Maha Geeta #30

The number eight is meaningful. These little stories carry deep symbolic meanings. Don’t take them as history. They have very little to do with factual events; they point to inner mysteries.

The number eight relates to yoga’s eight limbs. Patanjali has said: Only the one who completes the eight limbs—yama, niyama, asana, pranayama, pratyahara, dharana, dhyana, samadhi—will attain the truth. The father’s displeasure, his curse, conveys only this: “Those eight limbs through which one attains the supreme truth—I deform them in you.”

Let me remind you of the episode. The father was a Vedic scholar. Every morning he would rise and recite the Vedas. He was renowned; his name was known across the land—a great debater. And Ashtavakra, in the womb, listened. One day he suddenly spoke from the womb: “Enough! Nothing will come of this parrot-like chanting. Without knowing, there is no knowing—read as many Vedas and shastras as you like, scriptures are not truth; truth is attained through experience.”

The father was angered. His ego was hurt—both pundit and father in one. That a father should accept a son’s words—that’s a rare event. He becomes angry. A father can hardly accept that the son might be wise. Even if the son is seventy, the father thinks him foolish. Naturally so. The distance between father and son remains what it was on the first day; if the father is twenty years older, he remains twenty years older. To learn from the son is difficult; and if the father is a pundit, it is even harder. The father thought, “I know,” and the unborn child says, “You do not know”—this is too much! He isn’t even born yet.

So the father must have cursed him; and that curse was to destroy the eight limbs of knowledge. “Those eight limbs by which a person attains knowing,” the father said, “in you they are ruined. Now let me see how you attain the truth whose proclamation you make! If truth is not found in scripture, there is only one other way: sadhana. You say truth is not found in scripture—fine; then I deform the eight limbs of sadhana in you. Now how will you attain?”

And yet Ashtavakra did attain. The essence of Ashtavakra’s entire teaching is simply this: truth is already attained; it is received neither through scripture nor through sadhana. Sadhana is for that which has not been given. But truth we are born with. Truth is our self-natured right—not merely a birthright, a nature-right. Truth is what we are; so there is no question of attaining it. …Crooked in eight places—let it be; but truth will not be crooked. The self will not be crooked. Only the body can get bent and twisted.

Sadhana cannot reach beyond body and mind. So if you curse me to be twisted, the body will twist, the mind will twist—but my soul remains unaffected. This is exactly what Ashtavakra told Janaka: “O king! If the courtyard is crooked, the sky does not become crooked. If the pot is crooked, the space contained within is not crooked. Look at me directly; look neither at body nor at mind.”

Ashtavakra’s whole message is that neither scripture yields truth nor sadhana yields truth. That is why I have reminded you again and again: Krishnamurti’s message is the same as Ashtavakra’s. Krishnamurti also says: neither through scripture nor through sadhana. You get frightened and ask, “Then how will it be attained?” The very message is that the question “how” is wrong—it is already attained. When it is already attained, to ask “how will it be attained?” is an irrelevant question.

Truth has no conditions; truth is given unconditionally. It is given to the sinner and to the virtuous; to the dark and to the fair; to the beautiful and the unbeautiful; to man and to woman. Those who strove have it; those who did not strive also have it. Some received it by effort, some by grace. Neither effort is necessary nor is any demand for grace necessary—because it is already given.

It blooms at night, the jasmine;
at dawn, the hundred-petaled lotus.
For blossoming, neither light
nor darkness is required.
The moment consciousness awakens—
that is the dawn.

It blooms at night, the jasmine;
at dawn, the hundred-petaled lotus.
For blossoming, neither light
nor darkness is required.
The moment consciousness awakens—
that is the dawn.

And if awakening is what is needed, then nothing else is needed for awakening—only awakening itself is needed; you need only open your eyes. Everything is hidden by the eyelid itself, just behind the eye.

Have you noticed—if a tiny speck of grit gets into the eye, a grain of sand, some debris—the eye’s capacity to see is finished? This tiny eye can take in the Himalayas. Go and look at the Himalayas; snow peaks stretching for hundreds of miles, all appear within the eye. Such a small eye contains the Himalayas, but it is defeated by a tiny pebble. Let a speck enter the eye and the Himalayas are invisible; the Himalayas are hidden behind that speck. All that is needed is to remove the speck.

Ashtavakra’s teaching is only this: a little understanding, a slight opening of the eyelid—and everything is already as it should be; nothing is to be done; nowhere to go; nothing to achieve.

With open eyes, you see dreams; with closed eyes, your own.
What is your own abides within; outside abide the dreams.
In the world’s crowd of name and form, within is the One stainless.
The inner eye needs surati; the outer eye needs collyrium.
Make the seen unseen, and see the Unseen.
Illiterate one, you go on writing the perishable; the Imperishable is ever unwritten.

Understand—
With open eyes, you see dreams; with closed eyes, your own.
What is your own abides within; outside abide the dreams.

Whatever you have seen outside is a dream. If you want to see your own—then within! Whatever you see outside, if you try to possess it, you will have to run and run—yet where is it found? The running comes to an end—nothing comes into your hands.

Understand the nature of the world. Everything seems visible—nothing is actually attained. It looks as if it is right there—“just a little walk, a little more effort!” Like the horizon touches the earth—it looks a few miles away; we’ll run and reach, we’ll find the place where sky and earth meet; from there we’ll climb into the sky, set a ladder, build our Babylon, set a stairway to heaven—but that place where sky and earth meet is never found. It only seems to meet. An appearance! Which Hindus have called maya. It appears exactly as if the sky is meeting the earth; perhaps ten, fifteen, twenty miles away—just a short journey. But the more you go toward the horizon, the more the horizon recedes. It always appears to meet; it never does.

With open eyes, you see dreams; with closed eyes, your own.
What is your own abides within; outside abide the dreams.

Outside it seems you will get it—and you never do. Inside it seems, “How will I get it?”—and it is already given. The within is the exact opposite of the world. To see the world, open your eyes outward; to see the truth, open your eyes inward. Closing the eyes to the outside means only this: look within.

In the world’s crowd of name and form, within is the One stainless.
The inner eye needs surati; the outer eye needs collyrium.

For seeing clearly outside, we anoint the eye with kohl. For seeing within, the elders also “invented” a kohl. They called it: surati, smriti, jagriti, samadhi!

In the world’s crowd of name and form, within is the One stainless.
The inner eye needs surati; the outer eye needs collyrium.

To see clearly outside, apply kohl; you will see distinctly. To see clearly within there is only one collyrium—the collyrium is the Unstained itself! There is only one thing to be remembered there, only one question to be kindled there: “Who am I?” Let there arise from every side the single awareness, “Who am I?” Let a single question echo through your life-breath: “Who am I?” Slowly, under the hammer-blow of this very question, the inner doors open. This blow is like a hammer striking: “Who am I? Who am I?”

Do not answer, for the answer will come from outside. You ask quickly, “Who am I?” and say, “Aham Brahmasmi”—then the Upanishad has intruded. Do not answer; just keep asking. A moment will come when even the question will fall away. And where the question falls… where the question falls, there is the answer. Then you do not say, “Aham Brahmasmi”—you know it; you experience it. Words do not form; the recognition is in silence.

Make the seen unseen, and see the Unseen.
For now you are entangled in what you see. And what you see—that is the world, the realm of objects. The seer, the one who sees, is invisible, completely hidden.

Make the seen unseen, and see the Unseen.
Illiterate one, you go on writing the perishable…!

Nothing will come of writing and reading. We write and call what we write “akshar”—the imperishable. Have you ever thought? Akshar means “that which cannot be erased.” But you write what is perishable and call it imperishable—what a deception! Whatever you write will be erased. Scriptures you write—lost; names carved on stone—become sand. Whatever you write here is like writing your signature on the riverbank sand: a gust of wind and it’s gone. Perhaps it is less than that—like writing on water; even as you write, it begins to vanish.

Illiterate one! You go on writing the perishable and placing your trust in the imperishable? You write in time and long for the timeless? You clutch the small and hanker after the vast?

Illiterate one, you go on writing the perishable; the Imperishable is ever unwritten.
And it is precisely in your scribbling, in your entanglement with the perishable, that the Imperishable is not seen. The Imperishable is within you. For a little while, don’t write; for a little while, don’t read; for a little while, don’t do anything. For a little while, bid farewell to the visible. For a little while, open your inner eye—into surati.

The Sufis have the exact word for surati: zikr. Zikr means the same as surati. It means remembrance, recollection: “Come, sit, and remember the Beloved; evoke His remembrance.” What Hindus call nama-smarana—remembrance of the Name. Nama-smarana does not mean merely muttering “Ram, Ram.” Even if remembrance of Rama begins with chanting, it does not end there.

Understand Sufi zikr. Some of you may wish to experiment. The basis of Sufi zikr is “Allah.” The word is very sweet; it has great juice. We Hindus, Muslims, Jains, Christians divide the world and so we miss many nectarean things. I experimented with many words; none is as sweet as “Allah.” “Ram” does not have that flavor. When you hum it, you will know. The hum and the ecstasy that arise with “Allah” do not arise with any other word. Try it.

Some night, in darkness, close the doors, extinguish the lamp so nothing outside is visible—make darkness. Otherwise your old habit will persist—you will keep looking at something. Sit within. The first step of zikr: begin saying “Allah, Allah” aloud. Say it with force. Use the lips. For five to seven minutes say “Allah, Allah” aloud. In five to seven minutes a stream of rasa will begin to flow within; then close the lips. The second step: now say only with the inner tongue, “Allah, Allah, Allah.” After five to seven minutes of using the tongue within, the sound will begin to arise by itself; then drop even the tongue. Now, without the tongue, let “Allah, Allah, Allah” happen within. After five to seven minutes… deeper resonances will begin to arise, reverberations. Then stop speaking even inwardly; drop “Allah, Allah” there too. Now the word will not remain, but from its continual remembrance an after-echo will go on, waves will remain. As when a veena is played and suddenly falls silent—after a while the instrument is quiet, yet the listener remains moved, and the resonance continues; the sound fades slowly into the void.

If you have remembered Allah for fifteen or twenty minutes—first with the lips, then with the tongue, then without the tongue—you will come to that place where for two, four, five minutes the echo of “Allah” will continue to resound. As if every hair of your body is saying “Allah.” Keep listening to it. Slowly that echo too will fade.

And then what remains—that is Allah! Then what remains—that is Rama. The word does not remain, nor the after-echo of the word—what remains is a vast emptiness. Surati!

Use the word “Ram”—that will also work. Use the word “Om”—that too will work. But “Allah” is certainly very juicy. And the kind of intoxication you will see in the Sufis—you will not see anyone else on this earth so drunk. The wine you will see in the Sufi’s eyes—you will not see it in anyone else’s. The Hindu renunciate keeps chanting Omkara, but there is no intoxication, no ecstasy in his eyes.

The word “Allah” is like a grape; if you press it rightly, you will be astonished. You will begin to walk dancing. A humming will enter your life.

Surati, zikr, remembrance of the Name—let the names be any.

In the world’s crowd of name and form, within is the One stainless.
The inner eye needs surati; the outer eye needs collyrium.
Make the seen unseen, and see the Unseen.
Illiterate one, you go on writing the perishable; the Imperishable is ever unwritten.

And that which is hidden within—we have brought it with us. Nothing is to be produced—only uncovered, discovered. Better still, it is a rediscovery! Kept within, we have forgotten what is ours—what is truly ours. We have lost ourselves in dreams and forgotten our own. Bid the dream a little farewell; look at your own a little! The Unseen will be seen! The unwritten will be seen! The Imperishable will arise!

The sole meaning of the story that Ashtavakra’s eight limbs were bent is that surati suffers no obstacle. Whether the limbs are crooked or straight, whether you sit or stand…

You have seen—enlightenment has occurred in all kinds of postures. Mahavira was sitting in gaudohasana—it’s quite amusing! Jains do not worry much about what that was—gaudohasana: the way one squats while milking a cow. There was neither a cow nor any reason to milk—yet he sat in gaudohasana. At that time he attained the supreme knowledge.

Now gaudohasana is not a very elegant posture—try sitting in it. Buddha at least sat properly, in siddhasana. Mahavira sat in gaudohasana. Mahavira was a bit unusual. Naked, squatting as if milking a cow—then he attained enlightenment.

Whether the body is crooked or straight, short or tall, whether you sit like this or like that—no, posture has nothing to do with it. Whether the mind’s state is of merit or sin, intent on good or on bad—this too has nothing to do with it. Ashtavakra’s original sutra is only this: if you can be a witness—if the body is crooked, be a witness to the crooked body; if the mind is entangled in sin, be a witness to the mind entangled in sin—if you can stand apart and watch body and mind, the event will happen. Being crooked in eight limbs means: the eight limbs of yoga offered no means.

Be sure of this: had Ashtavakra gone to a yogi and said, “Initiate me into yoga,” the yogi would have folded his hands. “Sir, why put me in trouble? It cannot be done. You—and how will you do yogasanas? If I try to straighten one limb, seven will go crooked. If I fix this side, that side will fall apart.”

Have you ever seen a camel do yogasanas? No yogi could have admitted Ashtavakra into his yoga school. There was simply no way.

It is only a suggestive tale. It says: even a man crooked in eight limbs attained the supreme knowledge—so do not worry. Do not get overly entangled in the body and such.

I agree with neither Ramtirtha nor with your Ram. One is a constructive (positive) outlook on life; the other, a negative outlook. When Ramtirtha says, “I am content with whatever condition your will ordains,” he has looked at life with a constructive eye. He counts the flowers, not the thorns; the days, not the nights. If you ask Ramtirtha, he will say: between two days there is a small night. He will speak of flowers, not of thorns. He will say: what if there are a few thorns—they are needed to protect the flowers! His gaze rests on what is pleasant in life; on the auspicious and the beautiful—the unbeautiful is neglected. There is no attention to the inauspicious. And if the Lord has willed even the inauspicious, then some hidden auspiciousness must be there—such is his understanding.

This is the theist’s stance. It is an attitude of acceptance. The person who says, “Lord, I have said a total yes to you,” is like someone who signs his checkbook and hands it to God without filling in the figures: now whatever you write, that is accepted.

“I am content with whatever condition your will ordains!
This way, bravo; that way, bravo.”

Ramtirtha says, wherever you place me—here or there, it’s fine; give me heaven, I am intoxicated; give me hell, I am intoxicated. You cannot steal my ecstasy, because I have become content in your will.

Then you say, but to your Ram it feels like:

“This way there’s a mess, that way there’s a mess!”
This is exactly the opposite view of Ramtirtha, the atheist’s view—negative! You count the thorns. You say, yes, there is day, but between two nights there is a small day. Night on this side, night on that side; fall this way, there’s a well; fall that way, there’s a ditch—no escape in sight. Ramtirtha’s tone is of consent; your tone is of complaint. You say: be a householder—there are hassles; be a sannyasin—there are hassles. Live at home—trouble; live outside—trouble. Live alone—trouble; live with someone—trouble. There is nowhere to be free of trouble. Even if you live in heaven you will be in a tangle. In heaven there will surely be tangles too. There will be competition even there: who sits closest to God? Who sits far? To whom did God glance, and to whom did he not? And of course there will be politics. Wherever man is, politics arrives.

When Jesus was about to depart, his disciples asked him: at least tell us, in heaven you will sit at the right hand of the Lord, but what will be the positions of us twelve? Who will sit where?

Jesus is going to the cross and the disciples are occupied with politics—who sits where! A foolish question, but thoroughly human.

“Who will be number two after you? Who number three? Who are the chosen? How close to God shall we be, and how far?”

No, even if you go to heaven you will find something amiss there too. Someone will get a beautiful apsara, someone won’t. You will weep there as well: we missed on earth, and we missed here too. There, too, people have already taken possession; and here, too, saints arrived earlier and are entrenched. In short, the poor get knocked about everywhere!

“This way there’s a mess, that way there’s a mess!
This way hassles, and that way hassles.”
—This is a way of seeing.

You ask me, what is my view? I am neither theist nor atheist. I lean neither toward “yes” nor toward “no.” For me, “yes” and “no” are two sides of the same coin. What Ramtirtha has said, you have stood on its head—no real difference. What you have said, Ramtirtha has stood on its feet—again, no real difference. You think there is great opposition between the two—I do not. Now try to look closely.

“I am content with whatever condition your will ordains!”
In this, discontent has already begun. When you say to someone, “I am content,” what does it mean? Somewhere there must be discontent—otherwise why say it at all? “Whatever you do will be my joy.” But it is clear that it is not your joy. You will accept it. Whatever God does is right. And what else can be done? It is a state of helplessness.

Look carefully: the more emphatically you say, “No, I am absolutely content,” the more you reveal that inwardly you are not; somewhere inside there is a thorn.

I am neither theist nor atheist. I neither say I am content, nor that I am discontent. Because my declaration is that we are not separate from That at all—there is no way to be either discontent or content. We are content or discontent only with someone other than ourselves. This is the message of Ashtavakra’s Mahageeta.

You are That. Now with whom will you be angry and with whom pleased? Both imply duality. He who says, “I am content with your will,” also says: you are separate from me, I am separate from you. And so long as you are separate, how can you truly be content? The division will remain. He who says, “I am not content,” says just as much: my will is one thing, yours another; they don’t match. One has bowed: “All right, I will wrap myself in your will.”

But as long as you are, your will will also be. Even if you drape yourself in another’s will, nothing fundamentally changes. The great truth is something else: apart from That, we are not. We are That. Our will is His will; His will is our will. This is not a matter of your wanting or not wanting. Whether you say yes or no makes no difference. Your yes and no both announce the same thing: you have still not seen life’s nonduality; you are still entangled in duality. You take yourself as separate, and God as separate. Here there is no scope—whom will you say yes to, whom no?

A Sufi fakir prayed to God every day, for forty years: “Lord, Thy will be done! Whatever You will, let that be!” In the fortieth year, it is said, God appeared to him and said, “Enough! For forty years you have been harping on the same refrain—that my will be done! Once was enough; the matter was finished. For forty years you have been repeating it! Surely you are displeased. Surely you are complaining—very politely, very courteously. But every day you remind me: remember, I am not pleased. All right, it is compulsion. Power is in your hands and I am powerless! So, okay then, your will!”

This “your will” is rising from helplessness, your neck forced down! As if someone holds your head down and you can do nothing, so you say, “All right—your will!” But you have already taken God as other. God is not another. Only That is—either only He is and we are not; or only we are and He is not. There are not two—that much is certain. “I and Thou” are not two. Either it is I, if one speaks in the language of knowledge; or, if one speaks in the language of devotion, it is Thou. But one thing is certain: there is only One. Then what sense is there in it? What is the meaning? Whether you say yes or no, to whom are you saying it? You are saying it to yourself.

A Zen fakir, Bokoju, would rise every morning and call out loudly, “Bokoju!” And then he himself would answer, “Yes, sir! What is your command?” Then he would say: “Look—be mindful that none of Buddha’s precepts are violated today.” He would reply, “Yes, sir! We will be mindful.” No forgetfulness, live in remembrance! The day would begin. He would say, “We will be wholly careful.”

One of his disciples heard this and thought, what madness is this! To whom is he speaking? Bokoju is his own name. Every morning he calls out, “Bokoju!” and then says, “Yes, sir—what do you say?” The disciple asked, Master, explain this secret to me.

Bokoju laughed. He said, this is the truth. Where are there two here? Here we are the giver of commands and we are the obeyer. Here we are the Creator and we are the creation. We are the question and we are the answer. Here, there is no other.

So do not take this as a joke—said Bokoju. This is life’s reality.

You ask me, what is my answer? I say: there is One, not two. Nondual. Therefore rise beyond the negative and beyond the positive—only then does spirituality begin.

Understand the distinction: the negative is the atheist; the affirmative is the theist. And that which is beyond both negation and affirmation is the spiritual.

Spirituality is far higher than theism. Theism lives on the same ground as atheism; the ground of both is not different. One says no, one says yes—but both assume that God can be affirmed or denied, that He is other than us. Spirituality says: God is not other than you—you are That! Now what yes and what no? What is, is.

“I am content,” “I am discontent”—do not raise this matter at all. There, ignorance has entered. You ask me what I would say. I say: what is, is. If there is a thorn, there is a thorn; if there is a flower, there is a flower. Neither am I displeased, nor am I pleased. What is, is. It cannot be otherwise. There is not even a wish to make it otherwise. Live in it as it is. Ashtavakra has said: yathaprāpta—live in what is as it is; live it simply and naturally. Do not fuss, do not make a racket, do not bring theism and atheism in between—this is the supreme spirituality.

First, understand the meaning of mumuksha.
Mumuksha is when all your scattered longings gather together and turn toward the Divine; as small desires are like little streams, brooks, rivulets—when they all fall together they become the Ganges, and the Ganges rushes toward the ocean. You want wealth, you want position, you want to be beautiful, healthy, respected—there are thousands upon thousands of wants. When all those wants are absorbed into a single want and you say, “I want to know the Lord,” the Ganges is born. All the little springs and rivulets have poured into this great river—the Ganges sets out for the ocean!

But ultimately, even the Ganges has to disappear; otherwise she cannot meet the ocean. The moment of union will come when the Ganges must efface herself. If she insists on remaining the Ganges, she will miss the ocean. If she stands on the shore and says, “I have come so far, carrying such mumuksha, such longing for union with God; I haven’t come to disappear, I’ve come to attain God”—then she has missed. She will be left standing on the bank and will miss the ocean. In the end, the Ganges must fall into the ocean and be lost.

First, the small desires pour into the great longing of mumuksha; then, ultimately, even the longing called mumuksha must dissolve. That is why the supremely wise will say that mumuksha too is an obstacle. The desire to know is an obstacle. The desire for moksha is also an obstacle.

Mumuksha means the desire for liberation: “I want to be free!” One wants to be wealthy, another powerful, another immortal, another free—but desire remains. Certainly the desire for moksha is higher than all other desires, but still, it is a desire. A very beautiful desire—but a desire nonetheless. Decked and adorned like a new bride—but still a desire. And desire is bondage.

As long as I want something, the struggle continues; because my wanting runs contrary to the Whole. Desire means: what should be is not, and what is should not be. In desire there is discontent. Desire is born in the fire of discontent. And moksha happens only when we say: What is, is; and this is what can be. In that instant, rest descends. No demand for what is not; delight in what is. Contentment arrives, satisfaction, fulfillment.

Ashtavakra says: again and again the Self is found, again and again fulfillment arises—muhurmuhuh, again and again! As contentment grows dense, a greater peace showers; as contentment thickens, a greater bliss rains; as peace deepens, the Divine descends—muhurmuhuh—again and again, over and over! And there is no end to this journey.

So mumuksha brings you to the very door of the Divine, and then it holds you at the threshold. In the end, mumuksha too must be dropped. Ultimately all wanting must be let go, including the want for mumuksha. If you are to be free, even the aspiration for freedom must be relinquished.

But don’t be in a hurry. First, become the Ganges: gather all desires into the single desire for liberation. Let only one desire burn bright. The mind is racing in a thousand directions—let it run in one. Right now the mind is fragmented, with countless demands—let only one demand remain. When only one is left, you will become integrated. A yoga will bear fruit within you. Your fragments will end; you will become whole. And when you are wholly whole—you have become an offering. Then go and place your wholeness at the feet of the Divine. Say: Now I want nothing at all. Even this entire wanting—to know, for moksha, to seek You—we lay this too at Your feet! In that very instant the Ganges slips into the ocean; in that very instant she becomes the ocean.

There’s yet a flicker of self-awareness in my drunkenness;
grave flaws still stain my devotion!
There’s yet a flicker of self-awareness in my drunkenness;
grave flaws still stain my devotion!

If even so much awareness remains that “I am unconscious,” then devotion is not complete, prayer is not complete. If you walk the path intoxicated, ecstatic, yet a little thought lingers—“Look how intoxicated I am”—then the intoxication is not complete. Intoxication is complete only when even the thought of intoxication is gone. Liberation is complete only when even the longing for liberation is gone.

There’s yet a flicker of self-awareness in my drunkenness;
grave flaws still stain my devotion.

How can I say the station of annihilation is attained?
I still know at least this much—that I know nothing.

If even this much knowledge remains within—that “I know nothing”—it is enough of a bond, enough of a hindrance, enough of an obstruction.

And remember: man easily crosses the great obstacles; it is the small ones that truly trip him. The desire for wealth is petty; we can subsume it into the desire for moksha. We replace it with a greater desire—the desire for liberation. All that was distorted and ugly gradually becomes beautiful. The very idea of moksha is the idea of beauty—everything turns into grace. Then you hardly notice sorrow or pain. Only a very thin barrier remains—transparent, almost invisible! If there is a brick wall around you, you can see it. But a wall of glass, of pure crystal—it seems there is no obstacle, you can see through! You don’t notice the wall. Yet the wall is still there. Try to pass through and you will strike your head.

Mumuksha is a glass wall—barely visible. The worldly person’s cravings are gross, crude, like stones. The renunciate’s aspiration is very subtle, very transparent, very beautiful—and it can still hold you.

If even the memory remains that “I must be free,” you are not yet free. And if the desire for freedom lingers in the mind, you cannot be free. For to be free means simply this: no desire remains. But this one desire remains—and in it, all others are preserved.

Therefore Ashtavakra said a revolutionary thing: be free not only of kāma and artha, but of dharma as well. No scripture has a sutra like this. All have said, “Be free of artha and kāma”; none has said, “Be free of dharma.” In this, Ashtavakra is utterly original and unique. He says: Be free of dharma too, otherwise dharma itself will become a barrier. In the end, all desires must fall.

How can I say the station of annihilation is attained?
Manzil-e-fanā means becoming a zero, a nothingness.
How can I say that the station of annihilation is attained?
How can I say I have become nothing?
I still know at least this much—that I know nothing.
Even this much is an obstacle.
That much knowledge—that “I know nothing”—is enough of a wall; it will make you stumble.

I crossed the Himalayan heights,
a tiny pebble became a blockade.
A moment’s courage turns to mere doubt,
if at the root fear still lives.
I swam the ocean wide,
a shallow shore turned into resistance.
The goal is to be free of oneself;
beyond duality, what’s there to gain or lose?
Harmony with all was attained, yet
the very same conflict remained with myself.
In a subtle knot this silken mind—
while trying to unravel, awareness got entangled.
Action so tainted by ego,
that even purification became retaliation.
I crossed the Himalayan heights,
a little pebble became the obstacle.

A man crosses great mountains; a tiny pebble trips him. The elephant passes through easily; it is the tail that gets stuck.

I swam the ocean wide,
a shallow shore turned into resistance.

Many there are who swim the ocean and then get tangled at the shore.

There is a sweet incident in Mahavira’s life. His chief disciple was Gautam Gandhar. For years he stayed with Mahavira, yet he did not become liberated. He was the most brilliant of Mahavira’s disciples. His restlessness was great. He intensely longed to be free; he had left nothing undone, had poured his whole life into the offering—yet why was liberation not happening? He could not see that this very insistence was the hindrance; this anxiety, this tension. The desire for moksha too is born of the ego—this is the ego’s last play, now in the name of moksha.

When Mahavira died, that day Gautam was away, preaching in a nearby village. Returning, some travelers told him, “Don’t you know? Mahavira has left the body.” He began to weep right there. Weeping, he asked them, “Did he leave any last message for me?” For he was the closest disciple and had served Mahavira tirelessly, had staked everything; still some obstruction remained that he could not understand.

They said, “We did not understand what the message meant. We remember the words; don’t ask us the meaning—only you and he would know. He said just this: ‘O Gautam, you have swum the whole river—why are you stopping at the bank?’”

And it is said that hearing this, Gautam attained knowing! In that very hearing, liberation happened!

I crossed the Himalayan heights,
a tiny pebble became a blockade.
I swam the ocean wide,
a shallow shore turned into resistance.

A man swims the whole ocean, then thinks, “The shore is here now,” and clings to the bank—he stops. The shore too must be let go. Everything must be dropped. Even dropping must be dropped. Only then do you remain in your purest form—stainless. Only then does your liberation manifest.

To understand this dream, one must grasp a notion given to modern psychology by Carl Gustav Jung. Jung called it “the Shadow,” the shadow-personality. It is a very significant notion. Just as when you walk in the sun your shadow is cast—exactly so, whatever you do also casts a shadow within you. That shadow is the opposite. It is always the opposite of you.
And the law of life is that here everything moves through the opposite. Here, if woman moves, she cannot move without man; if man moves, he cannot move without woman. Where there is night there is day; where there is birth there is death. Where there is darkness there is light. Everything is bound to its opposite. Existence is a polarity—a duality, a two. Exactly the same is the situation inside the mind.

Now try to understand this dream.
You have said that earlier you used to dream: in a crowd, in an assembly, in society—suddenly I have become naked. That is the shadow. You wear clothes and meet people in society, in crowds; your shadow, in opposition to that, keeps generating the impulse to be naked. That is why often when someone goes mad he throws off his clothes and becomes naked. What the shadow had been saying all along and he never listened to—on going mad, he agrees with the shadow; he drops what he had been doing and begins to listen to the shadow. His shadow-form had always been saying: become naked, become naked!

That is why society insists so strongly: don’t be naked, don’t go out naked. Because everyone knows: from the very day human beings began to wear clothes, on that very day the desire to be naked arose in the shadow-personality. From the very day clothes were worn—since that day!

Those who live naked in the forests will never have such a dream. In their dreams they will never see that they have become naked, because they have not worn clothes. Yes, they might dream of wearing clothes. If they have seen people wearing clothes, then in dreams the longing to wear clothes may arise.

In dreams we see precisely what we have denied, rejected, renounced. In dreams that which we have thrown into the cellar of the house begins to rise in the mind. And whenever we do anything, something or other has to be thrown into that cellar.
If you have loved a woman, what will you do with the hatred that is linked to love? You will throw the hatred into the cellar. Then hatred will start coming in your dreams. One night in your dream you will murder your wife. One night in your dream you will find yourself strangling your wife. And you won’t even be able to think how—never did such a thought occur while awake; your wife is so beautiful, so beloved, everything is going well—how does such a dream arise?
You will sometimes find yourself fighting with a friend in a dream; because with whomever you made friendship, the feeling of enmity that arose alongside—you threw it into the cellar.

Twenty-four hours a day we act, and we throw things into the cellar. That is why Ashtavakra says: do not choose virtue nor sin. If you choose virtue you will throw sin into the cellar. It will cast its shadow in your dreams and become the foundation of your future life. If you choose sin you will throw virtue into the cellar. What is the difference, then? The one whom we call virtuous has suppressed sin within and displayed virtue without. The one whom we call a sinner has done the reverse: suppressed virtue within and displayed sin without. But everything is double, like the two sides of a coin.

“So when earlier you would dream in a crowd, in an assembly, in society—you would see: suddenly I have become naked!”
The very day Ajit’s parents first put clothes on him, that very day the shadow was born. Children do not like to wear clothes. They have to be forced, threatened, bribed: we’ll give you sweets, take this toffee, take this chocolate, we’ll give you this much money—but go out wearing clothes. In the child’s mind there is joy in being naked; because the child is wild, primal. He sees no reason why clothes should be worn—there is no reason. And without clothes there is such a sense of freedom and release; why be unnecessarily bound by clothes? And then the hassles arrive with clothes: you tore them, you got them muddy!

Now it is quite amusing that the very people who dress you then say, keep the clothes neat and clean, don’t make them dirty. He had never wanted to wear them. One trouble brings another. Then the chain goes on: wear good clothes, wear beautiful clothes, wear refined clothes—respectable! The net keeps spreading. Gradually, that childhood freedom of being naked slips into the cellar. It will sometimes cast its shadow in dreams. It will sometimes say: What a tangle you are in! What fun it was then! You jumped, you danced! If you went into the water—no worry. If it rained—you stood there, no worry. You rolled in the sand—no worry. These clothes have almost taken your life. From these clothes you have gained nothing; you have lost so much.

So that repressed longing will rise up within. It says: “Drop it—now drop it; enough! What have you gained? Only clothes remained; you lost the soul, you lost freedom!” Hence you kept becoming naked in your dreams.

The symbol is clear. You took sannyas—your parents didn’t make you take it. The clothes your parents put on you involved some kind of compulsion. This sannyas you took of your own free will, out of your joy. These robes you chose out of love, you chose with a feeling of reverence. Naturally, your attachment to these robes is not what it was to the other clothes. Your fondness for these robes is unlike the fondness you had for other clothes.

Therefore the dream of nakedness has dissolved; that curtain has fallen, that matter is finished. You yourself dropped the clothes that used to cause the dream of nakedness. The dream of nakedness was tied to those very clothes that were forced upon you. Now that dream has no meaning left. When those garments are gone, the shadow they cast is also gone. One side of the coin is gone; the other side goes with it.

Now you have chosen your robes by your own wish. So the feeling of being naked does not arise.

“But sometimes I see myself in a dream wearing non-ochre clothes.”

This needs a little understanding. Although with these robes there isn’t the same inner opposition as there was with the clothes foisted on you by your parents—you chose these of your own accord—still, whatever is chosen will cast a shadow. The shadow will be dimmer, not so dense. What was forced upon you throws a stronger shadow. What you chose freely throws a very faint shadow—but it will be there. Whatever we choose creates a shadow. Whether it is chosen freely or under compulsion is secondary. Choice creates a shadow. Only non-choice creates no shadow. Only the state of witnessing casts no shadow. Doership always casts a shadow.

This sannyas too is an act of doership. You thought, considered, chose. You also found joy in it. But the dream is giving you a big message. The dream is saying: now rise above the doer; now become a witness.

The moment witnessing happens, dreams disappear—you will be astonished to know this. In fact there is only one criterion to know whether a person has become a witness or not: have his dreams disappeared or not? As long as we are doers, dreams will continue—because doing means: we will keep choosing something!

Understand this. When Ajit took sannyas, he didn’t start wearing the full robes at once. In the beginning he changed the shirt on top but kept wearing white trousers. There must have been conflict. The mind must have said: “What are you doing? There is home, family, business!” Ajit is a doctor, a respected doctor. “The practice will suffer. People will think: he’s gone crazy! What has happened to the doctor?” Even when he wore the mala, he kept it hidden inside—but it cannot be hidden from me. Those of you who are hiding things inside, be warned! He kept it hidden within. Slowly he gathered courage; the mala came out. Whenever he met me, I would keep telling him, “How long will you do this? Now turn those trousers ochre too.” He would say, “I will, I will…” Slowly—perhaps it took two or three years. So for two or three years the mind was wavering, and that wavering has left a shadow within. He chose over many days, chose after much thinking—gradually he melted, he understood. Then he came fully into ochre robes. But those three years of a vacillating mind—shall I choose or not choose, half choose and half not choose—have left lines inside. Those very lines will mirror themselves in dreams.

Whatever we choose… choice means choosing against something. The clothes he used to wear—against those he chose the ochre robes. That which you choose against will demand its revenge. That which you chose in opposition will take its payback; it will sit within and watch for a chance: if ever an opportunity arises, I will avenge myself. If in ordinary waking life it doesn’t find a chance—some people do give it a chance: like “Swabhav” who was sitting here yesterday or the day before in ordinary clothes—then Swabhav will not get a dream, that is certain. The dream isn’t needed. He commits his dishonesty while awake; what need is there for a dream now? When you cheat in your waking life, then the dream has no role to play. Swabhav will not have a dream—but that is his misfortune. It is Ajit’s good fortune that he is having a dream. From this one thing is certain: no cheating is going on in the waking state. So a shadow is forming in the dream.

Now you have to go beyond the shadow of this dream too. There is only one way: accept it. Accept it with goodwill that I chose sannyas. Consciously acknowledge that I chose sannyas, choosing it in a struggle against the old clothes. Then admit that somewhere a suppressed attachment remained within toward the old clothes; accept that the attachment was there and I chose against it. The moment you accept it, it will vanish from your dreams. And the very moment you accept it, you will enter a new dimension. These ochre robes will remain ochre, but no longer as a “choice”—they will become a form of prasad, a gift of grace.

Understand this difference.

If you received sannyas from me as prasad—you said to me, “If you deem me worthy, please give,” and you made no choice—then no shadow will form in dreams. If you yourself chose—thought, thought again, weighed pros and cons, reasoned and argued—and then took sannyas, a shadow will form.

Ajit took sannyas after much thinking. Therefore the shadow remains. Now transform your sannyas into prasad. Drop even the feeling that “I took.” Now understand that it was given to you—Lord’s prasad, the Lord’s compassion! It is not my choice.

And that feeling suppressed within you—acknowledge that it is there; it belonged to your past, its shadow remains. On accepting it, this dream will gently depart. And know your sannyas as prasad. Even though you may have taken it after much thought, if someday you understand the truth you will find: you did not take it; I gave it.

There is a marvelous saying in the Koran: a faqir should never go to the doors of emperors or the wealthy. Whenever there is to be a meeting, the emperor should come to the faqir’s door.

Jalaluddin Rumi was a great, accomplished faqir. One day his disciples saw that he went to the king’s palace. The disciples were very disturbed. This was a violation of the Koran. When Jalaluddin returned they said, “Master, this is a transgression. And that one as virtuous as you should err! The Koran clearly says a faqir should never go to the doors of the wealthy or of kings and politicians. If a king must come, he should come to the faqir’s door.”

Do you know what Jalaluddin said? What he said is extraordinary! Only someone truly accomplished could interpret the Koranic saying this way. Jalaluddin said: “Do not worry about this. Whether I go to the king’s house or the king comes to me—in every case the king comes to me.” An odd interpretation! In every case! Don’t rely on your eyes and what you think you saw! Whether I appear to go to the king’s palace or the king appears to come to my hut, I tell you: in every case it is the king who comes to me.

Now when Jalaluddin says this, the disciples are stunned, but they still don’t understand: how can this be, in every case?

Jalaluddin said: Don’t be afraid, don’t worry. Sometimes I go to the king’s door because he cannot gather the courage to come. He is ignorant; I am not. I see his potential. I went so that I might prepare the way for his coming. Now he will come. If my going were to ask for something, then I would have “gone.” I went to give; so what kind of “going” is that? This is what the Koran truly means when it says, “Do not go”—its total meaning is only this much: do not go to beg. There is no prohibition on going to give. And the one who goes to give has not gone at all.

I agree with Jalaluddin. I say to Ajit Saraswati: you took sannyas after much thinking—that may be your understanding; as far as I am concerned, I gave it. Had you not thought, you would have received a little sooner; you thought, so you received a little later—otherwise, in every case, it is I who give.

All who have taken sannyas should note: whether you “take” sannyas or I “give” it—in every case, I am the one who gives. There is no question of your taking. How can you take? How can you stretch your hand toward the Infinite?

Sannyas is prasad. And the day this feeling is understood, that very day this dream will vanish. Only a little sense of doership remains; that much is the hindrance.

Everyone doubts surrender, because you try to do surrender by thinking it through. Whatever you do by thinking and rethinking will carry doubt. If there were no doubt, why would you be thinking at all? Then surrender is a leap—a quantum leap. Then you don’t do it by thinking. Then surrender is like a kind of madness, an ecstasy, a state of being possessed... a revolution of trust happens! But such a revolution happens to one in a hundred; ninety-nine do it by thinking.

So when you do it by thinking, what you have thought and decided—though it may be a majority decision—is parliamentary. You thought a lot and found: sixty percent of the mind testifies for surrender, forty percent does not. You say, “All right, now a decision can be taken.” But it is parliamentary. That forty percent that was not willing can at any time break off some members. It can bribe them, offer assurances about the future—“We’ll make you a minister; we’ll do this, we’ll do that”—it can poach some factions of the mind. Any day it can come to power. And the possibility is there. Because with that sixty percent by which you surrendered, after surrender the test will come: is anything happening through surrender or not? If from a sixty-percent surrender nothing really happens, the forty percent will say, “Listen, have you come to your senses now? We told you already—don’t do it; nothing will come of it.”

This is the inner situation. The event happens only at a hundred percent. It does not happen before that; water becomes steam only at a hundred degrees. At sixty degrees it can at most become very hot, it cannot turn into steam. So you have heated up. Your earlier calm is gone, fever has come, and you have taken on the bother of these ochre robes! You were already troubled enough—plenty of hassles—and you added a new one. That forty percent sitting inside—you cannot even criticize it; it has become the opposition party!

The opposition has one advantage: you cannot criticize it. It hasn’t done anything—how will you criticize it? That is why leaders of the opposition become very critical. They start criticizing everything—this is wrong, that is wrong! The one who is doing something is the one on whom blame for mistakes can be placed. The one who is doing nothing...

So a very amusing phenomenon goes on all over the world—inside and outside. The party in power cannot remain in power for long. Whatever it does, there will be some mistakes, some slips. Life’s problems are so vast that not all will be solved. Those that aren’t solved, the opposition keeps pointing at: “What about this? And that? Nothing has happened; the country is ruined!” Slowly people start listening to the opposition: “He is speaking rightly.” The opposition’s strength grows. As soon as the opposition comes to power, its strength starts crumbling. The ruler begins to weaken the moment he gains power; the non-ruler grows powerful by staying outside power.

Hence politics plays a game in the world. In all democratic countries there are two parties. India still hasn’t gathered that much sense—so there is needless trouble here. There are two parties; it’s a game. The public is fooled. Of the two, one is in power and does what it wants to do; the one out of power gathers its strength in the meantime. In the next election the second party comes to power; the first goes among the people and starts gathering strength again. There is a conspiracy between the two. One is in power, the other becomes the critic.

And the public memory is very weak. It doesn’t even ask, “When you were in power, why didn’t you make these criticisms? Now you’ve started criticizing? You were doing the very same things, but then all was right; now everything has gone wrong? And these who are saying everything is wrong—when they come to power, then everything will be right again!” Their being in power makes everything right; their being out of power makes everything wrong. Their presence is auspicious; their absence inauspicious.

The same thing happens inside the mind. The part of the mind that had said, “Don’t surrender, don’t take sannyas,” sits and watches: “All right! You took it, fine. Now what happened?” It keeps asking again and again: “Tell me, what happened?” Then the sixty percent of your mind slowly begins to slip. Some of its parts go over to the other side. Many times it comes to a fifty–fifty stalemate; then doubt arises, then you become very wobbly.

Sometimes it may even reverse—forty in favor of surrender and sixty against—then you start feeling an urge to drop sannyas and run away.

“I doubt my surrender.”
If you have done surrender, then doubt is bound to be there. Because surrender cannot be done. Surrender happens. It is like love. You fell in love; you don’t say, “I did love”—it happened!

So I have two kinds of sannyasins with me—one, who have done surrender: for them doubt will always remain; and the other, for whom surrender has happened: for them there is no question of doubt at all. It was not a parliamentary decision. It was not done by a majority. It was unanimous. It happened in total madness—that is what I call a quantum leap. It is not a process of going step by step—it is a leap.

Surrender is not something to be done. Surrender is the expression of understanding—it happens. Keep listening to me, keep drinking me in; stay close, remain in my shade—and slowly, slowly, one day you will suddenly find: surrender has happened! Don’t think about it—how to do it, when to do it. Don’t keep accounts. Just remain. The natural outcome of satsang is surrender.

Neither the disciple has to do it, nor the master. The master does nothing; his presence is enough. The disciple too should do nothing—just be present in the master’s presence! When these two presences meet, when they begin to interpenetrate, when boundaries loosen and there is a crossing over—when the distance between me and you goes on decreasing—just by listening, sitting, coming closer, a certain music begins to play within you. Neither do I play it, nor do you—it plays in nearness. My sitar is already playing; if you are willing to listen, your sitar will begin to sway with it; notes will begin to arise in your strings too.

So, neither does the disciple “do” surrender, nor does the master make it happen. A master who tries to extract surrender is a false master. And a disciple who “does” surrender has no understanding of discipleship. Surrender happens between the two, when both become utterly one. The master is already effaced; and when, by sitting near, the disciple too begins to efface, to melt—surrender happens.

“Or does it happen in the disciple with the master’s cooperation?”
There is no cooperation. The master does nothing. If the master does anything, he is your enemy—because his doing will make you a slave. On his doing, you will become dependent. Liberation cannot come from someone else’s doing. The master does not do a thing. He gives you an empty space. He opens his very presence before you—opens himself. The master is a doorway. A door has nothing in it, not even a wall; the very meaning of door is emptiness. You can pass through it. If you do not fear, if you do not start thinking and pondering, then gently the door is calling you.

Have you noticed—an open door is an invitation! Seeing an open door, as you pass by, you feel like entering. If you gather courage and accept the invitation, the master becomes a doorway; through it you enter.

The master is a catalytic agent. His presence acts; the master himself does nothing. And presence can act only if you allow it—give it a chance, give it an opening; drop your stiffness, relax, let yourself fall into rest.

What is, is already within you—and in the master’s presence you begin to know it.

He roamed, blind to his own scent—the musk-deer—
forest to forest; ignorant of the source,
he became the hunter’s target.
He roamed, blind to his own scent!
The musk abides in his navel-knot;
yet the musk-deer wanders madly, made blind by his own fragrance—
He runs, he flees: “From where does the scent come? The scent calls...!”

This fragrance you see in me is your fragrance. This note you have heard in me is the note of your own sleeping life-breath.

He roamed, blind to his own scent—
forest to forest; ignorant of the source,
he became the hunter’s mark.
The slayer hides somewhere, and suddenly the musk-deer falls into his hands. The deer had gone out seeking its own scent. You too have become the target of so many hunters—now of wealth, now of position, now of prestige. Who knows how many arrows have pierced you, and you wander—seeking yourself!
The musk-deer ran, blind to his own scent!
Unaware of your own fragrance, you keep running! For no reason, a thousand arrows of the world pierce you and leave your heart riddled.

A true master means only this: in whose presence you come to know that “the musk abides in my own navel.” It is within you.

Now you have surrendered. Before, you kept thinking; even now you are thinking—how long will you go on losing by thinking? Surrender was never to be done by thinking. One mistake you have already made; now that it is done, stop thinking. The tail is already cut—stop dreaming of attaching it again. Let the little life-line that remains, the little life-energy left, be put to good use—do not waste it in thinking!

One spark remains—will it light a pyre or a lamp?
The worn, weary hunter—the sun—is about to close his eye;
from the west the bird of darkness has flown, opening evening’s wings.
The aarti is being prepared—seek a conch or a shell.
The epoch of a single moment can be yours, if you can pay its price;
else a few earthen words will remain caught in Time’s throat—
bound to the incoming, what of all comings and goings—near or far?
One spark remains—will it light a pyre or a lamp?

That little life-energy left—will you use it only to light the funeral pyre, or will you light a lamp? Enough of thinking; now let all this energy flow into surrender. Come close, come nearer—so that what has happened within me may become contagious within you.

One spark remains—will it light a pyre or a lamp?
The aarti is being prepared—seek a conch or a shell.

You have surrendered; I have placed sannyas in your hands—will you just sit holding it? Play this flute!

Blow the flute as much as you like,
but without placing your fingers on the holes
the love-melody will not arise!

I have given you the flute—will you go on blowing emptily like this? Thinking and brooding is only blowing. Place a few fingers of your life-energy on the flute’s holes!

Blow the flute as much as you like,
but without placing your fingers on the holes
the love-melody will not arise!

Let this sannyas I have given you become an opportunity to evoke the raga of love for the Divine! Enough thinking. Did you not hear Ashtavakra? He said to Janaka: Through how many births have you done good deeds and bad—is it not enough by now? It is sufficient. Now wake up! Now attain quiescence, rest, cessation. Now come home—return to the source!

That source is called the witness, the sakshi. Sannyas is the flute; if you place your fingers rightly and play, the notes that arise will give birth to witnessing. Sannyas is only a journey—toward the witness. And until the witness is born, know this: sannyas is not yet complete.

Hari Om Tat Sat!