From Logic to Magic

Question: In your book, Inner Engineering: A Yogi’s Guide to Joy, you said that many of us need to retune our antennas to receive a clear image, a clear thought, which can help us to move forward. Can you elaborate on that?

Sadhguru: If I just see the way someone is sitting, I can tell what kind of troubles they will face in the next ten to fifteen years. The geometry of your form invites certain things – you can’t help it. In this culture, we created a very intricate science of how to sit, how to breathe, how to keep your body, how to keep your mind. If you get the geometry right, your perception will be enhanced. Only by enhancing your perception can you truly enhance your life – the rest is all imagination. I know imagination is hugely celebrated but we must understand that imagination is just recycling of your memory. It is only by extending the boundaries of your perception that your life is truly enhanced.

 

There is a scientifically verifiable methodology as to how to enhance your perception and unlock your genius. I do not mean human genius in terms of things like writing poems or creating paintings. There is a fundamental intelligence within you that allows this human system to function.

If you look at this human being that you are without emotional attachment, not as “myself” but as a mechanism, you will see it is the most sophisticated machine on the planet. And what are you manufacturing this with? You eat a fruit, let’s say a banana, it goes inside and within one-and-a-half to two hours, this banana turns into a human being. There is an intelligence here that can transform a fruit, a vegetable or whatever else we eat into such a complex machine. How could this be happening without underlying intelligence? But right now, this is an intelligence that you are unconscious about.

The entire system of yoga is about bringing yourself to a certain level of ease so that there is no static. What I mean by “static” is, on an evolutionary scale, the human mind is a relatively new happening. Since you don’t know how to use it optimally, it creates some amount of static. It is like a child playing with a radio – you will just hear all kinds of absurd noises.

If you bring your system to ease, you will notice there is intelligence beyond your intellect functioning all the time. You are not alive because of your intellect. If you look at our situation – we are on a round planet, which is not even stationary – it is spinning – in this universe that no one knows where it begins and ends, and we can still go about our lives without being concerned about any of it. There is a deeper dimension of intelligence within you, around you, everywhere. The human effort and striving should be towards accessing this dimension.

It takes a certain attunement with the rest of the cosmos for you to even walk on the planet. You will notice people who have had a few drops too many to drink suddenly struggle to walk. Walking is not a simple thing. All this is not happening out of your intellect – it is happening out of a deeper dimension of intelligence within you. If you touch this dimension of intelligence, you will move from superficial logic to the magic of life.