Maha Geeta #32

Those who know do not say what they know—what is known in the ultimate depth of life cannot be brought to the surface and given words. What is known is never said; it cannot be said. Words are cramped and small. Yet the knowers do speak. What do they say? And when they speak, do not think they are speaking about truth itself. In fact, they speak about you in relation to truth. Understand this distinction.

Mahavira knew truth, Buddha knew truth, Ashtavakra knew truth. But when they speak, truth as such is less important than the listener. They speak to the listener, otherwise the dialogue would be futile. They speak in reference to you. Naturally, Janaka is a very different kind of listener from Arjuna. Had Janaka stood before Krishna, Krishna too would have spoken the Ashtavakra Gita; and had Arjuna stood before Ashtavakra, what Ashtavakra said to Arjuna would not have been different from Krishna’s Gita.

Consider: you are ill and go to a physician. He does not pour his entire medical science upon you; he speaks in reference to your illness. The prescription is in reference to your disease. Of course it comes from his experience of medicine, but it is addressed to you. So do not think that if a doctor gives you a prescription, it is for every patient—so that now, whenever anyone in the house falls ill, there is no need to go to the doctor: we already have a prescription. You will become dangerous. The illness will hardly be cured; you will destroy the sick, even kill them. That prescription was for you, in reference to you.

Understand then: when someone stands before a knower to ask, if the person is very egoistic, the knower will say, Live as if everything is determined by fate. Because he is afflicted with the disease of ego. He has to be brought down from his ego. From the emptiness of that knowing a voice will arise: “Destiny, fate! Nothing happens by your doing.” For the egoist feels, Everything happens through my doing; I am the doer. The doer hides behind the ego. So the master begins to dislodge the doer. Once the doer is removed, the ego collapses like a house of cards.

But if the questioner is lazy—not egoistic and fiery, but inert, sluggish, indolent—and says, Whatever has to happen will happen; what comes of one’s doing? and sits there like a lump, then the knower will speak in reference to him. He will say, “Get up! Without self-effort nothing ever happens. Do something! Don’t waste yourself sitting, sitting, sitting! Bring some movement into life! Awaken some energy. God is not found by sitting idly—set out on the journey.”

Why? If such an ignorant person hears talk of fate, he will become very easy in his mind. He will say, That is exactly what we have always said. We are already endowed with wisdom: we do nothing, we just sit. The people at home keep nagging us—fools! One says, get a job; another says, start a business; someone says, do something—but we remain quietly seated.

In Japan this happened: an emperor was very lazy—utterly lazy. One day, lying in bed, it occurred to him: I am the emperor, so I can be as lazy as I like; no one can say anything. But what must be the condition of other lazy people? The poor fellows must be in great trouble.

So the emperor thought, Everyone does something for his own; I too should do something for them. He had it proclaimed throughout the realm: Let all who are lazy come to the palace. The state will provide for their food and lodging.

The ministers said, Your Majesty, you alone are enough! What are you doing now? If you do this, the whole kingdom will pour in—who will stay back? Who will care then? It will be hard to tell the true from the false—who is really lazy.

The emperor said, That is for you to worry about; but whoever is lazy will have the state’s protection. What is their fault? God made them lazy. They are living their life of laziness. They should have comfort and care. Those who act, manage somehow; but who belongs to the non-doer? He too should have someone. So you find out who is true and who is false.

The proclamation was made and thousands began to come—whole villages. The ministers arranged a test. They built huts of straw and housed whoever came. And in the middle of the night they set the huts on fire. Everyone ran out. But four men remained sleeping under their blankets. Others tried to drag them out, but they said, Brother, don’t trouble us at midnight. People shouted, The huts are on fire, you fools! They replied, Let them burn—but don’t break our sleep.

The ministers said, These four are certainly accomplished adepts. These four deserve the state’s shelter—that makes sense.

When such a person comes before a knower, what should he be told? Should he be told about fate? No, that philosophy will not serve his life. That medicine does not cure his ailment.

These statements are medicines. Buddha said again and again, I am a physician, not a philosopher. Nanak said often, I am a vaidya, not a thinker. The emphasis is on curing the disease you have.

Arjuna wanted to run away; he wanted inaction. Krishna pulled him—did not let him flee from action. Janaka is a king, and in a king’s heart naturally there is neither the question of having to do, nor the need to do. And naturally in a king there is a subtle ego—refined, polished. Even if the king does nothing, he still believes that the entire kingdom runs through his doing. Even doing nothing, that subtle notion persists. He thinks, Without me what would happen? The day I am gone, the sun will set on the world. People wonder, Who after me? No beggar thinks, Who after me? But those with position and power think, Who after me? Why? Why are you concerned? Those who come after will take care. No, he thinks, I must make arrangements. I must arrange even for after I am gone. I must set things in order. Make a will. The poor do not make wills—there is nothing to bequeath. The rich make wills—who will manage!

In Janaka there must have been a subtle sense of I-ness, lying very deep. You cannot hide it from the physician’s eye, for the physician’s eye is an X-ray, it sees far. You cannot hide from the guru’s eye. He enters your innermost consciousness. He exposes your unconscious. He sees where the accumulated impressions of many births lie—those you have forgotten, of which you have no memory—where seeds are lying that have not yet borne fruit, not yet blossomed, that have never sprouted, but which at any time, given the right season and a timely rain, will sprout.

So when Ashtavakra spoke thus to Janaka, remember: he spoke to Janaka. These statements are personal, given to individuals. What happens between a master and a disciple—do not mistake it for a universal truth. This is not a panacea. It is not a miracle drug that, whatever the disease, just take it and you will be cured. It will depend on your disease. Therefore sometimes the opposite happens. In fact, it often happens.

Now Ashtavakra’s Gita will often appeal to the lazy. The matter is turned upside down. It will attract the indolent. They will say, Absolutely true! This is what we have always known. Then, instead of the light of the Lord spreading in their life, the darkness of hell will spread.

This is exactly what happened in India. The extraordinary doctrine of fate made India poor and miserable. People became slothful and dull. They said, Whatever God does—if he gives slavery, if someone plunders us, fine; if he keeps us hungry, if there is famine, fine. People sat utterly meek, thinking nothing will happen through our doing.

These sutras are not to make you inactive. These sutras are to make you a non-doer, not inactive. And non-doership does not mean inaction. The non-doer is very active; only the action is no longer his own—it is surrendered to God. He does much, but he does not take the credit. He does everything and yet does not become the doer. He never says, I am the one who does. He does everything and offers it all at the feet of the Divine, saying, You made it happen; you did it.

Keep this in mind. If the supreme doctrine of fate begins to bring laziness and inaction into your life, understand that you have erred; you have not understood. If the doctrine of fate brings the light of action into your life, and you dismiss the doer, and the credit for all action is offered at the feet of God, then know that you have understood perfectly—your arrow has hit the mark.

It depends—on whom one is speaking to.

Purushartha is to still the mind that wavers moment to moment. Purushartha is to stop the process of thinking. Purushartha is to gather the mind and place it back into its source; to sweep all memories out of the palace of the brain. When the mansion of the mind is clean, you will have the vision of your own self. I swear to you: you will not die by stopping thought. Such is the definition of purushartha—the supreme purushartha!

Have you ever pondered the word “purushartha”? Purusha and artha! The consciousness hidden within you is called Purusha. Your body is a city, a pur; and the lamp of consciousness hidden within it is the Purusha. You are a whole township. Scientists say about seventy million microorganisms live in the body. Seventy million! Not a small hamlet—you are a big city, a metropolis. Even Bombay is small; only five million people live there. Your body houses seventy million—fourteen times the capacity! Your body is a crowd. Amidst all these microorganisms, hidden, is the lamp of your consciousness. Its name is Purusha—Purusha, because it dwells in the midst of this entire pur. Then to know the artha, the meaning, of that Purusha is purushartha. What is the meaning of this Purusha? Who is he? What is his taste?—to know that.

So there is only one purushartha: to know oneself. And to know oneself it is absolutely essential to drop the ego, because it alone does not let you know. Ego means: you have assumed you know yourself without knowing. Ego means: you have formed some false notions about yourself—“I am this, I am that”—Hindu, Jain, Brahmin, Shudra; wealthy, rich, poor; dark, fair; young, old. You have made such identifications. You are none of these. Youth comes and goes. Old age comes, and even old age goes. Life came, and even life goes. You remain the same. You are neither fair nor dark. The color of the skin does not dye the Purusha; the skin is outside. The Purusha is hidden very deep; the color of the skin never reaches there. The color of the skin is a very ordinary matter.

Scientists say the difference between the fair and the dark is only four annas’ worth of pigment. Today or tomorrow scientists will surely bring out an injection: if the fair-skinned want to become dark, take an injection—four annas’ worth of pigment, and in the morning you wake up dark; if the dark-skinned want to become fair, take a four-anna injection. So much conflict over four annas!

The color of the skin does not go within. If you are ill, the illness does not go within. If you are healthy, health does not go within. Within, you are always in that state of supreme transcendence—of one taste; neither illness nor health makes a difference. Whether you live or die, no ripple touches the inner Purusha. Rippless! No wave reaches there. Waves are only on the ocean’s surface; where are waves in the depths? And this is the deepest of the deep possibilities within you. Even the Pacific Ocean is not as deep as the depth at which your Purusha is hidden. To know the meaning of this Purusha is purushartha. And whatever you do for that knowing—that all is purushartha.

As for fate, its only meaning is: do not take excessive tension into your life. Walk, certainly. Travel, seek; but do not become tense. Let your effort be free of strain. Do much, but do not become agitated or anxious because of the doing. See the difference between the two: a painter paints—sit nearby and watch how he paints! Like a small child at play. No tension. When will it be completed, will it be completed or not—no concern; will anyone buy it or not—no concern. He becomes so absorbed in painting that the doing is complete in itself. The means is the end. There is no hankering for the fruit. Absorbed! A plunge happens! The painter disappears.

That is why all great painters have said: we do not know who takes hold of the brush in our hand! All great poets have said: we do not know who begins to hum the song within us! We are only carriers. We only bring its news out—messengers! As when you write with a pen, the pen does not write; you write; the pen is only steadied in your hand. Just so, the great painter or great poet or great dancer becomes only a pen in the hand of the Divine. Not that writing does not happen—writing happens profusely now. Only now can writing truly happen! But now God writes. No tension remains.

There was a great poet: Coleridge. He died leaving forty thousand poems incomplete. Before he died someone asked, “You have piled up such a mountain—why did you not complete them? And they are wondrous poems! Some are short by only a single line. Why not finish them?” Coleridge said, “How can I finish them? He had me write only up to there. I waited; the next line did not come. In my youth I used to patch—if three lines descended, I would add the fourth. But gradually I found my line did not match. Those three were incomparable; mine was very ordinary! It was like smearing mud on gold, adding stench to fragrance. When understanding dawned in me, I stopped doing that. If a poem descended complete, it was complete; if it descended incomplete, it remained incomplete. Sometimes half descended now and half a year later, and then it was complete. I have only waited. There is nothing of my doing in this. Speak to the one who had them written.”

Someone asked another great poet, Eliot, “What is the meaning of this poem of yours? I am a university teacher and I teach students. This poem pulverizes me. When it is time to teach it, my hands and feet begin to tremble. What is its meaning?” Eliot said, “Two people knew its meaning; now only one knows.” The teacher was pleased: “At least you know it.” Eliot said, “I did not say that. Two knew—God and I. I have forgotten. Now only He knows. When He hummed it in me, then I too knew. Then I was full to the brim. Then it was as if the rains had come and there was a flood. Every pore of me knew what the meaning was. It was not an intellectual meaning. My every breath recognized what the meaning was. The meaning filled me. Now years have passed; I have flowed and changed much. Now only God knows. Pray to Him. Perhaps, in some moment of prayer, He who gave me the poem will open its meaning to you as well.”

A great poem is a descent. So in the life of a great poet there is no tension. The grace you see on Tagore’s face is for this reason. The scent of the Upanishads in his voice is for this reason. To call him a poet is not quite right—he is a rishi. What came through him is not his—someone else sang. Someone else plucked the strings of the veena. At most he is an instrument, a veena; but the strings were plucked by someone else; the fingers of some other Unknown resounded upon them.

Effort without tension means: you no longer think of the fruit. Whatever is happening this moment, you are doing it totally. If God wants to bring it to completion, He will; if incomplete, then incomplete. If the fruit comes, fine; if it does not, fine. This is not your concern. When action is free of the hankering for fruit, tension disappears. Tension gone, the doer is gone; the doer gone, ego falls.

Such is the meaning of fate: that God is doing. So let me give you a touchstone: if action continues and the sense of doership is not retained, then know that you have understood Ashtavakra rightly. If action itself stops while the sense of doership remains, then know you have missed. And the latter is easier; the former is very difficult.

People come to me and say, “If He is doing, why should we do at all?” Think a little—your very saying “Why should we do?” shows you still cherish the idea that you are the doer. Earlier you used to do; now you say you will not do—but the notion “I am the doer” is still strong. You say, “Why should we do?”—as if until now you were the one who did! The delusion remains intact. One who understands will say, “Doing or not doing is not in our hands; whatever will be, will be. We will not obstruct. We will go along. We will flow with His wave.”

And sometimes it also happens that a person is exactly in the middle, with purushartha and fate balanced within. If such a person comes to a true master, he will say to him: both are right; purushartha is right and fate is right. Because this person is becoming balanced. To tell him purushartha is not right would break his balance. To tell him fate is right would break his balance. He is just attaining equilibrium.

A man asked Buddha, “Is there God?” Buddha said, “No.” That very day another man asked, “Is there God?” Buddha said, “Certainly.” And that evening a third man asked, and Buddha fell silent. At night Ananda began to ask him, “Will you drive me mad? I won’t be able to sleep tonight—please explain this to me. Settle it once for all: is there God or not? In the morning you said there is not. I thought, fine—at least we have one clear answer. By noon you changed and said there is. By evening you were silent.” Buddha said, “None of those answers was given for you. Why did you take them? If you snatch things in between, you will get into trouble. The one who came first already carried the notion that there is no God. I told him, ‘There is.’ It was necessary to dislodge him from his position. He was a nihilist. It was necessary to shake his atheism. His journey had stopped. He was sitting fixed in the belief—without knowing—that there is no God. Without going anywhere he had assumed there is no God. So it was necessary to push him, to shake his roots, to set him on the path. Therefore I said, ‘God is.’ The second man had sat down believing that God is—without seeking, without discovering, without effort, without sadhana, without labor, without meditation, without reflection—just a borrowed belief that God is. He too needed to be made to wobble. His faith was false, borrowed. I had to tell him, ‘There is no God.’ And the third man who came in the evening had no notion, no belief; he was a supreme seeker. To say anything to him is dangerous. To plant any notion in him is to distort his mind; therefore I remained silent. I said to him: silence is the answer. And he understood.”

And Buddha said: “Some horses move only when beaten. Some horses start moving if you merely crack the whip. Some horses begin to move just on seeing the whip; and there are such noble horses that even the shadow of the whip is enough.” For that third man, the shadow of the whip was enough. There was no need to wield the whip of words—just to remain silent… He saw me. The matter was understood. I had said what was to be said; he had heard what was to be heard. No word came in between; no doctrine came in between. Language was not used. Heart met heart, and we flowed together. He understood, and I understood that he had understood. Ananda, do not take any of these three answers for yourself. No answer was given to you.

If only you grasp this, the contradictions you see in the lives of the great ones will vanish at once. Then you will see no contradictions among Mahavira, Buddha, Krishna, Rama, Muhammad, Zarathustra, Jesus. Different disciples had different needs. For different patients, different medicines.

No. One whose experiences of pleasure and pain have ended is not affected by the pleasure and pain of others either. It may be difficult for you to think so, because you imagine he should be deeply affected by your joys and sorrows. No — he has seen that what you call pleasure is not pleasure at all. So, seeing your pleasure and your pain, compassion arises for you, but he does not become happy or unhappy. Only compassion arises — seeing that you are still caught in a dream!

Imagine two people sleeping in the same room, both crushed under a dream of suffering, both seeing a hellish nightmare. One wakes up. Naturally, for the one who has awakened, the dream’s pleasures and pains have become meaningless. Do you think that, seeing the other muttering and shouting beside him — hearing him say, “Move away, a demon is sitting on my chest” — he will become happy or unhappy? He will laugh and feel compassion. He will say, “Madman! He is still dreaming.” Will he try to remove the demon from the other’s chest? How can he remove it? The demon isn’t there; for removal it has to exist. He can see the good man lying there with his own fist clenched on his chest, murmuring, “A demon is sitting here — Ravana, the ten‑headed one, is on top of me! Take him away!” What will the one who has awakened do? He will try to wake this man up — not to remove his suffering, but to wake him up. Understand the difference clearly. When the awakened ones see you suffering, they cannot concede that your suffering is; they know suffering cannot be — it is a misperception. They try to awaken you. Seeing you run away, mistaking a rope for a snake, they bring a lamp. They say, “Wait a moment. Let’s look carefully at this snake — is it even there?” In that light the rope becomes visible to you as well, and you too begin to laugh.

The enlightened person is not affected in the least by your pleasure and pain. And one who is affected is not enlightened. Yet your joys and sorrows do evoke compassion in him. Sometimes he even laughs — seeing the power of a dream, the power of the false.

Think of a small child whose doll’s leg has broken, and he is crying. What do you do? Do you sit and cry with him? Do you too grow sad and shed tears? You say to him, “Son, don’t be foolish — it’s only a doll! It was bound to break. There is no life in it for you to be so upset. That leg isn’t a real leg.” Your wise words may not make sense to the child. But you know that one day he will grow up, gain a little maturity, and forget all about dolls. He will throw them away somewhere and never look back. Right now he is a child, so he plays with dolls.

Seeing you drowned in pleasure and pain, the enlightened one knows you are still asleep, dreaming.

Do not clutch at shadows, mind; Your sorrow will only double, mind. There is neither fame nor splendor, Neither honor nor riches. The more you run, The more you are deluded. Revere what is hard and real. Do not clutch at shadows, mind; Or grief will only double, mind.

All your sufferings are shadows — false, maya! To the awakened one, the one established in samadhi, what is real is revealed. One who has seen his own reality sees everyone’s reality as well. Even then, he has compassion for you — compassion because you are still asleep; compassion because he too was once asleep. And he knows your pain is intense; false, yet intense. He knows you are writhing — granted that what you writhe over is not. For he too once writhed. He too once cried and pleaded. He recognizes it.

He too once played with toys. Once dolls broke; once he was arranging a marriage in play and it didn’t happen, and he felt great sorrow. Once he had built a house of cards, a gust of wind came and blew it down, and tears streamed from the child’s eyes — such tears streamed from his eyes too. He knows. He recognizes it. He fully empathizes with your suffering. Yet still, laughter arises in him, because the whole thing is false — it is a dream. Of course he will not laugh to your face; out of courtesy and kindness he may pat you, he may say, “It’s terrible; it shouldn’t have happened” — but inside he is laughing.

Just as you explain to the little child, “Don’t be upset — so what if the leg has broken? The doll’s soul is immortal! Don’t worry. The doll has gone to God’s home; look, she is sitting in the Lord’s lap, having such a good time!” You explain. You say, “We’ll buy another doll. Don’t worry. Don’t cry or scream. Nothing is really lost. Everything will be fine.” You explain; you soothe. Yet inside you know that you too have to play along.

When the enlightened ones show sympathy in your suffering, it is a play, an act — out of courtesy. So that you are not hurt, so that you don’t feel offended. But alongside, they go on trying to help you wake up. Because the real event of going beyond suffering will happen only when you come to know that all pleasures and pains are shadows, maya.

Certainly, as awareness grows, sensitivity will grow. Ordinarily we live in a kind of fog—unconscious, stupefied. Like a man drunk, lying in a gutter—he doesn’t smell the stench. You think, “Poor fellow, lying in a drain.” But he’s enjoying himself. He may be dreaming he’s resting in a palace, that he’s become president and is holding court!

You see mud, filth, the gutter running past his nose. You imagine a terrible stink must be assailing him. But he’s unconscious. For stench to be felt, a little awareness is needed. In the morning when he wakes up and comes to, he’ll dust himself off and run home, bathe, put on sandalwood paste, do his prayers, dress up and sit in the living room. Then if you tell him, “Just go and lie down in that gutter again,” it will be impossible—now all the senses are alert.

Just so it happens. As awareness increases, many of the gutters in your life—things you were living as if they were heaven—become foul-smelling. Many pleasures you took to be pleasures begin to feel like pains, like pricks. So with growing awareness a certain turmoil grows: one becomes very sensitive, delicate; a deep tenderness surrounds you.

But this is on the way. As awareness moves toward completion, first your dullness breaks and sensitivity increases. Then comes a moment—the final leap of awareness—when wakefulness becomes so deep that body and mind fall away. Then no sensitivity gives torment, no suffering. The knowing is there. If a thorn pricks the Buddha, he is more aware of it than you are, because his awareness is profound. Yours is hardly anything.

Have you seen it? On a hockey field a player gets hurt, his foot is bleeding, but he goes on playing. He doesn’t know. Everyone else can see the blood, a red trail across the field; he doesn’t. He’s engrossed in the game, unconscious of the body. The moment the game stops, the referee’s whistle blows—instantly there is pain; he sits down, clutching his leg: “Oh! I don’t know when I was hurt.” The pain was there all along, but there was no knowing.

So when meditation first comes into your life, a great deal of knowing comes. With that knowing, sensitivity to all the things you’ve been doing wrongly arises. A little anger, and your very life-breath will tremble. A little jealousy, and poison will spread. A little hatred, and you will feel as if you’ve stabbed your own chest. It will be hard. But do not run from this difficulty, do not be afraid.

If the heart is small, grief cannot be contained there, and pain will turn back from the door without knocking. A pang arises only for the one whose destiny opens. Sorrow does not lift everyone into its lap and bless them. Only the one whose virtue is strong is washed by his own tears.

Pain will increase, anguish will increase, knowing will increase. But this is during the transition. A moment comes, a leap occurs. As at one hundred degrees water becomes steam and takes a jump, so at one hundred degrees of awareness a leap happens. Instantly you find your body and mind left behind. All pleasure and pain were there, in the senses. Now you are beyond. You are at a distance. Your identifications have all fallen away.

But before that moment, along with knowing, sorrow too increases.

In Sanskrit there is a beautiful word: vedana. It has both meanings: pain and knowing. Veda comes from the same root as vedana. Veda means knowledge, knowing. Vedana means knowledge, knowing; and it also means pain, suffering.

Sanskrit is a very unique language; analyzing its words is precious, because those who shaped it did so out of deep experiences of life. As knowing increases, pain increases. If, frightened by the increase of pain, you want relief, there is only one way: make the knowing smaller. That’s what we do. You have a headache—take an aspirin. What will aspirin do? It doesn’t remove the pain; it only dulls the knowing, relaxes the nerves so you don’t notice the pain. Greater trouble: your wife dies—drink! You go bankrupt—drink! Lower the knowing, and the pain will lessen.

Many have learned this dangerous trick. Life has much suffering, so they have pushed their knowing down completely: no knowing, no pain. But it is a very costly bargain. Without knowing, how will your Buddhahood ripen, how will your flower bloom? How will you become a lotus? Your sahasrara will remain unopened.

Do not panic; accept this pain. I call this acceptance tapascharya, true austerity. For me, tapascharya does not mean fasting, standing in the sun, standing in water—those foolishnesses are not austerity. Tapascharya simply means: as knowing increases, pain will increase; do not fear it—accept that it grows with knowing. For a little distance, pain will keep pace with knowing. Then a moment comes when knowing leaps beyond and pain is left behind. As a snake one day slips out of its old skin, so one day knowing slips out of the skin of pain. Knowing goes beyond pain.

But on the path there is pain. Accept it. Accept it as a device for awakening your knowing.

Have you noticed? When you are happy, God is forgotten; when you are in pain, you remember. So even suffering has its use.

There was a Sufi mystic, Bayazid. He prayed every day, “Do one thing, Lord: keep a little suffering with me. In sheer happiness I will forget you—you know me. In sheer happiness I will certainly forget. Give me only that much happiness that I do not forget; and keep giving me the rest as suffering.”

Bayazid is right. He is saying: if suffering remains, wakefulness remains. In pleasure, sleep comes. In pleasure, man falls asleep.

No part of life is useless, no melody of life is in vain. Bind everything into a single, melodious strain, gather the scattered notes into a song.

Sorrow too is meaningful. It also has essence. It awakens. The day you see that sorrow awakens, that day you will gratefully accept sorrow as well. On that day the “no” will drop from your life. You will accept even thorns, because you know there are no roses without thorns. This rose exists along with thorns. This flower of knowing exists along with pain.

One world, shaped into the visible. One imagining, merely possible. One world, incessantly eloquent. One solitude, soundless. One unbroken surge of movement. One unmoving, waveless stillness. Two readings, one poem.

There are not two. There are two readings—the poem is one. Truth is one. Look while half-asleep and the world appears. Look awake, and the Divine appears. The world and the Divine are not two different things. The sleeping person, when he looked for the Divine, saw the world; and the awakened person, when he looked at the world, saw the Divine.

The awakened one says: the world is not; the Divine is. The sleeping one says: where is the Divine? There is only the world.

These are two perspectives; the truth is one. Two readings, one poem!

The very language of missing or not missing is the language of greed. Drop greed. Join me in celebration.

“I will miss”—this means you are looking through the lens of greed: Let me secure everything, let everything be mine, let me close my fist on it all, let it all be in my strongbox—money there, meditation there; the world too, and God too. If you keep such greed, you will certainly miss. You will miss—because of greed. Drop this language of missing and not missing.

Here I am not giving you anything. Here I am taking things away from you. Nor am I sitting here to give you some knowledge. Join me in celebration for a while; hum along with me. Walk a little way with me. Take two steps with me—enough.

If once you get the taste of the Ultimate, then there is no fear. Then whether I am here or not—no worry. While I am here, let you get a little taste.

So drop this talk of missing, losing, and so on. If you stay entangled in these, you won’t be able to join my celebration. Desire is fine, but it is tied to greed; therefore it goes wrong.

The rays long to spread across the earth, the buds long to burst and be fragrant, each bough longs to be adorned with flowers— this flute of life longs to be played.

The birds long to sing the springtide song, the leaves to announce the message of the honeyed season, the breeze longs to chant the name of the lord of seasons— this flute of life longs to be played.

Good—the feeling is perfectly right. Just free it from the perspective of greed.

In this very moment I am here; you too be here with me. Do not keep accounts in the mind—let me save this, let me grasp that, should I hold this or not, did I understand or not. Drop it. Understanding and such is not the point. Enter the celebration, the festivity! Just sit with me. Just be with me; let satsang happen! Disappear for a little while. Here there is no “I”; if, on your side, you can disappear for a little while… But greed will not allow you to vanish; it will stand guard: how to catch, how to collect. Disappear for a little while! Become blank and empty. In that very instant, whatever I am, its taste will touch you. And that taste is the taste of your own future.

I spread my arms over the whole earth, yet the sky did not come into these arms. I called out to every acquaintance, yet hearing me, no one came close. Milestones stand, but their letters are erased— whom shall I ask how far my own village is? Milestones stand, but their letters are erased— whom shall I ask how far my own village is? We set out at dawn; now it is turning noon— whom shall I ask how far the cool shade is? Dust clings to the brow, the direction of the goal is found— whom shall I ask how far the holy feet are?

I am present here. You need to ask no one. You need not even ask me. Just hum with me for a moment. Enter into a little dance with my being for a while.

You will not miss. But if you remain entangled in the language of missing and not missing, you are missing, you have been missing, and you will certainly miss.

Hari Om Tat Sat.