Okay. So my name is Sandy Barrett and I'm here with our bi-weekly show called What's Happening to Discuss the News. And today we have with us Pete Garretano, who has been living in Costa Rica and he's just home for a while in the United States. And so I think we, I would love to ask Pete, what's going on today? What was life like in Costa Rica? And then how does that compare with what's going on in the United States? I might also mention about Pete that he was in Costa Rica when January 6th happened. And so he can give us some kind of an idea of what it's like to come back to the United States after January 6th. So what's going on? First of all, Pete, in your life in Costa Rica, how are things there? Well, I mean, obviously it's Costa Rica. So even in a normal day, it's way more relaxed atmosphere here. Politics isn't really a big thing there.  You know, it states, which is kind of nice. It doesn't really affect their daily lives that much. Is that right, really? No, they don't, you know, they're, you know, it's a country where the people basically are just trying to scrape out a living and enjoy life and put food on the table. And so, yeah, they've had the same kind of restrictions down there as here. But in general, the people are way more relaxed about it. Nobody's screaming at somebody because they don't have a mask on, you know, it's when you're outside, you're not you're not wearing a mask. Nobody's wearing a mask. I've been to I went to one funeral, actually, for the drummer to Grand Funk Railroad, who had lived down there for years, and there was 150 people at an outdoor ceremony, and maybe two people had masks on. So it's a it's a different atmosphere there. I mean, in general, of all the people I talk to down there, it's different than here where you have maybe a 60 40 split 60% of the people totally believe the the COVID news that's being fed to them and maybe 34 30% question it or don't believe it at all. Down there, it's 90% don't believe it.  And it's all the control people and it's not as bad as everybody says it is and blah, blah, blah. So, you know, it's it's kind of comforting down there because I know that most of the people that are feel the same way about it as I do, whereas here, you know, people are at each other's throat about the thing and that totally have totally accepted the story that's being told to them by the government and the media. So that's one of nice things. Of course, they still have the regulations. You can't go in a store without a mask. But besides that, it's, you know, it's not it's not really a big deal. They're they're wanting tourism to come back. So they've used restrictions. They've used restrictions. So you don't have to quarantine when you come to the country because they've determined, right? Yeah. And the three or four months since they've allowed tourists back, they've they've they've they think that not one tourist has brought COVID into the country. They are not, you know, and they need tourism down there. So we all I mean, we needed here too. I was in New York City visiting my son on when I first got back, I flew in Newark, New Jersey, and I went to visit my son in New York is totally locked down. Yeah, it's crazy. Totally. No restaurants, only outdoor dining. It's wintertime. I all have these little wooden boots outside, but nobody's going out to eat in the wooden boots. You might see one person out there, but it's all it's all kind of silly, despite the failure of the the lockdowns that keep pressing on with it and the suffering continues there. So it's, you know, people go to the grocery store and everything, but there's no there's no dining out. There's no bars. So no movies, no theater, no movies, no theater, all concerts. Right.  Yeah. You feel like a leper if you're not wearing a mask on the street. I was just outside. I was walking around without a mask and I people looked at me like there was something wrong with me, but I can't I really can't bring myself to wear a mask outside. It's just totally silly. So so I wanted to ask you what are your impressions about coming back and point your attention to the affair that happened on January 6 when there were some people, you know, that were at least what the media says were Trump supporters who broke into the Capitol and vandalized it and it is viewed as called right now in insurrection. First of all, do you have an opinion about that? Can we discuss that? Was it an insurrection? Well, I mean, I mean, I read I read a lot about it in, you know, various, you know, the New York Times and then other things, the Guardian and other papers online.  Yeah, I mean, it's horrible. People got hurt and people died. But a couple of people, right? Right. A couple of people died. I think one or two as a result of the riot, other people, I guess, had a heart attack or something. I'm not really sure. And that's it's a terrible thing, but it all seemed some of it when you watched on video seemed pretty nonchalant. And how many people actually were in the Capitol? A friend of mine said thousands. But I went online to try to find the answer and it looked like 104 or 150. Well, this is what I got into a little difficulty yesterday because I asked what I thought was a simple question. In other words, a simple question is how many people got into the Capitol, like you said, and nobody seemed to know the answer to that. And then I and then they said thousands. These are perfectly reasonable educated people. They're saying this. I said, there's no way thousands of people got in. There were, however, as far as I could tell, 50,000 people in the protest. Have you been OK? So I said, of those protesters, how many got in the Capitol? Has that number even been revealed? I looked everywhere today to try to find it. And the best I could find was there's 140 or restaurants out for people that, you know, they have video of all these people.  Also, who knows, you know, I mean, it was if it was staged or part theater, who knows that either? It's it was just added. It's an unfortunate thing because it's being used to further, possibly, censor and and and restrict our freedoms. You know, seeing that was a bothersome to me, is that I do a discussion group with a number of people that are connected to the town of Richmond. And they really had decided already what all of this meant. And to them, it was the insurrection against the government of the United States that it was armed. Most of the people that I was talking to thought that they that there were that there were arms that were being used and that it justified the shutdown of Washington, D.C., the occupation of Washington, D.C. by troops and that it justified the taking away of the civil liberties of all of us because of its serious nature. And I kept on pressing. Why can't you see that these people who got in were criminals and that they should be prosecuted in our regular courts? There's just no at all understanding that that probably is the most accurate description of the case, right? Right. I mean, it's it's like a hundred and forty people or whoever committed a crime. So we're going to punish 350 million people. That doesn't make any sense. Right. But the thing that bothersome is that once again, it's a complete breakdown of the rule of law that's happening in the country. And it's with the it's with the complete the compliance of most Americans. I mean, if you have troops in your streets, nobody seeming to think that this is unusual to protect against a crime, troops in the streets. Right. And and and this crime didn't really affect anybody. And I did what in any way. The crime was a crime that you often see in protest. There are two crimes, it seems to me. One is the breaking an entry into the capital of the United States. A B&E, right? Right. Unlawful trespass. That's another crime that protesters are often create or often commit. The third one, people died. It could be more serious. Nevertheless, it still is a crime. Right. And it doesn't make it more of a crime. Right. It's it's it's not more of a crime because it was the capital. I don't see why it was right. It's just it's just a basic criminal act that people should be prosecuted for. But yeah, I mean, it's being made and I mean, you know, I don't know, but it still all really seems kind of fishy to me. It seemed it seemed all pretty easy. It's it's I mean, but I mean, my fear still is that now all the they're going to connect all the dots here and say, and they already listed groups to be worried about. OK, we go with the white supremacist kind of thing and the neo Nazis and everything, but they've listed in the groups that need to be silenced or censored. They had the libertarians in there. That's me. Yeah. Well, it's I think I'm closest to a little closer to a libertarian than a Democrat or a Republican. Me too.  You're either with us or you're against this mentality. And that's not really it.  So I mean, that's the difference. So the fear is there's going to be no protest. There's no opposition to anything because it's all going to be viewed as a as a terrorist act. And that's what they're trying to pass legislation. Yeah, because now they're going to say, well, anytime these groups of people get together, it could be dangerous. It could become violent. But like you said, that's true of any protest, whether it's Black Lives Matter or any protest could become that way because there's always one or two or a handful of people in a group who are maybe in the little unhinged or or they are prone to doing something like that. Or they are provoking a response also. I mean, during the sixties, there were people in protests that became basically they were loose cannons, put it that way and that they would do something really provocative, which would call in a very serious response from the police. I'll give you an example. During a protest here, not so long ago over climate change, there are a group of people meeting in the Hilton Hotel. Do you remember that? Oh, I remember. There are governments. What? Yeah, OK, so what happened was that two or three of the protesters approached the Hilton. There was no plan to do that on the part of the other protesters. These people were acting on their own, really against the will in a lot of ways of the normal protesters. And they as they approach the Hilton, seemingly to make more trouble than all these unlabeled cops. Right. Do you remember that came out? Right. No badge numbers. And they shot rubber bullets into the crowd. Right. And then people injured. Now, that's essentially what has happened here also, isn't it? Not that it provoked an immediate response, because I'm not sure it did. Did it did the people in the capital? Was there was there an immediate calling of the police or what happened? Well, I don't think so. No, I mean, I think that that they just it seemed like they just let it happen. And, you know, I don't know the ratio of people to police, but it seemed like it was maybe one to one at best. But in the beginning, I mean, like I said, I've watched a little bit. In the beginning, it seems like they walked right in. They broke windows. Well, what didn't they break windows? Yeah, they broke windows. But I think in the beginning, they walk. I mean, I was reading about this doctor that she said she just walked right in the door and I can't remember Stephanie Gould, something gold, something gold. Yes, she's a she's a member of this group, a doctor's group that's kind of against the lockdowns and everything. She's a very prominent doctor. I hear it's not doctors without borders, but it's anyway. She said she just walked right in and she didn't want to cause trouble, but she said everybody's walking in. So I mean, even of the hundred and forty people that walked in, there might have only been 10 people who were going to break windows or punch somebody or do whatever happened, you know. Well, AOC is saying that they were actually threatening the lives of Pelosi. Well, that might have been the 10 or 15 people, too. I don't know. Do they have evidence of that? How would you have evidence of that exactly? They have video tapes. I don't know. But anyway, I mean, it's it's over with for now. It's just what are the repercussions going to be? What do you see as a new arrival back in your home country? What do you see other repercussions? I've I've hardly talked to anybody because I've been in the house. I talked to my son and my son in New York City, my daughter. I really haven't had conversations with anybody about it. I just know I mean, nothing's changed here. The climate is very uptight about everything still. But obviously, people are all the average person is joyous because Trump's gone and Biden has been elected. So that's the only thing I've seen that has changed. In Costa Rica, the people I talked to were just like, so what, you know, they don't they don't think that's any great shape. They let me let me draw your attention to the fact that the government has changed, right? Biden is now. They continue, people still continue to try to trash Trump, even though Biden is now in power and because of the insurrection or whatever you want to call it, the quote insurrection. What do you see as a as a result of things like liberty? What I see today, I see permanent fencing in the Capitol around the Capitol. Did you see that permanent? Yeah, permanent fences now around the Capitol troops in the Capitol. How do you view that that there are now thousands, I think of guard troops in the Capitol, Washington? I think it's horrible.  Who's the Congresspeople? Yeah, I'm sure the Congress, the president, I mean, whoever. It's it's the new it's the new rule of law. Now, is that going to go away as a temporary? Probably not. I mean, they're that's not. She says it's not the the fencing is permanent. That's what Pelosi said. What? Right. So it's going to be once again, it's we're going to be like, I just want to say Peru or something. But, you know, some some country where the the leaders are afraid of the of the people, basically, because and I mean. You know, it's too bad that they aren't really afraid and that they don't do something positive to try to make people happier. I mean, there's there's a reason that people are unhappy. And I don't think it's going to get better anytime soon. With the with the income and inequality and all the unemployment and everything.  I mean, I mean, we we've had this discussion with people who why have with people who are so excited about buying. And I said, I'm willing to give them a. Yeah, me too. I'm willing to give them a three, six month pass to see what happens, you know.  I mean, the government still has the right to arrest somebody and detain them without counsel and without charges because of 9 11, because we're still in a state of emergency. You can arrest an ordinary citizen and not even tell them why they're being arrested and put them in jail and not have them and give them counsel.  So what they're trying to do is pass legislation that basically could, I think, put these people in prison instead of just censoring them. And I mean, I, you know, I read through the whole speech that Trump made and there was the one that they said he incited people.  I didn't see one thing in there that that was saying people go get them or or fight or go, go, you know, nothing. So, you know, it's it's a dangerous precedent to set that. And Glenn Greenwald with an article about some guy that got fired just because he's he made a joke about the people who people were in the in that, you know, Congress that were yelling hang, hang pence. I'm sure you read that. Yeah. Right. Well, some really well known lefty journalist made basically a joke about it that said, oh, something about, well, you know, maybe if maybe if they hung pencil and solve all the problems or something, but it was just joking about what these people said and he got fired from his job. You know, so I mean, the the PC and the PC culture is getting worse and worse and worse when you can't even write something tongue in cheek, you know, or say something. So I don't know.  So what happens to this guy? Oh, I remember that. Yeah. I mean, that's what Glenn Greenwald pointed out. He there was one article where a guy pointed out six six or eight incidences over the last 10 years were very powerful people, said something, and then somebody went out and tried to kill somebody. It was no different. It was they were all worse than what just happened at the White House.   And the Bernie thing, the guy directly said, Bernie got me all fired up talking about Wall Street and rich people and blah, blah, blah, blah. So why would Bernie should be censored according to today's rules?   Well, there's also moves to do to kick people out of Congress right now. Yeah. And those are people like Ted Cruz. He's and again, I've never particularly had warm and fuzzy feelings about Ted Cruz, but they're trying to say, many people are trying to say that he deserves to be kicked out. Him and that guy, Holly and other Republicans, simply because they voted, I believe, not to certify. Right. Because they thought there was election fraud. Right. And then they label that and they label that a conspiracy theory. That's the other thing. So if you're if you have a conspiracy theory, you're might be deemed somebody that should be censored. Well, they can label it a conspiracy theory, although, you know, I had an argument with a friend about that just yesterday. And I said, you know, on the surface, things looked really weird. I, you know, the election. I mean, never before has there been such a weird flip after 8 a.m. the next day and only in the swing states. I said, so I see it was totally justified to question the results. I mean, they might have pressed it longer than they should have. But I don't think it was crazy to question what happened on the day after on the election. It certainly wasn't illegal to question that. No, no, that's that's what I mean. Well, so then they label these people, you know, it's a dangerous conspiracy theory. So to to to get people all fired up that the election was rigged. Yeah, I mean, maybe Trump took it too far. But once again, you had thousands and thousands of peaceful protesters and 100 that walked in and maybe five or 10 that did stupid violent things, which can happen at any protest, anywhere, any time. So it does happen anywhere at any time, right? However, if something that was done, that was a crime, those people should be prosecuted and ask people like me. And but that idea somehow has become anathema that we have to go to these extremes. My feeling is, why don't we just go by the rule of law that exists? Well, here's the danger in what could happen, Sandy, is that, you know, people don't realize we I mean, a lot of people don't realize there's still people in Guantanamo Bay who have never been charged with a crime. They've been there for 19 years now and because of the terrorist law and that they made a law like that for domestic terrorism, which has been proposed. Basically, they could arrest you, put you in jail and say, well, you were a domestic terrorist and we don't have to give you a right.  And that's what they could be labeling people who for whatever reason say there's election fraud.  And a lot of, you know, I'm not a I'm not a pro-life kind of person, but a lot of religious groups are worried that they're going to say pro-life people are domestic terrorists because they incite violence. And because if one person goes out and kills an abortion doctor, which once again, I think is a horrible thing, then the people who are pro-life speakers incited him to violence. Therefore, they could be put in prison, a preacher. Who knows? No, I know I have heard that I have heard that argument. Or people like people like me who are saying, look, look, let's be cautious about all this. Let's let's look at these people who have committed crimes and prosecute them to the fullest extent of the law. But let's leave other protesters alone, other dissenters, because there's another thing that's happening in the new administration. Like Nancy Pelosi said today, something about the that the heart that the insurrectionists existed within the Congress. What is she saying? Is she saying that Republicans or some Republicans are basically insurrectionists and should be bounced out of the Congress? Elected congressmen? Is probably because of the of the language they use, which they're now deeming as insightful. Right. I mean, I think it's the same thing. They're saying that people that opposed it said the election was rigged and got out there and said, Trump got screwed. That was a horrible, dangerous thing. And it's a terrorist act. And so they need to be booted out, right? Which is just it's a dangerous, dangerous precedent. It really is. Right. Well, it's a dangerous time, I think, to as you're being a libertarian, actually, to be in the political fracas, including people like us. I would guess. So what other what are you thinking also about the censorship on the internet? Also, what's going on, you think? Well, yeah, I mean, it's all it's all connected, right? I mean, because I mean, I personally, after seeing what once again, I wasn't a big Trump fan, but the fact that all the internet companies could censor the president was once again, a dangerous, dangerous thing. Because we what we found out is they're more powerful than the president. And they basically. Controlled the election because of that. I mean, and they could in the future control any election by just deciding which candidate would be allowed to have the platform, which is the largest platform in the world for to put forth your views. And if there was a candidate they don't like, they could censor them. They could say his views are dangerous or whatever for whatever. They don't have to have a reason because they've given us their private companies so they don't have to they don't have anything, right? Right, they can do whatever they want. But it makes it it's unfortunate because they are kind of a monopoly. So that but they're able to to control all this. So somebody's got to come up with another, you know, platform. I mean, there was one. It got shut down, whatever it was called parlor parlor parlor. But yeah, I mean, I got I am slowly getting off of all these out of all these companies and using Edward Snowden's advice and getting on different search engines because I don't want to give them my money anymore. So that's actually what Trump should have done in retrospect when this happened. He should have said, great, you're censoring me. Everybody get off of Google, use start page. Everybody get off of Gmail and use proton mail. And there's other search engines that don't use any of those things and that you aren't being surveilled. And he says the way to hurt these companies is take them take their money. They're wealthy companies. And if all my supporters stop using their services, it would cost them millions and millions of dollars might eventually do that anyway, right? He's not finished. You think Trump finished? That's exactly what he should do. He should say this is how you hurt these people. Just like I'm sure you read that thing about the the reddit that crashed. I can't understand. I'm trying desperately today to understand it. To do is stuff that I don't understand, like short selling, right? Right. Well, yeah, it's pretty easy to understand. I don't have to explain it because it's something. But the funny thing is then Wall Street got him shut down. And then, of course, the nighttime comedian people, whatever the talk show host joked about, Wall Street doesn't like being beaten at their own game. Because that's the way it is. That's what they do. They purposely crash companies to make money. And that's what they've been doing for a year. I mean, Goldman Sachs crashed the Mexican economy one year and all celebrated a big party because they made so much money doing it and caused millions of people to starve.  They're they're they're in it for the money. So the fact that these these guys read it was able to do it to them. Wall Street had been trying to kill this GameStop company for whatever reason. They tried to do it with what is it called Red Lobster. And what's the Italian place? For some reason, they had something. Olive Garden. Olive Garden, like a couple years back, they hated them for some reason. And they tried to crash that, but they somehow survived. But so they tried to crash this GameStop company. The stock price had gone down to, let's say, a dollar. And these guys got together. A bunch of guys got together and secretly did something to make the stock price. Watch your ears in that. Right. And so the stock price went up to like a hundred. And some hedge fund lost billions of dollars. I mean, it's since gone down. So hopefully these guys bailed in time. But yeah, I mean, it's there's no reason why we shouldn't be able to play that game if that's the game they play. Let me let me ask you one other thing about Glenn Greenwald. He has been it seems to me blacklisted for many of the networks. Correct. Right. Right. You had to quit the Guardian. He had to quit the intercept. Right. And MSNBC too, I think. Right. They used to interview him. So he appears now regularly on Fox. Right. Yeah, I think he does. Yeah. So what's the deal with him? What is his position about?  Right. Wouldn't you judge? So what is that position? It's mine too, I think, more or less. But what is it? Well, I mean, I think he's I think I would say he's like best buddies with like Edward Snowden and these guys because Julian Assange too. Right. Yeah. And I think that they both see what's going on is is the end of our rights. And they're they're trying to do something about it. But it's it's tough. I you know, I think the average person is just kind of going with the flow.   And so there's no reason they're not going to go along with you know, mandatory vaccines and censorship and all this stuff. As long as they keep eating and drinking and driving their car, I think that the average person is not going to care. I mean, Europeans care way more about this stuff. There's protests constantly about this stuff, you know, and they don't there. But in the Americans, yeah. But I mean, they're going to make it harder and harder to protest, I think. So, you know, I mean, and I don't think people I don't think people, the average person, the average 20 to 40 year old has no interest in going out in the streets and screaming and yelling and throwing rocks. So, you know, the way you do it is probably economically kind of like Reddit. Did you figure out a way to hurt these companies or people economically? I don't know. Well, the way that I think about what Greenwald's article is the following, that if you're talking about the rights under the American Constitution, the First Amendment rights, the right to free speech, the right to freedom of the press, to assembly, that those rights don't go away regardless of what you're saying or where you want to assemble or where you want to worship or not, right? So, it seems more and more though, if those rights are taken away from certain ideas, in other words, like if you if your freedom of speech is taken away from during an emergency, I think very few people think about the fact that in the next emergency, it might be them, then their rights are taken away from them. Nobody seems to realize that what is done to one group of people can also be done to another group of people. And so, most people think because those rights are freedom of speech, for instance, is being taken away from people who might support Trump, that's fine. So, they're saying that's fine. And I think that we all should remember that if you believe in the constitutional rights of free speech, it's absolute. It's for all groups. No matter if you agree with those groups or not, that the rights under the Constitution apply to all groups, even unpopular groups. Like Trump right now is pretty unpopular, I guess, although I'm not certain of that really even. But once his rights to free speech are taken away from, the next time ours can be taken away from, right? Well, yeah, that's one of the headlines of one of the articles I read that basically they're coming for them now, but they could be coming for you next. And that's really what you have to look at because these groups could decide in four years that the Democratic Party is the problem or whoever that is. And then they could do the same thing to them that they did to the Republican Party, just totally trashed the person. And once again, I'm not defending Trump as the greatest president ever, but basically he was taken down by the media. I mean, COVID and the media just did them in. They had it out for him mainly because he attacked them relentlessly, which wasn't really a great idea. And so they said, that's great. You want to call us liars? Well, you're going to lose the election. We're going to make sure you lose the election. And it was really only Fox had anything good to say about him. And all every other media outlet just trashed him constantly. I mean, once again, he had to fuel the fire. He didn't do himself any favors. I mean, I was having a conversation. If you'd just shut up the last year, he would have won the election again. But they had it out for him because he called the CIA, the FBI, the Department of Health, the CDC, and the media all liars. And that was a bad move. The man seemed to me naive in a way that he thought he could get away with it. But I think that's the best thing that was said that, it's like, it's kind of like, I mean, I hate to say it because it's used a lot of Nazi Germany. People said, well, they're going after the Jews. I don't have to worry. But guess what? It wasn't just that. I mean, what other countries were watching this? They were like, well, it's just the Jews. And then all of a sudden they went after everybody. I think the thing that bothers me personally is that so many people that I know on the left, I generally have been part of the left for years. And so many people on the left don't really care that this is happening. There's widespread censorship, widespread making people, what? Yeah, because they hated Trump. Right, I know. And that's a very, very, I know. I keep on saying, I don't believe that our politics should be governed by hate. I really don't. That's a very dangerous thing that's happened over the past four years. You know, you don't have to like anybody. But what I think reasonable people should do is look at the policies of everybody and decide based on what they are doing and the facts on the ground rather than whether they like a person or not. And that clearly was not the case during the Trump era. I wanted to mention one thing, other thing before we close. I mean, President Biden now is using his power to pass all these executive orders without the input of Congress. I find that worrisome. Now, there was an article about that also today that even people were telling them, please stop. This isn't the way it's supposed to be done. Who said that? People in his own party were telling them, please stop. This isn't the way it's supposed to be done. You're supposed to use Congress to go over some of these things and not just pass everything. He's up to 37 or 38 executive orders. Right, way more, way more than Trump, way more than Obama, way more than anybody. And I don't know why he's doing that. He has some majorities in both houses. Well, I mean, I haven't seen all of them. Some of them I'm very happy with, I mean, because some of the environmental ones that Trump did, I was very, very unhappy with like allowing drilling in Alaska. You might be happy. Now, I'm happy you're happy. I'm not unhappy about it. What I'm worried about is that he's taking executive power in a way that really is against the Constitution of the United States. I don't care if I like Senator, I don't like it. I want to just touch on something you said earlier. And one of the problems is this EUA and the state of emergency thing, which is our problem in Vermont. You know, I mean, the fact that the state of emergency is still in effect from 9-11 is just absurd. And every president has had a chance to end it, and none of them have ended it. They're not going to end it. I think because they, even though it's not legal, according to many people, they still use it as an excuse to do all these things. And the EUA, the emergency youth authorization, because of COVID has been used as an excuse to do things. And who knows when that's going to end? And you're in the same situation where they're using it as an excuse to put a vaccine out there, which maybe even isn't a vaccine and hasn't really been approved. They use this PCR thing, which wasn't really approved, but because of the emergency youth authorization, it's allowed to be used, which is different than approval. So you have drugs being used that aren't approved or tested. This is an experimental vaccine. There's no way around it. It has not been tested and proven by the normal protocol. And you have all this other stuff being done. Like all these tests are also not approved by the FDA. They're only allowed to be used because there's an emergency. And this is a dangerous thing. And it's the same thing with 9-11. And then people go, well, it's an emergency. And most of the cases around the country that have one have been that people have sued and said it's not an emergency. And that's kind of what needs to be done in the state of Vermont. But I don't know how easy it is to say, there's no reason that we should be calling what's going on a state of emergency. A hundred people have died over a year. You know, it's ridiculous that we say we're in an emergency situation here because of COVID. But people accept it because they're all afraid because the media, just like with 9-11, has got everybody scared of this dangerous, horrible thing that's killed 100 people in the state of Vermont. But look it, they are afraid of disease because everybody on earth is afraid of death, too. And that's really what's going on, I believe. But somehow there are those of us who, I guess, accept that we're all going to die. Maybe, maybe. I don't know, but it's the new world order has always been more frightening to me than the thought of catching COVID. And I don't know what makes the difference. I just don't know about that. Lastly, though, I think we should wind up is there is the thought that there will be new, new legislation passed labeling people domestic terrorists. Yeah. Yeah, that's what I think. Yeah, and that's what Biden and company are proposing. What does that mean? Does that mean that people who question all of this stuff could be rounded up? I think it's going to be just as broad as the war on terror from 9-11. And so it's going to be very, I don't know what the right word is, ambiguous, vague, whatever, so they can just decide at will who they arrest. I mean, face it, Obama had a guy killed in overseas that was a journalist and that had visited the White House after 9-11 to try to keep them from responding violently. And then he went back to his home country, was over there as a journalist. They had never had any proof he was doing anything except for writing things, basically saying the United States was horrible and they were doing the wrong thing and they killed him and his son. And a neighbor. A neighbor too, eventually, a young man too. And they said it was, well, the war on terror. Sorry, he's a terrorist.  And so yeah, my fear is they can do the same thing here with these people that they deem a danger to this. About that particular case, I think we should remember too that those three, two of them at least, the father and the son were U.S. citizens. Right, they were U.S. citizens. It was a totally illegal act, even, you know. But they used the old- And they got away with it too. They got away with it. Obama got away with it. Yeah. But we probably should close on that very unpleasant note, Pete, wishing you, I guess, you're going back to Costa Rica. I'm going to go back for a month and then I'll be back in March again. I'm visiting my wife and my mother I was trying to but she's afraid I'll give her COVID so I couldn't visit her. Okay, but you will be back in March? Yeah, March 2nd to 9th. That's town meeting day. No good. So you'll be able to, I don't know what, town meeting is going to be a totally different ballgame also. It's all mail-in ballots. It's been here, right? It's been destroyed, what? Yeah, it will be the mayor's race here in Burlington, but for a normal town meeting, for instance, in your town in Shelburne, it's also going to be for the very first time in history mail-in ballots. And town meeting has been the only direct democratic institutions that's left in this country that's directly democratic. In other words, face-to-face discussion, debate, voice, votes, and that's all going to be gone because now they're going to do mail-in ballots. It's really, that's also very shocking to me. Okay, so I guess we'll talk in a couple weeks, Pete. Thank you for being with us today. And thank you, Beth, and so we'll talk later. Thanks, Pete. Okay, bye-bye.


Hi, it is Gib to Gustavus Day and I'm here with Kari, Compost, Waste and Environmental Sustainability Manager and we're gonna talk about the very first part of her title, compost. We're gonna actually compost this coffee. So Kari, can you just tell me a little bit about composting at Gustavus? Yes, composting's a big deal here. So we can compost these coffees and these compost curbies right here. And look at their Gustavus colors. They are Gustavus colors. So you know, if you want to recycle your poo, look for the gold and black. Look for the gold and black, exactly. So compost gets picked up from dining services by our tool cat here. Wow. It goes back to our composter. I actually really needed that coffee. It's okay. Oh, I'm gonna get in this thing. My chariot. Oh, I'm gonna go to the pee ball in this. Hi, hello. Very much, I don't know. Okay, so we're gonna go for a ride now. Do you want me to just, I'm gonna just take this camera. That's fine. Hi. Okay. Oh, okay. There we go. All right. So, hi there. Okay. Hi, what's your name? Adam. Hi, Adam. I'm Tain. Okay, look at, I don't know how to turn this camera around. Oh, the camera's freaking out. Okay, it's fine. There we go. Look at it. It's looking at these things.  That's very cool. And now we're driving forward. I was very much expecting us to go backwards. But where are we putting these? Up on the loading dock. Okay. Switch out the old one or the new one with the old one. Okay. And then where do they eventually go? They end up in the compost shed, which is down by the golf facility. Compost shed. That's where I spent freshman year.  Shakopee. And they do a big industrial compost to get up there. That's very cool. And so how many of these are you moving a day? From food service, six to eight, depending on the day. And then around campus every dorm and every academic building has anywhere from one to three in each building. So every, you know, on a given day, there's 20 or 30 removing, something like that. That's very cool. Well, Gustavus, very sustainable. Look at all this composting that's going. And that's what your gifts are going towards. Also, probably your gifts will be going towards replacing this camera because I really don't know how to operate it and I'm very nervous I broke it. All right. Well, thank you so much for showing me around this. I hope everybody is going to give to Gustavus and let this shot all works out. All right. Bye-bye.


A large part of the problem people have when they think about a guru is the guru is alive. And if you look at the world everybody peeps, everybody worships people that are passed away. And so why is it so difficult for people?  How do people make the difference? Because how do they then say, well he's a man after all, and why is he claiming to be a realized man? Because we believe all realized men only become realized when they're gone. They have to be dead. They have to be dead. Yeah, I'm trying to not use that word, but yeah, they have to be dead. And that's a big problem. So let's talk about that. Anything that's good has to be dead. I know. Unfortunately. See this is because if you have to see value with what's here now, you need a certain intelligence, you need a certain awareness. You have to employ your own intelligence. Now somebody was here a thousand years ago or two thousand years ago to say that he was great and worship him is very easy because a million people are saying so. Everybody is fascinated by the past because generations of people have said so. So you don't have to employ your intelligence or awareness to know what is the truth. So even when a Krishna was alive, how many people really recognized him? Duryodhana clearly said, this guy can play with a child. Fight with a man. Make love to a woman. He can gossip with old woman. And this is no God, this is a rogue. So that's how they would have seen him. Now thousands of years later, it's very easy because everybody is saying Krishna is God. You also join up the gang and say it. You're just joining a gang, you're not seeing anything about Krishna as such. So similarly everybody else.  So when Jesus was alive, you know what horrible things they did to him. Now, you know, half the world wants to worship him. It doesn't mean anything actually. Because when he was there, only a handful of people get it. So let's talk about the concept of a guru. What is a guru and how does one find a guru? And why is it that different people have different gurus? Why is there… like there's one God, there could be one guru, right? It's like, okay, everybody goes there. You're wrong, in India we have thirty-six million gods and goddesses. So what is a guru? The word guru literally means guru means darkness. Ruh means dispeller. One who dispels your darkness is a guru. You can call him a light bulb if you want. He's on, that's all. So what you cannot see, he's able to make you see. So that's a guru. Or to put it in other terms, essentially because you're trying to make a journey and you're seeking a guru, he's like a roadmap. He's like a live roadmap. When you want to travel uncharted terrain, you will find it's extremely important. Roadmap is more than God. So you will see in the tradition, guru is greater than God, all this they're saying because because a live roadmap is more important than anything when you're lost in a unknown terrain. So can't I find my way without a guru? That's always the question. This question is coming from a certain egoistic standpoint. Why can't I do it myself? See, do one thing, using a watch, right? I'll give you all the parts for the watch. You build your own watch. Let me see. Something, it's very simple. I'm not asking you to build a computer or a spacecraft. I'm just telling a simple thing, like a watch. Most people have gotten rid of their watches today because they're looking at time in their cell phones or computers. So an obsolete instrument like this, I'll give you all the parts. You put it together, let me see. You may take a lifetime, I'm saying. Something so simple.  So what's your problem going to a guru for something that you do not know? Yeah, but there is something different here. Now, when I walk around Isha, as we'll see soon, what I notice among most people is, the closest I can describe it is devotion. Some people would call it worship. Now, when you find a guru, it's not an intellectual. Making a watch could be an intellectual exercise. Yet, finding yourself or finding something divine or living in the divine, how much, what is this concept of difference? Where do you come in with devotion and worship? Can you, can your guru help you without a sense of divinity that you find in the guru? So I've used three words, worship, devotion and non-intellectual. Yes. So, yes, I don't know how to make a watch, but I could transcend my present limitations and go into other dimensions. Why do I need to seek that kind of support, that subjective support? Because a watch is something else. The guru is dealing with you. Yes. Okay? Because you are the subject here, not another object. So, the devotion that you see around, you must understand one thing, at no point are we teaching devotion, are we encouraging devotion, but why do people seem to be so, you know, overwhelmed by the whole thing, ease.  You don't have thoughts, so this is God, this is that, that is big, if you are trained that way. Otherwise, simply as a human being, just out of gratitude, wouldn't you be overwhelmed and bow down to him? So, what you see here is just that, nobody has thought them that they should bow down, nobody has thought them they should be this way or that way, that is not at all encouraged, but because of what they have received, the overwhelming nature of what they have received, when that sense of overwhelming experience is happening within a human being, to bow down is a very, very natural thing. So, why is it, I want to ask you this question, why is it, the moment somebody begins to think that he's an intellectual, he's against devotion. I'm asking you, you're a filmmaker, could you make a good film without being devoted to it? No. There's no passion, there's no devotion, there's no film. There's nothing good that will happen in your life. No. So, now the devotion is not exactly towards me as a person, but the devotion is towards me as a possibility in their life, not me as a person. So, nobody creates anything truly worthwhile without being absolutely devoted to it. It cannot happen. Yesterday, I went through this amazing experience with you. It was a collective experience and then I saw your relationship with the meditators who were the volunteers in this incredible course that we did and there was something that connected you, I've heard stories about this. I've heard that as Jesus walked in and he spread this love and we always wondered, how could you just spread love? I saw that yesterday, but I saw tears in their eyes. We could explain that, but I saw tears in your eyes because I saw a two-way relationship. So, let's just keep with this idea of a Guru and tell me what is this two-way, because I saw you like a devotee, you know, you were like them. When you went to them, it was not just their emotion, it was yours. See, here you are using the word devotee. I don't know whether they're devoted or not. My life is devoted to them. Okay, that's for sure. My whole life is devoted to every human being on this planet, every creature on this planet. So, a devotion is just a deeper love affair. When I say a deeper love affair, generally these days at least people are understanding a love affair as some kind of a transaction of give and take. Devotion is a deeper love affair of just absolutely giving. Whether take is there or not just doesn't matter and it doesn't occur in your mind. So for me, my love affair is just with everything that I set my eyes upon. Whether it's a man, woman, child, animate, inanimate, it doesn't matter. Whatever I set my eyes upon, I'm in a deep embrace with that. So for me to come to tears, I don't even have to look at a human being. If I look at a cloud, I'll come to tears. If I look at a tree, I come to tears. If I close my eyes, I'll come to tears. So tears is not even about love. If you tell me I'm in love with people, I wouldn't feel that's a great thing. I feel you're lowering the whole thing. I'm not in love because love is still a kind of a transaction. This is a certain dimension of inclusiveness. Actually, in my experience, there is nobody else in this planet, nobody else in this existence. It's just me. In my experience, I don't see myself in somebody else, I just see myself. So this is not even devotion, this is not even love. This is just inclusiveness. And this is not my idea, this is not my philosophy. This is the way existence is.  Well, science can prove it to you today, isn't it? So when you say that I see only myself, you see everything embraced by as an inclusive idea, let's talk about that. This is not an idea, that's what I'm saying. See, inclusiveness is not an idea. Today, modern science can clearly prove to you that this existence is just one energy, reverberating in a billions of beautiful ways. But it's actually just the same thing. So this is not an idea. Science is telling you it's all one energy. The religions of the world for a long time without knowing or not knowing what they're talking, they've been screaming, God is everywhere. Whether you say God is everywhere or you say everything is one energy, are we talking about the same reality or a different reality? It's the same reality we're talking about. Here you're calling it energy, there they're calling it God, but it's the same thing. So now the difference, what is it that you're seeing here is a scientist has not experienced this. He has only mathematically deduced this. So intellectually knowing something may give you some satisfaction, some idea, but he doesn't give you an experience. Now a religious person has not experienced this. He just believes it. So belief gives him an emotional experience. Scientist gets an intellectual experience, but not truly experience. When I say experience, right now you experience this hands as yourself. This is neither intellectual nor emotional, it's just you. So Yogi is somebody who is not willing to settle for deductions or for belief systems. He wants to know it head on himself. So this is a hard nut. He wants to know everything by his own experience. So this can only happen if you are willing to enhance your perception. See right now, your perception has enhanced itself to a point where you experience the body as myself. So why is it not me? That's the question now. Well, this body was all over the place. This is just the food that you've eaten. In a way this body is just a piece of this planet. So now I'm saying, if you are capable of including 50 KG's of planet as yourself, what is the problem with the remaining tons? So somewhere you have stopped yourself because of a limited identity. So now the whole system of spiritual process is to take off that so that if you sit here, as you experience your hands and limbs as yourself, you experience the whole existence as yourself. So this is the fundamental difference between spirituality and morality. Here you know everything as myself so you know how to be with it. Morality is you see everything as other but you're somehow trying to be in harmony with it and it's a struggle, it's never worked. So what you're saying really is when you see that when I look and I only see myself, you're saying you're seeing eternity. You're seeing all of existence when you look at yourself. These are all big words. I call it myself because it's simple and above all, every human being, whatever he may think, essentially he perceives world only through himself, whatever he may be. He may think he's a great scientist but still he knows it only through the faculties of his perception. So our whole work is to enhance the faculties of perception, not imagine. So if your ability to experience the world can be enhanced by enhancing your perception because only what you perceive is real. Rest is just hallucinatory, isn't it?  You can make up one kind of story, I can make up another kind of story. You can make movies, but you can't make reality. Reality happens only by perception, isn't it? So the whole work is only to enhance perception. This is not about devotion, this is not about love, this is not about belief, this is not about faith, this is not about anything. This is just about enhancing your perception because only if you perceive you know, otherwise you do not know. Okay. So, Sadhguru, what I see here looks very much like if you go to Europe and there's this whole tradition on architecture called Gagoyles and you call it a Ghana. Yeah? So tell me about it. What is the relevance of this Ghana? Sir, you travel plenty in Europe, not much in India. So Ghana… these are all Shiva's friends then called Ganas. And in the Puranas it's always… And the Puranas being? The scriptures are the mythology. People call it mythology today because some scholars labeled it that way. Here it's the lore. So the Ganas are all Shiva's friends. Always they were the people who were around him. Though he had disciples, though he had a wife, though he had many other admirers, he always kept company only with these people. His private company was always Ganas. And Ganas are described as distorted, demented beings. Here it's not shown that way, but actually they go to the extent of saying they had limbs without bones. Okay? They had limbs without bones coming out of odd parts of their body. So they are described as distorted and demented beings. What I am saying is, they were just different. They were different from who we are. So why could they be so different? This may be a little hard to digest aspect of life. See Shiva himself has always been described as a yaksha swaroopa. A yaksha means a celestial being. A celestial being means someone who came from elsewhere. So if you look at the anthropological history of this planet of the human species particularly, somewhere between fifty to seventy thousand years ago, human beings as a species suddenly took an upward turn. Scientists are not very clear as far as I know. I am not hugely informed about science, but from what little I know, they are not very clear what happened. In a short span of ten, twenty thousand years, something happened to human species. They were just surviving on the planet like any other creature, slightly better. Suddenly they took an upward turn. What happened in those ten, fifteen thousand years, we do not know, ten, fifteen thousand years is not a big amount of time for a species to evolve. It's not a evolutionary kind of time. But something happened. So what the Indian way, the yogic way of looking at it is, Shiva arrived at that time. Somewhere approximately sixty, sixty-five thousand years ago, Shiva arrived at Manasarovar. And after he came... Which is in Tibet. Now it is in Tibet, yes. It's a lake. Yes. This is part of the... This is one of the remnants of the Tethys Sea, which is considered as a crucible of human civilizations. So today it's at over fourteen thousand, fourteen thousand five hundred feet from sea level, but it's actually an ocean which is moved up and become a lake now. So the Ganas are his friends who are not like human. And clearly it says they never spoke any of the human languages. They spoke in utter cacophony. Shiva and his friends, when they communicated, they spoke a language that nobody understood. So people, human beings describe it as total chaotic cacophony is what they spoke. But they were his friends. They always hung around him. He was the people... They were the people that he was really close with.   When the mother became distraught and asked him to replace a head, he put a head on the child, taking off a head from some other creature. We describe it as an elephant. But what you need to understand is, nobody called him Gajapati. We called him Ganapati. So he took off the head of one of his friends and put it on the boy. Yes. But they had limbs without bones. So he became a Ganapati. Slowly in the culture because a limb without bones means we thought it's an elephant and artists made this into an elephant. But actually he's not Gajapati, he's Ganapati. He has the head of one of the Ganas and he made them leader of the Ganas. He said, okay, from now on you are the leader of my people. So this guy is one of them. We didn't distort him so much. We made it little human-like so that people can relate to him. Isn't it cute? It's beautiful. We should talk a little later. I'm very fascinated by what you... because there's a lot of construction going on here. It's almost like, you know... The whole humanity is in construction. Okay. All right, I'll buy that. I'll buy that. But we should talk about the construction. What are you building here? And why is it so big? The blocks are really heavy. Man will last 2,000 years. So, Sadhguru, this is a temple that... I know you told me that it will last thousands of years. And it's a feminine temple. It's a temple devoted to the female aspect not only of us but the whole existence, the feminine aspect of existence. So tell me about this. This is not man-woman. What is it? What is feminine? What is masculine? So you need to understand this. Human understanding comes from a certain perception, a limited perception. When I say limited perception, right now your whole perception comes through your sense perception. Sense organs perceive something, only if there is something to compare with. Only because there's darkness, you understand light. Only because there's death, you understand life. So only because there's a woman, you know the man. Otherwise you wouldn't know. Because sense organs can perceive only in comparison. See, just your visual apparatus, for example, right now, you know silence only because there is sound. And you know sound only because there's silence, isn't it? See, right now if I show you this part of my hand, you can only see this. You cannot see this. If I show you this, you can only see this. So this is the nature of sense perception.  So the moment you perceive through sense organs, you already divided the existence. So because of the division, your mind also thinks in divisions. Because without divisions you cannot perceive. Without two there is no logic, so you need two. So these two fundamental principles, because we are human, we are a species with man, woman, masculine, feminine, we are calling them masculine and feminine. Two fundamental aspects. So in this culture, it may be referred to as Shiva, Shakti or in other cultures, Yin and Yang, whatever. So Shiva being masculine and Shakti being feminine. Yes. Why Shakti? Shakti means power. Why is that feminine? Not power, Shakti means energy. Energy, okay. It's energy. Unfortunately, because of various, you know, civilizational and exploitative situations in the human societies, we are thinking of energy as power and dominance. No, energy is just energy. Without energy nothing happens. So I could say this temple is a temple for energy. Feminine energy. Feminine. So let's go and tell me what feminine energy is, as against masculine energy. Is this what you call a leap of faith, right? From intellectualism to consciousness. This doesn't take any faith, it just needs a leg. Or a broken leg, okay? When we say a temple, this must be understood, the temple is like a body to energize the system. Temple is not a place of worship. Temple is not a place where you go and make appeals to some unknown god up there. This is not that kind. This is not a place where you lead a prayer. That is the uniqueness of this culture. Here a temple is like a body energized in a certain way. Now if you see the masculine temple that we have is circular in nature, because that is the quality that it is. The feminine temple is in the form of a triangle. There's a whole lot of things in its geometry, how it is made. See all the wings are thirty-three feet properly done in the multiples of eleven. It is made in a certain way to create a feminine energy there. Why thirty-three? If you go into these details there is an enormous amount of science behind that. Like your spinal column is thirty-three aspects. Which I just risked right now. So there are so many aspects to this which I don't wish to go right now. But essentially it is feminine energy. Where was the need for this in a way? See one thing is today, the feminine is at huge risk on the planet. So immediately people may think, oh that's because of the man. Maybe man instigated it. But when I say masculine and feminine, I'm not talking about male-female. I'm talking about those two aspects, those two dimensions of life without which our life will not be beautiful. Our life cannot work actually even in the most fundamental way. So because people start thinking in terms of dominance, this is a problem. If you're not looking at life as dominance, if you're looking at life as integration, if you're looking at life as co-operation, if you're looking at life as oneness, then without these two dimensions there is no existence. But unfortunately societies have taken on to this as to who is dominating right now, whether masculine or feminine. If any one of them dominates it'll turn ugly. It's not that if masculine dominates it'll turn ugly or feminine dominates it'll turn ugly. If any one of them dominates it'll turn ugly. So all if you start thinking in terms of dominance, your life will turn ugly. Instead of seeing how to embrace life, you're thinking how to dominate life. By domination you will not know life. Only by inclusion you will know life. So this is essentially to create an energy force where people can experience a powerful sense of feminine, a fiery nature of the feminine thing. See feminine is a very fiery form of energy. But today because we have made economics the most important aspect of human societies, naturally see we need to understand this, economics is being glorified as if it's some kind of a divine thing. Economics essentially means survival, survival process. A man used to go into the forest, have a hunt and bring a little bit of meat or fruit or whatever. That was the simple economics. Now it's complicated in a million different ways but it's the same thing providing for yourself and people around you. We are raising a simple survival process to a divine level which is a foolish way to live. Economics has a place in our life for sure, but it is not the be all of life. So feminine doesn't belong to that dimension. If in these societies love, art, music, above all aesthetics of life was dominant in a society. If aesthetics was as important as economics, nobody had to bring up the feminine. Feminine would be naturally dominant or let me not use the word dominant. Feminine would be naturally exuberantly alive and manifest in the society. Today either we are slowly making all the women like men because they have to survive, they have to earn money, they have to provide or a small percentage of them in reaction not being able to cope with that they're becoming like Barbie dolls. Here we are creating a woman who is fiery and powerful in a completely different way. But what you're saying is you just said love, art, aesthetics. Use those three words as part of the feminine energy. Now I'm a filmmaker, I'd like to assume that I have all three in myself. So that's my feminine energy. Yes it is. If you do not have the feminine, you won't look and think in terms of what's beautiful, what's not beautiful. You'll only think in terms of what's useful and what's not useful. You'll become utilitarian, the masculine is like that.  So am I in conflict constantly between my masculine and feminine self? See that's the whole thing. These two energies are the basis of creation. Why would they be in conflict? They're in absolute collaboration. It is only in human mind that's it's in conflict. In life it's not in conflict. In energy it's not in conflict. Only in mind it's in conflict because mind divides. Because perception is partial, that's why conflict. Otherwise there's no conflict in the existence between masculine and feminine. Because to people who are listening to you say the sheer absolute power of the feminine energy, they don't relate to that. They see feminine energy as something gentle, nurturing, soft. Tell me about the power of feminine energy because a lot of our culture talks about various goddesses that have a sense of huge power and almost viral power. The original goddesses that we created in this culture were all Kali, Bhairavi, now she's Bhairavi, all fierce, powerful creatures, okay? Somewhere down the line, when the outside influences came upon the culture and people made fun of them, people ridiculed your woman or like this, then they tried to domesticate the feminine and then they created Saraswati, Lakshmi, very soft, gentle, housewife kind of feminine. Bhairavi, you can't contain her to the limitations of your house. Not that she's… she cannot stay in your house. You cannot contain her to the boundaries of your house. She's… she's all encompassing. That's the nature of her. That's the nature of the feminine. That it's all embracing, not all conquering, you must understand. Man wants to be in conquest. A woman wants to embrace. If the feminine is dominant, the feminine wants to embrace. Masculine want to conquer. That's a big difference. By conquest you will never have it. By embrace you will have it, isn't it? So it's spirituality, very feminine, or it's the perfect balance. So what is the perfect… It is an… it is an absolute balance. There's no balance. It'll not work. It's not just spirituality. Life is an absolute balance. Existence is an absolute balance between masculine and feminine. So spirituality is not alien to existence. Spirituality is purely existential, not psychological. All these questions are coming up because society has become psychological, not existential. Spiritual process is purely existential. So masculine and feminine have equal roles in making it happen. You know, as good as you're talking, I can't help noticing all those people sitting, they're tapping and what they're creating and sculpting. That tap is almost feminine. Now is that my learning or is that truly feminine? That tap is not a big tap. It's so gentle that you can barely, you know, if you hear it. Yes. See now, now it's come to a point where the work has become almost feminine, okay? You have… you need gentle hands to do what they're doing. But before that, this rock was in the quarry, okay? There you needed some hard tools to cut it, make it a big piece, transport it in the truck, bring it in, hold it there, cut it down to size. All that was very masculine. If that masculine work had not happened, this feminine part would be not possible. This is so in the society also I want you to see. If the man goes about breaks down nature, builds his home and all this, then the woman comes in and makes it beautiful. If she didn't come in, he would just have a rock house which is of no consequence. Nobody enjoys being there. They'll have a house and they'll live outdoor. It's happening in cultures where feminine has been suppressed. They have great homes, but they always want to be outdoors. It's a good place to talk about what consecration means. What does consecration mean? What do you consecrate? I mean, what is that? What is that process and what is it achieved? See, this is happening everywhere around you, all the time. One form of existence or one form of energy is transforming itself into another. What is mud is becoming flower, fruit and food, isn't it? What is filth is actually becoming a flower. What is stink is becoming fragrance. It's happening.  So if you make mud into food, you call it agriculture. If you make food into this, you call it digestion. If you make this into mud, usually we call it cremation or burial or whatever. So if you can make a stone or some other gross substance or material substance into a divine reverberance, into highest, subtlest possible reverberance, that's called consecration. So the whole existence is doing it all the time in different levels. So this is a certain science and a technology through which you transform the grosser elements into finer elements. Unfortunately, this was always mistaken as producing gold. The alchemy of the West is always talking about producing gold. Gold has no worth except in the market, okay? It's only greed which makes a man go towards gold. The Indian alchemy never talked about making gold. Indian alchemy always talked about making grosser elements into finer substances, making a stone into the divine. So the whole Indian alchemy is like a consecration process. So we were never interested in making gold out of steel because we always felt steel is more useful than gold. Sadhguru, you keep saying this is word... two words you use, science and technology. And you've just called consecration the science and technology of taking stone and making it divine. I've often heard you talking about divine, the achievement of the science of becoming divine or achieving divinity and the technology. Why... why is it science? Is it that mathematical? Don't we have to cross one barrier to go beyond the mathematics of it or there's technology of it? Right now, there is an agricultural science, right? They will teach you how to study the soil, the qualities of the soil, the seed, the manual, everything. So they only set those conditions but they don't produce food do they? Can you... can they do it? They will set the soil conditions, they'll set the seed condition, everything else that's necessary to grow. But the growth itself, the transforming earth into food, that no scientist does, that is happening by nature. Here also the same thing. We have a whole science, if we set all these conditions, the growth becomes subtle. You know, I must tell you how it happened to me for the first time. I was building a... you know, like I've always been building something or the other. I think you're like... in another life you were an architect. Why in this life I am? Yes, in this life, but do you have this fascination for architecture? Every time I talk to you, you always bring architecture into it. Because creation is essentially shapes and forms, isn't it? Creation is a fantastic architecture. That's all creation is. It's fabulous, fabulous architecture. So now we are trying to create our own spaces, not in competition with creation, just in small imitation of the creation. So my architecture is straight from nature. I have not studied anything. So when I was building something and this was my first project, I'm building a farm near my shop and I'm doing it with a real short shoe string. So when I want to end... in the end I want to paint it, I don't have the money to go and buy regular paint. So I buy ordinance paint, military reject paint which is a worst kind of paint. If you paint it, 15 days it will be still wet, you can still stick to it. It's a good mosquito trap. So I get this paint and all the only paint they have is farm blue. I don't like the color. So I dilute it so that it's little lighter. And I don't have the thing to get painters to paint this large wall surface. So I want to paint it and it takes too much time to go like this. So what I do I dip, hold it here and just walk. One smear of paint from this end to that end, that end to this end. The first smear that I did, I dipped and walked like this. Here the smear was thick. As it went it became lighter, lighter, lighter, lighter and became really subtle. I just looked at this and I burst into tears. That was one great moment of realization for me. This is the whole creation. From a rock to divine, this all the thing is, it's either dense or it's subtle, that's all it is. It's the same existence everywhere. Whether you look at the earth or you look at your body or you look at what you call as divine, it is all the same substance. It is just getting subtler. So that was my huge realization for me, just a paint smear. And whatever we are creating as divine is just that, making a rock into a subtler form of energy. Every substance on the planet is exuding a certain kind of energy, reverberation which is a scientific fact. You can change the way it exudes, what type of energy it exudes, you can change that. Altering that to a very subtle and useful form of energy is consecration process.  Why this became necessary is, see once you step into the world for an ordinary person, a common man, every transaction in the world, whatever it may be, what is your profit is somebody's loss. What is somebody's profit is your loss. In every transaction there is something to be lost or something to be gained. Whether it's family transaction between husband and wife, father and son, business partners or every transaction, there's something to give up, something to take everybody, that's why it's a transaction. So if you're not sufficiently lubricated in your… the way you are, every transaction is a point of friction, a possible friction. There are some people who are making every transaction into a friction. Some people are conducting their transactions gracefully. So every day going sitting in the temple was just this, you are well lubricated. When you step out, you can pass through the world with least amount of friction. So this is a very, very significant instruction, which is still alive in the southern part of this country. Here nobody tells you if you go to the temple you should pray. They always tell you if you go there you must sit there. You must sit there for some time and come. But today the instruction has become like this, the way they are following it is they touch their bottom to the floor and they go. Nobody told you you have to pray. Nobody told you you have to make an offering. You just have to sit there. But they also told that people on the spiritual path need not go to the temple because they have self-charging mechanisms. So temple is essentially for a householder who has no his own way of transforming his energies. Use a public place, a battery-charging place it is. So this is feminine energy. It's triangular. The whole temple is triangular, pointing towards the southwestern direction, which is a feminine direction on the planet. In the northern hemisphere, southwestern point is very feminine. That's technology, what is it? Yes. We can actually demonstrate this to you. Really? Yes. How it's more feminine than the other directions. We can actually give you a demonstration. Okay. All right. And the masculine is completely the opposite way. Very direct sense of masculine is like this, but in between all both are spread out. See, when we say masculine and feminine, this is human intellect which is saying they are opposites. They are not opposites. They are not in conflict. They are in collaboration. One cannot exist without the other in the very nature of things. So it is only in the mingling of these two dimensions of energy. They are not two different energies. These are two manifestations of energy from the unmanifest. These two manifestations of energy only in the mingling of these two life happens. It's an equilateral triangle, okay? There are many aspects of the geometry which I don't want to go in, but the significant aspect is there's another triangle fitting into this in a smaller capacity. So our downward triangle is… This downward triangle always symbolizes the feminine. The upward moving triangle symbolizes the masculine. But here normally it would be depicted like this, okay? This is also the star of David and whatever else the star is used and this is the basic yantra for Sri Chakra and everything. This is the masculine and feminine meeting. But here the masculine is held inside the feminine triangle because here the masculine is unborn. It's in the womb of the feminine. So it's a smaller triangle held inside. It is not a larger triangle like a male meeting the female. This is like in the womb. The masculine is a child in the feminine's womb because here the feminine is in a dominant form. So there is a whole geometry of things into… in this where we are trying to build a body of the feminine to energize it in a certain way. So David will sit here. This is also a triangle and this is into the earth. Here there are steps going in. Being in the earth is very important for the feminine. So the deity herself is going into the earth and people have to go in to meet her, that's how it is. And there are lots of symbolisms attached and geometry involved in this whole process. In the end today you have walked in, it's like a construction site. After two months you walk into this space. Forget about the ambience. Walk with your eyes closed. You will see it'll just hit you in your face, the whole energy of it, that's how it will be. So it's a eleven-month gestation period. We are still working on the deity, it's elsewhere. It's based in solidified mercury and it's energized in a particular way where it's purely feminine, very fiery feminine nature. You will meet the woman of your life. I'll wait for that. I think that's a good promise.