 So, Sadhguru, did you start participating yoga at a very young age? What do you mean when I was young? I am a young man. When I was in the gym, for about seven years, every day, I could run up a coconut tree. Who showed you this far? I told you I've been a worm. Maybe you're like totally free, free bird and… Hey, bird has bird brains, huh? I got a human brain. Ha ha ha ha ha! A hungry man has no civilization, has no morality, is that the world we want to create? That's what our… our very farming is. So, if the entire country goes into organic farming, our food production will come to twenty-five percent of what it is. How many people do you think will die out of that? Hi, Sadhguru. Can you tell us about the place you are going to? We're going to the farm where they are doing tree-based agriculture. Yeah, and you can see how the land has improved in just a few years. I see a lot of young people in the ashram. Only young people. Only young people. From childhood, I have heard people around me say that yoga and spirituality are things that you should pursue after your retirement or towards the end of your life. But at the Isha Foundation, I see so many young people. What is the reason behind this? Spirituality is not when you're no good for anything. It's at the very beginning of your life, you must do it. But it is often said that we should live the material part of our life and explore spirituality at a much later stage. That is because of the images that they've created of spirituality, that it is something that is anti-life. You can… anything that you have, let's say your phone or your motorcycle, the more you know about it, the better you can ride it, isn't it? Why is that not true with your life? The more you know about this human mechanism, the better you can do it. Sadhguru, this one question in my mind for which I would never find an answer was when I used to watch Mahabharata, there was a saying that everything is pre-destined and nobody can change what is destined, or no one can change the direction of the mind. On the other hand, they would always say that life is in your hands. You should always work towards saying it is your karma. So, I always find these two things as contradictory. No, no, no, nobody said that. This is all losers. Losers in life explaining it like this, because Krishna looked like a loser. So, in his given context, he is doing everything possible. Well, a lot of things didn't work out as you planned, but the thing is it did its best. So, what do you have to say about teachings that say that everything is pre-destined? See, those things are said by losers who have nothing to show for their life. You don't want to accept your failures and do better. You want to explain your failures. Oh, explain it. You'll never know success in your life. So, you mean everything is determined by karma? No, no, no. Karma means it's your action. Yeah, when you say my life is my karma, you're saying my life is my making. This is the most dynamic way to exist. But now people have twisted it and made it aiyo karma. Karma is not something that you inherit. Karma, karma is what you're doing right now. So, what life throws at you is not always your choice, but what you do with it or how you hit it is your choice. Right now there is a corner. That is the way it is, but how you take the corner is entirely yours. Let's say somebody goes and crashes in this corner. Now they say the corner was difficult. That's not the point. You didn't know how to take it. That's all it is. That's so with every aspect of life. That's what karma means. It's your doing. If you make it, it's you. If you don't make it, it's you. This is the only culture which has looked at life like this. Everywhere they're saying, God is doing everything. If God is doing everything, why the hell are you here? So, Sadguru, did you start participating yoga at a very young age? What do you mean when I was young? I am young, man. You got old, huh? You got old, huh? I started my yogic practices when I was 11, 12 years of age. And also by the time I was 14, 15, I was in the gym for about seven years every day. Besides yoga and flexibility, would you also do a lot of stuff like weightlifting and strength training and bodybuilding or going to the gym? Not that kind of gym. I made sure that I was very leet, very strong. I could run up a coconut tree. Like that I was. So, for me, strength and flexibility were more important than bulging muscles. So, I kept myself very fit. I also spent a lot of time in the gym, working on myself. You don't have to… you don't have to say it. I can see it. So, we are here in this place. For the Gurus, you want to tell us what is… Tree-based agriculture. Tree-based agriculture. And what it does to the soil? Yes, for me, it is the same thing. Because for me, agriculture. Yeah, because you are A320. You don't know what is soil, what is earth. For you, it is the same. Agriculture means trees and plants. And that's what we do in agriculture, right? We plant trees. But what is tree-based agriculture? Agriculture is all about trees, farming, plants. See, right now, the important thing is this. What is happening to India soil and the world's soil is this. The organic content is going away. Because year after year, you are taking out the crop. You are putting a lot of pesticide. You are putting insecticide. You are putting fertilizer. But no organic content. Why organic content is, this whole process of life happens because of microbial activity. Even you, you are a bodybuilder. But 60%, 60% of you is just microbes, you know that? Only 40% is genetic material. 60% is just microbial life within you. So the food that you eat, you cannot even digest it without their help. Similarly here in the soil, whatever nutrients that are there, the plant really can't take it just like that. It has to exchange with the microbes. So it has to catch carbon from the air, make it into carbon sugars, pump it here and trading. Okay? For what it wants. So this is a very sophisticated marketplace in the soil. A handful of soil has anywhere between seven to ten billion organisms. So right now what we have done is using the trees, the green, whatever the material that is there in terms of leaf, we prune it and put it back into the soil continuously. And there are also some animals with animal waste also go into this. See now it is not rained in probably, you know, two, two and a half months. But you will see, come you've never done this probably, just dig here I'm telling you. Is it wet still? Yes, very, very wet. Look at that, look at that. That's rich soil, all right? It's the texture is different. Because it's always covered like this with leaf. Is this how it's supposed to be? Yeah, it's good. You don't see when you go to fields, you don't see covered with leaves. That is because they're killing it. No, but if the leaves fall on the ground, they will sweep it. No, because there are no leaves, where is the leaf? There are no trees. You're flying, did you ever fly in India? Yes, all the time. You're flying for an Indian airline, okay. So when you fly, probably for a pilot you can't look down. If you look down, you will see except western God and northeastern part of the country, the whole country looks like a brown desert. It's full of life. If you increase the organic content here to eight to ten percent, right now this may be around three to four percent. This is three to four percent? Yeah, eight to ten percent if you make it, your irrigation requirement will come down to thirty percent of what it is right now. That is if you're using hundred liters of water, thirty liters will do the same job. If you raise it to twelve to fifteen percent, ten to fifteen percent of water will do irrigation. So just imagine eighty-four percent of India's water is used for agriculture. If you bring it down to even twenty-twenty-five percent of what it is, there'll be ample water for everything. Right now we're just plowing the land, leaving it open. This is like peel off the skin, stand in the sun. You'll be screaming. Land is just screaming. People don't hear, that's all. So you think only solution is plowing for trees? No, no, not only trees. There are many ways to do it. Okay. The important thing is the ground should be not ripped open with plowing and left open to the sun. Something should be there. There should be grasses, there should be a crop, there should be some photosynthesis happening. So this leaf has come not just from the trees. They put cow crops and just chop it and put it right back here. So with this the yields have gone off significantly. For farmers within let's say five to seven years, many farmers are earning three hundred to eight hundred percent more income. You must see this is a small farm, it's a recent one. These are all just five, six year olds. You must enter a farm which is ten, fifteen years old. The water table has come up, soil organic content has gone up. The nutrient level in the food has gone up significantly. They're getting a much better price in the marketplace. And above all the farmer is earning three hundred to eight hundred percent more. I have a question. It used to be, I'm saying it was supposed to be eight to ten percent whatever. We have by our own ways made it down to three percent, four percent. No, no, not three percent, four percent. In India, sixty-two percent of India's soil organic content is below zero point five percent. Using agricultural land or? Agricultural land, it's gone below point five percent. That means we're on the verge of desertification. How many years we have? According to the UN, in the entire world, there's only sixty to eighty harvest left. That is anywhere between forty-five to sixty years max. By 2045, it's expected we'll be producing forty percent less food than what we are doing right now. And our populations will be over nine billion, nine point two billion. That's not a world you want to live in. You have two children, they will be in that world if you don't turn it around now. But the question was, let's say two hundred years back or three hundred years back, it's the content was okay for farming? See, I'm telling you, not even that far away. Even fifty-six years ago, there was no farm in this country without trees and animals. Now trees are gone, animals are gone. That's why my question is, if everybody knows that that's... They knew, not that they know. They knew. They knew. Now we've forgotten. But why have you forgotten? If this is a more... Because... See, it's like this. You're eating good food and you're doing well. The doctor checks you up and says, well, your calcium is not good enough. Your vitamin B-12 is not good enough, your iron is not good enough and gives you three pills for a month, two months, six months, something. You took these pills and you felt really good. Then you decided, I don't really have to eat it. I just have to multiply the pills. Instead of three, I will take thirty pills. That's what we did to the land. We put little fertilizer, everything burst out. We thought, this is it. And farmers were advised like this. Do you think it happened during that green revolution? Yes, it did. But we must also understand and appreciate why that was done. See, India was a country which was suffering with famines. Yes, yes, yes. Millions of people used to die. We were importing, we were importing wheat. Not only that, every other year there was famine, okay? So, famines means in 1942 famine over three million people died. So, this used to be the reality of this country. To offset that, to bridge that somehow, then we went into green revolution. So, it is like you're unwell, you took some pills and you got well. But then you should have improved your nourishment. But you just started taking only pills thinking it'll make you well. Those same pills are making you sick now. So, we are not against fertilizer, not against pesticide, not against anything. The important thing is, organic content should be there because first thing is, right now we are consuming the soil of the unborn child. We are eating up the future's soil. So, putting life back into this is the most important thing. I read somewhere that you should leave the planet if not better. At least the way. At least the way it came to you. It came to you how you received this from your ancestors. But we are degrading the planet and then giving it to us. Super degrading it. I'm saying just imagine, just imagine. Where are you from? Where you live? Mumbai, huh? No, Delhi. Delhi. Delhi, Kanpur. Okay, Delhi, Kanpur, wherever. In your city, suppose 40% less food is available in the shop, not that you don't have money to buy. There is no food, 40% less food. That means 40% of the people are not eating enough or they have no food to eat. What do you think will happen to your city? Chaos. What kind of chaos do you think? The poor will die, they will not get food. Really? You think they'll die? No, no. When they see you a well-built guy like you, they'll slaughter you. That's not the way it's going to happen. A hungry man has no civilization, has no morality, has no humanity left in him, isn't it? All signs. We'll push the world in that direction. Today, UN agencies are predicting by 2035 there will be dozens of civil wars in the world. Is that the world we want to create? But right now if we act, we can turn this around in the next 12 to 15 years time. Another question. I was working on this project of rainwater harvesting. I went around with gel boards of different cities. But then there is a problem, sir. See, my videos are watched by people around 25 to 30 years of age. Now, the best solution I could give them was it was costing them 50 to 55 thousand rupees to build a system for rainwater harvesting on their roof so that you can replenish. But then they're saying we don't have 50 to 50 thousand rupees to spend. The problem, why it fails, we make a video, people watch it. Yes, there's a problem. They will say, sir, Guruji is right. No, no, no, I don't give such… I don't give that kind of solutions ever. Here I'm saying this is not an ecological plan for the farmer. For the farmer, this is an economic plan. But it has an ecological impact. So everything ecological we do is like this, it's an economic plan. Because if it's not an economic plan, it will anyway not succeed, okay? They must make money out of it. Then only it'll succeed and then only it'll sustain. Okay, even if I had 55 thousand or one lakh rupees, I spent it today. Will I spend it every year, whatever is needed? No. It can only sustain if this becomes economically very good for me, isn't it? So this is about marrying economy and ecology. Otherwise, there'll be no success at all. So you're saying farmers who are on the ground working on their fields, they should bring this change or you want a government policy change? Policy change is a must because… See, today this farm is good. This is one generation of people. Because we have worked with them, they have made their farms like this. But let's say next generation comes, they may do their own thing. For you to see an example, for example, you live in Delhi, the New Delhi is built in a certain way. Because if you have, let us say, ten thousand square feet of land, you can't build a ten thousand square foot building. You build six, seven thousand, allows some space for yourself, your neighbor. This is the law. You cannot do it. If you do more, they'll come and knock it down. But just go to old Delhi and see. There's no concept of a window. One door entry, one door out, all sides there are more homes. There is no possibility of a window, all right? Is that the way to build a building? That happened when there was no law. So right now, if you have twenty-five acres of land, you can plow every inch of it and turn it into a desert in the next ten, fifteen years time. Nobody will ask you, why are you doing such a damaging thing? Because there's no law. We need a law that if you own agricultural land, you must have minimum three to six percent. This is minimum. To keep the soil alive, if you don't live well, that's up to you. But you can't snatch away life from future generations right now. Because once soil is gone, there's no life left. Eight. In that case, farmers would say that, you know, they would earn less. They are already earning that. Hey, I'm telling you, they're earning three hundred to eight hundred percent more. This is wrong education that we've given them, right? Tell me, if the soil is rich, will you earn less or more? More. If the soil is rich, will you commit suicide? No. Three hundred thousand farmers have committed suicide in India. If the soil was rich, even if they don't have money, if they can grow food for himself and his family, will he kill himself? Then why are we not looking at it? In United States today, in the last twelve years, fifty percent of the farmers have not seen a single dollar, okay? And the highest suicide rate among all professions is among the farming community. It's not just in India. This is because there is no strength in the soil. Your costs are going on because every year you have to keep on increasing the dosage of fertilizer and everything else. So costs are just rising by the year. They're not able to bear that. Otherwise, if you raise the food prices, other people will complain because inflation, they can't handle it. So the important thing is soil has to be rich. Soil should be alive because first twelve to fifteen inches of soil is the source for eighty-seven percent of life on this planet. When you're born, you come out of it. When you live, you eat out of it. When you die, you go back to it. This is the only magical place in the universe, not on the planet, where if you sow death into it, it bursts out with life. Tell me one other place like this. Let's make it happen, huh? Save soil. But it's going to take at least two to three years of transition period where farmers will learn less because... No, no, why? Straight away from the next harvest, they will learn more. See, because in your head it is stuck, you must do organic farming. This organic farming is a crime committed by urban people. Just talk about organic farming because... No, no, no. We pay so much to get organic farming. No, no. I'm not saying it's not good. I'm saying you never worked on the land. So, suddenly you declare organic farming. Right now, if the entire country goes into organic farming, without fertilizer, without pesticide, without any of those things, our food production will come to 25% of what it is. How many people do you think will die out of that? Sadhguru, that's what exactly I want to ask. Ki, how to bring this change? I'm telling you, institute it in the policy first. If you... Like in the city, there is a law. If you build a house, there must be so much ventilation, so much space, whatever. Similarly, if you own an agricultural land, minimum three to six percent organic content should be there. If that is there, you will use a certain amount of chemicals and stuff to grow. But if you increase the organic content to, let's say, six percent to eight percent or 10 percent, then your fertilizer and everything will come down. Your input cost will come down. Well, you may take two, three years to make this a re... enrichment. But that also can be offset very quickly. Within a year, you can do it. If the government is willing to give some subsidy for enrichment of soil, you understand? See, in Tamil Nadu, we've promoted this in the last 24-25 years. I've been telling the farmers, ten percent of your land should be trees, which will provide foliage for the remaining ninety percent. If you don't invest the ten percent, then everything will die. Now, if you invest the ten percent, you think you're earning less? No. In the remaining ninety percent, you earn much more than what you were earning with full hundred percent. But we are not saying don't use fertilizer. As the soil becomes richer, the use of fertilizer will naturally go down. So we are not anti anything, okay? This is not don't use fertilizer, don't do... These are things are said by urban people who have never done farming. Farming is a heartbreaking job. Once there is no necessary, you know, inputs to do that. See, you don't have to do agriculture like it's some kind of philosophy or religion. This is not what you believe in. This is about making a practical solution out of this. I'm just saying don't cut the golden goose. If I have to say it very simply, wait for the eggs to come. But it is scary to listen to the timeline towards what you have told us. See, right now we are partnering with UNCCD. That's a agency, UN agency for combating desertification. Desertification is the biggest problem in the planet right now. Nobody is talking about it because there's no money in it. Everybody is talking about fossil fuels, automobiles, coal, this one, that one. Because if you knock industry, it spills dollars. Here you can't go knock anybody. You have to spend your life to make it happen. Exactly. To convert about 125,000 farmers to tree-based agriculture in Tamil Nadu and Karnataka. Twenty-five years of our life is gone in this. With no reward. Not that there's no reward. No, to the people who are volunteering. No, they don't look for a reward. They want to do it. What's the reward? We're alive and we're happy. We're alive and we're happy, that's the reward. What other reward is there in life? You want a crown? It's a very uncomfortable damn thing to wear, just know that. Can you imagine a metal ring on your head? I always used to wonder that in an epic... It's a terrible thing to wear. See, right now you're wearing a helmet, it's properly cushioned, everything. That only irritates you after some time. Yeah, just a metal ring, metal ring, you put it on your head and walk around. That's the silliest thing to do. So we are not looking for a crown. Reach with life, it's reverberating the land. That's how it should be. Sadhguruji, where do you do so much research? Do you read? No, no, I don't do any research. What you tell about spirituality, life, but... Even the soil, this is because, you know, for six and a half decades I've lived on this planet. Others don't live on this planet, they live in their head. I don't have anything in my head, so I live on the planet. I'm like a worm. You ask a worm, it knows what is the soil condition, isn't it? Do you think the worm in this soil knows more about this soil than a scientist? It cannot tell us. This worm can speak, that's the only difference. That worm also speaks, you're not understanding a language. But it is strange to see that what is affecting our life, what is it affecting our children, we are not. Because nobody... I mean, even when I heard about... I was talking to Swamiji, he told me about all that desert, it's gonna turn into desert and the fruits and the vegetables. Itself, if the soil doesn't have any nutrition, there will be no nutrition. It has nothing. See, right now it's a fashion to eat salads in America. But for example, all right, you eat salad, you've been eating a buffalo. So, in California especially, it's very fashionable. But one important item, this is the only thing which means studied. If you study everything, it'll all come out. Lettuce, for example. It has only 10% of the nutrition it had 100 years ago. In 1920, if you ate it, what you got, today you're getting 90% less. You're eating trash, this is what we've done to our food. If you ate one orange in 1920, today you'll have to eat eight oranges to get the same thing. Can you eat eight oranges? Even you can't eat. But then people in 1920 must be starving. You can't... The amount of food you eat, the amount of space you have in the stomach, you need... So, if the food is rich, you don't need that much quantity. Right now, people are eating much more than what they should eat because it lacks nourishment. I thought it is because of the volume, it satisfies the hunger. No, no, that is also there. See, what level of activity, physical activity people were putting in 1920 and what level of activity you're putting now is not even 10%. Everything had to be done with your body, all right? So, we can think it's like, you know, in the petrol, whether you want to ride with 100 octane or you want to ride with 50 octane, it's a big difference. So, you know what happened, Higuru? One day I was flying with another captain, even I'm a captain. Oh, you're also a pilot? Yes, I'm also a pilot. I'm with Indigoyaline. So, he told me about you and one day I was on labor and then I actually tried to do Ishakriya, although I failed at it, but yes, then I started following your videos and your ideology. I have no ideology, huh? No, not exactly ideology, but… Simply life sense, huh? Yes, life sense. But yes, like my father tells me this every time, see, like as a child needs a teacher to, you know, guide in a certain way, my father told me that a person needs somebody, I mean, like for me it's you. Flying an airplane, such a simple damn thing. If you just pull it, it'll fly. But if there was no trainer, you think you would have? You would be dead probably, isn't it? Exactly, that's what my father tells me. Any unknown terrain if you want to walk? The question comes like, okay, so many people follow you, you are the trainer who shows them the path. Who showed you this path? I told you I have been a worm, I've lived on this planet, absorbed life. No, but I've seen so many of his videos, he never answers this question. He's always… Do I look like I was trained by somebody? No, I don't know how a master… No, just tell me, looking at me. I don't feel like… I feel like that maybe you're like totally free, free bird and… Hey, bird has bird brain, don't tell, call me a bird, huh? I got a human brain. Yep. Because the soil has micro… microcosm, right? It has more nutrition. Definitely it has. Really. Those neat-looking agricultural lands, lines and lines, they are not good lines. Unfortunately, we varotized like that, that's how land should look. No, this is how it should look, full of vegetation. Farmers living a quiet, nice life. Look at the house, family, settle, both these children are well educated now, all from the farm. But sir, you know, she's from Haryana, a farming background. But the main problem is everyone is sending their kids to cities. They don't want them to be far from… Unfortunately, yeah. Even… We have made some kind of a rudimentary survey. Not even two percent of the farmers want their children to become farmers. Yes, if that is a thing, just imagine in twenty-five years if this generation passes, where is the food security for this country? So, are you taking the same bike to ride to Europe? Europe, I'm riding a GT, 1600. Arabia, I'm riding this. From Tel Aviv to Oman, I'm riding this.