Once you go into the mountains,
that illiterate Sherpa who is there, who has not been to school
but… if he says “right” you turn right, if he says “left” you turn left.
Where will you search and how will you know who is Sadhguru and who is not Sadhguru?
Only if you strive to keep yourself open, depending upon how much openness you create,
that much of an active role I will play.
A Guru's grace is not designed to fulfill your plans.
Guru's grace is designed to fulfill the life's plan.
Only when you begin to experience me as something more than a person,
only then I am your Guru, till then I am not.
Question: If you could help us understand the role of a guru?
Sadhguru: (Laughs) When you say a Sadhguru, you’re saying an uneducated guru.
That’s what it means.
Because you don’t go… come to a Sadhguru to know about the scriptures,
you don’t come to Sadhguru to know about rituals
because the only thing that I know is I know this piece of life (Referring to oneself)
from its origin to its ultimate and this’s all I know.
By knowing this, by inference you know just about everything
because everything is made the same way.
Today, there is something called as the Constructional Theory
where they’re talking about how the atom
and the cosmos are essentially, fundamentally same design,
only the sophistication and complexity is multiplying.
So, the amoeba and you and me are made the same way,
only the complexity has multiplied.
Having said that, in what way is a guru relevant means
- you’re trying to walk an unchartered terrain.
Every year, I trek in the Himalayas in Nepal and Tibet.
Once you go into the mountains, that illiterate Sherpa who is there, who has not been to school
but… if he says “right” you turn right, if he says “left” you turn left.
You better do that otherwise you won't come back (Laughs).
You do that because he knows the terrain.
The same goes for this. This is just an inner terrain.
It's best to walk with somebody who’s already walked the path,
otherwise simple things will become complicated.
What is next door, you will go around the world and come back to it.
So, why is a guru needed?
It can be done without it.
I’m asking you a simple question – even to learn ABC, the alphabet, you needed a teacher.
But you could have learnt it by yourself, maybe you would have taken a lifetime,
but the teacher taught it to you in a month or two, that’s a big difference.
So, like somebody was talking to me and they asked what is this Guru about.
I said, this is the GPS, a living GPS -
a Guru Positioning System, you know (Laughs)!
If you want to find your way, it’s best… in unchartered terrain, unknown terrain,
it’s best to walk with somebody who has already done the terrain once or many times,
otherwise simple things will become very complex (Applause).
Full Screen Slide: Who was the first Guru?
Sadhguru: A little over 15,000 years ago.
In the upper regions of Himalayas, a yogi appeared.
Nobody knew where he came from,
his antecedents were unknown but he looked extraordinary.
So people gathered, they waited.
They thought he is going to perform some miracle but he did nothing.
Simply he sat, unmoving.
Only seven people hung on.
These seven people recognized that this is a fantastic miracle
because only someone who has transcended the physical nature can simply sit.
Then they begged him, “You seem to be knowing or experiencing something that we cannot imagine.
Please teach us.”
Then he gave them some few simply preparatory methods
and said, “You prepare yourself, let me see.”
They went on preparing themselves.
Months went into years, years went into decades.
Eighty-four years passed.
One day he just looked.
These seven people had become shining receptacles.
So, this Guru Poornima… this Poornima or this full moon after the summer solstice,
historically and also in terms of celestial arrangement of things, it’s significant
because Adiyogi chose to become an Adiguru.
The first yogi decided to become the first guru
over fifteen thousand years ago on this day which is called as Guru Poornima.
It is the birth of the first guru
and this is the day he delivered or he started transmitting
the most significant message to humanity which was never before.
That is, he made them realize that if you’re willing to strive,
all the limitations that nature has set upon you, you can cross.
Question Slide: How to Find Your Guru?
Questioner: For spiritual life, whether one has to search for a Sadhguru or it happens?
Where will you search and how will you know who is Sadhguru and who is not Sadhguru?
You have no way to judge, isn't it?
So, how do I seek something? You just seek.
You simply seek, ‘I want to know.’
The more you become ‘I do not know’ the deeper your seeking is, isn't it?
Seeking does not mean seeking something.
Seeking means seeking that which you do not know.
If you have to seek, you should not make any assumptions. Isn't it so?
You already made an assumption, ‘God is sitting up in the heaven, I am seeking him’
this is not seeking, this is just hallucination.
Seeking means simply seeking.
Seeking is possible only when a deep ‘I do not know’ has happened within you.
If a vacuum of ‘I do not know’ happens within you,
Sadhguru will happen to you,
you don’t have to search
because you don’t know how to search
Question Slide: What does one do when one seeks liberation and willing to strive for it fulltime?
Sadhguru: What does one do?
If you want to do it yourself, that’s one way.
Or you want to drive behind… see you want to find your own way; that is one way.
Totally without any help
you want to go through the uncharted lands, you are a Vasco da Gama or a Columbus.
Now if you drive by yourself without a road map,
we don't know what is just next building
to get there you may go round the world and get there.
Or in the process of going around the world, you may just get lost or fall dead. Yes?
Not everybody has the endurance t o complete the journey of that kind,
which is of uncertain duration, isn't it?
Or you go with a road map.
Somebody has told you this is it, this is it, this is it.
You do just that and go with the road map.
Still it's your effort, but somebody’s guidance.
Another way is you drive behind somebody,
that’s another way. Another way is…
even if you drive behind somebody there are risks of losing the taillights and getting lost.
Another way is you just get on to somebody’s bus.
If you just get on to the bus you sit there and you sleep off,
still you reach the destination, isn't it?
That’s some other way.
So what is it that you’re ready for, is something that you have to decide.
Question Slide: What role does a Guru play in a seeker’s life?
I have very strong sense of aesthetics.
Because of that,
only if you strive to keep yourself open,
depending upon how much openness you create, that much of an active role I will play.
If you allow me, I will even decide what you should eat for your breakfast -
Not as an imposition, but as a natural choice.
I’m saying, in the most mundane things also it can find expression.
‘So you're going to come…
and between idli and dosa you will choose for me?’ Not like that.
You're walking on the street,
whether you step into a pit or on the road or on the pavement
is determined not by you but by the sunlight, isn’t it?
In that sense yes, every aspect - if you are willing.
If you want to have your own life, it’s up to you.
You want me only to influence your spiritual life only, I’m fine.
Some people see sunlight only when they go on a vacation,
once a year.(Laughter)
Some people, every day in the morning,
they wake up early in the morning just to welcome the sun.
That’s your choice; I’ll leave that to you. (Applause)
Question Slide: How Do We Know If Guru's Grace is Upon You?
Sadhguru: I have said, “Once you sit with me even for a moment,
then there is no such thing as privacy in your life.”
So the moment you sat with me, particularly initiated by me,
after that there is no such thing as whether it is on or not – it is on all the time.
It is just that you are expecting grace just to fulfill your plans.
Most people are only expecting grace to fulfill their plans,
because this is the old habit of going to the temple, church or mosque and
telling God what he must do. (Laughs)
If he does not do, you will change your God.
So this is the old habit.
So, grace is not about fulfilling your plan.
Grace is about fulfilling life's plan for you.
This is not about fulfilling your petty plan, because every day your plans keep changing.
At different stages in your life,
many, many times you thought “this is it” and next moment you changed your decision.
So grace, a Guru's grace is not designed to fulfill your plans.
Guru's grace is designed to fulfill the life's plan.
You as a piece of life, to fulfill its plan, to make life arrive at its fulfillment,
not to fulfill your immediate plan.
You want to go on a vacation, “Sadhguru, why are you not helping me?”
This is not about that. (Laughs)
So don't every other day keep on questioning, “Is it there with me? Is it not there with me?”
I wouldn't be wasting my life with you if I could not sustain the support and make it happen.
Slide: Guru Purnima - A day of Grace
A guru is just a device. Guru is not a person. This must be understood.
Only when you begin to experience me as something more than a person,
only then I am your Guru, till then I am not.
Guru Poornima is significant because -
one thing is of a historical significance
because this is the day Adiyogi turned himself into a Guru after the summer solstice.
This first full moon has a certain impact.
It is generally considered as a day of grace.
and that is the day that first Guru chose to teach.
So, it’s a significant reminder for us, for every human being on the planet,
because everybody lives in their own limitations
of body, mind, social structures and strictures-all kinds of things.
It is for every human being, it’s important to know that there is a way to be beyond these things.
That’s the reminder of the Guru Pournima