Mind

If you are someone who cannot take care of herself, how will you be sure that your presence, your company is not becoming an influence of sickness on the other person?

Be very, very alert about cohabitation. Just don’t start living with anybody. Be very, very conscious of your personal…

If you take yourself as primarily physical, then beauty too for you would be something just physical. You will look at the woman most capable of successfully reproducing. That’s the prakritik definition of beauty.

The first thing that comes to mind is flowers. What are flowers? Flowers are the reproductive…

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…

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…

I’ll tell you what the rape of the mind is. When the mind has nonsensical purposes, that is rape of the mind. When things like stuff that happened in the childhood or teenage attracts you and dominates you, then the mind is being raped. Forgive me the clichéd expression, but…

Money is nothing on its own. Money cannot bring you peace. But established in peace, money and material and the world can be perfectly dealt with. Now you neither need to renounce money nor do you get attached to money, because your real need is peace not money. Now you…

Even if you want a deeper pleasure, you will have to go deeper into the mind, and going deeper into the mind is what the spiritual process is all about.

If the fellow is a lover of the good things of life, let’s say a complete hedonist, then encourage him…

If a bad thought is persevering in your mind, continuing in your mind, then it means that you are just calling it a bad thought. Deeply you are supporting it; deeply you think that it is a good thought. We call them bad. We actually do not consider them bad.…

Man’s hunger is not so much in the stomach; it resides in his mind. And no fruit is enough when it comes to the mind.

So, man has been destroying everything he can touch, and climate change is the most recent, the most devastating, and probably the most final symptom…

I have nothing against marriage. I have a lot to do with the mind of man. The mind that rushes towards security, the mind that wants to possess and hold captive another living being, I want to talk of that mind.

Marriage will decide the kind of work that you…

Who told you that rape is merely a sexual activity? Anything that you look at just as a body, as a material to be consumed, is rape. A mind that cannot love will only rape. And we all rape. Look at the way people spread dirt around. Is that not…

You have all the right to make a choice. But if you make a choice and don’t do justice to it, then that is very bad. In fact, correction of choices happens only when you have first of all fully tried out what you are doing. Unless you dedicate yourself…

If you are occupied in something really worthwhile, would you really care for things like pain? Even an ordinary sportsperson would tell you that when you are pursuing something even as normal as victory in a match, pain ceases to be a big botheration. Unless it becomes crippling; then you…

The mind is not evil; it is just stupid. You cannot put somebody to the sword just for stupidity. And how will you kill the mind? Does the mind stand independent of you? Does it?

The mind is your shadow. If you change, the mind will change. And that is…

Distinctions are a burden on the mind. If A is different from B, then one has to remember both A and B.

It is wonderful when A to Z are all one; then you can just remember A and forget everything else.

And if A to Z all are nothing,…

What is it that blocks creativity? A cluttered mind, an obsessed mind, a worried mind, a mind too particular about results. Just as creativity is uncertain, similarly are the results of creativity. And if you are someone who bothers too much about results, then you cannot be creative.

You would…

Every time you walk past a meat shop or come across a menu containing a lot of flesh, let that harden your resolve. No point throwing that menu on the waiter’s face. The waiter is a puny fellow. He didn’t even write the menu; he has nothing to do with…

Whatever has come to the mind has come with a promise. What is the promise? The promise is: I will give you peace.

The mind feels inadequate. The mind feels incomplete. Whosoever promises it completion, the mind latches on to it. It could be a thought, it could be a…

Your mind keeps racing—you find that a problem? Next time your mind runs away from the office, you too run away. Don’t say, “Oh, this fickle mind, it can’t rest; it is not spiritual enough!” Great that it is not spiritual enough; great that it is not tolerating rubbish.

Why…

Were our bodies to reflect accurately and honestly the state of our minds, none of us would have been able to walk firmly even for a distance of ten meters. Our legs would have shown up as cut, wounded, bruised, fractured the way, exactly the way our mind is.

Unfortunately,…

The mind is a dislocated child. The mind is a wanderer looking for its home.

There are only two kinds of inputs that can come to this lost and wandering child. The first kind of input is the one that takes it back to its home. The second kind of…

If you are not feeling right, don’t push yourself into believing that everything is alright. Your nature is total security and total relaxation. Any iota of doubt proves that you are not centered. Entertain it. Don’t dismiss it. Your doubts are not without a purpose. The agitation of the mind…

Man is not really starving in the stomach. Man is starving in the mind. In fact, man is the only species that is overweight and obese and still thinking about food.

You need money for mental aggrandizement. You need money to feel secure internally. You don’t need money merely to…

Unfortunately, this is the way most people look at the future: not with an intent to become better or improve, but with the intent to remain exactly as they are. That’s why future is such a big issue.

Then there is the other kind of mind. It says, “Obviously, I…

The mind is a simmering cauldron, always burning. Now, tell me what coolness is.

The mind is a madman rushing about, stumbling, falling, getting up randomly, darting, hurtling. Now, tell me what calmness is.

These aren’t things that first come to the exterior and can later be extended to the

Is freedom a thought, an idea, a concept? Is love a subject of the brain? All that the brain can have is thoughts, ideas, concepts. Is love a thought, an idea, a concept? If you are saying this, then you must be living a loveless life.

How is it so…

Body-identification is the root cause. Society plays a secondary role. And if you have identified how hormones and glands and the inner chemicals dictate you, and if you can see that fastidiously, if you can see that very clearly, then you would anyway not be vulnerable to the society anymore.…

The best way to save a marriage is to forget that you are married. Till the time you remain married, the marriage is doomed to fail.

If you want to redeem your wife, drop the wife and you will get a lover.

If you want to save your husband, drop…

If you are alright seeing animals slaughtered for food, for consumption, for anything, you are bound to then be alright seeing yourself slaughtered as well.

The attitude that you have towards others’ suffering is bound to be similar to the attitude that you have towards yourself. If you can smilingly…

Has there ever been a new mistake? How funny. That which piques you today, is it not the same thing that brought you down five years back? Oh, the names and forms change, faces change, situations change—has the tendency changed? The place where you fell, the time of the fall,…

You know of the biodiversity loss, you know of how close mankind is to a nuclear war that can be precipitated anytime. So anything can happen anytime. It’s obviously a very, very bad situation, and anybody can see that.

We have to realize that the root of all these external…

Don’t ask how to manage time. Don’t ask how to utilize time. Ask yourself, how do I manage myself? Because it is the self that is wasting the time. It is the self that is wasting everything that is around it. There are a thousand opportunities that come to you,…

In the office you are Mr. Nice; in front of the wife you are Mr. Submissive; then in the bar you will be the most raucous and unmanageable drinker, breaking bottles, throwing tantrums, inviting brawls.

The mind knows that it is suffering in one condition, but it is not intelligent…

In order to get satisfaction, man has burnt down the entire world and is still not satisfied, and will never be satisfied, even if the entire universe is burnt down to ashes. Man will still not gain contentment because man is choosing a false route. You can never get contentment…

Waiting for that fabulous holiday, we do not allow the mind to experience a certain inner vacation at all. The entire year, we remain tense in expectation of the year-end vacation. Why can’t you have your little vacations everyday? What prevents you? Why can’t you have half an hour of…

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 is like chopping off somebody’s limbs but ensuring that he lives—and he lives an entire…

If someone’s presence has a becalming effect on your mind, soothing effect on your mind, illuminating effect on your mind, liberating effect on your mind, go ahead, be with that person, or persons, as much as you want to. But be with them only as long as you do not…

We talked of enlightenment. We are talking of deceptions in the spiritual field.

So many people say they are enlightened. Would they have talked of enlightenment had there not been other so-called enlightened people before them? Even their concept of enlightenment is a borrowed concept. Such a borrowed enlightenment!

For us, support just means weeping with the weeping one. We totally forget that in most cases the ones who are weeping do not need to weep. The ones who are weeping are needlessly weeping, and if you support their tears, you are supporting their false centers; you are making…

You want to find time for something, but you say, “I can’t find time for it. It is important but I can’t find time for it.” Please be assured that somewhere you are convinced that that thing for which you cannot find time, you are convinced that that is not…

I have seen women in sub-zero temperatures—the temperature is minus four, and she is wearing almost nothing. That does not provoke a reaction from me but basic, simple curiosity. Are you cold-proof? Are you weather and climate-proof? Do you have some kind of divine heating mechanism inside you that men…

Do not let your inner welfare be conditional. If your inner sense of well-being is dependent on favorable external conditions, then it is a very sorry state to be in, because conditions are never under our control and, I am saying, I will allow myself to feel alright only upon…

You go to a shop, and how do you buy clothes? Good to touch, good to wear, and should appear expensive, shouldn’t appear cheap. This is what you do when you want to select a piece of cloth. And what would you do when you would want to select a…

There are cuisines around the world where animals are eaten alive. You like to have an octopus, a living octopus on your plate, and then you take the octopus and you take it in.

You have to address the entire value system. You have to ask man: Who are you?…

Questioner (Q): All reflections are coming from my limited mind. And when you shower pure nectar in every session, it seems my words would just pollute everything. I do acknowledge that I am related or connected to money, family, position, etc. and for me, Dṛṣṭā or Ātman is merely a…

Questioner: When I read and understand any verse from the Upanishads, is that understanding emerging from a personal comprehension or is it universal? Is understanding personal or universal? Is there a way to touch upon real understanding? Also, emptiness, lust, anger, intoxication and darkness appear and disappear. They do not…

Questioner (Q): Sir, it is very difficult for an individual like me to achieve consciousness during my lifetime. Now, how practical and how difficult is it for me as an individual to even think about super consciousness when I find attaining even relatively higher consciousness difficult? I am not conscious…

Questioner (Q): I want to talk about being committed to our decisions. Let’s say, for example, I decide that I will stop eating junk food from today, or rather minimize my consumption of junk food. But what happens is that I stick to it for a month or forty-five days,…

Questioner (Q): I am a PHD bioscience student, and my question is about the brain and the mind. There are some studies that postulate that we carry memories from our past lives. If that is true, how and where are those memories stored?

Acharya Prashant (AP): No, we don’t carry…