Bhakti Sutra #2

First thing: no one is ordinary. If you were ordinary, the point of “athato” would never arrive.

No one is ordinary, because God is hidden within you—and what could be more out of the ordinary than God? You are extraordinary. You may have assumed you are only pebbles and stones—but you are not. In truth, pebbles and stones don’t even exist in existence; existence is made only of diamonds.

So do not give space to the delusion that you are ordinary. I am not asking you to inflate your ego. I am not asking you to consider yourself extraordinary in comparison to others. I am saying that extraordinariness is the very nature of existence. It’s not that you are extraordinary and others are not; here, everything is extraordinary. There simply isn’t any provision for being “ordinary.”

Understand this paradox well: because you have assumed yourself to be ordinary, you strive mightily to become extraordinary—through wealth, position, prestige. The search of the ego is based on this: you have accepted that you are ordinary—and being ordinary hurts, it pricks like a thorn, the mind won’t agree—so you pretend to be extraordinary. The irony is, you are already extraordinary; no need to pretend. Those who recognize their intrinsic extraordinariness drop the ego at once—there is no more use for it.

Imagine a diamond that has assumed it is a pebble. Believing itself a pebble, it decorates itself so it may appear like a diamond. Who wants to be a pebble? So the diamond, thinking itself a pebble, paints and polishes itself so no one discovers it is only a pebble. But the day it recognizes, “I have always been a diamond,” that very day the illusion of pebblehood vanishes, and so does the urge to adorn itself. That urge was the shadow of the pebble-delusion. That day humility is born.

The day you know you are extraordinary, the race to become extraordinary ends; the day you know you are exceptional—because there is no other way to be. God’s signature is upon you. On every pore His song is written. On every fiber His hand-print is there—because He has made you. He beats in your heart. He breathes in your breath.

You are not ordinary. If you were ordinary, religion would have no way. Then the point of “athato” would never come. If you were merely ordinary, how would the light of God be kindled in you? How would you awaken? How would you become a Buddha? It would be impossible.

But you can become a Buddha; you can awaken; you can enter samadhi—because that is your nature. Even when you did not know, you were That. The only difference is knowing; existence itself is always the same. Some come to know; some go on living without knowing. The difference is between knowledge and ignorance; there is not the slightest difference in existence. Between you and the Buddha there is not an atom of difference—as far as existence is concerned. But the Buddha turned back and saw himself; you have not turned back to see yourself. You play the beggar; the Buddha became an emperor.

Whoever turns back and sees himself becomes an emperor. All were emperors; some remembered, some got the hint; others remained beggars, trying to become emperors. What you are trying to become—that you already are. This is the message of all religion. What you seek you have never lost; you have only forgotten.

In this whole existence I have never seen anything “ordinary.” Even a blade of grass is brimming with His colors. He sleeps in the stones and pebbles. It is He who awakens in the awakened, He who sleeps in the sleeping. In the wise, He is the wisdom; in the ignorant, He is the ignorance.

So there is no way to be ordinary. Just look a little into anyone’s eyes—or stand before a mirror and look into your own—and you will find that someone else is peering out at you from within. You are more than you. You do not end at yourself. You are only the boundary of your being; you have not yet gone inward, not yet dived.

Therefore, the first thing: do not fall into the delusion of being ordinary. That is why the Upanishads say, “Tat tvam asi, Shvetaketu! You are That, Shvetaketu!” Those who have known declare, “Aham Brahmasmi! I am That! I am Brahman!” These proclamations are not of ego; they are of nature. It is so. It is the fact. There is no way to deny it. However much you forget, one day you will have to return home.

So, first thing: do not assume you are ordinary. The moment you accept you are merely human, nothing more, the search stops; the door to what is more closes; possibility is blocked.

At Gangotri the Ganga is so meek and tiny—just a thin stream falling out of Gomukh. If the Ganga were to assume at Gangotri, “This is all I am,” she would dry up and vanish in some desert. But that little Ganga grows and grows; when she meets the ocean, she becomes the ocean. You may be at Gangotri now, but you are Ganga nonetheless. The ocean seems far—that is your misunderstanding. When I look into you, I see your future standing right behind you. In your seed I see the flowers that you will one day see blooming.

For me you are God—nothing less. Nothing less is even possible. So do not fall into the delusion of the ordinary.

Second thing: the point of “athato,” the revolutionary “now,” comes only when you begin to live and experience life’s sorrow and pain with awareness. You have suffered a lot even now—but in sleep. You have suffered pain while nursing the hope that happiness will surely come. “Today I am unhappy—no matter; somehow get through today; it’s only a little while; tomorrow everything will be fine.” In such hope you have lived. Hiding behind that hope, you have never truly seen your pain. You kept it covered.

Remove these curtains. There is no tomorrow, and no tomorrow will ever come—there is only today, only here and now. Do not wait for “tomorrow.” “Tomorrow” is a trick to forget today.

And “tomorrow” wears many masks. The one hoarding wealth wastes his life now thinking, “Once wealth is gathered, I will enjoy all pleasures.” The one racing after fame thinks, “Not now; now I must stake everything; when fame comes, I will enjoy.” That fame never comes; no Alexander ever truly conquers. The race after fame remains incomplete. Wealth is never enough to erase your poverty. It cannot be—poverty is a perspective, not something wealth can remove. The more wealth you have, the more your hope leaps ahead. Your hope always stands in the future; you are here, your hope is always tomorrow. If you have a hundred thousand, it wants a million; a million, it wants ten; ten, it wants a hundred. It always leaps ahead; you will never catch it. You will not fulfill your craving—but you will lose today, which is the very essence of existence.

If there is pain, look at the pain. Experience it; do not falsify it by tomorrow. Do not soothe it with tomorrow’s sedatives and go to sleep. Wake up to today. If there is pain, let there be pain. Let the thorn prick. That very sting will awaken you. Through that pain you will rise. In that pain you will see that you have been running on a wrong track; somewhere a fundamental mistake has been made. Whatever you have done so far, you have done leaving God out, putting Him aside. In whatever you have done so far, there has been no place for God.

It is said Galileo wrote a book on cosmology and showed it to a friend who was a theist. The friend read it through; it was orderly, logical, comprehensible; yet something felt missing: there was no mention of God—not even to deny Him. “Without God,” he said, “the cosmos feels incomplete.” Galileo replied, “There is no need. Without that hypothesis I have explained everything. I have no use for the hypothesis of God. Ask me anything you feel remains unexplained.” In the way Galileo composed his cosmology, so have you fashioned your life: there is no place for God. In that empty space, pain is born. In the temple meant for the Divine, if it remains empty, from there suffering arises.

Understand this a little: pain will remain until the lamp of God is lit in your life. Pain is the absence of God. Where God should be and is not—there is pain.

So when will the revolution of “athato” come in your life? When will you say, “Now, the search for devotion…”? Only when you see that what you took to be the wealth of life turns out, in its essence, to be nothing but suffering. What you called love was not love; what you called wealth was not wealth; what you called the “self” was not the Self. Your entire foundation was wrong.

You mistook the ego for the Self—that was not you; that recognition was deluded. You mistook outer wealth for true wealth—what kind of wealth can be stolen? What death can snatch is not wealth. The wise call your riches calamity; they call your property a misfortune. Wealth is that which even death cannot steal; which no one can take; which no thief can rob; before which death is defeated—that alone is wealth. You have heard: a friend is one who stands by you in adversity. That is also the definition of wealth: real wealth is what serves you in adversity. And what adversity is greater than death? That is the true touchstone. That which passes laughing through the door of death—that alone is wealth.

What you call wealth is merely a way to forget the poverty within. What you call ego is not you; it is a trick to cover yourself, a way to deny your ignorance. What you call position will not satisfy you; you will only grow more restless. A true “station” is where rest happens. The very meaning of “pad” (station) is the place where you sit and rest; where the journey ends; where the feet need walk no more. Where all positions become unnecessary—that is the real station; you have arrived. But have you ever known any outer position where the journey ends? Emperors who conquer the whole world are as agitated with desire as the beggar on the roadside—there is no difference.

I have heard: a Japanese emperor would ride at night through his capital. Many times he saw a fakir; whatever hour he passed, the fakir was always awake—sometimes standing under a tree, sometimes sitting—but always awake. The emperor’s curiosity grew. He asked, “Why don’t you sleep?” The fakir said, “I am guarding something. I have found something; I guard it.” The emperor looked around: a battered bowl, some rags—nothing else. The fakir laughed, “Don’t look there; look within me. What I’ve found is inside; I must not lose it. Only in wakefulness can it be guarded; in sleep it is lost. In unconsciousness I will forget. I must remain aware.” The emperor said, “I can’t see anything.” An emperor’s language is of the outer; a fakir’s language is of the inner. They travel different roads. The emperor said, “You guard some treasure? Then what is the difference between you and me?” The fakir replied, “Not much; a little—yet it is. You are rich on the outside, I am poor on the outside. I am rich within; you are poor within. That’s all. I am also poor, I am also rich; you are also poor, you are also rich. So I cannot claim a big difference. Death will tell; death will be the test.”

If you look into your life and stop evading yourself… As I see, you keep dodging yourself; you devise ways to avoid ever meeting yourself. A thousand methods: sometimes drink, sometimes cinema, sometimes even devotional singing—but to forget yourself. You drown in anything so you won’t remember yourself. Then even your hymn-singing is false; it is also alcohol. Kirtan is true only when it becomes a means to remember yourself, to awaken you, not to lull you.

The day you face the pain of life—face yourself fully—and find only sorrow… People come to me and ask, “Is there a hell?” I say, “How strange! You live in it, and you ask me?” They think hell is buried somewhere under the earth. Some fool must have said that. Hell is a way of living life in darkness; it is a perspective, a style—not a place. Heaven too is a style of living; it depends on you. Live awake and wherever you are, there is heaven. Live asleep and wherever you are, there is hell. Hell is born of sleep.

Just look—and you will find you are surrounded by hell on all sides. Is this hell not enough that you fantasize about more hell in the netherworld? The day you see the hell of life, that very day the point of “athato” has come. You will say, “Enough. Stop.” Your feet will halt. The moment you halt in the race of the world, revolution happens: a new sky—without edge, without beginning or end—becomes available to you.

Right now you live in a narrow lane that keeps narrowing, binding you day by day; your fetters tighten day by day. Your life is as if you are busy building your own prison. Call your prison a home, call it a temple—no one is deceived by your names. Give beautiful names to diseases; their sting does not disappear.

Wake up and recognize, see. The day you see the pain, your feet will stop—you will turn back. That turning, Mahavira called pratikraman: returning to oneself. Patanjali called it pratyahara: drawing back. Jesus called it conversion: revolution, transfiguration.

As of now the mode of your life is lust; when you halt, the mode becomes love; when you start returning, devotion. Where you are going now is the search for craving, for desire. Desire itself is the world. The world is not outside you anywhere. Hiding in temples and mosques you won’t escape the world; sitting in Himalayan caves you won’t escape either—because the world is in your craving. There too you will crave. People stand before God and keep asking. The asking doesn’t stop. They stand in the temple, but they do not face Rama; the idol is in front of them, and still they keep asking.

A man came to me and said he now had faith. His son couldn’t find a job; he prayed to God and gave Him three weeks: “If in three weeks the job comes, I’ll have faith for life; if not, the matter ends—you don’t exist.” And he said, “The job came. Now I worship and pray daily; so I came to you.” I said, “It must have happened by coincidence. Do you think God is cowed by your ultimatum of three weeks? This is a dangerous kind of faith; it will break any day. Try once more.” He asked, “What do you mean?” I said, “One more attempt. Your wife is ill; now that you have the key, get her cured too.” He said, “You’re right.” He went the next day and gave another ultimatum. Three weeks later he returned, very depressed: “You spoiled everything. Nothing helped; she got worse. My faith trembled.” Your faith stands on your demands: God is God only if He gives what you want—if He serves you in exchange for your worship. Then who is master—you or God? Your prayer is false; it is desire; the world again.

As long as you ask for something outside—thinking it will bring satisfaction, peace, moments of joy—you cannot get out of hell. To go outward is to go into hell. A consciousness moving outward cannot go beyond hell.

One halts when one sees the futility of life—the lack of essence, the failure—nothing in the hand but pain, nothing in the heart but tears, life utterly dark, the boat on the verge of sinking. In such a moment, when one stops, love arises; desire drops. You no longer ask; you become eager to give. Love gives; desire asks. As long as there is asking, know it is desire. When giving begins… You used to ask hoping asking would increase your wealth and bring happiness. The one who halts begins to give: “I tried asking; it brought pain. Let’s try the opposite.” He starts giving—and finds faint breezes of happiness begin to blow; a veena begins to sound somewhere distant; very distant—but the notes appear; a new realm begins.

That is the beginning for the one who has halted. He begins to give, to share—and as he shares, the notes grow clear. Then, startled, he discovers: those notes arise from within me! Until now I thought the fragrance was outside; it arises from within. “Kasturi kundal basai”—the musk is in my own navel. Then the return begins. The point of “athato” has come: now. Only then will you understand Narada’s Bhakti Sutras. Before that, they are not for the one going outward; not even for the one merely halted; they are for the one who has begun to return. That is the first thing.

Second thing: as long as you think you yourself will bring your happiness, the point of “athato” will not come. You will not bring it—you are the one who brought all your misery. This is the fruit of your own enterprise; the outcome of your labor. In the old idiom: the fruit of your karma. This suffering that surrounds you—you invited it. These guests did not come unbidden; you sent the invitations. You insisted they come. True, you invited them thinking something else. In your understanding there was a mistake. You invited friends; enemies arrived. You asked for flowers; thorns came—because from afar thorns look like flowers; from afar enemies look like friends.

A little boy went on a trip with his companions. He wrote to his mother: “The first day, all were strangers; I knew no one. The second day, all were friends—because we had become acquainted. The third day, all had become enemies.” Those three days are the story of an entire life: at first everyone is unfamiliar; then all seem friendly; then enmity begins. The drum from a distance is pleasant; up close it is useless.

You sent the invitations—maybe in some past births; now you’ve forgotten—but you called them. What has come to you is your doing; by your doing the misery will go on increasing, layering itself around you, strangling your throat.

By your doing there is suffering. When you halt, you suddenly see: there is no need to do. Everything is happening without your doing. In moments of love life feels spontaneous: all is happening on its own—birth, youth, old age, life and death. But when you return, when the dimension of devotion begins, you see: it is not happening by itself either. You are not the doer, and it is not happening mechanically. In every fiber of life there is a hidden purpose; in every particle a destiny—say, a Divinity—by whom it is happening.

The man of desire trusts himself. The man of love wavers in trusting himself. The one entering devotion drops trust in himself entirely; it shifts to God.

I have heard a famous couplet of Josh:
“Hand over, O Josh, the ledger of sins to God.
How long will you walk with this heavy burden on your head?”

How long will you carry this heavy load? Give it to God. You are needlessly troubled.

I have heard: a man turned seventy-five. Friends asked, “Any new experience you’ve never had?” He said, “I’ve never flown in an airplane.” They took him up for a half-hour city flight. When he landed, the pilot asked, “Are you pleased? Were you upset?” He said, “Not upset; but out of fear I didn’t put my whole weight on the plane.” Whether you put your full weight or not, it is on the plane.

I have heard: an emperor returning through a forest in his chariot saw a poor man carrying a heavy load. He felt pity. “Come, sit in the chariot. Where do you need to get off? I’ll drop you.” The man climbed in but kept the bundle on his head. The emperor said, “Why not put it down?” The man said, “Isn’t it enough grace that you let me sit? How can I burden you with my bundle too?” But whether you keep it on your head or set it on the cart, the weight is borne by the chariot.

Those who turn back a little discover: we were needlessly anxious. The Doer was doing; what was to happen was happening; we were only jumping in vain in the middle.

Then know that devotion has begun within you. The beginning of devotion means: I am not the doer; I cannot do; I am not—only He is. Then a singular love for Him is born in the heart. He is carrying your entire burden.

And then the devotee comes to know that even devotion is not a matter of his doing; prayer too will not happen by my effort. He will pray through me, then prayer will be. Even going toward Him will not be by me; when He walks using my feet, then I will arrive.

“My poor feet no longer rise;
Tell the destination to come running to meet me on the way.”

Little by little he realizes his helpless state: I am nothing. My poor feet won’t even lift now—only if He lifts them do they move. And then, what fear remains? If He must take me there, the destination itself will come mid-path and take me.

Therefore a devotee does not ask for the shore. He says, “Even if You drown me midstream, that is the shore.” He has given all his burden to Him.

In the Gita, Krishna tells Arjuna only this much: leave all your burden to God. Sit at ease in the airplane; do not foolishly keep holding your bundle. You are in the chariot—set the bundle on the floor. Become merely an instrument.

A guru means: one who is awake among the sleeping; one with eyes among the blind. That’s all. What you cannot remember has returned to his remembrance. What you keep hidden behind your back stands before him. He has peered into his own eyes, he has felt within his heart—and he has found God hidden there.
A guru means: one who has disappeared, and now only God remains there.

God, for you, is a very distant word. An infinite distance seems to be there—between your sleep and God. It will seem so, because God is the experience of awakened consciousness. That’s why even when you say you believe, you still cannot truly believe; even as you affirm, a doubt stands up within. You press it down, you hide it; but you know there is doubt somewhere: “Perhaps God may be.”

I have heard: a man’s car broke down. A wheel had come off. He was alone, livid with anger, hurling abuses—if you want to learn cursing, learn it from drivers; no one surpasses them. In the middle of a forest his car had failed, and he was swearing to his heart’s content—even cursing God. Another car stopped. A priest got out, a Christian clergyman. Seeing him spew such profanity—right up to God—he said, “Stop, brother, this isn’t right. Trust God. Everything works out.”
The man said, “How will everything work out? Will this wheel go and fix itself?”
The priest was a little scared, but he couldn’t go back on his words now. He said, “Why not? If there is trust, everything happens.”
“So you pray,” the man said.
Now the priest was in even greater trouble, because he too knew—where is God, really? He hadn’t thought the matter would go this far. The man was standing right there, and to retreat now would seem cowardly. He thought, What harm is there in trying? There’s no one else in this forest to see me; even if I fail, it will be only before this one man. So he prayed—and, to his amazement, the wheel lifted and fitted itself onto the car! The priest opened his eyes, saw the wheel up, and cried, “Oh God, are you really there?”
All his life he had been preaching about God to people—yet no trust! It’s a trade, a profession. One person trades in worship, another trades in God. Trust belongs to none.

Even the so-called theist sits with doubt within. That’s why the theist is afraid that atheistic talk might reach his ears. Would a true theist be afraid? The scriptures say: Do not listen to the words of atheists. Such scriptures could not have been written by true theists—they were written by those whose hearts still harbored the worm of doubt. Otherwise, what is there to fear? If your faith is complete, if doubt has truly burned out, what danger is there in hearing an atheist? Do listen. Perhaps, sensing your silent, unmoving listening, something may shift in the atheist’s life. Nothing will be altered in yours; perhaps your unwavering trust in God will prove contagious even to the atheist. Let him come near.

But theists tremble, they are frightened. The fear is of their own doubt; no one else can frighten you. You are frightened within. You know that if someone outside speaks words of doubt, your inner doubt—which lies asleep—will awaken; the hidden will be exposed. Outer doubt will call to inner doubt; a resonance will begin, and you will start trembling within.

God is very far for you—because you sleep. In truth, He is not far at all; the distance is only of your sleep. You are not far for God; for you, God is far—remember this. Like this: you are asleep; the sun has risen; its rays are showering upon you, but you sleep. For the sun, you are not far; it pours on you, trying to awaken every hair on your body. But you are in deep sleep; for you the sun is very far—you don’t even know whether it exists. You are lost in dense darkness.

At such times, when God seems very far, a true master can be useful—because the true master is like you, close to you: human like a human, of flesh, bone, and marrow—and yet he is something more than you; what you have not known, he has known; what you have not become, he has become. What you will be tomorrow—he has news of it. He is your future. He is the doorway to your possibilities.

God is very far; the guru is very near. Hence, without the guru, hardly anyone ever reaches God. The guru is a window through which you can see the far sky. The window is close at hand.

You sit in a room and I talk to you about the sky and its infinite beauty—useless. I tell you stories of sunbeams—useless. I speak to you of flowers—useless. But if I open a window, a shutter that was closed—you remain where you are; nothing in you has changed; you haven’t even risen from your couch; you made no effort—but a window opened. The far sky is no longer so far. A corner of the sky has come into view—and if you have caught hold of a corner, you will catch the whole. A faint fragrance of flowers begins to drift in. A few sunbeams slip in and begin to dance on the floor. You are just as you were; nothing in you has changed—but a window has opened near you.

A guru is a window. You remain the same, yet by being near the guru, through that window you will be able to peep into the vast sky.

A guru is like a drop; but the taste of the drop is the same as the taste of the ocean—just as salty. Buddha used to say: Taste one drop of the ocean, and you have tasted the whole ocean.

The guru is a drop—but a drop that has recognized the ocean hidden within itself. You too are a drop, but a drop with no inkling of the ocean hidden within. A drop can converse with a drop. Even so, dialogue between guru and disciple is not easy; between the seeker and God, it is impossible.

Do not stop at the guru; pass through the guru. The guru is a door—go beyond it. This is the difference between a guru and a sadguru. A sadguru is one who leads you toward God; more than that, he frees you from yourself—and he frees you from himself as well. Only that guru is a sadguru who teaches you to be free even of him—otherwise, in the end, the guru may capture you. Beware of getting up from the couch only to clutch the window frame; then you have missed. Be cautious of one who tries to make you cling to him.

First the guru will take away your world and your wrong viewpoints. And when they are gone, the last thing he will take away is himself—from you—so that you may enter the open sky.

And the real issue is learning the art of bowing. With the guru you learn how to bow. The day you can bow, everything is attained. The real issue is learning the art of effacement. With the guru you learn how to vanish. The day you can vanish, everything is attained.

Let there be some true ardor, some sincerity of intent—
then why argue whether that idol is God?
Let there be a little true feeling, a little arising of love,
a sprouting of love in our intentions and emotions—
why debate whether it is stone or the Divine!
Let a little taste of the Infinite come, a little purity of feeling,
a little understanding of the art of bowing.

Only the unwise argue. The wise use time and learn a depth of life.

This is the difference between a student and a disciple. The student is eager for argument; the disciple is eager to transform life. The student has come to collect bits of information; the disciple has come to change his very being. The student stakes nothing; he merely polishes memory. The disciple stakes his life; even if everything must be lost, he shows readiness. For until you are ready to lose all, you will never own the All. He who lost everything, attained everything.

So with the guru you learn the alphabet. God’s song is still too difficult. You don’t even know your letters yet. With the guru, learn the ABC—the ABC of God. Once you have learned, you set off on your journey.

Birds hatch and come out of the eggs. You must have seen them—perched on the rims of nests swinging on the branches—afraid, gazing at the sky: such a vast sky! Till now they were inside the egg—their world was very small, very safe, warm. The mother kept them warm. Now the world feels very cold; that warmth of the mother is gone. They sit on the edge; the mother flies. Her flight awakens in them some dormant, slumbering longing. They too want to fly—who does not want to fly! In flight there is freedom, there is release. But they wobble; they are afraid. They sit on the rim of the nest. They do not know their wings. How could they? You know your wings only when you fly. Before flying you cannot know that you have wings. How will you know without flying? You know your legs when you walk. You know your eyes when you see. You know your ears when you hear. You know your wings when you fly.

The fledgling has not flown yet, only just come out of the egg. How can he know he has wings? He is afraid. What does he do? What does he want? He wants to fly. He even tries—but he clutches the nest tightly lest he be lost in that vast emptiness.
What does the mother do? She gives a push. The chick panics, and in panic the wings open. He flutters back, circling once, but now he knows: he has wings. It may take a little time to learn the art, but he has wings! A great trust arises, a courage is born, a self-confidence dawns: this sky too is mine! On the strength of two small wings, the whole sky becomes one’s own. With two small wings, the ownership of the entire sky is granted! Then he experiments—going a little farther, and farther, drawing wider circles—until one day he sets out into the distant sky. Now the mother need not push.

The guru gives you a push out of the nest—nothing more. You could have done it too. And when you do it, you will find: Ah, I could have done this myself! But you will find this only after you have done it. Before that, how will you know you have wings? When the guru shows you, it will seem: Ah, this could have happened without a guru!

This is what happened with Krishnamurti: Annie Besant and Leadbeater—his mentors—gave him the push; his wings opened. Krishnamurti understood that it happens through me; the wings are mine. With a little courage it could have happened without the push. Since then forty-fifty years have passed; he has been teaching others: gather courage, leap; the wings are yours, no guru is needed! What he says is perfectly right; there is not a trace of error in it. But no one seems to leap. The statement is correct—but someone is needed to give you that push. And when the guru pushes, it will feel very bad. So first the guru calls you near and showers love—so you come closer, and closer, and closer; then one day he pushes. You will be startled: How could such a loving man turn so cruel! But that push is necessary—only then will your wings open.

Therefore, those who set out to seek God directly—take care. That direct seeking may well be a new trick of the ego, a new invention of the ego! Such people may end up sitting in the nest, eyes closed, dreaming of the open sky. That is easy.

Seek the guru; there is no need to seek God. The moment you seek the guru, that seeking becomes the search for God.

Your duty is only this: seek a servant of God.
Do not worry about God—He will be found, or not.
Do not be overly anxious about Him. But do seek a man of God. Find a guru. Then whether God is found or not—leave that worry. He will be found; don’t even bring it up. Because in seeking the guru, the first step is already taken.

To seek the guru means: surrender of the ego. To bow at someone’s feet means: the first practice in the art of bowing. Once you have bowed, God is certain to be found. Your not-bowing was the obstacle. Hence the guru’s great indispensability. There is absolutely no “need”—and yet there is total indispensability. Logically, it seems it could happen by itself. Where is the obstacle? You have wings, you have the capacity to fly, the sky is there—everything is present; then why a guru? If one thinks by logic alone, the need for a guru won’t appear. But you lack courage—therefore the guru is needed. Who will supply that courage? Who will give you the nerve? Who will give you that push?

In my village there is an old gentleman. He must have taught nearly all the village children to swim. He loves the river. As soon as the children are old enough to learn, they gather at the river. He spends five or six hours every morning teaching them to swim. He taught me too. When I learned, I said to him, “This is no teaching—you only pushed me!” He said, “That is exactly the teaching.” He throws the child in. The child panics; the man stands a few feet away. The child flails about, thrashing hands and feet—that is the beginning of swimming. Flailing is the beginning. Little by little, order comes. At first it is disorderly, born of panic. Then he runs and rescues the child, and throws him again, and again brings him to the bank, and throws him again. Sometimes water enters the mouth, sometimes the nose; sometimes there is great alarm; sometimes it seems, This is the end, I’m dead! He teaches nothing else. After five or ten throws, the movement of the limbs begins to find rhythm. In two to four days the child learns to swim. He “teaches” nothing—he merely removes the very panic that would have stopped you from jumping in by yourself.

God is attainable without a guru—but you will not attain. When He is attained, then you will know it could have been done without. But that knowing always comes afterwards.

Columbus discovered America. Until he discovered it, no one had any trust in him; people thought he was gone for good—he would never return. For he set out on mere imagination: If the earth is round… Galileo and Copernicus had established that the earth is round, but no one had seen it; it had not yet been seen. Only when space travel began and man went beyond earth’s orbit did we see the round earth. Before that no one had seen it; it was a hypothesis, logically sound, with a thousand proofs—but all indirect. Columbus said: If the earth is round, then if I travel straight on and on, one day I will return to the very place I started. If something comes in between, well and good; otherwise I will come back home. If the earth is round, I must return; there is no question of getting lost.

No one agreed to go with him. After years of searching, he could gather only eighty men. Some were ready to die—life had no meaning for them. Some were crazed, fanatics: “Come on, what does it matter? If we die, so what!” Not a single proper, sensible man was ready. Some soldiers went only because the queen commanded it.

With these eighty men, Columbus went. Those who had financed him—courtiers of the queen—said, “It’s a waste. These eighty men will die. Those millions will be squandered.” But the queen said, “Let him do it—it is an experiment; we shall see.”

Columbus discovered America and returned. There was a welcome in court. Those same courtiers said, “What’s special in this? Anyone could have found it. If the earth is round, anyone could have gone and discovered it.”

There was an egg on Columbus’s plate. He picked it up and said, “Let someone make this egg stand upright on the table.” Many tried—but how can you make an egg stand? It kept falling. They said, “It cannot be done; it’s impossible.”
Columbus struck the egg hard on the table; the lower end flattened slightly, and the egg stood. They said, “Ah, anyone could have done that!”
Columbus said, “But no one did.”

After it is done, everything seems easy. Before it is done lies the real difficulty. Before that doing, the guru is needed.

“No indispensability at all—and absolute indispensability.” You will come to know later: it can happen without a guru. But you will also see—if you look back—that it could not have happened; you would never have gathered the courage.

No, devotion has no forms.
Do loves have different forms anywhere? Love is simply one. Its taste is one.
Differences arise from the intellect; in the heart there are no distinctions. The Hindu’s intellectual notion is different, the Muslim’s intellectual notion is different, the Christian’s philosophy is different—those are matters of the mind. But when a Hindu is filled with devotion, when a Muslim is filled with devotion, when a Christian is filled with devotion, there is no difference in those devotions—they are one.
Devotion is of the heart. It relates to your inmost core, not to the external workings of your intellect. What you have learned is irrelevant; what your nature is, that is what matters. Yet it is true that devotion is both practice and attainment. There the first step is also the last step. The means are themselves the goal.
Devotion means: supreme love. What is to be practiced is supreme love. And when attainment happens, what arrives? Supreme love. It is supreme love that is to be cultivated, and supreme love that is to be received. There love is the path, and love is the destination.
And so it should be. For when you set out on a journey, the very first step you take on the path brings the destination one step closer. That step was not only on the path; it was also upon the destination. You complete a thousand-mile journey by taking one step after another; with each step the destination draws nearer, and one day you arrive. Which step was the most important? It will seem the last step, because it delivers you there. No—the last step is as important as the first. Had the first step been missed, the last would never have been.
You heat water—at ninety-nine degrees it is hot; at one hundred degrees it turns to steam. Is it because of the hundredth degree that it becomes steam? If the first degree had not been, the hundredth could not be; it would have remained at ninety-nine, and no steam.
The first step is also the last step. The path is also the goal.
What is the devotee’s path?
The devotee’s path is: ahobhava.
Ahobhava must be understood. That is his method.
Ordinarily, lust looks at what you do not have. The gaze of lust stays fixed on lack; it sees only what is absent. Devotion is the reverse; it sees what is present.
When you look at what you do not have, you are always tormented: so little, so little, so little! And it will remain little. You do not see the hundred thousand you have; you see the billions and trillions you do not have. You do not see the wife you have; you see all the women in the world.
If you ask a husband to describe precisely his wife’s face, he will be in trouble. Who looks at his own wife! He can describe the neighbor’s wife’s features in detail. He can even tell you what sari she wore today. But his own wife…
We do not see what is; we see what is not. Hence we remain afflicted. Because “what is not” pricks like a thorn; it feels like lack. It feels like poverty, like wretchedness. If you look at “what is,” ahobhava arises. So much has been given by the divine—what can you do but give thanks! Suddenly you find you are an emperor, not a beggar.
He gave a heart, He gave pain, and He gave delight within pain—
what treasures my Allah has bestowed on me!
Then even pain begins to feel like a blessing.
He gave a heart, He gave pain, and He gave delight within pain.
There is a sweetness even in suffering. Leave aside pleasure—there is a depth in pain; the devotee sees it. Leave aside heaven—even hell has a certain beauty; the devotee sees it. To the lustful, even in heaven, heaven is not visible; to the devotee, even in hell, heaven is visible.
And what you see, you begin to live in. A person lives in what he experiences, in what he sees.
The devotee lives in feeling.
The lustful lives in lack.
He gave a heart, He gave pain, and He gave delight within pain—
and then even in pain the delight becomes visible.
There is poetry even in pain.
Pain, too, has a secret.
There is a certain unique sweetness even in affliction.
Affliction has its own poetry.
And even in pain something is born which cannot be born without pain.
Whether there be sorrow, pain, desolation, or madness—whatever it may be—
the state with which You are pleased, that state is good.
And the devotee says: whatever the divine has given—whether there be “sorrow, pain, desolation, madness, whatever.” As soon as the devotee begins to see how much has been given—there was no worthiness in me and yet so much has been given; I was unworthy and life was given; I had earned nothing, and yet the capacity for infinite bliss was given; the good fortune to be, to have my nostrils breathe, my eyes see the sun’s rays, my heart feel the thrill of love, my ears encounter music! There was nothing—and out of nothing He made me and gave me everything!
The state with which You are pleased, that state alone is good.
Then the devotee has no will of his own; God’s will is his will: wherever He leads, there we shall go. Whatever He makes us do, that we shall do!
The devotee lets everything go. He becomes a mere instrument. The divine flows through him. This is the practice and this is the attainment. The day this state becomes complete…
When does it become complete? When is this good fortune fulfilled?… When the devotee’s destination arrives. First, the ordinary man who lives in lust complains; complaint is his life.
Listen to people’s talk—besides complaint there is nothing in their lives: this is not there; this is not right; this is wrong, that is wrong; everything is going wrong! They are surrounded by “wrong, wrong.” Nothing but complaint.
Listen to the devotee: nothing but ahobhava.
But when the destination comes, first complaint disappears, the devotee is filled with ahobhava; then even ahobhava disappears. For to give thanks still implies that a little bit of complaint must have remained. Otherwise, why thanks?
Understand this a little.
We say “thank you” only because, had it been otherwise, there would have been complaint. Thanks is the opposite of complaint.
Your handkerchief fell from your hand; someone picked it up and returned it; you said, “Thank you.” It means that had he not picked it up and given it back, there would have been complaint. So thanks came to the surface, complaint went within.
Thus, so long as the devotee is on the path, he is filled with ahobhava.
Ahobhava is better than complaint, because complaint is only pain, only sorrow, only darkness. In ahobhava everything becomes luminous, everything blossoms! But there is still a lack. Upon arrival, all talk ends; nothing remains to be said.
When even ahobhava does not remain, then ahobhava is complete.
One must be effaced in such a way that nothing remains. Let complaint die—and let even ahobhava die.
If there is a heart, it is His; if there is courage, it is His—
ruin yourself upon the path of love.
If there is a heart, it is His; if there is courage, it is His—
only with Him will the heart be born, only with Him will courage arise.
Ruin yourself upon the path of love.
He who, on the path of love, utterly dissolves himself—he becomes, for the first time.
Bhakti means: the art of effacing oneself. It is the art of dying; the art of losing oneself; the art of drowning oneself.

There is no question of “seems”—you certainly are! Otherwise you would have fallen long ago. Ripe fruits don’t hang on trees; ripe fruits fall. Falling is the only proof that the fruit has ripened—no other proof. Don’t think that turning yellow means ripeness; falling does.

The Upanishads say: “tena tyaktena bhunjithah.” They alone have truly enjoyed who have renounced—because renunciation shows they have fully tasted and understood that enjoyment is futile. The day enjoyment ripens, renunciation happens by itself. The day the fruit ripens, it falls.

“‘It seems…’”
Drop this talk of seeming; know for certain: I am an unripe fruit. Take this perception as truth, and the race to ripen will begin; the athato moment—the “now, therefore”—will soon come near.

Only when a person ripens is he a whole person. The very day you become fully human, that day you fall. When the human falls away, the divine begins. Where man ends, God begins.

Humans are beyond counting—
yet we still lament the lack of humanity!
There are many people, but where is humanity? There is a great shortage of humanness, because where are the ripened ones?

From earth to the Throne, ascent and growth are possible;
we can make you an angel too—become human first.
First become human; then we will make you divine as well.
Ripen first. Then divinity comes of its own accord. Where man is complete, divinity begins.

How will you ripen?
Ripening has become difficult—because all your conditioning, your whole education, your religions teach repression, not experience.

Understand this: whatever, if fully known, would make life appear futile—that very knowledge you are not allowed to complete.

We teach the child: don’t be angry. We should teach: be as angry as you can. When the child is angry we should say: do it thoroughly. For now you are at home; later, in the world outside, people won’t let you be angry—so complete it at home. On your father, on your mother—complete it. Others will not be so kind. Do anger totally so that you feel its burn and see its futility.

Anger is poison; it yields nothing but harm.
Anger is stupidity; you punish yourself for another’s fault.
Anger is ignorance; in anger you become a toy in others’ hands—anyone can press your button, anyone can make you angry; then you are another’s slave, you have lost your mastery.
But this will be seen only when anger is experienced totally.

My sense is that if even once in life you experience anger in its totality, anger ripens—after that you won’t be angry. The matter ends. The hand got burnt!

Once burnt by milk, one blows even on buttermilk. But you were not even allowed to be burnt by milk; blowing on buttermilk is far away.

You were taught: avoid sex; therefore you are entangled in it and rotting. I say: don’t avoid. Enter sexuality wholly. Go down to the very bottom, so that nothing remains to be known. Know it so completely that the relish itself is lost. Whatever we know completely, the taste ends. Wherever there is relish in you, know that there the knowing is partial—hence the unripe-ness. And in this way a whole life remains unripe.

Ripen!
Experience ripens.
The sun of experience ripens.
The pain of experience ripens.
Trial and error ripens.
Wandering ripens.
Straying from the path ripens.
When you ripen, you fall.
In that falling—in that very falling—the moment of divinity begins.

Therefore do not protect yourself; hurry. Wherever there is relish, live it out fully. Do not do it by halves.

I see this is how it goes: when you sit in the temple you think of the shop—because you have never sat fully at the shop. When you sit at the shop you think of the temple—because you have never sat fully in the temple. Wherever you are, you are half.

Sitting in the shop, lofty thoughts occur: What is there in this! The world is vain! This is all heard nonsense. Had you known it, your life would have been a revolution. You have only heard; it is parrot-talk. You have collected junk—borrowed stuff. Sitting at the shop, that borrowed rubbish starts circling in the mind. Then you go to the temple, and sitting there you feel an hour is being wasted—you could have earned something—because at the shop you were never fully there; the temple kept nagging you.

Wherever you are, be there totally. Whatever you do, do it completely. Enter into it—because remember always: nothing but experience liberates. And don’t try to deceive yourself—there is no easier path. Experience is the only path. Those who want to avoid experience and obtain knowledge cheaply will keep wandering; they will remain unripe. That is your current course—one should rather call it a downfall.

No, there are no means.
Does love have any means? Any technique? There is no technique.
Love itself is the supreme means.

O heedless one, the station of dust-like humility is very high—
the rank of effacement, O sleeper!… there is great height in disappearing.
O heedless one, the station of humility is very high:
this is a ground upon which no sky remains.

Bhakti is simply to vanish, to become a nothing; to empty yourself so that the Divine may become full within you; to make space so that his entry is possible; to break!

You have seen many things break, but you have not seen yourself break. You have seen many things erased, but you have not seen yourself erased. You have seen many die, but you have not seen yourself die.
Bhakti is to see yourself dying. It is the direct encounter with death.

You have seen the bubble, you have seen the glass—
who knows the delicacy of a broken heart!
You have watched the bubble on water, watched it burst…! Many times you must have seen a water-bubble breaking.
Little children blow soap-bubbles and watch them burst, watch their colors in the sunrays. Have you noticed? Inside the bubble there is nothing; outside, nothing. Outside is empty sky, inside is empty sky; in between, a thin film of water.

You have seen the bubble…
you have seen such a bubble burst.
…you have seen the goblet of glass.
Fling a glass down and see: it shatters into pieces, into fragments. But even that is nothing.
Who can know the tenderness of a heart when it breaks!
One who has seen the heart breaking—its subtlety no one can fathom. For where the heart breaks, where the heart too breaks like a bubble, where your very being breaks like a bubble—there you suddenly find the inner soul has merged with the vast Divine; there was just a thin wall—and it is gone!

Your ego is no more than a glass mirror: let it fall and it shatters. Just bend a little and let it drop. Learn to efface yourself—this alone is the sutra of bhakti.

In yoga there are a thousand methods; bhakti has only one. But one is enough. As the saying goes: one blow of the blacksmith equals a hundred of the goldsmith. The yogi makes a lot of clatter—khat-khat. That is why his doings are called “khat-karm.” He makes much ado. Who knows how many techniques he invents! Hence his methods are called gorakh-dhanda. The phrase comes from the name of the great yogi Gorakh: gorakh-dhanda! Gorakh devised so many methods that one gets lost in the methods themselves—arriving is another matter. Hence, gorakh-dhanda.

Bhakti knows only one sutra: lose yourself. Bow. Disappear.
God stands at the door: unless you bow here, you will not meet him there.

That is all for today.