BITS Pilani: When will life be sorted for good?

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

Questioner (Q): When we were studying for IIT, we used to think that everything would be sorted after getting into IIT or BITS. But it didn’t happen. Can such a thing actually happen at some point in life? Can I come to a point in my life where I can say that now my life is sorted? What are your views on this?

Acharya Prashant (AP): Forget my views. Do you want to take the truth?

Q: Yeah, I want to know the truth.

AP: The truth, as in the proverb, is bitter. The truth is that life can never be ultimately sorted. And if you can live with this realization, then you are realized. At no point does life become sorted. If you are too fond of being sorted, then you belong to the grave. That is where there are no matters, no affairs, no quandaries, no tussles, and no suffering. As long as you are breathing, there still remains a job to be done. The thing is, the job will still remain to be done even after you are not breathing.

Life is never going to be finally sorted. Don’t ever try to fool yourself or console yourself — that is what we call as the fool’s paradise, no? “Finally I have arrived. Finally everything is sorted. And if my life is not sorted, I want to convince myself that there have been others at least who have been fully sorted, and their example emboldens me to think that, on their lines, I too might become totally sorted one day.”

There has never, ever been anybody hundred percent sorted. There are always challenges, and those challenges arise from the body itself. Yes, you can continue to be a winner against yourself, but the battle will never be conclusively won. Your enemy is within you. As long as you are alive, the enemy is alive. How can you say you have had a final victory?

And the enemy feeds on your own energy, so the enemy will find new and newer ways to raise its head. That is called Maya. You can never be a definite winner. You can continue dodging her, you can continue beating her, you can have a favorable score line, but you can never say, “I have blanked her out.”

Now, learn to revel in this situation. The situation is called life. In this situation, you would…