Jeevan Darshan #5

My beloved Atman!
I would like to begin with a small incident.
An elderly but unmarried woman, frightened by loneliness, weary of living alone, bought herself a parrot. The parrot was very talkative, very clever and intelligent. It knew beautiful verses from the scriptures by heart, had wise sayings memorized. It could recite bhajans. The old woman was delighted; she had found a companion for her solitude. But after a few days a defect showed up in that parrot. When there was no one in the house and its mistress was alone, it would sing hymns and kirtans, recite sayings, use sweet words and voice. But whenever guests arrived, the parrot would change completely. It would start singing film songs and whistling, and at times even hurl obscene abuses.
The woman was very upset. Yet she had grown fond of the parrot. And in private he was a great companion. But whenever someone came to the house, he would utter such rude things that the woman would be thrown into embarrassment and distress.
That parrot was a parrot after all; a man would never do such a thing. A man does just the opposite: he sings film songs in private and chants bhajans in front of everyone. But the parrot, finally, was no great intellect. That mad creature sang hymns when alone, and in public sang film songs, whistled, and spoke vulgar words.
The woman panicked. What to do? She went to the pastor of her church. After all, the pastor’s business was precisely this: reforming people, making their lives good, purifying their conduct. She thought, if he purifies the lives of thousands, can he not change even a parrot’s life?
She went and requested the pastor: my parrot has a bad habit, can you not change it?
The pastor had no knowledge about parrots. But preachers rarely agree to accept their ignorance. He would not either. He said, 'Why, what difficulty is there? I have corrected hundreds of parrots.' Though it was in fact the first parrot he had ever dealt with. He lay awake all night—what to do, what not to do? And then an idea came to him: he himself had a parrot. Because it lived with a church pastor, it had memorized as many sermons as the pastor gave. And since there were constant hymns and bhajans and good talk in the church, that parrot had learned them too. It was a very religious parrot. The pastor thought, 'I will not be able to explain things to that spoiled parrot; but would it not be good if I left my parrot with him for a few days? This religious parrot will set the irreligious one right.'
He took his parrot to the woman’s house the next day. He said, 'I too have a female parrot. She is very religious. Apart from continuous discussion of religion she has no interest in anything else. Her prayers are so heartfelt that listeners come to tears. Her whole life is absorbed in prayer. So I will leave this female parrot with your parrot. In a week or two she will bring about a change of heart in him.'
He left his female parrot there. The two were shut in the same cage. The spoiled parrot stared for a while, stunned by the stranger. Then he extended a friendly hand. A little conversation followed. They became friends. And naturally, after friendship, he also invited love. He wove a net of love around the female parrot. But he was frightened at heart, for the female parrot was religious.
Religious people are very afraid of love. That parrot too was afraid: who knows if this invitation toward love would be accepted? But it was necessary to try. He tried. He danced, he leapt, he sang songs. In the end, he asked, lest all these antics might be angering her: he said to the female parrot, 'Do my songs and my invitation of love not anger you? For I have heard you are absorbed day and night in prayers.' The female parrot said, 'You are mad—what do you think I was praying for? What do you think I was praying for? To get you!'
From the next day the female parrot stopped praying. And the spoiled parrot stopped abusing. He too had been looking for a wife and was therefore abusing in anger. And the female parrot was looking for a husband and was therefore praying. Those prayers and those abuses had the same meaning; there was no difference between them.
I narrate this incident to say: if the inner being of a person does not change, then there is no difference between his abuses and his prayers. There is no difference between his going to the temple, his going to Shiv-alaya, and his going to the tavern. If the human heart does not change, then whatever he does, behind the doing the same petty ambitions, desires, and lusts are at work. On the surface the form changes, the manner changes, the clothes change—but inside, the inner story remains the same.
That is why I told this story. The two things appear different—one parrot’s abusing and another parrot’s praying seem very different. But it will seem different only to those who do not know. Those who look deeply will find that the longing and the lust in their inner being is one and the same.
Nothing happens by changing the outer conduct of man. Nor does anything happen by changing his words. Nor by changing his clothes and places. What needs to change is the inner soul of man.
But for thousands of years we have been so engaged in changing words, in changing acts, in changing clothes, that we have forgotten that changing these things brings no change, no revolution. And we have wandered so much in this changing, changing, that today it does not even occur to us that besides clothes and words and actions, is there anything else within to be changed? Is there any consciousness? Is there an Atman to be transformed? In these last three days I have spoken to you in this very regard.
He who hides himself behind garments is self-deceived—self-deception—he is cheating himself. And we are all participants in this great, this great madness.
Tonight I want to tell you a few formulas for changing the inner being.
On the first night I told you: it is necessary to know the facts of life, the naked facts. Because without knowing them, no science of transforming life can be understood.
On the second night I said: the capacity to think must be developed. A blind man cannot seek truth. The eye of thought—alertness, consciousness, reflection, contemplation, awareness, watchfulness—is needed, so that in the dark path of life he can seek his way and his destination.
And tonight I want to tell you: until the consciousness within man is transformed from the roots, neither will the mere knowing of facts have any real meaning—indeed there may even be a danger. If we only come to know the facts while our consciousness remains untransformed, it may happen that we conclude that there is no life beyond those facts. The West has fallen into such an error.
Freud sought the facts of the human mind and found that in man’s psyche there is nothing but sex, lust. And then he derived the conclusion that to live on the plane of sex is the goal of life. There the mistake occurred. To see the fact was right; but to stop at the fact is dangerous.
Facts are to be seen so that we can transcend them, rise above them. A pit in the road is to be seen so that we can pass over it—not so that we fall into it.
So I have spoken of seeing the facts—not so that we stop in them, but so that seeing them we can cross beyond them.
And the capacity to cross will be born of thought. But thought alone is not enough. Thought alone can also be dangerous. Thought alone is dangerous because the man who only thinks and goes on thinking—activity disappears from his life; he becomes inactive. And whatever transformation there is in life is an active, creative transformation, demanding labor.
An incident comes to mind. In the last great war a young man enlisted in the army. There was a great need of soldiers. He was enlisted in great haste, without much test. No one knew that he was a thinker—because a thinker cannot be a soldier. But he got in. And on the very first day when his squad lined up for drill and the commander gave the order, 'Left turn!' all the soldiers turned left—he stood straight. The commander said, 'Did you not hear?'
He said, 'It is not my habit to do anything without thinking. Let me think a little whether to turn left or not.'
The commander was astonished. It was the first time a soldier had spoken thus. Within two or three days it became clear that he was incapable of doing anything. But he had been enlisted, so some work had to be found. They removed him from the squad and sent him to the soldiers’ mess, thinking at least there he might do a little work.
On the first day they gave him a heap of peas and said, 'Separate the big peas from the small peas.' About an hour later the commander returned. He saw the plate of peas untouched. The man sat with eyes closed, head in his hands. He shook him and asked, 'What are you doing?'
He said, 'You have thrown me into great trouble. You said put the big peas to one side, the small peas to the other; but some peas are medium—where am I to put them? I am in such confusion, in such thought. Until it is decided where the medium peas are to go, it is not proper to lay a hand on the task. So I am waiting.'
This is not the kind of thought I have spoken of. From my words people often make mistakes. Not this kind of thought! This thought becomes a disease.
That is why, till now, those who were thoughtful in the world did nothing; and those who were utterly thoughtless did a great deal. Both are dangerous. If the thoughtless do something, danger is certain. And if the thoughtful do nothing, how will life develop?
Until now, those who do not think at all have been very active. Their activity has brought harmful results. And those who were thoughtful became inactive. From their inactivity life did not flower.
What thought have I asked for?
Not that thought which gets lost in itself and ends; but that thought which becomes a path, a way for life.
There must be creative thinking. Thought is only a means. If it does not create anything in life, it is futile—nothing more than fantasy.
I have spoken of these two facts. But both are incomplete. Knowing the facts of life is incomplete. Merely thinking is incomplete. When the third thing is fulfilled, then the other two become supportive; otherwise they become obstacles.
And that third thing I have to tell you today: the formulas for a radical transformation of the inner being.
What are the formulas for radical transformation of the inner being?
The first formula, the first thing: man is not familiar with his inner being. With that which we are not familiar—how shall we change it?
How to become acquainted with the inner being?
It will surprise you to know that there is a very simple formula that leads to acquaintance with the inner being, through which one comes to know oneself, to recognize, to see, to have a vision of oneself. And that formula is: silence.
We are continuously so busy inside ourselves, so occupied, so entangled—constantly at work within—that because of that entanglement, because of that busyness, we do not get the leisure to see that which is within.
If a man’s house has caught fire and someone tells him, and he runs from the market toward his home, and I meet him on the road and greet him—do you think he will see me or hear my greeting? No. And if tomorrow I ask him, 'I met you on the road and I saluted you; did you see me? You gave no reply'—he will say, 'At that time I was in no condition to see anything; my mind was so disturbed and entangled.'
When the mind is entangled within, its capacity to see diminishes. It cannot rise beyond itself. It becomes so absorbed in its own entanglement that what lies outside it is not seen.
We are all very entangled. We are all so busy that not for a single moment, on the plane of consciousness, is there any pause—no silence, no rest. Then how will there be a meeting with oneself?
To see oneself a resting mind is needed. And the mind rests only in silence, when it becomes quiet.
But we are never quiet. All day we talk with others—or we talk within ourselves—and when night comes we talk in dreams. And this talking goes on. Hands and feet tire; at night the body sleeps; but only the body sleeps—the mind keeps working. The body rests, but the mind cannot. And gradually the mind becomes so busy, so entangled, that it loses all power to see what lies beyond that entanglement.
So the first formula in the direction of self-transformation is: silence.
Lift the eyes toward silence, take a few steps toward silence.
How to take a few steps toward silence?
If you understand what meditation is, it is very easy. Nothing is easier. In the race of twenty-four hours, a few moments, a small hour can be found for this; a small corner can be found for this, where I leave my mind utterly in peace and silence—where I give it a chance, an opportunity to become silent.
And I tell you: the mind wants to be quiet; its entire longing is to enter silence. But you do not let it—you go on driving it, go on driving it. You never give it a chance to be left alone so it can become quiet.
Who wants to run in this world? Who wants to race? The mind also does not desire to run, nor to race. But we never give it the chance to stop, to pause.
Once a dog traveled from Kashi to Delhi. Everyone travels to Delhi. The dog too had the idea: I should go to Delhi. He must have been the first dog; now dogs all over the country have the idea to go to Delhi. He undertook the journey from Kashi to Delhi. In the geography of dogs, what he had heard from the elders was that it would take at least a month to go from Kashi to Delhi. But he reached in seven days.
The dogs of Delhi were astonished. They asked, 'Amazing, astonishing—you completed in seven days a journey of a month?'
The dog said, 'I too wished to take two or three months, but the dogs in the villages along the way would not let me stop. When the dogs of one village left off chasing me, the dogs of the next village started. I got no chance to pause even for a moment. Yes, the journey finished in seven days'—and saying this, the dog died. The Delhi dogs together made his grave and put a stone over it and inscribed this story. If you go to Delhi, try to find it—you will find that grave somewhere.
We too are after our minds in the same way as the village dogs were after that dog from Kashi. We give it no chance—no opportunity, no corner—to stop, to pause, to rest. And if the mind then tires, breaks, and only halts on the day death arrives, there is no surprise. To conceal the fact that we do not give the mind a chance to rest, we have invented strange theories. We say the mind is very restless; it does not stop.
This is false—utterly false. The mind can stop this very moment; you have not given it the opportunity. You give it opportunities to run and you think about stopping it—then your arithmetic is wrong.
I implore you: the mind can stop even now. The mind longs to stop. But you go on driving it. You arrange no opportunity for it. You arrange the chance to run, not to stop. Have you ever thought about this?
It surprises me—you have probably never thought—have I ever created an opportunity for the mind to stop, to be still? And the efforts you do make to stop it are also efforts to make it run. A man goes to a temple and begins to chant the name of God—do you think this is an effort to stop? He is mad. For repeating the name of God is itself a kind of running. The mind has been given yet another task. Now it is chanting 'Ram Ram,' 'Om Om,' 'Allah Allah'—but again you have given it work. You do not fail to provide work. The rosary is thrust into the hand and the beads begin to turn.
This is changing the job, not stopping the work. You have only found a substitute. The mind was singing film songs; you gave it bhajans. Now it recites hymns. You think a difference has come? The mind’s occupation continues; it has not found rest.
I tell you: the mind labors as much in singing bhajans as it does in singing film songs—no less. Bhajans too are an occupation, a work, a busyness. The mind stretches and strains there as well, gets involved there too.
If I run toward the village tavern, will my legs undergo a different kind of strain than if I run toward the village temple? In both cases my feet will move and tire. It makes no difference where I run; the question is that I am running.
Why the mind runs is not the question; that it runs is the question.
So even those who appear to be making efforts do not give the mind any chance to halt. They invent new tricks of running. And the mind is so tired of running that if it prefers the old race to the new, there is no surprise. It is accustomed to the old race; that path is known and familiar; it is easier for it. You want to impose a new race; it has difficulty. Keep trying for a few days—then it will run the new race too. But it will not be silent, it will not be quiet.
The mind needs a chance to be empty of all work. I call such emptiness meditation. That is silence. That is the state of being silent, where the mind is doing nothing at all.
What to do? You will still ask: what to do to bring such a state? Our language will interpret even this as a kind of doing.
In Japan there was a great fakir. He had a very large monastery, a great ashram—around five hundred monks. Far, across the forested hills, the ashram spread. There was a vast central building, and small cells spread across the hillside. The emperor of Japan went to visit the ashram. The fakir took the emperor around for miles. He explained what happened in each cell—who lived where: this is the dining hall, this the bath house, this, this—the library. He took him around the whole hill and explained.
But again and again the emperor asked, 'All that I understand—but this large building in the middle...?' That was the most massive; all the rest were small huts. That building soared high, its spire visible from afar. He had come to see that building. The fakir’s talk astonished him. He kept asking, 'I understand that the fakirs bathe here; what is there to explain? In that central building—what happens?'
But whenever the central building was mentioned, it was as if the fakir did not hear. At last the entire ashram was seen, the moment of farewell came, yet he said nothing about the big building. At the door the emperor said, 'Either I am mad or you are mad! I am returning without seeing the very building I came to see. And I have never seen a man like you. Three or four times I reminded you about that building. As soon as it is mentioned you become deaf—say nothing! And you took me around all kinds of useless huts which meant nothing to me.'
The fakir said, 'Forgive me—there is a difficulty. In that building we do nothing at all. We go there and sit in the state of non-doing. You ask, what do you do there? What shall I tell you we do? Everywhere else something is done—some action: somewhere we eat, somewhere we bathe. But that building is our hall of meditation. There we do nothing. Whenever someone wants to do nothing, he goes into that building. And you ask, what do we do there? If I say we meditate, that will be a mistake—because the very idea of doing is wrong. There, we do nothing. In truth, when we are in the state of doing nothing, that state is called meditation. That is what we do there.'
Silence or meditation means: for a few moments, slipping into the state of doing nothing.
But you will say, granted we sit in a corner, in a dark nook, close our eyes, leave the body motionless—still the mind will go on doing its work. How will we stop it?
Do not commit the mistake of stopping. If you try to stop, it will never stop. Because stopping is a doing. Stopping is an effort. Stopping—again a substitute is found; a new work begins: 'I must stop.' By stopping no one has ever stopped the mind. In fact, the rule is that the more you try to stop it, the more it will move.
Why so?
If we hang a sign on this door saying, 'Do not peep in,' will anyone be able to pass without peeping? No. Such a renunciate and ascetic would be hard to find in Bombay who would pass without peeping. And if someone did pass, his life would become a misery. He would keep returning in his mind to that sign: who knows what was there? At night he would dream of standing in front of this building: 'Let me peep and see what is inside.' All his life a restlessness would keep crawling within: who knows what was there?
Prohibition becomes attraction; denial becomes invitation.
He who tries to stop the mind sets it into motion.
Do not stop. Then what will you do? Do not do anything. If the mind runs, let it run. Let it run—do nothing at all.
If we spin a cycle wheel and then remove our hand, the wheel does not stop that instant. It has momentum; it runs a while even after we remove our hand. It has caught speed. It will complete as many revolutions as power has already been given to it.
So the mind too will not stop the moment you leave it. It has momentum, of a lifetime; and those who know say—of many lives. There is power, a great capacity to run. You have supplied it. It will complete its revolutions. Do not be alarmed. Let it revolve. Sit quietly by the side of the mind, like a person sitting on the bank of a river as it flows by. The mind flows on and he sits. He is not stopping it—not moving it, not stopping it. The mind goes on; he quietly watches. He is only a witness.
As soon as you become a mere witness to your mind, in a few days you will find the mind has become still, it has stopped, its movement has ceased. And the moment the movement of the mind ceases, you begin to get a glimpse of what is hidden within the mind.
But this will not happen by turning the rosary, nor by chanting God’s name, nor by repeating a mantra, nor by trying to stop the mind. It will happen by leaving the mind in every way and remaining only a witness.
You will say, being a witness is also a doing.
No. Witnessing is not a doing; witnessing is our nature.
All day we are awake and we see people walking on the road, trees along the way, birds flying in the sky—do you make any effort to see? At night you sleep and see dreams—do you make any effort to see? When there are no dreams and sleep is very deep, in the morning you say, 'I slept very deeply.' Someone must have seen—otherwise how do you say, 'I slept deeply'? That deep sleep too was seen by a witness. When there are dreams, someone sees the dreams; when there are no dreams, in the morning you say, 'There were no dreams.' That too is seen.
All life man goes on seeing. Seeing—darshan, or witnessing—is his nature. It is not an activity.
Therefore, sit by the bank of the mind and just keep seeing. Find a corner for an hour or half an hour. Give all your time to the world—save half an hour for yourself. In the end you will find that that half hour alone proved truly saved; all the other hours were lost.
The twenty-three hours we labor at in life prove to be like lines drawn upon water—they vanish while we draw them. Like palaces built upon sand—we build and they fall. Like houses of cards—one small gust and all the dreams turn to dust. But the little time a person saves for himself and in it becomes silent and still—the wealth that is found in those moments, the kingdom, the experiences—they become the abiding treasure of life. There is life.
So the first formula for the transformation of the inner being is: silence.
He who cannot be quiet, can never change his life. Only in deep quiet, in deep silence, in deep stillness do the visions of the capacity for revolution, for self-transformation, arise within. Such vast power is felt that anything can be changed. Such a great fire becomes available that the rubbish can be burned. Before that, there can be no revolution, no transformation.
So first attend to this. You run for twenty-four hours—do not run for half an hour. You keep the mind employed twenty-four hours—leave it idle for half an hour. You are entangled twenty-four hours—be only a witness for half an hour. This is the first formula.
And whoever, in all the world, has known anything, has not known without this formula. Whatever truth, whatever beauty, whatever supreme experiences have been attained—have been attained in silence, in solitude, in peace, in meditation. So whoever longs, whoever’s being thirsts—he will have to step in the direction of silence. This is the first formula.
The second formula is equally important, equally deep, equally necessary.
On the plane of mind—silence.
On the plane of heart—love.
Let the mind become quiet, empty—and let the heart fill with love, become full. But we do not live love either. Love remains hidden in our life; we never develop it. The seeds of love never become trees. For reasons unknown, even with such a great wealth in hand, we remain poor. A single fear works which prevents love from growing in life. A single mistake works; if I tell you that mistake, perhaps the doors of love may open.
And the mistake is this: Love will never develop in the life of the person who keeps asking others for love. In his life love will never develop. He who asks for love—within him love will remain like a seed; it will never sprout.
And understand this too: in whom love has not developed—even if he goes door to door begging—he cannot receive love. Because love comes by giving, not by asking. And the more he goes on asking for love, the less love can develop within, because love develops by giving. Love unfolds through gift. If you bundle it up within yourself it rots and is destroyed.
We are all carrying bundles of our love, our safes locked. Perhaps we think that just as money needs iron safes to be protected, so does love; and so we have locked up our love. We do not know—the law of money is one thing and the law of love is another. Money is safe when locked; love dies when locked. If the man who locks money in a safe were to put flowers in the safe—what would happen? The flowers would die. The rule for flowers is different; the rule for money is different.
We treat love like property; hence it does not develop. The great wonder is: love grows by distributing it, by lavishly pouring it out. The more intensely one pours love out of one’s heart, the more the heart becomes filled with love. And we are all very stingy and miserly.
If someone is stingy with money, no great harm; but in the matter of love, miserliness proves suicidal. The one who is miserly with love—that one is irreligious. And the one who is eager to give with an open hand—that one is religious. He who keeps pouring and distributing love—that one is religious.
Let me tell a small story.
One morning a beggar stepped out of his house. It was morning; people would be getting up. And you know, beggars come to beg early in the morning. No beggar comes in the evening. Beggars learned long ago that in the morning the human heart is a little soft; by evening it has become hard. All day long anger, toil, earning, money, money—by evening the heart becomes stone. At night it sleeps a little, by chance the mind becomes a little quiet. In the morning, alms can be had; in the evening no. Beggars understood this trick long ago; so they come in the morning.
He too, at dawn, set out with his bag. As he left, he put a few grains of rice into his bag. For beggars also understand this: if there is nothing in your bag, the person at whose door you beg is very likely to refuse. But if there is some rice in the bag, the likelihood of refusal decreases. He feels someone else has given—his ego is pricked—'I must also give.' If a beggar arrives with an empty bag, refusal is easy; the neighbor also refused—what is there to fear? For man does not give because the beggar needs; man gives so that it may be known that 'I too am a giver.'
So the beggar put a few grains of rice into his bag and set out. All sensible beggars carry something from home. If any of you are present here and commit such a mistake, do not—always put something in first.
He had just reached the royal road when the first rays of the sun began to break. On one side was the sun; on the other, a golden chariot shone—the king’s. The beggar, overwhelmed with joy, began to dance. He had gone many times to the king’s door; the sentries always turned him away. He had never reached the king. He had found alms from poor homes; but never from the king’s house—the sentries would not let him in. Today the opportunity had come—an auspicious moment, a good hour; the king himself was approaching in his chariot. 'Today I will stand before the chariot,' the beggar thought, 'I will stretch out my arms and ask. After all, he is the king; even a little will be enough for my lifetime—for generations of my children. There will be no need to beg again.'
Lost in such dreams, he stood. The chariot arrived and stopped. Before he could extend his bag—life sometimes plays odd jokes—the king himself took his own bag and held it out before the beggar. The king said, 'I have come today to beg. My kingdom is threatened by a neighboring state, war-clouds gather. The astrologers have said that if I make myself so humble that I go into the city and beg from the first person I meet—then perhaps I might win the war. The astrologers said, ego defeats in war. If I become humble and beg—I might win. So I have come to beg. And you are the first person I met—and what is auspicious is that I beg from a beggar.'
You can imagine what the beggar felt. What a crisis! All his life he had asked—never given. He had no habit of giving, no thought either; no practice of hands that give, no idea of a mind that gives. Only taking, and taking, and taking. He was afraid. Another might have refused—but how to refuse a king?
His dreams vanished. His imaginations about meeting the king turned to dust. And he was afraid of losing the few grains of rice he had. The king said, 'Be quick.' He put his hand into the bag. He clenched his fist around the rice—but it opened again. So much rice to give? He had never given from his own bundle. The king said, 'Quick, anything will do.' And then he brought his fist out—somehow he had managed to bring one grain of rice, with a pounding heart, a trembling mind. He was sweating. He dropped one grain of rice into the king’s bag. His breath was held. The king climbed into his chariot and left. Dust-clouds rose; the beggar stood there. Tears came to his eyes. He had lost one grain by his own hand.
He begged all day. The wonder was that day his bag filled to the brim—never before had it filled so. But his heart was sad, his eyes heavy, his steps slow. The grief was for the grain he had given. What he had received brought no joy. Who is ever happy with what he receives? No one. But what is lost—there is certainly sorrow.
Do not laugh at that beggar. Very few have the right to laugh; most are in the very same condition. Who is happy with what he has? But what he does not have—there is surely pain. He too was an ordinary man.
He returned home with a weeping heart. His wife saw the bag full and was happy. She said, 'Today our luck has opened—never was there so much!'
He said, 'You are mad—the bag is a little empty. One grain is missing that should be here, that could have been here. Had I been a little stronger today, we could have had one grain more. Today we are poorer than we could have been rich.'
The wife did not understand. She inverted the bag. Until then he had been merely sad; but as the bag was emptied he beat his chest and cried. Among the grains that fell, one grain had turned to gold. Then he wept, 'Why did I not give all the grains? All would have turned to gold!'
I do not know whether this story is true or false. There is no need to find out. But whoever searches in life will find that the story is true.
What is given in life turns to gold.
As much love as we distribute, that much our life becomes golden. What we hoard becomes dust; what we give becomes gold. Blessed are those who become capable of giving their whole life—then their whole life becomes golden.
The second formula of the chemistry of transmuting life is: love.
And love means giving.
And love means not asking.
He who gives love will find day by day that new springs seem to burst within him, that a new sweetness begins to flow into his life, that new sources of love have appeared. Then his heart begins to be transformed.
But we all ask. We all stand at one another’s doors with folded hands—'Give love!' The wife asks the husband, 'Give love!' The husband asks the wife, 'Give love!' Children ask parents; parents ask children. Students ask teachers; teachers ask students. Everyone is asking one another, 'Give love!' And no one has the idea that love is not something to ask for—it is something to give. Give—and you will find love begins to come. Ask—and you will find all the doors for love’s coming are closed.
The first formula: silence.
The second formula: love.
Live moment to moment, breath to breath, as if life were a process of showering love.
Blavatsky came to India. She traveled to many lands. Everywhere people noticed a strange habit in her: a bag always hung from her shoulder. Sitting in a bus, in a train, she would put her hand into the bag and throw something outside. Everywhere, people asked, 'What is in this bag? What do you keep throwing?' People would snatch the bag and look—she carried flower seeds. Sitting in the train, she would throw flower seeds along the roadside. People said, 'You are mad! Who knows if flowers will ever come out of these seeds?'
She would say, 'Do not worry about that—God worries about that. If there are seeds, flowers can arise.'
People said, 'Who knows whether you will ever pass this way again to see your flowers?'
She would say, 'It makes no difference—someone will see those flowers, someone will be delighted by them. Just the imagination of this fills my heart with joy. I see the flowers that will bloom, and the eyes that will be happy seeing them. And my life—by distributing these flowers—has become so full of joy, so fragrant, beyond measure.'
I am not saying that from tomorrow you should hang bags and throw flower seeds. No—Bombay’s roads are too hard; here it is difficult for seeds to sprout. Where human hearts grow hard, the roads also grow hard. Here it is very difficult.
But a human mind is never so hard that seeds of love cannot be sown. And no city’s roads are so hard that flowers of love cannot bloom upon love’s seeds—they surely will. Do not hang a bag; but from the bag of your heart throw as many flowers and seeds of love as you can. Nothing needs to be spent.
There is an English saying: 'It costs nothing to be kind, to be loving.' Nothing needs to be spent to be loving, to be kind. Whatever else you distribute will cost something. But in distributing love, nothing needs to be spent. And what comes is so priceless it cannot be measured. Getting up and sitting down, walking and talking, let life be an expansion of love. He who begins to live thus is religious; he is in the temple; he is near Paramatma; he is praying.
But we meet another as if we were meeting an enemy. We look at others as if we were seeing foes. Even when we shake hands with a friend, it is as if two corpses were touching. There is no love, no wave; within there is no quiver, the heart is not eager to meet, there is no embrace. In those hands, in those eyes, there is no touch, no wish to reach the other’s very life.
Look once into someone’s eyes, filled with love, and it will seem as if two inner beings have touched. Place your hand upon someone’s hand and let the love of your life flow—you will feel as if an electric current has passed. Life gives you opportunities all day long to be loving—and we remain hard, miserly. Then we go to temples to worship, then we read scriptures, then we attend satsang. All the satsangs, all the temples, all the worship—worth two pennies.
In the life of the man whose heart is without love there is no path to Paramatma, no door.
Live filled with love—let breath become love—and surely life will change and a new man will be born. This is the second formula.
And the third and last formula…
The first formula: a mind filled with silence.
The second: a heart filled with love.
And the third: a personality empty of ego.
We all live centered in 'I'—the ego. We all live—'I.' Around this center we weave our whole life. And this center is so false that if the life woven upon it later proves to be a dream, there is no surprise. This 'I' is not there at all. The 'I' is the greatest lie in the world—and we live by it, walk by it, labor and toil by it.
Ask anyone: why are you living, why doing, why moving? You will find it is to nourish his 'I.' A journey goes on—unceasingly. And this 'I' is such a falsehood, beyond measure.
A sannyasin from India, fourteen hundred years ago, went to China. The emperor came to him and said, 'I have tried all ways to fill my 'I.' As far as my eyes could see, I conquered the lands. My kingdom reached to distant borders. But my 'I' found no satisfaction; my ego was not filled. When I began to grow old and became frightened—this ego I do not find being filled—I consulted sages and elders. They said, give up everything. I tried giving up everything too. Yet my ego stands where it was. I am in despair—what shall I do? Someone told me you are here; so I have come.'
The fakir said, 'Go back now. Come at four in the morning. Tomorrow either you will remain or your ego will remain. Of the two I will finish one.'
The fakir’s words were strange—but fakirs are often strange. The emperor thought, no matter. He said, 'I will come at four. Do you assure me you will end my ego?'
The fakir said, 'Certainly. But keep one thing in mind—bring your ego along, do not leave it at home. Otherwise what shall I destroy?'
The emperor was convinced the man was mad. Can an ego ever be left at home? It is intertwined with life. If there were a way to leave it, the emperor would have long since left it. He had tried every way—it did not leave. And this madman says, 'Do not leave it at home!'
But he came at four. Dark night. The fakir stood with a staff. The emperor was afraid. This man is mad—dark night, lonely hill, a staff in hand—what does he intend? What is his purpose? What is his intent?
The fakir said, 'Have you brought your ego?'
The emperor said, 'You speak strangely. The ego sits within me—how could I leave it and come?'
The fakir said, 'Good. Have you ever searched within—or are you saying without searching that the ego sits within? No harm. You have brought it—even if within. Sit, close your eyes, and search within—where is it? I stand outside with a staff. As soon as you find it, inform me.'
The emperor closed his eyes. Dark night, silence of the hill; that mad fakir with a staff stands before him; the emperor begins to search within, peering into the nooks of the mind, traveling inside—where is this 'I'? Half an hour passed. The fakir shook him: 'You have not fallen asleep, have you? You are searching, aren’t you?'
The emperor said, 'Because of your staff I cannot sleep. And I am searching. And strangely—I look everywhere and it is nowhere to be seen.'
The fakir said, 'Look once more—perhaps it is hiding in some corner.'
The emperor closed his eyes and searched again. He had come full of tension. The morning rays began to break while he sat with eyes closed. The tension vanished from his face; his face became like a calm statue, like a limpid lake. As if something within had dissolved and the news had reached his face.
The fakir asked again, 'My friend—did you find it?'
The emperor began to laugh. He touched the fakir’s feet and said, 'I go. It was not found. And I have come to know that it is not. I had not searched within till today—therefore it was. I searched—and it is not.'
Ego is like darkness. If you go with a lamp to search, you will not find it anywhere.
I have heard that once darkness lodged a complaint before God: 'The sun persecutes me terribly. From morning he chases me, without cause. No quarrel, no disagreement, no conversation—yet he chases me from morning to evening. I am exhausted, harassed. I cannot even rest at night before the rogue is again there in the morning. I do not know where to go, to whom to complain—so I have come to ask You to explain to the sun. How long will this go on? It has been going on so long—I am terrified. Had there been enmity, that would be something.'
God called the sun. Such troubles must plague God constantly—so much mischief has been made, such trouble is natural. God said to the sun, 'Why this foolishness? What harm has darkness done to you? Why do you chase it? Why harass it? You remain—and let it remain. What is wrong with co-existence? Is there any harm? Politicians everywhere speak of co-existence—everyone should live together. What is the harm? You too live together. Hindus and Muslims live together. Communist Russia and capitalist America live together. Shudra and Brahmin live together. What quarrel have you? You are neither Muslim nor Hindu, neither communist nor capitalist. Live together. There is no harm in co-existence.'
The sun stood bewildered. He said, 'I do not understand—who is this darkness? Where is it? I have never met it. Why should I trouble it? I have not even encountered it—quarrel is far off, I do not even have friendship with it. Without friendship there cannot be quarrel. Please have mercy—call it before me. I will ask its forgiveness if by mistake I have erred. And in future I will take care not to chase it.'
It is said that many thousands of years have passed. God is still trying to bring darkness before the sun. He has not managed so far. And let me tell you, however omnipotent He may be—He will never manage. The matter will remain in the files. This case cannot be settled, because the sun refuses to accept the complaint until darkness stands before him.
How can darkness be brought before the sun? It cannot. Have you ever thought why? We see daily that when a lamp is lit in the house, darkness dissolves. Have you thought why? We do not think; hence why think of this?
If one wanted to bring darkness into the house, could one tie it up in bundles and bring it? If we wanted to pour darkness into an enemy’s house, could we pack it in crates and deliver it? No. If there is darkness in the house and we want to take it out—can we take it out? No.
Darkness is not. That is why it can neither be brought nor taken away. Darkness has no being of its own. Darkness is only the absence of light, the non-presence of light—an absence. It is not the presence of something—it is the absence of something. Hence nothing can be done to darkness. But light a lamp and it is not—because it was only the non-presence of the lamp.
Ego too is like darkness. It remains until we light the lamp of inner awakening. The day we awaken and search within, it is nowhere to be found.
The third formula is: the attainment of an ego-less personality.
How will this happen?
By leaving home and hearth?
It will not. Leaving home will only breed the ego that 'I am a renunciate.'
By leaving wealth?
It will not. Abandoning wealth will strengthen the thought, 'I have kicked away so much wealth.'
By abandoning clothes and standing naked?
It will not. Clothes have their own ego; nakedness has its own. You cannot escape this way. There is one way to be free: go within and search.
And the first two formulas I have given—whoever works upon them will find it very easy to go within and search. Reflect upon them again. He who becomes silent can search within. And he who becomes filled with love—his ego dies as it is; because in the giving of love the ego dissolves.
We can love only when we are not filled with ego. When I am full of 'I,' how can I love? That very 'I' is a wall of iron, a safe, in which I lock my love. When I have to spread my love, I will have to break the wall of my ego and flow out.
So the first two formulas—silence and love—when practiced, make the third very easy. He can go within and see that there is no ego. And where there is no ego—when the mind is silent, the heart is full of love, the personality empty of ego—that very moment becomes the moment of the attainment of Paramatma. That becomes the moment of the attainment of truth. That becomes the formula, the foundation, of the revolution of life.
If life is to be changed, it must be set in motion upon these three formulas.
Not because I say so should you set it in motion—nor should you. But think, reflect—experiment a little. It may be that within this seemingly ordinary body, within this ordinary earthly frame, the lamp that is Paramatma may be lit.
If even in one human being that lamp has ever been lit—then every human being, in every generation, in every age, has the right to attain it. If even one seed has sprouted and flowered—then all seeds have the right to attain it. Paramatma is present within us all. If only we could develop, see, know—that life becomes blessed and fulfilled.
May Paramatma bestow such blessedness upon all—this is my prayer at the end.
You have listened to my words with so much love and peace, with such silence—I am deeply obliged for that. And in the end, once again I bow to the Paramatma seated within each. Please accept my pranam.