---
section: Library
booktitle: "Tao: The Three Treasures, Vol 3"
booktype: "Discourses"
bookcode: "TREAS3"
dategiven: "16 August 1975 am"
place: " in Buddha Hall"
chapternum: "Chapter #6"
chaptertitle: "I will never Leave You"
acode: "7508160"
shorttitle: "TREAS306"
audio: "Yes"
video: "No"
esttime: "85mins"
displaytitle: "Tao: The Three Treasures, Vol 3: Chapter #6"
---

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<p class="question">WHY DON'T YOU EVER ANSWER MY QUESTIONS!</p>


This is from Anand Sariputta. If I don't answer, then that is the answer.


Try to understand it. There are reasons. If your questions are just asked for the sake of asking, I don't answer them, but that is the answer!


If your questions are too full of your ego -- the questions are less important, that they are YOURS is more important -- then I don't answer them. But that is the answer.


You should ask a question if it is a real need. I am not here to impart information to you -- that you can gather from anywhere. If it is really a need, I always answer. Even if I feel that the ego is too much in the question -- then too I answer, but then never directly; then I answer in some others' questions; and that I have been doing.


But when the ego is too much you are not worried about the answer, you are simply worried about one thing: whether MY question has been answered or not. I have been answering -- but through others' questions.


And why so much attachment even to a question, that this is mine and this is not mine?


A question belongs to nobody. And human problems are not very different. All humanity is in the same trap -- the whole humanity is in the same plight -- degrees may differ. And I have been answering so many questions, can't you hear that your questions have been answered so many times? But your ears are closed by the ego. You are waiting intently for when your question is to be answered -- and then you will miss.


I have not answered in a way, yet I have answered in many ways.


Now, whenever you ask a question, don't bother, and don't wait for ITS answer -- somewhere, indirectly, I must be answering it. I pay attention to your need, to your real authentic need, not to your pseudo ego needs.


Drop the ego and then ask. Don't ask for asking's sake. Let the question be really authentic. And then don't wait for YOUR question to be answered. Questions are questions. They are not yours or somebody else's.
<p class="question">YOU SAID ONE REACHES WHEN ONE IS TOTALLY FRUSTRATED. CAN ONE ALSO REACH IN TOTAL ECSTASY?</p>


That is impossible! Because total ecstasy is not possible unless you have reached. When you reach, only then total ecstasy flowers. Otherwise, what will be the need to reach, if you are already totally ecstatic? Then there is no point in going anywhere, you have already reached the goal!


In total ecstasy the goal is already left behind. Who wants to reach then? Where will you reach then? There is no more. The path has come to the very end.


In total frustration the ecstasy happens. And why do I say in TOTAL frustration? Because if you are still hoping that happiness is possible in this world -- and when I say THIS world always remember I don't mean the world of the trees and the birds and the sky, when I say this world I mean YOUR MIND, THIS mind, this ego centred mind -- if you are still hoping that maybe there have been many frustrations, but still there is a lurking hope that some day or other, somewhere in the future, with this mind that you have got, with this ego, happiness is possible, then ecstasy will not happen.


Ecstasy happens only when you have come to realize that with this mind no happiness is possible, an absolute realization of the fact that this mind is moving in circles. It is never going to be what you are seeking, it is never going to be a bliss, a benediction. When you realize this totally, suddenly the mind drops! Because without hopes how can you cling to it? And remember, the mind is not clinging to you, you are clinging to it. How Gan a dead thing like mind cling to you? You are clinging to it because there is hope Total frustration destroys all hope, one becomes hopeLESS.


A distinction has to be made. You also become hopeless many times but it is not total. Even in your hopelessness somewhere the seed of hope is hidden. Again it starts sprouting. You are finished with one woman or with one man; you are frustrated; but you are not finished with woman as such or man as such. With one particular woman you are finished, or with a particular man, but not with womankind, not with the phenomenon of the feminine. A desire lurks somewhere deep in your frustration also, that there must be a woman who is just made for you. And you can be happy with her. You are frustrated with particulars but not with the universal.


Frustration is total when you are frustrated with the universal. Then the energy moves inwards. It starts turning in. Then it is not moving out.


You may be frustrated with THIS house where you are living but not with THAT palace someone else is living in. Then you will try to bridge the gap, to convert the hut into a palace. You may be frustrated with the money that you have got, but not with money as such; with the power that you have got but not with the lust for power as such. Total frustration means you are really frustrated. You are suddenly in such a situation that there is nowhere to go, absolutely nowhere to go -- only then the energy turns in, and that turning in is ecstasy.


That's why I called it 'instasy' not ecstasy, because it is a turning in, moving in, going to one's own being. Now you are not 'other directed'. You are not future oriented. You are simply trying to know who you are. The whole world has disappeared. The whole nightmare of it is no more there. An awakening is happening. This awakening will become the goal, and then you will be totally ecstatic.


When I say totally ecstatic you can misunderstand me, because you have lived in misery, and whatsoever I say you will understand from the standpoint of a miserable man. When I say ecstatic you think of something opposite to misery, something like happiness. Then you misunderstand. It is neither like misery nor like happiness. It is different, absolutely different, categorically different, diametrically different, it is a totally different phenomenon. Bliss is neither happiness nor unhappiness. Both have disappeared, the duality gone, you are at home.


And you don't feel that you are ecstatic, remember. If you feel you are ecstatic there is still a possibility of misery coming back, because you are not one with ecstasy, you are still separate. You are still EXPERIENCING it. It is something other than you, it is not YOU.


If you ask Buddha, Are you ecstatic? he will shrug his shoulders. The very question is meaningless, irrelevant. That's why Buddha remained silent about many questions, because he found out that whatsoever he said would be misunderstood. If you ask me, Are you happy? what should I say to you? If you ask me, Are you unhappy? what should I say to you? Somebody HAS asked, You say that you are in paradise; is there pain in paradise or not? There is no pain, but immediately I would like to add -- there is no pleasure either. Because pleasure and pain are two aspects of the same coin. Pleasure converts into pain, pain converts into pleasure. They are not two things.


In Japan there is a story that I would like to tell you. In Japan they think that the white mouse is a good omen. If somebody suddenly sees a white mouse he feels very happy -- something good is going to happen to him.


One day it happened, a father and son were sitting, taking their dinner, when suddenly the son saw that behind the father there was a white mouse. He told his father: Don't turn suddenly, there is a guest behind you, a very good omen. Slowly move and see. The father slowly moved and saw a white mouse, and they were both happy because it was really a good omen, something beautiful was going to happen. The white mouse started moving around them, and because they were not disturbing him he started dancing and shaking; but when he shook, suddenly he became an ordinary grey mouse; because in fact he had fallen in a tin of flour, white flour, that's why he looked white; when he started dancing he became an ordinary grey mouse. Both father and son closed their eyes because the good omen had disappeared -- but even if you close your eyes the grey mouse is there.


This is a beautiful story. This is how it happens. Don't look at happiness too long, otherwise the white flour will drop and suddenly you will say: There is a grey mouse! Avoid! Let the white mouse dance behind you! Don't look too hard and don't look too long. Because in life good and bad are not two things. The day turns into night, the night turns into day again. It is a circle, moving like a wheel of a cart: the same spokes come again and again to the top, and go down.


If you ask me whether I am happy or unhappy, I cannot answer you in those terms. Those terms are irrelevant. At the most I can only say I AM. And that I AMNESS IS totally ecstatic. But there is no ecstasy as such. It is not an experience. It is my way of being at this moment. It is not something happening to me, it is the very nature. When you come to yourself, when you return back home, when you enter into your own innermost core of being, it is not that something new happens to you, it has been happening always; for the first time you realize it.


The realization may be new but the fact is very very ancient, as ancient as the world, as ancient as the gods. It has been there from the very beginning. But you are too much concerned with pain and pleasure in the outer world, your whole consciousness is moving outward.


Close the doors, close the windows, settle within, and suddenly one day you start laughing, one day you start smiling at the fact that you were seeking something that was already there.


I was reading a Christian missionary's life story. He had come newly to an Eastern town. The bungalow and the church were outside the town. There were only two bungalows; he occupied one -- and from the very first day, in the morning when he looked around, just to be acquainted with the territory and the place, he became interested in the other neighbouring bungalow. It looked beautiful. The trees were very green, and there were many flowers. He went around it, he wanted to know to whom the bungalow belonged, and he wanted to become acquainted, to be introduced, but he found no one there. He controlled his curiosity, but every day the curiosity grew more and more. One day he could not contain himself -- it must have been after he had been there one month -- he entered the garden, went to the main door, but it was locked. He went around the house, he couldn't see any sign of anybody there, it was absolutely empty and silent. He became a little apprehensive -- what was the matter? Then he came out again. On the gate he had just missed one thing, just on the gate there was a small notice: 'Key next door.' But he was surprised because next door was his own home! There was no other house, only two houses.


He came back, he enquired, his wife said: Yes, the key is here, why didn't you ask me? The day we came somebody came and said, Keep this key. I am going away for a few months. I will be coming back soon but my son has gone to the war and he may return meanwhile, and he may like to stay for a few days and rest, so keep this key. The key was in the house.


The missionary started laughing, he said, It was really a joke! For one month the house haunted me like anything, and I wanted to go in but I contained myself -- that's not good, to enter, interfere, trespass; but today I couldn't contain my curiosity, I said, It's okay, I must go and see what is the matter. And the key had always been in the house!


The key is with you. The treasure is with you. You have forgotten both. When the energy returns inwards -- that is the key. The energy returning inwards is the key, it opens the door -- and suddenly, the treasure of all treasures is there.
<p class="question">YOU SAID THAT WHEN TWO BEINGS ARE IN LOVE THEY ARE IN COMMUNION WITH EACH OTHER. THEN WHY DOES THE WORLD CALL IT 'FALLING' IN LOVE WHEN IT IS SUCH AN ECSTATIC HAPPENING AND NOT A FALL TO A LOWER PLANE?</p>


The world calls it falling in love because the world is ruled by the head, and heart is lower than the head.


When somebody falls in love he falls from the head towards the hear And heart is there in childhood, head grows later on. Head is a later growth. You are born with a heart, you are not born with a head. You are born only with the possibility of a head, not with the head.


Reason has to be taught, love cannot be taught. Reason has to be forced on you, your mind has to be conditioned. Schools, colleges, universities exist for reason, there exists no school, no college, no university for love -- there is no need! One is born with a heart already functioning perfectly. The head is just a possibility. If it is taught, conditioned, it will function; if not, it won't function at all.


So when again in your youth you move into the relationship of love, you feel it also like a fall, because the mind feels that you are moving backwards, falling towards the childhood, moving towards the heart again. And the head has a condemnation for the heart; that condemnation is also involved in that term 'falling.' The head is saying: What foolish thing are you going to do? Are you mad? It is a fall! Avoid it!


For the head, love is the greatest enemy; because once you are in love you become irrational. Look at two lovers -- they talk foolishly, they behave foolishly, they are almost mad, and the head goes on condemning and judging: What are you doing?


You are falling back. That's why the world calls love a 'falling'. But it is good to fall. In another sense also, not in a condemnatory sense, it is a fall, because it leads you towards depth. Reason is superficial. Heart is a deeper phenomenon within you, it leads towards depth, it is diving into your being.


Don't condemn it. The society condemns because the society looks at love as an anarchic phenomenon. We teach a boy or a girl, and we waste so much money on him, and then suddenly one day he falls in love, and the whole structure is disturbed.


It is said that the mother prepares the child for years to become wise; then he meets another woman and within minutes he is a fool again.


One woman prepares for years to help him become a little wise, and another woman comes in, and within a moment, he is a fool again.


Don't condemn it, because foolishness has its own beauty. In fact a man who cannot be a fool sometimes is not wise enough. To be constantly wise, to be wise twenty fours a day and seven days a week is FOOLISH. Sometimes you need to take a holiday from your wisdom and act like a fool. Then only there is balance. The fool is also part of life.


In old days every king in his court used to have a great fool. That was a balancing factor, because in the court there were too many wise men, and sometimes too many wise men prove to be too many cooks in the kitchen. They spoil. They are just 'reasons', they don't have the roots of heart. A fool was needed -- in every great court there was a fool. And he brought humour to the court, the sense of humour he brought; otherwise wise men bring long faces, sadness, seriousness. Of course seriousness is good, but only sometimes; it has its moments; and there are moments one should be a little foolish. To me, a really wise man is spontaneous -- when wisdom is needed he is wise, when foolishness is needed he is a perfect fool.


If you cannot move to the polarities, you are a fixed and dead phenomenon. One should be capable of moving, flexible. You should be able to reason deeply and you should be able to fall into irrationalities also. Calculate and love. Arithmetic and poetry. Wise and old, foolish and young. When the child and the old man meet, when the wise man and the fool have become one unity, you attain to the greatest growth. Remember this. Always retain the capacity to fall in love, to be foolish, to behave foolishly.
To me the only fool is the man who is always wise.


Life needs polarities and proportions. Foolishness is very refreshing. It cleanses your eyes, gives you perspective. It again brings the innocence of the child. It again gives you spontaneity. Then you are not fixed in a pattern, you are flowing.


But don't try to be a fool continuously -- that too is foolish. And it is easy for the mind to cling to one extreme. The most difficult thing for the mind is to change polarities because it disturbs your style. You would L;ke to be fixed in a pattern -- that is the way of least resistance. You have learned a trick and then you remain fixed in it. You remain closed in the known. You don't want to move to the unknown. You don't want to learn, you don't want to be open to the new facts.


Mind always wants either to be a leftist or to be a rightist, either to be this or that -- BUT TO BE SOMETHING. And life is in the flow -- TO BE NOTHING; the capacity to be everything and to be nothing; the capacity to move in any role and not get fixed in it. 'No role' should become your life style. You should be capable of moving, of dropping it, just as you drop your clothes.


Roles are just to be used, and if you don't get fixed and imprisoned in them, you retain the freedom and the flow and you retain the capacity to enjoy life in its totality. Wisdom is good, foolishness also. Arithmetic beautiful, poetry also. This is the paradox.


Use the head, use the heart, and if you can use both a tremendous revolution will happen. If you can use both you will become aware that you are the third force -- neither; you are neither head nor heart; because if you can move so easily from one to another you cannot be either; you must be separate from both -- then the witnessing arises; then the identification is broken. And that witnessing is what meditation is all about.
<p class="question">YOU OFTEN SAY 'I AM WITH YOU', BUT IN SUFFERING I ONLY ENCOUNTER SOLITUDE. IS THAT BECAUSE I'M NOT IN TUNE WITH YOU OR BECAUSE THE WAY TO THE CENTRE IS A SOLITARY ONE?</p>


When I say I am with you I mean it. I am with you. But you will realize me only when you are in a celebrating mood. When you are unhappy and miserable, you are blind. I am with you but you cannot see. Your eyes are filled with tears. And if you don't see, what can I do? I can just wait.


There is an old proverb that when you weep you weep alone, when you laugh the whole world laughs with you. Laughter has something religious in it. Maybe that's why it has been banned from all churches -- there's something religious in it.


If you want to feel me, that I am with you, laugh more, enjoy more, take life as fun, don't be serious.


I know -- this question is from Yoga Lalita, she is serious. A little too serious. Seriousness becomes gloomy; seriousness becomes like a disease; seriousness is pathological; it is ill. Laughter is health.


I'm not saying don't be sincere. Sincerity is totally different from seriousness. One has to be sincere and authentic; only then life will reveal deeper mysteries. But there is no reason to be serious and sad. Otherwise YOU WILL MISS ME. and that only means you will miss life.


Whenever you are sad you are closed, you are caved-in, you are not related to the world. The rosebush goes on flowering but you are not related -- it doesn't in fact exist for you. The moon goes on travelling in the sky, but it doesn't exist for you. The birds go on singing, their song will appear only like a disturbance, annoying. You are sad, you are cut off. Sadness breaks all the bridges with life.


When I say I am with you I mean it, but you will realize it only when you are happy and dancing. When I say happy and dancing I don't mean that in life you will not have sad moments. But if you know how to be happy you can enjoy a sad moment also. It is worth enjoying. It has something in it -- because there is nothing in life which is not precious. The only thing is to know how to enjoy it.


Laughter is beautiful, but shallow. Sadness looks ugly but is very deep. If you know how to enjoy laughter you will know how to enjoy sadness also. Then, if you are enjoying, sadness does not become a destructive force; then you are not disconnected from existence. Rather, in your sadness also, you are deeply related.


Then you will look at the flower -- and you had looked at the flower when you were laughing and dancing and celebrating, the flower was beautiful; but now the flower has a depth which it never had before. Now look at the moon; the moon is not now a two dimensional thing, it has become three dimensional. Laughter is two dimensional, sadness is three dimensional. But one has to learn from laughter, and then you can enjoy everything, even sadness. You can enjoy everything, even when you are unhealthy you can enjoy it; it has its own beauty.


Sometimes it has happened that people have become enlightened when they are ill. In a great fever, and Lying on their beds doing nothing, suddenly they awake in a totally different dimension. Lying on their beds, not doing anything, unoccupied, nothing to do, the mind was silent; a deep rest. And they must be enjoying it.


Life changes its colours with your interpretations. Illness looks like the enemy. If you are acquainted only with allopathic attitudes then illness is the enemy. But if you are acquainted with homeopathic attitudes then illness is not the enemy but the friend. It cleanses the body of the toxins, poisons. A fever is a friend not a foe. It has come to help you to cleanse the body, and the work is so tremendous, that's why you are feeling so hot.


If you can enjoy, you can enjoy everything. You have the key. And with that key you can open millions of locks; it is a master key. You try it!


You have a headache -- just try to enjoy and watch it. Suddenly you will feel a distance arising between you and the headache. The hammering continues in the head, but now the head is far away. If you go on, by and by you will feel the headache is still there but not part of YOU; somewhere on the very periphery of the world there is still a little hammering in the head but it doesn't belong to you. Your consciousness is totally different, totally separate from it. No identification exists.


But start by enjoying, celebrating. First try to find me with you when you are in a good pleasant mood, it will be easier. If you can find me then, then by and by whenever you are unhappy, also look around; try to find me -- it will be a little difficult. Wash your eyes, clean your eyes of the tears and look again. By and by you will see the shadow. Soon you will start feeling me.


And everything is good. Everything is good as it is. This should be THE VERY BASIC ATTITUDE. How can anything be wrong? If it is there it must have some purpose. You may not be aware though, that is another thing. But allow it. And watch! WATCH should be the keyword.
<p class="question">WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN PRAYER AND MEDITATION?</p>


A lot of difference. A great difference. in fact they are absolutely different things. Their movement is in different directions.


There are two types of religions in the world: prayer oriented religions and meditation oriented religions. Christianity, Judaism, Mohammedanism, Hinduism -- these are prayer oriented religions. Jainism, Buddhism, Taoism -- these are meditation oriented religions.


For a prayer oriented religion the concept of a personal God is needed -- to relate to. For meditation-oriented religions God is a useless hypothesis; it can be discarded easily into the dustbin. It is not needed.


Buddha could attain without any belief in God. The Taoist Lao Tzu never mentions the word God -- never! There must be a very great difference -- try to understand it.


Prayer is a dialogue between two persons: God and you. You are talking to God, it is a dialogue; it is not a silence. Words continue. You are not talking to another man but you are talking to another being; but that being is imagined also in the image of man.


It is said in the Bible: God created man in his own image. The reality seems to be just the opposite: man created God in his own image. You have an imaginary conception of a person there, somewhere. You talk. You confess your sins, you ask his forgiveness. You pray. Good, good for the heart. It helps a little bit. You feel more unburdened, you feel light. Maybe there is a God, maybe not -- that's not the point. But believing there is a God, you can unburden yourself, you can surrender yourself, it becomes easier for you. The hypothesis is helpful. But in Christianity, in Judaism, in Mohammedanism, nothing exists like MOKSHA. There is a heaven, and hell. Hell for those who have never been related to God in any way but rather were working against him, against his wishes, committing sins; and heaven for those who prayed, who worked for him according to his wishes.


But there is nothing like moksha: absolute freedom. Because even in heaven God will be the ruler; and he is not a democrat, he is absolutely dictatorial, because there is nobody on top of him and he is the creator: he can uncreate, he can create, he can do whatsoever he wants to do.


And he seems to be a little whimsical. He forgives sinners. Then the opposite must be happening also -- that people who are virtuous but never prayed must be suffering in hell, because people who were not virtuous but prayed are enjoying beautiful women and wine and good things in heaven. Seems to be a little whimsical.


It seems that man has created the hypothesis as a consolation. It seems the whole phenomenon of God arises out of fear not out of knowing, out of guilt, out of the misery man is, not out of understanding.


Meditation is not a dialogue, it is silence. There is nobody to relate to, to talk to. For a meditator prayer is foolish: What are you doing? To whom are you talking?


Just the other day I was reading a book -- a woman writing letters to God. Vivek looked at it and started laughing; she said, What foolishness! Letters written to God! But that is the mind of prayer.


I told you there are three layers of your being; first: where you are just reason. in reason, dialogue is not possible; it is a debate, always a fight. Then the second layer: of love; dialogue is possible. And then the third layer of being: dialogue again is impossible because there is nobody else. You alone exist in your crystal purity. In absolute silence.


The Bible says: in the beginning there was the Word. It starts from the word. Buddha cannot say that, he cannot agree with that. in the beginning was silence. And in the end also there will be silence. Meditation is silence, it is not a dialogue.


People who are reason oriented, head oriented, they become -- if they are interested in religion -- they become theologians. They write theories about God, they talk about God. If they are not religious, they become anti religious, they become philosophers, atheists, agnostics.


Then the second layer of your being: love, heart. If a man is religious love becomes prayer. If the man is not religious then love becomes poetry, art, painting, music.


Then the third layer, the deepest core, beyond which nothing exists, is being. Absolute silence; and absolute aloneness. There;s no difference now between religious and non.religious. At the centre everything becomes one. In that silence one is neither religious nor anti religious, because those are the terms of the reason. In that silence one's love is neither prayer nor art. Everything has become one. That silence IS meditation.


When people come to me, if I see that they are in their heads then I help them to be related, to move, to fall in love, to become a little foolish, so that they come down from their heads, so that they get down from the throne of the ego a little bit. Because one has to surrender in love. One cannot carry the ego. If one carries it, love is not possible. If I see that they have lived, they have learnt, they have experienced what love is, then I tell them to fall still deeper into meditation. It is the last fall because there is no abyss more deep than meditation. If you are head oriented -- move into prayer, love. But don't make it a goal, it is not the goal. That's why Christianity and Mohammedanism don't reach to the height of Buddhism. No, they remain with the second layer. (For the third layer something like Buddha, something like Lao Tzu, is needed.) They remain better than ordinary worldly people, but still not absolutely other worldly, they remain in the middle. Good as far as it goes, but not enough.


If you cannot love, pray. If you have loved and know what it is, then move into aloneness.


There are two sorts of aloneness; one is loneliness, another is aloneness. If you have not loved, and you move into solitariness, it will be loneliness, you will feel a deep hunger for the other. It will not be aloneness. The other will be there -- as absence. You will continuously feel the absence of the other, you will hanker. Maybe that's why people who have not loved well, they start talking to God, to an imaginary phenomenon -- to fill their loneliness, to be occupied with someone.


It is a fantasy, it is a dream -- good, religious, but still a dream. One has to go beyond all dreaming. One has to go to the point when one is sure enough that the other is not needed. I am not saying that that type of person will not love. In fact only that type of person can love. But then he loves out of abundance. Then it is not a NEED. On the contrary he is so full, flooded, that he would like to share. Then he is in search of people who would like to unburden him, who would help him unburden his heart. The greatest lover is one whose need for love has disappeared.


Otherwise, there are small lovers, for whom love is a need just like food. They cannot be without food and they cannot be without a woman or without a man. But when you can be without, and you can be as beautiful without as you are with, then the greatest phenomenon happens: out of silence, if a dialogue starts, it is the greatest dialogue.


So these are the two things to remember. If you feel that there is a deep hankering for love, then prayer is the way for you. Let the other be there, talk to him, be with him. The question just before this question was on my saying to you 'I am with you' -- that is for the second layer people, those who are in need of love.


If you become the third type of person then I will not say 'I am with you', I will say 'I am you'. Then there is no point in being with. Then simply I am you, you are me. Then there is no duality.
<p class="question">WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH YOUR HANDS? I FIND MYSELF MORE EMOTIONALLY MOVED BY WATCHING THEM, THAN BY LISTENING TO THE WORDS YOU SPEAK.</p>


It is natural, because when I am speaking I am speaking to your heads. Emotion cannot be involved, emotion cannot be there. I am talking to your reason to persuade it. And what am I doing with my hands? When I am talking to your heads I am continuously playing with your hearts also.


I have to work on two layers. For your head to be convinced that the time has come to drop itself, to commit suicide, that the time has come for committing a suicide of reason -- I go on talking. But that alone won't be enough. Because if suddenly your head is cut, and the heart has not started functioning, you will be in a very very deep confusion.


With my hands I go on working with your heart -- that's why in India we have called gestures, MUDRAS; when a Buddha makes a gesture it is meaningful, significant. Hands are very very deep sources of energy. By the movements of the hands patterns of energy are made, invisible energy; but if you can feel, you can feel; and you will feel that something is going on continuously in the heart.


It is just like -- have you seen a potter making an earthen pot? He works with both the hands, one inside the pot, another outside. From the inside he goes on supporting, from the outside he goes on giving the shape. And the wheel is moving. By my talking I go on destroying your head. By my hands I go on supporting your heart, encouraging it to function more, encouraging it to beat naturally.


It is natural if you feel that way. But don't pay much attention to my hands because if you pay too much attention to my hands then you will be related to my hands with your head. You just forget about my hands -- let them work! Because the heart functions in darkness. The functioning and the changing of the heart is indirect. It is just like the roots of the trees; hidden underneath the earth in deep darkness they function. If you bring them to light they start dying.


So don't pay much attention to my hands, because if you pay too much attention to my hands IT IS HEAD which is paying attention to the hands. Then you miss the point. You may enjoy it, you may feel a certain emotion arising in you, but the real thing has been missed.


You pay attention to my words! You be 60 completely absorbed with my words that my hands and your heart are left alone, you are not in between -- otherwise you can create trouble, you can become a barrier.


And I am working on the third layer also -- which you cannot see at all. The movements of the hands can be seen -- look! Words I use -- you can understand the meaning of them. Hands I use -- you can only see the movement, not the meaning. Words for the head, hands for the heart -- and then there is my being continuously overwhelming you. You cannot even see the movement of it. My being -- just like a cloud surrounding you.


But don't pay attention to my hands. Let them be indirect.
<p class="question">WHEN ONE IS DISTANT FROM THE MIND, ONE IS IN A STATE OF MEDITATION; BUT SUDDENLY OR GRADUALLY ONE IS IDENTIFIED WITH THE MIND AGAIN; ONE HAS FALLEN ASLEEP AGAIN. THIS IS VERY FRUSTRATING. CAN YOU SAY SOMETHING ABOUT THIS?</p>


This is frustrating, but don't get frustrated. Rather, whenever you see that you are getting identified with the mind, remember again, make yourself alert, shake yourself a little bit. Rather than putting energy into frustration, put energy into remembrance. Remember again, again you will be alert, and the mind will be far away.


It is going to happen again and again, you will fall asleep again and again and again, and you will have to bring yourself out of it. Don't start getting frustrated. It is natural, take it for granted, it is natural, you have lived with the mind for so long and you have lived identified with the mind for so long that it is natural that you forget again and again.


But even if for moments you become alert, aware, mindful, feel fortunate, because there are millions of people who live their whole life and not for a single moment do they become mindful, not for a single moment are they aware of what is happening, not for a single moment have they known who they are.


Feel fortunate. Don't feel frustrated. Always interpret things positively, don't interpret them negatively, because one negativity leads into another negativity; one positivity leads into another positivity. If you feel frustrated, then self remembering will be coming less and less to you, because it never comes in a frustrated mind, in a miserable mind, in an angry mind -- it never comes!


Then it will come less and less and you will feel more and more frustrated; as you feel more and more frustrated it will be coming less and less -- it will disappear completely.


Feel positive; if even for a single moment it happened, thank God, feel grateful, something superb has happened to you -- even for a single moment, so what? If it can happen for a single moment it can happen for the whole life!


In fact you never have more than one single moment with you, you never have two moments together. If it can happen for a single moment you have the key! One moment is the whole life, one moment is all eternity, because you will never get two moments together, only one moment always.


And if you can remember in one moment you can remember for ever and ever. Feel positive, feel thankful and grateful, and suddenly you will see more remembrances happening. A day comes when you never fall asleep. It comes, it has come to human beings like you, it has come to me, I am just like you.


There is nothing special about it. You are as capable as anybody else. Just be a little more positive towards this happening, that will do.
<p class="question">WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE, IF ANY, BETWEEN ONE'S 'CENTRE' AND ONE'S 'EGO-CENTRE?'</p>


One's centre is not ONE'S centre, it is the centre of the whole. And the ego-centre is ONE'S centre. That is the only difference, but that is a vast difference. When you are not there the centre is there but that is not YOUR centre, it is the centre of the whole.


When you are there you have a centre, a false, pseudo centre, which is not the centre of the whole, and until it is the centre of the whole don't be contented with it. Because you are in a dream, you are not in reality. And we have become so accustomed to dream that we have completely forgotten what is reality and what is a dream.


In the Eastern psychology we treat the reality as a dream. In the Western psychology they treat dreams as reality. That's why Freud, Jung, Adler and the whole company, they all go on interpreting, analyzing dreams to understand your reality. Dreams -- so significant! In the East we have never interpreted dreams, we have never bothered about it. Rather, we say the whole reality is a dream, a MAYA, illusion. But there is a temptation to take a dream as real.


It happened, Mulla Nasrudin once dreamed in his sleep that he was frying cowdung. He was very disturbed. Of course anybody would be. In the morning he went to a soothsayer, an interpreter of dreams, and he said, I am very worried! You tell me the meaning of it. The soothsayer said: My fee is one rupee. Give me one rupee and I will interpret it. Mulla Nasrudin jumped and said, You fool! If I had one rupee should I fry dung? I would go to the market, buy fish and fry that!


There is a tendency to take dreams as part of reality; then your whole reality becomes dream. Western psychology and the Western mind itself takes dreams as real. It is a very childish attitude. I call it childish because children do the same. Children never make any distinction between dreams and reality. A child wakes up in the morning crying and weeping. You ask him, What is the matter? and he says, I had a toy just now, where has it gone? He was dreaming about a toy, now he is awake and the dream toy has disappeared and he is crying and weeping -- he wants that toy back. He cannot make the distinction. The dream seems to be real.


Western psychology is dominated too much by the childish mind. Eastern psychology is dominated by the old, the mature, the wise mind. A child thinks the dream is real, a wise old man thinks the reality is dream.


The whole reality is a dream. One has to wake up. If you can wake up for a single moment -- feel grateful. And more moments will be coming and following. Don't get frustrated.


And, always remember, that if you feel the centre as yourself, then you also are a part of the dream -- that's the difference between the ego and the ATMAN, the self. Ego is a dream centre, centre of the dream personality; with the personality disappearing, the centre will disappear. Self or atman is a real centre. When everything disappears, still it is there. But it is not yours.


You ask me what is the difference if any between one's centre and one's ego centre -- there is. One's centre is not one's, it is of the whole. And one's ego centre is one's, it is not of the whole. And whatsoever belongs to you is dream, nothing else belongs to you. Reality belongs to the whole, it cannot belong to the part.
<p class="question">SO FAR, IN BEING A WITNESS, IT FEELS AS THOUGH IT IS PART OF MY MIND THAT IS WATCHING THE OTHER PART OF MY MIND. COULD YOU SPEAK ON THIS PLEASE?</p>


This is good, a good omen. When one watches, one comes to realize that this is one part of the mind watching another part of the mind. Now you have to realize who is realizing these two parts, who is realizing that THIS is part one, THIS is part two. Naturally you cannot be either, you have transcended both. And if again you feel this is a third part of the mind watching, then you become the fourth. If again you feel this is a fourth part of mind, then you again become the fifth. YOU ARE THE TRANSCENDENTAL, which always transcends. Whatsoever you can watch, you are never -- that should be the law, the criterion. Whatsoever you can watch you are never. You are the watcher, the watcher on the hill.
<p class="question">WHEN ONE FEELS HAPPY AND ECSTATIC, AND WANTS TO SHARE WITH OTHERS, BUT FINDS PEOPLE AROUND ARE NOT IN A MOOD TO CELEBRATE, WHAT SHOULD HE DO?</p>


You should celebrate their sadness! You should enjoy their sadness. Don't move against the people. Be with them.


'Being with' has a beauty of its own. If people are sad, you be sad -- but enjoy it, because there is no reason for you to be sad, you can enjoy it easily. Celebrate it deep down, but be sad. If they are crying, you cry: tears streaming down. But enjoy the whole thing, it is so beautiful!


Have you ever cried and enjoyed it? Try it, nothing like it. It beats all experiences. Suddenly you see that you can cry and enjoy! Tears can come but they are not of sadness, something beautiful is flowing through them. And whenever you are with people, in a subtle way you drop the ego.


Try to 'be with'. Make it a point as far as possible never to be against. Being with is to be religious, being against is to be political. So wherever people are going, you just be with them.


I will tell you one story. It happened, one of the greatest Greek sannyasins was Diogenes. He was a beautiful person because when one is not attached to anything one attains to a certain grace. When you are attached to things you become ugly, you become thing-like. He was absolutely a free man. He used to move naked.


He was caught by a few people, and those people were merchants of slaves. They wanted to sell him.


When it was really very difficult to catch him they pondered over it. They surrounded him, but he was a very strong healthy man; he could have defeated at least eight persons, and the slave merchants -- they were only four, so they were a little apprehensive.


Diogenes said, Don't be afraid, I am always with you. What is the matter? You tell me, I will solve the problem. They said, This is a problem you won't like to solve! He said, There is nothing which I don't like to solve, you simply say it! They said, This is our idea -- we are thinking to catch you and make you a prisoner. He said, Perfectly good! So why are you waiting? For whom? You start -- here are my hands.


They couldn't believe it! They looked at each other, it was suspicious! And this man giving them.... He said, Don't be worried! I never fight, I FLOW WITH. That has been my whole life style. So you take me! Make me a prisoner. If the whole wants it to be so, let it be so.


They were afraid, but still they tried. Then they regained their confidence, he was not going to fight.


Chained, he started walking with them -- but he was such a man, you cannot make a slave of such a man. Those four persons looked stupid with him.


And Diogenes said: Don't be afraid, you need not carry these chains, because I always FLOW WITH. I will come with you wherever you go. I will never leave you! They became still more afraid. What type of man was this, what manner of man?


But they started following whatsoever he said -- A Master is a Master, you cannot make.... A Master remains a Master even in a prison. By and by they started telling their own problems to him -- because he looked so happy, so tremendously ecstatic, not of this world!


They became friendly -- not only friendly, they became disciples; by the time they reached the market they were already disciples and he was the Master and they were saying, Master tell us THIS...! And he said, Don't forget that you have come here to sell me. You are losing your consciousness. Don't be so forgetful, remember why you have caught me! They said, We cannot do that now. But he said, You need not worry. Stick to your original idea. I will do it for you. They couldn't believe it -- what will he do?


Then they came into the market. Everybody was interested -- the whole market became interested in this slave because never before had such a beautiful slave come.


There was the auctioneer. And when Diogenes stood there and the auctioneer started saying: This man is beautiful and very healthy and very strong, Diogenes said, Stop! Let me come there. You don't know how to introduce a person! Afraid, the auctioneer came down -- because this man was so strong and so powerful. Diogenes stood there -- and it has never happened before in any slave market -- and he said, All the slaves, come here! A Master has come here to be sold.


This is how one should flow with people, with life, with trees, with rivers.


Don't fight. Fighting is the only sin. Don't resist. If people are crying -- you cry. If people are laughing -- you laugh. And if you can do this, suddenly you feel that you are just a witness, not a doer. And that is the secret of it all.
			

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> Copyright 1964-1990 Osho (Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh)
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