Mahaveer Vani #31

Now the sutra:
‘One should not consume in excess the substances of relish, for they create intoxication; and to an intoxicated man or woman, passions run in the same way as birds fly to a tree laden with delicious fruit.’

Apramad was spoken of—that was the inner point. At once the talk of rasa is brought in—that belongs to the outer. It is said: remain awake within, hold your awareness; and immediately it is added: from the outside too, take into yourself only that which does not increase your unconsciousness. Otherwise a man goes on meditating and goes on drinking wine—then it is as if one step is taken forward and one step backward. At the end of life you will find you are standing at the same spot. Not standing—fallen, right where you were born. There would be no surprise in it—but that is exactly what we all are doing. We go one step, and immediately one step back. Then better not to go at all. Do not waste strength and labor.

If within you the practice of apramad is on—the practice of meditation—Mahavira says: then do not take such substances as increase unconsciousness. And there are such substances; they are intoxicating. There are substances that support our inner negligence.

Therefore you see—someone drinks and immediately he becomes a different man; that is why even the drunkard relishes alcohol—because one gets bored being the same person, bored of oneself. When he drinks, there is a little fun. A new life seems to happen, a new man seems to arrive. Who is this new man?

It does not come from alcohol. That new man was hidden within. Alcohol can only support him. Alcohol produces nothing in you; it can merely provoke what is concealed, can goad it, can awaken it. Hence very amusing things occur.

One man, drinking, becomes depressed. Another, drinking, becomes cheerful. One starts abusing and brawling. One becomes utterly silent—takes to silence. One begins to dance and leap about; and one becomes so slack he is like a corpse, ready to sleep. The alcohol is one—and the differences so many! Alcohol in itself does nothing. It merely stimulates whatever lies buried within the man.

Often the opposite happens. A man who ordinarily laughs becomes sad after drinking—because the laughter was false, superficial; the sadness was inside, the real thing. The alcohol removed the false. Alcohol is a great seeker of truth. It removes the untrue—the person who kept laughing by putting it on. Now even that much awareness is hard, to keep pretending to laugh. The pretence won’t hold. The laughter will be lost. And all that was piled up beneath the laughter—sadness, sorrow, tears—will begin to come out.

Therefore whoever went to Gurdjieff—he made him drink heavily for fifteen days, only for diagnosis. For fifteen days he would keep pouring alcohol until the man was so unconscious that all he had plastered on the surface broke, and what was within began to come out. Then he would observe him.

Gurdjieff has said: until a seeker who comes to me agrees to drink, for fifteen days, as much as I say, I do not begin his sadhana. Because I do not yet know who the real man is. What he tells me—‘I am this’—that he is not. If I work on that, it will be wasted—lines drawn upon water. And what he is, even he does not know, he has suppressed it for lives upon lives. He does not know who he is.

I too continuously find this: someone comes and says, ‘This is my trouble.’ It is not his trouble. He says, ‘This is my disease.’ It is not his disease. He believes it is. That malady belongs to his layer, and he is not that layer. That layer he has manufactured.

A man comes and says: there is a stain on my shirt, and this is a stain on my Atman. If I set about washing it—even if it gets washed—the Atman will not be cleansed, because the stain was on the shirt, not on the Atman. Even if it does not get washed, it was not on the Atman. I will have to strip this man naked and see where on his Atman the stain is. Only there is it meaningful to wash; to waste time washing his shirt is futile.

Gurdjieff would make him drink for fifteen days, make him utterly unconscious, drown him thoroughly. One who had never drunk would become completely intoxicated, totally mad. Then he would study the man—what he is in reality.

Those whom Freud studied, he told them: tell your dreams—and no chatter. Do not give me your theories. Keep your philosophy to yourself; only report your dreams. When Freud first began his inquiry into dreams, he discovered that in dreams the real man appears. The upper faces are false.

You see a man touching his father’s feet, and in his dream he is murdering the father. Ordinarily you would think: the dream is only a dream; the real is that every morning he touches his father’s feet. That is not the real—mark it. The dream has become more real than your so-called reality, because you are wholly false. That touching your father’s feet in the morning is only a repentance for the real deed you did in the dream. The dream is the real thing. Why? Because in dreams you are not yet skillful at deception. The dream is deep, unconscious. In your conscious mind you show respect. In your conscious mind the wife is telling her husband, ‘You are my God,’ and in the dream another husband and another God appears. She says: ‘That is all dream.’

But this dream is deeper. Because in dreams neither doctrines work, nor society, nor the preached teachings. In dreams the real mind—the unconscious—manifests. Hence Freud said: if the real man is to be known, study of dreams is essential. It is the same point.

Gurdjieff said: with drink we will strip the unconscious bare. He said: we will take your dream-life; Gurdjieff’s method is swifter—within fifteen days it is known. With Freud’s method it takes five years. For five years one has to study the dreams; then he will conclude what kind of man you are, what your inner reality is, what your root disease is. But that diagnosis has become very long.

Mahavira says: whatever we take from outside into the inside cannot create anything inside; but if something is lying inside, then the outer can either support it or oppose it.

So the man engaged inwardly in the practice of apramad—who is working to awaken awareness—and at the same time goes on drinking in the evening, and in the morning prays, worships, meditates—such a man is inconsistent. He is doing the opposite to himself, contradictory. Such a man will never reach anywhere. One bull of his cart is going one way, the other bull another way. One wheel moves one side, the other wheel the other side.

I have heard: Mulla Nasruddin was on a journey. When he climbed to sleep on the upper berth, he asked the man below: I forgot to ask—where are you going? The man below said: I am going to Bombay.

Mulla Nasruddin said: Amazing! A miracle of science! I am going to Calcutta—and both of us in the same train! See the marvel of science: the lower berth is going to Bombay, the upper berth is going to Calcutta.

And Mulla slept with great pride.

We may laugh at Mulla, but our lives are just like that: one berth to Bombay, one to Calcutta. Behold the marvel of man! You keep doing opposing acts the whole time. The great joke is: whatever you do, you almost always do its opposite as well. And until you do the opposite, you feel a restlessness inside. Do the opposite—and all seems fine.

A man gets angry—then he repents. Ordinarily you think: a man who repents is a good man. But you do not see—one berth is going to Calcutta, one to Bombay. He gets angry, then he repents. Then he gets angry, then repents. His whole life this goes on. Have you noticed? And he always thinks: now I will not be angry. He gets angry and then repents. What happens? Ordinarily a man believes: I got angry and then repented, it is good—now I will never get angry. But this has happened many times before; every time he got angry and repented—and repentance does not cut anger.

The truth is the opposite: repentance saves anger, it does not cut it. Because when you get angry, the image you have of yourself in your own eyes—of being a good man—gets fractured. ‘Ah! I got angry! I—such a decent man! So saintly a character—and I got angry!’ So the pain that pricks is that your image has fallen in your own eyes. By repenting, the image stands up again. Again you become virtuous: I have repented, I begged forgiveness—Micchami Dukkadam—the account is settled, I am good again. The image is back where it was. The same image which stood before anger, which fell by anger—repentance has set it up again where it stood. Now you will again get angry; the position is restored, you are back at your station.

Repentance is a trick—like the hen is a trick of the egg and for producing the egg. Repentance is the trick of anger and for producing anger.

Now you can get angry again—the ground is ready. If one of the two breaks, the other cannot remain. If the hen dies, the egg cannot be; if the egg is broken, the hen cannot be. You have tried hard to drop anger—now please do at least this much: drop repentance. Do not repent. Leave the anger there; then your image will not be able to be reinstated, and it is precisely that image which gets up and becomes angry. But we are clever: we balance one act with another. We keep our scales even. We do a little good, immediately we do a little bad. We laugh a little, we cry a little; we cry a little, we laugh a little. We keep ourselves balanced.

We are like acrobats walking on a rope, maintaining balance all the time. Lean left—then lean right. Start falling right—lean left. Holding ourselves upon the rope.

A man reaches the goal only when the journey of his life is saved from this miracle: one berth to Bombay, one to Calcutta. When a man travels in one direction, then results, fruits, attainments come; otherwise life goes to waste—by one’s own hands, wasted.

So Mahavira says: ‘Do not consume in excess such rasa.’

Mahavira speaks with deep deliberation. He does not say: do not consume at all—for that would be an excess. Sometimes there may be a need to consume. Poison itself can be a medicine at times.

Mahavira is very considered. Each of his words is weighed. He never goes to extremes, for extremes bring violence. He does not say: never do this. He only says: do not consume in excess.

Remember: a medicine has a dose; alcohol has no dose. The delight of alcohol is precisely in excess. A medicine has a dose. A medicine is taken by measure; alcohol is not taken by measure. And whatever measure you begin with, tomorrow you will have to increase it—because you become habituated. The more you drink, the more that amount becomes useless. Then drink more, and more—only then some effect seems to appear.

Remember: if a man is drinking, the quantity will go on increasing. And if someone takes alcohol as a medicine, the quantity will go on decreasing—because as the disease subsides, the dose subsides. The day the disease is gone, the dose dissolves. But if a man takes alcohol as intoxication, then the quantity will rise daily—because each drink increases the disease and demands more drink.

Mulla Nasruddin used to say: I never drink more than one peg. His friends said: You’ve crossed the limit! Even lies should have a boundary. We see you pouring peg upon peg with our own eyes! Mulla said: I drink only the first. Then the first peg drinks the second; the second drinks the third. My responsibility is only for the first. From there the chain begins. For the rest I am not responsible. In my awareness I drink only one. After that—where is awareness, where am I, where is the drinker? Then it is the wine that goes on drinking the wine.

He is right. The first step into unconsciousness you take. Then the first step takes the second; the second takes the third.

Whoever wants to stop unconsciousness must stop at the first step—for there your decision is needed. At the second, stopping is difficult. By the third it becomes impossible. Every disease in our mental life can be stopped only at the first step. At the second, it is very hard. The further we go, the more terrible the disease becomes; and one who could not stop at the first—if he thinks he will stop at the third—he is deceiving himself. For at the first he was weighty, powerful, and could not stop; how will he stop at the third, when he has become weaker!

Therefore Mahavira says: ‘Do not consume in excess, for they create intoxication; and to an intoxicated man or woman, passions run as birds to a tree laden with sweet fruit.’

But we, on the contrary, want people to run towards us. We want to become delicious fruit, a laden tree. Where there are no fruits we hang false, fake fruits so that crowds rush to the tree. Birds are not deceived by fake fruits; men are deceived.

Everyone stands in the marketplace, making himself juicy, so that people rush from all sides and swarm over him like bees. Until a man feels he can drive many people crazy, he does not feel there is any joy in life. When the crowd begins to charge from all directions, then you feel you are a magnet, charismatic—now you are miraculous.

This is the relish of the politician, of the leader—that people are running towards him, flocking to him. This is the relish of the actor, the actress—that people are running towards them.

So we want to make ourselves a point of intoxication—so that the personality itself is wine and pulls others. And Mahavira says: whoever sets out to pull others has already been pulled by others. Whoever lives on the attraction of others is himself attracted by others. And whoever fills himself with intoxication, with unconsciousness—people will certainly be drawn to him, but he is losing himself, drowning himself. One day he will be empty, and he will miss the opportunity of life.

Certainly, a woman who is conscious will attract fewer people. A woman who is intoxicated will attract more—because an intoxicated woman becomes animal-like: all civilization, all culture, all that was on the surface—breaks. She becomes bestial. A man too—if intoxicated—will attract more people, more women, because he will become animal-like, with an animal momentum. And all passions in their animal aspect become more juicy. Therefore wherever sex intensifies, alcohol intensifies. In truth, without alcohol it becomes difficult to descend into sexuality—because even that small glimmer of understanding interferes. Once drunk, a man can behave exactly like an animal.

This tendency of ours—to attract someone—if you want to attract, then you must be intoxicated in some respect. The politician who speaks like a madman, who promises like a madman—who says, ‘Tomorrow, once power is in my hands, heaven will descend on earth’—he attracts more. One who speaks with understanding—nobody is attracted. The actress whose eyes seem to pour wine towards you—she attracts. If an actress were to have eyes like Buddha’s—if you went to her like a madman, you would return home quieted. She needs eyes in which the feeling of wine flows. The glow on her face should not awaken you—it should put you to sleep.

Wherever we find unconsciousness, there we feel rasa. Whatever, on seeing it, you forget yourself—know there is wine. If on seeing an actress you forget yourself—know there is unconsciousness, there is wine. And wine is not only in bottles; it is in eyes, in clothes, in faces, in hands, in skin. Wine is a very widespread phenomenon.

Mahavira says: one who partakes of such rasas which are intoxicating, and who does not erase, but increases, his inner intoxication—towards him passions will run just as birds run to a tree laden with fruit. And whoever is inviting passions towards himself is attracting his own bondage by his own hand. He is inviting his handcuffs and shackles: ‘Come.’ He is calling to his prisons: ‘Come and be built around me.’ Such a person can never be free, never be peaceful, never be empty, never attain to truth—because the first condition of truth is freedom. The first condition of truth is a state of being unbound. And how can one be free amidst passions?

‘Sex-enjoyments—kama-bhoga—by themselves create neither equanimity in anyone, nor do they create the deformation of attachment and aversion. But man himself, by making manifold resolves of raga-dvesha towards them, becomes deluded and deformed by moha.’

This sutra is precious.

Mahavira says: the entire game of sexuality is your own.

I was at the Kumbha Mela. A friend was with me. There was still some time before the fair began. We both were sitting on the bank of the Ganga—far, not too far, but far enough to be seen. A woman was combing her hair after bathing. Only her back was visible. My friend became absolutely mad. His interest in our talk vanished. He said to me: stop here. Until I see that woman’s face, I will not be at peace. Let me go and see her face. He went—and returned very dejected. It was not a woman; it was a sadhu combing his hair. Look at the gait with which he went—and the state of his steps when he returned! If he had been modest, cultured, he would have kept it to himself, and remained bothered all his life.

Truly speaking, from the back the form did seem attractive. But was the attraction there—or was it in the mind? Because when he went there and saw it was a man, the attraction vanished.

Is attraction in woman—or in the feeling projected upon ‘woman’? Is attraction in man—or in the feeling projected upon ‘man’?

The deep attraction is within; we spread it outside. Outside there are only pegs; upon them we hang our attraction. And it is not only when such incidents happen that you come to know. Today you are crazy about someone—there is great rasa. Tomorrow all grows flat—and you yourself cannot figure out what happened. Yesterday there was so much rasa—today why is all insipid? The person is the same—yet all rasa is gone!

If the attraction were really in the person, it would remain the same today, tomorrow, the day after. But the mind demands the new. Therefore, about whom you feel drawn today—be certain, tomorrow he will be less so; the next day, even less; the day after, faded; after eight days, you won’t even see—it will all vanish.

The mind demands the new; in the old, its relish is lost. This is the nature of mind; there is no fault—just its nature. Today you ate such and such food; tomorrow the same; the day after the same—on the fourth day you will be uneasy. The mind demands it so: today the same wife, tomorrow the same wife, the day after the same wife—on the fourth day the mind becomes sad. The mind demands the new. Therefore, if you want to keep attraction alive towards the wife, all avenues to the new must be completely closed—then by quarrelling and beating somehow attraction goes on. Hence we have made so many arrangements for marriage—that outside there remain no possibilities.

In those countries where outside possibilities have been allowed—marriage is breaking. Marriage cannot survive. Marriage is a great arrangement—such that the man cannot properly even look at any other woman; the woman cannot reach any other man. Then, in compulsion, we leave the two together. It means—I am to be served today the same food, tomorrow the same, the day after the same; and if there is absolutely no possibility of any other food, and the same food alone is available in my dungeon, then on the fourth day I will still eat the same, and on the fifth day. But if other foods are available, with no hindrance, no inconvenience, I will not eat the same.

So one thing is certain: marriage can last in the world only so long as we keep all outer attractions completely blocked. And in proportion as the outer attraction offers not only attraction but also danger, trouble, entanglement, harassment—only then can one hold back. Otherwise marriage will break. But such a marriage, when it breaks, was false. Only in a world where all attractions are available and marriage still survives—only then understand that marriage is. Otherwise it was a deception. Therefore the day there are no bonds to marriage—that very day we will know who is truly husband and wife. Before that there is no way to know—no way at all.

What I truly like, with whom I have a deep inner connection—this will be known only when all avenues of change are available, and yet there is no change. If there are no avenues of change and there is no change—then every wife is a sati, and every husband is devoted to one wife. The more pegs around us, the more we will see how much projection is there—how much our mind dances from one peg to another, to a third. The rasa we feel from that peg—that too is our own donation, Mahavira is saying. We receive nothing from it.

A dog has a bone in his mouth; he is sucking it. When a dog sucks a bone, one should sit and meditate upon it—for he is performing a very deep act which all men perform. The bone has no sap; but the dog’s mouth gets wounded in the sucking; from those wounds blood begins to flow. That blood that begins to flow, the dog thinks, is coming from the bone. That blood goes down his throat, tastes delicious—it is his own blood. But how is the dog to understand it is not from the bone? When he sucks the bone, only then does it come. The reasoning is natural—the arithmetic is clear: when I suck the bone, then it comes—so it comes from the bone. But it comes from the tearing of his own gums, from the wounds in his own mouth. The dog keeps sucking the bone with great relish—and keeps drinking his own blood.

When you derive rasa from another, you are sucking a bone. The rasa is of your own mind; it is your own blood that flows. From another nothing is received, nothing can be received. If even in sexual union you think you are getting pleasure—it comes from your own blood oozing; the other has nothing to do with it. It is bone-sucking. But it is difficult—neither the dog understands it, nor man. To understand oneself is intricate.

Mahavira says: ‘Sex-enjoyments by themselves do not create equanimity in man….’

Do not think that from sex and enjoyment some samata—balance—is obtained, or happiness, or peace. Do not think the opposite either. Ascetics think so: from sex and enjoyment sorrow arises, difficulty arises, raga-dvesha arises, hell is constructed. Note: this is the same man who yesterday believed sex and enjoyment bring heaven. The same man has now stood on his head. Now he says: sex and enjoyment bring hell.

Mahavira says: from sex and enjoyment neither heaven comes nor hell comes. Upon sex and enjoyment it is your mind that imposes heaven; upon sex and enjoyment it is your mind that constructs your hell. From sex and enjoyment you get only what you put into them. You receive only your own gift. And if you stop giving, stop projecting—then sex and enjoyment dissolve, they vanish. The pegs stand where they are; you stop hanging your tendencies upon them.

And the day a man knows: my pleasures are mine, my pains are mine—all feelings are mine—that day he is free. So long as I feel that sorrow comes from another, happiness comes from another—so long I am dependent, enslaved.

This is the meaning of liberation—that day I see all is my own spreading. Where I wished to see happiness—I saw happiness. Where I wished to see sorrow—I saw sorrow. What I saw were pictures sent by my own eye; the world only served as a screen—the pictures were mine. I myself am the projector. But projectors are not visible. Even in a cinema you sit watching—the projector is behind your back. It remains hidden there, within the wall; through a small hole the pictures go out—which appear upon the screen, where they are not. Where they are is behind your back; no one looks there. Nothing happens on the screen. On the screen only what the projector throws appears.

Mark it well: when I fall into some feeling towards a woman, a man, a friend, an enemy—the projector is hidden behind me, within me; from there I project the images, and the other person is only a screen upon which those images appear. I myself appear upon many people.

Psychologists say: when you see some defect in someone, then think very carefully—most likely that defect is yours. For instance: a father—if he was a donkey at school, he will not be able to tolerate a donkey for a son; he will try to make the son brilliant. If the boy does a little foolishness or stupidity, if his marks are a little low, the father will create a big hullabaloo. An intelligent father will not create so much fuss; a stupid father surely will. The reason is: the son is only a screen for projection. What remained incomplete in the father, he tries to complete in the son.

One day Mulla Nasruddin’s son brought home his school report—the annual exam. Mulla made great noise, much hue and cry: ruined us, brought shame! In no subject had the boy passed; in most he had scored zero.

But he was Mulla’s son—he stood there smiling. When the father had made enough ruckus and excited himself well, the boy said: just wait—this report is not mine; I found it in an old Quran. It is yours.

Mulla said: then fine—then what my father did to me, I will do to you.

The boy asked: what did your father do to you?

Mulla said: he skinned me raw, naked.

‘All right! Suppose it is mine—no harm. Where is yours?’

The boy said: mine is the same—that is why I showed you yours, thinking you might soften a little.

Mulla said: there is no way to soften. What my father did to me, I will do to you.

What we see in others—if you see someone as very jealous—think a little: perhaps that person is a screen, and jealousy is within you. If you see someone as very egoistic—think a little: perhaps he is a screen and the ego is within you. If you feel someone is dishonest—think a little; begin to turn back again and again—to find the projector. Do not go on gazing at the screen.

Mahavira says: all is coming from behind—from within—and spreading without. The whole play is yours. You are the author of the drama, you are its characters, you are its audience. Do not search the other—find yourself. Whoever engages in this search—one day he becomes free.

Enough for today.