Question:
Guruji, how can I become successful and happy?
Sri Sri Ravi Shankar: To become successful you need three things.
1. Skill
2. Energy, and
3. Dynamism
If you have skill, you have energy and you don’t do anything, then you can’t be successful. And you simply doing things without having skill, then also it doesn’t work.
Also, if you have skill and dynamism, but don’t have the energy then also success will not come.
For success to come what is needed are skill, energy, and then dynamism. You have to be dynamic. You have to work hard. All three things are needed!
There are people who sit and plan and plan and plan. They spend all their life planning but don’t do anything.
Around 15 to 20 years ago, a youth used to come to our satsangs in Bangalore. And he would buy every month about 25 magazines on How to be successful and How to make money. And he would go on reading them, and go on planning, and every time he would come and say, ‘I have this great magazine, I got this great idea, please bless me.’ I said, ‘Okay! Go do it.’
The next week he would come with another magazine and ask the same type of blessing. One year passed by; I also had patience and thought one day he would start something. But he never started anything. He would only keep buying magazines, keep asking me for advice, and keep making big plans, typing it all on the computer and that is it.
You should bundle all your feelings and throw them in the ocean, and relax!
Who cares?! Your feelings change all the time. Isn’t that so?
We have 100 acres of land for agriculture at the Bangalore Ashram, and this other gentleman, he would sit on the computer and make all these plans of where he will sow which seed, and how he will cultivate. He was the Head of Department for Agriculture.
All other people at the Ashram would say, ‘He does agriculture only on the computer.’
He would sit in the room and plan. Never went to the field to sow the seeds.
Similarly, this man was buying all these magazines and reading. One day, I called him and said, ‘Look, no more blessings. I do not want my blessings to go waste. Blessings will work only when you make an effort. So, you keep all these magazines aside. Don’t read or buy anymore magazines. Take up one thing and work on it, and you will be successful.’
Why I said this is because sometimes people with great idea don’t bring it into the practical field. And there are others who do a lot of hard work without thinking and without planning. They also can’t be successful. So you have to do both.
Without blessings things don’t move, I know. Blessings are essential, but blessings alone will not work, because somebody has to do work as well. Yes!
Work along with blessings, will make you successful.
I would say, even after you do your hard work and you find success, the real success is in your confidence. The real success is how confident you are, how much you keep smiling, and how boldly you can walk. That indicates your success.
