He whose every undertaking is free from desire-born resolve।
Whose actions are burned in the fire of knowledge, him the wise call a sage।। 19।।
Geeta Darshan #7
Available in:
Read in Original Hindi (मूल हिन्दी)
Sutra (Original)
यस्य सर्वे समारम्भाः कामसंकल्पवर्जिताः।
ज्ञानाग्निदग्धकर्माणं तमाहुः पण्डितं बुधाः।। 19।।
ज्ञानाग्निदग्धकर्माणं तमाहुः पण्डितं बुधाः।। 19।।
Transliteration:
yasya sarve samārambhāḥ kāmasaṃkalpavarjitāḥ|
jñānāgnidagdhakarmāṇaṃ tamāhuḥ paṇḍitaṃ budhāḥ|| 19||
yasya sarve samārambhāḥ kāmasaṃkalpavarjitāḥ|
jñānāgnidagdhakarmāṇaṃ tamāhuḥ paṇḍitaṃ budhāḥ|| 19||
Translation (Meaning)
Questions in this Discourse
Osho, you just said the body is blind, mechanical. But elsewhere you also say the body has its own wisdom, a body-wisdom. Please clarify. And another thing: in this verse it is said, “He has conquered his inner being and renounced all the paraphernalia of pleasures.” Please explain this as well.
Certainly, the body has its own wisdom. But that wisdom is like the wisdom of a blind man. The body is prajna-chakshu—an intelligence that functions without eyes. The body has its own intelligence, but it is mechanical intelligence.
What does this body-wisdom mean? For instance, you don’t have to make your heart beat; the body keeps it beating. If you had to beat it yourself, hardly anyone would reach seventy—miss for five or seven seconds, and you’re gone! You don’t circulate your blood; the body does. If you had to do it, you would be in great trouble. In truth, so much work goes on inside a small five-foot body that scientists say if we had to do it in a factory, we’d need a plant ten square miles in size. You are not running all that work; the body is—automatically, like a machine.
It has its own intelligence. Intelligence means it must take care of thousands of things—but mechanically. Suppose you cut your hand; the next day pus collects. You didn’t collect it; the body sent it. Do you even know why it collects? What you call pus is white blood corpuscles. The blood has two kinds of cells, red and white. The red cells are delicate, weaker; the white cells are powerful, sturdy. When there is a wound, the body immediately dispatches white cells to the area—a safety measure.
It is like your village being attacked: you station military units at the outskirts; you move women and children back; you shut the shops; you post soldiers—an attack! A wound is an attack from outside. The body instantly sends its troops there—the white cells. What you call pus is not filth; it is the layer of white blood cells that the body has sent. They surround the wound. Once that layer forms, outside germs cannot enter the body. Protected by that ring, the body begins its inner work—building new skin. Until the skin is ready, that thin film of “pus” won’t let outside germs penetrate. They are fighters.
All this is the body’s intelligence. It is no small thing. But it is the intelligence of a blind man.
In the sense I said the body has its own wisdom—yes, in that sense it does. And when I say the body is blind, I mean: if you are not present to the body’s actions, the body begins to run on habit.
A man smokes a cigarette. Usually he smokes by habit. He has no awareness of when his hand goes into his pocket, when the packet comes out, when the cigarette touches his lips, the match is struck, the smoke starts going in and out. It runs entirely like a machine. If awareness dawns, you will rarely find someone willing to do such stupidity as pulling smoke in and pushing it out. What is he doing? Just that—moving smoke in and out.
To spend money to poison your blood and shorten your life—this can happen only in unconsciousness; it cannot happen in awareness. Or, if a man is suicidal, then perhaps—but even suicide happens in unconsciousness, not in awareness.
Try one day to smoke consciously. Smoke, close your eyes, and meditate on the smoke: it went in; it came out; it went in. In a little while you will feel: am I a human being or a fool? What am I doing? It will feel very stupid, very idiotic. But we are quite foolish; so even foolishness becomes a business.
A few years ago the U.S. Senate decided that every cigarette packet must carry a big red warning: “This is harmful to health.” At first the cigarette companies protested: “We’ll suffer great losses.” They filed suits, went to court, saying their business would be hurt—because if a man reads on the packet each time that it is harmful to health, sales will decline. But psychologists said, “Don’t worry. One who can move smoke in and out will soon forget the red ink as well.” And that’s exactly what happened. For three or four months sales dropped by millions—but then they returned to normal. One who cannot remain aware while shuttling smoke in and out—how long will he notice red letters? It’s written; let it be. Who reads it?
Man is unconscious. And as long as he is, the body adopts mechanical habits—and mechanical habits become bondage.
An aware person does not acquire mechanical habits; he doesn’t even move his hand unnecessarily. If he moves it, he moves it consciously.
Buddha was passing through a village—this was before he became the Buddha. A fly landed on his shoulder. Ananda was with him. Buddha was speaking to him, and, unawares—as we all do—he brushed the fly away with his hand. Not consciously, not mindfully; the conversation continued, the hand pushed, and the fly flew off. Then he stopped and became sad. Ananda asked, “What happened?” Buddha stood silent for a moment, then he raised his hand to the spot where the fly had been—though it was no longer there—and brushed it away again. Ananda said, “What are you doing? What are you brushing away? There’s nothing on your shoulder.” Buddha said, “I am brushing it away again, as I should have—mindfully. The first time I brushed it off in unawareness. If one’s own hand works in unawareness, it can do dangerous things. Today it brushes off a fly; tomorrow it could press someone’s throat. If today I brushed the fly away without mindfulness, what guarantee is there that my hands won’t strangle someone tomorrow? They could. So I am standing here brushing in the way it should have been done. And next time I will remember to brush mindfully; otherwise karma becomes bondage.”
Unconscious action is bondage. Conscious action is freedom from bondage.
Your second question: Krishna says, having conquered oneself, leaving the paraphernalia of pleasures—what does it mean?
“Leaving the paraphernalia of pleasures” does not mean leaving material things. There is a difference between things and pleasure-things.
If objects are merely necessary and you don’t draw pleasure from them—if they simply fulfill your need—they are not pleasure-paraphernalia. But if objects are unnecessary, and you create them as sources of pleasure…
For example, a woman walks around with a kilo of gold hanging on her. She ought to be in a madhouse! There is no need to hang a kilo of gold on the body. For the body, it’s harmful; no bodily need is fulfilled. Gold is pleasure-paraphernalia. Why? Because wherever that gold flashes, eyes will be dazzled. People will feel, “Yes, somebody!” The husband is pleased to drape his wife in gold—his credit in the bazaar rises. His wife’s gold becomes his walking advertisement: “This man is somebody too.”
Men are clever. They don’t load the gold on themselves; they’ve loaded it onto their wives! Earlier they carried it themselves; slowly intelligence dawned. They understood this job can be handed over to women—why should we be troubled? Earlier they used to carry it.
“Give up pleasure-paraphernalia!” Krishna is not saying, give up material things. You cannot give up material things; life needs them. What is needed is perfectly right. Everyone’s needs are different, so each must decide for himself what his need is. And the decision is not difficult.
Have you put on clothes to cover the body? To keep out the cold? Or to make someone else’s eyes smart with envy? You can know this for sure. Stand before the mirror in the morning and you’ll know why you’re wearing that coat. Is it for the cold? To cover the body? Or to produce a sting in someone’s eyes? To make someone feel inferior? Are you wearing it in the hope that today someone will touch it and ask, “What did this cost?”
A person of awareness drops the paraphernalia of pleasure. He drops extracting pleasure from things. Such things are a useless burden when kept only for the idea of pleasure. And you don’t really get pleasure—only the burden remains. Sometimes the load keeps piling up beyond measure.
I was a guest at the house of a very wealthy man not long ago. There was no place to sit in his drawing room! Even walking was difficult. So much pleasure-paraphernalia had been packed into it that you could only enjoy it from outside at the door, not from within. The drawing room became useless for sitting; it had turned into a museum. One had to tiptoe through in fear that some statue might fall, something might get bumped—everything was expensive. He himself passed through there very gingerly. A drawing room is meant for ease—but that was gone! It wasn’t built to sit in; it was built to create a feeling in other people’s eyes. And when that feeling arises in others’ eyes, a certain juice comes—pleasure arises.
Pleasure comes from others’ eyes—it’s amusing—never from within. Someone says, “Your bungalow is very beautiful,” and then pleasure arises.
In Calcutta I used to stay at a certain house. Whenever I went, they couldn’t stop talking about their new home—the finest in Calcutta: a swimming pool, a garden, everything. No matter where you began the conversation, within two minutes it would arrive at the house. Start from Brahman, and it would arrive at the house! I tried beginning from every possible direction, but there was no use—within two minutes the track returned to the house. I even began from moksha, liberation. A minute and a half in, he said, “Tell me one thing: in moksha, are there houses or not?” And then he would begin about how he had built this house…
Two years later I was again a guest there, and he did not mention the house. I became a bit concerned. I tried several times to steer the talk to the house—praised the swimming pool, and so on—but he would deflect and change the subject. I asked, “What’s the matter? What went wrong? Earlier I did not bring it up—you did. Now I bring it up, and you don’t.” He said, “Don’t you see next door? A bigger house than ours has been built. What’s the point of talking about ours now? Until I build one bigger than that, it’s better to keep quiet. I don’t even go out into the garden,” he said. “If I go out, that house comes into view!”
This is our mind. Krishna says: give up the paraphernalia of pleasure.
He is not asking you to give up things. Things have their place. But trying to squeeze pleasure from them is madness. From goods you don’t get happiness; at most you get convenience. Material things are, at most, convenience—not joy. People mistake convenience for happiness and get lost. Convenience is perfectly fine. Happiness? Happiness does not come from outside, from things; happiness arises from oneself.
Therefore Krishna adds: having conquered oneself!
In truth there are two kinds of victory in this world. Some people keep conquering objects: from a small car to a big car, from a small house to a bigger house—conquering objects. In the end they find they have conquered things but lost themselves. At the time of death it becomes clear: what was won lies there, and we go. Nothing can be taken along; the bird flies alone. All that was won remains behind.
Then there are those whom we may call wise: they do not conquer objects. They know: objects were there when we were not; they will be there when we are not. Victory over objects is not real victory; victory over oneself is. They conquer themselves. Krishna speaks of such a person—self-victorious.
Mahavira has said: Lose everything and win yourself, and you are the victor. Win everything and lose yourself, and none is more defeated than you.
Whether you know it or not, Mahavira was called Jina for this very reason. Jina means “the conqueror”—one who has conquered himself.
One who becomes a Jina, who conquers himself, finds that there is nothing left anywhere worth attaining—in this world or beyond. One who has found himself has found all; one who has lost himself has lost all. Only the victory of the self is victory.
Such a person, having conquered himself, becomes free of the useless burden of the paraphernalia of pleasure. He does not swell with pride. While acting, he lives in non-action. Doing all that is necessary, not a single line is left upon him. He carefully hands the sheet over into the hands of the divine—without stain, without blot.
Enough for this morning; in the evening we will talk again.
Please remain for five minutes. And whoever has even a little courage, join in the kirtan. Dive for five minutes.
What does this body-wisdom mean? For instance, you don’t have to make your heart beat; the body keeps it beating. If you had to beat it yourself, hardly anyone would reach seventy—miss for five or seven seconds, and you’re gone! You don’t circulate your blood; the body does. If you had to do it, you would be in great trouble. In truth, so much work goes on inside a small five-foot body that scientists say if we had to do it in a factory, we’d need a plant ten square miles in size. You are not running all that work; the body is—automatically, like a machine.
It has its own intelligence. Intelligence means it must take care of thousands of things—but mechanically. Suppose you cut your hand; the next day pus collects. You didn’t collect it; the body sent it. Do you even know why it collects? What you call pus is white blood corpuscles. The blood has two kinds of cells, red and white. The red cells are delicate, weaker; the white cells are powerful, sturdy. When there is a wound, the body immediately dispatches white cells to the area—a safety measure.
It is like your village being attacked: you station military units at the outskirts; you move women and children back; you shut the shops; you post soldiers—an attack! A wound is an attack from outside. The body instantly sends its troops there—the white cells. What you call pus is not filth; it is the layer of white blood cells that the body has sent. They surround the wound. Once that layer forms, outside germs cannot enter the body. Protected by that ring, the body begins its inner work—building new skin. Until the skin is ready, that thin film of “pus” won’t let outside germs penetrate. They are fighters.
All this is the body’s intelligence. It is no small thing. But it is the intelligence of a blind man.
In the sense I said the body has its own wisdom—yes, in that sense it does. And when I say the body is blind, I mean: if you are not present to the body’s actions, the body begins to run on habit.
A man smokes a cigarette. Usually he smokes by habit. He has no awareness of when his hand goes into his pocket, when the packet comes out, when the cigarette touches his lips, the match is struck, the smoke starts going in and out. It runs entirely like a machine. If awareness dawns, you will rarely find someone willing to do such stupidity as pulling smoke in and pushing it out. What is he doing? Just that—moving smoke in and out.
To spend money to poison your blood and shorten your life—this can happen only in unconsciousness; it cannot happen in awareness. Or, if a man is suicidal, then perhaps—but even suicide happens in unconsciousness, not in awareness.
Try one day to smoke consciously. Smoke, close your eyes, and meditate on the smoke: it went in; it came out; it went in. In a little while you will feel: am I a human being or a fool? What am I doing? It will feel very stupid, very idiotic. But we are quite foolish; so even foolishness becomes a business.
A few years ago the U.S. Senate decided that every cigarette packet must carry a big red warning: “This is harmful to health.” At first the cigarette companies protested: “We’ll suffer great losses.” They filed suits, went to court, saying their business would be hurt—because if a man reads on the packet each time that it is harmful to health, sales will decline. But psychologists said, “Don’t worry. One who can move smoke in and out will soon forget the red ink as well.” And that’s exactly what happened. For three or four months sales dropped by millions—but then they returned to normal. One who cannot remain aware while shuttling smoke in and out—how long will he notice red letters? It’s written; let it be. Who reads it?
Man is unconscious. And as long as he is, the body adopts mechanical habits—and mechanical habits become bondage.
An aware person does not acquire mechanical habits; he doesn’t even move his hand unnecessarily. If he moves it, he moves it consciously.
Buddha was passing through a village—this was before he became the Buddha. A fly landed on his shoulder. Ananda was with him. Buddha was speaking to him, and, unawares—as we all do—he brushed the fly away with his hand. Not consciously, not mindfully; the conversation continued, the hand pushed, and the fly flew off. Then he stopped and became sad. Ananda asked, “What happened?” Buddha stood silent for a moment, then he raised his hand to the spot where the fly had been—though it was no longer there—and brushed it away again. Ananda said, “What are you doing? What are you brushing away? There’s nothing on your shoulder.” Buddha said, “I am brushing it away again, as I should have—mindfully. The first time I brushed it off in unawareness. If one’s own hand works in unawareness, it can do dangerous things. Today it brushes off a fly; tomorrow it could press someone’s throat. If today I brushed the fly away without mindfulness, what guarantee is there that my hands won’t strangle someone tomorrow? They could. So I am standing here brushing in the way it should have been done. And next time I will remember to brush mindfully; otherwise karma becomes bondage.”
Unconscious action is bondage. Conscious action is freedom from bondage.
Your second question: Krishna says, having conquered oneself, leaving the paraphernalia of pleasures—what does it mean?
“Leaving the paraphernalia of pleasures” does not mean leaving material things. There is a difference between things and pleasure-things.
If objects are merely necessary and you don’t draw pleasure from them—if they simply fulfill your need—they are not pleasure-paraphernalia. But if objects are unnecessary, and you create them as sources of pleasure…
For example, a woman walks around with a kilo of gold hanging on her. She ought to be in a madhouse! There is no need to hang a kilo of gold on the body. For the body, it’s harmful; no bodily need is fulfilled. Gold is pleasure-paraphernalia. Why? Because wherever that gold flashes, eyes will be dazzled. People will feel, “Yes, somebody!” The husband is pleased to drape his wife in gold—his credit in the bazaar rises. His wife’s gold becomes his walking advertisement: “This man is somebody too.”
Men are clever. They don’t load the gold on themselves; they’ve loaded it onto their wives! Earlier they carried it themselves; slowly intelligence dawned. They understood this job can be handed over to women—why should we be troubled? Earlier they used to carry it.
“Give up pleasure-paraphernalia!” Krishna is not saying, give up material things. You cannot give up material things; life needs them. What is needed is perfectly right. Everyone’s needs are different, so each must decide for himself what his need is. And the decision is not difficult.
Have you put on clothes to cover the body? To keep out the cold? Or to make someone else’s eyes smart with envy? You can know this for sure. Stand before the mirror in the morning and you’ll know why you’re wearing that coat. Is it for the cold? To cover the body? Or to produce a sting in someone’s eyes? To make someone feel inferior? Are you wearing it in the hope that today someone will touch it and ask, “What did this cost?”
A person of awareness drops the paraphernalia of pleasure. He drops extracting pleasure from things. Such things are a useless burden when kept only for the idea of pleasure. And you don’t really get pleasure—only the burden remains. Sometimes the load keeps piling up beyond measure.
I was a guest at the house of a very wealthy man not long ago. There was no place to sit in his drawing room! Even walking was difficult. So much pleasure-paraphernalia had been packed into it that you could only enjoy it from outside at the door, not from within. The drawing room became useless for sitting; it had turned into a museum. One had to tiptoe through in fear that some statue might fall, something might get bumped—everything was expensive. He himself passed through there very gingerly. A drawing room is meant for ease—but that was gone! It wasn’t built to sit in; it was built to create a feeling in other people’s eyes. And when that feeling arises in others’ eyes, a certain juice comes—pleasure arises.
Pleasure comes from others’ eyes—it’s amusing—never from within. Someone says, “Your bungalow is very beautiful,” and then pleasure arises.
In Calcutta I used to stay at a certain house. Whenever I went, they couldn’t stop talking about their new home—the finest in Calcutta: a swimming pool, a garden, everything. No matter where you began the conversation, within two minutes it would arrive at the house. Start from Brahman, and it would arrive at the house! I tried beginning from every possible direction, but there was no use—within two minutes the track returned to the house. I even began from moksha, liberation. A minute and a half in, he said, “Tell me one thing: in moksha, are there houses or not?” And then he would begin about how he had built this house…
Two years later I was again a guest there, and he did not mention the house. I became a bit concerned. I tried several times to steer the talk to the house—praised the swimming pool, and so on—but he would deflect and change the subject. I asked, “What’s the matter? What went wrong? Earlier I did not bring it up—you did. Now I bring it up, and you don’t.” He said, “Don’t you see next door? A bigger house than ours has been built. What’s the point of talking about ours now? Until I build one bigger than that, it’s better to keep quiet. I don’t even go out into the garden,” he said. “If I go out, that house comes into view!”
This is our mind. Krishna says: give up the paraphernalia of pleasure.
He is not asking you to give up things. Things have their place. But trying to squeeze pleasure from them is madness. From goods you don’t get happiness; at most you get convenience. Material things are, at most, convenience—not joy. People mistake convenience for happiness and get lost. Convenience is perfectly fine. Happiness? Happiness does not come from outside, from things; happiness arises from oneself.
Therefore Krishna adds: having conquered oneself!
In truth there are two kinds of victory in this world. Some people keep conquering objects: from a small car to a big car, from a small house to a bigger house—conquering objects. In the end they find they have conquered things but lost themselves. At the time of death it becomes clear: what was won lies there, and we go. Nothing can be taken along; the bird flies alone. All that was won remains behind.
Then there are those whom we may call wise: they do not conquer objects. They know: objects were there when we were not; they will be there when we are not. Victory over objects is not real victory; victory over oneself is. They conquer themselves. Krishna speaks of such a person—self-victorious.
Mahavira has said: Lose everything and win yourself, and you are the victor. Win everything and lose yourself, and none is more defeated than you.
Whether you know it or not, Mahavira was called Jina for this very reason. Jina means “the conqueror”—one who has conquered himself.
One who becomes a Jina, who conquers himself, finds that there is nothing left anywhere worth attaining—in this world or beyond. One who has found himself has found all; one who has lost himself has lost all. Only the victory of the self is victory.
Such a person, having conquered himself, becomes free of the useless burden of the paraphernalia of pleasure. He does not swell with pride. While acting, he lives in non-action. Doing all that is necessary, not a single line is left upon him. He carefully hands the sheet over into the hands of the divine—without stain, without blot.
Enough for this morning; in the evening we will talk again.
Please remain for five minutes. And whoever has even a little courage, join in the kirtan. Dive for five minutes.
Osho's Commentary
First: even the wise call him pandit.
The ignorant call anyone a pandit. The ignorant call him a pandit who has gathered many pieces of information. The ignorant call him a pandit who is a connoisseur of scripture. The ignorant call him a pandit who is adept in logical thought.
The wise do not call such a one a pandit. The wise call that one pandit who, having dropped desire and resolve, comes to that pure state of consciousness where there is a direct encounter with knowing, immediate realization. The ignorant call pandit the one who keeps a storehouse of what the knowers have said. The wise call that one pandit who is not borrowed; whose contact with truth is direct, without a mediator, who has the touch of it. And this touch can be only for the one in whom desire and resolve have grown thin. Therefore it is necessary to take to heart the second point: what is the meaning of the thinning of desire and resolve?
The thinning of desire we can understand—where passions have fallen, cravings have fallen; where the notion of getting something has fallen. Much has been spoken against desire; even so, let us understand it rightly. And then, that resolve too grows thin! That will be a little harder to grasp.
Desire means: the wanting of what is not. The thinning of desire means: total contentment with what is. The wanting of what is not is desire. To be utterly fulfilled with what is is freedom from desire.
Desire means a race. Where I stand, there is no joy. Where another stands, there is joy. I must get there. And the amusing thing is that where that other stands, and where I imagine joy to be, he too wants to get somewhere else! He too is unwilling to be where he is. He too has no joy where he is. His joy too is somewhere else.
Desire means: joy is elsewhere, somewhere else. Leaving the place where you are, joy may be anywhere—but not where you are. Not where you are, not what you are. It could be anywhere on earth; beyond earth, on the moon and stars; but not where you encircle the space of your being. The state of being you are in—there, it is joyless—that is the meaning of desire.
Freedom from desire means: whether joy be anywhere or not, where you are, it is complete; what you are, there it is complete. The very summit of satiation is freedom from desire. If not an inch of you wants to move anywhere else, desire will drop.
Why do the seeds, the sprouts, the storms of desire arise? Is it because truly joy is elsewhere? Or is it because you are unacquainted with the place where you are standing?
Ask the ignorant; they will say: desire arises because happiness is somewhere else. And if you must go there, how will you go without the path of desire? Ask the wise; they will say: the whirlwinds of desire arise because you have no idea what you are, where you are. If only you came to know what you are, desire would evaporate as dew drops evaporate at sunrise.
Joshua Liebman wrote a small story. He wrote of a Jewish fakir—very harried, very afflicted. As all are. It is difficult to find a man who is not harried. I have yet to see one who is not. Householders are harried, renunciates are harried. The householder wants to reach somewhere—in a journey of wealth, a journey of fame. The renunciate too wants to reach somewhere—in a journey to the soul, to the Divine, to liberation. But the race to arrive elsewhere is on.
And the one who wants to arrive elsewhere will be tense, will be troubled. He cannot be at peace. Even if it be moksha you want, then passion is working, desire is working. Even if it be God you want, passion is working. Desire is working. Then desire has not been burned.
And the wonder is that God is met only by the one whose desire has been burned. God comes only to the one who, even if God knocks at his door, says: Rest; do not hurry; there is no haste. I am also quite at ease here! Even if moksha opens its doors, and the man can say: I am already in moksha here; there is no need for doors to open—only such a person attains moksha. God comes only towards such a one who can even say to God: Wait.
The sannyasin too is harried and hurt. Desire has changed form, desire has not changed. Desire changed the object; desire did not change. Wealth was replaced by religion; pleasure by heaven; matter by God; house by temple. The object changed, the form changed, the manner changed; desire did not change. Desire began to run after new forms and new objects. Desire remains where it is.
So long as a man wants to reach somewhere, so long as he has a goal, he is not outside desire. As long as there is an objective, he is not outside desire.
Liebman’s fakir is harried! I said: the renunciate too is harried; very sorrowful, very pained. A life spent praying, and still no news from heaven! A life spent with folded hands at the Lord’s door, and the hands are still empty!
One night, as he fell asleep, that old fakir said to God: Enough now! How long must I pray? How much more must I worship? And for how long am I to call you? I am tired now. Until now I asked you for happiness; now I do not ask you for happiness. I only ask this much now: at least give my sorrows to someone else, and give someone else’s sorrows to me—it will do. There is no man more miserable on this earth than I.
Everyone feels that no one is more miserable than himself. Why? There are reasons. We see the thorns of sorrow in our own heart. The thorns in others’ hearts we cannot see. We have no access to others’ hearts. We only see faces.
And there is nothing more deceptive than faces. The face is a facade, a deception. The face is manufactured. Original faces are rare; mostly they are painted. An original face is rarely found—once in a Krishna, once in a Buddha; a face that is truly their own. Otherwise faces are prepared. Prepared to be shown. Masks. Each person keeps many faces at hand; whichever is needed, he puts on.
We see the other’s face; in the world we see smiles. But we do not see hearts. If we did, there would be heaps of tears. The truth is, people smile only to conceal the tears within.
Faces appear so cheerful, so fresh! Hearts are utterly stale. Do not be deceived by what appears on faces. They are like drawing rooms in houses. The drawing room exists for those who come from outside; it is not for living. The people of the house do not live there. They only appear there. When guests come, they appear in the drawing room. They live in other parts of the house, they appear in the drawing room! Faces are drawing rooms.
That fakir too was deceived. He saw people’s faces. He saw: people laugh, they smile. When I look within, there is nothing but sorrow. So he said to God: Leave aside the fuss of giving me happiness. I am even willing for this—give me someone else’s sorrow. Give my sorrow to someone else. Then he fell asleep.
At night he dreamt that a voice resounded from the sky: let everyone tie up his sorrows in a bundle and reach the town’s central hall. The fakir thought: My prayer has been heard. He tied up his sorrows, tied his bundle, and ran. On the way he saw the whole village running with their bundles. He looked at the bundles; he was a little alarmed. Not a single bundle appeared smaller than his. But the bundles were closed and the sorrows inside. Perhaps the sorrows might be more bearable.
The unfamiliar too has its attraction. What you do not know has its allure. A man tires even of his own pleasures; even others’ sorrows have their attraction. Living with them, you tire even of your pleasures. The truth is, pleasure brings boredom more than sorrow does. You do not see sorrowful people bored; you see the “happy” bored—board!
He thought: Good. No harm. At least in these bundles there will be new kinds of sorrows. Even the exchange of sorrow gives great relief.
This is what we often do—we keep changing. We drop one sorrow and pick up another. We divorce one, we marry another. We leave one sorrow and wed a second. In the interval where one sorrow is taken off and the next is put on, that small transition brings a little respite; even that small respite gives enough pleasure.
He thought: Let me exchange.
They reached the hall. Then another voice rang out: Hang your bundles on the pegs in the hall. All ran and hung their bundles. They hurried so that the pegs might not run out; so that their bundles might not remain in their own hands. There was great haste. But the pegs were enough and everyone’s bundles were hung.
Then the voice resounded: Now whoever wants may choose any bundle. The fakir ran swiftly. But you will be surprised—he did not run to pick up someone else’s bundle; he ran to pick up his own. Because when the bundles were lifted off heads and hung on pegs, and their sorrows began to peep out from within, he panicked that someone might pick up his bundle. He rushed and quickly took up his own lest someone else take it and he be ensnared.
When he hung his bundle, he realized: they are sorrows, yes; but they are mine, familiar. By long acquaintance he has grown accustomed to them. Who knows what unfamiliar sorrows might bring! And the other bundles looked long and large. His own seemed the smallest in the hall.
Taking up his bundle, the fakir felt somewhat satisfied; he looked around—and was astonished: everyone had picked up his own bundle! He even asked them: Why not exchange? You ran so fast. They said: Our own bundle looked smaller!
Faces come off. Hearts become visible, and then this is how it is.
We rush towards the other because it appears the other is happy and we are miserable. This is the seed of desire. We want to become like the other because it seems the other is happy, we are unhappy. This is the seed of desire.
Ask the ignorant and they will say: no, happiness is elsewhere; hence we run. Ask the wise and they will say: you run because you do not know who you are where you are.
Only the one who dives within, who knows a little of Atman, can be free of desire. Otherwise he cannot. Either Atman is known and desire vanishes, or desire vanishes and Atman is known. Two faces of the same coin.
The second point is even more difficult. Krishna says: resolve too…
Sankalpa means will-power. Drop resolve too. Ordinarily, if you ask thinkers like Carlyle, they will say: resolve is life-breath. If will goes, if you become will-less, without resolve, you will become impotent, a cleave. Nothing will remain to you.
But Krishna says: resolve too…
What is the use of resolve? So long as there is desire, there is use. When desire is not, there is no use for resolve. So long as wishes are to be fulfilled, will is needed. When there is no wish, what will you do with will? It will become a burden. Drop that too.
We need will because desires are to be fulfilled; for running, the legs need strength. To fulfill desire, strength is needed to reach the goal. That very strength is resolve.
We condemn the will-less: You cannot decide, you are without resolve; you cannot be firm, cannot be strong. You can do nothing. We condemn him because his desires are many and resolve is not.
If desires are many and resolve is absent, a man will go mad. For the wish to arrive is intense and the power to walk is not—he will be in great difficulty. The same difficulty that afflicts the aged with sexual desire: age has come; the body has given up; there is no strength to fulfill lust; yet the mind keeps churning sexual fantasies.
Remember: in youth sex is not so painful, because lust is there and strength is there. In old age sex hurts badly, because strength is lost; lust does not leave. Lust stands where it is.
We talk of increasing resolve, will-power, because desires must be fulfilled and without resolve they will not be. But if desires are to be dropped, then there is no need for resolve; then surrender. Otherwise that needless strength turns into a burden.
Remember: strength that is not used turns self-destructive, suicidal. Let me repeat: power that is not put to use begins to destroy its own bearer.
So Krishna is stating a very psychological truth—yet in order. He says: first let desire be thinned and gone; then resolve be thinned and gone.
If someone drops resolve before desire, he will land in great trouble—become very poor within, very mean within. If desire has gone, then it is dangerous for resolve to remain. For what will power do then? And when power cannot move outward, cannot run, when power cannot act, it begins to act within—and then it starts running inside. When power runs within, a man goes mad.
When power runs outside, he is mad too—but then he is normally mad, like everyone else. So there is not much trouble. But when power runs within, he becomes abnormally mad; extraordinarily mad. For while all run outward, he runs inside. Running within, you reach nowhere—you become like the oil-press bull, going round and round. Life becomes very difficult.
And mark this too: power has two forms. If it runs towards passions, it is creative. It creates—objects of desire, dreams, ambitions. If ambitions, passions, desires drop, power ceases to create; the power of resolve begins to destroy its own source, becomes destructive.
Hence Krishna’s second sutra is even more precious than the first: the one who drops resolve too…
He drops desires, drops resolve. He drops even this—“I have to arrive somewhere”; he drops this too—“I can arrive somewhere.” He drops this too—“there is a destination”; and drops this too—“I am a traveler!” He drops this too—“I have to pluck some far-off fruit”; and this too—“I can pluck and bring it back.”
Such a one, desireless and empty of resolve, becomes available to knowing. Why? Why does such a person become available to knowledge whom even the wise call pandit?
Because that person becomes, like a mirror, limpid and still. Have you seen a lake? When waves are moving, the lake cannot become a mirror. But if no waves move upon it—if it becomes quiet; does not run, does not move—stops; becomes still; goes into silence, into rest—then it becomes a mirror. Then its surface becomes a mirror. Then the moon and stars are reflected within. Then the sun of the sky is mirrored there. The whole sky is held by the small lake. The infinite sky—vast, without boundary—is reflected in the small chest of a lake.
Exactly so. When on the mind-lake there are no waves of passion, and no storm of desire, and when the mind is not shaken by power circling within, then the mind, like a lake, has become silent, still. In that stillness it becomes a mirror. In that mirror the vast Divine is reflected even in the small heart of a man; a face-to-face happens. God is vast; we are very small. The lake is small; the sky is enormous!
Yesterday a Muslim sister said to me: When I read in the Qur’an, Allahu Akbar—God is great—I could not understand what it means.
Truly, God is great. Very great. Whatever we can conceive, whatever we can think—He is always greater than that. Great does not mean we have measured Him to be so much. Great means our measuring is rendered useless.
Remember, great does not mean we have measured—measured and found big. Rather, we measured and found that no measurement works: too great! Allahu Akbar—so great! All our measures are futile. How will the One who is so great have an encounter with this little heart of man?
Have you seen: even a small mirror can host a vast encounter. The tremendous sun is reflected in a small mirror. The mirror is still great then. A tiny eye can hold Gaurishankar, the Everest. The vast Everest is caught by a small eye. Granted it is vast, and the eye is tiny; yet the capacity to reflect is infinite—the capacity to reflect. The eye is small, but the capacity to reflect is boundless. Therefore the eye is not small in that sense. In one sense Everest is the lesser. In one sense, Everest is reduced!
In one sense, before the heart of the devotee, God is the lesser. In this sense: the Infinite is vast, yet He is wholly reflected in the devotee’s small heart. The infinite is wholly held.
But that heart must be silent, still, emptied of passion and resolve. And then even the wise—the ones who know—call such a one pandit. Mark how precious Krishna’s condition is. Because if those who do not know call someone pandit, it has no value. None at all.
What value can it have when the unknowing call someone pandit? They call pandit the one who seems to know more than they do. The difference is quantitative—between one who does not know and one who knows more. You have read two books; he has read ten. You have done two classes; he has done ten. You have a primary certificate; he has a university one. But the difference is of quantity, not of quality. Of measure, not of essence.
But when one comes to know God, it is not a higher certificate compared to a lower certificate. It is not a PhD compared to a primary degree. It is not a degree at all.
Our word for degree is very telling—upadhi. Upadhi also means disease. In truth, the degree-holder, the upadhi-burdened, is sick. Because all degrees only make the ego heavier. All degrees and titles only accelerate desire and passion. All upadhis whip resolve into more running.
No, the one whom even the wise call pandit is free of upadhi. Degree-less. He has no title. He carries no certificate of knowing. He himself is the certificate of knowing. His own eyes are the testimony. The tones rising from his heart are testimony. His very skin, his rising and sitting, are testimony.
A fakir, Rinzai, was once visited by the emperor of Japan. The emperor asked: How can I know that you have known? The fakir said: Look at me—look at my rising, my sitting, my speaking, my silence, my eyes, my wakefulness, my sleep—look at me. The emperor said: What will come of looking at you? Is there no other proof? The fakir said: There is no other proof. I am the proof. If I have known, you will see His rising in my rising. If I have known, you will find His eyes seeing in my seeing. If I have known, when I clasp you to my heart you will hear His heartbeat in mine. There is no other proof. And if you cannot recognize this, there is no other way. I cannot produce witnesses. I myself am the witness. If I cannot be, then there is no way.
Krishna says: Even the wise call him pandit.
The ignorant call anyone pandit. Among the blind, even the one-eyed is king! No, that has no value.
Remember, this final utterance divides pandits into two categories. One, those whose knowledge is in quantity—a measure. But they are no more than computers. Their answers are tied up, memorized. Not their own. The answers belong to someone else—they only repeat. They are brokers, no more. The answers may be of the Upanishads, or of Buddha, or of Krishna, or of Mahavira. They are not their own, therefore not authentic. When someone speaks from himself—then! Knowing—then!
This world would be much more harmonious if these second-rate pandits were fewer. It would be blissful if they were not. The one who does not know, speaking like the knower, causes great harm.
The one who knows, even if he remains silent, benefits. The one who does not know—if he speaks, he harms. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, people do not know; they only know what is said by the knowers. Not even secondhand—passed through a thousand hands. All has rotted. The ignorant call them pandit.
But the wise call that one pandit who has met face-to-face, who has encountered; between whose heart and the Divine heart no veil remains; all veils have fallen. Whose heart has touched the Divine heart; who has looked into God’s eyes and has let God look into his own; who has met the sky like a silent lake—that one alone, that alone, can be called pandit.
Tyaktvā karma-phalāsaṅgaṃ nitya-tṛpto nirāśrayaḥ.
Karmaṇy abhipravṛtto ’pi naiva kiñcit karoti saḥ. 20.
And the man who, free of worldly supports, is ever fulfilled in the supreme bliss of the Divine—he, having abandoned attachment to the fruits of action and the conceit of doership, even while engaging well in action, in truth does nothing.
And such a man, such a person in that state of consciousness, does not rejoice in the props of the world. His joy has its source only in the Divine. He is not happy because of the world. He is happiness—without cause. As far as the world is concerned—without cause.
If someone asks Ramakrishna, Why are you dancing? he will not be able to give any worldly reason. He will not say: I have won the lottery. He will not say: Fame has come to me. He will not say: Many have begun to revere me.
If you ask Kabir: Why are you so intoxicated? Where does this ecstasy come from? He will be unable to give worldly reasons.
Our ecstasy is always caused, conditional. It has a condition. A son is born in the house—there are bands and drums. Wealth has come—garlands are hung. Our happiness comes from outside us. Hence it takes no time for it to turn into sorrow. Not long. Any happiness that leans on the world cannot last beyond a moment. Because the world does not last beyond a moment. Whatever is world-dependent is momentary.
Like a leaf of a tree trembling in a gust of wind. That leaf cannot remain in one position for more than a moment, because the wind itself does not remain in one state for more than a moment. By then it has moved on. A wave that rises in the river, raised by a gust of wind, cannot last beyond a moment because the gust itself does not last.
The world is momentary. There, all is momentary. The happiness that leans on it does not last beyond a moment. No sooner it comes than it is gone. The distance between coming and going is very small.
I was looking at two lines by a poet; I found them very charming. A slight spacing changes the meaning. The first line: Spring has arrived. The second: Spring has, gone. The first: Spring has arrived—spring has come. The second breaks “has come” into two—“has, gone.” Just that gap—has come joy; has, gone joy. You do not even recognize the “has come” when the second line has already happened. The truth is, the moment we recognize that happiness has come, it has already gone. Just a momentary tune plays and passes.
Krishna says: the joy of such a man is not world-dependent.
His bliss is unleaning, unconditional, without cause. Such a man’s joy does not come from somewhere—so it cannot go anywhere. Its source is Brahman, the Divine—Brahman, meaning from the Self itself. The springs rise from his own depths. His joy comes from his own interior. Then it is never lost, because Brahman is not momentary.
The world is momentary, hence world-born joy is momentary. Brahman is eternal. Therefore one whose sources are joined to Brahman—his joy is eternal; but causeless. You will not know when such a person will begin to laugh, when he will begin to dance, when tears of bliss will burst forth. His sources are within; they gush without cause. And what he gains from within, he never loses.
There are two kinds of supports in existence: leaning on the other; and leaning on oneself—or supportless. The happiness that comes from leaning on the other is another name for sorrow, another face of sorrow. Lift its veil and you will find sorrow. The second is self-sourced—or say, support-free. Better even a self-sourced sorrow than an other-sourced happiness; though, truth be told, self-sourced sorrow does not exist. I say it only for emphasis. Lift its veil and you will find joy.
This self-sourced happiness is what Krishna speaks of here. The one whose bliss is not world-dependent; whose mind-lake is not stirred by the gusts of the world; who does not dance to the flute of the world—that man, though he acts, does not gather the conceit of action.
How could he! Do you know when conceit in action arises? When you succeed at extracting happiness from others. And conceit is hurt, tormented, dragged in dust when you fail to extract happiness from others; you squeeze for happiness and sorrow is what is squeezed out.
The conceit of action is the conceit of success. Success is conceit. Success in what? In extracting happiness from the other. All successes are successes in extracting happiness from others. When you succeed, pride swells; you puff up like a rubber balloon full of air. The poor balloon does not know that swelling is the road to bursting. The more it swells, the nearer the burst.
But while swelling, who knows that the road is towards bursting! While swelling, the mind fills with delight: May more air be pumped in; may I swell more; may more successes be mine; may I swell more!
We do not know that swelling is only the path to bursting. Success is ultimately the gate to failure. Whoever succeeds will fail. Whoever is happy will be unhappy. Whoever fills with pride—today or tomorrow will burst and be punctured. And when pride is punctured, it is as if hell falls upon you from all sides. Naturally, when pride swells, it feels as if heaven rains from all sides.
Such a man, Krishna says, does not fill with the conceit of action. He cannot; because he becomes unrelated to the other. This is delightful and worth pondering.
We often relate conceit to the self. Conceit is always related to the other. We even call it self-respect. We think it belongs to the self. But conceit is not of the self. It is a thing of the other, other-oriented. Hence it is difficult to accumulate conceit alone. Conceit cannot exist alone. It is other-oriented. The other is required.
So you will have noticed: walking alone on a path, you walk in one way. On a deserted road you walk one way. If someone appears on the path, your spine straightens. Another appears and stiffness comes. The moment you see the other, you stiffen! The other’s presence immediately awakens an “I” within. The other’s presence produces the ego within. If the other folds his hands to you, the balloon of pride swells. If the other also walks stiffly past without folding hands, the balloon shrinks. All is dependent on the other. If the other is such that you are compelled to fold your hands to him, there is great pain.
This pride is other-dependent—its pleasure and its pain too.
The one who becomes related to himself—to his own source, to Brahman, to existence—his pride cannot stand. Pride is lost. The one who is himself has no pride. The one who is not himself—only a sum of what others think; a heap of public opinion; who has gathered newspaper clippings about himself—what this paper printed about him; what the neighbors say; what the village says; what others say—who stands on others’ opinions—such a person inflates pride. When it inflates, there is a certain relish.
Relish like scratching an itch. No other relish. The relish of scratching. It feels very good, very sweet. But he does not know that the very nails which bring sweetness will draw blood. Those nails that bring sweetness will soon turn poisonous. He does not know that those nails that bring relish and sweetness will soon become septic. He does not know; he keeps scratching. The more he scratches, the more sweetness he feels; the more the itch grows. The itch grows and he must scratch. Itch too has its pleasures.
The pleasure of ego, the pleasure of pride, is the pleasure of an itch. Very sick, very diseased—but there.
Krishna says: such a man does not swell with the conceit of action. He cannot. He has no pride left to be inflated. The balloon itself has been lost, into which pride could be filled.
Such a man, even while doing, is a non-doer. Such a man, while acting, is as if not acting. Such a man, doing everything, stands outside doing. For such a man the world of action becomes a world of acting—action becomes acting.
He does all—and when evening comes, he drops into sleep as one shakes off the dust of the day from one’s clothes. He drops what was done and sleeps. In the morning, he rises fresh. Fresh; not bound by the weight of yesterday’s acts; not pressed by the lines of yesterday. Not soiled by yesterday’s dust—fresh again.
In truth, even “yesterday” is too far. Each moment, such a man stands outside the past. Each moment he steps out of the gone moment and its deed. Nothing sticks to him; all bids farewell. Because there is no ego to cause sticking. The glue is not there on which acts adhere and a doer is fabricated. Such a man, while doing, is non-doing. And while not doing, he is doing.
Such a man is exactly as Kabir said: “With great care I wore the sheet, with great care I wore.” Care—what a lovely word—jatan. With great alertness, great skill, he wore the sheet of life; and “as it was, I returned it the same.”
Kabir said at death: With great care I wore the sheet of life—and as it was, so I returned it. Not a single line smudged. No line of experience, of doing, no blot or stain remained on the sheet. “Jyon ki tyon dhar dihini chadariya”—I returned the sheet exactly as it was.
Such a man, doing everything, does not do. He hands the sheet back to God exactly as it was: Hold! As you gave, I return it the same.
This state of non-doing amidst doing is of great care—great awareness, great witness-consciousness. Where it matures, life is attained. Where it does not, we live only in deception and in name.
Nirāśīr yata-cittātmā tyakta-sarva-parigrahaḥ.
Śārīraṃ kevalaṃ karma kurvan nāpnoti kilbiṣam. 21.
One who has mastered his inner instrument and body, who has renounced all objects of indulgence—such a hope-less man, performing only the actions necessary for the body, does not incur sin.
He who has dropped hope, expectation, future, the hankering for fruit; who has dropped pride; who has dropped the obsession to collect reflections of himself in others’ eyes—such a one performs the actions necessary for the body. Hunger comes—he eats. Sleep comes—he sleeps. Cold comes—he clothes himself. Heat comes—he puts garments aside. He does what is necessary for the body, and yet does not become bound by karma.
Mahavira rises and walks, just as anyone else rises and walks. Buddha eats, just as anyone else eats. Krishna wears clothes, just as anyone else does. And yet not exactly so; there is a basic difference. Not exactly the same; there is a difference in the depths—and a great one. See the difference within.
Ordinarily, when a man eats, he does not only eat. While eating, he does a thousand other things.
Observe yourself while eating. You do not just eat; while eating, your mind does a thousand things. You may be at the shop, in the office, in the market, in the temple; your plate is before you and simultaneously you are at the shop. And then, by reversal, you will be at the shop and simultaneously at the plate.
Ordinarily, while eating, we do not only eat; we do a thousand other things. But when one like Krishna, Buddha, or Mahavira eats, then he only eats. He does nothing else. First understand this difference clearly. It is deep. It is not visible on the surface; look within and you will see it.
Why do we, while eating, do twenty-five other things in the mind? Because there is desire. The body performs the act of eating; desire weaves its webs. Eating happens automatically, mechanically, like a machine. Not consciously; in unconsciousness. You are not needed at all. You can be wherever—in the shop, in the bazaar; the hand will keep putting food into the mouth; the tongue will push it inside; the stomach will digest it—mechanically. Your presence is not there.
When one like Krishna or Buddha does something, that is all he does. He is wholly present. His total presence is there. This difference is deep, and it has deep consequences. What consequences?
He who is wholly present while eating will never be able to overeat. He will not eat less, nor more. He who is not present while eating is unlikely to be able to take right food. He will either eat too little or too much. If desire is running fast, if it is in a hurry to run, he will eat less—or too much in too little time, which is also dangerous. And he will indeed eat more. Why?
The body is blind; it has no eyes of its own. To leave the work to the body is to leave it in blind hands. The body is mechanical, habitual. You eat at eleven every day. Even if hunger is not there, the body says it is hungry. If someone pushes the clock ahead or behind and it shows eleven while it is ten, the moment you see the clock, the body says, Hunger! It is not eleven.
Hunger at eleven is a habit. If you do not eat for one hour, people say hunger dies. If hunger were authentic, it should increase, not die. It was not hunger at all, only a habitual trick of the body: every twenty-four hours you put things in the belly; after twenty-four hours it signals: Put them in; time is up. Like a blind machine, it gives notice. And then: as much as yesterday.
Yesterday’s need may have been different; today’s may be otherwise. Needs change daily. In childhood needs differ; in youth, different; in old age, different.
The habit of youth eating does not leave in old age. The body needs less, but the body, from old habit, keeps eating as much. So the food that helped in youth hurts in old age, for food should lessen. With age, it should go on decreasing.
But who will keep such awareness? The one who is never present—he is at the shop, in the market; in some other village; somewhere or other—only not at the plate.
When one like Krishna or Buddha eats, he only eats. Hence wrong food never happens. Wrong binds; right frees. Whatever is right never becomes bondage; whatever deviates even a little becomes bondage.
Such a wakeful man performs the body’s actions as necessary and with awareness; he is not bound.
One more point: when we act with awareness, we use things. When we act in unconsciousness, things use us.
Notice: Do you eat things, or do things force themselves into you? The belly is full and sweets are set before you. You are under the illusion that you are putting things inside. If things had a tongue, they would say: We are forcing you to put us in; we are going in. And because we want to enter you, we are using you to go in.
Those acts bind us in which we are compelled. Those acts do not bind us in which we are freely willing. The food you have eaten does not bind you. The food that compelled you, binds you. The sleep you slept does not bind you; the sleep you fell into, that sleep binds you.
There was a Zen fakir—Bokuju. Someone asked him: What is your sadhana? Bokuju said: My sadhana? I have none. When sleep comes, I go to sleep. When sleep breaks, I get up. When hunger comes, I eat. When hunger does not come, I remain fasting. The man said: Stop this nonsense! Is that any sadhana? We do the same!
Bokuju said: The day you can truly do this, you will have no need to come ask me. The day you can do this, I will come to ask you. The man said: But no, admit it—we do the same.
He did not understand Bokuju’s point.
I have heard of another fakir. He was speaking in a temple when a man stood up and said: Stop this talk! My guru would stand on one bank of a river and his disciples on the other; a furlong apart. The disciples would hold a canvas, and from this bank the guru would write with his pen—and the writing would appear over there on the canvas. Can you do such a miracle? The fakir said: No; we do not do such small tricks. Then what miracle can you do? he asked. He said: Only one—that when sleep comes, I sleep; and when hunger comes, I eat. The man said: Is that a miracle?
But Krishna is speaking of precisely this miracle. It is a miracle—and a great one. The other tricks even a street performer can do. But this other one is the great miracle.
He who completes the body’s necessary actions with awareness, with witnessing, rightly—he does not fall into bondage. He is free even while doing. Nothing binds him.
Remember: excess binds—the extreme is the bondage. The middle is the freedom. But only one filled with great awareness can stay in the middle—with care, with jatan. Only the one filled with great alertness can remain in the middle. The moment he slips, excess begins.
Either a man overeats, or he fasts. Those who overeat often go on fasts. They have to. Wherever there is overeating, a cult of fasting arises. In poor societies fasting does not catch on. In rich societies it does.
Today in America the cult of fasting is strong. Overfeeding is everywhere; so fasting will spread. A man eats and eats, five times a day—then he must fast. And the one who fasts begins to eat with a vengeance after breaking the fast.
Excess always converts into excess. So what does the man who fasts do while fasting? He thinks what he will eat after breaking the fast. He thinks of food more than he ever did. During the fast he becomes a master of cookery! His whole relish circles around food. One excess to another! When he overeats and is vexed, he takes up fasting. But he never settles in the middle.
The man Krishna speaks of neither overeats nor under-eats. He does only what is necessary. The necessary never binds; the unnecessary binds.
Who will determine what is necessary? No one else can. I cannot tell you what is necessary for you. For one man three hours of sleep may be necessary; for another, six hours. The one with three hours will call the six-hour man tamasic. If the six-hour man is weak, he will take himself to be tamasic and try to sleep only three. If strong, he will say to the three-hour man: You have insomnia; go get treatment. If the three-hour man is weak, he will go to the doctor for tranquilizers; if strong, he will say: I am a seeker; I sleep three hours—because Krishna says in the Gita, “Yā niśā sarva-bhūtānāṃ tasyāṃ jāgarti saṃyamī”—when all are asleep, the disciplined one is awake; therefore I keep awake at night.
There can be no fixed rule. Each person’s need differs—so much that it defies accounting. With age the need changes; with work it changes; with rest it changes; with diet it changes; with the daily state of mind it changes. Even one man cannot fix it for himself: I slept six hours today; I will sleep six tomorrow too.
Tomorrow’s need will be decided tomorrow. Today’s food may not be there tomorrow. If you go hungry, sleep will shorten; when there is food in the stomach, sleep must lengthen to digest. If heavy-to-digest food is in the belly, sleep lengthens. If light food is there, sleep shortens. If you dug ditches the whole day, sleep grows long. If you sat in an armchair and rested, sleep becomes short.
Therefore the one who lives with awareness lives each day in what is necessary. He goes on cutting the unnecessary; it falls away by itself. In an aware mind the unnecessary drops of its own accord.
The unnecessary binds; necessary actions do not. Krishna speaks rightly: such a one performs what is necessary for the body. Necessary bodily acts do not bind. The unnecessary drops. With the unnecessary, the chains drop too.