The Bell Tolls for Thee

The first question:

Question 1:

ANAND VEETRAG, BEING NEVER DEVELOPS. BEING SIMPLY IS. There is no evolution. There is no time involved in it. It is eternity. It is not becoming. Spiritually, you never develop, you cannot.

As far as the ultimate goal is concerned, you are already there. You have never been anywhere else.

Then what is development? Development is only a kind of awakening to the truth that you are. The truth does not grow: only recognition grows, remembrance grows.

That's why I have not talked about the development of being. I talk about all the hindrances that are preventing your recognition. And knowledge is the greatest hindrance. Hence I have talked about it extensively. It is the barrier.

If you know that you know, you will never know. If you know that you know, what is the point of knowing? You can go on sleeping and dreaming.

The moment you recognize that you don't know, that recognition of ignorance goes like an arrow into the heart, pierces you like a spear. In that very piercing, one becomes aware - in that very shock.

Knowledge is a kind of shock-absorber. It does not allow you to be shaken and shocked. It goes on protecting you. It is an arm our around you. I speak about knowledge, against knowledge, so that you can drop the arm our, so that life can shock you into awareness.

Life is there ready to shock you every moment. Your being is there inside you ready to be awakened any moment, but between these two there is knowledge. And the more of it there is, the more your self-awakening will be delayed.

Become unknowledgeable.

And never think of spirituality as a growth. It is not a growth. You are already Gods, Buddhas, from the very beginning. It is not that you have to become Buddhas: the treasure is there - only you don't know where you have put it. You have forgotten the key, or you have forgotten how to use the key.

You are so drunk with knowledge that you have become oblivious of all that you are. Knowledge is alcoholic; it makes people drunk. Then their perception is blurred, then their remembrance is at the minimum. Then they start seeing things which are not, and they stop seeing things which are.

That's why, Veetrag, I have not talked about how to evolve your being. Being is already as it should be, it is perfect. Nothing is needed to be added to it, nothing can be added to it. It's God's creation. It comes out of perfection, hence it is perfect. Just withdraw all the hindrances that you have created.

And our whole society goes on working, endeavouring, to create hindrances.

A child is born. Immediately we start creating hindrances in him. We create comparison m him: "Somebody else is more .beautiful than you, and somebody else is healthier than you, and somebody else's child - look! look at his marks, at his grades, at his intelligence, and what are you doing?"

We start creating comparison. Comparison brings inferiority and superiority - and both are illnesses, hindrances. Now the child will never think about himself; he will always think in comparison to somebody else. The poison of comparison has entered in him. Now he is going to remain miserable.

Now the bliss of being will become more and more impossible.

Everyone is born unique. No comparison is possible. You are you, and I am me. A Buddha is a Buddha, and a Christ is a Christ. And no comparison is possible. If you compare, you create superiority, inferiority - the ways of the ego. And then, of course, great desire arises to compete, great desire arises to defeat others. And you remain in fear of whether you are going to make it or not, because it is a very violent struggle: everybody is trying the same - to become the first!

Millions of people are trying to become the first. Great violence, aggression, hatred, enmity, arises.

Life becomes a hell. If you are defeated, you are miserable. And there are many more chances of being defeated. And even if you succeed you are not happy, because the moment you succeed you become afraid. Now somebody else is going to take it from you. The competitors are all around, violently after you.

Before you succeeded you were afraid whether you were going to make it or not; now you have succeeded, you have the money and the power, now you are afraid - somebody is going to take it away from you. Before you were trembling, now you are trembling. Those who are failures are miserable, and those who are succeeders, they are miserable.

In this world, it is very difficult to find a happy man - because nobody is fulfilling the condition of being happy. The first condition is: drop all comparison. Drop all stupid ideas of being superior and inferior. You are neither superior nor inferior. You are simply yourself! Three exists NO ONE like you with whom you can be compared. Then suddenly you are at home.

And we start poisoning the children's minds with knowledge. We start teaching them things that they don't know. We teach them about God. We are teaching them a lie. This God is not going to be a true God - they don't know. We are forcing them to believe. And belief will become their knowledge.

And belief CANNOT really become knowing; it will be only a pretension. Their whole life they will think they know, and they will never know. The foundation has been laid in untruth.

We teach children that "You have an immortal soul." What nonsense you are teaching to them! And I am not saying there is no immortal soul, and I am not saying that there is no God, mind you. I am saying these things should not be taught as beliefs. They are existential experiences. The child has to be helped to explore into his inner world.

Rather than helping him in exploration we hand him ready made knowledge. That ready-made knowledge becomes his greatest problem. How to drop it?

That's why I have spoken extensively on the stupidity of knowledge. It is ignorance masquerading as knowledge. The moment you drop it you will be again a child - fresh, alive, vibrant, curious; full of wonder will be your eyes. And your heart will start throbbing again with the mystery of life. AND the exploration begins - and with that, the awareness. More and more you become aware of this inner consciousness that you have been carrying all along, but it has become too much stuffed with knowledge. So whenever you go in, you never find consciousness; you always find some content floating in consciousness. Knowledge is like clouds in the sky.

Right now, there are so many clouds in the sky. If you look at the sky you will not find the sky at all, only clouds and clouds.

That is the state of a knowledgeable man's mind: thoughts, scriptures, great theories, dogmas, doctrines, float like clouds, and he cannot see the pure sky.

Let these clouds disappear. And they are of your own making; they are there because you are clinging to them. They are there because you go on holding onto them. Loosen your grip, let them go, then there is a pristine clarity of the sky, the absolute infinity of the sky. That is freedom. That is consciousness. That is TRUE knowing.

A great Western philosopher, one of the greatest, David Hume, has written... hearing again and again from the great mystics, "Know thyself!" he says, "I also tried one day to know myself. I closed my eyes and went in. I found a few desires, a few thoughts, memories, dreams, imaginations... and things like that. But I could not find anybody else there. I could not find myself."

This is the true depiction of almost everybody's mind, except a few Buddhas. If you go in, what will you find? Contents, clouds moving around. And even such an intelligent person like David Hume could not see the point: Who is it who is looking at the contents? Who is this awareness that is finding a few memories, desires floating around? Of course, THIS witness cannot be a desire. THIS witness cannot be an imagination. THIS witness cannot be any thought. All is passing in front of this witness. And he was looking for the witness! Now, you cannot look for the witness as an object.

The only way to know the witness is to drop ALL content and become utterly empty. When there is nothing to see, your capacity to see turns upon itself.

That's what Jesus calls conversion. When there is nothing e!Be to see, one starts seeing oneself.

When there is nothing to hinder, the consciousness is pure, and in that purity it becomes self conscious .

And when I use the word 'self-conscious' I don't mean your self-consciousness. Your self- consciousness is not self-consciousness - it is just ego-consciousness. You don't know who you are; how can you be self-conscious? Your self-consciousness is a disease You become self-conscious only when you are facing people. If you are to deliver a speech you become self-conscious. And because of that self-consciousness, you become SO disturbed, almost paralyzed. Or if you are playing a part in a drama, you become self-conscious.

Your self-consciousness is nothing but the desire of the ego to perform a dying so perfectly that everybody appreciates it. When I am talking about self-consciousness I mean when all has disappeared and there is no other content left the mirror reflects itself.

It is like when a small candle is burning in a room. It reflects the walls, it reflects the furniture, it reflects the painting on the wall, it reflects the roof For a moment think: the walls have disappeared, the painting is no more, the roof has disappeared - ALL has disappeared, only the small candle is burning. Now what will it reflect? It will only reflect itself; it will only be self luminous.

This is the state of being.

Drop knowledge. Drop comparison. Drop false identities And this WHOLE process is negative!

Drop this, drop that... and go on dropping. Go on dropping till nothing is left to drop... and then it is there, God is there.

The second question:

Question 2:

YES, YATRI, I AM ABSOLUTELY SURE - I HAVE CHOSEN YOU. But you are still hesitating. You have not chosen me yet. Not that you don't want to choose me - you want and yet you are hesitating.

You have been standing for all these years on the threshold - in a kind of constant hesitation. Your hesitation is chronic. And you know you cannot go back. You cannot go back - that is impossible - but you are not going forward either. Hence the despair.

When I talk about the trust, the love, the patience, of the disciple, I am talking about you as much as about anybody else. And you have the potential! But you are completely oblivious of your potential.

You can grow into a huge tree of love and trust, but you are so hesitant that you won't allow your seed to drop in the soil and disappear.

And your hesitation is nothing special. EVERY intelligent person is hesitant; it is part of intelligence.

The mind wants to take everything into account before it takes a step. That's why it happens sometimes: fools prove more courageous than the so-called intelligent. And it happens sometimes that fools reach faster than the so-called intelligent. Fools act and the intelligent person simply contemplates; he never acts. But just by contemplating a thing, nothing ever happens. And if contemplation becomes your chronic habit, then you are caught into it. Then one thing leads to another, and you go on moving in a circle. And the circle i5 vicious.

Yatri, you are an intelligent person. That is your problem. That can become your great joy too! If you take the jump... it is difficult for the intelligent person to take the jump, but if he takes it, then naturally his flowering is far greater than the flowering of the unintelligent. His experience is multi- dimensional. And it is not only that his experience is a great celebration to him, he is also capable of sharing it with others. He can communicate it to others. The unintelligent may reach, but will not be heir to share; will be able to know, but will not be able to show.

So with the intelligent there is a problem: the problem is how to act, because the intelligence goes on keeping him hesitant, goes on keeping him in a state of paralysis: "To be or not to be? To do or not to do?" And he goes on thinking about pros and cons, and there is no end to it. This is his problem! But if HE takes the jump, then there is great beauty in his jump. He will know, and he will be able to express it too. He will be able to spread it too .

And there is a kind of bliss when you spread, when you share, when you start overflowing.

You ask me, Yatri:

DEAR MASTER - ARE YOU SURE YOU CHOSE ME?

I have chosen you, otherwise you would not have been here. Even though I have chosen you, you are only half here. Left to yourself you would not have been here at all. You are not here because of you - that much is absolutely certain. You are here because of me. And you are here in a reluctant way, as if always ready to escape, as if always ready to find an excuse to escape.

This is wasting opportunity. This is wasting something immensely valuable. The time that is wasted will not come back again to you. Gather courage! And I tell you: you have nothing to lose. Gather courage - you have all to gain and nothing to lose.

Even then, people are so much afraid. Even then, they go on thinking whether it is worth taking the risk. And they never think that they have nothing to lose - so why be so afraid? What risk? Risk is there if you have something to lose. Risk IS in remaining hesitant, because one day I am here...

one day I may not be here. Who knows about tomorrow? And when I am gone, then you will repent.

But then it will be pointless, it will be too late.

I have chosen you. And I have chosen you because I know the potential.

Just the other night, I gave sannyas to a beautiful woman, Avodha. She said she had not come here to take sannyas. She had not even thought about it. It is just out of the blue. I told her I have chosen her. It is not her choice. She had come here almost like a driftwood. Her coming was accidental.

She had come without knowing what was going to happen - out of curiosity, intellectual interest.

She is a therapist, must have become curious about what is happening here. She had come to see.

She had come to be a spectator, a watcher. She had not come to become committed and to become involved. But it has happened.

I have chosen her. She has great potential. She has a great possibility to open up, to bloom. I have chosen her; my work is done from my side. Now she can become a Yatri - she is also very intelligent. She can start hesitating. That will be wasting time. She can take the jump, and I hope she will take it. This has been my experience, that women are more courageous than men, because they know how to love. They know how to sacrifice all for love. Their love has a kind of totality in it.

Man's love remains a fragment of his life. Yes, an important part, but only a part; one thing amongst many things. But with a woman it is all her life, her whole heart, her whole being.

It is not just accidental that many more women became enlightened with Bud&a than men. Many more women became enlightened with Mahavir than men. Many more women have become enlightened down the ages than men. But you will be surprised: their names are not known. All the great Masters seem to be men. Very rarely, once, few and far between, you find one Rabia, one Meera, one Lalla - but very rarely. Why has this happened?

The capacity of the woman is to receive. Women have been the greatest disciples ever. That comes naturally to them - to receive. They are wombs, receptivities. They can absorb. They can drink the Master as totally as possible. Women are cannibals! They can eat the Master, they can digest him.

They become great disciples. But to be a Master is difficult for them, because to be a Master you have to do just the reverse: you have to start giving. That comes easier to a man. Receiving is very difficult for a man. Giving is not difficult, it is easier. That's how biologically, psychologically, he is made.

So let me say it to you: many more women have become enlightened down the ages than men, but still more men became Masters than women. It is a natural capacity.

So, I don't feel that Avodha will miss like Yatri. Yatri also need not miss any more - enough is enough! Take the jump. You can TAKE it! Everybody can take it. God is everybody's birthright .

The third question:

Question 3:

BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT RELIGION, and they cannot be religion. I am against rituals, but that does not mean that a religious person cannot go into a ritual. But when a religious person goes into a ritual, it is not a ritual at all. His heart is in it; then his words have wings.

So remember it: I am against the ritual when there is no heart in it. Then it is a ritual! But if there is a heart... just remember those three mystics, those three Russian mystics, praying to God: "You are three, we are three - have mercy on us!" This too is a ritual, a simple one, of their own invention; this too is a prayer - but their heart was in it.

A famous story about Moses:

He was passing through a forest. He saw a man praying. But the man who was praying was saying such absurd things that he could not go further. He had to stop the man. What he was saying was profane, sacrilegious. He was saying to God: "God, you must be feeling sometimes very alone - I can come and be always with you like a shadow. You can depend on me You need not be alone.

Why suffer loneliness when I am here? And I am not a useless person either - I can be of much use, I can be handy. I will give you a good bath. I can massage too. I am a shepherd. And I will take all the lice from your hair and your body..."

Lice? Moses could not believe his ears: "What is he talking about?"

"And I will cook food for you. And do you know what? - everybody likes what I cook. It is delicious.

And I will prepare your bed and I will wash your clothes. And I can do a thousand and one things!

And when you are ill I will take care of you. I will be a mother to you, a wife to you, a servant, a slave - I can be Al kinds of things. Just give me a hint so I can come ."

Moses stopped him and said, "Listen! What kind of prayer is this? What are you doing? To whom are you talking? Lice in God's hair? He needs a bath? And you are saying 'I will rub your body and make it absolutely clean'? Stop this nonsense. This is not prayer. God will be offended by you."

Looking at Moses, the man fell at his feet. He said, "I am sorry. I am an illiterate, ignorant man. I don't know how to pray. Please, you teach me!"

So Moses taught him the right way to pray, and he was very happy because he had put a man on the right track. Happy, puffed up in his ego, Moses went away.

And when he was alone in the forest, a very thundering voice came from the sky and said, "Moses, I have sent you into the world to bring people to me, to bridge people with me, but not to take my lovers away from me. And that's exactly what you have done. That man is one of the MOST intimate to me. Go back! Apologize. Take your prayer back! You have destroyed the whole beauty of his dialogue. He is sincere. He is loving. His love is true. Whatsoever he was saying, he was saying from his heart. It was not a ritual. Now what you have given to him is just a ritual. He will repeat it but it will be only on the lips; it will not be out of his being."

I am not against prayer, I am against the ritualistic prayer - BECAUSE IT IS NOT PRAYER, that's why I am against it. Don't learn empty gestures. Let your gestures be alive, spontaneous. Otherwise, deep down you know that this is a ritual, deep down you know that this is just a formality you are performing. And if that is your feeling inside, what is the point of going into it?

During a race riot in Detroit, the police stopped a black man driving an automobile which had a white pillow-case flying from the radio antenna.

"What's that for?" asked a patrolman.

"It's a white pillow-case," explained the driver, "to show that I'm neutral!"

The policeman quickly frisked him and discovered a pistol in his pocket.

"Neutral, eh?" said the cop. "Then what's this gun for?"

"In case somebody don't believe it," said the driver.

But that's what your rituals are. Deep down, you know that they are rituals. You yourself don't believe in them. They have been taught to you, you have been conditioned for them. You go on repeating them mechanically, robot like. If you don't repeat them, you feel something is missed; if you repeat them nothing is gained. And there is no understanding behind them.

"No," said Clarabelle. "Ah'm not that kind of girl. Besides, the grass is wet, Mama said I shouldn't, and two bits ain't enough."

What you have been told by others is never going to become your true life. It will remain superficial.

And not only that: your true life will remain absolutely against it. And all the rituals that you have learnt, you have learnt from others who had learnt them from somebody else. They don't know what they are doing. They don't know what they are teaching you.

So on the surface you learn one thing: deep down you learn quite another. Deep down, you learn falsity. Deep down you learn hypocrisy.

His grandmother watched the boy eat his soup with the wrong spoon, grasp the utensils with the wrong fingers, eat the main course with his hands, and pour tea into the saucer and blow on it.

"Hasn't watching your mother and dad at the dinner table taught you anything?"

"Yeah," said the boy. "Never to get married."

People are learning on two levels: on one level what you are teaching, on another level what you are. Small children are very perceptive; they go on seeing all the falsities. You cannot cheat a small child; he is very intuitive. He knows! And even if he allows you to cheat him, he knows that you are cheating and he knows that he is being cheated and he is allowing it, but he is just playing a game.

He is enjoying it! You think you are cheating him, he thinks he is cheating you.

I am against rituals because they have killed the spirit of religion in the world. But I am not saying don't pray, but let the prayer arise. Let it be of your own. Let it be of your own feeling. Don't repeat it parrot-like.

I am not against rules, but the rules should arise out of your understanding. They should not be imposed from the outside. I am not against discipline! but discipline should not be slavery. All true discipline is self-discipline. And self-discipline is never against freedom - in fact, it is the ladder to freedom. Only disciplined people become free, but their discipline is not obedience to others: their discipline is obedience to their own inner voice. And they are ready to risk anything for it.

Let your own awareness decide your life-style, life-pattern. Don't allow anybody else to decide it.

That is a sin: to allow anybody else to decide it. Why is it a sin? - because you will never be in it. It will remain superficial, it will be hypocrisy.

The fourth question:

Question 4:

CHINMAYA, YASHODHARA WAS NOT MY SANNYASIN. Sheela is. So beware - don't leave her in the hope that she will be sad or mad. If you leave her there is going to be celebration. Orangelujah!

Great celebration! So there is no point in leaving her.

The fifth question:

Question 5:

SANTOSH, YES. THERE IS great relationship. In fact, to call it relationship is not right - because energy IS understanding. They are not two things.

What kind of energy is understanding? When the energy is unoccupied, it becomes understanding.

When energy is occupied, it remains ignorance, it remains: unconsciousness.

For example, your sex energy is occupied with a woman or with a man. It will remain ignorance - because the energy is focussed on the object, it is going outward, it is extrovert. If the energy is freed from the object, where will it go? It will start falling into the subject, into your inner source. And energy falling back into the source becomes understanding, becomes awareness.

And I am not saying be against sex. No. But let sex be more a subjective phenomenon than an objective phenomenon. And that is the difference between sex and love. Love is subjective, sex is objective.

You become interested in a woman or in a man as an object. And sooner or later the interest will be finished, because once you have explored the object, then nothing is left. Then you are ready to move to somebody else. Yes, the woman looks beautiful but how long can she look beautiful?

An object is an object. She is not yet a person to you. She is just a beautiful object. It is insulting.

You are reducing a soul into an object, a subjectivity into an object. You are trying to exploit, .you are turning her into a means. Your energy will remain ignorant. And you will go on moving from one woman to another, and your energy will go on remaining in a circle. It will never come back home.

Love means you are not interested in the woman or the man as an object. In fact, you are not there to exploit her. You are not there to get something from her. On the contrary, you are so full of energy, you would like to give some energy to her. Love gives. Sex only wants to get.

And when love gives, it remains subjective, it remains rooted into oneself. Lovers help each other to be more and more themselves. Lovers help each other not to disappear, but to become authentically individual. Lovers help each other to be centered. Love is respect, reverence, worship. It is not exploitation. Love is understanding. Because energy is unoccupied with the object, it remains free, untethered to anything. And that brings the transformation. It accumulates inside you.

And remember: just as it happens in the world of physics, so it happens in the world of metaphysics.

After a certain quantity of energy... the qualitative change happens. The qualitative change is nothing but quantitative change.

For example, if you heat water up to a hundred degrees it evaporates. Up to ninety-nine it has not evaporated; it is still water - hot, but still water. But beyond a hundred, it evaporates - it is no more water. It has changed its form. The transformation has happened.

Just like that, when your energy accumulates and you don't go on wasting it on objects.... And people ARE wasting it on objects. Somebody is interested in money - he puts his whole energy on the money. Of course, he accumulates much money, but in accumulating it he dies, dissipates, becomes empty, becomes a beggar. Money goes on accumulating and he goes on becoming more and more beggarly. Somebody puts his energy into politics, into power. He becomes a prime minister, but deep down he is a beggar. He may be the greatest beggar in the country....

If you put your energy into objects, you will live a life of non-understanding, unawareness. Don't put your energy into objects. Let energy fall into your being. Let it accumulate. Let your life become a great reservoir. Let your energy just be there without any occupation. And at a certain point... the jump, the quantum leap, the transformation. And energy becomes luminous, turns into awareness, becomes understanding.

You ask, Santosh: IS THERE ANY RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN UNDERSTANDING AND ENERGY?

Yes, there is. It is energy that becomes understanding. So when you are depleted of energy, you start losing your understanding. When you are tired, your intelligence is less. You have observed it. In the mowing your intelligence is more fresh than in the evening. In the morning you are more understanding, more compassionate, more loving, than in the evening.

Have you observed? - beggars come in the morning to beg. They understand the psychology. In the evening, who is going to give to them? People are so angry by that time, so frustrated with life. In the mowing, they have rested the whole night, a deep sleep, the energy is fresh - eight hours accumulation of energy. They have more understanding, more compassion, more love, more sympathy. It is possible to persuade them to give something to you. They have, so they can give.

By the evening, they don't have; they have lost all they had. They are dead tired.

Children are more understanding - have you observed. it or not? - than the old people. Old people become very very hard, cruel, cunning. Their whole life they have remained occupied with objects.

ALL old people become Machiavellian. Young children are innocent, trusting, closer to Buddhas.

Why? - the energy is overflowing.

Young children learn things so fast. Why? The energy is there, hence the intelligence. The older you become, the more difficult it becomes to learn a thing. They say it is difficult to teach an old dog new tricks. Why? It should not be so, because the dog knows so many tricks, he can learn a few more. It should be easier for him because he has learnt so much. He has practiced learning so much that he can learn a few more easily. But that is not so.

Children learn fast. If a child is born in a town where five languages are spoken, he starts learning all five; he becomes efficient in all five languages. They all become his mother languages. A child has infinite capacity to learn. And the reason is only one: his energy is still overflowing. Soon it will be dissipated in life.

The man of meditation becomes the man of understanding because his energy accumulates. He is not wasting it. He is not interested in trivia; he does not put any energy at all into petty things. So whenever the time arises to give, he has to give.

Energy is understanding. Be conscious of it and use your energy very consciously, and use your energy in such a way that you don't simply go on wasting it.

The sixth question:

Question 6:

IT IS A FALSE ENTITY. It is not. There are two great falsities in the world. One is ego and another is death. These two things exist not. And they are not separate, they are joined together. They are aspects of the same coin; two aspects of the same untruth.

If you have ego, then you will be afraid of death, then death is bound to come - because you are clinging to a falsity. How long can you cling to it? Sooner or later you will have to see that it is false.

You can go on avoiding, you can go on delaying and postponing, but not for ever.

Death is the death of the ego. And ego is not in the first place. So a person who becomes free of ego also becomes free of death. Then there is nobody to die!

It is like: a great wave in the ocean believes that "I am, and I am separate from the ocean." This is ego. Soon the great wave will disappear in the ocean. Then it will feel death. And even while it is there, high in the sky, dancing the dance, whispering with the winds, having a dialogue with the sun, still the fear will be there, that sooner or later it is going to die. Because other waves are dying! And just a moment before they were alive.

You are living amongst people who are dying, continuously somebody or other dies. THE BELL TOLLS FOR THEE. Don't send anybody to ask FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS - IT TOLLS FOR THEE. Whenever somebody dies, it brings home the truth that you are going to die. But WHY did somebody die? Why in the first place? Because the wave believed itself to be separate from the ocean. If the wave knew that "I am not separate from the ocean," where is death? That wave becomes a Sufi. That wave becomes a Buddha. The wave who knows that "I am not separate from the ocean. I am the ocean. SO HUM - I am that;" then there is no death.

Ego is a false entity. It is needed - just as your name is needed. Your name is a false entity.

Everybody is born without any name. But we have to give a certain name, otherwise it will be impossible in the world - how to call him? How to address him? How to send a letter to him? How to give money or borrow money from him? How to drag him to the court? It will be so impossible if everybody is nameless. It will be sheer chaos! This world cannot exist; it will be a totally different kind of world.

And it will be very difficult to remember who your wife is and who your son is and who your husband is. All will be chaos. Names are needed, labels are needed. But they are false. They are utilitarian, but they are not true. When you give the name to the child, you are giving a name to the nameless.

And exactly like that is the ego. The name is for others to use and the ego is for yourself to use. You will have to say '1'. You will have to say, "I am thirsty." The reality is only that there is thirst. But if you go and suddenly declare in the marketplace, "There is thirst!" then it will be very difficult - who is thirsty? Where is it? You have to say, "I am thirsty." That "I am thirsty" is just utilitarian. In reality all that is is thirst, hunger, love. These things are true, but the 'I' is just needed to manage your life.

If you understand this, there is no problem. You can use it and you can know that you are not separate from existence. I also use the word 'I' - Bud&a uses it, Krishna uses it, Christ uses it. It cannot be dropped. There is no need to drop it! You just have to see the point that the word is utilitarian - useful in day-to-day life, but has no existential status.

Don't be befooled by the word. Don't start believing that the word is the reality. But it happens. I have heard Charles de Gaulle was a very egoistic person, as politicians are bound to be. A story is told about him:

One winter night upon retiring, his wife shivered and said, "My God, it's cold."

Yielding slightly, de Gaulle replied, "In bed, Madam, you may call me Charles."

People can start believing. Then you have given the word a reality which is not there, which does not belong there.

The MacGregor of Scotland were all big, husky, country men. They knew the wilds of their own surroundings, but had little use for the finer aspects of civilization. When a problem arose with respect to their land rights, the head of the clan - known as The MacGregor - sent to the university in Edinburgh for an attorney.

The city lawyer was pale and slight next to the clansmen, but he had the expertise they needed, so he was generously thanked and invited to share the MacGregor' gargantuan dinner. Entering the huge dining hall, the lawyer was pointed to one end of the table overflowing with food.

The lawyer, not wanting to usurp the master's place at the head of the table, said, "Oh, sir, I could not sit in the chair of The MacGregor himself."

"You may sit," The MacGregor assured him, "since it is he himself who invites you to do so."

Looking around at the tall sons beside him, the lawyer backed off further.. "Only The MacGregor should sit at the head of the table," he said.

The MacGregor laughed heartily and clapped the attorney on the back. "Sit where you are told, you foolish little man, for wherever The MacGregor sits, THERE is the head of the table."

The ego is just a belief in your specialness, in your personality, a BELIEF in yourself - and the belief is utterly false, not based in truth at all.

I am not. You are not. Only God is. Know it, and then you can use the word. But then it is just a word. It does not denote any reality. Only one is. Many are appearances. Many are false. Falseness consists of many and multiplicity. Truth consists of one.

The seventh question:

Question 7:

ARUP, SO IT HAS HAPPENED! IT IS NOTHING BUT PURE LOVE. Don't make it a problem. Don't think about it - allow it. The more you love me, the more it will happen, because love can know even with closed eyes, love can see even with closed eyes.

Without love, even open eyes are not open. And with love even closed eyes are open. And when the outer eyes close, the inner eye opens.

And how long are you going to see me with the outer eyes? Sooner or later you have to dissolve into the inner.

You are fortunate, Arup, it is a blessing. Don't make a problem out of it.

The mind is such that it goes on making problems even out of blessings. And if you make a problem out of it, there are many people to give you advice. Somebody will say, "This is cowardice."

Somebody will say, "This is fear." Somebody will say something else - and the mystery of it will be lost. It is nothing but love.

And it always happens: when you love, even eyes become a hindrance. Even to see with open eyes makes you feel the distance. When eyes are closed, all distance disappears. Then there is no space between you and me.

And this will happen to women more and more. Even in ordinary love when the woman is in the embrace of the man, she closes her eyes. Women are not voyeurs. Men are. When a man is making love to a woman, he wants to see what is happening - only then he can believe. Seeing is believing! If he cannot see, he cannot believe. He wants to keep the light on. Not only that: there are foolish people who keep automatic cameras in their bedrooms so that later on they can see "Really it happened?!"

But women almost always close their eyes, because to close the eyes you go beyond space and beyond time. Suddenly the outer disappears, and only the inner world remains.

The eighth question:

Question 8:

KRISHNA, YOU ARE! BUT DON'T BE WORRIED - it has happened to a few very great people before you. Martin Buber had his first satori on the toilet. You are in good company.

And the last question:

Question 9:

A BUSINESSMAN IS ONE THING, and to be in business is quite another. You can be in business AND religious, but you cannot be a businessman AND religious And they are poles apart. They are not synonymous. I am not saying that you have to renounce all your businesses to become religious. I am never in favor of any renunciation of the world. But when I say a businessman cannot be religious I mean something totally different. I mean the psychology - not the work that you do in the market-place, but the psychology, the mind.

The mind of a businessman is always bargaining, always greedy, always thinking of the profit, always in the future, always interested in petty things, mundane objects. When I say, "Don't be a businessman," I mean drop this psychology.

And you can drop the marketplace and go to the Himalayan caves - that won't help because I have seen great mahatmas who have renounced business, but they are still businessmen. Their psychology is the same. Maybe now they don't think in terms of the coins of this world, but they think in terms of the coins of the other world. Maybe they don't think in terms of having a bigger house here, but they think in terms of having a better house in paradise. Maybe they are no more interested in things of this world, but what difference does it make? They are still interested in things; their motivation is still that of greed.

Don't be greedy. Be generous! Don't be accumulative - be sharing! That is real renunciation. And then you live wherever you are, and you do whatsoever you are doing. And don't live for the future - live in the moment, for the moment. Then you are not a businessman. You may be IN business.

Don't feel sad. In fact, nobody need feel sad with me. All that I am asking you is not to change outer things at all, but inner attitudes, approaches, visions.

Finkel spent all morning trying to contact Saperstein and Shapiro, an important account. But when he asked for Saperstein, the secretary told him the man was out. And when he asked for Shapiro, the secretary told him he was tied up.

He'd called back five times, when he'd finally had enough. "What kind of business is this?" he fumed at the secretary. "One partner is out all morning, and the other is tied up for hours on end. What's going on there?"

The secretary apologized, "I'm sorry, Mr. Finkel. But, you see, whenever Mr. Saperstein goes out, he ties Mr. Shapiro up."

This is the mind of a businessman.

Or meditate over this:

Benny had worked as a tailor for many years. Came the time when he wished to retire, but his savings account was spare.

"Miriam," he confided to his wife, "I'm tired. I want to retire, but I don't know how we're going to afford it."

"Don't worry," said Miriam, "I have plenty of money." And she produced a bankbook with regular deposits stretching back the entire forty years of their marriage.

"Where did this come from?" cried Benny in amazement.

"Well," said Miriam softly, "every time, during the last forty years, that we made love, I put five dollars away."

Benny threw his arms around his wife, and impulsively cried out, "Oh, Miriam! For heaven's sake, you should have told me. If I had only known, I would have given you all my business."

This is the mind of a businessman.

Be in business - that is not a problem - but don't be a businessman. Think of greater things. Think of higher things. Think of beauty, love, truth, God. Think of meditation, satori. All these happen only when you are not greedy. All these happen only when you are in the moment, utterly in the moment.

All these happen only when you are relaxed and you have no tension.

This is what I mean when I say don't be a businessman.

And the really really last question:

Question 10:

When you stop thinking and you start thanking. If you can thank, all becomes possible - even the impossible becomes possible. If you can thank, then doors open. They open only for those who live in gratitude.

God gives his keys only to those who are grateful. God's keys remain unavailable to those who complain. And all thinking is a kind of complaining.

Thanking is the most beautiful flower that arises in one's soul. And, Gyan Bhakti, I have been watching you... slowly slowly, the bud is opening. It is becoming a flower. Soon you will have wings.

Soon your whole life will become a fragrance. Soon, not only one flower, but millions will bloom in you.

When one flower has bloomed, know well, the spring has come.