The discipline beyond discipline

THIS SUTRA IS ONE OF THE MOST IMPORTANT, one of the very central to Buddha's message. The very essence of his message is there like a seed. Go patiently with me into it, try to understand it. Because if you understand this sutra, you would have understood all that Buddha wants you to understand. If you miss this sutra, you miss all.

THE BUDDHA SAID:

MY DOCTRINE IS TO THINK THE THOUGHT THAT IS UNTHINKABLE; TO PRACTISE THE DEED THAT IS NOT DOING; TO SPEAK THE SPEECH THAT IS INEXPRESSIBLE; AND TO BE TRAINED IN THE DISCIPLINE THAT IS BEYOND DISCIPLINE.

The choice of the word 'doctrine' is unfortunate, but there are difficulties in translating. Buddha must have used the word SIDDHANTA. It has a totally different meaning. Ordinarily it is translated as doctrine; it should not be translated so. But the problem is that in the English language there is no equivalent to siddhanta. So I will have to explain it to you.

A doctrine is a consistent logical theory. A siddhanta has nothing to do with logic, theory, consistency. A siddhanta is a realization, a siddhanta is an experience. A doctrine is intellectual, siddhanta is existential. You can make a doctrine without being transformed by it. You can make a great doctrine without even being touched by it. But if you want to achieve a siddhanta you will have to be totally transformed, because it will be a vision of a totally different person.

The word siddhanta means the assertion of one who has become a siddha, one who has achieved, one who has arrived - his statement. You can be a great philosopher, you can figure out intellectually many things, you can systematize your inferences, and you can make a very consistent, logical syllogism which almost appears like truth, but is not truth. It has been manufactured by your mind. A doctrine is man-made; a siddhanta has nothing to do with man and his effort. A siddhanta is a vision - you come upon it.

For example, a blind man can think about light and can try to figure out what it is all about. He can even listen to great treatises on light and he can make a certain idea about it - what it is. But he will be as far away from light as he was before. He can even expound the doctrine about light, he can explain its physics, he can explain its structure. He can go deep into the constituents of light, he can talk about, he can write a Ph.D on it, a thesis. He can be declared a doctor by a university, because he has propounded a doctrine - but still he does not know what light is. He has no eyes to see.

A siddhanta is one which you have seen, which has been revealed to you, which has become your own experience, which you have encountered. A doctrine is almost imaginary, it is not real. A doctrine is almost always borrowed. You can hide your borrowing in many ways - subtle, cunning ways. You can reformulate, you can take from many sources and you can rearrange everything, but a doctrine is a borrowed thing - nothing original in it.

A siddhanta is absolutely original, new. It is your authentic experience. You have come to see what reality is. It is an immediate perception, it is a benediction, it is a blessing, it is a grace, a gift. You have arrived and you have seen what truth is.

The statement of a realization is siddhanta. Propounding a doctrine is one thing; giving expression to a siddhanta is totally different.

I have heard:

Once Mulla Nasrudin was talking to a few of his friends. He was telling his pals about the wonderful vacation he and his family had just had in the United States.

'It is a wonderful country,' he exclaimed. 'Nowhere in the world is a stranger treated so well. You walk along the street and you meet a well-dressed fellow with lots of dollars. He tips his hat and smiles at you, and you talk together. He invites you into his big car, and shows you the town. He buys you a fine dinner, then takes you to the theatre. You have more fine food and plenty of drinks, and he invites you to his house and you sleep nice all night. Next morning...

'What, Nasrudin,' a listener said, 'did all this really happen to you ? '

'No, not exactly, but it all happened to my wife,' said Nasrudin.

A doctrine is that which has happened to somebody else. You have heard about it. It has not happened to you - it is borrowed, dirty, ugly. A siddhanta is virgin.

A doctrine is a prostitute. It has been moving through many minds, through many hands. It is like dirty currency; it goes on changing its owner. A siddhanta is something absolutely fresh. It has never happened before, it will never happen again. It has happened to you. A siddhanta is deeply individual, it is a personal vision of reality.

What happened to Buddha is a siddhanta - what Buddhists propound is a doctrine. What happened to Christ is a siddhanta - what Christians talk about is a doctrine. What happened to Krishna is a siddhanta - what Hindus go on bragging about is a doctrine. What I am saying to you is a siddhanta - if you go and repeat it, it will be a doctrine. That's why I say it is a very unfortunate choice of words to put into Buddha's mouth.

MY DOCTRINE IS TO THINK.... No, let it be: My siddhanta is to think, my realization is to think, my own understanding is to think.... He is not proposing a theory, he is simply expressing an experience.

A few more things before we enter into the sutra.

A siddhanta is by its very nature paradoxical - it has to be so, because life is paradoxical. If you really have experienced it, then whatsoever you see and say is going to be paradoxical. Life consists of contradictions. We call them contradictions; life does not call them contradictions. They are complementaries.

Day and night dance together, life and death dance together, love and hate move hand in hand. We call them contradictions - in life they are not so. Life is big and vast, immense. It comprehends all the contradictions into it; they are complementaries.

When a person has realized, whatsoever he says is going to have the taste of paradox. That's why all great religious assertions are paradoxical. They may be in the Vedas, in the Upanishads, in the Koran, in the Bible, in the Tao te Ching.

Wherever, whenever you will find truth, you will find it paradoxical - because the truth has to be total; totality is paradoxical.

A doctrine is never paradoxical, a doctrine is tremendously consistent - because a doctrine is not worried about reality. A doctrine is worried about being consistent. It knows no reality. It is a mind game, and the mind is very very logical. And the mind says don't allow any contradiction in it. The mind says if you talk about light then don't talk about darkness because that will be inconsistent. Forget about darkness. The mind tries to prove that life is non- contradictory, because that is the mind's choice.

Mind is very afraid of contradictions, becomes very shaky when it comes across a contradiction. It insists on its own pattern. Mind is logical, life is not. So if you find something very logical, beware - something must be wrong in it. It must not be part of life, it must be man-made.

Everything god-made is contradictory. That's why people go on arguing about god. Why, if he loves man so much, then why did he create death? The mind finds it very difficult to accept the idea that God created life and also death. If it was up to you, if you were the maker of the world, if mind was the creator, then you would have never done that.

But think of a life where no death exists. It will be sheer boredom. It will be tedium. Think - if death is impossible, then you will be continuously in hell. If mind had created the world, then there would be only love, no hate. But think of a world where only love exists. Then it will be too sweet - sweet to the point of being nauseous. It will lose all taste, it will lose all colour, it will be flat. Love is beautiful because of the possibility of hate.

If mind was to create the world, or Aristotle was asked to create the world, then there would have been only day, no night; only work, no play. Then think what would have happened. God in his compassion never took any advice from Aristotle. And maybe that's the reason he created man in the very end. First he created other things - otherwise man would start giving advice.

That has been a problem - why did he create man in the end? First he created trees and the earth and the sky and the stars and the animals and the birds and the whole - then he waited and waited. Then he created man. And first he created man, then he created woman. Because man, just out of politeness, may have kept quiet, but a woman cannot keep quiet. He must have been afraid.

Don't create man otherwise he will start giving advice - do this, don't do that.

And for woman he waited last. And since he created woman he has disappeared - otherwise the woman would have nagged him to death.

One great industrialist was saying to me that for his new factory everything has been planned, agreed upon. The engineers, the architects, the planners, they have done everything and everything has been agreed. But then I asked, 'Why do you repeat again and again that everything has been agreed? Has something gone wrong?'

He said, 'Then I came home and talked about it to my wife - finished. Now she is suggesting things which will alter the whole idea. And if I don't do it now, then it will be a constant problem for my whole life. She will nag me to death.'

If Aristotle was asked to create the world, or help the world to be created, then the world would have been absolutely consistent - absolutely consistent. But then it would have been a world of misery and hell. Life is beautiful because there are contradictions. Work is beautiful because there is play. Work means you are doing something to get something out of it. Play means you are simply doing it for its own sake.

No, Aristotle won't allow it. Plato won't allow it. In his REPUBLIC, Plato says there will be no possibility for any poets; we won't allow them. They are dangerous people, they bring contradiction in the world - poets, they are dreamers. And they talk in such ways which are vague, ambiguous. You cannot make anything out of it - what they are saying, what they mean. In Plato's world, in his REPUBLIC, logicians, philosophers will be the kings; they will decide.

It has not yet happened, only a few things like that have happened. For example, Soviet Russia is more platonic, China is more platonic. These two countries are run by logic. You cannot find more miserable people anywhere else. Well-fed well-sheltered - because logic is a great arranger of things; everything has been arranged - only life is missing. Somehow man is not happy, because man cannot live by bread alone. You need the opposite also. The whole day you work, in the night you rest. You need darkness also.

A doctrine is a logical statement of a theory, and logic is like a chameleon - it goes on changing its color, it is not reliable. It is not reliable because it is not based in reality. It is not responsible because it is not based in reality. It is untrue because it is a partial truth. Remember, a partial truth is more untrue than a total untruth. Because a partial truth gives a feeling of being true. It is only half-true and nothing can be half-true. Either it is true or it is not true. A half-truth is absolutely untrue, but logic gives it a feeling that it is true; at least on the way towards truth. It is not even on the way towards truth.

And logicians go on doing somersaults, they go on changing their standpoints, because in fact they have not come to anything that is really real, just their mind games. One day one game, another day another game; they go on changing.

They remain consistent - consistent with their own train of thought, but inconsistent with reality.

I have heard:

'It is difficult to explain what a course of logic will do for a person's thinking, but let me illustrate,' said Mulla Nasrudin to his son. 'Suppose two men came out of a chimney. One is clean, one dirty. Which one will take a bath?'

'The dirty one, naturally,' answered the boy.

'Remember,' chided Nasrudin, 'that the clean man sees the dirty one and sees how dirty he is, and vice versa.'

'Now I get it, Dad,' answered the boy. 'The clean one, seeing his dirty companion, concludes he is dirty too. So he takes the bath. Am I right now?'

'Wrong,' said Nasrudin nonchalantly. 'Logic teaches us this - how could two men come out of a chimney, one clean and one dirty?'

Once you start playing the game of logic there is no end to it, and you will never win. The logician will always win. The logician will always win because you can always find a way. And you have nothing to compare with, you have no reality.

That's why so many philosophies exist, and all opposing each other, and not a single conclusion has been arrived at yet.

Down the centuries, almost for five thousand years, man has argued; man has not been doing much, but just arguing. Thousands of philosophies have been created, very neat and clean logic. If you read one philosopher you will be convinced. If you read his opponent you will be convinced. Read the third one, you will be convinced - and you will be getting into a mess. By and by you will be convinced by all and you will be mad, because you will not know now what is true. They are all wrong because the logical approach is wrong.

There are two ways to know reality. One is: just close your eyes and think about it. I call it 'about-ism'. It is always about and about, it never goes directly. You go on beating around the bush. You never beat exactly the bush - just around. You never penetrate the center of a problem, you simply go round and round. It is a merry-go-round. You can enjoy it - logicians enjoy very much. It is so beautiful to come with a new theory which explains everything - but it is just in the mind.

You close your eyes, sit on your easy chair and think about. This is not going to give you reality.

Reality is already there, you have not to think about it. You have to allow it. You have to drop all thinking so that you can see what is the truth, so that you can see that which is. If you go on thinking you cannot see that which is. It is impossible.

Your thoughts will create a smoke around you. Your consciousness will be covered by the smoke, your eyes will not have clarity, you will not have sensitivity. And continuously you will be searching and seeking your own ideas, imposing them, projecting them on reality. You will not give reality a chance to reveal itself.

A doctrine is arrived at through logical thinking. A doctrine comes through the process of 'about-ism'. A siddhanta is arrived at not by closing your eyes, not by thinking too much, but by dropping thinking as such, in toto; by opening your eyes with no prejudice, with no a priori conceptions, and looking direct into reality, facing reality direct. It is already there, it needs only you to be there.

And when you are absolutely without any thought, your mind is still, your memory is still, your thinking has completely ceased to be, then reality erupts, explodes. Then you become a receiver. Then siddhanta arises.

MY SIDDHANTA IS TO THINK THE THOUGHT THAT IS UNTHINKABLE....

The first thing, Buddha says, is to think the thought that is unthinkable. It is a contradiction, a paradox. Now, no logician will ever utter such nonsense. It is from the very beginning nonsensical. That's why logicians go on saying that Buddha, Jesus, Bodhidharma, Lao Tzu, Zarathustra - these people are all nonsense. Their propositions are meaningless - because they say one thing and in the next breath they contradict. Now look at this sentence: MY SIDDHANTA IS TO THINK THE THOUGHT THAT IS UNTHINKABLE....

Now just in a small sentence absolute contradiction - to think the unthinkable.

How can you think the unthinkable? If it is really unthinkable you cannot think.

If you can think then how can it be unthinkable? Simple, illogical - but what Buddha means has to be understood. Don't be in a hurry; that's why I say go patiently.

When he means... when he wants to say something, he means it. He is saying there is a way to know things without thinking. There is a way to know things without mind. There is a way to see into reality directly, immediately, without the vehicle of thought. You can be connected with reality without any agent of thinking - that is what he is saying. He is saying that the mind can completely cease its activity, completely can drop its activity and yet be - still, a reservoir - and see into reality. But you will have to experience it, only then you will be able to understand.

Sometimes try just to see. Sitting by the side of a rosebush, just look at the rose flower; don't think, don't even give names. Don't even classify. Don't even say that this is a rose - because a rose is a rose is a rose; whether you call it rose or something else makes no difference. So don't label it, don't give it a name, don't bring language in. Don't bring any symbol in, because symbol is the method of falsifying reality.

If you say this is a rose, you have already missed. Then you have brought in some past experience of other roses, which are not. Now your eyes are full of roses - rows of roses. In your life you must have come across many types of roses - white and black and red; all those roses are there floating in your eyes.

Now you are crowded by your past memories. And then, beyond all those memories is this rose which is real. Now the crowd of the unreal is so much you will not be able to reach and touch the real.

When Buddha says drop thinking he means, don't bring the past in. What is the point of bringing it in? This rose is here, you are here. Let it be a deep meeting, a communion, a connection. Melt a little with this rose, let this rose melt a little in you. The rose is ready to share its fragrance, you also share your being, your consciousness, with it.

Let there be a handshake with reality. Let there be a little dance with this rose...

dancing in the wind. You also move, be, look, feel, close your eyes, smell, touch, drink. This beautiful phenomenon that is facing you... don't go here and there - just be with it. No more right and left, just be direct like an arrow moving towards the target. If you bring words, language, you bring society, you bring past, you bring other people.

Tennyson has said something about the rose. Shelley has said something about the rose. Shakespeare has said something about the rose, or Kalidas. Once you bring language, Shakespeare and Kalidas and Bhaubhuti and Shelley and Keats - - they are all standing there. Now you are too full of your own ideas, now you are in a crowd, lost. You will not be able to see the simple truth.

The truth is so simple. Yes, it is just like a rose flower in front of you. It is utterly there. Why go somewhere else? Why not move into this reality? Why go and find past and future? Don't say this rose is beautiful, because this rose needs no compliments from you. Let it be a feeling. This rose does not understand human language, so why puzzle this rose? Why say it is beautiful? Because this rose knows nothing of beauty and nothing of ugliness.

For this rose, life is not divided and split; this rose is not schizophrenic. This rose is simply there, with no idea of what beauty is and what ugliness is. Don't call it beautiful. When you call it beautiful you have brought a concept. The mind has started functioning. Now, you may have a little experience of the rose, but it will not be true - your mind will be a distortion. You will think of this rose just as a representative of all other roses.

Plato says that every real thing is just a representative of something ideal. Plato says that there with god exists the idea of rose - that is real. The idea of rose is real and this rose is just a reflection of that idea. This is nonsense, this is really absurd.

This rose exists herenow with god. There is no idea in the mind of god. God has no mind as such. God is without mind. God is not a human being, and god has not been trained by any parents, and god has not been educated by any university. God has not been conditioned. There is no idea in the mind of god - and this rose is a real rose. God exists with this rose and this rose exists with god, and god has no barrier with this rose, no mind barrier.

But for Plato, the reality is unreal and ideas are real. For Buddha it is just the opposite: the reality is the real and ideas are unreal. If you follow Plato you will become a philosopher. If you follow Buddha you will become a religious man.

Religion is not a philosophy, religion is an experience.

So try it. Sometimes allow your no-mind to function. Sometimes push aside all your thinking. Sometimes let reality penetrate you. Sometimes let there be a blessing from reality. Allow it to deliver its message to you. But we go on living in words, and we pay too much attention to the words.

I had a teacher in the university and we used to go for a walk together. After few days I said, 'I will not come. Better I should go alone.'

He said, 'Why?' Because he was so much obsessed with names. Every tree which he would see he had to say to which species it belonged. Every flower - what it contains, its history. If he would see a rose, he would not see a rose, he would see the whole history of rose: how it came from Iran, in what century, who brought it to India - it is not an indian flower.

Now, he would never look at the flower, and I would pull him again and again back - 'This flower is enough. What is the point? Flowers don't have histories, only human beings have. This flower does not bother whether it is in Iran or in India. This flower has no idea of any past, it lives just herenow. It is neither Hindu nor Mohammedan, nor Indian nor Iranian. It is simply there. It is not even a rose!'

But it was difficult for him. Any bird he would see he would say, 'Wait, let me listen. What species of bird is this? From where has it come? Has it come from Siberia? Or from Middle Asia? Or is it a himalayan bird?' After a few days I said, 'You excuse me. You go alone. Because I am not interested from where this bird has come. This bird is here, it is enough. I am not interested in the scientific, historical explanation.'

Explanation, to a few people, is almost a disease. Through their explanations they try to explain away everything. They are obsessed with explanation. They think that if they can name a thing, label a thing, they know it. They are very uneasy unless they can label a thing, know a thing by name, categorize it, pigeonhole it - unless they do it they are very uncomfortable. It seems as if a certain thing is just offending them - why are you there without any classification? Once they have categorized it, pigeon-holed it, put a label on it, then they are at ease. They have known it. They are finished with the thing.

I have heard:

After the Second World War a german soldier raped a french woman and told her, 'In nine months you will have a son - you may call him Adolf Hitler.' To which the french woman replied, 'In nine days you will have a rash - you may call it measles.'

But by calling names, it changes nothing. What you call is absolutely irrelevant.

Whatsoever is, is! By your giving it a name it never changes. But for you it changes. Just by giving a name, reality becomes different to you.

It happened:

A lion and an ass made an agreement to go out hunting together. By and by they came to a cave where many wild goats abode. The lion took up his station at the mouth of the cave and the ass, going within, kicked and brayed and made a mighty fuss to frighten them out. When the lion had caught many of them, the ass came out and asked him if he had not made a noble fight and routed the goats properly.

'Yes indeed,' said the lion. 'And I assure you, you would have frightened me too if I had not known you to be an ass.'

It may make a difference to you by calling names, but it does not make any difference to reality. It may make a difference to you because you live surrounded by your language, concept, verbalization. You immediately go on translating everything into language.

De-language yourself - that's what Buddha means. Un-mind yourself, un-wind yourself - that's what Buddha means. Otherwise you will never know what is true.

MY SIDDHANTA IS TO THINK THE THOUGHT THAT IS UNTHINKABLE.

You cannot think about reality. There is no way to think about it. All thinking is borrowed. No thinking is ever original. All thinking is repetitive, all thinking is mechanical. You can go on chewing and re-chewing the same things again and again and again, but nothing new ever arises out of thinking. Thinking is old, rotten. It is a junk-yard.

You cannot think about reality because reality is every moment original. It is every moment so new that it has never been like that before. It is so absolutely fresh that you will have to know it. There is no other way to know it than knowing it.

The only way to know love is to love. The only way to know swimming is to swim. The only way to know reality is to be real. Mind makes you unreal. Mind makes you too much like thoughts - mindstuff, words, concepts, theories, philosophies, doctrines, scriptures, isms. Mind does not give you the real thing, it gives you only reflections - and those reflections are also distorted.

Buddha says attain to a clarity. Just see, just be. And then you will be able to think that thought which is unthinkable. You will be able to have a meeting with reality, a date with god.

THE THOUGHT THAT IS UNTHINKABLE - only that is worth thinking. All else is just wasting life energy.

TO PRACTISE THE DEED THAT IS NON-DOING.

This is what Lao Tzu calls wu-wei. Action in inaction - again another paradox.

But a siddhanta has to be paradoxical.

TO PRACTISE THE DEED THAT IS NOT DOING...

Ordinarily we know only deeds which we can do. We are surrounded by our doing. We don't know that there are things which are beyond our doing and still are happening. You are born. You have not given birth to yourself, it has simply happened, and it could not happen in a better way. You are breathing - but you are not breathing as an act; it is happening. You can try to stop it and then you will see you cannot stop it. Even for a few seconds you cannot stop it; you will have to relax, you will have to allow it. Breathing is life. It is happening.

All that is essential is happening, and all that is non-essential, non-existential, is to be done. Of course your shop will not be run if you don't run it. Of course you will not become a prime minister or a president if you don't struggle for it.

Nobody has ever become a prime minister without struggling for it; without violence you cannot become a prime minister. You will have to compete - a throat-cut competition. You will have to be cruel. You will have to be aggressive.

You will have to do it, only then it can happen. All that depends on your doing is accidental and all that goes on without you is essential.

Religion's whole concern is the essential, the world of the essential. You are there; not that you have done yourself, you are simply there for no reason. You have not earned it, it is nothing of your doing. It is a benediction, it is a gift. You are there: existence has willed you to be there, it is not your own will.

Watch it, understand it. When such a thing like life - so precious - can happen without your doing, then why bother? Then allow more and more the dimension of happening. Drop more and more doing. Do only that which seems needful.

Don't be bothered too much with the doing.

That is the meaning of a sannyasin. The householder, the GRUSTHA, is one who is simply possessed by the dimension of doing. He thinks that if he is not going to do, nothing is going to happen. He is a doer. A sannyasin is one who knows that whether he is going to do it or not, all that is essential is going to continue to happen. Nonessential may disappear, but that is irrelevant - but the essential will continue.

Love is essential; money is non-essential. To be alive is essential; to live in a big house or not is non-essential. To be fulfilled, contented, is essential; rushing, ambitious, always trying to reach somewhere, trying to perform, trying to prove that you are somebody, is non-essential. People live only in two dimensions: the dimension of the doer and the dimension of the non-doer.

Buddha says:

TO PRACTISE THE DEED THAT IS NOT DOING...

He says practise that. He says 'practise', because there is no other way to say it.

The word 'practise' looks like doing, that's the paradox. He says, 'Do that which cannot be done.' Do that which only happens. Allow, he means - allow that which happens, allow god to be there. Allow life to be there, allow love to be there. Allow the existence to penetrate you, to infiltrate you. Don't continue to be a doer.

He does not mean don't do anything at all. He says don't emphasize it. Maybe it is needful. You have to clean your room. Without your doing it, it is not going to happen. So do it! - but don't get obsessed with it. It is just a minor part.

The major part of life, the central part of life, should be like a happening. As the lightning happens in the clouds, so god happens. As rivers go on rushing towards the ocean and dissolve, so love happens. So happens meditation - it has nothing to do with your doing. Your doing is not essential for it to happen. It can happen when you are sitting and not doing anything. In fact it happens only then, when you are not doing anything and you are sitting. I insist for you to do many things as methods, but the insistence is only this - that you have to be tired, otherwise you won't sit.

It is as if you tell a child, 'Sit silently in the corner of the room,' and he cannot sit; he is so restless, he is so full of energy. He wants to do this and that and run around. The best way is to tell him to go and have seven rounds - run around the house seven times, around the block - then come back. Then without your telling, he will sit silently.

That's the whole point of my insistence to do dynamic, do kundalini, do nataraj - be spent, so that for a few moments you can allow happening. You will not reach to meditation by doing, you will reach to meditation only by non-doing. And in non-doing will happen the real thing.

The real thing cannot be produced; it always happens. One has to be just sensitive and open and vulnerable. It is very delicate. You cannot grab it. It is very fragile... fragile like a flower. You cannot grab it. If you grab it you will destroy it. You have to be very soft. It is not hardware, it is software. You have to be really soft, you have to be feminine.

Buddha says:

PRACTISE THE DEED THAT IS NOT DOING....

That is the message of all the great ones, the really great ones. The greatest realization on this earth has been this: that we are unnecessarily creating too much fuss. That which is to happen is going to happen if we wait. In the right season, the harvest; in the right season, the fruition. In the right season everything happens. If a man can learn only one thing - how to wait prayerfully - nothing else is needed. Ecstasy is a PRASAD, a gift of god.

You just try. Practise what Buddha says. At least for one hour you become a non- doer. At least for one hour, deep in the night, sit alone. Don't do anything - not even chanting a mantra, not even transcendental meditation. Don't do anything.

Just sit, lie down, look at the stars. That too should not be hard. Look very softly.

Don't focus; remain unfocussed like an unfocussed photograph - hazy, blurred, not knowing where the boundaries are. Just remain silent in the darkness.

If thoughts come let them come. Don't fight with them either. They will come and they will go - you just be a watcher. It is none of your business whether they come or they go. Who are you? They come without invitation, they go without pushing. They come and go, it is a constant traffic. You just sit by the side of the road and watch.

When I say watch, don't misinterpret me. Don't make watching an effort.

Otherwise people become very stiff and they start watching in a very stiff and tense way. Again they have started doing. What I am saying, or what Buddha is saying is - be in an attitude of not doing, be lazy.

Just be lazy, and see what happens. You will be amazed. Some day - just sitting, just sitting, not doing anything - some day, from some unknown source, a lightning, a benediction. Some day, in some moment, suddenly you are transfigured. Suddenly you see a quiet descending upon you. It is almost physical.

If a real meditator, a person who can relax, sits silently and allows, even somebody who is not a meditator will feel the presence - that something is happening. You may not be able to figure it out what it is; you may feel strange or a little scared, but if you sit by the side of a meditator....

Now, it is difficult to use the right word, because the word 'meditator' again gives the impression as if he is doing something - doing meditation. Remember again and again - language has been developed by non-meditators, so the whole language is, in a subtle way, wrong. It cannot express.

When somebody is sitting there, just sitting there, like a tree, like a rock, not doing anything, it happens: something from the above descends, penetrates his very core of being. A subtle light surrounds him... a glow, a blessing can be felt around him - even by those people who don't know what meditation is. Even passing by the side, they will also feel the impact of it. This benediction has been called god.

God is not a person, it is a deep experience when you are not doing anything and existence simply flows in you... the immensity of it, the beautitude of it, the grace of it.

You are not doing anything, you are not even expecting anything, you are not waiting for anything. You have no motive. You are just there like a tree standing in the winds, or like a rock just silently sitting by the side of a river. Or like a cloud perched on the hilltop - just there, no movement of your own.

In that moment you are not a self, in that moment you are a no-self. In that moment you are not a mind, you are a no-mind. In that moment you don't have a center. In that moment you are immense... vastness with no boundaries - suddenly the contact. Suddenly it is there! Suddenly you are fulfilled, suddenly you are surrounded by some unknown presence. It is tremendous.

That's what Buddha says:

PRACTISE THE DEED THAT IS NOT DOING; TO SPEAK THE SPEECH THAT IS INEXPRESSIBLE.

And if you want to say something, say that which cannot be said. Express the inexpressible. What is the point of saying things which can be said? - anybody knows them, everybody knows them. If you really want to express something, express the inexpressible.

What is the way to express the inexpressible? It can be expressed only through being. Words are too narrow. It can be expressed only by your existence, by your presence - in your walking, in your sitting, in your eyes, in your gestures, in your touch, in your compassion, in your love. The way you are - it can be expressed through it.

Buddha talks, but that is not very essential. More essential is his being, that he is there. Through his talking he allows you to be with him. The talking is just persuading you. Because it will be difficult for you to be in silence with a Buddha. He has to talk, because if he is talking you feel that everything is okay, you can listen. If he is not talking how will you listen? You don't know how to listen when nobody is talking. You don't know how to listen to that which cannot be expressed.

But by and by, living around a master, a Buddha, a Jesus, by and by you will start imbibing his spirit. By and by, in spite of you, there will be moments when you will relax, and not only that which he is saying will be reaching into your heart, but that which he IS also will penetrate. And with him the whole dimension of happening opens. That's the meaning of satsanga - being in the presence of a master.

... AND TO BE TRAINED IN THE DISCIPLINE BEYOND DISCIPLINE.

And Buddha says there is a discipline which is not a discipline. Ordinarily we think about discipline as if somebody else is trying to discipline you. Discipline carries a very ugly connotation - as if you are being disciplined, as if you are just to obey. The center that is disciplining you is outside you.

Buddha says that is not discipline, that is surrendering to slavery. Be free, no need to be disciplined from any outside source. Become alert, so that inner discipline arises in you. Become responsible, so that whatsoever you do you do with a certain order, a certain cosmos in it; so that your being is not a chaos, so that your being is not in a mess.

So there are two types of discipline: one, that can be forced from the outside.

That's what politicians go on doing, priests go on doing, parents go on doing.

And there is a discipline that can be provoked in you - that can be done only by masters. They don't enforce any discipline on you, they make you simply more aware so you can find your own discipline.

People come to me and they ask, 'Why don't you give a certain discipline? What to eat, what not to eat. When to get up in the morning and when to go to bed.' I don't give you any such discipline, because any discipline that comes from outside is destructive.

I give you only one discipline - what Buddha calls the discipline of the beyond, the discipline of transcendence.

I give you only one discipline and that is of being aware. If you are aware you will get up in the right time. When the body is rested you will get up. When you are aware you will eat only that which is needed, you will eat only that which is least harmful to you and to others. You will eat only that which is not based on violence. But awareness will be the decisive factor.

Otherwise you can be forced to become obedient, but deep down you go on being rebellious. I have heard a Second World War story.

A sergeant and a private were up on a charge of kicking the colonel. When asked for an explanation, the sergeant replied, 'Well, sir, the colonel came round the corner as I was coming from the gym. I only had my plimsoles on, he was in riding boots, and he trod on my toe. I am afraid the pain was so great, sir, that I lashed out - and before I realized who it was, sir.'

'I see,' said the orderly officer. 'And what about you soldier?'

To which the private replied, 'I saw the sergeant kick the colonel, sir. So I thought to myself, "The war must be over, so I can also kick".'

Whenever somebody enforces a discipline on you, deep down you resent, deep down you are against it. You may surrender to it, but you surrender always reluctantly. And that's how it should be, because the deepest urge in a human being is for freedom, for moksha.

To be free is the search. Down the centuries, for millennia, in many lives, we have been searching how to be free. So whenever somebody comes - even for your own sake, for your own good - and enforces something upon you, you resist. It is against human nature, it is against human destiny.

Buddha says there is no need to be obedient to somebody else; you should find your own awareness - be obedient to it. Be aware! - that is the only scripture. Be aware! - that is the only master. Be aware! - and nothing can ever go wrong.

Awareness brings its own discipline like a shadow. And then the discipline is beautiful. Then it is not like a slavery, then it is like a harmony. Then it is not as if enforced, then it is a flowering out of your own being, a blooming.

AND TO BE TRAINED IN THE DISCIPLINE THAT IS BEYOND DISCIPLINE.

People ordinarily seek somebody to tell them what to do - because they are afraid of their freedom, because they don't know that they can rely on their own sources, because they are not self-confident, because they have always been told what to do by somebody else, so they have become addicted to it. They are searching father-figures for their whole life. Their god is also a father, nothing else. That god is false which is a father. And the search for a father-figure is anti- life.

You should learn how to be free from all father-figures. You should learn how to be yourself. You should learn how to be aware and responsible. Then only you start growing. Maturity is always maturity towards freedom. Immaturity is always a sort of dependence and a fear of freedom.

A child is dependent - it's okay, it can be understood. He is helpless. But why remain a child your whole life? That is the revolution Buddha brought into the world. He is one of the most rebellious thinkers of the world. He throws you to yourself. It is dangerous, but he takes that risk. And he says that everybody has to take that risk. There is every possibility you may go astray - but life is risk.

It is better to go astray on your own accord than to reach heaven following somebody else. It is better to be lost forever and be yourself, than to reach paradise as a carbon copy, as an imitator. Then your paradise will be nothing but a prison. And if you have chosen your own hell on your own accord, out of your own freedom, your hell will also be heaven - because freedom is heaven.

Now here you will see the difference between Christianity and Buddhism.

Christianity says Adam was expelled because he disobeyed god. Buddha says obey only yourself, there is no other god to be obeyed. Christianity calls disobedience the original sin, and Buddha calls obedience the original sin.

Tremendous is the difference. Buddha is a liberator, Christianity created an imprisonment for the whole humanity.

Buddha's liberation is pure. He teaches you rebellion, but his rebellion is not a political rebellion. He teaches you rebellion with responsibility, with awareness.

His rebellion is not a reaction. You can be obedient, you can be disobedient.

What is Buddha saying? Buddha is saying neither be obedient nor be disobedient - because disobedience is again being conditioned by somebody else. You go on doing something because your father says don't do it, but again he is manipulating you in a negative way. You go on doing something because the society says don't do it, but again the society is determining what you should do.

Buddha says rebellion is not reaction. It is neither slavery nor reaction, neither obedience nor disobedience. It is an inner discipline. It is a discipline, it is a tremendous order, but it comes from your inner core. You decide it.

We go on throwing our responsibility on others. It is easier. You can always say that your father said to do it, so you have done it - you are not responsible. You can always say the leader said to do it, so you have done - you are not responsible. The whole country was going to do it, was going to war and was killing other countries - you have done it because you simply obeyed orders, you simply obeyed.

When Adolf Hitler's colleagues were caught after the Second World War, they all confessed before the court that they were not responsible, they were simply obeying orders. Whatsoever order was given they were obeying. If the order was given, 'Kill a million Jews!' they killed. They were simply following orders, they were simply obedient. They were not responsible.

Now look and watch: you may be simply trying to find out someone who says 'do this' so you can throw the responsibility on him. But this is no way - to throw the responsibility on anybody else. Life is yours and responsibility is yours.

If you understand Buddha, the world will be totally different. Then there cannot be any more Hitlers, then there cannot be any more wars - because there cannot be any obedience from the outside, and everybody responsible will think on his own. Not that 'Hindus are killing Mohammedans, so I have to kill'; nor 'Mohammedans are burning temples, so I have to burn because I am a Mohammedan.' Each individual should become a light unto himself, and he should decide - not as a Mohammedan, not as a Christian, not as an Indian, not as a Pakistani; he should decide according to his own consciousness; not according to anything else. This is what Buddha calls the discipline that is beyond discipline.

This is the definition of a religious person: He thinks the thought that is unthinkable; he practises the deed that is not doing; he speaks that which is inexpressible, ineffable; and he practises the discipline that is beyond discipline.

THOSE WHO UNDERSTAND THIS ARE NEAR; THOSE WHO ARE CONFUSED ARE FAR.

If these four things are understood, you are close to truth. If you don't understand then you are far away from the truth.

THE WAY IS BEYOND WORDS AND EXPRESSIONS, IS BOUND BY NOTHING EARTHLY. LOSE SIGHT OF IT TO AN INCH OR MISS IT FOR A MOMENT, AND WE ARE AWAY FROM IT FOREVER MORE.

Those who understand it are close.... Now let this be a criterion for you - you can judge. Let this be a touchstone for your growth. If you feel these four things are happening in your life - however, in whatsoever quantity... maybe a very small quantity, but if they are happening, then you are on the right track. If you are going away from these four things, you are going away from the way, the dhamma, the tao.

THE WAY IS BEYOND WORDS AND EXPRESSIONS, IS BOUND BY NOTHING EARTHLY.

The ultimate truth is not bound by anything that you can see, that you can touch.

It is not dependent on your senses. The ultimate truth is not material, it is immaterial. It is not earthly. It can not be caused by anything. That's why it can never become part of science.

You can mix hydrogen and oxygen and you can cause water to be there. There is no way to create ecstasy that way. There is no way to cause god that way. There is no way to cause truth that way. You can destroy water by separating hydrogen and oxygen, you can create water by mixing hydrogen and oxygen, but there is no way to destroy truth or to cause it. It is uncaused.

It is not a chain of cause and effect. You cannot create it; it is already there. You cannot destroy it, because you are it. It is the very life. You can only do one thing - either you can close your eyes towards it, either you can forget about it, you can become absolutely oblivious of it, OR you can remember, see, realize.

If you are lost in too much doing, ambition, riches, money, prestige, power, then you will lose track of the truth which is always by the side of you - just by the corner, just within reach - but you are keeping your back towards it.

OR you can allow it. If you become a little more meditative and less ambitious, if you become a little more religious and less political, if you become a little more unworldly than worldly, if you start moving more withinwards than without, if you start becoming a little more alert than sleepy, if you come out of your drunk state, if you bring a little light into your being, then... then you will be close, close home. You have never been away. Then your whole life will be transformed, transfigured. Then you will live in a totally different way; a new quality will be there in your life which has nothing to do with your doing, which is a gift, a benediction.

LOSE SIGHT OF IT TO AN INCH, says Buddha, OR MISS IT FOR A MOMENT, AND WE ARE AWAY FROM IT FOREVER MORE.

Look into it for a single moment, come close to it even a single inch, and it is yours, and it has always been yours.

This is the paradox of a siddhanta. This is not a doctrine, this is Buddha's realization. He is simply trying to share his realization with you. He is not propounding a philosophy or a system of thought. He is simply pointing towards the moon, the reality.

Don't look at his pointing fingers, otherwise you will miss; you will become a Buddhist. Look at the moon the finger is pointing to. Forget the finger completely and look at the moon and you will become a Buddha.

This is the problem that humanity has to settle. It is very much easier to become a Christian than to become a Christ, very much easier to become a Buddhist than to become a Buddha, but the reality is known only by becoming a Christ or a Buddha. By becoming a Christian or a Buddhist you are again becoming carbon copies. Don't insult yourself that way. Have a little respect for yourself. Never be a Christian and never be a Buddhist and never be a Hindu. Just be consciousness undefined, unbound, unmotivated. If you can do that much, all else will follow on its own accord.