Overcoming negative emotions 5 – Self-doubt

[Talk at North Florida University, Jacksonville, USA]

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
So, thank you for coming today and thank you for sharing your self-doubts.
So, I’ll try to speak today based on my experience as a writer. More than speaking, my main activity is writing. So, I’ll use an acronym, DIETS.
D-I-E-T-S. I wanted to make with doubts, but I couldn’t figure out the words. Somewhere close to that.
So, first thing is that doubt, many of you told about your doubt. When you asked about doubts, you told about fears. So, doubts and fears are related.
They are related, but they are somewhat different. Fear generally refers to what is out there. What will happen? At least the way we are discussing it.
Words can have different meanings. Self-doubt refers to what is in here. So, it’s like using a driving metaphor.
What will I meet on the road? What if there is a drunk driver? So, what will I meet on the road? That is fear. But what if my car fails? What if the wheel comes off? What if the brake fails? So, that’s doubt. So, in a sense, the two are related.
Doubts can lead to fear. Fear can lead to doubts. But the focus, we discussed about overcoming fear earlier.
So, fear and anxiety. Here, when we focus on doubts, I will focus more on inwards. And so, in doubt, the focus is on direction.
Direction means that actually what holds us back is not what we are. What holds us back is what we think we are not. What we are doesn’t hold us back.
What we think we are not, that is what holds us back. So, I think that, oh, you know, I am not that good. I am not that good.
So, we all have particular ideas of what it takes to be successful in life. And we have got those ideas from various sources. So, wherever we have got those ideas from, those ideas affect us.
And they shape our conception of what we need to do. So, the direction, when I said it’s inwards, it’s not just focussing on what I am. The focus is on what I am not.
And this focus is something which cannot be overcome unless that attitude is overcome. Because even if I say I am not this, and I become that, but there will always be something I am not. So, if my reference point is what I am not, I will always have doubts.
So, yes, there are certain things I am not and I may need to do those things. So, if I am not a good public speaker, I may need to learn how to speak well in public. But if my focus is always on what I am not, then that sense of inadequacy will always hold us back.
So, the direction of our thoughts, that means the direction of our focus, that is what we fundamentally need to change if we are to deal with self-doubt. That, okay, I am so and so person and I have an image, this is what it takes for succeeding in life. But it, whether that image is right or not, that image we have got from various sources.
And as long as we are externally focused, we will always have one doubt or the other. So, we are what we are. So, we have to work with what we have.
And that doesn’t mean that we should always remain what we are or we should always, we should not strive to improve. But, beginning with what we have is the way of building what we have. If I have say a house which is one level and I want to make a four-story building and next to me there is a four-story building, four-level building.
I think, oh, I don’t have one, I have only a one-level house, one-level house. Okay, what we have is one level. If I want to build two or three levels more, I can build on top of that.
But, when I have to build, I have to start with what I have. So, if we keep always looking at what we don’t, what we are not, then this doubt will always keep paralysing us. And that has no cure.
Because, we are not a replaceable resource for ourselves. I am the only resource that I have. Even if I am going to get anyone’s help, it is I who have to take the help.
So, I start with this point that this is what I am. Now, it could also be that there are layers to me, there are talents in me which I don’t know. And there are talents also which I don’t have.
But, when the first step in overcoming doubt is shifting the direction, the reference point from what we don’t have or what we are not to what we are. Then, the second point, I, we talk about introspection. Okay.
I accept this. Then, what is going on inside me? As an author, it is said in authors there are two voices which are there. There is a creative voice and there is a critical voice.
Those of you who are artists, you also know about these. So, the creative voice comes up with ideas. Come on, you could write on this.
This could be a thing you could explore. This is something which you can write on. And the creative eye, a creative side is the generator.
And along with that, there is a critical side. The critical side is the evaluator. Hey, this is not sound.
This doesn’t make sense. Who is going to be interested in this? Now, it is not that the critical side is bad or the creative side is good. Both are required.
Doubt is, in the yoga text of India, it is described that doubt is a sign of intelligence. But, doubt is not the only sign of intelligence. A foolish child may just rush across a road and be knocked down by a car.
So, when we are crossing a road, there has to be some caution. So, doubt. Can I go across before the signal turns? The walk over sign, the signal.
The doubt is good. So, doubt is not the problem. It is believing the doubt that is the problem.
Getting doubts is a sign of intelligence. But, uncritically believing the doubt, that is where we choke ourselves. That is where we work against ourselves.
So, getting doubts is a sign of intelligence but then evaluating the doubt is also required and that is also a sign of intelligence. So, some people are doubt free but sometimes they are foolhardy and that can be dangerous. So, there is a creative voice and the critical voice.
So, broadly speaking, the creative voice generates quantity. If I am very creative, I can write this, I can write that, I can write that, I can write that. So, the creative voice generates quantity and the critical voice generates quality.
Oh, this is not this good. I have to work on this. Process this.
Just discard it. So, when we have the critical voice good, then from the quantity, we can select, evaluate and develop quality. So, many people who get into writing suffer from what is called a writer’s block.
So, writer’s block means what an author has said that writer’s block means you sit in front of a computer till blood comes down on your forehead. You sweat and sweat and sweat and then bang your head against the laptop and blood comes out. Nothing comes out.
So, basically when we get writer’s block, what exactly is happening? The problem is not that we don’t have ideas. The same person who says I can’t write, you tell them to speak, they will speak very freely. So, it’s only when they start writing, I can’t do this.
Something comes up. So, the basic problem is when we have a writer’s block is that we are trying to access our creative side and our critical side simultaneously. So, when getting the idea, we are evaluating the idea.
Hey, this is no good. This is no good. So, when we try to access both simultaneously, then as soon as the creative idea comes up, immediately we evaluate it and reject it.
And then we don’t get anything out. So, that’s why when writers are suffering from writer’s block, one of the suggestions given to them is first get it out, then get it right. First get it out.
Just write down whatever comes in the mind. And then slowly get it right. So, the idea is that we just separate the two.
We separate the creative side from the critical side. Let the creative side express itself once. And after it has got its expression, then let the critical side come in and then evaluate that expression.
Now, in an activity like writing, this is relatively easier to do because in writing we have our own situation. That means we can write in our own diary, in our own computer and nobody is going to see it. Many times when we are acting in life, life may not allow us the leisure to separate the two.
But still, that does not necessarily mean that the two are necessarily always intermixed. So, every activity that we do is a practise, makes people perfect. So, we have practise.
And most often, when we have self-doubts, I earlier said what causes us, what holds us back is not what we are, but what we are not. And what this means is we often end up comparing our raw product with someone else’s refined product. So, when somebody, some author has published a book or an article and I read, this is so well written.
And what I have written, this doesn’t make sense. This is not at all good. But that author who wrote that, that’s not what he gave first.
They wrote and rewrote and they rewrote and that’s how it came out. William Wordsworth has said that and he wrote a letter to his friend. He says, I spent my morning very productively today.
Because after breakfast, I put a comma in my new poem. Before lunch, I deleted the comma. So, he spent hours on one comma.
That might be an extreme, but actually, when we see the finished product of someone, that is not their first draft. So, if we take the final draft of someone and compare it with our first draft, it’s just not going to work. If we compare a caterpillar with a butterfly, it’s not going to work.
If a mother compares a newborn baby with a nicely dressed and decorated child of some other mother, the newborn baby is messy. It needs to be cleaned, needs to be taken care of. And then, the newborn baby will also be attractive.
So, there are phases, there are developmental phases in everything that we do. So, quite often, if we introspect, we understand that if I am having doubts, that simply means that my critical voice, the critical side within me has become too strong and is not letting my creative side come out. So, when people watch movies or people read novels, especially those novels which involve some paranormal elements or some fantastic kind of action, then what is required for people to enjoy that is suspension of disbelief.
Suspension of disbelief. So, if we consider the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter has some magical powers. How can anyone have these powers? Now, if you want to enjoy it, just believe that he has these powers.
Suspend disbelief. So, if for the sake of enjoying fiction, we can suspend our disbelief and just enjoy that experience. So, why can’t we suspend our critical voice for the sake of giving vent to our creative voice? So, this means that when we want to do something in an area where we have hesitation or doubt, will I be able to do it? So, at that time the first thing we need to do is put aside the critical voice, suspend it.
Just let me do it right now. I will evaluate it, but later. So, when we can separate the two, just let me do it first and gradually improve it.
So, this helps us to recognise that it’s not that we can’t do it, it’s that we are overemphasising the voice which says you can’t do it. So, if we could make these two phases sequential then rather than simultaneous first creative, then critical. Now, of course some people can work differently also.
So, in writing again, there are two broad ways of writing. One is write fat, edit thin or write thin, edit fat. So, write fat, edit thin means just speak, just vent yourself out.
Whatever you want, you just write it. And then after you express yourself, then edit it. This makes sense, this doesn’t make sense.
This should come here, that should go there. So, one time there was one friend who wanted to write and he said, I can’t write. He was telling me, you write so well.
So, I told him, I don’t write so well. He said, you see my first draft. He said, no, no, you are a gifted writer, you are writing daily.
So, I have read books on writing, I don’t know how everybody goes through writing. So, actually, so then what I did was, I everyday write a small 300 word article in the Gita and then, so I wrote my first draft and then, I normally edit it and arrive at a final draft. So, then I started doing track changes before I went from the first draft to the final draft.
And when I started that, in a 300 word article, I had 5000 track changes. It’s a 300 word and there are 5000 track changes. So, when he saw that, I told him that, this is how I know great author but this is what I also do.
And there are some authors who publish nowadays with digital copies available, there are some authors who made their successive versions of drafts available online for their readers to see. So, if you look from the first draft to the final draft, the sheer amount of changes that happen, it’s incredible. So, if they had said that, oh, the first draft itself, this is no good, then nothing good will come out.
So, we need to just suspend that critical voice, start off and first get it out, then get it right. Another saying among writers is that, you can edit a bad page but you can’t edit a blank page. Just start off.
So, even if we do something badly, the fear of doing something wrong stops us from doing something right, doing anything right in fact. So, the fear of doing something wrong stops us from doing anything right. So, yes, we do something wrong, we do it once, twice and sometimes we have, we find that, yeah, over a period of time I improve.
Then we move forward and do it. Sometimes it may find that over a period of time also I don’t improve. Then we may decide, okay, this is not a field which I’m particularly talented in.
It’s not a field which I’m particularly interested in also. So, then let me move on to something else. But, the creative side needs to be released from the control of the critical side.
And this is where, so I’ll E, the third point I said that, this is where we need encouragement. Now, without encouragement, none of us can actually move on on our own. It is in the very nature of the human being that we are social creatures.
And we are very heavily affected by the way people around us function. Especially the way they see us, the way they talk about us, what they tell us. So, a British author, I think it’s Oscar Wilde, he said that, no, Mark Twain, he said that I can live for two months on a good compliment.
I can live for two months on a good compliment. It’s not just, there’s a difference between the good compliment and the flattery. Flattery is just, we want to get something done, and that’s why we speak something positive about that person.
But a good compliment is when we see something good in someone and then we appreciate that. So, all around us, we have some people who will encourage us, some people who will discourage us. So, when I said we have to silence the critical voice or suspend the critical voice, this critical voice does not originate in a vacuum.
Actually, that critical voice is an internalisation of external critical people. So, in our childhood, we may have been compared to someone, we may have had a sibling who might be better than us. Why are you not like your brother? Why are you not like your sister? Or you might have had a neighbour.
Or someone like that. So, there are different sources from which the critical voices may have come in our life. But once we understand from that point of introspection, okay, this is my critical voice, this is my creative voice, then I want to nourish the creative voice.
I want to not reject, but I want to regulate my critical voice. So, if somebody from outside is actually feeding that critical voice, is feeding my doubts, then that attitude will not work. In the long run, in our life, we will see our greatest regrets are not necessarily about the things we did and did wrong.
It’s often our greatest regrets will be about the things which we never did. Which we never did at all. So, among authors it is said, if an author begins a work and doesn’t complete it, that’s sad.
But more, but sadder than a work half done is a work never begun. So, fear kills more dreams than failures. So, oh, I may not achieve it.
And because of that we don’t start it also. And this, whoever encourages us. Now, encouragement does not mean that they unrealistically appreciate.
Somebody learning first steps in music and we tell them, you are going to be the next Mozart. Not that kind of encouragement. But, the way a mother encourages a child who is learning to walk.
The mother encourages child, it’s not that the mother is going to tell the child, oh, you can’t jump across this big river or this big big hole or whatever. No, just take small steps. But encouragement is required.
So, especially in a creative field that we are working or especially in an area where we are trying to overcome some negative tendency. So, we need at least one person who will encourage us. Sometimes, the encouragement may come accidentally as you mentioned.
But sometimes, we may have to plan that out for ourselves. This is a person who encourages me. This is a person who discourages me.
And there is a time for both also. When I am in the creative phase, I need encouragement. Afterwards, when I am evaluating, at that time, yes, I would also like to have some critical feedback.
It’s not that the critical feedback is bad. That is also required. But it has to come at the right time.
If basically, I am confident that I can do it, and I have done a significant part of it, then I am also myself in the mode of improving it. Then somebody says, you can do this to improve. You can do this to improve.
Okay, yeah, I can do this. But, when I am just starting off, and I am not even sure whether I will do it or not. At that time, the critical feedback comes.
Then, we just become disheartened. So, the encouragers who are there in our life. Now, it’s not necessary that the same person will encourage us constantly.
In different fields, we may need different encouragers. We may need different mentors, different guides. The focus has to be like that of a coach.
When a coach is training an athlete, the coach is aware of the shortcomings of the athlete. But the coach’s focus is on the potential. Yes, you can do this.
You can do this. The coaching is actually an art, where we are meant not just to, and the coach is meant not just to tell what is the right thing to do, but to actually inspire the confidence that the right thing can be done. So, if coaching was simply about don’t do this, do this.
That we can learn nowadays from a book also. We just search on Google and we can find out. What needs to be done for what.
But coaching requires creating the confidence that something can be done. T is transcendence. Transcendence means that actually we at our core are spiritual beings.
And as we are spiritual beings, there is a higher plan to our life. There is a transcendental element to life which we cannot perceive. That means that I may compare myself with others and I may feel I can’t do this that well.
I can’t do that that well. There is a horizontal reference point where we compare ourselves with others and somebody is higher, somebody is lower. But from a transcendental perspective there is a higher plan for our lives.
And in that plan we have been provided what we need. We are all on a journey of spiritual evolution. And whatever we need is provided for.
If there is something which we lack, either that is something which we don’t really need or that is something which will come to us. But what we need right now is what we have. This doesn’t mean that we don’t try to improve but it simply means that at first I talk about accepting where we are.
But that acceptance can be done with resignation or that acceptance can be with anticipation. Okay, this is where I am at. If I am driving a car and oh, I am 1000 miles away from my destination.
Yeah, I am 1000 miles away but I am on the right path. So I have to accept I am 1000 miles away. That means it is going to take me, if I drive at 80 miles, it’s going to take me 10 hours, 12, 13 hours, 14 hours.
Fine. I’ll go there gradually. But when we accept where we are it doesn’t have to be with resignation.
It can be that acceptance can be with anticipation. It means that I am whatever I need for my growth is provided. Actually, we all have a great power that is the power of our intention.
Power of our intention means that whatever reality we experience right now we are experiencing it as a result of our intentions. So our intentions, the world is reciprocal. The Bhagavad Gita is an ancient yoga text and it describes that actually the Supreme Consciousness reciprocates with our consciousness.
So this principle of reciprocity means that where we are right now is a reciprocation of what we intended. And there is conscious intention and there is subconscious intention. Suppose somebody, if there is an ant which is going south but the ant is on the back of an elephant which is going north then which direction is it going? South or north? North.
The ant is going south but it is in the back of an elephant which is much bigger which is moving much faster. So we may say this is what I want to do but why is this going wrong? This is my intention. We are like the ant moving south.
But within us there is this self-doubt which is like an elephant moving north. And because of that it is not that there is somebody out there who sabotages us. It is our own subconscious thoughts.
It is our own unevaluated beliefs about ourselves that sabotages. So transcendence means that this inner voice, this elephant that is moving on a wrong direction so you could see that. I talked earlier about the critical voice and the creative voice.
The creative voice is like the ant and the elephant is like the critical voice. The poor ant has no chance. The poor ant may walk and run but the ant will get nowhere.
Because the elephant is moving in an entirely different direction. So this the creative voice being like an ant and the critical voice being like an elephant, this disparity happens when we have a materialistic conception of life. Because within the materialistic conception we will see eventually.
We will see inevitably how there are so many people who are in so many ways better than me. Somebody looks better than me. Somebody speaks better than me.
Somebody has better memory than me. So we will look at all those people and we will sabotage ourselves. So transcendence means we understand that there is a plan for our life.
And we are what we are meant to be. I talked about this in the earlier class also. We don’t have to be anyone else.
If God had wanted us to be someone else, he would have made someone else. He has made you, you. He has made me, me.
So you are meant to become the best you and I am meant to become the best me. But often we think I have to become you and you have to become me. And this is where we create problems for ourselves.
So transcendence means lifting our vision up and understanding that there is a higher plan for our life. This higher plan, if we just accept that, then that elephant which is going in the other direction, sabotaging us, that just stops. It stops.
And then the ant can move on. And the ant covers some distance as per its capacity. So this critical voice, you are not good enough, you can’t do this, you can’t do that, you can’t do that.
It is basically the power of our own intention working against us. And to stop that, stop our intention from working against us, to get our intention to work for us. We can’t just continue looking horizontally.
No, this person like this, this person like that. We need to look up vertically. And looking up vertically is not just a conceptual idea.
It is actually a change of consciousness. A change of consciousness means that we practise processes for raising our consciousness upwards. Our consciousness determines what we perceive, what we enjoy, what we experience.
Depending on the level of consciousness, some people are sadists. They may see a small animal on the road and they kick it. Kick it and hurt it and when they hear screaming and pain, they get some perverse joy out of it.
Some other people are healers. They see some poor animal right on the road with a small dog and they take it to a vet. Get it bandaged, healed and when they see it’s healed, they feel good.
It’s similar, both are human beings. But for one, when the consciousness is so low, they think their pleasure is in hurting someone. For somebody else, their pleasure is in helping someone.
So this is a clear and simple example of how difference in consciousness causes different people to perceive things differently. So when we raise our consciousness upwards, then we harmonise with the divine energy that maintains the universe, that maintains us in the universe. Right now, in all of us, we are living, we are breathing, we are eating, we are digesting food.
There is so much happening in our body that we ourselves don’t know about, that we do nothing to control. What happens in our body, for example when we eat food, did I mention this example of digestion in this series? No. So, now with many of our bodily parts being replaceable by some machines, say, the heart is not working properly, we can have a pacemaker.
If the kidney is not working, we can have a dialysis unit. So many people have digestive problems. So researchers thought, can we replace the stomach with an artificial digestive machine? Anybody has a digestive problem? We could just implant that machine.
And they found that we need not a machine, but a factory. And not just a factory, but a chain of factories. So, in physics we consider work as force into displacement.
They found that if we consider when we eat one morsel of food and it goes into the body, it digests itself and converts into energy, the amount of work needed to digest one morsel of food is actually more than the amount of work that an average human being performs throughout the day. If we consider how much work we do in terms of lifting weights, or even just moving our bodies. But in the body the peristalsis moment that happens in the alimentary canal as the food cools down, that’s enormous.
So, we are not doing this digestion. The only time we think of our digestion is when it doesn’t work. Isn’t it? It’s when it doesn’t work, we think, why is it not working? So, he said that God gives and forgives, we get and forget.
We get and forget. So, just by looking at the broader picture of our existence, of our functioning, we can understand that there is a higher order which is taking care of our life. The transcendence is what will tremendously help us in combating the elephant that is running in the opposite direction.
So, we just did this musical meditation before this talk. This musical meditation, we chant the mantra, Hare Krishna Hare Krishna, Krishna Krishna Hare Hare, Hare Ram Hare Ram, Ram Ram Hare Hare. So, we chant this mantra.
What exactly are we doing? This mantra is not just sound vibration. It is a prayer which basically is a call of the part to harmonise with the whole. It’s an invocation.
O part, return to harmony with the whole. It is a prayer which is a prayer for loving service by which we harmonise with the whole. So, when we understand this, there is a higher plan.
All that I need to do is harmonise with the plan. Say, we are going in a crowded road. Now, if everybody is driving properly, we just maintain the speed, our vehicle also moves on.
So, like that we are all on a journey of evolution. This we may not see on our day-to-day basis in what is happening. But, in the long run, we are moving forwards.
And we see this when we get a spiritual vision. So, the most important thing for overcoming self-doubts is getting this transcendental vision that the self is a work in progress. And what the self is right now is good enough for right now.
Yes, we all need to improve, but we will improve in due course. I’ll conclude with the last point. S is steps.
Steps means that when we work, when we have ambition, when we have a vision, we can expand our perception. But, when it comes to execution, we need to focus our perception. I want to go a thousand miles.
Fine. But, right now, I will walk one step, one step, one step. So, unfortunately, say for example, when we are walking, we understand this.
Okay, even if I walk one mile, how do I walk it? One step, one step. That’s how we will cover one mile. This we understand very easily in terms of a physical activity like walking.
But, in terms of our overcoming of our self-doubts, we, as I said, we compare our first draft with other’s final draft. It’s good to look at other’s final draft. This is where I want to go.
But, the way from our first draft to that final draft is by one editing. Okay, this spelling, I’ll fix this. This sentence, I’ll fix.
This paragraph, I’ll move it. Just one editing, one typing. One key at a time we press, the draft improves.
So, it’s only when we think that, okay, I am here right now, and I have to go that far. I have to go that far, but I don’t have to go in one single leap. I can take small steps.
Small steps. So, when we focus, in the first session, I talked about this, when overcoming resentment, shifting our focus from, our driving question from why to how. Why is this happening to how can I act now? How can I move ahead now? So, in the same way, this how question of how can I how can I move ahead right now? Small, even if you take a small step, that small step is enough for us to move forwards.
So, when we have a self-doubt, oh, I can’t do this. I can’t do this. Okay, then what do you do? What can I do right now? So, what happens is, when the critical voice is coming in, from inside, you can’t do it, you can’t do it, you can’t do it.
Okay, what can I do right now? What can I do right now? What can I do right now? So, for writer’s block, it is said that, if a writer gets that, I can’t write anything. I can’t write anything. If that comes up, one of the surest ways to overcome a writer’s block is, I have tried this and it works well.
What is it? You just decide. I am going to write for one hour and if you don’t get any idea, just write. I have no ideas.
I have no ideas. I have no ideas. After writing 5-10 times, you get bored of typing that and start typing something.
And gradually, something good will come out of that. So, if I say, I can’t type even a single word. If I type that, then I can’t type even a single word.
I have typed 7 words. So, we have to learn to trick our mind. This critical voice that is there inside us says, you can’t do it.
So, we have to somehow find a way to out trick it. Yes, we may not be able to do the big thing that we want, that we wish to do, we aspire to do, but that doesn’t mean we can’t do anything. So, just take a small step that we can take.
It’s like, when there is darkness, at that time, suddenly the power goes off. Now, I can’t get the power back. But I can turn on my own flashlight.
And that turning on of the flashlight is enough to show me one step forward. And take that one step, take one step forward. And gradually, the light will come back.
So, the overcoming of self-doubt requires focussing on small steps. The key to training ourselves and trusting ourselves is small steps successfully taken. The key to training ourselves and trusting ourselves.
There is doubt, the opposite of doubt we could say is trust. So, how do I trust myself? Training myself means doing the right thing. Trusting myself means that I can do the right thing.
For both of these, for training ourselves and for trusting ourselves, the key is small steps rightly taken. Just take one step at a time. Whatever it is our doubt is, oh, you can’t do it.
Forget the idea of perfection. What can I do right now? Start off and as you keep starting off, one step, one step, we move forward. And eventually, we’ll find we have covered a significant distance.
So, shanai, shanai, slowly, step by step, one step at a time. And when we, it’s actually the, whenever we make any resolutions, we make a resolution, I will not do this for the rest of my life, ever again in my life. I’ll never do this ever again in my life.
But what happens is, I will never do this again. I’ll never do this again. I’ll never do this again.
When what? When you start thinking like this, the mind can work out so quickly. You know, what will happen? In future, some temptation may come, some situation may come. How will I say no to it again? So, if I just keep thinking, I’ll never do this again, I’ll never do this again, if I meditate on that, gradually, the mind will remove the never from it.
And what remains it? I will do it again. I will do it again. So, when we think of a resolution, I may think that I’m not going to do this ever again.
But, I can’t know what I’m going to do after one year, after one month, after even one week. But what I can know is, what I can do right now. What I can do today.
What I can do tomorrow. So, when we have to overcome our doubts, if we think of the rest of our life, how will I face it? It’s not going to work. Okay, can I take this one step now? Can I do this for today? If I just do it for today, then I move forward.
So, all of us are called to lift the weight of our doubts. We have to lift that weight and as we keep lifting it, our strength improves. And as our strength improves, then we can not only lift the boughs, there’s a weight above me and I’m just crushed under the ground.
I lift the weight, I lift the weight and eventually I can throw away the weight. So, like that our doubts are crushing us right now. And all of us are called to lift the weight of our doubts.
But, the only way we can lift the doubt is lift it for today. Unfortunately, what we do is that today’s problems are manageable today. But when I add the problems of yesterday and the problems of tomorrow to today, then even today’s problems become unmanageable.
So, if I think, yeah, I’ll do this today, but tomorrow I won’t be able to do it. Day after tomorrow I won’t be able to do it. Once I start thinking like that, then it becomes impossible.
Hey, right now I’m holding this mic. The mic is very light. There’s no problem in holding this.
But suppose, instead of one hour, I have to hold it for one day. If I had to hold it for one week, I have to hold it for one year. I have to hold it for my whole lifetime.
If I start thinking, if I have to hold for the whole lifetime, I have to hold this mic. I can’t do it. I’ll drop it right now only.
Why? Because the same thing, when we think of it for the whole life, it becomes a burden. So, and something is difficult for us to do. If we think that, oh, I’ll have to face this difficulty for my whole life, then it will be so disheartening that we’ll not be able to do it.
Let me do it for today. What is going to happen? As I lift a weight, my strength is improving. And as my strength is improving, then my capacity to lift the weight is improving.
And as my capacity is improving, then the weight, I can eventually throw it away. We just have to carry it. So, just small steps taken successfully.
So, instead of instead of becoming discouraged by what we can’t do, we become encouraged by doing what we can do. That is the shift in focus. What can I do right now? And do it and be encouraged.
And if we just keep doing it, we will find that eventually that which we thought was impossible for us to do, that becomes not only possible, eventually it becomes relishable. Doing it, we start doing it well and we start having fun doing it, whereas what we thought earlier was going to be a big burden. So, I’ll summarise what I spoke.
In overcoming self-doubts, I use the acronym DIETS. What was D? Do you remember? Yeah, it is direction. Doubt, I said doubts are caused by what? It is not what we are, but what we think we are not.
So, doubt is based on our negative comparison with some ideal that we have in the world. This is what it takes for success and that’s what I don’t have. So, if we just, if we are to construct a building, we have to look at what is the level here.
Somebody else has a big building, it doesn’t matter. So, when we shift our focus from what we are not to what we are, that’s the first step in the journey to overcoming doubts. So, I was looking inwards, introspection.
Where do doubts come from? So, doubts are because doubts are not, doubts are the sign of intelligence, but it is not the only sign of intelligence. There is a creative voice within us, a critical voice within us. So, if the critical voice comes too early, it suppresses the creative voice.
Writer’s block is because we try to access both and the creative voice is overwhelmed by the critical voice. So, instead of getting both of them simultaneously, we get them sequentially. Just get it out, then get it right.
Just as to enjoy fiction, we suspend disbelief. Similarly, to enjoy the creative flow, we suspend the critical voice for the time being. Just get it out.
First, we can edit a blank, we can edit a bad page, not a blank page. So, we could do it as a writer. No, we can say, write fat, edit thin.
Just get it out and then refine it or write thin, edit fat. First, get an outline and then expand it. So, how it works best for us will vary, but just separate the two phases.
Then, E was encouragement. We all need encouragers. There are, the critical voice inside us is actually an internalisation of critics outside us.
So, to the extent, we want our creative voice to be strong, to that extent, we need to find out those who encourage us. So, encouragement is not flattering. Encouragement means what is there is seen genuinely and is appreciated.
So, even if we have one encourager in our life, for the particular doubt we are trying to overcome, the particular creative thing that we are trying to do, that encourager will become like an external validator for our inner creative voice. And we want critics also, but we need them at the right time. After we have done a reasonable amount, and then we are in the mood of refining, at that time we need the critical voice.
Not in the initial stage of creating itself. Then, T was transcendence. That by horizontally comparing ourselves with others, we will see that there are so many ways I am deficient.
But if we look vertically and understand the transcendental aspect to our lives, we are on a journey of spiritual evolution, and we are what we need to be. And, just as there is so much that is going on in our body, when we digest food, for example, which we are not taking care of, but it is being taken care of. Similarly, the things which are beyond us will be taken care of.
So, once we have this faith that I am what I need to be, then, we will stop subconsciously sabotaging our conscious intentions. So, the self-doubt is like an elephant which is moving north while the intention is like the ant that is moving south on that elephant. So, while acceptance coming not from resignation, this is what I am, but acceptance coming from anticipation.
I am my only resource and whatever I will be called to do, I am good enough for that. That will enable us to move forward and stop the movement of that elephant in the wrong direction. All our doubts will stop when just acceptance comes.
The power of our conscious intention can be channelled constructively. And, lastly was S was steps. Yeah, small steps.
The key to training ourselves and trusting ourselves is small steps successfully taken. So, when we want to have an ambition, we may look at the long run, but when it comes to execution, start with small steps. Just do one step, one step.
So, when the mind says you can’t do it, just outwit it by doing it. You can’t write a single word. Just write that and the words get written.
So, when we, instead of thinking that I have to do something big, just do something small and gradually the big will evolve. When I think that I have to lift a weight for a whole lifetime, I will not be able to lift it for a few minutes also. I say you can never do that.
I will never do that. The mind will remove the never. Don’t think about the future.
Just start right now. And, in this way, as we keep taking steps forward, eventually we will find that whatever it was, whatever self-doubt was overcoming us, we have overcome that self-doubt. Thank you very much.
Yay, Krishna. So, are there any questions or comments? Sorry. Introspection.
Sure. So, thank you for sharing. Basically, I was thinking about how doubts are basically stirred up from our external expectation of what people might think of us or what we expect of ourselves to be, like our image or something like that.
So, how do you negate from that, completely detach from that attachment to what people think, because ultimately that’s what it is, having an expectation. Yeah. So, how do we detach ourselves from what others think about us, because that often generates self-doubts.
Yeah. There is this principle which we understand, it can actually, at one level, be very discouraging, and at another level, it can be very empowering. That is, that inside everybody’s head, a whole movie is going on, and in that movie, they are the star, and we are simply an extra.
We’re simply an extra. If we are watching a particular movie by someone, how many of us notice who the extra is? Maybe if we know the extra, we notice, I saw you in the movie. Otherwise, we don’t care for the extra.
So, basically, this is not to minimise the importance of relationships, but to create a sense of perspective. Actually, we worry so much about what other people think about me, but we will stop worrying if we knew how little other people thought about us. If we turn around, and we think about how much we think about other people.
We do think, but not much. We have our own life, we have our own issues, we have our own emotions. When they interact with us, we think about them.
But, everybody has their own life to live. And basically, in their life, we are extras. Some extras may have some important roles also, but still, the point is that we cannot give inordinated importance to other people’s opinions.
So, we have to begin our life from the fundamental platform, from the fundamental acceptance that we are alone. We come in this world alone, and we die alone. We are alone in this world.
We can form relationships, and these relationships can help us to overcome the feelings of loneliness that we may have. But ultimately, if we consider, if we consider from the perspective of karma, all of us have done some karma, all of us get some reactions. I cannot suffer your reactions, you cannot suffer my reactions.
So, this understanding that in others’ life drama, we are extras, and that every one of us is alone. That’s why I said these two things can be very discouraging at one level. No, I am alone.
Nobody cares for me. That’s not the point which we are making. We have relationships, and we want to care for each other.
People do care for us, we also care for people. But there is a foundational point from which we move forward. You know there is dependence, there is independence, and there is interdependence.
So, when there is dependence, when we are emotionally dependent on others, then one small disapproval from the other person can be devastating for us. So, we would like to go to the level of interdependence in our relationships. But it is only independent people who can become interdependent.
Dependent people cannot become interdependent. So, what I am talking about here is that we need to have this foundational understanding of which is the basis of independence. That yes, people do care for us.
Yes, I do care for people. I want relationships. But fundamentally inside everyone’s head is a drama going on.
They are the hero, they are the star player, we are extras. And we are all alone in this world. So, with this understanding, we get a certain level of independence.
And then we can choose interdependence. Yes, I get some validation from some person, and I give some validation to some other person. But if we do not come to this level of independence, then we will always stay emotionally insecure.
So, how do we overcome this, or how do we come to this level? Basically, we can look back, there are different thought exercises which could be done for this. One thought exercise is, let’s say, we can consider 10 years ago. We might have worried about some person’s opinion a lot.
Now, who knows, that person might not be there even in our life now. Of course, at that time, that person was important for me. And I don’t want to take the consideration of that person’s opinion.
But, the point is that we have to contextualise people and their opinions. Whereas, we tend to eternalise people and their opinions. Contextualise means, okay, I am going through this phase in my life, at this place, I have a relationship with this person, this person has an opinion about me.
And this opinion, this perception is not favourable for my growth. So then, this is one relationship, this is one, if we consider from a spiritual perspective, we are on a multi-lifetime journey. This is one life, and in this, I have one relationship.
So, I need to contextualise it. I don’t need to eternalise it. This person’s opinion of me becomes uncritically internalised as my self-definition of myself.
Then that is very damaging. So, by this thought exercise of looking back in the past, at some person’s opinion, which we consider very important then, but please think what did matter now. It can help us to prevent, help us to not get overly influenced by other people’s opinions.
And, along with that, if we can, as I said, find some people who encourage us, and then we keep their encouragement in the forefront of our consciousness. It’s not that people who discourage us or disapprove us are necessarily malicious. They may be ill-informed.
They may just be incompatible. There are various possibilities. But, if we are to grow in our life, then at present, what they are saying is not a resource for us.
Then I have to put it aside. So, it’s said that if you want to function in life, we need to have a soft heart, but we have to cover it with a thick skin. If you only have a soft heart and a soft skin, we will be tormented.
And, if you have a hard skin and a hard heart, then we will just be profoundly lonely. So, we need a soft heart, tender heart, but we need to cover it with a thick skin. That means that we want to develop relationships.
We are open for loving reciprocations with others. At the same time, we need to be prepared for shocks. So, that thick skin enables us to withstand the criticisms that may come, the disapprovals that may come.
And, in general, it is in the practise of bhakti, the practise of bhakti spirituality can help us develop this. Because we understand that we are souls and we are always loved by God, by Krishna, who is, Bhagavad Gita describes, God by the name Krishna, and he is always with us, no matter what, who does to us. So, the tenderness of the heart can be there internally, but the thickness of skin can be there externally, where we recognise that there are many people who have different opinions, and they will criticise us.
But, because we are internally connected with Krishna, internally spiritually nourished, we can resist that worldly criticism. Thank you. Thank you.
Okay. Thank you. Thank you.
Yeah. You had a question also? Okay. Yes.
I have a couple of questions. One is that when you mentioned first getting out and then getting right, but how can you apply that verbally? How can you apply that verbally when you are speaking this online? You can’t just say whatever you want to say. Oh, just kidding, I didn’t mean to say that.
And then, the next question is also how can you apply this to decision-making? So, if you are a speaker making big decisions, especially we are in college or we are making career decisions, some of these decisions take financial resources and take time, take effort and you can’t kind of come back from it. So, how do you apply as a mentor to that? Yeah. So, first get it out and get it right.
It can be applied in writing. But how can we apply it in real life where you are making decisions? Career decisions, it takes time, it takes money. Yeah, what I meant by get it out and get it right, I applied it to writing, but I was primarily applying it to thoughts.
The thoughts means that when we want to apply this, get it out and get it right in our career decision-making. So, when the thoughts are inside us, they just congest us. Do this, don’t do this, do this, don’t do this, do this, don’t do this.
So, even with, if I have three career options in front of me, there is a creative side will say, this is so good. Critical side will say, this is not good. The creative side will say, yes, this is good.
Critical side will say, not good. And when this goes on internally, then, okay, we don’t have a fan here, then it’s like a fan. A fan moves a lot, but doesn’t move anywhere.
At least the fan gives air, but when our mind moves in a circle, it actually doesn’t give cooling air, it makes the head hot. So, this is good, this is not good, this is good, this is good, not good, this is good, this is not good. So, at that time, getting it out does not necessarily mean that we do the thing, but it could just mean journaling.
Okay, this is what I write it down. Get it out. Things that are inside us, they congest us.
When we get that out, we can evaluate them more objectively. So, we get it out. Okay, this is what the creative voice is saying about this.
This is what the critical voice is saying about this. Okay, one option. No second option.
Look at all of those. And then, when we have to make a decision, we can decide that maybe I’ll keep some time for myself, maybe 3 months, 6 months, when I will evaluate these thoughts. So, first get out all the fears, get out all the hopes, put them down.
And then slowly start evaluating them. Okay, this is a good point. This, I need to get more information.
This, okay, let me find this out. Yeah, this looks like a good thing. This is not very sound.
I am being sentimental here. And then keep refining it. So, basically when we get it out, it’s like we are getting a snapshot of our mind.
And then, as we keep evaluating, analysing, whenever some further insight comes, further idea comes, further doubt comes, instead of thinking about it at that time, just note it down. And then have some quality time when we evaluate it. So, you may decide, this is a major decision in my life, so every week I’ll spend one hour on this.
So, whatever thoughts come in the mind, just note them down somewhere. And then add them properly in that analytical framework. Then, okay, this is here, this is here.
And then gradually if we keep doing it, that particular decision making process will become more and more well informed and well thought out. And say after six months of such a deliberation, if I come to a particular conclusion, I started with this, and now also I am thinking of the same thing. Let me go ahead with this.
But as we become, because we have gone through the process, whatever decision we make, it will be a well thought out decision, and then we will put the power of our conviction in executing that decision. Sometimes, even if we take a right decision, but if we are still choked by that doubt, maybe that could have been better. Maybe that could have been better.
Then, we will not execute the right option in the right way, with the right enthusiasm. And then the right will also turn out wrong for us. So, if we have gone through this whole process of thinking deeply, analysing, then, this is what I have chosen, and this is why I have chosen this.
And therefore, now I am going to move forward. So, we can, we can, so what happens, there are, in any option, like there are pros and there are cons. So, the pros, we could say, is like the creative side coming out.
The cons are like the critical side. Now, if I look at the cons in everything, then I may say, all the options are bad. What do I do? But then if I look at the pros, I say, all options are good.
What do I do? There are the pros and there are the cons. And then we have to see, we have to objectively evaluate. So, when we get things out, and then we evaluate them, then we have more, more objectivity, more clarity, and more conviction emerges for whatever decision we take.
So, it may not be so much in terms of doing a particular thing. Sometimes, in some fields, even doing may be possible. We might do some kind of apprenticeship or we might just try out some things.
But it is not possible in all walks of our life, definitely. But the point is that, if we do this at least internal deliberation, that helps us to arrive at a better decision and arrive at a greater conviction for executing that decision. Yeah.
Yeah, you can just tell. I will repeat. Yeah, correct.
I got the question. So, we make our decision and then there is also the transcendental aspect where there is faith. I think I mentioned this earlier that when I started public speaking for the first time, I was given a set of guidelines.
And the last guideline was while you are speaking in public, depend on Krishna. But in bracket, but only after you have prepared. So, the point is there is dependence on God and there is diligence for God.
So, both are important. So, we have been given some intelligence and we use our intelligence according to the best of our capacity. And after using our intelligence, if something is, we have done our part, then we leave the remaining to the higher powers that are there.
But it is not that we abdicate our responsibility. It is that we do our part and then we hand over the remaining. So, in a particular decision making process, we can’t think about everything.
But we don’t need to think of the factors that are in our control. And by doing the best that we can do, then we attract powers beyond us to help us to do that which we can’t do. As they say, God helps those who help themselves.
So, helping ourselves is our part. And that which is beyond us, that power, that assistance will come. So, when I said, in our particular context, I talk about decision making and say acceptance based on transcendence.
The point was that we understand that there is a plan in our life. So, the mind says, everything has gone wrong, oh, life is a waste, this went wrong, that went wrong, everything is terrible. So, at that particular point, we need to understand that there is a plan in life.
And even if some things have gone wrong, good can be brought out of that rock. This weekend I was at Fort Lauderdale and I did a series of talks there on spiritual lessons from car driving. So, So, after that, one Ukrainian girl, she came and she was talking with me.
She said that she had gone to one place, like an isolated retreat place. And she wanted to leave from there. And one friend had said that, I will pick you up.
They said, we will leave at 10 o’clock. He said, 10 o’clock? 10.15, 10.30, 10.45, 11. He was waiting, waiting, because it was so remote, she did not get any signal.
And finally at 11.30, he got some signal. And she called and said, I am waiting 1.5 hours. He said, oh, I am sorry, I forgot.
I am already so far away, I can’t come now. She was furious. He said, how could you forget? I told you yesterday, I reminded you today morning.
And then he said, oh, I forgot. And she didn’t even say sorry. The phone got cut off, basically.
Whether he said or not, he didn’t know. She was so angry. And then, just, so that evening she was there, just staying on, very, very angry.
And then one friend told her that the same boy, the same person was going to give her a ride around 12 o’clock, after he had talked for half an hour. He had met with an accident with a drunk driver. And the drunk driver had hit the vehicle exactly on the passenger side.
So, now he had not got he was in the hospital, but he was not so badly injured. But if anybody had hit the passenger side, he was killed over there. So, she was telling me that, I was so angry at that time.
How could this person forget me? What do I know? Why? What is happening in my life? So, that’s why we sometimes evaluate things from our limited perspective. And we just don’t know. There are things which go wrong.
Now, it was not that he knew there was going to be an accident. It was just his forgetfulness. But even others’ mistakes can be a part of a higher plan.
So, when I talk about acceptance, or acceptance based on transcendence, the point was that this negativity, you can’t do it, you made so many mistakes, you are good for nothing. Whatever I need to be, I am good enough for that. But from here, I want to move forward.
So, the steps are there, the decisions for the steps are there, that’s what we take. But we don’t beat ourselves up for where we are. We accept that wherever I am, for whatever reason I am, it is my mistake, somebody else’s mistake, for whatever reason, from here I will take steps forward.
So, that acceptance comes much easier when we have that understanding that there is a higher plan operation in our life. But that higher plan also requires our cooperation. And that cooperation is where we use our intelligence and we try to function using the best analytical skills, the best thought process that we can use.
Does that answer your question? Thank you. So, yeah. So, thank all of you very much for the last several weeks when we were there together.
And I thank especially Nila Vishwa Varun for this effort that they are putting in conducting this programme. I travel to various parts of America and indeed the world. You don’t have many places where first of all, there are few places where college programmes are going on, where spiritual knowledge is given, but they have a very friendly, welcoming, cheerful atmosphere which is special.
And more than that, they have also provided a facility. Many of you may have been at the Bhakti House where actually what you learn, you can also learn to practise it and live it in a spiritually conducive atmosphere. Otherwise, without a facility like this, spiritual knowledge is always beneficial.
But, getting spiritual knowledge and trying to apply it in extremely anti-spiritual or materialistic environment, that is like it’s like playing a beautiful flute amidst a storm. Nobody can get to hear it. So, our spiritual aspirations get swept away.
So, if you have this facility, this weekly programme is there and they have a programme at their home itself. You have a lot of facilities and I hope that and pray that you can use these facilities and that this series of talks have been of some assistance to you in your own spiritual evolution. Thank you very much.