---
section: Library
booktitle: "The Shadow of the Bamboo"
booktype: "Diaries"
bookcode: "BAMBOO"
dategiven: "24 April 1979 pm"
place: " in Chuang Tzu Auditorium"
chapternum: "Chapter #24"
chaptertitle: "None"
acode: "7904245"
shorttitle: "BAMBOO24"
audio: "No"
video: "No"
esttime: ""
displaytitle: "The Shadow of the Bamboo: Chapter #24"
---

```style
.sutra {
  font-style: italic;
  white-space: pre-wrap !important;
}
```
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Hock Hoe. Hock means prosperity, hoe means peace. Peace should be the center of life, then prosperity becomes the circumference automatically. If one is really peaceful, one prospers, one succeeds. Then whatsoever one does is bound to bring fulfillment. Then the man of peace has such an alchemical touch that whatsoever is touched by him turns into gold.


But the fundamental thing is peace, not prosperity. Prosperity is just like a shadow: wherever peace is, prosperity is, not vice versa. There may be prosperity and no peace; then it is worthless. Then it must have been achieved by foul means. Then somewhere there must be something wrong in it. And then it will remain only superficial and deep down you will remain in a turmoil. And that's what people do: they start by being prosperous and they think that if they are prosperous they will attain peace. This is just not possible.


If one becomes peaceful, prosperity comes. Jesus says: Seek ye first the kingdom of God, then all else shall be added unto you.


Prem Anat. Prem means love, anat means a big gem, a big diamond -- love, the diamond. There is nothing more precious than love. But love is not lust: love is prayer. Love basically has nothing to do with the world, with the world of objects. It has something to do with the interiority of your being. It is a quality, it is not a relationship. It is not that you are in love with somebody and then you are not in love -- falling in, falling out. That is not love -- that is something totally different.


Love is an inner quality, a fragrance. One is love, not in, but is. It has no reference to anybody. It simply refers to you -- that you are love, that you exist as love, that you behave as love, that you walk as love, that you live as love, that love is your existence. Then you have the greatest diamond in your heart. Then you have the most precious treasure in the world. Nothing else is needed -- that's enough, more than enough.


Anand Mahesh. Anand means bliss, mahesh means the great God -- bliss, the great God. Bliss is the original search. Everybody is seeking and searching for bliss -- knowingly, unknowingly, consciously, unconsciously, wrongly, rightly, but everybody is seeking bliss.


One can deny God, one can say that there is no God -- millions say there is no God -- but nobody can deny bliss. Bliss is far more significant than God himself, because nobody can deny it; even the atheist is seeking and searching for bliss. Hence I call it the great God, the God of gods.


Anand Alistair. Anand means bliss, alistair is a form of Alexander; it means a great helper of mankind. Your name will mean bliss, the great helper of mankind.


My understanding is that a blissful person need not try to help anybody: his very presence is a help. He need not make any deliberate effort to help; whatsoever he does naturally, spontaneously, without any self-conscious idea of helping, is helpful. His existence is helpful.


It should not be a deliberate effort. One should not become a missionary, one should not start helping people and serving people; one should not be a do-gooder. Those people are dangerous people; humanity has suffered very much from those people. They have proved a great mischief. Their whole effort to help is a hidden strategy to dominate. On the surface they serve; deep down they want to possess you. Their service is basically an ego-trip, and whenever there is ego, everything goes poisonous.


Just be blissful, and then whatsoever you do is good, is ethical, is moral. And without being blissful, never try to help anybody, because you will be harming. A miserable person can only harm and a blissful person can only help.


Anand Radha. Anand means blissful, Radha is the name of Krishna's beloved. Radha was not an historical person; it is a metaphor. It is a very significant word.


In Sanskrit, when the river moves towards the sea, from the origin to the goal, it is called dhara. If the river can move backwards, not towards the sea but towards the origin itself, then it is called radha. Dhara written backwards becomes radha. Radha simply means one who has started searching for the origin, for the very source from where we are coming. And the only way to reach to the source is to become a lover of existence.


Krishna represents the existence, and radha, the beloved, represents one who is in tremendous love with all that is. Love is the way to move back to the origin of life, to the very beginning, because the beginning is the end. And to come upon your original source is to be free from all misery. To know who you are is to come home.


Anand Jeff. Anand means bliss, jeff means peace with God. Bliss is possible only if you are at peace with God and by God I mean the whole existence. Ordinarily people are constantly in a struggle with existence -- not at peace but in conflict. And that is the root cause of all misery.


The part cannot fight against the whole, and if it tries to fight it is bound to go crazy. The leaf cannot fight with the tree and the wave cannot fight with the ocean. And that's exactly what man has been trying to do. Man is just a leaf in the tree of existence or a wave in the ocean of existence. But man wants to fight because it is only through fight that he can feel separate, special, unique. It is only through fight that he can attain to an ego.


If you are at peace with God, you are not, hence the fear of being at peace. If you are fighting, you are -- the more you fight, the more you are. But the more you are, the more miserable you will be the less you are, the less miserable. If you disappear completely, all misery disappears. And what is left is bliss.
Be at peace with existence and you will be blissful.


Prem Valerie. Prem means love, valerie means strong. One is strong only if one is rooted in love, otherwise one may look strong but deep down one remains hollow. One may have brute force but deep down one is weak. Without love the heart never attains to strength.


The miracle is that the man of love does not look like a rock. He is more flowing, more vulnerable, more delicate; he does not look strong. His strength is hidden. It is not on the surface, it is at the center; and the real strength always remains hidden. On the surface only the superficial appears. Love remains a song unsung... something potential, hiding in the deepest recess of one's being, but from there one is nourished.


Another meaning of valerie is health. That too is beautiful. Love makes one healthy and whole. Without love a person is basically ill. I am not talking about the physical health but the health of the total -- the physical, the psychological, the spiritual. When all these three are humming together, that is health. When there is no conflict between these three dimensions of man's being, when they are all in a kind of togetherness, helping each other, supporting each other, when there is a deep harmony, accord, that is health.


It is health because it heals the greatest wound in man's being; the wound is that of separation. Man has become separated from God and that is the wound. When you are perfectly healthy, functioning, humming as a total organic unity, that wound disappears; you are no more separate from existence. When your inner being is humming with music, suddenly you find that the same music is outside, and the separation between you and the outer disappears. Then there is nothing inner, nothing outer -- just one expanse, just one unity. That is health.
Love brings health, love brings strength, and ultimately love brings God.


[A sannyasin, leaving, says: Can you tell me which meditation to do while I'm gone? He likes whirling best.]


Then try that. That is one of the best things. If you can manage spinning, that is one of the very deep-going methods. If you liked it in your childhood you may be able to revive it.


Very few people can really enjoy spinning but those who can don't need any other meditation.
Try it, and if it feels good, then continue.
			

> [!info]
> Copyright 1964-1990 Osho (Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh)
>