The Psychology of Inner Peace | Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

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Stress should be like the pinch of salt in the food, not more than that. If it's more, it's unconsumable. And today what has happened is exactly this— too much stress we have taken in. We don't know How to get rid of that? So it has taken a big toll on our mental health.

One of the most recognized, prominent spiritual leaders in the world,

spiritual guru Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, founded the Art of Living and has grown to reach over 182 countries and 1 billion people.

When is the last time you experienced acute stress?

I have not had that. I'm sorry, I've never had that.

You've never had that experience?

See, my if my time is up now, if I have to catch a flight, I have to run. But at the same time, you know, if you are meditating regularly, there is certain calmness inside of you that prevails throughout. You're doing it fast, and if not this flight, I will catch the next one. Do you see what I'm saying?

I do. Yeah, there's an ease and an agility in the way that you approach life.

Agility is the word.

If there's one hope or thought that you would like to leave our community,

let's all get together with one message: a world free of violence. And make each one of us feel the part of a global human family.

It all comes down to?

Being a human.

I am?

Infinity.

Your favorite place to live?

Inside.

When you sit with the most ancient of questions, who am I, what have you come to understand?

That's the most valuable question that everyone should ask. The answer to that question is... That's it. All the best, Mikey.

Thank you. Thank you so much. First and foremost, I'm excited to sit with you because of what you have contributed to the wellness of millions of people. And so thank you for spending the time to have this conversation. We spend most of our time thinking about mastery of self. So when you hear the phrase mastery of self, how do you conceptualize it?

Getting rid of all that extra things we have been accumulating and just being natural. Be yourself.

Being yourself. And then one would say that being yourself is one of the hardest things to do because of the social pressures and the stress in the world. What are the best practices that you've developed

First thing is see life from a broader perspective. You have to keep in mind the context to life.

What does that mean?

Context means see life in the context of time and space. Everything is changing in the world, and your mind is changing, your thoughts are changing, your emotions are changing. So when you get bothered by something, you know, this will also pass. This will, this will pass. Change. That awareness that everything is changing and there's something in me that is not changing and latch on to that something that's not changing gives you enormous strength. That stress does not even catch on to you.

When you think about latching on, what are most people grasping and latching on to?

You have to latch on to something that is not changing in you. There is something which is not so tangible. But, you know, which is because of which you see all the changes. The perception of change is because there is something that is not changing. Right?

So the old kind of Zen koan that good news, bad news. Life is like falling through the sky with nothing to grasp, nothing to hold on to.

Yeah, yeah,

yeah. The good news is that there's no bottom.

There's no bottom.

There's no bottom. So how do you help people practice the ability to have a non-attachment or non-grasping?

First of all, don't take attachment as a botheration.

Don't take it as a—

It's a bother. Don't take it as an impediment, as a botheration for you. You are attached, so what? It's okay. It's okay to be attached.

Which is totally counterintuitive. Yeah. Okay.

Yes. So what? You know why you want to get rid of attachment? Because you feel it's going to give you pain. Right? Hmm. When you see this attachment, it's just one part of life, doesn't matter, and you are attached to something bigger, then it doesn't bother you anymore. And then, okay, you may intellectually know all this concept and everything. You will see that, oh, you have to accept things, I have to be living in the present moment, but it doesn't happen. That is where attention to your breath Plays an important role. Few minutes of breathing technique, you know, transports you to a space which is— which puts you in a very comfortable position within you and makes you so free.

Of all the practices, you have invested most in a breathing practice.

Breathing and meditation. Not just breathing, breathing combined with meditation.

Breathing and meditation practices have been around for thousands of years. What is your unique approach to meditation?

There are a number of different breathing techniques, many different types of meditation too. But what suits today's busy life and the amount of pressure that people have is what I've been promoting and teaching. which suits people and make them go deeper. You know, otherwise you can say that you sit and meditate for 8 hours, 9 hours, then you will feel sensation. There are many, many such techniques. Ancient days, people had nothing much to do. They'll sow the seed and they'll sit on the bank of the river or on the bank of the field, and they can sit for meditation for hours together. Today, people don't have that type of time or patience. The mind is not ready for it or used to it. Hmm. So these type of meditation which I recommend are that which is very profound and simple as well.

Before we get into kind of the mechanics of it, what are the pressures that you're finding that are happening for most people today? What are the leading pressures?

Mental health issues and pressure of being successful.

How do you define success?

If you ask me, I would say success is exhibiting your limitation.

Oh, exhibiting your limitation. Wait,

you know, I would say I successfully lifted a bottle of water. No. But if I feel my limitation is I can't lift more than 50 kilos, I lift 60 kilos. I said, oh, I. Successfully lifted it.

So success is the progression of growing. It's the going just beyond what you thought was possible.

Yeah, that is, I would say, ignorance of your potential.

How do you imagine people understand their potential? Potential is a double-edged sword. It's a very dangerous and wonderful idea to consider because there are— there's this idea of What you should become, who you should become. If you only knew what you were capable of, you would be more and do more. That is the dark side of potential. But the light side, the beautiful side of potential is like, you are capable of so much. So how do you think about helping people understand what they're capable of?

When you claim success, when you're— that means you are limiting your capability. You are not seeing that you are capable of even doing much more than this. And every failure, I would say, you must be proud of because you have stretched your limit. You've made an effort to go beyond your limit. If you have been sincere, you put all your effort and you find failure, you should be saying, oh yeah, I tried my best and now I at least I'm making an effort to go beyond my You know, this, I mean, this could be a very revolutionary attitude. This is not what common, normally people would feel. But I would say that can orient your mind to a very different attitude in which you don't sink into depression. You don't blame yourself, blame others for your failures. Do you see what I'm saying?

I do. And I think that most people in our community are trying so hard. To live a great life. They're investing in their psychology, they're investing in their craft, and they really want to live a great life.

That's good. That's quite natural.

And they're deeply afraid of not being good enough. They're deeply afraid of trying their best and publicly failing. So there, when you say mental health, mental health for our community are people that are trying very hard to be their best. And are afraid to come up short and are tired. They're anxious. They're overwhelmed. You understand those pressures.

Yeah.

And how do you—

That's where the meditation, breathing, a little bit of yoga, all this will help you.

Okay. So then when we will introduce best practices such as breathing and meditation and people say, yeah, I get it, but I don't have that kind of time. I'm too busy. I know you've heard it before. Actually, people come to you for the solution, but that out in the wild, that is a common answer. How would you address that concern?

It's like saying, I'm so hungry, but I have no time to have food. You know, having no time, I feel, is only an excuse. If you want to do something, if you see the benefit of it, you will always find time. When you know that what you invest is going to pay much more than what you even widely you could imagine, then why would you not invest it?

I think that that's the gap for most people, is that—

They don't give much importance to it. That's right. They're not aware what it can do to you.

How long did it take you to become aware of the power of tapping into awareness?

Awareness doesn't take time. It doesn't take such a long time to become more aware of what is.

It takes time to quiet your mind, to be with awareness. It takes time for me to quiet my mind, to be with awareness. This is why I've started meditating. I've been practicing for 20-some years, and I've now shifted my meditation to the morning because I'm a little bit more quiet. I'm a little bit more in tune. So your answer is—

You know,

actually,

when you are very restless, when you have too many things to do, that's when meditation is most needed. That's the best time.

Yeah. When you're Busy in your mind.

Yeah.

How long does it take to feel the impact of a meditation practice?

In the very first sitting, you can feel the impact.

And for some people, the very first sitting is overwhelming, right? Because there's so much happening. How do I quiet down? How do I get still? Am I doing it right?

That is why I had to train— we trained 38,000 instructors around the world. I mean, you sit with an instructor and he knows where exactly to— Put that mind and make it quiet in just a few minutes.

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It is remarkable the impact you've had. At the age of 4, you were understanding the Gita.

Well, I could recite the Gita.

Beethoven was said to perform at age 3 on the piano. How do you explain that capability that you have?

You know, our consciousness has been there for a long time, and it has impressions.

And what you're suggesting is that this is not the first time you've been here?

Absolutely not. We have all been here many times.

It is a foundational belief In Hindu is that reincarnation is part of the process.

Yeah, you can say an awareness about reincarnation has been there.

An awareness of reincarnation.

Reincarnation.

When you answer the most—

But today even science has come up with this. You know, there has been many, many experiments out there.

On consciousness.

On the consciousness and reincarnation.

It is one of the hard problems for humans is what is consciousness and Where does it come from? This is a hard problem in science. It sounds like it's not a hard problem for you.

Oh, see, it's a challenge for one to— it beckons one to go deep and understand that.

It does.

It's not a problem. Consciousness is not a problem.

The understanding of it.

It challenges you to know it.

When you sit with the most ancient of questions, who am I, what have you come to understand?

That's the most valuable question that everyone should ask. That chips off the extra marble around you and brings clarity and steadiness inside of you.

How have you come to understand who you are?

You know, it is not the answer to that question which is important. The question itself is important.

Yeah. Does that lead me to believe that you are unclear of the answer?

No, the answer to the question is what you are.

Are you not wanting to share the answer, or when you answer the question, or is it something that is difficult to put into words or impossible to put into words? Right. Okay, so I'm not alone.

It's difficult to put into words.

Yeah. I started asking the question, what am I? And that is an unclear answer as well.

You are lucky you didn't get clear clarity there.

I did not.

You know, clarity means concept. You are so clear, you, you got a concept about it. The experience of consciousness goes beyond your understanding.

Yeah.

You know, experience and understanding are 2 different levels. One is you intellectually grab, you understand, but experience is something which supersedes it, which goes beyond that, right? You feel a lot of love inside of you. Now, if you try to define love or express love, you will be a failure because you cannot do it 100%. You can give little glimpses of what it is not, But what it is, is hard to say.

When you think about joy, it's one of your first principles is to help people live with joy in a stress-free, nonviolent way. I want to come to the stress in a minute. How do you think about expressing the path to joy?

You know, you don't need to learn that. You are born with it.

It's a default.

Every child born on the planet is born as a bundle of joy. And when you drop the stress, when you get rid of all that boundaries that you create around you, you are simply a joy.

Is that why stress-free is so important to you? Is if you de-stress a human that you are left with the, the essence, which is a state of joy?

Yeah, it's a stress which obscures one's love. One's joy, one's compassion, all that, the qualities that you value in your life, all gets obscured by stress, right?

Yeah. Stress also helps me understand my actual skills, my actual capabilities. So when I'm put in a high-stress situation, whether it's a real stress environment or I've made it so, It helps me develop an understanding of what I'm capable of.

Stress has a value, like the gymnasium. You know, you go to gym.

That's right.

You lift the weights and you build the muscle, but you can't do it the whole time.

Okay, I'm really relieved because I've been able to research you but not meet you up until this point. And when you had a position on a stress-free approach, I— it It does not make sense to me. But now that you're saying, wait, stress is required. Working well with stress?

Occasionally.

Acute stress.

Occasionally stress for a limited period of time, it gives you a contrast.

Yeah.

You see, you will never appreciate stress-freeness if you have never experienced stress.

Okay.

But that is not your original state or natural state of being. That's why you, you can't be there forever. Then, you know, it destroys your nervous system. You go completely crazy. Too much of stress is no good. I would say stress should be like the pinch of salt in the food, not more than that. If it's more, it's unconsumable. And today what has happened is exactly this, you know, too much stress we have taken in. We don't know. How to get rid of that? And so it has taken a big toll on our mental health and our social behaviors, you see. Okay, a little bit stress in the exam, or you had to deliver things in time, that pressure of time, you deliver, you do act on that. But you are given a deadline, you have to finish this by tomorrow, so you put extra effort Putting that extra effort may look like stress, but if it is too much, if you have to do that day after day after day, you'll become a nervous wreck.

Are you more interested in helping people be great with stress or to dissolve the majority of stress in their life by changing the way that they use their mind?

We don't have to tell them to accept stress today because even if you don't want, it comes up somehow, right? Yeah. So all that you need to know is how to release stress, how to make yourself more strong, sane, you know, because stress obscures your perception, your observation, and your expression.

It can also heighten your ability to focus. It can heighten your—

Momentarily.

Momentarily. Yeah, that's true.

And if you have to do it the whole time, that's it. You will not be able to do that.

Yeah, that's right. When is the last time you experienced acute stress where your your body went into fight flight?

I have not had that. I'm sorry, I've never had that, Topo.

You've never had that experience?

Not that that too. My body went into like a rigidity or anything. No, no, no, no.

You've never had that?

No, I have never had that.

Wait, wait, wait, wait. You've never had

A breakdown moment of stress. If you're talking about a breakdown moment of stress—

Not a breakdown, but like a moment where—

Oh yeah, see, my, if my time is up now, if I have to catch a flight, I have to run.

Okay, so you have had that?

I will run. But at the same time, you know, if you are meditating regularly, there is certain calmness inside of you. that prevails throughout.

Do you have—

your action may be faster, but the calmness inside of you doesn't get rattled.

What do you call that?

You can call whatever it is.

Equanimity?

Equanimity. You can call it like calmness, equanimity, presence of mind, or, you know, awareness, mindfulness, whatever. That doesn't leave you. It stays with you. It may appear very strange, but that's true. On one level you are walking, another level you are fast, you are running, but another level there is serenity. And serenity. You are not anxious, oh, I may lose the flight. No, you are calm inside. You're doing it fast, and you know, if not this flight, I will catch the next one. Do you see what I'm saying?

I do. Yeah, there's an ease. And an agility in the way that you approach life.

Agility is the word, yeah.

What does psychological agility mean to you?

Seeing life from a broader perspective. Nothing matters. They say— I would say there is one mantra for it: so what?

Is that because you have multiple lives that you've lived, or is that because you've gained the wisdom to understand And really embody the impermanence of all things?

You know, look, I haven't tried to imbibe anything at all. It is quite natural. Wisdom, I see, is that which is so natural to you.

So you don't develop wisdom. It's already available?

Yeah. At least for me, that's what it is.

Yeah, I believe you.

I didn't, I didn't try to, okay, I accept, I should accept people. I should do this. I should forgive. None of that. I just be myself.

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So we talked about stress. We talked about the natural state of being. We're going to get to the practices in a moment. But when you think about pressure, is pressure real or is it imagined for the most part?

It is a very subjective thing. Someone may imagine pressure and someone might really feel the pressure. It could be both.

And it might feel like I'm jumping around, but I'm trying to— I want to— I would like to understand what you're—

See, I would say nothing is bad. bad in the planet. Like, even pressure is not bad, but if it is in its limit. You see what I'm saying? Yeah. Okay, you are pressurized to do, deliver something, it's okay, but you can do it. But if you put so much pressure on a child which it cannot handle anymore, it's going to get in a mental case. A little bit pressure is essential. I often tell parents, you know, control with the child should be that of a guitar string. If it's too tight, no music will come. If it's too loose, no music will come. Moderation. So pressure in moderation, always helpful.

Your analogies are great. One of the questions I had for you about you was, because of your presence, you have created hope. You've created a methodology. You have created a set of practices for people to live better in their own way. And you have also created a following. So the question I have for you is like, how do you manage your own psychology or your ego about people following you?

Listen, there is nobody behind me. Everyone is in front of me. I keep everyone in front all the time. So no following.

Yeah.

And I don't mind anybody, you know, who takes my thing and they— it's not even mine because we all been— all of us is just a channel for the universe to bring about what it wants to bring about. If you think I did something, you know, in the universe, that it's a big illusion.

When you see other gurus that have fallen from enlightenment, what happens for you?

I'm reminded of a pot which is not baked. Neither the pot stays nor the water. Pouring water in an unbaked pot.

Meaning that the pressure, the heat got turned up and there was nothing there. It's tragic when we see The position of enlightenment being corrupted.

Absolutely.

Yeah, one of the great tragedies.

Yeah, and it is taking advantage of people's goodness and their faith and destroying them.

I had the chance to be in a small room with the Dalai Lama, and it was maybe 30 people, and somebody asked him the question about the killing of Osama bin Laden. And he paused for a minute. He worked through his translator, and he came back, and his response was, I'm really sorry for people that are celebrating the death of Osama bin Laden. And he paused. And the room was confused, because his position that he continued with was that we need to have compassion for all humans, even, quote-unquote, ones that are perceived to be evil. Mm-hmm. When you think about people that are doing great harm in the world, what is in your heart for them?

First is dialogue.

Dialogue.

Dialogue. And second is trying to reform them. And if they don't reform, the final thing is take a stick.

The final thing is take a stick?

Take a stick. Oh, that surprises me. Yeah, that is the thing in the Vedic tradition, Hindu tradition. There are 4 aspects, you know. First is understand them, forgive them, give them options, and give a long rope. If nothing works, then finally take a stick.

You surprised me again. I did not think that would be your response. Okay.

But what happens, people don't have the patience for the first 3 stages. They take stick at the very first instance. That is wrong.

You have a strong position about authority. Can you talk about authority and power, or the lack of power that authority creates? Can you just share your, your insights on authority?

What authority? If you have authority on your own mind, that is the biggest thing you can have. If you don't have authority on your own mind, what authority you can have anybody else? It's an illusion. Authority, power that you get from people is the biggest illusion, whether it is in politics or it's in artistic field or in a religious field, any field it is. If you are depending on an authority or If you think you have an authority over people or over the situation or time, it's the most stupid thing one can perceive. You should simply look within and see you are just part of the whole existence, and real authority is in the existence, in the nature. You are just part of the ocean, you know. No wave can claim, I have authority over the ocean.

It's one of my favorite kind of reframes with people. Do you see yourself as the ocean, a pond, or a puddle? And people, oh, the ocean. And I say, well, you're acting like, you know, a puddle where somebody just jumped into your, into your water table and it's all the water's displaced. And over time, you're suggesting if you do enough self-discovery work, you would be more like the ocean.

You are the ocean discovering you are an ocean. You think, you imagine you are a pond.

Yeah, you already are.

You are that.

What do you hope that people in our community would understand, either from the Gita or from your insights, to live a better life?

The Gita, or this philosophy, is like an ocean. It's up to you what you want to take out of it. You just want a stress-free, violence-free life, or you want to communicate better with people, you want to find inner joy, You want to be unconditionally loving with everybody. All this is your possibility. You know, like in ocean, you go for— you can go for just surfing, you can go with an oil rig, take the oil, you can go and catch the pearls. Possibilities are enormous. And it's up to you to take it what you want to.

I get asked in subtle ways, like, what is it like to be In myself as a psychologist that understands how the best performers and doers in the world use their mind. What is it like to be inside of me when I'm in conversation with other people? Like, what am I doing with my own thoughts? And I'm really interested in what it's like to be you, maybe in this conversation or in all conversations.

Oh, I'm always empty.

Empty.

Hollow and empty. I never prepare my talks. I never prepare my answers or any questions anyway. Nothing. I just show up and whatever comes, that's what I blabber.

What does your training look like? Go back to maybe our first part of the conversation. How do you develop the ability to be fully present in any circumstance?

I don't even know if it's any training that That made me what I am. I feel that spirituality is not— usually people come to spirituality at some point of life when they find disappointment in job, relationship, or blah blah blah. But with me, none of those happened. From a very young age, this is what I was. This is like fish to water, you know.

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3 or 4 just really thoughtful questions and take it wherever you want. It all comes down to—

Being a human.

I am—

Infinity.

When you think of somebody you would like to sit with, to learn with, who would that be?

Myself.

Your favorite place to live? The desert. Why? Insight. Mastery is?

Recognizing you are not there.

Thank you so much for your time. What a felt presence that you have. I believe that you are unbothered. I believe that you are an empty cup. Yeah. And if there's one—

I think you know it now. There is a difference between knowing and believing. You believe what you don't know.

You believe what you do not know? And you believe I know it?

I think so.

You think I know it. If there is one parting hope or, or thought that you would like to leave our community, and again, our community are people that are smart, ambitious, they are thoughtful, they want to live a great life for themselves first, so they can share and impact others in a meaningful way. What would be one—

Let us all get together with one message. A world free of violence and make each one of us feel the part of a global human family. We are part of one global family.

And just to double tap on that, to do that, you must first be nonviolent with yourself, with your own thoughts.

It goes along with that. When you say to create a violence-free society, It starts from you also, from you only. Always whatever inside is what's going to come out. And how to free you from violence? Get rid of stress and meditate.

You know, I just would be remiss, just one more question is that how do you relate to me, to others who are trying and struggling and feel like a mess and like Like really trying to figure it out, and you're like, "Look, you just—I don't know—I woke up like this. I was born like this, and I'm how do you how do you how do you relate

to myself?

To me, to other to other people that are really trying hard.

I don't find any there is any wall between you and me. I feel you are part of me, part of my family. That's it. All the best, Mikey. Thank you. Thank you. Yes, yes.

Thank you so much. I can call you Mikey, right? Yes, yes.

Thank you.

Thank you so much. Thank you.

Yes. Next time on Finding Mastery, we're doing something a little different. Before songwriter and poetry slam champion InQ sat down with Mike, he took our entire Finding Mastery team, myself included, through an incredible poetry workshop. It was vulnerable, surprising, and honestly brought the team closer together. Then he and Mike sat down to explore how creativity can become a tool for self-discovery, why vulnerability can deepen our connection with others and how the stories we carry can either keep us stuck or help set us free. So join us Wednesday, October 7th at 9:00 AM Pacific, only on Finding Mastery.

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