Tao Upanishad #64
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Read in Original Hindi (मूल हिन्दी)
Sutra (Original)
बहुत से प्रश्न हैं।
Transliteration:
bahuta se praśna haiṃ|
bahuta se praśna haiṃ|
Translation (Meaning)
There are many questions.
Questions in this Discourse
A friend has asked: Osho, regarding the pyramids of Egypt you have said that their civilization and culture were at a peak. But those people placed human corpses inside the pyramids—kept mummies—and put food and drink, clothes, jewelry, and such things, so that these might be useful on the journey after death. Please explain: if those people were so highly evolved, did they not know that none of this is of any use after death?
Two things need to be understood here. First, when someone dies, whatever we do is related to us, not to that person. Your mother has died, or your father has died—you could simply throw the body outside the house; there is no need to bury it, it is pointless effort to carry it to the cremation ground. Because why carry a corpse to the cremation ground? It is only the body being taken—the soul has already flown. To take this body with a band and music is madness. To go to the cremation ground and shed tears over this dead body is madness. Understand this clearly: what you are doing is not for the dead father or mother; it is for you.
Those who placed clothes, bread, and goods with the Egyptian mummies were only giving this message: even knowing that none of it will be of any use to the dead, their love would not agree; their love wanted that whatever could possibly be done for the one who had died should also be done.
Understand this distinction well. You don’t know where the dead person is; you don’t know what would be of use to them. Prayer, worship, efforts for the peace of their soul—these are the things you can now do for them; whether they reach the person, you don’t know either. But you do them. If you understand rightly, you are doing them for yourself. It is your expression of love. And it will bring relief to you, not to the one who died.
Your father has died, and during the fortnight for the ancestors you perform certain rites. Don’t fall into the illusion that this will do something for your father. But what you do is for you—for your heart, for your love. It is your own consolation.
Someone’s husband has died. If she places food with him, it is not that the dead husband will eat. But the woman who cooked for him all her life will also want, at the moment of death, to place this food with him.
If you look in this way, you will begin to wonder what civilization even means. Civilization means that love becomes deeper and more expansive.
Certainly they were civilized people, and their hearts were also civilized. If it were only a civilization of the head, they would have thought exactly as you are thinking—what is the point? what is the gain? In truth, one might as well take the father’s bones and ribs out and sell them—you could get some money, and that would be profitable. The body is burned for no reason; what sense is there in that? Everything could be sold like goods. But you will not be able to do it—even knowing that the father’s soul will suffer no harm from it. What has been left behind has been left behind. Now if you are going to burn it anyway, better to sell it in the market. If only intellect is present, that answer will seem correct. And yet you will not want to sell; somewhere inside, the heart will feel wounded.
Now only the body remains, and it is clearly just dust. To place some money and jewels with this dust is not a sign of uncivilized behavior; it tells you the heart, too, lived at a certain height.
But there is a great difficulty: when civilizations are lost, whatever we think about them is nothing but our own projection. The Westerners who dug up these mummies and found goods inside thought, “These things were placed so the dead could use them.”
They were not placed for that reason. Love cannot accept that the beloved is truly dead. And where there is no love, even the living are dead. Let me tell a small incident to bring this to mind.
When Ramakrishna died, by custom his wife, Sarada, should have broken her bangles. Neighbors gathered and told her to break them. As she started to do so, she suddenly burst out laughing. People thought she had gone mad. And she refused to break the bangles. She said, “As I reached for my bangles, Ramakrishna’s words came to me—‘I shall never die.’ So his body may have been shed, but he has not died; therefore I cannot be a widow.” This is the first such moment in the entire history of India when a widow refused to be a widow upon her husband’s death. “If his soul is, then I am not a widow; I will wear these bangles.”
And Sarada continued to wear the clothes of a married woman. Every day, at the time she used to go to Ramakrishna’s room, she would say to him, “Come, the meal is ready.” No one was there—but Sarada went every day. People would sit there and weep listening to her words. Sarada would go to the place where Ramakrishna sat and say, “Paramahansa Deva, come, the meal is ready.” She would cook the meal, set his plate, return as if Ramakrishna were walking back with her, seat him, fan him. This went on for years—never a lapse. Then she would lay him down, put him to sleep, draw the mosquito net. This continued throughout her life.
We would certainly say, “This woman is mad.” In our reckoning this would never make sense. But if you think with a little heart, it is possible that for Sarada, Ramakrishna never died. Perhaps Sarada’s heart never accepted, on any level, that he had died. For us she is mad; but if we think with a little sympathy, it may be that we are the ones who don’t understand—and she is not mad.
One more thing is certain: Sarada was never unhappy; she remained blissful. If there is so much bliss in such madness, your cleverness is worth dropping—because your cleverness gives you nothing but sorrow. Your husband is alive, yet you have nothing but tears; your wife is alive, yet you have nothing but tears. And after Ramakrishna’s death Sarada’s eyes did not fill with tears—she kept laughing. And as long as she lived, Ramakrishna remained living—for her Ramakrishna remained alive.
Those who preserved goods with the mummies, preserved them with great love.
When Tutankhamun’s tomb was first opened in Egypt, it was a six-thousand-year-old corpse. His tomb had three sections, three layers. On the first layer, there was also a gold face of Tutankhamun, as if the corpse itself were there, with jewels and all sorts of goods. When they dug further, they found that below it there was again the same gold face and the same amount of goods. The body was on the third level. The upper two were decoys—because thieves used to dig into graves for the gold and jewels. So two decoys were provided: if the first grave was dug out, no worry; if the second too, still no worry; but the third should not be touched.
Those who created such tombs with such love for the dead Tutankhamun—their hearts should be understood. All the rites concerning the dead are proofs of the love of the living. They have nothing to do with the dead. If we become very scientific, then there is no need to do anything with the dead. The matter is finished.
But think a little: would you prefer to be like Sarada, or to run entirely by intellect and arithmetic? However correct intellect and arithmetic may be, joy does not arise from them. However wrong the heart may be, it is the door to bliss.
Those who placed clothes, bread, and goods with the Egyptian mummies were only giving this message: even knowing that none of it will be of any use to the dead, their love would not agree; their love wanted that whatever could possibly be done for the one who had died should also be done.
Understand this distinction well. You don’t know where the dead person is; you don’t know what would be of use to them. Prayer, worship, efforts for the peace of their soul—these are the things you can now do for them; whether they reach the person, you don’t know either. But you do them. If you understand rightly, you are doing them for yourself. It is your expression of love. And it will bring relief to you, not to the one who died.
Your father has died, and during the fortnight for the ancestors you perform certain rites. Don’t fall into the illusion that this will do something for your father. But what you do is for you—for your heart, for your love. It is your own consolation.
Someone’s husband has died. If she places food with him, it is not that the dead husband will eat. But the woman who cooked for him all her life will also want, at the moment of death, to place this food with him.
If you look in this way, you will begin to wonder what civilization even means. Civilization means that love becomes deeper and more expansive.
Certainly they were civilized people, and their hearts were also civilized. If it were only a civilization of the head, they would have thought exactly as you are thinking—what is the point? what is the gain? In truth, one might as well take the father’s bones and ribs out and sell them—you could get some money, and that would be profitable. The body is burned for no reason; what sense is there in that? Everything could be sold like goods. But you will not be able to do it—even knowing that the father’s soul will suffer no harm from it. What has been left behind has been left behind. Now if you are going to burn it anyway, better to sell it in the market. If only intellect is present, that answer will seem correct. And yet you will not want to sell; somewhere inside, the heart will feel wounded.
Now only the body remains, and it is clearly just dust. To place some money and jewels with this dust is not a sign of uncivilized behavior; it tells you the heart, too, lived at a certain height.
But there is a great difficulty: when civilizations are lost, whatever we think about them is nothing but our own projection. The Westerners who dug up these mummies and found goods inside thought, “These things were placed so the dead could use them.”
They were not placed for that reason. Love cannot accept that the beloved is truly dead. And where there is no love, even the living are dead. Let me tell a small incident to bring this to mind.
When Ramakrishna died, by custom his wife, Sarada, should have broken her bangles. Neighbors gathered and told her to break them. As she started to do so, she suddenly burst out laughing. People thought she had gone mad. And she refused to break the bangles. She said, “As I reached for my bangles, Ramakrishna’s words came to me—‘I shall never die.’ So his body may have been shed, but he has not died; therefore I cannot be a widow.” This is the first such moment in the entire history of India when a widow refused to be a widow upon her husband’s death. “If his soul is, then I am not a widow; I will wear these bangles.”
And Sarada continued to wear the clothes of a married woman. Every day, at the time she used to go to Ramakrishna’s room, she would say to him, “Come, the meal is ready.” No one was there—but Sarada went every day. People would sit there and weep listening to her words. Sarada would go to the place where Ramakrishna sat and say, “Paramahansa Deva, come, the meal is ready.” She would cook the meal, set his plate, return as if Ramakrishna were walking back with her, seat him, fan him. This went on for years—never a lapse. Then she would lay him down, put him to sleep, draw the mosquito net. This continued throughout her life.
We would certainly say, “This woman is mad.” In our reckoning this would never make sense. But if you think with a little heart, it is possible that for Sarada, Ramakrishna never died. Perhaps Sarada’s heart never accepted, on any level, that he had died. For us she is mad; but if we think with a little sympathy, it may be that we are the ones who don’t understand—and she is not mad.
One more thing is certain: Sarada was never unhappy; she remained blissful. If there is so much bliss in such madness, your cleverness is worth dropping—because your cleverness gives you nothing but sorrow. Your husband is alive, yet you have nothing but tears; your wife is alive, yet you have nothing but tears. And after Ramakrishna’s death Sarada’s eyes did not fill with tears—she kept laughing. And as long as she lived, Ramakrishna remained living—for her Ramakrishna remained alive.
Those who preserved goods with the mummies, preserved them with great love.
When Tutankhamun’s tomb was first opened in Egypt, it was a six-thousand-year-old corpse. His tomb had three sections, three layers. On the first layer, there was also a gold face of Tutankhamun, as if the corpse itself were there, with jewels and all sorts of goods. When they dug further, they found that below it there was again the same gold face and the same amount of goods. The body was on the third level. The upper two were decoys—because thieves used to dig into graves for the gold and jewels. So two decoys were provided: if the first grave was dug out, no worry; if the second too, still no worry; but the third should not be touched.
Those who created such tombs with such love for the dead Tutankhamun—their hearts should be understood. All the rites concerning the dead are proofs of the love of the living. They have nothing to do with the dead. If we become very scientific, then there is no need to do anything with the dead. The matter is finished.
But think a little: would you prefer to be like Sarada, or to run entirely by intellect and arithmetic? However correct intellect and arithmetic may be, joy does not arise from them. However wrong the heart may be, it is the door to bliss.
Another friend has asked, Osho, how can we know whether we are in tune with nature or against it?
It isn’t difficult to know. When you are ill, how do you know you are ill? And when you are healthy, how do you know you are healthy? What means do you have for knowing? When you are ill, you are in pain; when you are healthy, you feel light and exuberant. Exactly the same sickness and health happen on the inner, spiritual plane. When inside you are restless, agitated, disturbed, tormented—know that you are going against nature. And when within you are blossoming in joy, when a melody of joy is playing in you, when every pore is vibrating with it, when this whole world begins to appear like heaven—then know you are in tune with nature. There is no need to ask anyone else. Whenever there is suffering, it arises from being against the current; whenever there is joy, it is from being aligned. Joy is the touchstone.
But we live so much in misery that we take misery to be life itself; we don’t even discover that joy exists. People come to me—since they have no experience of joy themselves, they cannot trust another’s joy either. A sister came two days ago and said, “It isn’t believable that in kirtan people become so joyous that they start dancing within two minutes. I just can’t believe it.”
Naturally—how will one believe who has never danced in joy? If someone can’t even dance, if no ripple of delight ever arises within, how will belief be possible? For sure, it will look like some contrived act, some performance—that these people are arranged in advance, they just begin to dance on cue. How could such a thing be! Someone who has not felt joy even once in forty or fifty years—how will he accept that someone can be filled with joy in two minutes?
What has minutes or years to do with joy? If you can’t be filled in two minutes, how will you be filled in two years? And if you can be filled in two years, what prevents you in two minutes? What relation does time have with joy? None at all. But if there has been no taste...
So I asked that sister, “Have you ever come and tried kirtan, tried dancing?” She said, no. I told her, “Come and dance. Perhaps it may happen to you too—then you will know.”
We are even afraid of joy. Because we live in a society of miserable people; in it, to be joyous makes you maladjusted—better to be sad. The crowd around us is unhappy; if you too are unhappy, you fit in perfectly. If you are happy, people start suspecting that maybe your mind is not right. Laughing like this? Being so cheerful? Where there is a crowd of the sick and sorrowful, your being sorrowful keeps you in harmony with them.
That’s why we hurry to make children serious. Children are buoyant, joyous—dancing, jumping, playing. We get very uneasy with their dancing and jumping. You are reading the newspaper and you say to your child, “Stop this noise, this dancing and jumping; I am reading!”
As if reading the newspaper is more important than dancing and playing. As if reading the newspaper is more valuable. Children are weak, so they can’t say to you, “Stop this newspaper and come dance!” By the time they grow strong, you will have spoiled them; they too will be reading the newspaper and scolding their children.
All human beings are born in tune with nature, and most die out of tune with it. We are born aligned, but society—the structure all around—twists us and makes us serious. And anyone who won’t be serious, we tell him even when he is grown, “You’re childish; drop this childishness, be serious.” We prefer gloomy faces.
If you visit a sadhu or a saint and find him laughing aloud, you won’t go again. You want grave, sick faces. If a holy man laughs, surely something is wrong! A bad man may laugh, but a good man cannot—the natural quality of a good man, you think, is to weep. Look at your saints’ faces: a crowd of mourners. The one who can cry the loudest is the greatest saint: sorrow drips from every pore, hostility toward the world oozes out. Flowers do not bloom around them.
Only then do you feel reassured. The more harried the renunciate looks, the more ascetic he appears to you—naked in the sun, starving, fasting, a bag of bones—that’s greatness in your eyes.
It’s strange: somewhere in you there is a perverse delight in seeing the sorrowful. Notice—if a saint lives in a hut, you can easily bow at his feet; if he lives in a palace, you hesitate. Why? If a saint appears healthy, you suspect something: he looks as healthy as a householder. He should be all bones—then you’d feel there is renunciation. If a saint seems to enjoy anything, you are troubled. So wherever there is enjoyment, you break your saint away from it. He mustn’t eat well. If a beautiful woman is seen near him, you become very uneasy. Why? Wherever your pleasures lie, from there your saint must be distant: he mustn’t eat well; a beautiful woman mustn’t be seen near him.
So saints had to create single-sex monastic societies. Among Catholics, men live in one monastery, women in another. Among Jains, when monks travel, they go one way; nuns go separately. You won’t even let them stay together. Do you have so little trust in your saint? Why so much fear?
A Jain nun cannot travel alone; five must go together. Certainly the framers of the Jain code understood well that where five women are together, four will be guards upon the fifth. Those four will not let anyone enjoy; they will keep watch. You have installed an inner, built-in arrangement. With five together, none will be allowed to be happy; they will keep an eye on each other to see that no one is.
And there is this fear that a man and a woman together may be happier. Because what is your experience of happiness? Just two things: food, and woman or man. These two pleasures. So cut the saint off from both. Then you feel satisfied: now it’s fine.
The more dead he is, the better. If he is alive, there is fear—because life brings fear. How can a saint laugh? To laugh means he still has a taste for the world, for being. Laughter means there is rasa—juice. He should be juiceless. All his laughter should have dried up.
We live in a sick society. Our notions are sick, and we impose those sick notions on each other.
Even a father doesn’t want his son to be happy, though he says so. He keeps saying, “Everything I do is for your happiness,” but he doesn’t truly want the son to be happy. This will sound hard. The father will think, “Never! I want my son to be happy.” You say it; you even believe you want it; but what you do will make him unhappy. You can only do to him what your father did to you. To think anew is very difficult. So every father does to his son what his father did to him. There’s a mold, and you impose it.
Think a little: are you happy? If you are not, then it’s certain your framework cannot make anyone happy. But nobody thinks this. A father doesn’t think, “I am unhappy—how will my son, who follows my beliefs, become happy?” If I am unhappy, it is settled that I should not hand him my mold—whatever else happens. At least in some other mold there may be a possibility he might turn out happy. In mine, there is none.
But we don’t think. You enjoy imposing the mold; whether the boy becomes happy or not isn’t the question. You enjoy shaping him to your image. Strange: you are unhappy and you are molding him to your pattern.
People even come to advise me. They say, “Do this—this would be best.” I ask them, “Have you at least followed your own advice, and has joy come into your life? Only then advise me.” They say, “No, nothing has come into our life; that’s why we’ve come to you.” I tell them, “Then keep your advice safe and don’t give it to anyone—because you yourself are not its example.”
I recall: Henry Ford went into a shop and picked up a book—How to Grow Rich. Ford was already rich, but he thought there might be something in it. The shopkeeper said, “Mr. Ford, you’ll be delighted—the author is here in the back. We’ll introduce you.”
That spoiled everything. The author came out. Henry Ford looked him up and down and said, “Take this book back; I don’t want it.” The shopkeeper was astonished: “What are you saying! This book has sold hundreds of thousands of copies.” Ford said, “It may have sold any number—but I’ve seen the author; now what will I do with the book?” The man’s coat was torn. He had written How to Grow Rich! Ford asked, “Did you come in your own car or by bus?” The author said, “By bus.” Ford said, “I’m Ford—if you ever need a car, come to me, I’ll give you a discount. But for now, don’t write these books. If your advice hasn’t yielded you anything, what will it yield anyone else?”
Life is complex. If you haven’t found joy, don’t hand your mold to your son. If you haven’t found joy, don’t offer advice to anyone. It’s poison. You yourself are the result of such advice imposed on you. Don’t repeat that violence on others by imposing your mold.
That’s why we don’t recognize what it means to be in tune with nature—because we grow up in contrariness. The whole human institution is contrary. So Lao Tzu says: be as much in accord with nature as you can. Why have we become contrary? Let’s understand a little. There is a whole scripture to it.
Every person is born in accord, because we are born out of nature. But we do not accept a person in his naturalness; we press ideals onto him. We tell people: become a Mahavira, become a Buddha—if nothing else, at least become a Vivekananda! But do you know that Mahaviras don’t come twice? In twenty-five hundred years one hasn’t come, although countless fathers have told their sons to become Mahavira. Has any person ever been born again on this earth—any Ram, any Krishna, any Buddha?
Everyone is born unique. And we hand him ideals—“become this!” Parents are in difficulty because they don’t know what has been born in their house and what it can become. Nobody knows. Even the one who has been born doesn’t yet know what he may become. Life is growth in the unknown. So parents’ unease is: what mold should they give? They hand the mold of those who became luminous before—“be like them.” That mold becomes a noose, and it is precisely this mold that drives one against nature.
We cast people into molds and make them stand. They are trapped people, surrounded by iron chains. It’s difficult to get out. Humanity will not be healthy until we accept that every person is unique, neither a copy of anyone nor can ever be. No two people are the same; they cannot be; they should not be. Even if you succeed in becoming Ram, you will be nothing but a ridiculous sight. Ram being Ram is one thing; you being Ram is mere imitation. You will be false. There is no way to be a true Ram. Why? Not because it’s hard to be Ram—Ram happened without trying, so it doesn’t seem that hard. Nor because it’s hard to be Buddha—Buddha happened without trying. The hardness lies elsewhere: each person is born at a point in history, time, and space so utterly unique that it cannot be repeated. That point comes once and never again. Therefore no one can be repeated. Hence all ideals are dangerous.
Then we don’t accept people as they are. We all carry egos within; the ego accepts only itself and wants to run everyone according to itself. The most dangerous and criminal people in this world are those who want to run the whole world their way—even if you call them saints; your naming changes nothing.
Whenever I try to make someone walk according to me, I am committing murder. My ego may be gratified that many walk my way, but I am erasing those people.
A truly religious master points you toward your own nature; he does not want you to walk according to him. He tells you: become according to yourself, and whatever you must renounce, whatever trouble you must bear to become that, bear it. All troubles are small if the taste of the joy that comes from being yourself is found. They have no price; they’re easy.
If you keep trying to become according to another, you will become more and more miserable. You will never get even a glimpse of joy.
A glimpse of joy means: a harmony has arisen between my nature and the nature of the vast; now both are dancing bound in one rhythm. My heart has become rhythmically attuned to the heart of the vast; my note and the note of the vast have merged; there is no gap.
So I must be according to myself. No one will help you in this. Everyone will hinder you—everyone wants you to be according to them. Parents want it; then teachers in school want it; then leaders, then saints, then popes and Shankaracharyas—all want, “Become according to me.” It’s as if many vultures have fallen upon you from all sides; they all want to make a meal of you. In all this you forget you were born only to become your own kind. One thing, however, is certain: you go on suffering. Recognize that suffering. If you are suffering, understand well: you are moving against nature. Suffering is ample proof.
And when you suffer, do you know what you do? You repeat the very mistake that is the cause of your suffering. You go to someone and ask, “Show me a path so I can walk it and my suffering will end.” Someone will show you a path—it will be his path. Maybe it ended his suffering; but it is his path. And another’s path cannot be your path. You will have to find your own path.
Become acquainted with others’ paths—that can help. Recognize others’ paths—that can support your search for your own. But if you walk another’s path blindly, you will never find yours. How many have followed Mahavira—and not a single Mahavira has happened; how many have followed Buddha—and not a single Buddha has happened. Why this colossal waste of energy? Because your path is not another’s, and another’s path is not yours. Souls are unique, and each has its own way.
So what to do? Understand your suffering; find the cause of your suffering. Try to step out of that cause. Don’t go looking for ready-made paths; don’t go asking others. What is the cause of your suffering?
Countless people come to me—the cause of their suffering is so obvious that I’m amazed they don’t see it. It seems they don’t want to see. And even if you show them a path, they carry the cause along on that path.
For most people the cause is ego. It’s so clear, yet unseen.
People come; I tell them, “It is the ego that is causing pain.” They say, “Show a method to drop it.” Suppose I give them a method; they will walk it, but they will carry the disease along. I say, “Take a jump into sannyas.” They even take the jump. Then the ego of the sannyasin grabs them. They think, “Those who haven’t taken sannyas are smaller; those who have are on some height.” They look at non-sannyasins the way one looks, with sympathy, at the afflicted: “All right, wander as long as you must wander—we have arrived.”
This was their disease; I had asked them to drop it by a leap. They brought it along. When ten or fifty sannyasins gather, the question of big and small begins; quarrels start; politics begins; factions are formed; they start cutting each other down. They have created an alternative little world. In a group of a hundred the whole politics of Delhi or Washington reappears. Who sits where; who does what; who gets how much prestige—the whole disease stands there.
This is the difficulty: we don’t want to see the disease. Or it is like scabies: you know scratching hurts, but there is pleasure in scratching too. If there were only pain, no one would scratch. Scabies is a double trouble: scratching is enjoyable. Where there is pleasure mixed with pain, it is hard to stop.
You enjoy the ego; it is an itch. Then it also hurts. When it hurts too much, you come with folded hands, “Show me a way.” When the skin is torn and bleeding, you cry, “Help!” But in a little while the skin heals, the blood stops; then the creeping sensation arises again: “Scratch a little—what fun it is.”
Ego is a scabies. It is not pure pain; there is a taste mixed in it. That taste pursues you—wherever you go.
If you are suffering, know that the ego is there. If you are suffering, know you are going against nature. And there are two ways of going against nature. The body needs food. You can damage the body in two ways: eat so much that the body cannot bear it—suffering begins. That is against nature. Or don’t eat at all—fast—suffering begins.
So note: there are two ways to be against nature, and one way to be in tune. And the human mind finds it convenient to move from one contrariness to the other—because that too is an extreme. That’s why those who overeat often agree readily to fasting. In truth, one who eats rightly will never get into the stupidity of fasting. Why fast? One who eats only as much as the body needs—how will the question of fasting arise? Only if there has been excess will one swing to non-eating. And the one who overeats is immediately ready to undertake a fast.
Understand this: if you tell an overeater, “Eat less,” he’ll say, “That’s hard—better to not eat at all; that I can do.” If a man smokes, and you say, “From ten, smoke five,” he’ll say, “That’s hard—better to quit entirely; that I can do.” Why? Because he is habituated to excess—either all day, or not at all. Choosing between two extremes is easy; stopping in the middle is hard. Stopping in the middle means you are beginning to be in tune with nature. Nature is the middle, balance, samyam.
Remember, we have ruined the meaning of samyam. By “restraint” we mean the other extreme. If a man fasts, we call him very restrained. He is as unrestrained as the glutton. What is samyam? Balanced, in the middle; neither this side nor that; not leaning toward any excess—right in the center. Whoever abides in the middle is in restraint. And samyam is the formula for becoming aligned with nature. But your “restraint” is not restraint; it is just another name for lack of restraint—the other extreme.
There is ego, there is excess, and in the very things you want to drop there is also taste. You must recognize this. In every one of your sorrows there is your own hand—and a relish. You see only the pain; you don’t see the relish; that’s why you never get free. See the relish too. Only by seeing the relish will you get free of the pain. Tell the person with scabies who enjoys scratching: no matter how much you say it hurts, he agrees—it hurts, he has suffered it. First make him see: there is pleasure too! See it clearly. And if you want that pleasure, you will have to pay the price of pain. Then don’t ask to be saved from the pain.
People come and say, “Great restlessness!” I show them the cause. They say, “But that cause is hard to drop. Give us a method to remove the restlessness.” That’s why people fall for false tricks.
A man is mad after money. He says he won’t be at peace until he has millions. In this mad race his mind grows restless. He comes to me: “Great restlessness—give me a mantra, a mala, so I can be peaceful.” I ask, “Did you become restless because you weren’t turning a mala? Then by turning a mala you’ll be peaceful? What does your restlessness have to do with a rosary? Where does the rosary even touch it?” I tell him, “Your madness for wealth is your unrest.” He says, “But that’s hard to leave—give me some other method.”
He wants a method—that is, he wants to keep the pleasure of scratching and not have the pain. “Give me a mala so that while scratching I turn the beads, and the pain won’t come.” How will the pain not come? There is a cause for that pain, and no mantra will remove it. No mantra can erase your cause.
That’s why there are countless mantras and countless givers, and no end to your suffering. The mantra-givers also understand that you want to go on scratching, so they speak double. Mahesh Yogi says to his disciples: this mantra will bring you spiritual peace—and material prosperity too. He is saying: the pain will go and the itch will remain pleasurable. In the West, the basic reason for his impact is this promise: material prosperity too. Because you want wealth—and you want peace. If someone says, “In the race for wealth there will be no peace,” you say, “Then leave peace; let me race for wealth. When I have money, I’ll buy peace.” A mind set on money thinks everything can be bought—including peace.
Some things cannot be bought with money. And some things never come in the race for money. Some things cannot be bought with fame; and some things never come to the fame-seeker—because the desire itself opposes them.
A friend of mine is a state minister—again a minister now. When he is not a minister, he comes to me; when he is, he forgets me. When he is out, he comes and says, “Show me a way to peace.” I ask, “What is your unrest? Is it not that you are not a minister now?” What method can I give for that? And my method is such that you will never again be a minister. So I tell him, “Decide. If you really want peace, you will have to leave politics—because politics is an itch, and in it the scratching must continue. And politics is such an itch that even if you don’t scratch, others will scratch you. It’s hard. Even if you sit quietly, the agitators you have gathered who make you minister will not let you sit—they will scratch. It’s a leper colony of itches—people scratch themselves and each other. Step out.” He says, “You are right, and I want to leave”—when he is out of office he says so—“but right now it’s a bit difficult, there are entanglements.” Then I say, “Remain restless. Why complain?”
Our dishonesty is this: we want what unrest brings, and we also don’t want unrest. There is no way in this world. Be straightforward. If you want the taste of politics, unrest will be there—bear it gladly, see it as part of the bargain. But the peace of Buddha attracts you; the minister’s bungalow also attracts you. The mind gets filled with opposing desires. Then we want both at once. They won’t happen together. The one who wants to move in tune with nature must clearly understand why he is moving against it.
But we live so much in misery that we take misery to be life itself; we don’t even discover that joy exists. People come to me—since they have no experience of joy themselves, they cannot trust another’s joy either. A sister came two days ago and said, “It isn’t believable that in kirtan people become so joyous that they start dancing within two minutes. I just can’t believe it.”
Naturally—how will one believe who has never danced in joy? If someone can’t even dance, if no ripple of delight ever arises within, how will belief be possible? For sure, it will look like some contrived act, some performance—that these people are arranged in advance, they just begin to dance on cue. How could such a thing be! Someone who has not felt joy even once in forty or fifty years—how will he accept that someone can be filled with joy in two minutes?
What has minutes or years to do with joy? If you can’t be filled in two minutes, how will you be filled in two years? And if you can be filled in two years, what prevents you in two minutes? What relation does time have with joy? None at all. But if there has been no taste...
So I asked that sister, “Have you ever come and tried kirtan, tried dancing?” She said, no. I told her, “Come and dance. Perhaps it may happen to you too—then you will know.”
We are even afraid of joy. Because we live in a society of miserable people; in it, to be joyous makes you maladjusted—better to be sad. The crowd around us is unhappy; if you too are unhappy, you fit in perfectly. If you are happy, people start suspecting that maybe your mind is not right. Laughing like this? Being so cheerful? Where there is a crowd of the sick and sorrowful, your being sorrowful keeps you in harmony with them.
That’s why we hurry to make children serious. Children are buoyant, joyous—dancing, jumping, playing. We get very uneasy with their dancing and jumping. You are reading the newspaper and you say to your child, “Stop this noise, this dancing and jumping; I am reading!”
As if reading the newspaper is more important than dancing and playing. As if reading the newspaper is more valuable. Children are weak, so they can’t say to you, “Stop this newspaper and come dance!” By the time they grow strong, you will have spoiled them; they too will be reading the newspaper and scolding their children.
All human beings are born in tune with nature, and most die out of tune with it. We are born aligned, but society—the structure all around—twists us and makes us serious. And anyone who won’t be serious, we tell him even when he is grown, “You’re childish; drop this childishness, be serious.” We prefer gloomy faces.
If you visit a sadhu or a saint and find him laughing aloud, you won’t go again. You want grave, sick faces. If a holy man laughs, surely something is wrong! A bad man may laugh, but a good man cannot—the natural quality of a good man, you think, is to weep. Look at your saints’ faces: a crowd of mourners. The one who can cry the loudest is the greatest saint: sorrow drips from every pore, hostility toward the world oozes out. Flowers do not bloom around them.
Only then do you feel reassured. The more harried the renunciate looks, the more ascetic he appears to you—naked in the sun, starving, fasting, a bag of bones—that’s greatness in your eyes.
It’s strange: somewhere in you there is a perverse delight in seeing the sorrowful. Notice—if a saint lives in a hut, you can easily bow at his feet; if he lives in a palace, you hesitate. Why? If a saint appears healthy, you suspect something: he looks as healthy as a householder. He should be all bones—then you’d feel there is renunciation. If a saint seems to enjoy anything, you are troubled. So wherever there is enjoyment, you break your saint away from it. He mustn’t eat well. If a beautiful woman is seen near him, you become very uneasy. Why? Wherever your pleasures lie, from there your saint must be distant: he mustn’t eat well; a beautiful woman mustn’t be seen near him.
So saints had to create single-sex monastic societies. Among Catholics, men live in one monastery, women in another. Among Jains, when monks travel, they go one way; nuns go separately. You won’t even let them stay together. Do you have so little trust in your saint? Why so much fear?
A Jain nun cannot travel alone; five must go together. Certainly the framers of the Jain code understood well that where five women are together, four will be guards upon the fifth. Those four will not let anyone enjoy; they will keep watch. You have installed an inner, built-in arrangement. With five together, none will be allowed to be happy; they will keep an eye on each other to see that no one is.
And there is this fear that a man and a woman together may be happier. Because what is your experience of happiness? Just two things: food, and woman or man. These two pleasures. So cut the saint off from both. Then you feel satisfied: now it’s fine.
The more dead he is, the better. If he is alive, there is fear—because life brings fear. How can a saint laugh? To laugh means he still has a taste for the world, for being. Laughter means there is rasa—juice. He should be juiceless. All his laughter should have dried up.
We live in a sick society. Our notions are sick, and we impose those sick notions on each other.
Even a father doesn’t want his son to be happy, though he says so. He keeps saying, “Everything I do is for your happiness,” but he doesn’t truly want the son to be happy. This will sound hard. The father will think, “Never! I want my son to be happy.” You say it; you even believe you want it; but what you do will make him unhappy. You can only do to him what your father did to you. To think anew is very difficult. So every father does to his son what his father did to him. There’s a mold, and you impose it.
Think a little: are you happy? If you are not, then it’s certain your framework cannot make anyone happy. But nobody thinks this. A father doesn’t think, “I am unhappy—how will my son, who follows my beliefs, become happy?” If I am unhappy, it is settled that I should not hand him my mold—whatever else happens. At least in some other mold there may be a possibility he might turn out happy. In mine, there is none.
But we don’t think. You enjoy imposing the mold; whether the boy becomes happy or not isn’t the question. You enjoy shaping him to your image. Strange: you are unhappy and you are molding him to your pattern.
People even come to advise me. They say, “Do this—this would be best.” I ask them, “Have you at least followed your own advice, and has joy come into your life? Only then advise me.” They say, “No, nothing has come into our life; that’s why we’ve come to you.” I tell them, “Then keep your advice safe and don’t give it to anyone—because you yourself are not its example.”
I recall: Henry Ford went into a shop and picked up a book—How to Grow Rich. Ford was already rich, but he thought there might be something in it. The shopkeeper said, “Mr. Ford, you’ll be delighted—the author is here in the back. We’ll introduce you.”
That spoiled everything. The author came out. Henry Ford looked him up and down and said, “Take this book back; I don’t want it.” The shopkeeper was astonished: “What are you saying! This book has sold hundreds of thousands of copies.” Ford said, “It may have sold any number—but I’ve seen the author; now what will I do with the book?” The man’s coat was torn. He had written How to Grow Rich! Ford asked, “Did you come in your own car or by bus?” The author said, “By bus.” Ford said, “I’m Ford—if you ever need a car, come to me, I’ll give you a discount. But for now, don’t write these books. If your advice hasn’t yielded you anything, what will it yield anyone else?”
Life is complex. If you haven’t found joy, don’t hand your mold to your son. If you haven’t found joy, don’t offer advice to anyone. It’s poison. You yourself are the result of such advice imposed on you. Don’t repeat that violence on others by imposing your mold.
That’s why we don’t recognize what it means to be in tune with nature—because we grow up in contrariness. The whole human institution is contrary. So Lao Tzu says: be as much in accord with nature as you can. Why have we become contrary? Let’s understand a little. There is a whole scripture to it.
Every person is born in accord, because we are born out of nature. But we do not accept a person in his naturalness; we press ideals onto him. We tell people: become a Mahavira, become a Buddha—if nothing else, at least become a Vivekananda! But do you know that Mahaviras don’t come twice? In twenty-five hundred years one hasn’t come, although countless fathers have told their sons to become Mahavira. Has any person ever been born again on this earth—any Ram, any Krishna, any Buddha?
Everyone is born unique. And we hand him ideals—“become this!” Parents are in difficulty because they don’t know what has been born in their house and what it can become. Nobody knows. Even the one who has been born doesn’t yet know what he may become. Life is growth in the unknown. So parents’ unease is: what mold should they give? They hand the mold of those who became luminous before—“be like them.” That mold becomes a noose, and it is precisely this mold that drives one against nature.
We cast people into molds and make them stand. They are trapped people, surrounded by iron chains. It’s difficult to get out. Humanity will not be healthy until we accept that every person is unique, neither a copy of anyone nor can ever be. No two people are the same; they cannot be; they should not be. Even if you succeed in becoming Ram, you will be nothing but a ridiculous sight. Ram being Ram is one thing; you being Ram is mere imitation. You will be false. There is no way to be a true Ram. Why? Not because it’s hard to be Ram—Ram happened without trying, so it doesn’t seem that hard. Nor because it’s hard to be Buddha—Buddha happened without trying. The hardness lies elsewhere: each person is born at a point in history, time, and space so utterly unique that it cannot be repeated. That point comes once and never again. Therefore no one can be repeated. Hence all ideals are dangerous.
Then we don’t accept people as they are. We all carry egos within; the ego accepts only itself and wants to run everyone according to itself. The most dangerous and criminal people in this world are those who want to run the whole world their way—even if you call them saints; your naming changes nothing.
Whenever I try to make someone walk according to me, I am committing murder. My ego may be gratified that many walk my way, but I am erasing those people.
A truly religious master points you toward your own nature; he does not want you to walk according to him. He tells you: become according to yourself, and whatever you must renounce, whatever trouble you must bear to become that, bear it. All troubles are small if the taste of the joy that comes from being yourself is found. They have no price; they’re easy.
If you keep trying to become according to another, you will become more and more miserable. You will never get even a glimpse of joy.
A glimpse of joy means: a harmony has arisen between my nature and the nature of the vast; now both are dancing bound in one rhythm. My heart has become rhythmically attuned to the heart of the vast; my note and the note of the vast have merged; there is no gap.
So I must be according to myself. No one will help you in this. Everyone will hinder you—everyone wants you to be according to them. Parents want it; then teachers in school want it; then leaders, then saints, then popes and Shankaracharyas—all want, “Become according to me.” It’s as if many vultures have fallen upon you from all sides; they all want to make a meal of you. In all this you forget you were born only to become your own kind. One thing, however, is certain: you go on suffering. Recognize that suffering. If you are suffering, understand well: you are moving against nature. Suffering is ample proof.
And when you suffer, do you know what you do? You repeat the very mistake that is the cause of your suffering. You go to someone and ask, “Show me a path so I can walk it and my suffering will end.” Someone will show you a path—it will be his path. Maybe it ended his suffering; but it is his path. And another’s path cannot be your path. You will have to find your own path.
Become acquainted with others’ paths—that can help. Recognize others’ paths—that can support your search for your own. But if you walk another’s path blindly, you will never find yours. How many have followed Mahavira—and not a single Mahavira has happened; how many have followed Buddha—and not a single Buddha has happened. Why this colossal waste of energy? Because your path is not another’s, and another’s path is not yours. Souls are unique, and each has its own way.
So what to do? Understand your suffering; find the cause of your suffering. Try to step out of that cause. Don’t go looking for ready-made paths; don’t go asking others. What is the cause of your suffering?
Countless people come to me—the cause of their suffering is so obvious that I’m amazed they don’t see it. It seems they don’t want to see. And even if you show them a path, they carry the cause along on that path.
For most people the cause is ego. It’s so clear, yet unseen.
People come; I tell them, “It is the ego that is causing pain.” They say, “Show a method to drop it.” Suppose I give them a method; they will walk it, but they will carry the disease along. I say, “Take a jump into sannyas.” They even take the jump. Then the ego of the sannyasin grabs them. They think, “Those who haven’t taken sannyas are smaller; those who have are on some height.” They look at non-sannyasins the way one looks, with sympathy, at the afflicted: “All right, wander as long as you must wander—we have arrived.”
This was their disease; I had asked them to drop it by a leap. They brought it along. When ten or fifty sannyasins gather, the question of big and small begins; quarrels start; politics begins; factions are formed; they start cutting each other down. They have created an alternative little world. In a group of a hundred the whole politics of Delhi or Washington reappears. Who sits where; who does what; who gets how much prestige—the whole disease stands there.
This is the difficulty: we don’t want to see the disease. Or it is like scabies: you know scratching hurts, but there is pleasure in scratching too. If there were only pain, no one would scratch. Scabies is a double trouble: scratching is enjoyable. Where there is pleasure mixed with pain, it is hard to stop.
You enjoy the ego; it is an itch. Then it also hurts. When it hurts too much, you come with folded hands, “Show me a way.” When the skin is torn and bleeding, you cry, “Help!” But in a little while the skin heals, the blood stops; then the creeping sensation arises again: “Scratch a little—what fun it is.”
Ego is a scabies. It is not pure pain; there is a taste mixed in it. That taste pursues you—wherever you go.
If you are suffering, know that the ego is there. If you are suffering, know you are going against nature. And there are two ways of going against nature. The body needs food. You can damage the body in two ways: eat so much that the body cannot bear it—suffering begins. That is against nature. Or don’t eat at all—fast—suffering begins.
So note: there are two ways to be against nature, and one way to be in tune. And the human mind finds it convenient to move from one contrariness to the other—because that too is an extreme. That’s why those who overeat often agree readily to fasting. In truth, one who eats rightly will never get into the stupidity of fasting. Why fast? One who eats only as much as the body needs—how will the question of fasting arise? Only if there has been excess will one swing to non-eating. And the one who overeats is immediately ready to undertake a fast.
Understand this: if you tell an overeater, “Eat less,” he’ll say, “That’s hard—better to not eat at all; that I can do.” If a man smokes, and you say, “From ten, smoke five,” he’ll say, “That’s hard—better to quit entirely; that I can do.” Why? Because he is habituated to excess—either all day, or not at all. Choosing between two extremes is easy; stopping in the middle is hard. Stopping in the middle means you are beginning to be in tune with nature. Nature is the middle, balance, samyam.
Remember, we have ruined the meaning of samyam. By “restraint” we mean the other extreme. If a man fasts, we call him very restrained. He is as unrestrained as the glutton. What is samyam? Balanced, in the middle; neither this side nor that; not leaning toward any excess—right in the center. Whoever abides in the middle is in restraint. And samyam is the formula for becoming aligned with nature. But your “restraint” is not restraint; it is just another name for lack of restraint—the other extreme.
There is ego, there is excess, and in the very things you want to drop there is also taste. You must recognize this. In every one of your sorrows there is your own hand—and a relish. You see only the pain; you don’t see the relish; that’s why you never get free. See the relish too. Only by seeing the relish will you get free of the pain. Tell the person with scabies who enjoys scratching: no matter how much you say it hurts, he agrees—it hurts, he has suffered it. First make him see: there is pleasure too! See it clearly. And if you want that pleasure, you will have to pay the price of pain. Then don’t ask to be saved from the pain.
People come and say, “Great restlessness!” I show them the cause. They say, “But that cause is hard to drop. Give us a method to remove the restlessness.” That’s why people fall for false tricks.
A man is mad after money. He says he won’t be at peace until he has millions. In this mad race his mind grows restless. He comes to me: “Great restlessness—give me a mantra, a mala, so I can be peaceful.” I ask, “Did you become restless because you weren’t turning a mala? Then by turning a mala you’ll be peaceful? What does your restlessness have to do with a rosary? Where does the rosary even touch it?” I tell him, “Your madness for wealth is your unrest.” He says, “But that’s hard to leave—give me some other method.”
He wants a method—that is, he wants to keep the pleasure of scratching and not have the pain. “Give me a mala so that while scratching I turn the beads, and the pain won’t come.” How will the pain not come? There is a cause for that pain, and no mantra will remove it. No mantra can erase your cause.
That’s why there are countless mantras and countless givers, and no end to your suffering. The mantra-givers also understand that you want to go on scratching, so they speak double. Mahesh Yogi says to his disciples: this mantra will bring you spiritual peace—and material prosperity too. He is saying: the pain will go and the itch will remain pleasurable. In the West, the basic reason for his impact is this promise: material prosperity too. Because you want wealth—and you want peace. If someone says, “In the race for wealth there will be no peace,” you say, “Then leave peace; let me race for wealth. When I have money, I’ll buy peace.” A mind set on money thinks everything can be bought—including peace.
Some things cannot be bought with money. And some things never come in the race for money. Some things cannot be bought with fame; and some things never come to the fame-seeker—because the desire itself opposes them.
A friend of mine is a state minister—again a minister now. When he is not a minister, he comes to me; when he is, he forgets me. When he is out, he comes and says, “Show me a way to peace.” I ask, “What is your unrest? Is it not that you are not a minister now?” What method can I give for that? And my method is such that you will never again be a minister. So I tell him, “Decide. If you really want peace, you will have to leave politics—because politics is an itch, and in it the scratching must continue. And politics is such an itch that even if you don’t scratch, others will scratch you. It’s hard. Even if you sit quietly, the agitators you have gathered who make you minister will not let you sit—they will scratch. It’s a leper colony of itches—people scratch themselves and each other. Step out.” He says, “You are right, and I want to leave”—when he is out of office he says so—“but right now it’s a bit difficult, there are entanglements.” Then I say, “Remain restless. Why complain?”
Our dishonesty is this: we want what unrest brings, and we also don’t want unrest. There is no way in this world. Be straightforward. If you want the taste of politics, unrest will be there—bear it gladly, see it as part of the bargain. But the peace of Buddha attracts you; the minister’s bungalow also attracts you. The mind gets filled with opposing desires. Then we want both at once. They won’t happen together. The one who wants to move in tune with nature must clearly understand why he is moving against it.
A friend has asked, Osho, if we begin to live in tune with nature, what will happen to society?
Is society standing, sustained, because of you? Needlessly, everyone thinks he is the one holding this world together. It wasn’t only Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru people asked, “What will happen after you?”—you too keep wondering in your mind, “What will happen after me?” Nothing at all will happen; people will be perfectly fine. No one is going to suffer anywhere. Many are ready to take your place—and would be happy if it were vacated sooner.
If you become attuned to nature, what will happen to society?
What will happen to society! At the very least, one fragment of society will become good—so society will become a little better. No, you are not worried about society. You don’t even know what your question means. In truth you are asking: if I start living in tune with nature, then from that sick society with which I have ties—and in which I am presently planted—I will be uprooted. The question is not, “What will happen to society?” The question is, “What will happen to you?”
You will experience being uprooted. If you are not running among the runners, you will be pushed to the roadside. The runners will run with great enjoyment; there will be a bit more space. Your spot will be freed up; they will have no problem. You are the one who gets into difficulty. You feel, I will be removed. If I stand still and don’t run, people will shove me to the side: Get out of the way! If you won’t run, don’t come in the middle! Let those who are running run. From this comes a hurt in the mind—that I will be pushed off the road. The very juice seems to be on that road, that somewhere ahead a rainbow of fame is visible, and I will clutch it in my fist. People keep running. It seems the whole world is running; if we don’t run, what if everyone gets bliss and we are left out—what then?
Look at the faces of the runners. None of them is going to find bliss. They haven’t found it; there is no hope of finding it. They go on running because the rest of the crowd is running. And to stand still in the midst of this is difficult; whoever stands still becomes “maladjusted.”
So the difficulty is not what will happen to society. Your difficulty is: what will happen to you? Then decide for yourself. What is happening to you right now? In which heaven are you living at present? A curious thing: man never looks at what he is right now. And what will you lose? If you had something, it could be lost. You have nothing at all. You are needlessly like that naked man who stays awake the whole night lest someone steal his clothes. He has no clothes at all, yet he is afraid of the thief that someone might steal...
What do you have that could be lost? And whatever you do have is bound to be lost. You will not be able to save it, because whatever you have is external. A house, money—all that will be lost. Death will snatch it away. It is already as good as lost. What do you have within that will remain with you even in death?
One touchstone to keep in mind is: what will remain with me at the time of death? The friend who has asked says that in the pyramids they placed jewels, bread, and food beside the mummies; that will not go with them! What have you gathered around yourself? Will it go with you? Never mind that it won’t go with the dead—will it go with you? What have you accumulated around yourself?
I am not telling you to renounce it; I am only saying: understand that it is not going to go with you. Also search for that which can go along. And if it so happens that by dropping some of what cannot go with you, you can attain what does, then it is a bargain well made—not a sacrifice.
But fears are very strange. And you don’t even know whether what you are doing is being done by you, or others are making you do it. Your neighbor buys a car. Until yesterday you had no thought of buying one. Now the neighbor has bought it, so you must have it too. Why? Perhaps there was no need—otherwise you would have thought of it yesterday as well. But the neighbor brought one home; now your ego is in a contest with his. And it may be that he got into this tangle after seeing someone’s car at his office. Now you will get this car. For it you may lose your peace, your health, your sleep, your love—you may lose everything. This car is a must. And what will you get by getting it?
What you have lost will be hard to regain. And what you have gained is nothing. A swagger before the neighbor! But the neighbor is going to vanish, and so are you. These cars will be left standing, and you will be gone. And what you lost for their sake will become harder and harder to reclaim.
The great wonder with man is just this: he does not even know clearly whether what he is doing, he is doing himself, or others are making him do it. The crowd all around is making you do things. The clothes you wear—someone has put them on you. The house you live in—someone has settled you in it. The language you speak—someone has taught you. You are entirely borrowed. This borrowed personality is not your soul.
Lao Tzu’s whole purpose in being in accord with nature is just this: that you seek your own soul, your own nature. Get concerned with that which is truly yours.
If you become attuned to nature, what will happen to society?
What will happen to society! At the very least, one fragment of society will become good—so society will become a little better. No, you are not worried about society. You don’t even know what your question means. In truth you are asking: if I start living in tune with nature, then from that sick society with which I have ties—and in which I am presently planted—I will be uprooted. The question is not, “What will happen to society?” The question is, “What will happen to you?”
You will experience being uprooted. If you are not running among the runners, you will be pushed to the roadside. The runners will run with great enjoyment; there will be a bit more space. Your spot will be freed up; they will have no problem. You are the one who gets into difficulty. You feel, I will be removed. If I stand still and don’t run, people will shove me to the side: Get out of the way! If you won’t run, don’t come in the middle! Let those who are running run. From this comes a hurt in the mind—that I will be pushed off the road. The very juice seems to be on that road, that somewhere ahead a rainbow of fame is visible, and I will clutch it in my fist. People keep running. It seems the whole world is running; if we don’t run, what if everyone gets bliss and we are left out—what then?
Look at the faces of the runners. None of them is going to find bliss. They haven’t found it; there is no hope of finding it. They go on running because the rest of the crowd is running. And to stand still in the midst of this is difficult; whoever stands still becomes “maladjusted.”
So the difficulty is not what will happen to society. Your difficulty is: what will happen to you? Then decide for yourself. What is happening to you right now? In which heaven are you living at present? A curious thing: man never looks at what he is right now. And what will you lose? If you had something, it could be lost. You have nothing at all. You are needlessly like that naked man who stays awake the whole night lest someone steal his clothes. He has no clothes at all, yet he is afraid of the thief that someone might steal...
What do you have that could be lost? And whatever you do have is bound to be lost. You will not be able to save it, because whatever you have is external. A house, money—all that will be lost. Death will snatch it away. It is already as good as lost. What do you have within that will remain with you even in death?
One touchstone to keep in mind is: what will remain with me at the time of death? The friend who has asked says that in the pyramids they placed jewels, bread, and food beside the mummies; that will not go with them! What have you gathered around yourself? Will it go with you? Never mind that it won’t go with the dead—will it go with you? What have you accumulated around yourself?
I am not telling you to renounce it; I am only saying: understand that it is not going to go with you. Also search for that which can go along. And if it so happens that by dropping some of what cannot go with you, you can attain what does, then it is a bargain well made—not a sacrifice.
But fears are very strange. And you don’t even know whether what you are doing is being done by you, or others are making you do it. Your neighbor buys a car. Until yesterday you had no thought of buying one. Now the neighbor has bought it, so you must have it too. Why? Perhaps there was no need—otherwise you would have thought of it yesterday as well. But the neighbor brought one home; now your ego is in a contest with his. And it may be that he got into this tangle after seeing someone’s car at his office. Now you will get this car. For it you may lose your peace, your health, your sleep, your love—you may lose everything. This car is a must. And what will you get by getting it?
What you have lost will be hard to regain. And what you have gained is nothing. A swagger before the neighbor! But the neighbor is going to vanish, and so are you. These cars will be left standing, and you will be gone. And what you lost for their sake will become harder and harder to reclaim.
The great wonder with man is just this: he does not even know clearly whether what he is doing, he is doing himself, or others are making him do it. The crowd all around is making you do things. The clothes you wear—someone has put them on you. The house you live in—someone has settled you in it. The language you speak—someone has taught you. You are entirely borrowed. This borrowed personality is not your soul.
Lao Tzu’s whole purpose in being in accord with nature is just this: that you seek your own soul, your own nature. Get concerned with that which is truly yours.
A friend has asked: Osho, Lao Tzu says we should be in harmony with nature; won’t we then become like animals?
What are you right now? Are you not like animals already? What is there in you that is different from an animal? Anger is the same, attachment the same, hatred the same, lust the same, greed the same. What is there that is different?
Yes, there is one thing: animals don’t have cars, bungalows, safes, bank balances. You have more of those. But if you notice that animals sleep more deeply than you, seem happier, their life looks lighter, then these cars and houses begin to look like an expensive bargain. At least animals can sleep. Granted, they don’t have beds like you—none at all. But what use is the bed if, with the bed, sleep is lost? Animals sleep under the open sky. You have a house with stone walls. But what use is that house if inside it your very being trembles with fear? The animal sleeps peacefully even beneath the open sky. The freshness you see in its eyes in the morning is not there in yours.
What do you have that makes you fear that you might become an animal? You already are. And remember, only a human being can be in tune with nature; an animal cannot—because an animal has no way of being out of tune. Only man can come into harmony with nature. The animal is in harmony—unconsciously. There is no dignity in that, no attainment.
Understand it like this: one man is a beggar. And then there is a Buddha, born in a king’s house, who becomes a beggar. Both are asking alms on the road. The two are not the same kind of beggar. The beggarhood of a Buddha has a different flavor. The beggar’s misery is Buddha’s bliss. Both stand with a begging bowl. But Buddha is an emperor among beggars. Buddha’s beggarhood is voluntary, chosen. It is the outcome of his will, his own resolve. Buddha renounced wealth; his being a beggar is a stage after being an emperor. That other beggar has not renounced wealth; he asked for wealth but did not receive it. He is in lack. He stands in the stage before emperorship. He, the beggar, wants to be an emperor; Buddha was an emperor and is no longer. In Buddha’s beggarhood there is a richness. The other’s beggarhood is merely beggarhood—only emptiness. Within Buddha there is a fullness. The beggar cannot attain Buddha’s dignity.
Animals are with nature; they have never learned to be against it. They are like the beggar. Man has learned how to be against; he is like the Buddha. Now, if he becomes in tune, the secret he attains cannot be attained by animals. Animals are merged in the Divine, but unconsciously. Man has moved away from the Divine, but consciously. If man consciously merges into the Divine, he becomes the Divine himself.
Behind man is the animal; ahead is the Divine; in between stands man. Therefore man is in trouble.
There are two ways to his peace. Either he falls completely and becomes an animal. Becoming an animal means becoming unconscious. That is why when the mind is made unconscious by alcohol, you also seem very happy. When the drinking bout begins and five or ten friends drink, after a while civilization is discarded. Look at their eyes: slowly, a burden drops from their faces and eyes. A thrill and movement comes into their hands and feet; vigor enters their speech. They begin to speak from the heart, to speak loudly. They can dance and sing.
But now they are not in their senses. What a joke! When they were in their senses they could not dance; now that they are not, they can. This is becoming like animals—falling back down. Unconsciousness means falling downward; consciousness does not mean falling back, it means rising upward.
Therefore, in a saint’s eyes you will also see an animal-like simplicity, the same innocence. But the saint is not an animal. The saint has become as simple as an animal, but consciously. The drunkard is unconscious. Someone takes LSD, someone marijuana; a certain innocence, simplicity appears in his eyes too. But that is the animal’s innocence, animal simplicity. He has become unconscious; he has fallen; he has renounced his humanity.
Humanity can be renounced in two ways: by falling back, and by going ahead. Falling back is animality. Lao Tzu is not telling you to fall back.
Lao Tzu is telling you to go forward. He is saying: come into harmony with nature consciously. Consciously become quiet, become silent. Consciously drop all distortion, all uproar, all conflict. Consciously bid farewell to the ego. Consciously do not sow the seeds of strife. Do not clutch dualities; become free of duality—in awareness, in wakefulness.
So certainly, Lao Tzu will look just like an animal. Seat Lao Tzu beside a cow and it will be hard to tell the difference in their eyes—just as tranquil. But the cow does not know what Lao Tzu knows. Lao Tzu is aware now; he is drinking the very nectar of dissolving into nature.
The friend who has asked whether becoming one with nature might make a person animal-like—please note: a person can become like an animal; the way is to be unconscious. The more unconscious a person is, the more animal-like he becomes. Therefore, whatever you do in unconsciousness is animal-like. And whatever you cannot do in awareness, do not do it; because in those moments you become an animal. And those actions you can do only in unconsciousness—try to do them in awareness, and you will find you simply cannot do them.
You feel anger toward someone; when you get angry, you become unconscious. Only in unconsciousness can you do it. Your glands release poison into the blood; you don’t drink alcohol from the outside—you drink it from within. Now it can even be tested how much “alcohol” your anger has pumped into your blood.
You have glands that store poison for use—because anger cannot happen without unconsciousness. When the moment of anger comes, your face flushes red, your eyes fill with bloodshot heat, your hands and feet tense, your teeth clench—the blood is flooded with poison. Even now your poison can be measured—how much of it is inside you. Under the influence of this poison you might throttle someone’s neck, crack open someone’s skull.
A short while later, when the poison is spent and the energy has drained out through anger, then you repent and say: How did I do that? I never wanted to do such a thing! How did this happen through me? Then you think, it feels as if some spirit possessed me.
No one possessed you; you became unconscious, and you were drowned in the secretions of poison your glands were releasing. You feel, “I didn’t do it!” And in one sense that seems right; because you were not there—you were unconscious.
Try to be angry consciously, filled with total awareness, and you will find you cannot be angry. What cannot be done consciously—know that to be sin. And what can be done only consciously—know that to be virtue. There is no other definition of sin and virtue. That which you can do only in awareness is virtue—what cannot happen in unconsciousness.
Now comes the real twist. This means that even if you give in charity but do it in unconsciousness, then it is sin. Have you ever given charity consciously? It is difficult. When do you give? When you become unconscious because of someone. Four people come and say, “There is no donor in this village like you!” Your chest begins to swell. You used to think so yourself, but no one had said it till now. And they say that without you the work cannot happen; if your hand joins, success is assured. They are lifting you up, they are giving you poison. Now your glands will begin to release poison; you will give the donation—under that conversation, that influence, that praise, that vanity.
Later you will repent, just as you repent after anger. But then nothing can be done. You won’t sleep all night: “I gave a hundred thousand rupees—what moment did I get trapped in!” But when your name and photo appear in tomorrow’s paper, you will feel a little relief: “Never mind.” If a stone plaque is fixed on the building with your name on it, you will feel, “No loss, no cheating—fine.”
But if you give in charity in unawareness, if someone makes you do it—just as someone makes you angry—know that it is sin. And even anger, if you do it in awareness—no one makes you do it, you do it with full awareness—know that it is virtue. Because anger done consciously never harms anyone. It can only be for someone’s good. And charity done in unawareness harms you and harms the other as well.
Those who took the donation from you think, “We made a real fool of him.” They go back thinking exactly that; don’t imagine they think anything else. Leave them aside; even a beggar on the road who extracts four annas from you laughs behind your back. The one who cannot extract anything considers that the man is strong.
That’s why beggars catch you when there are four people around. If he caught you alone, you wouldn’t give him anything. Alone you would say, “Move on—what are you up to! At your age you can work!” But in front of four people he clings to your foot. Now it seems your honor is at stake before those four people over four annas. You are giving those four people the four annas, not the beggar. He has put you in a situation where he can make you do it.
Whatever a person does in unconsciousness—that is sin.
If you attune yourself to nature consciously, you do not become an animal—you are moving toward the divine.
There are two or three small questions more.
Yes, there is one thing: animals don’t have cars, bungalows, safes, bank balances. You have more of those. But if you notice that animals sleep more deeply than you, seem happier, their life looks lighter, then these cars and houses begin to look like an expensive bargain. At least animals can sleep. Granted, they don’t have beds like you—none at all. But what use is the bed if, with the bed, sleep is lost? Animals sleep under the open sky. You have a house with stone walls. But what use is that house if inside it your very being trembles with fear? The animal sleeps peacefully even beneath the open sky. The freshness you see in its eyes in the morning is not there in yours.
What do you have that makes you fear that you might become an animal? You already are. And remember, only a human being can be in tune with nature; an animal cannot—because an animal has no way of being out of tune. Only man can come into harmony with nature. The animal is in harmony—unconsciously. There is no dignity in that, no attainment.
Understand it like this: one man is a beggar. And then there is a Buddha, born in a king’s house, who becomes a beggar. Both are asking alms on the road. The two are not the same kind of beggar. The beggarhood of a Buddha has a different flavor. The beggar’s misery is Buddha’s bliss. Both stand with a begging bowl. But Buddha is an emperor among beggars. Buddha’s beggarhood is voluntary, chosen. It is the outcome of his will, his own resolve. Buddha renounced wealth; his being a beggar is a stage after being an emperor. That other beggar has not renounced wealth; he asked for wealth but did not receive it. He is in lack. He stands in the stage before emperorship. He, the beggar, wants to be an emperor; Buddha was an emperor and is no longer. In Buddha’s beggarhood there is a richness. The other’s beggarhood is merely beggarhood—only emptiness. Within Buddha there is a fullness. The beggar cannot attain Buddha’s dignity.
Animals are with nature; they have never learned to be against it. They are like the beggar. Man has learned how to be against; he is like the Buddha. Now, if he becomes in tune, the secret he attains cannot be attained by animals. Animals are merged in the Divine, but unconsciously. Man has moved away from the Divine, but consciously. If man consciously merges into the Divine, he becomes the Divine himself.
Behind man is the animal; ahead is the Divine; in between stands man. Therefore man is in trouble.
There are two ways to his peace. Either he falls completely and becomes an animal. Becoming an animal means becoming unconscious. That is why when the mind is made unconscious by alcohol, you also seem very happy. When the drinking bout begins and five or ten friends drink, after a while civilization is discarded. Look at their eyes: slowly, a burden drops from their faces and eyes. A thrill and movement comes into their hands and feet; vigor enters their speech. They begin to speak from the heart, to speak loudly. They can dance and sing.
But now they are not in their senses. What a joke! When they were in their senses they could not dance; now that they are not, they can. This is becoming like animals—falling back down. Unconsciousness means falling downward; consciousness does not mean falling back, it means rising upward.
Therefore, in a saint’s eyes you will also see an animal-like simplicity, the same innocence. But the saint is not an animal. The saint has become as simple as an animal, but consciously. The drunkard is unconscious. Someone takes LSD, someone marijuana; a certain innocence, simplicity appears in his eyes too. But that is the animal’s innocence, animal simplicity. He has become unconscious; he has fallen; he has renounced his humanity.
Humanity can be renounced in two ways: by falling back, and by going ahead. Falling back is animality. Lao Tzu is not telling you to fall back.
Lao Tzu is telling you to go forward. He is saying: come into harmony with nature consciously. Consciously become quiet, become silent. Consciously drop all distortion, all uproar, all conflict. Consciously bid farewell to the ego. Consciously do not sow the seeds of strife. Do not clutch dualities; become free of duality—in awareness, in wakefulness.
So certainly, Lao Tzu will look just like an animal. Seat Lao Tzu beside a cow and it will be hard to tell the difference in their eyes—just as tranquil. But the cow does not know what Lao Tzu knows. Lao Tzu is aware now; he is drinking the very nectar of dissolving into nature.
The friend who has asked whether becoming one with nature might make a person animal-like—please note: a person can become like an animal; the way is to be unconscious. The more unconscious a person is, the more animal-like he becomes. Therefore, whatever you do in unconsciousness is animal-like. And whatever you cannot do in awareness, do not do it; because in those moments you become an animal. And those actions you can do only in unconsciousness—try to do them in awareness, and you will find you simply cannot do them.
You feel anger toward someone; when you get angry, you become unconscious. Only in unconsciousness can you do it. Your glands release poison into the blood; you don’t drink alcohol from the outside—you drink it from within. Now it can even be tested how much “alcohol” your anger has pumped into your blood.
You have glands that store poison for use—because anger cannot happen without unconsciousness. When the moment of anger comes, your face flushes red, your eyes fill with bloodshot heat, your hands and feet tense, your teeth clench—the blood is flooded with poison. Even now your poison can be measured—how much of it is inside you. Under the influence of this poison you might throttle someone’s neck, crack open someone’s skull.
A short while later, when the poison is spent and the energy has drained out through anger, then you repent and say: How did I do that? I never wanted to do such a thing! How did this happen through me? Then you think, it feels as if some spirit possessed me.
No one possessed you; you became unconscious, and you were drowned in the secretions of poison your glands were releasing. You feel, “I didn’t do it!” And in one sense that seems right; because you were not there—you were unconscious.
Try to be angry consciously, filled with total awareness, and you will find you cannot be angry. What cannot be done consciously—know that to be sin. And what can be done only consciously—know that to be virtue. There is no other definition of sin and virtue. That which you can do only in awareness is virtue—what cannot happen in unconsciousness.
Now comes the real twist. This means that even if you give in charity but do it in unconsciousness, then it is sin. Have you ever given charity consciously? It is difficult. When do you give? When you become unconscious because of someone. Four people come and say, “There is no donor in this village like you!” Your chest begins to swell. You used to think so yourself, but no one had said it till now. And they say that without you the work cannot happen; if your hand joins, success is assured. They are lifting you up, they are giving you poison. Now your glands will begin to release poison; you will give the donation—under that conversation, that influence, that praise, that vanity.
Later you will repent, just as you repent after anger. But then nothing can be done. You won’t sleep all night: “I gave a hundred thousand rupees—what moment did I get trapped in!” But when your name and photo appear in tomorrow’s paper, you will feel a little relief: “Never mind.” If a stone plaque is fixed on the building with your name on it, you will feel, “No loss, no cheating—fine.”
But if you give in charity in unawareness, if someone makes you do it—just as someone makes you angry—know that it is sin. And even anger, if you do it in awareness—no one makes you do it, you do it with full awareness—know that it is virtue. Because anger done consciously never harms anyone. It can only be for someone’s good. And charity done in unawareness harms you and harms the other as well.
Those who took the donation from you think, “We made a real fool of him.” They go back thinking exactly that; don’t imagine they think anything else. Leave them aside; even a beggar on the road who extracts four annas from you laughs behind your back. The one who cannot extract anything considers that the man is strong.
That’s why beggars catch you when there are four people around. If he caught you alone, you wouldn’t give him anything. Alone you would say, “Move on—what are you up to! At your age you can work!” But in front of four people he clings to your foot. Now it seems your honor is at stake before those four people over four annas. You are giving those four people the four annas, not the beggar. He has put you in a situation where he can make you do it.
Whatever a person does in unconsciousness—that is sin.
If you attune yourself to nature consciously, you do not become an animal—you are moving toward the divine.
There are two or three small questions more.
A friend has asked: Osho, you said about a wayward son that one should let him pass through his experiences, and he will learn on his own. But even after experiencing, he still prefers the same thing—someone is asking about his wayward son—no matter how much suffering he has to endure, even if death itself should come, still he does the same. After stumbling again and again, he repeats it. What can be done? How to reform him?
You will not be able to reform him. If life cannot reform him, if even death cannot reform him, what will you be able to do? If what you say is true—that again and again, even after suffering, he does the same thing; even if death comes, he will still do the same thing, and he does not change—then take your hands off. You will not be able to reform him. You cannot be stronger than death. And one who does not learn from suffering—what will he learn from you? Do not call him a wayward son. You have found yourself a Jadabharata. Because those whom suffering does not reform, whom even death does not reform—these are great, arrived masters; they are in the ultimate state. Do not even try to reform such a one.
And why are you so eager to reform another? It is enough to reform yourself. But there is great pleasure in reforming others. Take care of yourself. And your son is likely to have more years left; you have fewer. Leave him and take care of yourself. Even if you succeed in reforming your son, that will not reform you. Reform yourself.
And it may well be that if you stop trying to reform your son, he may reform; because many fathers prevent their sons from changing precisely by trying to change them. Your insistence on reforming strengthens the other’s insistence on not reforming. Life is complex. When a father is determined—“I will reform him”—the son says, “All right, then let’s see who wins: you reform me, or I remain as I am.” Often sons get into a battle of wills with their fathers. And an egotistical father begets an egotistical son. This too is ego—to say, “I will reform him.” He is your son; remember, he will be of your type. You say, “I will reform him.” He says, “Fine—let’s see who reforms whom!” It may be that because of your reforming he is suffering so much and still not changing.
Kindly tell him, “Forgive me. Your life is yours; you know your business. We will now set about reforming ourselves.” Then he may come to his senses—because the very cause of stubbornness will be gone.
Remember, in this world no one can reform anyone. Reform is not such an easy matter. And those who have helped people change are precisely those who did not try to change anyone. Around them, change happened. If your son does not change by living near you, then understand that the matter is finished; nothing more can be done. If just by being with you someone changes, then know it is right. Change yourself so that a breeze arises around you—a climate your son, your daughter, your friends, your family can breathe.
But reformers become heavy. No one likes them. They turn nasty. And the whole household experiences, “How can we get rid of this nuisance?” You touch such subtle, delicate nerves in people that they cannot even tell you you’re wrong. And you become a burden. You become difficult to bear.
Human violence runs deep. And man commits violence in many ways. This too is violence! Why are you so frenzied about reforming? And if he does not want to change, you will achieve nothing. There is no way in this world to fix someone by force. There simply isn’t. Yes, an attempt to force-change can make him even more rigid. Many times, very good fathers end up producing very bad sons.
Mahatma Gandhi’s son took his revenge on Gandhi’s reforming. Now it is hard to find a better father than Mahatma Gandhi—very difficult indeed. Whatever “good father” can mean, Gandhi embodied it. Yet for Haridas he proved a bad father. What was the difficulty?
It is a great psychological matter—worth considering in this century, and for every father. Gandhi said, “Hindu and Muslim are the same to me.” But Haridas experienced that this was untrue. It was an idea; there was a difference. For Gandhi called the Gita his mother; he did not call the Quran his mother. And even when Gandhi said the Gita and the Quran are one, then what he approved in the Quran was only what matched the Gita; whatever the Quran said that the Gita did not, he simply left out—he did not mention it. So he searched the Quran for the Gita, and only then said, “It is fine; otherwise, no.”
Haridas became a Muslim; Haridas Gandhi became Abdullah Gandhi. Gandhi was deeply shocked. He told his friends, “I am very hurt.” When Haridas heard, he said, “What is there to be hurt about? Hindu and Muslim are one!”
Do you see? The father himself, unknowingly, gave the push. And Haridas said, “If both are one, then what is the problem? Whether Hindu or Muslim—Allah and Ishwar are your names for the same; all equal. Then whether Haridas Gandhi or Abdullah Gandhi—what pain is there?”
But Gandhi felt pain.
Gandhi spoke of freedom, yet he was very strict with his sons and imposed all kinds of dependencies. So whatever Gandhi forbade, Haridas did. He ate meat, he drank alcohol—he did it all. Because if there is freedom, then what does freedom mean? “Don’t do this, don’t do that, don’t do this”—and this is called freedom?
It became like what Henry Ford used to say. In the beginning Henry Ford had only black cars, no others. Yet he would tell his customers, “You can choose any color, provided it is black.” What does that mean? Freedom is complete—and from every side rules of bondage are tied: get up at such an hour, sleep at such an hour, pray at such an hour, and at such an hour… Eat this and don’t drink that. A net tightened from all sides—and freedom is complete! So Haridas did exactly what Gandhi had restrained.
If there were a court somewhere, Haridas would not be the only one to be arraigned. How could he be alone? Gandhi too would bear responsibility—the father as well.
Remember: if your son gets caught, you will not escape. Do at least this much—that only the son gets entangled and you are spared; even that is much. Withdraw your hands, and tell your son, “Do what you feel; do what seems right to you. If you feel it is right to suffer, then suffer. If your choice is to bear pain, you are free to bear it. We will feel pain seeing you in pain—but that is our trouble. What have you to do with it? That is our attachment; we will bear its fruit. It has nothing to do with you.”
If it pains me that my son drinks, that is my attachment—that I take him to be “my son,” and so I suffer. What is his fault in that? If my son goes to jail, I feel hurt—because my ego is wounded by my son going to jail. But that is my fault; what is his fault in it? Tell him, “We will be hurt; let us be hurt. That is our mistake, our attachment. But you are free.”
And set about changing yourself. The day you change, not only your son—other people’s sons may also come to you and change.
There are many more questions. When we meet again, we will take them up. Now, let us sing kirtan.
That is all for today.
And why are you so eager to reform another? It is enough to reform yourself. But there is great pleasure in reforming others. Take care of yourself. And your son is likely to have more years left; you have fewer. Leave him and take care of yourself. Even if you succeed in reforming your son, that will not reform you. Reform yourself.
And it may well be that if you stop trying to reform your son, he may reform; because many fathers prevent their sons from changing precisely by trying to change them. Your insistence on reforming strengthens the other’s insistence on not reforming. Life is complex. When a father is determined—“I will reform him”—the son says, “All right, then let’s see who wins: you reform me, or I remain as I am.” Often sons get into a battle of wills with their fathers. And an egotistical father begets an egotistical son. This too is ego—to say, “I will reform him.” He is your son; remember, he will be of your type. You say, “I will reform him.” He says, “Fine—let’s see who reforms whom!” It may be that because of your reforming he is suffering so much and still not changing.
Kindly tell him, “Forgive me. Your life is yours; you know your business. We will now set about reforming ourselves.” Then he may come to his senses—because the very cause of stubbornness will be gone.
Remember, in this world no one can reform anyone. Reform is not such an easy matter. And those who have helped people change are precisely those who did not try to change anyone. Around them, change happened. If your son does not change by living near you, then understand that the matter is finished; nothing more can be done. If just by being with you someone changes, then know it is right. Change yourself so that a breeze arises around you—a climate your son, your daughter, your friends, your family can breathe.
But reformers become heavy. No one likes them. They turn nasty. And the whole household experiences, “How can we get rid of this nuisance?” You touch such subtle, delicate nerves in people that they cannot even tell you you’re wrong. And you become a burden. You become difficult to bear.
Human violence runs deep. And man commits violence in many ways. This too is violence! Why are you so frenzied about reforming? And if he does not want to change, you will achieve nothing. There is no way in this world to fix someone by force. There simply isn’t. Yes, an attempt to force-change can make him even more rigid. Many times, very good fathers end up producing very bad sons.
Mahatma Gandhi’s son took his revenge on Gandhi’s reforming. Now it is hard to find a better father than Mahatma Gandhi—very difficult indeed. Whatever “good father” can mean, Gandhi embodied it. Yet for Haridas he proved a bad father. What was the difficulty?
It is a great psychological matter—worth considering in this century, and for every father. Gandhi said, “Hindu and Muslim are the same to me.” But Haridas experienced that this was untrue. It was an idea; there was a difference. For Gandhi called the Gita his mother; he did not call the Quran his mother. And even when Gandhi said the Gita and the Quran are one, then what he approved in the Quran was only what matched the Gita; whatever the Quran said that the Gita did not, he simply left out—he did not mention it. So he searched the Quran for the Gita, and only then said, “It is fine; otherwise, no.”
Haridas became a Muslim; Haridas Gandhi became Abdullah Gandhi. Gandhi was deeply shocked. He told his friends, “I am very hurt.” When Haridas heard, he said, “What is there to be hurt about? Hindu and Muslim are one!”
Do you see? The father himself, unknowingly, gave the push. And Haridas said, “If both are one, then what is the problem? Whether Hindu or Muslim—Allah and Ishwar are your names for the same; all equal. Then whether Haridas Gandhi or Abdullah Gandhi—what pain is there?”
But Gandhi felt pain.
Gandhi spoke of freedom, yet he was very strict with his sons and imposed all kinds of dependencies. So whatever Gandhi forbade, Haridas did. He ate meat, he drank alcohol—he did it all. Because if there is freedom, then what does freedom mean? “Don’t do this, don’t do that, don’t do this”—and this is called freedom?
It became like what Henry Ford used to say. In the beginning Henry Ford had only black cars, no others. Yet he would tell his customers, “You can choose any color, provided it is black.” What does that mean? Freedom is complete—and from every side rules of bondage are tied: get up at such an hour, sleep at such an hour, pray at such an hour, and at such an hour… Eat this and don’t drink that. A net tightened from all sides—and freedom is complete! So Haridas did exactly what Gandhi had restrained.
If there were a court somewhere, Haridas would not be the only one to be arraigned. How could he be alone? Gandhi too would bear responsibility—the father as well.
Remember: if your son gets caught, you will not escape. Do at least this much—that only the son gets entangled and you are spared; even that is much. Withdraw your hands, and tell your son, “Do what you feel; do what seems right to you. If you feel it is right to suffer, then suffer. If your choice is to bear pain, you are free to bear it. We will feel pain seeing you in pain—but that is our trouble. What have you to do with it? That is our attachment; we will bear its fruit. It has nothing to do with you.”
If it pains me that my son drinks, that is my attachment—that I take him to be “my son,” and so I suffer. What is his fault in that? If my son goes to jail, I feel hurt—because my ego is wounded by my son going to jail. But that is my fault; what is his fault in it? Tell him, “We will be hurt; let us be hurt. That is our mistake, our attachment. But you are free.”
And set about changing yourself. The day you change, not only your son—other people’s sons may also come to you and change.
There are many more questions. When we meet again, we will take them up. Now, let us sing kirtan.
That is all for today.