All writing in this blog are from the Masters who returned to THIS (this moment) after crossing THAT (enlightenment). Putting the names & images of the masters will change your perception about the content. That is against the teaching of the Masters. Unless all these images are dissolved, you cannot see yourself.
Millions of fingers can point to the same moon. Fingers are bound to be different -- but the moon is the same. By clinging to the fingers you will not see the moon. Forget the finger and look at where it is pointing. It is the very essence of all the teachings of all the buddhas of all the ages -- past, present, and future too.
The words of a Buddha may not be able to communicate the truth, but they can communicate the music, the music that exists in one who is enlightened.

Friday, August 29, 2008

What does one person need, to be really happy ?



We teach our children the same culture that has tortured us, the same values that have been heavy on us, that have only proved to be subtle chains, imprisonment. But we go on conditioning our children. The same education that has destroyed our grace, our innocence -- we go on stuffing the same knowledge into our children's heads. And we go on lying to our children as our parents lied to us.

And this has been going on and on for centuries. How can humanity be healthy, wholesome, relaxed? It is bound to be crazy.

In India -- as in Arabia, China, Greece, Rome, in all old countries -- all the old languages depend on memory, not on intelligence. You can become a great Sanskrit scholar without a bit of intelligence -- no need for intelligence, just your memory has to be perfect. Just like a parrot... the parrot does not understand what he is saying, but he can say it absolutely correctly, with the right pronunciation. You can teach him whatever you want. All old languages depend on memory.

And the whole educational system of the world depends on memory. In the examinations, they don't ask the student something that will show his intelligence but something that will show his memory, how much he remembers from textbooks. This is one of the reasons for your retarded mind. You have used the memory as if it were your intelligence -- a tremendously grave misunderstanding. Because you know and remember and you can quote scriptures, you start thinking that you are grown up, you are mature, that you are knowledgeable, you are wise.

If the child sees that the parents are very happy because he has become knowledgeable, he starts gathering more and more knowledge. He starts forgetting the knack that he had brought with him into this life, that was inborn. By the time he comes out of the university he has completely forgotten one of the most beautiful things that was given to him by God: the capacity to wonder, the capacity to see without thinking, the capacity to contact reality without the mind continuously interfering, distorting.
You will have to regain it.

Somebody asked Mark Twain, 'What does one person need to be really happy?'
He said, 'The first thing is that one should choose his parents rightly.'

Now that is impossible, it has already happened. You cannot choose your parents now. One should choose a right society. But you are always in a society. You don't choose it. You are always in the middle of it. And if you want to create it to your heart's desire, your whole life will be wasted. And it will never be changed because it is such a big phenomenon, and you are so tiny.

The only hope of any transformation is that you can change yourself. That is the only hope, there is no other hope.

Wednesday, August 27, 2008

It feels very good when you are surrounded by fools...



IF THE TRAVELER CANNOT FIND
MASTER OR FRIEND TO GO WITH HIM,
LET HIM TRAVEL ON ALONE
RATHER THAN WITH A FOOL FOR COMPANY.

The best thing is to find a master, because the master is the greatest friend possible; hence Buddha says MASTER OR FRIEND.

IF THE TRAVELER CANNOT FIND MASTER OR FRIEND TO GO WITH HIM, LET HIM TRAVEL ON ALONE RATHER THAN WITH A FOOL FOR COMPANY. But avoid fools. And that's what you never do. You collect fools around yourself. There is some secret in it: when you are surrounded by fools, you appear superior. It is very ego-fulfilling; hence nobody wants to live with somebody who is superior. People want to live with their inferiors, because your inferiors give you the idea that you are great.

To be with a master you will have to drop that idea that you are great, you will have to drop all that rubbish, you will have to drop your whole ego, you will have to surrender. You will have to dissolve in the master; hence people avoid masters. How many people went to Jesus? Very few, they can be counted on the fingers. How many people went to Buddha? Very few.... This has been always so. But people are very happy going to the Rotary Club. It feels very good when you are surrounded by fools -- it feels very good: all fools dressed up, and every fool feeling better than the others, and every fool bragging about himself, and every fool is being supported by other fools.

People love to be in the crowds, because in the crowds you can forget your inferiority. That's why people don't leave crowds. One crowd is that of Hindus, another is that of Mohammedans, the third is that of Christians and so on and so forth. Nobody wants to leave the crowd.

And even if sometimes people leave one crowd, they immediately join another. They escape somehow from one prison just to enter into another -- they cannot live alone. Buddha says it is better to live alone than with fools. If you can find a master or a friend, good; if you cannot, then it is better to be alone. Of course, it will be hard to be alone, it will be difficult because the crowd will create so many difficulties for you. The crowd does not love individuals, it does not want anybody to be independent; it wants everybody to be dependent on the crowd. It will create trouble for you. But all those troubles are cleansing, all those troubles are challenges. They sharpen your intelligence, they will make you wise.

Tuesday, August 26, 2008

Enlightened people have been giving new perspectives to people...



A doctor's son returned from the medical college. He had become an M.D. And the son said to the old father, "Now I am here, you need not work. You have worked hard your whole life. I will take your work, you just rest."

After three days he told the father, "That old rich woman you have been treating for almost thirty years I have cured in three days."
The father just beat his head. He said, "You idiot! That woman has been supporting our family. It is because of that woman you are an M.D. It is because of that woman your other brothers are becoming educated, and you cured her? Do you think I was not able to cure her? But to cure her was to destroy your education. That was half of my income!"

A doctor cures poor people quickly; with rich people he takes his time. It is natural, there is nothing wrong in it. The rich man can afford it, the poor man is unnecessarily wasting his time. And not only time, but the poor man may start asking that medicine also should be given to him because he has no money.

The rich man has to be kept. If he gets tired of one sickness, give him another sickness. Just put the idea in his mind -- "I feel you are going to have a heart attack." Just the idea, and his heart will start pulsating and in the middle of the night he will want to check his heart, whether it is failing or it is still there. Just give the idea, and then he remains your patient. Just tell him, "You need a continuous checkup every week. Your body is in a very fragile condition."

Doctors are living a very contradictory life. They are supposed to cure people, but if they cure all the people, then what will happen to them? If a society is completely healthy, and nobody is sick, the doctors will start getting sick, starving, dying. They will become beggars.

It was only in China, under Lao Tzu's influence, that for the first time a new method was introduced. It was out of Lao Tzu's great compassion that he went to the emperor and said, "The whole medical profession is basically wrong, because the doctor lives on the diseases of the people, and he is supposed to cure them. You are putting the man in a contradictory position."
The emperor asked, "What do you suggest?"

He said, "I suggest that the doctor should be paid by the emperor for keeping people healthy. When people feel they are losing their health, they become sick, the doctor's money has to be cut. He is not taking care well. Just the opposite of now: he will be paid to keep people healthy and if somebody falls sick, his pay will be cut. That will bring to the whole medical profession a totally different perspective."

And that's how enlightened people have been giving new perspectives to people, which the people don't understand in the beginning. People would not understand that you have to pay for health. Health is yours, what has the doctor to do with it? And the doctor has to lose money if you fall sick? That was absolutely right, though it looked strange.

Happiness need not be caused...



Man wants happiness, that's why he is miserable. The more you want to be happy, the more miserable you will be. Now this is very absurd, but this is the root cause. And when you understand the process of how the human mind functions you will be able to realise it.

Man wants to be happy, hence he creates misery. If you want to get out of misery, you will have to get out of your desire for happiness -- then nobody can make you miserable. Here is where Freud missed. He could not understand that the very desire for happiness can be the cause of misery. How does it happen? Why in the first place do you desire happiness? And what does it do to you, the desire for happiness?

The moment you desire for happiness, you have moved away from the present, you have moved away from the existential, you have already moved into the future -- which is nowhere, which has not come yet. You have moved in a dream. Now, dreams can never be fulfilling. Your desire for happiness is a dream. The dream is unreal. Through the unreal, nobody has ever been able to reach to the real. You have taken a wrong train.

Happiness is herenow, it needs no condition. Happiness is natural. Just see the point of it. Don't make conditions on your happiness. Remain happy for no reason at all. There is no reason to find some cause to be happy. Just be happy.

Trees are happy and they will not get any beer in the evening and any cigarettes, and they are perfectly happy. Look! ... And the wind blowing is happy, and the sun is happy, and the sands are happy and the seas are happy, and everything is happy except man -- because nobody is making any conditions. Just be happy.

But you say, "I will be happy only when this great house is mine." Now you are making a big condition. It may take years, and you will be tired and exhausted, and by the time you reach to the palace of your desires you may be close to death. That's what happens. And you wasted your whole life and your great house will become your grave. You say, "Unless I have a million dollars, I am not going to be happy." And then you have to work and waste your whole life.

If you understand then there is no need to put any conditions. Just see the point of it -- that conditions don't create happiness, they only give relief. But the relief cannot be permanent, no relief can ever be permanent. It lasts only for a few moments. Have you not watched it again and again? You wanted to purchase a car; the car is in your porch and you are standing there, very very happy. How long does it last? Tomorrow it is this old car, one day old. Two days after it is two days old, and all the neighborhood has seen it and they all have appreciated it, and finished! Now nobody talks about it. That's why car companies have to go on putting out new models every year, so that you can have new conditions.

Why wait for the evening? And why wait for the beer? Why not drink water and enjoy it while you are drinking it?,
You have heard Jesus' story that he turned water into wine? Christians have missed it. They think he really turned it into wine. That is not true. He must have taught the secret that I am teaching you to his disciples. He must have told them, "Drink it so joyously that water becomes wine."

You can drink water so joyously that it almost intoxicates you. Try! Just water can intoxicate you. It depends on you. It does not depend on the beer or the wine.

Whenever happiness comes to you, it comes for no reason at all. Suffering has a cause, happiness none. Suffering is caused by something. It is part of cause and effect: the mechanical world. Happiness is not caused by anything. Whenever you are available, it happens, as if happiness is your nature; whenever you settle into it, it happens. Unhappiness is not your nature. It has to be caused, it has to be created.

Whenever suffering is felt, you will always feel as if it is coming from the outside, and whenever you feel happy, you simply feel that happiness is arising from within you. Happiness is a flower of your own consciousness. Suffering is a thorn which has entered into you: alien, foreign, not of you. So whenever you suffer you start thinking that somebody, somewhere, must be responsible for it; known, not known, but somebody must be responsible for it. Whenever you are happy you never think that somebody is responsible for it. Whenever you suffer, you enquire as to the cause. Whenever you are happy, you never even ask.

If somebody is happy and he asks,'Why am I happy?' it will look absurd, it will look foolish, it will look mad. You are happy -- that's all. There is no 'why' to it. But if somebody in suffering asks,'Why am I in suffering?' nobody can say that he is asking irrelevant things.'Why' with suffering is relevant, with bliss it is irrelevant.

Remember this: the God which you remember in suffering is just a projection of your mind. The God which you remember in celebration is no more a projection of your mind, because mind is perfectly satisfied when you are happy. Mind means philosophy. When you are unhappy, then the mind is not sufficient -- then you need somebody's help, then you need somebody's shoulder to lean upon; then you invoke God.

Any act or no act, doing or no doing, becomes utterly blissful. It does not have to be caused by something. When your happiness is caused, you become attached to the cause, because you are afraid that if you lose the cause your happiness will disappear. If you are happy with a woman or with a man, you become attached; not only attached, you start creating prisons for each other, because without this woman, without this man, you cannot be happy. So your happiness turns into misery for both.

Meditation brings you a great experience that happiness need not be caused, and when you have found a happiness which is not caused by anything, you are simply happy -- just to be is to be happy -- then you don't create any prisons for anybody. Then you don't possess anybody, and you don't destroy anybody's dignity as a human being. You don't enslave people. You love, you share, just because of your abundance, not that you want anything in return. Without your asking, much comes to you. The moment you start asking, you have lost the very ground of being happy.

Monday, August 25, 2008

Without intelligence there is no heaven...


Obedience needs no intelligence. All machines are obedient; nobody has ever heard of a disobedient machine. Obedience is simple, too. It takes from you the burden of any responsibility. There is no need to react, you have simply to do what is being said. The responsibility rests with the source from where the order comes. In a certain way you are very free: you cannot be condemned for your act.

Obedience has a simplicity; disobedience needs a little higher order of intelligence. Any idiot can be obedient, in fact only idiots can be obedient. The person of intelligence is bound to ask why? -- "Why am I supposed to do it?" And, "Unless I know the reasons and the consequences of it, I am not going to be involved in it." Then he is becoming responsible.

Responsibility is not a game. It is one of the most authentic ways of living -- dangerous too -- but it does not mean disobedience for disobedience's sake. That will be again idiotic.

But just to go against obedience is not moving your intelligence higher. You remain on the same plane. Obedient or disobedient, but there is no change of intelligence.

To me disobedience is a great revolution.

It does not mean saying an absolute no in every situation. It simply means deciding whether to do it or not, whether it is beneficial to do it or not. It is taking the responsibility on yourself. It is not a question of hating the person or hating to be told, because in that hating you cannot act obediently, disobediently; you act very unconsciously. You cannot act intelligently.

When you are told to do something, you are given an opportunity to respond. Perhaps what is being told is right; then do it, and be grateful to the person who told you at the right moment to do it. Perhaps it is not right -- then make it clear. Bring your reasons, why it is not right; then help the person -- what he is thinking is going in a wrong way. But hate has no place.

If it is right, do it lovingly.

If it is not right, then even more love is needed, because you will have to tell to the person, explain to the person that it is not right. The way of disobedience is not stagnant, just going against every order and feeling anger and hate and revenge towards the person. The way of disobedience is a way of great intelligence.

So it is not ultimately obedience or disobedience. Reduced to the basic fact, it is simply a question of intelligence -- behave intelligently. Sometimes you will have to obey, and sometimes you will have to say, "I am sorry, I cannot do it." But there is no question of hate, there is no question of revenge, anger. If hate, anger or revenge arises, that simply means you know that what is being told is right, but it goes against your ego to obey it; it hurts your ego. That hurt feeling comes up as hate, as anger.

But the question is not your ego; the question is the act that you have to do -- and you have to bring your total intelligence to figure it out. If it is right, then be obedient; if it is wrong, be disobedient. But there is no conflict, there is no hurt feeling.

If you are obeying it, it is easier; you need not explain to anybody. But if you are not obeying it, then you owe an explanation. And perhaps your explanation is not right. Then you have to move back, you have to do it.

A man should live intelligently -- that's all.

Then whatever he does is his responsibility.

We have been brought up to follow the powerful -- the father, the mother, the teacher, the priest, the God. Essentially we have been told that whoever has the power is right: "Might is right." And you have to follow it. It is simple because it needs no intelligence. It is simple because you can never be told that it was your responsibility, that whatever happened was your responsibility.

In all the armies around the world only one thing is taught through years of training, and that is obedience. In Germany, in the second world war, there were good people, but they were heads of concentration camps. They were good fathers, good husbands, good friends. Nobody could have conceived -- watching them in their families, with their friends, in the club -- that these people are burning thousands of Jews every day.

And they were not feeling guilty at all, because it is only an order from above. And that is their whole training, that you have to follow the order. It has become part of their blood and their bones and their marrow. When the order comes, obedience is the only way. This is how man has lived up to now, and that's why I say obedience is one of the greatest crimes, because all other crimes are born out of it. It deprives you of intelligence, it deprives you of decisiveness, it deprives you of responsibility. It destroys you as an individual.

It converts you into a robot.

Hence I am all for disobedience. But disobedience is not just against obedience. Disobedience is above obedience and the so-called disobedience described in the dictionaries. Disobedience is simply the assertion of your intelligence: "I take the responsibility, and I will do everything that feels right to my heart, to my being. And I will not do anything that goes against my intelligence."

Just live intelligently.

If something is told to you, decide whether it is right or wrong, then you can avoid all guilt feelings. Otherwise, if you don't do it, then you feel guilty; if you do it, again you feel guilty. If you do it you feel that you are being obedient, subservient, that you are not being assertive, that you are not being yourself. And if you don't do it, then you start feeling guilty again -- because perhaps it was the right thing to do, and you are not doing it.

There is no need for all this clumsiness. Just be simple. If something is told to you, respond intelligently. And whatsoever your intelligence decides, do it this way or that -- but you are responsible. Then there is no question of guilt.

If you are not going to do it, explain to the person why you are not going to do it. And explain without any anger, because anger simply shows that you are weak, that you don't really have an intelligent answer. Anger is always a sign of weakness. Just plainly and simply explain the whole thing; perhaps the other person may find that you are right and may be thankful to you. Or perhaps the other person may have better reasons than you; then you will be thankful to the other person because he has raised your consciousness.

Use every opportunity in life for raising your intelligence, your consciousness.

Ordinarily what we are doing is using every opportunity to create a hell for ourselves. Only you suffer, and because of your suffering, you make others suffer. And when so many people are living together, and if they all create suffering for each other, it goes on multiplying.

That's how the whole world has become a hell.

It can be instantly changed.

Just the basic thing has to be understood, that without intelligence there is no heaven.

Sunday, August 24, 2008

Matter is more like a thought than like a thing...



Modern physics has discovered one of the greatest things ever discovered, and that is: matter is energy. That is the greatest contribution of Albert Einstein to humanity: e is equal to mc2, matter is energy. Matter only appears... otherwise there is no such thing as matter, nothing is solid. Even the solid rock is a pulsating energy, even the solid rock is as much energy as the roaring ocean. The waves that are arising in the solid rock cannot be seen because they are very subtle, but the rock is waving, pulsating, breathing; it is alive.

Friedrich Nietzsche has declared that God is dead. God is not dead -- on the contrary, what has happened is that matter is dead. Matter has been found not to exist at all. This insight into matter brings modern physics very close to mysticism, very close. For the first time the scientist and the mystic are coming very close, almost holding hands.

Eddington, one of the greatest scientists of this age, has said, "We used to think that matter is a thing; now it is no more so. Matter is more like a thought than like a thing."

Existence is energy. Science has discovered that the observed is energy, the object is energy. Down the ages, at least for five thousand years, it has been known that the other polarity -- the subject, the observer, consciousness -- is energy.

Your body is energy, your mind is energy, your soul is energy. Then what is the difference between these three? The difference is only of a different rhythm, different wavelengths, that's all. The body is gross -- energy functioning in a gross way, in a visible way.

Mind is a little more subtle, but still not too subtle, because you can close your eyes and you can see the thoughts moving; they can be seen. They are not as visible as your body; your body is visible to everybody else, it is publicly visible. Your thoughts are privately visible. Nobody else can see your thoughts; only you can see them -- or people who have worked very deeply into seeing thoughts. But ordinarily they are not visible to others.

And the third, the ultimate layer inside you, is that of consciousness. It is not even visible to you. It cannot be reduced into an object, it remains subject.

If all these three energies function in harmony, you are healthy and whole. If these energies don't function in harmony and accord you are ill, unhealthy; you are no more whole. And to be whole is to be holy.

The moment your body, mind and consciousness function together, you have become the trinity, and in that experience is God.

There is no relationship of consciousness and energy. Consciousness is energy, purest energy; mind is not so pure, body is still less pure. Body is much too mixed, and mind is also not totally pure. Consciousness is total pure energy. But you can know this consciousness only if you make a cosmos out of the three, and not a chaos. People are living in chaos: their bodies say one thing, their bodies want to go in one direction; their minds are completely oblivious of the body -- because for centuries you have been taught that you are not the body, for centuries you have been told that the body is your enemy, that you have to fight with it, that you have to destroy it, that the body is sin.

Because of all these ideas -- silly and stupid they are, harmful and poisonous they are, but they have been taught for so long that they have become part of your collective mind, they are there -- you don't experience your body in a rhythmic dance with yourself.

Consciousness is the highest form of energy. And when all these three energies function together, the fourth arrives. The fourth is always present when these three function together. When these three function in an organic unity, the fourth is always there; the fourth is nothing but that organic unity.

In the East, we have called that fourth simply "the fourth" -- turiya; we have not given it any name. The three have names, the fourth is nameless. To know the fourth is to know God. Let us say it in this way: God is when you are an organic orgasmic unity. God is not when you are a chaos, a disunity, a conflict. When you are a house divided against yourself there is no God.

When you are tremendously happy with yourself, happy as you are, blissful as you are, grateful as you are, and all your energies are dancing together, when you are an orchestra of all your energies, God is. That feeling of total unity is what God is. God is not a person somewhere, God is the experience of the three falling in such unity that the fourth arises. And the fourth is more than the sum total of the parts.

You have to learn how to play on these three energies so that they all become an orchestra. Then God is -- not that you see God, there is nothing to be seen; God is the ultimate seer, it is witnessing. Learn to melt your body, mind, soul; find out ways when you can function as a unity.

Drop old ideas of meditations, that just sitting underneath a tree with a yoga posture is meditation. That is only one of the ways, and may be suitable for a few people but is not suitable for all. For a small child it is not meditation, it is torture. For a young man who is alive, vibrant, it is repression, it is not meditation. Maybe for an old man who has lived, whose energies are declining, it may be meditation.

Running can be a meditation -- jogging, dancing, swimming, anything can be a meditation. My definition of meditation is: whenever your body, mind, soul are functioning together in rhythm it is meditation, because it will bring the fourth in. And if you are alert that you are doing it as a meditation -- not to take part in the Olympics, but doing it as a meditation -- then it is tremendously beautiful.

If we give only a fixed pattern of meditation, then it will be applicable only to a few people. That has been one of the problems in the past: fixed patterns of meditation, not fluid -- fixed, so they fit certain types and all others are left in the darkness.

The basic fundamental is, whatsoever the meditation, it has to fill this requirement: that the body, mind, consciousness, all three should function in unity. Then suddenly one day the fourth has arrived: the witnessing. Or if you want to, call it God; call it God or nirvana or Tao or whatsoever you will.

A real man can act; and also can be lazy...



To a workaholic almost everybody is lazy. But to the laziest, almost everybody is a workaholic.

It is difficult -- how to decide? Alexander thought that Diogenes was lazy, and Diogenes thought that Alexander was mad. Alexander tried to conquer the whole world -- this is sheer madness -- and Diogenes was so lazy that he remained naked, because it was such a botheration to put the clothes on and off. And then sometimes you have to wash them, and you have to look for Bahadur, and the soap, and this and that -- it is a long sequence of things.

Diogenes had only one begging bowl. That too one day he threw in the river, because it was such a botheration to clean it. And the day he threw it, he saw a dog that gave him the inspiration. He was going towards the river, thirsty, with his begging bowl, and the dog was also thirsty and he was also going to the river.

The dog ran fast, jumped into the river, drank to his heart's content. And Diogenes thought, "So the dog is far more intelligent. Without any begging bowl, and he is doing well. Why do I go on carrying this weight?" He threw the begging bowl, he thanked the dog; they became friends. They became so friendly that they started sharing the place -- where the dog used to live Diogenes also started living. It was just a big pipe, the dog used to live there; that became the house of Diogenes too.

When Alexander went to see Diogenes -- naturally, polar opposites are always attracted -- he was lying down on the sand by the side of the river in the early morning sun, warm, naked, he was enjoying, singing a song. The dog was sitting by his side, also enjoying the morning. Alexander came with all his paraphernalia, the generals and the prime ministers, and they declared, as was part of the court mannerism, that "Alexander the Great is here!"

Diogenes looked at the dog and laughed. Alexander could not understand why he looked at the dog; he asked why. Diogenes said, "I looked at the dog because only he will understand. These fools that you have brought with you, they will not understand at all. This dog is very wise. In the first place he never speaks -- so wise, never utters a word, just keeps everything secret. And he is the only one who can understand that one who declares that he is great, can't be. Greatness need not be declared; it is there, or it is not there."

Shocked, Alexander could not believe that this would be the way he would be received, but still he was impressed by the man -- he was so joyous. He said, "I feel a little jealous of you. Next time, if God asks me, 'Alexander, what do you want to become?' I will ask to become Diogenes."

Diogenes again looked at the dog. And it is said that the dog smiled. Alexander could not believe what was happening, what was transpiring. He said, "What is the meaning of it?"

Diogenes said, "It is so foolish to wait for the next life. We live moment to moment, me and my friend, and you are hoping for the next life. If you are so jealous of Diogenes, who is preventing you? Is God preventing you? Throw off the clothes -- and tell these foolish people to go! And the bank is so big, we can share. That is our house. First only the dog used to live here, then I became a part of it; you can also become a part of it. We have nothing else, so there is no quarrel, no competition, nothing."

It must have been one of the greatest moments in history. Just to think of it.... Alexander said, "I am happy that I came. I have seen a man worth seeing. Can I do something for you?"

Diogenes said, "You just move a little to the left, because you are hindering the sun. Nothing else is needed, because we don't need anything."

"Who is a lazy man?"

It is very relative. My own suggestion is: act only when it is essential. And even while doing things, don't become a doer, become a non-doer. Let God do things through you, then action and inaction are one.

That's what Lao Tzu says: Wu-wei -- action through inaction. Then action and laziness are no more opposite but complementaries. A real man will have both the capacities: he can act; he can be lazy, he can rest.

What ordinarily happens is that people become addicted, either to work or to laziness -- and that is wrong. Don't become addicted. Do, but don't become a doer. And then even while doing things you will remain at rest, perfectly at rest.

Alexander on the circumference and Diogenes at the center: that is my definition of a total man.

Friday, August 22, 2008

Am I progressing or not ?



When meditating, working on yourself, if you wonder whether you are making any progress or not, know well that you are not making any progress -- because when progress is made you know it. Why? It is just like when you are ill and you are taking medicine. Won't you be able to feel whether you are getting healthy or not? If you do not feel it and the question arises whether you are getting well or not, know well that you are not getting well. Well-being is such a clear feeling that when you have it you know it.

But why does this question arise? This question arises for so many reasons. One, you are not really working. You are just deceiving yourself. You are playing tricks with yourself. Then you are less concerned with what you are doing and more concerned with what is happening. If you are really doing it, you can leave the result to the Divine. But our minds are such that we are less concerned with the cause and more concerned with the effect -- because of greed.

Greed wants to have everything without doing anything. So the greedy mind goes on moving ahead. Then the greedy mind asks, "What is happening? Is something happening or not?" Be really concerned with what you are doing, and when something happens you will know it. It is going to happen to YOU. You need not ask anyone.

Another reason for asking this question is that we think that there are going to be some signs, some symbols, some milestones we can reach that show: "I have progressed so much," that "to this plane or to that plane I have reached so much." We want to calculate before the ultimate goal is reached. We want to be confident that we are progressing.

But, really, there are no milestones -- because there is no fixed road. And everyone is on a different road; we are not on one road. Even if you are following one technique of meditation, you are not on the same road; you cannot be. There is no public path. Every path is individual and personal. So no one's experiences on the path will be helpful to you; rather, they may be damaging.

Someone may be seeing something on his path. If he says to you that this is the sign of progress, you may not meet the same sign on your path. The same trees may not be on your path; the same stones may not be on your path. So do not be a victim of all this nonsense. Only certain inner feelings are relevant. For example, if you are progressing, then certain things will begin to happen spontaneously. One, you will feel more and more contentment.

Really, when meditation is completely fulfilled, one becomes so contented that he forgets to meditate -- because meditation is an effort, a discontent. If one day you forget to meditate and you do not feel any addiction, you do not feel any gap, you are as filled as ever, then know it is a good sign. There are many who will do meditation, and then if they are not doing it a strange phenomenon happens to them. If they do it, they do not feel anything. If they do not do it, then they feel the gap. If they do it, nothing happens to them. If they do not do it, then they feel that something is missing.

This is just a habit. Like smoking, like drinking, like anything, this is just a habit. Do not make meditation a habit. Let it be alive!

So do not think you are achieving much if you are beginning to see light or if you go on seeing beautiful colours. They are good, but do not feel satisfied unless real psychological changes are there: less anger, more love; less cruelty, more compassion.

Unless this happens, your seeing lights and colours and hearing sounds are child's play. They are beautiful, very beautiful; it is good to play with them -- but that is not the aim of meditation. They happen on the road, they are just by-products, but do not be concerned.

Your progress must be observed in your relationships. Relationship is the mirror: see your face there. Always remember that relationship is the mirror. If your meditation is going deep, your relationships will become different -- totally different! Love will be the basic note of your relationships, not violence. As it is, violence is the basic note. Even if you look at someone, you look in a violent way. But you are accustomed to it.

Meditation for me is not a child's play. It is a deep transformation. How to know this transformation? It is being reflected every moment in your relationships. Do you try to possess someone? Then you are violent. How can one possess anyone? Are you trying to dominate someone? Then you are violent. How can one dominate anyone? Love cannot dominate, love cannot possess.

So whatsoever you are doing, be aware, observe it, and then go on meditating. Soon you will begin to feel the change. Now there is no possessiveness in relationships. By and by, possessiveness disappears, and when possessiveness is not there relationship has a beauty of its own. When possessiveness is there, everything becomes dirty, ugly, inhuman. But we are such deceivers that we will not look at ourselves in relationships -- because there the real face can be seen. So we close our eyes to our relationships and we go on thinking that something is going to be seen inside.

Meditation is not just a certain thing which you do for one hour and forget. Really, the whole life has to be meditative. Only then will you begin to feel things. And when I say that the whole life is to be meditative, I do not mean to go and close your eyes for twenty-four hours and sit and meditate -- no! Wherever you are you can be sensitive and that sensitivity will pay. Then there will be no need to ask, "Am I progressing or not?"

Think twice before you start playing !!!


Meditation has all the space, the whole of existence available. You are the watcher, you can watch the whole scene. There is no effort to concentrate on anything, there is no effort to contemplate about anything. You are not doing all these things, you are simply there watching, just aware. It is a knack. It is not a science, it is not an art, it is not a craft; it is a knack.
So you have to just go on playing with the idea. Sitting in your bathroom, just play with the idea that you are not doing anything. And one day you will be surprised: just playing with the idea, it has happened -- because it is your nature. Just the right moment.... You never know when the right moment is, when the right opportunity is, so you go on playing.

Somebody asked Henry Ford -- because he had given a statement that: "My success is through nothing but catching the right opportunity at the right moment. People either think of opportunities which are in the future -- you cannot catch hold of them -- or they think of opportunities which are past. When they are gone and only dust is left on the road, then they become aware that the opportunity is passed."
Somebody asked, "But if you don't think of an opportunity in the future and you don't think of an opportunity which has passed, how suddenly can you get hold of it when it comes? You have to be ready."

He said, "Not ready -- you have to be just jumping. One never knows when it comes. When it comes, just jump upon it!"

What Henry Ford said has tremendous meaning. He said, "You simply keep on jumping. You don't wait; don't bother whether an opportunity is there or not: just go on jumping. One never knows when it comes. When it comes jump upon it and be gone. If you go on looking into the future: 'When is the opportunity coming?..." The future is unpredictable. If you wait, thinking "When it comes I will catch hold of it," by the time you become aware that it is there, it is gone. Time is fleeting, so fast, only dust will be there.

"Rather, forget about opportunities, simply learn jumping, so whenever it comes...."

Anytime -- lying in your bed, if sleep is not coming, play with the idea. Why bother about sleep? -- it will come when it will come. You cannot do anything to bring it; it is not in your hands, so why bother about it? Something which is not in your hands, forget about it. This time is in your hands, why not use it? Lying in your bed, on a cold night under your blanket, cozy and enjoying -- just play with the idea. You need not sit in the lotus posture. In my meditation you need not torture yourself in any way.

If you love the lotus posture, good; you can sit in it. But Westerners go to India and it takes them six months to learn the lotus posture, and they are torturing themselves so much. And they think that when they have learned the lotus posture, they have gained something. The whole of India sits in the lotus posture -- nobody has gained anything. It is just their natural way of sitting. In a cold country you need a chair to sit on, you can't sit on the ground. In a hot country, who bothers about a chair? You sit anywhere.

No special posture is needed, no special time is needed. There are people who think there are special times. No, not for meditation; any time is the right time -- you just have to be relaxed and playful. And if it does not happen it does not matter; don't feel sad.... Because I am not telling you that it will happen today, or tomorrow, or within three months or six months. I am not giving you any expectation because that will become a tension in your mind. It can happen any day, it may not happen: it all depends on how playful you are.

If nothing happens -- I am not promising you anything -- if nothing happens that's perfectly good, you enjoyed yourself. You played with the idea, you gave it a chance.

Go on giving it a chance. Henry Ford said, "Go on jumping and when the chance, the opportunity comes, jump upon it." I say just the reverse. You just go on giving a chance to meditation, and when the right moment comes and you are really relaxed and open, it jumps upon you.

And once meditation jumps upon you it never leaves.

There is no way.

So think twice before you start playing!