Goal

Fight for the right cause and let it consume you fully. That is the only way of living life. Fight for the right one and devote yourself totally to him. That is the only way of living and fighting. Give yourself up so totally that you cannot now be blamed…

When you say that you go to your workplace for a purpose, the purpose is never work, or is it? The purpose is the salary cheque. In fact, if work could be bypassed and you could straight away reach the salary cheque, then who would want to work? Now, why…

Both the genders have become even more anchored to their physical identity. The more you do that, the more you are in misery because, really, the body is not who you are.

There are places better and higher than the place of your gender specific hormones. Why do you want…

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 next goal is waiting for you, and that is deep frustration. You will feel…

When you are serious about victory, you do not strike at the enemy without being fully prepared. Those who just plunge themselves into battles without having checked their preparedness are the ones who don’t love victory too much. Because this battle is important, and because this battle must be won,…

Every young person who is about to choose a career, decide on work in life, must keep this in mind, my humble advice: See what is it that really, really troubles you, and then work should be the medicine for your trouble. That’s the way you must choose work.

Therefore,…

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…

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…

If you have to invest your hours, your months, your years, invest them on a cause. The cause could be your own development, or general development, social welfare, whatever. But let it be a cause, not a person. Let the cause occupy you fully.

This applies to both men and…

There is something honorable about dying against a major enemy. But what honor is there in being consumed by the little?

Set a great goal. Even if you lose, it will at least be a great defeat. And if you set a timid, scared, conventional, narrow goal, then even if…

Success does not lie in doing any random thing. Do you know why you are doing a certain thing? Are you sure what is worthy enough to be done? That’s the moot question.

Choose the right option. Make the right decision. Fight the right battle. And now it doesn’t matter…

We really do not know how to spend a Sunday, but we want to live two hundred years. If you are given one free day, you do not know what to do with it. You start looking here and there, wondering, “What to do? Some free time is there. How…

Before you excel, ask yourself, “What must I excel in? What is worth it?” Before you speed down a road, ask yourself, “Which road to take?” Speed comes later; choice of the right road comes first.

It is far better to be slow on the right road than to be…

All the economic theories, all the economic systems are predicated on this premise, based on this assumption that the goal of man’s action is to have more money. This they call as welfare, or even luxury. In some theories, they say that maximization of luxury is the objective of man’s…

What is the nature of a gymnasium? The gymnasium only gives you obstacles. Have you ever noticed? You want to raise something—what is the gymnasium giving you? Weights, and weights are obstacles against the rise. The gymnasium really does not support you, it actually obstructs you.

The world is anyway…

All the expanse of discipline is built upon the foundation of the goal. The goal comes first.

I might be a very violent man, and my goal is to blast a building off. To learn how to do it, I will have to live through stern discipline. I will have…

There is a lot that is broken on this Earth today. We need young people who come out, who set out and fix those things. Those are the kind of entrepreneurial ventures that are needed today. What we need is a very clear and precise type of entrepreneurial activity—activity that…

Do not call joy as freedom from pleasure. Just call joy as higher pleasure. If you call joy as higher pleasure, then it becomes possible to sacrifice lower pleasures for the sake of the higher pleasure called joy.

Otherwise, spirituality remains very scary to people who have been spoken to…

Going from class six to class seven in three attempts, having been kicked out of four schools, you manage to find some kind of a fraudulent certificate from one of those shady institutions that say, “Even if you are class seven fail, we will still give you a high school…

जो आदमी साहस के साथ अपने लिए एक सही लक्ष्य, सही काम, सही अभियान खोज लेता है, वो आदमी फिर बहुत मुश्किल से रुकता है। रुकेगा भी तो, पल-दो-पल को रुकेगा, हफ्ते-दो-हफ्ते को रुकेगा, महीने-दो-महीने को रुकेगा। वो कमर कस कर फिर आगे बढ़ जाएगा। हो सकता है वो आगे…

Take one step and be determined, then take another baby step. And when you are taking that one step, think only about that one step. One step is not very difficult, is it? But when you look at the mountain top, then it is; the looking becomes the deterrent.

People…

Intention, goal, purpose, desire, clinging, attachment, attraction—none of these are bad, provided they are towards the right object, right end. Please be attached, please be greatly attached, please be desirous, please feel the attraction, the pull towards liberation, towards Truth.

It is not for nothing that your mind is vested…

When you stand in front of a client and make an important presentation, what is it that makes you go weak in the knees? Expectations, greed… And there is only one solution to greed: Rama.

You try to feel like a champion. But in front of your boss, you discover…

The good news is that at any level, the maximum you do is sufficient. You are not demanded to do something beyond yourself. Just do the maximum that is within your capacity.

Good news is, you don’t have to exceed your capacity. The challenge is, you have to do the…

Don’t take life advice from uncles and aunts and models and celebrities. Don’t let cricketers tell you what kind of house to live in.

Your mom is beautiful, great, good, lovely. Is she the right person to tell you of so many other things in life? Please avoid. Does your…

If you choose a goal that is not worthy enough, you will try a lot to concentrate on your goal but you will find that invariably you get distracted after a while. That is not because the distractions are powerful; that is because your goal is powerless.

The goal itself…

Choose the right thing to do, and in that lies success. In that lies immediate success. Immediate success implies that you have been successful right in the moment of the choice itself; you don’t have to wait for the outcome. In fact, if you have to wait for the outcome…

There is no success in chasing a stupid goal and managing to attain it. If the goal in the first place is unworthy, what glory is there in attaining it more speedily than others?

So do not ask, “How do I get success in whatever I do?” You are trivializing…

Questioner (Q): I have heard you say that life should be purposeless and aimless. But if we do not aim for anything, then how will we crack our exams? When you were our age, you too prepared for exams like MBA, IIT-JEE, civil services, etc. But now you say having…

Questioner (Q): Acharya Ji, you often talk about the importance of time, and that is something that bothers me in the context of my career. I don’t know if I should continue in my current job or not. I took the job for very ordinary reasons: money and position in…

Questioner (Q): Acharya Ji, you once said that motivation and ambitions are symptoms of suffering but I think if one lives with ambition, the journey will teach him a lot. Life will become disarrayed. Please explain.

Acharya Prashant (AP): Don’t you see an obvious contradiction in what you are saying?…

Questioner: Acharya Ji, it is a question about selfless goals. I have not understood ‘goals’ yet. The freedom fighters, social workers, humanitarians are all working tirelessly to achieve something. What’s my responsibility towards country, people, and religion? For example, our culture and tradition need to be preserved. Is it not…

Questioner (Q): Sir, usually when we want to achieve something or we want to become a better person, we usually push boundaries. And when we push boundaries, we encounter pain. So, now what happens usually, every day, when I am trying to push my boundaries in any field, for example,…

Questioner (Q): In this age of competition, we try very hard for various types of exams, and sometimes it is possible that we come very close but may still end up on the losing side. If that keeps continuing, then won’t the repeated failures hamper our self-confidence? If they do,…

Questioner (Q): We are too considered or concerned about our society or the people around ourselves. So, whatever they say, like, a particular thing is the best, so, we start thinking in that direction. We get so-called motivated by them to achieve that thing. So, I guess ‘A,’ make targets…

Questioner (Q): What does Khalil Gibran mean, when he says, “He who works in marble, and finds the shape of his own soul in the stone, is nobler than he who ploughs the soil.”

Acharya Prashant (AP): What is work?

All work involves action.

Questioner (Q): Sir, my question is, what should be ones the purpose of life? Is it earning money, or happiness?

Acharya Prashant (AP): The lady is asking, ‘What is the ultimate purpose of life?’ She has already presented us two options: Earning money, and second happiness. But you already know.…

Questioner (Q): Acharya Ji, what is the purpose of life if death comes and the body is born again and again?

Acharya Prashant (AP): When do worries exist?

Q: When you are scared.

Acharya Prashant (AP): The questioner is asking how to be a good entrepreneur?

Entrepreneurship is about initiating something, right? Doing something, beginning something. Before you become a good entrepreneur, must you not ask what is worth doing? Or is entrepreneurship merely about collecting profits rather than salaries? To many people,…

Man has always been attracted towards the new. But attraction alone is not enough, especially when one is resistant to leave the old ways. 'New' comes with an opportunity to change, and equally with a responsibility to act to that change.

Bridging this gap between attraction and action, Acharya Prashant

Questioner: Pranaam Acharya Ji. My question is about suffering.

With your guidance, I have to come to see that my life is nothing but a big lump of suffering. It includes the whole swing of pain and pleasure, attachment and aversion, and my role in them as the ‘I’.

Questioner (Q): Acharya Ji, today I am listening to you from my workplace, so, I have a question related to work. You shared an inspiring story of Kabir and his profession, I want to have the same level of inspiration and energy in my profession. Your teaching has helped me

Questioner: Acharya Ji, which direction to take in life?

Acharya Prashant: What is it, that matters to you?

The direction in which you must go is determined by where you will feel the pain.

Question: As the years go by many of us remain confused about the ‘Goals of Life.’ I would like to be guided about the ‘Ultimate purpose of Life.’

~ Colonel S. D. Joshi

Acharya Prashant: But we have had purposes throughout our Life. Is there ever a purposeless moment

You are not under any obligation to be perfect. Alright!

Your incompetencies, your deficiencies are all welcome. They are the part of the game. Just be alive and alert.

And then even out of your own botched up action, something auspicious will happen. Like Shabri, she doesn’t know how to

Acharya Prashant: Kaustubh is saying he wants to be an IAS officer, and there is a huge burden of expectations and that is just draining away his life.

Kaustubh, do you want to be an IAS officer or is it out of expectations of others?

Question: Acharya Ji, we should have future plans also. What should set that in our minds that what we are going to be in future!

Acharya Prashant: Alright, that is a very sensible question. What’s your name?

Questioner:

Acharya Prashant (AP): Please see, there appears a very difficult task in front of us.

One approach is, the task is so difficult that I leave it to be handled by time. The task is so difficult that being with what I am today, with my energy, my resources, my…

Are you suffering, are you burning? Is there something that is eating you out?

Want to know the reason?

You have an ideal. You have a set idea of how things should be. You want existence to conform to your idea of things. You are so arrogant that you will