In the morning, when the priest went out, he saw the Master sitting near a milestone with
a few flowers on top of it, worshipping it. The priest came again and said, 'What are you
doing now? Worshipping a milestone?'
The Master said, 'Whenever the time to pray comes, I create my Buddhas anywhere,
because they are always all around. This milestone is as good as your wooden Buddhas
inside!'
It is a question of attitude. When you look with worshipful eyes then anything becomes
Divine.
And remember, the story about Eisai is easy to remember because the compassion is
shown towards somebody else. This story is even more difficult and complex to
understand because the compassion is shown towards oneself. A real man of
understanding is neither hard towards others nor hard towards himself because it is one
and the same energy. A real man of understanding is not a masochist; he is not a sadist,
he is not a masochist. A real man of understanding simply understands that there is no
separation -- all including himself is Divine. And he lives out this understanding.
To live out of understanding is compassion. Never try to practice it, simply relax deep
into meditation. Be in a state of let-go in meditation and suddenly you will be able to
smell the fragrance that is coming from your own innermost depth. Then the flower
blossoms and compassion spreads. Meditation is the flower and compassion is its
fragrance.
IS ZEN THE PATH OF SURRENDER? THEN HOW COME THE BASIC TEACHING
OF BUDDHA IS 'BE A LIGHT UNTO YOURSELF'?
The essential surrender happens within you, it has nothing to do with anybody outside
you. The basic surrender is a relaxation, a trust -- so don't be misguided by the word.
Linguistically, surrender means to surrender to somebody, but religiously, surrender
simply means trust, relaxing. It is an attitude rather than an act: you live through trust.
Let me explain. You swim in water -- you go to the river and swim. What do you do?
You trust water. A good swimmer trusts so much that he almost becomes one with the
river. He is not fighting, he does not grab the water, he is not stiff and tense. If you are
stiff and tense you will be drowned; if you are relaxed the river takes care. That's why
whenever somebody dies, the dead body floats on the water. This is a miracle. Amazing!
The alive person died and was drowned by the river, and the dead person simply floats on
the surface. What has happened? The dead person knows some secret about the river
which the alive person did not know. The alive person was fighting. The river was the
enemy. He was afraid, he could not trust. But the dead person, not being there, how could
he fight? The dead person is totally relaxed with no tension -- suddenly the body surfaces.
The river takes care. No river can drown a dead person.
Trust means you are not fighting; surrender means you don't think of life as the enemy
but as the friend. Once you trust the river, suddenly you start enjoying. Tremendous
delight arises: splashing, swimming, or just floating, or diving deep. But you are not
separate from the river, you merge, you become one.
Surrender means to live the same way in life as a good swimmer swims in the river. Life
is a river. Either you can fight or you can float; either you can push the river and try to go
against the c. or you can float with the river and go wherever the river leads you.
Surrender is not towards somebody; it is simply a way of life. A God is not needed to
surrender to. There are religions which believe in God, there are religions which don't
believe in God, but all religions believe in surrender. So surrender is the real God.
Even the concept of God can be discarded. Buddhism does not believe in any God,
Jainism does not believe in any God -- but they are religions. Christianity believes in
God, Islam believes in God, Sikhism believes in God -- they are also religions. The
Christian teaches surrender to God; God is just an excuse to surrender. It is a help,
because it will be difficult for you to surrender without any object. The object is just an
excuse so that in the name of God you can surrender. Buddhism says simply surrender --
there is no God. You relax. It is not a question of some object, it is a question of your
own subjectivity. Relax, don't fight. Accept.
The belief in God is not needed. In fact, the word 'belief' is ugly. It does not show trust, it
does not show faith -- belief is almost the very opposite of faith. The word 'belief' comes
from a root 'lief' -- 'lief' means to desire, to wish. Now let me explain it to you. You say, 'I
believe in God the compassionate.' What exactly are you saying? You are saying, 'I wish
there was a God who is compassionate.' Whenever you say, 'I believe,' you say, 'I
intensely desire.' But you don't know.
If you know, there is no question of belief. Do you believe in the trees here? Do you
believe in the sun which arises every morning? Do you believe in the stars? There is no
question of belief. You know that the sun is there, that the trees are there. Nobody
believes in the sun -- if he did, you would say he is mad. If somebody came and said, 'I
believe in the sun,' and tried to convert you, you would say, 'You have gone mad!'
I have heard an anecdote.
A certain lady, Lady Lewis, was appointed ambassador to Italy by the United States of
America. She was a recently converted Catholic, and, of course, when people become
converted, they are very enthusiastic. And she was boring everybody. Whosoever she
came into contact with, she would try and make him a Catholic.
The story goes that when she went to Italy as the ambassador, she went to see the Pope. A
long discussion followed -- it went on and on. A press reporter slipped closer and closer,
just to hear what was going on. The Pope had never given so much time to anybody, and
the discussion seemed to be very heated and hot. Something was going on. When the
Pope talks so long to the ambassador of the richest and the strongest nation in the world,
there is going to be some news.
Just to overhear, he came closer and closer. He could hear only one sentence. The Pope
was saying in a faltering English, 'Lady, you don't understand me. I am already a
Catholic!'
She was trying to convert the Pope!
If somebody comes and says to you, 'Believe in the sun,' you will say, 'I am already a
Catholic. I already believe. You don't be worried about it.' You know.
Somebody asked Shri Aurobindo, 'Do you believe in God?' He said, 'No.' Of course the
questioner was very shocked. He had come from far away, from Germany, and he was a
great seeker of God and he was hoping for much. Then this man simply says a flat no. He
said, 'But I was thinking that you have known him.' Aurobindo said, 'Yes, I have known
him, but I don't believe in him.'
Once you know, what is the point of belief? Belief is in ignorance. If you know, you
know. And it is good that if you don't know, know that you don't know -- the belief can
deceive you. The belief can create an atmosphere in your mind, where, without knowing,
you start thinking that you know. Belief is not trust, and the more strongly you say that
you believe totally, the more you are afraid of the doubt within you.
Trust knows no doubt. Belief is just repressing doubt; it is a desire. When you say, 'I
believe in God,' you say, 'I cannot live without God. It will be too difficult to exist in this
darkness, surrounded by death, without a concept of God.' That concept helps. One
doesn't feel alone; one doesn't feel unprotected, insecure -- hence belief.
Martin Luther has written, 'My God is a great fortress.' These words cannot come from a
man who trusts. 'My God is a great fortress'? Martin Luther seems to be on the defensive.
Even God is just a fortress to protect you, to make you feel secure? Then it is out of fear.
The thinking that 'God is my greatest fortress', is born out of fear, not out of love. It is not
of trust. Deep down there is doubt and fear.
Trust is simple. It is just like a child trusts in his mother. It is not that he believes -- belief
has not yet entered. You were a small child once. Did you believe in your mother or did
you trust her? The doubt has not arisen so what is the question of belief? Belief comes
only when the doubt has entered; doubt comes first. Later on, to suppress the doubt, you
catch hold of a belief. Trust is when doubt disappears; trust is when doubt is not there.
For instance, you breathe. You take a breath in; then you exhale, you breathe out. Are
you afraid of breathing out, because who knows, it may not come back? You trust. You
trust it will come. Of course there is no reason to trust, what is the reason? Why should it
come back? You can at the most say that in the past it has been happening so -- but that is
not a guarantee. It may not happen in the future. If you become afraid of breathing out
because it may not come back, then you will hold your breath in. That's what belief is --
clinging, holding. But if you hold your breath in, your face will go purple and you will
feel suffocated. And if you go on doing that, you will die.
All beliefs suffocate and all beliefs help you not to be really alive. They deaden your
being.
If you exhale, you trust in life. The Buddhist word 'nirvana' simply means exhaling,
breathing out -- trusting. Trust is a very, very innocent phenomenon. Belief is of the head;
trust is of the heart. One simply trusts life because you are out of life, you live in life, and
you will go back again to the source. There is no fear. You are born, you live, you will
die; there is no fear. You will be born again, you will live again, you will die. The same
life that has given you life can always give you more life, so why be afraid? Why cling to
beliefs? Beliefs are man-made; trust is God-made. Beliefs are philosophical; trust has
nothing to do with philosophy. Trust simply shows that you know what love is. It is not a
concept of God who is sitting somewhere in heaven and manipulating and managing.
Trust needs no God, the infinite life, this totality, is more than enough. Once you trust,
you relax. That relaxation is surrender.
Now, IS ZEN THE PATH OF SURRENDER? Yes. Religion, as such, is surrendering,
relaxing. Don't cling to anything. Clinging shows that you don't trust life.
Every evening, Mohammed used to distribute whatsoever he had collected in the day.
All! Not even a single pai would he save for the tomorrow because he said that the same
source that had given today, would give to him tomorrow. If it has happened today, why
be untrusting about tomorrow? Why save?
But when he was dying and he was very ill, his wife became worried. Even at midnight a
physician may be needed, so that evening she saved five rupees, five dinars. She was
afraid. 'Nobody knows -- he may become too ill in the night, and some medicine may be
needed and in the middle of the night, where would I go? Or a doctor may be needed and
the fee would have to be given.' Not saying anything to Mohammed, she'd saved five
dinars.
Near about midnight, Mohammed opened his eyes and he said, 'I feel a certain distrust
around me. It seems something has been saved.'
The wife became very much afraid and she said, 'Excuse me, but thinking that something
may be needed in the night, I have saved just five dinars.'
Mohammed said, 'You go out and give it to somebody.'
She said, 'In the middle of the night who is going to be there?'
Mohammed said, 'You just listen and let me die peacefully, otherwise I will feel guilty,
guilty against my God. And if he asks me. I will feel ashamed that at the last moment I
died in deep distrust. You go out!'
The wife went out, unbelieving of course, but a beggar was standing there.
When she came back, Mohammed said, 'Look, he manages well, and if we need
something, then a donor will be standing outside the door. Don't be worried.'
Then he pulled up his blanket and died immediately, relaxed totally.
Clinging to anything, anything whatsoever, shows distrust. If you love a woman or a
man, and you cling, that simply shows that you don't trust. If you love a woman and you
say, 'Tomorrow also, will you love me or not?' you don't trust. If you go to the court to
get married, you don't trust. Then you trust more in the court, in the police, in the law,
than in love. You are preparing for tomorrow. If this woman or this man tries to deceive
you tomorrow or leaves you in the ditch, you can get support from the court and the
police, and the law will be with you and the whole society will support you. You are
making arrangements, afraid. But if you really love, love is enough, more than enough.
Who bothers about tomorrow? But deep down there is doubt. Even while you think you
are in love, doubt continues.
It is reported that when Jesus was resurrected after his crucifixion, the first person to see
him back alive was Mary Magdalene. She had loved him tremendously. She ran towards
him. In the New Testament it is said that Jesus said, 'Don't touch me.' I became a little
suspicious because Jesus saying, 'Don't touch me,' does not look right. Something
somewhere has gone wrong. Of course it is okay if a pope says, 'Don't touch me,' but a
Jesus saying, 'Don't touch me.' Almost impossible. So I tried to find the original. In the
original the Greek word can mean both touch or cling. Then I found the key. Jesus says,
'Don't cling to me,' not 'Don't touch me, but the translators have interpreted it as, 'Don't
touch me.' The interpreter has entered his own mind in it. Jesus must have said, 'Don't
cling to me,' because if there is trust, there is no clinging if there is love, there is no
clinging. You simply share without any clinging; you share in deep relaxedness.
Surrendering means surrendering to life; surrendering to the source from where you come
and to where one day you will go back again. You are just like a wave in the ocean: You
come out of the ocean, you go back to the ocean. Surrendering means trusting in the
ocean -- and of course, what can a wave do except that? The wave has to trust the ocean
and whether you trust or not, you remain part of the ocean. Non-trusting, you will create
anxiety -- that's all. Nothing will change. only you will become anxious. tense, desperate.
If you trust, you flower. you bloom. you celebrate. knowing well that deep down is your
mother, the ocean. When tired, you will go back and rest in her being again. When rested,
you will come back again to have a taste of the sky and the sunlight and the stars.
Surrendering is trusting and it has nothing to do with any concept of any God, any
ideology of any God. It is an attitude.
Then you can understand the meaning of Buddha s last utterance. Be a light unto
yourself. When he says. Be a light unto yourself. he means: if you have surrendered to
life you have become a light unto yourself. Then life leads you. Then you always live in
enlightenment. When he says. 'Be a light unto yourself, he is saying don t follow
anybody, don't cling to anybody. Learn from everybody but don't cling to anybody. Be
open, vulnerable, but remain on your own, because finally the religious experience
cannot be a borrowed experience. It has to be existential; it has to be your own. Only then
it is authentic. If I say something and you believe in it, it is not going to help. If I say
something and you search, and you surrender, and you trust, and you also experience the
same -- then it has become a light unto yourself. Otherwise my words will remain words;
at the most they can become beliefs. Unless you experience the truth of them, they cannot
become trust, they cannot become your own truth. My truth cannot become yours,
otherwise it would have been very cheap. If my truth could be yours then there would be
no problem.
That is the difference between a scientific truth and a religious truth. A scientific truth
can be borrowed. A scientific truth, once known, becomes everybody else's property.
Albert Einstein discovered the theory of relativity. Now there is no need for everybody to
discover it again and again and again. That would be foolish. Once discovered, it has
become public. Now it is everybody's theory. Once discovered, once proved, now even a
school child can learn it. Now no genius is needed -- you need not be an Albert Einstein.
Just a mediocre mind will do; just an ordinary mind will do. You can understand it and it
is yours. Of course, Einstein had to work for years -- then he was able to discover it. You
need not work. If you are ready to understand and put your mind to it, in just a few hours
you will understand.
But the same is not true about religious truth. Buddha discovered, Christ discovered,
Nanak and Kabir discovered, but their discovery cannot become your discovery. You will have to rediscover it again. You will have to move again from ABC; you cannot just
believe in them. That won't help. But that is what humanity has been doing: mistaking
religious truth for scientific truth. It is not scientific truth, it can never become a public
property. Each individual has to come to it alone, each individual has to come to it again
and again. It can never become available in the market. You will have to pass through the
hardship; you will have to seek and search and follow the same path. A shortcut cannot
even be made. You will have to pass through the same austerities as Buddha, the same
difficulties as the Buddha; you will have to suffer the same calamities on the path as the
Buddha and you will have to be in the same hazards as the Buddha. And one day, when
the clouds disappear, you will dance and be as ecstatic as the Buddha.
Of course, when an Archimedes discovers something, he runs naked in the streets,
'Eureka! I have found it!' You can understand Archimedes within minutes, within
seconds, but you will not be ecstatic -- otherwise every school child would run naked in
the streets, crying, 'Eureka!' Nobody has done that since Archimedes did it. It happened
only once. For Archimedes it was a discovery; since then it has become public property.
But it is good that the religious truth cannot be transferred to you otherwise you would
never achieve the same ecstasy as Buddha or Jesus or Krishna. Never, because you would
learn. it in a school textbook -- any fool could transfer it to you. Then the whole orgasmic
experience will be lost.
It is good that religious experience has to be experienced individually. Nobody can lead
you there. People can indicate the way but those indications are very subtle -- don't take
them literally. Buddha said, 'Be a light unto yourself.' He is saying, 'Remember, my truth
cannot be your truth; my light cannot be your light. Imbibe the spirit from me, become
more thirsty from me, let your search be intense and be totally devoted to it, learn the
devotion of a truth-seeker from me -- but the truth, the light, will burn within you. You
will have to kindle it within you.' You cannot borrow truth, it cannot be transferred, it is
not a property. It is such a subtle experience that it cannot even be expressed. It is
inexpressible. One at the most tries to give a few hints.
The second question:
Question 2
PLEASE EXPLAIN THE NATURE OF THE EXPERIENCES WE CALL BOREDOM
AND RESTLESSNESS.
Boredom and restlessness are deeply related. Whenever you feel boredom, then you feel
restlessness. Restlessness is a by-product of boredom.
Try to understand the mechanism. Whenever you feel bored you want to move away
from that situation. If somebody is saying something and you are getting bored, you start
becoming fidgety. This is a subtle indication that you want to move from this place, from
this man, from this nonsense-talk. Your body starts moving. Of course, because of
politeness you suppress it, but the body is already on the move -- because the body is
more authentic than the mind, the body is more honest and sincere than the mind. The
mind is trying to be polite, smiling. You say, 'How beautiful,' but inside you are saying,
'How horrible! I have listened to this story so many times and he is telling it again!'
I have heard about Albert Einstein's wife, Frau Einstein. A friend of Albert Einstein used
to come many times and Einstein would tell some anecdotes, some jokes, and they would
laugh. But the friend became curious about one thing: whenever he came, and whenever
Einstein started telling jokes....
Einstein was a Jew, and Jews have the best jokes in the world. Because they have
suffered so long they have lived by jokes. Their life has been so miserable that they had
to tickle themselves -- hence they have the most beautiful jokes. No other country. no
other race, can compete with them. In India we don't have good jokes at all because the
country has lived very peacefully -- no need to tickle. Humor is needed when one is in
constant danger; one needs to laugh at anything. Any excuse will do to laugh.
....Einstein would tell some joke, some anecdote, some story and they both would laugh.
But the friend became curious because whenever Einstein would start saying something,
the wife would immediately start knitting or doing something.
So he asked, 'The moment Einstein starts telling some joke, why do you start knitting?'
The wife said, 'If I don't do anything, it will be tremendously difficult for me to tolerate
because I have heard that joke a thousand and one times. You come sometimes -- I am
always here. Whenever anybody comes he tells the same joke. If I didn't do something
with my hands, I would become so fidgety that it will be almost impolite. So I have to do
something so that I can move my restlessness into work and I can hide behind the work.'
Whenever you feel bored you will feel restless. Restlessness is an indication of the body;
the body is saying, 'Move away from here. Go anywhere, but don't be here.' But the mind
goes on smiling and the eyes go on sparkling, and you go on saying that you are listening
and you have never heard such a beautiful thing. The mind is civilized; the body is still
wild. The mind is human; the body is still animal. The mind is false; the body is true. The
mind knows the rules and regulations -- how to behave and how to behave rightly -- so
even if you meet a bore you say, 'I am so happy, so glad to see you!' And deep down, if
you were allowed, you would kill this man. He tempts you to murder. Then you become
fidgety, then you feel restlessness.
If you listen to the body and run away, the restlessness will disappear. Try it. Try it. If
somebody is boring you simply start jumping and running around. See. Restlessness will
disappear because restlessness simply shows that the energy does not want to be here.
The energy is already on the move; the energy has already left this place. Now you
follow energy.
So the real thing is to understand boredom not restlessness. Boredom is a very, very
significant phenomenon. Only man feels bored, no other animal. You cannot make a
buffalo bored. Impossible. Only man gets bored because only man is conscious.
Consciousness is the cause. The more sensitive you are, the more alert you are, the more
conscious you are, the more you will feel bored. In more situations you will feel bored. A
mediocre mind does not feel so bored. He goes on; he accepts; whatsoever is, is okay; he
is not so alert. The more alert you become, the more fresh, the more you will feel as if
some situation is just a repetition, as if some situation is just getting hard on you, as if
some situation is just stale. The more sensitive you are, the more bored you will become.
Boredom is an indication of sensitivity. Trees are not bored, animals are not bored, rocks
are not bored -- because they are not sensitive enough. This has to be one of the basic
understandings about your boredom -- that you are sensitive.
But Buddhas also are not bored. You cannot bore a Buddha. Animals are not bored and
Buddhas are not bored, so boredom exists as a middle phenomenon between the animal
and the Buddha. For boredom a little more sensitivity is needed than is given to the
animal. And if you want to get beyond it then you have to become totally sensitive. Then
again the boredom disappears. But in the middle the boredom is there. If you become
animal-like, then boredom disappears. So you will find that people who live a very
animalistic life are less bored. Eating, drinking, marrying -- they are not very bored, but
they are not sensitive. They live at the minimum. They live only with that much
consciousness as is needed for a day-to-day routine life. You will find that intellectuals,
people who think too much, are more bored, because they think. And because of their
thinking they can see that something is just repetition.
Your life is repetition. Every morning you get up almost the same way as you have been
getting up all your life. You take your breakfast almost the same way. Then you go to the
office -- the same office, the same people, the same work. Then you come home -- the
same wife. If you get bored it is natural. It is very difficult for you to see any newness
here; everything seems to be old, dust-covered.
I have heard an anecdote.
Mary Jane, the very good friend of a wealthy broker, opened the door cheerfully one day,
and then quickly attempted to close it when she discovered the person on the threshold to
be her lover's wife.
The wife leaned against the door and said, 'Oh, let me in, dear. I don't intend to make a
scene, just to have a small friendly discussion.'
With considerable nervousness Mary Jane let her enter, then said cautiously, 'What do
you want?'
'Nothing much' said the wife, looking about. 'I just want the answer to one question. Tell
me dear, just between us, what do you see in that dumb jerk?'
The same husband every day becomes a dumb jerk; the same wife every day...you almost
forget how she looks. If you are told to close your eyes and to remember your wife's face,
you will find it impossible to remember. Many other women will come in your mind, the
whole neighborhood, but not your wife. The whole relationship has become a continuous
repetition. You make love, you hug your wife, you kiss your wife, but these are all empty
gestures now. The glory and the glamour has disappeared long before. A marriage is
almost finished by the time the honeymoon is over, then you go on pretending. But
behind those pretensions a deep boredom accumulates. Watch people walking on the
street and you will see them completely bored. Everybody is bored, bored to death. Look
at their faces -- no aura of delight. Look at their eyes -- dust-covered, no glimmer of inner
happiness. They move from the office to the home, from the home to the office, and by
and by the whole life becomes a mechanical routine, a constant repetition. And one day
they die... almost always people die without ever having been alive.
Bertrand Russell is reported to have said, 'When I remember, I cannot find more than a
few moments in my life when I was really alive, aflame.' Can you remember? How many
moments in your life were you really aflame? Rarely it happens. One dreams about those
moments, one imagines those moments. one hopes for those moments -- but they never
happen. Even if they happen, sooner or later they also become repetitive. When you fall
in love with a woman or a man you feel a miracle, but by and by the miracle disappears
and everything settles into a routine.
Boredom is the consciousness of repetition. Because animals cannot remember the past,
they cannot feel bored. They cannot remember the past, so they cannot feel bored. They
cannot remember the past, so they cannot feel the repetition. The buffalo goes on eating
the same grass every day with the same delight. You cannot. How can you eat the same
grass with the same delight? You get fed up.
Hence people try to change. They move into a new house, they bring a new car home,
they divorce the old husband, they find a new love affair, but again that thing is going to
become repetitive sooner or later. Changing places, changing persons,, changing partners,
changing houses, is not going to do anything. And whenever a society becomes very
bored, people start moving from one town to another. from one job to another, from one
wife to another, but sooner or later they realize that this is all nonsense because the same
thing is going to happen again and again with every woman, with every man, with every
house, with every car.
What to do then? Become more conscious. It is not a question of changing situations;
transform your being, become more conscious. If you become more conscious you will
be able to see that each moment is new; but for that, very much energy, tremendous
energy of consciousness is needed.
The wife is not the same -- remember. You are in an illusion. Go back home and look
again at your wife -- she is not the same. Nobody can be the same. Just appearances
deceive. These trees are not the same as they were yesterday. How can they be? They
have grown. Many leaves have fallen, new leaves have come. Look at the almond tree.
How many new leaves have come! Every day the old are falling and the new are coming.
But you are not that much conscious.
Either have no consciousness -- then you cannot feel repetition -- or have so much
consciousness that in each repetition you can see something new. These are the two ways
to get out of boredom.
Changing outside things is not going to help. It is just like arranging the furniture in your
room again and again. Whatsoever you do -- you can put it this way or that way -- is the
same furniture. There are many housewives who continuously think about how to
manage things, how to put things, where to put them, where not to put -- and they go on
changing. But it is the same room, it is the same furniture. How long will you deceive in
this way?
A brief television skit I once saw was of a caveman and a cavewomen who were kissing
wildly and hysterically. They broke apart only to say, 'Gee, this is great!' then they turned
to kissing again.
Finally the cavewoman pulled away to say, 'Listen. Do you suppose this wonderful thing
we have discovered means that we are married?'
The caveman bent his small mind to the matter and finally said, 'Yes, I guess we are
married. Now let us kiss some more.'
Whereupon the cavewoman put her hand to her head and said in sudden anguish, 'Oh, I
have such a headache!'
Two persons meet, strangers -- everything is wonderful, beautiful. But sooner or later
they become acquainted with each other. That's what marriage means. It means that now
they are settling, now they would like to make it a repetition. Then the same kissing and
the same hugging is no longer beautiful; it becomes almost a duty.
A man came home and found his friend kissing his wife. He took the friend into another
room. The friend was trembling with fear. Now there is going to be something! The
friendship will be broken.
The husband seemed to be very angry, but he was not. He closed the door and asked the
friend, 'Just tell me one thing. I HAVE to -- but why were you kissing?'
'I HAVE to, but why were you kissing?' By and by everything settles, newness
disappears, and you don't have that much consciousness or that quality of consciousness
which can go on finding the new again and again. For a dull mind, everything is old; for a
totally alive mind there is nothing old under the sun. Cannot be. Everything is in flux.
Every person is in flux, is river-like. Persons are not dead things. How can they be the
same? Are you the same? Between when you came this morning to listen to me and when
you went back home, a lot has happened. Some thoughts have disappeared from your
mind, other thoughts have entered. You may have attained to a new insight. You cannot
go the same as you had come. The river is continuously flowing; it looks the same but it
is not the same. The old Heraclitus has said that you cannot step twice into the same river
because the river is never the same.
One thing is that you are also not the same, and another thing is that everything is
changing.... but then one has to live at the peak of consciousness. Either live like a
Buddha or live like a buffalo, then you will not be bored. Now the choice is yours.
I have never seen anybody the same. You come to me -- how many times you have come
to me -- but I never see the old. I'm always surprised by the newness that you bring every
day. You may not be aware of it.
Remain capable of being surprised.
Let me tell you one anecdote.
A man entered a bar, deep in private thoughts of his own. He turned to a woman just
passing and said, 'Pardon me, Miss, do you happen to have the time?'
In a strident voice she responded, 'How dare you make such a proposition to me!'
The man snapped to attention in surprise and was uncomfortably aware that every pair of
eyes in the place had turned in their direction. He mumbled, 'I just asked the time, Miss.'
In a voice even louder the woman shrieked. 'I will call the police if you say another
word!'
Grabbing his drink and embarrassed very nearly to death, the man hastened to the far end
of the room and huddled at a table, holding his breath and wondering how soon he could
sneak out the door.
No more than half a minute had passed when the woman joined him. In a quiet voice she
said, 'I'm terribly sorry, sir, to have embarrassed you, but I am a psychology student at the
University and I am writing a thesis on the reaction of human beings to sudden, shocking
statements.'
The man stared at her for three seconds, then he leaned back and bellowed, 'You will do
all that for me, all night, for just two dollars?'
And it is said that the woman fell down unconscious.
Maybe we don't allow our consciousness to rise higher because then life would be a
constant surprise and you might not be able to manage it. That's why you have settled for
a dull mind, there is some investment in it. You are not dull for no reason, you are dull
for a certain purpose -- if you were really alive then everything would be surprising and
shocking. If you remain dull then nothing surprises you, nothing is shocking. The more
dull you are, the more life seems to be dull to you. If you become more aware, life will
also become more alive, livelier, and there is going to be difficulty.
You always live with dead expectations. Every day you come home and you expect
certain behavior from your wife. Now look how you create your own misery: you expect
a certain fixed behavior from your wife and then you expect your wife to be new. You are
asking the impossible. If you really want your wife to remain continuously new to you,
don't expect. Come home always ready to be surprised and shocked, then the wife will be
new. But she has to fulfill certain expectations. We never allow our total flux-like
freshness to be known to the other. We go on hiding, we don't expose, because the other
may not be able to understand it at all. And the wife also expects the husband to behave
in a certain way, and, of course, they manage the roles. We are not living life, we are
living roles. The husband comes home; he forces himself into a certain role. By the time
he enters the house, he is no more an alive person -- he is just a husband.
A husband means a certain type of expected behavior. The woman there is a wife, and the
man there is a husband. Now when these two persons meet there are really four persons:
the husband and wife, which are not real persons -- just personas, masks, false patterns
expected behavior, duties, and all that -- and the real persons hiding behind the masks.
Those real persons feel bored.
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