Sadhguru on the Lost Concept of Heaven

No, today we have come to this place where if you want to be peaceful, you need a chemical. You want to be joyful, you need a chemical. You want to be healthful, you need a chemical. Well, you want to be ecstatic, of course there is a chemical. Right. So what is the consequence of this? Why this is happening? One thing is in this generation, one thing that's happened in people's minds is the heaven has collapsed in people's minds. The heaven? Yes. How so? See, I've been talking to people, fifty years ago if I spoke to people, and I asked how many of you want to go to heaven, almost eighty percent would raise their hands. Today you go to your university and ask them how many of you want to go to heaven, they'll say, hehehehehehehehehehehehehehehehe. They think it's a ridiculous question. Alright, nobody will raise their hand. So in their minds, heaven has collapsed, there's no place to go. So they want to do it everything here. Alright. So they have not found how to be joyful and ecstatic within themselves. So chemical usage, initially it became alcohol, then it became chemicals, it's getting stronger and stronger. And you know, so many people dying of those things every day and illnesses, and it's costing a nation and the world a lot. It's not just in one country, it's going across the world. Law enforcement agencies may be controlling it a little bit, but they can never control it totally because the consumption is mass-based. It is more people maybe consuming these things than people eating bread. It's becoming like that. So this whole movement, where it's going means if you do not raise human consciousness, if you do not teach people how to sit here feeling absolutely blissed out within yourself by your own nature, because this human mechanism is the most sophisticated chemical factory. If you are a good CEO, you would produce the chemicals that will give you fantastic experience. If you're a lousy CEO, you're giving yourself a bad experience. Now you're buying chemicals from outside to fix that, alright? So essentially, you're a bad manager of your own system. You're not taken charge of this. Why has that happened? Because your education, your society is talking about conquering the world, but never thought you anything about how to take charge of this. Do you agree with me? The most… In this room, there's so much technology here. In this room, the most complex and sophisticated technology is within your system. Yes or no? Human system. Yes. This is. Have you read the user's manual? There's no user's manual. There is. There is? Yes. Where is it at? It's built into the machine. Oh, how do I get it? You need to pay attention. You're reading Inner Engineering. Read that carefully. There are… I'm reading it. I'm in the middle. I'm at part two. There are pointers as to how to read your own user's manual. Yes. Let me take you back to this concept of heaven. You know, when you're talking about people in universities that you say, how many of them want to go to heaven, the problem is they don't have any evidence of heaven. And so when a lot of these young people that are atheists or agnostics, they don't want to buy into anything that they believe is connected to fairy tales, or they're connected to some sort of an ideology that they believe was manufactured to control people and to keep people in check. That's what I said. The heavens collapsed in their minds. In their minds. But it's also because heaven is connected to religion, and religion is connected to atrocities. There's a lot of people that think of religion. They think of the evils of the Catholic Church, or they think of, you know, what religion has justified, the horrors of history, the things that people have done in the name of religion. So a lot of younger, sophisticated, intelligent people don't want to believe in anything that there's no evidence for. So when you say, how many of them want to go to heaven, say, show me a video. Tell me where I'm going. Do you have a map of heaven? I am not asking that question. I know. Offering a ticket. I'm just telling you, heaven has collapsed in people's mind, which is a good thing because… It's a good thing? It is because… because the idea that this is not the place to live well. There is another place where you will live well. Is a wrong idea. Right. This is the place to live well. You can have heaven right here. Yes. And who told you, you're not already in heaven and making a mess out of it? No one. I think that's possible. We are in heaven making a mess out of it. We also could be in hell too, right? So right now, whether we want to fix the soil or we want to fix the human mind, we are only trying to see that you don't mess up the heaven in which we have landed. Yes. I could agree with that. I think the problem is the term heaven, when you say it, people think of a biblical heaven. They think of a place that you go… No, no. Every religion has their own kind of heaven. That's the whole thing. I'm saying before Bible came, there have been heavens in other places. Yes, yes. You know one thing I found really interesting… This is one thing good about this soil is, see, people may even have separate heavens to go to, but we all come from the same soil. Our bodies go back to the same soil. So this is a unifying factor irrespective of one's religion, caste, creed, whatever else. So in your mind, this concept of heaven relates to like a harmony amongst yourself, the… and the people, the living things around you, including the soil. See, essentially it's like this. If you feel pleasant in your body, we call this health. Yes. If you feel very pleasant in your body, we call this pleasure. If you feel pleasant in your mind, we call this peace. If you feel very pleasant, we call this joy. If you feel very pleasant… If you feel pleasant in your emotion, we call this love. If you feel very pleasant, we call it compassion. If you feel very pleasant in your very life energies, then we call this blissfulness. If you become very, very pleasant, then we call it ecstasy. If your surroundings become pleasant, we call it success. So to create pleasantness in the surroundings, we need the cooperation of people and forces around us. Without everybody's cooperation, you can't create a pleasant atmosphere. But pleasantness of the body, pleasantness of the mind, pleasantness of emotion and energy is one hundred percent your business, isn't it? So if you're feeling ecstatic, you are in heaven. You are in heaven because your idea of heaven is a very pleasant place, isn't it? Yes. This place, this planet earth is very pleasant except for the human beings who are creating unpleasantness among each other. Well, this sounds like a great concept, but human beings are very complex. Their emotions are complex, their needs and desires and their trauma and pain and insecurities and all mental health issues. How does one get to that spot? Like what you're saying sounds wonderful. I mean, you're a guru, you're a literal guru. So when you sit here and tell people these things, they go, well, that sounds easy for that guy. No, it's not easier difficult. You got a great beard? It is not easy or difficult. It's not? It is a question of wrong direction or right direction. That is, you went to an apple tree and you're digging the roots because you are a potato farmer. That is the only problem you have. You're the source and seat of your experience is within you. What happens within you? Should it happen your way or my way? Tell me. Your way or my way? No, what happens within you? Should it happen your way or my way? Well, it's within me. When you say within me, do you mean my thoughts? Your thought, your emotion, your body, whatever your chemistry, your energy, everything. What happens within you? Should it happen your way or somebody else's way? Well, I think if your way sucks, maybe you should listen to other people and maybe try their way. Say if it happened your way, would you keep yourself blissful or miserable? You would keep yourself blissful if you were wise, if you were wise and your mind was working properly. But if you have mental health issues, if you're filled with trauma, if you're poorly educated, you're starting from a deficit, a severe deficit where you don't think correctly. No? No. You don't? That is not the problem. The original problem, the root of the problem is this. Let's address one step at a time. Okay. See right now, the simple question is, what happens in your mind, your emotion, your chemistry, your energies must be your way, isn't it? Well, it's yours. Yes. It is yours. So it must be your way. But it's not happening your way right now because it's in a compulsive reactive state. Okay. So anybody can cause anything within you. So if I decide what clothes you must wear, what food you must eat, what you should do every day, you will call this slavery, isn't it? Or the government. Don't go there. So right now, someone else, something else can decide what happens within you. Isn't this the most horrible form of slavery? That someone can decide whether you're happy or unhappy. Yeah, that's not good. That's not good. That's not the best path. So the problem is just this. An intelligence which needs to be conscious is unfortunately unconscious and compulsive. So the only problem that you have is compulsive reaction to life around you. What is needed is a conscious response to life. So this simple thing, people have not handled from their childhood. Right. So when you don't handle this one thing, everything will be wrong. Everything will be accidental. Your success and failure both are accidental. So what do you say to someone, maybe they're 30 years old, and they've had this life of mistakes and regret and maybe alcoholism or gambling or some other problems, but they want to be conscious. They want to be blissful. They want to be enlightened. They want to be a happy person, filled with love. What path do they take? What steps do they take to correct the journey they're on? Why is it though human beings are not the strongest creatures on the planet compared to other species, why is it the human beings are dominating this world? Simply because of our ability to use tools, isn't it? And our intellect, our ability to manipulate our environment. Yes, but even then if we didn't have knowledge of using tools, the buffaloes would have mowed us down, all right? Yes. So your intellect, they don't care. It's your ability to use tools. You made an arrow. You made a gun. You made so many things. Yes. Everything, all instruments. Right now, microphone or telephone or whatever else. These are all instruments to enhance. We are this much because of our instruments, we become that much. Right now, there is one little screw here in this furniture. I will ask you, you're a strong guy. I will ask you to unscrew this with your hands. You do it. You may lose all your nails. I'll allow you to use your teeth. Maybe you lose some of them. It's going to be a problem. But it'll be right there. But if I give you a screwdriver, boom, in a minute, you will get it out. So this is the power of the tool. So as there are tools for doing things in the external world, there are tools to handle this because you don't have a toolkit. This machine, which is the most complex machine is going crazy. Right now, you're reading in engineering, it's a toolkit. Yes. You just use the tools. Don't worry about the philosophy. Don't worry about belief system. Don't worry about your concept, somebody's concept, your beliefs, somebody's beliefs. Just use the necessary tools. Being peaceful, joyful, loving is a natural outcome of that. Okay, well, what are those tools? Like the scenario that I laid out, you have a person who's 30 years old. They have a history of trauma in their life. They're very unhappy, very depressed. Maybe they're alcoholics. They're trying to get their life in order. Today, I want you to understand this. The user foundation and this engineering process that we're doing around the world, in 2021, I think, I think it's 2021, our video views are 2.2 billion. 2.2 billion video views? Yes. That's a lot. Yes. Why? Because it's worked. Because we have- Because of what? It has worked, I'm saying for people. It's worked? Yeah. We have over 16 million volunteers working with the foundation. Why are they doing this? Because the only reason is it has worked. What is it that's worked? I did not teach them a morality. I did not teach them a philosophy. I did not promise them miracles. I did not pull gold chains out of thin air and give it to them. No, nothing. Simply tools to fix themselves. Just how to sit, how to breathe, how to manage yourself. This is all. Yes. But you're entertaining. That's also one of the reasons why you have that many views. How many views do we have? If you had guessed. Put your mic down so we can hear you. On YouTube, I guess? Yeah, let's just go with YouTube. No, no, it's okay. That's not the point. All told. How many views? Two... I don't know. Say 4 billion, it's okay. No, no, no, probably about the same. Sounds about right. Yeah, and we're not teaching you shit. No, that's not true. Other people are that are on there. But I think that... I see what you're saying, that it works. But what I'm saying is... No, why it works is... What are those tools? This is all very mystical and difficult for people to grasp. There are mystical aspects also, but that is not for everybody. But I mean this conversation is... Only for those who are interested in those things, who want to pursue that aspect. For the rest of the people, for somebody, if their backache goes away, his life changes. For somebody, if his headache goes away, his life changes. Somebody drops his alcohol consumption addiction, his life changes. Somebody, some compulsive thought that may... It drives him crazy, if that goes away. These are simple things. This is just a small screwdriver, is all he needs. He doesn't need a total overhaul. Mysticism is a different aspect. It is like you're not just interested in living well. You want to know the very root of life. That's a different aspect. That's not for everybody. That is only for those who seek that. But for common people, all they want to do is, they want to live peacefully, joyfully, with some sense of purpose to whatever they're doing in their lives.