June 10, 2013
Bangalore, India
Q:Gurudev, you said there is freedom in giving away your rights, and nobody can take away what is yours. Now, if somebody takes away my rights to something, should I just wait believing that it is mine and it will come back to me, or should I fight?
Sri Sri: First of all, if you believe someone has taken away your rights, you should correct your thinking. If it is your right, no one can take it away from you. You should stand up and take your rights.
This I have said in Hindi: Drop your sense of authority over something.
If you say I have the authority over something, just drop the authority. Here, authority may be the right word to use. Do you see what I am saying? See, when you give your authority to your loved one then it definitely comes back to you.
Often, we want to exert our authority on others by force.
For example, you have authority over your wife, but if you do not exercise your authority over your wife and instead give away your authority to her, then that brings freedom.
Are you getting what I am saying?
You have a right over your children. What I am saying is, don’t exercise your authority over your children, rather give away your authority to them. That brings freedom to them.
If you do not force your authority on your loved ones then that brings freedom.
Suppose you are a school teacher, you definitely have an authority over all the kids. Now if you exercise your authority over the kids, they will run away. Isn’t that what usually happens? Similarly, say you have 50 employees working under you and you exercise your authority over them, then the work place will not be a pleasant one for them. So instead you should give away your rights.
Who can give away their authority? Only one who has full authority with them.
One is like giving charity, while the other is like trying to give when you do not have any money in the first place.
What you are saying is, ‘How can I give when I do not have any money to begin with?’ What I am saying is, ‘You should give some charity’.
So you can only give when you already have owned the right fully. Got it?
You can give away your rights only when you know it is yours in the first place. If somebody has snatched away your rights then you should fight it out with them. But if you have given it to them then that is a different issue. Then that is called love. Giving away your right to someone else is an act of love, but if someone has snatched away your right then you have not given it to them at all. Then you should fight and take it back. Did you get it?
Now what do you do? Do you wait to claim back your rights?
Suppose you have a home and some gangsters come and snatch your property from you. Should you just give away your rights over your property? I would say no. You should stand up against them, get a good lawyer, go to the police and do all that is needed to get back your rights. But before you die at least give away the right (over your property) to somebody otherwise it will go to government, or it will be left unclaimed.
At least you give away your right to your property to someone before leaving this planet.
Q:Gurudev, I get bad dreams at night, and this happens very frequently. I am afraid. Please help.
Sri Sri: There is no need to fear. Just chant Om Namah Shivaya before sleeping at night, or Jai Gurudev, or you can say both and then sleep.
See in our country, and in other countries around the world, before sleeping, children were made to say prayers, is it not? Does anyone follow this now-a-days? How many of you here do it? (A few people raise their hands)
See, very few sitting here follow this. Before sleeping all of you should pray and make the children pray too. Chant one shloka (prayer verse), or take the name of some deity you revere, or just offer thanks to God for the day given to you.
There is no need to pray in Sanskrit only. Even saying a prayer in Hindi will do. God does not only know Sanskrit. He understands your regional languages as well. So just pray. What is important is the feeling.
So before you sleep join your hands and pray, ‘Thank you God for the gift of today. Bless me that I may sleep well tonight and may my day tomorrow be good’.
So you may recite a few lines like this. Or you may just remember God, and chant any name of the Lord that you know. You can chant the name of your deity or your Guru, or any saint. Pray and surrender everything to them and go to sleep.
In the ancient days, children would pray to their mother and father and then go to sleep. But nowadays children don’t have such devotion towards their parents.
If parents keep fighting with each other the whole day then how will the children feel like praying to them? They think, ‘The parents keep fighting with each other, how we can treat them as God?’
If you do not believe in God, or any other deity, then also it is fine. There is no compulsion to believe in God. In that case sit silently with yourself for a few moments and just quiet the mind. Simply remind yourself, ‘My soul is eternal and I am pure’.
In the Ashtavakra Gita, it is said, ‘Aho Aham Namo Mahiyam’, this means, ‘I bow down to myself’.
We can say this (bowing down to oneself) only when there is no sense of guilt within us. Thinking this way, just relax within yourself. You should do this much at least. So meditate for some time and then sleep. Then you will not have bad dreams and you will have good quality sleep.
Q:Why does Lord Brahma have no temple except in North India?
Sri Sri: Lord Brahma has no temple because he has finished his job and has already created the world too. Why would people worship him when his job is done? See, the temples were made much later. Lord Brahma, Lord Vishnu, and Lord Maheshwara (a name of Lord Shiva) are different energies all in one. It is said, ‘Brahma Shivomeya Astu Sadashiva’ (from the verses of the Linga Purana, a Hindu mythological scripture dedicated to Lord Shiva).
Q:Dear Gurudev, there is a friend of mine who is working in a government factory. She has not received her salary for the past seven months now, but she is still smiling. She has asked me to convey this to you Gurudev.
Sri Sri: Yes I know this. It is so surprising that some people who are working in government offices have not gotten their salary for the whole year. How do they pay their bills? The same is the case with some airlines.
I was surprised to know that some airline crew were working but they did not get salary for eight to nine months. This is total irresponsibility. These people cannot leave their jobs because they don’t know whether they will be able to get another job or not. So they keep working with the hope that they will get the salary soon, one day or another. Let us all pray that they get their salary soon.
http://www.artofliving.org/what-sri-sri-said-today
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