Chapter title: Live at the Maximum

‌Chapter title: Live at the Maximum‌

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25 November 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Archive code: 7611255 ShortTitle: WHIP16 Audio:

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Anand means bliss and amara means eternal, deathless, immortal. And in the East we define bliss as that which is eternal. Happiness is that which is momentary. When happiness becomes eternal, it becomes bliss.

Happiness is just a glimpse of that bliss -- as if you have seen the far away Himalayan mountain peaks in a dream... or in a dark night there is a sudden lightning and you have seen the vision -- mm? Everything was clear for a moment, then again the darkness -- and even darker than before.

Happiness is a far away glimpse of bliss. -And by its very nature it is momentary. You cannot make lightning permanent -- by its very nature it is momentary. People hanker for happiness and they want to make it permanent. That is the whole desire of the human mind -- to make happiness something permanent, which abides, which remains. But by its very nature it is non- abiding, by its very nature it is momentary.

Human beings go on struggling for the impossible. And then of course there is frustration. You can look everywhere -- there is frustration, misery.

So don't hanker for happiness, rather search for bliss -- and that is a totally different dimension. That's what meditation is all about -- the technology of the inner search for something which is eternal in you.

Only on the base of that can one come to a point where one can relax and be really happy. This ordinary happiness makes you really more and more unhappy. By the time you are settling with your unhappiness, again there is a moment of lightning -- again there is happiness, again you are unsettled, again desire arises... then there is frustration. By the time you are settling again, another moment of happiness.

So these moments of happiness are far between -- and between two moments of happiness there is great misery. We suffer that misery in the hope that the moment will be coming. It has not come today --

tomorrow it will be coming, or the day after tomorrow, but it must be coming. We live by hope.

To enter into meditation is to enter into another dimension -- the dimension of no hope, no desire... the dimension of no time. And the search is not for happiness at all -- the search is for that which is eternal. By the time you recognise the eternal in you, suddenly there is bliss, and then bliss is no more like lightning --

it is a permanent light in you that abides. Then happiness is not something that comes and goes -- you are happiness then.

When happiness becomes just your nature, it is bliss. When it comes and goes it is of no use. It is just like a toy, mm? The child becomes engaged, occupied, enjoys playing with it, but meanwhile misery goes on growing and it goes on exploring again and again.…

Anand means bliss and jagdeesh means god, lord of the world; so, god of bliss. And everybody is this --

the ultimate. We may know it, we may not know it. We may recognise, we may not recognise, but the reality remains the same -- only God is, and everything else is just a dream. This name will remind you continuously. So be a god, live

like a god, move like a god.

God has not to be realised -- God is already there. It is your reality... it is you. One has just to start living it on the way.

And that is the basic teaching that I am bringing to you -- that God has not to be searched for. It is not somewhere far away -- it is already the case. Just start living it.

Whatsoever you do, do with the conscious idea that you are God -- love like a god, move, walk like a god. Mm? just let that feeling arise more and more. And once you start living that vibration, suddenly you become aware that you have always been that. And not only you -- the moment you recognise that you have been always divine, the whole existence suddenly turns into a totally different world; everything becomes divine.

.… And do a few groups here.

First Tathata. Tathata means to be in a state of suchness -- it is a buddhist word... to live life as it is without hankering for any improvement, because all improvement is a desire of the ego. To think of oneself in terms of becoming is to create misery. So Tathata means whatsoever is, is -- live it. Don't compare it with 1/08/07

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the past and don't compare it with the future. Let that moment, the present moment, be all, as if there is no other time -- in fact there is not, only the present is. Tathata means living in the present, and living so totally that the past and the future disappear, so you are passionately herenow, intensely herenow. You become a burning flame -- your torch burns from both ends together. And in those moments one exists at the optimum.

We are living at the minimum, that's why we are missing the joy. We are not meant to live at the minimum. We are made to live at the optimum, we are made to live at a hundred degrees -- from there is evaporation, transformation. But we

live near about ten degrees: just lukewarm -- neither cold nor hot.

Tathata means that this moment is all, so you cannot dissipate your energy and you cannot spread your life. There is no past -- it is already gone; and there is no future -- because it has not come yet. So all that you have got is this atomic moment. There is no way to spread your life. You cannot be horizontal, you have to be vertical -- because this is the only moment there is, and you have to live in depth. That creates intensity... that creates passion. Life becomes a passionate affair. Then each moment has its own flame, and there is no smoke.

Smoke comes when you are not burning totally. If you burn a new, freshly-cut log, it smokes because it resists, it fights the fire. It is not ready to burn, the sap is still alive; the log is not dry. The log is not ready to move with the flames -- it fights. There is resistance, struggle, conflict, so there is no fire, only smoke; the log smokes. When the log is dry, there is no smoke -- there is pure fire. When there is no past, when there is no future, you are not wet with desire -- you are dry.

And this moment is all. There is no way to spread yourself anywhere, so you dive deep. And in that depth one starts living at the optimum -- and to live at the optimum is to live like a god. So Tathata will be your first step towards it. And the second is Sahaj.…

Sahaj means spontaneity. That which happens on its own accord -- only that is true and that is beautiful and that is good. That which you do is wrong. Whenever you are the doer you have erred. Being spontaneous means that whatsoever life wants, it happens. You cooperate with it -- with no condemnation, with no judgement, with no good/bad. Nothing is moral, nothing is immoral.

There are only two types of things: either natural or unnatural. So if you go on dropping the unnatural, the natural becomes a bigger stream by and by. That will be the second step, and then I will tell you what else to do... and the camp is there.

And fundamentally I am here, mm? So just drink me as deep as you can. And you are not new here.

Some day you will recognise that you have been with me before.

So it is a continuity of an old story.…

The Shadow of the Whip

Chapter #17

Chapter title: Now is the Season to Explode

26 November 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Archive code: 7611265 ShortTitle: WHIP17 Audio:

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[The Sajah -- spontaneity -- group is at darshan. The group leader said it was a very exciting group with a tremendous amount of life energy. However, one woman who seemed to have a breakthrough, left the group.]

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Sometimes some people leave. If they feel like leaving that is their spontaneity, so let them leave.

Nothing to worry about. We are not to force anybody -- that is their choice, mm? And when somebody leaves, help him not to feel guilty about it -- that is to be remembered. Don't feel it as a rejection -- that he has rejected the group or the group process; no don't take it that way.

This is how it evolved in his or her being -- to leave. So if it has come into somebody's mind to leave, then that is the spontaneous thing to do. Then forcing him or her to be in the group will be against the group, against the very philosophy of the group. Even if the person forces himself to be there and you come to know, just tell him not to force, because that is against the whole process. The process is to float... and who knows? Surprises will be there! Sometimes somebody comes floating to a point. where he simply jumps out of the river. That's how it happens to him -- so say good-bye! But don't make it in any way be felt as a rejection of the group -- because if you feel that it is a rejection of the group, then knowingly, unknowingly, you will create a guilt feeling in the person who has left. He will start feeling that he has done something wrong, that he should not have done it. No.

One thing has to be absolutely clear about my work: I don't want anybody to feel guilty about anything.

I want humanity to be completely free from guilt. Now all the religions of the world have done just the opposite: they have made people feel very very guilty. They have made all people feel like sinners. That's why the world is so miserable. The ceremony has lost its music, its dance. Everybody is so sad and the whole thing has become ugly because everybody is so guilty. If you eat this, you are guilty; if you drink that, you are guilty. If you make love to this woman, you are guilty. If you have some revolutionary ideas, you are guilty. If you have some eccentric sexuality, you are guilty... a thousand and one traps to make you guilty!

Unless you completely deaden yourself you cannot be respected. So the society respects only the dead people, and the alive people are all guilty and sinners.

My whole approach is just the contrary, the diametrically opposite -- I would like you to feel happy.

Whatsoever you do, you are accepted. The way you want to do it is good for you

-- good that for three days, four days, you were with the group. We are happy that for four days we continued to be together.

When next time somebody leaves, give him a good farewell so that he leaves without any guilt. And it the person leaves without any guilt, your group has worked tremendously for him. If he comes next time to do the group, he will not

come out of guilt. He will come out of a feeling that this is the group where hc belongs, that this group has to be completed not out of guilt that he has done anything wrong, but out of a feeling that he has missed something.

The original meaning of the word sin is 'missing the mark'. It is tremendously beautiful. It has lost its original meaning. A sinner is one who missed the mark -- nothing else!

So next time when somebody leaves, give him a good farewell. Let him leave with good feelings that he has left a beautiful group, a friendly one behind -- and a great desire arises in him or her to come back next time.

The group worked well. That was my feeling about it -- that it should become very very spontaneous.

That's why I have given the name Sahaj; it means spontaneity, natural; whatsoever is, is good and we accept it totally.

It will go on changing because a spontaneous group will change every time. It will bring many surprises to you too. You will never be fed up with it, because if it is structured, participants change but the leader remains the same, and every time he is repeating the same. But that will not happen in your group. It will be as new to you as it will be to the participants.

In fact the group has no leader really -- you are just a coordinator, just to be there to help, that's all... a midwife.

And that is the real function of a leader -- to be a midwife. If something is being born, you help. You cannot produce the child and you are not supposed to make a pregnancy. If somebody is carrying a pregnancy, you help. You just facilitate the process, and whatsoever is.… You are not worried whether a girl is born or a boy, or a fool or a wise man; you are not worried about it. That's not the point -- you simply help.

And each time there will be different things, because different people will be coming with different pregnancies. It is going to be a continuous surprise, and it will remain very very alive.

[A group member says: I often feel totally restless -- wanting to go somewhere and not knowing where to go.]

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And what are you doing for twenty-four hours? I think you need a little more creativity, more action. It is just energy -- nothing else -- and energy needs work.

This is how man makes problems. When a child is a child he hankers to be a young man because he looks all around -- older people are so powerful, and doing many things which he would also like to do. He wants to grow up fast -- as fast as possible. In fact he prays to God, 'By the morning make me bigger, stronger.' When one is young this problem arises -- so much energy, what to do? It constantly goes on driving you mad: do something!

One does not know what to do and where to go and anywhere you go it makes no difference -- it is there again. So young people go on moving from one town to another, from one country to another, from one guru to another.… Again they become restless. They are constantly on the move. The young energy is a vagabond... it is vagrant. Then it creates problems. One becomes so anxious with energy. And then there is old age.

Old people come to me and they say, 'We cannot meditate. We would like to, but the energy is not there.

We would like to dance like these young people -- we cannot.' So it seems that whatsoever happens, there are problems.

A wise person is one who uses all the situations of life. When he is a child he enjoys childhood. He does not bother a bit for growing up soon or anything -- he does not think about it. When he is a child, he is a child. He enjoys that innocent, irresponsible state of mind. When he is a young man he becomes creative.

He does not go rushing from one place to another; rather he starts using the energy to move from one space to another space -- the journey becomes inner. And you have a thousand and one spaces yet unexplored.

So it is pointless to go to Kathmandu and to Goa and to Kabul -- it is meaningless. There are Kathmandus within you and Goas within you and vast tremendous beautiful beaches of being -- you need to go there.

So when a person is wise and young, he uses, rides on the waves... dances, laughs, lives, loves, and does not make any problem out of it. When he is old, he uses that too; when the energy is gone he can sit silently.

Now he can follow the zen maxim: sitting silently, doing nothing, and the grass grows by itself.

This is how a wise man should be -- using all opportunities as they come. And each opportunity has its own beauty and it opens its own door.

So right now dance, sing, love -- use your energy! Invest it in inner exploration -

- paint, make poems, write a novel. This is the time when one needs to do many many things, because once energy is gone if you have not done many, many things, you will repent -- but then it will be too late. So use this time to do a thousand and one Things. Enjoy doing them and then the restlessness will disappear.

This is how I have lived. When I was a child I was never worried about growing up. Why? Why should one? Then I lived like a whirlwind.

Somebody, a young man, asked Confucius, 'How to be silent?' Confucius looked at him and he said,

'Have you gone mad? When you die you will rest in your grave -- then you will be silent! What is the hurry?

Right now enjoy! Right now don't be worried about silence. Everybody is to die, that much is certain. Then in your grave there will be eternal silence -- you enjoy it then!'

Confucius is right. This is no time to become grave-like. This is time to flower! This is the season to explode! If you are not exploding, there will be trouble, mm? It is just like a tree which is somehow hoarding its flowers and fruits inside it, and does not allow them out. It will go mad! Sooner or later the tree will be on the psychiatrist's couch, going through psychoanalysis. But trees don't do that -- they are not that foolish.

When it is time, they flower. When it is time, many fruits come. They become so heavy with fruit that their branches start touching the earth. When it is time to drop the fruits, they drop. When it is time to drop the leaves, the leaves drop and they stand naked against the sky. When it is time to die, they die silently.

They live each moment as it comes.

This is my essential teaching: live each moment as it comes. You have energy -- be creative, mm?

[Another group member says: The fourth day leader had been saying to everybody to go crazy, and at the first moment a fear came into me -- like being oppressed by violence... going into a space where I didn't feel like going. Then the group entirely focused on me saying, 'Get angry! Get angry!' And they started slapping me and fighting me.… And I didn't know how to cope with this violence... So how to cope with the aggression? -- because I didn't feel any anger against anybody or anything to get into stuff like that. The 1/08/07

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first three and a half days were really spontaneous, and then after these days, this fear.]

Mm mm. In such a situation you should listen to your own spontaneity, and then you would have enjoyed the last days tremendously. They were hitting you -- let them hit -- but you didn't feel anger, so what could you do? If you didn't feel, you didn't.

There is no need to create a feeling. Nobody has ever been able to create a feeling. You can pretend, you can act, but how can you feel? If you are not feeling, you are not feeling.

So this was a good opportunity -- that they are slapping your face, and hitting and saying things and provoking you, and you were just sitting there. This was your craziness!

Just sitting there... Buddha-like. And sooner or later they would have felt that they were crazy and what were they doing to this poor man? He is simply sitting there looking at the whole scene, enjoying it or smiling.

They could have killed you -- and even if they kill, what is wrong in it? (Osho chuckles. ..laughter) I don't see the point -- what is wrong? One day you will die... and you will not find such a beautiful group to die in! (laughter) You missed an opportunity!

Next time it happens, just listen to your spontaneity. This may be their spontaneity -- and of course when somebody is hitting you and you don't get angry, he becomes more angry because this man is defeating him. So that is his problem. If you could have watched, it would have given you such a great insight into your being and such a transcendence. All this craziness around you and you were sitting there.

This is what is happening to me! (laughter) What else can I do?

But it happens the first time. In the next group you look at it again. Otherwise some time repeat Sahaj.

And just let them. What are they doing? What can they do? At the most they can kill, that's all. Once you accept the worst, then there is no problem. You should have lain down there amidst them and let those crazy people do what they were doing -- shouting and screaming -- and they would have worshipped you finally!

They would have touched your feet! (laughter) You would have simply attained! You would have become enlightened or something! This is how enlightenment happens! (chuckling... laughter) The Shadow of the Whip

Chapter #18

Chapter title: Know You are the Universe

27 November 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Archive code: 7611275 ShortTitle: WHIP18

Audio:

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Deva means divine and niseema means without any boundaries -- unbounded, unlimited, infinite. And this name is to remind you continuously that nothing is limited. All limitation is imposed by the mind, otherwise everything is unlimited. It begins nowhere -- it ends nowhere. It is almost as if you stand at a window and look at the sky -- the frame of the window becomes the frame of the sky. But the sky is unlimited -- it is your window that gives it a limitation. The mind is very limited, existence is unlimited.

So whenever you look through the mind you will see boundaries, definitions. Whenever you can see something without the mind, all boundaries disappear. Hence the insistence of all the great meditators that one has to achieve a state of no-mind, because only then you know the real as it is. Otherwise you know something as it is not, as the mind manipulates it, as the mind makes it appear. You know that, but that is not real.

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If you look at a tree it looks limited. But if you penetrate a little deeper, the roots have gone into the earth, they are joined with the earth, and the leaves are joined with the sun, with the sun rays. Every leaf is continuously in a tremendous play with the air. Without the air, without the sun and without the earth, the tree won't exist. It can't exist for a single moment.

So to define the tree is not right. In the definition of the tree, the earth has to be there, the sun has to be there, the air has to be there. And then there are more subtle layers.…

Now even scientific researchers show that if you love the tree, when you come to it, the tree feels very happy. It sways... it welcomes you... it spreads its arms towards you. So even it is connected with love.

If you come to the tree with hatred and you want to cut the tree, it shrinks, becomes afraid, hates you from its very guts. Now there are scientific ways to know it. And not only when you hate the tree does it hate you -- even that somebody is coming with the idea to cut the tree... the very idea is enough! So it means that the tree is connected even with ideas.

And not only that.… When you are going to cut a particular pine tree, the other trees will also be antagonistic to you. You are not going to harm them, but the rosebush will be angry at you. You are going to cut the pine tree -- they have lived together for so long. They have an affinity, a family, a communion.

The garden will miss the pine tree -- the whole garden will miss it.

If you go deeper and deeper, you see that things are so interconnected that it is difficult to define anything. That's why God is indefinable -- because God simply means the totality of all the interconnections, of all the positive interconnections, impossible interconnections -- past, present, future.

The totality of all the interconnections is what God is. It is impossible to define.

But the mind tends to define, categorise, label. The mind says, 'This is a man, this is a woman' -- and this is all nonsense because in every man there exists a woman, and in every woman there exists a man. This is utter nonsense to say, 'This is a man, and this is a woman.' Maybe there is a little difference of emphasis that's all. Because each child is born out of two parents, man and woman; the child inherits both. Your mother goes on living in you, your father goes on living in you, so how can you be just a woman?

And you cannot be only that which you look on the surface. There are layers upon layers of your being not even known to you, so how can you define?

Just a few days ago one old woman came -- of course old, so an old pattern of thinking. And she said, 'I am very much impressed by you Osho, but I cannot take sannyas because I have accepted Jesus as my teacher. I am a Christian and I am an orthodox Christian. I am tremendously impressed, I love what you say, but I cannot follow you, I cannot come with you.'

I told her, 'If you really love Jesus, you have to come with me. If you are really a Christian, how can you avoid me, how can you escape? But if you are not a Christian, it is another thing. Then you can go on playing with the label "Christian", and "Christ", and this and that.'

By giving you this name, Niseema, I would like you to go deeper into things, and to drop the old habit of the mind. Nothing is clear-cut -- that's the beauty. That is the mystery of life -- that nothing is clear-cut.

Everything penetrates everything else and everything is a member of everything else... everything is overlapping everything else. It is almost like waves on the surface of the ocean. Have you ever seen a single wave? It is impossible to see a single wave on the ocean. Whenever a wave exists, it exists in a great pattern of waves.

You cannot exist alone. You exist in this universe!

This word universe is beautiful -- it means unity: uni means unity. We exist in unity, and the unity is multi-dimensional. We are joined with the past. You are joined with your father, with your mother, with your mother's mother, your father's father, and so on and so forth up to Adam and Eve, and to God who created Adam and Eve. You are joined to all that is ever going to happen in the world. You may disappear, but you are joined, because you will create a certain ripple which will continue.

I may be gone, but I am creating a certain ripple that will remain. You may be gone, but you loved somebody and that love created a ripple that will remain and remain and remain. It can never disappear, it will have its own repercussions... it will go on vibrating. You throw a small pebble in the lake and ripples arise. The pebble settles very soon at the bottom, but the ripples continue. They go on moving towards the shore -- and there is no shore to this existence.

I am talking to you.… In this moment something is transpiring between me and you. I will be gone, you will be gone, but that which is transpiring will abide. So these words will go on echoing, reechoing. The speaker will not be there, the listener will not be there, but what is transpiring between the two in this moment has become part of eternity. And there is no shore, so these ripples will go on and on and on.

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Now scientists say that if we can invent something more speedy than the speed of light, we can catch many things from the past. For example, Krishna talked to Arjuna -- those vibrations must be somewhere, passing near some star. If we can reach and catch them there, we can listen to it again.

Jesus can be photographed still. The only problem is how to invent a vehicle that goes faster than light.

Some day it may be possible. For example, Krishna (the ashram's photographer) is taking a photograph.

When he takes a photograph it takes time for the light to reach to the plate. When his photograph comes it is not exactly of the present; it is of the past. A split second has passed -- so a thousand years have passed; that makes no difference. If we can run ahead and from there we can take a photograph, we can take Jesus surrounded' by his disciples by Lake Galilee, talking to them and telling his parables. Nothing is lost!

This is the meaning of universe -- it is a unity. Whatsoever has happened, has happened, whatsoever is happening, is happening, and whatsoever will happen... they are all connected.

This is the meaning of niseema. So feel this more and more.

And just by feeling it, you will feel tremendous joy arising in you. Limitation is misery. To think of oneself as a woman is to become miserable. To think of oneself as a Christian or a Mohammedan is to become miserable. To think of oneself as this or that is to become miserable. Dropping all identity, one becomes blissful.

So let your sannyas be a great dropping of all the identities. Know that you are the universe. This is the meaning of saying that you are God.…

[The Encounter group is at darshan. One group member says: You gave me a

message last time that I should take more initiative... I find it more difficult than I thought it would be.]

Mm mm. I was also thinking it would be difficult. It is difficult to take initiative because to take initiative is to take risk. One never knows where it will lead and what will happen. And the basic fear is that if you take the initiative, maybe the other is going to reject.

The fear of rejection is there, so people don't take initiative -- they simply wait. They simply wait for something to happen: somebody will turn up, somebody will knock at the door. Then you live at the minimum. Maybe some day somebody turns up but you will never live at the optimum.

And to live at the minimum is not to live at all -- live at the optimum. So make each moment an adventure. Take the risk! At the most you can be rejected. What is wrong in it? -- nothing. At least you will have the satisfaction that you tried. I'm not saying there is a guarantee that you will succeed, but to fail is better than not to try -- at least you know that you tried.

And if you fail you are not responsible for it -- you tried your best. Then when God encounters you finally in the final encounter -- you can say to Him, 'It is you! I have tried my best. Whatsoever I could do, I did. And if I failed, you have failed, not me.' And that is something worth saying. But if you have not tried at all how will you face your God? What will you say?

The opportunity was given but you were afraid -- afraid of what? At the most, the worst possibility is that you may be rejected. So accept the worst and hope for the best... and continue. You will start enjoying.

Once you take the risk, by and by you start enjoying the thrill of initiative. In fact, if each time you take the initiative you are accepted, there will be no thrill. The thrill comes because there is a possibility, fifty/fifty.… Maybe you go to somebody and you tell him, 'I love you.' Mm? There is a thrill, because who knows? He may say, 'Forget all about it. I am not interested.' Or he may say, 'Thank you! I was also waiting, and I was afraid to take the initiative.'

If each time it turns out to be 'yes', it will be meaningless. If whomsoever you approach says 'yes', there is no thrill. That moment between yes and no is the moment of thrill, of sensation, aliveness... throbbing.

That is the moment when you burn like a flame. So try!

It is hard. It is hard only because you have not tried it before. Once you enjoy it, once you have learned the taste of it, it will be hard not to take the initiative. It is just an old habit, that's why. In this group, try more.

One has nothing to lose. What have you got to lose? Nothing to lose except your misery. So if you fail you can have your misery back... nothing to be worried about. Who can take your misery? If you want to be miserable you can always be, nobody can take your misery. But if you simply go on sitting, waiting for something to happen, it may happen, it may not happen. And even if it happens it will be the very very minimal.

Because this is my feeling: when you move enthusiastically towards life then enthusiastic people move 1/08/07

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towards you -- the same challenges the same. If you simply sit, then a lazy bum some day may move towards you. He may be sitting by your side -- sitting and feeling tired -- and you are also tired, and he will say, 'Hey! What are you doing there? Wanna fall in love or something?' (laughter) So you will find some bum... some lazy fellow -- just like you! And then too you will both sit. Now who should initiate? Who should hold the hand first? And who should say, 'I love you,' or this and that?

Many people I see that way -- sitting closed, not knowing what to do... from where to begin. So if you remain closed in that way, you will find some day that some. closed person has landed upon you. Before it happens, take initiative. When you take initiative and you are enthusiastic, moving, full of energy, riding radiantly on the wave of life, then you will find some adventurous people. Somebody who is courageous will become interested in you.

I have seen it happen -- even a very homely woman can become very beautiful if she has initiative. And a very beautiful woman can become very ordinary if she has no initiative. Initiative gives you a glow.

Certainly a corpse cannot take any initiative. So when you don't take any initiative, by and by you will become more and more corpse-like.

Have you seen it? Once a woman gets married she starts becoming ugly, fat, loses proportion, loses charm. What happens? She is settling. The old enthusiasm, the old urge to explore, to take the initiative, to find someone, is finished. She has arrived, so now what is the point?

In a society where divorce has a bigger rate, women are more beautiful than in a society where divorce has a very low rate. In a society where women have the possibility of getting married again and again, they keep younger. In India, after twenty-eight, thirty, the woman is finished. In America she keeps young at least up to forty-five. And you can even find a woman of fifty who is still young. The reason? Still the initiative is possible; things have not settled.

The day marriage disappears from the world people will be more beautiful because each day there will be a possibility. You follow me? If the marriage completely disappears you cannot afford to be fat you cannot afford to be ugly, you cannot afford to be stupid. You have to be on guard, alert, throbbing with life.

You have to remain attractive -- you cannot afford to be unattractive. You cannot be lazy, otherwise you will not be in the flow of life -- you will be thrown out, discarded... thrown in some out of the way place.

You will no more be a part of the main current.

If marriage disappears people will be more alive because they will be less settled. More opportunities will be there, and things will be changing more. There will be more of a flux-like quality, liquidity, movement. But people don't want to take initiative. Immediately they find somebody -- anybody whom by chance they can grab -- they settle immediately.

Don't be in such a hurry to settle. You have not even grabbed anybody and you are trying to settle. Don't settle. This settlement is a suicide -- move out of it. Be more playful. Life is fun! Don't be too serious about it -- there is nothing to lose!

The only losers I have come across are those people who have never tried -- otherwise all are winners; whoever tries is a winner. Even if you lose, I say you win something. Maybe you don't win the first prize, you win the second or the

third or there are always booby prizes... something (laughter). Try! What other group are you going to do ?

[Another group member says: The group's been very hard for me. The leader comments: She is tremendously strong -- no matter what happens she still won't show. Osho says to the leader:]

She will not be hard... Two days are still there -- two days, so she will be very soft. She is very soft inside -- just a strong will. So once she can surrender her will to her heart, she can become as soft as is possible for a human being.

There are two types of possibilities: one is, a person is soft because he has no will -- but his softness cannot be very big, it will be very tiny, very small. The quantity cannot be very explosive. He is soft because he is weak, the softness comes because of the weakness. These people will be very sentimental, emotional. Anger will come easily, love will come easy, and nothing will be abiding. It will be just a mood.

These people will be very flux-like, they won't have any integrity. Soft they will be -- but their softness is part of their weakness. That softness is not going to help much.

But she can become soft in a totally different way. There are people who have a will. If they want to be hard, they can be hard. If they want to be soft they can be soft -- but their softness will have a strength; it will not be part of their weakness. And then it is tremendously beautiful.

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She can be soft and strong in her softness. If she decides not to be soft, then there is no way. But if she decides to be soft, she can become the softest person in the world. She has a very clear-cut will. The only question is that if the will is against the heart, she will remain hard. If the will surrenders to the heart, she can become a flower.

And this is a real softness. Mm? Weakness is just a simulation: it just appears soft because the person is weak, it is a sort of impotence. She will be from tomorrow, mm? I have put her head right on the way. (to the group member) Don't betray me I am promising them! (laughter) Right?

[Another group member says: I can't let go totally -- and of course that applies to other things also.]

I think you have some impossible concept of totality that is bugging you. We can create impossible concepts and then we can be very unhappy. Now you have a perfectionist's idea about totality.

And in fact, totality and perfection are just the contrary -- opposite goals. A perfectionist can never be total. And a person who wants to be total should never think in terms of perfection.

A perfectionist is an idealist. He has some idea, ideal, and he has to fulfill that ideal. So an idealist is always miserable because he always falls short. Whatsoever he does there is something missing -- and he has made some ideal which is impossible. And only the impossible looks to him to be the ideal, that which cannot be achieved becomes very attractive. It is an ego trip -- he has to do something which nobody can do.

He has to do something which cannot really be done. He tries for it and he falls short of it again and again...

feels miserable. Out of his misery he again tries... again tries and his whole life

becomes a wasteland.

Now totality is a totally different question.

A person who believes in totalily is not a perfectionist, he has no ideal -- he simply believes in The natural Whatsoever happens is good. Everything satisfies him because There is nothing to com-pare.

Now you say that you are not capable of expressing your anger totally. What do you mean by totally?

You. have some ideal -- that this should be this way. Whatsoever you are doing is enough! That's all that you can do right now. You cannot go ahead of yourself.

You can only go the way and to the extent that you can go! All that you are doing is all that you can do.

This acceptance is part of the concept of totality. One accepts one's limitations and one knows that the impossible is not possible. And the possible is human -- it has flaws, limitations. Be human! Don't ask for the super-human. The super- human is always inhuman. Just be human, relax -- and in that relaxation more will become possible.

Now you are tense, you feel that you are not doing as you should do, but from where is this 'should'

coming ? Maybe you are watching others, comparing, but that may be possible for them. They are not you --

you are not them. You are you and they are they.

Somebody is crying to his heart's desire and you cannot cry -- now a comparison arises that this is how one should cry totally. But this may be natural to the person and may be unnatural to you -- because you are not alike; nobody is like anybody else. Each individual is so unique -- and one has to be respectful of this uniqueness. That's what I call religiousness: respect your uniqueness! It is nothing to brag about, it is not an ego trip. It is a simple acceptance... a recognition that everybody is different -- just like fingerprints. Your fingerprint is different to mine, but there is no good, no bad. It is not that mine is better and yours is not good -- there is no comparison. Yours is yours, mine is mine.

So stop watching others. Start accepting yourself. And whatsoever is coming, that's right for you! Relax into it, and you will see more is coming. But that comes by relaxation, not by creating an ideal and a strained effort. No need! This is the idea in your mind -- a 'should' exists somewhere. You have some vague concept.

The philosophy of totality has no idea of perfection. It is very human. Relax for these two days, and whatsoever comes naturally is good. More is not needed -- there may not be any more! Always listen to your nature, and never try to impose anything on top of it -- that is very cruel, that is a sort of masochism.

Then you become miserable, and when you become miserable you make more effort. When you make more effort, you are still more miserable... so on and so

forth. Relax!

My whole effort here is to help you to accept yourself... whosoever you are! If I can take your guilt away from you, I have helped you tremendously. If I can take your ideals away from you, I have helped you tremendously. If I can make you simple and natural, ordinary, I have helped you tremendously. And just the opposite has been done by the so-called religious people up to now.…

They create guilt. Whatsoever you do. they are ready to condemn it -- that this is nothing! Improve!

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They go on creating the tempo. And of course you feel that this is good for your ego, so you go on improving yourself. The ego is never fulfilled, and your life is wasted. For these two days, simply relax.

Whatsoever comes is right.… Easy is right!

The Shadow of the Whip

Chapter #19

Chapter title: Meditation -- the Ultimate Music

28 November 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Archive code: 7611285 ShortTitle: WHIP19 Audio:

No Video:

[A sannyasin asks: Would give me any guidance on places that might be good for me to visit. I wish to go on a pilgrimage in India.]

Go to all the buddhist places: Bodh Gaya, Sarnath, Sanchi, Ajanta, Ellora -- all the buddhist places. And if you are close to some other place you can go, mm? But your whole plan should be to visit all the buddhist places. They will give you great insight into things, and you may start remembering your past lives. (Osho had said to this sannyasin that he had been a Buddhist in past lives.) But before you go, you meditate well, do a few groups -- and particularly the buddhist meditation group here, mm ? That will prepare your mind.

And then you start from Ajanta, Ellora, Sanchi, Sarnath, Bodh Gaya -- the buddhist places, mm? and keep Buddha in mind. Dream about Buddha... think about Buddha. It will be a great help.

[Osho said one could visit places as a tourist but one would miss much ]

You can go and you can visit -- then they are ruins. Something in you can make them again alive, then they are no more ruins. But that depends on you. If you want to visit just ruins, there is no problem you can go. You can go to Bodh Gaya but you will not feel Buddha there at all. And he can be felt there.

When once such a person exists, he leaves such tremendous energy there. He became enlightened in that place -- Bodh Gaya -- under the same tree that still exists. He continuously walked for years around the temple; those stones are still there on which he would walk and meditate, and under the tree he would rest and meditate.

If you have a feel, and if you have some understanding of how a Buddhist meditates while walking, how a Buddhist sits silently and where he goes into his inner world, those stones will not be ordinary stones. If you can also go into that space, you will have a tremendous realisation.

This is my approach: if you want to go and see Lake Galilee and you want to

visit Jerusalem; do some christian prayer -- otherwise it is meaningless. If you want to go to some hindu places, then do some hindu meditation -- because these places open their doors only to those who are ready.. They are not really for visitors.

In the East visitors have never existed -- this is a western phenomenon. Unless somebody has a feel for some place, he will never go. A Mohammedan will go to Mecca -- nobody else will go. For centuries Mohammedans have not allowed anybody else to enter, because it is pointless! Unless you have a love affair with Mohammed, it is pointless. Why crowd the place? In fact your presence creates a wrong vibration. If somebody is there who is just a visitor, a tourist -- which is a very ugly phenomenon -- he 1/08/07

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creates a certain vibe.

I have seen tourists -- just moving with their cameras, and foolish chit-chat, and with their radios, where one needs to be absolutely silent. And within one hour they have visited the whole place and they have gone

-- finished! They have taken the pictures for their albums. Now they can go back and tell others that they have been to Bodh Gaya, they have seen the place.

This is absurd -- because the place is not an outer thing. Unless you are in tune with it, the sound will not happen. You may go and you may miss. So it is futile !

My feeling is: first do a few groups here -- particularly the buddhist group -- and after the buddhist group immediately go with that same quality inside you. Walk the way that Buddha taught his disciples to walk... with that grace, with that silence, with that contentment, with that awareness. Breathe as the Buddha has taught his disciples -- in a certain rhythmic way. And then don't be in a hurry. When you go there, be there for two, three days. It is not a question of just seeing the temple -- it can be seen within fifteen minutes.

And don't rush to another place -- just stay there for two, three days. In many

moods sit under the tree.

Sometimes in the morning, sometimes in the evening... sometimes deep in the night. Bribe the priest and go in the night -- in the middle of the night when nobody goes there, and all visitors are gone, and guides and tourists are no more there, and the place is absolutely silent as it must have been when Buddha was sitting there. Deep in the middle of the night, in the dark night, just sit under the tree.

Just remain available there, and there is a possibility that you may come in contact with something.

Then it is worth making that effort.…

Anand means bliss, blissfulness, and gandharva means the celestial musician. In the indian mythology, Gandharva is the musician of the gods. In heaven, Gandharva is the musician of the gods -- he plays for the gods. So it has become synonymous with music. And that is going to be your path. So listen to music in all the various forms, in all the varieties. Birds singing, or the rain falling, or a waterfall, or just the wind passing through the pines... dancing... instruments; if you want to play, play, otherwise listen. And you also sing sometimes. There is no need to sing anything meaningfully, mm? Just a sound, a babbling will do... just a chanting of anything -- meaninglessly -- just as one chants the alphabet. But let music be your very centre, and you will be tremendously benefited.

Music is one of the most natural ways to grow. And if one can understand music, there is no need to understand anything else. The whole existence is musical. There is a music... eternal music. It is there even in silence. In fact it is more so when there is silence. The stars are singing -- One has just to develop a receptivity.

So I am not saying that you have to become a musician. If you feel, good.… Otherwise the music is available. You can become just a receiver, a total receptor, and that will do. But .creating a little music is also helpful and good. And it is not a performance, so it is not meant for anybody -- it is just for your own joy.

What have you been doing?

[The new sannyasin says he is a sculptor working with stone.]

Mm, mm ! It is music -- music in the stones.… That's very good... that's very good. It is music. All art is music... only medias differ.

Meditation is the ultimate music -- it is medium-less. And when there is no medium there is perfection, because the medium, whatsoever it is, creates hindrances. You can work as much as you want, but still you will feel that if there were no medium then the thing would have been perfect. If the medium stands there against your work.… Mm? if you are working on a stone and the stone resists.… In every possible way it gives you a good fight -- nobody wants to yield, nobody wants to surrender. The stone also has its own will

-- it wants to keep its shape, it is not ready to be altered so easily. You can do it, but still you will feel the medium is a barrier.

The medium is needed to express, but the very medium of expression becomes the barrier. You can use beautiful words to express truth, but they become the barrier.

In China they say that when a musician becomes perfect, he throws his instrument, because then the instrument creates disturbance. When an archer is perfect, he breaks his bow. And when a poet has come to perfection, he no more says anything -- he keeps quiet. Then his poetry is silence.

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So meditation is the ultimate music because the medium disappears. Music is there but there is no medium. Only those who can hear without the medium will hear it, and only those who can see without the medium will see it.

That's why Jesus goes on saying to his disciples, 'Those who have ears, hear, and those who have eyes, see.' He was talking not to blind men, not to deaf people -- they were as normal as we. But he goes on saying again and again, 'If you have eyes...' He is talking about some message which cannot be expressed...

which remains unexpressed. And one who can see something invisible, only he can understand that message, otherwise not. So your meditations will help you tremendously. Your art will be transformed -- it will reach new altitudes.

In the East we have always been working in every way, in every possible way, to reach God. It may be religion, or it may be music, or it may be dancing -- whatsoever -- but in the East our effort has been to reach God from everywhere. So everything eastern has a quality of religiousness to it: Sculpture has a tremendous religious quality. The western sculpture lacks much. It is more sexual, more physical, more earthly. And if sometimes it moves away from the physical, at the most it reaches to the psychological. And then too out of one hundred, ninety percent becomes pathological: Picasso and others --

Chagall -- look a little pathological... as if the mind were not quiet, as if the mind were neurotic. Things are topsy-turvy; the symmetry is lost. It seems a crowd inside. Picasso doesn't seem to be one man -- seems to be many men, and all painting together. So the painting comes, but it is a collage -- it is not one piece, it is not unity. It is not cosmos, it is a chaos... a neurotic thing.

And if you watch Picasso's painting too long, it will create pathology, nausea, apprehension and fear. If you watch an eastern painting -- japanese, chinese or indian -- just by watching it you will become quiet and peaceful.

[Osho recounted a taoist story about a king who commissioned an artist to paint a picture. Months passed, during which the king would impatiently enquire as to whether the painting was ready to be seen yet.

Finally the artist finished his work and showed it to the king -- it was a picture of a forest with a track going through it and into a hill. The track disappeared into the horizon as far as one could see. It was a beautiful picture -- almost lifelike -- and the king asked the artist where the track led to.

'I don't know myself,' said the artist, 'I'm going to find out.' And with that, the story goes, he went along the track and disappeared into the painting ]

I love this story!

If you really watch a painting, you should disappear. Just by watching it your mind will subside, thoughts will disappear. And when mind is not there, you are not there -- then you disappear. So, much is going to happen!

And for short you can simply use Katya. Anand means bliss and Katyayani is a name of the mother goddess. In India we conceive of God in both ways. A few religions conceive of Him as man, a few religions conceive of Him as woman... a few as 'he' and few as 'she'. In India the male chauvinist attitude has never been very predominant, so down the centuries both the traditions have continued: a few think of Him as father, and few think of Him as mother. Katyayani means mother goddess; a name of God -- in the form of a woman. So the whole name will mean blissful mother goddess.

Forget the old name completely, mm? The old is gone, and this this is the beginning of a long journey.

And the journey is such that it is sweet in the beginning, it is sweet in the middle, it is sweet-in the end. But it is a long journey.… So a great pilgrimage starts this moment. Feel blessed ! Good, Katya. Good! (Osho touches her head in blessing, smiling warmly.)

It is a name of an ancient Buddha. Gautam is only one Buddha; many have preceded him and many have followed him. Buddhahood is a state of consciousness; it has nothing to do with Gautam Buddha. Buddha is just like Christ -- Jesus is his name, Christ is his state of consciousness; Gautam is his name, Buddha is his state of consciousness, hence he is called Gautam Buddha.

This is the name: Samantbhadra -- he is an ancient Buddha. Samant means infinitely, and bhadra means graceful; infinite grace -- that is the literal meaning of the word. But it is a name of an ancient Buddha, very significant. And I am giving it to you because I see the possibility that you will be growing on buddhist 1/08/07

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lines, potentially you are a Buddhist. So if you know it consciously, many pitfalls can be avoided and the path can become very straight and direct.

[In answer to Osho's invitation to take sannyas, a visitor replies: I feel very confused about it. I don't know myself what to do. I can't get hold of anything.]

You will never be able to get hold of anything that I say (laughter). I am so contradictory (a chuckle in his voice) that it is very difficult. I don't allow any hold... I am almost like mercury. So if you want to get in, get in -- don't bother about the hold. You will never have it -- and there is no need.

You have entered life without having any hold on it. One falls in love without having any hold on love.

And one day one dies -- and without even understanding the ABC's of death. My sannyas is almost like that.

I don't even try to explain it, because explanation makes things ugly. Explanation is not needed.

The whole effort is to drop reason and all the games reason goes on playing. It is an absurd step. Mm?

sannyas is an absurdity, a sort of voluntary madness -- willingly one becomes a little mad. You try it! It will lead you into new spaces. And it will be very helpful. You can do the same meditations without becoming a sannyasin, but you will miss much because you will feel that you are an outsider and you will never be able to get into the very spirit of it.

All great things happen when you have become an insider. Then you float easily, you open easily --

otherwise one remains on guard. If you are here without becoming a sannyasin, you will continuously remain on guard, and my sannyasins will go on attacking you, 'Why are you not becoming a sannyasin?' So you will remain on the defence and that will create a fear. You will be afraid to communicate, afraid to make friends, because the fear will always be there -- if you become too friendly, these people are going to seduce you into sannyas. And you will be a little afraid of me too.

Once you have taken sannyas, all fear disappears -- now there is nothing else. The worst has happened!

(laughter)

Just do it right now!

[The visitor says: Yes, please.]

Prem means love and buddha means consciousness, intelligence; loving intelligence, loving consciousness, or love awareness. Love is the first thing to be done and the second thing will be awareness.

So the name is just a condensed formula for your whole work: first warming up through love, and when you are floating, flowing, you have melted, and you are no more frozen and cold, no more indifferent, compassion has arisen -- then the next step is to become aware.

Feel more loving, affectionate, caring. Mix with people, hold hands, hug people -

- people are beautiful.

Don't miss any opportunities in which you can be loving -- never miss any opportunity of love. Then you have created the right jumping board for awareness, and then your awareness will not make you cold. Your awareness will be like a flame -- alive; it will not be dead.

The Shadow of the Whip

Chapter #20

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