- 3 months ago
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00:00There is nothing in your body that does not want animal flesh.
00:05We may keep saying, oh, it is not good, this, that, forget it.
00:08Meat eaters, in general, you may find, are sturdier, taller.
00:13The majority of the world consumes flesh copiously and is still more or less healthy.
00:19We all know the condition of animals, how dismal, how torturous.
00:23We know about these kind of dog fights and bull fights and stuff.
00:26So how do we resolve all this?
00:29How do we resolve this?
00:31What's your take?
00:32What would convince a person to not do all those things?
00:35You cannot have any material argument, but none of those material arguments clinch the day for you.
00:42They are not decisive.
00:43You cannot have a final argument that you present to a flesh eater and he will turn vegetarian in a flash.
00:49That's not what would happen.
00:51What is it then that would make a person quit harassing animals?
00:57It's not that difficult to see.
00:59It's just that when your mind is dominated by greed and lust and hunger, then you choose not to see these obvious things.
01:08When you realize who you are, then you will not do things that hurt you.
01:13So, since the last seven, eight years, I have very actively been involved in animal rescue because I relate to their faces and their suffering more than anything else.
01:27So, what is we all know the condition of animals, how dismal, how torturous?
01:35We know about Jallikattu, we know about these kind of you know mad animal spots, brutal spots, dog fights and bull fights and stuff.
01:51So, how do we resolve all this, how do we resolve this, what's your take?
01:59Because I have been actively been there rescuing and you know feeding and taking care and stuff and it's a massive Jagannot and sometimes depressing also to see how it is right from the slaughter to you know I mean everybody in my family is a non-vegetarian except for me.
02:25So, every time they all come over and you know you know so there's this debate every time so you know how how do we again I know it does boil down to them.
02:39You see the it's very simple the way our bodies are we can take in animal flesh the fact is
02:54there is nothing in your body that does not want animal flesh you can bring up a child on sixty seventy percent meat and fish and egg and this kind of diet and the child can grow up into a physically strong
03:21and mentally active human being it's very possible.
03:26So, Prakriti this physical nature has no objection to humans eating flesh just as Prakriti has no objection to a lion killing a deer for food.
03:48We may keep saying oh it is not good this that forget it meat eaters in general you may find are sturdier taller all those things yes of course we know that meats are not good for the body.
04:12We also know the health benefits of veganism we know all those things but still the majority of the world consumes flesh copiously and is still more or less healthy.
04:27If you look at Nobel prize winners more than 90 percent of them would be flesh eaters.
04:34So, it's not as if they are just doing physically well they are doing materially and intellectually well as well.
04:43So, and if you compare non meat eaters vegetarians or vegans to flesh eaters you may even find that the flesh eaters are more prosperous.
05:00Because yeah.
05:01Right.
05:02The West is more prosperous and the West is largely meat eating.
05:07So, there is no material argument against flesh consumption first of all let's get that straight.
05:17You cannot convince someone of health benefits, you cannot convince someone of prosperity, you cannot convince someone of mental health, all those arguments have very little weight.
05:32And that's why those arguments have largely failed.
05:35Right.
05:36You go and tell someone that meat eating is not good for you and the doctors say that, well that's true.
05:44In one particular position the doctor will tell you avoid red meat.
05:48In another position the same doctor will tell you eggs are very good for you, oh this kid is underweight give him chicken soup.
05:55So, medical science is quite equivocal on that.
06:05Right.
06:06You cannot very unambiguously declare that medical science is against flesh consumption because it is not.
06:21What is it then that would make a person quit harassing animals?
06:31Whether in the form of Jalli Kattu or these adventures.
06:34Whether in the form of Jalli Kattu or a leather belt or a shiny purse or a fur coat or milk tea or of course flesh.
06:49Or zoos.
06:50Or pets or so many other forms of exploitation.
06:59Or even the things that you do to stray dogs.
07:05What would convince a person to not do all those things?
07:10You cannot have, remember, any material argument.
07:14Yes, there are a lot of material arguments.
07:16Of course I know.
07:17I have been into this since long.
07:19But none of those material arguments clinch the day for you.
07:24They are not decisive.
07:26They can make you think.
07:28But they will not force you into submission.
07:33You cannot have a final argument that you present to a flesh eater and he will turn vegetarian in a flash.
07:43That is not going to happen.
07:45They have such creative ways of arguments.
07:48And many of their arguments are factually not misplaced when they say those things.
07:56They are factually not misplaced.
07:58So, what is it that makes a person just do away with all this nonsense and violence?
08:15The argument cannot be material.
08:18The argument has to be related to your identity as a suffering consciousness.
08:32When you realize who you are, then you will not do things that hurt you.
08:44I am suffering.
08:48And I am suffering because I do not love myself enough.
08:51Had I loved myself enough, I would have taken care of myself.
08:55I am suffering in the inner way.
08:58The inner way.
09:02That animal is so much like me.
09:05That animal is conscious.
09:07So much like me, so much like me.
09:14If I can exploit that animal, if I can wreak suffering on that animal, I can do the same to myself.
09:25The more I am violent towards that animal, the more I am violent towards consciousness itself.
09:38Because remember, it is a mark of low consciousness to consider consciousness as fragmented.
09:47Please get the flow of the whole thing.
09:52I am suffering because my consciousness is lowly.
09:56It is a characteristic of lowly consciousness to think that my consciousness is different from your consciousness.
10:04Or that of a plant or that of a plant.
10:06Exactly.
10:07Exactly.
10:08The very otherness is a characteristic of low consciousness.
10:13So, I am already suffering because my consciousness is low.
10:19That is making me live in hell.
10:22And because of my low consciousness, I think that that dog or that goat or that chicken is a separate, totally isolated, totally entity that I can slaughter without any repercussions on my own well-being.
10:40That is a mark of my own lowness.
10:45But if I slaughter that, I am just extending, reinforcing my lowness, therefore my suffering.
10:54It is a mark of high consciousness to understand that consciousness is not fragmented.
11:00The thing within that bird is the same as the thing within me.
11:08Not only the same, it is one.
11:11Therefore, if I hurt the thing within the bird, I am hurting the thing within me.
11:16I do not want to hurt myself.
11:17Therefore, I am not going to hurt the bird.
11:19Are you getting it?
11:22So, only when you are greatly interested in your own inner well-being, will you quit flesh
11:30consumption or animal harassment or cruelty.
11:34Otherwise, you will continue and you will have a thousand reasons, several of them very difficult
11:41to argue against.
11:43Realization of one's own true identity and depth in wisdom.
11:57This is the only way exploitation of environment and cruelty towards all living forms is going
12:08to stop or reduced.
12:10Otherwise, it is going to continue.
12:16What is bad is that even those who are vegetarian are usually vegetarian for very flimsy reasons.
12:23I am born in a Brahmin family or a Jain family or some other reason.
12:28Therefore, I do not eat meat.
12:30Now, this is such a shallow reason.
12:32It will just yield any time, yield to pressures, yield to circumstances, yield to company.
12:45I am a college-going boy and it is a thing in my modern circle to be vegan.
12:55Therefore, I am vegan.
12:57Without having any spiritual core, I am vegan.
13:00So, this kind of veganism is going to be very short-lived.
13:03It is not going to work.
13:04Plus, that fellow is going to remain violent in spite of being vegan.
13:10And if you are violent, then that violent is going to seep into your relationship with
13:17animals in some way or the other.
13:18You may not be an active flesh consumer, but you would still be contributing to animal cruelty
13:24in some way or the other because the violence within you has not abated.
13:29So, the only way we can address this violence in the relationship between man and animals,
13:39or man and woman, man and man, this entire issue of relationship is by addressing the question
13:48of identity.
13:49Unless we realise who we are, if we think of ourselves as men, women, rich, poor, young,
13:57old, we will stay very distant from the truth.
14:03It does not matter what your gender is, how much money you have, which caste you come from,
14:12you and I are the same because you have sleepless nights, I have sleepless nights, you have nightmares,
14:19you do not know what you want, I do not know what I want.
14:28Unless we realise we are all one in our suffering, unless we look into a dog's eyes and see our
14:37own, our own pain, it will be very difficult to stop us from hurling a stone at that dog.
14:46You know, you have got this chicken and you have the knife in your hand.
14:54You look at the chicken and if you cannot see something that is just from within you, you just
15:08cannot see almost your own face there.
15:11If you cannot see that, that being is as much afraid of death as you are, you will slaughter,
15:26you will slaughter.
15:33So, reality and idealism are too small to work against ignorance.
15:43Ignorance is a mighty thing.
15:45The only thing mightier than ignorance is the light of truth.
15:51Maya is no light weight, she trumps everything except the truth, the reality.
16:01So, if we want to counter Maya through moralistic arguments and these modern ideologies and such
16:11things, we will fail.
16:20The person is a vegan but he wants a big house for himself.
16:25The person is a vegan and he wants a big house for himself and of course in the house,
16:29there is going to be no leather, no fur and the house is big.
16:34Hello sir, how are you vegan?
16:37Where is all the electricity going to come from?
16:40Don't you know what causes the destruction of forests?
16:44You are indirectly contributing to the destruction of forests and you call yourself vegan.
16:48How?
16:50The fellow is a vegan but believes that climate change is a hoax.
16:59What kind of veganism is this?
17:03We will remain cruel because there is nothing in our physical nature that forbids cruelty.
17:24In fact, whenever I speak about animal cruelty, people retort saying that, but even the lion kills the deer.
17:37You know?
17:38You know?
17:39And that's quite a revelation because that fellow is equating himself with the animal.
17:47With the predator.
17:48With the predator.
17:49You know?
17:50In Prakriti, we all are predators.
17:52Even the deer is a predator.
17:54Even the deer is a predator.
17:57So, the fellow is saying, I am not a conscious being.
18:02I am an animal being.
18:04I am just like the lion and if the lion can kill, I too can kill.
18:08As long as your identity is that of the physical being, which is the animal being, you will kill.
18:15Only when you realize that you are not going to be satisfied remaining the animal being,
18:24will you acknowledge that you are the conscious being beyond the animal?
18:29Then you will say, I will not do what the animal does.
18:33Because doing what the animal does is not going to satisfy me.
18:37What the animal does is for the animal.
18:39I am not the animal.
18:41Therefore, I cannot follow the ways of the animal.
18:44I do what a suffering consciousness must do.
18:47And a suffering consciousness can hardly kill and expect freedom from suffering.
18:56I am suffering.
18:59I am waiting outside the doctor's cabin.
19:02And what do I do there?
19:04I shoot lizards.
19:06The doctor is not going to be happy with that.
19:21So, if we are all a part of the same consciousness, so when Raman Maharishi says that there are no others
19:29consciousness or when Osho says .
19:36How do we, I understand that all you can do is be a good human and try to inculcate all,
19:49you know, the facts of consciousness into your being and around wherever you are.
19:56How do you reconcile when these two stalwarts say these kind of things?
20:02I mean, if I have to tell it to a 5-year-old?
20:07No, it is the 5-year-old probably already understands it intuitively.
20:16Or say an 11-year-old.
20:19Depends on how badly distorted the 11-year-old is .
20:24So, it is not difficult to help them see that thing.
20:31They talk to dogs.
20:35They play with rabbits.
20:37They are always, they are living it, right?
20:39They are already living it.
20:41They do not go to the rabbit and wriggle their necks.
20:45You would not have seen a 5 or 11-year-old doing that, right?
20:51Because there is already an innate realization that the stuff and me are the same.
20:58In fact, in children's shows or comics or cartoons, you will always find animals talking.
21:09So, this anthropomorphization itself suggests that kids see the same consciousness in animals as they do in themselves.
21:21Or nature or anywhere else.
21:23True.
21:24Even trees have names.
21:26Even trees have names.
21:27Even toys have names.
21:28So, it's not that difficult to see.
21:33It's just that when our mind is dominated by greed and lust and hunger than you choose not to see these obvious things.
21:43things. I want to kill that goat because of my ideology or hunger or religious values,
21:50whatever, some nonsense. I will choose not to see what's there in the goat's eyes. It's
21:59a choice made. It's a deliberate choice towards self-delusion. If I look into the goat's eyes,
22:05I cannot slaughter the goat. Therefore, I'll look elsewhere and just…
22:10That's why many of my relatives also say ki, I can't see what I can see, but when I can't see what I can't see, I can eat.
22:19This is, you see this, this is, you are cheating yourself in the worst possible way and you expect
22:34life to be kind to you. You expect not to be cheated by others. If you have grown such expertise
22:43in deception, be prepared to be deceived now. Amazing.
22:52Talking about these random happenings, as you said that, you know,
22:57Ja kha gala tum kaati ho, phir wo kaate tumhaar. Kabir said it very rightly.
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