Namaste... MudLotusFragance

Actions are clouds, doings are clouds: the being is like the sky

The first sutra:

AS A CLOUD THAT RISES FROM THE SEA

ABSORBING RAIN, THE EARTH EMBRACES,

SO, LIKE THE SKY, THE SEA REMAINS

WITHOUT INCREASING OR DECREASING.

AS A CLOUD THAT RISES FROM THE SEA

ABSORBING RAIN, THE EARTH EMBRACES,

SO, LIKE THE SKY, THE SEA REMAINS

WITHOUT INCREASING OR DECREASING.

HE IS SAYING to the king: Look at the sky. There are two Phenomena -- the sky and the cloud. The cloud comes and goes. The sky never comes and never goes. The cloud is there sometimes, and sometimes it is not there -- it is a time phenomenon, it is momentary. The sky is always there -- it is a timeless phenomenon, it is eternity. The clouds cannot corrupt it, not even the black clouds can corrupt it. There is no possibility of corrupting it. Its purity is absolute, its purity is untouchable. Its purity is always virgin -- you cannot violate it. Clouds can come and go, and they have been coming and going, but the sky is as pure as ever, not even a trace is left behind.

So there are two things in existence: something is like the sky and something is like the cloud. Your actions are like the cloud -- they come and go. You? -- you are like the sky: you never come and you never go. Your birth, your death, are like the clouds -- they happen. You? -- you never happen; you are always there.


Things happen in you: you never happen.


Things happen just like clouds happen in the sky. You are a silent watcher of the whole play of clouds. Sometimes they are white and beautiful and sometimes they are dark and dismal and very ugly; sometimes they are full of rain and sometimes they are just empty. Sometimes they do great benefit to the earth, sometimes great harm. Sometimes they bring floods and destruction, and sometimes they bring life, more greenery, more crops. BUT the sky remains all the time the same good or bad, divine or devilish, the clouds don't corrupt it.


Actions are clouds, doings are clouds: the being is like the sky.


Saraha is saying: Look at my sky! Don't look at my actions. It needs a shift of awareness -- nothing else, just a shift of awareness. It needs a change of gestalt. You are looking at the cloud, you are focussed on the cloud, you have forgotten the sky. Then suddenly you remember the sky. You unfocus on the cloud, you focus on the sky then the cloud is irrelevant, then you are in a totally different dimension.


Just the shift of focussing... and the world is different. When you watch a person's behavior, you are focussing on the cloud. When you watch the innermost purity of his being, you are watching his sky. If you watch the innermost purity, then you will never see anybody evil, then the whole existence is holy.

The Tantra Vision, Vol 1 Chapter #3 Chapter title: This honey is yours

This honey is yours - only one sky

AS A CLOUD THAT RISES FROM THE SEA
ABSORBING RAIN, THE EARTH EMBRACES,

SO, LIKE THE SKY, THE SEA REMAINS

WITHOUT INCREASING OR DECREASING.

SO FROM SPONTANEITY THAT'S UNIQUE,

REPLETE WITH THE BUDDHA'S PERFECTIONS,

ARE ALL SENTIENT BEINGS BORN, AND IN IT COME

TO REST. BUT IT IS NEITHER CONCRETE NOR ABSTRACT.

THEY WALK OTHER PATHS AND SO FORSAKE TRUE BLISS,

SEEKING THE DELIGHTS THAT STIMULANTS PRODUCE.

THE HONEY IN THEIR MOUTHS, AND TO THEM SO NEAR,

WILL VANISH IF AT ONCE THEY DO NOT DRINK IT.

BEASTS DO NOT UNDERSTAND THE WORLD

TO BE A SORRY PLACE. NOT SO THE WISE

WHO THE HEAVENLY NECTAR DRINK

WHILE BEASTS HUNGER FOR THE SENSUAL.

EVERYTHING CHANGES... and Heraclitus is right: you cannot step in  the same river twice. The river is changing, so are you changing too. It is all movement. It is all flux. Everything is impermanent, momentary. Only for a moment it is there, and then gone... and you will never find it again. There is no way to find it again. Once gone it is gone for ever. And nothing changes -- that too is true. Nothing ever changes. All is always the same. Parmeneides is also right; he says: There is nothing new under the sun. How can there be? The sun is old, so is everything. If you ask

Parmeneides, he will say you can step in any river you want -- but you will be stepping in the same river always. Whether it is the Ganges or the Thames does not make any difference. THE WATER IS THE SAME! It is all H20.

And whether you step in the river today or tomorrow, or after millions of years, it will be the same river. And how can you be different? You were a child; you remember it. Then you were a young man; you remember that too. Then you became old; that too you remember. Who is this one who goes on remembering? There must be a non-changing element in you -- unchanging, permanent, absolutely permanent. Childhood comes and goes; so comes youth and is gone, so old age -- but

something remains eternally the same.

Now, let me say to you: Heraclitus and Parmeneides, both are right -- in fact, they both are right together. If Heraclitus is right, it is only half the truth; if Parmeneides is right, that too is only half the truth. And half the truth is not the true thing. They are stating half-truths. The wheel moves and the hub does not move. Parmeneides talks about the hub, Heraclitus talks about the wheel --

but the wheel cannot exist without the hub! And what use is a hub without the wheel? So those two contradictory looking half-truths are not contradictory but complementary. Heraclitus and Parmeneides are not enemies but friends. The other can stand only if the complementary truth is there -- otherwise not.

Meditate on the silent centre of a cyclone....

But the moment you state something, it can at the most be only half the truth. No statement can cover the whole truth. If any statement wants to cover the whole truth, then the statement will have to be of necessity self-contradictory, then it will have to be of necessity illogical. Then the statement will look crazy.

Mahavir did that -- he is the craziest man because he tried to state the whole truth and nothing but the whole truth. He drives you crazy, because each statement is immediately followed by its contradiction. He developed a sevenfold pattern of statements. One is followed by its contradiction, that is followed by its contradiction... so on and so forth. He goes on contradicting

seven times, and only when he has said seven times, seven different things contradictory to each other, then he says now the truth is told perfectly -- but then you don't know what he has said.

If you ask him: "God is?" he will say, "Yes," and he will say, "No," and he will say, "Both," and he will say, "Both not," and so on and so forth he goes.... Finally you don't come to any conclusion; you cannot conclude. He does not give you any chance to conclude. He leaves you hanging in the air.

This is one possibility if you are insistent on saying the truth.

The other possibility is that of Buddha -- he keeps silent, knowing that whatsoever you say will be only half. And half is dangerous. He does not say anything about ultimate truths. He will not say the world is a flux, and he will not say that the world is permanent. He will not say that you are, and he will not say that you are not. The moment you ask anything about the absolute truth, he prohibits. He says, "Please don't ask, because by your question you will put me into trouble. Either I have to be contradictory, which is going crazy; or I have to utter a half-truth, which is not truth and dangerous; or I have to keep quiet." These are the three possibilities: Buddha has chosen to

keep silent.

This is the first thing to be understood about today's sutras, then with this context it will be easy to understand what Saraha is saying.

Osho The Tantra Vision, Vol 1, Chapter #3 Chapter title: This honey is yours

Without thinking...

Enter this moment

Philosophy is not darshan. Darshan is the eastern term. Darshan means perception, philosophy means thinking. Herman Hesse has coined a new word to translate darshan into western languages. He calls it `philosia' -- `sia' from `to see'.

Philosophy means to think, and darshan means to see. Both are basically different; not only different, but diametrically opposite. Because when you are thinking you cannot see. You are so filled with thoughts that perception is blurred, perception is clouded. When thinking ceases, you become capable of seeing. Then your eyes are opened, they become unclouded. Perception happens only when thinking ceases.

For Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, and the whole western tradition, thinking is the base. For Kanad, Kapil, Patanjali, Buddha, and the whole eastern tradition, seeing is the base. So Buddha is not a philosopher, not at all; neither is Patanjali, nor Kapil or Kanad. They are not philosophers.

They have seen the truth; they have not thought about it.

Remember well that you only think when you cannot see. If you can see, there is no reason to think.

Thinking is always in ignorance. Thinking is not knowledge, because when you know, there is no need to think. When you don't know, you will the gap by thinking. Thinking is groping in the dark.

So eastern philosophies are not philosophies. To use the word philosophy for eastern darshan is absolutely wrong. Darshan means to see, to attain the eye, to realize, to know -- immediately, directly, without the mediation of thinking and thought.

Thinking can never lead to the unknown. How can it lead? It is impossible. The very process of thinking has to be understood. When you think, what do you really do? You go on repeating old thoughts, memories. If I ask you a question -- does God exist? -- you can think about it. What will you do? All that you have heard, all that you have read, all that you have accumulated about God, you will repeat. Even if you come to a new conclusion, the newness of it will only be apparent, not real. It will be simply a combination of old thoughts. You can combine many old thoughts and create a new structure, but that structure will be apparently new, not new at all.

Thinking can never come to any original truth. Thinking is never original; it cannot be. It is always of the past, of the old, of the known. Thinking cannot touch the unknown; it is repetitively moving in the circle of the known. You don't know truth, you don't know God. What can you do? You can think about it. You will move in circles, around and around. You can never come to any experience of it.

So the eastern emphasis is not on thinking, but on seeing. You cannot think about God, but you can see. You cannot come to any conclusion about God, but you can realize. It can become an experience.

You cannot get to it through information, through knowledge, through scriptures,
through theories and philosophies; no, you cannot get to it. You can get into it only if you throw all knowledge. All that you have heard and read and collected, all the dust that your mind has collected, the whole past, must be put aside.

Then your eyes are fresh, then your consciousness is unclouded, and then you can see it.

It is here and now -- you are clouded. You have not to go somewhere else to find the divine or the truth -- it is here. It is right there where you are. And it has always been so -- only you are clouded, your eyes are closed.

So the question is not to think more; the question is how to come to a nonthinking
consciousness.

That's why I say that meditation and philosophy are anti each other.
Philosophy thinks, meditation comes to a no-thinking consciousness. And eastern philosophies are not really philosophies. In the West, philosophies exist; in the East, only religious realizations.

Of course, when a Buddha happens, or a Kanad or a Patanjali happens, when someone comes to realize the absolute, he makes statements about it. Those statements are different from the Aristotel an statements, from western philosophical conclusions.

The difference is this: a Kanad, a Buddha, first comes to realize -- the realization is the first thing -- and then he makes statements about it.

Experience is primary, and then he expresses it.

Aristotle, Hegel and Kant, they think, and then through thinking and logical argument and dialectics, they reach particular conclusions. These conclusions are reached through thinking, through mind, not through any practice of meditation.

Then they make assertions, then they make statements. The source is different.

For a Buddha, his statements are only as a vehicle to communicate. He never says that through his communication you will achieve the truth. If you can understand Buddha, that doesn't mean you have achieved the truth; that simply means you have gathered knowledge.

You will have to pass through meditations, deep ecstasies, deep pools of the mind, only then will you come to the truth.

So truth is reached through a certain existential experience. It is existential, it is not mental. You must change to know it and to be it. If you remain the same and go on collecting information, you will become a great scholar, a philosopher, but you will not be enlightened. You will remain the same man; there will have been no mutation.

That's why I said that philosophy is one dimension Meditation is quite the contrary, the very opposite, the polar-opposite dimension.

So don't think about life; rather, live it in depth. And don't think about ultimate problems; rather, enter this very moment in the ultimate.

And the ultimate is not in the future. It is always there, timelessly there.

Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, Vol 2 - Chapter #12 - Chapter title: Enter this moment

Bodhidharma's Breakthrough Sermon

Bodhidharma: The Greatest Zen Master
Chapter #15
Chapter title: Breakthrough... to buddhahood
12 July 1987 am in Gautam the Buddha Auditorium
Pag. 196


BODHIDHARMA'S BREAKTHROUGH SERMON.

IF SOMEONE IS DETERMINED TO REACH ENLIGHTENMENT, WHAT IS THE MOST ESSENTIAL METHOD HE CAN PRACTICE?
THE MOST ESSENTIAL METHOD, WHICH INCLUDES ALL OTHER METHODS, IS BEHOLDING THE MIND.

BUT HOW CAN ONE METHOD INCLUDE ALL OTHERS?

THE MIND IS THE ROOT FROM WHICH ALL THINGS GROW. IF YOU CAN UNDERSTAND THE MIND, EVERYTHING ELSE IS INCLUDED. IT'S LIKE WITH A TREE. ALL OF ITS FRUIT AND FLOWERS, ITS BRANCHES AND LEAVES, DEPEND ON ITS ROOT. IF YOU NOURISH ITS ROOT, A TREE MULTIPLIES. IF YOU CUT ITS ROOT, IT DIES.

THOSE WHO UNDERSTAND THE MIND REACH ENLIGHTENMENT WITH MINIMAL EFFORT. THOSE WHO DON'T UNDERSTAND THE MIND PRACTICE IN VAIN. EVERYTHING GOOD AND BAD COMES FROM YOUR OWN MIND. TO FIND SOMETHING
BEYOND THE MIND IS IMPOSSIBLE. BUT HOW CAN BEHOLDING THE MIND BE CALLED UNDERSTANDING? WHEN A GREAT BODHISATTVA DELVES DEEPLY INTO PERFECT WISDOM, HE REALIZES ...THE ACTIVITY OF HIS MIND HAS TWO ASPECTS: PURE AND IMPURE ...

THE PURE MIND DELIGHTING IN GOOD DEEDS, THE IMPURE MIND THINKING OF EVIL. THOSE WHO AREN'T AFFECTED BY IMPURITY ARE SAGES. THEY TRANSCEND SUFFERING AND EXPERIENCE THE BLISS OF NIRVANA. ALL OTHERS, TRAPPED BY
THE IMPURE MIND AND ENTANGLED BY THEIR OWN KARMA, ARE MORTALS. THEY DRIFT THROUGH THE THREE REALMS AND SUFFER COUNTLESS AFFLICTIONS. AND ALL BECAUSE THEIR IMPURE MIND OBSCURES THEIR REAL SELF.

THE SUTRA OF THE TEN STAGES SAYS, "IN THE BODY OF MORTALS IS THE INDESTRUCTIBLE BUDDHA-NATURE. LIKE THE SUN, ITS LIGHT FILLS ENDLESS SPACE. BUT ONCE VEILED BY THE DARK CLOUDS OF THE FIVE SHADES, IT'S LIKE A LIGHT INSIDE A JAR, HIDDEN FROM VIEW." AND THE NIRVANA SUTRA SAYS, "ALL MORTALS HAVE THE BUDDHANATURE. BUT IT'S COVERED BY DARKNESS FROM WHICH THEY CAN'T ESCAPE.

OUR BUDDHA-NATURE IS AWARENESS: TO BE AWARE AND TO MAKE OTHERS AWARE. TO REALIZE AWARENESS IS LIBERATION." EVERYTHING GOOD HAS AWARENESS FOR ITS ROOT. FROM THIS ROOT OF AWARENESS GROW THE TREE OF ALL VIRTUES AND THE FRUIT OF NIRVANA.

Pag. 196

Bodhidharma's Bloodstream Sermon

Bodhidharma: The Greatest Zen Master
Chapter #2
Chapter title: A pilgrimage to your own being
5 July 1987 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Pag. 17

BODHIDHARMA'S BLOODSTREAM SERMON

EVERYTHING THAT APPEARS IN THE THREE REALMS LEADS BACK TO THE MIND. HENCE, BUDDHAS OF THE PAST AND FUTURE TEACH MIND TO MIND WITHOUT BOTHERING ABOUT DEFINITIONS. BUT IF THEY DON'T DEFINE IT, WHAT DO THEY MEAN BY MIND? YOU ASK. THAT'S YOUR MIND. I ANSWER. THAT'S MY MIND. IF I HAD NO MIND, HOW COULD I ANSWER? IF YOU HAD NO MIND, HOW COULD YOU ASK? THAT WHICH ASKS IS YOUR MIND. "THROUGH ENDLESS KALPAS WITHOUT

BEGINNING, WHATEVER YOU DO, WHEREVER YOU ARE, THAT'S YOUR REAL MIND, THAT'S YOUR REAL BUDDHA. THIS MIND IS THE BUDDHA, SAYS THE SAME THING. BEYOND THIS MIND YOU'LL NEVER FIND ANOTHER BUDDHA. TO SEARCH FOR ENLIGHTENMENT OR NIRVANA BEYOND THIS MIND IS IMPOSSIBLE. THE REALITY OF YOUR OWN SELF-NATURE, THE ABSENCE OF CAUSE AND EFFECT, IS WHAT'S MEANT BY MIND. YOUR MIND IS NIRVANA. YOU MIGHT THINK YOU CAN FIND A BUDDHA OR ENLIGHTENMENT SOMEWHERE BEYOND THE MIND, BUT SUCH A PLACE DOESN'T EXIST. TRYING TO FIND A BUDDHA OR ENLIGHTENMENT IS LIKE TRYING TO GRAB SPACE. SPACE HAS A NAME BUT NO FORM. IT'S NOT SOMETHING YOU CAN PICK UP OR PUT DOWN. AND YOU CERTAINLY CAN'T GRAB IT. BEYOND THIS MIND, YOU'LL NEVER SEE A BUDDHA. THE BUDDHA IS A PRODUCT OF YOUR MIND. WHY LOOK FOR A BUDDHA BEYOND THIS MIND?

BUDDHAS OF THE PAST AND FUTURE ONLY TALK ABOUT THIS MIND. THE MIND IS THE BUDDHA. AND THE BUDDHA IS THE MIND. BEYOND THE MIND THERE'S NO BUDDHA. AND BEYOND THE BUDDHA THERE'S NO MIND. IF YOU THINK THERE'S A BUDDHA BEYOND THE MIND, WHERE IS HE? THERE'S NO BUDDHA BEYOND THE MIND, SO WHY ENVISION ONE? YOU CAN'T KNOW YOUR REAL MIND AS LONG AS YOU DECEIVE YOURSELF. AS LONG AS YOU'RE ENTHRALLED BY A LIFELESS FORM, YOU'RE NOT FREE. IF YOU DON'T BELIEVE ME, DECEIVING YOURSELF DOESN'T HELP. IT'S NOT THE BUDDHA'S FAULT. PEOPLE, THOUGH, ARE DELUDED. THEY'RE UNAWARE THAT THEIR OWN MIND IS THE BUDDHA. OTHERWISE, THEY WOULDN'T LOOK FOR A BUDDHA OUTSIDE THE MIND.

BUDDHAS DON'T SAVE BUDDHAS. IF YOU USE YOUR MIND TO LOOK FOR A BUDDHA, YOU WON'T SEE THE BUDDHA. AS LONG AS YOU LOOK FOR A BUDDHA SOMEWHERE ELSE, YOU'LL NEVER SEE THAT YOUR OWN MIND IS THE BUDDHA. AND DON'T USE A BUDDHA TO WORSHIP A BUDDHA. AND DON'T USE THE MIND TO INVOKE A BUDDHA. BUDDHAS DON'T RECITE SUTRAS. BUDDHAS DON'T KEEP PRECEPTS. AND BUDDHAS DON'T BREAK PRECEPTS. BUDDHAS DON'T KEEP OR BREAK ANYTHING. BUDDHAS DON'T DO GOOD OR EVIL. TO FIND A BUDDHA, YOU HAVE TO SEE YOUR NATURE. WHOEVER SEES HIS NATURE IS A BUDDHA. IF YOU DON'T SEE YOUR NATURE, INVOKING BUDDHAS, RECITING SUTRAS, MAKING OFFERINGS AND KEEPING PRECEPTS ARE ALL USELESS. INVOKING BUDDHAS RESULTS IN GOOD KARMA. RECITING SUTRAS RESULTS IN A GOOD MEMORY. KEEPING PRECEPTS RESULTS IN A GOOD REBIRTH. AND MAKING OFFERINGS RESULTS IN FUTURE BLESSINGS. BUT NO BUDDHA.

Pag. 17

Without him... without you

Osho...

This is my observation:

that you cannot find a single human being on the whole of the earth who has not had some moments of reality. In spite of yourself, sometimes the glimpse comes to you, because it is not only you who is seeking reality -- the reality is also seeking you. It is not only that you need God: God is in tremendous need of man. You cannot be without Him; He cannot be without you.

You can forget Him, but He cannot ever forget you. You may be standing with your back towards Him, but He goes on trying to reach you. Your hands may be very small; His hands are not small. He can reach you wherever you are, even in the seventh hell. And He goes on groping for you, remember this.
That's why many times -- not because of you, in spite of you -- a glimpse happens.

But you cannot recognize it. Many people have religious experiences but they cannot recognize them as religious. Sometimes they are aesthetic experiences. No true aesthetic experience can be other than religious.

When you see a beautiful face of a man or a woman or a child, if really you are struck by the beauty, the experience is not only aesthetic; it is religious. In that moment of beauty, God has looked at you through that face; God has revealed himself to you through that face. Through those eyes, the depth of existence has tried to communicate with the depth of your being. Depth has talked to depth, there has been a dialogue. It has not only been aesthetic.

Suddenly one morning you are light and graceful. You are fresh and unburdened. The past is no more haunting you and the future has not yet started. You look at the sky, a vast emptiness, and everything stops within you. You also become a vast emptiness. It is not just an aesthetic experience; it is religious.

Beauty is truth... and truth is beautiful!

Sometimes you hear music and the mind stops. The music surrounds you, you are drowned in it. You are no more there.

Just a transparent presence: the music goes through and through. In that moment, it is not only music that is happening; it is religion. But you don't recognize it.

You think religion happens only in the church, where dead priests go on beating around the bush? In fact, the church is the last place for religion to happen. It is a graveyard; God is not alive there. A church is full of dead gods. They were alive once, somewhere in the past. They are just histories now.

When Jesus walked on earth, around him religious experiences were happening. But now Jesus is a dead myth. He's worshipped in churches, preached about and about, but he's not there.

The church, the temple, is the last place for religion to happen, for God to penetrate you. He comes to you in more alive ways. He comes through the wife, through the child, through the husband, through the friend. Sometimes, even through the enemy.

Flowers and ocean and sand and the mountains and the stars and the birds: He comes in a thousand and one ways, but always alive.

He's life; you can forget the name'God'. The word has become very dirty -- drop it!

Just call Him life, that will do; call Him existence or being, that will do. If truth seems too harsh, call Him love, that will do. If truth has been too much monopolized by philosophers, drop it.

Love is perfectly beautiful.

Wherever you have had any poetic experience, wherever your heart has become a.small poem -- something throbbed within you, something unknown -- there is religion.

Recognition may take time. Sometimes for lives you may not be able to recognize.

And when you recognize you will simply laugh, you will go mad with Laughter, because in that recognition many other things which were left unrecognized will also be recognized... without

Last question...

The last question:

I CERTAINLY WANT TO BECOME ENLIGHTENED. BUT IF I DO, WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT
MAKE FOR THE REST OF THE WORLD?

But why are you worried about the rest of the world? Let the world worry about itself. And you are not worried about what will happen to the rest of the world if you remain ignorant....

If you are ignorant, what happens to the rest of the world? You create misery. Not that you knowingly do it, you are misery -- so whatsoever you do, you sow seeds of misery all around. Your hopes are meaningless; your being is significant. You may think you are helping others -- you hinder them. You may think you love others -- you may be simply killing them and murdering them. You may think you are teaching others, but you may be simply helping them to remain ignorant forever -- because what you hope, what you think, what you wish, is not significant. What you are is
significant.

Every day I see people around who are loving to each other -- but they are killing each other. They think they are loving, and they think they are living for the other, and without them the life of their family, their beloveds, their children, their wives, their husbands, will be miserable -- but it is miserable with them. And they try in every way but whatsoever they do, it goes wrong. It is bound to be so, because they are wrong. Doing is not of much importance, the being from where it comes, originates, is. If you are ignorant, you are helping the world to become a hell. It is already. This is what has happened through you. Wherever you touch, you will create hell.

If you become enlightened, whatsoever you do -- or you need not do anything -- just your being, your presence will help others to flower, to be happy, to be blissful.

But that should not be your concern. The first thing is how to be enlightened. You ask me, "I want to be enlightened." But” that wanting seems to be very impotent because immediately you say "but". Whenever "but" comes in, it shows the desire is impotent. "But what will happen to the world?" Who are you? What do you think about yourself? Does the world depend on you? Are you running it? Managing it? Are you responsible? Why give so much importance to yourself? Why feel so important?

This feeling is part of the ego and this worrying about others will never allow you to move to a peak of realization, because that peak is achieved only when you drop all worries. And you are so efficient in accumulating worries that you are simply wonderful. Not only your own, you go on accumulating others' worries -- as if yours are not enough. You go on thinking about others, and what can you do? You can only get more and more worried and mad.

I was reading a viceroy's journal. Lord Wavell's journal. The man seems to be very sincere, deeply honest, because some remarks he makes are just superb. One remark he makes in a journal is, "Unless these three old men, Gandhi, Jinnah, and Churchill, die, India will be in trouble." These three men, Gandhi,Jinnah, Churchill -- and these three were helping in every way! Churchill's own viceroy writes in a journal that these three men should die soon. And he hopefully even gives their ages: Gandhi, 75,Jinnah, 65, Churchill, 68. Because these three are the problems. Can you think of Gandhi imagining that he is the problem -- or Jinnah, or Churchill? All are doing their best to solve the problem of this country! And Wavell said that these three are the problem, because all the three are adamant, stubborn; every one of these three has the absolute truth and the other two are absolutely wrong. These three absolutes cannot meet anywhere -- the other two are simply wrong. There is no question about it.

Everyone thinks as if he is the center and he has to worry about the whole world, and change the whole world, transform the whole world, create a utopia. All that you can do is just change yourself. You cannot change the world. You can create more mischief trying to change it; you can create more chaos; you can harm; and you can puzzle. Already the world is too puzzled. You can puzzle it more and confuse it more.

Please leave the world to itself. You can do only one thing, and that is, you can achieve inner silence, inner bliss, inner light. If you achieve this, you have helped the world very much. Just by changing one ignorant spot into an enlightened flame, just by changing one person from darkness into light, you have changed apart of the world. And this changed part will have its own chain reactions. Buddha is not dead. Jesus is not dead. They cannot be dead because there is a chain reaction -- from one lamp, from one flame, another flame takes over. And a successor is created,
and they go on living.

But if your light is not there, if your lamp is without a flame, you cannot help anyone. The first basic thing is that you must attain your inner flame. Then others can share. Then you can kindle others' light also. Then it becomes a succession. Then you may disappear from the body but your flame goes on passing from hand to hand. Up to eternity it goes on and on. Buddhas never die, enlightened persons never die, because their light becomes a chain reaction. And unenlightened persons never live, because they cannot create any chain, they don't have any light to share, no
flame to kindle someone else's flame.

Please be concerned with yourself only. Be selfish, I say, because that is the only way you will become selfless, that is the only way you can become a help and a blessing to the world. Don't be worried about it; that is not your concern. The greater your worries are, the greater you think your responsibilities are. And the greater your responsibilities, the more you feel yourself as being great. You are not. You are simply mad. Get out of this madness of helping others. Just help yourself. That's all that can be done.

And then many things happen... but they happen as a consequence. Once you become a source of light, things start happening. Many will share it, man will be enlightened through it, many will attain life, more life, abundant life through it. But don't think about it. You cannot do anything about it consciously. Only one thing can be done and that is: you can become conscious. Then everything follows.

Jesus says somewhere, "Enter into the kingdom of God first. Seek ye first the kingdom of God, then all else shall be added unto you."

I repeat the same.

You can be silent... that you can laugh

When you seek a result, it is the mind; when you don't seek a result, it is meditation. Kick the pot and walk out, meditate and walk out; don't ask for the result. Don't say, "What will happen?" If you think about what will happen you cannot meditate. The mind goes on thinking about the result; it cannot be here and now, it is always in the future. You are meditating and thinking, "When will the happiness come? It has not come yet."

If you forget the result completely, if there is not even a flicker in the mind for the result, not a single vibration moving into the future - when you have become a silent pool, here and now everything happens. In meditation cause and effect are not two -.cause is the effect; the act and the result are not two - the act is the result - they are not divided. In meditation the seed and the tree are not two -, the seed is the tree.

For the mind everything is divided: the seed and the tree are two, the act and the result are two. The result is always in the future and the act is here, you act because of the future. For the mind the present is always sacrificed for the future, and the future does not exist. There is always the present, the eternal now, and you are sacrificing this now for something which is nowhere and cannot be anywhere.

That's what I mean when I tell you to meditate. Meditation is just a situation; silence is not going to be the consequence of it. No, meditation is just creating the soil, the surrounding, preparing the ground. The seed is there, it is always there; you need not put in the seed, the seed has always been with you.
That seed is Brahma; that seed is atma. -- that seed is you. Just create the situation and the seed will become alive. It will sprout and a plant will be born, and you will start growing.

Meditation doesn't lead you to silence; meditation only creates the situation in which the silence happens. And this should be the criterion -- that whenever silence happens laughter will come into your life. A vital celebration will happen all around. You will not become sad, you will not become depressed, you will not escape from the world. You will be here in this world, but taking the whole thing as a game, enjoying the whole thing as a beautiful game, a big drama, no longer serious about it.
Seriousness is a disease.

Buddha must have known Mahakashyap. He must have known when he was looking at the flower silently and everybody was restless, he must have known only one being was there, Mahakashyap, who was not restless. Buddha must have felt the silence coming from Mahakashyap, but he would not call. When he laughed, then he called him and gave him the flower. Why? Silence is only the half of it. Mahakashyap would have missed if he had been innocently silent and didn't laugh. Then the key would not have been given to him. He was only half grown, not yet a fully grown tree, not blossoming. The tree was there, but flowers had not yet come. Buddha waited.

Now, I will tell you why Buddha waited for so many minutes, why for one or two or three hours he waited. Mahakashyap was silent but he was trying to contain laughter, he was trying to control laughter. He was trying not to laugh because it would be so unmannerly: What would Buddha think? What would the others think? But then, the story says, he couldn't contain himself any more. It had to come out as a laugh. The flood became too much, and he couldn't contain it any more. When silence is too much it becomes laughter; it becomes so over flooded that it starts overflowing in all directions. He laughed. It must have been a mad laughter, and in that laughter there was no Mahakashyap. Silence was laughing, silence had come to a blossoming.

Then immediately Buddha called Mahakashyap: "Take this flower -- this is the key. I have given to all others what can be given in words, but to you I give that which cannot be given in words. The message beyond words, the most essential, I give to you." Buddha waited for those hours so that Mahakashyap's silence became over flooded, it became laughter.

Your enlightenment is perfect only when silence has come to be a celebration. Hence my insistence that after you meditate you must celebrate. After you have been silent you must enjoy it, you must have a thanksgiving. A deep gratitude must be shown towards the whole just for the opportunity that you are, that you can meditate, that you can be silent, that you can laugh.

Only you remain...

This sutra says: MEDITATION IS THE SEED.
On your great journey, your quest for life, your pilgrimage to the temple of truth, meditation is the seed. What is meditation? Why is it so valuable -- so valuable that if it flowers you will become God, and if it rots you will rot in hell? What is meditation? Meditation is the state of no-thought consciousness, where you are fully conscious but thoughts are absent. You are, but the mind is not. The death of the mind is meditation.
At present, you are not. There is the mind and mind alone. It should be just the opposite: there should be only you, without any mind. Right now the mind consumes all your energy. All your life-energy is being sucked by the mind.
Have you ever seen the air plant? the amar-bel? It is a parasite that attaches itself to a tree and lives off of it, sucking its energy. The tree ultimately dries up and dies. It is called amar-bel, the immortal creeper. It is just like the mind. It has no roots. It needs no roots, for it lives off the parent plant. It sucks the tree dry as it nourishes itself. The Hindus have given it an apt name, the immortal creeper.
Your mind is also an immortal creeper. It does not die. It lives on indefinitely. It follows you for countless lives. What is interesting is that it has no roots, no seeds. Its existence is rootless. It should be dead, but it lives on you.
Your mind envelops you. You are completely smothered by it. All your life-energy is sapped by the mind. You are almost dried-up. Your mind lets you have just enough to keep you alive. The parasite does not kill its host tree outright; the host is allowed to retain enough for its most basic needs. A master treats his slave similarly: the slave is given just enough to stay alive.
Your mind gives you just enough to permit your survival. It gobbles up ninety-nine percent of your energy and allows you just one percent so that you can maintain the body. In a non-meditating state, the mind is ninety-nine percent and you are one percent; in a meditative individual the individual is ninety-nine percent and the mind only one percent. If you become one hundred percent and the mind is zero, that is the state of samadhi.
Then you are completely liberated; the seed has developed into a full-grown tree. There is nothing left to be achieved now. All that was to be attained is already attained. All potentiality has turned into reality; all that was hidden is now manifest. Then existence becomes filled with your fragrance; then the music of your dance is heard in all corners of the earth, and even far away in the moon and the stars. It is not that you alone are thrilled -- the life-stream of all existence throbs within you. Then existence becomes filled with celebration. Whenever a Buddha is born all of existence celebrates. All of existence yearns to see your seed turn into a spreading tree.
Meditation means: where the mind is as good as gone. Samadhi means: where the mind is completely void and only you remain.

This sutra of Shiva says: MEDITATION IS THE SEED.
Therefore we have to start with meditation. Right now, in sleeping and in wakefulness, in consciousness and unconsciousness, the mind has you in its grip. Thoughts invade you in the day and dreams in the night. All the twenty-four hours the mind argues and debates and the most amazing thing is: it all leads to nothing. What have you attained by all your reasoning and thinking? Where has it taken you? What goals have you reached?

Be This One

THIS CONSCIOUSNESS IS THE SPIRIT OF GUIDANCE OF EACH ONE. BE THIS ONE

Question 1
SOME OF THE TECHNIQUES IN THE ONE HUNDRED AND TWELVE METHODS SEEM TO BE END RESULTS AND NOT TECHNIQUES, SUCH AS THOSE THAT SAY TO "BECOME UNIVERSAL CONSCIOUSNESS" OR "BE THIS ONE" ETC. IT SEEMS THAT WE NEED TECHNIQUES TO ACHIEVE THESE TECHNIQUES. WERE TECHNIQUES LIKE THESE MEANT FOR VERY ADVANCED PERSONS WHO COULD JUST BECOME COSMIC AT A MERE SUGGESTION?

Such techniques were meant, not for very advanced persons, but for very innocent persons -- simple, innocent, trusting. Then just a suggestion is enough. You have to have something to do because you cannot trust.You don't have faith. Unless you do something, nothing can happen to you because you believe in action. If something happens to you suddenly without any doing on your part, you will be scared and you will not believe it. You may even bypass it; you may not even record in the mind that it happened. Unless you DO, you cannot feel something happening to you -- this is the way of the ego. But for an innocent person, for an innocent, open mind, just a suggestion is enough. Why? Because really, the innermost being is not something to be achieved in the future -- it is here and now, it is already the case. Whatsoever is to be attained is here, present in you right this very moment. If you can trust without any effort, it can become revealed. It is not a question of time, of you having to work it out. It is not somewhere far away that you have to travel to. It is you. You may call it God, you may call it nirvana or whatsoever you like -- it is you already. So even a suggestion , if believed totally, can reveal it to you. That's why so much significance is given to SHRADDHA, trust, faith. If a person can believe in the master, just a hint, a suggestion, an indication -- and in a flash everything will be revealed.
The basic point to be understood is this: there are things which you cannot attain right now because time will be needed to produce them. They are not with you. If I give you a seed, it cannot immediately become a tree. Time will be needed, and you will have to wait and work. Then the seed cannot become the tree immediately. But you are really the tree already. It is not a seed which has to be worked, it is a tree hidden in darkness, it is a tree which is covered, it is a tree which you are inattentive too -- that's all. Your inattention is the cover. You are not looking at it, that's all. You are looking somewhere else and that's why you are missing it. In a trusting moment the master can tell you, just by a suggestion, that it is here. And if you can believe, if you can look in that dimension in trust, it will be revealed to you.
These techniques are not for advanced people; they are for simple, innocent people. Advanced people are, in a way, difficult. They are not innocent, they have been working, they have attained something, and they have a subtle ego behind it. They know something so they are not innocent, they cannot believe. You will have to argue and convince them -- and then too they will have to make some efforts. By an innocent mind, I mean a mind which is not arguing. It is just like a small child. The child goes with his father hand in hand, he is not afraid. Whatsoever the father is leading, he must be leading in the right direction. The father knows -- so the child need not worry about it. He is not thinking of the future, what is going to happen is not his concern. He is enjoying the very journey; the end is not the problem at all. For the father it may be a problem. He may be afraid. He may be wondering whether they have lost the path or not, whether they are on the right path or not. But for the child it is not a problem. He knows that the father knows. That's all. And wherever the father leads, he will follow -- and he is happy at this very moment.
A trusting disciple, an innocent mind is just like a child -- and the master is more than a father. Once the disciple surrenders, he trusts. Then at any moment, when the master feels that the disciple is tuned, that the disciple is in harmony, he will just give a hint.
I have heard about a Zen master, Bokuju. He struggled hard to attain enlightenment, but nothing happened. Really, with a hard struggle sometimes nothing will happen, because the hard struggle is through the ego. And through hard struggle the ego becomes more hard. He did whatsoever could be done but the goal was no nearer. Rather, on the contrary, it was further away; further away than when he had started the journey. He was puzzled, confused, so he came to his master. The master said, "For a few years just completely stop any effort, any goal, any destination. Just forget, and live moment to moment near me. Don't do anything. Simply eat, sleep, walk, and just be near me. And don't raise any question... just see me, my presence. And don't make any effort because nothing is to be achieved. Forget the achieving mind because the achieving mind is always in the future -- that's why it goes on missing the present. Just forget that you have to achieve anything."
Bokuju believed in his master. He started living with him. For a few days, a few months, ideas floated in, thoughts came, and sometimes he would become uneasy and would think, "I am wasting time. I am not doing anything. How can it happen without doing anything? If it couldn't happen through such hard effort, how is it going to be easily attained by not doing anything?" But, still, he believed in the master. By and by the mind slowed down, and in the present of his master he started to feel a subtle calm flowing -- a silence would fall from the master onto him. He started feeling a merging. Years passed. He completely forgot that he was. The master became the center and he started to live like a shadow.
Then the miracle is possible -- this happening itself is the miracle. One day, suddenly, the master called his name, "Bokuju, are you here?" Just this, "Bokuju, are you here?" And he said, "Yes, master." And, it is said, he became enlightened.
There was nothing like a technique, not even a suggestion -- just, "Bokuju, are you here?" The total presence had been called, "Are you here, not moving anywhere, not gone somewhere else? With total intensity, are you present here?" And Bokuju said, "Yes, master." In that "yes" he became totally present there.
It is said that the master started laughing and Bokuju started laughing, and the master said, "Now you can go. Now you can move out there and help people by your presence." Bokuju never taught any method. He would simply ask this much, "Just be near. Remain present." And whenever a disciple was in tune, he would call the name of the disciple and ask, "Are you here?" This was the whole technique.
But this technique will need a grounding of your mind, a deep innocence. There are many techniques which are simple, the simplest possible: just a saying, "Be this one" -- just a hint. But it must have been said by the master in a certain moment. "Be this one" cannot always be said. It must have been said in a certain tuning, when the disciple was totally one with the master, or totally with the universe, merged. Then the master says, "Be this one" -- and suddenly the focus will change and the last part of the ego will dissolve.
These methods worked in the past but now it is difficult, very difficult, because you are so calculating, you are so clever. And being clever is just against being innocent. You are so calculating, you know too much arithmetic. This calculation goes on and on in the mind: whatsoever you do, it is always calculated, planned. You are never innocent, never open, receptive; you believe too much in yourself. Hence you go on missing. These methods won't be helpful for you unless you prepare. That preparation can be very long, and you are very impatient.
This age is basically the most impatient age that has ever happened on this earth. Everyone is impatient, everyone is too time-conscious, and everyone wants to do everything immediately. Not that it cannot be done -- it can be done immediately. But with such time-consciousness it is impossible. People come to me and they say that they have come only for one day. The next day they are going to Sai Baba, and after meeting him they will go to Rishikesh, and then they will go somewhere else. Then they return frustrated and they think there is nothing India can give. It is not a question of whether India can give something or not, the question is always whether you can receive it or not. You are in such a hurry and you want something immediately. Just like instant coffee, you think of instant meditation, instant nirvana. It is not possible. Nirvana cannot be packed, cannot be made instant. Not that it is impossible to make it instant, it can become instant -- but it can become instant only with the mind which is not after the instant. That's the problem. It can become instant. Immediately, this moment, it can happen. Not even a single moment is needed. But only to one who is relaxed about time completely, to one who can wait for infinity -- for him it will happen instantly.
This looks paradoxical but this is the case. If you can wait for eternity, you will not need to wait at all. But if you cannot wait for even a single moment, you will have to wait for eternity. You will have to wait because the mind which says, "Let it happen immediately," is a mind which has already moved from the moment. It is running, it is standing nowhere, it is just on the move. A mind which is on the move, on the way, cannot be innocent.
You may not be aware of it but innocent people are always without time-consciousness. Time lingers slowly. There is no hurry to go anywhere, they are not running. They are enjoying moment to moment. They are chewing each moment. And each moment has its own ecstasy to deliver. But you are in such a hurry that it cannot be delivered. While you are here, your hands are in the future, your mind is in the future -- you will miss this moment. And this will be always the case; you will always miss the now. And NOW is the only time! The future is false, the past is just memory. The past is no more, the future is yet to be -- and all that ever happens is the now. Now is the only time.
So if you can be prepared to slow down a little, to become non-calculating, playing like children, here and now, then these simple techniques can work miracles. But this century is too time-conscious. That's why you ask, IT SEEMS THAT WE NEED TECHNIQUES TO ACHIEVE THESE TECHNIQUES. No. These are techniques, not end-results. They look like end-results because you cannot conceive of how they can work. They can work in particular mind; they cannot work in other types of mind. And really, those who know, they say that all the techniques will ultimately bring you to the innocence where the phenomenon happens. When the phenomenon happens, it will be because the techniques will have brought you to that innocence -- if the innocence is there.
But it is difficult now because nowhere is innocence taught; everywhere we are teaching cleverness. Universities are not to make you innocent, they are to make you clever, cunning, calculating. The more clever you are, the better you will be in the struggle of life. You can gain much wealth, prestige, power, if you are calculating. If you are innocent, you will prove to be stupid; if you are innocent, then you will be nowhere in this competitive world. This is the problem: in this competitive world you may not be anywhere, but in that non-competitive world of nirvana, if you are innocent, you will be somewhere. If you are calculating you will not be anywhere in the world of nirvana, but in this world you will be somewhere. And we have chosen this world to be our goal.
Old universities differed completely, their orientation was totally different. Nalanda, Takshila -- they did not teach calculation, they did not teach cleverness. They were teaching innocence. Their orientation was different from Oxford or Kashi or Cambridge. Their orientation was totally different -- they were creating a different type of mind. So it almost always happened that a person who studied in Takshshila or Nalanda would become a BHIKKHU, a SANNYASIN, in the end. By the time he graduated from university he would renounce this world. Those universities were anti-world; they were preparing for some other dimension. They were preparing you for something else which cannot be measured in terms of this world. These techniques were for those type of people. Either they were innocent by their nature or they were training themselves to be innocent.
When Jesus said to his followers, "If someone hits you on one cheek, you give him the other," what is he intending to do? He is trying to make you innocent. Only a foolish person would do this. When someone hits you on one cheek, a calculating mind will say, "Hit him hard, immediately." And a really calculating mind will say, "Before someone hits you, hit him. Because attack is the best defense." Ask Machiavelli -- he is the cleverest mind. He says, "Before someone attacks you, you attack him, because attack is the best defense. Once someone has attacked you, you are already weak; he has already gained over you. Now the race is not equal. He is ahead of you. So don't allow the enemy to go ahead. Attack before anybody attacks you."
This is a calculating mind; this is a clever mind. Machiavelli was read by every prince and every king in medieval Europe -- but he was such a clever person that no king would employ him. He was read -- his book was the bible for power-politics, every prince would read his book The Prince and they would follow it -- but no king was ready to employ him because he was such a clever man. It was better to keep him away -- he was dangerous; he knew too much. He said, "Virtue is not good, but pretending to be virtuous is. Don't be virtuous, but pretend always that you are virtuous. That is the real good because then you gain from both the ends: from vice you gain, and from virtue also." This is the calculating mind. Go on pretending that you are virtuous, and always praise virtue. But never be really virtuous. Always praise virtue so others know that you are a virtuous person. Always condemn vice -- but don't be afraid to use it.
Jesus says, "When someone hits you on one cheek, give him the other. And if someone takes your coat, snatches it, give him your shirt also. And if someone forces you to carry his load for one mile, tell him that you are ready to carry it for two miles." This is patent foolishness, but very meaningful. If you can do this, these techniques will be for you. Jesus is preparing his disciples for sudden enlightenment. Just think about it. If you can be so innocent, so trusting, that if the other is hitting you, he must be hitting you for your good -- so give him the other cheek also, and let him hit it. The other's goodness is believed in, trusted in; no one is your enemy. When Jesus says, "Love your enemies," this is the meaning. No one is your enemy; don't see the enemy anywhere. That doesn't mean that there will not be enemies and there will not be people who will exploit you. There will be. They will exploit you. But be exploited -- and don't be cunning. Just look at that dimension: be exploited but don't be cunning. Be exploited but don't be mistrusting, don't disbelieve, don't lose faith. That is more valuable than anything others can cheat you of. Nothing else is so valuable.
But how do our minds function? If one man deceives you, the whole of humanity is evil. If one man is dishonest or you think that he is dishonest, then you don't believe in man at all. Then the whole of humanity has become dishonest. If one Jew is a miser, then the whole race of Jews is miserly. If one Mohammedan is bigoted, then all Mohammedans are. Just one is enough for us to lose our faith in all. Jesus says, "Even if all are dishonest, you should not lose faith, because faith is more valuable than what these dishonest people can take from you by their dishonesty." So really, if you lose faith you are losing something; otherwise nothing is lost.
For such innocent people these techniques are enough, they will not ask for anything more. You say, and it happens to them. Just on hearing the master many have become illumined -- but in the past, not in this age.
I have heard a story about Rinzai. He was a very poor BHIKKHU, a poor SANNYASIN, a beggar. As he was sleeping in his hut a thief entered. There was nothing in the hut except a blanket that he himself was using. He was sleeping on the floor, covered with his blanket. Then he became very uncomfortable and stared to think, "What an unfortunate fellow! He has come so far from the village to find something, and there is nothing in my hut. What misery! How to help him? The only thing is this blanket." And he was under it and the thief would not have the courage to snatch the blanket, so he slipped out from under it, left it there and slipped into a dark corner. The thief took the blanket and went away. The night was very cold, but Rinzai was happy that the thief had not gone back empty-handed.
Then he sat at the window of his hut. The night was cool, and the full moon was in the sky. He wrote a small haiku, a small poem. In the haiku he said, "If I could have given this moon to that thief, I would have." This mind! What has he lost? Just a blanket. What has he gained? The whole world, all that can be gained. He has gained innocence, trust, love.
For this man no technique is needed. His master would say, "Just look. Be aware. Be alert." And that would do.

Meditacion is that seed

BIJAVDHANAM
ASNASTHAH SUKHAM HRIDAE NIMAJJATI
SVAMATRA NIRMANAPADAYATI
VIDYA-AVINASHE JANMAVINASHAH.
MEDITATION IS THE SEED.
JUST SITTING, RELAXED WITHIN HIMSELF,
HE ENTERS SPONTANEOUSLY INTO THE LAKE OF
SUPREME BEING.
HE ATTAINS TO SELF-CREATION OR BECOMES
'TWICE-BORN'.
ETERNAL KNOWLEDGE LEADS TO CESSATION
OF BIRTH AND DEATH.

Jesus' disciples said to him, "Tell us about the Kingdom of God." And Jesus replied, "The Kingdom of God is like a seed." In our discussion today we shall talk about this very seed that Jesus speaks of.
Meditation is that seed. The seed in itself has no meaning. The seed is only a means; it is a potential tree. The seed is not a state of being; it is a stage on the journey. When a seed grows and becomes a tree, it reaches the goal. It flowers and bears fruit. This is its success. In a like manner, when the seed of meditation becomes a tree, it also flowers and bears fruit, and that blossoming is God.
It is necessary to understand the state of the seed. You constantly ask about God, but this is a futile enquiry. Why ask about the tree when you haven't cared for the seed? Without sowing the seed, how do you expect to see the tree? And God is not an external happening that you can see with your eyes. God is your own purified state; God is your own development. You will not be able to see God in others until the seed hidden inside you sprouts and becomes the tree.
No matter how hard they try, no Mahavir, Buddha, Shiva or Krishna can reveal God to you, for your God is hidden within yourself. At present He is in seed form; He is not yet a tree. You can see nothing in a seed. When the seed bursts and the tree sprouts, when it develops, you will manifest yourself. The flame within you will be kindled, and then you will know that God is.
It is difficult to defeat an atheist for this very reason. He always asks, "Where is your God. Show Him to me." His very question is wrong, so whatever answer is given will also be wrong. God is hidden with you. He hides within the questioner. And you cannot see the other man's God, for it is an internal happening. When your own seed sprouts you will know.
Right now you are like the seed, but you do not understand this seed, so you seek outside. As long as you seek without, your seed will lie dormant; it will not sprout, for it needs water and soil. It needs light and love, just like a small child. When you turn your eyes within, when your attention flows inward and your life-energy turns within, the seed will get that energy; it will become alive, it will sprout. MEDITATION IS THE SEED.

If you refuse to bathe and if the desire for a bath catches hold of you, then the desire is not the problem; the problem is you. You are restless. You do not know. You have never meditated. You have never indulged in this troublesome practice, and you want to eradicate your restlessness? It can never be eradicated without bathing in meditation.
Meditation is an internal bath. As the body is rid of dust and dirt, and becomes clean and fresh after a bath, so is meditation a bath of the inner soul; and when everything becomes fresh within, then where is the turmoil? Where is the sorrow and worry? Then you are thrilled. You are cheerful and blooming. There are bells on your ankles and your life becomes a dance. Before that you are sad, tired and distressed. And if you think that the cause of your distress is outside you are mistaken.
There is only one cause for your restlessness: you have not let your seed of meditation develop into a tree. Try as hard as you will, you will remain restless. Perhaps you imagine that peace will come if you accumulate the right things -- wealth, status, honor, health, sons and daughters... but there is no end to your restlessness. The more of these things you gather, the more your life will be filled with restlessness, and the more intense it will be.
A poor man is restless, a rich man more! Why is this so? Why does restlessness increase with wealth? It doesn't! The poor man is also restless, but he doesn't have enough time to know it. The rich man has the time to notice it; it pricks him like a thorn, and he sees it all around him.

When you have gratified all your needs, you will suddenly realize that the actual need is for meditation. All other needs were for the body, not for your self.

Beloved

The Bauls say,

Scanning the cosmos
you waste your hours.
He is present
in this little vessel.
In this little body
He has made His abode.

He is here
in this little vessel;
in you.
He is there,
the God of Gods,
the King of Kings,
the Beloved.

Permanence... Eternity

NOTHING HAS HAPPENED,
AND NOTHING WILL HAPPEN.
WHAT IS THERE, IS THERE.

Once you touch your source of permanence, your eternity, you have touched the eternity of life also. Parallel to you, things happen. If you are at the center, you are capable of looking into the very center of life. If you are on the periphery, you are capable of only looking at the periphery of life. The periphery goes on changing.
Have you seen a bullock-cart moving? The wheel moves, goes on moving, but at the center of the wheel something remains permanent. On that permanent hub the wheel moves. On that unmoving hub the wheel's movement exists. Exactly like that, you have a hub -- that hub is unmoving; and you have a wheel-like personality that goes on moving. You have travelled far, thousands of miles and thousands of lives, and the wheel knows many roads and many paths, but the hub has remained where it is. Now you can look at reality in two ways: either from the wheel -- then everything is changing every moment; or from the hub -- then nothing is changing.
"Nothing has happened and nothing will happen. What is there, is there."
How to find this hub of life? -- by becoming a witness, one finds it. Eating, eat -- but remember that there is a point inside you which has never eaten. Food goes into the body; your consciousness remains watching. Somebody insults you, anger arises; you remain a witness. The insult comes from outside, the anger arises on the periphery, and you remain at the center, watching. Yes, somebody has done something, provoked your periphery, and there is anger on the periphery, and the anger is surrounding you like a smoke cloud, but you are at the hub, watching. You are not identified with the periphery. Then the insult is outside, and the anger is also outside of you. Both are separate and far away. Both are different from you.
When this awareness grows, dreaming stops, by and by. When this awareness grows, the wheel moves slower and slower, because there is no point. You never move, so what is the point of travelling the whole earth? You remain the same; then desires slow down. One day it happens: the wheel is as silent, as unmoving as the hub. That is the point when enlightenment happens.

Nothing can be added to truth...

It is very difficult to see; when truth knocks at your door, it is very difficult to open the door and receive the guest, and welcome the guest -- because when truth knocks at your door, suddenly you become aware that you have been living up to now with lies, that up to now you have been untrue, that all your declarations were false and all your dogmas were false. When truth comes face to face with you, suddenly your whole life is nullified. Your whole past has been just a darkness. It is too much for the ego to accept. It is better to deny the truth, it is better to close the door, and say that truth never knocked at your door. It is better to say that there has been never a Buddha, never a Jesus, never a Krishna. It is better to say that to save your own face.

There is nothing wrong in being worldly. Be worldly, and yet remain unworldly -- that is the very art, the art of living between two opposites, balancing oneself between two opposites. It is a very narrow path, like a razor's edge -- but this is the only path. If you miss this balance, you miss truth.

And remember, and always keep it in your heart: truth, love, life, meditation, ecstasy, bliss, all that is true and beautiful and good, always exists as a paradox: in the world, and not of it; with people, yet alone; doing everything, and being inactive; moving and not moving; living an ordinary life, and yet not being identified with it; working as everybody else is working, yet remaining aloof deep down. Being in the world and not of the world, that is the paradox. And when you attain this paradox, the greatest peak happens to you: the peak experience.

The moment you also start living like a rosebush, rising like a sun, floating like a white cloud, you have come to a profound understanding of the mysterious, of the miraculous truth of existence.

Nothing can be added to truth.
Truth is always pure, nude, alone.
And there is great beauty, because truth is the very essence of life, existence, nature. Except for man, nobody lies. A rosebush cannot lie. It has to produce roses; it cannot produce marigolds -- it cannot deceive. It is not possible for it to be other than it is. Except for man, the whole existence lives in truth.
Truth is the religion of the whole of existence -- except man.
And the moment a man also decides to become part of existence, truth becomes his religion. It is the glorious moment.

When I say that except for man everything is living truth -- the ocean, the clouds, the stars, the stones, the flowers -- that everything is nothing but truthfulness, nothing but just itself, with no mask, and only man is capable of deceiving others, of deceiving himself -- it has to be remembered that this is a great opportunity. It has not to be condemned, it has to be praised, because even if a rosebush or a lotus wants to lie, it cannot. Its truth is not freedom; its truth is a bondage. It cannot go beyond the boundaries

Knowing Flowers...

A WOMAN came to me a few years ago. She sat just in front of me holding my feet, crying. It was a beautiful moment. Somehow, she had been able to feel me. But then she became afraid; then I could see -- suddenly she left my feet, recoiled backwards. I asked her, "What has happened? Something was going deep in you -- why have you withdrawn yourself?"
She said, " I am a professor in a university and I teach psychology -- this must have been a relapse, a regression. I must have regressed towards my childhood; you must have worked like a father-figure. No, this is nothing. Yes, something happened, but it was a relapse into childhood. Yes, something happened, but it was nothing but a sort of hypnosis. Your eyes got hold of me." Now she has explained it away.
Something was on the way, something was really going to happen. One moment more and she would have been a totally different woman, and there would have been no possibility of her falling back. She would have crossed the point of no return. But just before it, she recoiled back, became afraid. And, of course, she was intelligent -- as intelligence goes -- a well-educated woman, capable of rationalizations. She immediately produced a rationalization: "It may be a sort of hypnosis, or a relapse into childhood, or you must have reminded me of my dead father." Now that which was happening has been cut.

Many times God has reached you, and many times you have withdrawn yourself. Many times He has walked with you and you have not recognized Him. Many times He has shouted at you: "Lazarus, come out! " and you won't listen. Or you think: "He must be calling somebody else -- Lazarus is not my name. " Let me tell you: Lazarus is your name!
And don't think about this story just as a story. That's what Buddha has done, that's what Bodhidharma has done, that's what Lao Tzu and Chuang Tzu have done: they have shouted at you, they have taken you by your hands and shaken you. Very few understand. In most of the cases people become angry, they become annoyed, because you are disturbing their sleep. They are sleeping and having beautiful dreams, golden dreams, sweet dreams, and you are disturbing their sleep.
That's why they had to kill Jesus, murder Mansoor, poison Socrates -- these people were great disturbers. They were disturbing your sleep.
"MAY I BE SO BOLD, SIR, " ASKED SHIKO, "AS TO ASK WHETHER YOU UNDERSTOOD?"
Now this is a very meaningful question. People go on believing that they understand -- and this very idea that they understand keeps their ignorance intact. The first step to be taken towards understanding is to understand that you don't understand, to recognize and realize your ignorance, to realize in deep humility that you have been ignoring the truth.
I was reading a small story:

Four frogs sat upon a log that lay floating on the edge of a river. Suddenly the log was caught by the current and swept slowly down the stream. The frogs were delighted and absorbed, for never before had they sailed.
At length the first frog spoke, and said, "This is indeed a most marvellous log. It moves as if alive. No such log was ever known before."
Then the second frog spoke, and said, "Nay, my friend, the log is like other logs, and does not move. It is the river, that is walking to the sea, and carries us and the log with it."
And the third frog spoke, and said, "It is neither the log nor the river that moves. The moving is in our thinking. For without thought nothing moves."
And the three frogs began to wrangle about what was really moving. The quarrel grew hotter and louder, but they could not agree.
Then they turned to the fourth frog, who up to this time had been listening attentively but holding his peace, and they asked his opinion.
And the fourth frog said, "Each of you is right and none of you is wrong. The moving is in the log and the water and our thinking also, but if you look still deeper then nothing has moved, because nothing can move and there is nowhere to move."
And the three frogs became very angry, for none of them was willing to admit that his was not
the whole truth and that the other two were not wholly wrong; and they were not ready to think that they didn't know, and this fourth foolish frog -- he knows? It was against their egos.
Then the strange thing happened -- this has always been happening: the three frogs got together and pushed the fourth frog off the log into the river.

It is very difficult to see; when truth knocks at your door, it is very difficult to open the door and receive the guest, and welcome the guest -- because when truth knocks at your door, suddenly you become aware that you have been living up to now with lies, that up to now you have been untrue, that all your declarations were false and all your dogmas were false. When truth comes face to face with you, suddenly your whole life is nullified. Your whole past has been just a darkness. It is too much for the ego to accept. It is better to deny the truth, it is better to close the door, and say that truth never knocked at your door. It is better to say that there has been never a Buddha, never a Jesus, never a Krishna. It is better to say that to save your own face.
It is very difficult to understand that you don't understand. It is very humiliating. And think of an emperor: emperors have been thinking that they know everything; they have even been trying that they are the representatives of God on earth, the very incarnations of God on earth. They have power -- power blinds the eyes. It is very difficult to see that you are ignorant when you have money, respect, power. When others think that you know, it is very difficult.
Shiko's fear was relevant.
"MAY I BE SO BOLD, SIR, AS TO ASK WHETHER YOU UNDERSTOOD?"
THE EMPEROR SHOOK HIS HEAD SADLY...

but the Emperor must have been a humble person -- maybe blind, but still humble; may not have seen what had happened, what had transpired; may not have seen what Fu-daishi had brought as a gift, but he was not arrogant, not very egoistic. There is a possibility for him. He was sad that he could not understand; he was not annoyed.
Remember: anger and sadness are two aspects of the same energy. These are the two alternatives. Either the Emperor could have been angry, or sad. Angry -- then he would have killed Fu-daishi; then Fu-daishi would have been thrown into the prison, poisoned, murdered, crucified. But he was sad. Then there is a hope.
Sadness has something beautiful in it, because sadness can become creative. Anger is always destructive. If he had been an angry person he would have thought that Fu-daishi had insulted him. But he thought: "I have missed an opportunity. " If you can be that humble then more possibilities open for you.
The Emperor is not very far off the mark. Sooner or later, he will enter on the path.
"WHAT A PITY," SAID SHIKO. "FU-DAISHI HAS NEVER BEEN MORE ELOQUENT."
Rapping on the table, shouting so hard and so loud, walking with such intense grace -- bringing Buddha to the palace: yes, Fu-daishi has never been more eloquent. He has said that which can be said. He created the situation in which there was every possibility that the Emperor could have seen. Whatsoever he could do, he had done. You cannot find any fault with Fu-daishi. More cannot be done. In fact, he had already gone out of the way to do it.
In the first place, it is very difficult for a man like Fu-daishi to come to the palace. Emperors should go -- but he must have been of tremendous compassion: he came to the palace. A disciple should go to the master; but sometimes it has happened that a master has come to the disciple –

out of sheer compassion and love. Then, he came with his full flame, he came naked. He had never been so aflame, he had never revealed his being so totally as on that day.
And then... there are stories: Once Buddha came and sat silently. There are other stories of other Zen masters: They came. They stood on the platform, looked around, left the platform, not saying a single word. But Fu-daishi is the only one who rapped on the table, who shouted loudly, who tried to shake the Emperor out of his stupor. Yes, Shiko is right: "Fu-daishi has never been more eloquent."
In that moment a transfiguration was possible.
Chao-pien says:
A SUDDEN CLASH OF THUNDER...
THE MIND-DOORS BURST OPEN,
AND LO! THERE SITTETH THE OLD MAN
IN ALL HIS HOMELINESS.

Fu-daishi created a sudden clash of thunder. If the Emperor had really been ready to receive this tremendous compassion, this grace, this gift, then the mind-doors must have opened, burst open... AND LO! THERE SITTETH THE OLD MAN.
You are already that which you are seeking. That which you are seeking is already sitting inside you, it has already entered you. It has been there before you ever were: AND LO! THERE SITTETH THE OLD MAN IN ALL HIS HOMELINESS.
But the Emperor missed.

I AM shouting to you every day, every morning. Of course, I am not rapping on the table -- I am rapping on your heads! because your stupor is bigger and greater. Beating on the table won't help. Beating on the table, there is every possibility you will become angry at me -- you will not even be sad. So, in different ways, in different words, I go on hammering on your head.
But remember: whatsoever I am saying is not the thing that I want to say to you. Whatsoever I am saying has nothing to do with truth, because truth cannot be said. Whatsoever I am saying is nothing but a hammering. If you become awake, you will see the truth. This is just to create an opportunity. I am shaking you hard -- and if you allow, if you don't resist, if you cooperate with me, if you are ready to go with me, if you can trust, if you are courageous, then my words can become a clash of sudden thunder.
Life is slipping by... each moment... you are missing it. Enough is enough! You have missed long; now missing it has become a habit -- you will have to break this habit. The only way to be benefited by me, the only way to be blessed by me and by my presence, is to gather courage. Come out of your graves! Only your periphery is dead -- you can never be dead. That is the meaning of the story of Lazarus: only the periphery can be dead; you can never be dead. Deep down, life is eternal. Burst forth! Rush out!

This is the whole effort of all the masters: to create a sudden clash of thunder so those who are fast asleep can be awakened.
A SUDDEN CLASH OF THUNDER...
THE MIND-DOORS BURST OPEN,
AND LO! THERE SITTETH THE OLD MAN
IN ALL HIS HOMELINESS.
That old man is what Zen people mean by God. Their term is beautiful: the old man. It is your nature -- ancientmost, eternal nature. It is the old man. Drop the mind! Stop thinking! Become more alert! See the trees and listen to the birds, with no screens of thoughts hindering the path. Meet directly! Truth is immediate, radiant, herenow. It is not that truth has to be discovered -- only you have to become aware. Truth is already here.
Let me shake you, allow me to shake you out of your sleep. Don't go on thinking that you understand. You don't. Your knowledge is a way of ignoring the truth. Drop this ignorance -- and ignorance cannot be dropped by accumulating more knowledge. Ignorance can be dropped only by dropping the knowledge that you have already accumulated.
Knowledge is the barrier to knowing. When knowledge is dropped, knowing flowers.

Nothing can be explained...

NOW LET ME help you to enter into this beautiful story. I will not explain it. I can just seduce you to enter into it. I can simply allure you to enter into it. I can only persuade you to have a taste of it.
BUTEI, THE EMPEROR OF RYO, SENT FOR FU-DAISHI TO EXPLAIN THE DIAMOND SUTRA.

Now the Diamond Sutra is really a Kohinoor; it is one of the most significant utterances ever uttered on this earth. Buddha's sayings in the Diamond Sutra are the most precious. But the basic thing in the Diamond Sutra is that nothing can be explained, that life is utterly unexplainable; that life is such that all explanations fall short, that all philosophies prove very narrow. The sky of life is so vast that there is no way to confine it in any hypothesis or doctrine.
Buddha himself never used to talk about metaphysical problems. He made a list of ten or twelve problems, and before he entered a town or a city his disciples would go and declare in the town: "Don't ask about these twelve problems because he will not answer." Not that he cannot answer -- if he cannot answer then who will answer? -- but that these problems are unanswerable. They are better left not touched; better they are left alone.
Nobody should ask about God. Buddha would not say God is; he would not say God is not -- because he said both are irrelevant. To say God is, is as irrelevant as to say God is not -- because that which is, is beyond the positive and the negative. That which is, it is beyond the minus and the plus. That which is cannot be said 'is' and cannot be said 'is not'. It is far beyond both. That which is, it is beyond dichotomy, it is beyond dialectics, it is beyond duality. 'Is' and 'is not' create a duality. Existence is one, organically one; it comprehends both.

Questions like this, Buddha would say, please don't ask.
This Emperor Butei asked another Buddha, Fu-daishi, a Zen master, to come to his palace and explain to him the Diamond Sutra. Buddhists long too much to understand what this Diamond Sutra is. It is utterly absurd. It is difficult to understand, because it has nothing explained in it. Those are utterances of tremendous value, but no philosophy is woven around them, no system is created. Those are atomic utterances. And the substratum of them all is that nothing can be said. Just like Lao Tzu's TAO TE KING: The Tao that can be uttered is no longer Tao. The truth that is said is no longer truth. Truth said becomes untrue -- said and it becomes false. Now what to do? How to understand?
The Emperor must have been reading the Diamond Sutra. And there is no other way than to ask some Enlightened person -- because the Diamond Sutra, or scriptures like that, are utterly illogical. Unless you can find someone who has become awakened you cannot sort it out, you cannot figure it out. It will be very confusing to you. You can go on repeating it, you can even enjoy the music of your repetition, the rhythm, but you will never be able to penetrate into the mystery. The mystery can be explained only by an alive person.
ON THE APPOINTED DAY FU-DAISHI CAME TO THE PALACE, MOUNTED THE PLATFORM, RAPPED ON THE TABLE BEFORE HIM, THEN DESCENDED AND, STILL NOT SPEAKING, LEFT.
This was his discourse on the Diamond Sutra. He did a great job! What did he say by doing this?

First thing: that truth can be explained only in action; words are not enough. If the Emperor had watched rightly the way Fu-daishi walked, there was the commentary on the Diamond Sutra. The grandeur, the dignity, the beauty, the grace,.the way he walked -- there was the commentary on the Diamond Sutra. He must have walked like Buddha -- he was a Buddha. He must have carried a milieu of Buddhahood around him. He must have brought a different type of universe with him into the palace -- a dimension alive. His door was open: if the Emperor had had any eyes, he would have seen that Buddha himself had come. It was not Fu-daishi, it was Buddha walking again on the earth -- in another form, under another name. The container may have been different, but the content was exactly the same.
Fu-daishi walked, MOUNTED THE PLATFORM, RAPPED ON THE TABLE BEFORE HIM... why did he rap on the table before him? He must have seen the Emperor fast asleep. He must have seen him dozing. Just to make him a little alert, just to shock him!... THEN DESCENDED... he did well! What more can you do? When a person is asleep, that's all that can be done: you can shout at him, you can knock at his door. HE RAPPED ON THE TABLE... what else can you do? Then gracefully he must have descended... AND, STILL NOT SPEAKING, LEFT. Because if he had spoken on the Diamond Sutra he would have proved that he himself had not understood it.
On the Diamond Sutra it is impossible to speak: it is the very truth. No, it would have been profane. It would have been a sacrilege! It would not have been right. Only silence can be the commentary. Had the Emperor had any ears to listen to silence, he would have understood.
... AND, STILL NOT SPEAKING, LEFT. Why did he leave so suddenly? -- because more is not possible. You cannot forcibly give the truth to somebody who is not ready. He did whatsoever he could; now there was no point in lingering any longer.

And that suddenly leaving the Emperor was also another shock. He must have jolted the Emperor to his very roots. He came like a cyclone, almost uprooted the tree of Butei! The Emperor could not have even dreamt that such a rude behavior.... He was doing it out of tremendous compassion, but to the Emperor it must have looked rude, uncivil, unmannerly.
And in a country like Japan where people are obsessed with manners, where their faces have all become false, where everybody is carrying a mask! For centuries the Japanese have been the most false people in the world, always smiling. The Emperor must have been shocked; he could not have believed what happened... and so suddenly comes Fu-daishi!
And he must have waited for so long for this appointed time. And he must have longed for so long that he would say something, that he would enlighten him, he would help him to know. And here comes this man: walks, mounts on the platform -- leaves without uttering a single word!
BUTEI SAT MOTIONLESS FOR SOME MINUTES...
He must have been completely incapable of figuring it out. Fu-daishi had shocked him out of his wits! But had he been a little aware, that interval would have opened a new dimension for him. Fu-daishi has invited him, he waits there, seeing that the Emperor is completely asleep -- even shouting is not going to help. Even if you call "Lazarus, come out! " he will not listen.
He left. The Emperor was shocked. For a few minutes he sat motionless
... WHEREUPON SHIKO, WHO HAD SEEN ALL THAT HAD HAPPENED, WENT UP TO HIM AND SAID, "MAY I BE SO BOLD, SIR, AS TO ASK WHETHER YOU UNDERSTOOD?"
Now to ask this even of an ordinary man is dangerous. And to ask an emperor: "Sir, whether you understood...?"

Now this man, Shiko, is a man of tremendous understanding -- must have been. He has understood the significance of the gesture of Fu-daishi. He must have seen the glory that walked; he must have seen the light that shone in silence. He must have seen those eyes overflowing with compassion. He must have felt the grace that came like a breeze -- cool, calm, serene. He must have felt sorry for the Emperor also.
"MAY I BE SO BOLD, SIR, AS TO ASK WHETHER YOU UNDERSTOOD?"
THE EMPEROR SHOOK HIS HEAD SADLY.
He has not been able to understand. He is sad. He must have become even sadder because of this man, Shiko. Now he can see that something has happened; now he can feel that some opportunity has passed his door, that some momentous interval was available to him, and he has missed.
THE EMPEROR SHOOK HIS HEAD SADLY.
Many people have been doing that down the centuries. A Buddha comes, a Jesus comes, a Krishna, a Zarathustra -- very few, very rarely. Shiko's are very few -- those who understand. Butei exists as the mass; Butei is the many; Butei is the majority, the crowd. Buddha comes and walks; he brings another world into this world. He brings tremendous beauty, but you cannot see, you cannot feel,
Jesus goes on saying to his disciples: "If you have ears, listen! If you have eyes, see!" Truth was standing before them. God Himself was standing before them. God has come many times to the earth -- He cares for it! In many forms He has been seeking you. Never think for a moment that you are uncared for.

It is not only that you are seeking God -- God is also seeking you in many, many ways. Sometimes as a Krishna with his flute, sometimes as a Buddha with his silence, sometimes as a Jesus with his revolutionary approach to life -- in millions of ways God has been extending his hand towards you, groping for you. Sometimes your hand has even touched His hand -- but you don't understand. Sometimes even a glimmer, a tremor has gone through your spine, but you don't understand. On the contrary, you explain it somehow.