At an intimate gathering with ashramites and volunteers at the Isha Yoga Center, Sadhguru explains how to make best use of this space to immerse yourself in grace, and blossom into your ultimate possibility. He also points out a few common roadblocks on the path and how to tackle them.
Sadhguru: The Guru is not a person. In fact, his personality is a hindrance. If you look at anyone’s personality, there may be some things you like, and some things you do not like; some things you love, and some things you hate. What is key here is the sadhana that has been offered, and, above all, the energy space that has been created for individuals to blossom beyond their limitations. If you neither do your sadhana properly, nor give yourself to the space around you or your activity, then you will panic.
If you become available to the energies that are here, then the fundamental process of life – even the physical process of life, disease, and aging – could be reversed in many ways. Disease, aging, and death are progressions of life. No one can completely avoid them. For sure, you will die, and that is a good thing. For those who have do not live fully, the same thing happens to them all the time. Every moment of their life, they die of fear, anxiety, jealousy, or hatred. If there is a big difference between life and death, it means you lived fully.
The only thing that could hinder you from breathing this space, becoming a part of it, and allowing yourself to blossom into a different possibility on a daily basis is if you are too busy covering your ass all the time. If you are one way, but you want to show yourself another way, it takes too much life. It is not worthwhile.
One simple thing you can do is to look upon every tree, blade of grass, cloud, stone, brick wall, man, woman, child, and every creature that you see as Sadhguru. All of them are reverberating pretty well. Just look upon everything the same way. If you see a tree, see it like Sadhguru is standing there. If you see a stone, see it like Sadhguru is standing there. Then you will take in these energies. Otherwise, you will be immune to everything. If you are busy covering your ass, you will miss everything.
There was an old farmer who had an old donkey. One day, the donkey fell into an open well that was dry. It fell thirty feet down and started crying piteously, wanting to come out. The farmer went and looked down the well. This fool of an ass fell into the well and, now the farmer would have to spend money to get it out. He thought, “What is the point in getting this ass out? Anyway, in a year or two it will die. It is of no use and not doing any work.” So he called his neighbors and said, “Let’s fill up the well because it is anyway dry.” All of them brought their shovels, and started throwing earth into the well. The terrified ass cried even more piteously, wanting to come out. But they were filling up the well.
After some time, the ass suddenly stopped screaming and started doing something very strange and smart. Every time a shovelful of earth fell on its back, it shook it off and took one step up. Eventually, it climbed out. By then, everyone was full of admiration. The old farmer suddenly felt pride and said, “See, my donkey is so smart!” And he tried to caress it. The donkey promptly turned around and kicked him in the face. The moral of the story is: never try to cover your ass because it will come back and kick you in the face one day.
When it comes to an inward journey, no one can come with you. If you want to take an outside journey, someone can walk with you, hold your hand, or carry you. But if you want to go inward, there is entry only for one person – yourself. When you start an inner journey, it is most important that you do whatever you can do. There are certain things that you are not even aware of – I will do those. There are certain blocks within you that you are not even aware of. You cannot handle what you are not aware of. But you must deal with whatever you are aware of – no one else can deal with that.
You can pass your work on to someone, pretending you are sick. But if you pass on whatever sadhana you need to do to someone else, you will become sick. Everything that is needed to make an individual blossom into a completely different possibility is here. The necessary instructions, energy, inspiration, and ambiance are here. The only thing it takes is you.
