Tao Upanishad #120

First, all of nature’s evolution is unconscious. Nature has brought existence up to the human being quietly, without any practice on your part. But human evolution will no longer be unconscious. Man stands at the threshold where the process of conscious evolution begins. From here on, only the one who practices, who labors, will rise further.

Man is the bridge between unconscious evolution and conscious evolution. Nature is unconscious; it brought you as far as being human. What did you do to become human? Your humanity is not your personal earning. Over hundreds of millions of years, through nature’s very slow pace—trial and error, doing, failing, correcting—nature has delivered you to this shore called humanity. But beyond this nature cannot carry you. She has left you on the bank of humanness; from here you must evolve consciously. Otherwise you will keep dying and dying as a human. This is what the Hindus called the doctrine of repetitive transmigration. You will not attain Buddhahood the way you attained humanness; for Buddhahood you must make a conscious effort.

Beyond man there are these three steps. The first is: on the plane of the body you must become healthy; you must earn your livelihood at the bodily level. Nature does not force animals and birds to earn a livelihood; it is available. Plants need water—water is available; they need food—food is available. But man must work even for the body to survive; otherwise, even the body will be lost. And this is a blessing, not a misfortune. What comes free—does it ever truly come to be yours? Only what is gained through effort becomes your wealth. Only that which you earn through labor is yours; all else came free and will be taken away free. That which you gained through toil, for which you suffered, for which you expended energy—this cannot be taken from you.

From the bodily plane the conscious journey begins. You must arrange to care for the body, otherwise you cannot even live. When the body is fully healthy and fulfilled, it is not inevitable that the needs of the mind will arise. It may be that you keep circling in the life of the body alone. Then a great sadness will come. Because the body’s race has finished and the gate to the next journey has not opened. Sadness has only one meaning: it arises when you have reached a halt and no further path is visible. Not everyone is sad; only the fortunate. Being miserable is one thing—everyone is miserable; sadness is only for the fortunate.

Sadness is a great quality. It means: the journey up to here is complete—now what? When that “now what?” stands before you and no gate is visible, no path appears, then sadness surrounds you. Sadness means: you are being forced to repeat what you have already done. There is no juice left in doing it, no hint of joy. The taste has turned insipid. You have had sex, eaten food, rested, built houses, arranged all comforts—now what? The body’s work is done; now your life-energy wants a new journey but finds no door. This is sadness.

If you are not continually alert and you make no effort to break this sadness, no door will open by itself. In human life, henceforth nothing will happen of itself; it must be earned. Man’s dignity is that he is not a beggar; he does not ask for alms—he seeks only the reward of his own labor. To ask for more makes no sense. And even if it comes, it does not come; even if it lands in your lap, it is a burden, because you are not ready to enjoy it.

If you have labored, you will set out on the journey of the mind. There are poetry, music, beauty—these are subtle tastes. Food and sex are gross tastes; they mean your consciousness is not yet refined. The one who can relish music, who can descend into the depths of poetry, who can find in a sunrise a relish greater than in sex, who can experience a deeper taste in the stars at night, in the babble of a river, in the song of a waterfall—this person’s journey of the mind has begun.

But the journey of the mind too soon reaches a halt. Then sadness catches you again—and this second sadness is denser than the first. For it is not very difficult to go from body to mind. Body and mind are very close—neighbors. Their houses are separated by a thin wall, a doorway. The body and the mind speak the same language, only at gross and subtle registers. The experience in music is the same as in sex—on a very refined plane. The relish of beauty is the same as in food—on a very subtle plane. The language is one.

Those who know say body and mind are not two; they are two faces of one coin. Think of the body as the manifest form of the mind, and the mind as the unmanifest form of the body. Imagine a piece of ice floating in water: nine parts are submerged, one part visible. The visible part is your body; the submerged is your mind. So it isn’t proper to call them two. They are one thing with two ends—the mind slightly deeper, the body slightly on the surface.

Hence it is not hard to go from body into mind. There too sadness comes, but it is not very heavy; with a little effort it breaks. But when you stand between mind and soul, then a great sadness seizes you. That sadness visits only the Buddhas. Do not take it as suffering or a curse—it is a blessing. It is through that very desolation that you will awaken and dig; in that very thirst you will burn and be able to come to the shore of the final lake. Without thirst, who would walk to the lake?

So do not call thirst a misfortune. Yes, if the thirst is tepid, one you can postpone, then it is a misfortune. But let a thirst seize you so irresistibly that every pore burns, not a moment of rest remains, and you cannot stop until you reach the ocean; be possessed so that there is no “you” left—only thirst; every pore calls out—only then can you cross the distance between mind and soul. That distance is vast.

Between body and mind there is scarcely any distance; if any, it is slight. Between mind and soul the distance is immense—indeed, infinite. The mind is momentary; the soul is eternal. The mind is a water-bubble—now here, now burst; the soul has neither beginning nor end—it simply is. The languages are different; there is no bridge in between. Very few cross.

There is a temple in Thailand with an ancient, sweet legend. In that temple stands a victory tower with a hundred steps. Climb to the top and the view is beautiful. The legend says that on the first step lives an invisible serpent. Whenever anyone climbs, that serpent accompanies him only up to the height of his consciousness—if one’s consciousness reaches ten steps, the serpent goes up to ten; twenty, then twenty. The serpent is under a curse: until it reaches the last step three times, it will not be freed. And until now, in infinite time, it has reached the last step only once.

Thousands of pilgrims come daily; the temple is a great place of pilgrimage. They climb—one step, two steps, three steps—sometimes someone reaches halfway. The last step, they say, has been reached only once—perhaps when a Buddha came by. The serpent must wait. By now it is tired, despairing: in infinite time only once it has reached the last step, and it needs three! Hard to find three Buddhas in infinite time.

Surely, the gap between mind and soul is vast. Millions are born, but only once in a long while does someone attain the supreme state without which no one can truly rest, which is everyone’s destiny—postpone it as you will, you cannot avoid it. The distance is great; immense labor is needed—abhipsa is needed, not mere desire. Abhipsa means you stake everything—hold nothing back. Only then may the step be taken and the leap happen that drops you from mind into soul.

Naturally, the West is filled with despair, meaninglessness, melancholy. But from this the East concludes, “We are very fortunate!” Do not fall into that illusion. Do not ever fall into it, because in the East, gurus and sannyasins lull people with, “You are blessed—look how sad the West is!”

You are unfortunate. Your bodily needs are unmet; so many of you haven’t even been caught by the first sadness that drives one from body to mind. Your mental needs are unmet; so the second sadness has not caught you either. Do not imagine you are blessed.

If you are blessed, what will you say about animals? They are more blessed than you. And if animals have gurus—Shankaracharyas—they must be telling them, “You are in better condition than humans—look how anxious and restless humans are. At least you are peaceful!”

Then what of plants? Their Shankaracharya must be preaching, “You are better than animals. They must still wander a bit for food; sometimes they find it, sometimes not. You stand rooted. The rains come; nourishment rises from the earth—you are beyond concern!”

Then there are stones, mountains; their Shankaracharya must be saying, “Your good fortune is boundless. Sometimes rains fail and plants grow restless; sometimes the soil loses vitality and plants go hungry. But rock—blessed are you! You have no worry. Rain or no rain, fertile soil or barren—you are absorbed in the supreme samadhi.”

Remember, stupor is not samadhi. Only one who is conscious can be filled with melancholy. Does an unconscious person feel sadness? That’s why among humans you will find the shallowest people appear most cheerful—strolling the streets, sitting in hotels and clubs, Rotary and Lions. The shallower the person, the happier he seems. As one thinks more deeply, as consciousness grows dense, the smile fades. He sees: is this life at all? Is becoming a Rotary Club member some destiny? What comes from fine dining? A little entertainment, a dream—it will vanish.

Where thought is born, sadness arrives. These toys you took for life now look like toys. And death waits at the door. She will seize you any moment, and the toys will be left scattered. Death cares nothing for your wealth, your property, your position, your prestige; she won’t grant even a moment. You may plead, “I am a member of Parliament—wait!” She will not. Parliament, toys, status, prestige—everything will lie in the trash. As soon as death knocks, you must be ready to go. The bubble bursts.

One who truly reflects becomes anxious. Here only fools seem carefree. Either Buddhas are carefree, or fools are. And if you are carefree, don’t imagine you have become a Buddha. In millions, only one may become a Buddha; the rest are fools.

The East is very foolish. The East lives mostly below even the bodily plane. A few live on the mental plane. Very few are attempting to enter the soul.

But in the West a great current has flowed. The body’s needs are met, hunger is gone, food is sufficient, so the life entangled with the body has been freed. The energy that was spent earning bread and clothing is released and now serves the mind. People are immersed in music and literature; someone sculpts, someone paints. In the West it’s hard to find a person without a hobby.

In the East, only occasionally will you find someone with a hobby. Life itself is enough—who has leisure for hobbies? After eight or ten hours at shop or office, after twelve in the fields, where is the energy to paint or compose songs? Breath has poured out in sweat—who will sing? Inside is emptiness. One falls on the bed and sleeps; in the morning, the same race begins. Who will hear the music of the sky? Who has time to open eyes to the stars? Who will look at flowers? To recognize a flower one needs ease, a little calm; to truly perceive it, a restful state.

So in the West people are on the plane of mind—and thus engulfed by great melancholy. Because nothing further is visible. They have known music, sung songs, made sculptures, painted, made their homes beautiful—now what? A rock stands before them. Life seems meaningless. Meaning comes from a goal; when the goal is lost, meaning is lost.

The poor man’s goal is bread; so life has meaning, because bread is a need. In truth, he has no leisure to think about meaning. The rich man’s goal is the splendor of the mind—its comforts and arts. People think, “When we have everything, we’ll lie back and listen to music, to birds.” But that too is exhausted, for it too belongs to nature; it too is sensory. The day that is exhausted, a great melancholy descends: for what should one live now? The body is full, the mind is full; there seems nothing to gain, nowhere to go; what could be had in the marketplace has been bought; what society can provide has been had; the best of culture—Mozart, Wagner, Beethoven—has been heard; Kalidasa and Bhavabhuti—read. Now what? When this “now what?” arises after mind, life seems meaningless.

Hence the West’s greatest thinkers—Sartre, Jaspers, Heidegger, Marcel—are filled with melancholy. They are in the same state as the Buddha when he left the palace. The night he left, he was full of vast sadness; it was sawing through his life; everything was there—and nothing had essence; life was mere boredom. It was a new moon night outside, and within too, a dark amavas—despair and darkness. Sartre, Heidegger, Marcel—this is their state in the West. Their difficulty is that the entire Western life-structure has denied the soul. What you deny, that door closes completely.

The Eastern life-structure has always affirmed the soul. When you are tired of the mind, not all is finished; one thing remains. In the very air of the East something is always “still remaining.” Truly, your work on body and mind was preparation for this—now the time has come to seek what is the real quest.

The West accepts body and mind; beyond that it has no acceptance—hence turmoil. When the mind exhausts and its pleasures are done, the West is seized by a sadness, and sees only one remedy—suicide. Not self-cultivation, but self-destruction. Here is the difference between East and West. The Eastern stream, when all else is done, gives a new goal—the soul, which is absent in the West.

Therefore Sartre keeps circling back to melancholy. When Buddha became utterly sad he did not circle; he set out in search of the soul—because the air of the East has praised the soul since time immemorial. Everyone waits for that moment when their small needs are fulfilled and they can begin the great journey. Consciously or unconsciously, deep within, the search for the soul is hidden—whether you know it or not. You may indulge the body, but in some unconscious corner a voice asks, “When will you rise from this? When will you awaken?” Even in the most unconscious person, that tone echoes—that is the voice of Eastern culture. That is the East’s fortune.

The East is poor and wretched—that is its misfortune. Whenever the East gains Western-level comfort—as it once had, in Buddha’s time—hundreds of thousands set out in search of the soul, and hundreds attained its vision. It is like our fixed plan: when all worldly work is finished, we will go on pilgrimage—the journey into the infinite will begin.

So Buddha had a way; the culture had a door. Western culture ends at the mind; when mental cravings are exhausted, a wall appears, not a door—hence such sadness. But this won’t last long, because no culture can endure sadness for long. And suicide cannot be a goal. Man will find a way; he will break the wall and make a door. That is why thousands from the West are coming to me—seeking.

Just yesterday a young man came—a major writer with ten or twelve famous books. Big name in the West—honor, prestige, wealth—everything. I had read him before; I never imagined he would show up. He did—seeking. He’s been to Sufis, Tibetan lamas, trained in Gurdjieff’s system—searching far and wide.

The wall will break. How long can it stand? The West is nearing a great religious revolution. The signs have already appeared; the first ray of the sun has broken—dawn is near. Hence the West now faces the East.

And a very amusing event is happening. The intelligent people of the East are looking toward the West. The East’s scientists, engineers, doctors are running West—there lie the sciences of body and mind. If your village doctor has a London degree, that’s something; a Pune degree is “okay.” A surgeon with FRCS—that’s something! Knowledge of body and mind is there; we are borrowers in that realm. We go there. For the sciences of body and mind the East sits at the West’s feet; for the science of the soul the West bows at the East’s feet. A unique thing is occurring.

From the East, those who circle back to the West carry news of spirituality—meditation, yoga, sannyas. From the West, those who return to the East bring news of science—not religion, not spirituality.

The East must learn from the West the sciences of body and mind—and the sooner the better. We have neglected them long enough; time to understand. Note: if the East thoroughly understands and organizes body and mind, there will be no comparison. The science of the spirit is already here; the two lower steps are broken. If the two lower steps are missing, how will you reach the third? You can sing its praises, worship it, but you cannot climb. That’s why you worship the Gita, the Upanishads, the Vedas. The Vedas, Gita, Upanishads are steps to climb—not objects of worship. How will worship help you climb, when the first two steps are broken?

Rightly seen, the West is at present in a better position than you. Its first two steps are ready; the third is missing. The third can be built—and they are seeking it. Soon they will build it. Before they do, you repair your first two which are lost and loosened. Otherwise, you will have to go West to learn spirituality too—no greater misfortune! For centuries we constructed that entire science, and you would have to go West to learn it? But without the first two steps, the third also breaks; how will you keep it? Those two are its foundation.

Therefore I say again and again: the poor cannot be religious; their two steps are missing. The rich are not necessarily religious, but they can be, if they wish. Understand the difference. Wealth does not guarantee religion, but it makes it possible. With wealth you reach the place where the futility of this life becomes visible. Without money, the futility of money will not be visible; without beautiful women, the futility of beauty won’t be visible; without holding office, the stupidity of office won’t be visible. Only when you have seen all the colors of life do you see it is all folly.

Still, it isn’t necessary. As I said yesterday, for a poor person to be religious requires a great imagination, sensitivity, deep intelligence—to see even what he doesn’t have, and to see its futility so deeply that it becomes clear. For a rich person, less intelligence is needed; even minimum intelligence is enough. Hence even a foolish rich man can become religious, if he wishes. Only a truly intelligent poor man can, and that too with great effort. The rich are in a position where the futility of things should appear—if they have even a little intelligence. If a rich person is not religious, understand his intelligence is so degraded that he sees nothing—he is blind. Only a totally blind rich man can avoid becoming religious. For what does he find? The palaces are empty; the heart is barren; no clouds of love rain, no streams of nectar flow, no sound of bliss echoes; the palaces are like tombs—everything dead. The rich have everything outside and nothing inside. Even the dullest can see that nothing is inside.

Therefore the West will not remain desperate for long; it will find the path. That is the effort underway. Thus the West runs toward the East to learn the science by which the third step is built, the wall broken, the door made. Once the West holds the keys, you will have to go West to learn religion too—because the West is skillful; whatever it does, it does thoroughly.

Here I see Indian sannyasins; I don’t see such totality. Even when they meditate, it is lukewarm, as if they do it because I say so. They don’t put their whole life on the line—something is always held back. When Western sannyasins come, they stake everything. They hold back nothing; they wager their life. Results come quickly.

I am astonished daily. Indians say, “This meditation doesn’t fit; that one also doesn’t; in this, the breath feels strained; in that, the legs hurt.” A thousand excuses. Tell them there’s a gold mine and they’ll scale the mountain. Whisper that money is being handed out and they’ll risk life and limb. But for meditation they complain of aching legs, of breathing difficulty. Westerners don’t. They first put everything in and see it through. If they have difficulty, it is with the fourth stage of meditation, never the first three. Indians struggle with the first three; the fourth never even arrives—how could it, when the first three are incomplete?

I wonder what this means! Whatever the West does, it does to completion—either not at all, or utterly. The East is half-hearted; it does, but incompletely. The Eastern mind is in dilemma—wants to keep the world and God both; one foot in each boat, and the boats go in opposite directions. He gets torn. The courage to stake everything has been lost.

The reason is the same: the first two steps are missing. Courage comes only when you see nothing here is truly worth keeping, so you can risk all. As long as you think there is something here worth guarding—and you’d like to carry it along on the spiritual journey—you have not climbed the first two steps.

So do not be pleased with your question that the West is despairing, melancholic, feels meaningless. It will be your good fortune to be so seized by melancholy that you too see this life as futile, this race as meaningless; to be so desolate that nothing in life seems substantial—so you can stake your whole life. The next leap demands you in your entirety; the half will not do. Has anyone ever traveled halfway—half at home, half on the road? If you go, you must go whole.

Kabir said: “Let those who can burn their houses come with me.” Which house does he mean? The one you want to protect. You want to keep your house and also go on pilgrimage. In truth you want God free of cost; or you want God so that you can ask for boons regarding the world.

Have you ever thought what you would ask if God appeared to you? Think honestly: if tomorrow morning God stood before you, what would you ask? On a piece of paper, write three things. You will be shocked at your own desires—“a beautiful wife, a film actress; a big house; a big car; victory in my lawsuit.” Whatever you ask will reveal where you are. Your asking will expose you. Will you start begging when you see God—or will the seeing itself so fulfill you that you say, “Nothing to ask”? In the very impulse to ask is hidden the fact that you did not seek God—you sought something else and were going to use God to get it. God was not the goal; what you want to ask for is the goal. If God appears and you ask for an Impala car, then the car was the real deity; God was just a shopkeeper. Your eyes were on the car, and you used God to get it. When you go to the temple, notice what you ask. Your asking is the barrier between you and God.

Those two lower steps are missing; hence a thousand cravings crowd in. If you can be fulfilled with God alone, know that you have crossed the first two steps.

So do not think yourself fortunate; that is dangerous. Then you will lounge in complacency and your journey will be blocked. Don’t give yourself false consolation. And don’t think, “Westerners are coming East; we must be in a high state, that’s why they are coming.” Another illusion. At any time there may be one or two in such a state, but the whole East is not. In our minds we think, “Buddha was born in the East, Mahavira in the East—and we too were born in the East! It must be our lineage.” The Buddha’s lineage is decided not by geography but by consciousness. Only one who attains Buddhahood is his descendant. Do not decorate your ego with false ornaments and sit satisfied—that could be your death. Those ornaments become chains; that false consolation, a grave.

Awaken! I know your first two steps are broken. You will need great intelligence, great awareness. That is why I give you methods of leaping rather than climbing—because the steps are broken. Who knows when they will be rebuilt? When steps are missing, one can jump two at a time. Only by leaping will you reach. The West does not need to leap; it stands on the second step—if the third appears, it will place its foot. But the East must leap; two steps have been missed. And there is a reason—there is a mathematics to it; nothing happens without cause.

Whenever a country becomes prosperous, it discovers prosperity is useless. As soon as that is seen, it turns to the search for the soul, for God, and moves toward liberation. Then a negation toward the first two steps sets in—“they’re useless.” Their maintenance stops; nobody cares; they begin to be condemned. Slowly the society becomes anti-matter, anti-body. And what you oppose—its step breaks. When it breaks, the predicament we face arises.

When a society is poor, wealth has value; it chases wealth. In chasing wealth it neglects religion. When it gathers wealth, it finds it useless, then it turns to religion. Then it neglects wealth, and slowly grows poor again. Like a wheel, the whole thing turns.

The East was rich—very rich. People called it a golden bird—and it was. In those days of the golden bird, it discovered that all that gold is futile; there is no essence in being a golden bird. Rivers of milk and curds are worthless. All this world is insubstantial—maya, a dream. And that finding is true. When it found all this a dream, who maintains a dream? Neglect set in. With neglect, the East slowly grew poor. Now poor, the steps are broken; religion is no longer connected. The current eagerness is: how to regain wealth? How to regain the body? How to regain the pleasures of mind?

Now the West is rich. When the East was rich, the West was poor. It’s like the outer sun—when it is in the East, the West is night; when in the West, the East is night. What is true of the outer sun is true of the inner sun. When the East had light, the West was in darkness—horrendous poverty, no talk of religion. Now the sun is rising in the West; in the East there is a dark night. The whole East is being pressed under the new-moon of communism—whose meaning is: matter is important, not God; this world is all, there is no other; the dream is the truth—care for it and all will be well. The East is becoming communist; the old structures are breaking. It is hard to save them. The West is slowly becoming religious. In the East, a young man is a communist; if he isn’t, people doubt if he is truly young. Socialist, communist—by whatever name, the young man in the East is communist.

In the West the young have become hippies. Do you know what “hippie” means? It means: there is no essence in this world. Clothes—whatever; bathe or not—whatever; money or no money—whatever. No need for big houses or big cars. Walk on foot; hitch a ride on a passing truck—whatever. Sons and daughters of the richest families are hippies. Hippie is the Western version of sannyas—the Western way to be a renunciate.

Buddha turned thousands into sannyasins. Sannyas meant: we do not care for this life; we will neglect it. If there’s food, fine; if not, we will sleep hungry.

Western youth are withdrawing from society—a kind of sannyas is being born. And Eastern youth are entering the world. The sun rises in the West and sets in the East—and that is natural. But if there is understanding, even in the darkest night you can be fully illuminated; and with foolishness, you can sit in darkness even when the sun is out.

So don’t be overly troubled. One who has understanding lights the inner lamp and leaves the outer sun to itself. The foolish one, even with the sun risen, keeps his eyes shut.

Peace cannot come from violence—Krishna knew it, Muhammad knew it. And it didn’t come either. After the Mahabharata, what peace descended on India? The war was fought; what peace followed? The land remained disturbed. Violence did not end; it continued. After Muhammad’s battles, what final peace came among Muslims? In fact, many became even more agitated. Muhammad’s sword became an excuse for some to wield the sword; his wars became a logic to justify later wars. The community remained turbulent, often war-prone. Krishna failed in that sense, Muhammad failed too: nonviolence simply does not arise from violence.

You will ask: then did Krishna and Muhammad not see this?

They saw it clearly; but there was no other way. It was compulsion—choosing the lesser evil. Understand this carefully.

Krishna’s question was not whether nonviolence would come out of war; even he knew it wouldn’t. How can nonviolence be born of violence? How can love arise from hatred? How will an enemy become a friend by making him your foe? Madness! Does anyone ever come alive by killing? Will flowers bloom on trees if you set them on fire? If you sow thorns, will you get a bed of roses? Krishna knew this. No one is more discerning than Krishna. He knew well: war would not bring peace; violence would not bring nonviolence.

But that was not the question before him. The question was to choose between two violences; it was not a choice between nonviolence and violence. War stood there. Either the Kauravas’ violence would prevail, or the Pandavas’—the choice was between two kinds of violence. Had the choice been between violence and nonviolence, naturally he would have chosen nonviolence. But that choice did not exist. Two kinds of violence faced each other; there was no way but to choose the lesser evil. The Pandavas were less harmful than the Kauravas—just that much. If the Pandavas lost, the Kauravas would win—and a terrible violence would triumph. If the Kauravas won, violence would win completely; if the Pandavas won, violence would win only halfway.

This is the secret of the Gita. Duryodhana never asked, “Should I fight or not?” The question did not even arise in him. And the scene was the same for him as for Arjuna: friends and relatives on both sides; a family civil war. Brothers on this side and on that; Krishna on one side and his army on the other. One was fighting his own army. A civil war—precisely that. Yet Duryodhana felt no doubt. Arjuna did—because Arjuna was less violent, hence he questioned.

Arjuna said, “Better I leave and go. What will I gain by killing my own? Even if I win the kingdom by killing them, what value would such a kingdom have? My mind would ache forever on a throne wet with blood. It would be a nightmare of sorrow. The faces of those I hewed down with my own hands would haunt me. I would neither eat in peace nor sleep at night. Better I flee; let me renounce this battle. For mere victory I cannot sanction such slaughter. My limbs grow weak; the Gandiva slips from my hands; my hands tremble.” In this he revealed himself: he was the less violent one.

Duryodhana never had such a question; he was unambiguously violent. Arjuna’s violence, at least, had thought, awareness, wakefulness in it. He was willing to renounce wealth, kingdom. He had understanding. That is why Krishna labored so much to persuade him to fight.

The arithmetic is simple: Krishna saw clearly that if Arjuna fought and won, power would go to those who were the lesser evil. When the choice lies between two evils, it is right to choose the lesser.

In this world, the choice between good and evil arises very rarely; the choice is almost always between the lesser evil and the greater evil. It is like going to a doctor and he says, “This leg is so diseased we must amputate it; if we don’t, both legs will be lost.” What will you do? Or he says, “One tooth is rotten; remove it, or the rest will decay.” No one enjoys tooth extraction. No one takes pleasure in losing a leg. The doctor is not a partisan of amputation; he does not say, “Everyone should have a leg cut off.” No—he says, “In this situation, if we don’t remove it, the other will be lost too.” The options are: lose both legs, or lose one. Better to lose one. If there were a way to save both, the doctor would never recommend amputation. If all the teeth could be saved, he would say, “Treat them; keep them.”

Krishna tried every way to avert war. The Pandavas did too. But it proved impossible. On the other side stood a thoroughly war-loving man. Violence burned in his eyes; he was deranged. In such a case, either the world would be left in Duryodhana’s hands while the five Pandavas became monks and went to the Himalayas—which they were ready for; they were prepared to give it up. Hence the strange event: Krishna had to prepare them to fight. For he felt: if war must be, let the decent win—those who do not trust war. If war must be, let those win who were ready to renounce. If war must be, let Arjuna win, not Duryodhana.

There was no way except to choose the lesser evil.

The same was true for Muhammad. Whomever he fought, the reason was simply that the people around him understood no other language than battle. There was no alternative. When you stand in the world, you must choose among the options the world permits. The tribes among whom Muhammad lived understood only the language of the sword. If Muhammad had refused to fight, then those who had gathered around him in meditation, prayer, and religion would have been massacred. The choice was stark: either the seekers be slaughtered and the irreligious prevail, or the seekers defend themselves.

Granted, fighting never brings peace; violence never yields nonviolence. But the violence of a good person is at least a better kind of violence, and the violence of a bad person is worse. If the choice lies between worse violence and better violence, better violence is preferable.

Keep this in mind and your dilemma will vanish. There is no difference between Krishna and Mahavira; the difference lies in circumstance. Yet the followers of Krishna and Mahavira have quarreled needlessly. Their situations were different. Mahavira says, “Do not eat meat,” because there the options are genuinely two. He says, “Walk with awareness, lest an ant be crushed underfoot needlessly; if it can be protected, why kill?”

Mahavira addressed the seeker, the renunciate. Had Mahavira stood where Krishna stood, I say he would have given the very counsel Krishna gave—because there was no other way; the situation was clear. But Mahavira was not there; his circumstance was different. He was not on a battlefield; he had renounced the world and spoke to renunciates: move toward nonviolence and drop violence, for violence only breeds violence. What would Mahavira do in Krishna’s position? Either refuse to advise—which would be improper—or give the same advice Krishna gave.

I have often pondered: if the situation is the same and the sage is changed, will a different counsel emerge? Thinking it through, I find it impossible. The wise will give the same counsel, because there is no other way. If Mahavira had been in Arabia and not in India—India with a different climate, a different discourse; a land with millennia of teaching on nonviolence, from the Vedas onward; Mahavira the twenty-fourth Tirthankara, preceded by twenty-three great ones who carpeted the path with blossoms of nonviolence; a mighty current flowing from behind—then the whole land had the capacity to understand the language of nonviolence, and Mahavira could say what he said. Muhammad did not have such a current behind him; he was the first of a great stream, whereas Mahavira was the last of one. That makes a great difference. Arabia then was largely composed of fierce tribal peoples, with little shared civilizational legacy or institutions to lean on. Had you spoken of nonviolence there, you would have been the one proved naive—because there was no way to converse; the word would carry no meaning. Violence was the only language they could understand.

So Muhammad tried to explain in their own language; there was no other way. He too took up the sword—but on his sword he inscribed: “Peace is my message.” It was the attempt to explain peace through the language of the sword. There was no other route. The very word “Islam” means peace. Even peace had to be explained through the sword—because everything depended on those who could understand. When I explain to you, I must speak your language; otherwise I’m the madman, babbling in a tongue you do not know. If Mahavira had stood where Muhammad stood, that same sword would have been in his hand, with the same engraving: “Peace is my message.” And had Muhammad been born in India in Mahavira’s time, he would have become the twenty-fourth Tirthankara. There was no escaping it.

Circumstances change from day to day, and they determine what can and cannot be said; how far people can be taken; how far their consciousness can be drawn out. We must also ensure we don’t demand the impossible so people drop the matter altogether.

Suppose I set you a task so distant it looks like the Everest summit; you might drop it, saying, “Not for me; let me just live my ordinary life.” But if I first show you a small hill you can climb, and then a higher one, your courage will grow, your trust in yourself will deepen. Later I’ll point you to a higher peak. One day, once you’ve acquired a taste for climbing, you will yourself ask, “Now show me the last one. Why go up and down endlessly? Let me climb the one after which nothing remains to be climbed.”

One must speak watching you—how far your understanding can be stretched, lest the words pass entirely over your head.

Arjuna was a good man—exceedingly good. Otherwise, who in a battlefield ever grows so alert as to reflect? When the enemy stands before you, filled with anger and fever, do you ever pause to ask, “Should I strike or not? Would it be right?” You don’t even remain conscious. To talk of awareness in a moment of war, to speak like a monk in the midst of battle—there is something of the monk in Arjuna, not merely of the soldier.

And understand this principle I keep explaining: When a soldier stands at the peak of his martial power, renunciation is born. He has known it all. Arjuna had seen through the entire game of killing and dying. He was no ordinary fighter; none greater than he—the archetype of the warrior. Having seen the futility of it all, the feeling of renunciation arose.

You will be surprised: the Kshatriyas have produced more renunciates—and deeper ones—than the Brahmins. The Kshatriya experience is different: having seen the full range of passion and violence, nonviolence becomes intelligible to them.

That is why I see a great difference between Gandhi’s and Mahavira’s situations. Mahavira was a Kshatriya; Gandhi a Baniya. Those to whom Mahavira spoke were veterans of a warrior’s life; those to whom Gandhi spoke were a people rendered fearful and demoralized. Otherwise, does a nation remain subjugated for a thousand years? A small foreign power holds a vast land for two or three centuries; before that, other powers rule for eight centuries. A people kept under for so long cannot be a people of courage; fear and weakness had seeped into the society. Gandhi was speaking to a frightened populace.

Hence Gandhi’s nonviolence became, to a great extent, a tactic. Human beings find many devices to mask their timidity, and Gandhi’s teaching suited the fearful—and it worked. But the moment power came, the cohesion dissolved. Those who had vowed nonviolence took up the gun. It had been easier to struggle nonviolently against the British because there was no capacity to wage a violent struggle. But once strength came into their hands, they readily fired bullets at their own countrymen.

In these few decades of freedom, the number of bullets fired by avowed nonviolence-lovers has exceeded what the British fired in two centuries. To be truthful, Gandhi’s nonviolence could prevail because the British were a particularly cultivated people; otherwise it would not have prevailed. Had it been the Germans in place of the British, Gandhi would have been crushed to dust. The British, being cultured and generous of spirit, understood the language of nonviolence. Consider this: the British did not kill Gandhi; we ourselves did. How easy it would have been for them to remove him and end their troubles! They did not—because they had a conscience; they protected him, honored him, even gently handed over power. Then we killed him. Vallabhbhai Patel, Gandhi’s own “Sardar,” could not save him, though the British had. There is even the possibility—conscious or unconscious—that some who called themselves Gandhians had a hand in it. Unconsciously, many must have wished the old man would pass away, for he had become an obstacle. Earlier, he had been a leader and a cover under which the timid could hide. Now he obstructed everything—still singing the refrain of nonviolence.

Gandhi’s nonviolence was, in fact, a consolation for the timid. He elaborated a whole scripture of nonviolence from a place of fearfulness. If you study his life closely you will find a thread of timidity. In youth he was exceedingly shy, fearful. When he sailed from India to Europe, his mother made him swear a vow of celibacy. Likely, he took it out of fear—because she said, “We will not let you go unless you vow,” and he wanted to go. On the ship he befriended a gentleman. When the ship reached Cairo, that gentleman set out for a brothel—as travelers often do in port towns—and invited Gandhi along. Gandhi was so timid he could not say no. Then you will understand how he took that vow—because the very thought of refusing this man filled him with dread that he might be thought impotent or afraid. Out of fear, he went along—hands and feet trembling, sweat pouring, the vow weighing on him—unable even to tell the woman, “I have taken a vow; please let me go.” He sat with eyes closed, somehow gathered himself, and fled. If you trace his whole life, you will find timidity as a motif; a fearful man, and a fearful man’s religion. From that fearfulness he slowly fashioned a scripture of nonviolence—timidity hidden underneath, nonviolence on top.

We rarely analyze the lives of those we revere; we don’t peel back the layers to see how their lives were formed.

Mahavira is different. His nonviolence was that of a Kshatriya, born not of fear but of great fearlessness. Krishna was a Kshatriya too; he would have understood Mahavira’s nonviolence. Muhammad as well; he would have understood it. These are fighters—and nonviolence is the final fight. Then you fight with love, but it is still a fight. In violence you fight with hate because you have no trust in your love. In violence you lift the sword because you have no trust in your own strength—you borrow strength from the sword.

Nonviolence is a person’s ultimate power. Then he drops the sword because his hands are enough. He drops weapons because the heart is enough. He does not attack because prayer is enough. He defeats you by his love. He does not even wish to defeat you—because that too is violence. He “loses” to you, and thereby defeats you.

This is Lao Tzu’s whole scripture: lose—and the one to whom you lose is the one you will overcome. Hence Lao Tzu is a great champion of the feminine power. He says: What is a woman’s strength? That she loses to the one she loves. And you know: losing, she takes complete hold. You feel you have won; in truth she is the one who wins. The weakest woman, losing to you in love, clings like a vine to a tree—so delicate she could not even stand alone—yet at last you find she has won and you have lost. Without saying a word, she has you do what she wishes; she stands behind you, yet in fact she is in front. Her way of being ahead is to stand behind. She envelops you in love and service, creates around you so gentle a breeze you do not wish to break it.

What happens to a woman in love is what happens with the nonviolent one. Violence is the mark of a masculine mind; nonviolence is the feeling of a feminine heart.

Only nonviolence begets nonviolence; never violence. But there are situations in which the choice is not between violence and nonviolence, but between better violence and worse violence. And sometimes the choice is between better nonviolence and worse nonviolence. This is the difference I draw between Mahavira’s nonviolence and Gandhi’s. Mahavira’s nonviolence is of one kind—there is fearlessness in it; it is good nonviolence. Gandhi’s is of another—there is fear and timidity in it; it is poor nonviolence.

So there are four things in the world. If only violence and nonviolence existed, things would be simple; they are not. There is good (healthy) nonviolence and sickly nonviolence; there is healthy violence and unhealthy violence. Only one whose inner wisdom has become very steady can choose among these four. When, through meditation, you can see through things, it becomes clear. Because sickly nonviolence still looks like nonviolence, and healthy violence still looks like violence. Therefore, if you cannot recognize better violence, Krishna and Muhammad will seem violent to you; and if you cannot recognize poor nonviolence, Gandhi will seem nonviolent to you.

When your insight becomes deep, when thought grows quiet and the mirror of your mind becomes clear, the dust removed, then you will see. And you will find this everywhere: good character and bad character; better criminals and worse criminals; good saints and bad saints. You may find this odd—saint must mean “good.” But if sainthood stands upon fear, it is bad; and if “unsaintliness” stands upon fearlessness, there is something good in it.

Life is a little complex; not as simple as arithmetic. Until you develop the capacity to recognize life’s complexity, much of what I say will elude you—and the danger is you may even understand it the other way around. So walk very alertly with me, because I often tread very dangerous paths. It is necessary: only by walking them will you gain practice, and even dangerous paths will become easy and simple.

Last question:

It was bound to happen. Because the very desire to attain enlightenment is the obstacle to attaining it. You will not get it that way—by wanting. Desire creates tension; tension becomes a headache. In this world you might, perhaps, obtain things by trying; but the things of the other realm descend only when you are in silence. The way to receive them is that even the one who is trying to get them disappears. Otherwise a headache is created.

Now, what is to be done?
Drop the idea of attaining enlightenment. Instead, take care to be blissful and quiet in this very moment. Do not ask about tomorrow and do not think about tomorrow. If this moment passes in joy, that is enough. Because the next moment is born out of this one. If this moment passes in joy, the next will, by itself, pass in even deeper joy. From where will the next moment come? It, too, is born out of you. If you are happy now, you will be happy tomorrow. Do not ask about tomorrow. Live today! And whoever lives today—their headaches melt away.

Still, it may be that through long habit the headache is not only mental; it has become physical—not only in the mind, but has entered the nerves of the brain. Then do one thing: do not try to remove the headache—try to bring it on.

This will seem very difficult, but it is a marvelous device. And it works not only for headaches, but for many things.

The more you try to get rid of a headache, the more tense you become—and the headache arises. The first headache remains; and a second headache is added: how to get rid of the first! The headache is there—accept it. The moment you accept, your nerves will relax. With acceptance, half the headache is gone. Not only accept it, but with a feeling of grateful awe, be thankful to the divine: “You have given this headache; there must be some reason, some secret. We accept it. We do not know what benefit might come tomorrow from this headache. We do not know. We accept.”

Try to bring the headache—invite it to come. When the headache is there, make every effort to let it reach its full momentum, its full intensity. And you will be astonished: within a few days, the more you try to bring it, the harder it becomes for it to come. And the more you try to give it momentum, the less it is. And the more you accept, the more it disappears.

This is Lao Tzu’s method. Accept the suffering of life, and suffering goes. Whatever is happening, accept it; do not struggle. Once struggle drops, all things become simple, auspicious, peaceful, and blissful.

There is a young man here in Poona. He is a professor in a college. About five years ago he came to me and said he had a big problem. The problem is that he forgets himself and again and again starts walking the way women walk. So in college there is bound to be trouble; anywhere there will be trouble—people will laugh; and a college has become the most dangerous place of all. There are a thousand, five hundred students, and if a professor walks like a woman, he becomes an object of jokes and laughter. And the more he tries to avoid it—because he goes carefully, placing each step carefully—the more trouble he gets into.

So I told him, Do one thing: practice walking like a woman. People are already laughing, the jokes are already there, the bad name is already there; nothing more can happen. Now that walking like a woman is happening anyway, then do it skillfully.

He said, What are you saying! I am dying trying to get rid of it, and you say I should practice it?

I said, You did not manage by trying to remove it—now listen to me. Tomorrow, go to college, and from home itself, try to walk like a woman.

He was very frightened, but he gathered courage. And for three months continuously, whenever he went to college, he tried consciously to walk like a woman. But in three months, not even once did he succeed—he could not walk like a woman.

The mind has a mechanism; some things are unconscious. If you make them conscious, they dissolve. Some things live precisely because you fight them. If you accept, they disappear.

That is what I am saying in relation to the headache. And try this in many areas of your life. The disturbances will differ, but accept them—accept them with gratitude—and then see: you have snatched away their very life! You have cut their root! You have struck at the very source!

That is all for today.