Spiritual Insights
(A Collection of Spiritual Teachings)
Part 1
1. Nobody can live without a soul, and once you start thinking
that there is no soul, your life starts losing all meaning. The soul is your
very integrating concept; without it you are cut away from existence and
eternal life. Just like a branch cut off from a tree is bound to die -- it has lost
the source of nourishment -- the very idea that there is no soul inside you, no
consciousness, cuts you away from existence. One starts shrinking, one starts
feeling suffocated.
2. “Drop the idea of becoming someone, because you
are already a masterpiece. You cannot be improved. You have only to come to it,
to know it, to realize it.”
3. Live in the world without any idea of what is
going to happen. Whether you are going to be a winner or a loser, it doesn’t
matter. Death takes everything away. Whether you lose or win is immaterial. The
only thing that matters, and it has always been so, is how you played the game.
Did you enjoy it?—the game itself? Then each moment is a moment of joy.
4. You are the truth; you are not to go anywhere. You have to
stop going, so that you can remain at home where the truth is. It is not a
question of following a path; on the contrary it is a question of not following
any path, not going anywhere, so you can be here -- so that you can be now,
just within yourself. Every path leads astray, that was Bodhidharma's approach. No
practice is needed. You are really where you need to be. It is just that you go
on and on, round and round, but never settle down into your own being.
5. Dharma means self-nature. For example, to be hot is the
dharma of fire; to be cold is the dharma of ice, the self-nature. What is the self-nature
of man? No-selfness, silence, and suddenly an upsurge of compassion. Every
seeking is going to take you away from yourself, so non-seeking is one of the
essentials of Bodhidharma's teaching.
6. Don’t go anywhere. Pull all your energy inwards. Close all
your petals and just be in. And you will experience what dharma is, what
self-nature is. Then practice it. Then act as if you are nobody. Then act with
great compassion. Then let your whole life be simply a presence, but not a
person because there is no self inside you.
7. ALL PHENOMENA ARE EMPTY. Whatever happens outside you in life
is just empty, as empty as dreams; it is made of the same stuff. THE WISE WAKE
UP and see the whole of life as a long series of dreams -- sometimes good,
sometimes bad, sometimes sweet, sometimes nightmarish, but they are all dreams.
The awakened one neither dreams in his sleep nor is deluded by the dreams of
the outside world while he is awake. They contain nothing worth desiring.
8. The realization of enlightenment, or buddhahood, is
difficult. And it is also not difficult. It is difficult if you start looking
for it. It is not difficult if you simply sit down, settling within yourself in
calmness, quietness, being just purely aware. Then you are the buddha, then you
are the enlightenment. It is not that you become enlightened, it is not your
becoming. It is your very being, it is you in your simplest, spontaneous
nature.
9. Enlightenment is your self-nature. Once somebody attains to
enlightenment, the greatest difficulty is to convey it to those who are living
in darkness and who have never seen any light. It is almost like talking about
light to blind people. One enlightened master has been reported to have said,
"My whole effort of conveying my experience is just like selling glasses
to blind people."
10. “I'm simply saying that there is a way to be
sane. I'm saying that you can get rid of all this insanity created by the past
in you. Just by being a simple witness of your thought processes.
It is simply sitting silently, witnessing the thoughts, passing before you. Just witnessing, not interfering not even judging, because the moment you judge you have lost the pure witness. The moment you say “this is good, this is bad,” you have already jumped onto the thought process.
It takes a little time to create a gap between the witness and the mind. Once the gap is there, you are in for a great surprise, that you are not the mind, that you are the witness, a watcher.
And this process of watching is the very alchemy of real religion. Because as you become more and more deeply rooted in witnessing, thoughts start disappearing. You are, but the mind is utterly empty.
That’s the moment of enlightenment. That is the moment that you become for the first time an unconditioned, sane, really free human being.”
11. On the path of Gautam Buddha there is no reward because the
very desire for reward comes from a greedy mind. The whole teaching of Gautam
Buddha is desirelessness and if you are doing all these so-called virtuous
acts, making temples and monasteries and feeding thousands of monks, with a
desire in your mind, you are preparing your way towards hell. If you are doing
these things out of joy, to share your joy with the whole empire, and there is
not even a slight desire anywhere for any reward, the very act is a reward unto
itself. Otherwise you have missed the whole point."
12. Each person comes into this world with a specific destiny--he has
something to fulfill, some message has to be delivered, some work has to be completed.
You are not here accidentally--you are here meaningfully. There is a purpose
behind you. The whole intends to do something through you.”
13. “That is the simple secret of happiness. Whatever you are doing, don’t
let past move your mind; don’t let future disturb you. Because the past is no
more, and the future is not yet. To live in the memories, to live in the
imagination, is to live in the non-existential. And when you are living in the
non-existential, you are missing that which is existential. Naturally you will
be miserable, because you will miss your whole life.”
14. “Nobody is
superior, nobody is inferior, but nobody is equal either. People are simply
unique, incomparable. You are you, I am I. I have to contribute my potential to
life; you have to contribute your potential to life. I have to discover my own
being; you have to discover your own being.”
15. “Doubt--because
doubt is not a sin, it is a sign of your intelligence. You are not responsible
to any nation, to any church, to any God. You are responsible only for one
thing, and that is self knowledge. And the miracle is, if you can fulfill this
responsibility, you will be able to fulfill many other responsibilities without
any effort. The moment you come to your own being, a revolution happens in your
vision. Your whole outlook about life goes through a radical change. You start
feeling new responsibilities--not as some thing to be done, not as a duty to be
fulfilled, but as a joy to do.”
16. “You exist in
time, but you belong to eternity-
You are a penetration of eternity into the world of time-You are deathless, living in a body of
death- Your consciousness knows no death, no birth-
It is only your body that is born and dies-But you are not aware of your
consciousness-You are not conscious of your consciousness-And that is the whole
art of meditation; Becoming conscious of consciousness itself.”
17. Unless you start feeling the source of light within yourself, you will
not be able to see that light anywhere else. First it has to be experienced
within one’s own being, and then it is found everywhere. Then the whole
existence becomes so full of light, so full of joy, so full of meaning and
poetry, that each moment one feels grateful for all that god has given, for all
that he goes on giving. Sannyas is simply a decision to turn in, to look in.
The most primary thing is to find your own center. Once it is found, once you
are centered, once you are bathed in your own light you have a different
vision, a different perspective, and the whole of life becomes golden. Then
even dust is divine. Then life is so rich, so abundantly rich that one can only
feel a tremendous gratitude towards existence. That gratitude becomes prayer.
Before that, all prayer is false.”
18. The moment you
become miserly you are closed to the basic phenomenon of life: expansion,
sharing. The moment you start clinging to things, you have missed the
target--you have missed. Because things are not the target, you, your innermost
being, is the target--not a beautiful house, but a beautiful you; not much
money, but a rich you; not many things, but an open being, available to
millions of things.”
19. If you want to learn anything, learn trust - nothing else is needed. If
you are miserable, nothing else will help - learn trust. If you don't feel any
meaning in life and you feel meaningless, nothing will help - learn trust. Trust
gives meaning because trust makes you capable of allowing the whole descend
upon you.”
20. If you live
consciously, if you try to bring consciousness to every act that you go
through, you will be living in a silent, blissful state, in serenity, in joy, in
love. Your life will have the flavor of a festival. That is the meaning of
heaven: your life will have many flowers in it, much fragrance will be released
through you. You will have an aura of delight. Your life will be a song of
life-affirmation; it will be a sacred yes to all that existence is. You will be
in communion with existence — in communion with stars, with the trees, with the
rivers, with the mountains, with people, with animals. This whole life and this
whole existence will have a totally different meaning for you. From every nook
and corner, rivers of bliss will be flowing towards you. Heaven is just a name
for that state of mind. Hell means you are living so unconsciously, so
absurdly, in such contradiction, that you go on creating more and more misery
for yourself.”
21. Energy can have
two dimensions. One is motivated, going somewhere, a goal somewhere, this
moment is only a means and the goal is going to be the dimension of activity,
goal oriented--then everything is a means, somehow it has to be done and you
have to reach the goal, then you will relax. But for this type of energy the
goal never comes because this type of energy goes on changing every present
moment into a means for something else, into the future. The goal always
remains on the horizon. You go on running, but the distance remains the same.
No, there is another dimension of energy: that dimension is unmotivated celebration. The goal is here, now; the goal is not somewhere else. In fact, you are the goal. In fact there is no other fulfillment than that of this moment--consider the lilies. When you are the goal and when the goal is not in the future, when there is nothing to be achieved, rather you are just celebrating it, then you have already achieved it, it is there. This is relaxation, unmotivated energy.”
No, there is another dimension of energy: that dimension is unmotivated celebration. The goal is here, now; the goal is not somewhere else. In fact, you are the goal. In fact there is no other fulfillment than that of this moment--consider the lilies. When you are the goal and when the goal is not in the future, when there is nothing to be achieved, rather you are just celebrating it, then you have already achieved it, it is there. This is relaxation, unmotivated energy.”
22. “The world is like
a waiting room in a railway station; it is not your house. You are not going to
remain in the waiting room forever.
Nothing in the waiting room belongs to you – the furniture, the paintings on the wall . You use them – you see the painting, you sit on the chair, you rest on the bed – but nothing belongs to you.
You are just here for a few ...minutes, or for a few hours at the most, then you will be gone.
Yes, what you have brought in with you, into the waiting room, you will take away with you; that’s yours. What have you brought into the world? And the world certainly is a waiting room.
The waiting may not be in seconds, minutes, hours, days, it may be in years; but what does it matter whether you wait seven hours, or seventy years?
You may forget, in seventy years,that you are just in a waiting room. You may start thinking perhaps you are the owner, perhaps this is the house you have built. You may start putting your nameplate on the waiting room.
Nothing in the waiting room belongs to you – the furniture, the paintings on the wall . You use them – you see the painting, you sit on the chair, you rest on the bed – but nothing belongs to you.
You are just here for a few ...minutes, or for a few hours at the most, then you will be gone.
Yes, what you have brought in with you, into the waiting room, you will take away with you; that’s yours. What have you brought into the world? And the world certainly is a waiting room.
The waiting may not be in seconds, minutes, hours, days, it may be in years; but what does it matter whether you wait seven hours, or seventy years?
You may forget, in seventy years,that you are just in a waiting room. You may start thinking perhaps you are the owner, perhaps this is the house you have built. You may start putting your nameplate on the waiting room.
23. “If you
love a person, you accept
the total person. With all
the defects. Because those
defects are a part of the person. Never try to change a person you love, because the very effort to
change says that you love half, and
the other half of the person is not accepted .When you love, you simply love.”
24. You don’t have any
problems — only this much has to be understood. This very moment you can drop
all problems. because they are your creations. Have another look at your
problems: the deeper you look, the smaller they will appear. Go on looking at
them and by and by they will start disappearing. Go on gazing and suddenly you
will find there is emptiness — a beautiful emptiness surrounds you. Nothing to
do, nothing to be, because you are already that.”
25. “If you
know your being, there is no question of becoming. All that you could have ever
imagined to become you already are. You are gods who have forgotten who they
are. You are emperors who have fallen asleep and are dreaming that they have
become beggars. Now beggars are trying to become emperors, in dreams they are
making great efforts to become emperors, and all that is needed is to wake up.
26. “The
longer a person has been dead the greater is the tradition ... If Buddha is
alive you can barely tolerate him. ... You cannot believe this man has known
the ultimate because he looks just like you ... Hungry he needs food, sleepy he
wants a bed, ill, he has to rest – just like you ... That is why Jesus is
worshiped now and yet he was crucified when he was alive. Alive, you crucify
him; dead, you worship him.”
27. “Respect
life, revere life. There is nothing more holy than life, nothing more divine
than life.”
28. You
should live in the world but remain untouched by it. You should remain in the
world, but the world should not remain in you.”
29. Never belong to a
crowd; Never belong to a nation; Never belong to a religion; Never belong to a
race. Belong to the whole existence. Why limit yourself to small things? When
the whole is available.”
30. Man ordinarily
lives in loneliness. To avoid loneliness, he creates all kinds of
relationships, friendships, organizations, political parties, religions and
what not. But the basic thing is that he is very much afraid of being lonely.
Loneliness is a black hole, a darkness, a frightening negative state almost
like death … as if you are being swallowed by death itself. To avoid it, you
run out and fall into anybody, just to hold somebody’s hand, to feel that you
are not lonely… Nothing hurts more than loneliness.
But the trouble is, any relationship that arises out of the fear of being lonely is not going to be a blissful experience, because the other is also joining you out of fear. You both call it love. You are both deceiving yourself and the other. It is simply fear, and fear can never be the source of love. Only those who love are absolutely fearless; only those who love are able to be alone, joyously, whose need for the other has disappeared, who are sufficient unto themselves…
The day you decide that all these efforts are failures, that your loneliness has remained untouched by all your efforts, that is a great moment of understanding. Then only one thing remains: to see whether loneliness is such a thing that you should be afraid of, or if it is just your nature. Then rather than running out and away, you close your eyes and go in. Suddenly the night is over, and a new dawn … The loneliness transforms into aloneness.
Aloneness is your nature. You were born alone, you will die alone. And you are living alone without understanding it, without being fully aware of it. You misunderstand aloneness as loneliness; it is simply a misunderstanding. You are sufficient unto yourself.”
But the trouble is, any relationship that arises out of the fear of being lonely is not going to be a blissful experience, because the other is also joining you out of fear. You both call it love. You are both deceiving yourself and the other. It is simply fear, and fear can never be the source of love. Only those who love are absolutely fearless; only those who love are able to be alone, joyously, whose need for the other has disappeared, who are sufficient unto themselves…
The day you decide that all these efforts are failures, that your loneliness has remained untouched by all your efforts, that is a great moment of understanding. Then only one thing remains: to see whether loneliness is such a thing that you should be afraid of, or if it is just your nature. Then rather than running out and away, you close your eyes and go in. Suddenly the night is over, and a new dawn … The loneliness transforms into aloneness.
Aloneness is your nature. You were born alone, you will die alone. And you are living alone without understanding it, without being fully aware of it. You misunderstand aloneness as loneliness; it is simply a misunderstanding. You are sufficient unto yourself.”
31. You see my five fingers, but somebody
can see the five gaps between my fingers. Ordinarily you will not see the gaps,
you will see five fingers. But the gaps are more real: fingers may come and go,
gaps will remain. Between sounds of music there are gaps of silence. The
authentic music consists not of sounds,but of the gaps. Sounds come and go;
those gaps remain. And music can make you aware of those gaps more beautifully
than anything else; hence I have to say that music comes next to silence.”
32. You need not
search for uniqueness, you are unique already. There is no way to make a thing
more unique. The words “more unique” are absurd. It is just like the word
“circle.” Circles exist; there is no such thing as “more circular.” That is
absurd. A circle is always perfect, “more” is not needed.
33. “First
thing: There is no need to survive in this world. This world is a madhouse.
There is no need to survive in it. There is no need to survive in the world of
ambition, politics, ego. It is the disease. But there is another way to be, and
the whole religious standpoint is: You can be in this world and not be of it.
“When I listen to my feelings, my inner voice, they tell me to do nothing.…”
Then don’t do anything. There is nobody higher than you, and God speaks to you
directly. Start trusting your inner feelings. Then don’t do anything. If you
feel just to sleep, eat, and play on the beach, perfect. Let that be your religion.
Don’t be afraid then. You will have to drop fear. And if it is a question of
choosing between the inner feeling and the fear, choose the inner feeling.
Don’t choose the fear. So many people have chosen their path out of fear, so
they live in a limbo, they live in indecision. Fear is not going to help. Fear
always means the fear of the unknown. Fear always means the fear of death. Fear
always means the fear of being lost—but if you really want to be alive, you
have to accept the possibility of being lost. You have to accept the insecurity
of the unknown, the discomfort and the inconvenience of the unfamiliar, the
strange. That is the price one has to pay for the blessing that follows it, and
nothing can be achieved without paying for it. You have to pay for it:
Otherwise you will remain fear-paralyzed. Your whole life will be lost. Enjoy
whatsoever your inner feeling is.”
34. “There are always problems in the world, and the world has always been
there, and the world will remain there. If you start trying to work it
out—changing circumstances, changing people, thinking of a utopian world,
changing the government, the structure, the economy, the politics, the
education—you will be lost. That is the trap known as politics. That’s how many
people waste their own lives. Be very clear about it: The only person you can
help right now is you yourself. Right now you cannot help anybody. This may be
just a distraction, just a trick of the mind. See your own problems, see your
own anxieties, see your own mind, and first try to change that. It happens to
many people: The moment they become interested in some sort of religion,
meditation, prayer, immediately the mind tells them, “What are you doing
sitting here silently? The world needs you; there are so many poor people.
There is much conflict, violence, aggression. What are you doing praying in the
temple? Go and help people.” How can you help those people? You are just like
them. You may create even more problems for them, but you cannot help. That’s
how all the revolutions have always failed. No revolution has yet succeeded
because the revolutionaries are in the same boat. The religious person is one
who understands that “I am very tiny, I am very limited. If with this limited
energy, even if I can change myself, that will be a miracle.” And if you can
change yourself, if you are a totally different being with new life shining in
your eyes and a new song in your heart, then maybe you can be helpful to others
also, because then you will have something to share.”
35. Just look at life
with more playful eyes. Don’t be serious. Seriousness becomes like blindness.
Don’t pretend to be a thinker, a philosopher. Just simply be a human being. The
whole world is showering its joy on you in so many ways, but you are too
serious, you cannot open your heart.”
36. “Have you ever
thought about it? If somebody asks, “Who are you?” what do you answer? You say
your name. The name is not yours, because you came into the world without a
name. You came nameless; it is not your property, it has been given to you. And
any name, A-B-C-D, would have been useful. It is arbitrary. It is not essential
in any way. If you are called “Susan” good; if you are called “Harry” good, it
makes no difference. Any name would have been as applicable to you as any
other. It is just a label. A name is needed to call you by, but it has nothing
to do with your being. Or you say, “I am a doctor” or you say, “I am an
engineer”—or a businessman, or a painter, or this and that—but nothing says
anything about you. When you say, “I am a doctor,” you say something about your
profession, not about you. You say how you earn your living. You don’t say
anything about life; you say something about your living. You may be earning
your living as an engineer, or as a doctor, or as a businessman—it is
irrelevant. It does not say anything about you. Or you say your father’s name,
your mother’s name, you give your family tree—that too is irrelevant because
that doesn’t define you. Your being born in a particular family is accidental;
you could as well have been born in another family and you would not even have
noticed the difference. These are just utilitarian tricks—and man becomes a
“self.” This self is a pseudo self, a created, manufactured self, homemade. And
your own real self remains deep down hidden in mist and”
37. “Thoughtlessnes
There is a Totally Different Quality of Being which Comes by not Thinking, Not good, Not bad, Simply a State of No-thinking. You simply Watch, you simply Remain Conscious, but you don´t Think, and if some Thought Enters, they will Enter, Because Thoughts are not Yours..They are just floating in the Air. All around there is a no sphere, a Thought-Sphere, all around. Just as there is Air, there is thought all around you, and it goes on Entering on its Own Accord. It Stops only when you become more and more aware. There is something in it. If you become more Aware, a Thought simply Disappears, it Melts, Because Awareness is a Greater Energy than Thought.
Awareness is like Fire to Thought. It is just like you Burn a Lamp in the House and the Darkness cannot enter, you put the Light off from Everywhere Darkness has entered, without taking a single Minute, a single Moment, it is there. When the Light Burns in the House, the Darkness cannot enter. Thoughts are like Darkness; they enter only if there is no Light within. Awareness is fire. you Become more Aware, less and less Thoughts Enter.
If you become really integrated in your Awareness, Thoughts don't enter you. you have Become an Impenetrable Citadel, nothing can Penetrate you. Not that you are closed. Remember you are absolutely open, but just the very Energy of Awareness Becomes your Citadel. And when No Thoughts can enter you, they will come and they will bypass you. You will see them Coming, and simply, by the Time they Reach near you they Turn. Then you can Move Anywhere, then you Go to the very Hell Nothing can Affect you.
This is what we mean by Enlightenment.”
―
There is a Totally Different Quality of Being which Comes by not Thinking, Not good, Not bad, Simply a State of No-thinking. You simply Watch, you simply Remain Conscious, but you don´t Think, and if some Thought Enters, they will Enter, Because Thoughts are not Yours..They are just floating in the Air. All around there is a no sphere, a Thought-Sphere, all around. Just as there is Air, there is thought all around you, and it goes on Entering on its Own Accord. It Stops only when you become more and more aware. There is something in it. If you become more Aware, a Thought simply Disappears, it Melts, Because Awareness is a Greater Energy than Thought.
Awareness is like Fire to Thought. It is just like you Burn a Lamp in the House and the Darkness cannot enter, you put the Light off from Everywhere Darkness has entered, without taking a single Minute, a single Moment, it is there. When the Light Burns in the House, the Darkness cannot enter. Thoughts are like Darkness; they enter only if there is no Light within. Awareness is fire. you Become more Aware, less and less Thoughts Enter.
If you become really integrated in your Awareness, Thoughts don't enter you. you have Become an Impenetrable Citadel, nothing can Penetrate you. Not that you are closed. Remember you are absolutely open, but just the very Energy of Awareness Becomes your Citadel. And when No Thoughts can enter you, they will come and they will bypass you. You will see them Coming, and simply, by the Time they Reach near you they Turn. Then you can Move Anywhere, then you Go to the very Hell Nothing can Affect you.
This is what we mean by Enlightenment.”
―
38. THE WAY OF THE
Buddha is not a religion in the ordinary sense of the term, because it has no
belief system, no dogma, no scripture. It does not believe in God, it does not
believe in the soul, it does not believe in any paradise. It is a tremendous
unbelief—and yet it is a religion. It is unique. Nothing has ever happened like
it before in the history of human consciousness, and nothing afterward.”
39. You were born as a
no-mind. Let this sink into your heart as deeply as possible because through
that, a door opens. If you were born as a no-mind, then the mind is just a
social product. It is nothing natural, it is cultivated. It has been put
together on top of you. Deep down you are still free, you can get out of it.
One can never get out of nature, but one can get out of the artificial any
moment one decides to.”
40. People are more interested in how to
grab and get. Everybody is interested in getting and nobody seems to enjoy
giving. People give very reluctantly—if ever they give, they give only to get,
and they are almost businesslike. It is a bargain. They always go on watching
to make sure they get more than they give—then it is a good bargain, good
business. And the other is doing the same. Love is not a business, so stop
being businesslike. Otherwise you will miss your life and love and all that is
beautiful in it—because all that is beautiful is not at all businesslike.
Business is the ugliest thing in the world—a necessary evil, but existence
knows nothing of business. Trees bloom, it is not a business; the stars shine,
it is not a business and you don’t have to pay for it and nobody demands
anything from you. A bird comes and sits at your door and sings a song, and the
bird will not ask you for a certificate or some sign of appreciation. He has
sung the song and then happily he flies away, leaving no traces behind.”
41. “How to start the
journey? Start becoming more and more a witness. Whatever you do, do it with
deep alertness; then even small things become sacred. Then cooking or cleaning
become sacred; they become worship. It is not a question of what you are doing;
the question is how you are doing it. You can clean the floor like a robot, a
mechanical thing; you have to clean it, so you clean it. Then you miss
something beautiful. Then you waste those moments in only cleaning the floor.
Cleaning the floor could have been a great experience and you missed it. The
floor is clean now, but something that could have happened within you has not
happened. If you had been aware, not only the floor but you would have felt a
deep cleansing. Clean the floor full of awareness, luminous with awareness.
Work or sit or walk, but one thing has to be a continuous thread: make more and
more moments of your life luminous with awareness. Let the candle of awareness
burn in each moment, in each act. The cumulative effect is what enlightenment
is. The cumulative effect, all the moments together, all small candles
together, become a great source of light.”
42. Watch
the waves in the ocean. The higher the wave goes, the deeper is the wake that
follows it. One moment you are the wave, another moment you are the hollow wake
that follows. Enjoy both--don’t get addicted to one. Don’t say: I would always
like to be on the peak. It is not possible. Simply see the fact: it is not
possible. It has never happened and it will never happen. It is simply
impossible--not in the nature of things. Then what to do? Enjoy the peak while
it lasts and then enjoy the valley when it comes. What is wrong with the
valley? What is wrong with being low? It is a relaxation. A peak is an
excitement, and nobody can exist continuously in an excitement.
43. “All you want is to be happy. All your desires, whatever they may be,
are longing for happiness. Basically, you wish yourself well...desire by itself
is not wrong. It is life itself, the urge to grow in knowledge and experience.
It is choices you make that are wrong. To imagine that some little thing-food,
sex, power, fame-will make you happy is to decieve oneself. Only something as
vast and deep as your real self can make you truly and lastingly happy.”
44. If a child is afraid in the
dark, we say, "Don't be afraid, be brave." Why? The child is innocent-
naturally he feels fear in the dark. You force him: "Be brave." So he
also forces, then he becomes tense. Then he endures the darkness but now tense;
now, his whole being is ready to tremble and he suppresses it. This suppressed
trembling willfollow him now his whole life. It was good to tremble in the
darkness, nothing was wrong. It was good to cry and run, nothing was wrong. The
child would have come out of darkness more experienced, more knowing. And he
would have realized, if he passed through darkness trembling and crying and
weeping, that there was nothing to fear.
Suppressed,
you never experience the thing in its totality, `you never gain anything out of
it. Wisdom comes through suffering and wisdom comes through acceptance.
Whatsoever the case, be at ease with it.
45. What
is the secret- how to enjoy suffering? The first thing is: if you don't escape,
if you allow the suffering to be there, if you are ready to face it, if you are
not trying somehow to forget it, then you are different. Suffering is there but
just around you; it is not in the center, it is on the periphery. It is
impossible for suffering to be in the center; it is not in
the nature
of things. It is always on the periphery and you are the center. So when you allow
it to happen, when you don't escape, you don't run, you are not in a panic,
suddenly you become aware that suffering is there on the periphery, as if
happening to someone else, not to you, and you are looking at it. A subtle joy
spreads all over your being because you have realized one of the basic truths
of life: that you are bliss and not suffering.
46. Infinite
space exists between you and your body -- infinite space, I say. An
unbridgeable gap exists between you and your body. And all suffering exists on
the periphery. Hindus say it is a dream because the distance is so vast,
unbridgeable. It is just like a dream happening somewhere else -- not happening
to you -- in some other world, on some other planet.
When you
watch suffering suddenly you are not the sufferer, and you start enjoying. Through
suffering you become aware of the opposite pole, the blissful inner being. So when
I say enjoy, I am saying: Watch. Return to the source, get centered. Then,
suddenly, there is no agony; only ecstasy exists.
47. Life
is such a mystery, no one can understand it, and one who claims that he understands it is simply ignorant. He is not aware of what he is saying, of what nonsense he is talking.If you are wise, this will be the first realization:
life cannot be understood. Understanding is impossible. Only this much can be
understood -- that understanding is impossible.
48. Mind
is the illusion that which is not but appears, and appears so much that you
think that you are the mind. Mind is maya, mind is just a dream, mind is just a
projection... a soap bubble floating on a river. The sun is just rising, the
rays penetrate the bubble; a rainbow is created and nothing is there in it.
When you touch the bubble it is broken and everything disappears -- the
rainbow, the beauty- nothing is left. Only emptiness
becomes
one with the infinite emptiness. Just a wall was there, a bubble wall. Your
mind is just a bubble wall -- inside, your emptiness; outside, my emptiness. It
is just a bubble, prick it, and the mind disappears.
49. The
mind is not your reality; it is a false interpretation. You are not the mind,
you have
never been
a mind, you can never be the mind. That is your problem- you have become identified
with something which is not. You are like a beggar who believes that he has a kingdom.
He is so worried about the kingdom -- how to manage it, how to govern it, how to
prevent anarchy. There is no kingdom, but he is worried
50. The
mind can exist only if you continuously seek something. Why? It is because
seeking is desire, seeking is moving into the future, seeking creates dreams.
So somebody is seeking power, politics, somebody is seeking riches, kingdoms,
and then somebody is seeking the truth. But seeking is there and seeking is the
problem, not what you are seeking. The object is never the problem, any object
will do. The mind can hang on to any object, any excuse is enough for it to
exist.
51. Somebody
was asking me, "You go on talking every day?" I said, "Because
there is nothing to be taught." Some day you will suddenly feel it -- that
I am not talking, that I am not teaching. You have realized there is nothing to
be taught because there is no truth.
What
discipline am I giving to you? None. A disciplined mind is again a mind, even
more stubborn, more adamant; a disciplined mind is more stupid. Go and see the
disciplined monks all over the world Christian, Hindu, Jain. Whenever you see a
man who is absolutely disciplined you will find a stupid mind behind it. The
flowing has stopped. He is so much concerned with finding something that he is
ready to do whatsoever you say.
If you
say, "Stand on your head for an hour," he is ready to stand on his
head. It is because of desire. If God can be achieved only through standing on
his head for hours, he is ready, but he must achieve.
I am not
giving you any achieving, any desiring; there is nowhere to reach and nothing
to achieve. If you realize this you have achieved this very moment. This very
moment, you are perfect; nothing is to be done, nothing is to be changed. This
very moment, you are absolute Brahma.
52. You
are the inquirer. You have come to me to inquire about how to achieve truth,
you have come to me to inquire about how to achieve a state of mind which is
blissful. You have come to acquire knowledge, to solve the mystery, and I
repeat to you: There is no state of mind, because there is no mind; there is no
truth, so no seeking is allowed. All seeking is futile; search as such is
foolish. Seek and you will lose, don't seek and it is there, run and you will
miss. Stop: it has always been there. And don't try to understand- be.
Understanding is superficial. Under the Bodhi tree, Buddha has not known more.
You may know more.
Unlearn.
Drop knowledge, and that which is more will happen to you.
A real
master teaches you unlearning; it is never learning. You have come to me to unlearn
whatsoever you know, never learning. You have come to me learned, so whatsoever
you know, please drop it. Become ignorant, become like a child. Only the heart
of a child can knock at the doors of the divine, and only the heart of a child
is heard. Your prayers cannot be heard; they are cunning. Only a child, only a
heart which doesn't know can be.
53. And
only if this happens, that through meditation vegetarian food comes into you
not through mind manipulation, it is good.But manipulating by the mind,
argument, reasoning that vegetarian food is good, that it will help you to gain
spirituality, is not going to help anything. Your clothes, your food, your
habits of life, your style, everything will change; but this change is not
basic. The basic change is going to be in you and then everything else follows.
If you meditate long enough, deep
enough, it is impossible for you to hurt anybody for food; it is impossible. It
is not a question of argument, it is not a question of scriptures, it is not
who says what, it is not a question of calculating that if you take vegetarian
food you will become spiritual; it is automatic. It is not a question of
cunningness, you simply become spiritual. The whole thing seems so absurd. Just
for food, killing animals, birds, seems so
absurd, it falls down. Your clothes change automatically; by and by you like
looser and looser clothes. The more relaxed you are inside -- loose clothes.
Automatically I say; there will be no decision on your part. By and by, if you
use tight clothes you will feel uneasy. Tight clothes belong to a tense mind,
loose clothes belong to a relaxed mind. But the inner change is the first thing
and everything else is just a consequence. If you reverse
the order you will miss then you will become a food addict.
It is the
other way round: food cannot make you spiritual, but if you are spiritual your food
habits will change.
Eating
anything will not make much difference. You can be a vegetarian and cruel to
the extreme, and violent; you can be a non-vegetarian and kind and loving. Food
will not make much difference.
54. What
you eat makes no difference; what you are is a totally different phenomenon.
And when that changes, everything will change; but that change will not be from
the mind, it will be from the innermost being. Then things will change
automatically. Sex will disappear by and by. So I don't say be a brahamachari,
be a celibate. That is foolish, because if you force celibacy you will become
more and more sexual in the mind and your whole mind will become ugly and
dirty; you will think only of sex and nothing else. That is not the way. you
will go crazy and insane. Freud says that ninety percent of madmen are mad
because of repressed sexuality. I don't say change sex, I don't say change
food; I say change your being and then things will start changing.
Why is so
much sex needed? Because you are tense, sex becomes a release. Your tensions
are released through it -- you feel relaxed, you can go to sleep; if you
repress it, you remain tense. And if you repress sex -- the only release, the
only possibility of release -- what will happen? You will go mad. Where will
you release your tensions then?
55. Change
yourself and food will change, clothes will change, sex will change. But change
should come from the innermost core, it should not come from the periphery. And
all turmoil is on the periphery; deep down there is no turmoil. You are just
like the sea – go and watch the sea. All the turmoil, all the waves clashing,
is just on the surface; deep, the deeper you go, there is more and more calm.
At the deepest part in the sea there is no turmoil, not a single wave.
56. First
go deeper into your sea so you achieve a calm crystallization, so you achieve
the point where no disturbance ever reaches. Stand there. From there every
change comes, every transformation comes. Once you are there you have become a
master; Now whatsoever is unnecessary can be dropped, and can be dropped
without any struggle and fight.
Whenever
you drop something by fight, it is never dropped. You can drop smoking by fighting,
and then you will start doing something else which will become a substitute. You
may start chewing gum, it is the same; You may start chewing pan, it is the
same, there is no difference. You need something to do with your mouth --
smoking, chewing, anything. When your mouth goes on working, you feel at ease
because through the mouth tensions are released. So whenever a man feels tense
he starts smoking. Why is it that through
smoking or chewing gum or tobacco tensions are released?
56. Just
look at a small child. Whenever he feels tense he will put his hand in his
mouth, he will start chewing his own hand. This is his substitute for smoking.
And why does he feel good when his thumb is in his mouth? Why does the child
feel good and go to sleep? This is the way of almost all children. Whenever
they feel sleep is not coming they will put the
thumb
inside the mouth, feel at ease, and fall asleep. Why? The thumb becomes a substitute
for the mother's breast, and food is relaxing. You cannot go to sleep on a hungry
stomach, it is difficult to get sleep. When the stomach is full you feel
sleepy, the body needs rest. So whenever the child takes the breast in his
mouth, food is flowing, warmth, love. He is relaxed, he need not worry;
tensions are relaxed. The thumb is just a substitute for the breast; it is not
giving milk, it is a false thing, but still it gives the feeling.
When this
child grows, if he takes his thumb in public you will think he is foolish, so
he takes a cigarette. A cigarette is not foolish, it is accepted. It is just
the thumb, and more harmful than the thumb. It is better if you smoke your
thumb, go on smoking to your grave; it is not harmful, it is better. No harm is
done but then people think you arechildish, juvenile, then people think what
you are doing is stupid. But there is a need so it
has to be
substituted.
And in
countries where breast-feeding has stopped, more smoking will automatically be there.
That's why the West smokes more than the East -- because no mother is ready to give
her breast to the child because the shape is lost. So in the West smoking is
increasing more and more; even small children are smoking.
