The difference between seriousness and Immersion

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

Question: In one of our sessions we came across the words, ‘seriousness’ and immersion’. Sir, there we only came to know about their surface meanings. There was no light thrown on their exact detailed meanings. What is the basic difference between them? Which one is more advantageous to inculcate and how can we enhance it?

Acharya Prashant (AP): See, words by themselves are nothing but when we are saying that we need to differentiate ‘seriousness’ and ‘immersion’, what we are saying is that these are two distinct states of mind and we must understand what they are.

Names are not important, what I will be calling as seriousness, you can call it something else. What is important is to understand that this is a state of mind. You can give any label to it. Seriousness in some senses can be a beautiful word as well. Jiddu Krishnamurti would always say ‘Be serious’.

In what sense are we saying that seriousness is a load? Understand this. Seriousness implies- a mind that is bogged down. Seriousness implies that I am considering something very very important. Don’t you say that I am serious about something? When you say ‘I am serious about something’, what do you mean? You mean that this thing is important.