I love games, and I'll play any. Games are a way of training ourselves to be heavily involved without being serious.

When we say Tamil, we are not talking of a language but an entire civilisation.

Tamil people are generally considered very intelligent. But there, politics runs in a different way. Movie stars have a larger-than-life image in Tamil Nadu, and people vote for that image.

The problem with humans is that they are unable to handle their own intelligence.

There is no such thing as Dravidian ideology. Some people just made it up, maybe to win elections.

I think family businesses are still crucial for India's economy, but they need to professionalize. For young entrepreneurs, too, family should play a significant part.

People should look at building long-term businesses, not just selling a business.

People have to know that when momentum for a national movement has to be built, basic things have to be talked about first.

Ram Rahim was not a spiritual leader but a lowgrade film star that the media enjoyed talking about.

Automobile companies are always allergic to any kind of environmental movement.

Corruption has seeped into every section of life.

Growth by accumulation only is sickness.

Somebody accumulates a lot of muscle and think himself to be a big man. But this big man is only big when all around him are smaller.

Successful people suffer because they work beyond their energy.

This is something that everyone has to understand: you don't win anything on your reputation.

The reason why the entire world sits up and watches World Cup football is the intensity of involvement with which people are playing a game: just kicking a ball around, but with such skill and involvement that it is like the last thing they are going to do in their life.

The process of wanting to clean India is not an overnight job. At the same time, if we can inspire all citizens, it would happen much more quickly.

No yogic practice is performed without cleansing the body first.

It is important that global business leaders understand that they need to think beyond their quarterly balance sheets and see what it is that they are creating.

When we step into a new terrain, we experience vast uncertainty. Uncertainty is just a situation that you do not know how to handle.

If your idea of a guru is from a calendar, who has candy-floss beard and a constipated look on the face, then definitely I am not that.

For me, health, education, and spirituality should never be commercialised.

Most creatures in nature die consciously. Cobras, for instance, choose a particular place on a particular branch of the tree. Many a times, I would try to force-feed them out of my misplaced compassion, but they would just puke and go back to sit on the same branch.

Children never seek happiness: they are happy.

Integrity is about pursuing bigger goals that are beyond your personal success. If people see you only for yourself, they will not trust you. And, without trust, no growth and success are possible.

I'm not modern or ancient: I'm just contemporary. I'm sure every guru of his time was contemporary.

I'm comfortable with anything that fits me well. Bad tailoring is what I am uncomfortable with.

What people think is their individual nature is just a bundle of thoughts, emotions, ideas, opinions, and prejudices. The world can do without this individuality.

Leadership is neither about you or me; it is about something that needs to be done. Leaders figure out how it can be made to happen and get ten or a million people to see that this is the way to do it.

At my ashram, people work long hours joyfully because they are inspired. When people are involved and joyfully doing something, they usually turn out ten times more and do more than what they would normally do as a duty.

Many philosophies have evolved based on the choice of food. But one must remember there is nothing religious, philosophical, spiritual, or moral about the food we eat. It is only a question of whether the food is compatible with the kind of body we have.

If you listen to your body, your body will clearly tell you what kind of food it is happy with.

In terms of the quality of food entering you, vegetarian food is definitely far better for the system than non vegetarian.

Yoga means union. Union means the boundaries of the individual self-dissolve, and you experience existence as yourself.

In India, nothing is accomplished by policy changes alone. Unless people can relate emotionally to something, nothing happens on the ground.

A sense of morality makes a person repetitive in thought and action. Such a person will obviously not get anywhere.

If you impose morality on people, they will find ways to circumvent their guilt. They will make offerings to temples - or other places of worship - but also continue doing things that make them feel guilty.

When you stop people from doing certain things, there is a good chance that they will do exactly what they have been told to abjure. That is how human nature is.

At times, it appears easy to sermonise on morality and ethics. But morality and ethics appear good only when applied to others, never on oneself.

When there is a choice, it is best to eat live vegetarian food. 'Live' means in its uncooked condition, because a live cell has everything in itself to sustain life. The idea is to take life into you. When we cook food, it destroys the life in it.

Yoga is not a belief system - it is not a new religion, philosophy or a teaching but a technology. I call it a technology because you don't have to believe it; you just have to learn to use it. It does not matter what your religion is, what your colour is, what your race is, or where you come from. If you learn to use yoga, it works for you.

Yoga is not Indian; it does not belong to India.

If you don't have very strong emotions or very intense thoughts about something, you cannot get depressed.

Being mentally ill is not a joke. It is a most painful thing.

If you have physical ailments, you will get everyone's compassion, but when you have a mental ailment, you will get laughter, unfortunately. This is because it is very difficult to make out when somebody is sick and when somebody is being stupid.

Golf is basically about geometry and your ability to gauge how things are, the terrain, the distances, and exerting the right amount of swing and force.

There are no problems in the world. There are just situations. Some situations you know how to handle. Some you do not know how to handle.

There is no good leader. First of all, if you think you are a leader, you are just messed up in your head. People should think you are a leader. If you think you are a big success, again, you are messed up. Other people should think you are a success.

If you don't take yourself seriously, you will die joyfully. If you take yourself seriously, you will go through a lot of misery.

I have not worked with farmers. I have not worked with prisoners. I have only worked with human beings. I didn't see anybody as anything other than that.