The people you relate with, are they bringing out the right side of you to the surface, or are they bringing out the wrong side of you to the surface? In the name of religion, people can be taught to hate others, and in the name of religion, people can be taught to love each other. Now in the context of religion, are they teaching you to hate? And I know it is happening to a very large extent in the world.
Religion was becoming a premise by which in order to make you hold on to your religion, they are teaching you to hate others who are not from your religion and this is neither going to do good to you nor going to do good to the world nor the world is going to see you in the proper light, it’s going to break down everything. Because in the name of religion if somebody is teaching you to love, in the name of religion somebody is teaching you to bring your right self to the surface.
There is a nobler side inside each one of us and there is an ugly side inside each one of us. Half of an animal, half of a human, and which part of you is being unfolded consistently by the world? The world that is teaching you to be wrong, the world that is teaching you to bring out the negativity to the surface is playing the role of a “Saguni” in your life. Making bad become worse and they can never be your world, they should never be your world.
A friend who teaches you to do wrong encourages you to do wrong and appreciates you to do wrong is not your friend because he’s destroying you. In fact, I will tell you, I would have probably had a lot more friends in this city. If latecomers were allowed. If drinking should – was never discussed as something to be dropped. If dropping smoking was never addressed. You are never expected to be honest. I really think we would have a lot more people in the city celebrating us.
A little manipulation to whatever is being done, little manipulation. Very calculated, it’s not very difficult. Little manipulation and so much would have been different. But I don’t think we would have built the sort of growth that we have built-in this period of time. It’s absolutely essential to ask. I know you prefer the friend who tells you let’s cut the class, then the friend who says we should not do it. But I think you should understand who is your right friend.
I think you prefer the one who is telling you to transcend the habits compared to him. You prefer those who support you to practice those habits, but you’ll have to ask yourself, are you helping each other to come up? Or are you pulling each other to go down? You need to ask yourself this question. What he said is absolutely beautiful. Inside each one of us, there are divine possibilities and there are animalistic possibilities and whom you surround yourself with is either going to bring out the worst in you or going to bring out the best in you and be aware of whom you surround yourself with.