---
section: Library
booktitle: "The Buddha Disease"
booktype: "Diaries"
bookcode: "DISEAS"
dategiven: "05 January 1977 pm"
place: " in Chuang Tzu Auditorium"
chapternum: "Chapter #5"
chaptertitle: "Take life in the spirit of a picnic"
acode: "7701055"
shorttitle: "DISEAS05"
audio: "No"
video: "No"
esttime: ""
displaytitle: "The Buddha Disease: Chapter #5"
---

```style
.sutra {
  font-style: italic;
  white-space: pre-wrap !important;
}
```
<!--This file is automatically generated. Do not edit!-->


Deva means divine, abhiyana means adventure divine adventure. And remember it always -- that life is never a static thing. And the moment you make it static, it has already slipped out of your hand. Life is only in the process. It is in adventure, pilgrimage. The goal is always arriving, but it never arrives. And it is never going to arrive -- that is not the nature of life. If the goal arrives, all meaning is lost. Then there is nothing left.


So god is the goal who always appears to be arriving, promising, but who never arrives. You are always coming closer to it. But the play continues -- the adventure remains.


So take life as an adventure. Never think in static terms -- always think in dynamic terms... movement, process.


Our language is very faulty -- it turns everything into a static thing. It makes nouns out of verbs. For example, love. Now, love can never be a noun. It is always loving -- it is never love. Life becomes a noun. Life is never a noun -- it is a verb. It is always living.


And all languages do that mischief -- they change the nature of the verb and reduce it to a noun. And when you talk about love it seems as if you are talking about some thing. And love is not a thing. When you talk about god, it appears as if you are talking about some thing -- and god is not a thing.


God is the total process of existence. Rather than calling it existence, it is better to call it existing. That which is existing and goes on existing -- that is god.


So god is the impossible goal -- yes, a goal it is, but impossible... and that's the beauty of it.


One has to seek it, knowing well that one is never going to arrive. But in that very search is joy, in that very adventure is bliss. So I will call you 'abhiyana', mm?


And you have come now to the right place. You have knocked on many doors -- but that is natural. Before one knocks on the right door one has to knock on many doors, because there is no other way to know the right. One has to grope in the dark... one has to go on knocking. One can never be certain.


And everything helps. Even wrong doors help -- they help you to reach to the right door. They are also needed -- they have a certain purpose to fulfill. So whomsoever has helped you to come to me -- good people, not-so-good people, religious, irreligious, real, phoney -- to whomsoever has helped you, feel grateful towards them all, unconditionally grateful, because without them you would not have been here.


Life is such a big mystery, and so many people are playing their roles in it that we never know how we are helped.... But you have come!


[The new sannyasin said that previously he had done jikra. 'Jikra' means remembrance, and is a sufi meditation. See'the great nothing', october 8th, where bhagwan described this meditation in detail.]

And how were you feeling doing jikra?

[The sannyasin replies: My heart breaks!]


Good! The heart is meant to be broken. Its purpose is that -- that it should melt into tears and disappear. The heart is to evaporate, and when the heart has evaporated, exactly in the same place where the heart was, you come to know the real heart.


This heart has to break. Once it has fallen apart, suddenly you come to know a deeper heart. Just like an onion, you peel it and the new layer is there.


So this heart is the outermost heart -- mm? once it has broken, a fresher heart, a deeper heart, will become available. And with that heart, jikra will go even more deep. You have to continue jikra. It is one of the most beautiful methods.

[Osho recommended groups for him and then said.... ]


.... In between, join sufi dancing and t'ai chi. And I call it simply t'ai chi -- not t'ai chi chuan. And there is a difference between the two.


T'ai chi chuan is a war method, a defense method. When you use t'ai chi in fighting, then it is called chuan. But the moment you are getting ready to fight, you have missed the whole thing. Then you cannot be really relaxed. The very idea of defence, of fight, is ugly, non-meditative. So we simply use t'ai chi. It is not to defend, it is not to attack. It has nothing to do with the war methodology. It is just a process of going inwards -- and a tremendously significant process. So join t'ai chi, and forget chuan -- completely forget chuan. Mm? because that is how the whole thing was destroyed.


These things are not to be used in the ordinary way. But it happened in japan and china.... Both the countries tried to transform even meditation into war methods. Man is so mad that even if you give him meditation, he will change it into a war method. Meditation is meant to give you peace, silence -- but even that, in the hands of the politicians, will be turned into a war method, into violence.


That's how in Japan meditation disappeared completely, because it went into wrong hands... just as it is happening in the modern world. Physicists invented the atomic energy. It could have been a blessing but it fell into the hands of the warmongers. And Einstein was very sorry....


Just two days before he was dying, somebody asked him,'Would you like to become a scientist again if you are given another chance, another life?'


He said,'Never! One mistake is enough! I would like rather to be a plumber -- at least I will not harm anybody.'


Einstein himself, not knowing at all what would happen, wrote the letter that introduced roosevelt to atomic energy. He was thinking that the atomic energy would be used for peaceful purposes, creative purposes, but it was used for destruction. The same has happened with meditation.


T'ai chi is a beautiful meditative process. It fell into the hands of the politicians; they used it -- because tai chi can make you so still, so silent, so disciplined, that you can be very dangerous. And you can be in tremendous control of your energies. The same happened with zen methods -- they were reduced into certain technologies which can be used in war: archery, wrestling. And then all sorts of things were reduced.
So forget that chuan -- t'ai chi is enough!


Deva means divine, and darpan means mirror -- a divine mirror. That's how I see every being -- a mirror for the divine. And unless we reflect the divine, we can never be satisfied. Once we become a perfect mirror to the divine and god can have a look into his face through your face, immediately there is tremendous contentment... one is fulfilled.


So each being has to become a mirror -- and that's what meditation is all about. When the mind has no thoughts it becomes a mirror. When it has thoughts, there are ripples and the lake is so much disturbed that the moon cannot be reflected in it. When there are no winds and no ripples and the lake is completely silent and asleep, then it is a mirror.


So human consciousness can be in two states: one is that of turmoil -- that state we call the mind; another, when there is no turmoil -- that state we call meditation. In meditation one becomes a mirror -- and nothing else is needed.


Deva means divine, gatha means story; divine story. The meaning is almost the same as gospel.


And every human being is a story yet not unfolded. It is as if everyone is just a seed waiting for the right season to sprout. This divine story has to be completed, and one can complete it only if one very consciously takes one's life in one's own hands.


Ordinarily people exist accidentally... just like driftwood, not knowing where they are going. Ordinarily people don't have any idea about what they are doing with their life. It is a mess -- they go in all the directions simultaneously. And the ultimate result is not a beautiful story completed, but madness. Will it be easy to pronounce? -- 'gatha'.


Deva means divine, abhinaya means acting, drama, play -- divine acting. The whole life is nothing but a play, and one should not take it seriously. The moment you take it seriously you get into trouble. The very attitude of seriousness is the root cause of all anxiety. Take it non-seriously, take it easy... take it as a fun! That is one of the most essential teachings of the east -- that life is nothing but a drama.


In the west psychodrama is a very new invention, but the east has always looked at life as a psychodrama. Play it well, but don't be bothered too much about whether you succeed or fail, because in the final analysis it makes no difference. The winners and the losers are all equal, because it is just a game -- it is not real. The only real thing is the witness, and all else is just acting.


If you can keep this in your awareness, it will transform your whole life. And this I give you as a key -- it will unlock many doors. When I give a certain name, I mean that the name should become a reminder to you. So whenever you remember your name -- abhinaya -- remember that all is acting, and whatsoever you are doing, relax immediately.


Then and there, relax -- it is acting. Even if you were going to fight, relax; you were going to be angry, relax -- it is just acting. I'm not saying not to be angry. If anger is there, relax and be angry, but be playful -- don't take it seriously.


There are people who will be angry seriously, and there are people who will not be angry because they are very serious -- they cannot be angry. Both are the same! They both take life very seriously.


So this has to be remembered. It will give you many new spaces within your being. Look on all around as a vast stage -- so many people, so many actors, so many stories going on, so many things happening. God is playing in a thousand and one ways -- millions are his forms of play, but all is play. And once this insight goes deep into you -- that all is play -- your anxiety disappears.


But man is very neurotic. Have you seen people playing cards? Even in playing cards they become so serious that they are ready to kill each other! Just playing cards -- the kings and the queens are just false; or playing chess -- everything is false... but people can get very serious about the false too. Then the false also looks like the real.


Try just the opposite -- if you are non-serious, even the real becomes false. Hence in the east we say that the world is illusory, maya. The meaning is not to take it seriously. The word'maya' basically means magic show. You don't take the magician seriously -- you know that he is playing tricks. If he has produced a pigeon, he must be hiding it somewhere -- you don't take it seriously.


In the east we say that the whole world is a magic play -- god is the magician. Nothing is serious here.


And this is my message for you on your sannyas birth, mm? -- to take life very very non-seriously... in the spirit of a picnic.


[The new sannyasin says: I've done the vipassana here, in India... it was very difficult for me to get into.]


Yes, it is difficult. You got into a serious thing in the beginning (laughter). Mm? these vipassana people are serious people.... You got into wrong company from the very beginning!


Do some other groups first, mm? Then I will give you vipassana again. But one should first prepare. Vipassana directly is not good -- it becomes a heavy trip. It is a hard thing.


.... Whenever there is no group, continue all that is available here, but keep alert not to be serious. And when I have seen that you have learned how not to be serious, I will send you into vipassana. Right?


Prem means love, shakti means energy -- love energy. And that is the stuff the whole universe is made of -- love energy. From the lowest to the highest, it is one energy... manifesting in many ways -- gross and subtle -- but it is one energy. On the lowest it appears as electricity, on the highest it appears as prayer, but it is one energy.


So do a few things. One: more and more feel that you are less solid and fluid. Feel more and more that you are energy rather than a solid body. Relax the solidity... Let it melt. Mm? just as you can melt ice -- it becomes water; then you can heat water and it becomes vapour. Ice was solid like stone; when it is vapour, you cannot even see it -- it has become invisible.


These are the three forms of all energy: solid, liquid, vapour. Ordinarily people exist at the first -- the solid... frozen. We are all frozen love energies. A few of us who are very fortunate can melt a little and become liquid. Even fewer are capable of becoming vapour -- invisible.


So I call you love energy so that you can start working on these lines. Think of yourself more as energy, less as body. When you think of yourself as body, you are more solid, defined. When you think of yourself as an energy, you are more like a cloud -- nebulous, no definition, no boundary. Move like a cloud. And when you are sitting silently, close your eyes, and feel more and more like vapour -- evaporating, moving into the invisible... becoming invisible.


And soon, within a few days, you will have a few glimpses. The possibility is there -- that's why I am saying that you will have a few glimpses that suddenly you are not. Suddenly you will be shocked -- you have evaporated. You will have to open your eyes to see whether your body still exists or not. You will have to touch your body to feel whether it is really real or not. And when that happens you have to come and tell me.


So whenever you have time do the meditations, do groups. In the remaining time, walking on the road feel like a cloud -- nebulous. Then with closed eyes feel that you are moving into the invisible, disappearing... Losing all form, all visibility.


Any day it will happen, and when it happens come and tell me. Then I will give you a certain technique. So remind me whenever it happens.
			

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