If you are unable even to do this, then, taking refuge in My yoga.
Renounce the fruits of all actions; do so, self-controlled.।। 11।।
Better indeed is knowledge than practice; meditation surpasses knowledge.
Better than meditation is renunciation of action's fruit; from renunciation, peace follows at once.।। 12।।
Geeta Darshan #6
Available in:
Read in Original Hindi (मूल हिन्दी)
Sutra (Original)
अथैतदप्यशक्तोऽसि कर्तुं मद्योगमाश्रितः।
सर्वकर्मफलत्यागं ततः कुरु यतात्मवान्।। 11।।
श्रेयो हि ज्ञानमभ्यासात् ज्ञानाद्ध्यानं विशिष्यते।
ध्यानात्कर्मफलत्यागः त्यागाच्छान्तिरनन्तरम्।। 12।।
सर्वकर्मफलत्यागं ततः कुरु यतात्मवान्।। 11।।
श्रेयो हि ज्ञानमभ्यासात् ज्ञानाद्ध्यानं विशिष्यते।
ध्यानात्कर्मफलत्यागः त्यागाच्छान्तिरनन्तरम्।। 12।।
Transliteration:
athaitadapyaśakto'si kartuṃ madyogamāśritaḥ|
sarvakarmaphalatyāgaṃ tataḥ kuru yatātmavān|| 11||
śreyo hi jñānamabhyāsāt jñānāddhyānaṃ viśiṣyate|
dhyānātkarmaphalatyāgaḥ tyāgācchāntiranantaram|| 12||
athaitadapyaśakto'si kartuṃ madyogamāśritaḥ|
sarvakarmaphalatyāgaṃ tataḥ kuru yatātmavān|| 11||
śreyo hi jñānamabhyāsāt jñānāddhyānaṃ viśiṣyate|
dhyānātkarmaphalatyāgaḥ tyāgācchāntiranantaram|| 12||
Translation (Meaning)
Questions in this Discourse
A friend has asked, Osho, is it not possible to develop intelligence and feeling together? Can a healthy person not practice meditation and devotion at the same time? A person is whole—intelligence, feeling, and action—then why should the path of practice be one-sided?
A person is indeed whole—but that person is an ideal. That is not you who are already whole. When a person’s wholeness is revealed, attained, then everything in them becomes complete. Their intelligence is as sharp as their feeling is deep. Their action, their intelligence, their heart, all come together—like a threefold confluence.
But that is the final goal. You are not yet like that. You have a journey to make. So you will only be able to travel from the side toward which you lean more, the dimension for which you have greater interest and inclination.
Right now you are fragmented, incomplete. One person has abundant feeling but little intelligence. Another is skilled and attached to action, with little intelligence or feeling by comparison. Another has deep intelligence but a barren heart and no bent for action. In this way we are incomplete, each in our own way.
Wholeness will be attained; it is not here yet. And this incomplete person must begin from their incompleteness. So it is wise to choose the path that suits what is strongest in you.
And the path is always one-sided. The destination is complete. If the path itself were complete, then the destination would lose its meaning.
What is the difference between path and goal? The great difference is that the path will be partial. Therefore, as many people as there are in this world, so many paths will be. Each person will start from where they stand; each will begin from what they are. We are to arrive at that place where the person dissolves, and the impersonal, the formless, the complete is attained.
All rivers travel toward the ocean. The ocean does not travel anywhere. One river comes from the east, another from the west. Some flow south, some north. Rivers must take routes. If a river thinks, “The ocean has no dimension, no direction; therefore I too will take no direction,” it will never reach the ocean. To reach the ocean, a route must be taken.
Where we stand, the ocean is far.
So the more important question is not what the complete person is, but how you, the incomplete person, are. Understand yourself and then set out on the journey. If you can walk, fine; if you can go by bullock cart, fine; if you can ride a horse, fine; if you can fly by airplane, fine.
What means you choose depends on your capacity. And the means matter. And the means will be one-sided. Because the means that suit you will not be another’s; there will be differences within them.
Take a devotee—like Meera. Meera cannot understand Buddha’s path. Meera—a woman’s heart, a heart full of love—this loving heart can understand this: let me fill myself with the Divine, enthrone the Divine within, keep my doors and windows open for the Divine to enter and take up residence. But Meera cannot understand Buddha’s way: that one should empty oneself utterly, become void.
Understand this a little. It is easier for a man to understand “empty yourself.” For a woman it is easier to understand “fill yourself, fill yourself completely.” Woman is womb—physically and mentally. She can fill herself; the tendency to fill is natural to her. Man empties himself—even at the bodily level he empties. Filling feels a little difficult to him.
So Meera understands: let me fill myself with the Divine; let me become a womb and let the Divine be contained within. Buddha finds it difficult to understand that. For Buddha it seems right to pour himself out in every way and become utterly empty; and when he becomes a zero, a shunya, then union with truth will happen.
Buddha becomes truth by becoming empty. Meera becomes truth by filling herself with the Whole. Their paths are different—indeed not only different, but opposite. Yet the destination where they arrive is one.
Upon reaching the goal, it will be hard to distinguish between Buddha and Meera. All the difference was the difference of the path. As the goal comes closer, the difference diminishes. And when the goal is fully reached, you will not be able to tell by their faces who is Meera and who is Buddha!
But that is the very last event. Even an inch before that final event, Buddha and Meera can still be told apart; differences remain. I have spoken in broad strokes. But each person has their own nuance.
That is why there are so many religions in the world—because different people, traveling by different paths, have had glimpses of the truth. And the one who has glimpsed it by a certain path will naturally say, “This is the right path.” There is no mistake in their saying so. They do not know the other paths. They have not traveled them. About paths you have not traveled, what can you say? Of the path you did travel, you will say, “This is right—come to this one.” And you will warn people not to get lost on some other path.
Therefore, when people of different religions say, “Come to our path,” it is not necessary that there is no compassion in what they say, or that it is only a political desire to convert you. Not necessary. There may be compassion. They may wish that the path by which joy has come to them might also be yours.
But this creates a danger: each knower of a path becomes ready to call other paths wrong. Then conflict, dispute, enmity arise naturally.
If it dawns on us that as many people as there are on this earth, so many are the paths to the Divine—so it must be—then things change. I cannot stand in your place, cannot start from your place. I cannot live your life, nor can I die your death. No exchange is possible. You will live for yourself and you will have to die for yourself. And you will walk your walk. I will walk in my way. If this understanding becomes clear—and it should—then the world can become better.
If it becomes clear that each person will walk by their own path, in their own way, then we will find no reason for quarrels between religions. But everyone harbors the notion that the way they walk is the only right one. That causes the trouble.
As you are, so will your path be—because your path issues from you. It will reach the Divine, but it begins from you. On the way, you will go on disappearing; and the day you reach the Divine, you will find that you are no more.
Therefore, up to now, no person has met God. As long as the person remains, there is no news of God. And when God is, the person has ended, is erased, is lost.
When a drop falls into the ocean, so long as the drop remains, it remains apart from the ocean—even if the distance is only an inch, half an inch, a hair’s breadth. As long as it is still separate from the ocean, it remains a drop. The moment it meets, the drop is gone; only the ocean remains.
So to say “the drop meets the ocean” is difficult. It meets only when the drop is no more. And while the drop remains, it does not meet; it remains apart.
You will disappear on the path. The path will bring you to an end. The very meaning of a path is a device for your dissolution, for losing yourself, for ending yourself.
In one sense religion is death, and in another sense it is life. Death, in that you will be no more; and supreme life, in that the Divine will be attained. The drop will be lost, and the ocean will be.
But at the first step, do not brood over wholeness. For now, understand your own leaning. Walk in accordance with your inclination. Otherwise much time and energy will be wasted.
I often see this: someone is born into a household whose inherited conditioning is devotional, yet he is not a devotional type. Someone is born into a Jain home, in Mahavira’s lineage, yet his heart is like Meera’s—then he will be in trouble. Or someone is born in a bhakti tradition, but has intelligence like Buddha or Mahavira—again, trouble. Because what will be taught will not suit him. And what might suit him is not his sect.
Walking against your grain brings great suffering. And no one can arrive by going against themselves.
One reason for the widespread irreligiousness in the world today is that people never investigate what suits them. They only worry about the family they were born into; which scripture was taught to them—the Quran, the Bible, or the Gita. They do not ask: What am I? What is my nature? Will the Gita fit me? Or the Quran? Or the Bible? That which fits you is your path.
The world can become more religious if we stop tying religion to birth. Let children be taught the teachings of all religions, and let it be the child’s decision—when they are twenty-one, when they have come of age—to choose their religion. Give them all the teachings, show them the ways to recognize their own heart, and at twenty-one let them choose. Then the world can become more religious, because each person will choose what suits them.
Right now your suitability is not considered. It is mere accident where you are born. Whether it harmonizes with you or not is hard to say. That is why you will notice: when a religion first begins, the living spark it has does not remain later.
When Mohammed appears, those who become Muslims do so by choice. They were not born into Islam—there was no Islam before. Under Mohammed’s influence they come, and they choose Islam. Then their children are born into Islam—they will be dead inside.
When Buddha is alive, the person who becomes a Buddhist chooses. He considers, “Do Buddha’s words resonate with me or not? Is this suitable or not?” So he becomes a Buddhist by choice. But his son, and his son’s son, will become so without choosing.
The moment religion is linked to birth, it goes dead. That is why, when Buddha is alive, there is a freshness around him; when Mahavira is alive, the air near him is vibrant; when Mohammed or Jesus are alive, flowers bloom around them—but later they do not bloom. Gradually they wither. They must wither. Later, religion becomes a burden.
If a thousand or two thousand years ago some ancestor of yours chose a religion, for him it was a choice, a revolution. For you? For you it is an inheritance. You got it free—without choosing, without effort, without thinking, without understanding. In that sense you cannot be truly Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu.
My own understanding is that the world will be better the day we teach the teachings of all religions and leave each person free to choose their own religion. Then the quarrels between religions will also end. Because in one household there will be five or seven different religions. One son will choose Sikhism, another Islam, another may remain Hindu, another will become Christian. That will be their joy. And when seven, eight, ten religions can coexist in one house, then religious riots can end in the world; before that, they cannot. There is no other way.
Therefore truly religious parents have a great responsibility: if they want their children to be genuinely religious, do not make them Hindu, Muslim, Christian. Give them only the teachings of religions. Tell them, “Understand well, and when your moment comes, when the feeling arises in you, then choose. Whatever you choose will be yours.”
In this way we can remove much turmoil from the world.
All paths are right. But not all paths are right for everyone. Every path can take one to the goal, but not every path will take you. Only one path can take you—yours. Hence it is necessary to discover which path can carry you.
A musician, a poet, a painter—certainly their religions will differ, because their personalities differ.
If a poet is handed a religion dry as mathematics, a religion of rules, he will not understand; it will not suit him. Even if he forces himself to wear it, it will be only an outer garment. It will never connect with his soul. That religion will not become a seed within him, will not sprout, will bear no flowers or fruit. He needs a poetic religion, one that dances and sings. Only with such a religion will he find harmony.
A painter or sculptor needs a religion that sees the Divine as beauty, that worships beauty; only then will it suit him. A religion that is hostile to beauty, that opposes rasa, melody, will not suit him. And even if he somehow fits himself into it, his heart will never be touched; a distance will remain.
A mathematician who wants work as clean and precise as “two plus two is four” will not be influenced by a poetic religion. The Upanishads will not move him, because the Upanishads are poetry. Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras will influence him, because they are science.
You must search yourself first, before you set out to search for the Divine. That is number two. You are number one. And if you are mistaken about yourself—if you do not understand well what you are like—then you will not be able to seek the Divine; because the path issues from you.
Therefore self-analysis is the first step. And if true self-analysis has not happened, wait; do not hurry. There is no harm. If it takes a year, two, four, ten just to discover what you are, what your inclination is, what your personality is—there is no harm.
Once you have truly caught your own pulse, recognized your own current, the path becomes very easy. Otherwise you will wander at many doors that were not for you. You will travel many roads and return only dust-laden, because those roads were not yours.
Even then, do not make the mistake of declaring that any path you did not reach by is wrong. That path may be right for someone else. It proved wrong for you; that does not make it wrong for all.
A seeker must keep this much humility in the heart: the path by which I did not arrive is not necessarily wrong—it only shows that there was no harmony between me and that path. I was not suited to it, or it was not suited to me. But it may be suited to someone.
Keeping that person in mind, always remember: whenever something is wrong, say, “It was wrong for me.” And whenever something is right, say, “It was right for me.” But do not proclaim it as a universal truth. Such proclamations cause many people pain, suffering, and confusion.
But that is the final goal. You are not yet like that. You have a journey to make. So you will only be able to travel from the side toward which you lean more, the dimension for which you have greater interest and inclination.
Right now you are fragmented, incomplete. One person has abundant feeling but little intelligence. Another is skilled and attached to action, with little intelligence or feeling by comparison. Another has deep intelligence but a barren heart and no bent for action. In this way we are incomplete, each in our own way.
Wholeness will be attained; it is not here yet. And this incomplete person must begin from their incompleteness. So it is wise to choose the path that suits what is strongest in you.
And the path is always one-sided. The destination is complete. If the path itself were complete, then the destination would lose its meaning.
What is the difference between path and goal? The great difference is that the path will be partial. Therefore, as many people as there are in this world, so many paths will be. Each person will start from where they stand; each will begin from what they are. We are to arrive at that place where the person dissolves, and the impersonal, the formless, the complete is attained.
All rivers travel toward the ocean. The ocean does not travel anywhere. One river comes from the east, another from the west. Some flow south, some north. Rivers must take routes. If a river thinks, “The ocean has no dimension, no direction; therefore I too will take no direction,” it will never reach the ocean. To reach the ocean, a route must be taken.
Where we stand, the ocean is far.
So the more important question is not what the complete person is, but how you, the incomplete person, are. Understand yourself and then set out on the journey. If you can walk, fine; if you can go by bullock cart, fine; if you can ride a horse, fine; if you can fly by airplane, fine.
What means you choose depends on your capacity. And the means matter. And the means will be one-sided. Because the means that suit you will not be another’s; there will be differences within them.
Take a devotee—like Meera. Meera cannot understand Buddha’s path. Meera—a woman’s heart, a heart full of love—this loving heart can understand this: let me fill myself with the Divine, enthrone the Divine within, keep my doors and windows open for the Divine to enter and take up residence. But Meera cannot understand Buddha’s way: that one should empty oneself utterly, become void.
Understand this a little. It is easier for a man to understand “empty yourself.” For a woman it is easier to understand “fill yourself, fill yourself completely.” Woman is womb—physically and mentally. She can fill herself; the tendency to fill is natural to her. Man empties himself—even at the bodily level he empties. Filling feels a little difficult to him.
So Meera understands: let me fill myself with the Divine; let me become a womb and let the Divine be contained within. Buddha finds it difficult to understand that. For Buddha it seems right to pour himself out in every way and become utterly empty; and when he becomes a zero, a shunya, then union with truth will happen.
Buddha becomes truth by becoming empty. Meera becomes truth by filling herself with the Whole. Their paths are different—indeed not only different, but opposite. Yet the destination where they arrive is one.
Upon reaching the goal, it will be hard to distinguish between Buddha and Meera. All the difference was the difference of the path. As the goal comes closer, the difference diminishes. And when the goal is fully reached, you will not be able to tell by their faces who is Meera and who is Buddha!
But that is the very last event. Even an inch before that final event, Buddha and Meera can still be told apart; differences remain. I have spoken in broad strokes. But each person has their own nuance.
That is why there are so many religions in the world—because different people, traveling by different paths, have had glimpses of the truth. And the one who has glimpsed it by a certain path will naturally say, “This is the right path.” There is no mistake in their saying so. They do not know the other paths. They have not traveled them. About paths you have not traveled, what can you say? Of the path you did travel, you will say, “This is right—come to this one.” And you will warn people not to get lost on some other path.
Therefore, when people of different religions say, “Come to our path,” it is not necessary that there is no compassion in what they say, or that it is only a political desire to convert you. Not necessary. There may be compassion. They may wish that the path by which joy has come to them might also be yours.
But this creates a danger: each knower of a path becomes ready to call other paths wrong. Then conflict, dispute, enmity arise naturally.
If it dawns on us that as many people as there are on this earth, so many are the paths to the Divine—so it must be—then things change. I cannot stand in your place, cannot start from your place. I cannot live your life, nor can I die your death. No exchange is possible. You will live for yourself and you will have to die for yourself. And you will walk your walk. I will walk in my way. If this understanding becomes clear—and it should—then the world can become better.
If it becomes clear that each person will walk by their own path, in their own way, then we will find no reason for quarrels between religions. But everyone harbors the notion that the way they walk is the only right one. That causes the trouble.
As you are, so will your path be—because your path issues from you. It will reach the Divine, but it begins from you. On the way, you will go on disappearing; and the day you reach the Divine, you will find that you are no more.
Therefore, up to now, no person has met God. As long as the person remains, there is no news of God. And when God is, the person has ended, is erased, is lost.
When a drop falls into the ocean, so long as the drop remains, it remains apart from the ocean—even if the distance is only an inch, half an inch, a hair’s breadth. As long as it is still separate from the ocean, it remains a drop. The moment it meets, the drop is gone; only the ocean remains.
So to say “the drop meets the ocean” is difficult. It meets only when the drop is no more. And while the drop remains, it does not meet; it remains apart.
You will disappear on the path. The path will bring you to an end. The very meaning of a path is a device for your dissolution, for losing yourself, for ending yourself.
In one sense religion is death, and in another sense it is life. Death, in that you will be no more; and supreme life, in that the Divine will be attained. The drop will be lost, and the ocean will be.
But at the first step, do not brood over wholeness. For now, understand your own leaning. Walk in accordance with your inclination. Otherwise much time and energy will be wasted.
I often see this: someone is born into a household whose inherited conditioning is devotional, yet he is not a devotional type. Someone is born into a Jain home, in Mahavira’s lineage, yet his heart is like Meera’s—then he will be in trouble. Or someone is born in a bhakti tradition, but has intelligence like Buddha or Mahavira—again, trouble. Because what will be taught will not suit him. And what might suit him is not his sect.
Walking against your grain brings great suffering. And no one can arrive by going against themselves.
One reason for the widespread irreligiousness in the world today is that people never investigate what suits them. They only worry about the family they were born into; which scripture was taught to them—the Quran, the Bible, or the Gita. They do not ask: What am I? What is my nature? Will the Gita fit me? Or the Quran? Or the Bible? That which fits you is your path.
The world can become more religious if we stop tying religion to birth. Let children be taught the teachings of all religions, and let it be the child’s decision—when they are twenty-one, when they have come of age—to choose their religion. Give them all the teachings, show them the ways to recognize their own heart, and at twenty-one let them choose. Then the world can become more religious, because each person will choose what suits them.
Right now your suitability is not considered. It is mere accident where you are born. Whether it harmonizes with you or not is hard to say. That is why you will notice: when a religion first begins, the living spark it has does not remain later.
When Mohammed appears, those who become Muslims do so by choice. They were not born into Islam—there was no Islam before. Under Mohammed’s influence they come, and they choose Islam. Then their children are born into Islam—they will be dead inside.
When Buddha is alive, the person who becomes a Buddhist chooses. He considers, “Do Buddha’s words resonate with me or not? Is this suitable or not?” So he becomes a Buddhist by choice. But his son, and his son’s son, will become so without choosing.
The moment religion is linked to birth, it goes dead. That is why, when Buddha is alive, there is a freshness around him; when Mahavira is alive, the air near him is vibrant; when Mohammed or Jesus are alive, flowers bloom around them—but later they do not bloom. Gradually they wither. They must wither. Later, religion becomes a burden.
If a thousand or two thousand years ago some ancestor of yours chose a religion, for him it was a choice, a revolution. For you? For you it is an inheritance. You got it free—without choosing, without effort, without thinking, without understanding. In that sense you cannot be truly Buddhist, Muslim, Hindu.
My own understanding is that the world will be better the day we teach the teachings of all religions and leave each person free to choose their own religion. Then the quarrels between religions will also end. Because in one household there will be five or seven different religions. One son will choose Sikhism, another Islam, another may remain Hindu, another will become Christian. That will be their joy. And when seven, eight, ten religions can coexist in one house, then religious riots can end in the world; before that, they cannot. There is no other way.
Therefore truly religious parents have a great responsibility: if they want their children to be genuinely religious, do not make them Hindu, Muslim, Christian. Give them only the teachings of religions. Tell them, “Understand well, and when your moment comes, when the feeling arises in you, then choose. Whatever you choose will be yours.”
In this way we can remove much turmoil from the world.
All paths are right. But not all paths are right for everyone. Every path can take one to the goal, but not every path will take you. Only one path can take you—yours. Hence it is necessary to discover which path can carry you.
A musician, a poet, a painter—certainly their religions will differ, because their personalities differ.
If a poet is handed a religion dry as mathematics, a religion of rules, he will not understand; it will not suit him. Even if he forces himself to wear it, it will be only an outer garment. It will never connect with his soul. That religion will not become a seed within him, will not sprout, will bear no flowers or fruit. He needs a poetic religion, one that dances and sings. Only with such a religion will he find harmony.
A painter or sculptor needs a religion that sees the Divine as beauty, that worships beauty; only then will it suit him. A religion that is hostile to beauty, that opposes rasa, melody, will not suit him. And even if he somehow fits himself into it, his heart will never be touched; a distance will remain.
A mathematician who wants work as clean and precise as “two plus two is four” will not be influenced by a poetic religion. The Upanishads will not move him, because the Upanishads are poetry. Patanjali’s Yoga Sutras will influence him, because they are science.
You must search yourself first, before you set out to search for the Divine. That is number two. You are number one. And if you are mistaken about yourself—if you do not understand well what you are like—then you will not be able to seek the Divine; because the path issues from you.
Therefore self-analysis is the first step. And if true self-analysis has not happened, wait; do not hurry. There is no harm. If it takes a year, two, four, ten just to discover what you are, what your inclination is, what your personality is—there is no harm.
Once you have truly caught your own pulse, recognized your own current, the path becomes very easy. Otherwise you will wander at many doors that were not for you. You will travel many roads and return only dust-laden, because those roads were not yours.
Even then, do not make the mistake of declaring that any path you did not reach by is wrong. That path may be right for someone else. It proved wrong for you; that does not make it wrong for all.
A seeker must keep this much humility in the heart: the path by which I did not arrive is not necessarily wrong—it only shows that there was no harmony between me and that path. I was not suited to it, or it was not suited to me. But it may be suited to someone.
Keeping that person in mind, always remember: whenever something is wrong, say, “It was wrong for me.” And whenever something is right, say, “It was right for me.” But do not proclaim it as a universal truth. Such proclamations cause many people pain, suffering, and confusion.
A friend has asked, Osho, in bhakti-yoga you have given love a fundamental place. I don’t know whether we ordinary people are familiar with love or only with lust! What is the difference between the two? And can lust become love?
It is worth asking, and worth understanding. Because we take lust to be love. And lust is not love; it can become love. In lust there is the possibility of love. But lust itself is not love; it is only a seed. If rightly used, it can sprout—but a seed is not a tree.
So the one who becomes satisfied with lust, or concludes, “This is the end,” will never even come to know what love is.
Lust can become love. Lust means attraction between two bodies—between bodies. Love means attraction between two minds. And devotion means attraction between two souls. They are all attractions, but on three planes.
When one body is drawn to another body, that is kama, sex. When one mind is drawn to another mind, that is prem, love. And when one soul is drawn to another soul, that is bhakti, devotion.
We live on the plane of the body. Almost all our attractions are bodily. But this does not mean that bodily attraction is bad.
Bodily attraction becomes bad if it obstructs the journey to the higher attractions. And the body becomes a friend, a staircase, if it cooperates with the higher.
If, being attracted to someone’s body, you slowly become attracted to their mind; and being attracted to someone’s mind, you slowly become attracted to their soul—then your lust did not become distorted; it moved on the right path and reached all the way to the divine.
But if you stop at someone’s body, it is as if you went to someone’s home and kept circling outside, never entering through the door. The fault is not of the house; the fault is yours. The house was inviting you to come in. The walls you see from the outside are not the house.
The body is only the house. Inside is the dweller. And there is a double dwelling within: within the house lives the person, which I am calling the mind. And if you enter even within the person, in the innermost womb is the indwelling God, which I am calling the soul.
Every person, in their depth, is the divine. Catch them a little more shallowly and they are a person. Catch them from the very outside and they are a body. Each human being has three dimensions. As body, one is matter. As mind, one is a person, conscious. And as the divine, one is formless, the great void, the fullness.
Kama, prem, bhakti—three steps. But understand this: so long as you are being drawn to someone’s body… And note, it is not necessary that you are drawn only to the bodies of living human beings. It may be that in the image of Krishna it is Krishna’s body that draws you—then that too is kama.
Krishna’s beautiful form—their eyes, their peacock-plume crown, the flute in their hands, their rhythmic, proportioned presence, their blue-hued body—if that attracts you, that too is kama. That is not yet love; not yet devotion.
And if, even in your son’s body, the body is forgotten and you feel the pulsation of life—no thought of form remains, only the sense of an unprecedented event, a wave of consciousness—if such a glimpse arises, there is love with the son as well. And if, in your son himself, you begin to experience the divine, that is devotion.
So bhakti, love, and lust do not depend on with whom, but on what kind of relatedness! It depends on you—how you see, and how you move.
Always watch: what is it that is attracting you—the body, matter, form?
But do not misunderstand me as calling anything bad. It is good. Even this much is no small thing! There are people whom even the body does not attract—then how will inner attractions arise? Nothing draws them. They are the living dead; they walk like corpses. Nothing pulls them, nothing calls them. There is no sense of an invitation. They are alone in this world, strangers, unrelated to existence.
No harm—at least if the body draws you, it tells you you are alive. Something pulls you, something calls you, something invites you outward. That too is a blessing. But stopping there is dangerous. You sell your life too cheaply. You halt for pennies. The journey could have gone much further. You stopped at the doorstep and imagined the destination had arrived! You mistook a halt for the goal. Rest—yes—but keep moving.
I have heard: someone asked the Jewish mystic Hillel, “What is the meaning of spirituality?” He said, “Further, and further.” The man said, “I don’t understand.” Hillel said, “Wherever you feel like stopping, remember these words: further, and further. Until you come to a place where nothing further remains, keep going. That is the meaning of spirituality.”
Do not stop at the body. Further. The body too belongs to God; therefore nothing is bad. There is not even a trace of condemnation in me. But the body is body, even if it is God’s—an outer rampart. Further. The mind too is a rampart—deeper than the body, subtler than the body, yet still a rampart. Further. And when we leave both body and mind and enter within, all ramparts fall away and only the open sky remains.
Therefore, through love for any person, God can be realized. Even by falling in love with a stone image, God can be realized. You can reach the divine from anywhere. Only remember: do not stop. Do not stop until the void arrives and there remains no journey ahead. Keep going until the very path disappears.
But about lust, the human mind has become very sick. For thousands of years man has been taught to be against sex. The body has been condemned. We were told that the body is the enemy: destroy it, break your friendship with it, drop all connection with it. “The body is the obstacle”—this has been taught.
This kind of instruction has had harmful consequences, because it is ignorance, not understanding. The person who begins to fight with his own body will be destroyed in that very fight. His entire search will be lost in that struggle.
The body too belongs to God. A true theist does not admit that there is anything in this world that is not divine. The theist says, everything is his—therefore one can go to him from every side. Everything is his temple.
Those who preached enmity, hatred, condemnation—to suppress and destroy the body—must have been pathological, a bit sick. Their minds were afflicted with neurosis. They were not healthy. A healthy person sees that even through the body there is news of him. The body exists in this world only because God is; otherwise even the body would not be. And the body is alive because a ray of the divine reaches it and touches it.
Seen in this way, the whole world becomes worthy of acceptance. Lust too is acceptable. It is your energy—and God has used it, used it abundantly.
Flowers blossom—do you know why? Birds sing in the morning—do you know why? The peacock dances—why? The cuckoo’s song delights—why?
It is all lust. The peacock dances as an invitation to the beloved. The cuckoo sings in search of a mate. Flowers bloom to attract butterflies, so that butterflies may carry the flowers’ pollen grains to other flowers.
Have you seen the semal tree! When the semal’s flower ripens and falls, the seeds attached to it are wrapped in cotton. Botanists long wondered why seeds would need cotton, why a semal should need cotton. After much inquiry they discovered: if the seeds fall beneath the semal itself, the tree is so large that they will rot in its shade and not sprout. To carry the seeds far away, the tree produces cotton, so the seeds, entangled in the fluff, will be borne by the wind to distant places, where they can fall and new trees can grow.
What are those seeds? They are the tree’s virility, its seed—lust.
Look closely and the whole world is a play of sex. And in this whole world only man can rise from sex to love. That capacity is uniquely human.
Lust is present everywhere—in plants, in animals, in birds. If in your life too there is only lust, understand that you have not yet become human; you still belong to the realm of plants and animals. That is present in all life.
A human being can rise to love. Man’s possibility is love. The day you become loving—rising from lust and filling with love—the attraction of the other’s body no longer remains important. The attraction is to the other’s person, the other’s consciousness, the other’s qualities—to what is hidden within. When your eyes begin to see beyond the body, when a glimpse of the person appears, then you have become human.
And when you become human, another doorway opens in your life: devotion. The day you become a devotee, that day you become divine; that day you attain divinity.
Sex is the possibility of the whole world. If you too live in lust and end there, you have achieved nothing; a human life wasted. If the flowers of love blossom in your life, you have achieved something.
And after love, the second leap is very easy. Love deepens the eyes, and we begin to look within. And when we can see beyond the body, seeing beyond the mind is not very difficult—because the body is very gross. Once we can see within it, the mind is very transparent, like glass; within it too things become visible. Then every person becomes a temple of God. Wherever you look, if the eye goes deep, the same lamp is burning within. The lamps may be millions, but the flame in them is one—the flame of the one divine.
So the one who becomes satisfied with lust, or concludes, “This is the end,” will never even come to know what love is.
Lust can become love. Lust means attraction between two bodies—between bodies. Love means attraction between two minds. And devotion means attraction between two souls. They are all attractions, but on three planes.
When one body is drawn to another body, that is kama, sex. When one mind is drawn to another mind, that is prem, love. And when one soul is drawn to another soul, that is bhakti, devotion.
We live on the plane of the body. Almost all our attractions are bodily. But this does not mean that bodily attraction is bad.
Bodily attraction becomes bad if it obstructs the journey to the higher attractions. And the body becomes a friend, a staircase, if it cooperates with the higher.
If, being attracted to someone’s body, you slowly become attracted to their mind; and being attracted to someone’s mind, you slowly become attracted to their soul—then your lust did not become distorted; it moved on the right path and reached all the way to the divine.
But if you stop at someone’s body, it is as if you went to someone’s home and kept circling outside, never entering through the door. The fault is not of the house; the fault is yours. The house was inviting you to come in. The walls you see from the outside are not the house.
The body is only the house. Inside is the dweller. And there is a double dwelling within: within the house lives the person, which I am calling the mind. And if you enter even within the person, in the innermost womb is the indwelling God, which I am calling the soul.
Every person, in their depth, is the divine. Catch them a little more shallowly and they are a person. Catch them from the very outside and they are a body. Each human being has three dimensions. As body, one is matter. As mind, one is a person, conscious. And as the divine, one is formless, the great void, the fullness.
Kama, prem, bhakti—three steps. But understand this: so long as you are being drawn to someone’s body… And note, it is not necessary that you are drawn only to the bodies of living human beings. It may be that in the image of Krishna it is Krishna’s body that draws you—then that too is kama.
Krishna’s beautiful form—their eyes, their peacock-plume crown, the flute in their hands, their rhythmic, proportioned presence, their blue-hued body—if that attracts you, that too is kama. That is not yet love; not yet devotion.
And if, even in your son’s body, the body is forgotten and you feel the pulsation of life—no thought of form remains, only the sense of an unprecedented event, a wave of consciousness—if such a glimpse arises, there is love with the son as well. And if, in your son himself, you begin to experience the divine, that is devotion.
So bhakti, love, and lust do not depend on with whom, but on what kind of relatedness! It depends on you—how you see, and how you move.
Always watch: what is it that is attracting you—the body, matter, form?
But do not misunderstand me as calling anything bad. It is good. Even this much is no small thing! There are people whom even the body does not attract—then how will inner attractions arise? Nothing draws them. They are the living dead; they walk like corpses. Nothing pulls them, nothing calls them. There is no sense of an invitation. They are alone in this world, strangers, unrelated to existence.
No harm—at least if the body draws you, it tells you you are alive. Something pulls you, something calls you, something invites you outward. That too is a blessing. But stopping there is dangerous. You sell your life too cheaply. You halt for pennies. The journey could have gone much further. You stopped at the doorstep and imagined the destination had arrived! You mistook a halt for the goal. Rest—yes—but keep moving.
I have heard: someone asked the Jewish mystic Hillel, “What is the meaning of spirituality?” He said, “Further, and further.” The man said, “I don’t understand.” Hillel said, “Wherever you feel like stopping, remember these words: further, and further. Until you come to a place where nothing further remains, keep going. That is the meaning of spirituality.”
Do not stop at the body. Further. The body too belongs to God; therefore nothing is bad. There is not even a trace of condemnation in me. But the body is body, even if it is God’s—an outer rampart. Further. The mind too is a rampart—deeper than the body, subtler than the body, yet still a rampart. Further. And when we leave both body and mind and enter within, all ramparts fall away and only the open sky remains.
Therefore, through love for any person, God can be realized. Even by falling in love with a stone image, God can be realized. You can reach the divine from anywhere. Only remember: do not stop. Do not stop until the void arrives and there remains no journey ahead. Keep going until the very path disappears.
But about lust, the human mind has become very sick. For thousands of years man has been taught to be against sex. The body has been condemned. We were told that the body is the enemy: destroy it, break your friendship with it, drop all connection with it. “The body is the obstacle”—this has been taught.
This kind of instruction has had harmful consequences, because it is ignorance, not understanding. The person who begins to fight with his own body will be destroyed in that very fight. His entire search will be lost in that struggle.
The body too belongs to God. A true theist does not admit that there is anything in this world that is not divine. The theist says, everything is his—therefore one can go to him from every side. Everything is his temple.
Those who preached enmity, hatred, condemnation—to suppress and destroy the body—must have been pathological, a bit sick. Their minds were afflicted with neurosis. They were not healthy. A healthy person sees that even through the body there is news of him. The body exists in this world only because God is; otherwise even the body would not be. And the body is alive because a ray of the divine reaches it and touches it.
Seen in this way, the whole world becomes worthy of acceptance. Lust too is acceptable. It is your energy—and God has used it, used it abundantly.
Flowers blossom—do you know why? Birds sing in the morning—do you know why? The peacock dances—why? The cuckoo’s song delights—why?
It is all lust. The peacock dances as an invitation to the beloved. The cuckoo sings in search of a mate. Flowers bloom to attract butterflies, so that butterflies may carry the flowers’ pollen grains to other flowers.
Have you seen the semal tree! When the semal’s flower ripens and falls, the seeds attached to it are wrapped in cotton. Botanists long wondered why seeds would need cotton, why a semal should need cotton. After much inquiry they discovered: if the seeds fall beneath the semal itself, the tree is so large that they will rot in its shade and not sprout. To carry the seeds far away, the tree produces cotton, so the seeds, entangled in the fluff, will be borne by the wind to distant places, where they can fall and new trees can grow.
What are those seeds? They are the tree’s virility, its seed—lust.
Look closely and the whole world is a play of sex. And in this whole world only man can rise from sex to love. That capacity is uniquely human.
Lust is present everywhere—in plants, in animals, in birds. If in your life too there is only lust, understand that you have not yet become human; you still belong to the realm of plants and animals. That is present in all life.
A human being can rise to love. Man’s possibility is love. The day you become loving—rising from lust and filling with love—the attraction of the other’s body no longer remains important. The attraction is to the other’s person, the other’s consciousness, the other’s qualities—to what is hidden within. When your eyes begin to see beyond the body, when a glimpse of the person appears, then you have become human.
And when you become human, another doorway opens in your life: devotion. The day you become a devotee, that day you become divine; that day you attain divinity.
Sex is the possibility of the whole world. If you too live in lust and end there, you have achieved nothing; a human life wasted. If the flowers of love blossom in your life, you have achieved something.
And after love, the second leap is very easy. Love deepens the eyes, and we begin to look within. And when we can see beyond the body, seeing beyond the mind is not very difficult—because the body is very gross. Once we can see within it, the mind is very transparent, like glass; within it too things become visible. Then every person becomes a temple of God. Wherever you look, if the eye goes deep, the same lamp is burning within. The lamps may be millions, but the flame in them is one—the flame of the one divine.
A friend has asked: Osho, I am engaged in the practice of karma-yoga, but I am afraid that perhaps I am deceiving myself! Because I neither practice devotion nor meditation. I simply keep doing the actions that life brings. But what is the criterion by which I can know for sure that what I am doing is karma-yoga and not self-deception? And how can I find out whether this karma-yoga is my nature, suited to me, or not?
The question is precious. And in the mind of the one who has asked it, there is not mere curiosity but mumuksha—a burning longing for liberation. It is a question risen from pain, not from the intellect.
The question is precious. And in the mind of the one who has asked it, there is not mere curiosity but mumuksha—a burning longing for liberation. It is a question risen from pain, not from the intellect.
Certainly, a human being is capable—very capable—of deceiving himself. When we deceive another, the other is there and may catch us. But when we deceive ourselves, there is no one to catch us—we ourselves are both the giver and the receiver—so we can carry it on for a very long time. We can deceive ourselves for lifetimes; in fact, we have and we are.
So it is natural for a seeker to wonder: “I am neither meditating nor devoted; I just keep doing my work. Am I perhaps deceiving myself?”
Three things are necessary to understand.
First: If you have surrendered your action to the Divine, then what happens through meditation will begin to happen through that letting go. You will start becoming peaceful. If you are still restless, know that the karma-yoga you claim to be practicing is mere deception, because the moment I hand over all action to the Divine—“all action is His”—there remains no place for restlessness. Restlessness persists only so long as I carry the whole burden on myself. If in your karma-yoga your restlessness is dissolving, has dissolved, and you are becoming quieter and quieter, know that you are on the right path; it is not a deception.
Second: If you have left action to the Divine, then whatever fruit comes will leave your inner state even, in equanimity. Whether there is pleasure or pain, success or failure, a sameness will arise within. If success pleases you and failure pains you, know that you are deceiving yourself. Because once I have left it to the Divine, then neither success nor failure is mine—now it is His. If He wants failure, that is His will; if He wants success, that too is His will. I am out. Karma-yoga means I have left everything to the Divine and I remain only a vehicle. I have no responsibility now; all responsibility is His. I stand outside as a mere witness. Then equanimity is born. Success is fine, failure is fine—and not a hair’s breadth of difference occurs within. You remain the same in success as in failure. If such even-minded wisdom is arising and growing, know that your karma-yoga is right; you are not deceiving yourself.
Third: As soon as one leaves everything to the Divine, this whole world begins to appear dreamlike, like a play. It seems real only so long as “I” am the doer. When I leave all doership to Him, the whole affair becomes a drama. You become a spectator; you are no longer the doer. Remember, as long as I am the doer, the world is one thing; when I have left all to the Divine, He becomes the doer—then who are you? Only the watcher remains. You are sitting in a cinema: a film is running; you only watch. You remain just the seer.
So the third point: as you leave all to the Divine and enter karma-yoga, the world becomes a dream, a play. You remain only the witness. If witnessing is growing in you—peace is growing, equanimity is growing, witnessing is growing—know you are on the right path; there is no scope for deception. If these do not grow, you are deceiving yourself. And if they are not growing despite great effort, understand that this approach is not in tune with your nature. Try—if movement begins in these three directions, the path suits you. If not, try another doorway.
But what do people think karma-yoga means? They think fulfilling one’s “duty” is karma-yoga. “There is a wife and children; alright. Now that one is entangled in the world, one must work a job or a business, earn, feed them—fulfill one’s duty.” Those who speak thus are dull and cheerless, not brimming with joy. They are carrying a load. Deep within they wish the wife and children would somehow disappear—that would be so good. A desire for murder lurks deep down. Or, “If only I hadn’t made this mistake!” Now that they are trapped, they must carry the burden; so they carry it—and they call this doing their duty. And they call it karma-yoga!
This is not karma-yoga. It is a kind of impotence: neither can they renounce nor can they fully live; stuck in-between. They lack even the courage to be sannyasins and leave—“Yes, a mistake was made; forgive me, I’m going.” That courage they don’t have. Nor do they have the courage to relish what is, to accept it as the Divine’s grace with a heart of “ahó-bháva.” They hang in midair like Trishanku. This they call “doing duty.”
Remember, the word “duty” is a very dirty word. It means carrying a burden.
There are two kinds of people. One: those who love their wife, and therefore work. They will never say, “We are doing our duty.” They will say, “It’s our delight. For the woman I love, I want to build a home, buy a car, plant a garden; to give her the loveliest place I can”—so they are joyous; they won’t use the word duty.
“Our children are ours. We rejoice in their joy. The freshness in their eyes, their sparkle delights us, so we work hard. Our labor is our happiness, not our duty.” Such a person is good; at least he is happy.
Second: one who says, “I have left everything to the Divine. The Divine bids me raise these children—so I do.” He, too, is happy, because he is fulfilling the Divine’s will. He is not performing duty either. He is carrying out the Divine’s wish, having surrendered himself. One rejoices in the beloved of the wife; the other rejoices in the Beloved that is God. But both are joyous; there is no duty in either.
Between them is a third, the Trishanku. He knows nothing of God, and has lost even the thread of love for his wife. He is stuck in-between and says, “I am fulfilling my duty.” He calls this karma-yoga. This is not karma-yoga. This man is dead inside. He lacks courage. He must decide something.
Always remember: whenever you move in the right direction, joy will increase within you. In the wrong direction, melancholy will grow. If your “duty” is making you sad, a mistake is happening somewhere. Either move towards God; or even move towards the wife—no harm—but at least be happy. Because one who can be happy in love for the wife can one day be happy in love for God—the capacity for joy is there. At least he knows how to be joyous.
And one who becomes so happy in the little happiness of a wife—when his journey towards God begins, his joy will know no end. One who was delighted by the sparkle in his child’s eye—when he begins to perceive the Divine in this whole cosmos, his joy will be boundless, without limit.
But beware of the one in-between. He is great mischief. Beware of this in-betweenness—it is deception.
Wherever joy begins to dry up, where the stream runs thin, know you are going wrong—because the organic direction of life is towards joy. If you start becoming sad...
That is why I do not call a sad monk a monk—he is ill. Better the householder who is joyous—at least he has one thing right: he is joyful. But the “saints” we usually know are long-faced people. If you go to them, they try their best to lengthen your face too. If you are laughing, if you are cheerful, then surely you must be sinning—there must be something wrong somewhere!
Keep your distance from these gloomy folks. They are sicknesses. We have found antibiotics for other diseases—but not yet for these. These are deep ulcers on the mind and heart. Beware.
A monk who is not blissful is lost. The monk’s bliss should be endless! We revel in trifles, and you are not equally blissful even in God? We dance for shells, and you claim to have diamonds—yet your face shows you’ve lost even the shells; diamonds you never got.
The natural, wholesome flow of life is towards joy. Let joy be your touchstone—your assay. Test everything upon it. If something does not give joy, know that a mistake is happening somewhere.
Do not be afraid of joy. Even if someone insists that joy is wrong, do not be swayed. Because if joy is wrong, then nothing in this world can be right. Yes, it can happen that your joy is misplaced—that you are rejoicing where there is nothing to rejoice about. That can be. But that you are experiencing joy is true, even if the situation is unworthy. So keep increasing your capacity for joy. The day your joy becomes larger and the given situation too small to contain it, you will rise above that situation.
A child gathers pebbles and is thrilled by colorful stones—fills his pockets till they are heavy. Parents say, “Throw them away! Why carry this trash?” But the child won’t throw them. He even sleeps with them. And a father who snatches them is not wise—he does not only take away pebbles, he steals the child’s joy. He doesn’t know what harm he is doing. The pebbles are worthless, but the child’s inner happiness is precious—and it is that he has taken. And the child cannot yet understand that what was taken was worthless—how could it be worthless when it was giving joy?
The “wise” often act foolishly. Don’t snatch the pebbles from the child; give him understanding. As understanding grows, one day you will find the pebbles lying in a corner—he no longer looks at them, because he has found new joys. Then even if you throw them away, he won’t notice. One day he himself will throw them away.
As understanding grows, new fields of joy open. True religion does not take your joy away—it only increases your understanding, so that joys which have become meaningless fall away by themselves.
Certainly, the joys you take in this world are not really worth taking—they are like a child’s colorful stones. But no harm—if you are enjoying, fine. What is needed is to grow in understanding.
Understand this distinction well.
If you go to sad “saints,” they will take away your joys. They will snatch your pebbles, and with them your inner delight. They do not give you understanding; they rob your joy. Robbing joy does not increase understanding.
Right religion increases your understanding. As understanding grows, the useless falls away; the meaningful begins to draw your hand. And gradually you find that the world slips from your hands just as a child’s pebbles do; and within this very world your vision reaches the essential—and union happens.
Understanding should grow. And with it, joy increases, not decreases. If you start abandoning joy, both joy and understanding diminish.
Whatever you are doing, keep testing one thing continuously: is your joy growing through it? If yes, move fearlessly in that direction. Even if it is not perfect joy yet, no worry; the direction is right. Sooner or later, what is wrong will fall away, and what is right will come into your sight. But a seeker must keep testing himself. And if you feel that nothing is happening, it is right to begin seeking the Divine from another direction.
So it is natural for a seeker to wonder: “I am neither meditating nor devoted; I just keep doing my work. Am I perhaps deceiving myself?”
Three things are necessary to understand.
First: If you have surrendered your action to the Divine, then what happens through meditation will begin to happen through that letting go. You will start becoming peaceful. If you are still restless, know that the karma-yoga you claim to be practicing is mere deception, because the moment I hand over all action to the Divine—“all action is His”—there remains no place for restlessness. Restlessness persists only so long as I carry the whole burden on myself. If in your karma-yoga your restlessness is dissolving, has dissolved, and you are becoming quieter and quieter, know that you are on the right path; it is not a deception.
Second: If you have left action to the Divine, then whatever fruit comes will leave your inner state even, in equanimity. Whether there is pleasure or pain, success or failure, a sameness will arise within. If success pleases you and failure pains you, know that you are deceiving yourself. Because once I have left it to the Divine, then neither success nor failure is mine—now it is His. If He wants failure, that is His will; if He wants success, that too is His will. I am out. Karma-yoga means I have left everything to the Divine and I remain only a vehicle. I have no responsibility now; all responsibility is His. I stand outside as a mere witness. Then equanimity is born. Success is fine, failure is fine—and not a hair’s breadth of difference occurs within. You remain the same in success as in failure. If such even-minded wisdom is arising and growing, know that your karma-yoga is right; you are not deceiving yourself.
Third: As soon as one leaves everything to the Divine, this whole world begins to appear dreamlike, like a play. It seems real only so long as “I” am the doer. When I leave all doership to Him, the whole affair becomes a drama. You become a spectator; you are no longer the doer. Remember, as long as I am the doer, the world is one thing; when I have left all to the Divine, He becomes the doer—then who are you? Only the watcher remains. You are sitting in a cinema: a film is running; you only watch. You remain just the seer.
So the third point: as you leave all to the Divine and enter karma-yoga, the world becomes a dream, a play. You remain only the witness. If witnessing is growing in you—peace is growing, equanimity is growing, witnessing is growing—know you are on the right path; there is no scope for deception. If these do not grow, you are deceiving yourself. And if they are not growing despite great effort, understand that this approach is not in tune with your nature. Try—if movement begins in these three directions, the path suits you. If not, try another doorway.
But what do people think karma-yoga means? They think fulfilling one’s “duty” is karma-yoga. “There is a wife and children; alright. Now that one is entangled in the world, one must work a job or a business, earn, feed them—fulfill one’s duty.” Those who speak thus are dull and cheerless, not brimming with joy. They are carrying a load. Deep within they wish the wife and children would somehow disappear—that would be so good. A desire for murder lurks deep down. Or, “If only I hadn’t made this mistake!” Now that they are trapped, they must carry the burden; so they carry it—and they call this doing their duty. And they call it karma-yoga!
This is not karma-yoga. It is a kind of impotence: neither can they renounce nor can they fully live; stuck in-between. They lack even the courage to be sannyasins and leave—“Yes, a mistake was made; forgive me, I’m going.” That courage they don’t have. Nor do they have the courage to relish what is, to accept it as the Divine’s grace with a heart of “ahó-bháva.” They hang in midair like Trishanku. This they call “doing duty.”
Remember, the word “duty” is a very dirty word. It means carrying a burden.
There are two kinds of people. One: those who love their wife, and therefore work. They will never say, “We are doing our duty.” They will say, “It’s our delight. For the woman I love, I want to build a home, buy a car, plant a garden; to give her the loveliest place I can”—so they are joyous; they won’t use the word duty.
“Our children are ours. We rejoice in their joy. The freshness in their eyes, their sparkle delights us, so we work hard. Our labor is our happiness, not our duty.” Such a person is good; at least he is happy.
Second: one who says, “I have left everything to the Divine. The Divine bids me raise these children—so I do.” He, too, is happy, because he is fulfilling the Divine’s will. He is not performing duty either. He is carrying out the Divine’s wish, having surrendered himself. One rejoices in the beloved of the wife; the other rejoices in the Beloved that is God. But both are joyous; there is no duty in either.
Between them is a third, the Trishanku. He knows nothing of God, and has lost even the thread of love for his wife. He is stuck in-between and says, “I am fulfilling my duty.” He calls this karma-yoga. This is not karma-yoga. This man is dead inside. He lacks courage. He must decide something.
Always remember: whenever you move in the right direction, joy will increase within you. In the wrong direction, melancholy will grow. If your “duty” is making you sad, a mistake is happening somewhere. Either move towards God; or even move towards the wife—no harm—but at least be happy. Because one who can be happy in love for the wife can one day be happy in love for God—the capacity for joy is there. At least he knows how to be joyous.
And one who becomes so happy in the little happiness of a wife—when his journey towards God begins, his joy will know no end. One who was delighted by the sparkle in his child’s eye—when he begins to perceive the Divine in this whole cosmos, his joy will be boundless, without limit.
But beware of the one in-between. He is great mischief. Beware of this in-betweenness—it is deception.
Wherever joy begins to dry up, where the stream runs thin, know you are going wrong—because the organic direction of life is towards joy. If you start becoming sad...
That is why I do not call a sad monk a monk—he is ill. Better the householder who is joyous—at least he has one thing right: he is joyful. But the “saints” we usually know are long-faced people. If you go to them, they try their best to lengthen your face too. If you are laughing, if you are cheerful, then surely you must be sinning—there must be something wrong somewhere!
Keep your distance from these gloomy folks. They are sicknesses. We have found antibiotics for other diseases—but not yet for these. These are deep ulcers on the mind and heart. Beware.
A monk who is not blissful is lost. The monk’s bliss should be endless! We revel in trifles, and you are not equally blissful even in God? We dance for shells, and you claim to have diamonds—yet your face shows you’ve lost even the shells; diamonds you never got.
The natural, wholesome flow of life is towards joy. Let joy be your touchstone—your assay. Test everything upon it. If something does not give joy, know that a mistake is happening somewhere.
Do not be afraid of joy. Even if someone insists that joy is wrong, do not be swayed. Because if joy is wrong, then nothing in this world can be right. Yes, it can happen that your joy is misplaced—that you are rejoicing where there is nothing to rejoice about. That can be. But that you are experiencing joy is true, even if the situation is unworthy. So keep increasing your capacity for joy. The day your joy becomes larger and the given situation too small to contain it, you will rise above that situation.
A child gathers pebbles and is thrilled by colorful stones—fills his pockets till they are heavy. Parents say, “Throw them away! Why carry this trash?” But the child won’t throw them. He even sleeps with them. And a father who snatches them is not wise—he does not only take away pebbles, he steals the child’s joy. He doesn’t know what harm he is doing. The pebbles are worthless, but the child’s inner happiness is precious—and it is that he has taken. And the child cannot yet understand that what was taken was worthless—how could it be worthless when it was giving joy?
The “wise” often act foolishly. Don’t snatch the pebbles from the child; give him understanding. As understanding grows, one day you will find the pebbles lying in a corner—he no longer looks at them, because he has found new joys. Then even if you throw them away, he won’t notice. One day he himself will throw them away.
As understanding grows, new fields of joy open. True religion does not take your joy away—it only increases your understanding, so that joys which have become meaningless fall away by themselves.
Certainly, the joys you take in this world are not really worth taking—they are like a child’s colorful stones. But no harm—if you are enjoying, fine. What is needed is to grow in understanding.
Understand this distinction well.
If you go to sad “saints,” they will take away your joys. They will snatch your pebbles, and with them your inner delight. They do not give you understanding; they rob your joy. Robbing joy does not increase understanding.
Right religion increases your understanding. As understanding grows, the useless falls away; the meaningful begins to draw your hand. And gradually you find that the world slips from your hands just as a child’s pebbles do; and within this very world your vision reaches the essential—and union happens.
Understanding should grow. And with it, joy increases, not decreases. If you start abandoning joy, both joy and understanding diminish.
Whatever you are doing, keep testing one thing continuously: is your joy growing through it? If yes, move fearlessly in that direction. Even if it is not perfect joy yet, no worry; the direction is right. Sooner or later, what is wrong will fall away, and what is right will come into your sight. But a seeker must keep testing himself. And if you feel that nothing is happening, it is right to begin seeking the Divine from another direction.
Osho's Commentary
“And if you are unable even to do this, then, with a controlled mind and having taken refuge in the yoga that leads to my attainment, renounce for my sake the fruits of all actions.”
Krishna said: “Consider that I am doing all actions.” But if even this is not possible—if it is difficult for you to feel “You are doing, O Lord; how can I believe that?”—then...
It is difficult indeed. If someone tells you “God is doing everything,” you will say, “How can I accept that? I am the one doing.” I have seen people who, once convinced that God does everything, stop doing anything. They say, “If God does everything, what should we do?” But the sitting is what they are doing! At least that much they keep for themselves. They don’t say, “God is making us sit; all right.” No—they say, “We are sitting. What can we do now? If God is doing everything, we will do nothing.” But “we will do nothing” means they can at least do that much—so earlier whatever they were doing, they never really believed God was doing it; they were. Hence now they say, “We will refrain and see how God does it!”
It is hard to accept that God is doing, because the ego does not agree to “I am not the doer.” Yes, if something bad happens, the ego may agree that “God did it.” When failure comes, one easily attributes it to God or fate. When success comes, one says “I did it.” Success nourishes the ego; and what nourishes the ego we want to keep for ourselves.
I have heard a story. A sannyasin lived in a small ashram. He would tell people, “I built this ashram; I attained knowledge; I renounced.” One day a cow wandered into the ashram and ate the flowers and garden. Seeing this, he grew angry, picked up a stick and struck the cow—she died. A brahmin standing at the door asked, “What have you done! You have killed a cow!” The sannyasin replied, “God does everything; what am I? His will! Without Him, could the cow die? Without His command could my hand even rise? Not a leaf stirs without Him.” But the ashram he had built; the knowledge he had attained; the renunciation he had done—the cow, God had killed!
Such are our tricks. When you lose in life, you say “fate”; when you win, you say “I.” To leave everything at God’s feet is difficult. Failure we can easily leave; success we cannot. Yet both come.
So Krishna says, “It may be difficult for you to leave action to me—because you will have to leave yourself, and leaving yourself is supremely difficult. Then do one thing: if you cannot leave action, at least leave the fruit of action.”
This is a little easier than the first, because the fruit is not in our hands anyway. We can act, but what fruit will come we cannot determine with certainty.
I can throw a stone at you—but that it will kill you is uncertain. It could strike you and cure an illness. It has happened. In China, from such an accident acupuncture was born. About three thousand years ago, in a war, a soldier was shot in the leg. He had suffered headaches all his life—incurable. The bullet went through. As it struck, the headache vanished. Doctors were amazed: how could a leg wound cure a head? They investigated and discovered that in the body’s network of nerves and energy-flow are points which, when impacted, affect faraway points. They mapped about eight hundred points. No need to shoot—just a tiny prick is enough. Acupuncture inserts a needle at specific points; your headache vanishes.
The man who fired the bullet hadn’t intended to cure the man’s head, nor could he imagine that his shot would give birth to acupuncture, benefiting not just one man but millions. You can think “I am doing,” but you cannot ensure what will happen. The happening is not in your hands. You may give poison and it may prove nectar; you may give nectar and it becomes poison. The fruit does not depend on you; it depends on a vast cosmic order.
So Krishna says: if you cannot leave action—because you feel you do it—at least leave the results, for the result is not yours. Act if you must, but leave the fruits to me: whatever happens, God brings the result.
“Renounce all fruits of action and leave them to me. For, without knowing the essence, practice is inferior to indirect knowledge.”
Many people keep practicing without knowing the essence—why they do what they do. Someone has told them, so they do it. A gentleman was brought to me when his mind was on the verge of breakdown. Someone had told him to plug both ears with his thumbs and listen inside for the rumble of clouds. He had been doing so for three years. Now the rumbling had grown so loud that he heard nothing else—even without plugging his ears, the roar continued; he couldn’t hear others speaking because the inner thunder was on. I asked, “Why did you try to hear the rumble?” He said, “I wanted peace; I was told this would bring it.” Would you not think—how will thunder bring peace? It is a technique, a meditation experiment, but you should at least grasp its essence. Now he has succeeded—and is troubled: he wants to be free of the thunder!
Many people do all sorts of things—headstands because someone said so, or because they read in Nehru’s autobiography that so-and-so stood on his head and became very intelligent. If becoming intelligent were as easy as standing on your head, fools would be scarce—because fools can at least stand on their heads. Certainly there can be benefits—but without understanding the essence?
If too much blood goes to the brain, damage occurs. You don’t know how much blood your brain can handle, nor do your teachers. Human intelligence arose because man stood upright; less blood flowed to the brain, allowing delicate neural fibers to form—animals did not develop such intelligence because too much blood flows to their brains. At night, if you sleep without a pillow, you may not sleep—because the delicate fibers are irritated by increased blood flow. Place your head on a pillow, blood flow reduces, and the fine fibers can rest. If you do a headstand, first ensure how much blood your neurons can bear—or they may break. I have not seen headstanders becoming especially intelligent; has any headstander invented a science or won a Nobel prize? This does not mean headstand has no benefit—but these are subtle matters and require proper training, with a full understanding of your brain and physiology. Otherwise you only harm yourself.
People begin pranayama without knowing how much oxygen their cells need—too much oxygen causes fainting; too little causes fainting. Life is balance—very delicate balance. Hence Krishna says, “Without knowing the essence, do not plunge into practices, Arjuna. Better than blind practice is indirect knowledge.”
Indirect knowledge (paroksha jnana) means what the scriptures say. What the scriptures say is safer than practicing blindly without understanding the essence. Scripture means the words of those who knew—who experienced and recorded their realization—for the benefit of those who do not yet know.
Understand this well. Those who knew, experimented, practiced, realized, and reached—they spoke not merely for themselves but for those who do not know. There is a difference. They can speak as they knew—but if care is not taken, their knowledge becomes dangerous for you. So scripture is spoken with the ignorant in mind, so that it does not cause harm.
Jesus spoke in little stories—parables. They are so simple anyone can understand, and yet so profound that they are hard to truly grasp. The stories are framed so that one who only understands the story will enjoy it and go on; the story won’t harm him—his understanding will increase a little. But one who can enter deeper will find deeper meanings—each parable has many layers. The first layer is just a story a child can enjoy. The second layer yields a different meaning, the third another. Scripture is written with the ignorant in mind, with keys hidden so that knowledge does not fall into the wrong hands, and the keys appear only when the seeker can use them rightly. Such is “shastra,” scripture—not every book.
Scripture is a very scientific arrangement—and remains effective even thousands of years later. But even so, reading scripture does not guarantee that you grasp its meaning; you will see only as much as you are able. Hence commentaries became necessary—those who saw more than you wrote expositions, again using the same care that knowledge not fall into wrong hands. An ignorant person is safer in ignorance than with knowledge; a sword in a child’s hand is dangerous.
Today, science faces a similar crisis. Einstein said before dying: if I were born again, I wouldn’t want to be a scientist—I would be a plumber. What I’ve given has fallen into the hands of those who can destroy the world, and I have no power to stop it. Scientists now think they should hide knowledge from politicians—the most foolish tribe—because knowledge in the hands of ignorance is perilous. In spirituality too we once discovered keys of enormous value—but giving them to everyone is dangerous. So scripture both reveals and conceals: it reveals as much as you can assimilate and hides what isn’t yet useful. When you assimilate one step, the next appears—like stairs, one at a time. Each key used rightly places the next key in your hand.
Therefore Krishna says: practice without understanding the essence is inferior to indirect knowledge. Accept second-hand knowledge from those who know, rather than blundering into practices you don’t understand.
But indirect knowledge is still borrowed. However much you learn from shastras, it is not your own experience. Patanjali knew, Vashistha knew, Shankara and Ramanuja knew; you heard and believed—your information grew, but not your awakening. Awakening grows only through your own experience.
So Krishna says: better than indirect knowledge is meditation on my true nature—on the Divine. Better to close the books, close your eyes, and remember God.
What will you do in remembrance? How to meditate on the Divine? Understand a small thing. Do nothing. Lie down or sit—and let go completely. Do nothing—not even breathe deliberately. Let the breath move on its own. For five minutes, keep only one attention: that I do nothing, I lie like a corpse. In five, ten, fifteen minutes—whatever it takes—let there be deep relaxation. When all has become quiet and only the breath is audible—sometimes a thought will drift by, an ant may bite, a sound may come—but you on your part remain utterly at rest, as if you are not.
In this stillness, hold only one feeling. Whatever form of the Divine is dear to you—any name, any image. If the Buddha’s image is dear, let only that appear in the empty mind. If the sound Om appeals, let Om resound within. If Ram-Ram appeals, let it echo within. Take hold of whatever is dear to you and evokes the remembrance of the Divine.
It happened that a Sufi fakir advised an emperor to remember God. That emperor loved a diamond he had won after great wars; he kept it with him day and night. When he sat to remember God, thoughts of the diamond kept arising. He returned to the fakir and said, “This diamond obstructs me; how can I renounce it?” The fakir said, “Don’t renounce it—renunciation will make it an even bigger obstacle. Instead, forget God for now; remember the diamond. Close your eyes and look only at the diamond—and think, ‘This diamond is the form of God.’”
The emperor was astonished; he had expected to be told to renounce. But the fakir was wise. The emperor meditated on the diamond; the diamond stopped obstructing—because an obstacle only blocks where you are trying to go elsewhere. When there is nowhere else to go, even the diamond stops blocking. He had only the diamond, so he began to experience the Divine through it. In a short time the diamond disappeared, and only God remained.
So whatever your “diamond” is—your wife’s face, your child’s eyes, your friend’s image, the form of Krishna or Rama or Jesus—choose where your heart naturally leans. If nothing else, take your own photograph—that at least you have. Look at your face in the mirror, close your eyes and say, “This is the form of God,” and remain with it. You will also reach—do not fret, “How can it be my own picture!” If your own name is dearest to you—everyone loves their own name—then there is no need to chant “Rama.” What is not dear will be useless. Without love, nothing will help. If your own name appeals, repeat that and understand it as the Divine’s name. In a few days you will find you have disappeared and only God remains.
“Better than indirect knowledge is meditation on my true nature. Better even than meditation is the renunciation of all fruits of action for my sake.”
Because even meditation is your action—you feel, “I am meditating.” A subtle line of “I” remains. Therefore Krishna says: better still is renunciation of the fruits of all actions. And through renunciation, supreme peace arises immediately. As soon as one leaves everything to the Divine, the very basis of restlessness drops. If you want restlessness, keep everything on your head—take even others’ burdens onto yourself; gather the world’s suffering on your head, and you will be skillful at increasing your turmoil.
And this is how most people live. The world’s burdens on one head! If you want to be free of the load and find peace, leave it to the Divine. You are worrying needlessly. The burden is not really on your head. You are like the villager who, for the first time on a train, kept his bedding and bundle on his head. He thought, “I have a ticket only for myself. If I put the bundle down, someone may complain. Besides, the train already carries so many people; if I add the weight of my bundle, the train may stop—better to keep it on my head.” But whether on his head or on the floor, the weight was still on the train; he was suffering needlessly. He could have put it down—the train carries it anyway.
Leave everything on the Divine and you become unburdened. This does not mean you were carrying the burden; you were carrying it unnecessarily—God is carrying it.
Therefore Krishna says: one who leaves all actions to me is supreme. He needs no meditation, nothing else. Doing one thing, all is done: surrender to God. Renunciation brings instant peace—it must.
But do not think renunciation means leaving house, home, clothes—running away. That renunciation will cling to you; wherever you go, you will announce, “I have renounced everything.” That “I who have renounced” will travel with you. True renunciation means: I am not the doer, I cannot do; the doer is He. I have been needlessly meddling in the middle.
I have heard that at Puri, the chariot would roll out, and a small dog once started walking in front. People were bowing, prostrating in front of the chariot. The dog thought, “Ah, poor fellows!” and inwardly blessed them: “Be happy!” His arrogance grew: “The chariot is out for me. People prostrate for me.” By night he could not sleep—if he died of a heart attack, it would not be surprising.
We are all like that dog: walking as if the chariot moves for us; as if the whole world runs for us. We trouble ourselves for no reason. Surrender means: I drop these anxieties; this is not running for me, nor am I running it. I am worrying in vain. Therefore the religious person becomes supremely peaceful: God does all; he frees himself from the sense of doership.
This does not mean he becomes inactive. It only means he leaves it to Him—if He wants, He will make him act; if He wants, He will make him sit inactive. On his own side there is no personal striving left. He flows in the river wherever it carries him. If it drowns him—drowning too is a kind of shore.
Let us pause for five minutes. No one should get up midway. Please keep in mind a few things: some people come and sit in the middle, then try to leave from the middle. Sit towards the outside; if you need to go, sit at the edge. And during the kirtan, no one should get up. After five minutes of kirtan, then go.