must you get a heart attack? It is a small matter. Let it happen. It’s okay. Every day more people lose money in the stock market than what is the number of those… read_more

The meat eater is a self-deluder. You cannot eat meat without firstly lying to yourself. He will not want to know what the reality of meat consumption is. He will not want to know how animals are kept and how they are slaughtered. He will not know what the conditions… read_more

Even when you are identified with being the winner or the loser, still there is something within you which can neither be a winner nor a loser. It is your fundamental nature. It is your fundamental nature that gets hidden when you are obsessed with winning or losing.

The fact… read_more

The one relationship that is of maximum importance is the one you have with yourself.

When you are not alright with yourself, obviously you will seek an alternative to your company: “Can there be somebody to relate to? Can there be somebody to sit with, fill myself up with, form… read_more

In fact, if there is one unpardonable crime, it is bad parenting. You are not even killing someone, you are disfiguring someone and sentencing him to live an entire life. How does that sound? It’s like chopping off somebody’s limbs but ensuring that he lives—and he lives an entire life… read_more

Have you looked at kids playing? If you look at kids playing and if you look at animals playing, you won’t find much difference. In fact, human kids go along very well with animal kids. Later on, when we cover ourselves with a lot of acquired knowledge, with a lot… read_more

Man is born in a battlefield. Man will have to deal with challenges. Now, it is upon you which challenges you choose to deal with. You could either fight several miscellaneous, worthless wars—that cannot really even be called as wars, call them skirmishes, squabbles—or you could devote yourself to the… read_more

Most people never evolve beyond their psychological age of three, four, ten, or twelve years. So they have to be consoled like kids.

If a two-year-old is crying, you cannot talk reason to him, can you? What does a two-year-old need? You pick him up, caress him a little, kiss… read_more

What does it mean to have an inauthentic relationship?

To be authentic is to be complete and secure in yourself. Anything authentic is not in need of further improvement or refinement; it is already authentic. That is the way the authentic mind functions: it does not relate with the other… read_more

Dogs do it on roads, and no dog first allures the bitch with gifts or promises or rounds, or stuff over the fire, or holy chants. All that doesn’t happen. The dog knows what it wants, the bitch knows what it wants, and they just get over it quite quickly.… read_more

No situation is too bad to make a right choice in, and no situation is so good that you no more need the right choice—in a good situation, in a bad situation, in apparently easy situations, in apparently tough situations. Anything can happen anytime.

It’s a matter of your choice,… read_more

The evil can consume you in two ways. One is, you look at evil and you find it beautiful. Some people do; they are captivated by the sheer charm of evil. Aren’t the dons in the movies sometimes very charming? In fact, the most charming characters in the movies in… read_more

When you meet a person, meet in friendliness, meet in love, meet to share, meet to play, meet to rejoice. That’s right relationship. Don’t meet to sit at that person’s feet. That’s vulgar. You don’t need to sit at anybody’s feet. This head can bow down only in front of… read_more

Why do you call a theft a theft only when one is taking away something from others? Is it not theft when you take away your greatest possibility and potential from yourself? Is it not theft? Are we not criminals against ourselves, first of all?

If I deprive you of… read_more

The worst are those who say, “But what do I do? I am helpless.” These are in the lowest state; they are the worst self-deceivers. They harm themselves and they pollute the entire environment.

A little better than these are those who at least try exercising choice, though their choices… read_more

Hold on. There will be temptations; old habits, old environments will beckon you, but stand still and strong. Don’t give up. It’s a battle worth fighting and worth winning. Don’t lose this one.

If you can win this one, then in all the forthcoming battles of life victory is guaranteed.… read_more

You are what you want. If you want to change who you are, then you will have to want something radically different. Your destination, your desire decides your constitution. You become what you intend to achieve and be.

If you love the mud, you will become an earthworm. If you… read_more

Why must man consume with careful consideration? It destroys your inner world. Inwardly it pushes you deeper into the belief that by means of more and more, increased and increased consumption, you will be able to get rid of your inner disquiet.

So, it is not good for you inwardly,… read_more

If you are suffering, there is nobody but you who is responsible. Unless you fully accept that responsibility, there is no freedom. If your suffering is just incidental, then how can there be freedom from it?—because incidents can happen any way, any day.

You have to, first of all, clearly… read_more

Let nobody say that he or she is making the right choices in life because she does not know. We all know. We prefer to suppress the inner knowledge. It’s an inner conspiracy against ourselves, just because we want to continue enjoying certain privileges in life—certain physical privileges, material privileges,… read_more

You are not born alone. You are born welded to the body. The two of you are born together, and the two of you cannot go together. Born together, but can’t live together, but have to live together. ‘Live together’ not in the sense of reaching a compromise—the two of… read_more

Where are the pleasures? I do not see any pleasures! I do not see anybody being pleased. You are talking of renunciation of pleasures as if pleasures do exist. Where are the pleasures? Go to a weekend party and show me who is happy. And if people were indeed happy,… read_more

When you don’t operate from a spiritual center, then you operate from an emotional center. These emotions are causing this climate change. You are so emotional about that next foreign holiday, right? That is carbon intensive. You are so emotional about having a good, nice nest of your own—that is… read_more

If an apple and an animal are the same thing, then an animal and a human being are the same thing. Eat the human being as well. And if you do not eat the human being, then extend the same logic to not eat the animal as well.

The best… read_more

Obviously it is inhumane to kill an animal to consume its flesh, and that’s one of the biggest indicators of our inner depravity. But then, who are the Americans really to point fingers at China? You kill pigs, you kill lambs, you kill cows—what to say of chicken and fish?… read_more

You did not do what you should have done for yourself; therefore you now expect somebody else to do good things for you.

The responsibility to bring goodness to your life rests primarily upon you, not upon somebody else. To bring somebody to life and then expect that somebody to… read_more

You have an exam tomorrow morning, and right now the body wants to sleep.

You very well know that you have an urgent task at hand, but the body is yelling for food.

You very well know that the fellow in front of you is a teacher, but the body… read_more

The planet has already given you as much as it could. You cannot draw any more from it. So, we can very safely and very confidently say that for the world, in general, the future is internal growth. If economics is about welfare, then further welfare of this planet and… read_more

When you say sadness is just sadness, then you have gained freedom from sadness. It means being free from the obligation to label sadness as a loss of self-worth. If you let sadness go deeply into you, there is no way it is not going to touch joy.

It is… read_more

“And then as soon as we finished having sex, I noticed I just wanted nothing to do with her. And I noticed that in the morning, I was lonely and a little aloof as well.”

The kind of person you choose to have sexual union with is a reflection on… read_more

There is only one way to test whether you have done the maximum you can. If you have done the maximum you can, then you will find that things have started happening on their own, in unexpected, unplanned, unprecedented ways. You are now helpless; you can do no more, but… read_more

“I have to eat to satisfy my body, so why can’t I use contraception and have sex with a woman and not procreate?”

This is such a bad analogy. They say sex is like food, both are physical needs. No sir, please! Sex is not like food. No, no, no.… read_more

To love is to see that the other is in trouble. To love is to extend a helping hand. Love is not about admiring somebody’s physicality, or using someone for some means. Love has to be an exercise in compassion.

So, I often say, when you relate to the other,… read_more

If the mind is a diseased organ, then why do you trust it so much? If it is a diseased organ, then whatever you see through it, why can’t you just reject it? Why do you trust this unfaithful servant so much? If I have a machine that continuously gives… read_more

Physical nearness has to be the tail of the elephant. Once the entire elephant has passed through, only then you must see the little tail. Only that much importance it must have.

Instead of that, the sexual aspect becomes the elephant. As far as the real, truthful, spiritual aspect is… read_more

“Why are women so emotional? If we are saying that it is okay for a man to be emotional, there is an implicit assumption that men are not emotional but women are.”

Both are. It’s just that both express their emotionality in different ways. Inner urges, latent tendencies in women… read_more

Living totally does not mean that you need to have a flamboyant lifestyle, that you need to be lavishly spending or lavishly consuming. Living totally means that you remain the same in the moment of your deepest fulfillment and in the moment of your deepest frustration.

Living totally is something… read_more

Choose a person who will challenge you, not someone who will pamper you, console you, tell you, “You are beautiful as you are.” And in the very same way, choose work. Choose work that will really be difficult to handle. Because if it is difficult to handle, then maybe it… read_more

Life is decided by no factor stronger than the company and the environment you give yourself. So be careful. Be careful about the people you meet, be careful about the stuff you read, be careful about what you eat, be careful about what you are seeing, what you are hearing.… read_more

As long as the goal is not tremendously big, life has no real purpose. If your goals are small they are no goals. You will be frustrated if you don’t achieve them, and you will be doubly frustrated if you achieve them. Having achieved them, you will find that the… read_more

Because this world knows no contentment, no God, so it tries to gain fulfilment through sex, and it asks you to be a factory of sexual performance. You can neither be that, nor do you need to be that. Do you think about your nose so much? This too is… read_more

The past is a great resource. It is not to be wasted away or thrown away or forgotten. If you do not really decode your past, you are bound to repeat your past. Forget all the propaganda coming from the neo-spiritual circles that say that the past is something to… read_more

We all have arguments in favor of our weaknesses, no?

“What do I do? I am just a kid.”

“What do I do? I don’t have the right background.”

“What do I do? I am just twenty years old.”

“What do I do? Nobody helps me.”

“What do I do?… read_more

Respect is not a permanent tag that you give to someone. When they are in a frame of mind that is worthy of respect, respect them. And when they have ganged up with unworthy ones, with debauched ones, in that moment, are they still worthy of respect? When they are… read_more