Question - Gurudev, How to get rid of sufferings?
Gurudev Sri Sri Ravi Shankar ji - There are 2 reasons behind your suffering:
1. Ignorance – we are miserable due to our own ignorance
2. Old karmas – we are experiencing something now to pay off some old karmas.
These are the only two reasons.
It is okay to have some challenges in life. You should have that confidence within you that, you can overcome the challenge. Earlier also challenges have come in your life and you have overcome them; you have gone beyond them. Learn from that.
Look back at your own life and see how many challenges you have had and how you have sailed through them and come out of them. This will give you confidence.
The other option is to realize that you have to pay some debt so you are undergoing what you are undergoing.
Further, don’t compare yourself with others. You think other people who don’t do anything in spirituality are rising up? What do you know about them? They may have a lot of money but may not have good sleep. You don’t know their suffering.
People by hook or by crook make wealth, they reach to the top, and then they fall from there. Hasn’t it happened? So many people who have climbed to the top using wrong methods, haven’t they fallen?
What should you do by looking at all that? You should always go with a determination of righteousness.
What is that you want? You should have a clear understanding of this. The brain is like a computer; the consciousness works like a computer. First make sure of what you want.
If you confused and you don’t know what you want, then pray, ‘Agne naya supathā rāye asmāna viśvāni deva vayunāni vidvān‘.
This prayer is in Ishavasya Upanishad, which means: May the Divine lead me and give me the best. And have the faith that only the best will happen to you.
