Sadhguru: About transforming or about reviving this Maha Kumbh as a knowledge base,
as a place and a time that people… large number of people will seek as a source of inspiration,
healing and transformation which is what it has been for thousands of years. Maybe in the last
five, six or ten decades in a century, it could have to some extent lost its relevance and its significance
simply because… well, the nation has not been in our own hands. So reviving this, what this means,
why is this, what is so significant about taking a bath once in twelve years (Laughs)?
It’s not about that - this comes from a fundamental dimension of yoga which is
referred to as Bhuta Shuddhi, which means to cleanse the five elements in our system.
Everything in the universe - this body, this planet, the solar system, the universe and the cosmos
everything is just a play of five elements. The entire universe is just a mischief of five elements,
not five million, just five. This shows the brilliance behind creation.
The trillions and trillions of forms that life has taken - all this only with five ingredients.
So, the yogic system, the fundamental form of yoga is Bhuta Shuddhi where it is understood that,
if you gain some mastery over these five elements - your health, well-being, prosperity,
access to the universe, all these dimensions are taken care of, if only you take charge of these
fundamental ingredients which make you, who you are right now
and make which makes everything what it is right now.
This body, the elemental composition of this body is such that seventy-two percent of this body is water,
twelve percent is earth, six percent is air, four percent is fire, the remaining is akash.
For one to live well here water plays the most important role because seventy-two percent of this body is water;
seventy-two percent of the planet is water.
So, the Kumbh or this science of making use of the confluence of rivers at certain latitudes
came, not because of belief, not because of some blind faith, this came because of keen observation
of how life and the different forces around us function and how we can ride that, how we can make use of that.
The modern science is beginning to open its eyes to this that, between equator that is the zero degrees latitude
to thirty-three degrees latitude, the centrifugal force that the planet generates because of its spin,
largely works in a vertical manner. As you go further north it becomes tangential
but here it works in a vertical manner. Eleven degrees centigrade is one place where it is perfectly vertical.
So, after much search within myself, we established the Isha Yoga Center at eleven degrees latitude
because if one is doing sadhana the maximum benefit happens here, because the earth’s centrifugal force
is pushing everything upward in a vertical manner rather than in a tangential manner.
So from zero to thirty-three degrees this was known as the sacred land
on the planet, because spiritual sadhana found utmost results or maximum results happened
in this region for whatever sadhana that an individual person does.
So within this latitude, we identified many spots where at different times of the year
and different times of the solar year which lasts for twelve and a quarter years,
there the forces are working in a certain way and those places were identified as places to be
on that particular day or that particular period.
Wherever two water bodies are meeting with a certain force, it creates a certain… a churning of water.
This body being over seventy-two percent water, being there at that particular time
when it is on a particular nakshatra in the solar cycle, the maximum benefit happens to the body.
In the ancient times everybody understood that this mandala of forty-eight days
if you stay at the Kumbh and every day you are in that water with the appropriate sadhana attached to it,
you could transform your physical body, your psychological framework, your energy framework
and above all find enormous spiritual growth within you, within a span of one mandala which is forty-eight days.
But today slowly it has become more… just a quick visit, a half a day visit where you take a simple
one dip and you’re out. Well, maybe in today’s world, we can’t get all of you for forty-eight days at the Kumbh,
but I was talking to the Chief Minister and said it’s important that we set at least
forty days of sadhana for everybody. Wherever they may be, everyday ten to twelve minutes of sadhana
in their own homes for forty days then come and take a dip. This will make a huge difference
because the importance of it is, at a certain place if a certain volume of energy is happening,
do you have the ability to receive it, do you have the ability to perceive it?
If you cannot perceive no matter where you are, everything will go waste.
So, the whole science of why the Kumbh, why at certain latitudes, why were the confluence of water bodies
are happening, there’s an elaborate science about it, I don’t want to go into the entire process now,
but essentially this is what it is, because if the water within you does not respond to the water outside of you.
Now the water that is here, how this water behaves within you will determine the nature of your health
and well-being in a big way. How will it behave? It will behave the way you treat it.
In the sense, today modern science has come to this and recorded various series of experiments
they have come to this, that water has enormous memory within itself.
They are calling water as fluid computer because the volume of memory and intelligence
which is there in the water is so phenomenal.
This is something we need to understand, water is not a commodity, it’s a life-making material.
The water that you drink is not just going whichever way; it is taking the form of a human being.
It has the memory and intelligence - only if you treat it well, it tends to behave well,
if you treat it badly it tends to behave badly.
So, there’s a whole science culturally established in this country as to how to treat the water that you drink.
So these aspects have been largely lost because we are becoming a very economy driven cultures.
Economics is only about our survival, about procurement of this and that, what we need.
Economics is not the guide point of our lives. The interest of mystical dimensions
or the spiritual sciences have always been what are the laws which govern the inner nature?
So, towards this goal many things were created, many, many dimensions, many, many aspects,
many, many tools and many, many methods as to how to get there.
Among all these things Bhuta Shuddhi is one of the most powerful processes.
The Kumbh Mela is an offshoot of this Bhuta Shuddhi process.
It’s my intention and my wish that this Kumbh Mela should not become just one more
ritual, where huge number of people gather, this should become a transformative process.
I’m telling you, we as Indians if we display a different level of equanimity within us,
you believe me in the next twenty-five years, we will be the most valued nation because
this will be the biggest challenge for the rest of the world (Applause).
Rest of the world wants to know how to be, they know how to do but they don’t know how to be.
This is something that we can offer to the world, because when it comes to the inner mechanics
of a human being, I’m not saying this with the prejudice of being Indian,
when it comes to the inner mechanics of the human being, no culture has ever looked at
the inner dimension of the human being with the profoundness, that this culture has explored.
As Mark Twain once said after his visit - it seems he even come… came to the Kumbh Mela
and he said, “Anything that can ever be done by either God or man has been done in this land.”
That is the impression we created (Applause).
That is the impression we need to create tomorrow for the rest of the world, that anything that
can be explored to, in the subjective dimension we have explored this.
Unfortunately the presentation has lost its way and it has become a ridiculous presentation,
we have become cow worshipping, snake charming and whatever, whatever kind of nation and
now we are shifting into IT (Referring to Information Technology). All this is fine but the important thing is
we know how to be, no matter what is around us, within us we know how to be,
which will be the most valuable thing on the planet in the coming years, because everybody will get
many comforts that modern technology will offer. After it comes… when they don’t have it,
they think if they have it everything will be fixed, the moment they have it, they know nothing
in life is settled, that is when the whole world will become seekers one way or the other.
Or as I said earlier for the first time, human intellect is evolving like never before,
every human being slowly is able to think for himself. Right or wrong it doesn’t matter
but he is beginning to think. Once he is beginning to think, you transporting him to heaven for well-being
is not going to work. You have to offer it here and you telling him the softness of the cushion on this sofa is
going to make your life well, is not going to work because everybody would have sat on it
and it means nothing. Only because people are deprived, these kind of philosophies have worked
because people have been deprived for a long period, if you just tell them you can eat well,
that looks like heaven. The whole description of heaven is that you can eat well or you can do something well.
All that people are deprived of, it’s up there but these things will not work in future.
People will look for real solutions. When they look for real solutions, believe me, nowhere else in the world
can people offer profound solutions as India can offer because this is something that we’ve invested
our time, life and energies for almost eight-ten thousand years and we have gleaned this knowledge,
not something that we believe, not something that we made up as philosophies,
something that we observed and noted down and made tools as to how to access this.
It’s my wish and my blessing, that this Kumbh Mela should become a huge step in that direction
to awaken the world to this possibility (Applause).