Sri Sri Ravi Shankar shares ten mindset rules for success, including welcoming criticism, stepping out of comfort zones, and learning from different cultures. He argues that guilt acts like a fuse protecting you from harm, that passion plus dispassion plus compassion drives growth, and that meditation reduces stress while improving your abilities.
He's a spiritual leader and founder of the Art of Living Foundation. The Art of Living Foundation aims to relieve individual stress, societal problems, and violence. In 1997, he established the International Association for Human Values. He's Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, and here are his top 10 rules for success.
I am one who always welcomes criticism, and I encourage people, you should welcome criticism and be bold enough to give criticism. If the criticism is coming out of benevolence, that I want that someone is criticizing me so that I can become better, then it is always welcome. But if someone is criticizing just out of jealousy or trying to pull someone down, then that is not good. Then that is coming from a malefic mindset. So constructive criticism, I feel everyone should welcome. Criticism with compassion, criticism with love is the most adorable thing, and it should always be welcomed. If you can embrace the embarrassment, nothing can shake you. It's one thing that people try to run away from is embarrassment. Yeah, criticism. A mild form of embarrassment is a mild form of criticism, a mild form of feeling uncomfortable. So sometimes we need to get out of the comfort zone, feel that little uncomfortable, less than, you know, abilities in us dawn. If you are content, happy, if you are centered, everything will flow to you. You don't have to go and grab something. Things will come your way. Do you see what I am saying? This is, this is why this world is called Maya. You know Maya? Maya means When you try to go and grab it, it runs away from you. What? If you try to possess, if you try to grab something, it just runs away. And if you are stable, still, content within yourself, they all run towards you. You know, I say we are all global people. We have to learn something from everywhere in the world. And I would say we have to learn the precision and the timeliness and the commitment from Germans. The world should learn. I always say the perfection is always Germans. Etiquettes is always from England, the mannerism, etiquettes, you know. And business and salesmanship, Americans. Teamwork from Japanese. Japanese are so good in teamwork. Similarly, spirituality from India. Human values, spirituality, compassion, it all comes from India. So we need to get the best from every part of the world, and the next coming generation will see that sort of global human being, you know. Of course, technology has shrunk the whole world into a global village. Today, through technology, in one second we communicate with the whole world. In the same way, if we can tune our minds to that simplicity, to the innocence, to caring and sharing, we will find the whole world as one family. The global family. When you want to have balance, you will definitely have it. You can have it. Got it? Just this, 'I want to have balance my life'— this thought itself is good enough. You have already balancing. You are moving in that direction. Yeah, this question simply arises, 'How do I do it?' You know you can do it. Ask yourself, your consciousness will tell you, 'I am not balanced, I am missing out on this.' Your consciousness will say, then you listen to your consciousness. If you are attending to your work too much, your consciousness will prick, 'Hey, you're forgetting your family, your wife, your children, your husband.' Then you say, 'Okay, I'll attend to them.' If you are attending too much, immersed so much in the family and forget about all other things, then your consciousness will prick. My God, what am I got into? What did I get into? Day and night I am just immersed in this family affairs. I am not being useful to the world. I had to do something. I had to pursue my cause. I have to do justice to my work. That might will prick, then you do that. But this wanting to keep balance in life, that very thought is good enough. It's like the fuse in the electrical system, you know. You know the fuse in the electrical system? Whenever electric current surges too much, the fuse will break and save everything else. Like that, that little amount of guilt must be there, like the fuse in the system. You don't justify your fault, but that little bit is okay to have, like the fuse in a electric— you know about the electrical system? In all that electrical board, there'll be one small box called fuse. So whenever there is imbalance in current, the fuse will burst and save the rest of the electrical system. Like that, in life, a little bit of guilt should— is okay, but not too much. Like salt in the food, if there is too much salt, can you eat it? No. Got it? So wanting to have balance is good to have that. Like breathing in and breathing out, we need passion, we need dispassion, and we need compassion. All three has to exist. People without passion cannot achieve anything in their life. So you need passion, especially youngsters, they need to have a passion. If they lack passion, they get into depression. So passion is essential, but only passion— this has been the problem. Only passion will lead to disappointment and despair. So you need to have a little detachment, that is dispassion. And dispassion is where, it's like, okay, you did a lot of activity and you take some time to sleep, rest. You let everything go and you relax. You switch over to the side. And meditation is part of it. The ability to let go and move forward, that I would call as dispassion. And in between, we need compassion. If you see you have made a wrong decision, you have to weigh the pros and cons. Should I continue on this all my life, or should I change? If I change, what is the loss that I will face? 'What is the problems I may encounter?' You have to weigh it. You have to see how much the change will make you better, or if the change is going to make even more problematic, better don't change. Just carry on with whatever your wrong decision you made. You know, sometimes you can't change. 'You have made a wrong decision, you have to go.' You know, you can't think of being a bachelor after you have had a kid. Once you have a child, then you have to be a father or mother and continue. Then no point in regretting the past. Similarly, you wanted to be a doctor, but you became an engineer, and after 25 years of serving as an engineer, you can't say, 'No, I made a wrong choice.' 'Oh, I should have been a doctor.' There's no point now. You can't go back to study in the school and become a doctor again. You are an engineer, continue in that direction. Got it? So you have to weigh the pros and cons. You see, to achieve anything in the world, it needs effort. To achieve anything in the world, any pleasure or any material thing you want to achieve, it needs effort. If you look at the benefits that meditation bring into our life, we feel it is all the more relevant, all the more needed. In ancient times, meditation was used for enlightenment. for finding the Self. And meditation is a way to get rid of misery, to overcome misery, overcome problems. Meditation has been the way to improve one's abilities. 3 things. And today, leaving apart, leaving aside enlightenment, if you see the social ills of today, the stress and tension, it calls for one to meditate. The more responsibility you have in your life, more is the need for meditation. Life is much larger than failure and success. Life is much larger than birth and death. We are much beyond them all. Hmm? Got it? If you have this strength, if you can understand this knowledge, then you will walk like a king. Nobody can shake you.
Thank you so much for watching. I made this video because Shagun Rawat asked me to. So if there's a famous entrepreneur that you want me to profile next, leave it in the comments below and I'll see what I can do. I'd also love to know which of the top 10 rules had the biggest impact on you. Leave it in the comments and I will join in the discussion. Thank you so much for watching. Continue to believe and I'll see you soon.
