SGTW: “Who am I” is not a question that you ask somebody
It is a question that you ask yourself.
You don't know who you are is it a small problem?
If you genuinely,
if this question is burning within you then you come
(Music Plays) Who Am I?
Shoropratum Mukherjee: Pranam Sadhguru,
I am from West Bengal,
my name is Shoropratum Mukherjee.
I have been following you for last three months…
Sadhguru: Was that a warning (Laughter)?
Shoropratum Mukherjee: No, no, why, why sir?
I have been following you for last few months
and I have been watching your videos
and literally I can say that I am your fan.
But I have one question
that I have noticed that
you have said that whatever we accumulate in our life,
like our salary, our reputation, our wealth, our body fat also
– it’s all… we can say that it’s mine, but it’s not me.
You say and I have seen this and
it’s extremely logical,
sure I can say that the house is mine
but that’s not me,
I can say that the body is mine but that’s not me.
Then what is me?
if I release whatever I earned, if I release whatever?
(Applause) then what is me?
What is my existence?
That’s what I want to know.
Sadhguru: Oh, why are you asking me, hmm (Laughter)?
Please sit down.
Well, what is you? (Few laugh)?
Right now what you think is me is just a bundle of thoughts, emotions, ideas, prejudices,
philosophies, ideologies
– a hotchpotch of many things that you picked up.
You’re a scrapbook, tch,
this doesn’t sound good.
No, you are a cocktail (Laughter).
Shall we upgrade him a little more? Questioner: Upgrade him.
Sadhguru: You are a bouquet of flowers (Laughter).
All right?
So what is you?
This happened at the Cincinnati airport in Ohio, United States,
people had line up to check in at the airline ticket booth.
One man just skipped the line and came straight in the front and
thrust his ticket.
The lady at the counter,
she said, “Sir there is a line.”
He said, “No, no, I am in a hurry.”
She said, “Everybody’s in a hurry,
you are on the same plane, (Laughs)
please stand in the line.”
Then he said, “Do you know who I am?”
She looked at him,
promptly picked up the microphone and said,
“There is a man here
who does not know who he is,
can somebody help him (Laughter)?”
So,
who am I?
is not a question that you ask somebody.
It’s a question that you ask yourself.
Make it more and more profound (Applause).
If…
If you had stood up…
this is like a…
what you are asking is like a morning prayer,
you know?
How people pray.
If you go and learn one mantra umm, umm, umm
your child is doing aye chuhuuu! (Makes funny sounds)
and phone also you can attend in between these days (Laughter).
Even in the temple, priest is attending the phone in between (Laughter)… all this.
This happened closer to Christmas,
a lady in Minnesota was praying.
She was overheard by the neighbors.
She was praying, “Dear god,
please this time,
last time that old fool Santa Clause came
and he mistook my prayers,
what I want is a thin slim body and a fat bank balance,
last time he mistook this (Laughter).”
Why I am saying this is,
you please look at all the prayers on the planet,
“Dear god give me this,
give me that,
save me, protect me.”
Does it look like
something divine or does it look like simple survival?
Survival outsourced (Laughter)!
To survive on this planet
you just need four limbs
and a few brain cells which work (Few laugh)
So right now,
“Sadhguru, all that is okay
but I want to know who I am!”
This whole 'who am I' business became very popular
because of Ramana Maharishi, you know?
You heard of Ramana Maharishi?
He’s not a Bengali (Laughter).
So, Ramana said “Who am I?”
and sat down there.
People today think they don’t have to do anything,
if they once in a way ask somebody
“Who am I,”
they think they are being spiritual.
I was teaching a program in Los Angeles.
There are bunch of people,
about hundred-and-fifty people,
all prominent people,
many of them from the Hollywood crowd
and a whole lot of young women were looking similar.
They are not sisters,
they have the same doctor (Laughter).
And…(Applause)
and then one of them says, “Sadhguru…”
I am just teaching them
a simple twenty-one minute practice. Why?
To turn you inward
because you are asking this question out,
you will not find anything.
If I tell you are an aatman, parmatman, nonsense,
where does it take you?
Just more vocabulary (Few laugh).
See if I tell you you are a soul,
you are a divine entity,
you are Aatman,
you are Parmatman,
you didn’t get anywhere.
You just got more nonsensical vocabulary.
That’s all you got!
So I said “We are teaching you a simple process,
twenty-one minutes how to turn inward.”
“But you are telling us
all this twenty-one minutes
we have to do all this
but Ramana Maharishi said you don’t have to do anything.”
Tch, (Laughs) I said, “Whoa, whoa,
Ramana got to Los Angeles?”
But Ramana did nothing, that’s a fact.
He simply sat like that (Gestures) cross-legged.
Simply, doing nothing, absolutely.
Rodents came and bit and ate his flesh,
it festered, wounds became worm infected,
he simple sat doing nothing.
If you can do that kind of doing nothing,
immediately there is an answer, all right?
But now in California
they are made like this,
if a mosquito bites they will call 911 (Laughter).
Yes that’s how it is.
In this state you don’t ask.
So right now
if… this is an existential question,
this is not a small question.
You don’t know who you are, is it a small problem?
Hmm?
It is a fundamental problem, isn't it?
And you are getting up and introducing yourself,
where you…
Bengal you’ve come from and everything
and now you are asking the question,
the question has not matured yet.
If you stood up and
you could not ask question and tears came to you,
I would have answered this question completely differently.
But now it’s a joke so
I am joking with you.
Is that okay?
Hmm?
Question is there,
it’s a good thing the question is there
but the question needs sharpness to penetrate.
It still doesn’t have enough intensity
that it can penetrate something.
It’s right now a casual question.
So right now
I can tell you something,
who you are
but it’s not in your experience.
If I tell you something which is not in your experience,
what can you do?
You can believe it
or you can disbelieve it.
If you believe it
you are not any closer to it,
if you disbelieve it
you are not any closer to it.
If you believe me
you can go and tell some fancy positive story.
If you disbelieve me,
you can go and tell some negative story about me.
But you have not moved an inch, isn't it?
So if you genuinely,
if this question is burning is within you,
if tonight if this question bothers you so much
you cannot sleep,
you cannot sit, you cannot stand,
if it bothers you like that,
then you come,
I’ll give you something else.
Something totally different (Applause).