 Oh, the sun is still on, so it's not run out. They tell me that it could last for another a billion and a half years, so 83 days is not much. One thing I was asking myself when I was watching the video was, why and how did you get interested in soil? I know you did a lot of work on rivers and water, which was very something that people can touch and understand. Why and how did you choose and decide to pick up soil as a key topic? I did not pick up soil. I came out of soil. I'm just trying to remind everybody that's true with you also. There's one guy here, I don't know if you saw him, he's all smeared in soil. He's called the soil man. Did you see that guy? So that is a soil man. What are you I'm asking? Hello? You know all the same thing. So this is a bit hard to explain logically, but I know now it looks cliched because now you are the earthworm, what do I do? I've been calling myself a worm because I'm made like this. People don't understand this because they always think there is a said knowledge behind me. No, I got a completely empty head, totally empty. So because of that, like a worm I crawled on this planet. I've been here for six and a half decades. If I don't know how life works within me, I must be either a Martian or a bloody fool. Hello? No, I'm just here. People say, oh, we've also lived on the planet. How come we didn't see it? No, you have not lived on the planet. You have been living in your head. I don't know what the hell is there. Because you live in your head, your own thoughts and emotions have become far bigger than why the planet, your thoughts and emotions are bigger than the cosmos, isn't it so? Hello? I have no such thoughts and emotions. I just crawl on this planet like a worm and you know I'm a non-licensed road-driven pilot so I fly at 5,000 feet usually. So when I look down at people, they all look like worms crawling around and they are, they don't realize till you bury them, till then they don't get it. So I have no interest in soil. I'm soil. I don't know what you're made of. That's a good question and when building on that you're... I mean, because we are soil, why is soil not at the center more than it is today? I think soil, I mean everyone's talk about forest, about oceans and somehow soil has been missing up to now. You know I need every human being on the planet right now. So I don't want to be very critical, why? There's a whole lot of stuff behind it. Leave that aside because why have they ignored soil? You must ask them or you must do... little young people are here, you must do some research. Why is it people are avoiding talking about soil? What is the issue? You must look at it. There's a whole lot of stuff behind that anyway. Now the important thing is, see people like to talk about rainforest. Most of them have never been in a rainforest, believe me. They have not. They don't know what's a rainforest. I've lived in jungles in southern India in the western gods which are rainforests. If I went in for two, three weeks in the jungle by myself and by the time I came out when I came back home even my mother wouldn't recognize me. Head to toe, I would be bitten by insects. My own shape would have changed. It would take another four days to get back to normal shape. Everything from head to toe, every millimeter of the body all these creatures would have tasted. They won't leave you. I encountered tigers, I encountered very close encounters with elephants and the wild buffaloes of the southern India. They were all okay. When you came out, the biggest impression on you were these insects because they will explore you. And why I'm saying this is, this is why we are missing the point. We are sitting in the world. I'm not saying this is not important. Right now we are concerned about the panda becoming extinct. Yes, it's a concern. Tiger, they have recovered a bit but I'm glad they paid attention and they recovered the numbers have come back. We are concerned about exotic things. But suppose, please do not misunderstand that I don't care for the tiger. I come from tiger country where we have immense regard and love for this animal. It's a magnificent animal. You have, I don't know if you read English poetry or what German is it? Here, tiger, tiger burning bright. Do you know that? No. Tiger, tiger burning bright what immortal hand or eye could frame that fearful symmetry. This poem and my encounters with tiger has a very deep profound impression on me. But suppose there were no tigers in this world, still it would go on. What you need to understand is 80% of the biomass insects have gone in the last seven years. But you think insect is a damn thing that must go. What you don't understand is if tigers go away, you will still live. If all the insects go away in four and a half to six years, life on this planet will end. Yes. If all the worms go away, within eighteen to twenty-four months life on this planet will end. If all the microbial life goes away, it will end right now. So we have not understood the significance of how life is made. Because of microbial life in the soil, we are a consequence of that. Even in the evolutionary scale of things, we are a consequence of that. So our priorities are about something bright and beautiful. We have not looked at, it's just brown, you know, soil. We look at the sky. It's nice, you look at the sky, I'm not against it. It is fine. But if you lose your fundamentals and then focus on something else on the top, well you will pay a price, that's what is happening right now. So soil has been ignored because it's under your feet. It was taken for granted, always. It's there. It's true and what you say about the soil being dirty and neglected in a way is often present. Today we were... The word dirt, we must address this. In many nations, many cultures, they call refer to soil as dirt. If that is dirt, all of us are dirt bags, hello? At least you must admit that. Yeah, it's true. We were in the field today and we take some companies to the field and we try to, you know, they all commit to regenerative agriculture. A lot of companies have made these commitments now publicly. They realize and often driven by the climate agenda. But when the executives and the leaders from these companies are trying to understand what it is, they've disconnected from the earth and from nature. They live in the city, they have their careers and so we take them to the field. And today we were near Lyon in France, you know, taking them to touch the soil. And one of the ladies, she's a manager of a big business and she's the CEO. She didn't want to touch the earth world. She refused and we tried to put the dirt in her hand and she was... You're calling the dirt too? No. You said it was dirt. No, no. I was trying to put the soil in her hand. I don't understand what you're saying. It's unfortunate that a lot of people think they're about earth. Let's call it soil then. So I was putting the soil in her hand and there was an earthworm and she didn't want to touch it. She was scared of it. And many people are scared of earthworms. So how do we make them love earthworms as much as they love tigers? They... loving a tiger is a dangerous thing. Earthworm is very safe. So that is what this is about, to shift the narrative in the planet, to make people understand it's living soil, it's not an inert substance. And the shocking thing is even today most agricultural ministries in the world still address soil as an inert substance that they could manage by adding this chemical and that chemical. No, it's a... it's the largest living system, not just on the planet. In the known universe, this is the largest and the most sophisticated living system. But unfortunately, people are still treating soil as an inert substance because the life is microbial anyway for your information. Your body itself is sixty percent microbial life. Only forty percent use your parental genetics. Young people, next time your mother or father tries to tell you what to do, you can tell them you're only twenty percent. Should have known that before. Yes. And one thing I've remarked is that we are in a world where we want to quantify everything. So you can quantify a hectare of forest. Now everyone is quantifying tons of carbon and I think it's a good thing for starting to measure how we can progress towards fighting climate change. But how do we measure soil? And I think that it's like the researchers and the people that are working on that, they are a bit like soil, they're a bit underground. They're coming to the surface slowly, but it's like it's missing somehow the measurements and the ability to characterize. But then the question is, can we really do it? It's a very complex system with multiple interactions and sometimes I wonder in an attempt to do that, isn't it a challenge that we have ourselves that we want to measure everything? We want to characterize everything, put everything in a box and soil be put in a box. So this is important that you brought up the subject. If we measure you, we will know your weight, your height, you know, different aspects. What is your shoulder, what's your waist, what is your this, what is your that. Do we know anything about you by these measurements I'm asking? Hello? You will know nothing about an individual person by measuring this and that, isn't it? Even if you measure the size of your heart or liver or kidney, doesn't say a damn thing. It could be a big heart, may burst next moment. So this measurement business is simply because we're trying to logically deduce life itself into few numbers. Because we have this problem, your education has brought this problem to you. First you must understand and then you will do it. Let me bring it to your awareness. You have not understood a damn thing about your life. Do you know where you come from and where you will go? Hello? So how come you're living, you shouldn't live? Because if you don't understand, you don't do it right. So you don't understand the thing about this life but you're living. So you need to understand the same is true with every other life. You don't understand a thing about it. You... can I tell a small story? Yes, please, please. This is my story. That people... you know when I was four or five years of age, I suddenly realized I don't know anything. Don't know anything means don't know anything at all. That is if you give me a glass of water, I'm staring at this water for hours on end because I don't know what it is. I know how to use it of course, but I don't know what it is. Even today you don't know what it is. It's the only substance found on the planet in all three states, you know? But do you know what it is? With all your scientific knowledge, you still do not know one atom in its entirety. You know how to use it, you know how to fuse it, you know how to break it, you know how to make a bomb out of it, but you don't know what it is even today. That is true with an atom and that is true with everything in creation. So this pompousness of thinking we got it, we got it. You haven't gotten anything, hello? It's important to understand that we don't understand a damn thing but we can learn to live. We can learn to live. If you learn to live, you will understand being in harmony with everything around you is the best way to live. So if you come to this, then naturally you will pay attention to every life. Tiger and ant both have been made with exquisite care. Whoever made it or whatever made it, hello? You've never played an attention to an ant because it's just an ant. I've paid a lot of attention to them because they've they've eaten something of me and I've also eaten something of them. Yes. So if you pay enough attention to an ant, it's an exquisite machine, unbelievable. If any of you want to design an automobile, you must look at an ant. If you can make a machine like that, oh my god, it go anywhere you want on anything, on any terrain, boom, it'll go. Yes or no? So unfortunately, we have gotten into this measurement business. Who is important, who is not important, who is big, who is small, what is up, what is down, what is God, what is devil, we've made these decisions about everything. This fundamental thing about putting one about the other is the problem that translates into everything which has also brought us here. Tiger is more important than the ant somewhere. I must tell you this, you know, when my daughter was growing up, when she was three-and-a-half months old, she started traveling with me alone and she was driving with me just by herself with me and I tire up on the motorbike. No, no, on a car. So I am driving all over the place, wherever I go, I am staying in so many different people's homes and she is growing up in different homes. Everybody is wonderful to her but you know adults have this problem. They want to teach her something. Adults have this itch. When they see a child just bouncy and joyful, they want to teach the nonsense that they learned which never worked in their life. When I say it never worked in their life, see between a child and you, in twenty-four hours time, who is more joyful? Child, who should be a consultant for life, who should listen to whom? Idiots who are working on the street thinking they are spinning the planet themselves, they should be consultants for life. Or a child who doesn't understand a damn thing and he doesn't care, he's just enjoying his presence here, you should listen to him. Because now you're churning up philosophies, we in the movement do this, do that nonsense. All right? All of you were like that? Hello? Yes or no? So, this, you know, I know that everybody wants to teach her something so I put a rule. You can play with her, you can talk to her, nobody will teach her anything. No one, two, three, no ABC, no Mary had a little lamb. Because I don't care Mary had a little lamb or not. People said, what are you doing to this girl? She will not even know how many fingers she has. I said whether you call this ten or million, what does it matter? Hello? I will say this is a million, what's the problem? Just another word. As long as she knows how to use her hands, I don't care whether she thinks this is ten or million. So she grew up like this. And when she was around, you know, I thought I won't send her to school but my travels caught up with me. So I put her in a school where there is minimum amount of schooling. And when she was around thirteen years of age, she came home one day little disturbed by what happened in the school that day. Then she said, you're teaching everybody so many things. You are not teaching me anything. I said, see, I don't do things unsolicited. Now you have come, sit down here. I said, see, this is all you need to know about your life. Never look up to anybody. She looked at me like this, what about you kind of look on her face. And especially me, if you look up to me, you will miss the whole point. You need to look at me for what I am. Then I'm of immense value to you. But if you look up to me, maybe you will nail my picture on your wall. And that won't help you. You've done that to many people already. So many people have been nailed on your wall, isn't it? Hello? If anybody, if anybody you think is worthwhile or great, you will nail them. That's not it. You never look up to anybody. Never look down on anybody or anything for that matter. This is all. If you do not look up to anything, do not look down on anything, you will see everything just the way it is. And that will allow you to navigate your life comfortably through everything, seeing everything as it is. The moment you think this is higher, that is lower, because a million is more than ten, isn't it? If somebody comes here with twelve fingers or twenty-two fingers or you think he's great, no, you think he's a freak. Hello? Yes or no? Now, because you've made this normal, what's your problem if somebody had twenty-two fingers? Hello? This is the problem, that you have silly judgments on everything and everything and everything. So your education, your religion, your philosophies have done this to you. It's time you crawl a little bit on this planet to feel it the way it is. The texture of life, not the nonsense that you learn somewhere, the texture of life you must feel. If you feel that, no way you will miss the significance of soil. So Sadguru, when we go in the boardroom of these big companies, the powerful people that are sitting up the pyramid and that wanted to get up there because they were driven maybe by... Usually in the pyramid they were all dead people. It's what it used to be. So we meet them and they see us, often as a cost, sometimes as a way to implement some commitment they've made. How do we get to... They look at you as a worm. Yes, and they ask us why we're called like that and we explain. But how do we touch the child in them? We know it's there. And sometimes it comes up, they laugh. But when we're in the office, when we're talking to them in an office and there are people watching, it's difficult. And sometimes we're a bit stuck with this because there are some postures which are slowing down the ability to connect with what you just mentioned. See, when you said pyramid, as you know, pyramids were built for the dead. Hello? Dead idiots who want to preserve their body. I'm saying if you've not done anything eco-friendly in your life, at least allow your goddamn body to rot in the soil. You know, these days it's happening everywhere, particularly I don't know what is happening in Europe, but in America people are storing up the bodies in racks in a building like a parking lot. See, one important thing you need to do is, when you're done with this, you collected it from the soil. Yes? The food that you eat. At least when you're done with it, you must put it back where it belongs, isn't it? No, you started making wooden coffins. That was not enough. Now they're making aluminum and steel coffins. That is not enough. They put a concrete tub and in that they put the coffin. Now that is not enough. There's not enough space for that. They're racking them up in a building like it's a car parked in a parking lot. And somebody is advertising, somebody has built a company, I don't know if you're working with them. Somebody has made a company, I'm sure you're not. They have made a company where they're telling you for 1.2 or 1.4 million dollars, they will get your body and leave it in the space, when you die. Not now, when you're dead. So they will leave it there so that you will float in space, your body will float in space forever. This is the worst thing you can do. Earth, soil, you want to export it to space? At least when you're done, damn, put it back, no? Hello? About these people. Yes. You're talking about the mummies in the pyramid. Those in the top, who are very, very fast from... Have you ever visited the Egyptian pyramids? No. Now you should go, because it's right at the top and quite a journey. It's like a womb. You have to really go into it and right there at the top, one small niche, these millions of tons of stone were used to just create a room which is just about like 8 by 12 or something. This is some great infrastructure to build. I know it's more well right now in the world. I appreciate that. I know there are certain reasons why it was built for certain angles and stuff. That is fine. But I'm saying, if you think you're high above, that means you're far removed from life. That's what it means. If you think you're up somewhere above everybody, what it means is you're far removed from life. If you're removed from life, there are two ways, you're removed from life or life is removed from you. One of these things, all right, they're not very different. One is dead, another is living dead. You may think it's success, but people are walking on the street, a whole lot of them unfortunately are walking like it's the end of the world. Hello? I'm saying the expression. What for? What are you here for? See, this... I really thought this virus, this pandemic will wake up people because mortality was hung in front of your face, irrespective of your age or your health condition, isn't it? You're healthy but you could be dead tomorrow morning. So when mortality is hung in your face, I thought people will wake up because one of the first things we do in the yogic system is, if somebody says genuinely, not like how they're saying in the West, their idea of spiritual journey is they will buy a spiritual bath soap or they got a crystal that they found which is spiritual, living that if somebody genuinely sees they want to walk the spiritual path, first thing is we make them volunteer in the cremation grounds. They must go sit there, watch the bodies being burnt every day because you must clearly your body, not just you in the head, that you reminded yourself, your body should know its motto. When it knows its motto, it behaves completely differently and very sensibly that you know you have a limited amount of time. Well, we don't want to die today, we would like to kick the can as much as possible, but you know its motto. If you're conscious that your motto, you would rearrange your life very differently, not above, on the ground, yes or no? Hello? If you knew that your life here is brief and it's on a time leash and it's getting over, right now what is ticking is not the clock, but your life ticking away every moment. Since you came here, you're about an hour closer to your grave I'm just reminding you. All of us. Hello? Yes it is. See this is not some morbid thought. You made it like this, the death is something unnatural, you should not think about it. No death is very natural. The most natural thing that happens to you in your life is birth and death, isn't it so? Hello? This is the most natural thing that you do. So I thought this pandemic will bring home something two years if constantly living under the shadow of death. If you do not know this, I published a book just a month before pandemic called Death, The Inside Story. Okay? So it's a best seller in India, we did not release it anywhere else because I think in India there's little more awareness about one's mortality than the rest of the world who walk around as if they're immortal. This immortality is insensitivity. If you understand your mortal you would be far more sensitive to life. If you're conscious that right now your mortal, as you sit here your life is ticking away, how you respond to life around you would be very different. This is not just to human beings, this would be to everything, everything, life itself, the source of life itself, not just the worms, not just the microbes, the very elements which make you, the food that you drink, the food that you eat, the air that you breathe, you would respond to everything differently if you're conscious that you're mortal right now. And if you remain conscious this would naturally blossom within you. Right now this is the most important thing I thought this pandemic will do that. And people are asking me, Sadguru, why did you publish this book just before the pandemic? You knew it is coming. That also they want to blame it on me. So basically basically what you're saying is reconnecting them to life and death more or making them more aware that are just conscious of that process and that's like… See, not reconnecting them to life and death, there are no two things. Right now I can say I'm living or I can say I'm dying. Both are true, isn't it? Hello? I'm dying right now. One day the process will be complete. Right now is the process on or no? Hello? Immortal people I'm asking? Those in the upper regions it is already on. It is not different. We call it by two different names but it's actually the same thing happening right now. So this is the nature of our existence. In our minds because we are intellectually approaching everything, we create polarities. We create polarities simply because our intellect the data collection for our intellect happens through our five senses and our five senses are made like this. If you see this part of my hand you cannot see this part of my hand. This is the nature of your vision, isn't it? Even if you take a grain of sand if you see one part you can't see the other part. Do what you want. If you hear the sound you can't hear the silence. If you see dark you can't see light. So we have created polarities in our mind because our mind is fed with this half-baked information. This information is good for survival. Survival is always you versus something, isn't it? If the hand bites you crush it because it's you versus him. If a tiger comes you can't crush him but do something. Because survival is always you versus you or you versus the other. So the problem with these people is they think they've gone to the top but they're in basic survival mode. They can't come to ease. If you can't come to ease if there is no ease in you you will never blossom because you're always like this. That means you're constipated. No I'm not just talking about that constipation alone. Essentially constipation means life doesn't happen as an outburst. It happens little by little. That's constipation. So your joy your love your peacefulness everything happens little by little and you're counting people. You know today I'm with a journalist and he's asking me, tell me five dates in your life which were significant for you. I said I can't think of any damn date like that because for me every moment has been super significant for me. No, no we have a format you have to tell me what are the dates. I said 1947 he said why India became independent then tell me four more dates he said four more dates I said okay 1957 he asked why I said I was born so this problem of making one thing more significant the other has come because the very information gathering mechanism that you have is the five senses seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, touching all of these things only give you part by part information never gives you a whole picture of anything. So from this comes your education from this comes your whole proficiency in many many things it's all bits and pieces these bits and pieces you can never put it together but what you do is as you get more and more qualified I don't know what is your qualifications all of you those guys must be all PhD very high there high up there so what happens is when you get this whatever qualification this is a limitless number of pieces let's say a trillion piece jigsaw but you found five pieces you put it together and say I told you it's a bear all right that's what is happening right now right now the soil scientists in the world people who have invested their life into soil science they're humble enough to admit that we do not even know one percent of the life in the soil with our life of study one percent with one percent whatever decisions you make are bound to be wrong decisions isn't it hello what you say about the survival mode before and the competition it's funny because what got us and our agricultural system into this place and you described it in the video that we've been producing one crop we want wheat we want corn we want rice and then we kill everything we want those crops to produce it so we kind of make them compete to get what we need and the more as much as we can out of it we use chemicals etc and what I see with the regenerative agriculture movement is really an opportunity to get the species I don't know if some of you are familiar with permaculture I'm sure yes how to get those species to grow together to enhance each other to work together and I feel somehow there is a parallel in the way we regenerate soil to maybe how we can regenerate some of the of society of our way of being and with which should we start first maybe that's because without some transformation in the human beings their actions will not be productive they will be destructive see we must first of all understand all this has happened not because of some evil design all this has happened in pursuit of human happiness and well-being yes or no there was no evil person sitting somewhere and planning how to destroy this planet there is no such thing it is all in pursuit of our happiness and well-being why such a thing happens see suppose you sat in your car and you want to move forward but you engage reverse gear and press the throttle you know what happens maybe you will enter your kitchen or bedroom going backwards through the garage right now that's what is happening or let me tell you a better story this is the case of a potato farmer one day a potato farmer wanted to eat apples so he went to the apple tree and got out of sheer habit he started digging for apples when he did not find any he became furious and dug furiously then the tree came down upon him that is what we are doing right now because human experience is generated from within you pain and pleasure happens from within you joy and misery happens from within you agony and ecstasy happens from within you the only thing that ever happened to you happened from within you isn't it so hello anything that you ever experienced happened within you or did it happen here I know people told you love is in the air if it happened within you it happened otherwise it did not happen so an experience or the seat of experience is within you whatever experience you want to have pleasant or unpleasant you need to turn inward instead of that you are trying to squeeze the world so in this effort like a potato farmer who is digging up for apples he will never find apples but he will turn the whole planet upside down and this ability to turn the planet upside down has been hugely enhanced because of technological capability because of machinery and things like that what ten thousand men could not do in a day now one machine will turn it around alright one guy sitting on the machine is doing ten thousand people's work so for that the planet is not enough so essentially we have competence and capability and intelligence which can only function consciously if it functions instinctively and compulsively like any other creature every other creature can function instinctively and compulsively because their competence is very low human competencies are at such a level at this level of competence you are supposed to function consciously you are the only creature on this planet I am not talking about the earthworm the human being you are the only creature on this planet who is referred to as a being isn't it there is no tiger being no elephant being no such thing only this one is a being you are supposed to know how to be somebody had hopes on you Saaguru what you said was powerful in the sense that often in the ecology movement or in the environmental movement we see a lot of people trying to find who is guilty they try to say it's the big company no it's the farmer is spraying pesticides he's a bad farmer or some people say no it's the old generation they ruin the world they always end up in kind of a game of who is going to win and who is guilty and where I think somehow we could be trying to find solutions but there is always a way to get people to fight about something see if you are to the word ecology or environment or let's say ecologist or an environmentalist first thing is you must find out whose face you want to bash otherwise you are not an environmentalist what kind is ec I am not your kind for sure because all of us doesn't matter what is the nature of your work who you are all of us are partners in this destruction yes or no knowingly right now this light is burning something is burning somewhere isn't it you don't know whether it is gas or gasoline or coal or what the hell it is something is burning every one of us are partners in this destruction the only way to turn it around is every one of us become partners in the solution there is simply no other way people coming to me Sadguru can you fight these fertilizer companies they are so terrible why are they so terrible oh they have caused so much damage see if they have the capacity to cause so much damage we need them for the solution isn't it they are capable of so much don't we need them for the solution we need them businesses need not be beaten down they need to be transformed for sure nor nor individual humans human beings need to be beaten down they also need to be transformed today today we had one question and I think everyone realizes you know when you buy paper when you buy I don't know wood etc you start to influence on forest you start to try to change your consuming behaviors companies start to buy things differently and they start transforming but soil and I had the product manager for cereal brands and they were like how do I tell people about soil there is no label, there is no certification scheme how do I tell them, how do I understand it because I can't explain to them the microbes and the organic matter they already lost them how do I tell them how do I get them to become a partner of the solution easy question see today you are here alive you drink water, you eat food all those things are there but right now if you keep your mouth shut and just hold your nose like this for three minutes or let's say five minutes I'll give you because many of you are practicing inner engineering so I'll give you five minutes in five minutes you will be dead yes or no what happened the only thing that happened is you lost your contact with the atmosphere which means medically it's not the only thing but medically you did not get the oxygen that you need so let me tell you the story you've heard of that man or woman that cave man usually it said cave man as if women did not exist then were you around okay no way talking about 40,000, 50,000 years ago when some cave man or cave woman came up with a smart idea that we could use fire to cook our food grand idea isn't it there are so many things you are enjoying today because of that one discovery that somebody realized that they could cook food with fire much before you much before the ladies cave ladies doesn't sound good cave man sounds good so nearly a billion years before that one very smart fungi or an algae we do not know like we do not know whether it is a man or woman we do not know whether it is a fungi or an algae really smart one learnt how to cook its food from the perpetual energy of the sun solar cooking you know it learned this before this happened before this discovery happened by this very smart fungi the oxygen content in the atmosphere on this planet was a shade over one percent today it is twenty one percent it is because of this phenomena that we call as photosynthesis that the oxygen content in the atmosphere has increased to twenty one percent so the source of your life is just this that this life started doing photosynthesis out of that came more complex life in the form of plants and trees out of that came animals and well we are here today wondering who the hell we are and it is because of that but what has happened on the planet now is in the last thousand years thousand years ago how much photosynthesis was happening and today how much is happening the drop is eighty five percent but all the people are only talking about carbon dioxide I am not saying that is not an issue that is an issue but I thought you need oxygen hello are there CO2 people we need oxygen and one process that is generating and putting oxygen back into the system all the time is this green leaf all this no I thought you were all green people this green leaf is taking the carbon making it to carbon sugars passing it down to the soil so that the microbial life will give them the nutrients and oxygen as waste it is throwing it into the atmosphere which is our life source hello a plant's waste material is our life source I want you to understand down in the soil this is how it is to another species of microorganisms one species is excreta is the food for the next one and the next one if the carbon sugars go through three to four species then that carbon stays in the soil for over thousand years that's what needs to happen more photosynthesis how do we do it oh let's do rain forest then you don't know what is rain forest because it would take a thousand years to create even if you plant all the necessary things in a place minimum thousand years it will take for it to genuinely become a rain forest so you don't talk about rain forest you just talk about photosynthesis because we can put it back you can't put back rain forest just like that that's not a joke that's not something that you do in a generation if we withdraw maybe rain forest will come up in five hundred thousand years if you assist maybe you can reduce it by twenty percent of the time probably I don't know nobody knows because nobody's ever created but possibly because we have created small forests looking at how ecosystem comes back like that maybe we can reduce the time that it takes in so thousand years maybe we can do it in eight hundred years at seven hundred years or five hundred years I don't know but we could reduce the time with some assistance but that is not even a practical solution because five hundred years is not a time that you can plan for all right you can plan if you plan for fifty years that's a big deal five hundred years human beings cannot plan because we don't know what will happen in five hundred years anything could happen all right it will be wasteful to create infrastructure for five hundred years later we at least create infrastructure for two generations from now that much must happen for every generation at least next two generations you're taking care of so let us not talk about building back forests one important thing that needs to happen in this whole processes because you are with corporations I'm telling you and also everybody is the term forest produce must go out of our vocabulary there is no such thing there must be no produce from the forest it's over that phase of our life is over whatever you're getting from the forest you must grow it on your farmland if you want timber you must grow it on the farmland you want honey you must grow it on the farmland whatever you need that you were earlier getting from the forest must happen on the farmland that will be very very beneficial for protecting the forest above all for enhancing the farmland I think that's a good good business plan it is I must tell you the business is already on see in India we today it is happening seamlessly in some places some places we are still struggling to get the loss changed there were loss like this if you grow a tree in your own land a farmer for example and at some point when he needs it if he cuts it he could be arrested for that because the tree belongs to the government it's crazy because of this nobody wants a tree on their land if I can't use it why will I use my land to grow something so I have been pushing for this that the loss should come that a farmer can grow what he wants and use it as he wants only then he will grow trees so it took seven and a half years and in the seven and a half years unfortunately three governments changed in that state so three times starting from ABC once again and I had to put dedicated people to move the goddamn file from table to table table to table there is so much inertia out there for so many reasons because one thing is we can't pay we only got dedication and commitment we got no money to move things so I have put people there every day morning evening they are going to the office trying to push the thing to the next table somehow it moved and today we have loss they have cleared most of the species a few species they have still not cleared that today you can grow and fell it when you want based on this law we created a whole project called Cauvery Calling on this we wrote a policy called Rally for Rivers which is the official policy of the Indian government now for all the twenty-eight states it is the first time that a private agency a policy document generated by a private organization has become a policy in India for the very first time it's a recommended policy for all twenty-eight states and based on that this Cauvery Calling project this is all some of them are happening simultaneously now today if you if a farmer plants a tree we geocode this in collaboration with ISRO which is the Indian Space Organization free of cost they are doing this for us that they geocode an individual tree so the farmer every year on that given date he has to take a picture and send it put it on the government website within ten to twelve hours he gets the money for the growth of the tree growth related subsidy apart from that we created a digital market the government of India did this but with our impetus they did this today there is a digital market which still needs to be activated in a much bigger way but it is on that you can sell a four year old tree ten years later that is now you can sell it they fix the price now and at five years if you say see my tree has grown this much the girth is this much if you show a picture they will pay you something six years you show they will pay you something when it completes its term when they come to fill it they will pay the full amount but the farmer doesn't have to wait for fifteen years he starts getting something what has happened out of this is for many farmers every twelve years when they selectively fell a few trees they are getting enough money which is equivalent to they selling their land so every twelve years they sell the land and keep the land this needs to happen because if you do not make agriculture into a very lucrative process it will die it is happening already we made some kind of a survey in India sixty-three percent of India's population is right now engaged in agriculture well we need to reduce that population that's a different thing but when we surveyed this not even two percent of the farmers want their children to become farmers in another twenty-five years when this generation passes what are they going to do what is the plan for food production because this is not a simple thing making mud into food is not a simple thing it's magical if you live on a farm you will understand how magical it is how empty bare land boom it will come up and then it becomes food that you eat is not a small thing it is very important if this talent of transforming mud into food is erased from the planet or from given societies or nations the kind of situations you will face in the next twenty-five years is not very pleasant Satguru I think just one last question from me I think you everything you say makes me think about the earthworm the earthworm goes between the surface and the depth and it keeps going up and down between where there is air and where there is no air and you are talking about theory and practice about spirituality and action you are talking to the big guys to the big leaders of this world but you are also talking to the farmers in India to make change if there was one thing you wanted to tell us for us to become earthworms as well what would it be see if I tell all the people who live in the city go and work in a farm, have an experience of that they will go and ruin the farms they better say in the city another thing is people will say, Satguru I am going to go and fix my garden that's very cute of you but it's not a solution now you are in the city that means you have wifi hello and you have an instrument in your hand you have a smart phone or a dumb phone hello smart phone smart phone so you should not use your smart phone to send silly messages hello, it's not befitting of a smart phone to send silly messages you can do a little bit of it you know I allow some margin for that but this is a powerhouse if you just learn how to use it sitting here you can transform the world yes or no this is what you need to do that instead of doing what you can do you will say I will go work on the farm you will be a disaster most of you at least because you are not equipped for that not only that and the farmer and the earthworm has to suffer you more people on the farm is not the answer what is important right now is we are democratically ruled nations largely in a democracy there are two things you have a vote and you have a voice I will not mess with your vote that's your choice but your voice your voice must raise for concerns that matter to you and the future of humanity right now that's all I am asking you shall we do tomorrow no it has to happen now because in a concerted way if the population of the world speaks only then the governments will have the confidence to go for long term policy making why this is the issue is we must understand we have given them a mandate only for four to five years in most nations hello so suppose you were elected to be the president or prime minister of this country and you have five years what would be your natural tendency what best you can do for five years that's what you want to do yes or no because your mandate is for five years after five years you don't know who will be there you don't know especially if you take a long term policy for sure you will not be there yes this has repeatedly happened everywhere isn't it people who do populistic things are there for long periods of time those who do genuine work are gone in five years time has it not happened in any number of countries hello yes so now I want you the people of this world to give this confidence to democratically elected governments if you do something that will bear fruit after fifteen years after twenty years we are still with you whether you are there or not take these investments in this country we are with you we don't see you need to understand whoever you are as it is in your families in a country however rich or well well a country is resources are always limited if you do this something here goes missing this is the nature of things so when you say I am standing up for long term policies my children and their children we are looking at this and we are willing to be with you it means something you may have to forego somewhere but I am telling you financial investments are not the problem because finances needed are not very big it is the commitment which is missing it is the relentless focused in one direction which is missing for that also without people giving a mandate how will any government do you or anybody did not elect a government to do something fantastic you elected them to fulfill your desires isn't it in which country in which country upon this planet have sixty percent of the population spoken that we are ready for long term investments we are ready for long haul we want to think long term well being of this planet and future generations tell me in which country has anywhere people spoken then how do you expect the governments to do it this is the time to speak let's make it happen I think now it's time for for you guys to ask a few questions to sad guru so okay so the microphone should we give you this one no no they have a microphone we will take only questions not a commentary please right now hello hello test yeah I will do yeah hello my name is Armin I'm nationality planet earth so me myself first of all I want to say hello to everybody hello to planet earth hello to you sad guru I think everybody here in this room want to thank you for what you have done we are really happy to have you here so I am an electrical engineer maybe a little bit a hobby guru and a hobby I don't know but I also have done many projects in Africa I electrified many villages I done in Egypt I did a lot of farming we value everything that you are but please come to the question I am not here to ask a question I'm here to provide you sad guru with something you please do that privately I will listen to you this is everybody's time this is everybody's time please I just want to give the world a lot of hope and I want to tell them we can do a big change and it will happen in a few years and now I'm here to promise you that this will happen sad guru thank you for your meeting later on thank you please only questions ok if you have any otherwise we can make some music where are you ok here my name is Yael I live in Bern I've heard you you have reiterated FAO statement that we may have only 60 years of soil left so this issue is really really urgent but online I've seen people they have like they have questioned this and they asked for more evidence and shouldn't they shouldn't they leave this what do you think what's your name you say Yael I don't intend to do this but suppose I have an intention to murder you is there any evidence evidence will come only after you murdered isn't it hello is there any evidence that somebody has an intention of doing something terrible no now in this case there is substantial evidence even before the intention itself has been expressed you're talking about a very senior person in UNFAO who said this there's only 60 years alright what is this online scientist argument what is 67 years is it are you crazy whether it's 60 years or 120 years what does it matter we are moving in that direction of soil extension isn't that the important thing hello so this kind of nitpicking is happening because these are WhatsApp scientists they read two messages somewhere scientists people have invested their entire life in the science please listen to them everybody is saying somewhere around that time somebody says 60 years somebody says 80 years it doesn't matter whether it's 60 years or 600 years but if we are moving towards the path of destruction is it not time to turn around I'm asking you I want to help save the soil so I have a question how can I as a kid help to save the soil well you know our children at the isha homeschool took this commitment that they will get 10 million children in India to write to the prime minister yesterday's numbers they sent me how many letters have gone by now prime minister's office is inundated with children's letters of paintings and drawings save soil it is not yet it is nowhere near 10 million yet but it doesn't matter how many million but when children write if a million children write to your prime minister or any prime minister or president do you think he will be unmoved and untouched by the whole thing and say hell with it hello do you think so no you need to understand this painting of political leaders as some kind of crazy people who came from somewhere no they were like you and me they were willing to stand up and do the work that you were not willing to do that's what it means in a democracy hello they didn't drop upon us from somewhere else well once they get there so many things might have happened you may like them you may dislike them you have a right to dislike them but are you willing to do the job most of you are no I'm telling you and if you get there will you do a better job I don't think so you may have better ideas but idea is different execution on a large scale is different everybody can have ideas to put it into action there are so many issues and there are so many problems so as a child you Sanya the son if you can get at least a thousand children to write letters to your prime minister that this soil is important for us do something thousand will do in a small country like this the methodology the methodology of how to do it employ whatever you want whichever way you dance you sing do something get all the children in various schools to write letters oh oh yeah please thank you hello hello come here oh you too so here you got all this see this is what I was saying all these little little children all over the planet huh you must get them going how many are here around this planet how many I don't know I'm counting it as one thousand so one thousand children you make them write to the prime minister okay all the artists are here please hold it you do one thing you keep it with you I will sign it and give it to you you join Sanya and make it two thousand okay okay yep take this one what is this oh you Switzerland soil but I don't want to take it all the way to India should we not put it back where it belongs okay thank you okay okay sir thank you thank you very much hello Miss Manuela thank you for tonight I have a question how can we make this important environmental cause really cool and trendy so our youth can do anything to make it happen on social media you think I'm not cool enough you're amazing but in Switzerland what could we do see right now what we are aiming at is a policy to protect soils why I'm insisting on policy is see now he's a earthworm I'm just a worm so let's say he's got that much of land under him either he owns it or he has control over it or he's influence over it let's say he does a great job I have an influence over a certain amount of land I will do a great job what is the guarantee the next generation will do the same thing unless it's enshrined in the policy it will not stay that way that is the important thing we need to understand see if you have ten thousand square feet of land in Geneva an urban land you cannot build ten thousand square feet of building isn't it there is a law how much you can build some space you have to allow for yourself your neighbor and stuff but if you have ten acres of land in the rural part of this country you can plow every inch of it and in ten years you can turn it into a desert generally in most nations there is not one law to question even question you why have you done this I'm saying soil is not our property it's a legacy it belongs to the future generations also this is not the end of the world unfortunately this generation is calling themselves generation Z I'm telling them don't do that that looks like the last generation to me don't call yourself Z call yourself something else so right now UN FAO is saying the food that we are eating right now it doesn't even belong to your children it belongs to the unborn child in my emotion eating away the food of the unborn child sounds like crime against humanity to me that's how I feel I don't know it's important that everybody feels this way because an unborn child means the most helpless creature hello even if a tiny little child I'm saying even if a five-year-old boy or girl if you try to do something they will also fight some defences there an unborn child means absolutely at your mercy and you eat up their food what kind of people are we we need to change that evening unfortunately is taking we have time for one final question from the balcony upstairs there is a roving mic so please ask your question my name is Ruby and I'm from India I have one question for you I attended your event last evening at UN Palais also and I still have one question as you know Geneva is the hub for commodity trading especially agri-based commodity trading products so you did speak about what common people like us governments could do my question to you is what do you think the large and the small commodity trading players particularly the ones in the agri-based commodity could do to save the soil thank you see action will come to all those things over a period of time right now because I'm a horribly pragmatic person okay so horribly pragmatic some people think I'm not even spiritual because you know somebody comes to me some celebrity kind of person in a conversation like this he's sitting like this and also final question Sadhguru how to beat Pakistani team in the cricket game why you want to beat Pakistanis in the cricket game when you're playing a cricket game you just got to hit the god damn ball not Pakistanis you don't try to hit the Pakistanis you hit the ball instead of hitting the ball you're trying to hit somebody that's not what the game is about right now this is what I'm telling you this is about policy change if the policy doesn't change you do some nice things I do some nice things it's not going to last we've already done those things plenty you might have also done very wonderful things but it is it will not last unless it's instituted in the policy so first thing is the simple the most simple thing that we're asking is just this because we want to ensure at this stage of policy nobody is against it in the last two years I've spoken to thousands of people all sorts of people not one person has said this is not necessary because what I'm asking is such what I'm asking is just this if you have agricultural land give incentives to make it three to six percent organic content where is it right now in northern Europe it is average is 1.48% which for a temperate climate is very bad why I'm saying for temperate climate bad is you're using the soil only for four to five months and it is only 1.48 that's very bad in southern Europe it's just a shade over 1% 1.1, 1.2% this if it drops below 1% it's called desertification in a temperate climate in Africa it is 0.3% it is desert on an average its whole thing is desert in India the average is 0.68 which is again a desert so when this is the thing the most important thing is in every nation because when it comes to ecology when it comes to soil your national boundaries mean nothing okay these are human problems that we have cut the planet like a cake and said this is my planet this is your planet and constantly we are going about fighting on imaginary lines that we have drawn in our heads hello no you call it a map but it's your head isn't it hello there is imaginary lines that we have drawn these if these lines are for administrative efficiency it's okay but now these lines have become concretized in such a way in our minds and hearts we will fight and die and we are willing to kill the whole world if necessary because my piece of the cake so this is another matter let's not go there right now the important thing is we want every nation in the world not just one nation every nation in the world to come up with this policy minimum three to six percent agricultural soil must have that much organic content why is this because that is the minimum necessary to keep the soil organisms alive whether you eat or not it's up to you I'm leaving it to you I'm saying I'm not forcing that you must eat isn't it nice hello whether you want to eat or not whether you want to feed your children or not I will leave that choice to you but we have an obligation to the life on this planet that soil should stay alive if you don't live well that's up to you future generations must have the opportunity to live well for that the base is soil must be alive first of all to understand soil is a living entity it's not an inert substance next thing to understand is to keep it alive to keep the organisms alive and active it needs a minimum of three three is not the ideal minimum is three today there are about two billion people on the planet who are water stressed what water stressed means is that two billion people every day fight and struggle to get their drinking water and their daily potable water by 2032 it's expected water stress will stretch to 3.5 billion people if 3.5 billion people are finding difficulty in having drinking water on a daily basis you think you can keep Geneva fine with a big lake like this you think you can stop a few billion people from coming here your armies your police your nonsense your laws will not work when a billion people start moving hello? it is expected by 2032 1.2 billion people will be migrating on this planet there is no way you are going to stop such a wave of humanity all that will happen is your humanity will evaporate and you will become like a beast to protect what is yours and they will behave in another way to get what they want this is not a world you want to create for water to be present everywhere the most important thing is the organic content if you raise the organic content to 8 to 12% in a given soil your irrigation requirement will come down to 30% of what it is right now that is if you are using 100 liters it will come down to 30 liters if you raise the organic content to 12 to 15% your irrigation requirement will come to 10 to 15% that is 100 liters will shrink to 15 liters right now nearly 67 to 68% of the world's fresh water is used for agriculture all the stuff that we are using 67% or more is used for that in India we are using 84% of our water resources for agriculture if you reduce this to 30% would it make a huge difference for human beings wherever they are living? hello? so the first and foremost thing is there must be a universal policy across the world that if you own lands minimum 3% must be there how do you enforce this? you can't enforce this right now you can give incentives right now 1.48 is the average in this part of the world if you give an incentive that if you make it 3% you will get this much money farmers will strive to get it there now once they get the incentive there is also a carbon market which also they can access people like what's bastion? I keep saying bastion I'm sorry so they are there they can link these things and farmers can benefit from the carbon market that's the second stage of benefit the third stage of benefit is when you go to the market you're right now falling for this trick of organic you go and buy an organic apple what are the rest of the apples inorganic is it? I'm asking you you don't know what they are alright? so people are trying to quantify how much fertilizer, how much pesticide I'm telling you you can never find out 100% it's just a vague measure instead of that if you say this apple comes from 3% organic content land it comes from a land regenerated to 3% now there is a whole science to tell you if an apple grows in 3% organic content what are the extra nutrients it has what will it do to you in terms of your health and well-being what are the ailments it will prevent for you what are the possibilities for you and your health so there is already enough science we need to call it that so the third stage of benefit for the farmer is the marketplace more in the marketplace it will find its own level so if you go to the marketplace and here is one apple that comes from 3% organic content here is another that comes from 6% organic content you can choose to buy this this may cost 10% more or whatever more but you can choose to buy it because instead of eating 5 apples you can eat 1 that is what it means that means all of us can eat less and still be well nourished which is very important for your health and well-being one reason lot of physical ailments or chronic ailments sees people are eating much more than what they should eat that means you are processing much more raw material to get that much of energy people keep asking me Sadguru where is your energy coming that was the first question see if you eat properly only 40% if you live properly rather only 40% of your energy should come from the food that you eat the remaining 60% should come from the sunlight water and air that you breathe for this you need to do some little in engineering for yourself and what kind of food and how you eat not only what you eat, how you eat also makes a huge difference if you regulate these things if you not use the word regulate if you consciously eat if you consciously live all these things will fall into place that's why this is under the umbrella of conscious planet because what we need is a conscious planet it should have happened without loss but that didn't happen the only way to push it is with loss so right now when you are taking this step don't talk about the tenth step because you will fall flat on your face hello you take this step properly right now the first step is we move three to four billion people on the planet once you do this no government will reject this I'm telling you I'm speaking at the COP 15 and already the you know the Commonwealth nations have made a declaration 54 nations accounting for 2.7 billion people they've already said they will push the soil policy in their countries the Karecom nations in Caribbean region have already committed they've signed agreements with us now in COP 15 170 nations are being represented here the agenda is soil this time and in the world economic forum this time soil agenda will be an important part for sure never before it's been for the first time in a business meeting soil agenda will be important so businesses will do what they do but I'm telling you even if they are very large businesses their influence in the soil is still small compared to the size of world's agriculture it's still small yes they need to do what they have to do but that's not where the main pieces the main pieces is in governments offering incentives for raising organic content then businesses can come in carbon markets can come in then the marketplace of produce will go into different stages depending upon how carbon's effectiveness the food that you're growing how what is organic content in that sense this is how it needs to happen when you're taking this step please don't talk about the tenth step because that is how most movements have ended I want you to understand this of all the ecological stuff that we have spoken environmental things that we have spoken the only one thing one convention that's happened successfully is about fixing the ozone holes because that was a convention with a single agenda all others are talking about one hundred agendas that means only conferences will happen this is not I'm not doing this for entertainment this is not a joy ride for me if I want to take a joy ride I will take it somewhere else at sixty five thirty thousand kilometers is definitely not a joy ride I want you to know in a hundred days there's not a single day for contingencies people's faith in me and such not a single day has been built as contingency if the man or the machine fails what to do there is not a single day's break anywhere so this is not a joy ride this is a life's commitment thirty years I've spoken about it endlessly but people did not wake up so we're doing this if you have woken up wake up the rest of the world do whatever the hell you have to do Basta Asashis the CEO of Earthworm thank you to both of them if I can and Kath Guru always people are asking what can we do what can we do one thing is follow the journey and Save Soil Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube learn to use these platforms because I want you to understand this is the first time in the history of humanity that you have the ability to sit in your own home and reach the world this is the first time don't waste this opportunity share savesoil.org website as many people as you can make Save Soil song reverberate in the world you can download it from the website your children write a letter to the Prime Minister or president of a country you write a letter to the local representative your MP or whoever he is and put up Save Soil stickers on your cars if you don't have a car on your face now a surprise for you ladies and gentlemen a little surprise for you you all know the very famous Chet Doar right? at the La Clémor it is lit up and blue and green color tonight especially for Save Soil so check it out evening it starts at sunset and hashtag Save Soil of course to spread it on social media as well I would like not just to thank Satguru from all my heart and of course Bastian Sasche as well from Earthworm but also the Isha volunteers here in green and all of you for coming tonight now beyond race, religion, gender, geography Soil is really the unifier this is really reflected in our room here tonight a huge and beautiful mosaic of different people now it's a global effort of course to save our planet's soil from extinction now here is the Soil Song which has been created to really spread waves and soil positivity around the world it's a dance for Earth as well so we can all get a little bit active and joyful tonight to celebrate Soil and really, really make an impact I must keep the jig going for next 83 days oh yes and we want to see it down next day somewhere somebody should be dancing alright so let's start the dance and follow the hashtag Safe Soil and also the website of course safesale.org for more information let's get the party started this very body is so my body, your body This is a generational responsibility, save soil, let's make it happen.