Utsav Amar Jati Anand Amar Gotar #9

I want to shatter that entire logic. I want religion to fall in love with the earth. The body is not against the soul; the body is the temple of the soul. Give it respect, give it a welcome; because in the temple of the body, God is enthroned.
And the earth is the ground of life. The roots of life go deep into the earth, just as the roots of trees go deep. And the greatest flowers that have blossomed—Buddha, Mahavira, Krishna, Christ, Mohammed—the fragrance in them has risen from the depths of the earth. It is the fragrance of this very world; there is no other world. This is the only existence; there is no second existence.
The second existence was invented by pundits and priests. And why—it must be understood. Here, in this world, they could not make man happy. Here, they could not give man’s life dignity and grandeur. Here, they could not give his life meaning and poetry. So there was only one way: to praise some morning of the future so that this dark night could be endured. Give man the ideology of an afterlife.
And the dead do not return to tell what happened; so the pundit, the priest was safe. The dead do not come back; they bring no news. And his trade depends on what is supposed to be after death. Politicians joined this conspiracy too, for it was in their interest. Somehow give man consolation. However false the consolations, let them soothe him. For when man is satisfied, he becomes void of revolution. Where consolation is, the fire of revolution goes out. No ember remains in the soul; only ash remains.
That is why this country, which for the longest time has been the most “religious,” is the most extinguished country. Its soul is nothing but ash. The most dead of countries. Why? For centuries the pundit and the politician together have been feeding poison to man.
My effort is that this conspiracy break, this night break, this spell of darkness break. The morning has to be sought here—on this very earth, in this very life! And if there is a life after this, one who can find bliss in this life will be able to find it there too. Because to the one who has learned the art of finding bliss, even if you throw him into hell, he will discover bliss there as well. And one who has not learned this art—what will he do even if he reaches heaven?
If your so-called saints were to reach heaven, what would they do there? Even heaven would give them only sorrow. All their lives they have practiced sorrow. Those who stood in the sun and melted and tormented their bodies—will they sit beneath wish-fulfilling trees? Will habits ingrained for lifetimes allow them to sit under the kalpavriksha? No; there too they will prepare beds of thorns. Those who never sang, never danced, never lifted an ektara—do you think that in heaven they will suddenly become players of the vina? Will they start playing the flute? Will they dissolve into dance? Will the rasa be born?
Then you do not understand the arithmetic of the human mind.
Make a poor man rich and still he does not become rich—he remains poor. His way of thinking, understanding, living remains that of the poor. That is why among the wealthy you find so many misers. What does “miser” mean? It means: outwardly there is wealth, but within there is the habit of poverty. There is wealth, but he closes his fist over it.
And when you close your fist over wealth, wealth dies. Wealth is alive only if it circulates. That is why English has the right word—currency: that which runs, flows, remains a current. A coin is a coin only if it moves; once a fist closes over it, it becomes soil.
A miser had buried gold bricks in his garden. Gold bricks are not meant to be buried, but how can the habits of poverty let go? Even with gold bricks, he lived like a pauper. And people cover their poverty with fine, noble arguments. He would say, “I am a simple man. I love simplicity.”
If you love simplicity, then let go of the gold bricks. Your simplicity does not let you leave the gold bricks; and in the name of simplicity you cannot even enjoy them.
His only “enjoyment” was that every morning he would dig up the spot, look at his bricks, feel happy, then cover them again. A neighbor noticed this daily and sensed something. One night he entered the garden, dug, found the gold bricks, took them, and put ordinary clay bricks in their place.
The next day, when the miser dug, the gold bricks were gone; there were clay bricks. He began shouting, “Alas, I’m ruined! Save me!” The neighbors gathered; the very neighbor who had taken the gold came too. People began to console him, “Don’t panic.” That neighbor said, “What difference does it make to you? Every morning just dig and look at these bricks. Whether the bricks are gold or clay, what difference does it make? Your routine is only to dig, look, and cover. Clay bricks will serve just as well. You were not going to use the gold anyway.”
In this world, people on getting wealth do not become wealthy; they become stingy, miserly; the grip of poverty is deep. And they dress poverty in beautiful robes—simplicity! plainness!
And if such people were to reach heaven somehow—even by mistake—the ascetics, monks, mahatmas who here practiced only sorrow: they cannot truly reach; for them the gates of heaven must be surely closed. And if they have been reaching, then by now so many ascetics and gloomy, despairing people would have gathered there that heaven would be worse than hell. What would they do there?
Umar Khayyam is right: you have never drunk wine here. In heaven even if streams of wine flow, what use is it? Will you be able to drink? Drinking too requires practice.
Umar Khayyam is a Sufi fakir, an accomplished, enlightened being. People have thoroughly misunderstood Umar Khayyam. The misunderstanding grew with the English translation. When Fitzgerald translated Umar Khayyam’s Rubaiyat into English, he took the words literally—wine as wine.
Sufi fakirs mean by wine: the love of God. Drink it as much as you can. Bliss, ecstasy, intoxication! Umar Khayyam is a realized Sufi. He did not write in favor of wine pressed from grapes; he wrote in favor of the wine distilled in the soul. These quatrains point to an inner bliss and intoxication. And he has given very sweet arguments. He says: Listen, O clerics! Listen, O renouncers and ascetics! If you have not practiced drinking wine here, what will you do in heaven where rivers of wine flow? You will sit on the banks and weep. We will drink—because our practice here will serve us there.
Understand the meaning! He who is blissful here will be blissful in heaven too. Wherever he is, he will be blissful. This life is a school, a training.
My message is: bliss!
My message is: celebration!

Take up the flute, let the earth resound, my lovely dark Shyam.
Let the songs resound, let measureless pride fall—
Like stars, the dance has formed a wedding procession.
Let things be destroyed, friend! A hundred tasks of dissolution—
Take up the flute, let the earth resound, my lovely dark Shyam.

I have only one prayer—and yours should be the same—
Take up the flute, let the earth resound, my lovely dark Shyam.

Say to the divine: lift the flute and play! But the divine’s flute will play only when you play the flute. Perhaps his flute is already playing, but your ears are deaf. Perhaps his bliss is already showering, but the doors of your heart are closed.
Do not condemn the mud of this world merely by calling it mud; lotuses are hidden in this mud. And when a lotus blooms in this mud, do not forget the mud. In praising the lotus, do not forget the mud! Because the lotus is the very expression of the mud.

After many days,
the beautiful, tender face of the sky
peeks out
from between the clouds!
After many days
a bud below
has blossomed again—
rising out of the mire!

Between the mud and the lotus, no relationship seems apparent. Yet there is a relationship. The mud is the mother; the mud is the womb in which the lotus ripens and appears.
This earth—grant that it is mud; but do not forget the other truth: in it lies the possibility of the lotus’s revelation. Your saints and seers condemn it calling it mud. Their condemnation has become so intense that you have forgotten a lotus is hidden here.
I want to remind you of the lotus. Do not fall into condemning the mud; seek the lotus. And the day you find the lotus in the mud, will you not thank the mud that day? Will you not thank the body that day? Will you not be filled with gratitude toward this earthly world? In the very world where God can be experienced—can that world be condemned?
I want to fill you with love for the world. I want the age-old conditioning of denial lodged in your hearts to be wiped out, erased. They alone are stopping you from seeing and knowing the divine. Dance, and you will find him. In dance he comes nearer and nearer. Hum, sing—and he too will hum within you, sing within you.

Strike the notes of honeyed music,
tune the instrument of words!
Let the knots of the heart open again—
let the movement, rhythm, and beat of words fall in streams,
in a moment melt into pure awareness!
Simple play and laughter,
light the lamp!
Strike the notes of honeyed music,
tune the instrument of words!

Unfurl your boat beyond the horizon,
close the tired eyelids of imagination,
pour fragrance of song each passing moment,
and in the sweet sound,
wash your lips anew!
Strike the notes of honeyed music,
tune the instrument of words!

I teach song. I teach music. My message is one: bliss—celebration, festivity. And celebration cannot be made into a doctrine; it can only be a way of living. Your life itself must speak it. If you say it with your lips, it becomes hollow and false. It has to be spoken with your very life-breaths. And where there is bliss, there is love; and where there is love, there is God.
I am building a temple of love. You are blessed; your hands are helping in the building of that temple. You are selecting its bricks. You are becoming its doors and gateways.
Long ago the temple of joy departed from the earth. Yes, once Krishna played the flute; then it must have been here. Then, in some unfortunate hour—out of despair—we handed our life over to the hands of impotent people. Our life fell into the hands of hollow pundits. They looped heavy scriptures around our necks so that even walking became difficult, let alone dancing. And they stuffed great doctrines down our throats so that the throat is choked—how can a song be sung?
I want to take away your scriptures, your doctrines, your sects. I want to make you weightless—so weightless that you can spread your wings and fly in the sky. I want to give you the sky. I do not want to make you Hindu, Muslim, Christian, Jain, Buddhist—I want to give you the whole sky! And only if you fly toward the sun will you know the secret of the Vedas, the grandeur of the Upanishads, the glory of the Quran, the mysteries of the Bible. Only then will you know Kabir, Nanak, Farid, and their wondrous realm.
But this knowing must be existential. Do not take my word for it. I do not want to create belief in you. I want to give you experience. I want to pour wine from my flagon into your cup. Clean your cup. Hold your cup out before me. Do not be afraid; do not be frightened of becoming intoxicated. Certainly, if you become ecstatic, people will call you mad. Because people have left the privilege of ecstasy only to the mad; they have not allowed anyone else to live in ecstasy. Do not worry. Even if people think you mad, what is lost? The real question is what God thinks. The real answer has to be given there; what have we to do with people? If people consider you mad, so be it—good!
I have heard: A Sufi fakir, Bayazid, was asked by a disciple—one who himself had become accomplished, who had attained enlightenment. He said, “What shall I do? I am in great trouble. Since people got wind that I have become enlightened, a huge crowd gathers. I do not get a single moment to sit in peace. I cannot even sleep at night—they keep pressing my feet. All day they follow me. What shall I do?”
Bayazid said, “Do this: pretend to be mad. Start abusing, throw stones, hit people. In two days the crowd will disperse.”
He did just that, and in two days the crowd dispersed. The crowd has no eyes. They thought he was mad. He came and bowed at Bayazid’s feet and said, “Thank you! Otherwise they would have tormented me. Now nobody comes. In fact the situation is reversed. If I go toward anyone, he runs away. People say, ‘He has gone mad.’ But it is very good. Now even in the market I am alone, in solitude.”
If people think you mad, what harm? People in any case hardly consider anyone else wise. Here, each one thinks himself wise. Whether they say it or not, they consider others foolish. At most they will talk.
But live bliss, even if some price has to be paid. Be thought mad if you must. Live bliss! If a cross comes, let it come. For a blissful man, even if he is nailed to a cross, it becomes a throne. And if a miserable man sits on a throne, it remains a cross, never a throne.
My message is small: live with bliss! And live all the colors of life, all its notes. Do not deny anything. Whatever belongs to the divine is auspicious. Whatever he has given is meaningful. To deny any of it is to deny God himself—that is atheism.
And then a unique revolution occurs! When you accept everything and begin to live in bliss, the process of transformation starts within you. The inner chemistry changes—anger becomes compassion; kama becomes Rama, lust turns divine. Within you, thorns begin to blossom like flowers.

Yog Sudha, among the fundamental sutras of life there is one: here beggars get nothing; here emperors receive. Desire is beggary; desirelessness is to become an emperor. The more you crave, the more it will slip through your fingers. Life will become like mercury—scattered everywhere, impossible to gather.

Do not ask. Do not aspire, do not desire. Desire means the coming tomorrow. Desire means the future. Desire creates time, and time is the world.

Live this moment—in its authenticity, its density, its totality. And live intensely, with urgency! Life has been given—what is there to beg for now? What greater gift could there be? There are the moon and sun, trees, flowers, birds, people—such a beautiful existence. The impossible has happened. And you are alive! And within you is consciousness! You know that you are alive; that very knowing is consciousness, the proof of the soul. The experience of life—that I am alive, that I am—this is the evidence of soul. Soul means awareness of consciousness. “I am conscious”—that very knowing is soul. What more do you need? The soul is yours, and this whole sky, and all these moons and stars!

But we keep asking, we keep hanging our hopes on something. Your hopes will not be fulfilled. They will make you poorer day by day.

Sudha, you say: “I don’t know what my eyes keep searching for.”
Everyone’s eyes are searching for something. And that is why they are empty—nothing is found. Stop seeking, stop searching. Close your eyes. Sit within yourself. Settle within. In seeking the running continues. Do not run. To get wealth you must run, to get position you must run; but if you would attain the Divine, you must stop, not run.

You say: “In the heap of ashes there is neither flame nor spark.”
It is true. And what is that heap of ashes? It is the heap of your past desires. If you keep groping and searching in that…

Now change. Change your direction. Stop searching; start losing yourself. Close your eyes and dive within. There, the fire of life never goes out. There, the spark of life never turns to ash. That very spark is called the soul. If a connection is made with that spark, a ray of the Divine is joined. And if one ray is in your hand, the whole sun is in your hand; the sun is no longer far.

But you must go within. You are searching outside, as everyone else is searching outside. And outside there is nothing. Remember something delightful: the one who finds within, for him everything is also without—because for the one who has found within, the division of inner and outer falls. For him, everything is within. The moons and stars revolve within him. The sun rises within him. Flowers blossom within him. Birds sing within him. The vastness is contained within him. Whoever has known the self becomes one with the whole. For such a one, the distinction of inner and outer no longer remains. That distinction belongs to those who remain outside and who have not known themselves.

You say: “There is much in life, yet even after winning nothing was gained.”
No one ever gains anything by winning. Winning is the way to lose your way, not to gain. Winning becomes the staircase to defeat. The arithmetic of life is very puzzling, upside down. Here, lose—and you win. Here, strive to win—and you lose. Blessed be the defeated! Here the one who has lost, utterly lost, surrendered—his is the victory, the great victory! A victory that can never be snatched away.

That is why I define sannyas as surrender. Not resolve, but surrender. The only good use of resolve is to bring you to surrender. Gather your entire will for one task—surrender. Gather all determination and dissolve the ego. Become like a zero. Then it is victory upon victory.

Lao Tzu said: “No one can defeat me.”
Someone heard and was surprised, for Lao Tzu was no wrestler. He said, “Looking at your body, I think anyone could defeat you—and you say no one can defeat you! In this very village there are powerful wrestlers who would flatten you in a moment.”
Lao Tzu still said, “I tell you, no one can defeat me. Because before they throw me down, I will lie down myself. I will lie down of my own accord. How will you defeat me? I am already down—how will you defeat me? I have no desire to win—how will you defeat me? I do not want to win. I have understood the stupidity of winning. How will you defeat me?”

Hear this, ponder it, let it sink deep. If you yourself have yielded—before existence, before the Divine—who can defeat you? How?

But people want to win. The would-be winner is like one trying to swim upstream against a river’s current. The Ganges is flowing to the ocean and you are headed toward Gangotri. You will lose—certainly. Perhaps you will manage a few strokes, perhaps for a moment you will feel, “Now I am winning, now I am winning,” but your defeat is certain.

It was the rainy season and the village river was in flood. People came running and said to Mulla Nasruddin, “What are you doing sitting here? Your wife fell into the river! The flood is fierce; no one even dares. If you wish, jump and save her.”
Mulla ran at once, didn’t even take off his clothes, leapt into the river and began swimming upstream. A crowd had gathered and shouted, “Nasruddin, what are you doing? The current has carried your wife downstream!”
Nasruddin said, “Silence! Do I know my wife or do you? Any other woman might be carried downstream, but my wife always goes against the current. She must have gone upstream. I know her very well—her arithmetic and her logic. Don’t teach me. If my wife has fallen in, she will have flowed upward. Her head is screwed on the wrong way.”

But however hard you swim upstream, however much you try—how long can the effort last? Today or tomorrow your feet will slip. And this is the vast current of existence—and we are all fighting to win! One day we fall, badly. Even the greatest Alexanders fall.

So, Sudha, you too will fall. Drop the infatuation with victory, the desire to win.

A sannyasin is one who has declared that winning and such are children’s games. Now I have lost; I have lost to the Lord. Now let His will be fulfilled; I have no will. Wherever He takes me, I will go. Wherever He carries me, I will flow. Whichever bank He moors me at, I will be moored—that is the bank! And if He drowns me midstream, then midstream is the shore.

Then no one can defeat you. Then your victory is absolute, final.

But in our minds, somewhere, the desire to win remains—to get something, to become something. This desire to become is our disease. Some want to become wealthy—that is their disease. Some want high positions—that is their disease. Some want to be meditators, some want to be devotees—those are their diseases.

A religious person is one who has seen the futility of becoming and who says, “I am content with what I am. Just so—content. I do not want to become anything else.”

Mulla Nasruddin once told me that he too had a strong desire to become a sadhu. Someone told him there was a monk at Belur Math who lived without eating or drinking. He went with great reverence. Seeing him, he was very disappointed. He did not eat or drink, yes—but he was very attached to clothes. He had very beautiful clothes—pure white!
Then came news that in a certain village a naked sadhu had arrived. So he went there. He was truly a carefree saint. Nasruddin began serving him. The sadhu gave him the work of collecting bamboo splinters, straw, and reeds. “What for, master?” he asked. “We’ll build a hut, child!” the sadhu replied. Nasruddin ran away from there.
But his longing did not end. He had heard much of the northern mountains, so one day he reached Gangotri, where by chance he met a sadhu who did not live in a hut—he roamed naked in the open. He had no attachment to disciples either, but Nasruddin clung to him, though the sadhu never cared. One day the sadhu, for no reason, became pleased with him and said, “Child! Ask for whatever you want! But I will not make you a disciple!”
“Master, tell me—how are you so happy?” Nasruddin asked.
“Because I have no desire, child! I am absorbed every moment in the Lord’s service,” he said.
“Why do you remain absorbed in the Lord’s service?” Nasruddin asked.
“To attain the supreme state, child!” the sadhu said.
On hearing this, Nasruddin ran away even faster. The man seemed so dangerous that Nasruddin’s desire to become a sadhu died then and there.

Give the mind even a small opening to get something, to become something—and it immediately stands up; the ego starts constructing itself. Whether it is the wealth of this world or the other, it makes no difference.

Sudha, if I have any royal road to learn, any secret, any key by which all locks open—it is very simple: drop the race to become, drop the race to get. Rejoice in what you are. As you are, rejoice. This very moment! Do not set conditions like, “I will be happy when I have this much money, or this much position, or when I am a sage, or when I reach heaven; until I have the vision of God I will not be happy.” Then you will never be happy.

Be happy without conditions. Say, “I am happy as I am.” God will come seeking you. God too seeks the company of the happy. God also avoids the unhappy. Who doesn’t avoid the unhappy? There is a saying: Laugh, and the whole world laughs with you; weep, and you weep alone. Dance, and all existence dances with you; sit dejected, and you sit dejected alone.

God comes near those who are carefree, who are in joy, who are rapt in delight. But if you are to be rapt in delight, then drop the very talk of becoming—now! Just as you are!

Sudha, what is lacking in you? What is, is beautiful. As you are, you are beautiful. God has made you thus.

But people lay down strange conditions. They cannot dance and say the courtyard is crooked. If you can dance, what difference does a crooked courtyard make? One can dance even in a crooked courtyard. And if you do not know how to dance, what will a perfectly square courtyard do?

Mulla Nasruddin went to an eye doctor. His eyesight had begun to dim. The doctor said he would need glasses. The glasses were made; Mulla went to collect them. He asked the doctor, “Once the glasses are on my eyes, I will be able to read and write, right?”
“Certainly,” said the doctor. “That is why they were made. You will read and write perfectly.”
Mulla said, “That truly would be a miracle—because I don’t know how to read or write.”
If you don’t know how to read and write, will spectacles make you literate? Even if the courtyard were perfectly square, every corner a neat ninety degrees, what would that do if you don’t know how to dance? You may have the most beautiful veena, and not know how to play it! Even if I were to give you Krishna’s very flute, what would you do with it? Krishna’s consciousness is needed too. It is not the flute that produces Krishna’s song; it is Krishna’s very life-breath. The flute is the same—a hollow reed—like the one you have. The excellence is not in the flute; it is in the one who plays.

Sudha, you say: “Why does it keep slipping again and again?”
It slips in your very attempt to grasp it. Drop the grasping; learn to live with an open hand. No wish to get anything, no wish to hold anything. As you are, where you are—experience joy each moment right there. When the sun rises in the morning, bow brimming with delight—one more day given! When the sun sets in the evening, say farewell with joy—another wondrous day fulfilled! Live each moment like this—in gratitude, in grace. Then without clutching, everything comes into your hand, and without winning, there is victory.

Anand Jagtap, I do not believe in nations. The very notion of the nation is undesirable. I consider national borders to be a sin. I want to see this whole earth as one. India, Pakistan, China, Japan—these should go. How long will these ruins of the past keep riding on our chest? Man is one; and as long as we have fragmented the earth, man too will remain fragmented.

I have heard that in a school a geography teacher devised a trick. He broke a world map into many pieces and spread them on a table, then called the children and said, “Put these pieces together and make the world map again!” Very difficult: such a big world, such tiny pieces—hard to fit. You might place Constantinople where Timbuktu should be; Timbuktu next to Peking; Peking in America—very difficult!

But there must have been one intelligent child, a sharp one. He turned the pieces over and looked at the backside—and found the key. On the back was the picture of a man. He flipped all the pieces and set about assembling the man. When the man’s picture came together on one side, the world map fell into place on the other. The picture of the man was the key to assembling the world. That is how the teacher assembled it too; otherwise even for him it would be hard to remember—the world is big.

As long as your world is fragmented, man is fragmented. And as long as your man is fragmented, your world is fragmented. I have no trust in fragments; my reverence is for the whole.

You said that seeing my ashram you felt another realm.

You seem to be a thoughtful person. Anand Jagtap is the editor of a paper called Vivek Varta. Editors are not usually so understanding; journalists collect garbage. But you are a connoisseur. You have a portion of intelligence; that is why you could sense another world here.

Surely, what is happening here is almost impossible. To see it, you need sharp eyes—the eyes of a jeweler.

But a natural question arose in your mind: How meaningful is this in our country, India?

First of all, in the land of Buddhas, Krishnas, and Mahaviras—if it is not meaningful here, where would it be meaningful? If in Krishna’s land the celebration of bliss I am creating has no relevance, then where could it have? Where would a better context be found? It would be very difficult on some other soil, within some other cultural stream, to sing the song I wish to sing. If it cannot happen in the land of the Gita, where else will it happen?

We have produced many enlightened ones over the centuries. Even though they have not been able to transform our crowd yet—the issue is difficult; it is not their fault. The crowd does not want to change. If someone does not wish to wake up, awakening him is impossible. If someone wakes and still keeps his eyes shut, what can you do? But this country has priceless wealth. Not that it belongs only to this land; it belongs to all, to the whole world.

You ask: “In our India, how meaningful is this?”

You see India limited to the problems printed in the newspapers every day. For you, India ends with those daily problems—Hindu–Muslim riots in Aligarh, a strike somewhere, a police mutiny somewhere, firing somewhere. You take India to be the petty politicians and their tug-of-war in Delhi. You confine India to poverty and wretchedness.

Then you are not counting the people in samadhi; you are not counting India’s awakened ones. You are counting thorns and leaving out the flowers.

I count the flowers; I am not worried about the thorns. My vision is this: if you pay too much attention to the thorns, even the flowers turn into thorns; and if you water the flowers with attention, even the thorns turn into flowers. I am not a pessimist; I am supremely optimistic.

Poverty, wretchedness, India’s problems—all can disappear; only give India a right perspective to resolve them. Our problems are of our own making; therefore removing them is easy. Today there is such technological progress in the world that India has no need to remain poor. If we are poor, perhaps it is because we want to remain so; we are poor because our ways of thinking are foolish. We have the most beautiful land, the most beautiful sky. We are not short of talent either.

But we have forgotten to honor talent. So whenever a talented person is born here, he too has to leave India. We have become adept at honoring the dull-witted. We have invented such criteria that only the dull-witted can qualify.

Someone gets up at five in the morning—our respect! Someone does not smoke—our respect! Someone eats only greens—our respect! Someone wears khadi—our respect! Someone performs daily worship—our respect!

Will talent arise out of this? Does getting up at five produce genius? Does not smoking produce genius? Does wearing khadi produce genius?

In fact, only a simpleton can spin a charkha three or four hours a day. There are more important things to do in life. If by spinning a charkha three or four hours a day you manage to produce a year’s worth of clothes, you think yourself intelligent? If a little intelligence was there, the charkha will drown it. You keep turning the wheel for hours—whirr, whirr, whirr—and you end up: dunce, dunce, dunce. Whatever little energy in the head was left, the charkha will drink it up.

But our criteria for respect are strange! Someone eats only one meal a day—our respect! We honor thoroughly uncreative things. Therefore, talent is born in India, but talent has to leave India. Talent is insulted here; it is honored in America, in England, in Germany. And if talent wants to come here from outside, we do not want to let it in.

Now I am creating an arrangement here to which scientists are eager to come, doctors are eager, professors, writers, poets, musicians... But the Government of India does not want to let them come. This is the first chance when we could attract Western talent here. But there is hardly any government as blind as India’s.

Learn to honor talent, and learn what talent is. Free yourself from the negative definitions of talent you have made. Enough talent arises in our own country, and talent can come from the whole world. In the minds of the whole world there is a regard for this land—not for the land as such, but because of the rare people born here. This country can again become the golden bird. There is no reason for it to remain poor, except you; you are the reason.

So the little world I am creating naturally seems out of context. People tell me they enter the ashram gate and it feels like another world; they step outside and it feels like a completely different world. Sannyasins who have once entered do not wish to go out; they do not even want to look beyond the gate. Outside, the whole situation is so pitiable, so sorrowful, so unseemly, so lamentable that those with even a little sensitivity would rather not look at it.

Many people from the West ask me: In this poor, miserable, suffering country, will people understand you? Will they be able to recognize you?

It is difficult. But because it is difficult, it is a challenge—and a challenge worth accepting. First let us create a small world, a living example: that man can live differently; that there can be another way of life; that with very little there can be great joy. Then, on the basis of that example, we will invite the whole country: Come and see. And what is possible here is possible anywhere. There is no reason for obstruction—except our mental background, our deeply set conditionings; they must be broken. That is exactly what I am at work upon.

Today, of course, my ashram does not at all fit the context of this country.

Just yesterday I received a book someone has written against me. In the preface he writes that he agrees with me ninety-nine percent. He agrees with me on every point except one: when I say that in sexual energy lies the possibility of samadhi, that the energy of sex one day becomes samadhi—on this one point he disagrees. Otherwise, he agrees with everything.

But reading his book I was amazed. He agrees with ninety-nine percent of what I say, yet he did not write a book in favor of those ninety-nine percent points. He disagrees with one percent, and for that he wrote a book.

See this negative mind! A bush in which roses are blooming everywhere, and there is one thorn; and you write a book about the thorn, and not about the roses. A book is far off—he never even wrote an article. An article is far off—he never even wrote me a letter. I had never heard his name; I learned it only when the book came into my hands. He wrote a whole book, got it printed at his own expense, and is distributing it. And he himself admits he has no opposition to ninety-nine percent of what I say.

Today, certainly, what I am saying is outside India’s accustomed frame. For centuries you have been taught to oppose sex; I am talking of transformation. For centuries you have been taught to condemn wealth; I say: use wealth, do not condemn it. Wealth has significance. Money is not everything, but neither can I say money is nothing. Wealth is a means, and a valuable means. If for thousands of years you have been taught that wealth is despicable, how will you create it? Who will create what is despicable? So if you have remained poor, who is responsible? And if today I say wealth can be created, honor wealth; it is a precious, useful instrument—much is possible through it. Not everything—I am not saying everything. You cannot buy love with money, but you can buy bread. And without bread, love is difficult.

Jesus’ famous saying is: Man cannot live by bread alone.

True. But it is incomplete. Half a sentence must be added: Man also cannot live without bread.

Money cannot buy love or God—true. But money creates the facility in which prayer can happen, meditation can happen. Money gives the opportunity to seek God. On an empty stomach, Gopala is not praised.

If today I say: honor money, it makes people uneasy, because I am opposing their entire tradition. They have been condemning wealth, and I say honor it. If I say: give comfort to the body, they are shocked; for they have heard sadhus say: torture the body. Sit by a blazing fire even under the noonday sun. And when it is cold, stand naked on ice. When hungry, do not eat. When sleepy, do not sleep. Fight and cut the body in every way; be as cruel to the body as you can; be as violent as you can toward it. And I am teaching: respect the body, love it. When hungry, eat; when sleepy, sleep; when thirsty, drink. Yes—only as much as is needed. Too much harms, too little harms. I teach balance, rightness.

But all this runs counter to your rigid notions. Therefore, today my commune, my family, falls outside the country’s context. Being in this land, I have become a foreigner. But truth cannot be suppressed for long; it will surface, spread, and seize the very soul of this nation. Yet first I want to create an example, a place one can see, where I can invite people and say: Look! A sannyasin can be productive. My sannyasins are productive. You will be surprised to know that in India we do not beg; we do not stretch out our hands for alms—and never will. A sannyasin can be productive, creative.

A new commune is to be built over four square miles; the work has begun. At least ten thousand sannyasins will live there. We will farm collectively, run collective workshops, and produce. Everyone will receive according to his needs—comforts and facilities—but no one will have personal ownership of money. The whole family will live as if what is there belongs to us all. And we will start many dimensions of productive work. Then we will be able to invite people: See this band of merry ones! No one has a penny in his pocket, yet no big tycoon in India—Birla or Tata—can live with this grandeur and this rejoicing. When people see this dance, this celebration, the fragrance will spread.

That is precisely why people like Morarji Desai are trying in every way to prevent the commune from coming into being. They throw every possible obstacle, try to trap me in legal nets by any means. But that is impossible. You move from branch to branch; I from leaf to leaf! Before you can even think of trapping me in a legal net, I am standing completely outside it. It is impossible to ensnare me legally, because my sannyasins include the finest lawyers, who proceed with utmost care, inch by inch. We have the finest economists. Every step is placed with care. That is why it is taking a little time. But delay is auspicious, because each step is becoming firm.

Jagtap, there are only two options. Either I make my ashram like the other ashrams in the country—then the contexts will match. Or I try to make the whole country like my ashram—then the contexts will match. My choice is the second. There are many ashrams that fit the country. As poor and shabby as the country is, so are those ashrams—poor and shabby. As the country begs, so do they—beggars. Begging has become the very soul of so-called Indian culture. People live in those ashrams as others do outside—only deader. In the marketplace you may still find a little sparkle, perhaps someone laughing; but in those ashrams only dead people sit. They reach there when they are near death anyway—go to Kashi to turn on their side for the last time. Then they go on chanting Ram-ram; nothing else remains to be done.

My ashram does not fit the country’s frame at all—because the country is in the wrong. I would have the country fit the frame of my ashram. It is a great endeavor, a Bhagirath effort; but it is worth doing, and there is joy in doing it.

Also, I am not thinking in terms of your past. My entire outlook is future-oriented. Keeping the coming future in view, everything is being done. What is gone is gone; I have no concern with the past. I am concerned with what is coming—with what is arriving even now. Why worry about what has gone? Prepare for what is coming.

And soon you will tire of your politicians—you are already tired. For thirty years you have seen their stupidities, seen them well. How much longer will it take? In another five or ten years you will be fed up. And when you are, what option will you have? The day you are utterly bored of your politicians, you will have no alternative but what I am saying. I am the only alternative. You will have to pay attention to me. And by then I will have raised the family that becomes a proof. I do not trust in talk alone; I am at work. But surely, this work is deep and takes time.

Yet an unprecedented experiment has begun. And this experiment is not going to stop—because with this experiment is the support of the divine.

Anand Vitarag, Muni Thothumal has been chosen as Acharya Tulsi’s successor. And you can see the feudal style—“crown prince”! The kings are dead, but the crown princes are not! The owls have died, but they have left their brood!

And what is Muni Thothumal’s talent? A consummate toady! A master flatterer. He leads the pack in flattering Acharya Tulsi.

Neither Acharya Tulsi nor any of his disciples has any experience of samadhi. I’m not saying this idly. Acharya Tulsi has asked me, “How should I meditate?” And he told me, “I will send my sannyasins, my monks, to you—please teach them meditation.” But even in that there was dishonesty. There was no taste for meditation. His monks did come to me, learned the techniques of meditation, and went back; but they never meditated themselves. They started conducting meditation camps. Just as I hold meditation camps, Acharya Tulsi began holding camps in imitation. There was politics even in that. They learned meditation not to do it, but to make others do it.

And Muni Thothumal is utterly hollow! I met him; seeing his hollowness I gave him that name—Thothu means hollow—so it wasn’t without cause. He is like a parrot. He can use fine words. But what comes of using fine words? He is a pundit—but punditry is not wisdom. He is a knower of scriptures. But being a knower of scriptures does not make anyone a knower, a seer. Therefore he can do exegesis. And in this country many will be pleased by such exegesis, because many people’s exegesis is the same. “Sublimation”! Fine-sounding words!

But how does sublimation of sexual desire happen? Sublimation can happen only when someone has descended into sexual desire and seen its futility—and not only its futility, but the possibility of the energy hidden within it. He who has descended into sexual desire and seen two things—the futility of sex and, like samadhi, the hidden possibility within it, the lotus seed in the mud—only in his life can sublimation happen.

But Muni Thothumal and others like him are simply escapees. They have not lived life anywhere. When Jain monks used to come to me to ask questions… Now they don’t have the courage; now they are even afraid to enter this door, lest someone come to know! Even then they were afraid, but not so much, because my sannyasins had not yet come into being. I was traveling alone in the country. Then Jain monks would meet me in many places. And almost always two questions they asked. One was, “How should we meditate?”

And I would say to them, “You have become monks and you don’t know meditation! The very meaning of muni is one who has experienced silence—how are you monks? You changed your clothes and became monks? You have not known silence, and now after becoming monks you ask how to meditate! Without meditation how could anyone become a monk?”

And their second inevitable question, especially the monks’, was, “What should we do about sexual desire? It keeps surfacing. If we somehow suppress it all day, at night it comes in dreams; it won’t leave us.” Muni Thothumal asked the same: meditation and sexual desire. And now he gives speeches and writes articles against my book, “From Sex to Samadhi.”

And the amusing thing is, there isn’t a single Jain monk or Hindu sadhu who doesn’t read “From Sex to Samadhi.” Why are you reading it? Karpatri Maharaj wrote an entire book against that book—so much labor! What use is it to you? Some two hundred books have been published in my name, but only one book gets read—From Sex to Samadhi. At least in India that’s the book that’s read and discussed. From Mulla Nasruddin to Morarji Desai, they read only that one and discuss only that.

When I said Morarji Desai should read the other books too, his secretary wrote asking me to kindly send the list of all the titles; they didn’t even know the names. So I sent the list. But I don’t think they will read other books, or even if they do, they will understand them.

Why is “From Sex to Samadhi” so discussed in India?

For many, many years—centuries—India has repressed sexual desire. India’s mental situation is still what the West’s was before Freud. In India Freud has not yet been born. Hence the revolution Freud gave the West has still not happened here. People who come from the West understand me instantly because Freud prepared the ground. But in India Freud has not appeared; I have to do double work—Freud’s work too.

Muni Thothumal has no experience—neither of sex nor of samadhi. Yet claims are made. In this country, claiming is a great sport.

One of Acharya Tulsi’s other monks—more honest than Thothumal—Chandan Muni, spoke in a meeting with me about fifteen years ago. To speak alongside me is a tricky business. He spoke before me, proclaiming lofty things about self-realization. I spoke after him and said I doubted that Chandan Muni had attained self-knowledge. I said, “Put your hand on your chest and say you have known the soul.” He is an honest man; he bowed his head and stayed silent. But he said to me, “If you have time at noon, I would like to meet you.” We met at noon. A handful of people gathered. Chandan Muni said, “Please let the others go; I want to meet you in complete privacy.”

I said, “Let them sit; they will hear too.”

“No,” he said, “send them away. I want complete privacy.”

So everyone was sent out and the door was closed. Then tears fell from his eyes and he said, “You hurt me, hurt me deeply! My ego has been shattered to pieces. But I have come to confess that I have not attained self-knowledge. I have had no samadhi.”

“Then why all that nonsense?” I asked.

He said, “It is all written in the scriptures; I was just saying what is written.”

“Then why not have the courage?” I said. “You had bowed your head; you could have said plainly that you have not attained self-knowledge.”

“How could I do that?” he said. “Otherwise those who revere me would push me out. That’s why I asked to send them out—many of my followers had come, a crowd of Terapanthis had gathered—send them out. In their presence I wouldn’t be able to open my heart honestly.”

Chandan Muni is a more meaningful person than Thothumal. At least he had that much courage. He couldn’t do it in public—granted; had he done so, a greater revolution would have happened. He couldn’t say it from the platform—granted; but isn’t it something that he came! In private he shed tears; he said, “I was only repeating like a parrot; I know nothing. Please give me the keys of meditation. Tell me what I should do.”

I gave him the keys of meditation. He said, “That I cannot do, because people will instantly recognize that this is your meditation. And Acharya Tulsi will not agree, and my lay followers will not agree. I cannot do Dynamic Meditation, not even Kundalini Meditation, nor Sufi dance.”

I said, “That is exactly what is needed. Quietly, when everyone has gone, do it at night in solitude.”

He said, “That is very difficult. We are not even permitted to walk alone; the monk’s order is always together. So if at night I start ‘Hoo, Hoo,’ they will think I have gone mad! And what answer will I give? I can’t even take your name; it is forbidden to say we learned anything from you.”

And these people go around waking up the country! These sleeping people, these blind people, are leading the blind.

You ask, Anand Vitarag, that great anger arises, often you feel like going to talk to him. What should you do?

Go—by all means, go! Proclaim the truth openly and boldly! But don’t think they will be able to hear or understand.

A teacher was taking attendance, but a student named Gaya Ram was sitting on the back bench, staring at a mouse going in and out of its hole. When the teacher called Gaya Ram’s name, he didn’t hear. The teacher shouted, “Why ‘gaya’?”—playing on “gaya” meaning “gone.” The student, startled, blurted, “No, sir, the tail is still left.”

You will speak, but they won’t hear. Their minds are caught by other little mice. Even so—go! Shake them, jolt them, try to wake them up. Perhaps a sharp blow will awaken them. The capacity to awaken is in everyone—even in Thothumal! The divine sleeps in him just as much as in anyone else. Who knows, in some auspicious moment…!

But if you go and plead like a meek lay follower, nothing will happen. You will have to sound a call for revolution for anything to happen. You will have to raise your voice, seize their shoulders and shake them—then something can happen.

A religious guru came to a village. Mulla Nasruddin also went to listen. The guru’s sermon was that creating obstacles in another’s life is violence. After the discourse, Mulla came up on the stage and said, “I’ll tell you a great joke; listen carefully. The joke has four parts.

“First part: A Sardarji was going somewhere on a bicycle with his wife on the back. A pothole came on the road, and the wife cried, ‘Ride carefully!’ The Sardarji stopped, got off, slapped his wife, and said, ‘Who’s riding the bicycle—you or me?’”

The guru said, “Rightly said; one should not interfere in another’s work.”

Mulla continued, “Now the second part. They reached home. The wife sat down to make tea. She was angry, so she started pumping a lot of air into the stove. The Sardarji said, ‘Look, the tank might burst!’ The wife grabbed his beard and slapped him. ‘Who’s making the tea—you or me?’”

The guru said, “Bravo, what a joke! One should not interrupt someone else’s work.”

Mulla went on, “Now listen, the fourth part. Once the Sardarji…”

The guru interrupted, “Brother, first tell the third part! How did the fourth come after the second?”

Nasruddin didn’t pause; he swung a fist into the guru’s back and said, “Who’s telling the joke—you or me?”

If you can do something like that, Anand Vitarag, something may happen. If you go and bow three times politely, Thothumal is not going to listen.

And it is right to go, because if people go and keep telling such people, then perhaps some day awakening may dawn. These people are not evil, only deluded. Their aspiration is good—that is why they renounced, fled, left home, became monks. Somewhere there is a noble longing, though the direction is mistaken. Someone handed them falsehood and they grabbed it—but they had set out to seek truth. That they caught hold of the false is another matter; that they cling to it is another matter. But they are not bad people.

And don’t think those who speak against me are doing so knowingly. It is entirely unconscious. Because I am striking at their foundations. I am cutting the roots of their profession. If my vision takes root, then after fifty years you won’t find a Jain monk or a Hindu sadhu in this land. There will be many sannyasins, but with a completely new adornment, a new lifestyle. They won’t be Hindus, Jains, Muslims. They will be bliss-intoxicated, al-mast; their religion will be ecstasy.

So of course there is friction. Therefore go. Awaken the noble longing that lies within them. And don’t delay, because as your monks grow older their capacity diminishes, they become senile, and their courage to transform wanes. So don’t delay. If they can awaken, it will bless them and also the many who listen to them.

Rather than persuading some ordinary person, it is better to persuade monks and mahatmas. Because who knows how many people that mahatma is deluding, misleading! If you can bring that one onto the right path, many who follow him can also come onto the right path.

The matter is difficult, though, because Thothumal is about to be the successor. And succession can be had only if one walks exactly on the Terapanth line without an inch of deviation. It will be hard to forgo the pleasure of being the religious leader of seven hundred monks.

Even so, I trust, ultimately, in human goodwill. Even in your mahatmas I acknowledge goodwill. Somewhere the seed lies; perhaps it will sprout—who knows in which rain. Perhaps you yourself will become the instrumental cause. And don’t delay—who knows about tomorrow!

There is a story in the Bhavishya Purana: Muni Thothumal died. Naturally, he reached heaven. He was a great guru, performed great renunciation and austerities; so he was welcomed instantly with bands and fanfare. And in the Terapanthis’ heaven…

Mind you, heaven is partitioned. No Sthanakvasi will enter the Terapanthis’ heaven—worse than hell! And no Shvetambara will go to the Digambaras’ heaven; he would never commit such a sin, not even by mistake. And will any Jain step into the Hindus’ heaven? If his shadow falls there, he will bathe. Then there are the Muslims, and the Christians, and the Jews—each with their own heaven. Just as they divided the land here, these crazies reached there and divided that too—built walls. Each sits within his own wall, hoisting his own flag high! And there is such din that no one can hear what anyone else is doing. In heaven there is such hullabaloo—here Hari-kirtan, there Ram-dhun, somewhere an endless scripture-recitation on loudspeakers. Microphones and all have reached heaven!

So Thothumal became the chief angel of the Terapanthi heaven. Then after him Hema Malini also died. She too reached heaven. How she got in is hard to say. But where does bribery not work! And then, seeing Hema Malini, how could a gatekeeper refuse? He must have hurried to open the gate, in a fluster. It opened—he hardly knew when. He must have been waiting for the day she’d die—a blessed day indeed!

The gatekeeper opened the gate and said, “Since you have come here, it is proper to tell you that entrance to heaven is granted on one condition only. You must cross a narrow bridge together with our chief angel, Muni Thothumal. The bridge is very narrow, and it has a peculiarity—keep it in mind, for your own good. While crossing that bridge, if any ill-feeling or lustful thought arises in your mind toward the angel, you will instantly fall below—and falling, you will reach hell. So think beforehand.”

Hema Malini said, “All right, I agree.”

Hema Malini and Muni Thothumal reached the bridge. And the actress had taken no more than ten or fifteen steps when Muni Thothumal crashed down from the bridge.

Before such a thing comes to pass, Anand Vitarag, go! Wake Thothumal up, make him alert! Actresses will pass by, perhaps without a lustful thought arising; but your monks, your mahatmas will not make it across. They are filled only with lust. But they cannot reveal this lust, cannot tell anyone. Understand their sorrow too! Understand their pain! I understand their sorrow, their pain. That is why I speak so harshly.

This harshness is like a surgeon’s—there will have to be cutting and opening, the pus must be removed. In my heart there is only the wish that some good and benediction may happen to them. They cannot tell anyone what their inner state is, because if people come to know, the crowd that cries “Victory, victory” will disperse at once.

The crowd cheers because it believes you have attained perfect celibacy, perfect samadhi. And you have to maintain that deception. You must stage that pretense of attainment. You have to go by the crowd’s beliefs—just as the crowd says. Otherwise the crowd will not honor you. It is a mutual arrangement.

The crowd honors those who obey the crowd. And only those in whose lives no ray of intelligence has dawned can obey the crowd. Who can obey the crowd? Sheep can, not lions. There are no herds of lions! They have no crowd. A lion walks alone; he can walk alone. Sheep cannot; their safety is in the herd.

Anand Vitarag, go—awaken them! And since you too were once a Terapanthi, it is your responsibility that now, if a ray of the sun has begun to be visible to you, if a thread of song has begun to fall into your hands, go and sing your song to them, open your heart before them, give them a little news of your joy. Always trust that no one is so lost that he cannot be brought back to the path. Even mahatmas can be brought back.

What I said yesterday to you was only a joke. Yesterday someone asked me, “Is God everywhere?” I said, “Everywhere—except in your mahatmas.” That was just a joke. God is in your mahatmas too; he is sleeping very deeply, snoring loudly—but he is there.

Go—awaken them! Remember, in the effort to awaken another, your own awakening also deepens.

Enough for today.