This today have I gained; this heart’s desire I shall obtain।
This is mine; and more wealth, too, will again be mine।। 13।।
That foe I have slain; others too shall I slay।
I am the lord; I am the enjoyer; perfect am I—strong and happy।। 14।।
I am wealthy, of noble birth; who else is there equal to me?
I will sacrifice, I will give, I will rejoice—thus, deluded by ignorance।। 15।।
Distracted by countless thoughts, enmeshed in the net of delusion।
Addicted to the pleasures of desire, they fall into an unclean hell।। 16।।
Geeta Darshan #6
Available in:
Read in Original Hindi (मूल हिन्दी)
Sutra (Original)
इदमद्य मया लब्धमिमं प्राप्स्ये मनोरथम्।
इदमस्तीदमपि मे भविष्यति पुनर्धनम्।। 13।।
असौ मया हतः शत्रुर्हनिष्ये चापरानपि।
ईश्वरोऽहमहं भोगी सिद्धोऽहं बलवान्सुखी।। 14।।
आढ्योऽभिजनवानस्मि कोऽन्योऽस्ति सदृशो मया।
यक्ष्ये दास्यामि मोदिष्य इत्यज्ञानविमोहिताः।। 15।।
अनेकचित्तविभ्रान्ता मोहजालसमावृताः।
प्रसक्ताः कामभोगेषु पतन्ति नरकेऽशुचौ।। 16।।
इदमस्तीदमपि मे भविष्यति पुनर्धनम्।। 13।।
असौ मया हतः शत्रुर्हनिष्ये चापरानपि।
ईश्वरोऽहमहं भोगी सिद्धोऽहं बलवान्सुखी।। 14।।
आढ्योऽभिजनवानस्मि कोऽन्योऽस्ति सदृशो मया।
यक्ष्ये दास्यामि मोदिष्य इत्यज्ञानविमोहिताः।। 15।।
अनेकचित्तविभ्रान्ता मोहजालसमावृताः।
प्रसक्ताः कामभोगेषु पतन्ति नरकेऽशुचौ।। 16।।
Transliteration:
idamadya mayā labdhamimaṃ prāpsye manoratham|
idamastīdamapi me bhaviṣyati punardhanam|| 13||
asau mayā hataḥ śatrurhaniṣye cāparānapi|
īśvaro'hamahaṃ bhogī siddho'haṃ balavānsukhī|| 14||
āḍhyo'bhijanavānasmi ko'nyo'sti sadṛśo mayā|
yakṣye dāsyāmi modiṣya ityajñānavimohitāḥ|| 15||
anekacittavibhrāntā mohajālasamāvṛtāḥ|
prasaktāḥ kāmabhogeṣu patanti narake'śucau|| 16||
idamadya mayā labdhamimaṃ prāpsye manoratham|
idamastīdamapi me bhaviṣyati punardhanam|| 13||
asau mayā hataḥ śatrurhaniṣye cāparānapi|
īśvaro'hamahaṃ bhogī siddho'haṃ balavānsukhī|| 14||
āḍhyo'bhijanavānasmi ko'nyo'sti sadṛśo mayā|
yakṣye dāsyāmi modiṣya ityajñānavimohitāḥ|| 15||
anekacittavibhrāntā mohajālasamāvṛtāḥ|
prasaktāḥ kāmabhogeṣu patanti narake'śucau|| 16||
Translation (Meaning)
Questions in this Discourse
The first question:
Osho, in this chapter of the Gita the qualities of the divine and the demonic are described. The earth seems packed with asuras, while a deva appears only once in millions. Why is this so?
Osho, in this chapter of the Gita the qualities of the divine and the demonic are described. The earth seems packed with asuras, while a deva appears only once in millions. Why is this so?
There is an indispensable balance in life. As much evil as there is here, there is that much good. As much darkness, that much light. As much life, that much death. Neither can be more or less. Both are needed in equal measure, only then does life move. They are the two wheels of the cart.
The world is moving, has moved, will go on moving—because its two wheels are equal. Yet the question is meaningful. Ordinarily it does look as if the earth is full of demons; where are the devas?
Try to understand. We see only what we are. If the earth appears full of asuras, that is a vision of our own demonic tendency. We cannot even recognize a deva. He may appear, he may be present, yet we will not recognize him. Unless a little glimpse of divinity has been kindled within us, no relationship is formed with the awakened deva in the other.
What we see is the spread of our own eyes, the expansion of our own vision. We do not see what is; we see what we are.
A person filled with divine endowment begins to see fewer demons and more devas in this world. A saint stops seeing bad people. What appears bad to us—the saint’s interpretation of it changes. And in accordance with interpretation, the form of what is seen changes.
But to the saint it begins to appear that all are good. To the un-saint it appears that all are bad. Both views are incomplete. And when you attain the perfect state of witnessing—where you do not join yourself to saintliness, nor to un-saintliness, where you become separate from both the bad and the good—on that day you will see that in the world the two are equal. And without that equality the world could not move, could not live even for a moment.
So if the earth appears to us full of asuras, it has only one meaning: we are living in demonic endowment. It has nothing to do with the earth.
One night Mulla Nasruddin ate bhang. In that intoxication the ground seemed to be spinning. In the morning, when he sobered up, he said, “Now I understand. The man who proved that the earth moves must have been a bhang-eater!”
We only project our experience—there is no other way. Through whatever is within us, we see the other. We do not see the other’s real state; our mind spreads over it, our shadow covers it. Then what we see is the expansion of our own mind. The other becomes like a screen. Our own consciousness appears to us on that screen. In the other we see ourselves. The other is like a mirror.
So if it seems that the whole earth is full of asuras, know that your mind is filled with demonic endowment. Apart from this it is a symptom of nothing else. It gives no news about the earth—only news about you; news about your eyes; news about the mind hidden behind the eyes.
And if sometimes you happen to see a deva here and there, it only means that your inner divine endowment is also a little active. It has not died completely; it is alive. Some ray of it is present in this darkness; therefore you sometimes catch its glimpse in another. As you become absorbed in the divine endowment, the world will begin to appear divine.
But remember, the ultimate state of yoga is freedom from both these feelings. The day the world appears to you in its suchness, the day no feeling from within spreads over the world, on that day you will have a unique experience: all things are in balance. Here bad and good are equal. Here sinner and virtuous are equal. Here the wise and the ignorant are equal. Their measure is always equal. If that measure wavers even a little, the world is destroyed. That balance is maintained.
The day you see this, the day this state of balance is experienced, that day you will neither call the world bad nor good. You will not call the bad man bad, nor the good man good. You will say: bad and good are two sides of the same coin. That day you will not want to eradicate the bad, nor to preserve the good. Because you will know: if the bad is erased, the good too is erased; if the good remains, the bad also remains.
Lao Tzu has said, when the world was religious, there were neither good men nor bad men.
When you too become supremely religious, neither bad nor good will remain. Then bad and good will be a cosmic conjunction. Just as hydrogen and oxygen together make water, so the bad and the good together make the world. And that measure is always equal.
The world is a balance. But we do not see balance, because we are not balanced. If we are a witness, we will be balanced.
So there are three directions in life. One direction is: take the demonic endowment within as your nature—then the whole world is bad. The second possibility is: identify with the divine endowment within—then the whole world is good. And a third, ultimate possibility is: free yourself from both these qualities, from this duality, and be a witness—then the world is a conjunction of bad and good, a joining of night and day, a mingling of darkness and light, a balance of cold and hot. And the day you, choiceless and without preference, choose neither of the two endowments within, that day is your ultimate liberation.
We have three words. One word is hell—one who has identified with the demonic endowment. The second word is heaven—one who has identified with the divine endowment. And the third word is moksha—one who has freed himself from both endowments.
Even a deva is not free; he too is bound. His bonds are pleasing. His chains are of gold. His prison is precious; it is well adorned. His life is laden with ornaments. But laden he is; he is not weightless. The bad man is bound with iron chains; the good man is bound with golden chains. But there is no lessening of bondage.
Only India has used a unique word: moksha. No other religion, no other people in the world have conceived moksha. Heaven and hell are known to the whole world. Islam, Christianity, Judaism are familiar with heaven and hell. The notion of moksha is uniquely Indian.
Moksha means a person who is free not only from hell but also from heaven; who has dropped the bad and has also dropped the good.
This is very difficult to understand, because the good seems to us beyond question—why drop it? But then we have no experience of the deeper order of life. Behind the good the bad remains hidden.
If you say, “I speak only truth; I will always speak truth; I will always cling to truth!” one thing is certain: falsehood also rises within you. Otherwise how would you know truth? How will you save truth? How will you protect it? Falsehood is present within; against it truth arises.
If you say, “I am a practitioner of celibacy; I will cling to celibacy; I will never abandon celibacy!” it means sexual desire is surging within you. When sexual desire has utterly ended, even the very idea of celibacy will not be known.
When a disease is completely gone, you will not even know health. Therefore, when you fall ill and then become healthy, you get a little glimpse of health. After falling into illness, when for the first time you begin to be healthy again, then you come to know what health is. If you were always healthy, you would forget health; you would have no remembrance of it.
Because of sorrow we come to know happiness; because of the bad we come to know the good.
Moksha means: now both my bondages are gone; now I am free; I have no choice. Neither this endowment is mine, nor that. I have dropped the very endowments. This is the ultimate state. This is the state of the paramhansa.
Where you are standing now: if the world appears bad, understand that demonic endowment is clouding your eyes. If the world appears good, understand that the divine endowment has surrounded you. If the world appears both, and the balance between the two is seen, understand that the voice of the witness has been born.
One must keep searching for that third. Until it happens, understand that we are still wandering outside the temple of religion; our inner entry has not yet happened.
The world is moving, has moved, will go on moving—because its two wheels are equal. Yet the question is meaningful. Ordinarily it does look as if the earth is full of demons; where are the devas?
Try to understand. We see only what we are. If the earth appears full of asuras, that is a vision of our own demonic tendency. We cannot even recognize a deva. He may appear, he may be present, yet we will not recognize him. Unless a little glimpse of divinity has been kindled within us, no relationship is formed with the awakened deva in the other.
What we see is the spread of our own eyes, the expansion of our own vision. We do not see what is; we see what we are.
A person filled with divine endowment begins to see fewer demons and more devas in this world. A saint stops seeing bad people. What appears bad to us—the saint’s interpretation of it changes. And in accordance with interpretation, the form of what is seen changes.
But to the saint it begins to appear that all are good. To the un-saint it appears that all are bad. Both views are incomplete. And when you attain the perfect state of witnessing—where you do not join yourself to saintliness, nor to un-saintliness, where you become separate from both the bad and the good—on that day you will see that in the world the two are equal. And without that equality the world could not move, could not live even for a moment.
So if the earth appears to us full of asuras, it has only one meaning: we are living in demonic endowment. It has nothing to do with the earth.
One night Mulla Nasruddin ate bhang. In that intoxication the ground seemed to be spinning. In the morning, when he sobered up, he said, “Now I understand. The man who proved that the earth moves must have been a bhang-eater!”
We only project our experience—there is no other way. Through whatever is within us, we see the other. We do not see the other’s real state; our mind spreads over it, our shadow covers it. Then what we see is the expansion of our own mind. The other becomes like a screen. Our own consciousness appears to us on that screen. In the other we see ourselves. The other is like a mirror.
So if it seems that the whole earth is full of asuras, know that your mind is filled with demonic endowment. Apart from this it is a symptom of nothing else. It gives no news about the earth—only news about you; news about your eyes; news about the mind hidden behind the eyes.
And if sometimes you happen to see a deva here and there, it only means that your inner divine endowment is also a little active. It has not died completely; it is alive. Some ray of it is present in this darkness; therefore you sometimes catch its glimpse in another. As you become absorbed in the divine endowment, the world will begin to appear divine.
But remember, the ultimate state of yoga is freedom from both these feelings. The day the world appears to you in its suchness, the day no feeling from within spreads over the world, on that day you will have a unique experience: all things are in balance. Here bad and good are equal. Here sinner and virtuous are equal. Here the wise and the ignorant are equal. Their measure is always equal. If that measure wavers even a little, the world is destroyed. That balance is maintained.
The day you see this, the day this state of balance is experienced, that day you will neither call the world bad nor good. You will not call the bad man bad, nor the good man good. You will say: bad and good are two sides of the same coin. That day you will not want to eradicate the bad, nor to preserve the good. Because you will know: if the bad is erased, the good too is erased; if the good remains, the bad also remains.
Lao Tzu has said, when the world was religious, there were neither good men nor bad men.
When you too become supremely religious, neither bad nor good will remain. Then bad and good will be a cosmic conjunction. Just as hydrogen and oxygen together make water, so the bad and the good together make the world. And that measure is always equal.
The world is a balance. But we do not see balance, because we are not balanced. If we are a witness, we will be balanced.
So there are three directions in life. One direction is: take the demonic endowment within as your nature—then the whole world is bad. The second possibility is: identify with the divine endowment within—then the whole world is good. And a third, ultimate possibility is: free yourself from both these qualities, from this duality, and be a witness—then the world is a conjunction of bad and good, a joining of night and day, a mingling of darkness and light, a balance of cold and hot. And the day you, choiceless and without preference, choose neither of the two endowments within, that day is your ultimate liberation.
We have three words. One word is hell—one who has identified with the demonic endowment. The second word is heaven—one who has identified with the divine endowment. And the third word is moksha—one who has freed himself from both endowments.
Even a deva is not free; he too is bound. His bonds are pleasing. His chains are of gold. His prison is precious; it is well adorned. His life is laden with ornaments. But laden he is; he is not weightless. The bad man is bound with iron chains; the good man is bound with golden chains. But there is no lessening of bondage.
Only India has used a unique word: moksha. No other religion, no other people in the world have conceived moksha. Heaven and hell are known to the whole world. Islam, Christianity, Judaism are familiar with heaven and hell. The notion of moksha is uniquely Indian.
Moksha means a person who is free not only from hell but also from heaven; who has dropped the bad and has also dropped the good.
This is very difficult to understand, because the good seems to us beyond question—why drop it? But then we have no experience of the deeper order of life. Behind the good the bad remains hidden.
If you say, “I speak only truth; I will always speak truth; I will always cling to truth!” one thing is certain: falsehood also rises within you. Otherwise how would you know truth? How will you save truth? How will you protect it? Falsehood is present within; against it truth arises.
If you say, “I am a practitioner of celibacy; I will cling to celibacy; I will never abandon celibacy!” it means sexual desire is surging within you. When sexual desire has utterly ended, even the very idea of celibacy will not be known.
When a disease is completely gone, you will not even know health. Therefore, when you fall ill and then become healthy, you get a little glimpse of health. After falling into illness, when for the first time you begin to be healthy again, then you come to know what health is. If you were always healthy, you would forget health; you would have no remembrance of it.
Because of sorrow we come to know happiness; because of the bad we come to know the good.
Moksha means: now both my bondages are gone; now I am free; I have no choice. Neither this endowment is mine, nor that. I have dropped the very endowments. This is the ultimate state. This is the state of the paramhansa.
Where you are standing now: if the world appears bad, understand that demonic endowment is clouding your eyes. If the world appears good, understand that the divine endowment has surrounded you. If the world appears both, and the balance between the two is seen, understand that the voice of the witness has been born.
One must keep searching for that third. Until it happens, understand that we are still wandering outside the temple of religion; our inner entry has not yet happened.
Second question:
Osho, you said that man is born carrying divine and demonic endowment in equal measure. Then why is it that in this world the demonic endowment seems to blossom and bear fruit more? Why is the harvest of divine endowment so rare?
Osho, you said that man is born carrying divine and demonic endowment in equal measure. Then why is it that in this world the demonic endowment seems to blossom and bear fruit more? Why is the harvest of divine endowment so rare?
The demonic endowment seems to flourish because that is what we desire. A thief appears to us as successful. A thief piles up wealth and builds prestige. A thorn pricks our heart at this. We too want that kind of palace, that kind of wealth, that kind of position and prestige. We do not even gather the courage to steal, yet we crave what the thief has amassed; that craving wounds the mind. Then the mind says, “The thief is prospering. We are virtuous and yet we are not prospering.”
If you are truly virtuous, you will see the thief suffering. If you are unvirtuous, you will see the thief succeeding.
There are, in large numbers, two kinds of thieves in the world: those who muster the courage to steal, and those who never steal but only fantasize about it.
People come to me and say, “We live contentedly; we do no wrong; we injure no one; yet we face failure. And look at so-and-so—doing black-marketing, smuggling, cheating, swindling—and succeeding!”
His “success” looks like success to you because you too want that very kind of success. If your mind were truly saintly, you would also see that man’s inner agony. He may have built a palace, but if you could see the torment through which he passes inside that palace, you would see it.
His inner agony means nothing to you. His outer show is what you see, because you too want the outer show! What he got and you failed to get—this pricks the mind. Therefore he looks successful and you look like a failure to yourself.
Only a bad man can call a bad man’s success a success. A good man will feel compassion—compassion for the bad man. He will look within the bad man and find that he has accumulated wealth but lost himself; he has amassed treasure but destroyed peace; he has gathered means but lost his way. To a saintly heart his “success” will look like suicide; he has rotted himself, sold himself.
Yet it may appear to us that the bad man is succeeding; every day people see bad men “succeed.”
A bad man cannot truly succeed. And if he appears to succeed, understand that there is some confusion in your definition of success. A bad man must fail.
I have heard: Alexander, expanding his empire, reached the banks of the Nile. Along the way he broke countless borders, destroyed many kingdoms, defeated many armies. But at the Nile he experienced great astonishment. Everywhere else he met resistance and struggle; people fought to their last breath. But when he reached the Nile, he was welcomed—festooned gateways, showers of flowers, invitations, festivities—no question of fighting! He was startled and amazed.
In the first city he entered, the people invited the entire army of Alexander to a banquet. The finest food, wine, dance, music—everything was arranged. Alexander was stunned: What kind of way is this—to welcome an enemy! He was also a bit ashamed, because if they had stood with swords, Alexander could have conquered them; but they stood with love—how to conquer that?
When the platter was brought before him, he became angry, struck the table with his fist, and said, “What is this? Are you making a mockery of me?” For the bread was of gold, the vegetables of diamonds and gems. Alexander said, “Are you fools? I suspected as much when I entered the village: you didn’t fight; you welcomed us with garlands. Now it is certain you are mad. No one eats bread of gold!”
An old man, the eldest in the village, said, “If you wanted bread of wheat, you could have found that at home. Since you are coming here after so much trouble, we thought you must be in search of bread of gold!”
What you see in the thief, the bandit, the rogue, is his bread of gold. But bread of gold cannot be eaten; within he starves. And you call that “success” because your craving is the same; that is what you too desire.
What we desire discloses our endowment. If a thief appears successful to you, you are a thief—though you may never have stolen. If the thief seems successful to you, then a saint will seem to you a failure. You might pity the saint; your envy will be for the thief. You will say of the saint, “Simple fellow, let him be. He doesn’t understand.” But your envy and competition are with the thief.
First understand this: evil never truly succeeds; it can only appear to. The illusion is in the seeing. Goodness always succeeds; it can only appear to fail. The “success” of evil is external; the success of goodness is inner.
Whoever has known even a taste of joy in this world has known it because of goodness. Whoever has tasted great suffering has tasted it because of evil.
If we could open the hearts of Hitler, Genghis Khan, or Tamerlane, we would behold a great hell. But their names are emblazoned in history; they will remain. You may think they succeeded—they built vast empires—so you may think they succeeded.
In truth, those who truly succeeded on this earth perhaps have no names in history; you may not even know of them. Who succeeds in life? The one who knows peace, who is touched by bliss, who gets a glimpse of samadhi.
If you ask me for a definition of success: samadhi is the definition. Those who taste a little of samadhi, who dance in samadhi, whose heart thrills in samadhi—only they are successful.
And the bad can never be in samadhi. The bad will be scorched and anxious; his mind will grow more and more infernal.
So first: the demonic endowment appears to flourish because that is what we desire. Demonic endowment has never truly flourished. In those whose hearts long for the divine endowment, the demonic is always seen as wandering, miserable; it has never flourished—always withered.
Second: Why is the harvest of the divine endowment so rare?
It is rare because of a few simple laws of life.
One, to do wrong you need do nothing—it is a downward slope. Let water flow and it will naturally run into the hollows; to go downward water needs no effort. To climb a mountain is difficult; to make water go uphill requires an arrangement, effort, energy—and failures may occur.
Evil is a slope—what is lower than we are. Good is what is above us. Evil is what we have already passed through—animal, plant—we have been there. To go back is easy.
Consider: a student who has passed up to matriculation; if he wants to sit for the first-grade exam again, what difficulty will there be? None. If he wishes to re-enter first grade, no one will stop him—and he will be “very successful” there!
What we have already ascended in evolution is always easy to descend. Get the oldest man angry and he behaves like a child. Even the wisest, if enraged, behaves foolishly, childishly—stamps his feet, breaks things, shouts. This is regression, going back.
Going back is always easy because the path is familiar; it needs no search.
Divine endowment means going forward, touching heights. The higher the peak, the greater the effort—and the more the slips and falls.
Remember, only he falls who tries to rise. One who is going down has nothing to fall from.
Divine endowment is above us; we must reach out, journey, move toward the Himalayan summit. Obstacles will arise; failure may happen; we may fall, lose the way. In going down there is no fear of falling and no fear of losing the path; it’s familiar, well-known. And there is ease in descent because there is no resistance; in climbing, the whole body strains.
Thomas Alva Edison made around a thousand inventions—the most by any man—from small to great: electricity, radio, telephone, and more. His home was full of inventions. Visitors were astonished—everywhere some innovation. At a tap, place your hand below and the water starts; remove the hand and it stops!
One day the American President came to see. He marveled at everything and said, “One thing I cannot understand. You, such a mind of invention, but your garden gate is so heavy it takes real force to open. Did you not think of that?” Edison said, “You have not understood. I did think. Whoever opens my gate once sends five gallons of water into my tank. I keep no servants; visitors come all day; every time they open and close, the gate pumps five gallons up.”
Whenever anything is to be sent upward, there will be some labor and heaviness, because we are working against life’s gravitational law.
The earth pulls things downward—gravity. Throw a stone upward, your hand tires and hurts; the higher you throw, the more energy you spend—and the stone still returns. As soon as your imparted energy is spent, the earth drags it down. Downward pull requires no effort; it is nature’s tendency.
The demonic endowment is gravity—the earth’s pull.
A newborn cannot stand up immediately after leaving the mother’s womb; to stand is to fight gravity. So the child first crawls; the earth is pulling. If he tries to stand, he falls at once. He crawls, then braces on his knees, then with support stands, then takes a few steps; he falls, bruises his knees, gets hurt—slowly, slowly. His legs are capable; the body is ready, but he must struggle with gravity. One day he balances and stands.
Then standing seems easy. But even now whenever you are tired you must lie down, because standing—even if easy—still fights the earth’s pull and tires you. That’s why we get tired standing; to rest we lie flat. The pleasure of sleep is from dropping the fight with gravity; we lie flat; we become babies again; we no longer fight the earth. All night we rest; in the morning we can stand again.
Standing means struggle. If you want to fly, the struggle is greater, for then you seek complete freedom from the earth.
The demonic endowment is like gravity—easy. To be bad you need no great contemplation, no great intelligence.
Studies of criminals show: ninety percent are dull-witted, idiotic, lacking intelligence. Yet strangely the unintelligent often look “successful” through wrongdoing, while the intelligent seem to lose. The unintelligent have one capacity: to fall lower; if the competition is to fall, he will beat you. And all of us are competing with him in that direction; thus he seems to win.
The lower one can fall, the faster he will “succeed.” Whether the race is for wealth or politics, the bad man “succeeds” because he can fall deeper. Between two politicians the one who can stoop lower will win; he will need less effort.
I have heard: Winston Churchill, campaigning in a constituency, asked an old man for his vote. The old man said, “I will think.” Churchill pressed him. The man said, “If you insist, then I will say I pray to God to be kind that only one of you two can win. Both are trouble; it’s good that only one evil will win!”
Another story: A farmer reached the gate of heaven, saddened by the scene. He knocked a long time; no one cared. Then he saw behind him a politician who had died after him. The politician knocked and the gates opened at once; the gatekeeper ushered him in. The farmer waited, thinking, “So here too no one will care for me! The politician wins even here.” Inside he heard band music—welcoming the politician. After the fanfare, the gates opened for the farmer. He thought the band would play for him too. It didn’t. He asked the gatekeeper, “Is there favoritism here as well?” The gatekeeper said, “None at all. People like you come here daily. A politician comes once in thousands of years; a special welcome is due.”
In politics it is hard to be good; the good will lose there—because it is a competition in falling, who can go deepest.
Religion is the reverse journey of politics. There the competition is to fly into the sky, who can go farthest from the earth’s pull! There the difficulty begins. The farther you go, the more the earth pulls and the greater the struggle. But out of that struggle the soul is born; out of that tension, resistance, and restraint your personality is forged, you are integrated, centered.
So yes, the harvest of divine endowment is rare. Also because around us everyone is busy producing demonic endowment. Man lives by the crowd; he follows it. Where the crowd goes, you go. Your parents, your family, your society do something; the child is born and learns to do the same.
For the demonic endowment there is abundant “education.” For the divine there is none. Where there is provision, skill comes; where there is none, our limbs grow weak.
Because you walk, your legs work. If you don’t, they will shrink, be paralyzed. Because you look, your eyes are alert; if you live in darkness long, they become blind. Because you listen, the ears become keen; a musician’s ear is keenest; he longs to catch the subtlest change of note. A painter’s eyes glow; a philosopher’s mind sharpens.
What we do, we become skillful in. What we don’t, we become clumsy in. If our eyes were bandaged from birth and opened only in youth, we would all emerge blind.
Scientists say: if any sense is unused for three years, it atrophies.
We have been using demonic endowment for lifetimes; we have not used the divine for lifetimes. Hence it feels difficult; the soil has hardened, we never plowed or sowed it; it has become a stony plateau. Where we have been farming, that feels easy; the earth is ready, soft; seeds take quickly.
But however difficult the harvest of divine endowment looks, once you begin you will find even that difficulty is not difficult. And once you taste it, you will see that demonic endowment was far more difficult; old habit made it seem easy. It carried many hardships—sorrow and only sorrow.
Where the crop may come easily but the fruit is always sorrow, what is the value of such ease? If the sowing is hard but the fruit is joy, then it must be called simple and natural.
Whoever has known has said: samadhi is very natural, very simple; the final attainment is not difficult. It seems difficult to us because we have taken no steps toward it, paid no attention. Our feet are crippled in that direction.
So don’t sit and think it is difficult. Do something and make it simple. Doing makes things simple.
If you have never swum, water looks terrifying; you can’t believe you will survive if thrown in. Those who teach swimming do nothing but throw you in; then you flail hands and feet to save yourself. That flailing is the beginning of swimming. Bring a little order to it and you will swim. Learn just a little coordination. Once you get the knack, you will find nothing simpler than swimming; only in the beginning it feels like death.
Begin! This upward flight is also a kind of swimming. At first there will be difficulty—naturally. As practice deepens, the difficulty changes. A moment comes when samadhi is the only ease. Then nothing is harder than being bad.
If you are truly virtuous, you will see the thief suffering. If you are unvirtuous, you will see the thief succeeding.
There are, in large numbers, two kinds of thieves in the world: those who muster the courage to steal, and those who never steal but only fantasize about it.
People come to me and say, “We live contentedly; we do no wrong; we injure no one; yet we face failure. And look at so-and-so—doing black-marketing, smuggling, cheating, swindling—and succeeding!”
His “success” looks like success to you because you too want that very kind of success. If your mind were truly saintly, you would also see that man’s inner agony. He may have built a palace, but if you could see the torment through which he passes inside that palace, you would see it.
His inner agony means nothing to you. His outer show is what you see, because you too want the outer show! What he got and you failed to get—this pricks the mind. Therefore he looks successful and you look like a failure to yourself.
Only a bad man can call a bad man’s success a success. A good man will feel compassion—compassion for the bad man. He will look within the bad man and find that he has accumulated wealth but lost himself; he has amassed treasure but destroyed peace; he has gathered means but lost his way. To a saintly heart his “success” will look like suicide; he has rotted himself, sold himself.
Yet it may appear to us that the bad man is succeeding; every day people see bad men “succeed.”
A bad man cannot truly succeed. And if he appears to succeed, understand that there is some confusion in your definition of success. A bad man must fail.
I have heard: Alexander, expanding his empire, reached the banks of the Nile. Along the way he broke countless borders, destroyed many kingdoms, defeated many armies. But at the Nile he experienced great astonishment. Everywhere else he met resistance and struggle; people fought to their last breath. But when he reached the Nile, he was welcomed—festooned gateways, showers of flowers, invitations, festivities—no question of fighting! He was startled and amazed.
In the first city he entered, the people invited the entire army of Alexander to a banquet. The finest food, wine, dance, music—everything was arranged. Alexander was stunned: What kind of way is this—to welcome an enemy! He was also a bit ashamed, because if they had stood with swords, Alexander could have conquered them; but they stood with love—how to conquer that?
When the platter was brought before him, he became angry, struck the table with his fist, and said, “What is this? Are you making a mockery of me?” For the bread was of gold, the vegetables of diamonds and gems. Alexander said, “Are you fools? I suspected as much when I entered the village: you didn’t fight; you welcomed us with garlands. Now it is certain you are mad. No one eats bread of gold!”
An old man, the eldest in the village, said, “If you wanted bread of wheat, you could have found that at home. Since you are coming here after so much trouble, we thought you must be in search of bread of gold!”
What you see in the thief, the bandit, the rogue, is his bread of gold. But bread of gold cannot be eaten; within he starves. And you call that “success” because your craving is the same; that is what you too desire.
What we desire discloses our endowment. If a thief appears successful to you, you are a thief—though you may never have stolen. If the thief seems successful to you, then a saint will seem to you a failure. You might pity the saint; your envy will be for the thief. You will say of the saint, “Simple fellow, let him be. He doesn’t understand.” But your envy and competition are with the thief.
First understand this: evil never truly succeeds; it can only appear to. The illusion is in the seeing. Goodness always succeeds; it can only appear to fail. The “success” of evil is external; the success of goodness is inner.
Whoever has known even a taste of joy in this world has known it because of goodness. Whoever has tasted great suffering has tasted it because of evil.
If we could open the hearts of Hitler, Genghis Khan, or Tamerlane, we would behold a great hell. But their names are emblazoned in history; they will remain. You may think they succeeded—they built vast empires—so you may think they succeeded.
In truth, those who truly succeeded on this earth perhaps have no names in history; you may not even know of them. Who succeeds in life? The one who knows peace, who is touched by bliss, who gets a glimpse of samadhi.
If you ask me for a definition of success: samadhi is the definition. Those who taste a little of samadhi, who dance in samadhi, whose heart thrills in samadhi—only they are successful.
And the bad can never be in samadhi. The bad will be scorched and anxious; his mind will grow more and more infernal.
So first: the demonic endowment appears to flourish because that is what we desire. Demonic endowment has never truly flourished. In those whose hearts long for the divine endowment, the demonic is always seen as wandering, miserable; it has never flourished—always withered.
Second: Why is the harvest of the divine endowment so rare?
It is rare because of a few simple laws of life.
One, to do wrong you need do nothing—it is a downward slope. Let water flow and it will naturally run into the hollows; to go downward water needs no effort. To climb a mountain is difficult; to make water go uphill requires an arrangement, effort, energy—and failures may occur.
Evil is a slope—what is lower than we are. Good is what is above us. Evil is what we have already passed through—animal, plant—we have been there. To go back is easy.
Consider: a student who has passed up to matriculation; if he wants to sit for the first-grade exam again, what difficulty will there be? None. If he wishes to re-enter first grade, no one will stop him—and he will be “very successful” there!
What we have already ascended in evolution is always easy to descend. Get the oldest man angry and he behaves like a child. Even the wisest, if enraged, behaves foolishly, childishly—stamps his feet, breaks things, shouts. This is regression, going back.
Going back is always easy because the path is familiar; it needs no search.
Divine endowment means going forward, touching heights. The higher the peak, the greater the effort—and the more the slips and falls.
Remember, only he falls who tries to rise. One who is going down has nothing to fall from.
Divine endowment is above us; we must reach out, journey, move toward the Himalayan summit. Obstacles will arise; failure may happen; we may fall, lose the way. In going down there is no fear of falling and no fear of losing the path; it’s familiar, well-known. And there is ease in descent because there is no resistance; in climbing, the whole body strains.
Thomas Alva Edison made around a thousand inventions—the most by any man—from small to great: electricity, radio, telephone, and more. His home was full of inventions. Visitors were astonished—everywhere some innovation. At a tap, place your hand below and the water starts; remove the hand and it stops!
One day the American President came to see. He marveled at everything and said, “One thing I cannot understand. You, such a mind of invention, but your garden gate is so heavy it takes real force to open. Did you not think of that?” Edison said, “You have not understood. I did think. Whoever opens my gate once sends five gallons of water into my tank. I keep no servants; visitors come all day; every time they open and close, the gate pumps five gallons up.”
Whenever anything is to be sent upward, there will be some labor and heaviness, because we are working against life’s gravitational law.
The earth pulls things downward—gravity. Throw a stone upward, your hand tires and hurts; the higher you throw, the more energy you spend—and the stone still returns. As soon as your imparted energy is spent, the earth drags it down. Downward pull requires no effort; it is nature’s tendency.
The demonic endowment is gravity—the earth’s pull.
A newborn cannot stand up immediately after leaving the mother’s womb; to stand is to fight gravity. So the child first crawls; the earth is pulling. If he tries to stand, he falls at once. He crawls, then braces on his knees, then with support stands, then takes a few steps; he falls, bruises his knees, gets hurt—slowly, slowly. His legs are capable; the body is ready, but he must struggle with gravity. One day he balances and stands.
Then standing seems easy. But even now whenever you are tired you must lie down, because standing—even if easy—still fights the earth’s pull and tires you. That’s why we get tired standing; to rest we lie flat. The pleasure of sleep is from dropping the fight with gravity; we lie flat; we become babies again; we no longer fight the earth. All night we rest; in the morning we can stand again.
Standing means struggle. If you want to fly, the struggle is greater, for then you seek complete freedom from the earth.
The demonic endowment is like gravity—easy. To be bad you need no great contemplation, no great intelligence.
Studies of criminals show: ninety percent are dull-witted, idiotic, lacking intelligence. Yet strangely the unintelligent often look “successful” through wrongdoing, while the intelligent seem to lose. The unintelligent have one capacity: to fall lower; if the competition is to fall, he will beat you. And all of us are competing with him in that direction; thus he seems to win.
The lower one can fall, the faster he will “succeed.” Whether the race is for wealth or politics, the bad man “succeeds” because he can fall deeper. Between two politicians the one who can stoop lower will win; he will need less effort.
I have heard: Winston Churchill, campaigning in a constituency, asked an old man for his vote. The old man said, “I will think.” Churchill pressed him. The man said, “If you insist, then I will say I pray to God to be kind that only one of you two can win. Both are trouble; it’s good that only one evil will win!”
Another story: A farmer reached the gate of heaven, saddened by the scene. He knocked a long time; no one cared. Then he saw behind him a politician who had died after him. The politician knocked and the gates opened at once; the gatekeeper ushered him in. The farmer waited, thinking, “So here too no one will care for me! The politician wins even here.” Inside he heard band music—welcoming the politician. After the fanfare, the gates opened for the farmer. He thought the band would play for him too. It didn’t. He asked the gatekeeper, “Is there favoritism here as well?” The gatekeeper said, “None at all. People like you come here daily. A politician comes once in thousands of years; a special welcome is due.”
In politics it is hard to be good; the good will lose there—because it is a competition in falling, who can go deepest.
Religion is the reverse journey of politics. There the competition is to fly into the sky, who can go farthest from the earth’s pull! There the difficulty begins. The farther you go, the more the earth pulls and the greater the struggle. But out of that struggle the soul is born; out of that tension, resistance, and restraint your personality is forged, you are integrated, centered.
So yes, the harvest of divine endowment is rare. Also because around us everyone is busy producing demonic endowment. Man lives by the crowd; he follows it. Where the crowd goes, you go. Your parents, your family, your society do something; the child is born and learns to do the same.
For the demonic endowment there is abundant “education.” For the divine there is none. Where there is provision, skill comes; where there is none, our limbs grow weak.
Because you walk, your legs work. If you don’t, they will shrink, be paralyzed. Because you look, your eyes are alert; if you live in darkness long, they become blind. Because you listen, the ears become keen; a musician’s ear is keenest; he longs to catch the subtlest change of note. A painter’s eyes glow; a philosopher’s mind sharpens.
What we do, we become skillful in. What we don’t, we become clumsy in. If our eyes were bandaged from birth and opened only in youth, we would all emerge blind.
Scientists say: if any sense is unused for three years, it atrophies.
We have been using demonic endowment for lifetimes; we have not used the divine for lifetimes. Hence it feels difficult; the soil has hardened, we never plowed or sowed it; it has become a stony plateau. Where we have been farming, that feels easy; the earth is ready, soft; seeds take quickly.
But however difficult the harvest of divine endowment looks, once you begin you will find even that difficulty is not difficult. And once you taste it, you will see that demonic endowment was far more difficult; old habit made it seem easy. It carried many hardships—sorrow and only sorrow.
Where the crop may come easily but the fruit is always sorrow, what is the value of such ease? If the sowing is hard but the fruit is joy, then it must be called simple and natural.
Whoever has known has said: samadhi is very natural, very simple; the final attainment is not difficult. It seems difficult to us because we have taken no steps toward it, paid no attention. Our feet are crippled in that direction.
So don’t sit and think it is difficult. Do something and make it simple. Doing makes things simple.
If you have never swum, water looks terrifying; you can’t believe you will survive if thrown in. Those who teach swimming do nothing but throw you in; then you flail hands and feet to save yourself. That flailing is the beginning of swimming. Bring a little order to it and you will swim. Learn just a little coordination. Once you get the knack, you will find nothing simpler than swimming; only in the beginning it feels like death.
Begin! This upward flight is also a kind of swimming. At first there will be difficulty—naturally. As practice deepens, the difficulty changes. A moment comes when samadhi is the only ease. Then nothing is harder than being bad.
Osho's Commentary
“And the thoughts of those demonic men are like this: ‘Today I have gained this; I shall obtain that desire. I have so much wealth, and it will grow even more in the future.’”
The demonic man runs after “more.” Whatever he has, he wants to increase it. Whatever he has never seems enough.
He is obsessed with quantity. If he has ten, it must become a thousand; if a thousand, ten thousand; if ten thousand, ten million—numbers! He lives in figures, in spreading large numbers. Whatever he has is too little.
And whatever he has gives him no joy. Joy is always where he is not.
For the demonic, happiness is always somewhere in the distant sky. He lives in hope. There is no juice in what he has. The joy is in what he does not have. Until he gets it, he cannot be happy. He keeps running. He wastes today for tomorrow; tomorrow he will waste again for the next tomorrow. He sacrifices his whole life to the future and keeps postponing living: “When I have everything, then I will live.”
A German thinker had great wealth and great love for study. He wanted to know as much as possible. He began collecting rare books from all over the world—texts in many languages. A vast library arose—books in fifty languages; there was not a single great work he had not searched out. Busy collecting, he found himself ninety years old. It struck him: “I gathered, but when will I read?” The shock was so great it killed him. For ninety years he had been thinking: “Tomorrow. Let me collect more; then I will study; then I will know.”
The demonic man does the same with money and position. He never gets the leisure to use them; the race ahead grips him. He daily sacrifices the present to the future.
Remember: only the present has reality. The future is a dream. Whoever loses today for tomorrow wastes today. Once the habit of losing today is formed, you will always lose today—whenever time arrives, it arrives as today; tomorrow never comes.
And the race for more has no end; it attaches itself to everything. Whatever you get, your demonic mind will say, “More!” Try to imagine any state where your mind will say, “Enough!”—you can’t. Sit alone and ask: how much wealth would make my mind stop asking for more? First you will say, “Ten million.” But even before anyone hands you ten million, a voice will say, “Why settle so low? Why not a billion?” Your mind runs to the last number you know; and even at the last number you will feel restless: “Why didn’t I study more math? Then I wouldn’t be stuck.” Even the whole world will seem too small.
Someone told Alexander, “You are conquering the world, but if you conquer it you will be in trouble.” Alexander asked, “What trouble?” The man was Diogenes, a fakir. He said, “Then you will discover there is no second world.” They say Alexander became sad at once. “Don’t speak such depressing things,” he said. “First let me conquer this one.” But his heart fell at the very thought: after conquering one, there is no other! He will never tire; the demand for more will go on.
The man of divine endowment lives fully today, here, with what he has, as he is. This does not mean he does not grow. Only he truly grows. The “more” emerges out of today—but he does not demand it. It is the fruit of living today, not his claim.
The demonic does not live today; he keeps thinking of more. His “more” runs in the mind; it is not the fruit of life.
Understand this paradox: the demonic thinks “more, more,” and the more he thinks, the less he has—life is being spent. The divine does not think of more; he accepts what is wholly and dives into it. From that immersion, more flowers; much more comes to him.
Someone asked Jesus, “Can it be that we seek God and also get the pleasures of the world?” Jesus said, “Do not think of worldly pleasures at all. First seek the kingdom of God, then all else shall be added unto you.” The seeker of God, the man of divine endowment, is searching for God in this very moment. All else follows, but he does not demand it.
The less the demand, the more comes. Those who beg remain beggars; those who do not beg become emperors. Life is full of such riddles! Those who ask remain beggars; what they have is taken away. Those who give become emperors; what they do not have is given too.
Jesus has a paradoxical saying: “If you ask, even what you have will be taken away; if you give, even what you do not have will be given.”
So it is, and so it happens every moment. Whatever you asked for in life—you don’t have it. Whatever you gave, you do have; what we let go becomes ours forever; what we grasp becomes a burden and prepares to slip away.
“Today I have gained this; I shall obtain that desire. I have so much wealth; in the future there will be even more. That enemy is slain by me; the others too I will slay. I am rich, I enjoy wealth; I am endowed with all siddhis, powerful and happy.”
This is worth understanding.
The demonic is always full of the desire to destroy others: how to wipe others out. He thinks, “When none are left, I will be complete. If no one else remains on this earth, I alone will be emperor. Whoever is contrary to me must be wiped out; whatever is other than me must be destroyed; only then will my empire be unhindered.”
The man of divine endowment does not think of destroying the other; he thinks of dissolving himself. Get this difference clear. He says, “As long as I am, suffering will remain. When I am not—when I become a zero—bliss will be.”
The kingdom of the divine comes when the ego disappears. The demonic seeks a kingdom by eliminating others.
The demonic may spare you if you become like a corpse before him. If a demonic man marries, he will turn his wife into a thing—kill her spirit. She will have no life left: “If I say night, it is night; if I say day, it is day.” If a demonic woman marries, she will turn her husband into clay—make him a shadow. A demonic father wipes his sons; he “raises” them, but as corpses—no freedom, no dignity.
The demonic kills enemies; he makes friends into living-dead. To be his friend you must be a corpse.
Today I was reading about King Farouk of Egypt. A herbal physician wrote his memoirs. Farouk had called him for treatment. When he arrived, Farouk was gambling at cards with his ministers—the prime minister among them. The physician watched, waiting till Farouk was free. He was amazed: no matter who held the better cards, Farouk always won. Farouk sensed the man’s astonishment and said, “No need to be surprised; they are my servants; it is their duty to obey.” He turned to the prime minister and said, “No need to cheat—just lose.” At once the prime minister dropped his cards and lost.
That is the demonic mind: he kills enemies and wipes friends so that no life remains.
Sit near a demonic person and you will feel he is draining you, destroying you. Sit near a man of divine endowment and you will feel he is giving you life; your withered being turns fresh. With him even the smallest person feels valued, welcomed—he too is a blessing. Even the greatest, sitting near the demonic, will feel his life made petty. If someone makes you feel small, know the demonic is at work. If in you there is a tendency to make others small, know the demonic fills you.
To feel and affirm the dignity and worth of the other—that each person is an end unto himself, not a means; each person is of ultimate value—such goodwill in you gives birth to divine endowment.
Immanuel Kant made this one of the pillars of his ethics: never treat another person as a means; treat him always as an end.
The other is not your instrument to be used. To use him is to treat him as a thing. But our condition is such that our own dead box seems more valuable than a living person.
I have heard: Mulla Nasruddin was traveling by train, the compartment jam-packed. He was trying to lift his heavy iron trunk onto the upper rack. A woman below said, “Sir, don’t put it up there; it may fall; it’s heavy and iron.” Nasruddin said, “Madam, rest easy—there’s nothing in it that can break.” The woman’s head breaking did not even occur to him. There was nothing breakable in his trunk!
This is our state. The other’s head is less valuable than our box. The person has no value for a demonic mind; personality has no dignity. He wants to kill enemies; he thinks, “Today I killed that enemy; tomorrow I will kill others.” His thinking is destructive; he is a worshipper of death—a messenger of Yama.
The opposite is the worship of creation—creativity: “Let me make, build something; where there was nothing let something be; where the ground was empty let a plant arise.” The worship of creation is the path toward God.
All the world’s religions call God the Creator. It is not easy to prove God as Creator; it is hard to gather proof that the world was created at some moment. Certainly none of us was present at the beginning; there is no witness. Whatever we say is imagination, for if we were present, creation had already happened.
We know nothing of the first moment; we can only imagine God created it—or did not. Mental luxury. And yet religions insist God is Creator. Why? Because whoever is seized by creativity, whoever becomes a creator in his life, begins to experience God. From that experience comes the certainty that the deepest nature of existence is creative. If you can give birth even to a song, in that moment a godly flavor arises in you. Paint a picture, sculpt a statue, raise a child, nurture a plant till it flowers—those moments are tiny glimpses of God.
Destruction is anti-divine; creation is prayer toward God. Prayer that is not creative is barren. Shouting in a temple will not help much; if that energy goes into creation, prayer becomes alive. Only when you are a creator are you close to God.
The demonic keeps believing, “I am rich; I am an enjoyer; I possess all siddhis; I am strong and happy.”
He is not happy, but he holds the belief to convince himself. This is a deep psychological truth: we try to convince ourselves of what we are not. The weak convinces himself he is powerful; the coward repeats he is brave.
When I was in school, my Hindi teacher, from the first day, always told stories of his bravery: “I am so courageous I go to the cremation ground even on the darkest night.” After hearing it a few times, I said, “I doubt it. It isn’t even something to boast about—and there’s no need to repeat it unless you are afraid. You can’t go.” Sweat appeared on his brow. “How did you know?” he asked. I said, “No mystery; your repetition shows you are persuading yourself.”
The ugly repeats, “I am beautiful.” The fool repeats, “I am intelligent.” The weak repeats, “I am strong,” and seeks to prove it—by climbing on the chests of those weaker than himself. It’s easy to find someone weaker or more foolish; the world is large.
The Western thinker Alfred Adler founded Individual Psychology and placed inferiority complex at its base: whatever is inferior in a person pushes him to its opposite so he and others may forget his lack. He studied deeply and said: whatever people go mad after reveals their weakness. A Hitler is driven by inferiority; until he convinces himself he owns the world he will not be at peace. Those weak of leg try to run fastest. We try for the opposite to show ourselves and others, “Who says we are weak?”
Once, while Adler was lecturing that people chase what they lack—poverty-shamed people chase wealth; status-poor chase high office; the ugly chase beauty—a man stood up and asked, “Does this apply to you too?” Adler didn’t catch the joke. The man said, “Does it mean those weak of mind become psychologists?” Still, there is truth in Adler.
Krishna is saying the same: such a man is not happy and cannot be, but he believes, and loudly proclaims, he is happy. His propaganda deceives you.
Politicians in high office look, from the outside, radiant—garlands, applause, “bliss.” If only you could peek into their lives, you’d see they are miserable and harried, trying somehow to avoid total disgrace—and being disgraced at every moment. But when they come out, they smile; it is painted on, while inside they cry and tremble. Yet they try to show they are delighted, and so you too are deceived.
You too, when you step out of your house, create illusions. Let a guest visit, and husband and wife speak such sweet words to one another as they never do otherwise! When alone, their real faces appear. Etiquette, “civilization.”
Mulla Nasruddin’s wife said before a guest, “We’ve been married twenty-five years—twenty-five years I’ve lived imprisoned in this house; we’ve never once gone out together for a walk!” Nasruddin said, “Fazlu’s mother, don’t make a mountain out of it. You exaggerate. When the stove exploded once, did we not go out together?” So it is in every house. But outside, husband and wife going to the cinema or market look like they enjoy supreme bliss.
Every fairy tale ends: the prince married the princess and they lived happily ever after. Here the story stops—and nothing could be a bigger lie. Here the real sorrow begins. Before this there was a little imagined happiness. But stories rightly end here; beyond this would be indecent to tell.
We all keep up a face outside: not happy but showing happiness; poor but showing we are not. Even if we must borrow furniture to impress a guest, we do. The demonic hides his poverty and projects its opposite. He says, “I am wealthy; I enjoy pleasures; I possess siddhis; I am strong; I am happy.”
None of these are true for him. They are true for the man of divine endowment: he becomes truly wealthy—godly; all powers, all joys shower upon him. That happens to the divine. But the demonic assumes and advertises; if the advertising is clever, others believe—and if enough others believe, the advertiser may believe too: “So many accept it; it must be true.”
“I am very rich, of a great clan; who is like me? I will perform sacrifices; I will give in charity; I will rejoice”—thus, deluded by ignorance, the demonic is infatuated.
He does nothing of the sort; he will neither sacrifice nor donate; but he keeps thinking, “I will.” He thinks good thoughts; he does bad acts. Thinking so gives him a comfort: “I am not a bad man.” You do the same: think fine thoughts of what you will do; thus you feel as if you are doing it. “If not today, then tomorrow—but certainly I will!” You will never do it. You have lived fifty years and never did; how will you in future? Who will do it? You? And you keep postponing. The bad you do today; the good you think you will do tomorrow. That thought helps you bear your wickedness; it dulls the thorn; it becomes a protection.
“I will perform sacrifices; I will give charity; I will rejoice”—deluded by such auto-hypnosis. “Infatuated”—meaning: he persuades himself with such thoughts, and slowly he believes he is a donor without giving, because he has thought about giving so often. Repetition grooves the mind.
In the West, Emile Coué told people: no need to do anything else; whatever you want to be, keep thinking it. If you want health, keep repeating, “I am becoming healthy, I am healthy.” It has an effect. Whether you become healthy or not, you begin to feel you are.
Once Coué asked a friend on the road, “How is your mother now?” The friend said, “Worse—very ill; no hope.” Coué said, “Wrong. It’s only her idea that she is ill. Remove the idea and she will be fine.” Later he asked again, “How is your mother?” The friend said, “Now she thinks she is dead. Earlier it was illness; now the idea is that she has died!”
If you repeat a thought, a trance forms around you—a hypnosis. The bad man hypnotizes himself with good thoughts: “I will rejoice; I will donate; I will sacrifice.” I have heard that when Mulla Nasruddin died, he wrote a will: “Half to my wife; half of the half to my son; half of that half to my daughter; and whatever remains, to the poor.” The lawyer said, “But nothing remains!” Mulla said, “I know—there is nothing. That’s why I’m saying ‘half’ rather than numbers. No one will actually get anything—but what fine thoughts to die with! Scriptures say those who die with good thoughts reach good worlds.”
The bad man constantly thinks good thoughts and weaves a trance of suggestions. He thinks “I will rejoice, I will give, I will sacrifice”—but all in the future. What he actually does is the opposite—he grabs. If you go to steal and think, “What’s the harm? I’m taking from the rich; I will distribute to the poor,” the sting of theft is dulled and you feel religious! You are snatching now; the giving is fantasy. The giver’s mind will snatch from the poor too if given a chance: “There are even poorer; I will give them.” In the end he will find there is no one poorer than himself; so he should keep all he has taken.
Once Mulla Nasruddin went to a neighbor and said, “Would you consider helping? An old widow has lived ten years in a house without paying rent; today the landlord is evicting her. Please help.” The neighbor, thinking Mulla was pleading for the widow, said, “Whatever you say, I will help,” and gave money. “You seem close to her; who are you?” Mulla said, “I am the landlord. She hasn’t paid for ten years.” He thought he was helping the widow!
Our mind knows many tricks and uses them so long that we stop noticing.
“Bewildered by many confusions, trapped in the mesh of delusion, intensely attached to sense pleasures, impure, they fall into hell.”
Hell does not mean some underground torture chamber where they are thrown. These are symbols. Whoever lives in such feelings has already fallen into hell. He lives in hell. Inside him a fire burns every moment—sorrow, anguish, pain. He is deeply tormented. Whoever has never shared happiness cannot receive it; whoever has shared only sorrow will get sorrow condensed—it will rain upon him. That rain is hell.
What we give returns to us a thousandfold—whether joy or sorrow. We harvest what we distribute.
Such a person who gives sorrow and only imagines giving joy will receive sorrow and only hope for happiness. He cannot get it. Our actual actions bear fruit; our results are what we do. If you are receiving sorrow, you think, “People are bad; they give me sorrow.” You receive sorrow because you have given sorrow—yesterday, before, in the past. You are receiving what you distributed.
Someone tried to kill Buddha—a madman set a mad elephant on him; a rock was pushed from above while he meditated under a hill. The disciples said, “This man is evil.” Buddha said, “Do not say that. I must have given him some sorrow; it is returning. I want to close this account. Let him push the rock; let him unleash the elephant. I will make no reaction now; I will not even call him evil—otherwise I start a new exchange, and this will go on. What he does is the result of what I did. Let me end the book here.”
When we get sorrow, we think others are giving it. It is illusion. Why would anyone waste time? People have their own lives. Somewhere you created an echo; it returns today. Whoever silently accepts like this, his past burdens are cut and no new ones are created.
If ever you receive joy, know you must have given joy—knowingly or unknowingly. If we take our joys and sorrows as the fruits of our own actions, we have understood karma: I receive what I do; I harvest what I sow—nothing else is possible.
As this understanding grows, you will slowly be freed from the demonic endowment and enter the divine. Cultivate the opposite and you will settle into the demonic. Settled thus, Krishna says, they fall into great hell.
Enough for today.