QUESTION & ANSWER WITH GURUDEV

QUESTION & ANSWER WITH GURUDEV

POSTED ON: FRIDAY, APRIL 16, 2021

Q: Dear Gurudev, if this whole existence is Maya or illusion, then what is the importance of being in action? Aren’t our actions just illusions as well?

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar:

Yes, yes, yes absolutely.

Once Adi Shankara was saying that the whole world is all illusion, everything is maya, it is not real, it is dream-like. Just now, wake up and see, all that has happened until this moment, is it there anymore? It is all gone, everything. This morning, when you had breakfast, is it not like a dream for you now? Just think of this morning, is it not like a dream? It’s all gone. Could this be a dream? Just project your mind on the future. You are going to go sleep, and then come back tomorrow, this is all like a dream.

Another 10-20 years will pass, one day you will be under the ground or as ashes, everything will be done. Is it not like a dream? That is what Adi Shankara was saying - life, the whole universe is all made up of one thing. He was talking Quantum Physics.

Do you know what Maya means? It means that which can be measured. This whole world can be measured. Thus, whatever you can measure is all temporary, it is not permanent, because measurement is always relative. You may measure something here, you measure the same thing on the moon or in another space, it will measure differently. Vedanta said the same thing, what science says, millenniums ago.

Once, when Adi Shankara was walking, a crazy elephant started chasing him, so Shankara ran for shelter. Someone asked him, "Why are you running, the elephant is Maya, it is an illusion!"

Do you know what he said? He said, "Yes, the elephant is an illusion, my running is also an illusion". So, different levels of reality exist. You need a dream gun to shoot a dream tiger, from a real gun you cannot shoot a dream tiger.

I am tempted to share another incident. There is a very well known psychic and astrologer who came to our program one day. On the second day he came with bandages on his legs. When I asked if he got into an accident, he said, "No, I didn’t go anywhere". At night, he saw a dog or a tiger in his dream, and kicked the wall so hard to run away from the animal, that he woke up with a fractured leg. The psychic had a fractured leg the next morning when he tried to kick the dream tiger with his real leg. So be careful on that count, okay? (Laugher).

Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

http://qawithgurudev.blogspot.com/