MESSAGE OF SRI SRI RAVI SHANKER

H.H. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

Unless you have had unpleasant moments in life, how will you recognise and enjoy the pleasant moments?

In life, everything is impermanent. Turn back and see - all that you did is like a dream now. You cried, wept, got angry and became agitated. But that didnt stay with you forever. All has passed, the whole thing is finished. In future, you may become the mayor of the town, or rise to the highest position, or have a lot of wealth. So what? That will also pass. Nothing stays forever. This very moment will also pass. See the impermanence in every moment. See the impermanence in everything.

In life, God gives you a pinch of unpleasantness every now and then. This makes you aware of the pleasant moments. Suppose you have never had unpleasant moments in life, how would you ever know the pleasant ones? It is because you have experienced unpleasantness, you can value pleasantness. Every pinch that you are having in life is for the best, to make you strong and capable to face challenges. This is what makes life lively and enjoyable. If you had only pleasant times, your life would stagnate with utter boredom. You would become like a stone. So in order to keep you alive, nature gives you a little pinch now and then.

Nothing is permanent - whether pleasant or unpleasant, it will also pass. Just turn back and tell me very honestly, every time you had a difficulty, were you not taken out of the difficulty? Any time you had some problem, you got a helping hand. You were picked up.

You might have heard stories of people who were stuck in some problem/disaster, but they still came out of it. There are stories of people who were drowning in the river where there was nobody to help and they dont know how they were saved. I dont mean that you should jump into the ocean and see whether somebody takes you out! All I want to say is that you dont have to be afraid in life, because there is always support.

You see, there is purpose in life. Otherwise why are people born and why do they go through all that they are going through? Are you born just to pay your bills? If you are born just to pay your electricity and phone bills and your taxes, life is not worth living. You work so hard day and night; the whole week is spent madly working, coming home tired, eating and sleeping, etc. Again the next day is the same. Weekends have become another routine, a change in routine that is all. It is the same gossip, the same movies and the same types of conversation.

If youre awake, then you will see there is impermanence in everything around. Just watch when four or five people get together and talk, have a gossip session. It is great fun! In a gossip session, people keep changing their topics. If ten people are talking about the weather and you change the topic to stock markets, everybody will immediately talk stock markets, whether they know about it or not. And then from stock markets you change to health food. They will not have completed the previous topic but they will jump on to this topic!

Being aware of this impermanent nature of your life, you find that there is something in you that has not changed. And also, you become aware of the changing nature of happenings. There is a reference point by which you can say things are changing. That reference point is the source of life. Getting to that reference point is wisdom. With wisdom, your life improves.

(H.H. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar is the founder of the Art of Living)