Keep moving, even if it is dark

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

Questioner: I have lived life in images. In past I have kept myself away from experiences with the excuse of not being sufficiently prepared. I realize now that all this is a myth. How can I be prepared without practice?

But I’m still afraid, afraid of losing, afraid of not having the proper logic to debate my opponents. My competitor is winning with walkovers, I’m losing respect, people, chances of a good life. I have the opportunity to save myself but instead I’m asking you what to do. Seems, I want to surrender and live like a slave. Why am I letting somebody steal an edge over me?

Is my self image so low that I’m not standing up for myself?

Acharya Prashant: Abhay, this is a classical case of, ‘duvidha mein dono gaye, maya mili na Ram’ (In doubt, both are lost: the material and the Truth).

It’s a phase of transition, it’s an intermediate stage, and right now you belong neither here nor there. When somebody is in this kind of situation, I advise him to keep moving forward with greater speed, and greater determination. Don’t just stop there. And if someone repeatedly tells me that he can’t move forward, then I advise him to turn back.

There’s a city of maya, it’s a beautiful city, enchanting, appealing, bewitching but it survives on your life-blood. It gives you a few good moments but at the cost of the essence of your life. It gives you pleasure at the cost of the essential.

And then there is the city of the Beyond, that city when looked at from the city of maya is not very attractive. It’s a calm, serene place but it does not have too many flashy attractions. It is the city of bliss and the city of maya is the city of bling, the city of blitz. Most of us care for blitz than for bliss.

In between these two cities is a great jungle. The city of maya does not teach you how to cross the jungle, it does not even give you the required strength to be prepared to cross this jungle. As we said, that city survives on your life-energy. And if you’re living in that city you won’t have the energy required to cross that jungle, it’s going to be terminally tough.