Meditation and Spirituality

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Meditation and Spirituality

Robert Thurman: I’m very happy to be here with you and understand that you have had wonderful experiences and also that you are helping many people with great compassion and kindness, which to me is the highest qualification, so I’m delighted to be here with you.

Sadhguru: Thank you.

Robert Thurman: Absolutely. Even today, there’s a way of saying that nations themselves are losing their power to these multinational things that are bigger, like these oil companies, particularly, and military companies, that are bigger than any nation actually and the nations are bidding to have their business and terrified and they don’t want to pay taxes to any nation and then the nations cannot control them.

Sadhguru: For America, one big possibility is right now if your trousers are torn at the knee, the whole world has their trousers torn at the knee. I’m saying in some way America has become a leader in many ways, so if my intention is if you can get America to meditate, the whole world might meditate.

Robert Thurman: I agree. Sure. Absolutely. If they meditate, of course, on the right thing. Unfortunately, there are some people meditate … I know a lot of people who meditate on the wrong thing, in the sense that they don’t learn anything about displacing the ego at first, before meditating.

Sadhguru: No, what I would say is if the meditation is a good tool if it is given properly. That is the job of the meditation, to transform the human being.

Robert Thurman: Yeah, sure.

Sadhguru: If it leaves him untransformed, obviously they did not get the right thing that’s all.

Robert Thurman: Exactly. Well, anyway, we have in Indian Buddhist teaching they say it’s wisdom that enables you to achieve … [foreign language 00:02:00] that enables you to achieve enlightenment and there are three levels of that wisdom. The wisdom borne of learning, the wisdom borne of critical reflection, and then finally wisdom borne of meditation.

Sadhguru: Without the learning and the critical reflection, the third story of the building, which is the meditation one, might not go in the right direction is the idea, but I know some meditation teacher, one particular one who I won’t say who, but we were having that discussion once and he said, “If meditation is the third story, I’m going to build the third story on the ground.”

He didn’t want the first two stories of the learning and the critical reflection.

I don’t have the first two stories.

What?

I don’t have the first two stories. I only have the third floor.

That’s what he said. That’s right. He doesn’t want them.

See-

Americans like that because Americans spend 20 years in school and learn a lot of things, but since they didn’t learn the deeper things about their spirituality, it didn’t really help them. It just makes them more nervous.

That means they’re not meditating.

What?

That means they’re not meditating.

Exactly. Good.

If they’re truly meditative, it is a self-transforming process. The moment we start seeing something as good and bad, then it all comes … You know, in this country, there are certain parts of the nation always talking about good guys and bad guys. The moment you speak about good and bad, you divide the world and if you really come down to what is the definition of good and bad, it all amounts to what I do is good, what you do is bad.

No, no, no.

That is how-

That I-

In the world, that’s how it works out.

What?

When we divide the world into good and bad, my side is good and your side is bad. That’s how it will work out in the world.

My side is bad. I’m bad. I’m happy to admit to being bad. I’m not trying to say I’m good, but I do think love is good and hatred is bad. There’s no doubt. Hatred is not good. Love is good, but I don’t say I’m loving. I’m quite bad. I lose my temper all the time and cranky. My wife has to straighten me out often, so I’m not saying that, but I think there are practical level … Ultimate level, when you transcend everything, you can say beyond it, perhaps yourself, Sadhguru, but for us ordinary people, love is good and hate is bad. Non-violence is good and violence is bad.

We agree about that. I mean, everybody thinks that. Don’t you think … If you see someone doing something mean and angry, you’re not happy with that.

The question is not about if love is good or something else is bad. The question is just about is it an inclusive process or an exclusive process. Today, everything is about being exclusive. Whatever you see, it’s about being exclusive. We build a whole society on exclusivity and then we talk about love and love love all the time because we’ve built clear cut walls and try love across the wall.

Well, Sadhguru, I have to say inclusive is good, exclusive is bad.

No, it is …

I’m just kidding. I’m teasing.

I get you. I’m not being teased. What I want you to understand is the important thing is inclusive is not an idea. Inclusive is the nature of life. Exclusive is an idea. Individual peoples idea of exclusivity is there, but as we sit here, what the trees are exhaling, you’re inhaling. What you’re exhaling, they’re inhaling, and we’re all sharing this air.

The nature of life is inclusiveness. It’s not my concept or your concept. Meditation is about becoming one with life within, not what you gather in your mind. If you become one with what is here, inclusiveness is a natural way of being. Not as a concept, not as an ideology, not as a belief system, but as life is. Being in tune with life.

That sounds good. I mean, it doesn’t sound bad. I don’t want to say good because it might … I don’t want to be exclusive to bad. That’s nice, Sadhguru.