Knowledge Sheet - H. H. Sri Sri Ravi Shankar

Q: Gurudev, I understand spiritual practices are to meet God, but that is not my motive. I want to excel in life and in my career. How can spirituality help me do that?

Why does spirituality suggest one generic solution to all of life’s problems.

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar: 

See, when you are hungry, the only way to satisfy hunger is to eat. If you say, “I am thirsty”, there is just one solution to quench the thirst, you need to drink liquids. But what type of liquid you should drink? I say you have many choices. From water to juice to milk, anything can quench your thirst. But liquid is what can quench the thirst. Similarly to enrich your life, you need spirituality.

What does spirituality really mean? 

All that the spirit represents, i.e., love, peace, happiness, compassion, commitment and understanding. These are all the qualities of the spirit.

You need to nurture your mind, you need to nurture your emotions, you need to sharpen your intellect, and you need to do whatever is needed to make your behavior better. So anything that nurtures the spirit is spirituality. Proper rest, some knowledge, and expanding your vision, all this is part of spirituality. And all of this is needed for a civilized happy life.

See, anything you do in life, it is all directed towards being happy. Why do you even do some service to somebody? It is because it gives some happiness to you. When you serve someone it gives you joy. So anything we do in our life is directed towards happiness, and greater happiness, and greater happiness. That’s how the mind goes. And the greatest happiness is reposing in the being. It is when you feel that everyone is a part of you and you are a part of everyone.

So to be successful in life you need values, you need integrity, you need a vision, you need energy, and you need dynamism. And spirituality is the one thing that gives it all of you.

If you are healthy, you can see better, you can eat better, you can speak better , you can hear better and you can run better. All this depends on just one thing. Similarly that which enriches your spirit is so essential to enrich all other aspects of life.