Sadhguru: Meditation is a phenomenal empowerment
that you can do whatever is needed in the world,
whatever, I mean that, and still remain untouched by
the process of activities that we need to conduct in the world.
If you sit here, your body is here,
your mind is there, who you are is little away.
This is the end of suffering, and this is meditativeness.
Sadhguru: Namaskaram.
Probably, the second most
repeated word, oft-repeated word,
in these last few weeks,
apart from corona virus, is meditation.
Everybody is suddenly, people who had never meditated in their lives,
never even considered that possibility, are now suddenly talking about meditation –
the need to meditate, wanting to meditate.
Let us examine this meditation, what this is?
First of all, what does the word "meditation" mean?
The English word "meditation" doesn't really mean anything,
in the sense, it doesn't say anything specific.
If anybody sits normally with their eyes closed,
it's assumed they must be meditating.
One can sit with their eyes closed and do many things.
You can do Japa, Tapa, Dharana, Dhyana, Samadhi, Shoonya, Samyama,
or you might have just mastered the art of sleeping in vertical postures.
So the word "meditation" in English language doesn't specify anything.
Generally we assume, or generally people assume that, meditation means Dhyana.
In Tamil Nadu, it's Dhyanam; if you go little north, it's Dhyana; if you go really up north, it's Dhyan.
If you go further up, it becomes Chan (Referring to Chinese word for meditation); if you go little more east, it becomes Zen.
Same thing.
So, what is this dimension
that we are trying to describe with this word "meditation"?
One fundamental thing that we need to understand is,
you cannot do meditation,
because meditation is a quality.
A quality is a consequence of a certain process.
You can initiate a process, you can conduct a process.
You cannot conduct a quality – quality is just a consequence.
It is like, you want...
flowers in your garden.
You don't sit there and do flower meditation.
You know what happened to the "flower people" (refers to "hippies," a subculture formed in San Francisco in the 1960s).
If you want flowers in your garden, you don't have to think flowers...
you have to think soil, manure, water, sunlight.
If you conduct this process of these ingredients properly,
flower and fruit is a consequence.
But today...
the world has become so goal-oriented.
Because they're so goal-oriented,
they are not interested in the soil,
definitely not interested in the manure, and all the other things,
but they want flowers and fruit.
If you want flowers without soil, manure, water and sunlight,
well, you will have to settle for plastic flowers.
Plastic flowers are very wonderful.
Those who think of utility, it serves you in many different ways.
It comes with a five-year guarantee.
Flowers are a nuisance (Laughs).
If you keep flowers in your house,
you have to look at them, at least five times in a day, what's happening.
Are they thriving well or not?
But if you keep plastic flowers in your home, five years guarantee...
unlike your life.
If you're alive, there is so much to do,
you even have to dodge the virus, invisible virus.
But the dead only have to be preserved. So essentially,
the dimension and the process that you're referring to as meditation,
is very life-oriented.
When I say life-oriented, today largely
you're material-oriented, or, at the most, mind-oriented,
maybe emotion-oriented, or physical body, which is a material, again.
Largely life has become like this. People's idea of life is,
if someone says "my life," (Laughs)
you're supposed to understand, they're talking about their job,
they're talking about the economic condition in the country or in the world,
about their car, maybe about their dog, sometimes about their husbands or wives.
It could be anything. But, the only thing that's truly life,
is what is throbbing in this (Referring to oneself) – this is life.
Rest are arrangements that we have made, hoping
that these arrangements will allow us to enhance our life.
Whether it's education, career,
relationships, marriage, children, wealth,
whatever – all these things one is after,
only in the hope that it will enhance our life.
As you know, most people, instead of enhancing their life,
largely get entangled with these accessories.
Accessories have become larger than the life process.
Well, I think (Laughs), in a very cruel way,
the virus is bringing focus on the life.
You suddenly understand
your expensive home has become a prison.
Your expensive car is as good as junk,
because you can't drive it, at least for some time.
And right now, the world is in a situation where we do not know how long,
how long will it take before you're back on the road and swing around a little bit in your automobile.
You do not know. So now naturally, a whole lot of people
are asking all over the world, how to meditate, what should I do?
As I said, you cannot meditate, but you can become meditative, because it's a quality.
If one cultivates their body, mind, emotion
and energies to a certain level of maturity,
you will be naturally meditative twenty-four hours of the day.
Meditation is not an impairment,
that if you're meditative, you have to close your eyes and be limited to one place.
Meditation is a phenomenal empowerment that
you can do whatever is needed in the world, whatever, I mean that.
Whatever is needed in the given situation,
and still remain untouched by the process of activities
that we need to conduct in the world.
This empowerment, or without this empowerment,
in fact, a human being is crippled, because
if what you have to think, feel, understand, and act in the world
is going to rub off on you in such a big way,
naturally you will hesitate to do what is needed.
Naturally, you will avoid doing things that need to be done.
In a way, the moment you are in a state where
your own activity and the activity of the world around you,
and the activity of your mind and your emotion,
once they're impacting you every moment of your life,
then, in some way, you will cripple yourself, because
naturally you would want to keep the scale of your life very limited,
because activity, thought, emotion, involvement with life
can cause enormous amount of suffering.
Once there is fear of suffering, knowingly or unknowingly,
you will limit the scope and possibilities of your life.
Meditation means just this, in a very simple way if we have to put it,
if you sit here, your body is here,
your mind is there, who you are is little away from these two dimensions
of physical body and mental accumulations.
These two accumulations of body and mind, if a little space arises between you and this,
this is the end of suffering, and this is meditativeness.
Isha Kriya is an extremely simple process, but a powerful tool.
These three ingredients: your breath, your thought, and your awareness,
in the right combination, if you use them,
your ability to use the mind and the body is so greatly enhanced,
that you almost look superhuman for somebody else.
But I'm telling you, this is human, this is not about being superhuman.
This is about realizing being human, is super.