Sahaj Yog #7

The moment you start seeking, you miss. Seeking itself is the first mistake. To seek means you have already assumed that God is lost. Can God be lost? And if something can be lost, could that be God? The very decision to seek is where the slip begins. The more you seek, the more it recedes. No one has ever found God by seeking. This is precisely the proclamation of Saraha’s sahaj-yoga—the path of spontaneity.

Notice: Saraha does not even mention the word “God.” Even naming becomes a mistake, because the moment the name is uttered, people rush out to seek. God is that which appears when all seeking drops; let seeking itself fall away, and He is found. Seeking means the mind is taut. Seeking is craving, desire. Seeking says, “Not yet—someday.” Seeking brings in time. I am here and God is elsewhere—seeking creates the gap, the interval.

God is exactly where you are. Where God is, there you are. We are fish in the ocean of the Divine. If a fish sets out to find the ocean, she will get into great trouble—how will she ever find it?

God is not to be sought—He is to be lived. This is the wondrous revolution of sahaj-yoga. God is—drink! God is—dance! You are in God; He throbs in every breath of yours—and you ask, “Where is God?” Where is He not? Can you find any place where God is absent? The One who is all-pervading—that is what we mean by God. You keep repeating like parrots that God is omnipresent, and still you ask, “Where is God?”

Omnipresent means: the same outside, the same inside. Omnipresent means: the same in the speaker and the listener. Omnipresent means: awake—He; asleep—He. Omnipresent means: truth is He, dream is He; Brahman is He, Maya is He. Even when you wander, you wander within Him. You cannot wander outside Him; there is no outside. Even if you wished to go beyond Him, there is no way.

Even when you are caught in delusions, you are in Him—because delusions too are waves rising on His ocean. One who understands this becomes simple, natural. All seeking is gone. No more pilgrimages to make. Where you are is the place of pilgrimage; as it is, it is sacred. Then vision begins. When the eyes are free of craving and empty of search, you begin to see. In trees, in moon and stars—and not only in the moon, but in the moon’s reflection trembling in the lake—you see the same, for whose reflection could it be?

The awakened have always said: Brahman and Maya are one. Maya is His energy, His power, His shadow. Whoever sets himself against Maya will never know Brahman, because in Maya He plays; Ram alone pervades.

The day even in your dreams a glimpse, a shadow of the True begins to appear, that day revolution happens. But you are seekers. To be a seeker is to be mind, and where mind is, there is obstruction. Seeking manufactures mind: “Let me get this, let me get that; let me gain wealth, let me gain position.”

You think the desire for wealth and status is irreligious, while the desire to attain God is religious? Then you are in deep confusion. The very urge to attain is the mother of mind. What you want to attain makes no difference—stone or diamond, earth or sky, Kashi or Kaaba. If there is something to get, somewhere to go, restlessness will arise, tension will grow, and the future will pull you—a future that is false, that is not. What is, is now. You say, “Tomorrow, there.” But what is, is here and now.

Mind is the tension between here and there, between now and someday. The moment no thought of getting anything arises in you, in that very moment mind is gone. Then comes rest; then comes peace. In that peace it becomes visible. It was there even when you did not see it—only now you see it, because the eye is no longer filled with smoke.

Is it a boat or the moon’s shadow upon the ocean’s waters?
When will that boat of light touch the shore of night?
Is that untouched lunar shade a frolicsome ripple,
A fleeting kiss of light on parched, impatient lips?
Dream, or ideal, or resolve—call it what you will—
A jewel of a ray, a blossom on the body of dusk!
Beyond the reach of clay—are all things false there?
Are eyes, fixed on limits, chained to the horizon’s bar?
How can literate eyes read what the heart hums within—
What fragrance once inscribed as verse upon the gentle breeze!
Let the unreachable become reachable—this is the abyss’s longing;
Made vocal, written upon the deep heart of the ocean!
What is that song of the Unseen the moon keeps writing—
Boundless love on the boundless grief of the bounded!
The quarters beat the drum, the sky is sound, Time sings,
Sun and moon the flute and lute, stars the tinkling anklets!
Is it a boat or the moon’s shadow upon the ocean’s waters?
When will that boat of light moor at the shore of darkness?

Have you seen the moon’s shade upon a lake, upon its waters? It is just as true. A shade, yes—but if understood, it is as true as a boat, and it can ferry you across. And going “across” does not mean going far away; to go across is to come near. Let a little rest happen, and the seeing begins.

What is that song of the Unseen the moon keeps writing—
Boundless love on the boundless grief of the bounded!
The quarters beat the drum…

Then all directions become instruments.

The quarters beat the drum, the sky is sound, Time sings,
Sun and moon the flute and lute, stars the tinkling anklets!

The whole existence fills with delight, with celebration, with a single resonance. Ears are needed to hear—and the world is music. Eyes are needed to see—and the world is beauty. A silent heart is needed to savor—and everywhere is God. Only God is. Even in this moment you are not a hair’s breadth away from God. But if you ask and set out to seek, the slip begins; you fall. Then it becomes very difficult—where will you search? How will you search?

The seeking mind is not the attaining mind. The seeker’s mind keeps losing. Some things are found only when they are not sought; to seek them is to ensure you will lose them. Consider sleep: if sleep does not come at night, what will you do? Whatever you do will obstruct sleep. Do nothing, and sleep will come. Simply lie down and wait; it will come. But if you get up, exercise, chant mantras, run around—sleep will be more difficult, because doing becomes the barrier. Sleep is relaxation.

God comes in just that way—like sleep. You do not search for God. Sit quietly for a little while, and God arrives; He is already arriving, but a crust of restlessness lies in between and so the meeting does not happen. His boat is eager to moor at the shore of your darkness.

Is it a boat or the moon’s shadow upon the ocean’s waters?
When will that boat of light moor at the shore of darkness?

It is about to dock; it longs to. At your dark shore His boat is already moored. But your eyes are entangled far away on the horizon. You are searching for Him in the other world; He is present in this world. You seek Him after death; He is life. And you look for Him in some disembodied soul; He is matter too, and consciousness as well. He is everything.

This is the foundational stone of sahaj-yoga: God is not to be sought; learn the art of getting lost—and He is found. In relaxation you dissolve. You, as an ego, exist only in tension; that is why man stays taut. Let one tension go and another is grabbed: the race for wealth is dropped, then the race for position; drop that, and the race for religion begins. Some race always continues. As long as the race continues, the mind rules.

Mind is like a bicycle: as long as you keep pedaling, it keeps moving; stop pedaling and it stops. Mind keeps urging, “Seek something, do something—why sit idle!” And the one who sits has arrived. Learn to sit. You have been seeking for lifetimes—and the danger is, if you keep seeking, guides will also appear. In this world, that is inevitable.

Economics has a law: wherever there is demand, suppliers arise. You only have to ask, and someone opens a factory. You only have to ask, and someone begins producing the goods.

Whatever is demanded, providers will appear; if there is a market, sellers will come. You ask, “Where to search for God?” and guides will appear. Whether they know or not—what difference does it make?

I have heard: in America a shop sold invisible hairpins. Women went mad for them—an invisible hairpin no one can see, yet it is in your hair! What woman wouldn’t want that? The shop was crowded. A lady bought a box, opened it—of course, she couldn’t see them. She asked, “Are they really there?” The shopkeeper, who knew her, said, “What is there to hide from you? For three weeks we’ve had none—but sales are going strong.”

Invisible goods are the easiest to sell—and what is more invisible than God? That is why the trade has flourished for centuries. There are shops, shopkeepers, priests—they sell the invisible God. And because the goods are invisible, no one can cause trouble about not seeing them. And the delivery terms are such that you will receive after death. No one returns from death; so who can find out whether anyone received anything? Meanwhile, people have been so frightened that they think they must make some arrangement—pile up a little merit, give some alms. And the alms, of course, must be given to that very priest who gives the assurance.

Priests live on promises—just like politicians live on promises. You see the fun: every five years there are elections. The politician comes and promises, and you again believe that this time they will be fulfilled. They never are. Are promises given to be kept? The promiser has no use for keeping them; he only wants your vote. You will not vote without promises, so he is ready to promise whatever you want. “Give the vote once, and the matter is postponed for five years.” In five years you will forget; life’s problems are so many—who remembers promises! Five years later he stands before you again. You are so consumed by your demands that you cannot even see you are being fed false promises, never kept—and still you do not wake up.

I have heard: a politician came to campaign in a tribal area. The tribals—simple folk, scarcely clothed—were gathered by the village headman and were listening. The politician said, “Brothers and sisters! If you vote for me, I’ll get a school opened in your village.” Loud applause. The tribals cried, “Hoya-hoya!” The politician was delighted. He had heard many “long live’s” and “down with’s,” but “hoya-hoya” was new! And the way they said it, with such joy, he thought they were praising him greatly. His fervor rose: “Not just a school; I will get a hospital, too.” Then real uproar—“Hoya-hoya!” even louder. He was thrilled: “I will even have a train run here!” Now the tribals stood up, clapping and dancing—“Hoya-hoya!”

His joy knew no bounds. So excited, he said to the headman, “Take me around the village—these are such good people, all their demands will be met. The promises I have given—within five years, you will see them fulfilled. Let me take a round.”

The headman led him along. Narrow footpaths—no roads, a forest village. Along the paths people relieved themselves; heaps lay here and there. The headman said, “Walk carefully, leaderji—don’t step into the hoya-hoya!” Only then did the politician realize what “hoya-hoya” meant. But by then it was too late.

Politicians live on false promises. Priests have lived for centuries on false promises—“You will get heaven, paradise.” Whatever you want there, they arrange it for you. But all this—you will get after death. You are content with that, because you do not want the bother of God right now. You say, “Let me finish what I’m doing; after death, God will also be obtained.” You want to manage this world with one hand, the next with the other.

You too do not want God right now, because if He comes now, your life will have to change. You will have to change. Just think—if God were to meet you today, what a predicament it would be! All your plans would be thrown into chaos. The bridges of dream you have built would turn to dust; your card-castles would collapse; your paper boats would sink. If God comes today—what trouble! I ask you: if God were available today, right now, could you honestly say, hand on your heart, that you are ready to meet Him now? You would say, “Not so fast. I still have to run my shop. I have an election to contest. The children are in school. I have just been married. Just tell me the technique, where and when He can be got; when it suits me, I’ll seek.”

So you ask, “Where is God?” God is here! And you ask, “Where?” You ask, “How will we get God?” God is already gotten! The wonder is how you do not see Him; the wonder is how you stand with your back to Him. But it also comforts you to postpone: better if it doesn’t happen today. And the priest is pleased that you want tomorrow. You grant him time; in the meantime he exploits you. His business continues, your religiosity continues, and the world remains as it is—not a hair’s difference. It’s a most convenient arrangement. The priest keeps performing worship; in temples and mosques the bells and the azan go on; the aarti keeps circling; and you remain busy in worldly hustle. Everything goes on as before. And you nurse a sweet belief inside: after death you will meet God—after all, you have earned so much merit, given so much in charity, kept so many fasts, chanted so many mantras, turned the rosary so much. God is fixed. You have not had to give up anything, nor change, nor pass through any fire. The priest has made it convenient; he has promised you “tomorrow”: “Surely you will get it—see, you wear the sacred thread, surely you will; you keep the tuft, surely you will; you apply the tilak, surely you will.” He gave you cheap assurances, and you were satisfied with cheap assurances. You do not truly wish to receive, and he has no capacity to give.

Can anyone give God? And if one truly wishes to receive, is there any need to wait even a moment? Open your eyes now, be quiet this very instant—and He is.

The quarters beat the drum, the sky is sound, Time sings,
Sun and moon the flute and lute, stars the tinkling anklets!

Then the sound of Om will become audible to you this very moment. Be simple, sahaj. The seeker is not simple. The desirer is not simple. Drop all craving; be ordinary. Do not even make a self-image of being religious—that too is ego. Be ordinary. That is why Saraha did not use the word “God”—he said, “Be sahaj.”

Live simply, as animals live, as birds live, as plants live, as moon and stars live—live that simply. One difference will remain between you and birds and plants: in your simplicity there will be consciousness, awareness, wakefulness. When that awareness and your simplicity meet, God happens.

You are God—and you ask where to search! In the seeker himself is hidden that which he seeks.

Then it must be something else; it is not the pain of separation from the Beloved. For the ache of divine separation is a good fortune. It is not suffering at all. It is a benediction, not a curse. Only the fortunate receive it, the blessed receive it. It is a very sweet pain, utterly honeyed!

Those who have known it will never say that the pang of separation from God is unbearable. They will dance. They will say: is it not enough that within us the fire of longing for him has been lit? Countless are the unfortunate in whose hearts not even an echo of him has sounded. Countless are the unfortunate whose ears have not caught even a single note of his music, whose eyes have not glimpsed even a trace of his form, who live utterly unacquainted—so unacquainted that they do not even know there is a God!

You are blessed if there is turmoil within you, if a thirst has arisen. Do not call this suffering. To call it suffering would be a mistake.

Who is ever granted such regal devastations?
We would have built no nests; we kept watching lightning.

So splendid a ruin is available to very few. To go mad for God is a magnificent ruin. It is new life pulsating through death. It is a flower hidden in a thorn...

For that “cruelty,” I’d sacrifice a hundred graces; for that delight, I’d offer a hundred torments.
We proved worthy of that pain for which none are deemed worthy.

Blessed is the one in whose heart pain has arisen; in whose heart the longing has surged; who has awakened to the fact that the Divine is; whose being is filled with the urge to drown in the Divine.

But if you have taken God to be an object, and you are eager to acquire him as an object, then there will be suffering—just like the suffering of someone who wants to build a house and cannot, and the ego is wounded; or wants to buy a car and cannot, and the ego is hurt; or wants to do something and fails, and feels, “I am a nobody—worthless, good for nothing!”

If you make God an object too, an ornament for your ego, there will be pain. But God is not an object, nor an adornment for the ego. God is an intoxication. And assuredly, it is an intoxication that begins, but never ends. The lovers of God live forever in the sweetness of separation—forever, because every meeting reveals that there is more yet to meet. Separation has no end. It is not that one day you discover, “Now I have him whole.” The meeting with God has a beginning; God is never had in his totality. Our hands are too small. Our heart is too small. How could we contain a sky so vast? How will the ocean fit into our tiny pot? Even if the pot is filled, the boundless sea remains outside.

The thirst for God is of such a kind that the more you drink, the more it flames into thirst. But this is no misfortune, no pain—it is a sweet pain.

Behold, there is one law in love’s fidelity:
Remember the moments of grace; forget the years of trial.

Keep in memory that single instant when the nectar flowed; and for years when no nectar comes and only desert stretches everywhere—forget those years.

Behold, there is one law in love’s fidelity:
Remember the moments of grace; forget the years of trial.

This is a devotee’s first discipline: those even tiny moments that arrive—the moments of his joy, his surge, his flood, his radiance—these alone he keeps in remembrance. The long nights that pass without him, when no glimpse is found—those he does not even remember. They have no value for him.

Let the blood-drenched heart keep flowing, turning into tears again and again—
We too are stubborn: we will go on smiling.

The devotee goes on smiling; is it not enough that the ache to have him, to dissolve in him, has arisen?

Let the blood-drenched heart keep flowing, turning into tears again and again—
We too are stubborn: we will go on smiling.

A devotee does not know how to count thorns; he knows only how to count flowers. Gradually, thorns cease to appear; everywhere he sees only blossoms. And one day, even in the thorns he sees flowers.

When clouds of sorrow gather over the heart,
In that moment, turn and smile toward your heart.

Melancholy comes, clouds close in; but do not forget the art of looking with a smile. The moment you look with a smile, the clouds disperse and the sun appears.

We tried too, but could not forget you—
Some lack was ours, that you could not remember us.

Even in life’s comforts we could not forget your grief.
Our lips laughed a thousand times; the heart could not smile.

Our tongue was padlocked; there was a mist in our eyes—
We know not if we revealed the heart’s secret, or managed to hide it.

The fault was in our own longing, the shortcoming of our own eyes.
He had already lifted the veil; we could not raise our gaze.

God is standing right before you; if a mistake is happening, it is ours.

The fault was in our own longing, the shortcoming of our own eyes.
He had already lifted the veil; we could not raise our gaze.

Only we stand with our eyes downcast, nailed to the ground. He stands before us, his veil lifted. The truth is, he never had a veil over him; the veil is on our eyes. Our vision is cloudy. The Divine is eager, every moment, to come; we alone are not ready to receive.

We tried too, but could not forget you—
Some lack was ours, that you could not remember us.

Remember: some deficiency of our own, some obstacle of our own, has become a wall. But it often happens that when devotion is borrowed and the devotee lacks understanding, he begins to complain: “I can bear it no longer. The pain of separation is too much. Now he must grant me union.”

His hunger for the fruit is so intense that he cannot see: “There must be some flaw in my effort; some mistake in my thirst; perhaps my vessel is placed upside down.”

The fault was in our own longing, the shortcoming of our own eyes.
He had already lifted the veil; we could not raise our gaze.

Look closely: recognize the error in your own seeing. Somewhere you are missing. If you want to see God in some particular form, you will miss. Someone insists on seeing Rama with bow and arrow—then you will never meet him. And if ever you do, know it is the net of your own imagination. Another wants to meet Krishna playing the flute. You have imposed an expectation. You will not allow God to come as he wishes; you will not allow him to come in his nakedness, in his truth. You want him to come wearing your costume, in your style, fulfilling your expectation—then the night of separation will go on and on; there will be no dawn. Your concepts block the way. Keep no concept of God in the mind. Drop all notions. Say to him: “Come as you are—not as a Hindu, not as a Christian—come as you are! I have no demand, no expectation. However you arrive, I embrace you. In whatever color, I accept. You are welcome—come. I am ready to recognize you in every color and every mode. I have kept my eyes open. Come!”

But one is a Hindu, another a Christian, another a Muslim—there lies the obstacle: religious in name, but not truly religious. You have woven a great net. Consider: if you have decided that Krishna must appear in yellow silk, and if he stands before you in white, doubt will arise: “Ah, Lord Krishna and white cloth? Where is the yellow?” Your notion is not being matched. Or you insist on bow and arrow. Today, the bow has outlived its use—what value does it have now? Once in a while on Republic Day, a few tribal folk in Delhi carry bows and arrows; otherwise no one is seen with them. Even for them they serve little use—stored away for January 26th, polished for the parade. What is the meaning now? And if your God still carries a bow, he must be exhausted, shoulders aching. Forgive him; give him leave. Tell him, “Drop the bow and arrow now.” But there will be uproar if God lets go of the bow!

In one town where I was visiting, a riot broke out because college boys staged a play—an “Modern Ramleela.” There was trouble because the village priests and the orthodox were enraged: Rama, Lakshmana, and Mother Sita in modern dress! Mother Sita in high-heeled shoes! A fracas ensued. It was their jest, but the foolish are countless; in this country, count one and you’ll find a thousand. Chairs were smashed, stage curtains torn, the boys beaten—“Mother Sita and high heels!” Yet the satire was dear and meaningful.

Everything is changing—do you think the ever-new God will not be new? And remember: Rama, Krishna, Buddha are experiences of God. These persons knew the Divine. They are windows through which the sky was seen. But do not sit worshiping the window frame, or you will forget the sky and clutch only the frame. Look at the sky! The window is not the sky; it only shows the sky. Through Rama, the sky was seen; through Krishna, the sky was seen. What will worshiping the frame do? See the sky! That Vastness which was in Rama will come—that Vastness, not Rama. That Vastness which was in Krishna will come—that Vastness, not Krishna. But you cannot bear Vastness.

Arjuna wanted Krishna to reveal his cosmic form; the story says Krishna did. When Arjuna beheld it, he trembled. His Gandiva slipped from his hand, he shook, sweat poured. He begged, “No, no—return to the form of my friend.”

It’s a pleasing tale. You want God to come in a way that suits you. But God can only come as he is. If you are delayed in attaining him, the sole reason is that you have placed many conditions: “Fulfill these and these.” God is bound to no one’s conditions. God, and meet conditions? Become unconditional.

The fault was in our own longing, the shortcoming of our own eyes.
He had already lifted the veil; we could not raise our gaze.

The Hindu eye cannot rise; the Muslim eye cannot rise. The eye will rise only in one who is neither Hindu nor Muslim. To be Hindu is like having a stone tied to your eyelids. The gaze lifts only when there is no stone, no burden—when one is weightless, simple and innocent like a child. And when such eyes lift, you are astonished to find that what we wanted to seek, to attain, was always present. We could have had it any time. If we did not, the fault lay in our own eyes.

And then, the one who bears his ache soon sees this truth as well—

Such is, from eternity, the nature of the lightning of Beauty:
Whomever it lays waste, it turns into a Mount Tur.

Whomever he demolishes, he showers with ambrosia. To whom he gives death, he gives supreme life. Such has always been the way of the splendor of the Divine—his glory, his festival, his great celebration. This has been true since the beginning.

Such is, from eternity, the nature of the lightning of Beauty:
Whomever it lays waste, it turns into a Mount Tur.

There is no greater good fortune than to be effaced in his hands. To die by his hand—there is no greater blessedness. For whom he dissolves, he remakes. In dissolving lies becoming. As a seed breaks and is gone, and becomes a tree—so dissolve.

But your desire is: “Let me remain, and let God be attained.” There you go wrong. “Let me remain, and let God be attained”—these two cannot be together. Either you, or God—choose one of the two. If you wish to save yourself, you will never make contact with the Divine; if you are ready to lose yourself, the contact can happen now. Those who have desired him, who have understood a little, who have sipped a little of his wine, who have tasted a drop—say something else. They say: even the waiting is so sweet—who cares for union! The waiting is so lovely—who cares for union! Whether union happens or not, who is worried? The waiting is so dear!

I almost fear he might come and end the relish of waiting.
I fear my petition might be granted.

Sometimes the devotee is afraid: “Every day I pray, ‘Come, come, come’—what if he actually comes? Then what of the joy I am savoring in the waiting, the thrill with which I keep watch, these eyes fixed on the path, this heart that listens, thudding, for the sound of footsteps—what of all this happiness that is raining on me?”

I almost fear he might come and end the relish of waiting.
I fear my petition might be granted.

Sometimes this fear arises. And you say: “The pain of separation, the Lord’s separation, is unbearable.” No—you have not yet understood. Otherwise you would be intoxicated. It is not about bearing or not bearing: it is a great delight. This waiting is full of joy. To hear the footfall of his coming: now he comes, now he comes; the wind bumps the door—you feel he has arrived; the gust scatters dry leaves along the path and a sound is heard—you run, “He has come!” The moon casts a shadow upon the lake—you feel his boat has glided in; he has come. His boat has touched the shore of my darkness—now, now!

If such waiting is undertaken with a heart brimming, could you say it is unbearable? You would say instead: “Lord, give me more of this ache,” because this ache is sweet.

And this ache refines you. In the fire of this ache you will be purified—you will come out pure gold. Learn the devotee’s language. Learn the devotee’s art. Learn the devotee’s style.

Mukesh Bharti! Philosophical questions are often false questions. They are frequently arrangements to hide the real questions of life. Philosophical questioning is an arrangement for deception.

You are afraid to ask the real questions. And real questions do not become ornaments for the ego; fake questions do. Someone comes and asks, “How can I find God?” Hidden in the very question is the suggestion that “I am a seeker of God. I am not a small-time fellow. Mine is the ultimate quest. I talk of lofty things! I am not just curious, I am a true aspirant; liberation alone is my longing. I do not get into petty matters. I am not a small, paltry man. Look at my question—my question reveals who I am!”

But if you look closely at reality, the questions of his life are not yet solved. He still hasn’t resolved how to be free of sexual obsession. But he raises the topic of Ram. He is not yet free of lust, and he raises the topic of Ram. The fun in raising the topic of Ram is that it immediately gratifies the ego. If someone were to come and ask, “How do I be free of sexual obsession?” naturally the ego would be hurt. The few people sitting around would hear, “We thought you were celibate, and you are asking how to be free of lust!”

A Jain monk wanted to meet me. I said, “Fine.” But he said, “I want to meet in private.” I said, “Why worry about privacy? It would actually be good—let your devotees also hear what we talk about.”

But he wouldn’t agree. When I went to meet him, he said, “Now let the others leave.” Some thirty or forty people had gathered. Then one of his devotees blocked the door. I asked, “Why the need to send them away?” He said, “You don’t understand. I want to ask questions which I cannot ask in their presence. In front of them I can only talk about soul-God and liberation, etc. In truth, I cannot even ask questions in their presence; I can only give answers, because I only explain and preach to them. They will be in great difficulty if I ask, ‘How to be free of sexual desire?’ because they take it for granted that I am already free. Please understand my trouble.

The man was honest. He didn’t have the courage to ask in front of everyone, but he was honest nonetheless. He said, “My problem… I have nothing to do with soul or God. Forty years have gone to waste. This sexual craving is eating me alive. Please help me be free of it.”

I asked him, “Why don’t you ask the acharya of your own order?” He was a monk of Acharya Tulsi. So I said, “Your great acharya is Acharya Tulsi; why not ask him?” He said, “Regarding sexual obsession, I cannot ask anyone but you, because no one will understand, and no one will be willing to accept that I am still afflicted by lust. Moreover, the condition I am in is the same condition of other monks in my order. They don’t have an answer either. They too are in the same trouble. A collective hush has been adopted: don’t talk about it.”

The Western sannyasin is not hollow; his questions are about the realities of life. He doesn’t ask, “How to find God?” He doesn’t ask, “How to attain moksha?” He doesn’t ask, “How many hells are there, how many heavens?” He has no interest in such matters. He asks the real questions of life. He says, “I am agitated by anger; how can I be free of it?” And the wonderful thing is: if you are free of anger, heaven becomes available; if you are free of lust, Ram becomes available. You don’t have to ask for Ram.

But the Indian mind has become very restless with ego. For thousands of years an arrogance has settled on the Indian psyche: that we are a philosophical, religious country—this holy land! As if other lands are unholy. As if there are many lands. The earth is one, continuous. Where does India end? Earlier Pakistan was also holy land; now it is not. A line is drawn on a map, and the holy land is finished. Earlier Bangladesh too was holy land; now it is not. This is a great joke! So it is in the hands of politicians to decide what is holy land and what isn’t. Who is the arbiter? The map changes, and the land changes! But this ego is deep within us; we have nurtured it for thousands of years.

We don’t have anything else. No wealth, no prosperity, no education, no health—everything has been lost. Only this hollow swagger remains with us; that’s why we don’t want to drop it. It’s the only prop left for our ego. Everything else is gone. Only one claim remains—that we are religious. And even that is only talk; we are not religious. But how to drop it? When someone has lost everything, he flaunts the one little refuge he still has.

So you ask, why do we Indians ask philosophical questions? You keep flaunting to say, “We are religious. We don’t ask petty matters.”

Indians even come and tell me that your Western sannyasins ask trivial questions. To them, those questions seem trivial. A Western sannyasin asks, “There is a lot of ego in my mind—what should I do?” This seems trivial, because we are already convinced: Ego? We don’t have any ego! How can we ask such a question? We ask lofty questions. We ask airy questions. We ask celestial questions.

Westerners come to me and ask, “This chain of thoughts doesn’t break; it flows continuously. Is there any method?” The Indian comes and asks, “What is savikalpa samadhi, what is nirvikalpa samadhi? What is nirbija samadhi? What is sabija samadhi?” The joke is, even if I explain what nirbija samadhi is, it’s clear in the very word—seedless; and what nirvikalpa samadhi is is clear in the very word—without alternatives. The words themselves suffice; no definition is necessary. And you have so many scriptures! The question is not what nirvikalpa samadhi is. The question is that you are surrounded by alternatives—how to go beyond them? The real question is not the definition of nirvikalpa samadhi. The real question is: what is the ladder, the means, by which a mind entangled in choices can go beyond them?

But to admit, “There are diseases in my mind—lust, anger, greed, delusion”—the Indian mind does not accept. These are enemies—how can I admit they are within me!

So sometimes people ask questions in roundabout ways about someone else. A man came and said, “My friend is in great difficulty; please help. My friend has become impotent. He is very disturbed.”

I said to this gentleman, “Look at me for a moment.” He looked. I kept looking at him for a while. He became a bit nervous, a bit upset, a bit restless; he began looking around. I said, “Look, why didn’t you send your friend? Your friend could have come and said, ‘I have a friend who has become impotent.’ I said, ‘Can’t you even muster that much courage? Have you become so impotent that you can’t say this is your ailment? It’s written on your face.’”

He was very flustered. He got angry: “What are you saying! This is not my question.”

I said, “Bring your friend along, and one thing is certain: I will solve it. The matter will be resolved, because in ninety-nine out of a hundred cases, those who become impotent are so only psychologically, not physically—purely mentally. And often it happens that a man is impotent with his wife but not with a prostitute. In fact, he is bored with his wife, and out of that boredom impotence has set in. So I said, ‘The matter will be resolved—but honestly. Either bring your friend—I want to see who this friend is; without seeing him nothing can be done—or tell the truth.’”

He looked around and said, “What is there to hide from you? The trouble is mine.”

We have lost even that much courage! We can’t state our own trouble. We ask theoretical questions. We think that by asking theoretical questions, the matter will be resolved. “What is nirvikalpa samadhi?” Perhaps in understanding its meaning, you will also grasp a formula for being free of your choices. No—it won’t happen that way. Because when you ask for a definition of nirvikalpa samadhi, I will give you a definition of nirvikalpa samadhi. Nothing will come of that definition. Patanjali has already given it. Nothing can be added to it. The ultimate definition has been given; no improvement is needed. The final word has been spoken. Now the question is how to reach it; how can that definition become my experience?

But for that you will have to ask questions of life. You will have to ask what your real obstruction is. You don’t ask the real obstruction, because asking it feels like admitting, “What a fallen man I am.” But what will hiding do? You are what you are. In my eyes, the person who raises real questions is not a fallen man—he is the real man. The one who raises false questions, weaves verbal nets, never raises a direct and meaningful point, goes round and round but never comes to the center—that man is wasting time. But this is the condition.

Lust is your trouble, and you come and ask, “What is the meaning of brahmacharya?” You are circling around. If lust is your pain, then ask: “What is lust, and how can I go beyond it?” Don’t raise the topic of brahmacharya. But the word brahmacharya is priceless, prestigious. The moment you raise that word, an aura spreads around you: “See this man; he is interested in celibacy!” You are hiding your wounds with flowers. Remember: wounds hidden under flowers turn into sores.

Don’t indulge in philosophical verbosity. Grasp the facts of life. And I am not saying that what philosophy says is useless. If you seize the facts of life, one day you will reach that experience too—certainly you will! But you will have to climb the steps. Don’t start talking of the sky already. Right now you are on the ground; talk of the ground. Understand the law of the ground. The person who understands the law of the ground, the gravity of the earth, is the one who can go beyond gravity. Out of that very understanding, the path to transcendence emerges. One day that person will rise into the sky.

Those who first made the airplane didn’t chatter about the sky. Those who first lifted a plane into the air understood the law of the ground—how gravity pulls things, and what device could carry one beyond that pull. For those who went to the moon, the greatest question was how to be utterly free of the earth’s gravity. From understanding that, going to the moon became easy.

No one reaches the sky by talking of the sky; one reaches by understanding the ground. No one realizes the soul by talking of the soul; by understanding the laws and mysteries of the body, one comes to know the soul.

Recognize the facts; you will arrive at the truth. But we don’t talk of facts. We talk directly of truths. Then our conversation remains empty talk—philosophical discussion, utterly useless, valueless, merely bookish. That is why it often happens that what seems a very important question to one person appears completely unimportant to another.

A Jain comes and asks, “What is nigod?” Now, for others, what meaning does “nigod” have? No Hindu asks what nigod is, no Sikh, no Muslim, no Christian. It is a technical term of the Jains. Nigod is that state where souls resided before entering the world—the state of darkness, total darkness—like the womb in which a child stays for nine months. In the same way, all souls remained in darkness for an infinite time; nigod is the womb of all souls.

Now this is the Jains’ technical accounting. They have to indicate some place from where souls came. The Jains do not accept God; they do not accept that God created the souls, because they say if the soul is made, it becomes a thing. They are right: how can something created be conscious? And whatever is created can someday be destroyed, so the eternity of the soul is broken; then “soul” has no meaning—just unnecessary trouble. Therefore the soul is not created. Then where did it come from? They must find some device; in place of God they must posit some principle—nigod.

But if someone asks them, “From where did souls come to nigod?” After all, they must have come from somewhere to nigod too. Even in the womb the soul comes from somewhere. From where did the soul go to nigod? But every philosophy reaches a point where it must fall silent—it has to—because it is all verbosity. There is no answer to where souls came from to nigod. The Jain monk will get angry if you ask, “From where did the soul come to nigod?” He will say, “This is an excessive question,” just as Yajnavalkya said to Gargi: “This is an excessive question, Gargi.” Gargi had asked, “What holds Brahman? The earth is held by the sky; the sky is held by Brahman. O Yajnavalkya, what holds Brahman?” Yajnavalkya got angry and said, “Your head will fall! This is an excessive question!”

“Excessive question” only means: the one for which you have no answer. And to threaten to chop off the head—this is not a good sign. This is not discussion. This is not satsang; this is raising a club: “If you ask further, we’ll crack your skull.”

Every philosophy halts somewhere, because its answers are artificial. Artificial answers cannot give ultimate satisfaction. You can stretch them: “This is held by that, and that is held by something else,” but in the end you will get tired. Then you will say, “Stop now. Don’t ask beyond this; otherwise there will be no end to it.” There must be an end; otherwise scriptures may begin—but how will there be an iti, a conclusion?

So the Jain says: nigod. But don’t ask from where souls came to nigod. If you ask, there will be a quarrel.

When I was at the university, whenever a Jain monk came, my task was to ask the very questions that had no answers—whether it was a Jain, or a Hindu sannyasin.

Once a celebrated Hindu sannyasin came to a village. Those who had organized his talk came to me with a request: “Please, be kind—don’t come.” I asked, “Why?” They said, “It creates a big disturbance; the satsang gets spoiled. You ask such questions for which there are no answers. Our sadhus and sannyasins get angry. If they get angry, their reputation suffers, because sadhus and sannyasins shouldn’t get angry.”

I said, “The only questions worth asking are the ones that have no ready-made answers. What is the value of those with pat responses, memorized like parrots? Everyone knows them. What juice do they contain?”

Philosophical questions have no value. Either they have answers—ready-made, parroted—and then they have no value; or they have no answers at all—then also they have no essence.

Ask living questions. Ask questions connected to the reality of life. Life is what needs to be resolved. Don’t get into the riddles of the sky. Untangle the little knot that is your life. In its untying, the whole existence unties.

So my advice to you, Mukesh, is: drop the Indian habit. It is better to ask psychological questions rather than philosophical ones, because psychology is your state. That’s where you are. That is where the tangle is. That is where the disease is. And where the disease is, there alone can treatment be given.

Buddha emphasized this greatly, but we did not let Buddha remain in this land. We uprooted Buddha from here. Buddha was the only Indian who did not glorify philosophy—unique among Indian seers. Among Indian thinkers, Buddha is great precisely because he called philosophy worth two pennies. If someone asked him a philosophical question, he would say: “Once a man in a forest was struck by an arrow, a hunter’s arrow. He fell. The village physician came and began to pull the arrow out. The man was a philosopher. He said, ‘Wait. First answer some questions. First, is the arrow real or illusion? Does it even exist, or is it merely a hallucination?’”

Now this is great trouble—whether the arrow is real or merely an illusion! The physician said, “Let me remove the arrow first—then you can debate and consult philosophers. I am a physician, not a philosopher. Whether the arrow is true or false, one thing is certain: if it remains a little longer in you, you will die. I can say at least this much—that you are on your deathbed. I know how to remove the arrow; I don’t know whether the arrow is true or false. I do know that if it remains a little longer in your body, you will die—your blood is becoming poisoned. Let me take it out.”

The man said, “Poisoned? Then is the arrow smeared with poison? What proof is there?”

The physician said, “Find proofs later; right now there is no time. If you die, there will be no facility left for finding proofs.”

“Who shot this arrow?” he asked.

“How would I know who shot it? Someone shot it; the arrow is lodged—let me take it out,” said the physician.

“Was it a friend who shot it, or an enemy?” the philosopher began asking.

Philosophizing is a kind of disease; it pursues you to the very end. The physician saw this was a highly contagious philosopher—an old disease. He told four men, “Hold him, and I’ll remove the arrow. It’s not right to waste time in his blather.”

Buddha used to say: when you come and ask me questions like, “Does man survive death or not? Are there seven heavens or three? Where is liberation—in this world or beyond?”—then this story comes to my mind: you are dying. The arrow of life is stuck in your chest. And I am a physician; I can remove this arrow. But you’re indulging in useless talk. You ask whether life is true or illusion. The arrow of life is lodged, and you are talking of the afterlife. You ask how many arms God has, how many heads—what form God has. And I am interested in your arrow. Let the arrow of life be removed; let your tangle be cut; let you be resolved; let there be resolution within you, samadhi—then you can find all the answers yourself. And the truth is, the moment samadhi happens, no questions remain, nor any search for answers. Samadhi is liberation. In samadhi it is known there is no death—only the deathless.

Samadhi is the experience of the divine. Then no one asks how many hands He has. What childish talk is this? How many heads? You are inventing stories! He has neither heads nor hands—or all hands are His, and all heads are His. But when samadhi flowers, all answers are found. Samadhi is the answer of answers.

But this country uprooted Buddha. We did not let him live. We did not let his current survive here. And why? For the very reason that the philosophical tradition of this land was contradicted by Buddha’s factual, practical, reality-based teaching. The pundits and philosophers of Buddha’s time said, “Buddha does not know liberation; that is why he says these questions are useless. He doesn’t know what happens after death; that is why he does not answer.” And people must have liked it: “Right; if he knew, he would answer. He doesn’t know, so how can he answer?”

And I tell you: Buddha was among those few who knew. And because he knew, he didn’t answer—because you are wasting time with answers. You don’t need answers; you need medicine. But no one is interested in medicine.

What this country did to Buddha, it is doing to me. I want to give you medicine. You want to hear the glory of brahmacharya, and I want to tell you about the grip lust has on you. The trouble begins right there. You don’t want to hear it. You want to hear the praise of celibacy—as if you haven’t heard enough praise already! For thousands of years you have been hearing it—what has happened? You are afflicted by lust, yet you don’t want to understand the science of lust. Because to understand it you must accept, “I am also lust-ridden.” Never! “I am Indian! Born in a holy land! I am religious!”

Yesterday a newspaper came from Germany. The editor must be very perceptive. He published the news that I am coming to Germany, and land is being sought for my ashram there. And that I am coming to Germany because Morarji Desai and company do not want to let me live in India. A very investigative fellow! I haven’t even thought of going to Germany, nor any such thing… But he has said something to the point!

This country has this old habit. It is keen to hear useless talk. It feels pain when it has to hear anything meaningful, because its ego gets hurt. And we imagine that the kind of things we have been listening to for centuries—that alone is religious discourse.

Letters come to me: “Why did you speak on the science of sex? Rishis and munis always speak on celibacy.” I tell them, “I am neither a rishi nor a muni. I am a scientist! Leave your rishis and munis to you. They are yours to keep. I am no one’s muni or rishi. I am a scientist. I am a physician. I want to give medicine. I am truly eager to cure. I have no interest in philosophical analysis of disease; my interest is in how to cut the disease, how to go beyond it. I want to draw out the pus that has filled your life’s veins—even though when the pus is drawn, there will be pain. If you get angry at the pain, the pus cannot be removed. And when the pus comes out, there will be a stench. But you don’t even want the stench to spread. You say, ‘Spray perfume over it and leave the pus inside—don’t bring it out. Why expose what is hidden?’”

But that pus is growing deeper in you. You are rotting within.

This country has rotted badly. There are few living people here now—mostly corpses. And philosophical discussions are going on. The dead have gathered and are holding satsangs. And in those satsangs such things are discussed that have no connection with anyone—nothing to do with anyone.

Mukesh! It is an old habit of this country, and it has lost much because of it. Now this habit should be dropped. Now we must plant our feet firmly on the earth, sink our roots into the realities of life, so that our branches can rise into the sky. And the higher a tree wishes to go into the sky, the deeper it must send roots into the soil. If a tree says, “I won’t send roots into the ground; I will only fly in the sky,” it is mad. That tree will never grow. It will fall, and fall badly.

That is exactly how we have fallen. We lie in the dust and keep shouting that we are the glory of the world—though no one else says so; we ourselves keep repeating it. Others come, look at us, and pity us. We don’t appear to them as the glory of the world.

But one thing is true: a few people were born among us who were the glory of the world. But because a few were born, it does not make the whole nation religious. Because one Buddha was born, it does not make the whole land religious; nor does one Mahavira. They are the rare ones. In truth, the great wonder is that people like Buddha and Mahavira could be born among people like us! They are exceptions. And an exception only proves the rule—nothing more. The birth of a Buddha only proves that there is a crowd of buddhoos (fools). The wonder is how, among such a crowd, one man became a Buddha. And the great fool within you becomes the rishi-muni of the fools—their leader, their elder, more accomplished even than they.

This country needs a new direction—one that is realistic. But if you start talking of reality, people abuse you. People abuse me. They say I am an atheist, or that I am a materialist, a Charvaka. If you talk of reality, you become a Charvaka. Who wants to be called a Charvaka! So people don’t talk of reality. They go on discussing Brahman. By discussing Brahman, they are considered great knowers.

I don’t want to drown you in talk of Brahman. I want to give you methods to resolve the realities of life. And if life’s problems are resolved, one day you will know Brahman. Brahman is not known through discussion; it is known when the state of samadhi flowers within you and all is resolved. Brahman can be known; it does not need to be debated.

Now look at this Indian question—Pragya has asked: Now what business does Pragya have with baddha, mumukshu, mukta and nitya... what has she to do with them? Right now Pragya should be understanding what jealousy is. At this point in her life, jealousy is her concern. She should be understanding what enmity is. She should be understanding what lust is. She should be understanding what anger is, what greed is. No—what she wants to understand is that Ramakrishna said, “baddha, mumukshu, mukta and nitya are the four kinds of jivas”—that’s what she wants to understand! And what will happen by understanding these? Nothing will be solved by that. No real knot of wisdom in your life will open by it. On the contrary, knots may become more tangled; more obstacles may arise.

And these words are clear anyway; there is hardly anything to figure out. Baddha means: the bound. Understand who has bound you. “Bound” means: those whose life-breath is in chains; whose consciousness is in a faint; who lie in a prison. Now what are the causes of our stupor? What chains are upon our hands? How do we break them? If they break, the experience of freedom will happen.

And mumukshu means: one who seeks to find the root and basis of bondage—by what am I bound, why am I bound, how can I go beyond this bondage—one who longs, inquires, investigates. The one who only does this investigation intellectually is a mumukshu; the one who carries it out existentially, in his very being, is mukta. The one who, breaking these chains, comes to know that there is a state of no-bondage—he is liberated.

At the beginning, when the taste of freedom comes, it feels: I am free! A faint line of “I” remains. When that last faint line disappears, the state of moksha dawns. Mukta means: a slight line is still there, the final shadow—“I am free.” A trace of “I” remains. When even that feeling bids farewell, that is moksha.

So the words are straight and clear; the stumbling is not here. For me, the more important question is: why did this arise for Pragya at all? Let Ramakrishna say what he said—let it be. Why did this question arise for Pragya?

And I know Pragya, I see her—Pragya lives here in the ashram. I know her problems. Those problems have no relation to this question. But, having asked such a fine question, Pragya must be pleased with herself: “See, what a high question I asked!” The question has been asked just for the sake of asking. But Pragya, what relation has this to your life? Peer into your actuality—there, all the upheavals still stand! Naturally, one has to go beyond all those upheavals. And one will have to understand those upheavals. For now, understand anger, understand lust, understand greed, understand jealousy, understand violence, understand hatred.

But people never ask these questions; they ask grand, lofty things! And by asking lofty things, an illusion arises that we are eager for lofty things.

The honey-fragrance of your breath
will never again come near.
Sweet coaxings, dreamlike love—
foam remains, the tide is empty now.
Even flowers prick like thorns;
all people have turned to dust of dreams.
Tears flow through the whole night,
recalling and recalling what has passed.
What the life-breath treasured all life long—
that boon became a curse.
Boat and oars, all against the wind—
see, all dreams have turned to dust.

Sooner or later all dreams turn to dust. The one who becomes alert beforehand and does not fall into dreams—or if he falls, falls with such skill that when he wants to step out, he steps out—otherwise life keeps swaying from one dream to another, and another to a third. And by the time awareness dawns, it is too late. After the birds have pecked the field bare, what use is regret?

As often happens, people only in old age, nearing death, begin to understand what life’s real questions were—but how will you solve them then? It’s too late now. Now, just chant “Ram-Ram!” And does chanting “Ram-Ram” solve anything? Anger is boiling within, and you chant “Ram-Ram”—how will that help? At most, you’ll begin to chant “Ram-Ram” in anger; what else will happen? You’ll say “Ram-Ram” as if hurling stones or thrusting a dagger! You must have seen it—people chant “Ram-Ram” in different ways.

Mulla Nasruddin was stepping out one morning when his wife said, “Listen, on your way, give the maid a couple of proper scoldings.” He said, “Scoldings? And you were the one who said the maid is lovely and works so well! What’s the need for scoldings?” She said, “She does work well—she’s the best among all the maids we’ve had. But today do scold her a little, because if she’s angry on the day the carpets and durries need cleaning, if she’s a bit worked up, she gives them a good thrashing and they’re cleaned properly. Just scold her a little. The durries are to be cleaned today.”

Now, if a man is angry and the chance arises to beat a rug, you can imagine... he won’t spare it. And if a man is calm and he beats a rug, that’s a different matter.

Your emotional state permeates your actions. An angry man will chant “Ram-Ram” with anger too. You can see it. A calm man will chant “Ram-Ram” with calm. So chanting “Ram-Ram” as such does nothing. A man full of lust will, on seeing a beautiful woman, begin to chant “Ram-Ram” loudly—but know that he is beating a rug! He says “Ram-Ram,” but inside a surge is rising. He is somehow trying to manage himself, suppressing his lust by saying “Ram-Ram.”

“Ram-Ram” is not going to solve anything. Yes: when the problems in life are truly resolved, the presence of Ram happens; the descent happens. This will sound upside-down to you, because you’ve been told: just chant “Ram-Ram” and all will be well. I tell you: if it were so, this country would have been well long ago, because everyone here chants “Ram-Ram.” Is life really so cheap, so easy—that by chanting “Ram-Ram” everything is set right? When everything is set right, then the experience of Ram happens. I am telling you the opposite, absolutely opposite. Hence my process will be different.

We have organized some thirty therapies here. But I can’t send any Indians into those therapy groups. Because no Indian asks the kind of question that would allow me to send him. I have to send only Westerners. I would like to send Indians too. But now take Pragya—what would be the point of sending her there? In a therapy group there will be no discussion of the bound jiva, the mumukshu jiva, the liberated jiva or moksha. Pragya will feel: what useless things are happening here! There, your anger will be provoked. There, the flames of your fire will be fully fanned, so that you can see your anger in its utterly naked state.

Pragya will be frightened. She’ll say, “What is happening? This is adharma!” Because people get so angry there that we’ve had to pad the therapy-room walls. When they flare up, they start pounding the walls, banging their heads. So that heads don’t split, we had to pad the walls. And sometimes anger rises to such a pitch that they grapple with one another. But this is an experiment in bringing anger wholly to the surface. If anger comes to the surface, you can see precisely how much fire is stored within you; in that very seeing, in that very experiencing, a revolution happens inside—you become a witness. And in witnessing lies transformation.

But how will Indians understand? To them it looks like upheaval. They say, “You should teach nonviolence, and you are teaching violence!” I am not teaching violence; I am preparing the path for nonviolence. But the path for nonviolence is laid only when the smoke of your violence is fully vented.

Tantric experiments are also going on here. In those experiments the effort is to bring your sexuality fully to the surface, so that nothing remains repressed or crippled—everything rises up. When it rises, there is a release. An essential part of healing is catharsis—bringing up. One is freed only from that which has been brought up. As when some sickness is boiling inside you, and if vomiting happens, you suddenly feel light. Why light? Because the rubbish and poison that had collected in your stomach, your body threw it out—you were unburdened. Exactly such vomiting is there for lust, for anger, for greed.

But some people have secretly filmed these therapies. Pictures get printed in newspapers, and people think great mischief is happening! “This is rank adharma!” Because in those therapies, sometimes people throw off their clothes and become naked. In those therapies, one must keep no limits at all, so that no chance of repression remains; everything surfaces. And the great wonder is that when everything surfaces, suddenly a lightness comes. Then meditation becomes easy.

I want to send Indians into these therapies too. But Indians don’t ask the questions. They don’t say, “Lust is tormenting me.” They say, “What is moksha?” They don’t say, “I am afflicted by sexuality.” They say, “I’ve taken a vow of brahmacharya.” And if I send them, they won’t understand what’s happening. And then they’ll go all over the country proclaiming that great disaster is afoot!

I truly want to do something here. Not just talk—I want a revolution. I want to change your life from the roots. I want to give you a new kind of experience and a new kind of consciousness, a new lustre. But for that you’ll have to be authentic. Philosophy won’t do; you’ll have to be scientific.

Now, because I don’t send Indians into these therapies, some Indians think they don’t need them—that’s why they’re not being sent; “We are already pure and wise. These Westerners need it. They are corrupt; they need purification. We’re already bathed clean; that’s why we aren’t being sent.” Forgive me, that’s not the reason. You’re not being sent because you don’t yet have a scientific eagerness to transform your life. You’re trapped in verbiage. You’re caught in word-nets. You speak cleverness; you speak trickery. A deep hypocrisy sits inside you. That’s why you’re not being sent. The moment you begin dropping hypocrisy, I will start sending you. As your capacity grows and you become courageous, I will send you too. Right now, you will be very frightened. If I send someone into therapy, his wife will show up saying, “Who knows what he’ll do in therapy!”

A friend had a chronic headache, for years. I told him, “Go and receive the Japanese massage called shiatsu here.” He went; his wife arrived there too. The practitioners sent word to me that because of his wife there’s a big hassle—she stands right there on his chest! I had them ask the wife. She said, “I’m afraid—since the masseuses are women, I will be present there. I don’t trust my husband.”

The practitioners told me that when the wife isn’t there, the husband relaxes, he becomes light. Ninety percent of the headache disappears simply in the wife’s absence. The remaining ten percent goes with the massage. But when the wife arrives, the husband tenses up, becomes rigid.

The truth is, ninety percent of that headache was the wife herself. Even so, there was a result: seven days of shiatsu, and a lifelong headache was gone.

Now the wife is eager to have it herself, but the husband won’t agree. Because my setup is that women are massaged by men. The husband was fine with women massaging him; he had no objection. But now for a man to massage his wife—that bothers him. He doesn’t want it. The wife is eager, but the husband... and the husband is God! The wife at most stood on his chest and could do nothing else; the massage still happened. But the husband will not give permission for hers.

There are differences in the energies of male and female bodies. When a man massages a woman’s body, the energy penetrates deeply—because male energy and female energy fall into harmony; a kind of musicality arises. If a woman massages a woman, their energies repel each other.

As with magnets: bring a negative pole near another negative, and they push apart; bring a positive near a negative, and they come together. So it is with the negative and positive electricity of woman and man—their magnetic poles. If a man massages a woman, only then can the massage go deep; otherwise it cannot. And if a woman massages a man, only then can it go deep; otherwise it cannot. And a massage can go so deep that it releases tensions at your deepest layers.

It was those tensions that were causing the headache; the headache ended. Now the husband has experienced that his trouble is gone; the wife too has some troubles that could go—but the husband is not willing. Such is our Indian mind!

You cannot imagine under what adverse conditions I am working. The whole situation is contrary. Your entire tradition is biased in favor of disease. And you have gilded disease with such colors that you worship the disease! And if today those diseases are broken, your beliefs will crack, your old worries will crack, your old traditions will crack. And only a few brave souls can endure that cracking. And one who does not have that much courage—no sun is going to rise in his life.

This life will be lost. Life is always lost like this. Before it is lost, set it right.

It goes on making me miserable!
All hopes have withered away,
the world of love is ruined,
the pyre has burned, the ash has flown,
even the heart’s mourning is done;
and yet some strange surge—who knows why,
the wretch goes on living!
It goes on making me miserable!

Right up to dying, you remain filled with some deep craving; it just won’t leave. And that very craving is the greatest upheaval of your life. That craving’s name is lust. All the remaining cravings—greed, anger—are but forms of lust.

But lust remains packed within you to your dying breath, because you never got any opportunity to resolve it. You received nothing but conditionings to suppress it. You found many who condemned it, but none who explained it. You kept sitting on its chest... but that is like sitting on a volcano. That sitting is utterly false. Death will make you very desolate. You passed through life without ever knowing it.

White has spread across your hair; startle, turn over a bit—
O sleeper oblivious since evening, see how much night has passed!

In the very night, all passes. In the very night the hair turns white. In the very night old age arrives; in the very night death arrives. And you never ask the questions of life. You just want sweet stories to fall asleep to. You want stories that give you consolation.

I want you to have truth, not consolation, not contentment—truth.

In the babble of its desires, alas, the heart had assumed
love is truth, eternal—time cannot touch it!
Alas, the wretch did not understand
this is a coming-and-going shadow;
hope is shadow, life is shadow;
love, fondness, youth are shadow;
all that we have received is fated to vanish like a dream!
The eyes, alas, are meant to forget,
the mad heart to fall asleep!!

Everything will be erased. Before everything is erased, the witness should be born within you. And for the witness to be born, you must have the courage to pass through whatever experiments make it possible. Pragya, if the witness awakens, then you will know what bondage is, what longing for liberation is, what liberation is, what moksha is. With the awakening of the witness, everything is understood.

And if you want to awaken the witness, then wake up to the realities of life. Don’t stay entangled in false, airy dreams and doctrines. Don’t raise scriptural curiosities; raise living inquiries. Put your real problems before me. Don’t hide them under pretty doctrines.

I can heal your wounds—but if you hide them under flowers, how will they heal? They will fester into sores; they can even become cancer.

That’s all for today.