A young man must have a healthy contempt towards the world

The following is an excerpt from a samvaad (dialogue) session with Acharya Prashant.

Question (Q): Sir, I recognize that there is a thirst in me. Where am I missing out? Is It forgotten, or maybe just missed? What is the reason? Why is it happening?

Acharya Prashant (AP): You still have some belief, in all that has been fed into you. Society, culture, all kinds of inputs that your mind has received, have told you that venues of emancipation do exist within this world.

You have been told that there are objects and people within the world, that can offer you the ultimate.

And you have been repeatedly told that. You have been repeatedly told that the Highest that is possible to a man, is a worldly thing.

So even though you experience the urge for the Highest, yet you rush outwards, to fulfill that urge.

Experiencing that urge is a welcome sign. But the direction in which you go for fulfillment is a foolish direction. That urge is real, but the means, the methods, and the directions you are choosing will not quench that thirst. Why are you choosing those means and directions? It is because you have been told that the valuable lies outside of you.

TV advertisements have drilled it in you that buying the next pair of shoes will bring you peace. Stupid movies have implanted it in you that the face or body of a woman can bring deep relief to you. You are unable to reject these influences totally; they have gone down very deep into you. They have gone down so deep, that now they are no more mere thoughts. They have become tendencies.

You have totally forgotten your clean and innocent state.

You have totally forgotten that all that you believe in today has been fed into you. You are not like this; these are mere concepts.

Today you do not take them as concepts;

today you take them as some kind of eternal truths.

You feel that — This is it. Obviously, this is a fact that having good money gives you contentment. Obviously, this is a fact that having an attractive woman by your side gives you peace. Have you ever really, impartially, calmly investigated this…