Pod Insights Tetragrammaton with Rick Rubin Sri Sri Ravi Shankar About this episode 'Gurudev' Sri Sri Ravi Shankar is a spiritual leader, humanitarian, and peace ambassador. In 1981, he founded the Art of Living Foundation, introducing meditation, yoga, and the Sudarshan Kriya breathing technique through programs now offered in more than 180 countries. In 1997, he co-founded the International Association for Human Values to support humanitarian and peacebuilding initiatives. He has participated in conflict-resolution efforts in regions including Colombia, Iraq, Kashmir, and Côte d'Ivoire, while speaking at institutions such as the United Nations, the World Economic Forum, and the European Parliament. He is also the author of numerous books on meditation, spirituality, and personal well-being, including An Intimate Note to the Sincere Seeker.
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Transcript Speaker names marked ? are inferred from speaking time and the show’s known hosts — they are not voice-verified.
0:24 Speaker 00 This planet always had some peaceful places, peaceful times.
0:32 Speaker 00 It's not that the whole planet was being disturbed at one point of time. Maybe during Covid, even then, there were places where there has been peace. Like there is day somewhere on the earth and night somewhere else. Like that peace and disturbance have been part of this existence from a long time.
0:57 Speaker 00 In the recorded history, I hear about just 285 years were without any war or recorded conflicts. But conflicts are also part of life.
1:12 Rick Rubin? Is sitting practice the best thing that we can do is that number one?
1:19 Speaker 00 Sitting, meditation is essential. I would say it's essential. Once you are well into practices, if you have practiced meditation for a long period of time, then whether you lie down, you are walking, you are talking, that serenity or meditation goes with you. It stays with you.
1:46 Rick Rubin? So if you practice enough, the feeling permeates you all the time?
1:50 Speaker 00 Absolutely. It's just your vibration turns into that space and then you create joy. You don't say, “Oh, this is bringing me joy,” but you are the source of joy.
2:04 Rick Rubin? Do you feel that from the practice you've done and from the state that you're in, that you can see a change in people when you're with them?
2:15 Speaker 00 Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. It's obvious.
2:18 Rick Rubin? How has your relationship to practice changed over the course of your life?
2:23 Speaker 00 Well, from my childhood, I have been in this sort of space, which I have from a very young age.
2:33 Speaker 00 So, it's not just some moment that happened that I completely shifted, nothing like that.
2:42 Speaker 00 But of course, I took some silence retreats and I myself went into silence for 10 days. And then when I came out of silence, I started teaching, then the breathing technique came. Those things happened, but meditation was like fish to water for me, natural.
3:01 Rick Rubin? Tell me about the benefits of being in silence.
3:06 Speaker 00 You know, it consolidates yourself in ways that you can't even explain. You know, you'll be able to hear the noise in your own mind. And then, you know, the mind becomes like a laser beam, very sharp and focused. So, it's very beneficial. I would say silence is the mother of all creativity. See, suppose you want to write a music or write some lyrics, or a poem or anything, you need a quiet place, right? You can't come up with a creative idea in a noisy place.
3:47 Rick Rubin? No.
3:47 Speaker 00 See, now you are in a beautiful, quiet place. So that your creativity finds an expression. And so silence is necessary for creative, productive activity.
4:03 Rick Rubin? What would be a suggestion for those who have trouble being in silence and feel they're not comfortable being with themselves?
4:12 Speaker 00 Yeah, that would happen. That's why you need a teacher.
4:16 Rick Rubin? Yeah.
4:16 Speaker 00 Someone who is experienced, who can just hand-hold you through that journey. See, even to learn swimming, you need a coach. If you know that there is a lifeguard standing on the swimming pool, you would just jump without any fear or anxiety. So, same way, silence for the first time may be rattling. It may be very confusing.
4:45 Speaker 00 So if there is a person who has experienced the deep silence and is sitting with you, it becomes so easy for you to get into that silent space.
4:56 Rick Rubin? Beautiful.
4:57 Speaker 00 Because we are all just energies and we transfer energy with each other, we exchange. So silence is also one such high-volt energy that can bring about transformation in people's life. Yeah.
5:15 Speaker 00 More than word silence can be, it's a lot.
5:19 Rick Rubin? Really?
5:19 Speaker 00 Yeah. I don't speak much.
5:26 Rick Rubin? Would you recommend that most people starting off meditate for the same amount of time? Or is it different for different people?
5:35 Speaker 00 Yeah, a general thing is about 20 minutes, half an hour. It's good to begin with, yeah. It's not the amount of time, but it's the intensity with the meditation moves in you. That's more important.
5:50 Rick Rubin? Have you noticed the difference in the outcome when someone meditates by themselves versus meditating together in a big group of people?
5:59 Speaker 00 Oh yeah, they have qualitative differences there. They both are needed for an individual. Sometimes a group meditation and that can uplift our spirit, our energy, our field. It creates a field of magnetic energy that makes it easy for you to go deep in. And other times, it's good to be by yourself and meditate alone. They both have their own benefits and both are necessary.
6:30 Rick Rubin? Are there many opportunities to meditate with other people?
6:34 Speaker 00 Oh yeah. We do create in Art of Living, we have full moon meditations, we have group meditations very often.
6:43 Rick Rubin? Beautiful.
6:44 Speaker 00 Almost everywhere. We open our meditation session to everyone to come and join.
6:51 Rick Rubin? Tell me about Vedic astrology.
6:56 Speaker 00 Vedic astrology is one of the most ancient astrology. I mean, you know, it's startling to see how to the minute and second, the calculation that was done from thousands of years ago, holds good even for today. If you have seen the Vedic Almanac, they call it the Panchang, exact time of eclipse, exact time of transition of planets, all are calculated and mentioned, are given. And so, the mathematics in that is so exact, and so also the knowledge that comes about,
7:39 Speaker 00 predictions and the nature of a person. Astrology gives you a roadmap, it's like a GPS of life. It should not be mistaken as a fatalistic science. It's not fatalistic, it is futuristic. It gives you an opportunity, tells you what all you can do, what all your possibilities, what would be the pitfalls that may be. So, it helps one to manage and steer your life through that.
8:16 Rick Rubin? Do you have any idea how they figured it out?
8:20 Speaker 00 You know, this is all part of the Vedic wisdom, the knowledge, which was all downloaded, actually it's not someone who received, who wrote by their intellect, but something that they recognized, that came to them in vision, that came to them as a premonition or... In the modern language, you can say they downloaded it. So, Vedic astrology and also same with Ayurveda. Just imagine, so long back ago, they could see which herb and what are the combinations which would suit for a particular part of your body. What's good for your liver or kidney or spleen or pancreas.
9:05 Speaker 00 I mean, this is startling science.
9:09 Speaker 00 The research, if you go on research also, it may take you maybe several centuries to find out all this. Wow. Materia medica. And it's all in poems. Most interesting is the only materia medica which is in poetry form is in Ayurveda. So, from the Vedic wisdom, there are four subordinate Vedas. In that comes Ayurveda and Vastu. About architecture, about music. How different sounds can impact your moods. This is on Gandharva Veda. And then on the subordinate limb, and the limbs of Vedas, you have Jyotish, the astrology.
9:53 Speaker 00 So in astrology, it's deeply connected with mantras, sounds. And what sound vibration would dilify what negative impact for you? And what are the impact of the macrocosm and the microcosm? So this connection between the microcosm and macrocosm is so well explained in astrology.
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12:40 Rick Rubin? How different does a mantra function if it's sung out loud versus if it's repeated internally?
12:51 Speaker 00 Certain mantras are good to repeat inside. It has to be kept within yourself when you get initiation. These mantras are helpful in taking your mind deep into meditation. Otherwise, there's a lot, many other mantras which you're chanting loud and listening to them. They create a feel of vibration. That's good, that's good.
13:18 Rick Rubin? Can you remember the first time you had a feeling of transcendence?
13:25 Speaker 00 As I said, you know, it was there for me from very, very childhood. So, I couldn't pinpoint one time, "Oh, I had this wow experience."
13:36 Rick Rubin? How did you come to it in childhood?
13:39 Speaker 00 We were here many lifetimes before, you know?
13:44 Rick Rubin? Did you seek it out, or was it given to you?
13:50 Speaker 00 As far as I remember, I never sought for anything. And I, you know, I didn't go searching for anything.
13:58 Rick Rubin? Were your family members also practitioners?
14:02 Speaker 00 Yeah, of course. My mother is a mother, my parents. It was in the family, the mantras and the puja, they were all doing. They were quite, in that sense, quite steeped in it.
14:20 Rick Rubin? I read that early in life, you spent some time with Maharishi.
14:23 Speaker 00 Yes.
14:23 Rick Rubin? Can you tell me about that?
14:25 Speaker 00 It was so wonderful that in my young age, in my teenage, I spent my time with all great saints and sejas of India. Now that I'm older, now I'm spending time with young people.
14:41 Speaker 00 Yeah. Maharishi was such a wonderful being to be with him. For something, yeah.
14:51 Rick Rubin? How would you say the different saints of that period of time were similar and different from each other?
14:59 Speaker 00 You know, there is one common thread between everyone of them. That is wisdom and serenity and love, and that was it. But their expressions were different.
15:12 Speaker 00 So many had different type of expression. Maharishi was very scientific outlook and he was very sensitive to the Western society and Western needs. And there are others who are very traditional and different, yeah. But it's more than what one speaks, it's the vibration.
15:35 Rick Rubin? I see.
15:36 Speaker 00 It's a vibration. That's, that's something nobody can deny, and it's so beautiful, yeah.
15:42 Rick Rubin? Are the new discoveries different understandings of ancient practices? Or they're actually new methods?
15:51 Speaker 00 You know, Lord Krishna says, you know, "The ancient path is like a walkway, is like a trail." You know, trail sometimes gets covered, but then, when you clear the trail, it is both new and old.
16:09 Rick Rubin? I see.
16:11 Speaker 00 So, nature reveals itself to, you know, time to time what is needed for that time. And everyone else is just an instrument for nature to play its game.
16:22 Rick Rubin? How important is spending time in nature?
16:26 Speaker 00 One has to be within one's own nature, one's true nature. And of course, everything is part of nature only. You must realize that.
16:39 Rick Rubin? I know that when I spend time on the beach, with the ocean, I feel different than the nature of a big city.
16:48 Speaker 00 Yeah, that's, that's fine. You may feel that way. But a point comes in life where nothing makes a difference to you, wherever you are, whatever you are doing. Even the most noisy place can sound musical to you. If your mind is in, in the self, if you are centered, noisy place also doesn't matter to you. And if you are disturbed, even this so beautiful, nice place also will be very disturbing and lonely. So it all depends on us, how we feel, how the feelings come around.
17:31 Rick Rubin? Tell me about the art of living training.
17:35 Speaker 00 Art of living is just seeing life from a broader perspective in context of time and space.
17:46 Speaker 00 And learning about the seven layers, we are a little bit knowledge about seven layers. The body, breath, mind, intellect, memory, ego, and then the self that is, which is beyond the ego. So, a little bit understanding, a glimpse of these, but bring a huge transformation. And this we do with the little breathing techniques and a little bit of meditation and all that together. And some techniques, you know, of broadening our consciousness, our awareness. And it has helped people all over the world, yeah.
18:28 Speaker 00 I, I only see this as a, as a gift that has come to this generation, which does not have so much time or patience to pursue any spiritual practices, you know. These people are in such a hurry, they have to do so many things. They want everything very quick. And this is something in a short period of time opens up those doors and removes the cobwebs around the mind, which causes so much anxiety, tension, sleeplessness and all that. So physically it is helping. We have number of programs. And first, this is a basic program is one thing.
19:11 Speaker 00 Because like in our days, we used to spend many years to learn something. A spiritual journey was not one or two days matter. It's for months together you have to do the practices. So today, nobody has neither patience nor the time or resources. So they need things in a short form. So a little bit glimpse into it. What, what would help them to be healthy, happy here is the basic programs we do. And then for advanced seekers, then you have, take them through a four-day, five-day silence retreat.
19:54 Speaker 00 And then deeper, you know, on as programs on at various levels, where you get the ability to bless others. You get so centered, and then you become a blesser. You will be able to help people, to heal them from their physical ailments, mental traumas, and bring a smile on others' face. And it's very gratifying for people. And when you are able to be of help to people around you, you feel such a sense of purpose in life and satisfaction. This is what people are looking for, you see? If you ask people, everyone says, "What is the purpose of my life?" Life becomes really meaningless
20:39 Speaker 00 if it is only self-centered. But if our life is useful to everybody, you don't even feel the time.
20:47 Rick Rubin? For most people, even the glimpse is enough to change their lives, would you say?
20:53 Speaker 00 Oh, yeah, yeah, of course. See, we are teaching this program in the prisons around the world. More than 800,000 prisoners around the world have undergone the program. And you must listen to their experiences, their testimonies. It just moves you. And same with the inner-city gang members and the antisocial people who were, people used to go with their guns and keep shooting. Those sort of people with criminal and tendencies, violent tendencies, there are huge change
21:36 Speaker 00 in their whole outlook towards life. These are some of the very important things that indicate to us, "Look, the knowledge can bring transformation." Just a little bit of knowledge is good enough to bring a beautiful change in life.
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23:34 Rick Rubin? Would you say you're the same person you were when you were a child?
23:39 Speaker 00 Yeah, keep saying that I am a child who refuses to grow up. Do you know English is more close to Sanskrit than other languages, Hindi or other languages?
23:52 Rick Rubin? I didn't know that.
23:53 Speaker 00 Yeah. It will be startling the months, names of the month. That's all in English. They are on Sanskrit actually.
24:01 Rick Rubin? Really?
24:02 Speaker 00 You are to you are saying December, you are saying October and then November, December these months we say they are all Sanskrit names. This Ambhar means the tenth sky. Ambhar means sky. Dash means ten. Dashambhar means tenth sky. November means ninth sky. October means eighth sky. September. Sapta Ambhar, seventh sky. So, March was supposed to be the new year, the spring. So, March is new first year. February is the fagend of the year. The last month of the year. So, new year should begin in March actually.
24:48 Speaker 00 With the spring solitude.
24:51 Rick Rubin? So, spring is actually when the cycle starts?
24:54 Speaker 00 When the cycle starts, exactly. That was like that till 500 years back when a king of England decided to have the new year celebrated in January because he was born in January. And then, see, all the verbs that we have in English like go. It's Sanskrit, Gama. Gaba means go. Kacha is go. Organs of the body, hand, heart, hastha. Nasika, nose. Danta, dental.
25:32 Speaker 00 Heart, hirdaya. You see, English is eighty percent in Sanskrit.
25:37 Rick Rubin? Wow, it's an unknown fact. It's very interesting.
25:41 Speaker 00 Yeah, like daughter, in Hindi, daughter means beti. But in Sanskrit is duhita. Duhita is close to daughter, not beti. Like sutta, son. Beta is so far away from Sanskrit, beta in Hindi. So, if you compare Hindi and English, English is more close to Sanskrit.
26:03 Rick Rubin? Wow, and Sanskrit's older, yes?
26:05 Speaker 00 Older, yeah, much older.
26:08 Rick Rubin? Wow, I wonder how that came to be?
26:09 Speaker 00 Yeah, swasa, sister.
26:13 Speaker 00 So, I mean, I can go on and on and on. Sanskrit is not foreign to English. Sanskrit is the mother of English language.
26:21 Rick Rubin? Wow.
26:23 Speaker 00 So, anyone who is thinking Sanskrit is a foreign language,
26:25 Rick Rubin? Yes.
26:26 Speaker 00 you are making a blunder. Because you are disowning your own mother.
26:30 Rick Rubin? Wow.
26:30 Speaker 00 The mother of English is Sanskrit.
26:33 Rick Rubin? Tell me about physical practice and breath work.
26:37 Speaker 00 We have the three dimensions. The physical body and then the breath, the prana, and then the mind. So, breath work or prana is the link between the mind and the body. So, doing breathing exercise is a way to have a say over the mind and the body also. So, it's very useful and very helpful. The first act of our life is we took a deep breathing. Then we started crying. We couldn't cry without the breath in, right? The last act of life is we breathe out.
27:19 Speaker 00 So, throughout the life, we keep breathing, but we never pay attention to our breath. So, for every emotion, there is a particular rhythm in the breath. This is what I've been talking like the last half a century. How breath is so important to have a say over your mind. And it's a way for your spirit to, expression of our spirit. And the breathing exercise can enhance the vibrations in your body and in your mind. And that is what consciousness is all about. Consciousness is just the vibrations.
28:04 Speaker 00 And it doesn't take too much time to learn about it. Just a few hours, you can learn about different rhythms of the breath and what impact it has in what part of the body. See, when you are happy, you breathe different. When you are upset, you breathe different. So, if you are in a bad mood, you don't have to wait for time to turn around. Your breath can help you to get out of your bad mood in no time. So, it's one of the ignored dimension.
28:38 Speaker 00 That's what we are bringing up in our kapalini.
28:42 Speaker 00 We're giving prominence, making people aware how important it is.
28:47 Rick Rubin? I imagine the speed of the breath, how fast, how deep, and where you place it in the body.
28:54 Speaker 00 Yeah, there is rhythm in the breath. When you're happy, your inhalation is deeper and exhalation is not so deep. When you're frustrated, your exhalation is prominent. And there are rhythms in the breath, if you observe. And the breath changes from the left nostril to right nostril. There is a lot about it. And even knowing a little bit about our breath can help us to be more independent. Independent of our own emotions, our, you know, physical comfort or discomfort. We'll be able to manage many things. Heat or cold and,
29:39 Speaker 00 you know, how to feel warm from inside, how to feel that. Yeah, there are many, many possibilities out there.
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31:25 Rick Rubin? Have the Vedic teachings been continually practiced from thousands of years ago till today?
31:34 Speaker 00 Yes, yes. But it was kept as a guarded secret with very few people. They would only share it with, you know, people who are really ethical or whom they see that they are fit to be given knowledge. Maybe some royalties were given. But you know, I thought, you know, it's the other way around. We can make people fit and more moral and ethically strong by teaching them this.
32:06 Rick Rubin? Yes.
32:06 Speaker 00 So I am a little bit of a rebel in that direction. I said, whatever traditional knowledge is there, it should be available for everyone on the planet. Every human being is a right over them.
32:21 Speaker 00 That's my view from the very beginning. So I wanted people to have that.
32:27 Rick Rubin? So there was a time it was more like a secret knowledge?
32:31 Speaker 00 Yes, it was always guarded as a secret knowledge. Because there are chances for people misusing it.
32:37 Rick Rubin? Because it's very powerful?
32:38 Speaker 00 Powerful knowledge.
32:40 Rick Rubin? Over the course of your lifetime, how have you seen the acceptance of spiritual practices change?
32:49 Speaker 00 Oh yeah, big way. Forty-five years back, it was not the same. The mainstream people thought, oh, this practices meditation, this must be a little... Maybe some cuckoo or something.
33:05 Rick Rubin? Yeah.
33:05 Speaker 00 They would not think that it is a mainstream narration. But today it's different. And you know, last year, hundred and ninety-two countries came together to declare World Meditation Day.
33:21 Rick Rubin? Wow.
33:22 Speaker 00 This has never happened in United Nations. Of course, ten years back, they did World Yoga Day, twenty-first June. But last year, specifically meditation was taken as a very serious thing. And when I led the meditation in United Nations, the Secretary General, he said this, you know, Gurudev, we need this before every negotiation. When people meditate, they become calm and they're able to listen to others. Our perception, our observation, our expression, all improves through meditation. And that's why I feel it's very important today
34:04 Speaker 00 to bring a robust mental health in our society. This has been a very big issue. Perhaps you may also have never heard about bipolar schizophrenia when you were all young, right?
34:19 Rick Rubin? No.
34:19 Speaker 00 I had never heard about these words.
34:20 Rick Rubin? No.
34:22 Speaker 00 You know, when I went to school and college, we never heard about bipolar or schizophrenia. Today, people take pride in taking the antidepressants. That is so surprising. People think, oh, say I'm taking Prozac. I mean, that shows the mental health issue is a very big issue in the world.
34:47 Speaker 00 Now, these practices will help you to get out of those mental health challenges. And you don't need to take medications. Even to sleep well, you need today... Sleep has become an abnormal function. To make it normal, you have to consume sleeping pills. If you meditate, do the breathing techniques, our sky techniques, Sudha Shankriyan, you have very good sleep, you have very good alertness. And another thing, the modern day life is about the mindfulness. People talk a lot of mindfulness.
35:30 Speaker 00 The mindfulness is, I would say, is just the parkway to your home, it's just the portico of the house, it's not the house. Mindfulness is a product, a by-product of meditation. If you practice mindfulness too much, it causes more tension to you. It is doing something. Mindfulness is keeping your mind alert. And this is a lot of effort. This is strenuous on our mind and brain, actually. Meditation is just the opposite, it just relaxes you. It gives you deepest rest, so that when you come out of meditation,
36:14 Speaker 00 mindfulness is already there with you. Natural, it's not an imposed, practiced one. It is a natural outcome in your life. You are very mindful, you are very aware of everything. But that should be the by-product of meditation.
36:34 Rick Rubin? Would you describe meditation as an active or passive process?
36:40 Speaker 00 It's an active-passive process. It's an activity in the sense you have to sit and do it. It is passive in the sense you let it happen, because you let go of doing anything or everything. When you let go, meditation happens to you.
37:00 Rick Rubin? So is the active part really about letting go of everything else?
37:06 Speaker 00 The active part is wanting to do and sit for meditation.
37:12 Speaker 00 And let go.
37:13 Rick Rubin? Yes. Tell me about the different kinds of meditation. There's guided meditation, body scans, mantra meditations, focusing on a candle, focusing on breath, focusing on sensations in the body. Do they do different things?
37:32 Speaker 00 Yeah, yeah, there are, there are as many as hundred and twelve different types of meditation techniques. What technique you do is not that important. You have to do the technique correctly. You know, many times people do the body scanning. It's good if it remains to body scanning. But then they take them on an imagination, imaginative drive.
37:56 Speaker 00 And they say, "Oh, imagine you are on the beach. You are holding the hand of someone very dear to you." No, suppose you have two persons who are very dear to you. You have two kids. Then your mind starts working, "Whose hand am I holding?"
38:10 Rick Rubin? Yeah, it becomes work.
38:12 Speaker 00 It becomes a mental gymnastics. So the mental gymnastics, we should not do it. That becomes a strain on you. And then you say, "Oh, imagine there is a blue light coming." Well, that's an effort. But if you say, "Just take your attention to your right foot, a right thumb," that is easy.
38:36 Rick Rubin? Simple.
38:37 Speaker 00 Simple. So, non-imaginative, gentle scanning is what we call yognitra. That is good, it's good to do. But then there are meditation with mantra meditations. You take an initiation from a teacher of your mantra. And then the teacher will tell you how to use the mantra, how to take it. That's, that's very good too. And guided meditations are very good also in the group. Many times, if you are not able to meditate on your own, guided meditation is very comforting and takes you deeper.
39:17 Speaker 00 So, any meditation is okay. But the thing is, you, you need to know that the goal of all meditation is to be nothing, to get into the space where you are simply energy and you are just love.
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41:54 Rick Rubin? Would you say that the root of all conflicts is the same?
42:02 Speaker 00 No, there could be many causes for conflict. But there can be one answer, that is getting back to your true self and seeing the conflict as just a stepping stone for where you want to be.
42:21 Rick Rubin? If both sides of a conflict meditate, the chances of them finding resolution are better, yes?
42:27 Speaker 00 Oh yeah, yeah. Even if one side meditates also, they get the skill how to manage and get over the conflict, yeah.
42:38 Rick Rubin? Tell me about the meditation in prison. How does it come to be? And is there a resistance initially to doing it?
42:46 Speaker 00 Oh yeah, whether inside prison or outside, there has been resistance in people to do. But once they know it, when they do it, when they are guided through it, they love it. In conflicting zones like Iraq, when they're after war, or also in Colombia, in Sri Lanka, in many of these areas, we have done programs for the people. There you don't talk about peace, people are only looking for justice. As I say, you are fighting for justice, yeah, you must. But for fighting also, you need energy.
43:28 Speaker 00 If you are shaken from inside, you have no energy to fight, right? So the strength comes to you when you go deep inside. Once you go inside, your mind becomes much more clearer. Then your hatred disappears.
43:46 Speaker 00 Every child who has come into this planet have come as a bundle of joy. So, if you see through my eyes, there is no bad guys on earth.
43:57 Speaker 00 They are bad because of their environment, or their education, or lack of it, or the circumstances that they got into, or lack of opportunity to know how to manage their own emotions. All these causes them to be who they are. So, if we remove this veil of ignorance from them, you find them like what they were as a child, a bundle of joy with bubbling enthusiasm. So, inside every culprit, there is a victim crying for help. And we need to heal them.
44:39 Speaker 00 Once the victim is healed, culprit disappears. The people who are engaged in crimes are all these people who do antisocial with burglars, and those who, you know, walk around with a gun, and random shooting, and mindless killings. They all need help. They were not born into this world as such. They were all misled, misunderstood, mistreated, and misinformed, and miseducated, ill-educated.
45:18 Rick Rubin? You said "remove the ignorance", you didn't say "educate", you said "remove the ignorance", which implies they already know, we all already know.
45:30 Speaker 00 Correct. The veil need to be removed.
45:32 Rick Rubin? Yes.
45:33 Speaker 00 The curtain, the veil which is, you know, shrouding the light that you are, need to be removed, that's all.
45:42 Rick Rubin? Yeah, and it sounds like the ignorance is the thing that was learned. And that's the thing that can be taken away to get back to the natural state.
45:51 Speaker 00 Correct.
45:53 Rick Rubin? I saw a video where you spoke about not being nice. You recommended not to be nice. I think it was about pleasantries.
46:01 Speaker 00 Yeah, yeah. Sometimes, you know, you get so stuck in being so pleasant and you're not so authentic then. So you don't have to be nice all the time. When you want to say the truth, you can say it.
46:18 Speaker 00 And you should see the reality as it is and express it as it is, without offending anybody. That's one thing. You don't have to be too nice, too goody-goody. At the same time, you don't need to be rude and offend others too. The truth can be unpleasant and still need not be bitter.
46:42 Rick Rubin? How has your education in physics informed your spiritual understanding?
46:48 Speaker 00 Well, education in physics keeps you very curious. It keeps your scientific temper and very objective in nature. As I see, it's always helpful. You know, the ancient Oriental philosophy, they never separated science from spirituality. They said they always came together, were together actually. Even if you see the Gita and the Vedas, they start with the 36 elements, that the first element is earth. You need to know earth, then water, then fire, then air, then ether, and then mind, intellect, memory, and then it goes on.
47:33 Speaker 00 Then finally, it says the Shiva Tatvada, Shiva Principle, the pure consciousness. So it's just an extension of each other. Spirituality is an extension of material science. A material science is very much a part of the spirit. So they can't exist one without that. This division, I find, is very artificial. It just makes us in compartments. A holistic outlook towards life.
48:10 Speaker 00 Body, mind and spirit. And that's what the modern sciences are. Now, today, the scientists are speaking about the consciousness. And every object has a consciousness. And what you see is not real. In 2022, three scientists got the Nobel Prize for declaring, “This is not real. This world is not real.” And this is what has been said from ages.
48:40 Rick Rubin? Yeah.
48:40 Speaker 00 That what you see is just permutation, combination of atoms. And it's not real. What is real is the wave function, the energy underneath it all. Because this is all changing. Everything will change. The non-changing aspect of existence is consciousness. That's what we are. Even in you, you know. Now, you have a white beard. Before, that was different. And as a young boy, you didn't even have beard. But there is something in you that's continuing. Though your body is undergoing changes, your thinking has changed, your emotions are changing.
49:22 Speaker 00 But something there is that has not changed over the years. And logging on to that something, I would call a spirituality. And that brings stability, strength, creativity and vibrance in life.
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