Sadhana Sutra #10

There are two ways to victory in life. One: that you fight and try to win. But that path is only an appearance. There will be much fighting, but victory will never fall into your hands. You will certainly fight—and many times it will seem as if victory is just at hand—yet you will find that victory never arrives. It keeps slipping away. It will always look as if in the future victory will be possible. Your logic, your intellect will insist that victory is possible, but it will not be.
The reasons are there, because that with which you are fighting is a part of you. As if someone were to make his two hands fight—what would victory mean? Whose would it be? How would it be? Within both hands, it is I. If I wish I can make the left hand fight the right. But do not fall into the delusion that the right hand is me or the left hand is me, and that the other is not me. A fight can happen, but it will be futile. Neither the right can win nor the left. If I wish, I can fall into the illusion of making one win, I can lift the right hand up and push the left down and think the right has won. But that victory is utterly false, because in any moment I can lift the left up.
Since in both it is I who am fighting, there is no way to win, nor is there any way to lose. Neither will there ever be a total defeat, nor ever a total victory. One thing is certain: in this struggle—in this fight between my two hands, which are mine—my strength will be depleted, expended, and destroyed. Whoever goes by this path will only miss. He will never win; even his loss will never be total—and the illusion will remain that victory could be.
Let us try to understand this. Because for lifetimes this very road has been ours. Hence neither have we won, nor have we lost. Where you stand is neither the place of victory nor of defeat. Had you even truly lost, you would have chosen another way! The defeat never became final, and the hope of victory remains. And victory too has not happened.
You fight with anger. For a moment it seems you will win, but the very next day you know the victory was only imagination. Anger seizes you again. You fight with sexual desire. For a moment it seems you have become a victor, and then you are defeated once more.
Understand this process rightly.
When do you fight sexual desire? When the tide of sex is at ebb, then you fall into the illusion that you are winning. After the sexual act, desire naturally subsides. Just as after eating, hunger is gone, and at that time you may think fasting is possible. There is nothing surprising in that. After hunger ends—after food—a man immediately becomes a faster! But eight or ten hours later that decision will not stand. When hunger returns, you will find fasting difficult. On a full stomach a man can decide to fast. Even if he does not decide, he can praise fasting. On an empty stomach, the decision breaks.
When the energy of sexual desire fills you, you become lustful. And when you have had intercourse and the energy has been discharged, the hunger is gone; then you repent. Then you think, What useless business am I caught in? Why am I wasting the energy of life? What is all this? This is animal-like! And then you take the vow of Brahmacharya. But those decisions are false. After a short while, when sex-energy gathers again, you will find your decisions have broken. The woman again appears beautiful, the man again becomes attractive, the mind is once more filled with desire.
So, when your belly is full, you become a partisan of fasting. When your belly is empty, you begin to dream of food. You neither ever win, nor do you ever finally lose. Sometimes you have the illusion of victory, sometimes of defeat—but nothing becomes complete.
What is the reason? Because that which fights, and that with which you are fighting, are both parts of one and the same energy. Who is fighting sexual desire? Who is fighting the senses? Who is fighting sin? Who is fighting anger?
Understand this a little rightly. The one who gets angry is the one who fights anger. In the morning he is angry; by evening he fights anger—the same person who did it! You split yourself in two.
Those among you who are fond of cards know there is a game one plays alone. He lays out the cards on both sides. A move from this side, then a move from that side! Alone he plays, and enjoys winning and losing as well! Now this is very amusing! Who will win, who will lose? He alone is playing the whole game! Hide-and-seek with oneself.
This needs to be understood well. Because on this path, where the hope of victory remains and victory never happens, we have wasted the energy of lifetimes. Most people are still wasting energy in the same way. Their mistake is natural, because hope is born.
I was a guest at a house. The home of a very wealthy magnate. An elderly man—now no more. Very charitable, from Rajasthan. When I stayed with him he must have been over sixty-five. He told me, I have taken the vow of Brahmacharya four times in my life. Another friend with me was greatly impressed. I told him, do not be so impressed—first ask him why he did not take it the fifth time. Because what does it mean to have taken the vow four times? It means it broke three times. And if it broke three times—do not hurry, ask him why he didn’t take it the fifth time. The old man began to weep and said, You have pressed the right nerve. Whoever I tell that I have taken the vow four times—no one till now has asked why not the fifth! I did not take it the fifth time because I had failed four times; I did not have the courage to take it again. I understood that this will not be possible for me.
But the man is honest. Even this much understanding is considerable honesty. If only this understanding had gone a little deeper—but it did not. He thought, I am weak, therefore I cannot win. That is wrong. You are not weak. The way you are fighting is such that in it you cannot win.
Understand this difference clearly. Otherwise all the methods of sadhana will unknowingly fill you with inferiority.
Sadhus, sannyasins—they persuade you to take the vow of Brahmacharya. Their words impress you. Because in the moments of sex you feel you have become a slave to something. Something is driving you—you are not the master. The sting of sex is precisely this: not sex itself, but the experience of slavery. It seems as if something pulls you by force and you have to be pulled. And you can do nothing. Therefore the words of sadhus and sannyasins appear attractive. Everyone wishes to be master. We want to be such that nothing can drive us; such that only what we want to do, we do. Not to be in the state where even what we don’t want to do, we have to do—this is bondage.
So, words against sex appeal to us. They appeal because we have known the slavery of sex. Whenever someone speaks against it, we are impressed. In that impressed moment we even decide: Good! From now on I will restrain myself into Brahmacharya; now I will fight. But victory does not come by decision. Decision is not enough. Decision is necessary, but by itself it does not give victory. It depends on which path you choose. If the path you choose does not lead to victory, your decision will only mislead. And there will be only one result of your decision—the same that has always been: you will be filled with a sense of weakness. Again and again you will be defeated. Again and again your decision will break and you will feel, I am feeble, I am weak, I am impotent—this is not for me. This is the work of Mahaviras.
This has nothing to do with Mahavira and such. The difference between you and Mahavira is not that you are weak and he is strong. The difference is only this: he is on the right path and you are on the wrong. And on the wrong path, whoever walks, results will not come.
Thus all religions have filled man with inferiority. It is strange. All religions say, you are Paramatma, you are Moksha, you are of the nature of Brahman—but the result is the opposite. Wherever religion becomes influential, there people experience: we are sinners! Religion says you are Paramatma, but people feel within: we are sinners. They feel: we are low, mean—nothing can be done by us!
What is the reason? Religions insist on your supreme virtue, and the outcome is guilt! Inferiority, guilt, lowness, weakness arise in you. A deep self-condemnation takes root: I am bad. And remember, for a man in whom this feeling arises—that I am bad—connection with Paramatma becomes very difficult, exceedingly difficult. Hence, the more religious a country becomes, the more it is gripped by the feeling of sin. It should be the opposite—but this is what happens.
Behind this lies only this: the path you take simply does not lead to success. There is the appearance of success—otherwise you would not walk; again and again it seems you will win, but you never do.
Those Mahatmas who keep advising you—they too have not won. I know them closely; in privacy they ask me the same questions you ask. So between your Mahatmas and you there is not a grain of difference. If there is a difference, it is only that you are a bit more honest; they are a bit more dishonest. Where they have not won, they keep the appearance of victory intact!
Sadhus and saints come to me. Great acharyas with hundreds of disciples, hundreds of sadhus and sannyasins—they too ask me in private: How to conquer sex? And they write books on Brahmacharya! They administer vows to others! A big net. I ask them, When Brahmacharya has not happened to you, why are you binding people to the vow of Brahmacharya? The tangle you are caught in—why are you trapping others? Say honestly that it hasn’t happened to you—perhaps then a path will open. Let us all ponder together: where is the mistake? Where is the barrier?
The mistake is here. If a man walks by a wrong road, the only thing he finds is failure. The right path… What is the right path? If you fight with yourself, you will not be able to win. Because who will win, who will lose? All these energies are yours. Kama, krodha, lobha—sex, anger, greed—are your energies, your powers.
Then what to do? This sutra will tell you what to do.
Within you it is necessary to find a point that is beyond both—then victory will begin. Sex-desire is there, and there is the craving for Brahmacharya—both are there, and they are in conflict. They are on the same plane; on this plane there can be no victory. They are equal forces; there can be no victory. If above these two, within you, a point could be found that is neither eager for sex nor eager for Brahmacharya—understand the difference—that does not say, I relish sex, nor says, I relish Brahmacharya; if within you such a point could be found, it will lead you towards victory.
That point we have called sakshi-bhava, witnessing. If this witness is found within you—who can look at both with neutrality—then you will set out on the journey of victory. Because this third has no fight with anyone. It is not fighting at all. As a witness it will see both sex and the desire for Brahmacharya.
I use the word—Brahmacharya-vasana. Understand it well. Sex is a vasana, a craving; Brahmacharya too is a craving. No one has told you that Brahmacharya too is a vasana. But it is—the opposite craving of sex-desire. When we are harassed by sex, we crave Brahmacharya. Anger is a craving and non-anger is a craving. When we are burned and wounded by anger, we crave non-anger. But that too is a craving. Whatever is opposite to anger will be a craving. Whatever is opposite to sex will be a craving. Both belong to the same plane. Do not think that something is not a craving because it is opposite. Samsara is a craving. And if, frightened by samsara, you take Sannyas, then Sannyas too is a craving.
Not from fear of the world, but from witnessing of the world—Sannyas that is born of sakshi-bhava is not a craving, it is liberation.
It is a little intricate. But remember one thing: opposites are of the same nature. Opposites cannot be of different natures. If sex is a craving, then its opposite—Brahmacharya—is also a craving. The difference is only this: as you stand upright on your feet, and then you do a headstand—both are you. On your feet it is you; on your head it is you. Sex-desire stands on its feet; Brahmacharya stands on its head. But it is only the inverted form of the same.
Can you, between these two cravings, catch hold of a witnessing that sees both? Which is not on the side of either. Which does not choose this against that, nor that against this. Which looks at both. Which is the drashta of both. Only the victory of this drashta is possible—because this drashta has nothing to win; it is already the winner.
Understand this rightly. The deeper this drashta-hood becomes—the more it is already victorious. There is nothing for it to win. It stands outside the fight; it is no longer in it.
And the moment you stand outside the fight, you see in what madness you were entangled. From sex to Brahmacharya, from Brahmacharya back to sex—you were swinging like the pendulum of a clock. When the pendulum first went to the left, you thought it was going left. You did not know that while going left it was gathering the energy to go right. It goes left only so that it can go right, gathering momentum. The mechanism of the clock is such that while going left it appears to you to be going left, but you do not know it is gathering strength to go right. The more it goes left, the more it will be able to go right. Then it goes right—you think it is going opposite. But while it goes right, it is again gathering energy to go left.
Meaning: when you fill yourself with ideas of Brahmacharya, you are gathering energy to become lustful. When you think of fasting, you are recreating the relish for food. If you go on eating and eating, the relish for food will end. The gap of fasting is needed. From it the relish is reborn. If someone kept feeding you incessantly, you would be frightened—you would become an enemy of food. If someone forced you to remain in sex continuously, you would run from that place in such a way you wouldn’t stop or look back. A gap is needed.
You have sex, then two days of fasting—celibacy. In that Brahmacharya you will once again collect the taste to descend into sex. If you do not understand this inner mechanics, you will keep fighting and never be free. Your talk of Brahmacharya will only create the flavor of sex again. From it the taste is reborn.
The reverse is also true. Your indulgence in sex again makes Brahmacharya important. After sex you repent, and your mind becomes very saintly. After anger you repent. And you think your repentance is the opposite of anger. No—your repentance gives you fresh energy to be angry again. Therefore those who repent keep getting angry. They can never be free.
Repentance is not the enemy of anger; it is its friend. If you drop repentance, your anger will end. But you won’t drop repentance. After anger you enjoy greatly that you are repenting—now you are becoming non-angry. You do not know that because the pendulum has gone to one side in anger, now in repentance it will go to the other! And again it will have gathered the power to go back to anger!
Opposites support each other. From the opposite, taste is produced. Therefore when you change tastes you… Those who inquire into mind have very different conclusions. You think when you change tastes that you are becoming an enemy of the previous taste. No—you are only trying to regain the previous taste anew.
A Western psychologist has recently proposed something. It is startling, but very true. The proposal is that husband and wife keep quarreling because they are not given the chance to change the taste in between. Disturbing—at least for people of old morality. Yet there is truth behind it. And experiments are going on in the West. The experiments are these: if a husband and wife, in between, form relations with other men and women, their original relationship becomes zestful again, it does not perish.
Our belief till now has been the opposite: if a husband becomes interested in another woman, then his taste for his wife is finished. This is utterly wrong. His interest in another woman—a fasting from his wife for a while—will bring him back to the wife with relish. And if the wife does not hurry, only waits a little, he will return. And that return will be fresh. The flavor will be new again.
Hence the experiment of wife swapping runs in America. Small clubs where people exchange partners. Those who have tried this all report similarly: our taste for our own wives increased, and our conflicts decreased.
However dangerous this may sound to believers in old morality, the future is likely to go with it. Old morality cannot survive; it has given much suffering to husbands and wives. It is natural. The rule is the same: if you are given the same food every day, how long will you manage? In seven days you will be upset and think even fasting is better. But if the food is changed daily, the relish remains. After four or six days, the same food again—and the relish is preserved.
On all planes of life this is deeply true. So when you keep swinging between opposites, do not think that sometimes you become very saintly, and great ideas of Brahmacharya and great talk of knowledge and Self-knowledge arise. It is nothing—only the device to return to the body with fresh relish by talking a little of soul. But there is also a point different from both, within a man—and that is the key to victory. That point is sakshi-bhava.
Now let us take these sutras.
The first sutra: 'In the coming battle of life, keep the attitude of witnessing. And though you will fight, do not become a warrior.'
The battle will continue, but in the war of witnessing there is a difference. You will fight, but do not be a warrior—do not take sides. Do not become repentance against anger. Do not become Brahmacharya against sex-desire. Do not be a warrior. The battle will continue, but you become a witness. Stand a little apart and watch both with equal feeling.
Become equanimous. Recognize both sex and Brahmacharya as vasanas. Recognize the world as vasana and Sannyas too. Recognize bondage as bondage, and Moksha too. And beyond both, beyond the opposites, establish yourself. Say, I am only the one who sees, not the doer. I am not the karta, because the karta becomes the warrior. The moment you do, you become a warrior.
And there is only one formula for non-doing—and that is witnessing. Otherwise, everything becomes doing. Whatever we do carries the sense of doership. And where doership exists, on that plane victory never happens. There we choose one side at a time. When we choose one side, the other side grows stronger. A day comes when we have to choose the other. When we choose the other, the first becomes stronger. Thus we sway between dualities. The name of this duality is samsara.
The only method to be outside this duality is: do not choose in the duality—simply watch it.
What does this mean? It means that when sex-desire arises, you watch that it has arisen. When it comes, feel that it has surrounded you. Do not fight—just know that it has surrounded you. Whatever sex-desire makes you do, do—but stand at a distance watching: sex-desire is making this and this happen. As if you were a spectator and you were watching a play. You have no fight. When sex reaches its peak, still keep watching: in sex this and this is happening. When sex begins to fall from the peak, keep watching that now it is falling, and repentance is grabbing the mind—watch that too. As repentance thickens and feelings of Brahmacharya arise, watch them too: now Brahmacharya is arising.
If this entire movement is seen in sakshi-bhava, you will understand sex and Brahmacharya are not two things; they are the rising and falling of one wave. And the day you see this—that both are vasanas—sex is the rising wave and Brahmacharya the falling wave, anger is the rising wave and repentance the falling wave, samsara is the rising wave and Sannyas the falling wave—on the day you see both together, linked, that very day victory begins in the battle—without becoming a warrior. Choice stops—choicelessness is born. Now what is there to choose? If both are one, nothing remains to choose. And when there is nothing to choose, you begin to slide outside of duality.
Choice is duality; choicelessness is beyond duality. Grasp this witnessing and slowly become absorbed in it. Suddenly you will find the victory that could not be achieved by fighting has begun to come without fighting.
'Do not be a warrior.'
This sutra is very deep—do not be a warrior. Yesterday we took the sutra: now you can enter the temple of Prajna; and on its walls are written flaming letters—you will be able to read them. This is the first sutra of that temple of Prajna. It is written in flaming letters on the temple:
'In the coming battle of life keep the attitude of witnessing. And though you will fight, do not become a warrior. That is you yourself.'
That witness is you yourself.
'And yet you are limited and can make mistakes.'
That witness is your innermost. It is the deepest form of your life. And you are standing on the periphery still. You can err—the witness cannot. The witness is your supreme being. You are distorted. Life’s experiences, roads, paths, the world, innumerable births—sanskaras—have distorted you. On the periphery you are covered with dust and debris—you can err. You cannot be trusted. Do not trust yourself as a doer, for the doer stands on the periphery. He stands close to karma; he is bound to karma. If you trust yourself as doer, you will repeat what you have always done. You are a circle, a vicious circle. You will keep revolving as before.
Understand this a little.
Do you ever do anything new? Look back at life and you will find you go round in a circle. In the morning anger, at noon repentance, by evening loving, at night anger again, in the morning hatred—the circle keeps moving. If you keep a diary for three months, you will be shocked: are you a machine or a man? And if with strict honesty you keep such a diary, you can even declare what will happen on each day for the next three months! From morning itself you could hang in the house your daily calendar: at this time I will be angry, and at this time I will be calm, and at this time I will be full of melancholy. And if every member of the house would hang his calendar each morning, great convenience would come. The wife could say: at five, when you return from the office, I will not be in a fine mood—please note. The husband can see the calendar and move accordingly. The wife can see the husband’s calendar. And both could arrive at some compromises.
As it is, we clash like the blind. And the great joke is that when we clash we always think someone else is troubling us. Whereas it is the inner circle that is moving—no one else is troubling you. As women have their monthly cycle, no one is taking their blood, no one is injuring them—it is their inner cycle through which menstruation happens. Exactly so your twenty-four-hour cycles keep turning; no one is troubling you. In certain moments you are sad, in certain moments happy. When happy, you think someone is making you happy; when sad, you think someone makes you sad.
And the great amazement is: it depends on your inner state. The same thing can make you sad if you are predisposed to sadness, and the same thing can make you glad if you are disposed to gladness. A little inner observation will astonish you. Then you will not go around blaming the world. You will find the inner seasons keep changing: sometimes rain, sometimes sun, sometimes cold—the inner seasons keep changing. And if you become a witness to the inner seasons, you become the master.
But you become the doer! When anger comes, you become the angry. When sex-desire comes, you become lustful. When the craving for Brahmacharya comes, you raise the flag of Brahmacharya. You identify. Stand apart. The farther you are from your moods, the greater the mastery.
In sakshi-bhava is mastery. In becoming a warrior is defeat.
This will look very inverted, because we think: without becoming a warrior how will we win? In this world one wins by becoming a warrior. In spirituality, by becoming a warrior nothing comes into your hand but defeat. And even defeat is not complete—otherwise a man would be disgusted! Defeat remains incomplete and hope always remains: I will win, I will win. And victory never comes!
'That is you yourself.'
That witness is your innermost.
'And yet you are limited and can make mistakes. He is eternal and without doubt. He is the eternal truth. Once he has entered you and become your warrior, then he will never utterly abandon you, and on the day of great peace he will become one with you.'
You have two forms: you standing at the periphery, and you hidden at the center. At your center you are Paramatma—you are supreme power. At your periphery you are a weak man. If you keep fighting at the periphery, only your little power will be of use. If you slide toward the center, your power goes on increasing. Precisely at the center a man need not fight at all. He is so supremely powerful that the vrittis burn up in that great power and turn to ash. The great question is not how to fight—the great question is how to become supremely powerful. When that great power is present, the periphery is humbled, exhausted. The disturbance at the periphery falls silent. This is the formula of how to win without fighting. And victory comes without fight.
The second sutra: 'Seek the soldier and let him wage the war within.'
You remain the witness.
'Seek the soldier and let him wage the war within. Be alert in seeking him, else in the frenzy and haste of battle you will pass him by. And he will not recognize you until you have recognized him yourself. If your call reaches his attentive ears, he will fight from within you and fill your inner drab emptiness.'
This sakshi-bhava—seek it. With this search you will find that soldier who will fight on the periphery. But a great difference remains: you will not become that soldier; you will not become the warrior; you will not go to fight; you will merely be present. What does this mean?
It means that when anger arises in you, repentance does not yet arise in you. If both rise together, they cancel one another and you will be silent. Right now, when anger arises, repentance is not there; when repentance comes, anger is gone. They arise one by one. When sex arises, Brahmacharya does not arise; when Brahmacharya arises, sex is not there. They never meet. If they meet, they cancel. They cancel one another like debit and credit—and you fall silent. But when one comes, the other is nowhere. When the other comes, the first has left. There is no meeting.
Understand this, because it is the innermost event of victory. If both arise together, what will happen? If, when you are filled with anger, you are simultaneously filled with repentance—what will happen? Repentance and anger will cancel one another. If, when you are filled with sex, the craving for Brahmacharya is also present—both will cancel. And when they cancel, neither Brahmacharya nor sex remain in the account.
Understand the difference.
Therefore the supreme Brahmachari knows no sense of Brahmacharya. One to whom Brahmacharya truly happens has no identity around it, no ego around it. Whoever feels 'I am a Brahmachari,' and keeps guarding and managing it—that Brahmacharya has been chosen as opposite to sex. Sex is not cut; it is watching for its chance. This man has gathered energy around Brahmacharya, but sex waits. Soon the mood will change; the season will change. In this world nothing remains—everything changes.
Except the witness, all in this world is changeable. Only one point, eternal and timeless, where no change ever happens—the rest changes. On the periphery the wheel keeps turning; only the nail at the center, where sakshi-bhava is, does not move. There all things are still.
So if you choose Brahmacharya against sex, sex is suppressed in the unconscious, waiting. When you tire of Brahmacharya, it will seize you by the head; it will not let go. Sadhus and sannyasins become afraid even of sleep—because in dreams sex seizes! So frightened they become that if a woman is sitting somewhere—scriptures written by such crazed people say—do not sit there for so many minutes! If a woman has sat and gone—even that spot is dangerous—do not sit there! For if you sit there, sex will arise.
From the spot where a woman sat, sitting there does not raise sex. But if sex has been forced down violently, it can arise. Even the touch of the earth will feel pleasurable where a woman sat! This is a symptom of madness, not of Brahmacharya. The symptom of Brahmacharya is that even if a woman embraces you, sex does not arise. The symptom of madness is that where a woman sat—she has gone—you sit there and sex rises!
You yourself are raising it. Nothing has happened to the ground. Such miracles happen only to Mahatmas! The miracle that sex arises by sitting where a woman sat can happen only to Mahatmas. It has nothing to do with the woman; it is entirely the Mahatma’s craftsmanship. What the Mahatma has been doing to himself—suppression, fight—he is so harassed inwardly that any excuse will do—any excuse.
You have heard and read that when rishis and munis reach siddhi, Apsaras descend from heaven to tempt them. What business is this in heaven? Who opened this shop? What use in corrupting rishis? Who is so keen?
No—no Apsaras are coming from anywhere. It is the unconscious mind of the rishis and munis. Women have been so deeply repressed that they don’t leave even at the last moment. And then the rishi falls! No one is corrupting them. This is an entire psychological play. The repressed becomes powerful. And at the last moment it becomes so powerful that because of it they lose. The hand that had won loses. And both hands belong to them. Brahmacharya was imposed—dragged into place. But the repressed desire within is watching for the road. A moment will come, the pendulum will turn. When it does…
So you cannot enjoy this taste. You have no Apsaras descending. For Apsaras to come, you must first be a Rishi. If you wish to call Apsaras, you must pass through the process of becoming a rishi. The pendulum must swing so far to the left that when it swings right, it reaches heaven. For it to swing right, enough energy must be accumulated. If you want Apsaras, become a rishi! Since rishis disappeared, Apsaras disappeared!
Nowadays no Apsaras come! Not because Apsaras are finished—but because rishis are not there. Create rishis—Apsaras will arrive. They are the derangements of the rishi’s own mind. What was suppressed appears, pursues. If suppression is much, it becomes so concrete. The rishis are not mistaken; they reported exactly: Apsaras came. And they will be as beautiful as no earthly woman could be.
That beauty arises from repressed desire. That beauty is self-created. When you are full of desire, the deeper the desire, the more beautiful women will appear—or men will appear. If you are brimming with lust and have been fasting long, even an old woman will appear beautiful.
That beauty you see is your projection. It is like the hungry man—dry bread seems a supreme delicacy. There is no supreme delicacy in the dry bread; the delicacy is in his hunger. If you are full, even if a supreme feast is set before you, it will not occur to you that food is there.
Fast one day and walk the street—you will read only hotel and restaurant signs. No other shops will appear! And you will read them with relish; the boards will appear beautiful. The foods and sweets displayed will look as if seen for the first time. The colors, the fragrance, the beauty, the ultimate mystery—such that never before! It is not there; it is within you; you are putting it there.
A man casts around himself his own moods. So rishis and munis certainly saw Apsaras, but they were their mind-creations.
If you become a witness, this result will happen: you will see both at once. The farther you stand, the more you can see both together. Distance is needed to see both. If you are too close, only one is visible.
I sit here and I can see you all. If I come closer, I will see fewer. Closer still—fewer. If I come right up to someone—only he is visible. The greater the distance, the wider the perspective.
So when a person becomes a witness, he begins to see anger and non-anger, greed and non-greed, hate and love, sex and Brahmacharya—together. Then he is astonished: this is one wave—here anger, there repentance; here the world, there Sannyas; here indulgence, there renunciation—two forms of one wave. As soon as this is seen, both appear together and cancel one another. That is the soldier. No need to be a warrior.
It is necessary to find that soldier where opposites are cut—by their co-presence, cut on their own. This self-cancelling is victory in war without violence—without fighting.
'Find the soldier and let him fight within.'
Soldier means: the co-presence of the opposites—the experience of both together.
'Be alert in seeking him, else in the frenzy and haste of battle you will pass him by.'
Many times you come near him. But you are less interested in understanding and so eager to fight—your mind so impatient and hasty for victory—that you pass by the soldier who could make you win; you do not even see him. If you are in a hurry, in the haste to fight, in the impatience to win, you will go on missing him. To see him requires non-haste, silence, calm, naturalness. Then only will you see him. Then only can you create the distance. Then only can you see both together.
So do not hurry to win—if you truly wish to win. If you want quick victory, then do not hurry at all. Do not be in haste—if you desire a quick result. The more hurried you are, the more you will remain in restlessness and keep missing.
Within you is that very power that will set you free. The very power within that has bound you will free you too. But do not hurry. Patience, waiting—and no impatience for victory—then your victory is certain.
'And he will not recognize you'—remember, that soldier is within you. 'But he will not recognize you until you recognize him yourself.'
He sits there, unused. You are not using him! You are ignoring a great power. That great power is hidden in this: see both opposites together. You go on missing it. You see one; when you tire of it, you see the other. But if they do not meet, there can be no cancelling. They cannot nullify one another.
'If your call reaches his attentive ears, he will fight from within you and fill your inner drab emptiness.'
The third sutra: 'Receive from him the order for battle and obey it. Do not obey it as that of a commander, but as if it were your very own being and as if in his words your own secret wishes were finding voice. For he is you yourself, but boundlessly wiser and stronger than you.'
This witness within you—leave the whole battle to him. Do not make yourself the warrior. But as soon as you become capable of using him, capable of seeing through him, orders will begin to come which lead surely towards victory. Do not take orders from scriptures, not from words—take them from your witness. He will always take you in the right direction. There is no possibility of his erring.
But we, who knows from whom we take orders! We do not even care whether those we obey have reached anywhere or not.
The great joke is that we take orders from people like ourselves. Because people like us fit our understanding. If you are tormented by sex, it is very likely you will find a guru tormented by sex and imposing Brahmacharya. It is very likely you will find him. You will not be able to reach a guru who is not tormented by sex and in whom Brahmacharya is natural. Because natural Brahmacharya will not be within your grasp. You are so tormented, so unnatural, that only unnatural Brahmacharya will appeal to you. If you reach a natural person, you will find twenty-five excuses and run away.
Why? Because the very things that bother you—if you see that they do not bother your guru, you will not be able to accept that he is not bothered. Because you are. You will run. You will choose a guru like yourself. It is difficult. And you will never be free through him, because he will put you into the same net—into the opposite net of what you were already caught in. But it is the same chain—lustful people choose Brahmachari gurus.
I see it continually. A few days ago a Member of Parliament and a big industrialist came to see me. They began by saying: your memory is extraordinary. Right then I felt this man’s memory must be weak—otherwise would this be a topic? What has that to do with anything? So his memory must be poor. When again and again he said, Amazing—you never forget names, books, acquaintances for years—your memory is extraordinary—then he said: Last month at Cross Maidan when you were giving talks on the Ramayana—I have never spoken on the Ramayana; I was speaking on the Gita—he said: What things you said! We have heard Ramayana from great pundits. Then I said: Sir, the moment you arrived I understood you are sick with weak memory.
What impresses you gives news about you. It does not give much news about the other—it gives news about you. If you hear that so-and-so is a bal-brahmachari, a born celibate—the poor Mahatmas have such announcements made—then lustful people are quickly eager about bal-brahmacharis. There is no other reason. The reason is their weakness, their trouble. Standing at one extreme, the other extreme calls to them.
You are greedy. If someone says he has renounced millions, you fall at his feet. This gives news about you. Whether he renounced or not is of little consequence. But you cling to a single coin—so one who renounces millions immediately impresses you—you immediately clutch at his feet.
Jainas write in their scriptures: Mahavira renounced so many horses, so many elephants! They keep talking about how many horses and elephants he left—this is news about them. Whether Mahavira left or not is not of great importance. And why horses and donkeys—what has their leaving to do with anything? What use is the count?
But they keep increasing the numbers! This is news about their attachment. Therefore the greedy gathered around Mahavira. Therefore the Jainas became wealthy. The greedy became interested in Mahavira because he was a renunciate—greed immediately grasps that.
Whom you grasp depends on you. Then a great mishap happens. In this world even great gurus fail, because those who cling to them are utterly the wrong people. You did not understand Mahavira. Because of your greed you became eager: this man left so much—amazing! Because you cannot drop a single coin—and this man left so many horses, elephants, jewels! This man is the true guru. And you are utterly wrong for this guru.
Life is very complex. If you want to receive precise orders and be saved from yourself—because even in seeking a guru you will seek through your periphery—you will find the wrong one. Even if you seek the right one, you will project the wrong on him. It is proper that you move back and stand in sakshi-bhava. First watch yourself from witnessing. As the capacity for witnessing develops, inner orders will begin to be available. These alone are true. They will take you on the right path. The search for your own voice—of the inner self, the antahkarana—is utterly essential. Without that, you will drift like a piece of wood on the waves—sometimes crashing here, sometimes there—wasting time.
First of all you must search within. After that, even the guru you choose will be a different matter—because then it is not chosen by your periphery, not by your sick self. It is your inner voice that has come.
If you understand sakshi-bhava even a little, then the guru you choose can take you across. He can become the boat. But it must be an inner order—not the talk of the periphery.
'Receive from him the order for battle and obey it. Do not obey it as that of a commander, but as if it were your very own being, and as if in his words your own secret wishes were finding voice. For he is you yourself, but boundlessly wiser and stronger than you.'
Hidden within you is a form of you that is far more powerful and far more wise. Listen to him. Follow him. But for that it is necessary that in the midst of the dualities you learn to awaken into witnessing.