Geeta Darshan #7

Many things need to be understood. First, this is not your first birth. You are not new to the earth. You have been here many times; you have searched many times; you have searched in the scriptures many times; you have sat at the feet of masters many times. The essence, the distillation of all those lives travels with you.

If it ever happens that the feeling of discipleship, of guru-bhava, arises near someone, it has only one meaning: through the endless journey of past lives you have earned the eligibility to surrender to a master. Without that, guru-bhava cannot arise.

Flowers come only when the tree has grown, the branches have spread, the leaves have come, and the season for flowering has arrived. From seed straight to flowers—never.

So first keep this in mind: if true guru-bhava has arisen, then your search in the scriptures has already been completed. You may not know it; your conscious mind may have no idea.

And if guru-bhava is deluded, false—just a notion and not a real arising—it will not last long. It has little value. It is as if someone has placed a flower on top of the seed from the outside; it has not grown from the seed.

If guru-bhava has truly arisen, your life will start to change. That is the sign that it is real. Guru-bhava is a great revolutionary event. The feeling of surrender to someone begins to change life from the roots. The one who surrenders dies; a new person is born.

If the feeling of surrender, of going for refuge, is real—and by real I mean arising out of the experience of past lives—then revolution has begun in you; experiences will start to unfold.

Your tendencies will shift; your greed, anger, and sex will be altered. Your compassion will deepen; friendliness will grow. A certain indifference toward pleasure and pain will arise. The future will cease to seem so precious; the present will feel more valuable. And beyond what is visible, your eyes will begin to turn toward the invisible. In such a life differences will begin to appear on every side.

If the feeling of surrender to the master has come out of past experiences, there will be no difficulty in recognizing it. But if it has just appeared—sometimes that happens—then it is not your own feeling arising; rather, under the master’s influence, a flower has been set upon you.

A person may be impressive. There can be force in their personality, in their speech, in their very presence. In the shadow of that influence you may feel you are surrendering—but it will not last long. It is no more than hypnosis. A single rain will be enough to wash it away.

This is the touchstone: if your surrender is changing you, if it endures and gradually becomes a steady state, then understand that you have no need of scriptures; the work of scriptures has already been done. But if the feeling of surrender comes again and again, toward many, does not abide—comes and goes; a little water and it all flows away—then know it is only the influence of persons.

That surrender is not yours. No real transformation, no revolution will ever come from it. You will remain as you were. Harm is also possible—because the person who is affected without changing within begins to organize his whole life on the surface. He can be influenced by anyone; wherever he goes, he will be influenced. But the influence is only on the surface waves; in the depths of his life nothing happens.

In the depths, whatever happens happens only through your own experience. If your experience is ready and you meet a master, surrender, refuge arises. If your inner experience is not ready and you meet a master, influence arises. Influence comes in a moment and goes in a moment; it has little value. It is like going to see a picture—a film; you are moved for a while. But as soon as the lights come on and the bell rings, you remember it was only a film, a play of light and shadow; there was nothing to cry about, and you walk out laughing. Your eyes may still be wet, but it was all on the surface; it has no inner consequence.

Listening to me can also be an influence. My words may feel pleasant, may seem logical. The poetry of my speech may capture your mind. But there is not much value in that; it is worth no more than entertainment. As you go out, it will all be lost, blown away like smoke.

But if within you the experience is ripe, and then my words resonate with it—if the seed is in the soil and the rain comes—then germination will happen. You must bring the seed yourself.

No master can give you experience. A master can become the rain. If the seed is within, it can sprout. The master’s presence can do the work of the gardener. But no master can be the seed for you; there is no way.

Keep examining this continuously: are we living only by influences? Keep searching within to see whether you are merely hypnotized, or whether something is happening inside.

People go to the temple every day. Look at their faces in the temple; they seem full of devotion! The moment they step out, their faces change. They may have been going to that temple for lifetimes, yet the temple does not change them. They are the same as ever. In the temple they put on a face. That too has become a habit. As they enter the temple they adopt a devotional mood.

But assumed moods have no value. The feeling must arise from within. And if it arises from within, then why only in the temple? It will remain outside the temple too; it will remain everywhere.

So if only while listening to me you feel like surrendering, it has little value. If after you leave, that feeling keeps resonating within; if, awake or asleep, its tune continues to play in you; if it follows you—and not only follows, but because of its presence your life is altered—if you were about to slip your hand into someone’s pocket and that feeling within stops you; if an abuse was about to leave your lips and that feeling becomes a barrier; if someone has fallen and your hand goes out to lift him—if that feeling becomes deed—then know it is within you.

If the feeling begins to become action, it means it will change your conduct. If the feeling does not become action, you will remain the same. Perhaps a few fine sayings will get collected in your intellect. Fine sayings have no value. Fine sayings are like fine dreams. However good the dream, it is still a dream. Even if in a dream you become an emperor, in the morning you find you are a beggar. Nothing has really changed.

So if I say, “You yourself are Brahman; the imperishable indweller is hidden within,” and hearing me you feel, “Yes, that is right,” but nowhere in life, in action, does any difference appear—then it has no value. Consider it a deception; and the sooner you come out of that deception, the better. People wander from one guru to another, from one ashram to another. No ashram changes them. Then they think all ashrams are useless; there is no essence anywhere. No guru changes them. Then they think all gurus are useless; there is no true master.

The difficulty is not with the true master; the difficulty is with you. If you are ready to change, even a small child can change you. If you are not ready to change, even Krishna himself standing beside you is powerless to do anything.

Keep this in mind. Whatever influence arises, let it start becoming your action. Give it the chance to become action. Wherever an opportunity appears, immediately allow your feeling to transform into deed. Whenever a feeling becomes a deed, its line grows deeper within you.

What you think has little value. What you do has great value—because what you do connects with your very being. What you think keeps wandering in the intellect.

There are many people with very fine ideas. Those fine ideas have no value; when the time comes, they do not work. And what they do bears no relation to their ideas.

Whatever I speak to you, my purpose is not to impress you. Impressing people is child’s play. You get impressed even by a street juggler; therefore it has no value. A juggler is beating his little drum on the roadside; you stop right there. So impressing you has no value, no meaning. You get impressed by anyone.

Let life begin to circulate within you! Let the current of your life take a new momentum!

So worry neither about scriptures nor about influences; take care to see what is happening within you. This requires constant observation. And whatever happens within you—that alone becomes your treasure.

At the moment of death, neither scriptures nor the master can go with you; neither the master’s words nor the influences you have collected will be of any use. At the moment of death, what you have done all your life—only that will accompany you. At death, the essence, the distillation of your actions will set out on the journey with you. At death, only you will remain, and the total of your own deeds; all the lines of whatever you have done are inscribed upon you.

So keep reflecting: how is the current of your life flowing? That is the only criterion.

From whom are you hoping—me or yourself? From the way you ask, it seems you are hoping for something from me. As if, because you listened to me and remained where you were, the fault is mine! When did I ever tell you that by merely listening you would become something else? If only it were so easy that people changed by listening, the world would have changed long ago.

People do not change by listening—that much is clear. In fact, the truth is: the more they listen, the more dull they become, because they get addicted to listening. The first time they hear something, perhaps their intelligence stirs a little; with repeated listening even that movement is lost. Then listening itself becomes a habit. “This is all familiar,” they feel. Listening becomes a kind of intoxication; one begins to crave it.

If you listen to me with eagerness and nothing changes in you, then the moment it strikes eight, you come—out of craving. Just as someone craves a cigarette: if at eight he doesn’t smoke, he feels restless. It is a habit, an addiction.

Addiction has a strange nature: do it, you gain nothing; don’t do it, you suffer. Go and listen—no real benefit; don’t go—restlessness! Whenever this happens, understand it has become a habit. It is a disease, and no attainment will come from it.

But why be disheartened? If you decide, “Then I will stop listening,” even that will make no difference. If listening has not helped, how will not-listening help? To make a difference, something will have to be done from your side. Listening is very convenient: you need do nothing—just sit there.

People come to me and say that reading my books is less enjoyable than listening to me. Because in reading you must at least make a little effort—your eyes, your attention. Listening spares even that little labor. And when listening, the mind gets absorbed; for that time you feel a kind of peace. For that time, at least, you cannot perform your other mischiefs; your mind is occupied, and its usual stream is interrupted.

All that is fine—but it won’t change you. If someone thinks he will be transformed by listening, he is mistaken; he will never change. If you want to change, listening can give you hints, pointers—threads you can use to change. But by listening alone, no one changes.

There is an old saying: you can take a horse to water, but you cannot make it drink. You can lead it to the riverbank—how will you make it drink? The horse must drink. That much I can do: bring the horse to the river; I cannot make it drink.

Now you say, “Like the horse I have been standing here for so many days, and my thirst is still not quenched!” The river is flowing, the horse is standing—what now? And who has to do it? The one who brought the horse to the river, or the horse?

You can stand there for lifetimes; the river will keep flowing. The river flows every moment. But the horse must bend a little, lower its neck, bring its mouth to the water.

When I speak, when I say something, the river flows right by you. You can sit on the bank for days, savoring the sight—the glitter of sun on the water, the music of its flow, the beauty of trees and birds along its shore. But your thirst will not be quenched.

And the river can do nothing more to quench your thirst. You must bend down, cup your hands, and drink. If you are prepared, why only drink? You can dive in and become one with the river. But it will not happen merely because the river is present; you will have to do something.

You say you listen, and with eagerness. That, by itself, is not doing. From this current of the river you must select something to drink. If a thought seems meaningful, don’t leave it at “seems meaningful”—make it meaningful. If an insight feels precious, don’t stop at thinking it is precious; use it, taste it. Drink it, so it begins to circulate in your blood and unite with your bones.

If what I say feels so delightful, then when the source from which it arises becomes your own inner spring, you cannot imagine how much sweetness will flood your being. If what I am saying feels dear, then the day you drown in the source from which it comes and become one with it, your life will be filled with light upon light.

But the danger is: if something sounds good, we memorize it; it lodges in the intellect. At most, we use it to talk to others—to tell them, to explain to them. That is the only “use.”

At best, what you hear becomes your words; it will not become your life. And if it does not become your life, listening is futile.

If you feel you are listening and going nowhere—how will you go anywhere? You must go. Begin to move. Even a single step is great, because once the first step is taken, the second becomes easier. And no one can take more than one step at a time. Take one step, and in a sense the whole journey is solved, because thousands of miles are walked one step at a time. But take a step.

Make it a rule: whatever feels deeply appealing, attempt to experience it. Whatever covers your heart and mind with fragrance, attempt to live it. Be concerned to know it directly.

A young man used to come to me. He was very keen on meditation. He attended meditation camps. But I never saw him meditate. I saw him at two or four camps; he met me many times; he brought many questions—good questions; he listened with great eagerness.

I asked, “What are you doing?” He said, “I’m doing research on meditation. I have to write a thesis.”

He was trying hard to understand meditation, but he had no personal concern with it. He would finish the thesis; some university would give him a degree—finished! For him, meditation was a subject for intellectual exercise, not for experiment.

It is like this: a lake of nectar is full, and someone keeps investigating around it to write a thesis on nectar—and never drinks it! We would call him a great fool. He could have written the thesis after drinking—and done it better. For what can you say about what you have not known? Whatever you say will be borrowed—stale, external—not an inner realization.

Max Planck, a scientist, wrote in his memoirs that he was studying biology and psychology, trying to find the inner relationship between them—how the mind affects the body. He was in love with a young woman. One evening they were sitting together, the moon in the sky, speaking of love. Suddenly she stood up abruptly and said, “Forgive me. This is finished. Don’t meet me again.”

Planck asked, “What’s the matter?” She said, “For days I have noticed that whenever you speak of love, you place your fingers on my pulse.”

He was measuring whether, when he talked of love, her pulse changed! For him, love was a thesis topic. He had no reason to enter love; he was checking whether, when the mind is affected, the body is affected.

Of course it is. When you are in deep love, your pulse quickens. When you are near your beloved, your whole body becomes more vibrant; blood flows faster; the heart beats more strongly; you feel alive. When your beloved moves away, you wilt; everything slackens.

All that is true. But the girl did right. She said, “This is over. Love is not a matter of scientific curiosity.” She said she had often suspected something, because while talking you seemed to be doing something else—but today she had seen clearly that he was holding her pulse.

At first she must have thought he held her hand out of love—but he was checking her pulse!

Such a man may indeed discover the relation between mind and body—but he may miss a unique experience: love.

You can be “interested” in meditation as an intellectual churning; then you will return with peels, while fruit was available.

When you listen to me and it sounds good, feels dear, stirs eagerness—this is not enough. It is necessary, because after it something more can happen; but it is not sufficient. It is only primary. Take the second step.

Move from thought to experience. Do not stop at thought. Otherwise you will go on thinking, go on thinking, and be finished. Whoever ends in thinking has not known life. An incomparable treasure was at hand, and he let it slip through his fingers. Even though the method lay with him, he did not use it.

One night Mulla Nasruddin came home distraught, sweating, shaken. He hurried in and bolted the door.

His wife asked, “Why are you so frightened? What happened? Where are you coming from?” He said, “I was returning from the shop. A thug met me. He snatched my glasses, took the fountain pen from my pocket, took my money, even made me take off my coat—and even my shoes.”

His wife said, “But you carry a pistol!” Nasruddin said, “It was my good fortune the rogue didn’t notice the pistol—otherwise would he have left it?”

Then what is the pistol for?

You know the methods of meditation. They will lie around like that pistol. You will be busy protecting them—and never use them. Why? Because you do not know their value. Whatever knowledge you have turned into your life—that alone is truly yours.

I have heard an old Jewish tale. When God created the world, he asked the leader of the Hindus—perhaps Krishna—“I have some commandments. They’ll be useful. If you like, I can give them to you.” Krishna, or the Hindu leader, said, “Let me see a sample. What kind of commandments?” God said, “For example, adultery is a sin.” The Hindu leader said, “That may be true—but then all the juice will go out of life.” He showed no eagerness to accept the rules.

God asked the leader of the Muslims—perhaps Mohammed. He too said, “First let me know what the commandments are, then I’ll take them.” Thinking the first sample had not been liked, God offered another: “Do not kill.” Mohammed said, “That’s all right—but if we never kill, others will kill us. The wicked will rule the world. And without war, how can peace be established?”

God kept roaming. Finally he met Moses, leader of the Jews. Being a Jew, a trader, he surprised God, because while others had asked for samples, Moses asked, “How much does it cost?” God was startled; he wasn’t even asking what the commandments were! God said, “They cost nothing—they’re free.” Moses said, “Then we’ll take ten.” Hence the Ten Commandments! But they are kept in the book.

You too, if something is free, will take ten instead of one. If nothing needs to be done, if no transformation or revolution has to happen within you—if you can get something while sitting idle—you will take ten instead of one. But it will remain locked in a book; it will have no value.

You sit here and listen. You don’t have to do anything; for an hour or so you are spared even the little effort you might have had to make—there is relief, a kind of comfort.

Do not turn this comfort into an addiction. If words give you pleasure, begin the journey toward the source from which the words arise. And only when what I am pointing to becomes visible to you should you stop—only then understand the goal has come. Before that, stopping is not right. And I cannot do this for you; you will have to do it yourself.

No one else can walk for you. No one else can see for you. No one else can experience for you. And it is good that no one else can, otherwise you would be deprived forever—you would remain crippled.

If another walks for you, your legs will atrophy. If another experiences for you, your heart will wither. If another can see for you, your eyes are of no use. And if another could realize the self for you, your soul would be lost forever.

Therefore one of the deepest laws of existence is this: no one else can do for you whatever is truly valuable. You must do it yourself. For it is only by doing that growth happens. Only by doing are you formed. Only by doing does your real life and birth take place.

No; they are two forms of the same state—two stages of the same state.
Understand! I continually say that to attain him one needs infinite patience. And I also continually say that he can be attained in a single moment. The two statements appear contradictory. For if he can be attained in a single moment, what need is there for infinite patience? Then there would be no need to be patient even for a moment—what can be attained in a moment, let us attain it now.
And when I say that only by holding infinite patience will you attain, you feel that infinite patience must mean it cannot happen in a single moment; even if it happens in infinite lifetimes, that would still be early.
They seem opposed, but they are not. The mathematics of life is like a riddle. They are complementary. Try to understand!
He can be attained in a single instant—if there is infinite patience in you. And if patience is lacking, you will not attain even in eternity. Because your patience itself is your eligibility to receive. The more the patience, the sooner it happens.
Infinite patience means it will happen in this very instant—because nothing is missing; you are holding the whole of patience. Infinite patience means: even if it never happens, I will not lose my calm. Infinite patience means: even if it never happens—ever—I will continue to wait. For one whose mind is like this, it will happen this very moment, because there is no longer any purpose in making him wait. The matter is finished. He is ready.
And one who is ready for such patience—will he be restless? Restlessness is tied to impatience. Only one who is utterly serene can hold such patience. And one who is willing for such patience—will he be miserable? For the miserable are the impatient.
The miserable are in a hurry. Only one who is in joy moves slowly. When an emperor walks, he does not rush. If an emperor hurries, it shows he has not learned the art of being an emperor.
One runs only when there is something to gain. One who has everything—why should he run? All running betrays a sense of lack. Infinite patience means: I have everything; there is no haste for anything. If the Lord too is attained, it will be a surplus. Understand this a little.
I had everything, and if the Lord is attained, it is a surplus. If he were not attained, nothing was missing. If he is, I will become more than whole—but I was already whole, because I was in no hurry; there was no ulterior purpose, no running about.
Complete patience means you are content as you are. That is the moment of tathata—of suchness. You are wholly content that, “All is right.” And this “all is right” is not a consolation to persuade yourself. It is not that nothing is right but you tell yourself “everything is fine” so the mind may be pacified. No. It is that nothing appears not-right. Everything is fine. There is no sense of dissatisfaction anywhere. There is no race to get something more. And as for the Lord—when he may come, we can leave the timing to his grace. From our side we are not measuring out time. If he does not come today, we will not repent by evening, we will not weep and wail that the day passed and till today—one more day wasted.
Tomorrow we will wait again. In that waiting no dimness will enter; we will not let desire creep in, nor urgency, nor impatience. If such infinite patience is there, God is found in a single instant.
People come to me and say, “You say it happens in a moment, but why doesn’t it happen?”
Their very question—“Why doesn’t it happen?”—is the obstacle. If it happens in a moment, it should happen right now! And one who is in such a hurry that it must happen right now—his mind is so tense, so miserable, so dissatisfied, so disturbed—how can union with the divine happen in such a mind?
And the one who says, “It should happen now,” is not valuing the divine very much either. He’s saying, “If you’re going to happen, happen now; otherwise a thousand other tasks await, and if you delay, let me first settle those.” For him God is not something so valuable that he is ready to give time to it!
The more valuable a thing, the more time you are ready to give. We plant seasonal flowers; they bloom in a month, and in a month they are gone.
If we wish to plant trees that touch the sky, we must wait for years. One generation plants, another enjoys the fruit. You will taste the fruit next birth, not in this one. It is a great tree!
For those who value the divine, it would never even occur to say, “Let it happen now.” They know such a statement is absurd. To let such words come to the lips is irreligious. Even to think, “Let it happen now,” is irreligious.
Such a vast event, such an immense explosion—there will be waiting. And precisely because it is so vast, whenever it happens, know that it happened quickly—for there is no ground for delay. Whenever it happens, the devotee will say it happened swiftly: “I was not yet worthy, and it happened—so soon!” The unworthy says, “Let it happen now. If not now, then forget it.”
People come to me and say, “We are leaving by the evening train. Tell us something so that our life is transformed—just like that.”
I don’t know what value they think life has! Does life have any value for them at all? They are running! And in such running, their whole life will be lost; they will gain nothing.
When someone came to Buddha, he would say, “Sit with me without asking for one year. After one year you may begin to ask.” The impatient one would say, “Then I will come after a year!” Buddha would reply, “Then I will make it two years—for one year you have already thrown away, and one remains.”
A Zen fakir, Rinzai, was approached by a young man. He said, “My father is old; I don’t have much time. I am the only son, and he is aged; it is necessary that I serve him. But I want to learn meditation.” Rinzai said, “It will take about thirty years, because you are in such a hurry!” The youth could not understand. He said, “If I am in a hurry, make it faster—thirty years! By then my father will have died.”
The youth asked, “If I work twice as hard, then what?” Rinzai said, “Then it will take sixty years. I had assumed you were already ready to give your all. If you say you will work twice as hard, that means you were keeping half in reserve. You are a dishonest man. The thirty I told you were counting on your total effort. You say you’ll double it—then it will take sixty.”
The young man said, “Then I will not ask further. Sixty is fine. Who knows—you might make it one hundred and twenty!”
And the youth stayed. For three years he remained with Rinzai. Rinzai never asked him again why he had come or what he wanted to learn.
Many times the thought arose in the young man’s mind: What am I doing? What is not being done? Years are passing! Father is growing older. And nothing has even begun! But he thought, “Asking is dangerous. This man is a great troublemaker! If I ask, he might say ‘a hundred years!’ Better to remain silent. Let’s see what happens.”
After three years Rinzai said, “Now your first lesson begins—and you are worthy. Had you asked within these three years, I would have made it one hundred and twenty. Then I could not have completed the work; I too am growing old. Half I would do, half my disciples. But you did not ask for three years; now I begin.”
By the fifth year the disciple attained samadhi. When he did, he said to Rinzai, “So quickly! I could never have imagined!” Rinzai said, “Because you had consented to sixty years. Your willingness for sixty years was your preparation for waiting.
“Sixty years” means: readiness to lose an entire life. The youth was at least twenty-five when he came. Sixty years means: now he will die; there is no way back.
Such is the meaning of infinite waiting: our readiness is such that even if it never happens, we will not complain. That is what a devotee is—one who does not complain. One who has complaints is no devotee.
You will be surprised: you can find atheists who have no complaints at all; but to find a theist without complaint is hard. And the mark of a theist is that he has no complaint.
There are two kinds of atheists in the world. One, who proclaim that God does not exist; so there is no one to complain to—whom would you complain to? So whatever is, is fine. The second kind are those who believe there is a God—but only so that there is someone to complain to. Their God exists only for complaint: so they can say, “Look, this isn’t happening; that isn’t happening; do this; why didn’t you do that? Why such delay?” Without God, to whom would they complain?
Your God is merely the accumulation of your grievances. The devotee has nothing to do with complaint.
This “infinite waiting” I speak of is patience free of complaint, free of conditions. Think of it. If such a state of mind is present, there is no reason why the happening should not occur right now.
Infinite patience becomes like the open sky. Then there are no doors or boundaries in the heart. Everything is open, nothing is closed. What more is needed for God to descend? That is all that is needed.
So first, there is no contradiction between the two; they are parts of one and the same sadhana.
As for the second point: yes, they are extremes. But they are the two extremes of one line. And in this world, no line is truly straight: all lines are circular arcs. Every line is part of a great circle.
Euclid, the discoverer of geometry, said there are straight lines. But Einstein and later inquirers established that straight lines do not exist. Because the ground on which you sit is round; draw any line upon it and extend it, it will eventually encircle the earth and become a segment of a great circle.
Thus every line is part of some vast circle; no line is straight. All lines are curved, turning; they are segments of a circle. The straight line does not exist in the world.
Therefore everything moves in circles—moon, earth, stars, sun, seasons, a human life—everything turns circularly. And when the two ends of a line come near, the circle is completed. Bring the two extremes of any line together—where they meet, the circle completes.
Infinite patience is one end of the line. And “it can happen in a moment—sudden”—is the other end. Where these two ends meet, the circle completes. And there is not even the slightest gap between them. They are extremes, yes, but meeting extremes.
Remember also: in life every leap is taken from an extreme, not from the middle. If you wish to go out of this room, you will have to find a door on this side or a window on that side. Standing in the middle, there is no way out. The middle means distance from the door. You must go to the periphery; you must reach an extreme.
Therefore all methods of sadhana in the world are extremes. Extreme means the last edge—there, a leap is possible. From the middle, where will you jump? You will only hop about in the room. You must go to the edge.
One extreme says the happening can occur in a single instant. There is a lineage that believes in sudden enlightenment—especially in Japan, the Zen masters hold that it can happen in a single moment. And they prepare the seeker to be ready for that one moment. The preparation may take years; the happening occurs in an instant, but preparation may take years—sometimes lifetimes.
It is like heating water: steam forms in a single instant—upon reaching one hundred degrees it begins. But it may take hours to reach one hundred degrees; and that depends on the fire beneath.
If you sit with ashes, it will never reach. If there are embers but covered with ash, it will take a long time. If there is a blazing fire, leaping flames, the event will happen quickly.
So the more intensity within—the more longing, the more fire for the happening—the sooner it will occur. But the happening itself is instantaneous.
The water keeps heating, keeps heating; at ninety-nine degrees it is still water, not yet steam. In a second, at one hundred degrees, it leaps. The leap is precious. As water, it flows downward. As soon as it becomes steam, it begins to rise upward. The whole direction changes.
As water, it was visible, material. With the leap, it becomes invisible, airy, lost in the sky. While visible, the earth could pull it down; gravity had effect. As steam, it moves beyond gravity; it rises toward the sky—another world’s laws begin to work.
The event happens in a moment; and yet the Zen masters must labor for lifetimes, or for many years in one life, to create the heat.
There are other masters too: among the Sufis in Islam there is a group that believes in infinite waiting. They do not speak of the instant. They say: wait infinitely. Stay seated, wait. Stay awake, wait. It will happen someday in the infinite span of births.
Now here is the delightful thing: these two are opposite methods, extremes. Yet the Zen master arrives, and the Sufi master arrives. And the wonder is that when the Zen master arrives, he too reaches a happening that occurs in an instant after years of labor; and when the Sufi arrives, he too reaches a happening that occurs in an instant after infinite waiting. The happening is the same.
So two points. One: when we heat water, at one hundred degrees it becomes steam. Two: the water must be heated. Emphasize whichever you wish.
If you emphasize the heating, you will say: it is a long journey, much waiting will be needed. The water will heat and heat and heat; at the end it will become steam. Emphasize the process. If you emphasize the end, you will say: whenever the water becomes steam—no matter how long it takes—it becomes steam in an instant. The water takes a leap.
But these two are parts of one process. That is why I say them together. If the waiting is infinite, it happens in a moment. If it is to happen in a moment, the preparation must be infinite. And there is no contradiction between them.

What is the fear about? Who is afraid? It is the ego within us that is always afraid it may get trapped. And this very ego never lets us get trapped anywhere. But then we are deprived of the whole of life.

A young man came to me and said, “I do want to love, but I don’t want to get entangled. I don’t want any hassles.”

If you want to love, you will have to get entangled. Love happens only when you dive in. If you stand at a distance, guarding yourself like a watchman, the happening will not happen.

And what is it you are saving anyway? What do you have that is worth saving? Who is this that is trying so hard to be safe? Even if you keep safe this trembling life, what will you do with it? What use is the kind of freedom that is so frightened? Freedom that is afraid is no freedom at all.

Mulla Nasruddin came home late one night. His wife raised a ruckus: “Late again? I’ve told you a thousand times—stop coming late! Where were you?” Nasruddin said, “Sensible wives don’t ask such questions.” She was blazing. “And sensible husbands…?” Before she could finish, Nasruddin cut in, “Wait! Sensible husbands remain bachelors.”

The frightened man may look very sensible, but he will be deprived of life’s experience.

Love is an experience. You know it only by entering it. And its getting-you-caught is beneficial, because if in that very entanglement you can remain inwardly unentangled, nectar will shower in your life. To enter the prison and yet not have your freedom destroyed—to maintain your inner freedom even there—that is the art.

So, first, there is love in life. The relationship of master and disciple is love’s ultimate relationship. That is an even bigger entanglement. Because it is easier to remain free while living with a wife; to remain free while living with a master is far more difficult, more intricate, because his net is greater. It does not stop at the heart; it reaches to the soul. Yet even there, the possibility of freedom exists. And the wonder is: the more totally you let yourself go there, the more free you are.

Dependence arises because you do not let go. If you let go, dependence loses all meaning. A jail feels like a jail because you don’t want to be in it. And if you want to be there? Then the jail is finished. Then, if the jailers try to throw you out, that becomes bondage. Wherever there is our inner resistance, our opposition, there we feel trapped.

If a young man truly loves a young woman, being trapped is not felt. If the woman truly loves, it doesn’t feel like being trapped; love then feels like liberation. If there is no love—only fear and the urge to protect oneself—then it feels like being trapped, like shackles and prison.

I am saying to you: you feel bondage where you are fighting.

When the Bhoodan (land-gift) movement failed, a “seize the land” movement arose across the country. I heard that, in imitation, in a village—surely in Gujarat!—people launched a “seize the wives” movement. They said, “In socialism, how can it be that when many have no wife at all, some men have two? This is intolerable.” So the men without wives took out a procession: “Seize the wives! Take one from those who have two and give her to those who have none. This is essential for socialism.”

Mulla Nasruddin was out of town; he had two wives. He returned to chaos—one of his wives had been carried off by the procession. Mulla ran, grabbed the leader’s hands and said, “Don’t do this injustice.” The leader said, “Who’s unjust—you or we? A hundred men in this village have no wife, and you have two! You’re enjoying double! And we’ve no time—we still have to seize fifty more wives. Move aside!” Nasruddin still clung to him, trembling, “No, don’t do such injustice!” The crowd felt pity. The leader said, “Be a man! Don’t whine like a woman. Take your wife back!” Nasruddin fell at his feet and said, “You don’t understand—take the other one too!”

Bondage! Where love is gone, marriage becomes bondage, becomes dependence. Where reverence is lost, the master becomes a prison.

Where reverence is, the master is liberation. Where love is, love’s relationship is freedom. Lovers make each other more free than they could ever be alone—because two freedoms meet.

And the master is supremely free. When you come into contact with his liberation, when you get caught in his net, if there is no resistance in you, you become supremely free. Only if there is resistance will you feel you are caught. Feeling caught in the net is not because of the net; it is because “I don’t want to be caught.”

A man is swimming in a river; he feels the river is flowing against him—because he is trying to go opposite to it. He thinks the river is his enemy. Another man is floating with the river, going where it goes. He feels the river is his friend, his boat, carrying him without effort.

If you go against the current with the master, you will feel trapped. If you flow with the master, you will experience liberation. It depends on you—on the disciple—whether the master becomes dependence or freedom.

You will also have to writhe. The quest is great, profound. Before the finding, there is much pain. Before water is reached, you must pass through intense thirst. And as you come to a master, your restlessness will increase, not decrease. If it decreases, know this master is not for you—because decreasing means the fire is cooling.

At the master’s door your thirst first increases, because on seeing him you see, for the first time, the bliss of one who has drunk the water. For the first time comparison arises, the ache arises. For the first time the longing deepens: “When will I be like this? How? When will this be mine?”

The first glimpse of bliss deepens your sorrow—just as you are walking in the dark; in the dark, the eyes adjust and you can manage. Then a car passes, blazing light; after it passes, the road looks even more terrifyingly dark. Comparison is created.

Coming to the master, for the first time comparison arises. For the first time you see where you are—what hell, what anguish.

So the writhing will arise. And the master’s effort will be to intensify it—because the more you burn, the sooner the boiling point comes near. The more you ache, the more relentless the search, the nearer the lake. If you burn totally, the lake appears that very instant.

Therefore you will have to writhe—and you will have to die. That is the last thing. The master’s very work is that. The master means death. One who cannot kill you is not a master; one who cannot erase you is not a master. He will cut you down. And when you are utterly finished, only then will he let you go: “Now the work is done.” There is no way to attain the Divine without dying. Without losing yourself, the quest does not complete.

Hence the ancient sutras say: the acharya, the master, is death. In the Katha Upanishad, when Nachiketa is sent to Yama, he is sent to the master. Yama is the symbol of the master. There, you die.

That is why people avoid the master. They devise twenty-five strategies to escape—rationalizations upon rationalizations. Even if they listen to the master, they say, “Good—but my time has not come yet. I’ll do it when the time comes.” A thousand tricks a man employs to save himself.

Just as you try to escape death, so you try to escape the master. The day you truly understand, going to the master means: I am wrong, and the wrong must be burned. I am deluded, and the delusion must be erased. As I am now, I am mortal; this mortality must die so that the immortal may arise.

Death is the door to the immortal. The one who agrees to vanish attains that which never vanishes. On one side the master kills, on the other he revives—death and rebirth, a new life.

Are getting caught in the master’s net, the writhing, and the dying indispensable parts of the process of transformation? Absolutely indispensable parts. And before you get caught, either run away and never look back, because the master is dangerous. Pause for a moment and there is the danger you will be caught. If you are caught, you will have to writhe. If you writhe, you will have to die. They are steps of the same single path.

But what does one who truly wants self-transformation want? He wants precisely this: “As I am, I am wrong. What I ought to be, I am not; what I ought not to be, that I am.” So he is ready to be erased, to be scattered, to be nothing. Only one who is ready to be nothing can meet the master.