When we start coming for spiritual programs, our college friends criticize us – how to respond?

Answer Podcast

Transcript

This is an AI-generated transcript and may contain some errors.
Thank you. So if we try to come for spiritual programs, then some of our friends in our school or college criticize us. Because it’s a good activity, they would be criticizing that.
So how can we respond in such situations? Actually whatever we do, we cannot avoid criticism in this world. Whatever we do. Some of you may know the story of the man with his child and a horse.
So how many of you don’t know the story of the man, the child and the horse? I’ll just quickly tell you. There’s this man and his child, and they were riding a horse. They brought a new horse and they were riding it.
And people said, just see, you are putting a double burden on the horse. The poor horse has been crushed. Then the man said, he told his child, you can talk.
The child was walking around. People said, what is this? You know, where has parent and love gone? The child is walking, the father is comfortably riding. And the father said, okay child, you get on the horse, I’ll walk.
And then people started saying, you know, the father is aged. The child is young. Why is he riding? Why is he not allowing his father to ride? And the father said, child, you also get down.
So the horse was walking, and the two were walking. I said, what stupidity? You have a horse, why are you walking? So, what do you do? So in, if we base our decision making on avoiding criticism, we will never be able to do anything. Not even anything good.
We’ll not be able to do anything. We’ll become paralyzed. So, criticism is just a fact of life.
So we have to use our intelligence and understand what is important for us. What is good for us. And we do that irrespective of whether we get criticism or not.
And, that is the first point. We can’t just base our decisions on avoiding criticism. It’s like, I think that if I will avoid criticism, that is the basis of my decision making.
It’s like, I decide to travel, and by traveling, my purpose is to avoid crowded roads. Well, okay, you can avoid crowded roads, but will you get anywhere? If you have a particular destination to go, we go to that destination whether there is a crowd or not. We persevere.
So, when we are traveling, our purpose is, yes, traffic jams are never pleasant. But avoiding traffic jams is not the purpose of traveling. Similarly, avoiding criticism should not be the purpose of our life and the basis of our decision making.
We will be criticized, but if we use our good intelligence and we act based on that. That’s the first point. Second point is that we also need to choose our social circle.
Because if we find that we are being criticized for doing some activity which we know are good, then that means that social circle may not be so good for us. So, we need to change our social circle. That doesn’t mean that we reject and back-criticize those people, those friends.
Let me just understand that, you know, they are at a different stage in their life. Their intelligence is at a different level. They may be coming from a different cultural background.
And their understanding is overall different from ours. So, we let them do what they want to do, but we do what will be important for us. And over a period of time, see, people who are driven by their impulses, they do recognize that acting with intelligence is good.
But they are not able to do it. And if they see somebody else doing it, they feel it is a threat for them. So, they want to put that person down also.
But actually, real friendship is not that we all fall into a ditch together. Yes, you wonderful friends. No.
Real friendship means we can find a way to come out of a ditch. And then others say, no, come down over here. Why are you leaving us? I say, no, you, I am not leaving you.
I am inviting you. Come with me. So, if we use our intelligence and we can start living, we start living better, we start living more on principles, we become more committed, we become more peaceful, more happy.
Others will see that. And over a period of time, their criticism will change to appreciation. And some of them may follow us also.
And even if that doesn’t happen immediately, what we need to do is, we need to understand that I need a social circle where I will be accepted. And that’s why when I started the talk, I said that for all of you, to have a facility like this, where we can get spiritual association, so close to the college, is a rare blessing. So, we need a social circle where we, where what we are doing is accepted, validated and respected.
And that’s why choosing our association is extremely important. And lastly, we find that some people are criticizing us too much. Then, sometimes the criticism is simply born out of malice, that they appear ill-willed for us.
And sometimes, the criticism may be born out of misconceptions. So, if they have some misconceptions, then we can, rather than just reacting to the criticism, we can, we can actually inquire from other devotees, okay, when they say like this, if I go here, it will become like this, if I go, if you do this, it will become like this. Get those misconceptions addressed.
So, there is, to criticism, a rational component and there is an emotional component. So, the emotional component, we cannot really address because people’s emotions are of an harvest. They are what they are.
We can’t change their emotions very well. That will take some time. But there is a rational component to the criticism.
They may have genuine doubts. Sometimes, they may be well-wishers and they feel that you move this, you neglect your studies, this will happen, that will happen. Then we can get it addressed.
So, that way, we see criticism not as a threat but as a predictable phenomenon whenever we try to do anything purposeful and then intelligently respond to it. First, by deciding that I lack rational intelligence, not just by avoiding criticism. Second, by choosing a better association.
Third, by recognizing that the best way I can be a friend to them is not by doing what they want me to do, by going down with them, but by determinately rising and then setting an example by which they will also rise. And fourthly, if they have some rational objections, addressing those rational objections to me. That way, we can persevere on the right path and inspire them also to come on the right path.
Thank you.