00:04:27
What You Know
Duration : 00:04:27
What matters in this life is what you know, not what you think.
A man once had a question about the Divine, and he went to a wise man and he said, “You’re a wise man. Tell me, where is the Divine?” So the wise man said, “Okay.” So he called his servant, and he said, “Bring me a big thing of salt.” The servant brought a big thing of salt. And he said, “Now bring me a bucket of water,” and he brought him a bucket of water.
He gave the salt to the man, and he said, “Now take this salt, put it in the bucket of water, and stir, stir, stir, stir, stir.” And he kept stirring; he kept stirring, stirring, stirring, stirring—till the salt disappeared. The wise man said, “Where is the salt? Has it disappeared? Is it gone?” And the man said, “Yeah, it’s gone!” He said, “No! Taste the water. It’s still there.”
The same thing with the Divine. The Divine that you search for is unsearchable, cannot be searched for. Do you know why? It’s already there. Closer than your nose! Closer than your fingertip, dissolved into this magnificent creation, everywhere—and in you too. In you too!
You’re trying to see that salt that was held in the guy’s hand once. It’s still there, but that’s not the way it is. But it’s still there.
When you, in your life, begin to understand the simplicity—not the complex. See, everybody has told you things; you never questioned them. You didn’t question. The people told you things; you didn’t question them. You just said, “Ahh, okay….”
And you went along like this all your life. And today, you’re here, and I’m going to challenge you. I absolutely am going to challenge you—on what you know and what you don’t know. And I am going to say to you, that what matters in this life is what you know, not what you think.
You touch something hot; you burn yourself. And what do you say? “Oh, I thought it was turned off.” Huh! So, tell your fingers that: “It’s okay. Don’t hurt. I was thinking the iron was turned off.”
Your finger says, “I don’t care what you thought. I don’t care what you thought. That iron was hot. And you, dum-dum, touched it—and now, I’m going to let you know you shouldn’t have done that.” This is how it is.
You’re not here to suffer—but suffering is there. You’re not here to suffer, but suffering is there. Choose that that will take you towards that beauty that is inside of you.
– Prem Rawat
00:02:21
The Song
Duration : 00:02:21
Start understanding that simplicity and the rhythm of that simplicity
Understand that you are the flute, and you are the flute player. You are the flute, and you are the flute player. But you are not the song. You would be the song too if you could control your breath, birth, and death. But you don’t.
Life is encapsulated in these two brackets: birth and death. Between these two, you are alive. So play in unison with the song. What is the song? The song is existence.
This breath that comes into you, this fountain that comes into you is the simplest of acts that happens. Nothing can be simpler; it’s the simplest of acts and yet so incredibly profound.
Start understanding that simplicity and the rhythm of that simplicity, and you will play the song—with the song, your tune. And what is the outcome? Hmm! The same outcome that a musician gets when he hits the note just right! It’s called fulfillment. Fulfillment.
– Prem Rawat
00:03:19
Prosperity on the Inside
Duration : 00:03:19
A person who prospers on the outside but not on the inside, that’s a house that’...
Do you know what today is to you? It’s the day that goes by too quickly—right?
People say, “I don’t have enough time during the day.” It’s not that you have enough time or not—because the days are exactly the same. It’s your wants, your wishes; they keep multiplying, multiplying, multiplying....
It is what takes you to the shop, “I want to see the dresses. Oh, yes, this blue one would look perfect.” You buy the blue one. By the time you get home, “I wish I would have bought the red one.”
How many of you have closets that are overfilled? Why? (Oh, me too, believe me.) But, yes! All these, all these, all these keep rotating and rotating, and the desires keep going: “The days get shorter.” Not the days get shorter; the desires get longer.
And all you have to do is then remember that which is important, that which will produce gratitude—not confusion and anger and fear and doubt—but gratitude, because a heart filled with gratitude will dance. And as a consequence, peace will reign in your kingdom. The drought will be gone, and prosperity will come.
There’s prosperity on the outside, and there’s prosperity on the inside. A person who prospers on the outside but not on the inside, that’s a house that’s going to fall one day. (Physics!) Termites, they eat the inside; then that house falls.
But when there is prosperity on the inside, then there will be prosperity on the outside. And when there’s prosperity on the inside and the outside, everything goes fine. Everything goes fine.
This is not about sacrifice. This is about discovery. This is not about confusion; this is about clarity. This is not about believing; this is about knowing—because that is the only way that peace will ever come to you—ever.
– Prem Rawat
00:05:41
Know Where You Are
Duration : 00:05:41
You will never live in tomorrow!
You see, my friends, you will never, ever live in tomorrow—ever! Never. And if you don’t believe me, stay up all night; watch your clock. And tonight at twenty-three fifty-nine, fifty-nine, when tomorrow will be precisely one second away, one second later it will have moved. What you thought was tomorrow would have become today.
Do you know you have been living in a very long “today?” Do you know that? It’s just been today! Every day that you are alive in—is today, today, today, and today. And then one day, no more day. But it’s today.
So, here is the problem. Is there a problem in thinking about tomorrow? No, of course not. What’s the problem, then? Well, the problem is, tomorrow has become the source of your hope—not today. So the problem is, the hope is coming tomorrow—and you’re stuck in today!
So it’s like, you keep asking for more gold, and it keeps coming in your neighbor’s house. You see the problem? You want it in your house, and your neighbor keeps getting richer. You asked for a great looking wife, and he has one. And you asked for a faithful dog—yours isn’t, but his is!
Hope should be coming from today! Do you know how to bring hope from today? It shouldn’t be licensed to tomorrow. It should be today.
Hope brings you joy! But if your hope is tied to tomorrow, which is not coming, so neither is your joy. Yeah, I’m just being logical. It’s a problem. It’s a real problem.
And this moment that you live in…. And it’s the same thing. You only live in one little sliver of all this time that we talk about, and it’s called “now.” And you’re stuck in now. You can’t go back, and you can’t go forward. You’re stuck in now. And do you have any idea what “now” is?
So, here are the problems. So, you see the problem? You have no idea where you are. You have no idea who you are; you have no idea where you are; you have no idea why you’re here.
And you have a map. You have a map. And the problem with the map is, you have no idea where you are on the map.
So when Socrates says, “Know thyself,” he may as well say, “You’d better know where you are on that map.” Because as soon as you know where you are on the map, you can choose to go anywhere on that map. But if you don’t know where you are on that map, how will you go anywhere? And here is the belief problem.
So, should you just believe, “I’m here”? It’s problematic. Navigation-wise, it’s a big problem.
So, this is the business of “present position.” This is the business of knowing where you are on that map. Who are you?
And if you want to traverse this ocean of life, please, this is supposed to be an enjoyable journey…not you drowning in it! This is supposed to be existence, the epitome of joy, the epitome of parties, the epitome of all that is possible—life. Life.
– Prem Rawat
00:03:36
Awakening
Duration : 00:03:36
Unless we know that we can make choices, it’s a lost cause!
Beautiful saying from Gandhi, “Eye for an eye, and the whole world will go blind.” That’s what I’m seeing! Eye for an eye— “He did this; you did this; you did this; you did this.” The world’s going blind! And that’s what will happen.
And you know, the incredible thing is this: it’s never too late. It’s never too late. It’s never too late. That’s what awakening is, in my opinion; in my experience, it’s never too late.
Whenever we, I, you as an individual…we make that choice…that the situation can change. Can! Can! If we can fight with such devastation, then we can also have peace with remarkable results.
Darkness does not have to have an identity; darkness does not have to have any identity. All it has to have is absence of light. And its demise happens, not by removal, but by presence of light. It’s that simple; it’s that simple.
Unless we know that we can make choices, it’s a lost cause! We need to know that we can make choices. And every day that is given to us—that we have in our life—is the day that we can make a choice, and it’s never too late to make the right choice. Make the choice—but you have to choose.
You know, this is what I—I’m saying it here: “All I want—like you have in your life, a dream—I too in my life have a dream.” This dream is a little different. This dream requires that I be awake to see its fulfillment, not asleep.
And the dream is that peace will be mankind’s finest achievement. Finest! That will be our finest hour. That will be our finest success. That will be the apex of civilization—that we have come together and made a difference, not only for ourselves, but for our future generations.
– Prem Rawat
