India’s Best Kept Secret | Hear For Now Ep.13

The more we think about the wellbeing of others rather than solely meditating on ourselves, the happier we become.

Those between the ages of 18-30 today are amongst the loneliest generation in history, statistically. 

And the happiest and healthiest cultures of the world are often those that ‘have’ the least.

Abhi and Ananda share their realisations from their recent trip to India, a country where spirituality and living in full consciousness of humanities place in context of the complete whole is deeply ingrained into the essence of the culture. 

Real wealth comes from loving people and using things, rather than loving things and using people.

Tune in to this episode of the Hear For Now podcast to discover what we have lost in today’s society, and how we can regain it.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:00

We see ourselves as so advanced in so many ways, and so we end up looking down on places like India. Yeah. You know, we see them as not being as happy, and people say, Oh, we need we we need to help people in India. The reality is you can be advanced materially in so many ways, but if you don't have the outlook of gratitude on all those things that you've advanced in, it's completely useless. And in India, they have way less, but they're way more grateful for it. They have that real wealth of gratitude and compassion and love, and like you said, they're so personal.

SPEAKER_03 0:49

Hi guys, welcome back to the Here for Number podcast. It's been a minute for myself actually, and for Abhinandana as we've been away in India, but super super happy to be back with Joseph, who we've been missing dearly, and back to be with all of you. Um, I hope everyone is well. Abhinandana, how does it feel to you back in the UK after being away in the holy land of Mother India?

SPEAKER_02 1:14

Yeah, very holy place, it is India. Well, so many different holy places there. It's nice to be back. There's so many positives to being away from the busy streets of London. Uh, you know, there's so many amazing things about India. You know, when you're in certain places in India, we were in West Bengal, Mayapur, for example, one of the places we went to, it's like everywhere you go, it just reminds you of spirituality. You know, in India, the average sweeper on the street, he knows he's not this body. He knows he's experiencing a set of karma that he's you know accumulated over many lives. He knows that ultimately the highest goal of life is spiritual knowledge. Whereas in the West, even the most intelligent person is unaware of that, you know. So when you're in some of these places in India, you walk around and it's just so easy to remember your goal, you know, your purpose. And that's something really nice. And it helps us kind of remind ourselves what ideal society should look like. Not that India is a completely perfect ideal society nowadays. I mean, it's changed a lot, influence from the Western world. But uh it's nice to reflect, it's nice to learn, it's nice to see how people live there, live like them. You know, when I travel, I like to just live like the people in that place, not kind of from the outside as a tourist, not where I get into it, immerse myself. But after a month of being there, maybe after like the third week, you kind of start to think, okay, I'm ready to go back. I want to start putting into practice what I've been learning, you know, speaking to people about it, sharing this wisdom and this lifestyle, and applying it where it's more difficult in London, you know. So that's how I feel. Wow. What about you?

SPEAKER_03 3:05

Yeah, similar to you. I mean, I always feel so happy when I'm in India. I this time was my third time going. Um, the first time I went, I was going by myself, kind of seeking spiritually, and then uh the times after well, I guess the times after that I was also going seeking spiritually, but with other people. And um yeah, whenever I'm in India, I never I never want to leave. We stayed in I think three or four different places. We went to Mumbai for well, I went to Mumbai first, Abby came a bit later to the countryside, about a couple of hours' drive away from there. Uh staying in the village. Uh I didn't want to leave there. We went to Marapur, I didn't want to leave there. We went to Puri, I didn't want to leave there. Um And I mean we were meant to come back after being in uh Puri. But as we got we got a a drive from Calcutta to Did we go? Oh, we were driving towards the airport anyway. We got to Delhi, we jumped out of the vans, and then our group leader came over and he was he didn't seem very upset about it, but he was but he was like the bombs are going off in Iran, we're gonna have to stay in India. And all of us were like, get in there. Obviously, oh Say as well.

SPEAKER_02 4:21

Nice one, Joseph. Joseph's cut our editor is shaking his head and disagree. What's if it's okay, we can keep going, no worries. Yeah, turn it off.

SPEAKER_03 4:32

It's Joseph's trap phone, sorry guys. Um but no, of course it's devastating what's happening in Iran. It's tragic, it's kinda yeah, it's awful. But we were we were happy sad about that, but we were very happy to be able to stay in India for a few more days and we got to go to Vrindavan, which is um Yeah, it's the most special place in the world. It's like kind of like Abby said, you know, in India generally, everywhere you look you're reminded of spirituality. Um and in Vrindavan I mean it's yeah, everywhere you look, when your eyes are closed, you're deeply absorbed in spiritual practice. Like you just walk down the road and you see people just lying flat on the floor offering their obeisances to something somewhere. Um People chanting mantras, dancing, spiritual songs being sung, um, offerings of diff the smells of different offerings of foods to deities. Um you know, very early in the morning the city's alive. Not because people are out clubbing, but because they're going to the temple to worship their di to worship their God like this, to worship God. Anyway, and so it's it's incredibly special being in these places. And whenever I'm there I don't want to leave, but then at the same time, um you can carry these places with you anywhere in the world. Um as long as you're meditating deeply on um yeah, on the lessons and on the relationship that you have with that place, that you can create the spiritual world wherever you are, um especially when you're feeling separation from those places, intensifies your relationship and your hankering, and then you can try and share share what you're experiencing and what you have experienced with other people. So, you know, like you, I was sad to leave, but I was happy to be back and to um share all everything that we got um in these places with everyone here in the UK. So it was an amazing, amazing trip. Um and Joseph will be coming soon. Going soon to India.

SPEAKER_01 6:54

It does make me reflect on when I was in India though. I I felt a very humbling experience actually being in India. Humbling and also I felt that the people there were more personal somehow. I don't know if you found that. But I felt that um more a lot of the time people are more simple but more happy. And that was quite humbling to me because I thought I had a lot of knowledge and expert expertise and all these things, but it just humbled me to see how happy they are with just being simple and just having a spiritual practice and I remember as well being an Indian we went to this old Shiva temple and everyone was just like like calling out for God, like screaming and like dancing and like um you don't see that so much because people go into like a church or synagogue or mosque so much. Maybe you do some, but not not to the same degree by any means. And so for me, and also the queue was like eight hours long to get there, and so we paid extra and then we got like four hour queue. I know it's the queue was fun, but it was like in London I'm looking around and people are queuing like eight hours for a pair of shoes, you know? Yeah, but rather than like yeah to see to see God or to see a spiritual place, and so yeah, it changed me a lot, my my perspective on life and what's important.

SPEAKER_02 8:15

Because we see ourselves as so advanced in so many ways, and so we end up looking down on places like India. Yeah, you know, we see them as not being as happy, and people say, Oh, you need we need to help people in India, they don't have the same facilities that we have, you know, they're not as advanced as us, they need more money, we need to send resources there, bring them up to our level. People look down on them in that way, or they just look down on them as less intelligent and don't mind them too much. But the reality is you can be advanced materially in so many ways, but if you don't have the outlook of gratitude on all those things that you've advanced in, it's completely useless if you don't have that perspective, that deep perspective on life. And in India, they have way less, but they're way more grateful for it. We have way more here, and we're way less grateful for it. So in India, they have that real wealth of gratitude and compassion and love. And like you said, they're so personal. When you speak to someone in India, they're looking at you straight in the eyes, and there's nothing about it, the conversation, that makes them feel uncomfortable or feel like they have to put something on or put on some kind of personality. They're just looking at you in your eyes and connecting with you as a soul, even the average person, it's not like certain groups are just where we went. No, people are just they're there with you, you know, they're present, and that's quite rare in uh in London. In London, when you meet someone like that, you're like, Why are you looking at me so closely or are you being weird? But in India, it's it's common, it's just normal.

SPEAKER_03 9:40

It happens so often, doesn't it? You're just walking, or you're on a break show, you're walking down the road, and then yeah, someone's staring at you so intensely for such a long period of time and it doesn't feel uncomfortable at all. Like it's so pure the intention behind it. And um Yeah. It's almost like to the Westerner, to the conditioned westerner, it's almost like funny or strange or a lot you know, people who are so they're just very honestly expressing themselves. Like you said, they're fully with you. They're not judging you. There's no ulterior motives. There's generally speaking this is of course. It's like whereas we're so used to so many formalities and so much kind of um false politeness, for example, these things you speak about, you know. It's like that when you c when you connect or speak to someone that's so themselves in a really unadulterated way and so pure, it feels um yeah, it feels unusual. It's wonderful, it feels unusual. Um But yeah, to what you were saying, Joseph. I remember when I first went to Vrindavan and we arrived, and yeah, I looked off the rickshow and I saw these people doing topping their obeisances on the floor and hear someone playing a flute and hear so many things going on. And went to the hotel, put our bags down, and then we went to this amazing temple called Krishna Balaram Temple in Vrindavan. And when we arrived at this temple, the evening arti uh was just about to start. And so we walked in and I looked to my right and I just saw like hundreds of Rajavasis local people of Vrindavan. Just hundreds of people. And I looked to my left and almost immediately the curtains opened and the deities were there, and there was this Kirtan, this Kirtan going on, and it was just climaxing, and everyone was just going crazy. And everyone was jumping, like hundreds of people jumping. And I remember just I just felt like an ant. I felt like I had I was just getting into Krishna consciousness at that point in time, and I had never seen anything like that. And I remember just thinking, I have I have no devotion whatsoever. Like I just remember just thinking, I feel like a fraud actually for being here. I just feel like a complete fraud. Like this is what real like realized devotion, they actually have genuine love. There's no it's organic. There's no doubt in their mind, like they they're fully absorbed in actual loving relationship with Krishna here. Yeah. I don't even know who Krishna is. I think I do. I've got some kind of sentimental, fantastic idea in my mind, but I don't know at all. And they were there. I just I spell like an ant. Remember? And I remember we went for dinner after that, and everyone in my group, they were having like some dinner, whatever. And they were they all seemed really happy, like having a great time in Rindavan.

SPEAKER_02 12:50

I was just You're having an existential crisis. He was crying.

SPEAKER_03 12:54

Literally, I was sitting with that by I was sitting at the end of the table, like, oh my gosh, like I'm not qualified. Everyone said, you know, maybe it's too early for you to go to Rhindavan. Oh man, I shouldn't be here. Oh my gosh, I'm not qualified to be here, I'm not ready to be here. And I remember I went back to the hotel that night, I was with my roommate Alex, and I said, um, it's pretty intense here, isn't it? And he was like, Yeah, it is an amazing place, isn't it? And I was like, I was like, I feel like it, I feel like an ant. And he's like, Oh, really? I was like, Yeah, I feel and I just went to sleep that night. I was like, okay, tomorrow morning I just I need to go to the temple and I just need to pray to Krishna Um to humble me. Um so that I can truly deeply experience and see the Dharma, see this, see this place with no aspiration, but just accepting whatever is revealed to me like that. And so I went the next morning and I prayed. And then after that, yeah, it was the most amazing time, blissful experience. They have real devotion. Yeah, they have real devotion there. We're training, we are training, we're training here in in the West to develop real devotion that they they have the yeah, it's more mechanical here, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 14:14

When you try and take up spirituality in the Western world with our conditioning, our childhood, how we were raised, what we're taught is normal. Then you come to spiritual life and you hear this idea of service, just selfless service, doing things for other people, no expectation of anything back. It's like unheard of completely. I've never done anything like that in my life. You know, we never do things like that. There's always some reciprocation expected, you know. Even in a subtle way, just in a relationship, you know, you expect something back. And if you give to even a friend and they don't reciprocate with you, then you know, you get upset. Whereas, you know, in spirituality, it's about giving, just giving and not expecting anything you do. And of course, naturally we get in return because that's that's love. Love is reciprocation. But in India, you see these people who are raised in this culture, culture of giving, culture of love, a culture of God consciousness, where you know, that's in the center of everything they do, all their relationships, their family. For them, it's just automatic to act in that certain way. To be humble is automatic for people there sometimes. Um to serve, you know. We're not this trip, but in a previous trip, we were traveling through some villages, and we would enter a village, and immediately people would just invite us into their home and just start cooking for us and hanging out with us. And it's like you'd never, ever, ever do that here, you know. And for us, maybe in our circles, it's like something you kind of learn, get into. Okay, maybe you do something like that, but you'd have to sort of convince yourself, okay, I should do this. This is the right thing to do. I should, you know, serve this person, I should cultivate some, you know, humble attitude and try and do something for them out of kindness. Okay, I'm gonna do it now. You have like this mental process of preparing yourself. In India, they just love it, they're so happy to do things like that, cooking for others and giving and going to the temple, you know, super early in the morning and not, you know, doing it begrudgingly, like excited, getting up at 4 a.m. excited and running to the temple. And you go there, the temples are packed. 4 30 in the morning, packed with people, hundreds of thousands of people. I mean, it's crazy. Yeah, everyone is doing that, and it's not like some ritualistic thing, they're coming and you know, no, they're going and they're dancing, we have their hands in the air and they're singing. And I mean, it's just so beautiful. Spontaneous, spontaneous love and service.

SPEAKER_01 16:29

I think that's one of the things that I learned in India is that the more spiritual progress one has, the less they think about themselves and the the more they think about others. Is what I one thing I took away last year. It's one example of I think you spoke about him before Radnat Swami, who's I'm an amazing spiritual teacher. And I went to his spiritual community that he has in India. I remember he gave a lecture, um, he was so absorbed in the lecture, he just had no idea the top the time that was going by. It was like a three-hour, four-hour lecture, and he was like, Oh wow, the moon's coming up and going across the sky. Didn't realise how late it was, he's just like so absorbed in giving to others. And even I remember bringing my dad to the studio when away, our meditation studio, and he was like, they just have no ulterior motive here, they just want to give. Wow. And wow. I think that's yeah, material life. We always have an ulterior motive of you know maybe it's wealth, maybe it's knowledge or um fame, anything like that. It's we always want something, but yeah, that's one big reflection I've been having and trying to cultivate within myself is that actually the more spiritually advanced one is the advanced one is, it seems that they think about their le their self, their individual needs less and the needs of others more, spiritually, not just physically. So I think that's one big lesson from India that I got last year, but I still think about and see with advanced people.

SPEAKER_03 18:00

Yeah, you're not I was I was gonna say your your dad should leave a Google review. No, I was also gonna say zero ulterior motive, five star. Like the people here have no ulterior motives, five-star review, thank you. No, but that's amazing that your dad had that reflection. It's really a special place, Studio 108. Um, but no, I was gonna just comment on what you were saying about yeah, this mood of just giving because when we were in Maya port, um, and we heard we had this amazing personality, Badrina Ryan Swami, speaking, and he gave this wonderful, just incredible, inspiring class, and it turned out to be his last class before he left his body, before he left this world. Um, and yeah, I just thought it's a nice, it's a perfect example and representation of being in this mood of giving, expecting nothing in return. Like he said in that class, I don't think I have much time left. Um, and the way he spoke was as if he knew he didn't have much time left. It was so urgent and so emotional, and he's not gonna get it. He's not getting anything, he's not thinking I'm gonna get something back from doing this. But he so earnestly and desperately wanted people to understand that reading these Vedic scriptures and literatures like Srimad Bhagavatam, Bhagavad Gita, and all these books is fundamental and is the way to open your eyes to realizing and understanding what truth actually is. That so many of us, most people don't know how to be happy. Particularly if you haven't been fortunate enough to be raised in a culture like the culture that those people in India have been raised in, like most of us have been. Like we don't know how, we don't know we don't know how we don't know what our purpose is, we don't know how what our purpose should be in life, you know. We run around trying to figure it out in so many ways as we're growing up. People develop anxiety and so many other issues. I mean he was saying the countries with the highest GDP are the are the countries with the highest rates of incarceration, the highest rates of suicide, all these things. He was just really trying to drill home this point that nobody knows how to be happy, but the solution is in these texts and literatures. And yeah, he was crying as he was saying it, you know. It's like that's how absorbed he is in giving to other people. That he wants everyone else to take up this mantle knowing that he's gonna leave. Like he's not gonna be able to give anymore. So everyone else, please can you give for me like this, you know? It's amazing. Amazing.

SPEAKER_02 20:42

Yeah, we throw around this word you hear in spiritual circles or in India where Indians speaking English, they throw up, they use this word often, auspicious or auspiciousness. And that was a word that I couldn't really fully understand at the beginning. But you kind of get the vibe when you hear people speaking it in context, uh auspicious, like to create an atmosphere of good fortune or to create an atmosphere of you know you're setting yourself up for success, basically, you're creating an atmosphere where good things will happen, you know, an atmosphere of auspiciousness, a fortunate atmosphere, a fortunate lifestyle. And I recently heard a definition of auspiciousness, what real auspiciousness is, what it really means. Um and it's that when people are always thinking for the welfare of others, that's where an auspicious atmosphere exists. When you're always thinking of the welfare of others. So, like what your dad noticed, you know, he came in here, sure he had some personal interactions that made him feel that way, but it's also in the atmosphere. It's thick in the air. When everyone's thinking of the welfare of others, everyone's trying to be selfless. Everyone's, you know, thinking about others, not thinking about themselves. And because of that, everyone's so joyful. Because selfishness is, you know, immediately linked to so many um mental diseases. Selfishness immediately is linked to depression, anxiety. All these different things because you're you're you're self-conscious. You know, when you become self-conscious, you become depressed, you become anxious, you become sad, you become unmotivated, overly cautious. So as soon as you start thinking about others, and everyone's thinking about others, everyone's also extremely joyful and extremely happy. And then that auspicious atmosphere, it's whatever it is, whatever you call it, it's more of an energetic thing, it's thick in the air. You can feel it. When people walk into a place like Studio 108, like your dad did, you can feel like wow, there's something special here that you've never experienced before. Or when you go to India, especially in one of these places like uh Mayapur, Vrindavan, you know, you can feel it, like everyone's really looking out for each other. Everyone just wants to see everyone else happy, everyone just wants to serve God ultimately, and uh that's like something amazing. I mean, yeah, wow, that's why people love coming to studio in a week, you know. People come twice a week, three times a week, and you just can't get enough of it.

SPEAKER_03 22:55

Yeah, that is so profound, yeah. That is so at least in the air. Yeah, it is so profound, isn't it? You can literally feel it in the atmosphere, yeah. Like you literally feel less mental when you go to these places. Yeah, because it's in the atmosphere that everyone is thinking about other people and are benefiting other people, and you yourself start thinking like that as well. Stop thinking about yourself. It's actually amazing that, isn't it?

SPEAKER_02 23:19

Yeah, and the less you think about yourself, the happier you'll be, you know. You just have to think about others, and automatically your problems go away. And then the people ask, oh, but then I'm just gonna get exploited, right? And the people are gonna take advantage of me, people are gonna take me for granted, you know, I'll be too nice. But no, just help the right people. Choose the right people to help, you know? Like someone like Joseph's daddy comes in and he feels it and he's so grateful. He feels wow, this place is amazing. Everyone just wants to give. That person's grateful, and that person you can help them and think of them and want to uplift them unlimitedly, they'll never take advantage of you. Whereas someone who walks in is kind of like, oh, you know, the ticket price was too expensive, or oh, I didn't like this part of my food, I'm gonna submit a complaint, or these are things. It's all fine, okay. But that's not a person, that's a per type of person who maybe they don't feel like gratitude, they might not reciprocate, and you know, you might fall into that problem dealing with them. But you just gotta choose the right people to be around and the right people to help and think of.

SPEAKER_01 24:18

I think it's interesting that service of thinking about others, but without an ulterior motive. Because similarly, you could be like, Well, yeah, I'm always thinking about others, but you could always have an ulterior motive as well. I'm always thinking about others of someone who I can sell my product to, or someone who I was reading in in this book that you mentioned, the Srimad Bhagavad time about um this person called Bharat Maharaj, and he was always thinking about this deer, but before that he was very spiritually advanced, he would be meditating, he would be um doing all these austerities and had a very high level of realisation that he was always thinking about the care of this deer for whatever reason, and it said that his spiritual progress sort of halted at that point, and in my own life as well, although I had a lot of spiritual practices, I had my own business, and I was always thinking about you know how to make money here, how to I was always actually thinking about others, but always with an ulterior motive a lot of the time, and a lot of the time I would have like my spiritual practice at home. But then at work I would be not spiritual, and I'd come home and I'd try and be spiritual again. So you could always be thinking about others, but always with an ulterior motive as well. So but in India, in these places, these holy holy places, they think about others, their welfare physically, but always seeing them as a soul, always seeing them as a spiritual being. And I think that that's that's real spiritual progress, you know. That's real auspiciousness.

SPEAKER_02 25:44

It's real love. Yeah. Because yeah, you're right, that doesn't actually just stop there, thinking of others, because you can think of others in a material way. Yeah. Even if it's not with an ulterior motive, you know, if it's just, you know, thinking of my family and their health, thinking of my country, my nation, you know, I'm gonna fight for my nation on the battlefield, or thinking about the whole world, thinking about the whole human race. But then what about the animals? Okay, thinking about all living entities on this planet, thinking about what about other planets? So the only real way to invoke that auspicious atmosphere is not just to think about others in their body, but to think about the soul, which then automatically think about everyone because the soul is equal, all living beings, you know, and always comes back to the source, it connects back to divinity. So, yeah, the body is not enough.

SPEAKER_03 26:30

I remember um in a temple I was going for breakfast, and there are these ladies who cook these amazing breakfasts um on Sunday mornings, and um anyway, they spend many hours preparing all these preparations for everybody, and then they come upstairs and they serve everybody. Anyway, and so I came downstairs to take my breakfast, and they were serving everybody, and I was just thinking, my gosh, you know, they've been cooking for everyone for so long, now they're serving everybody. When are they gonna be able to have their breakfast like this? So I was saying, look, thank you so much. This looks amazing, but please go and sit and take your breakfast and I will serve. I've already got my plate, like I'll serve everyone. And um they were like, No, no, don't worry, don't worry. Please, please, let us serve you. Please let us serve you. And I was saying, No, you you literally you've been cooking for hours. Everyone else is eating, you're not gonna have anything, you're not gonna be able to eat anything. Please go and sit. I'm satisfied, and I will serve you. And they said, No, we've actually saved our plates. Don't worry, we've saved our plates, and so we're gonna serve you. And I was like, Oh, you've saved plates? They're like, Yeah, we've saved our plates, please relax. It's all right, don't worry about it. We've got our plates, we just want to serve everyone now. I was like, Okay, okay, that's all right then. Anyways, they served me. I went I took my plate and I sat down, and then uh I got up maybe 20 minutes later to go and get, I don't know, another glass of orange juice or whatever. And I came round and I saw them, and they weren't serving anyone anymore, but they were sitting in the corner and they had like these tiny paper plates, and they were eating like one grain of rice of each plate. And I was yeah, I was just like, oh my gosh, it's just amazing. It's just astounding, isn't it? It's like yeah, they just have they literally, like you said, they just love to serve, they want to serve you. That is what they derive their happiness from. It's just amazing. It's just amazing, like it's literally inconceivable to my mind. Um it's just inconceivable. You just grow up, like you said, you grow up being always worrying about yourself, basically, like self-preservation. You're taught to think about yourself. Like I have to save myself, I have to worry about myself constantly. Like it breeds so much anxiety, so much anxiety, unnecessary anxiety. Anyway, um yeah, there's many stories like this. Um the Swami you were speaking about in the eco-village, Radnath Swami, he as well. I remember when he the story when he first went to India and he was travelling by himself, looking for God, and he came to Vrindavan actually, this place. Uh correct me if I'm wrong on the story, but he met he met this older Babaji, this spiritual practitioner. Um, and he would go every day. Uh oh, you I I used to say I can't remember the story well. Can you remember it clearly? I remember it a little bit, but not so clearly. It was about the blanket, right? Yeah, the blanket one. Yeah. Um he was staying with this old Babaji, and he was very old and very frail. And at night in Rhindavan in the winter time, it gets very cold. Um, and he was sleeping on the floor next to the Babaji. Um, and the Babaji had this blanket, and he said, Please take my blanket, please. Like I want you to be warm, please take this blanket. And he said, No, no, no, no. He insisted so much that Radnath Swami, he thought, okay, I'll take the blanket, and then when he falls asleep, I'll just go and put it on him because he needs to be warm. Anyway, and so Radnath Maharaj he fell asleep. Oh, sorry, he fell asleep with a blanket. And no, sorry, the Babaji fell asleep. Radnath Maharaj had the blanket and then he got up and he put it on the on the Babaji, and then he went back to sleep. And then like two hours later he woke up and the blanket was back on him. Anyway, I misplayed this carried on for like two the whole night. That's so fun. Anyway, it's just amazing, isn't it? There's this.

SPEAKER_02 30:48

That's love, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 30:49

Yeah, it's love.

SPEAKER_02 30:50

It's love. Love means to serve. Yeah. Serve means to please, to please means to know. Yeah. I try and make it a practice. I'm not really good at it. I'm still very selfish sometimes, but I try and make it a practice, make a point of things to when I get something like I get really excited about, like some food or some sweet that I really like. And then as soon as I can kind of notice anyone, kind of look at it and oh, what's you know, what's that? Just just give it immediately, give it to that person. Just just get rid of it. And I noticed very clearly, depending on how much you like that thing, to the degree that you were excited to enjoy that thing, when you give it away, you feel way better. I mean, it's the the feeling is so much better to give it to somebody than to eat it yourself, you know. So if you're just objectively looking at life and just thinking, I want to enjoy, okay. Fine, even if you want to enjoy, giving is the best way. I mean, it's so much more pleasurable to just give away things that you really like to someone else who wants it. And then you just all of a sudden you feel this sense of satisfaction, you know, deep satisfaction, much longer lasting and deeper than than just eating that thing or enjoying that thing or watching that thing, whatever it is, or you know, using that blank, that warmth you feel from sleeping with the blanket is not nearly as warm as the inner warmth you feel by giving it to someone else. Yeah, and you feel so much better by doing that, yeah. And so I just think it started by doing it once, maybe, and then I just noticed the feeling like, wow, this is so much better. There's something to it, you know. Yeah, just do it every time, just give things away. Even yeah, I'm not perfect, not to put myself on the pedestal.

SPEAKER_03 32:29

I still selfishly enjoy things. Very quick, just that you can understand that, even just like um, even before I was very deeply involved in spiritual life, that everyone everyone can understand that there's a higher pleasure in sharing things that you love and value. Or you get a lot more happiness through seeing other people happy, just observing other people's joy at something. Like, um, yeah, I used to love I mean I still love music, but I used to love sharing music with people, like songs that I might be hearing that I thought. I would get I would derive joy from hearing the song, but I get greater pleasure in seeing other people really enjoying that. Or you like a movie or something, then you want to go and share it with other people. You want to watch it with other people, you know, these sorts of things. But why is that? It's because um yeah, there's there's a greater relish in seeing other people happy and seeing yourself happy. And the root of it's um spiritual, like according to all these scriptures, Bhagavad Gita, Shrimad, Bhagavatam, and all these countless scriptures that um actually as souls where our mood is to serve. That's what it says in literally every every single scripture virtually um that our natural nature is to be to be rendering some service, and that we're happiest when we're doing that. It's like uh you get yeah, go on.

SPEAKER_01 33:59

I was gonna take you to a bit of a dark, darker place. Let's do it. So it was very happy this podcast, so I just wanted to bring some. Let's balance it out with some balance, some dark energy. Bit of dark energy. No, I was actually speaking to this criminal lawyer recently, and he was talking about he has to watch all these criminal cases and see the videos of people doing stabbings and people doing heinous crimes and all these things. And so he was telling me about this and seeing how someone might murder someone, he'd have to watch the video, and then he would see how much animosity they had, and then they would keep on going, even after the person was completely finished, they would keep keep on going, keep on going. And he saw the amount of anger they had. And then we were just talking about like the psychology of these type of people and what makes someone go down that route. And we would talk about the prison system and all these different things that doesn't really work because people are locked up in maximum security, they don't really have rehabilitation. I think um within five years, like 70% of murder um murder cases go back to prison, something like that, something crazy. Um anyway, so we we're speaking about all these things, and then relating that to spirituality is what what what does what goes through someone's mind when they do that? Obviously, they're bewildered by anger, by hate, by all these things, but before that they actually know have no knowledge of of of spirituality. Their knowledge is stolen by this illusory energy of I am this body, they are that body, I want something that they have, and they lust over it. They I really I'm so upset that they stole my drugs or whatever it is, and that leads to anger, that leads to hate and all these things. And so one's knowledge is stolen by this illusory energy of of me and mine and you and yours. Whereas in in in the spiritual world, actually, you have knowledge of who I am beyond this body and mind, and that we're all equal spiritually, and rather if one's black, white, Hindu, Muslim, Jewish, and in that way uh instead of your knowledge being stolen by this um illusory energy of um difference and division, actually you're unified and there's there's a oneness there of that we we're different, but there's a oneness of I'm a soul, you're a soul. And and you don't do those types of things. Um you don't get lusty over material things because you have spiritual knowledge and therefore you want to serve rather than just having material knowledge. And so we came to the conclusion together that actually the prison system doesn't really work because there's no really spir spiritual um spiritual reformation. There's only material reformation and then they go out and they still have the same traumas as before, they commit the same squ same crimes, etc. But if there was actually spiritual transformation of you're not this body, you're a spiritual being, then naturally you would want to serve because I was hearing recently that actually the most self-interest is a spiritual path because you're you're actually benefiting yourself the most. Um but in turn you actually think about others more as well. So yeah. Although it's very happy and nice what we're talking about, actually the other end of that is actually quite horrific if we don't have this knowledge as well. Sorry to make it quite heavy.

SPEAKER_02 37:32

No, it's okay. I just reminded me of this. I I I don't usually watch movies, but on the way back from India I watched a horror movie on the plane. And uh yeah, I mean a lot of it is about what you're talking about. I mean, it really kind of connects with what you're talking about. If you saw I wish you would I wish I could just play the movie in your mind like five seconds now so you could see, but it's like really relevant. It's called Him, and the premise of the movie, without getting into it too much, is that you know, this person was trained his whole life by his father to be, you know, a football player, American football. And um and he got to the stage where he was like, you know, the number one draft pick, you know, he had a really good college football career and and all this, and his desire for it is so strong, you know, and then he meets this guy who starts to train him up, and everything that this guy is doing basically is instilling in him a deep lust and greed to be the number one, you know, quarterback in American football. Just instilling in him this, you know, you need to go deeper and find a desire within you that is unrivaled, you know, to be the number one, to be the best, and no one can beat you. You have to want it so bad. So you're just cultivating in him lust. And it's like where you're talking about, you know, you have desire. If you entertain that desire too much and put so much faith into that desire, it turns into lust. You know, lust and greed. That lust and greed is unfulfilled and become angry. You become angry, your your memory, your intelligence is all bewildered, goes out the window completely. You don't know right from wrong anymore. You you know, you you don't know what's your highest benefit. So you end up doing things like killing people and murdering and doing wrong things, doing immoral things. That's kind of the process. So the movie, the whole movie, he's just training him and instilling in him this deep lust to be number one. And then at the end of the movie, the final scene is this main character just going out and just killing everyone that's wronged him, basically. Sorry if I kind of just spoiled the movie. But I don't think anyone is watching this cares too much. It's a bit old now, so probably see it already. But yeah, he just goes and it's just it's well, kind of like a Quentin Tarantino-esque scene where you know the climax is just this huge slaughtering scene at the end, you know? And it's just you can see clearly, it's the culmination of all this lust in his heart that's built up, and then it it wasn't fulfilled, and he killed everyone that wronged him the entire movie. He just goes around and just brutally slashes everyone's throats and kills them and decapitates. It's like this really epic scene, but it's the culmination of all this desire that's been built up in his heart, trained in him, and then unfulfilled, and then he just mets it all out at once in this scene. So it's like people are suddenly conscious of this idea, you know, that by unfulfilled desires, unfulfilled lust, that's where anger comes from. And then you don't know what real morals are. We know it, but the problem is we don't train people, you know, the other way. That the consumeristic society, they train people in the same way, like this guy was being trained. They they train you, instill lust and desire in you, but we don't have any training for the opposite. We don't have training to remove lust from people's hearts, we don't have training to stop people from being greedy, you know. We don't train people to do that. That's why crime is on the rise, all these different problems are just getting worse. It's crazy. It's crazy. We know about these things, but we just don't tackle the problem in the right way, you know?

unknown 40:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 40:54

I met a lady recently, and she um sometimes as a Studio 108 volunteering group, we go out and we share books on spiritual knowledge and wisdom, and this one lady came to the table. She seemed very nice, and she was asking questions and then she suddenly goes, Do you guys believe in God? And I was like, Yeah, we do. And then she said, I think anyone that believes in God is a narcissist. Um because how could a God that's all-loving, that's benevolent, let all this hate go on in the world, allow such heinous crimes and allow such genocide and all these things, how could that god allow that? And um I realized she was quite memical actually towards what we were doing, but she seemed nice, but she wanted to sort of test you, test me. Yeah, and so yeah, I just asked asked her, you know, what she said she was into like mindfulness and things like this. I said, What got you into mindfulness? And she said, Yeah, because I thought it would help others. I'm I'm a nurse, I thought it would like help others in that way. Um but yeah, that philosophy of um there is no god, anyone that thinks there is a god is a narcissist, that in itself forces one to to take shelter of material things, and that causes last anger, greed. Because how can you have spiritual love or how can you have knowledge of knowledge of something higher if you're always relying on yourself because our senses are so imperfect? Um we can't see ultraviolet rays, we can't hear what a dog can hear, all these things. But we're relying on our own interpretation of life for happiness. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:51

Yeah, you can just say that person, you know, you have free will, right? So you can go and do a bad thing to harm someone else. That's why there's evil in the world.

unknown 43:03

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 43:03

It's as simple as that. Yeah, she didn't want to hear it though. It wasn't like a logical thing. Yeah, I'm just saying because you have the you know the conversation, yeah. You know, I have free will to do what I what I like. That's what this world is for. So I can go out and kill people, I can go out and steal, I can go out and insult others, harm others. That's my choice. God didn't make me do that, you know. I can do that on my own. And that's why this world is the way it is. And then I have karma, so then the bad things happen to me in return. So that's why there's evil in the world. It's quite simple, actually, quite a simple concept. But again, we don't have the tools to teach people about it these days.

SPEAKER_03 43:43

That's uh people don't have an education. Real Just don't have an education. Yeah. You don't have any Yeah. They don't so many of these people they don't mean any they don't mean any harm. They're just expressing their frustration because they don't have any knowledge. Knowledge. They don't have a they've never been taught, they've never experienced something higher. They don't have the they like you said, there's not the tools, they haven't had the opportunity, so they're not trying to personally atta Well externally it's a personal attack sometimes, but it's just their frustration at not having heard the exposure to any of this knowledge or the opportunity. It's like by no fault of their own necessarily. But they haven't had that opportunity. Um so yeah, it's the duty of those that have to try and share that with other people.

SPEAKER_01 44:36

But what I found interesting was like today I mentioned it to you earlier. I met someone who met this volunteering team sharing books out, and one of them gave him a meditation practice, which was to try and a mantra. I mean, this is a completely homeless guy, he had nothing, and yeah, very simple person. And he said, I did this mantra, and whenever I'm sad, whenever I'm anxious, whenever I'm angry, I do this mantra, and it helps me so much. And so even though externally he seems so much lower than this lady who looked middle class, who looked like a nice person externally. Actually, internally, she she was much less simple, and therefore she was arrogant in many ways, and she couldn't surrender to a spiritual practice, and therefore this homeless guy actually looks much happier. Now I'm seeing him. He has absolutely nothing, but he's um he took shelter of a spiritual practice. Whereas someone who might have so many material things, even look at the politicians, the leaders of our society, they might have so much materially, but what impact are they making in the world and how happy can they be with that impact?

SPEAKER_02 45:41

Yeah, just starting wars. Look at what's happening now in the Middle East. It's crazy. It's crazy. It helped us stay in India for a little longer, helped us have a nice trip, but I don't think it was really worth it. There's crazy stuff going on there. You know, mad stuff. What are we gonna do? Seems like it's just getting worse. What are we gonna do, Joseph?

SPEAKER_03 46:02

That's the real narcissism, isn't it? You know, that's the real narcissism. Yeah. You know, these people who are so fixed on accumulating and uh satisfying their greedy desire to laud it over material nature, and they're willing to wage war just to distract from some other, frankly, like demoniac activity that they've been doing. You know. Not that that's necessarily the reason, but I mean there's so much going on that um that's tr that's horrible to read about in the news that yeah, something like this happens, then everyone's mind is diverted to the you know what I mean? So has the real narcissism, you know.

SPEAKER_02 46:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 46:55

But yeah, so what can we take in summary from this time in India that we can try and implement and give people practically to implement in their lives?

SPEAKER_02 47:12

Just try and be good and don't try to be great. That's my message to everybody.

SPEAKER_01 47:18

Can you expand on that?

SPEAKER_02 47:20

Try and be good because you know, in every situation we get confused and bewildered about doing things for ourselves, and it just it takes away the clear intelligence of what's the right thing to do in the situation. And the right thing will always bring you, you know, bring yourself back, you know, a better result also. Might not seem like it because we have some selfish desire that's distracting us, covering our knowledge, but the right thing to do is always the best for everyone in the situation, you and everyone around you. And we always do things that we regret later. So be good, just in every situation, just think what's the right thing to do, and try your best not to let anything cloud that judgment. But don't try and be great because in the chase for greatness is so much suffering and so much trampling upon others, and uh cultivation of so much selfish desire and disappointment because how many people really achieve this kind of greatness that we speak about? Be great in the sense that you know, you know, it's a it's a it's just a phrase, don't take it too literally. We should be great and we should, you know, be good at uh the things that we do, we should have good skills, all these different things. But the idea is that we shouldn't look for adoration, we should just try and be good, be the best person you can be. And if you get recognized for it, great. Maybe that'll be a good example for others. If you don't get any recognition, it's completely fine. Just in every situation, try and do the right thing and be good. And that simple mentality will bring you so much satisfaction in life. To be simple in that way, just try and be good. Don't try to be great.

SPEAKER_03 48:52

That's my message. Yeah. For me, just to try similar to you, but to try and learn from people that uh seem genuinely happy. Like so many of these people in the public eye who have position or adulation and all these things. Um Yeah, I think Mother Teresa said that in in the West she would meet so many of these people and they would have so much, but she'd look into their eyes and she wouldn't see hope. But when she was in India specifically, and she was holding people in her arms who were dying, in their eyes she would still see hope. And she said, That is the most priceless thing. Um because they have some knowledge of where they're going, they have knowledge of purpose and meaning and direction and actual knowledge and realization of that. Um So, yeah, to be humble enough to try and seek out those who are deeply and genuinely satisfied and to try and learn from them.

SPEAKER_01 49:58

I wasn't in India, but one thing that I learned when you guys were away was that spiritual practice isn't independent but interdependent, I felt. When you guys went away, I almost thought I was trying to run through mud. Because I was having like so much advice, support, encouragement, and just friendship with a lot of the guys that went to India, and I found it a lot harder to do my spiritual practice, to um do my services and all these things. But then I just ended up taking a lot more shelter of the people that were in London who I was friends with and getting closer with them, and then towards the end of it, I got made really deep relationships with others that I wasn't as close with. So overall I think it was good for me. But I could have just not done that and been oh so depressed, everyone's away. But um, yeah, it made me worried about the spir the spiritual practice is interdependent. That that quote where you can go very fast by yourself, but if you want to go far, go with others, and so I definitely took shelter of other spiritual people in the community, and that was really good. Amazing, so amazing.

SPEAKER_03 51:10

It's good to be back. Thank you so much, guys, for tuning in, and we'll see you on the next episode.