6

< Previous | Contents | Next >

‌CHAPTER 6

6 February 1977 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Shanti means peace, bhadra means grace – peace and grace, peace that comes through grace. There are two types of peace possible: one that man can cultivate – that is not of much meaning; the other that comes from god as a gift, that which cannot be cultivated; that is real peace.

So remember it: one can cultivate peace and look peaceful, and may not be peaceful. Rather than practising it, one should allow it to happen. One should simply be the receiving end and allow god to help. And once you allow god to help, you will find tremendous peace coming to you.

[The new sannyasin says: Sometimes I’m so very depressed. I feel I don’t want to go on living.It

started six months agoI feel like everything is futile.]

This can be used in a great way, because as I see it it is not exactly depression – it is a sort of indifference towards life. It looks like depression but it is something different. It is an indifference – and it is better than depression, because depression cannot be used in any way; one has to overcome it. Indifference can be used in a very creative way. You have just become aware of the futility of life, that’s why the suicide idea comes in.

The idea of suicide simply means that you have become aware of the futility of life, the meaninglessness of it all. And nothing is wrong in it, because this is the reality. The others who are not depressed are really deluded! They are in the wrong space; you are not in the wrong space but you will look in the wrong space because you are a minority.

People are too much involved in life. They think something great is going to happen and they hope – your hope has disappeared. But this is a good sign – you have come to me in the right moment.

[Osho said that when hope disappears, one can either commit suicide or take sannyas. Both take you out of this life, but while suicide is destructive, taking sannyas is a creative step.

See ‘Blessed are the Ignorant’, December 6th where Osho talks in greater detail about suicide and sannyas.]

Sannyas takes you out of this life in a very creative way – it becomes a transcendence. That’s why in india, people have never been committing suicide very much.

India is one of the poorest countries – people should commit suicide more, but they commit less. The number of suicides in India is the least in the world. And the reason: whenever a person starts feeling that life is meaningless, he starts looking towards religion to find another meaning, something of the beyond.

So don’t be worried about it. The suicide has happened – you have committed it by becoming a sannyasin. The person who was just a moment before, is no more. Say good-bye. That person is gone. Now...

This new person does not have that problem, will not have that problem. Just do these groups and then I will tell you what to do. This will go... it’s nothing to be worried about, mm?

In the East we have been tackling suicide for centuries and converting the suicidal tendency into sannyas. Don’t be worried – you have committed suicide, so now there is no problem left!

[To an initiate Osho says:]

This will be your new name... and the beginning of a new life, a new birth.

Sannyas, to be meaningful, has to be a new birth – less than that is not helpful. And it is a question of attitude – birth is a question of attitude. If you take the decision that the past is finished and you close that account completely, you will not go on thinking about it any more; you will not again and again reshuffle it. Because that which is gone is gone, and it is simply stupid to waste any more time on it – as it is you have already wasted too much on it.…

So be completely finished with it... stop looking backwards. Many people are living like that. Their life is in a mess because of this mechanism: we go forward and we look backward. We are not looking where we are going, and we are looking somewhere where we cannot go. Unless your vision falls exactly right in front of you, you will miss the goal.

It is as if a person is driving just by looking in the rear-view mirror. It is very dangerous, because you are driving forward and you are looking backward.

That’s how the mind functions, because the mind is memory, the mind is past; the mind has no future. Consciousness belongs to the present and the future – the mind belongs to the past. If you become alert, there is no past; then you are in the present and there is a great opening for the future.

The present can function in two ways: either it can be a closing of the past or it can be an opening for the future. The present moment is most vital. If you look back, it simply goes on closing the past, and you go on wasting the present moment in thinking about the past, that which has been. You go on wasting – crying for the spilled milk.

Once you disconnect yourself from the past, once you make a clean break – as if in one stroke of the sword you simply cut yourself and then you don’t look back – the future opens to you all the possibilities, all the possibilities.

Sannyas is just a change – a radical change – in the direction of your vision. So let it be a true, authentic beginning. And the beginning requires only one thing: that you stop wasting time with the past. Whatsoever was, was; good, bad, it is irrelevant. Don’t repent for it because there is no way to undo it. Don’t go on cherishing it, because there is no way to repeat it. So if it has been good, it is gone; if it has been bad, it is gone.

And carry this idea always. because each moment a new past is created. Always get rid of the past: don’t accumulate it. That is the basic requirement for becoming a sannyasin – that a person starts living in the moment, in the present and becomes open to the future. There is great thrill and great adventure enters into your life.

And this will be your name: anand svardharma.

Anand means bliss, svar means self, dharma means nature; bliss, self, nature. And that is the basic truth – bliss is the nature of the self.

Bliss is not something that you have to achieve. The very idea of achieving it creates the trouble. It is already there – you have just to recognise it. It is already there – you have to start living it. It is not something that you have to practise, cultivate, achieve. There is no need to postpone – it is already there just like breathing. It is your inner breathing, the breathing of the soul. That’s why in India we call it ‘svardharma’ – it is your innermost core.

It is you... you are made of the stuff called bliss. It is not that you have to attain it, so there is no need to wait that tomorrow you will attain or the day after tomorrow, or after life or in heaven; there is no need to wait. If somebody just understands the idea of it, he simply starts living it. So start living bliss from this very moment!

We have been taught to make each and everything a goal. Certainly there are things which are not given, which are not in-built. Svardharma means in-built.

A child is born – he has not brought a great treasure with him. If he wants to have a treasure he will have to work for it, he will have to earn money, he will have to compete, he will have to do a thousand and one things; then too it is not certain whether he will get it or not. Even if he gets it, it is not going to make him rich in any inner things. It may be just a cover to hide his poverty. Deep down he will remain the same poor man because the outer riches cannot fulfill the inner poverty. The outer cannot go into the inner: their dimensions are so separate, so diametrically opposite that they never criss-cross ever – there is no meeting ever.

A man can be very rich outwardly and very poor inwardly and vice versa. A man can be very rich inwardly and poor outwardly. I am not saying that a man cannot be both – a man can be both. I am not saying a man cannot be neither – a man can be neither. But they have no relationship to each other – they are separate phenomena.

Money has to be earned; prestige, power, fame, have to be earned – but not bliss, not god, not truth. They are already there; one has just to look in and to have the courage to start living it.

When people ask me how to be happy, I simply tell them, ‘Be happy!’ – there is no question of ‘how’. If you ask how, you will never be happy – you have asked the wrong question. No technique is needed.

You are already breathing – there is no question of how. Even to ask the question of how to breathe, one must be breathing already. One cannot exist without breathing, and one cannot exist without the innermost core of happiness, otherwise a single moment would be impossible to tolerate.

Deep down, somewhere, we are still at home. Howsoever miserable, if you look deep down, somewhere there exists an oasis. Howsoever the situation may be contrary to your expectations – failure, frustration – still there is a shelter somewhere deep within you where you are at home, otherwise everybody would go mad, everybody would commit suicide. Not for a single moment could humanity exist.

Deep down we are rooted in some infinite source of nourishment. We are not using it as much as we should, but still, we are rooted in it. We are not rooted consciously but we are rooted unconsciously. The only thing that has to be done is to make this rooting, centering, a conscious phenomenon.

So start living happily, blissfully, from this very moment, and you will be surprised that there is no ‘how’ to it – one can simply start living just like that.

Whatsoever is, is. And there is no need to desire. Whatsoever is, is already given; whatsoever is needed, is already provided for. That’s the meaning when Jesus says to his disciples, ‘Look at the lilies in the field. They labour not, yet they are so beautiful, so happy. Not even solomon arrayed in all his riches, was so beautiful and so happy. Look at those poor lilies, infinite in their richness.’

Svardharma means that deep down you are carrying all that you need. You need not labour for it, you need not toil for it, and even solomon was not so beautiful and so happy as you are already. Just a recognition of the fact.…

And the only work that I am here to do is to shake you out of your sleep. Nothing else is needed – just a good alarm, so you open your eyes and you recognise that you had fallen asleep and you started dreaming.

Svardharma means that which you know when you are fully awake; that which is always yours, has been always yours – cannot be otherwise.

[A visitor asked Osho how he could find which was the path for him – devotion or meditation. Osho checks his energy.]

Good.Devotion will be your way. It will need a little courage but devotion will fit perfectly. You

have a very loving heart. Maybe you have never allowed it to have its say; mm? you have been by-passing it – you have been putting it off. You are a little afraid too, but that’s your way.

Meditation will look easy to you but will not go very deep. You may like to choose meditation, because you will feel a little more in control with meditation. With love, with devotion, you will be moving into something which you cannot manipulate; rather, you are completely gone as far as your control centre is concerned. You are at the mercy of some unknown energy.

So people are afraid of devotion, but more people can reach through devotion than through meditation, because the heart is a purer medium and is uncorrupted by society. The mind is very much corrupted by society, very much trained, cultivated, conditioned. The mind is cluttered with too many opinions, philosophies, doctrines, theories. The mind is a complete madhouse.

The heart has remained uncorrupted, virgin, because the society does not worry about it. Society has never touched it – in fact the society does not want to touch it. It is dangerous... it is very rebellious. So in a way it is good, because society has not used it – it is there, like a field which has not been cultivated for long, so full of vitality. Just a little seed, and a great crop will be very easily possible. So start moving towards devotion.

I am creating here a situation for moving to it. It is a way of the madman, the way of devotion, but it is tremendously beautiful and it will fit with you.

And this is my understanding – that whenever you are confused or whenever you cannot decide, whenever you feel divided, it is always the path of devotion that you need.

Because confusion cannot be got rid of by the mind. The mind is the faculty that creates confusion. It is the mind that always creates division, this or that, to do this or not to do this, to be or not to be. The mind is always dividing things.

It is just like a spectrum: a ray passes through the prism and is divided, is broken in seven colours. Anything that passes through the mind is divided into duality – becomes two, this or that.

The heart is undivided, indivisible. So whenever you feel any problem of what to do, then it is better to surrender to the heart. With heart, with love, you also become one... a certain unity arises.

In the modern world it has become more and more difficult to follow the path of devotion, because innocence is needed, trust is needed, and both have become impossible. But I can see that you can easily trust and you can easily move in a very innocent way. Just try, and it will explode. The flowering will not be very farGood!

< Previous | Contents | Next >