Jo Ghar Bare Aapna #8

Fundamentally, it is useful for religion. But religion is the soul of a person. And when the soul changes, behavior changes on its own. If the within changes, the without inevitably follows. That change, however, is like a shadow, like an outcome. It walks behind. It is like asking: if a man runs, will only the man run or will his shadow also run? The question is of that kind. If the man runs, the shadow is bound to run. Yes, the reverse is not possible: if the shadow runs, will the man run? First, the shadow cannot run. And even if it appeared to, there is no way for the man to run after it.

So, if a person’s practical life changes, it is not necessary that his religious life has changed. It may be that in behavior he is a very good man, and inwardly not good at all; very good with others and very bad with himself; what is expressed is very good, and what remains unexpressed and suppressed within is very bad. But the reverse cannot be. If his within changes, it cannot happen that he becomes good inside and bad outside. That is impossible. For the outer personality is a shadow-personality; within is the soul.

So the fundamental result of meditation is upon the soul; but its secondary results spread over one’s entire life. The inner richness of such a person will certainly increase, and the avenues for outer richness will also open wide. Because as soon as a person becomes inwardly rich, the sense of inferiority disappears. Then, in all those outer endeavors where inferiority was creating obstacles, obstacles will no longer arise. As soon as one becomes inwardly rich, one becomes deeply assured about oneself. A trust in oneself arises as never before. The losses one incurred through self-distrust will no longer be incurred. When there is inner richness, life becomes so juicy, overflowing, fulfilled that anger and hostility cease to arise from that life; pettiness stops. The obstacles he had erected with his own hands in the outer world through pettiness and jealousy all fall away at once.

When life is enriched from within, one naturally becomes a theist. There is no other meaning to theism. In truth, one has received so much within that one has to thank even the God who is not yet known. One has received so much inwardly, without any effort of one’s own, that it has to be taken as grace. And whenever there is inner joy, the “no” does not arise in the mind; a “yes,” an acceptance toward things arises. And when a deep acceptance of the divine arises within, on all sides, then all the forces of existence become supportive. For so long as I am fighting with the world, the world will go on fighting me. The day I stop fighting with the world, that day the world too stops fighting me. And then victory is assured, in all directions, even the outer ones—because there remains no way to lose.

So meditation will change the inner mind, and its process is religious. But then the whole person will change; relationships will change. Not only will his outer conduct change, his outer attainments will also change. He will not become only a good father, or only a good husband or a good wife, a good mother; he will also become a good shopkeeper, a good businessman. Skillfulness will naturally spread through his outer life. That is why Krishna could say: yoga is skill in action. That skill in action—that efficiency in work—will be the news that inwardly someone has become greatly skillful.

So everything outside will change—but the beginning of change will be within. Outside will be the result. By trying to change the outer, nothing truly changes; only conflict with oneself is created. By changing within, not only does the inner change, everything outside changes too.

Thus meditation has worldly meanings as well, and worldly uses and benefits too—but they are secondary. And one should not begin by talking about them. If one goes into meditation for their sake, one cannot meditate. If someone thinks more money will come, or more fame will come, he cannot meditate. Although, once meditation happens, money has often come; once meditation happens, fame has often come. But meditation cannot be done for money and fame. The one who does it for money and fame is basically unqualified; for him, meditation loses its very meaning. Yes, once meditation happens, all this too may come. And if it does not come, even then it makes no difference. Then poverty itself becomes great richness; ill-fame appears as fame; defeat becomes victory. Therefore, whether it came or not is something only outsiders can tell. The one who stands within no longer even notices whether it has come or not.

Just as I am different from Patanjali—so is it. And when Patanjali needs no other source, I too need no source. And if Patanjali can be authentic, there is no obstacle to my being authentic. The delightful thing is: rather than giving proof from a man who lived five thousand years ago, it is better that I, who am present, be the proof. You can talk to me; you can ask questions. You cannot talk to Patanjali, nor can you question him.

The meditation I am speaking of—one could say—it is “mine.” But this “mine” has nothing to do with the “I.” It is “mine” only in the sense that if I were to make someone else the authority for what I say, it would not be trustworthy. “Mine” in the sense that whatever I say is from experience, not from thought. It is not collected from any scripture; it is known directly. But “mine” does not mean the egoic “I.” That mistake happens again and again. Because as long as the “I” is, the experience of meditation cannot be. As long as the “I” is, meditation cannot be experienced. So “mine” is just a makeshift word—put it in brackets. It does not have the same meaning as “my chair” or “my house.”

By “mine” I mean only this: whatever I am saying, I speak from experience. And for experience I do not need to go to any Patanjali—because no Patanjali ever needed to come to me. Therefore its source is neither in any scripture nor in any person.

But this does not mean that what I call meditation was not known to Patanjali or to Buddha. They have known it. Yet what I have known, I speak from my own knowing; it is not borrowed from theirs. If one journeys by what I call meditation, one will reach the very place where Patanjali must have reached through meditation. I am not speaking of someone who may have reached by reading Patanjali. Wherever Patanjali reached, this meditation will also take you there. Wherever Buddha reached, this meditation will also take you there.

In that sense it is not “mine” either, because it is eternal, timeless.

But there is a secret of religion: whenever it is to be attained, it must be attained anew, by oneself. Religion is not merely discovery; it is always rediscovery. In science nothing needs to be rediscovered—only discovered; it is invention. Newton discovered it; now another need not do it again. It is done; it has become everyone’s inheritance, everyone’s property. Whoever wants to go further, will go beyond Newton. There is no need to reinvent Newton’s invention.

Religion differs here from science. Whatever Patanjali discovered—whenever someone sets out to discover it again, it is rediscovery. One discovers the same thing Patanjali discovered, but discovers it afresh. For in religion, the search itself is an essential part of that which is found. The process of searching is an indispensable part of attaining. Therefore each must pass through the process again and again.

My approach is not scriptural. And I cannot understand how one can be scriptural and yet a meditator! To be a meditator while being scriptural is difficult. In fact, meditation is a very non-scriptural journey. It is not scholarship, not erudition. Patanjali can be known—through his scriptures, his sutras. But one who knows in that way, through scripture and sutra, will be caught in reflection and thought. Even if he understands Patanjali rightly, it will be through thinking; if he misunderstands, that too will be through thinking. Even if he goes to experiment with Patanjali’s sutras, that experiment will be dependent on words and on thought.

And there is a fundamental difficulty in meditation. Whenever one goes into meditation through thought, the seeds of that thought remain in the meditation. When he descends into meditation, those seeds he has held begin to project. What he has thought, the mind makes him see. What he has believed—having set out with that belief—the mind projects just that. It says: Look, Kali is standing here! Krishna is here! Christ is here! Look, the chakras have awakened! Look, the kundalini has risen! Whatever he set out believing, the mind will give him visions of it. These visions will be utterly false. This does not mean that kundalini does not exist. It means the kundalini that appeared in that experience is false. It is the mind’s delusion, the mind’s play.

There is another kundalini that does not awaken by believing. It rises only out of becoming empty—having dropped all words, all knowledge, all scriptures, all seeds of thought. Its description is not in any scripture; it cannot be—because it rises differently in each person. Therefore, if your kundalini matches exactly with the scriptures, be certain it is false. Because you are not Patanjali; what happened to Patanjali cannot happen to you in exactly the same way. In other words, a perfect match between your meditative experience and the scriptures is a very dangerous sign—it cannot be. If you pass through experience, in many places you will feel it matches, and in many places you will feel it does not. Then understand: what has awakened within you is truly yours; it is not the mind’s game.

Therefore my stance is always that no one should lean on scripture. Let the scriptures be taken away. And even what I am saying—no one should go into meditation by believing it. Because meditation means we are dropping all belief. I am included in that. For you, I too am a scripture. If Patanjali is a scripture for me, then for you I am also a scripture. If you proceed by believing me—fixing it that what I say will happen—and set out to seek that, it will happen. It will certainly happen. Because the mind’s play is wondrous. And its great secret is that the mind mints a false coin for everything; it produces a counterfeit for everything. Whatever it may be, the mind can trick you into thinking “this is happening.” It uses the power of the mind’s dreaming.

Every night we see all that is not. In the so-called meditations too, that which is not is seen. All such meditations are sabeej (seeded) meditations, in which the seed of thought is present. And that seed will blossom—the seed of thought—and spread over the mind; what you wished for will be seen, what you set out to attain will be “attained.” And yet nothing will be gained—only the mind’s play—and you will stand where you were.

For this reason too I do not wish to speak in terms of “this is Patanjali,” “this is Raja Yoga,” “this is Buddha-yoga,” what it is or is not. I want only to say: whatever I am saying, I have known it so. But for me it is knowing; for you it would become believing. And this has always been the mistake. What for one was knowing, for another became belief. But the believer imagined that his belief was also knowing. And just then, all the mischief begins.

There is no need to believe me either. The first condition of meditation is: to go without seed. There should be no seeds there; otherwise they will sprout—go seedless. Do not go carrying any thought; empty thought, become a zero. And the day such a state comes that you can say: now there is nothing in the mind—no seed left that can sprout, no imagination that can appear, no thought left that can be seen—when you stand in the ultimate emptiness, you will reach the very place where Patanjali reaches, where Buddha reaches, where anyone reaches.

But beforehand I will not give support to any scripture, because such questions arise from the very urge to cling to scripture: if Patanjali is right, let us cling to Patanjali; if Buddha is right, let us cling to Buddha; whoever is right, let us hold on to him. But you will not know who is right until you yourself know. Before knowing, none is right; after knowing, you will find all were right. But that is after knowing, not before.

In fact, the word “guidance” by itself doesn’t say anything. It tells you nothing. Two things. Guidance seems indispensable to us. But guidance can be seed-laden and it can be seedless. There can be guidance that plants thoughts, imaginations, and beliefs in your mind. And there can be guidance that strips you of all your thoughts and beliefs, takes them away from you.

So when someone says, “I will guide you,” there is great fear that he will hand you thoughts to hold on to. When someone says, “I am not a guide,” there is a possibility he will take all your thoughts away. One who says, “I am your guru,” is very likely to sit down inside your consciousness. One who says, “I am not a guru. We just happened to meet while walking on the road. You asked, ‘Where does this path go?’ I know, so I tell you, ‘It goes here.’ That’s all—no further relationship.” There isn’t even the question that someday you should come back to thank me; the matter ends right there.

If the guidance is seedless, there will be no guide there. And if the guidance carries seeds, then the guide will be very dominant. In fact, such a guide will say, “First accept the guide, then the guidance.” He will say, “First make me your guru, then initiation.” “First accept me, then knowledge.” But where the other kind—seedless guidance—is—language itself is a bother, so I have to use such expressions—the seedless guidance, the seedless teacher will say, “First of all, know that I am not a guru.” That is, decide first that you will not create the guru–disciple relationship. Decide first that my words will not become seeds for you. Decide first that you will not cling to me. Decide first that in your mind there will be no special place for me. Then we can proceed.

There will be a difference between these two.

Hence the difficulty. When someone like me says, “No guide, no guidance, no guru,” you feel troubled: “But guidance is needed!” Yet even in saying this, guidance happens—and then all the dangers of guidance are cut off. And when someone says, “Without a guru there will be no knowing,” then all the dangers of guidance positively come into being.

So the guru who is not ready to deny his gurudom loses the qualification to be a guru. The guru who first cuts down his guruness gives the qualification of being a guru. Now, this is very upside-down. But it is so. It is so. In a room, the person who keeps announcing his superiority again and again—know that his mind is inferior. Naturally; otherwise he would not announce it. And the one who sits quietly in a corner so that you hardly even notice whether he is there or not—know that his superiority is so assured that any proclamation is meaningless. This is the whole difficulty of life: here things keep turning upside-down.

Therefore, the one who says, “I am a guru,” know that he is not worthy of being a guru. And the one who says, “Guru-wuru—everything is futile! Which guru, what need!”—know that from this man something can be received, because the guruness is so deep that any announcement is futile.

But this doesn’t register. Then the daily difficulty grows; the obstacles keep increasing. We fall into a double error: the one who says, “I am a guru,” we accept as a guru; and the one who says, “I am not a guru,” we refuse to accept as a guru. Then these two kinds of trouble arise. The one who says, “I am a guru,” we go to learn from him; the one who says, “I am not a guru,” we say, “All right, he himself says he is not a guru—so the matter is finished. What is there to learn!”

These double mistakes go on continuously. And both are mistakes. Both are mistakes. One who has attained can be a guide. But do not fall into the illusion that one who has attained the Divine will take any relish in being your guide. What relish could there be! If, having found the Divine, he still finds some relish in acquiring four disciples, then his finding of the Divine must have been a little weak. And the one who has relish in getting four disciples—and then relish if the four become forty—know that nothing very great has yet been found.

Therefore this is a very paradoxical statement. A person like Buddha, who is worthy to be a guru, will keep saying, “What guru! Keep away from gurus!” Why does he say so? Because at the crossroads there stand people very eager to become gurus—and we too are very eager to become disciples. Eager to become disciples, not to walk. Eager to receive guidance, not to follow it.

So false gurus are available, and false disciples too are available—and relationships form between them. The true guru is not a guru, and the true disciple is not a disciple. So the question does not even arise; it is not a question at all. These are meaningless and irrelevant things. They serve no purpose. If such an understanding comes…

Let’s take them one by one. Yes—what did you say?

There can be two kinds of reasons. In fact there can be many, but broadly two will do.

- One: he may only be imagining, not actually experiencing. Even for imagination my presence gives support. Alone, even imagining becomes difficult. Imagination too asks for props. So in my presence he will be able to imagine more easily, and it will be easier to mistake imagination for experience. At home, if the same kind of thing happened, he might suspect it is only imagination.

- The other, less frequent, possibility: you did not imagine; you actually took a leap. For a moment you jumped two feet off the ground; you lifted your head and saw a little higher. Then you fell back to the ground. That is possible too.

Both can be useful. Even imagination is an indicator that you want to imagine—really, that you want to experience; that is why you imagined. Not everyone will even be able to imagine. Don’t think that just by coming close everyone will at least imagine. If imagination has happened to you, it shows there is a possibility in you, a longing for experience. The desire has a seed; therefore imagination arises. When it becomes seedless, the real will happen.

So to the person to whom imagination has happened, I would say: understand that it was imagination. He will insist, “No, it was an experience.” His insistence is meaningful; the poor fellow is saying, “I want to experience—how can you call it imagination? I have experienced.” But he does not see that if imagination is taken to be experience, then the real will never happen.

If it was imagination and it happened near me, how will you check whether it was imagination or a real moment of seeing higher in my presence? Both can be lost later. But if it was imagination, your personality will remain exactly as it was before. If it was a real step upward—even if it is lost—your personality will have changed. You will not be able to remain the same as before. This is the touchstone.

Do you understand what I mean? You may not be able to replicate that experience at home, but you will no longer be the same person you were before it. If you become exactly the same again and the experience does not return, know it was imagination—because imagination does not touch the personality. That is the criterion. Experience touches the personality, even if only for a moment. What difference does the duration make!

I am in a dark night and lightning flashes; for an instant I see. A moment before, in the dark, I believed there were ghosts; now for a moment I have seen—open sky, no ghosts; there are trees, flowers, a path. The lightning flashes and is gone. Can I be the same as I was a moment before? Granted the light is not steady; I have no lamp in hand, no battery; the darkness is thick again—perhaps thicker than before, because after tasting light, darkness feels deeper. But still, you cannot be what you were. There are no ghosts all around, no thieves, no wild beasts. In this same darkness you are now unafraid. You place your feet more firmly on the path, more assured; you have a sure trust in reaching; there is no fear of going astray—you have seen the path. You have known; you are no longer the same.

But if you only imagined the lightning, the ghosts will not vanish; you will not see the trees or the path. The danger is that the path you imagined—if you walk it in reality—you will fall into a ditch. Better to grope your way and know you do not know the path. One who gropes can still walk in the dark, but one falsely assured—“I have seen the way”—is certain to fall.

So whether it was imagination or experience—you must examine this. I am speaking from your side. From my side it is always clear. I have no need to test what you are doing while sitting before me. It is for you that I say: apply the touchstone. For me it is certain whether you are imagining or experiencing, because your whole aura changes. When you are in imagination, a haze of drowsiness falls around your face; your outer face carries the same outlines it has when you dream. When you are in experience, your face shows the outline of one who has just awakened—the very first instant of waking. The basic colors, the light, the lines of the face, the thrill in the body, even the hairs on the skin—everything is different.

These are very outer differences; the inner ones go much deeper. There is no point talking about those here. Inwardly it is very clear; one can see right through you, what is happening. But for your testing I say: if the experience does not return, look to see whether your personality has been affected and changed by it. If you cannot become the same as before, understand that somewhere you did leap—though you have fallen back, something was known, you had a glimpse. If you become the same again, know it was imagination.

You can keep imagining all your life. You may come to me a thousand times, take “experiences” a thousand times, and still be the same person. People wander through ashrams, go to gurus, do practices, meditate—and return exactly as they were. Nothing changes. Then they have imagined.

And what are you asking?

There are two or three points here. One is that the process of meditation never brings any danger. The process of meditation never brings any danger. Yes, dangers may be known to us—that is a different matter. It is not the same thing. We may perceive dangers, but the process of meditation never brings any danger. It can happen that in meditation a moment comes when it feels, “Now I am going to die.” Then, for us, a danger seems to have happened; we get frightened. But the process of meditation does not bring any danger. This experience of dying is itself a very fortunate experience. If you pass through it, you will find rebirth—a life in which there is no longer any fear of death. If you do not pass through it and turn back, you will remain where you were.

So dangers will seem to be approaching, but they never actually are. They are only ideas of danger. I simply remind the seeker this much: many times ideas of danger will come—keep moving on.

Now, how many people can I help? Let me make my position clear. There are gurus who say they will help from behind as well—meaning, even when they are not physically present. I am among those who say that even when I am in front of you, I do not help. I do not help at all. Because any kind of help from me is harmful to you. And if, through my help, something happens to you even once, your resolve becomes weak forever.

You too would like it if I were to awaken your Kundalini. And for me as well, it is much easier than explaining things to you—to just awaken your Kundalini. Because awakening Kundalini is very easy; explaining to you is very difficult. But if I awaken your Kundalini, I am crippling you forever; I am breaking your resolve forever. The blow I give to your willpower—no enemy stabbing your chest with a dagger could inflict such a blow. Then you will never again be able to stand on your own feet. And not just for one life; this event will follow you for many lives. Whenever a desire arises in your mind, the thought will arise with it: “Let someone else awaken it for me.”

And a Kundalini awakened by another is not Kundalini; it is an imagination that someone else has stirred in you. Because you did not awaken it, it will feel true to you; you did not imagine it. But another can only arouse imagination in you, not the truth. And since you have no clue of the truth, you will not even know whether what has been aroused is truth or imagination. We have known only imaginations, and in that imagination Kundalini will also get attached. And if another has awakened it, then it is false—one. And if another has awakened it, then your own power of resolve, which could have awakened the real, becomes paralyzed forever. So I cannot help even when I am right in front of you. I do not help. I am a strict enemy of anyone “helping.”

Therefore whatever has happened, I have no hand in it. Since I have no hand in it, whether you are a thousand miles away, a thousand feet away, or five inches away, it makes no difference. Whatever dangers there are are yours, the ones that may befall you—but in truth, those “dangers” do not really exist.

And then, if from my emptiness so much can happen within you, the void presence of the divine is forever and everywhere for you—let that be your companion. One cannot rely on me: I am here today, gone tomorrow. That is why, for all who relied on persons, the person became an obstructing link between them and the divine.

Even today, the divine is present now, yet a devotee of Buddha is chanting “Namo Buddhaya.” He is going back via twenty-five hundred years—via Buddha—making a needless five-thousand-year detour in the mind to reach the divine. And the divine was here, available for a direct relationship. And the day Buddha was present, he was no more than he is not today. Which is to say: nothing is to be had from the person. The benefit that could be gained from his non-presence then, you can gain today as well.

Do you see my point? In the benefits of presence, there may be a difference; in the benefits of non-presence, what difference could there be? None at all. So the one repeating “Namo Buddhaya” is needlessly getting into trouble, caught in a long journey through time that serves no purpose. But he is bound; he will tell his son, “Remember Buddha,” and his son will tell his son the same. Buddha—who, in truth, never was! That is, whose presence never did anything to anyone; it was from his non-presence that you drew benefits. But now you will go on suffering losses in his name.

It is good that the one who is truly present—the divine—is present. But we fail to draw upon the divine, because it has no body. We cannot sense its presence, because its presence and absence are the same. Its presence is absence; its absence is presence. Its non-being is its being, and its being is its non-being. Hence we fail to connect with it. So we look for little gurus we can see. And among them are some showmen who say, “We will awaken you; we will make it happen.” And we are so frightened and weak that we think, “If someone would awaken us, how wonderful that would be.” But how much harm he will cause—you he will harm, and himself as well. Harm is never one-way. Benefit is never one-way either. Harm is always two-way, with twin arrows: when I wound you, I wound myself. Benefit too is two-way: when I benefit you, I benefit myself.

Therefore whoever, knowingly or unknowingly, harms you in any way is harming himself. For the person who “awakens” your kundalini—imaginary—can only arouse your imaginary kundalini if he takes it as real; otherwise, why would he indulge in such madness? He is expending great effort and energy. In truth, his own imaginary kundalini must have been “awakened”—awakened by someone else; awakened by someone else. And he is wasting all this time, spoiling all this time.

So if this is understood clearly: neither in my presence do I help you—I do not help at all. Therefore, in my absence you will not be harmed. Since there was never any account attached to my presence, my absence has no bearing. And because I tell you plainly that I do not help, I never want to give you the opportunity to connect to the divine via me. There is no such connection. The divine is present everywhere; connect with that directly. And the meditation you are doing—its very meaning is that you are connecting directly with that. If dangers arise, surrender to that, and let whatever happens, happen. Leave it to the divine; let whatever it does, be done.

And the great joke is that we are afraid to leave it to the divine, yet we feel greatly assured leaving it to a person. Our weaknesses have no bounds; our insanities have no end. If I say, “I take your responsibility,” you go back more assured. When I say, “Leave your responsibility to the divine,” you say, “You are abandoning us, leaving us helpless.” The case is this: you trust a well but cannot trust the ocean. But the well that has come to know “I too am connected with the ocean” will not bind you to the well. For a well is nothing but the ocean peeping through a hole in the earth. A well is a hole through which the ocean is peering. But the well that has not realized it is connected to the ocean, and thinks, “I am the ocean,” will tell you: “Do not wander anywhere; keep returning to this well—if water is to be had, it is only here.”

I know the ocean is peering out in many places: in small wells, in great lakes, in rivers, and in some places the ocean itself is present, boundless. It is everywhere—surrender yourself to that. Therefore the process of surrender and thanksgiving I ask you to do at the end of meditation is precisely so that your connection does not get tied to me. It would be convenient were I to receive your thanks; it would be easier for you too. But I say: give your thanks to the divine. I want only this: whatever comes to you tomorrow, whatever happens to you tomorrow, let your dealings be directly with the divine. I should not be anywhere in between. Therefore there is nothing to worry about there—no danger, no cause for danger.

Yes, yes, it makes no difference.

As for Desmond Morris, when he calls man “the naked ape,” his purpose is quite different. He is simply saying that the ape has hair on his skin while man does not; in that sense man is naked. Man has nothing of his own to cover his body. That is why the naked ape had to invent clothes. What monkeys and bears have, man does not. So he had to find something else to cover himself.

When I tell people that in meditation whatever happens should be allowed—even if nakedness happens—the onlooker will think, “This man has dropped his clothes and gone back to being primitive.” But even the most primitive man makes some arrangement to cover his body—less or more, that is another matter. The wildest of the wild, by degrees, also contrives to hide the body. The person who stands naked in meditation is not regressing; he is going ahead. He is moving beyond the clothed man. Superficially both look the same: the forest-dweller is naked, and this one too is naked.

A child is simple; you can snatch a coin from his hand and he will let it go. A young man who has spent his life accumulating money can never let go. Then the same man becomes old; you take the coin from him and he laughs. It appears to be the same as with the child, but it is not regression. The old man has traversed the journey of youth’s money-making. When he was a child, all that was to manifest in youth was hidden in him. Now he is old; all that has come and gone, nothing remains hidden within.

So, in the depths, children can never be truly innocent; only the old can be, in depth. The child sits with all the potential cunning that will appear tomorrow. He cannot be deeply innocent, because everything is still hidden in him; given the chance it will develop and manifest. Sexuality is yet to come. If the child stands naked it is not because he is free of sex; it is because he is as yet unaware. When the wave of sex comes, he will cover his body.

Therefore a child is never innocent in depth—only on the surface. One should say: the child is merely ignorant, and ignorance looks like innocence. He is simply unknowing; in unknowing, innocence seems to be, but it is not.

Then the same child becomes young, and all the faults appear, all the tendencies awaken—what was not visible in childhood arrives. Anger, jealousy, lust, greed, violence—everything; cunning, dishonesty, hypocrisy—all come. And then he becomes old, and now he laughs. Now there is no greed, no dishonesty, no cunning; again you can find the child in his eyes. But he has not become a child; he has gone beyond, knowing. This is transcendence. The old man is knowledge, is wisdom. The innocence that comes out of knowledge and the innocence that comes out of ignorance may look similar on the surface, but inwardly they are not the same.

So when a person becomes naked in meditation, this is not the nakedness of the jungle. The jungle’s nakedness is ignorance; the nakedness of meditation is an attainment. It is something altogether different; it has nothing to do with the jungle. Yet from the outside they may look alike—that is our illusion of similarity. And then the question arises: what benefit will come from this nakedness?

Many benefits arise out of this nakedness. Not that everyone will get them. Those whom clothes have not harmed will naturally get no benefit. But it is hard to find a person whom clothes have not harmed.

So the benefit will be in the same measure as the harm has been. And the amusing thing is: those who have been harmed less can throw the clothes quickly, and those who have been harmed more take longer. There are reasons. The more one has been harmed by clothes, the more afraid one is and the more one clings—afraid that what is hidden under the clothes may be exposed. Therefore the one who has not been much harmed can drop them easily; for him there is no great fear. He can drop them soon and undo the damage. Those who have been harmed more cannot drop them for long and go on preserving their hurt.

These are the very people who will ask, “What will be the benefit?” Those who could benefit most are the ones who ask, What will I gain? In fact they ask in order to gather courage to throw the clothes. If the scale seems to weigh on the side of benefit, heavier than the loss they feel inside, if the balance settles, then they will consider it. You understand—the reason for their calculating? They feel the loss will be heavy; if only the pan of profit could outweigh it, they might muster courage.

But the one who drops clothes for the sake of profit will get no profit. These are the intricacies, the complexities; they must be understood. A mind that seeks gain is not innocent; it is cunning, shopkeeping, bargaining. You are only throwing away cloth—no great feat. You take off your shirt and you expect to find God? You don’t even consider what you have actually done. You have thrown off clothes and stand naked; and you demand, “Where is liberation? I am naked!” What have you really renounced?

No—the reason you ask about benefit is another: the losses look huge. “What will people say?” That appears to be the great loss. In our mind there is no fear greater than public opinion—not even death. A man going bankrupt will prefer suicide to bankruptcy, because of “What will people say?” A man caught in a wrong act will prefer to die rather than let people know. In our minds, “What do people say?” is priced higher than life. Therefore you are not wearing clothes; people have clothed you. These are not just clothes. And everything else we keep holding on to—do not remain in the illusion that we are holding them; others’ hands are holding them on us.

In the bathroom you become naked because the other is not present. It is not a road, not a public square. In the bathroom you undress. Why? Outside you were saying, “There must be some benefit before I take my clothes off.” Why do you take them off in the bathroom? Because there you alone are—there is no public opinion, no one to say anything about you.

So the great fear is: What will people say? And I hold that in the depth of meditation the greatest benefit happens the day you drop this idea. As long as you clutch “What will people say?” you can never come to your private truth. You will live only around the public truth—the socially sanctioned version of truth.

So what benefit accrues to the one who drops clothes? The great benefit—if not for benefit’s sake, but spontaneously in meditation—is that for the first time he stands alone, outside the worry of what people say. This is no small event; it is immense.

All our anxiety is this: what does someone say to someone—husband to wife, wife to husband, father to son, son to father, master to disciple, disciple to master—who says what to whom? But we never ask the one question: what do you say to yourself?

So the moment you drop your clothes, you are making a decision. It is a decisive moment. In that moment you are not merely throwing away cloth; you are throwing away the fear of public opinion. You are saying, “All right—you are you, I am I!” And with the dropping of the clothes—only a pointer—many inner fears gathered around “What will people say?” fall away; you become instantly light. Instantly light.

A second benefit is this: we have never mustered the courage to see ourselves as we are. We have accepted ourselves as we are not. We carry an image, an idol we move around with: “This is me.” The day you stand naked—outwardly a small event, but it cannot happen without an inner event. That is why I do not say, “Stand naked and meditate.” I say, if nakedness arises in meditation, let it arise. I could tell you, “First take off your clothes and then meditate”—then this benefit will not happen.

I say to you: when the inner event happens, then become naked. Naked means: the moment comes when you want to know yourself as you are, and you want others to know you as you are—no longer desiring otherwise. Then you have taken the greatest step toward truth. First you must know your nakedness completely—of body, of mind, in the deepest depths. Only then will you attain the explosion where the Ultimate is revealed. But before that, reveal yourself to yourself. Then all your images, imposed and maintained for the sake of others’ opinions, will fall away. When someone puts powder on the face, it is never for oneself, it is for someone else. Therefore as the person changes, the powder changes. If there is no one to impress, one can do without it; if there is, one cannot do without it.

All that you do with your body you are, in truth, doing with others. The moment you change your relationship with your body, you have changed your relationship between yourself and others.

This is the outer event, but its inner end is where you will gather the courage to know naked truth. And there are great nakednesses in life that must be known. Otherwise we live in deception. Clothed, we forget that we are naked. Living in a house we forget that the grave is near, the cremation ground is close. In health we forget that disease is growing behind us. In happiness we forget that sorrow is knocking at the door. If we see things in their full nakedness, every happiness will be seen bringing sorrow in its wake; every birth will be seen as calling death along.

A third point: even our bodily sensitivity has become very faint. Instead of the body, we are aware of clothes. When I say “be aware of your body,” you are aware only of your clothes. You are standing not naked but clothed. A gust of wind comes and touches your shirt; the shirt touches you; the wind never touches you. So your experience of the wind is of the shirt’s touch; you do not experience the wind. When the sun’s rays fall upon you, your shirt drinks in their warmth and then transmits heat to your body. Your experience of the sun is the warmth of the shirt, not of the sun’s rays.

The moment cloth is removed from the body, life and you stand face to face. The sun’s rays touch your skin, touch you—there is no tailor in between. The gust of wind touches you. For the first time a thousand ripplings arise in your body of which you are unfamiliar, unaware. For the first time, when you stand naked and eyes all around are upon your nakedness, your inner eye too—because from outside you cannot see your own body—when you stand naked, for the first time from the inside you become conscious of your body: “This is my body.” And this consciousness is very different, very different.

To see this hand from the outside is one thing; to experience it from within is quite another. The first time someone stands naked in meditation and, for the first time, the whole world touches the body, and bodily sensitivity awakens—clear and direct—then from within you can experience: where the winds touch me, that is my body; where the rays heat me, that is my body; where people’s eyes see me naked, that is my body. And this inner consciousness toward the body, this sensitivity, this sensibility, is a deep experience that serves your self-knowing. There are a thousand other benefits. But if anyone becomes naked for the sake of benefit, no benefit happens at all.

Even onlookers can gain many benefits. And those who might be harmed are already being harmed without seeing you naked—because they look at nude pictures, they watch nude films. They don’t abstain, they don’t stop. And the irony is that a nude photograph does more damage than a naked human body ever does. The naked human body as it is is not at all that attractive; but a nude photograph is crafted in a very scientific way and is alluring. It is manipulated. The naked body is unmanipulated—it is simply as it is. Don’t fall into the illusion that a nude photo shows things “as they are.” A nude photo is created keeping in mind all the points of attraction of your mind’s sexual desire.

When a naked person is standing upright in meditation, you cannot take delight in their nakedness for long—in fact, not at all. You notice that they are naked and the matter ends; there is no more relish to it. A naked body soon becomes insipid. But a nude photograph you will want to turn back to again and again, because it is made with a very deliberate psychological design. It’s made with your mind in view: what your mind wants to see in nudity is highlighted; what it doesn’t want to see is removed. What your mind wants is brought to the fore; what it doesn’t want is pushed into shadow. It is entirely manipulated, curated. Hence a naked person is never as titillating; a nude photograph is very titillating—its allure returns again and again.

There is another point: if, on seeing a naked person, your lust drops—as it does. In meditation, seeing a naked person, your lust will immediately fall, because a naked person standing in meditation is not erotic. And the body becomes what the mind is. Our body takes on a thousand seasons and moods. When a body full of lust is naked, it is one kind of body, with one kind of vibration. When a person in meditation stands naked, it is another kind of body, with different vibrations. Seeing a naked person standing in meditation, there is a possibility that meditation will be awakened within you. Seeing a naked person steeped in lust, the possibility is that lust will be awakened within you—because these are vibrations. Therefore a naked person standing in meditation is not “ordinary” nudity. And as soon as someone sees them, the first realization is: What is there in nakedness for which I was so eager to look?

This happened just recently in Ajol. A friend with an acute torment of sexuality—who had been telling me constantly that this is his issue, how to resolve it; who, even at his age, a father of two or four children, says that if he’s walking down the road and sees a woman, he cannot refrain from giving a shove of some kind—in this camp, when a woman became naked, he followed right behind her. That very evening he came to me and said, I don’t know whether that woman got any benefit, but the benefit I received is beyond calculation. Seeing her naked, I cried for the first time—because I had wanted to see every woman naked! And there is really nothing to it! It’s simply this, right here!

His sexual tendency received a severe shock. For the first time he felt that his desires and cravings were utterly futile. He came and told me, Today for the first time I am experiencing that I am free of woman. Now there is no such chasing; now I can pass by without giving a shove.

So yes, there will be benefits. As for harm—some might be harmed, perhaps. But those who could be harmed will not wait for a meditation camp to get harmed. They will already have done themselves harm. They will not wait to come to a meditation camp for harm; they will manage it anywhere. There is abundant facility for their harm. For their harm, coming into meditation is absolutely unnecessary. There is no need to come to a meditation camp to prepare for harm, because society has provided plenty of arrangements. Yes, for those who could benefit, there is nowhere in society any arrangement at all.

Nudity is being used by prostitutes, dancers, actresses, and advertisers too. But all of them are exploiting your sexual desire. Nowhere is nudity being used for the dissolution of your lust. Everywhere it is used for exploitation.

Even to sell a car, they have to stand a half-naked woman next to it. A half-naked woman has nothing to do with the car. This makes no difference to the car’s quality, adds no strength to its mechanism, and proves nothing about the car being good. Yet the car sells—because, with a naked woman standing there and the car, in the human mind the car becomes a sex object; it becomes associated. Hence the color, contour, and shape that cars are gradually taking are those of the female body—their curves and turns are of the female form. As cars keep getting more curvy day by day, they are becoming symbols of sexuality.

So they place a beautiful, naked woman next to it. The buyer’s first glance will not go to the car; it will go to the woman, and then to the car. And along with the woman a yes-mood is created, an acceptance arises. Now he can say yes to the car as well.

Therefore, in the West the entire trade, shopkeeping, and salesmanship have gone into the hands of women. Men will not be able to stand in shops for very long. Because psychologists have said it clearly, and everyone has understood: you have to sell a shoe—by all means, sell it—but if a beautiful woman’s hand is on the shoe, it’s easier to sell. And when a beautiful woman puts the shoe on your foot, it is hard to refuse. Her sex appeal has worked. And when, after putting on the shoe, she says, You look very handsome, then it is not the shoe that is sold; it is the woman that has been sold. Then it becomes very difficult to leave that shoe. This is exactly what the man had been wanting—that some woman would one day say, You look very handsome. Now not taking that shoe is very hard; you will have to take it. This shoe is no longer ordinary; it has become a fetish—it has become a symbol of the woman; her words have been attached to it. This is how it is being used all over the world.

But the amusing thing is that no one goes and asks them, Won’t this cause any harm? Yet if, in meditation, a man or a woman becomes naked, people come and ask me, Won’t this cause harm? These are the very people who buy toothpaste too from the hand of a naked woman—bicycles, cars, houses as well. These are the same people who ask, If a woman becomes naked in meditation, won’t it cause harm?

If harm was to happen, enough has already happened; no more can be inflicted. But for the first time, the experiment I am doing in meditation is an antidote. A naked body in meditation does not arouse lust in your mind; it dissolves it. Tantra has tried this in thousands of ways, and millions have become free of sex through the path of Tantra. Through the path of moralism, none ever became free. But that is another matter.

Yes, certainly yes. Because whatever we have suppressed—if we are given total freedom to express it, freedom for no reason at all—then whatever is repressed within us is released. There is anger, there is violence, there is lust. You are shouting, dancing, crying, jumping—through all this, the energy that was held down disperses, is spent, goes out. And the pent-up drives are purged.

So meditation breaks inhibitions. Only meditation breaks them; there is no other way. And civilization is such that inhibitions inevitably arise. Nor is there, at present, any hope that we can create a civilization that does not produce inhibitions, that does not produce repression—because it seems difficult that humanity will ever fully understand, listen to, and agree with the words of a man like me.

If ever a civilization were built on the vision of a man like me, there would be no need for inhibitions. And if there were no inhibitions at all, there would be no question of catharsis. But for now catharsis is necessary: they are there, and in a very ugly way. Every person is a suppressed person. There is no one inside whom nothing is suppressed.

Different things are suppressed in different people; therefore the expression will differ. So we must find devices through which this can be expressed. If we express it on people, we will get into trouble—that is not possible. If we turn to immorality, it will be expressed, but the net will only grow deeper. If we commit crime, it will be expressed, but prisons will fill; laws will multiply—courts, police, rules—and there will be turmoil. And those upon whom we unload it will be hurt needlessly. They were not responsible for your inhibitions. The other was not responsible for your inhibitions.

And the strange thing is: what are you to do? The entire civilization—the whole social structure and order—makes you inhibited. There is only one way: without any reason, let your drives be dissolved into emptiness. Meditation provides exactly this arrangement. After this dissolution you will become light. And in that lightness you can set out on the inner journey; otherwise you cannot.

It is not different from auto-hypnosis and hypnosis; it is more. As far as auto-hypnosis goes, the path of meditation goes along with it, on the same road. But where auto-hypnosis stops, this path goes beyond. And because of that going-beyond, even in the stretch where it runs alongside hypnosis there remains a fundamental difference.

The very basis of hypnosis is that your conscious mind goes to sleep. To become stupefied, to fall into a trance, is hypnosis. The process of hypnotic suggestion takes you into drowsiness. The more drowsy you become, the more sleep-like you become, the more you can be hypnotized. Then in that hypnotic state anything can be made to happen through you, because your discrimination is asleep.

In this process of meditation you are not to go into trance; in fact, you cannot—because the whole process is active. That is why a hypnotist will lay you on a bed or seat you in an easy chair. He will make sure you are brought into a condition where trance can happen. Once hypnotized, you slip into deep sleep. That sleep differs only slightly from your ordinary sleep. It is induced—that is the difference. It is contrived. Therefore the one who has contrived your sleep maintains a relationship with you—only with him; all your other connections fall away.

The process of meditation is active. For ten minutes you are breathing deeply. In such deep breathing, sleep is impossible. If you fall asleep, your breath will immediately go slack. To breathe like that you have to remain awake. The suggestions I give are of the same kind as in hypnosis, yet they are not the same.

The hypnotist tells you, “You are getting sleepy. Let go—and sleep.” I tell you, “Make the breath deeper and deeper.” The deeper the breath, the more impossible it becomes to fall asleep, because the blood circulation increases. The law of sleep is that circulation must be reduced. In fact, the very formula of sleep is: the less the flow of blood in the head, the deeper the sleep.

That is why you use a pillow. When the head is raised and the rest of the body is lower, less blood reaches the head. The pillow has no other meaning. And the more “civilized” we become, the higher the pillows will get—because so much blood runs to the head during the day that at night it has to be reduced, and reduced, and reduced.

In meditation, such intense breathing is accelerating the blood flow. Not only is the blood moving faster; your body’s electricity is being awakened. With that alive in you, you simply cannot sleep. Sleep is impossible.

Then in the second stage you are to give full expression to whatever is happening—dancing, jumping, crying, laughing. That is why I do not suggest that all of you should laugh. If I were to suggest, “All of you laugh,” it would come too close to hypnosis. No. I say: whatever feels right to you, do it totally. I say to you: whatever feels right to you, do it totally. I want to keep you aware the whole time. Because it is you who have to work in meditation. If you fall asleep, who will meditate? I have to keep you awake.

The hypnotist is trying to put you to sleep. If you do not sleep, he cannot do anything with you. Only if you sleep can he do something.

This is exactly the opposite, utterly different—though it may look similar, moving on the same road, running parallel.

Then in the third stage you are asking, “Who am I?” You have to ask it so intensely that not for a single moment, even at the level of the mind, can drowsiness creep in.

All three of these experiments are so intense that you cannot fall asleep. Therefore you cannot be hypnotized.

Up to this point we move alongside hypnosis. We both are using suggestion, suggestibility. But our intention, our journey, our goal are entirely different. Hypnosis ends by putting you to sleep.

After these thirty minutes of intense process, I leave you in the divine. Now you have become a lump of energy. Now only a dancing, leaping energy remains—pure power. Now you can take the jump. With so much energy, so much vitality, you can plunge into the ocean. Now you can gather the courage you could not gather before. Now your whole force is active. This has nothing to do with hypnosis. Now you are setting out on a new journey, which is beyond suggestion. Now you alone have to do it. Silently, you have to drown in it.

So there is some coordination with hypnosis, because I am using suggestion. There is some similarity. But deep within there is a fundamental difference—and that difference is the greater one. That alone will work further; everything else will be left behind.