Questioner: Acharya Ji, I am not able to continue any resolution in my life and not able to give my best efforts in any area of life. What to do?
Acharya Prashant:
You will be able to put yourself fully only into the full.
If the resolution, the will itself is arising from a narrow part of your mind, how will you be able to devote the entire mind towards its fulfillment?
That is why most people are unable to do justice to their resolutions or desires. The desire is incomplete and therefore remains incomplete. It’s a strange thing – because you ask for little, so you do not get even the little.
If the desire is of the Complete, then there is a possibility of its completion.
You remember the words of Jesus? “Those who have much, shall be given more. And those who have little, shall be deprived of even what they have.” First of all, have a goal worth fulfilling, and the goal that is worthy of being fulfilled is nothing but fulfillment itself.
The more constricted, shallow, and partial your goal is, the more difficult it will be for you to devote your entire energy towards it. It’s not worthy of taking up the whole attention, of the great Totality that you are. You will continue to find yourself incapable of doing justice to it. Incapable of doing justice not because you are too small to take care of the goal, but because you are too big for the goal. That’s the danger with having petty goals.
Two-fold.
One – the goal is petty. Second – even though it is petty, it still remains unmet.
If you meet the goal what you get is something petty. But because the goal is petty, you do not get even the petty.
Deep down your mind knows what it wants, and it will not settle for anything less than that. You try to trick your mind, you try to talk your mind into settling for far less than what it deserves, but ‘you’ who is talking is a very shallow piece of the mind. The mind is bigger than this talker, the mind is far deeper than the one who is trying to channelize the mind’s energy towards the goal. So the mind won’t oblige you.
You are trying to somehow win the co-operation of the mind, the mind will keep stubbornly refusing. You are little, mind is bigger than you, and mind is looking for something bigger than even itself. It won’t settle for anything less than the infinite.
You are trying to talk a thirsty elephant into buying a coke can. The coke-can might work for you, the thirsty elephant knows very well that the can is too small for its size. The elephant won’t be duped. You won’t be able to take the elephant for this stupid ride. What the elephant needs is the very ocean. And then you wonder, “Why does my friend not oblige me with co-operation? After all, I am obliging him with something.”
Don’t you see what you are offering is so puny? Offer something that is worthy of being offered, then you will find that your dormant powers have awakened.
When you set a goal large enough, then that within you awakens which is large enough to achieve that goal.
The price of setting a small goal, having a small desire is that you will be defeated. And that’s nothing wrong – being defeated. But you will be defeated by the small.
If one is defeated in a worthy endeavor, if one is defeated by someone who is worth being defeated by, then it’s understandable. But look at the way people lead their lives. They are not consumed by great battles, they lose their lives to daily attritions. It is not major wars that get the better of them. They are grounded into dust by daily, petty friction, and petty strife.
There is something honorable about dying against a major enemy. But what honor is there in being consumed by the little?
Set a great goal. Even if you lose, it will at least be a great defeat. And if you set a timid, scared, conventional, narrow goal, then even if you win, it would be a timid victory. What would you rather have – a great defeat or a vapid victory? That’s the choice to make.
