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‌CHAPTER 13

13 February 1977 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Prem means love and atharva means fire – love fire. And that’s the fire that keeps us alive, and that’s the fire that runs the whole existence. That’s the fire that one has to experience to know what god is.

Physicists say that the existence consists of nothing but electricity, and they are approximately true, because electricity is a form of fire. But I say approximately true because one dimension is missing. Their electricity is dead – it has no consciousness in it... no love in it.

All religions have said that the world consists of fire, ‘elan vital’, but they add a new dimension to it. It is fire, it is love, it is consciousness. So become a fire – worshipper – that’s what your name means.

Atharva is also the name of the first man who discovered fire. He is the first priest of fire and he created the first temple of fire. It is one of the most ancient names.

With fire, with the discovery of fire, the whole civilisation evolved. There has never been another discovery more important than the discovery of fire. Not even atomic energy is so important: man can live without it, but without fire?

They say there have been two great discoveries only: one is fire and the second is the wheel, the bullock cart. First is fire, second is the bullock cart. Up to now there have been only two basic discoveries. Then the discovery of fire has gone into details and atomic energy is the ultimate. The wheel has moved into many many developments, improvements, and all mechanism is nothing but based on the discovery of the wheel. But these two are the basic, very basic, fundamental discoveries. Man has yet to discover the third basic thing.

Fire is certainly more important than the bullock cart, more important than the wheel. And fire is not only fire.…

So attune yourself to fire more and more. Sometimes just sit by the side of the fireplace... watch the play of the flame. Get in tune with the flames – just sitting by the side.

That’s the joy that comes sitting by the fireplace – the sound of burning wood... the smell, the warmth and the colourful play of flames. Then those flames disappear into the cosmos... the visible simply becoming invisible – and that’s how one has to disappear one day.

In meditation that happens one day: just a moment before you were there, and a moment afterwards you have disappeared like a flame into the cosmos.

So watch the play of flames. If a big fire is not possible – it is difficult in a hot country, here – you can just watch small flames... just a candle will do. Just see the shapes that the flame takes – the wavering, the non-wavering and sometimes simply disappearing. And get more and more in tune with the fire element.

Look at the sun – sometimes in the morning, in the evening – wherever you find the fire element, don’t miss the opportunity, and you will find great happenings through it. Mm? that’s my feeling about your energy.

There are five basic elements and there are five basic types of people, and in each person one element predominates, either fire or air or water or earth or sky. And once you know exactly what element predominates in you you have the key in your hand. Then your whole future is in your hands. If you don’t know what element predominates in your being, you can go on doing many things but it is groping in the dark.

For example, a person who has the predominance of fire in his being, if he follows those methods which are for water people he will never succeed in his life in anything. In fact all his doing will be his undoing, because the water-element methods are just the opposite, they are not fire-element methods. You throw water when you want to put out fire, and those methods will work just like that.

But people go on doing this because it is difficult to know your own element. That is possible only when you go to a master and you are initiated and he can look into your being and feel where you are, what you are, what your possibilities are and in what direction you should move.

So this is your first step – to get in tune with fire – then I will give you many more things to proceed further.

[Osho suggested a few groups that a sannyasin newly arrived should do. He said it would take a little time to become oriented to the East.]

The mind takes a little time to relax. The speed of the eastern mind is slow; the speed of the western mind is very fast. The east has never been concerned with speed – speed has never been an obsession with them. Things move slowly... as if they are not moving at all. The river flows, but flows so slowly that not even a, ripple is seen. That has become the very nature of the eastern consciousness.

So when you come to the East it is not only a change of geography – it is a change of psychic atmosphere. It is a change of psychology more than a change of geography. The geography is not much different, but the East has developed a totally different map of consciousness. To be slow has been a value.

In the West to move fast is the value. Where you are moving is not the big problem. If you are moving fast enough, good; if you have speed, then perfectly good. You may be going farther away from your goal – that is not the point – but if you are going fast everybody will congratulate you. In the East that is not the point.

Even if you are not moving at all, there is no disvalue in it. If you are happy unmoving you are at the goal already.… So, a very different vibe. Now the East is very much disturbed because the education is western and the East has also become ambitious to become like the West, so there is great turmoil. The new ambition is creating a very great rift in the eastern consciousness from its own past.

So this is happening – that when an eastern person becomes attuned to the western consciousness, he is in more trouble than the western person himself, because the western man has a long tradition of being speedy. The eastern man simply goes berserk. He loses his old pace, and the new pace is so antagonistic to his whole being that he feels almost uprooted. A great alienation arises, one loses one’s home.

So when you come from the west you are changing a psychological zone. The body will adjust within three days, the mind will take at least three weeks – and that too depends. If you understand how to relax and how to mix here, it comes sooner. Sometimes I have seen a few people who have been here for three, four months and they have not got in tune – they are still out of step.

And this is my feeling, that you have a very speedy mind; that’s why I am talking about speed. You want to do things fast. That will be a barrier, so drop it consciously.

Do the meditation camp, dance, sing, and just sit. Enjoy a little laziness as if you are not doing anything; it is just a holiday. Don’t be serious, take things easy – as if they are fun.

That is the meaning of the indian word ‘ashram’. ‘Ashram’ means a place where you can rest, a place where you can relax, a place where you can play, where you can fool around. Not a place of work but a place of great rest.

So be restful and cool down, mm? Things are going to happen. Once you have cooled down a little and you have got into step with things here, you will suddenly see that many things start happening on their own accord.Just the right tuning.

[A visitor, the son of a sannyasin, asks: What is the best method, technique, to reach a state of no-mind?]

Mm. (a pause) You really want to get there ? [The visitor replies: Not for long – just for a visit.]

Mm.But people who visit never come back!

[The visitor asks: Then why do the meditations? What are you trying to do?]

Because people want to go there, remain there, abide there. Because who would like to come back once you know what no-mind is? When you have reached such a space, who would like to come back to the mind?

The mind is a prison... the mind is a hell. Once you get out of the hell, you are not going to come back. But good – if you want to go as a visitor, go as a visitor... because I have never heard of anybody coming back! (chuckling) Many people have gone as just visitors and gone forever. But good – the idea arises in you to have a taste of it; that’s very good. It is possible.

But what is the right technique? – one has to try a few techniques. It cannot be said outright what the right technique is because the same technique that is right for one is not right for another. And the same technique that may be right for you today may not be right for you tomorrow. It depends... it changes.

So the best way is to try a few techniques and then whatsoever suits you.These five meditations

are here – try all of them. They belong to five types of people and one is bound to be for one type or another. So out of these five one is bound to fit with you. But from the beginning, just go openly, just do them experimentally, hypothetically, just to see whether it goes or not. But then go into it totally so that you can have a feel. If you don’t do it totally you will never be able to decide whether it works for you or not.

So in this camp do all the meditations – just experimentally, just to choose which one fits you – and then after the camp tell me which one fits with you. Then things will be very easy. On that line we can work out your whole map – what to do and what not to do and how you can reach, and even if you want to visit, how you can visit the land of no-mind. But you will have to do all.…

Nothing? A few groups will also be very helpful. But I have a feeling that you don’t like being advised.(a pause).

Then you have to go and do and see things. I can advise you but you don’t like being advised. And unless I see that some person is really ready to take the advice, I never give the advice, because advice is the thing everybody is giving to everybody else and nobody is taking. I never give advice unless I feel that the person is going to take it.

You seem to be too cleverat least you think you are. You may not be but you think you are. And

that cleverness will be a barrier. But nothing wrong – if one feels that way, one feels that way.

Try all the groups, try all the meditations – just trial and error – and then have a feel for yourself. Then if the idea arises that it will be good to ask meBut ask only when you are ready to take the

advice, because I never give advice unless I feel certain someone is going to listen.

You are just asking by the way, at a safe distance. That will not be of much help – you will be here and you will not be really here. You will have to lose your ego a little. Then you can mix with

the things here. Things are happening but they happen only for those who mix, otherwise one can remain standing on the bank.…

The river is flowing – unless you jump into it, the river is not going to jump on you. The river will go on flowing – you may remain thirsty; you will have to bow down. You will have to go to the river, you will have to bend, you will have to drink out of the river or you will have to dive, take a dip into the river. Then you will be cleansed, purified – but you will have to do something. You cannot just stand by the side of the river – that won’t help.

So jump into this orange river! Start doing meditations. They are very crazy, and that’s why people who think too much think that this looks crazy. But only crazy things can help you out of yourself – less than that won’t do.

Man is so encapsulated in his thoughts that unless something crazy happens he will not jump out of them. The mind is a very old habit – long, long... of many lives.

And I understand the problem – there are such complexitiesYour mother has brought you here –

that is a problem, because nobody wants to listen to his own mother. Otherwise it is easierWhen

a young man brings his mother it is easier, the mother goes into sannyas very easily, because the mother still wants to listen to the child. She still feels for the child – the child is her extension.

But if the mother brings the child, the child feels very resistant, because to become a sannyasin now or to become a part of the thing that is going on here, will be yielding to your mother, will be accepting the fact that she is wiser than you, that she knows better than you. That is very difficult.

Particularly in the west the new generation is very against the parents. A great revolt is on.so

whatsoever the mother is doing must be wrong. She goes to the church, the church is wrong. She is a Christian, Christianity is wrong. And if she has become a sannyasin, the sannyas must be something wrong, otherwise why should your mother be interested in it? So that’s the barrier – you have to understand it.

Don’t look through the mother, look directly. It is not a question of your mother; forget your mother. Her work is done – she has brought you here; her work is finished. Now don’t go on resisting and fighting with her. That is not a question.

And she is not in any way trying to persuade you. It is simply that she has felt a certain joy and she would like to share it with you, hence she has brought you here. Now forget your mother – she will be meditating and doing her thing; you start doing on your own.

There are so many young people here – mix with them, listen to them, talk to them, bring your heart, communicate, and soon you will have the feel of it – of what is happening here. Something very rare is happening here, and it happens rarely. So don’t miss that opportunity just because your mother has brought you here. Relax a little.…

And [to the mother] don’t try anything – just leave him. Mm? don’t try to persuade. Don’t have even the idea that he should become a part here and he should go and do and meditate – nothing! Just give him total freedom to do whatsoever he wants to do. The situation is here – if he wants to

participate, he can participate. And simply don’t say anything about it. Talk about other things, but not about me, not about sannyas, not about meditation. Only in that way may he become interested directly, otherwise it will be very difficult.

It is happening every dayWhenever one person becomes a sannyasin and gets deeper into it,

naturally he or she wants to bring all those who are related – children, husband, wife, brother, sister – but I see that there are very great complexities.

If the boy brings the mother, it is easier. One mother took sannyas and she told me she only took sannyas because she felt her boy would feel so happy, and then by and by she entered. Mm? just an old woman – near about seventy-five or more – and she said, ‘My boy is feeling so happy. He has not said anything to me but I know he has brought me here and he will be tre-mendously happy if I become a sannyasin!’ And then by and by she entered herself – on her own she became a part of...

But when the mother brings, then it is very difficult, very difficult, because the very problem is that the child has to say no to the mother, no to the father. He has to – there is a basic necessity for it – otherwise he will never be independent. But once this becomes a habit, it goes on and on.

When George Bernard Shaw’s mother died, he wept. And somebody asked him – because he was so old, seventy or something – they said, ‘Why are you weeping? One day or other the mother has to die.’ And what did he say?

He said, ‘I am weeping because now to whom will I say no? To whom? Now there is nobody left – my father is gone, my mother too. I have not a single person left to whom I can say no.’

A rare insight: ‘To whom am I going to say no now? I have become an orphan!’

So this is natural. Just give him total freedom; let him do whatsoever he wants to do.

[The intensive enlightenment group present tonight. One member says: I’ve been feeling very hateful and judging – all my friends, everything. And it’s very uncomfortable.]

Mm, nothing to be worried about. You have touched some space inside yourself and something that has always been there has come up. You must have repressed judging and you must have repressed your hatred. While digging with the question ‘Who am I?’ you must have broken that repressed layer. It happens – it is like digging. Mm? you dig a hole in the earth and then things which are underneath start coming upand these are the things people have repressed!

From your very childhood you must have been taught not to judge, not to hate – be loving, be friendly, this and that – so that has created the situation. Now going deeper into your being some layer is broken and things have surfaced.

Again you want to go into silence to repress them – no need; they will disappear by themselves. Enjoy rather than being afraid. There is no need to say to anybody, because that will create complexity. If you are judging somebody, enjoy! What is wrong? Don’t say!

[She asks: Be silent.judge silently?]

Yes, judge inside. If you see that this man is a fool, say inside that this man is a fool, and enjoy it – that you now know that this man is a fool... (laughter) and you never knew; it is a great revelation! But there is no need to go and say to the fool, otherwise he will take revenge, and if he is really a fool he will do some harm.

So just go on judging – nothing to worry about. But enjoy it so all that is inside comes up and is allowed. The unconscious will become unafraid of your conscious and it will see that the conscious is allowing, so more will be brought. Mm? no need to be afraid.

These are not judgments about the people – these are just repressed judgments. You may have repressed something against somebody. That man is not here, but somebody walks the same way and that judgment will come against this man. He has not done anything to you and you don’t know who he is, but he is walking in the same way as a man against whom you have a repressed judgment used to walk. It will come up!

Good! This man is helping you – be thankful. There is no need to tell him ‘You are a fool’ – just tell him, ‘You are a great help for my spiritual growth.’ Tell him that, mm? (laughter)

... First let these judgments come up – they will disappear. And hatred, let it come and it will disappear. But don’t act according to it – remember, that’s not the thing to do, otherwise there becomes a chain. Mm? you hate somebody and you act, then he will act; then there is no end. Just watch it! Enjoy it, that there is great hate and you want to kill (the groupleader). So what is wrong – kill inside, mm?

You can write on your pillow ‘amida’ and beat the pillow. Nothing wrong in it, but there is no need to go to amida and tell her! Just say to her, ‘You are a great help in my spiritual growth’ – then everybody else will know what you mean! (laughter) Right?

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