In the silent yet passionate pursuit of spirituality, the quest for inner wellbeing can sometimes be obstructed by domestic strife. With wit and wisdom, Sadhguru dissects the notion that sadhana, or spiritual practice, could be the culprit in a tangle of matrimonial conflicts. Find out more about the true nature of spiritual process and its impact on relationship bonds.
Questioner: Namaskaram, Sadhguru. My husband and I practice sadhana offered by Isha, but we’re experiencing conflicts on a daily basis. Is this part of the spiritual process?
Sadhguru: You are blaming it on the spiritual process? Spirituality has always been a good excuse for divorce. If you say you are leaving because you cannot stand him, then people may think what kind of a woman or man you are, leaving your husband or wife and children. But if you say, “I have a spiritual urge,” it may be different. You know Gautama the Buddha left his wife and a young child in search of spirituality – so there is historical support.
Your intelligence is truly useful to you and the world around you only when you come to a state of balance. Otherwise, human intelligence can be the most crooked thing in the universe.
What you want to do with your husband is your business; I am not getting into that. Anyway, sadhana is an inward process, not something that you do with someone else. We may all be sitting in the same hall, but you do not do the practices with them; you do them within you.
When I was a young boy, because my father was an academically very accomplished man, he expected his son to carry on the legacy. He preserved all his medical texts and his notes hoping I would carry all these books on my head. But even at the age of five or six, I was somewhere else. When they gave me a book, I would not read a single word, nor would I move my eyeballs here and there. A little speck on a paper was enough for me to get totally absorbed. It was like a hole through which I could see the whole universe.
I did not know why he had to get upset every time he saw my latest report card. For 12 years, I consistently went for the most valuable digit – zero; my commitment was to not get anything more than that. When he came and spoke to me, initially, I heard him say something like, “What to do with this boy? What will happen to him?” After some time, I could not make any meaning out of the words; I just heard the sounds. Then, I did not even hear the sounds. A little later, I did not even see him anymore – I just saw a blob of energy hopping around.
So, if you want to meditate, distance is a wonderful thing. No one messes with you.
Everyone is looking for a bond. I thought you came here because you are looking for freedom and liberation. You must make up your mind, are you looking for a bond, or are you looking for liberation? When you seek liberation, and the whole world leaves you alone, it is fantastic. Using the sadhana as an excuse to leave your husband or wife is not the way. It is not because of the sadhana but because you are already having trouble.
Spiritual process does not mean all relationships will break. It means everything becomes conscious. When nothing you do is compulsive, it is a good way to be. When you consciously choose in every moment, there is a certain beauty to everything that you are related to. When you are compulsively stuck to it, there is a certain ugliness to everything. So, your marriage or divorce has nothing to do with the spiritual process. It is a choice.
