Maha Geeta #90

Again you ask. The same thing is being said every day. The same thing is being repeated endlessly. By asking again you will not be able to hear. If, after so many repetitions, it doesn’t sink in, it might be understood if said just once. The matter is so simple. So the issue is not the repetition of the words; the issue is your stupor. You are so asleep that, however many times it is repeated, nothing will change. Perhaps with too much repetition you will think someone is singing a lullaby and you will fall into an even deeper sleep. Repetition many times does not result in awakening.

Again you ask: what is the secret of immediate awakening by mere hearing?

If there were a secret, then enlightenment would never be available by hearing alone. If there were some secret, something hidden, it would have to be searched for. Effort would be needed. That awakening which happens by hearing alone means precisely that there is no secret at all. The divine is manifest, not hidden. The divine is present, not behind veils. The divine stands before your eyes, and behind your eyes. The divine has surrounded you from all sides. Other than the divine there is nothing. Where is the secret? Those who thought the divine is a secret missed. Then they will start searching for the divine. And what is so present that apart from it nothing else exists—if you set out to find it, you have already missed. The missing happens in the very search. As if at high noon someone starts looking for light—what will you say, will he find light? Sunlight is pouring on all sides; he stands right in the sun and says, “I want to search for light. Where is light, what is the secret of it?” The very asking contains the error. The very asking is the mistake.

It is the pundits who have erected secrets; the divine is utterly manifest. The whole business of the pundits depends on creating entanglement. Otherwise how would there be anything left to solve? If the matter is tangled, the pundit is needed. If it is already clear, there is no need of a pundit.

If truth can be obtained by mere hearing, it simply means there is no need to bring anyone in between. Not even the need to hold anyone’s hand. No need to follow anyone. Because there is nowhere to go—you are in truth. You have only to awaken. Open your eyes and see: it is high noon and the sun is pouring everywhere. With eyes closed you stand and ask, “What is the secret of the sun’s being? Where should we look for light? Where is the key to it?” Even if a closed-eyed man were given a key to obtain the sun, what would happen? The essential point has been missed.

You ask, what is the secret?
If there were a secret, truth could not be available by hearing alone. Ashtavakra’s entire teaching is: by hearing alone. Why is it said so? Because you have not lost the truth. Imagine a king who has fallen asleep and in his sleep dreams he has become a beggar. Someone wakes him and says, with waking alone the matter is finished. You are the king; you are dreaming the beggar. Then the alarm clock is enough—by hearing alone. Yes, if you truly were a beggar, then by hearing alone you could not become a king. However much someone repeats, “You are a king,” you know you are a beggar.

So you keep asking that there must be some secret to being a king! Ashtavakra is saying: you are the king. How you have become a beggar—that is the wonder. The treasure is with you; not for a single moment has your connection with it been broken—had it broken, you could not even be. Understand it like this: a tree is standing. If its connection with the roots were broken, the tree could not exist. Of course the tree may not see the roots. The roots are hidden in the deep darkness of the earth. Even if the tree were to peer down, it would not see them. And if the tree began to ask, “How shall I find my roots? How shall I know that I have roots?”—what would you say? The roots are there; otherwise you could not be.

When you speak, God speaks; when you breathe, God breathes; when you walk, God walks. You asked the question—God asked it. The question is arising from the depth of the divine itself. It is a pointer on the path of awakening. The divine wants to awaken in you. You are searching for a method; by searching for a method you will postpone it to tomorrow, because methods are never solved today. If the thing is hidden, it will take time to find; time will pass—tomorrow, the day after, in the next life. Ashtavakra says: it can happen now, here, this very instant; not a single moment needs to be lost. There is absolutely no secret.

There is no secret in Ashtavakra’s utterance. Nothing esoteric, nothing hidden. It is straightforward. The point is simply this: you are the divine. You can be only by being the divine. Therefore by mere hearing the happening can occur.

Then you ask: as a preliminary groundwork for this great happening, what preparation is necessary?
You won’t accept it, will you? Without preparing a preface you won’t agree? And you have been preparing the preface for lives upon lives. Where does the preface ever get ready? The preface is unnecessary. In preparing the preface you are getting lost. You are preparing for that which is already present. You are trying to bring that which has already arrived. That which has to be lived, you are busy searching for. The plate is set before you and the meal is to be begun, yet you wander through markets. You are researching cookbooks. The food is ready, the food is served, nothing needs to be done—but your mind is not willing to accept.
What is the reason? Why does such a question arise? It has been asked by Swami Yog Chinmaya. Why does such a question arise? It arises because mere hearing does not bring you the realization of truth. So you think to yourself that there must be some secret somewhere, some prelude that you are failing to fulfill. Otherwise, why didn’t it happen to me just by listening? To save your ego you begin to find devices. You think there must be a prelude, something hidden. Janaka must have made some preparation earlier, and I have not—that’s the only difference. The difference is not of preparation; it is of awareness. Janaka listened with awareness; you are listening in unconsciousness. Janaka saw with open eyes; you are trying to see with closed eyes. The difference is not of preparation; you have eyes just as Janaka had. Lift the eyelids—do not ask about preparation. If you ask about preparation you will again move into effort; then effortless awakening cannot happen.
“Of this great event...”
Why do you call it a great event? What could be more simple and straightforward than this? What could be simpler than knowing what already is? Why call it a great event? There is a reason behind calling it great. By calling it a great event you can say, if it isn’t happening right now, it’s not our fault—the event is so immense! It will happen in its own time. We will labor, we will run life after life, and then the destination will come. The event itself is so great! This gives you a double advantage. First, if it doesn’t happen today, you don’t feel pain. You say it cannot happen today anyway. So you get the comfort of sleeping till tomorrow. Tomorrow we will see. Tomorrow again you will call it a great event and postpone it to the day after. Great events don’t just happen like that! Only after lifetimes of toil do they happen. They are the fruit of many lives of labor. They don’t just happen!

By calling it a great event you have found a device—on the surface it looks like praise, but it isn’t praise at all; it is an insult to the happening. The entire essence of Ashtavakra is that this happening is utterly easy, natural, absolutely ordinary. Nothing in this world is more ordinary than the Divine, because the Divine is the very breath of the whole existence. What could be more ordinary than that? In the waterfall is the waterfall, in the tree is the tree, in the bird the bird, in the man the man—woman in woman, man in man, child in child, old in the old—the Divine is the all-pervasive flavor of all. In the sinner the Divine is “sinful,” and in the virtuous the Divine is “virtuous.” In hell the Divine is infernal, and in heaven heavenly. What could be more ordinary? In the tiniest the same One abides, and in the vastest the same One abides. In the atom the same, and in the infinite the same. What could be more ordinary than the Divine, for the Divine is universal, without attributes. That is what Ashtavakra said yesterday—without qualities, without any special characteristic.

But we want to place the Divine up above—the highest thing—on the same ladder where wealth, position, prestige stand, and above all of them God stands. We think we are honoring God by this. We are deceiving the Divine.

Do not call it a great event! It is very ordinary. And it is not something that is going to happen; it has already happened. Whether you wake up or not, the Divine is seated within you. Whether you accept it or not, the Divine is present within. Your very presence is the shadow of Its presence. The shadow. Only That is; you are but a shadow. As when a man walks in the sun and a shadow forms, so from the movement of the Divine countless forms arise. Form is the shadow of the formless. Shape is the shadow of the shapeless. Sound is the shadow of emptiness. Music is the shadow of silence. The source isn’t being seen; you are entangled in shadows. Just wake up, startle, stir, and you will find you are the source.

So do not call it a great event. In calling it great you have already created the device—then preparation will be needed; great events don’t just happen! Yama, Niyama, Asana, Pranayama, Pratyahara and a thousand exercises, then Dharana, Dhyana, then Samadhi—practicing this eightfold yoga, lifetimes will pass. This is exactly the difference between Patanjali and Ashtavakra. Patanjali is sequential—practice slowly, step by step. Hence Patanjali had great impact; people liked the approach. Ashtavakra had little impact. The matter was so simple the ego could not like it. Understand this.

Ashtavakra doesn’t appeal to the egoist. The egoist says, “Simple? Then there is no juice in it.” He enjoys climbing Mount Everest. What fun is there in climbing a little hill in Poona! If you climb that hill and plant a flag and ask the newspapers to report it—“Hillary climbed Everest, I too have done the same!”—people will laugh: anyone can climb a hillock; there’s nothing to it! Climb Everest—then it’s something. That is a great event. This is no event at all—children climb such hills. What is the substance in it?

So man keeps searching for newer devices. The route by which Hillary climbed—no one had ever reached Everest that way—he reached; the very day he reached, mountaineers began looking for another route, even more difficult. Now they have done that too. They reached the same summit, but now they receive greater praise because they chose an even more difficult route, one that even Hillary did not take. Soon someone will find a third route. Then, after Hillary went up by climbing, some madman may crawl his way up to Everest, because no one has crawled up yet. Or a yogi may try to climb standing on his head, in a headstand. The ego always delights in the difficult; the more difficult, the more juice.

If the Divine is simple, the egoist loses interest. If the Divine is difficult, the egoist is excited. Difficulty charms him; it is a magnet. That is why I tell you: in temples, mosques, gurdwaras and pilgrim places, if you look closely at the monks and renunciates you will find that ninety-nine out of a hundred are great egoists. Because they have gone in search of God. They look at you and see insects. What are you doing? Shopkeeping, office work, farming—insects! Seek God, look at us, we are doing something! What are you doing? You are animals, not even human. Why? Because you seek the simple; they seek the difficult. And I tell you, the one who turns to the simple is the true sannyasin—the one who drops the infatuation with the difficult. That is true renunciation. The renunciation of the difficult is renunciation, because with it the ego falls dead. Without the difficult, the ego cannot survive; it walks only on the crutches of difficulty.

With the simple, the ego has no movement. The Divine is so simple that there is nothing to do; it is already done. That is why Ashtavakra says: you will not get it by being a doer, only by being a witness. It is present. Just sit a little, quietly, with eyes open, and look. Where are you rushing? What is this frenzy?

Do not call it a great event. By calling it great you prepare the ground—for preparations.

“For this great event, what preparation is necessary as a prelude?”
If preparation is necessary, then Ashtavakra is wrong. If a prelude is necessary, Ashtavakra is wrong. No prelude is needed. You are already standing there; no ladder needs to be placed. Wherever you stand, there is the Divine. This proclamation is so revolutionary: the Divine is simple, accessible, already attained.

But I understand your difficulty. When you hear this, you say, “Perhaps, but why am I not getting it?” If I’m not getting it, surely there must be some device being hidden, some key not being told. There must be some method, some ladder that I am not placing—otherwise why don’t I get it?

You do not want to see that your eyes are closed. You are sitting blind. You are asleep. You are in a swoon. You don’t want to admit this. If you admit “I am unconscious,” the ego feels hurt. It is easier to think: there must be a ladder I didn’t get; somewhere it exists, I will find it—there is no fault in me, the lack is in the ladder. I am fine. Some people got the ladder, I didn’t—that’s all. The difference between Janaka and you, you think, is the ladder. But a ladder is external. You shift it to circumstances.

If you were born poor and someone born rich becomes enlightened, you say, “What to do? I was born in a poor home, so I didn’t get the facilities to become enlightened; otherwise I too could have become enlightened, but the facility was missing.” You put it on facility. You did not take the straight fact that something may be lacking in you. Not all born in rich homes become enlightened! Nor do all the poor remain without light. But you evade. Notice: whenever someone succeeds, you search for excuses—why did he succeed? You decide he must have bribed someone, or had relatives in the ministry. When you succeed, you never ask whom you bribed or which relative you had in the ministry! When you succeed, you simply succeed. When another succeeds, it’s nepotism. When another passes, it’s bribery.

A woman came to me; her son had failed his exam for the third time. She pleaded, “Do something.” “What?” I asked. “The teachers are after him,” she said. “They just won’t let him pass. It’s all nepotism. They pass their own people. There’s bribery, and we have nothing to give.” She said, “Talent has no value these days.” I knew well what the boy’s “talent” was!

After three or four years of struggle he finally passed his matriculation. When he passed, I asked her, “Tell me, whom did you bribe? Which devotee of nepotism did you meet?” She said, “What are you saying? The boy is talented—these people kept misleading him for four or five years. He could have passed long ago.” Now there is no nepotism, no bribery!

Reflect on this. Janaka attained by just listening; you are not attaining by listening; so you think there must be some device. Either Janaka had prepared beforehand, arranged something so he awakened upon hearing. What is the difference between you and Janaka? Why are you not awakening? The difference is only this: you are not listening. Janaka listened and awakened. You are not listening. Perhaps you are so eager to awaken that you cannot listen. Even while I speak, you are calculating within—what is there to do? You go on thinking, “Yes, this point is right—note it, remember it, we will try it.” While you are “listening,” you are not listening; you are scheming. That is why you go on missing.

Janaka simply listened. He did no arithmetic. He listened as one listens to birdsong. He listened as one listens to music. When you listen to music, what do you do? You don’t interpret or analyze; you don’t say, “I agree with this part and not with that; this suits me, this doesn’t; this accords with my scripture, that does not.” While listening to music you become absorbed. You don’t think. Music is not a doctrine; it is a wave, a stream of rasa.

Janaka listened like one listening to music. You listen as if to science, constantly computing. Error fills your listening. There is no prelude to be prepared; no need. The fault lies in your listening—you are not listening. While listening, a thousand thoughts and plans are running. You are eager to arrive somewhere, to become something. One who is eager to become will not be able to hear Ashtavakra, because Ashtavakra says: there is nothing to become, nothing to know, nowhere to go. No destination. Where you are is the place. There is no other place. Right now, in this very moment, be silent, be still, open your eyes—fulfillment will shower.

“Is immediate awakening possible without any kind of direct or indirect preparation?”
See how the mind keeps calculating.
“Without any kind of...?”
There must be some device being hidden from you; that’s why you are not realizing.
“Without any kind of...?”
Because of such notions, you are drawn to those who prescribe preparations. They say, “First improve your conduct.” It appeals: if conduct is not improved, how will God be found? As if there could be any relation between finding God and improving conduct! It is like going to hear music and, when no rasa arises, someone says, “First improve your conduct. Put your conduct in order, then you will understand music.” As if conduct had anything to do with understanding music!

Yes, it is true that knowing the Divine transforms conduct; but the improvement of conduct has no causal relation to finding the Divine. Yes, it is true that if one becomes full of rasa in music, a revolution happens in life—everything changes—because music is such a great transformation. If you become capable of hearing and understanding music, changes begin. Your anger will begin to evaporate, because one who is immersed in music cannot be immersed in anger; anger is dissonance. One who is immersed in music will not be so charmed by wealth; wealth belongs to the noisy world. One immersed in music will delight in peace, because what does music do? When you listen, the waves of thought fall asleep and within spreads a tranquil sky—without a single cloud, all clouds gone—an empty azure expanse.

When the taste of peace comes to you through music, you will gradually see the intrinsic connection between peace and music. When you become silent, music begins to flow. Then you won’t even need an external veena; wherever you are silent, the inner veena will start to sing. In truth, the real music is not in the outer veena; by listening to the outer, you begin to hear the inner—music is there. The outer is only a trigger.

“Without any kind of...?”
Then the mind argues: if not direct, then perhaps some indirect preparation. If it is not visible, perhaps a hidden preparation. But is immediate awakening possible without any direct or indirect preparation? That is Ashtavakra’s whole teaching. Not merely possible—only that is possible. In no other way does awakening happen. Those who, after thousands of efforts, one day arrive, then discover: it could have happened at any time—if only I had listened. I didn’t listen; hence it didn’t happen.

I have often told you Buddha’s parable of four horses: one moves only when beaten hard; the second moves when the whip is cracked—no need to strike; the third moves by the mere presence of the whip; and the fourth is so sensitive that even the shadow of the whip is enough—the mere possibility is sufficient.

I was reading about a madman. He was a writer, a great one, and went insane. He was confined in an asylum for three years; no signs of recovery. After three years he suddenly said, “Bring paper and pen; I feel like writing.” His doctors were delighted: some sanity was returning. If he remembers he is a writer and wants to write, there is hope. He sat with paper and pen. He stopped all the craziness—no shouting, dancing, screaming—he became utterly quiet, writing from morning on. He wrote five hundred pages. For months this continued. The doctors thought he was cured, no madness left.

When the book was done he asked the chief physician, “Would you like to read my novel?” “Of course,” said the doctor, eager to see what he had written. He began to read. The first line: “A general leapt onto his horse and said, ‘Move, boy, move, boy, move, boy!’” And for five hundred pages, the same: “Move, boy, move, boy!” The doctor panicked, flipped pages—“Move, boy!”—five hundred pages. He rushed back: “What is this? What kind of novel?” The man said, “What can I say? The horse is stubborn—what can you do? The general kept saying ‘Move, boy!’ At last I too got tired; so I ended the novel.”

Some horses won’t move even after five hundred pages of “Move, boy!”

No direct preparation is needed, no indirect preparation is needed. Only understanding, only simple seeing is enough. And those who attained after great labor also found, upon attaining, that it could have been had without labor; the labor was in vain. It has nothing to do with labor.

When Buddha attained and people asked, “How did you get it?” Buddha said, “Don’t ask. Because what I did is not what brought it. It could have come to me without doing anything. I kept missing because I kept seeking. The very seeking made me miss. The day I dropped seeking and sat under the Bodhi tree, all seeking left—at that very moment, it happened.”

When Buddha returned home after twelve years, his wife asked, “I have only one question—answer truthfully. What you found outside the palace, in the forest—could it not have been found here if you had stayed?” Buddha said, “It could have. Going was not necessary. I went—that is another matter. Going was my mistake. Because if the Divine can be found somewhere, it can be found here. God doesn’t dwell only under a particular banyan tree. He doesn’t dwell only in a hut or only in a forest. Where is the place where He is not? Is there any place where the Divine is not? Then it can be found everywhere. Understand it this way: it is already found.”

This is Ashtavakra’s essence: the Divine is your nature—your own cadence, the song rising within you, your fragrance.

There is a Sufi story. A fakir saw in a dream that God stood before him and said, “Your prayers have reached me, your worship has reached me. Ask—what do you want? Take this sword?” The fakir said, “What will I do with a sword, Lord?” God said, “With this sword you can conquer the whole world. Its nature is assured victory. Think.” The fakir said, “I have little, and that troubles me enough—why are you after me? I am already harassed; why take on the nuisance of the whole world? Keep your sword; I don’t want it.” Then God took off His ring and said, “Look at this diamond—the largest in the world. With it you will be the richest of all. Take it.” He said, “What will I do with it? Eat it, drink it, wear it—what? Don’t entangle me with a stone. Whom are you trying to deceive? I am not a child. I have not wasted my years; this hair did not turn white for nothing in the sun. Whom will you fool?”

Then God said, “Do you want this, then? This apsara stands behind me; her body is of gold and she will be ever young, never old—take her.” He said, “Those whose bodies are not of gold, who today or tomorrow will grow old and die—those, though transient, bring enough trouble; this would be nuisance without end. With the transient at least there is the relief that it will end someday; this will never end. You say my prayers have reached you—are you angry with me, or what is it? Why do you want to embroil me? Leave this poor man alone. If this is the fruit of prayer, I will stop praying.”

God then said, “What do you want then? Ask, for I will not let you go without asking.” Near God stood a small rose plant. The fakir said, “Give me that.” God said, “What will you do with it? It will bloom in the morning and wither by evening.” He replied, “From it I will be reminded of life—that it blooms in the morning and withers by evening. Its fragrance will remind me that such a fragrance I too carry within me—O Lord, when will it manifest? Its beauty will keep alive in me the thought: if a flower is so beautiful, how beautiful must the human soul be! When will I behold it?”

The Divine is your fragrance—like the fragrance of a rose. The Divine is not an object you go out to find; it is your own fragrance. When you become still and turn your nostrils toward it, when you turn your eyes inward, when you spread your hands within, suddenly you find: found, found. And then you do not find something separate from you; you find union with yourself—self-meeting.

No, no preparation is needed—neither direct nor indirect.

Certainly. Love is the music of the witness. Love is the fragrance of witnessing. Only when one becomes a witness does love begin to shower. And certainly Ashtavakra did not speak of this love—deliberately. Knowing well that what you call love, you might mistakenly take to be the same.

So Ashtavakra spoke of witnessing and left love aside. He spoke of the seed and the tree, and left the fruit out—the fruit will come. You sow the seed, tend the tree, water it, keep gardening—the fruit will come. When it comes, it comes; why talk about it beforehand?

Deliberately he left love aside because there has always been a danger in speaking of love: you also believe you love; you have known a certain kind of love. Hearing the word “love,” you might assume your love and Ashtavakra’s love are the same. To save you from this danger, Ashtavakra kept silent about love—knowingly so.

I am not leaving it out—knowingly. Why? Because another danger has arisen. Since Ashtavakra did not speak of love, many came to believe that love is a sin. Many said: if one is to be a witness, love must be cut from the roots. That is the second misunderstanding.

Ashtavakra tried to save you from one delusion—that you might worship the mud of lust as if it were the lotus of love—but another delusion took birth. Man is such that if you save him from the well, he will fall into the ditch. But fall he will; he cannot be without delusion—he finds comfort in it. To prevent the worldly from mistaking their lust-laden “love” for the love Ashtavakra points to, he did not speak of love. But he did not reckon that there are renunciates in this world too—imitators, carbon copies. They noticed there was no mention of love in witnessing, so they chopped love off at the root. “Become loveless, then you will be a witness.” This is an even more dangerous misunderstanding; therefore I am deliberately bringing love back in.

In my view the first danger is not so bad. What you call love—granted, it is not the whole of love—but there is a glimpse within it of that love which, in the state of witnessing, finally blossoms. What flowers at the last is faintly reflected even now in your love. Granted, what connection can there be between mud and lotus? Yet when the lotus blooms, it draws its nourishment from the mud. Place mud and lotus side by side and you see no obvious relation, but every lotus blooms only from mud; without mud it cannot bloom. Still, mud is not the lotus. And remember: the lotus is hidden in the mud—latent, secret, waiting to manifest. What you call lust has God’s lotus hidden within it. Your lust is mud, muck—foul-smelling, yes—but I know that from this very mud the lotus will arise.

Ashtavakra wished to save you from one mistake—that you might begin worshipping the mud as the lotus. Great compassion. But then others arose who said, “Mud is not lotus, so get rid of the mud.” They threw away the mud—and the lotus never bloomed, because without mud it cannot. That second mistake is the greater one. The first mistake at least leaves a possibility: the mud is there, and the lotus is concealed in it; not yet manifest, dim, but present—you could search and find it. But the one who dries up the stream of love, who rids himself of “mud,” leaves no possibility for the lotus at all. In the first case there was potential; in the second there is none.

Love is the fruit of witnessing. I want to give you both together. I want to remind you that your love is not yet love; it is still to take the journey. Your love still has to evolve; more and more flowers must bloom out of it—do not stop at your present love. But I also say to you: do not cut your love down either, because what is to come is hidden within it. The tree is hidden within the seed.

Who can see the tree inside the seed? You too do not see God inside your love. But when you do have a glimpse of the divine, you will recognize, “Ah! That dim shadow in what I called love—this was it.” When you loved your wife, your son, your husband, your friend, you saw a faint shadow of God—very dim, much smoke, the flame unseen, half-lost. But however much smoke there is, the old logic texts say: where there is smoke, there is fire. Smoke is proof of fire; there can be fire without smoke—an incandescent ember may give no smoke—but smoke cannot be without fire. So: where there is smoke, there is fire. Where there is lust (kaam), there is God (Ram).

Your life is full of smoke, granted. But within this smoke a fire is hiding. Take the smoke as a hint, a pointing—use it to search for the fire. That is why I speak of witnessing and love together. You must remain alert to both—awaken the witness and protect love. If you save witnessing at the cost of love, you will become dry, withered, dead. Your peace will be that of the cremation ground, not living. Your truth will be dead and arid; the sap will not flow. Your truth will be like a desert—no flowers will bloom. Your veena will snap. You may become quiet, but no music will descend into that silence. That is not attainment; that is a miss. You missed in the world; now you miss in renunciation. You keep missing.

So I say: hold both. Do not lose love, and nurture the witness. If witnessing and love grow together in balance, samadhi will ripen in your life—and not a desert-samadhi, but one in which thousands of lotuses bloom; a peace not of the cremation ground, but living, throbbing, blissful; an emptiness brimming with fullness.

Then whether you walk the path of witnessing—the path of the meditator—or the path of love—the path of devotion—do not completely drop the other, do not forget it. On the path of love, let witnessing remain as a shadow. On the path of meditation, let love remain as a shadow.

“Paths that seem separate to the eye—
This sight makes the traveler afraid.
It is only a turn in the road, O wayfarer;
At the goal, they meet and are one.”

The differences are of the road. When travelers reach the destination, all the roads meet.

“Paths that seem separate to the eye—
This sight makes the traveler afraid.
It is only a turn in the road, O wayfarer;
At the goal, they meet and are one.”

Do not be afraid. Until now it has gone otherwise: those who spoke of devotion did not speak of meditation, fearing meditation might obstruct devotion. Those who spoke of meditation did not speak of devotion, fearing devotion might obstruct meditation. What I am saying to you is a more courageous statement than has been given before. All the earlier statements were incomplete. I am telling you the whole thing—and to tell the whole means to say together what seem opposites. Some spoke of day, some of night; I speak of day and night together, for to me they are conjoined. Some praised dancing, some silent sitting. I say: what is your dance if there is no silence in it? And what is your silence worth if it cannot dance? Some praised the world, some renunciation. I say to you: be a renunciate while living in the world—and do not be frightened, a renunciate does not fear the world! Live in the world, and yet do not live in the world—that is my definition of sannyas. I want to join all opposites.

And the basic energy of your life is the energy of love. When you light a lamp, the flame—that is witnessing. But the lamp burns because it is filled with oil; we call that oil sneh—affection, love. We say the lamp burns, but have you ever seen the lamp itself burn? What burns is love, the oil, the sneh. We say “the lamp burns,” but the lamp never burns—love burns. Love burns and becomes the flame. The energy of love becomes witnessing. When love becomes incandescent, it appears as the witness.

Not the lamp—the oil, the love—ever burns.
The earthen head its ornament,
Fragrance and light its canopy,
Woven at the heart a garland,
Petal-rays of streaming fire.
Not the tree—the seed bears fruit.
Not the lamp—the oil, the love—ever burns.
With two steps—birth and death—
It measures the whole of worlds,
Carrying the traveler’s provisions,
Two eyes of joy and sorrow.
Not form—O formless One moves.
Not the lamp—the oil, the love—ever burns.

I speak so much of love because love is the very energy that will become witnessing. I speak so much of witnessing because its flame will illumine your life. Your life will be complete, whole, on the day the lamp of witnessing burns within and from your life flows the stream of rasa, of love. Do not break from others—let love keep you bound in a thousand relationships. And do not be so lost in those relationships that you break from yourself—let witnessing keep you awake in your own light. When witnessing keeps you with yourself and love keeps you connected with others, you have found life’s balance—you have found samyam. For me, samyam means balance.

I do not call the indulger “self-restrained,” nor the renouncer either. The indulger is imbalanced in one direction—leaning excessively toward pleasure. The renouncer is imbalanced in the opposite—leaning excessively toward renunciation. Between indulgence and renunciation, where opposites meet—where day and night merge—there is samyam.

Certainly, when I speak of love, I am not speaking of your love; I am speaking of my love—remember that, do not forget. In your love you have found nothing but thorns: jealousy, envy, hatred, rivalry, conflict, quarrel. The taste of your love is very bitter. I am not speaking of that. And your love has one inevitable feature: unconsciousness, swoon. Your “love” cannot happen without a kind of stupor.

People come to me and say, “What should we do? When we go deep into meditation, our love breaks.” If meditation breaks it, it was not love; it was a swoon. The love that increases as meditation deepens—that is love. That is the touchstone: love that stands the test of meditation; meditation cannot break it—rather, it grows.

Have you ever known what winning is, what losing is?
In this brief life, did you learn life’s essence?
On the road of life you met charming, unknown companions,
Gave them your inner being—they became your worshiped guides;
You loved, yet never knew love’s foundation.
Have you ever known what winning is, what losing is?

You forgot your own goal, matching your steps to theirs;
Day and night you spent in their adoration.
All the gifts of affection—those, they plundered;
Giving you love’s illusion, they led you off your path.
Not even in dreams did you wonder where peace abides.
Have you ever known what winning is, what losing is?
You loved, yet never knew love’s foundation.

The foundation of love is awareness. Without awareness, love misleads—it becomes bondage. With awareness, love liberates. But ordinarily you will find: if you cultivate awareness, your “love” breaks; if you cultivate “love,” your awareness breaks. Then neither your awareness is true, nor your love. True love is not opposed to awareness; true love enhances it. True awareness cannot be broken by love—rather, it becomes stronger, denser.

But we are unbaked pots; a slight rain and the clay dissolves. A shower of awareness—and the pot of love breaks. A shower of love—and the pot of awareness breaks. We are very unbaked. The basis of this immaturity is one thing: our sleep. We are busy doing so much, yet nothing is firm. We do not even know who is doing within. The business is running, the net of life is spread, but we never pause even for a moment to ask: why? for what? There has been no recognition of oneself. When you recognize yourself, you will find that love and witnessing—devotion and knowledge—are two faces of one energy. They come together. If you cultivate love and it is ripe and real, witnessing will come of itself; it has to come. If you cultivate witnessing and your awareness is genuine, love will come; it has to.

So understand it this way: if, while practicing witnessing, love does not arise, then somewhere there is a mistake in your practice of witnessing—otherwise love must come; it is the fruit. How could the harvest be sown and no fruit appear? The fruit must appear. And if you love and witnessing does not arise, then again know there is a miss somewhere. Keep both in view. And if, little by little, both come into balanced harmony, then that unparalleled event will happen in your life which you may call moksha, nirvana, turiya—or whatever name pleases you.

It is natural. When one person takes sannyas, the hundreds of people connected with him will feel turmoil in their lives. Your sannyas means you have changed. So all the relationships others had formed with you till now will have to be rearranged. And no one wants the hassle of changing.

A woman once asked me, “If I start meditating, will there be any trouble between me and my husband?” Before I could answer, she said herself, “What a foolish question—why would meditation create trouble?”

I told her, “You are wrong. Your question is right; your own answer is wrong. Meditation will create trouble.” She asked, “How? Meditation will make me more peaceful—so how can trouble arise?” I said, “It is not a question of your being peaceful or not. Your husband has lived with you for twenty years; a certain kind of settlement has happened between you—after all the quarrels, disturbances, tricks, anger, a kind of harmony, a compromise, has set in. Now if you meditate, it means changes will begin inside you. It means your husband will have to begin again from A-B-C. In effect, it will be as if he had to marry again and adjust to a different woman. Everything will have to be reworked.” Even then she didn’t quite get it.

I said, “Do one thing—try an experiment for seven days. It will be fake, but you will understand. When your husband gets angry, you go on smiling. The smile will be false for now—because it won’t arise from within you yet—but a meditator’s smile does arise from within. For now, just experiment.” After seven days she said, “You are right—my husband is going crazy. He gets angry; I smile; he says, ‘What’s wrong with you? Are you in your senses?’ He says it was better when you used to quarrel!”

If your wife laughs when you abuse her, it will hurt you more. When she abuses back, what’s the hurt in that? Wives abuse! If she laughs, it means you are being small. Abuse sets you as equals: you abused, she abused—settled; you are companions in the same game. If she laughs, she is suddenly up there in the sky, and you start wriggling like a worm below. Unbearable. The husband is the household god—how can he watch this!

I told that woman, “And remember, that was a fake smile. After meditation, if someone gets angry, a real smile will arise on its own, seeing the childishness of it. But your husband will not tolerate you becoming more mature than him. Right now you get lustful; after meditation, love will grow but lust will decrease. Right now there is hardly any love—only lust. The whole balance will be disturbed. After meditation love will deepen but lust will lessen, and your husband will be angry—because he made you a wife to keep satisfying his lust. Suddenly the balance tips. His sexual craving will start to look pointless to you, and seeing that you are no longer very cooperative in his cravings, he will be furious. Think it through.”

You think you took sannyas. But you are connected to many people; all of them will have to change. They will be troubled—your sannyas, but they must rearrange! What a nuisance! If they had that much courage, wouldn’t they have taken sannyas themselves? People simply lack the courage to change—otherwise they would have gone first. No one wants to change. A person builds a framework, a rut, and moves along that track—a line-bound fakir. Everything becomes “in order,” and it feels like a kind of ease.

You’ll be surprised to know: people gradually make peace even with their sufferings. They don’t want to change those either—because change brings hassle. Each time you change, you must restructure your life. Very few have that courage. Who wants to start again from A-B-C!

That’s why, as age advances, people’s capacity to learn diminishes. Small children learn quickly; they have not yet set up a rigid order—no harm in learning. They can pick up a new language easily. But once you’ve learned one language, learning a second becomes difficult—because the first comes in the way. Once you’ve mastered one job, you lose the nerve to learn another—you feel, who knows if I’ll succeed in that?

So, you took sannyas; peace has come within; outside there is upheaval—entirely natural. But don’t be anxious about it. It is their problem, not yours. If you decide to take sannyas only when no one else will be disturbed by it, you will never take sannyas—you will never change; you will go on rotting as you are. Let it be their problem, not yours. Rather, watch with amazement: “Strange—the sannyas is mine, yet others are the ones getting disturbed!” You have made their strings vibrate too.

There are other reasons as well.

It’s not only that their arrangement with you is broken; your sannyas also hurts their ego. “Ah, we are left behind—you have gone ahead! How dare you? Who do you think you are?” They want to prove you are ignorant, you are crazy—not because you are, but because that’s how they can save themselves. It’s a defense. If it’s established that you went mad, they can be satisfied: “We are not mad; that person went mad.” And naturally they can “establish” it—because the crowd is theirs; you are alone. They are many; you are few. In this world, what the many say becomes the truth—there’s no other measure here. What the crowd says, that is “truth.” And what has the crowd to do with truth! If the crowd knew truth, Buddha and Mahavira would not have had to flee to the forests.

Think: Why did Buddha and Mahavira go to the forests? Most people think they went for the peace of the forest. Wrong—they went because of the crowd’s turmoil. You think they sought the forest’s peace—you are mistaken. They fled the crowd’s unrest, its trouble. To change amidst them would have created endless hassles. Better the forest—no one interferes there.

I have offered my sannyasins a greater challenge. I say: don’t flee to the forest. That is the cheap way—running away. Let the happening happen here. Bear all the troubles here. Accept all these challenges right where you are.

Also, you have fallen in love with me—that is sannyas. Certainly your wife will not be pleased, your husband will not be pleased.

A woman came to me: “I want to take sannyas, but my husband says he will commit suicide if I do.” Suicide! I asked, “Why?” She said, “My husband says, ‘I am your husband; whatever you need to ask, ask me. What is it that I don’t know?’” And then she says, “The funny thing is, he won’t even allow your books in the house—throws them out! He says, ‘Whatever you want to ask… am I your husband or is someone else? If you take initiation from someone else, that will be a great insult to me!’ As if there were a scriptural rule to be initiated by one’s husband!” But the husband wants ownership in every way.

Wives get upset too. Wives come to me and complain, “Since you came into our husbands’ lives, such disruption! We try to talk, and he plays your tape. I feel like breaking that tape recorder! We want to share our joys and sorrows—and he is engrossed in your book!” These books begin to look like enemies.

You must have seen: wives snatch books—even snatch the newspaper. You sit reading the paper; she pounces and grabs it. Because even a newspaper becomes a rival: “I’m here, and you look at the paper? Look at me!” Petty things give birth to competition and jealousy.

It is a big event—you have staked everything and come along with me. Naturally, there will be some difficulties at home; the wife will be annoyed, the husband annoyed. The sons will worry, “What has happened to Daddy?” The children will go to school; other children will ask, “What’s wrong with your daddy? Has he lost his mind? Why is he wearing saffron? Why that mala around his neck? Why not get him treated? Why not show him to a psychiatrist?” This will happen. It is entirely natural.

Since I fell in love with you
the whole world became my enemy.
Every lane hurls abuses,
every window throws a taunt.
Everyone, passing on the road,
points a finger at me.
They declare me a criminal,
brand me thief of Love’s jewel.
Even my own now treat me
as if to settle a score.
Since I fell in love with you
the whole world became my enemy.

Ever since this news spread
the whole garden has sulked.
There was some bond of friendly words—
even that has snapped now.
Every branch mocks me,
every bed scatters dust at me.
Every bud has turned into a thorn,
every flower into a live ember.
Even my own now treat me
as if to settle a score.
Since I fell in love with you
the whole world became my enemy.

So it will be. It is natural. Accept it. This is an inevitable link on the path of practice. If it didn’t happen, that would be surprising! If it does, what’s surprising? It’s exactly as it should be. Don’t be agitated by it; don’t worry; don’t take on any anxiety because of it—and do not try to make everyone’s mind quiet. Don’t try any remedy; otherwise they will grow even more restless. The more you try to fix things, the more they will try to undo your fixes. Remain indifferent. This uproar will not last long. Soon people will forget you. They will say, “All right—he’s gone, so he’s gone.” When a man dies, he is forgotten. You have merely become a sannyasin; people will forget; they’ll say, “Fine…”

In my childhood I had no interest in going to the market, visiting people’s houses, attending banquets or weddings. My family was naturally disturbed. They wanted to take me along. They dragged me. I would say, “Fine—if you drag me, I’ll go.” Then I would just stand there. People would ask, “What’s the matter?” The family understood it was not good to take me—worse trouble follows. I would stand or sit silently, and people would start asking, “What’s wrong with him?” They stopped taking me.

At first they sent me on errands, out of kindness: “Let him go to the market—buy some vegetables, some provisions; otherwise how will he learn life?” My trouble was, if they sent me to buy ajwain (carom seeds), I would forget and come back with cardamom. They would bang their heads! I would repeat all along the way: “Ajwain, ajwain, ajwain…” If someone met me and asked, “Where are you going?”—that was enough; ajwain would be gone from my head! I’d have to return and ask again. Gradually they stopped sending me.

Or if they sent me to buy something—there was no interest in it; I didn’t want the hassle. Suppose they said, “Go buy bananas.” I would go and ask the vendor, “Which are the finest and most expensive bananas?” The vendors all knew me; they would hand me the most rotten ones at the highest price. I’d say, “Fine.” Once my aunt sent me for bananas; I asked for the best and most expensive; he gave me rotten ones at the top price. I brought them home; my aunt slapped her head and said, “Take these to the beggar woman next door.” I went to her; she said, “Throw them in the trash. Don’t ever bring such things here.” “All right,” I said—and threw them away. Slowly the family understood. And I already knew: ultimately I had nothing to do with all that—so why practice it? I was practicing non-doing.

It came to this: I would be sitting in the house; my mother would be sitting in front of me and say, “There is no one around to send for vegetables.” And I would be right there! She’d say, “No one is to be seen.” I’d say, “I don’t see anyone either.” A dog would wander into the house; I’d be sitting there; my mother would say, “There’s no one in the house and the dog has come in!” And I would be sitting right in front of her.

Slowly they accepted it. What could they do? There’s a limit. For a while they pulled this way and that, dragged me here and there, sent me; but there’s a limit.

You have become a sannyasin; now remain absorbed in your own inner mood. People will say this and that, pull you here and there. Don’t create quarrels, and don’t try to explain anything to them. They won’t understand because you explain. What has happened within you—immerse in that juice. Be lost in your own ecstasy. Soon you will find that those who taunted you are becoming curious; those who laughed yesterday will come and sit near you. Those who said yesterday you had lost your mind will begin asking your advice: “You have become so peaceful—how? What happened? The old worries no longer show on your face. There’s a glow of calm in your eyes, a grace has arisen—what happened?” But even then, don’t try to explain. Live your ecstasy. If they choose to be anxious about your ecstasy, that is their decision. No one can stop anyone from taking anxiety.

Yes, if you become anxious because of their anxiety, they will harm you. If they sense that you are keen to appease them—“No, what I did is right and you are wrong”—you will get caught in useless argument. And remember: there are things that cannot be proved by argument. Sannyas is one of them. Just say, “All right—consider me mad. I accept it. But I am blissful in my madness; it suits me. I am happy. Forgive me. You remain right in your wisdom; I remain right in my foolishness.” Slowly they will make peace with you. And slowly you will see the results of your peace, your silence, your ecstasy. Don’t get entangled with them.

Had I been alone,
perhaps I’d have come sooner.
But trailing behind
was a long queue of relationships.
Some were chains on the feet,
some the path’s steep climb,
some the body’s ties that held me,
some the mind’s bonds that stopped me.
That is why I was delayed—
forgive this helplessness of mine.
The whole earth would perish
if forgiveness were to dry up.
I had thought to give you
my whole life,
but the goal was so far away—
walking and walking, evening fell.

Let it not happen that, standing before the Divine, you have to beg for compassion. Let it not be that you have to say, “I stopped—because there were so many relatives; I stopped—because there were wife and children; I stopped—because there were so many entanglements. Forgive me, shower your mercy.”

No—do not go to God’s door begging for mercy. Go in delight, in celebration. Do not go asking pardon—go offering thanks. And the only way is this: in this world of relationships, whatever duties arise from those bonds, fulfill them. If there is a wife, fulfill your duty; if there are sons, fulfill your duty; if there are kin and relations, fulfill your duty—just fulfill your duty, nothing more; don’t get over-involved. Do as much as is necessary and stay outside of it. Be in the marketplace and be outside the marketplace. Be in the crowd and be outside the crowd. Slowly you will find: the very crowd that insulted you will begin to respect you.

But I am not saying this so that you should desire the crowd’s respect. If you do, you have missed. What has the crowd to do with you—insult or respect, both are the same. What have others to do with you! One who has to set out on his own search must loosen his ties with others a little. One who has to walk within must turn his gaze outward a little less. The very energy that runs outward must be drawn within. When I say that those who insult you will one day respect you, I state it only as a fact—it happens. I do not say: do this so that people will respect you. If you do, you will never reach that state where respect flowers on its own.

One who insulted you—that was his whim; he did what seemed right to him. One who respected you—that was his whim; he did what seemed right to him. He gave what he had. You accept both insult and respect with the same gratitude; thank both, and with eyes closed dive within.

“Nothing but suffering”—is that your own experience, or have you picked it up from someone else’s words? “Not a trace of happiness”—is that your experience, or have you memorized the sayings of the enlightened? I suspect you have learned the sages’ words by heart. Because if it were truly your own experience, awakening would have to happen. It is inevitable. If a thorn is stuck in your foot, there will be pain. If suffering is in fact your lived experience, awakening will come of itself. Suffering wakes you, it scours you, refines you. That is its value.

People ask me, “Why has God given the world so much suffering?” I say to them, think a little: there is so much suffering and still you don’t wake up; if there were none, there would be no hope at all. Even with all this pain you keep on sleeping!

Suffering is a device to awaken. Even with such torment you drift along asleep. The hope of pleasure does not break. It feels as if, not today, then tomorrow happiness will arrive. Not yet, but soon. We have lost so far, but we won’t keep losing forever. And the mind goes on whispering, “More—just a little more; wait a bit; who knows, the mine of happiness may be just ahead. We have dug this far; a few more spadefuls and we’ll hit the seam—dig a little more.” “More” is the mind’s mantra.

Let ruby-tipped arrows be drawn upon the brows—
More, and yet more!
Moisten the treasure of music, O land of the veil;
Let dreams rain down in the sky’s expanse;
Do not bind the life-breath of vision with restraint—
Let the round continue!
More, and yet more!

Scent every particle with the songs of the earth,
Set life aflame, O friend of flowers;
Let the lips drink honey to the full—
Surely there’s some abode of fragrance!
More, and yet more!

Call body and mind from the edges of melody,
Tilt the pitcher of love at the flute’s lip;
Let the hum of bees arise in the bowers,
Crown your head with sound!
More, and yet more!

Let ruby-tipped arrows be drawn upon the brows—
More, and yet more!

The mind keeps saying—more, just a little more. One more cup to drink, one more embrace, one more kiss. There’s still time—who knows, what hasn’t come yet may come now. It is hope that keeps man being drawn on and on.

Omar Khayyam has a song where he says: I asked the pundits, the mullahs, the learned, the great teachers, “How does man keep on living despite so much suffering?” But none of them gave any answer. And I came out of the door I had gone in by—empty as empty, just the same. Alarmed, one day I asked the sky, “O sky! You have seen everything—the lives of billions upon billions, their hopes and dreams, their breaking, their falling into graves; rainbows of desire, shattered and choked with dust. You have seen it all for eternity. Tell me—there is so much suffering: how do people keep on living?” And the sky said: “On the support of hope.” Hope! The whole secret of man’s intoxication is hope—now more, a little more, just a little more.

You say life is suffering. You haven’t really seen it. And you say you have never found happiness, not even in dreams. Granted—who has found it? No one. Yet you still dream that perhaps tomorrow it will come. Even in dreams happiness does not come, but we go on dreaming of it. When your illusion about happiness breaks—when it is seen that happiness cannot be had outside, that it has no connection with the outer world, that happiness comes to those who go within, to those who come into themselves, to those who become witnesses—then in that very instant the happening happens.

You ask why awakening doesn’t come. Because you have not allowed the arrow of suffering to pierce you cleanly. You have devised many strategies to endure it. Someone suffers and says, “It’s because of past-life karma”—a clever consolation. “Because of past lives I suffer; nothing can be done; that’s the end of it—now it has to be endured.” Another says, “I suffer because I don’t yet have money; when I do, I’ll be happy.” Another, “Because I don’t have a beautiful wife; when I have one, I’ll be happy.” “I have no son; when I do, I’ll be happy.” Don’t you see that thousands who have sons are not happy? What delusion are you nursing? Thousands have wealth and are not happy, yet you say, “When I have it, I will be.” Thousands hold high positions and are not happy, and still you refuse to see. You say, “When I get there I’ll be happy—what have I to do with those thousands? My case is certain—I am the exception.” That is your illusion.

There are no exceptions. No one has ever found happiness from the outside; only suffering. Whatever comes from the outside is suffering; and whatever flows from within is happiness.

That is why awakening hasn’t happened. You keep rationalizing your sorrows, and you keep tying yourself to the hope of pleasure. You say, “It will come—someday it will come. Somehow we’ll manage it. If we must snatch and grab, or even steal, we will—but we’ll do it; it will happen.” You are trying to squeeze oil from sand. You fail to see that no one in the world has ever extracted oil from sand. No one has ever become happy from the outside—whether Alexander or Napoleon or great magnates—all come empty-handed and go empty-handed.

Yes, a few have attained supreme bliss—a certain Ashtavakra, a Buddha, a Krishna, a Christ, a Muhammad—just a handful. Look toward them. The common reason for their happiness is one: they all turned inward.

You want happiness? There is nothing wrong in that. You are simply seeking in the wrong direction, therefore you wander. Suffering comes by law. If you try to exit through the wall, your head will smash, your skull will crack—there will be pain. Go out by the door. The door is inward; the wall is outward.

I have heard of a most remarkable ascetic in Greece—Diogenes. He lived naked, carefree. Even Alexander felt envy toward him. Alexander went to meet him. When he saw Diogenes, his heart skipped a beat. He said, “If I have to be born again, I will tell God: this time don’t make me Alexander—make me Diogenes. It’s astonishing—you have nothing, yet you are so blissful!” Diogenes said, “Precisely because I have nothing, I am blissful—no worry, no anxiety. There used to be one thing I had, and so there was a little worry.” Alexander asked, “What was that?” Diogenes said, “I had renounced everything, even clothes, and was naked—but I kept a bowl in my hand to drink water. One day I went to the river to drink; behind me a dog came running, and before me he drank and trotted off. I said, ‘This is the limit! I’ve been lugging this bowl around—clean it, fill it, drink. To hell with the bowl! This dog is a greater monk than I.’ I let go of the bowl and took the dog as my master. If you want to meet that dog,” Diogenes said, “he lives close by.” They lived together. He had brought a tin garbage barrel from a dump to the riverbank; the dog lived in it and so did he. “He is my guru,” he said. “He taught me, ‘Why carry this bowl?’”

Alexander said, “I’m happy to have met you. Tell me if I can do anything for you; it would please me.” Diogenes replied, “Just step a little aside—you’re blocking the sun. It’s morning and I’m taking the sun. That’s all—what else could I possibly need from you? And what do you have that you could give me? Remember, don’t stand blocking anyone’s sun. If you can manage only this, it is enough. You are dangerous—you will rob many of their sunlight. All this army—where are you going? Whose sun do you intend to steal? You have stolen the sun of a poor man like me—I was enjoying myself, lying on the sand by the river, taking the morning sun—and you came and stood over me. And then you ask me what I want!”

Alexander said, “I’m going to conquer the world. But my ultimate goal is the same as yours—to be at peace, to rest.” Diogenes burst into laughter. “Then what need of such a journey? Don’t you see me? I am at peace and at rest. You rest too. This riverbank is wide enough for both of us, and for others as well. There is no hindrance here.” Alexander said, “I cannot do it now.” Diogenes said, “Then you will never do it. Only the one who can do it now can ever do it.”

Therefore I say to you: whatever is possible is possible now—shravanamātreṇa—by the mere hearing. Postpone it to tomorrow and it is lost. If you don’t want to do it, don’t—only don’t say you will do it tomorrow. If you don’t want to, say plainly: “I don’t want to.” At least that will be honest. Don’t practice this dishonesty of “tomorrow,” because who has ever done it tomorrow? “Tomorrow” is a device for not doing. What is to happen can happen today, now, here. As you are, where you are, dive within. In that dip is the meeting with the divine.

Sit on the bank,
By the river.
Don’t gather
Conchs and shells.

You have gathered plenty of conchs and shells. Now sit a while.

Sit on the bank—
Now sit on the shore.
By the river—
Sit beside the stream of this world.
Don’t gather
Conchs and shells—
Enough collecting; now sit on the shore—be unmoving, be a witness.

Yoga—
Self-communion.
Enjoyment—
Bodily union.

You have tried many bodily unions and found nothing.

Yoga—
Self-communion.
Now taste yourself a little. You wandered tasting others; your mouth turned bitter; life filled with acridity. Now let a stream of nectar flow; let your inner song resound; let your own rhythm arise. If you set out a little inward, if you seize a single ray of awareness, you will reach the sun.

Soil
Sprouts seeds—
Repeats the routine.
Soil
Becomes the seed—
Finds the feet of God.

There are only two kinds of people in the world. One repeats the routine—

Soil
Sprouts seeds—
Repeats the routine.
Soil
Becomes the seed—
Finds the feet of God.

How long will you go on repeating this mechanical life? Create something—first of all, create yourself. And even there, what is “creation”? Only the removing of a veil.

Self-creation means simply this—self-discovery. Uncover yourself.

Walk a little within and you will suddenly find that God has set out toward you with a thousand steps. You take one step; he takes a thousand. You alone are not seeking him—he is seeking you too.

My life is a desert—
When you come, it turns to monsoon.
So estranged is the season of spring
It no longer comes at all;
So wayward is this thirsty mind
It will not rest even for a moment.
My goal is unseen—
If you walk with me, there is vision.

No hint of you, not even your footfall—
The auspicious hours have ebbed away.
The festival of love lies empty now,
And all the sparklers have burned out.
My sacrifice is incomplete—
If you stay with me, it becomes worship.

Tangled tresses, tear-damp lashes—
This alone has become my acquaintance.
The world looks with suspicion,
Moment to moment my life seems a play.
My vows feel cursed—
When you touch them, they turn holy.

When you tighten the strings of the veena,
This singer-mind becomes a celestial musician.
If only you stay beside me,
Every moment of life becomes a festival,
Every sigh the sweetest song,
Every tear a drop of honey.

Place your hands in the hands of the Divine—he is ready within you. Hand your veena over to him. This is Ashtavakra’s entire message: be a witness—not the doer, not the enjoyer. Let what God wishes to do be done—be merely an instrument. Become a gust of wind, a dry leaf; wherever he carries you, go.

When you tighten the strings of the veena,
This singer-mind becomes a celestial musician.
If only you stay beside me,
Every moment of life becomes a festival,
Every sigh the sweetest song,
Every tear a drop of honey.
My vows feel cursed—
When you touch them, they turn holy.
My sacrifice is incomplete—
If you stay with me, it becomes worship.
My goal is unseen—
If you walk with me, there is vision.
My life is a desert—
When you come, it turns to monsoon.

This can happen. It can happen now—shravanamātreṇa. Hari Om Tat Sat!

That’s all for today.