Society – A Big Lie, Sadhguru, Isha Foundation

I am not interested in the wellbeing of the society because society is a big lie. Where is society? I only see individual beings and only the individual can grow. Each one is enormous and tremendous in his own way, each one unique.

“Oh, if we think of ourselves are we not selfish?” These are the “good” people talking. If you don’t know how to be well, what wellbeing will you bring to the world? If you don’t know how to be joyous, if you don’t know how to be peaceful, if you don’t know how to be ecstatic, whatever you do in the world, you’ll only spread your misery around. That is all that is happening right now. If individual human beings are not well, no society is going to be well.

If you do not even know how to keep this little person happy, are you going to make the world happy? These are miserable people with good intentions, and they are always keeping account of all the good deeds they do. They are hoping the accounts are properly kept in the heaven, and one day they will go there because of all the good deeds that they did. I just heard that computers in the heaven have crashed and they lost all the data!

If individuals are rotten and you go on tinkering with the society, you will have only empty rules and empty morality. The world is full of that. The world is full of highest morals but look at the immoral way in which people are living. With morality, the world has not become clean. It has become dirty. Only because of morality, the world has become filthy.

This is because people are thinking of social wellbeing and not individual wellbeing. If you know how to be well within you, this wellness will grow into society. If you don’t know how to be well, what wellness will happen in the society? If you are a sick person, will you make the society well? You will only go on to spread your sickness in the world; nothing else will happen.

That is why in Isha yoga, the approach is “I am willing to change. I am not looking forward for the world to change. I am willing to change.” When you say I am willing to change, it is a huge revolution – a silent revolution. We don’t have to shout slogans, we don’t have to slaughter people, we don’t have to throw stones at each other, but very quietly the world will change. Your homes will change, your offices will change, even if a little bit of change enters you. That is the only way wellbeing will come into the society.

Ranked amongst the fifty most influential people in India, Sadhguru is a yogi, mystic, visionary and a New York Times bestselling author Sadhguru has been conferred the Padma Vibhushan by the Government of India in 2017, the highest annual civilian award, accorded for exceptional and distinguished service.