 Namaskaram, on this day, 39 years ago, Sadhguru had a profound experience on his beloved Chamundi Hills in Mysore. It is that experience that has given birth to what we know as Isha today. On this momentous occasion of Sadhguru's Enlightenment Day, volunteers from Karnataka offered Guru Pooja today at that now famous point on Chamundi Hills known as Satguru Spot, expressing their gratitude towards their Guru. We would now like to share with you, we would now like to share with you a glimpse into the celebrations by way of a short photo montage. When you want to express something which doesn't fit into the limitations of logic, poetry becomes very useful. In those four lines, you can hit somebody in such a way that it really hits them and forever they'll remember those four lines just transforms their life. So poetry is a powerful tool like that. Namaskaram and a very warm welcome to all of you. I'm delighted to be here at the launch of Sadhguru's new book of poems, Eternal Echoes. There are many of you here who are familiar with some of Sadhguru's work and this is a chance to immerse yourself in over 500 pages of it. But for those of you, perhaps some of you online and elsewhere, who are more acquainted with Sadhguru as the proponent of Inner Engineering, as the proponent of yoga, as a science, of technologies, of well-being, this is a chance to be acquainted with a somewhat different Sadhguru. And for those of you who've known Sadhguru through his many avatars online as the dynamic navigator of the external world, as a charismatic public speaker, as the initiator of multiple projects, as an aviator, a golfer, a motorcyclist, this is yet another chance to be acquainted with a somewhat different Sadhguru. Because this is the province of the lyric, not of logic. This is the province of the twilight world, not the province of hundred-watt illumination. And Sadhguru himself describes himself in these pages at various junctures in particularly interesting ways. At one point, he describes himself as a wanderer of the twilight world. At another point, as a borderline being. At yet another point, as a fathomless, empty page. And at yet another point, as one who can see in the dark of the cosmic womb. These were some of the images that I took away with me at the close of this book. These were the powerful moments that lingered with me. And I must say at the start that I did not approach this book as literature with a capital L because that's not what it aspires to be. This is, to my mind, a series of utterances. It's almost like having a glimpse into a mystics journal. It's a series of utterances in which we see a person not particularly concerned with issues of form or craft or even grammar. But what there is in abundance is glimpse after glimpse into the unimaginably eventful inner life of a mystic. And this remained with me above all. I think for those who are fascinated by the many faces, the many dimensions of Sadhguru, this offers a glimpse into him as that borderline being, standing on the cusp of diverse worlds as a dual citizen of both the darkness and the light. And for those who are seekers, this book offers the chance to be transported to a place that I think every seeker is passionately and deeply curious about, which is the state of mystical union. And for devotees and disciples, this offers the chance to be transported to a place that every devotee yearns to be, which is the heart of the Guru. It's a book of intimacy. It's a book of vulnerability. It's a book of frequently unguarded tenderness. It's a book of playfulness as well. It's a book above all of heart. And on that note, I'd like to invite on stage the author of Eternal Echoes. Before we move into the conversation, I'd like to invite on stage someone who's made a very significant contribution to this book. And that is the illustrator of this book, responsible for 12 chapter illustrations. And someone who works primarily with pen and pencil sketches but has also been involved in many other fields of art. She is none other than Kauruko Yamazaki. And to call her an illustrator is perhaps not entirely fair because these sketches are not illustrations of the text as much as they are responses to it. I'd like to welcome on stage Kauruko Yamazaki to say something about her journey. Thank you very much for your kind introduction, Arun Dati. And so before I move on to my main presentation tonight, I want to express my deepest gratitude to Satguru for this beautiful opportunity to rekindle my passion for art and explore a forgotten and hidden aspect of myself and to share my work alongside your poetic masterpieces. So thank you so much. So how my journey started with this book was that in 2020, in the beginning of 2020, a dear friend of mine has encouraged me to restart my drawing and art as a hobby. So I used to draw as a child, but it was a long forgotten hobby of mine. And around the same time, I happened to share a portrait of Ananda Maima, an Indian saint that I've drawn eight years ago with Satguru. This is one of a very rare piece that I've done as an adult. I haven't really drawn so much after I started my academic and financial career. And he liked it, and he suggested that I would do a portrait of Bhejima. So I'm not sure whether it's on the screen. But yes, so that time it was a lockdown in the ashram. I only had pen and pencil, so that was the only medium. And this is what I produced, yes. And initially it was daunting because I haven't drawn in eight years and I haven't really drawn or painted in almost 20 years, and I'm very much self-taught. But when I started working on the portrait, it just flew out as if it wanted to manifest on the paper. So the process was very natural and I must say it was a very spiritual and meditative process for me. And I must say I learned a lot about myself through this experience of creating this art. So I do recommend art as a meditative practice. I think one is able to explore a part of ourselves that's hidden from the mundane consciousness. So after that portrait, he suggested that I should do the illustration for this poem book. Which was, and of course I said yes, I wouldn't let this opportunity slip by, but I was quite nervous about this. But he wanted the book to be divided into 12 themes. So I read all the poetry's, categorized it into 12 themes and the publication department also helped in finalizing these 12 themes. So tonight I would like to share 7 of that 12 drawings that I've done. So each drawing has many elements, with many interesting elements that is meant to invoke different interpretation and different people. So the drawings, when I was working on it, I didn't have the final composition in my mind. So it evolved as I drew and I delved into the theme and the poetry. So I'm sure there are a lot of elements that people can discover and also find their own interpretation. So the first chapter is on life. So this work, as you can see, the main theme is the phases of the moon. And so the phases of the moon represent the cycle of female reproductive system. But also it represents the cycle of life. So I have the image of the fetus that's floating in cosmic womb, the galaxy. And I've etched a geometrical design to show that with the right clarity and perception, one can see order in chaos, seeming chaos in nature. So this is the first chapter. The second chapter is on death. So here you can see the skull, which represents death. But also I included a lotus flower. And for me, lotus flower represents life, but also the flower of dispassion. So Sadguru often speaks about the process of living death. So for one that's in touch with their own mortality and holds the beautiful flower of dispassion in one's heart, the beingness of that one is transparent and free of all distortion. So that's the state in which one can become a true offering in life. So for me, this lotus flower and the skull represent the beauty in the acceptance of of death. And I've also included the image of moth, which is representation of transformation from one face to the other. So the third illustration that I want to share, I think, is on yoga. Yes. So there is a lot of theme of duality and unity in this. So some of the main feature is the female yogini that represents the manifested material aspect of the world. And a faint silhouette of a yogi behind her that represents the masculine and unmanifested of the world. There is sun and moon, and there is many other elements with many interpretation. I will let you explore and come up with your own interpretation. It's international imagery. Yes, maybe. Many cultures, I'm sorry. As many cultures, yes. So the fourth illustration that I would like to share is, I think, yes, Guru. So obviously, this Guru's lotus feet. And I've included five geometrical shape platonic solids, which actually represent five elements. And the infinity sign at the top that represent mastery of these five elements, the Guru's mastery over these five elements. So that's this picture. And the next, yes. So this is actually one of my favorite drawings. Initially, the face was clearer and it's modeled on the face of Sadguru in his 20s. This is not how I looked, okay? But he suggested that I should make it more abstract because everybody has their own image of Shiva in their mind and it's better not to interfere or in other people's imagination of Shiva. So he actually gave me a very specific instruction to how to improve this drawing. And it really turned out much, much better than the original version. So I really like this drawing. So the next, this is Mystical. So I love being in the Naga shrine, the snake shrine in the ashram. I always sit there. But for me, that shrine and snake represent the mystical realm. And I've included the symbol of seven chakras to represent transcendence into these mystical realms. So that's what I included here. So the last piece that I would like to share tonight is on the chapter on human toil. And this is my most favorite chapter in the poetry book. And the most difficult, I really struggled to come up with the symbolism. But in the end I came up with the image of a man carrying a weight, climbing up the mount of skull and bones, looking up heavenwards. So Satguru always speaks about how looking up heavenwards for a solution is a disaster. So this man is looking towards the destination that he will not reach, not knowing that he is stepping on the remains of others who's also embarked on the same journey that he has. And the bottom icon shows the trajectory of evolution of life on this planet. So initially it starts from the single-celled organism to all the animals. And you might not be able to see it, but at the end I included a skeleton of a dog. And I know that the dog accompanies Kala Bhairava, the Lord of Time. And so I would leave the interpretation of that last part to you. So this is the last illustration that I would like to share tonight. But I would like to give special thanks to Greta Corey, who has worked on these beautiful graphics and icons in this book. Also Moonsami Nagarajan and Kashinath Gopagani for working on the design aspect. I'm really sorry, maybe I butchered their names. And the people in the Impressions and Publication Department and also of course the Maas and Swamis, who's too shy and humble for their name to be mentioned in this presentation. But thank you so much for the support. And to end this presentation I would like to say that this book will be a companion to my spiritual journey. It's much more than just a poetry, there's so much layers of meanings and insights. And I know that it would accompany me everywhere I go. And thank you so much for this opportunity. And thank you so much for letting me share part of my journey with you tonight. Thank you, Kay. Sadguru, the format that we've decided to follow today is very open-ended. We have a few poems that we've shortlisted and there are some convergences between Sadguru's list and mine. And I'm going to request Sadguru to read the poems and then simply talk about them. I think we'd all be curious to know what went into each of those poems. So Sadguru, I'm going to hand this over now to you. And I'm going to ask you perhaps to start with this very short poem on page twelve. The full? When? Oh! What do you want to know about that? When it was written. That's true. After you read it. When, when a man is woman, bird a flower, red is blue, life, death, twilight. Ladies first. I will have my say later, Sadguru. Please go ahead. Okay. You have the last word. See the, the greatest predicament that a human being faces and the greatest tragedy that human beings are going through and the greatest struggle that all humans seem to be toiling with is just this. Their sensory perception gives one-sided perception. If you see this, you can't see this. If you see light, you can't see darkness. If you hear sound, you can't hear silence. So life becomes a heap of opposites, her contradictions. Trying to wade their way through these contradictions, how much suffering, unbelievable. How much confusion, how much struggle. If you, if anybody ever documents in one year, these 7.6 or 8, I don't know where they've crossed 8 billion, I don't know. Secretly, we don't know how many children are born. If this nearly 8 billion people, if you document what kind of suffering they're going through in one year or in one day, just one day, it's enough for eternity. All this is simply because they have misunderstood instruments of survival or as instruments of knowing. You must know which is light and which is darkness if you want to walk through this. You must know which is man, which is woman if you have to operate in the world. So these differences are very one-sided. Well, in many ways I've said this. Now it's become bit too common for everybody to know this because I've been speaking about this for some time. Well, you are sitting here as a man or a woman, but you came here because a man and woman came together. Your mother and father exist within you. You being a woman or a man is just a surface thing, but you've taken it so seriously. And you go through a whole lot of circus. Just being a man or a woman, how much circus in the world? Forget about light and darkness, that's more complicated. Gender is the simplest damn thing, but how much struggle, how much social confusion, how many religions and scriptures have been written about this misunderstanding endlessly, this is just that because between light and darkness, you think they are two different worlds because it looks like that. The day looks like one kind of world. This planet looks different during the day. During the night, it's a completely different world, but it is not. It's the same world. I think you get that point during twilight to some extent. This is why it's always important to wake up before the sun comes up because you don't have to do anything. If you're just alert and looking, slowly the perception will go into you. This is why always in yoga, Brahmamurtam you should be up because twilight starts then. In twilight, if you're awake, you perceive that the differences that you have made out in your mind because of misperceptions of senses that you have settles within you when that happens, when? When? Cop out. I think this was about 2019 when I was in United States, our triple I, the Aesha Institute of Inner Sciences, is a spectacular place, nature-wise. We're here to build. We've built some, a lot more to build there. But in terms of nature is a truly spectacular place and where I stay, you just cannot escape the sunset. The sun is at you because we are on top of a bluff and there is a valley. When the sun is setting, sun is in level with you. Like this usually happens only at the ocean. Even there there will be a little bit this thing. Here sun is below you when it is setting. So you cannot escape sunset at all, even if you want to. So as I was watching the sunset, I saw this is the thing that everybody is missing. It's not about the glory of the sunset. It is a clear transition where this and that is not there. There's only this and this. It's this kind of poem, I must say, Sadhguru, this very spare and cryptic poem that I feel the essence of this book lies. No, I know some more words than that. I know I don't have your kind of vocabulary, but I know some more words. I was about to say some nice things which I might withdraw at this point. There's a kind of haiku-like quality to this poem which makes me actually want you to read it once more, if you will. I don't know. When a man is woman, bird a flower, red is blue, life is death, twilight, how many times a child would have thought a red flower and a bird flying, they're not different. One is stuck on the plant, another is flying, they're just the same things. The soil and you are the same thing. The earth and the sky are the same thing. So I think children below three, four years of age are seeing things like this. I still see things like that. I never grew up. You know, Sadhguru, in the introduction to this book, Sadhguru mentions that it was in his years on the farm outside Mysore that a lot of his poetry happened. And you say there that the power went off every evening and you would spend hours in darkness, and that was the time when poetry happened to you big time. Particularly today, Sadhguru? Yeah, many times in the darkness of Karnataka's famous power cuts at that time, I would write in the darkness and I would write like eight, ten poems in the evening or in the night. And in the morning I would have a great difficulty reading them because I scribbled them in the dark. Well, none of those poems are here, they're all gone. But, Sadhguru, you mentioned that actually being in the dark had something to do with those poems happening. And today when your entire life seems to be spent in the glare of the spotlight, almost twenty-four hours, when does poetry happen? I'm not in the spotlight. The image of who I am is in the spotlight. I'm never in the spotlight. You're in the twilight. I'm always in the coolness of twilight. Is it that poems like this, I'm just wondering, because you talk about writing these fragments, in many of these poems you almost sense that it's a kind of shorthand, that there is a mystic who's transcribing this mind-bogglingly complex inner life into a few very short urgent fragments of verse. That is because I'm… right from childhood it's been so. I'm very bored with language. I don't like language. You know, I'm talking all the time, writing books, but essentially I don't like language. Because it never says what really, what I am, what I experience, what I know can never be said. So I'm not a great fan of any language for that matter, so I did not really learn any language. Well, you made a comment, that grammar, because I never read any grammar. Even now I do not know the fundamentals of English grammar. I know only by speech and I can write a little bit. But I did not learn any language with any… any decent sense of interest, whether it's Kannada or Telugu, in the… all these I learned at some point. But because my learning was so just on the surface, enough to transact at that moment, most of those languages had just gone out of me, because I did not learn the alphabet, I did not learn the grammar, I did not learn how a language is built. There is a certain beautiful complexity to language, while people, at least many linguists and others say, the most complex thing that human beings have actually done in their brains is language. Well, because they have not done anything beyond that. Yes, language is a phenomenal thing. It gets, you know, many, many things. Otherwise we would be doing, ah, boo, boo to each other, all right. Languages brought so much… so many aspects to our lives. But for me, it… it never paints a full picture. So my interest in language is very minimal and generally there are people who manage a forest flower, they order me. Sadhguru, by tomorrow evening we need a poem, because we have to publish, it has to go to print, then only they will tell me when it's going to print. So, I sit down and write four or five poems in ten, fifteen minutes and I'll send them only one usually, so that next few months they'll always come just before going to print, I do that. And also when I'm writing, the moment I cross eight, ten lines, I have to conclude, very rarely I've written four or five page poems. They're not here, I think, in this book. Otherwise, eight, ten lines I'm done with it. I have to close it with the next two lines, because by then I'm bored. Is it then the brevity of poetry that draws you? No, among the things that you can do with language, probably poetry is the most insightful. Well, it does not describe things like prose, prose can say so much detail. See, if you go into the detail of creation, because my business is creation and the source of creation, I'm not interested in anything else, if you want to go into the detail in prose, let's say to describe a tree. If you spend a thousand years, you cannot describe it. There is so much detail. So poetry has the ability to skip all the detail, not say anything, but still give some kind of an impression that at least people have a sense of they have not understood, which is very important. Oh, I get it, I get it, means you've not gotten anything, because a lifetime of observation, still you will not know anything. A leaf, one leaf, a lifetime if you observe, still you won't get it. So at least poetry gives you that sense of wonder. At least you know you don't understand all of it. You see a small part of it and that small part is a little keyhole. If you know how to make a key for that, maybe it will open, maybe it will, but making the key takes some skill. In fact, it's those poems that I want to return to because there are some that I've shortlisted, Sadguru, and I'm going to ask you to read a couple. These are the more overtly mystical poems in the book. I've written some in Monchon, I feel. I know, I was just telling Radhe, those are probably the ones we should be reading, but I'm going to ask you to first read a poem called Hooked. That's on page 18. And given what you were just saying about poetry, not filling in all the blanks, not joining all the dots, these are the poems, the very mystical poems that I think make a deep impact. Hooked, scent of a flower, coolness of a breezy whiff, the celestial splendor of the night, relentless beat of the heart, and the gentle moment of breath, all these seemingly innocuous happenings make me a living, throbbing, intense life. This brilliant mix of innocuous and the incredible can only be an outcome of a mindless, unthinking intelligence of the beyond that made me a slave in my own life, a life without persona, a life bereft of its own longings, a life that is conquered by the infinite will. The cool fire of this eternal mill burns me not, but leaves me blessed. I'm sorry, leaves me blissed out and hooked. Do you remember when you wrote it? 2020. It's a recent, very recent. Yeah. Tell us more. I think these days, when I'm in India, I'm hardly writing anything because morning they send me nearly hundred pages of administrative stuff to read. So, most of the time my journal never gets open for months here if I'm here. When I'm in Nepal, I've written so many poems in the trek and when I'm in U.S., because of the time difference, they leave me alone in the morning and in America, people don't work till eleven o'clock. So, I have time in the morning and more poems happen there than here. You don't remember the specific moment when you wrote this? This is all, you know, when I'm here in India, if I get my coffee, it's very, very good. When I'm in United States, it is like weather. Some days it's wonderful, some days it's like this. So, when the coffee was good, I wrote. That's my cue to ask for a poem on coffee, but I shall not, I shall desist and ask you instead to read this poem called Mukti. What page? 99. Why are you stopping one step short of Mukti? Nineteen. Mukti, a strange drift, overwhelming all that I knew, all that I always was, all that I never... I'm sorry, all that I ever wanted to be, all that meant something to me, not at all unpleasant, but a sense of sweetness of being, soaked in sugar syrup, a drowning and death of one, a drowning and death of one, and conception and birth of another, a familiar me being dissolved, an unfamiliar power being born, seemed like a catastrophe, catastrophe of the puny me, an effulgent celebration for the life as it explored beyond the limits of my body and perceptions, having been a prisoner of my own device, feel embarrassed to celebrate liberation. Is this a recent one? No, this must be many years ago. I was struck by both these poems, which is why I wanted Sadguru to read them together, because for one it strikes me, Sadguru, that in your poetry, you allow yourself to speak of bliss, of rapture, there are times you speak of nameless ecstasies, here you speak of being drenched in sugar syrup, it's the kind of Sadguru we would never see otherwise, not very seldom in your talks, would you talk of being drenched in sugar syrup? You would talk of, you always speak of the beyond as that which is not, you speak of the journey in terms of breaking limitations, you would not speak of it in terms of affirmations. Would you agree? There have been many mystics in the past, in this country, where they're sitting under a tree, you have to be somewhere around a town because even whatever you are, you still need to eat, okay? You don't want to be in the town, you're just outside of the town, but once people sense some kind of power and just by chance, if you happen to do something for somebody to help them at a given moment, then people start gathering. So there have been many mystics who actually threw stones at people pretending to be mad. You can't throw stones today. But your prose is your verbal equivalent of throwing stones. Kind of. Because because in so many ways I have seen too many people. They're, you know, for example, in an engineering program, which is our basic approach to people to start with. At one time there was no such device, we were simply doing whatever. But the rex tempore doing would not reach too many people. As people gathered, we structured a program and delivered it. But things have changed a lot today, but in eighties when I was teaching, nearly eighty percent of the people came because of some physical ailment. Only fifteen-twenty percent came because they want to know something. Today I think the percentage is only about eight to twelve percent of the people are coming from physical ailments. All others are coming out of a thirst. Which is a massive shift in human consciousness itself in the world, that there are more people looking for truth like never before. But at the same time, twentieth century creatures are u-turn human beings. They keep making u-turns too often. So how much of time and energy to invest? I never think, you know, people always thanking me, Sadhguru, so much time you gave me, all this, I never think like that, because I'm, I'm okay. If, if it doesn't matter whether this is small or big or whatever, when I'm doing something I do it. But in terms of energy, to do certain things, many human beings will never break the limitations of who they are with the kind of energy that they have. They will not. They will have to do lifetimes of sadhana if they have to generate that kind of energy. This is where a guru becomes important. But how much energy to invest in somebody because if they are, see, if you set up a rocket like this, you can fire it up fully because it's going like this. But if this is a rocket which is going to go hundred meters like this and go like this, one thing it may come and burst on you, some of them have. Otherwise they may go and hit somebody else or they may kill themselves or if not kill, they will cause suffering to themselves. So how much energy to invest in a given life has always been a challenge because twentieth century humanity is a bombastic humanity. There are not too many words and too little things. Yes, like never before because never before in the history of humanity this many people went to school. Never before. So this many people never learned this much language and this much deception of language. Every time I want to take a step, any serious step I ask them a dozen times, are you sure? Can you really keep this up? Sadguru, I'll give my life. I don't give my life, keep the damn life. And do this, this and this. Fourth day, no, Sadguru, I don't like to do this, I don't like to do that. Hey, god damn it, I asked you three days ago. This is all the time happening. This is a laughing matter. This is not a laughing matter, this is life and death matter for me because you deplete yourself by working like this. Well, but unfortunately that's how it is because as a generation of people, very few people, I'm very, very proud to say in this yoga center I have hundreds of people who are here for more than twelve, fifteen, twenty years, not once have they even asked for an appointment to see me. Not once have they complained about their anything. Not once they have come to me asking, Sadguru, my problem, if at all if they come it's only for something, for the foundation, for the work to be done. There are hundreds of people like that. I bow down to them because they don't belong to these times, they are from another time. But in today's world, because of probably the nature of education, everything is frivolous information. There is no in-depth involvement with anything. There is no in-depth involvement with anything. When our education is like this, you learn chemistry. Forty-five minutes. Tongue, you learn literature. Tongue, you learn biology. Tongue, you learn physics. What kind of nonsense is this? Unfortunately, this is our education system. So this is why you produce such flaky people who can't stick to anything because they do know what is involvement. They do not know what it means to invest their life into something. They are like this. So, it is a... I'm not complaining, they are all wonderful people, but... But would hearing about nameless ecstasies and sugar syrup a little more often be more invitational? No, no. They'll be coming for the sugar. Is that a bad thing? Is that getting sidetracked? Of course. If... We just talked about twilight. If sweetness and bitterness are not two different things, then what are you choosing? We start the day with a name ball. We could start with a laddoo. Maybe more people will get up at five o'clock in the morning. Hey, from tomorrow it's laddoo. Even she may get up. I may. But since you mentioned that the two are inextricable, in fact, I want to ask you to read this poem called Pain, which takes us away from sugar syrup entirely. What is the pageant? I found it a moment ago. Can you see it? I think... At least I know where my pain is. It's thirty-four. Pain. My pain is not of the undead, nor is this the pain of the lost, nor of defeat and failure. This is the pain of the mother when one in her room turned against her. She would be willing to go just to let him be. If she lets go, she will kill. If this is the pain of knowing... This is the pain of knowing. In your love, you will destroy. In your withdrawal, you'll destroy. That which is but your pot. Till the pot is willing to be whole, the pain will take its toll. This true of creation and me. I think we'll talk more about laddus and shivers today. I know, but I must ask you when you wrote this. This was one of the consecrations we were doing. And I prepared people for more than six, seven months. And then we went into the process. And not all of them, it was a group, but some of them have turned around and doing their own thing. Then I noticed... First I lose my sense of smell. There was no COVID at that time. Then I lost my sense of taste. Completely my tongue became like rubber. I repeatedly asked them, what is it, what is happening, are you okay? I just asked them. But the process is full on. Then I'm not somebody who easily falls off like that, but then I go and fall in a pit. A pit that is dug there. I go and fall into a pit and hurt my left side. Then I'm very sure something is happening and I stop it for a day. And I come here and I back up my car and bash up the left side of my car. Then I go back and stop everything and say, what is happening? Then slowly it comes out, some people are making u-turns. So at that time you abandon it. It's going to be very destructive. You continue, it will be a problem. So I read, I made this poem and I didn't read it to them. I thought it would be too insulting, so I left it. But, Sadhguru, is this what being a disciple is then, that one is actually being incubated? See, you just came because your back is aching. You do Surya Kriya, your back ache went away and you think you found a guru, I'm fine with you. But you want to do something else. You want to step into another dimension of life. Now, now you need to be different. This is not going to work. This is not a zoo. When I say a zoo, it's not something you just go and look at the tiger which is behind the bars. You have to live with the tiger. It's very different. Going to the zoo and going into the forest are two different things. With the zoo, you definitely encounter the tiger. But it's not a tiger, it's a caged cat. You go there, he will show you what he is. Then you have to show who you are. So it's very different. In many of your poems, Sadhguru, I'm thinking of a couple of others, which may not be time to read, but they remind me of this poem, Pain, because you speak of a simultaneous sense of catastrophe and celebration. That's a problem with me. That's why nobody is taking me seriously. But there is another poem, Sadhguru, where you speak of having two hearts. One is perennially rejoicing and the other is perpetually grieving. Living with one heart seems difficult enough. See, to... I'm trying to find an analogy, but any analogy will feel silly. Essentially it is like this. Deep down, I'm just incapable of suffering. Any number of times when other people are in pain, other people are in deep states of suffering, I shed tears with them. I go through what human beings go through. But human beings do not know what is their core. They don't understand. It's only their physiological and psychological space which hurts. Beyond that, it never hurts. So once you open up the doors, beyond your physiological and psychological space, there is no such thing as suffering. But, well, if something hits my body, something pokes my body, will it hurt? Yes, it hurts. Will it cause suffering? No. But if you wish to, because in empathy with somebody, you wish to suffer with them, you can, but it's because it's optional. It never lingers in you. It is just that enlightenment does not mean you're denied of anything. Pain, pleasure, this, that, everything is possible. But everything is by choice. So, well, I don't know if those poems are here. Is a dragonfly here? Must be. I wrote poems on dragonflies, earthworms and stuff. I don't know if they included in this. But I saw this earthworm, you know, struggling out, he's come out in the sunlight and that's not his place and he's struggling. If you try to catch him, he'll get crushed, he's so tender. You can lift him and put him, but, you know, it's already late and the ants have gotten on to him. Well, I twitch and turn and suffer with him for a few moments. But, even if it happens to myself or my own, it'll be the same. I can, in empathy I will go through all that. But deep down, there is another door, which is of the beyond, which is in everybody, but they kept it closed because they think somebody will steal it. Because this habit of keeping everything locked, locked, locked, they kept themselves locked. But that dimension doesn't suffer. That is the most important aspect because that is life. This is just like clothes we wear, the body and the psychological structure which assists us to walk through the world. It is only helpful to walk through this world, you need a body and a mind. You don't need that to just be here, actually. To simply be here, you neither need a body or mind. But to walk through the world, to navigate through the world, you need these two instruments. So, it is like for a lot of people, it's a very superb marketing skill also. There is an iPhone. iPhone has become more important than the eye. They can live without their being, they can't live without their phone anymore because there is more profoundness in the phone than in those people. And they are smarter. They call smart phones because they are smarter than you of course. So, this is the same thing. Whether you did it with a gadget or with the body or with your own psychological structure, it's the same thing. It is just going further. I hope that will bring realization because at least when they lose their phone, they may get realized. A lot of people realize when they are about to lose their body, when they know they are going to lose it. A lot of people realize. They light up at the last moment. All their life they were in darkness, but they light up at the last moment because they realize everything that they thought is real is not real. It's going to just vanish like that. In sheer terror. They light up in sheer terror. Oh no, not everybody is in terror. You must see people dying. Not everybody dies in terror. You preparing for terror. Don't do that. They're not dying in terror. Many of them, most of them are bewildered because they thought this is it and they lived. Whatever. Whatever their silly business, their career, their body, their pleasures, their homes, you must go and see. You know, like I've had this opportunity to go into some of my religious homes after they died. The kind of things they all stored up, all the valuable things in their life, all the trinkets is unbelievable. All these things they invested their life in and didn't even take one. At least one souvenir they could take. They didn't. So when it comes to them, all these things that you invested in is not really life. They're just bewildered. But some will realize, they light up. Terror is... you know, when doctor tells you, terror, when you start seeing you ebbing away, usually there is no terror. Life has its own sugar syrup. That is so comforting to know. No, traditionally they call it Bhairavi Yathana. But that's painful, right? No, you can dip pain... You see, you can dip nimble in sugar and eat it, right? That's what we're calling a tomorrow's laddu. Okay, Sadhguru, I'm going to ask you to move to this poem called Human on page 112. Oh, I like that number. One, one, two... Human. Human. Even when at home, I longed for home, bearing pain of longing for home, strangely got cured in being homeless. When the walls of home dissolved, a pristine home, unwalled and unfettered, devoid of love, affection, or companions blossomed, shall I call it my being? When was this written? Must be twelve, fifteen years ago. Do you remember the moment? This was written in a Samyama program. That's one time nobody's bothering me. Everybody's got their eyes and mouth shut, so I'm writing something. Where do you write, Sadhguru? You write on... Where do you write? If I'm at home, I have a journal. A whole lot of poems were written on airplanes. Yes. So many of them were written on tissue papers. Yeah. You know the... the small paper napkins that they give you, I wrote on them. One poem was written on a cloth napkin. I had to steal it. But in the end, I forgot to take it. I folded it and capped, and I told the hostess, see, I need to take this. She said, ha ha ha, I said, see, I wrote a poem. She laughed and she said, okay, you can take it. But I forgot and came off. So a lot of tissue paper poems, later on I transferred it into the journal. But generally on any kind of piece of paper, like, you know, here it's not there, otherwise usually there's one paper and pen. So I'll scribble something and then take it and maybe there are some swamis who are... whichever way I write, because sometimes I'm writing, lying down, sometimes sitting, sometimes standing. I just scribble like that. But there are one or two swamis here. Whichever way I write, they almost get it 100% right. When I just take a picture of it and send it, they will type it and send it back to me within five to ten minutes. Rarely one or two words will be wrong. Almost everything as it is. But you always write in longhand. Oh, yes. Never on a... No. On a computer. No, no, no. I don't know such things. Okay. There's a whole almost a genre of literature that's emerged that's all being written in transit lounges and in airports, because that's really where some, you know, people spend so much of their time and actually get the time to write. So I was curious about how it is for you, particularly with the kind of schedule that you have. No, transit, wherever the phone is working, they'll keep me busy usually. So only on the airplane it's not working so. But this is a poem about home and also a poem about... It's a poem about a kind of homesickness and then it's a poem about a kind of homelessness and then it's a poem about homecoming. And I wanted you to tell us more about that journey because I think in some way many of us have shared that journey but not on the level of, not on the profundity that you're talking about it here, but I think many of us have had glimpses of that journey. Is this the blueprint for almost every seeker? Yeah, I would say there's literally no human being who's not confronted with a thought and an emotion like that, but they manage to brush it aside. It doesn't bother them enough. The pain of not knowing doesn't tear them. That's the whole problem. They come to terms with ignorance. They make a deal with ignorance. They will build relationships where everybody will conform. This is the best way to live of comfort, companionship, love, affection. These are all things you're seeking. I know a whole lot of people have raised human emotions to heavens. If you say love, they say divine love. If you say joy, they say divine joy. If you say bliss, they say divine bliss. You don't need any God's help to be joyful, loving, peaceful. As a human being, you endowed with these qualities. So all those who deprived themselves of that, they either seek God or they settle for a dog. Yeah, usually. Because they want unconditional love. This is the demand. Because the nature of love is such that it's like a flower. If you don't watch it for two minutes, it'll fall. It'll wither and fall right there. Either you want to let it fall or you have to nourish it every moment or you have to concretize it. That means you take a picture and keep it on your phone screen or you institutionalize it with marriage or this or that. So essentially, well, I'm not against any institution because institutions are needed in the world to operate, otherwise there'll be chaos. That is a different thing. But you cannot institutionalize joy or peace, like right now we think United Nations is the institution for peace. No, no, you cannot institutionalize peace. You cannot institutionalize joy. You cannot institutionalize love or anything for that matter. Institutions are functional instruments in a given society. I have utmost respect for them because without it, people, whole lot of people wouldn't know how to live. You need institutions. There is a government. There's a democratic process. There are variety of things, all right? There are courts. There are parliaments. Well, ninety percent of the time some nonsense may be happening there but still these institutions are important because without that there'll be total chaos. So I'm not talking against institutions but institutionalizing things that happen within a human being is a silly effort. But is it possible to embark on a journey without this sense of home sickness? See, let one human being honestly say when you are with your most loving parents, however doting and wonderful they were to you that you never felt this is not where you want to be. That is a dishonest human being because love gets tedious. Somebody's fondness gets very tedious. Comfort gets tedious because the nature of life is it wants to constantly expand. If there's no room for expansion, it doesn't matter you are kept in a whatever. I won't use because everybody uses the word golden palace. I think golden palace is totally unesthetic in my visual perception. I hate golden palace but whatever is the most wonderful palace or as you say Shangri-La, whatever, it'll get tedious. All the heaven bound people, they don't know how bored they will be within three days in that place of goodness. So I'm saying it doesn't matter. It's not because there's something wrong with your parents. They may be most wonderful people but the very nature of a human being is such only if you're a pet animal, if you have reduced yourself to that you're just happy with the means that you're getting and somebody is fondling you once in a way and you're happy with that. For that you must be a pet animal. You should not be born as a human being. Once you're born as a human being, it is natural wanting to break barriers. So when you're young as a child or a teenager you think barriers means they're all physical. Before you understand the barriers are not really physical. Whether you build your own house or you live in your parent's house or you live in a slave master's house, the house and walls are not the barrier. It is all within us. Before you realize that or how soon you realize that will lead to either transformation or frustration. And this homelessness, this whole phase of vagabondage of being a nomad, you have poems about being a nomad. Is that also an intrinsic part of every seeker's journey? See, do not separate seekers and non-seekers. Everybody is a seeker. Some quickly compromise. Some endure. There is nobody who is not a seeker. Some seek and forage within their own limitations. Some want to seek. Some seek in a safe manner. Some seek dangerously. But there is nobody who is not a seeker. Everybody is a seeker. And therefore this period of homelessness or vagabondage is universal? It may not be a period for everybody. It may be just momentary for a whole lot of people because people will feel terrified when they feel there, if they just look at it and see actually, you know, just the nature of life. Forget about your home. Suppose you left somewhere, you know, I've seen people, you know, when we were children, when we were growing up, Mysore has a Dasara exhibition which goes on for one-and-a-half months. So this is a place where all the youth will go and hang out and, you know, there are things to eat and a lot of entertainment shows going on, music going on, various kind of circus elements and all things going on. In this... In this exhibition grounds, which is hardly maybe ten, fifteen acres, maybe twenty acres of land and full of lights everywhere and shops and stuffs going on, every day either children or woman or some man, they get lost from their families in that crowd. Maybe fifty-thousand to hundred-thousand people will be milling around and people get lost. All the time when the music show is happening, one policeman will announce, there is a child here by name Vikram, his father's name is this thing, his mother's name is this thing, he's crying here, come immediately. Hey, goddammit, we came to listen to music. If you brought a child, figure out how to hold on to you. If you don't figure that out, ask him to come and wait at the gate and pick him up there, nothing is going to happen, all right? These are not times where great amount of kidnappings happening, anything in my soul, nobody kidnaps you in my soul. Okay? At least nobody kidnapped me. So, this ridiculous thing and grown-up women, they're lost from their husband or their family. They're crying in the middle of the road. It's a well-lit place, the whole damn place is over-lit, all right? There were no phones, that was the only thing. All you have to do is go near the gate and wait, or if you're a car or a motorcycle, go and wait there or just stand there. Let's see if your man wants to find you or not. I'm saying they will be, even men I've seen, grown-up men crying loudly because their wife or their child had gone somewhere. Unbelievable. So, the sense of being lost, nothing, you don't have to drop them in the middle of Kalahari or something. In my soul, Dasara Exhibition. I know my soul people will be listening and say, how can Sadhguru speak like this? Does he know the pain of getting lost in Dasara Exhibition? I'm saying this is how people are. I've seen people in the jungles when some of my friends came with me in the forest, not even deep inside, just in the borders of the forest. Somewhere they go here, there and they get lost. They're just, just few meters away somewhere and they can't see us. Baa! They start crying. Grown-up boys, having lost in the forest for days and weeks don't know where the hell I'm going. I know if I keep walking, on some road something will come because I know how wide western guards are. At the most 150-200 kilometers, if I walk, I will come to the coast or to some city. But in the meantime, you should see how people behave because for them, nothing big needs to happen. Smallest things, if they lose their wallet, they lose their phone, gone. Everything is gone, all right? So they don't have to lose their life. This is why I said when… Oh, I'm sorry. When a time comes when you're going to lose your body and everything that you know as life, either terror will come when they first realize that. But slowly as life starts ebbing, it gives you a certain anesthetic. This is the nature of life because life doesn't just pop out like this. It is leaving slowly. As it starts leaving slowly, you will see there is a kind of an anesthetic, there's a kind of comfort that they come to. You will see there was struggling in pain, that was happening. But as death is slowly coming approaching, last few days you see they become peaceful, nice, some of them even joyful. A few are bewildered, what's happening? Because they never thought this will happen to them. So being lost is not about a certain situation. It is the nature of life. It is the nature of life. You have been given the intelligence to find out what is the nature of life. If you did not have the intelligence, if you were like any other creature, none of them have those problems. They're never lost. They're all fine. Physically they may be lost in the terrain sometimes, but otherwise they're just fine. They never feel lost. This is the greatest privilege that human being has. You can be lost. Just believe me, if you cannot be lost, obviously you're chained, isn't it? You're chained? Of course. See these days I've seen, especially in United States, people are taking their children with a... what do you call this? A leash. A leash. Like a dog leash. They can pull it... There is a thing where you can shorten the leash or lengthen the leash according to the traffic and whatever else is happening. A child is running on a leash. Maybe for single mothers it's a convenient way of handling. I can understand there are no two-three people to run after the child. The mother doesn't have the energy of the child because he runs all over the place. Maybe it's a practical solution. I'm not commenting about that. One who is on the leash or a chain cannot be lost, isn't it? You need to understand being lost is a great privilege because you are not on a chain. It's a human privilege that we can be lost because nobody is holding us on a leash. That sounds like one of the poems in the book. You'll find many of those lines, just two lines at times, but there are many of those moments in the book as well. I'm going to ask you, Sadhguru, in fact, to read this poem called Here and Here because speaking of homelessness, 131, this almost seems to be the address at which you're at. Here and here. Let me say that this poem was written in Lebanon. I will tell you later why and how. There are many Lebanese people out here. Oh, they turn into birds these days. These people want to know who I am. These children of God drunk upon the fruit of ignorance want to know where I come from. These pearly dewdrops that hang precariously from the blades of grass, I'm in them. The lovely fresh orange blossom of the spring, I'm in them. The silent songs of these timeless rocks, I'm in that. The age-old scent of the cedars, I'm in that. The sweetness that the mother's breast bears for the child, I'm in that. The coyote howling away in their ancient sorrows, I'm in that. Where is there for me to come from? Where is there to go? All has become stillness as everything that is moving and unmoving is me. This was, you know, for me going and teaching in a Middle Eastern country or a West Asian country as we know it here, especially so close to that region where three major Abrahamic religions have come from. There is a certain... they may not consciously know this, but I saw this in almost every person there that they have a sense of expectation that a messenger, a messiah will come. It is so palpable. They may not... because they are modern educated, they may not be thinking like that consciously, but in their mind it's so deep-rooted that they're expecting somebody to come and somebody comes, it is always like easy, easy the man who's been sent. Because they've always been told somebody will come from somewhere and he will bring you the message or he will deliver you or whatever. So this expectation, you know, like I landed in the Beirut airport, which was quite an experience, I don't want to go into that. So the immigration officer asked me, what have you come here for? I said I teach yoga. He looked at me like this and said, just read the Bible. I said, yes sir. Because this is Lebanon, he can always send you back. General security. Whatever they called them. Anyway, so when I walked in and there's a whole bunch of very super enthusiastic, our volunteers who had done programs elsewhere waiting, Hoda who walks on eggshells was walking around in the... Hoda is somewhere here. So she was in the airport and so many others that I had not seen before, but they were all like this. He's either... So that look and the way of addressing you, the kind of questions, everything was somewhere in a very depth of their psyche. It is this that the messenger will come, a messiah will come or maybe son will come or whoever will come. This is so deep rooted. So, I mean I have some fantastic memories of that country, very unfortunate to see what's happening to it now. Such a beautiful and spectacular country, but unfortunately it is what it is today. So that is when I wrote this poem and said, I'm not coming from anywhere, I'm here. But I want you to... Nobody sent me, I'm not an agent. But Satguru, it ends with those lines which I... I wonder if I could ask you to just dwell on. See, for example, if we take you into this forest, there may be an elephant just hundred feet away. I'm saying hundred feet because that's the last point of safety. Even if it's hundred feet away, it's standing right there. You can't see it unless it moves, unless you have a very trained eye. You go with a local tribal, he says, Anga, Parangya, this bird, that snake, this thing, he will point. You will see like this, you won't see a thing, you won't see an elephant. If you can't see an elephant, that means something else, right? So, most people only notice that which moves. Anything that's still, they don't know, including themselves. They know only those parts which are moving. What is still, they do not know. Till they know the... There's no word for this. Let me put it up, use a mundane word. Till they know the pleasure of stillness. Till they know the profoundness of stillness. Till they know the stillness which is the very core of you and the cosmos. Till you know that, you really don't know anything. So, your thoughts, your emotions, the fluids of the body, the secretions, all these things are keeping you going. It is all fine, nothing wrong with it. Nothing wrong with anything. We... we use the loo and flush it. Is there something wrong with it? Because we do it with doors closed. Nothing wrong with it. It is just, that's what it is. Similarly, eating you may do it in public, but that is also, ingestion and excretion are not very two different things. I know I'm making things ugly for people. But I'm saying, there's really no great something about it. There's something fantastic about the life process. So, all of it is fine. All the things happen in the name of life, eating, sleeping, this, that works. Everything is fine. But within you, are you still a human creature? Or are you at least in transition to become a human being? That's a question. If you're a being, there is no such thing as being, unless you touched upon the stillness. People will sit like this, they feel little calm and they say, I'm very still. We're not talking about that. That kind of stillness that freezes you from inside out, where you could be here for a hundred years without thinking or feeling a damn thing. What is the use of such a life? This is the problem. Because you think only that which is moving is important. You need to understand over 99% of the cosmos is unmoving. Over 99% of even a single atom is unmoving. It's stillness. And if you only make yourself identified with the moving parts, you are just this much. But if your experience goes beyond these moving parts of mind and body and touches the stillness, then you're cosmic in nature, in cosmic in your experience. Is it ecstatic? Is it pleasure? Is it this? There are no such things. These are all... Language is a consequence of the moving parts of life. If my tongue and my lips were not moving, there would be no language here, isn't it? So language is just a consequence of the moving parts. You don't expect that to touch the stillness or the still core of who we are and what everything is. So in this culture, we call it Shiva, unmoving. At this given point, Sadguru, what is it like inside you? What are you experiencing inside you at this given point? When you speak of being here and here, I'm not going to let you get out of this with a joke. I do want you to say, if you can, can you describe how far can language go? At this given point, as you sit here with us, our idea for many of us at least, our idea of here and here, is this particular evening, sitting with your book of poems, sitting around you and listening to you read, what are you experiencing right now? When you said inside of you, I thought you were investigating what I had for dinner. So I'm glad it's not about that. Anyway, those who, who provide me with daily bread at home, usually they won't do anything unasked. They tell them something, they'll make it. Today, they got somehow excited by today's momentum, that's happening. I'm sure they won't read the book. English is not their language. But unasked and without permission, they made paesam for me. So I'm in sugar syrup today. We had some paesam today. See, without this and that, say something which is not about this and that. Say something. Say even you are speechless. I'm not a mystic. No, no, you're a linguist, that's why I'm saying, say something which is neither about this nor that. I cannot say it, but I would try to point in an image to it. That's why I said like this of a standard. I was pointing at an image. Is that as far as it goes? No, image means it is this. This is an image, that's an image. An image is trying to bring together the abstract, something that cannot be said. Let's not say abstract, something that cannot be said with something very concrete. It tries to link the two. Can you employ language where there is no this and that? No, but... Let's move to the next poem. In fact, I've chosen the next poem. Is it another? It is exactly, it's perhaps an answer to this question. It's called disarm. What is it? 145. Oh, this is from 1994. 140? Yes, 145. Okay. Disarm. Sit still, says my heart. Do not raise your dust. Let the world find its way to you. But my mind, the worldly wise says, raise a storm or you will never get this world to disarm. Well, this is 1994 where I'm... where I've still... we've just come here and where that now Kaivalya Kutir, now it's a concrete building, you can't call it a Kutir anymore, but they still call it. But it was just a thatched roof hut and that's it. Sixty-eight of us landed up here. They had no clue what to expect out of me. But they took a brave step of coming away for ninety days, man and woman. Sixty-eight families, there was full-scale drama going on. All those people who came, some of them were young, who could run away from their families. Many of them were married with children and everything, so big family drama was happening everywhere I knew. So I'm... at that time, my only goal is somehow to fulfill the Dhyanalinga and then either leave completely or go back to my vagabond life. But to do one thing, you had to do ten things because lifetimes of failure, simply because... not because you were not capable of doing it, simply because you could not garner society's goodwill. This has always been the problem of the mystics. That's why they withdraw because not everybody has the gall to hide their experiences and their intent in at least rudimentary language like me. Most of them don't care. Those who care don't have the means. Those who have both generally don't have the time. So at that time I'm still contemplating how far to get involved with the social system. And we're trying to do it like this and suddenly a big gossip mill starts in Coimbatore. Some secret school has been started. They're doing all kinds of things. They're taking drugs. People are sitting on the hill with binoculars and watching. I call them, hey, come here. They won't come. They'll go away. At that time, we don't have a fence. We don't have a gate. They can walk down and see in what condition are we. Are we on drugs or are we on oxygen or are we on ozone? What are we on? They can come and find out, but no. Because from there it gives a proper view what kind of drugs we are on. All right? They're sitting there and watching and then there is a meeting in Coimbatore city. They want to bring five hundred people in trucks and demolish the ashram. When I heard this, what kind of idiots would need five hundred people to pull down this hot tub? I can pull it down single-handedly. With a few volunteers in minutes you can pull this down. Why do you need five hundred people? No, no, maybe they need inspiration, you know. They have to come to work themselves up and maybe they also wanted to beat us up or whatever, because people are in all kinds of experiences. They're taking drugs, they're doing this, they're doing that, everything. Binoculars, I can see them shining. They're sitting there and watching. These are not some local kids. These are pillars of the society. Okay? So, they're sitting with a ham radio out there and telling them, should we sign this, you know, it's walking on the ground. This is happening, that's happening. Somebody who is also a ham radio member, you know, these days I think it's gone because of this phones have come everywhere and a friend of mine was like, hey, these guys are talking about you, man. I said, what are they talking about me? They're talking every step that I take, what's happening, what's not happening, everything. So, when this was happening, my mind thinking to what extent should I engage with these idiots? I'm not talking about any one specific group. This is a common terminology, fondly I call people. So, I'm just calculating to what extent am I willing to go? Say, how far I've come my engagement in the world. Because I'm fundamentally reluctant to get engaged with… to engage with the world. But I know if you don't create enough goodwill, they will anyway ruin it. We are preparing people, already it's brewing. When I actually get to work, things will happen. So, we have faced this before and I know many other yogis and sages who face this. So, goodwill mission, we started. Going and giving public talks, introductions, what is it that they're impressed with, with their stupid education? One thing is, if somebody can speak English, they're… all right. This is an unfortunate reality in the country. Another thing is, you must be smarter than them. So, that was never a problem. So, going there in every house, talks and introductions, questions, then slowly the word spread. You know, this is… this is… this is in the programs, young boys standing up and asking this. People are all talking in the town. It seems nobody can win an argument with you. I said, because I never get into an argument, so they cannot win with me. So, like this, we built up goodwill, not necessarily with sweet words, making them confused. Because everybody is utterly confused about life, they just made some silly conclusions, my home, my wealth, my money, my wife, my husband, my children. With this, they've made some false conclusion about themselves and they think, this is it. So, I just asked a few questions and confused them. I didn't even say anything, I just raised a few questions. They got confused. Doesn't take much. You don't have to say some great philosophy. You just ask three questions. People who've been reading scriptures entire life, they get confused. Because goddammit, you're just trying to find some meaning where there is no meaning. You're trying to find meaning to life, simply because you have never experienced life in it's any kind of profoundness. Why would you need a meaning? If you had watched the sun rising in the morning genuinely and really it did what it has to do to you, what it is doing to every other life, if it did that to you, why would you ask what is the meaning of the sun coming up? Only an idiot will ask such a question or he must be a philosopher or he must be religious. What is the meaning? No, god is slowly pulling up the sun because well, all kinds of things have been said. So, in the process of earning goodwill, I just raised questions that they had never raised in their life which yielded a lot of result. Some were angry, but there was an overwhelming sense of involvement. So we built the goodwill till we built the goodwill like this form. I was thinking how much, how much does to raise just enough for completing this one work or should we go further, how far to go? This was always a question because I've always been an extremely reluctant guru. That's not how people see me today. People think I'm some kind of a YouTube star or an Instagram star or whatever nonsense, but I'm within myself, I'm super reluctant about public exposure. I know nobody's going to believe me. But when I play a role, I play to the hilt. Till now I've played, I know I need to play for some more time. Maybe one day suddenly I will stop. Not that I have any problem playing that role now, but at that time I didn't want to really step into the world like that. I just wanted to finish my guru's will and leave. Either leave or leave whichever way. But too many people got involved. They were putting their lives into it, so there was no leaving. But when you say reluctant, Sadguru, you're right, many people would find that difficult to believe, given that it's been twenty-five years since that poem was written and your life seems to be more dynamic than ever before. Is there, we were talking earlier about this borderline being, which is the phrase that you use in one of your poems, is this a difficult path to tread, knowing when to... deciding how to navigate this between stillness and involvement? It's not difficult. It's just a choice. Making the choice, I took a bit of time, because I know getting involved in the world, what a huge compromise of yourself you have to make. But we made the choice and it's fine. Can people miss the stillness in this storm? That's a left to them. All the everything that we teach them, all the sadhana that we give them, is towards stillness. But if they think I exist only on YouTube and many meditators coming and telling me, Sadguru, every day, some, some of them come, every day I go to bed listening to you. I said, God damn it, I thought, I am talking to people to awaken them, but you are using it to go to sleep. And some people coming and telling me, every day, Sadguru, when I wake up, first thing is I listen to you. I said, first thing is you're supposed to do your practice. No, Sadguru. What to do? I know that there are many other poems, Sadguru, but I'm going to ask you at this point not to read the one that I'd originally intended, but to move on to your Guru poems where you actually speak of your own master. These are among the most spare poems in the book and perhaps amongst the strongest. So it would be a pity to bring this to a close without reading those poems. Where is that? 161 My master, brooding, squinting, staring, I could not hit the mark. He walks in like a wanton monarch with a crooked stick and he makes his mark. My master, lost, lost to life and death, both I did, but moved me not. A man who walks with a stick comes to me, the able-bodied one, having seen birth and death and all that life can bick with, still sitting dumbstuck. Here comes the man with a stick to have me struck with his lightning stick. My master, I let the whole world go by of spiritual and material, of land and sky. I searched in the mother's womb and in the lover's bosom, but such a one I did not find till I clawed to him like a worm. I'm sorry, till I crawled to him like a worm. My master, what can the poor guru do? All I have done is do and do. After seeking all that is there, after seeking all that is there to see, he comes to teach me how to be my master. The breath that passes out will not come back. The guru who touched me and left me, left me not and need not come back. Well, this... Even the tissues wet, what the hell? This is during the Anadi program. We had a ninety-day program in Isha Institute of Inner Sciences in 2010, seven years ago. Well, in many ways as the wholeness program here, there it was the Anadi. So, it was a... the wholeness program was what we did here ninety days, the paucity of organization. Every day, we had to collect money from the volunteers to buy that day's vegetables. That's how we were. And the days when it didn't turn out like that, we just fried green gram and ate happily and drank kanji. And everybody was fine and when it rained, the hut collapsed. So they need... they said they need three days to build that and put the anti-termite treatment. So we went up in the mountains and stayed for three days. When it was raining, pouring, it was raining right in monsoon time. But we did everything the program went on. Everybody did their sadhana. My girl was just three-and-a-half years of age, I think. Yeah, four years of age. With her there in the pouring rain, everything went on fine. Well, in United States things were much better organized. We had a proper Mahima Hall and the people for them it was a very strange situation to sit with somebody like this for ninety days. They never imagined they would do that. Not that here it was any different, even here it was the same, but it's more so because culturally they were much less prepared in that way. So we did various sadhanas and various possibilities in that this is... this is something that I always see when I speak something or when I... in some way when I touch somebody's lives the next thing they will ask me, Sadhguru, who is your guru? They think I went to some school. It's like if you write you know, if you write good poetry people will ask, who thought you were English? Who? Which college you went to? Like that, that's the same question. Well, that's not how it works at that time I wrote these five poems right there sitting on stage in front of people when they were doing something in about ten, twelve minutes I had these five things ready because I don't really formulate things. When I'm writing this word I don't know what's the next word. You know, I don't know the sentence or the line that I'm writing. I only one word. After that I'm just writing. So, maybe it's my partner. But when you're writing it brings me to that question you know, there's another point in the book where you call yourself this fathomless empty page and what would make the empty page what would impel it to fill five hundred and fifty pages of poetry? Where does that impulse come from? When you are eternally empty you can do what you want. See, it's like this you... you can take photographs of yourself selfie of course today as many as you want, they will stay it'll keep on occupying the memory of your phone. At some point your phone will say enough of your beauty queen, stop because it'll memory run out. But every day twenty-four hours you can stand in front of your mirror and do what you want. All right? You can dress up in hundred different ways every day and show the mirror even if you happen to live for thousand years it will still show you who you are because there's no memory. So that's an empty page there is no memory. There is a dimension of intelligence within you where there is no aorta of memory it's uncontaminated with memories and meanings once that page is open for you you can do what you want it's like writing on water you can write what you want it'll be gone. Is it an outpouring or is it a need to actually address as in the case of your master poems you said you were actually addressing questions Usually as I said usually it's by the order of the publishing English pub they called it's not they don't serve beer there it's English publications department all right in that there is a card to prove department it's called forest flower from there they order Okay, suppose they were not there would you be writing poetry? The forest flowers are always there isn't it? Tell us more about the impulse of this mirror why would this blank this empty mirror Does the mirror seek reflections? No No So why does it write? Why is this blank page creating printed pages? But somebody is coming in front of it so it reflects So it's movement it's in complete stillness but this dynamism of the outer world impels it to write I wouldn't say it impels me See I'm not an inspired writer like that I'm not an inspired anything really I'm essentially to lack of vocabulary I would say fundamentally I'm just lazy I don't like to think I don't like to do anything I never usually think it's just that people think they have to practice thinking and they're all the time thinking it's a worn out machine see this is a machine the physical body is a machine the more you use it the better it gets this is a machine the more you rest it the better it sees it the more clear you make it the better it sees it So a mirror need not be fuzzy because of too many things written on it because you didn't like your own image you put lipstick on the mirror also now there's a problem whatever you put on yourself no problem isn't it? So a mirror is not impel by anything but doesn't resist anything doesn't matter what kind of creature you are a mirror doesn't resist isn't it? What is inspiration for a mystic? See inspiration the word inspiration essentially means you have to be driven either by somebody or something either a cause or a person or a philosophy or an ideology or a goal that's inspiration why would a mystic be inspired? I'm not inspired by anything I just do what's needed that's why it doesn't matter how much activity I perform there is no burden of activity there is no burden of function there is no burden of either speaking or writing or doing anything because it is not driven it's simply as it's needed does it make it very unromantic and not unromantic because the romance you need listen that but we are talking about this and that what I'm still trying to understand is you said earlier and I think that came closer to the answer of a certain realm of paradoxes best expressed in poetry there's a poem called meaning yes in fact should we? yes you must do that because you're trying to take me there yes I am one one seven I think they had a belly full of poetry for the day and and all the people online have fallen asleep and of meanings of meanings okay call it what you want love, friendship, purpose or God you're scanning the invisible for an illusion that may assist your life to find meaning I'll read that again call it what you want love, friendship, purpose or God you're scanning the invisible for an illusion that may assist your life to find meaning in abandoning this search shall you find the invisible presence sans meaning to write this great phenomena of creation without contamination of meanings it's a human problem, meanings nobody else, no other creature is looking for a meaning it's only human beings who are looking for a meaning this is a very what to say a very paltry or a puny way of using the intelligence that has invested in us trying to give a meaning even the cloud looks like Shiva if your heart is so full with Shiva and you see him everywhere that's fine with me but you saw the cloud Shiva Parvati and you want to tell everybody you know only I saw cloud was in the form of Shiva you are one big you know Shiva has an animal with him his vehicle so this meaning is you're trying to give value to life because you've not realized the value of life you do not know the value of being alive you're trying to find a meaning you spoke to God you know people are speaking to God somebody said this very nicely I forget the exact words if you speak to God it's okay but if he speaks to you that means you need to go you know where so somebody is speaking to God somebody is speaking to their lover somebody is speaking to their husband or wife or child or whatever not out of sheer joy and involvement simply to attach meaning to their lives otherwise it will become meaningless I want you to know that your existence is a meaningless existence you are a speck of dust in this cosmos it's meaningless but it's phenomenal if you experience it it's phenomenal if you mentally psychologically try to search for a meaning you will make up meanings which will all be shattered I hope life shatters it you know I have blessed people may you be disillusioned you said Guru where are you saying this do you want to live with illusions the sooner you are disillusioned the better it is for life but most people are disillusioned towards their death that's a late comma late goer rather no late comma because there is jazz coming when they are about to go you speak in several poems of this kind of meaningless half the audience is asleep this is the nature of you know how often does one get a chance to sit and talk poetry with Sadguru I don't think we need to call this to a halt soon do we not sure there are people online in the comfort of their homes they can watch it later Sadguru I think there are many poems here that speak of this kind of effervescence without purpose as you call it this meaninglessness which I think many people these are the poems that make me pause time and again because we may talk about life without meaning and you know this purposeless existence you don't say life without meaning that will mean something else but many people think they are on a spiritual journey because they are looking for the meaning of life that is the whole problem all they are looking for is an explanation you just have to this is why so many people can be so easily what do you say radicalized because they are looking for a meaning alright how you get radicalized maybe if your radicalization leads to some kind of violence physical violence people think it's radicalization no most of the population is radical they are radicalized just that they may not cause any physical harm to somebody but I want you to understand if you have found meaning to your life you are a harm to humanity you know this is going to make me super unpopular but I am at this stage of my life where I can be unpopular you know there was a time I had to earn goodwill I am not there anymore so I am telling you if you found meaning to life you missed it because you can only make up a meaning in your mind there is no meaning in the sky anywhere there is no meaning in this cosmos anywhere it's only in human mind you can make up meanings so you are faking something and you are thinking it's real and you are thinking it may be disillusioned soon so that maybe realization will happen have you found a meaning in a flower or a cloud or an empty sky no it's only in human mind right I think very often poetry itself is a kind of break a kind of reprieve from meaning that's part of its beauty no no deeper meaning now rhythms sound deep deeper meaning poetry is always believed to be deeper meaning I know I know that there are questions that are coming in from elsewhere as well and we'll come to them in a moment but it's very difficult to not ask Sadhguru to read some of the poems that I think are the most unusual in this book which is poems of utter tenderness we've all known or many of us have known the compassion of a guru not everybody experiences me like you thinking you'll have your moment this is not the incisive crisp authoritative sometimes steely Sadhguru this is a particularly tender vulnerable Sadhguru and I think it would be good for us to hear that in the poems too much tenderness or just tenderness 268 too much tenderness tenderness let's go too much no any of the tender poems there are three of them let's do tenderness I thought so tenderness the irony of life that I should now be doing I'm sorry the irony of life that I should now be doing everything to bond myself to bind myself to bind to demarcate boundaries that no one should cross doing my best to be self-centered all these antics just to keep this crumbling cage intact with the work done while linger on depart gracefully says my mind but what to do with lovers who have lost themselves in the process of loving too many lovers the very remembrance brings tears of too much tenderness so I will act brash and go on I've been brash enough when was this written this is just after Diana Linga I I was completely incapacitated I couldn't sit up or anything my speech was gone for almost I don't even remember how many days but for a enough significant enough time that I had no speech and I was living in the shrine there was nowhere else I could move I could move to my bedroom at that time when things slowly people were tending to me and putting me back on my feet somehow at that time when I when I first you know I sat here just this side of the leaning tree under another tree there and I spoke to a small group of people that day where I had to be helped to sit down and get up because the last few months were killing for me it had taken my life at that time nearly I would say in terms of my my energy body nearly sixty-five seventy percent was severely kind of gone very badly damaged mall did it consciously because it had to happen in that time bound way things were going out of control in outside situations there was no time there was no room to do anything else but when people so many people gathered and like most people thought I won't make it it was so so at that time the effort to come back was too much to build back the system and put it back quite a few people stood with me you know there are no words for it how they stood with me so at that time the struggle of almost recreating this body and we thought we will just make because there are invites from United States for many years and we thought we will just make one trip before I leave one trip to United States so that I could put some seat in the west and come so when I went there because there were so many medical issues nothing was diagnosed every time there's a blood test bizarre you know diagnosis was being made that I have cancer here I have tumor there I have this and I have that and all kinds of things but every other day it kept changing then the doctor said the way you are we have to declare you as blue light emergency that you cannot fly I said please don't do that I have to go back to India because if they declare you blue light emergency they won't let you get on to an airplane then I had to literally request the doctor please don't do this he said no Sadhguru you cannot go on to a plane which is more than three to four hours if something happens it will be good I said it doesn't matter I need to go back home I need to go back to India I am not going to die here and I won't die on the plane so when it was like that the amount of effort it took to put this back definitely there were thoughts is it worthwhile doing that because it took so much effort there were too many people who mattered well here I am you know you have often talked the guru as a device I remember reading this again some days ago and I wondered if you could say something about how without giving away trade secrets how this works I am not in any training okay but how does this work on the level of the physical presence of the guru the non-physical presence of the guru and also what we are seeing now which is the image of the guru which proliferates particularly with the online world and so many images of you everywhere are all these you talked of actually consciously crafting your persona your personality is the image similarly crafted and how are each of these dimensions intended to operate well people who've been around me for three years or so a little more than that some of them who followed me from Karnataka or been with me for nearly thirty-five years at least well my daughter has been with me for thirty years now oh I'm sorry I divulged her age in case she is telling everybody she is eighteen I'm sorry so they know how many times I've completely changed my characteristics everything that I am the way they knew me I'm like that depending upon the type of action that I'm preparing for now suddenly in the last three years see nobody had seen me riding a motorcycle till twenty-nineteen but now suddenly half the world believes at least half the world that follows us believes I'm a motorcycle guru this is the world I want you to understand they've just seen a handful of pictures or maybe short videos but only in twenty-nineteen I mean twenty-seventy now twenty-seventy in first time yes twenty-seventy in just in Bangalore and Mumbai I rode just for half an hour it's only after that Kaveri calling and then after that a few pictures here but they think all the time I'm riding motorcycles all my life no for almost over thirty years I neither touched a motorcycle nor did I ever think about it though at one time I lived on it so now you know tomorrow we are leaving for the Himalayan jaunt after forty-one years I'm riding in Himalayas have people who come with me will see I'm not lost today forty-one years is a long time in a man's life but it feels like I'm not lost today how I was in two thousand that I was just talking about how I am today is another world it is not another world it's a completely different man if you're looking at me as a man this is a completely different man so many people who knew me then are a bit disappointed with me that Guru is to be fiery like this if you look like this everybody would get zapped these days he's acting like a joker it's okay because I am as a man I am what I am for the moment of action that I need to do otherwise I'm not even a man that may be hard to digest but I'm not Is there anything more you want to say about how the device works? Is door a device? In a sense yes you need to walk through it only then it works I think we've come to that point when it would be good to have a couple of questions and a break from mine so we have I think a video as well as one live question we have a couple of we have Kangana Ranaut in the audience yes Namaskaram sir hello ma'am Sir Guruji your poems are so wonderful you just got the book you haven't read it I have some of them I've read on Instagram and on your other social media accounts and these poems are so wonderful I've never read anything anything like this before because I've grown up on poetry I've been a fan of poetry they're more emotional or sensual you know or melancholic or more but this obviously triggers something else in you beyond that so I want to ask you the question that ma'am had asked you that you said it's just a reflection that you know it's just a reflection you are just a mirror but it must be cathartic as well right because you explained right now in so many events of your life when you said that consecration was happening and people were acting funny that time you expressed yourself and then there is this poem which I just saw too much tenderness I think you may have written about somebody you lost in your life so do you feel a sense of you know can you putting your story out there to what is the purpose of it see only if you have something pent up you need a cathartic process I do I look like I have gathered any substance living here no you don't and what you said about these being absolute reflections I do agree with that also no I mean to say catharsis is meaningful only when you have some pent up stuff this is something I know I was in United States and this journalist was interviewing me said Guru all the time you're busy how do you unwind yourself I said I don't wind myself up first of all why do you wind yourself up and then unwind yourself I don't wind myself up so where is the question of catharsis see when when before I am 21 I wrote certain kind of poetry which was more of all about injustice and anger and you know stuff like that but then when I was around 2021 I realized this is just rubbish if you want to look for injustice everything looks unjust in the world this simply nothing which is just there's no justice justice itself is a foolish idea I know people will attack me for this but I'm just saying that what I want is justice what you want is injustice that's the understanding of justice aren't there some fair things to happen yes the world has to be fair but is there something absolute called justice and injustice well if you go and spend enough time in the courts which I have not done but I know what happens there if you spend enough time in the the temples of justice you will understand what is justice and injustice what I am saying so even in a home if there are two children one will feel there's injustice against that person always this is going on sometimes there may be some substance to it sometimes no but whichever way you do life even here I am sure in the ashram some people feel I am unjust I am you know spending more time with somebody doing something more to someone else doing to you this is always there so is there some way to do life in such a way that everybody will feel they got what they have to get no people who think they have to get something you can never ever satisfy them never doesn't matter what you do today you can make them happy tomorrow they will come up with something else so this idea of trying to be just to everybody no I am inclusive I don't hold one above the other but action I know in action everything is injustice they are simply not possible it is simply not possible to be just right now you are sitting here and asking the question if all these five thousand people want to ask this question now one one question I am sure they have their own we will be sitting here forever all right so is it justice no it is not it is not fair that way if you look at it it is just that in your heart you hold everything the way it is not one above the other once you are like this you act as it is possible you know the imperfection of action in this world do it whichever way action will never be perfect however you do it only a fool will think I have done something perfect there is no such thing as perfection in action because however you do it there is a better way to do it always and always somebody can find fault with how we have done it I myself can find hundred holes in everything that I do including my poetry yes so it is not about that it is just that there is a tremendous phenomena here we are completely deviating from that because we are too invested in our psychological drama but without the drama there is no movie making so probably you searched and so which one is something you can sing in the next song next movie none of these are no good I will write one I will write one for the Hindi cinema maybe why not we are waiting sir I know there is one more question I think that is on screen yes I have just heard that your new book of poems is coming out which is called the eternal echoes I am very excited and I am looking forward to reading it but I have read these few poems and out of them one of my favourites is Linga so I am just going to read it out for everybody to listen to it you are the first born the first expression of the cosmic emptiness the wise man despite to be the source of all this lively mystery you are the source of all me you are the lowest and the highest the games that you play the multitude of forms for which you are the source neither this or neither this nor that I walk through creation to discover you and me oh Ishana the most glorious form blessed is Isha to be your abode it is a beautiful poem and I absolutely love it but may I ask you the poem is called Linga and why is there no mention of Shiva standing near Adiyogi Bhani, what are you doing there Oh Yes It's page 429 Sadhguru, if you want to read it It's okay No, I know the poem Well in the in the vastness of nothingness this vast emptiness which you call as base in English language here in the yogic culture we call that Shiva that which is not Linga means a form has happened that means it is no more that which is not so once Linga has come Shiva no, there is something now there is no nothing anymore it's something is on Well, something is just an expression of that nothingness but still in our perception something has manifested that's important because we are like that you don't know where you were before you were born you're here now you're here nobody is talking about your grandmother anymore because she's not there I'm sorry she may be there great-grandmother I'm sorry I don't wish to send anybody early your great-grandmother we are not talking about her now because you're here you have manifested your great-grandmother is the basis of your existence but we don't talk about her anymore unless he was such a superstar otherwise she's forgotten forgotten does not mean dismissed it's only because of her we are here today similarly only because of Shiva there is Linga but once Linga has come we have a form we have a new child to play with we are not interested in the dead anymore so you know in the Indian languages these words are so related Shiva, Shava, all these things Shava means the dead Shiva means the nothingness or that which is not so the Linga has manifested the poem is about the Linga so we are not talking about the Shiva Mouni you're Mouni but you're talking what can I do Sir, Guru, I know that you wanted to have other tones entering this conversation so I'm going to move to your place poems there are several poems in this book that are about places and I think what makes it different from the typical postcard poem is the fact that we actually see Satguru participating in the invisible inner history of many of these places that he visits so I'm going to ask you to read this poem called America Oh! What's the page here? 508 America During darkness of these woods fed upon the native blood in the twisted tangle of the fallen wood the spirit of the fallen Indians stood Oh brothers your identity a mistake those who oceans crossed did make the greed for gold and land laid waste the spirit of wisdom and grace the children of those who by murder did take are taintless of their forefathers mistake those who lived fed upon the milk of courage and pride stood as spirits of defeat and shame Oh the murder and the murderous embrace me let me sit, let me set your spirits to rest don't ask me to speak about it it speaks for itself well this America poem which probably I must have written in 2003 well in 2007 six or seven we bought the land on the trail of tears and in 2020 we made the native American trip unfortunately life takes that long to manifest we did of mystics and motorcycles we rode across United States did around 10,000 miles in 36 days touching our 21 states American states and over 17 native American nations but there is a specific story here which I see that you're not getting into tired? no I'm not tired but there are babies who have to wake up at 4.30 in the morning do you not want to hear the story about what was mentioned here? this has been spoken many times do you accept that answer? yes those are all all right we'll give you a very brief answer maybe to this and then read any poem that you'd like to read oh I don't know which one is where so they haven't been marked in your book? no okay so I have a couple of requests who is there? dumbfounded okay I don't know what it's about anyway when the flower opened its petals and sprayed its fragrance into the not so fragrant world dramatic as it was there was no attendant music and there was no auditory applause so it is when the greatest of events happened within you what drama I'm saying? yes when was it written? I really don't remember I don't remember when I wrote this I don't remember really I don't know when I wrote this so they read just not but you also have to read grace and just playing laugh your head off if you can cry your heart out if you cannot laugh where you are not just not the roots of divine are entrenched in this body where the flowering of the divine occurs where the flowering of the divine occurs there heaven is this divine flowering happens not in the heavens above but in the inner spaces none can see the flowering but can anyone miss the fragrance just not and you shall know speaking of the snot you actually have a poem called the smell of Shiva 460 that's also a place poem so tell us something about when it was written and where smell of Shiva the silent mountains stoic but full of ice the roaring river rapid in a hurry to lose itself a nameless valley steeped in occult ways people as earthy as earthworms found ways to bend nature to their will seeking the mundane through magic the smell of Shiva makes me sit down for a night a day and a night and how to tell the fools of his plumbless ways this is in the Yalabong valley in Nepal it's one of the strangest places that we have hit we were trekking I don't remember which year when we were probably probably 2012 or 13 somewhere around there so it was a hard trek and then we walked into this valley this is we were walking miles through nearly four-and-a-half five feet of marijuana all full valley so they are already laughing what if they laugh about a plant but they are like that so in many places we have to battle our way through this marijuana plants it has a fragrance of its own then we found a clearing next to a roaring white river then I noticed some strange signs around and I started looking around then a few of this mountain people came men to investigate and one old woman I looked at them and I knew who they are these are all this you know there is a lot of shamanism in that there are some short videos and some absolutely insane pictures we have of them going into all kinds of states so the moment I saw them I knew what they are then we try to talk to them and they are very simple mountain people but they were steeped in occult so there is a whole probably forty minutes to one hour video on this which they are usually playing in the trek when we trek in Nepal maybe we can put it out for you tomorrow here so I don't know I don't think it's on the YouTube and all that because it's a bit crazy stuff because this valley is a crazy place totally crazy they found ways being alone in these mountains no roads, no communication, no nothing they found their own ways quite something I love the title what is that? smell of Shiva people do not know this even Padmasambhava see people think Padmasambhava is a Buddhist because Tibetan Buddhism has enshrined him now Padmasambhava always carried a trident in his hand he is not a Buddhist monk he had two wives one Indian wife and one either Nepali or Tibetan wife both of them travelled with him wherever he went always with a trident so definitely he was not a Buddhist not of he was a monk he is a completely different kind so these are lands where he travelled and later on well probably in his later age I don't know exactly but probably in his later age he settled in Tibet or he stayed there for some time and came back to the Gangetic plain in his later age there are various beliefs accounts of this but essentially he is a mystic who did things in strange ways and some of them who travelled with me in 2019 we went to Padmasambhava cave oh I don't think that's something that they'll ever forget in their life something incredible there tell us more you can come this far you can enter the cave and then not say anything what time do you get up in the morning no no you don't have to reveal but there are many here who have to get up at 4.30 in the morning okay I have to admit defeat so I'm going to ask I think it's actually best to leave with the sound of a poem in one's years I must say despite the inquisition that I've subjected Sadhguru to I am a lover of poetry and I do believe that the best poetry is just the kind that you can marinate in sink into and there's an entire book waiting for you to immerse yourselves in I'm just going to ask Sadhguru to read perhaps two poems and leave us with those I thought one okay two alright which two tell me quickly and just play Grace and just play where is Grace why has no one marked Sadhguru's book what page 548 no it's marked 548 I can find it that's all Grace we have found the fame I'm sorry we have found the flame that can burn beneath the water we have found the union that can be united under the severest knife we have found the bliss that can bloom even in the very face of death we have found the love that can stir in most barren that can stir most barren of hearts we have found a guile that can slip out of hell's own corner we have found the grace that has placed us beyond all disgrace we have found a jointedness that can make Shiva feel like too oh Shambhu your grace has brought us this far may we proceed on to you where's the next one okay when I'm finding the page huh when I'm finding the page they will all pause 32 just playing there are private spaces in my mind where I agree with all unsundry but there are public spaces in my mind where I could debate all that anyone says or thinks this is not a contradictory existence just that deep down I never took sides of any sort though I stand stoutly for all that I take up don't you go thinking I'm in a confessional mode just playing with you as deep down in this me there is really no you and me just playing thank you thank you Satguru telling this to you that the highest literary award in India is called Sahitya Academy Award Arun Dati has just won this last week so congratulations