19

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‌CHAPTER 19

19 February 1978 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Deva means divine, ullas means celebration. And that has to be the key for you: celebration has to become your religion. Misery is sin; sadness, seriousness, are companions of misery. Joy is virtue, and all that helps joy should be nourished, cherished, invited.

Let your life be integrated at the centre of celebration. Only choose that which is celebrating, joyous. If you can go on dropping all that is sad, sombre, serious, all that gives you a long face, you will be moving in the right direction. Cultivate all that brings joy, and I say ‘all’: the bodily, the psychological, the spiritual. The real celebration is when the body, the mind and the soul all dance together. If only the body dances, it is happiness; something is missing in it. It is very gross. If only the soul dances then it is very subtle, abstract, not of the earth. It has wings but no roots; again something is missing. Between the two is the bridge of the mind. The mind can divide the two, it can also unite the two. When the mind divides, it is called the mind. When it unites, it is called meditation. And when all the three dance so together, as if they are one, that is ullas, that is celebration.

So let this be your criterion. Whenever the question arises of what has to be done, this has to be the criterion: if it brings joy, do it. And whatsoever brings joy to you will bring joy to others too. Sometimes it may not be very apparent, but this is the fundamental law: that which brings joy to you is bound to bring joy to everybody, and that which brings misery to you is bound to create misery for others, sooner or later. Be utterly self-full, and remember that in being self-full, you are serving humanity. There is no other service. All that goes on in the name of duty is ugly. Duty is a dirty four-letter word; avoid it! Do things out of joy but never out of duty.

Deva means divine, agam means unfathomable. God is unfathomable, immeasurable. We can enter god but we can never know him in his totality, because the totality has no boundaries. God never becomes an object. We can dissolve in god, but we cannot hold him in our hands; and that’s the fear, that’s why people avoid god. Even if they talk about him, even if they go to the church and to

the temple, they read the Bible and they listen to the priest, they avoid him. In fact all their churches and temples and rituals are nothing but strategies to avoid the real god. These are ways to protect themselves from that unfathomable phenomenon. They have created tiny gods of their own, they have manufactured their own gods.

The Bible says, ‘God created man in his own image’; man has repaid god: he has created god in his own image. And of course the god that is man’s image, man’s creation, is bound to be pseudo, false; you can hold him in your hand. But the reality is immense: you cannot hold it, you can only dissolve into it. Just as a river drops into the ocean, man has to disappear and dissolve.

That readiness to dissolve is what sannyas is all about. It is to learn how to die, it is to learn how to love; and both are the same. From one side it is called love, from another side it is called death – two aspects of the same coin. But god is an abyss, he is bottomless; you go on falling and falling and you never arrive at the bottom. But the fear exists only before you have taken the jump. Once you have taken the jump it is utter joy. The more you disappear, the more blissful you become, and the moment you disappear totally there is total bliss. Then all is simply blissful and a benediction.

... I can see the fear in you. And it is better to be aware of the fear, it is better to know what it is so you can move in spite of it. Everybody has fear, about that there is not much difference between people. Even the courageous, the brave, have as much fear as the cowardly; the quantity of fear is almost the same. Then where is the difference? The difference is not in fear and its quantity; the difference is that the courageous goes in spite of it and the cowardly is prevented by it. Both have fears.

So courage does not mean fearlesseness; courage simply means that the fear is there but still you are going, you will not listen to the fear, you will ignore it. Great fear of dissolving is there in you. You are afraid of both love and death. You may not even be conscious of it, but as I am saying this it will make you conscious and you will be able to observe it. This name will remind you that the ultimate bliss is possible only when you put this fear aside and go into the unknown.

Deva means divine, mohan means beauty – divine beauty.

And that is the only beauty there is. All beauty, all other beauties are only skin-deep. One can fool oneself for the time being, but sooner or later the other beauty wears out and one is left in utter ugliness because one never developed the real beauty. The real beauty has nothing to do with the face but with the luminosity that comes from your within. It has nothing to do with the form of the eyes but with light that shines through them. It has nothing to do with the body but with the inner presence that vibrates through the body. The real beauty arises at the core, at the very core of your being, and spreads outwards towards the body. The false beauty is just on the surface; it has no roots in you. It is ungrounded.

Remember: one has to seek and search for the real beauty. And the real is eternal, it remains: once you have found it, you have found it forever. The momentary is simply a wastage of time, it is a kind of dream. One can remain occupied in a dream for the time being, but the moment you wake up you see that it was all foolish, stupid.

[The new sannyasin says: Before I came here I was in Goa. For three days before I left I was in a state of very high energy. I wrote some notes in a book. Two days after I arrived here you gave one

of the lectures using almost exactly the same words as were written in the book. Please can you comment?]

It is possible, it is possible. We are all connected, very deeply connected. We are only separate on the surface, at the centre we are one. On the periphery we are individuals, in the centre we are universal. And if sometimes you are at the centre, you can have all those glimpses which happen to anybody who is at the centre. At some time everybody moves to the centre; in spite of oneself sometimes one reaches. It can happen accidentally also: something triggers a process, one is flowing very high.

You may not be able to express it sometimes, or maybe your expression is not adequate, because the expression belongs to the periphery and the experience belongs to the centre. When you are at the centre you experience something. When you come back to the periphery you may not be able to express it or may be able only to express it inadequately. Somebody else may be able to express in a better way. Listening to him, suddenly you will see, ‘But this is what I was going to say, this is what I have been feeling.’

It has always been happening in the world. Now they call it synchronicity; parallel processes are going on. Scientists also think that if a certain discovery is made, for example, the theory of relativityNow they say that if Einstein had not discovered it, then within months somebody else

would have discovered it because many people around the earth were feeling the same. Einstein was just the first to express it. When he expressed it, many people felt that this is what they had been vaguely feeling. It was ambiguous, not very clear and loud, but it was there. In some mysterious way it was felt by many people.

Sometimes it has happened that a patent has been registered in America on a certain day, another patent for the same thing has been registered in England on the same day and another in Japan. All the three persons have come to discover the same thing almost at the same time. It becomes difficult: who is the discoverer? Einstein himself said later on that if he had not discovered the theory somebody else would have; the time for the idea had come.

So you will feel this many times. And when you are in a kind of depth or height – call it height or depth – when you are not feeling ordinary, when you are feeling something extraordinary, then you will have glimpses. And others may have those glimpses in that state too. Those who permanently abide in that state can always feel whatsoever is being felt around the world.

It happens. Life is more mysterious than we think it is, it is far more mysterious than fictions. It will happen again and again – watch! Good!

[A new sannyasin says that for three years she had private therapy because she felt no inner contentment... restlessness, rebelliousnessbut it has not helped much.]

But they are not problems. One should be rebellious, and one should be joyously rebellious! It is not a problem.…

Mm, but when you go to the orthodox therapist – and now psychotherapy is almost as orthodox as anything – they will say that rebellion is a problem and they will bring you down to the normal. In fact the normal is the problem.

A man who has no rebellion in him has no salt, a man who has no rebellion in him has no spine; but the society consists of spineless people. The psychotherapist is paid by you but really he is in the service of the society: he serves the society and he takes the fee from you. His deepest commitment is with the society, the established society. He is in a deep conspiracy. He makes people feel guilty – people who are rebellious, people who are not able to fit in the common rut, people who are not mediocre and who aspire for something higher, who aspire for something greater, people for whom this life as it is does not give any contentment. They are the adventurers, the explorers, they are the salt of the earth. They need no therapy; they need all encouragement to go into their rebellion as deeply as possible, to go in search of the unknown. They are the pioneers. But pioneers have always been thought somehow to be mad, eccentric, crazy, and the society has always tried to pull them down to the bourgeois level.

Society needs yes-sayers; it does not want anybody who is individual. It wants people who are only personas, just pseudo, individual for the name’s sake, otherwise not, people who dress in the same way as everybody is doing, who go to the same church as everybody is going, who want to live a life which is everybody’s life. These pioneers don’t want to live their life – that’s what rebellion is.

So the first thing for you: I am not here to destroy your rebellion. I am here to enhance it, to protect it, to help it, to make it stronger. I am not here to destroy your discontentment either, because unless there is discontentment one cannot search for god. To be discontented with the world is the beginning of the search for god; the beginning of the search for another world, if there is any possibility of there being one. Unfortunate are those who are satisfied with the world: with their job, their wife, children, the car and the house – they are unfortunate. They have settled very cheaply, they have sold themselves very cheaply. They are sold out, they are no more alive.

Be discontented, that is not a problem, because out of that discontentment a search arises for something better, something bigger, something higher. Out of this discontentment one day contentment arises. That contentment does not arise by destroying discontentment; it arises by following your discontentment, by going with it. Befriend it!

[A visitor is hesitant to take sannyas: I keep hearing you talk how your old self dies when you become a sannyasin... ]

But a new self is born! And the old you have known already, so what is the point of keeping it? You have lived it, you have experienced it. It has no more any significance; going on living it will be just repetition. You should be able to die every moment so that the new becomes possible; then only do you live. That is not a difficulty! And what is there to cling to in the old? The old means that which is gone, which exists only in your memory and is nowhere else, which is no more a reality, is not part of existence; there is no point in it. And if you are too burdened with it and too attached to it, it will not allow you to live this moment. It will interfere, it will take you backwards.

It is as if you are driving a car and you go on looking in the rear view mirror; the car is going ahead and you are looking in the rear view mirror, out the back, at the road that is gone. You are in danger, because you have to look ahead! It is good that drivers don’t follow this rule, otherwise there will be only accidents and nothing else. But people follow this rule in their lives, that’s why life is full of accidents and nothing else. People move forwards and look backwards.

If god wanted you to look backward he would have given you eyes at the back (laughter) but he has not done that. He wants you to remain looking ahead, towards the new. Say good-bye to the old!

You are already sannyasin... unnecessarily creating trouble. Become a sannyasin. Close your eyes... close your eyes!

Look! – you have died to the past, there is no problem.

Anand means bliss, amido is the Japanese name for Buddha. The Sanskrit name is Amitabh; it means infinite light, light and light and light. The name moved from India to Tibet, from Tibet to China, from China to Korea, from Korea to Japan, and this much change has happened: it has become amido. But it is a beautiful change: it has become more soft, more round, more feminine. Amitabh looks more masculine, amido looks more feminine: and Buddha is a feminine personality. So become a blissful Buddha!

And it is just the idea that the past is valuable which creates the problem. The past is not valuable; the value is in the present. Out of the present the future is born. And we should not burden the present too much with the past, we should allow the present to have its own space. That’s all that I mean by dying to the past and being born to the new.

You can move easily; I don’t see that there is much of a problem in it. Just a decision on your part and you will become new.

[A sannyasin said she just heard that her former lover, who is now in the west, has a new lover: It’s been putting me through a lot of stuff and I suppose I just wanted to know how I’m doing.]

It is a good situation. You can also start moving with somebody. Don’t miss this opportunity, it is a good opportunity. Whenever a partner leaves any love relationship, don’t miss that opportunity; find another partner, have another experience. And one never knows which experience is going to become a liberating experience. So rather than feeling jealous and miserable and sad, use the opportunity. Good! – she has given you freedom. Now you can move into some other relationship.

If it is heterosexual it will be far better, because a homosexual relationship cannot go very far. It can go somewhere but cannot go very far. For a relationship to go really far, polar opposites are needed. Only in that tension of opposites can the relationship move to the highest pitch possible.

So rather than falling into sadness and feeling sorry for yourself and being angry and all... And that is pointless! If she has moved with somebody it is also good. Use this opportunity too.

Never miss any opportunity; that is my message. Always useEven if some negative situation is

there use it as a stepping stone and transform it into something positive. Try with thisor would

you like to feel sorry?...

The natural tendency is to feel sorry, sad, angry, in a rage and that you have been cheated, and this and that – all nonsense! People live accidentally. Nobody is conscious; if they were conscious they would be in a totally different world. One day she fell in love with you; that was an unconscious thing. Now she has fallen in love with [someone else]; that is another unconscious thing. Don’t think that she has cheated you or she has been deceiving you. Nothing of the sort!

The love with you was an unconscious thing and then you got involved in each other; now another unconscious thing has happened. But you can move consciously; that’s what I mean. Move consciously, take a decision that this is good, you are free... at last!

Use this freedom. Create some new situation for yourself. You need that situation, and you have needed it for a long time. I was waiting for something like this! (chuckling) And you know it! You have been always afraid because of this, but now I have not done anything – it has happened on its own. Or do you suspect?...

You don’t suspect my hand in it or do you have some suspicion?... the idea may come, but I have nothing to do with it!

[She answers: I don’t see why I have to be with a man.]

Then be with a woman!... but at least move. Be with a woman; that too is good – the change of the woman. Be with a woman; even that is good, a little change is good. I wanted you to make a bigger change but you want to make a little change; that too is good.

But do something before you settle in your misery. Jump out of it. And send a telegram of congratulations to them so that they will be happy. Otherwise she will be suffering, feeling that she has cheated you, what will you be thinking? and such a great marriage is broken. Just send a message of congratulations.

Be finished with it and start moving. Your friendship remains; that is not the point. And be quick, because once they come here, she will start moving with you again; she will also be thinking, ‘Why move with a man?’ She has been more courageous than you: she has taken a good step. But people fall into old patterns easily because they are familiar patterns, that’s why you asked, ‘Why should I move with a man?’ You have been moving with a woman; about that you have become fixed. With a man it will be starting from abc again. If it is possible always make as big a change possible, let it be a big change. But okay, if you are miserly, move with another woman, mm?

[She says: It doesn’t feel that anything happens with a man.]

Then move with a woman; I am not insisting on it.If something happens with a woman, you move

with a woman, mm? It is good.…

Good is good; not so good is another thing! (laughter) Good is good enough. If you cannot have one hundred percent, have fifty percent, thirty percent whatsoever, but have! Take that small step first; maybe that will help you, mm? because it will be difficult to find a woman.

Try, mm? And when you have found the woman, just bring her here. Try to find somebody. Some day the search for a man will also become possible: you are coming closer. But this breaking of the bondage is very good; I am happy. And be quick, mm?

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