Of the spirit of gravity part 1

Anyone who wants man to rise to the heights of the stars is bound to be an enemy of the Spirit of Gravity. Gravity is not only a physical phenomenon; it also has a parallel in spiritual life. Just as things are pulled downwards by the earth and we call it the force of gravity, so something in man also pulls him downwards, which Zarathustra calls the Spirit of Gravity.

Why has man remained a pygmy when he has the potential to be a giant? Why has man remained a small bush when he can become a cedar of Lebanon, reaching high into the sky, into the openness and freedom? Why does man cling to the lowliest things instead of getting free from all that makes him mean, ugly, violent, jealous? Why cannot he grow to the heights of love, consciousness, blissfulness, and shower all around flowers of blessings? There must be something that pulls him downwards and does not allow him to go upwards.

Zarathustra gives it exactly the right name - the Spirit of Gravity. And one has to be very aware to get rid of this gravitation. This gravitation functions on man only if he is unconscious; the more unconscious he is, the more he is in the grip of gravity. The more conscious he becomes, the more he is free to rise above himself. And unless man rises above himself there is no possibility left for further evolution.

Man has been barren for thousands of years. Every other animal has given birth to some other animal higher than itself. Man goes on reproducing himself; he does not give birth to something that is superhuman.

Zarathustra's sole concern is the birth of the superman. He is trying to approach from every direction, to remove all the hindrances, all the obstacles, and to give every incentive and challenge so that you're not smugly satisfied with what you are, but a tremendous discontent and longing arises in you - which takes you beyond yourself, which gives you wings and opens the whole sky as your home, which allows you to be a citizen of infinity and eternity. That's what he means by the superman.

Zarathustra says, I AM ENEMY TO THE SPIRIT OF GRAVITY: AND TRULY, MORTAL ENEMY, ARCH-ENEMY, BORN ENEMY! - every mystic is. Mysticism can be defined as a struggle against the Spirit of Gravity.

I COULD SING A SONG ABOUT THAT - AND I WILL SING ONE, ALTHOUGH I AM ALONE IN AN EMPTY HOUSE AND HAVE TO SING IT TO MY OWN EARS.

THERE ARE OTHER SINGERS, TO BE SURE, WHOSE VOICES ARE SOFTENED, WHOSE HANDS ARE ELOQUENT, WHOSE EYES ARE EXPRESSIVE, WHOSE HEARTS ARE AWAKENED, ONLY WHEN THE HOUSE IS FULL: I AM NOT ONE OF THEM.

HE WHO WILL ONE DAY TEACH MEN TO FLY WILL HAVE MOVED ALL BOUNDARY-STONES; ALL BOUNDARY-STONES WILL THEMSELVES FLY INTO THE AIR TO HIM, HE WILL BAPTIZE THE EARTH ANEW - AS 'THE WEIGHTLESS'.

First, have a little glimpse what constitutes in you the Spirit of Gravity.

All possessiveness of things makes you heavy, does not allow you to fly; it destroys your wings. I am not against using things. Use as many things as you can, but don't possess them, because the moment you possess something, without your knowing it you are possessed by those things. A man who desires only money soon finds himself a prisoner of his own possessions. He used to think he possesses, but finally he finds he is possessed.

There is a Sufi story: A small hut, very small, and a Sufi mystic with his wife lives there. In the middle of the night - it is raining and it is in a dark forest, wild and dangerous, too - somebody knocks on their door. The wife is near the door, sleeping. There is not much space inside, just enough for two persons to sleep.

The husband says, "Open the door. The night is dark, the forest is full of wild animals. Somebody has forgotten the way. He certainly needs refuge."

The wife is angry. She says, "But there is no space inside our hut. There is only enough space for us two to sleep."

The mystic laughed. He said, "It is not a palace of a king - however big the palace may be, it is always smaller than a poor mystic's hut. Two can sleep, three can sit perfectly well. We will sit and talk and tell stories and sing songs. It is a beautiful silent night; even the rain is creating a certain music. Open the door!"

The wife opens the door. Drenched with water, a visitor enters and he says, "I am sorry to disturb you. I got lost, and I could not see any light anywhere except in your hut. I was aware it is so small, but there was no other way. Outside, life is in constant danger. The forest is full of wild animals."

The mystic said, "There is no problem; we have enough space. Two can sleep, three can sit. And we don't go out much and we don't know much about the world. You are welcome. We will listen to you tell about many things that you know about the world. What we know is singing songs - we will offer you our songs, and the night will be gone soon; almost half of the night is over. Please close the doors and be at ease, and don't feel that you have disturbed us. You have graced us; you have given us a chance to welcome a guest; you have made us richer. We are very poor people - no guest ever knocks on our doors. It has thrilled our hearts."

The man sits. The mystic sings a song, so beautiful, so in tune with the rain and the sounds of silence in the forest. And just then somebody else knocks on the door. The mystic says to the guest, "You are close to the door, please open it. Somebody needs refuge; the night is dangerous outside."

But the man who was asking for refuge just a few minutes before is angry. He says, "What do you mean? There is no space."

The mystic says, "It is not a palace of a king, which is always short of space. It is a small hut of a poor mystic. We are sitting; three can sit comfortably. Four will have to sit a little tight, more close to each other. And it is really a joy to feel each others' warmth and love - the night is cold. The guest is welcome. You open the doors! And remember, a few minutes before you were in the same position."

Reluctantly the man opens the door.

Another man has lost his way in the forest and he says, "Excuse me, I am absolutely helpless; otherwise I would not have knocked on your doors. I can see the place is so small and already three persons are sitting."

The mystic says, "There is no problem. We will sit a little closely to each other. There are gaps between the three; there will be no gaps between the four. And to feel each others' love, to feel each others' warmth, to feel each others' life is a joy in itself. You are welcome. Sit down and close the door."

Now the hut is completely packed. The mystic sings another song, and as he ends the song there is another knock on the door, and a very different kind of knock. Everybody else is shocked. They know the mystic will allow whoever is knocking. The mystic says, "Open the door. He is nobody, he is one of my friends. He is a donkey who lives nearby, a wild donkey."

All the guests and the wife become angry, and they say, "This is too much. It is beyond tolerance.

You want a donkey in this place where there is no space left even for sitting comfortably?"

The mystic says, "How many times do I have to remind you that this is a poor mystic's hut. There is always space, one just has to find it. We are sitting; now we will be standing. And anyway, three- fourths of the night is past. Soon there will be the sunrise. Open the door and let the guest in - it does not matter whether he is a man or a donkey. To me, anybody who is asking for refuge should be welcomed. And you remember perfectly well - you were in the same state just a few minutes before."

Very reluctantly the person opens the door and a donkey, drenched with water, enters, and the mystic says, "Poor donkey, he needs our help. Let him stand in the middle and we will surround him.

He will get a little warmth. And perhaps you don't know that he loves my songs. I will give a special song in his welcome. Close the doors."

They are all puzzled. He sings a song, and the donkey listens very attentively.

And then the morning... they disperse. While they are dispersing and thanking the man for his hospitality, he says, "There is no question - you have obliged me. You have made me feel as if I have a palace. In fact, forgive me; I could not give you more space because so many guests arrived simultaneously. But remember always, the space is a question of your spirit. It is not a question of physical roominess; it is a question of spiritual spaciousness."

This mystic is not under the law of the gravitation that pulls people downwards. His approach to the problem gives an indication that he has wings. The Spirit of Gravity cannot disturb him.

Whenever you feel to do something which is harmful to anybody, whenever you do something which is only a hypocrisy, whenever you do something which is nothing but acting, inauthentic, insincere, whenever you are not being truthful, you are falling downwards, you are losing your heights. Whenever you feel jealous, full of hatred, full of violence, anger, rage, you can even feel it - that you have become heavy. Jealousy makes you heavy, anger makes you heavy, egoistic pretentions make you heavy.

You can almost feel it and discriminate between things - what makes you heavy and what makes you light. Love makes you light, kindness makes you light, compassion makes you light, silence makes you light, joy makes you light. Anything that makes you light and weightless helps you to get free of the imprisonment.

But man is so blind that sometimes he behaves in almost unbelievable ways. I have heard that two men were going to work in faraway Alaska. The last village, and then they may not encounter any other human beings. They purchased everything that they would need for three, four months while they were working in Alaska. They were no ordinary people; both were scientific explorers, and this was an expedition for scientific research.

In the small grocery store where they purchased their things, the man who was tending the shop suggested to them, "You may think that it is none of my business to suggest this to you, but I know Alaska; I know you will not find any human beings. This is the last place. Now you are entering into a deep loneliness. You may miss your wives, but you will not be able to find a woman. And just for people who go into deep loneliness for some work, I have a certain plastic woman, inflatable. It is a piece of art. You just fill it with air; the pump is attached. And you will be surprised - you have never seen such a beautiful woman with such a great, proportionate body."

One of the two men said, "It is all nonsense. Don't get convinced by this man - it is simply stupid." But the other man became interested. He said, "I will purchase it." And he said to his friend, "Remember, it is my woman, and I don't like anybody fooling around with my woman."

The other man said, "I have never thought that you are so stupid. It is just a plastic bag."

But he said, "I want you to be warned beforehand. I will not be able to tolerate it if you try to approach my woman in any way." He said, "I can't even dream...."

But you don't know - living four months alone.... And the other man was talking every day about the woman, saying, "She is so cute, so beautiful. In fact, now I am worried that I may never like a real woman, because no real woman is so beautiful and so obedient."

Slowly, slowly the other also started feeling the need of a woman, and one day when his friend was out he took the chance. He inflated the flat woman, and he said, "My God! She is far more beautiful than any Sophia Loren." And he could not resist - he made love to that plastic bag. Not only that, playing with those plastic breasts he cut with his teeth one of the breasts. And the woman flew out of the window! - because the air went out so suddenly, it flew out of the window. And at that very moment the friend returned and he said, "This is too much. I warned you, and you did not listen."

And he simply shot the man.

After four months he came back to the village to purchase some more things that he needed. The shopkeeper asked, "How is the woman doing? And I don't see your friend." The man said, "Don't talk about it. He is no friend. I had to shoot him." The shopkeeper said, "Shoot him? For what?"

He said, "He was fooling around with my woman. I had paid for her. And I have come to get another woman, because he destroyed the woman, also." The shopkeeper could not believe that jealousy could become such a heavy thing - and for such trivia.

But jealousy is keeping you down. Your anger is keeping you heavy. Your competitiveness, your lust for possessions, has made you a pygmy; otherwise you could also be a giant like Zarathustra or Gautam Buddha.

Zarathustra says, I AM ENEMY TO THE SPIRIT OF GRAVITY. Rather than pointing out all the things that make you heavy, he is simply using the words THE SPIRIT OF GRAVITY. It contains everything that makes you heavy.

... AND TRULY, MORTAL ENEMY, ARCH-ENEMY, BORN ENEMY!

I COULD SING A SONG ABOUT THAT - AND I WILL SING ONE, ALTHOUGH I AM ALONE IN AN EMPTY HOUSE AND HAVE TO SING IT TO MY OWN EARS.

THERE ARE OTHER SINGERS, TO BE SURE, WHOSE VOICES ARE SOFTENED, WHOSE HANDS ARE ELOQUENT, WHOSE EYES ARE EXPRESSIVE, WHOSE HEARTS ARE AWAKENED, ONLY WHEN THE HOUSE IS FULL: I AM NOT ONE OF THEM.

Those singers are not authentic singers. The song is not coming as a spontaneous phenomenon.

Their song is a commodity. They need an audience - the purchasers; they cannot sing it alone.

They cannot be a flower, blossoming in the aloneness of a deep forest where nobody is going ever to pass. But the flower will blossom in all its beautiful colors, and it will release to the winds its fragrance - unconcerned whether it ever reaches any nostrils, whether these beautiful colors are ever seen by any eyes. It is an inner growth. He will not wait for some passer-by, for some crowd to appreciate and applaud.

Zarathustra says, "There are other singers too, very artful, very eloquent, but they will sing only when the house is full; I am not one of them. My song is my soul. It is not for sale; it is not a commodity. I do not sing for somebody's entertainment, I sing it for my own sheer joy. It is my joy to sing it. It has nothing to do with whether anybody appreciates it or condemns it."

HE WHO WILL ONE DAY TEACH MEN TO FLY WILL HAVE MOVED ALL BOUNDARY-STONES - my song is for absolute freedom, devoted to the free spirit of man; it wants to move all boundary- stones - ALL BOUNDARY-STONES WILL THEMSELVES FLY INTO THE AIR TO HIM, HE WILL BAPTIZE THE EARTH ANEW - AS 'THE WEIGHTLESS'. My song is not part of the Spirit of Gravity; my song is the beginning of a weightless existence.

THE OSTRICH RUNS FASTER THAN ANY HORSE, BUT EVEN HE STICKS HIS HEAD HEAVILY INTO HEAVY EARTH: THAT IS WHAT THE MAN WHO CANNOT YET FLY IS LIKE. Most of the people for thousands of years, have behaved like ostriches. Their logic is the same: dig a hole in the sand and put your head inside it. It helps the ostrich. It is called "ostrich logic." It helps him not to see the enemy; and if he cannot see the enemy, he concludes that there is no enemy. And he is capable of running faster than any horse, but his idiotic logic makes him a victim - anybody can kill him.

The moment he sees the enemy approaching he immediately closes his eyes and puts his head deep into the sand. And then he is perfectly at ease, because he cannot see the enemy, so there is no enemy. But in fact he becomes more vulnerable - if he had had his eyes open he could have escaped, he could have fought, he could have managed to save himself.

Zarathustra is saying, "Man, who cannot yet fly, is just like the ostrich. He has the capacity, but he has dug deep holes in the earth; he is clinging to the earth. He is afraid to lose his possessions, he is afraid to lose the crowd, he is afraid to lose his family, he is afraid of a thousand and one things.

Because of his fear, which is absolutely unfounded - it is just his projection of the mind - he remains static; he does not move. He does not become a wanderer into unknown lands, he does not go climbing the mountains to unknown heights.

These are the basic things: to be a wanderer as a stranger into strange lands, and to be a mountain climber to the heights. They are primary practices for flying into the sky. One cannot just start flying.

You will be surprised to know that for almost one hundred years, from all over the world mountaineers have come to the Himalayas and have made tremendous efforts, dangerous efforts to reach to the unconquered peak, Everest. Before Edmund Hillary, hundreds of mountaineers died; not even their bones have been found. But the most amazing thing is, these mountaineers were coming from all over the world, but no Indian ever bothered - it was too risky, too dangerous.

Even a group of women mountaineers from Japan... and after Edmund Hillary, their effort was more dangerous because Edmund Hillary had chosen the least risky path to reach to the peak of Everest.

This group of young women from Japan chose the most dangerous path, which had never been tried before, and they reached to the peak of Everest. Their victory was far greater than Edmund Hillary's, because Edmund Hillary's path was almost well-known - because all the mountaineers were going on the same path, the easiest one.

From the other side, from the side of China, Everest is a very steep climb. Although they were the second to reach, in my opinion their climbing Everest was far superior.

First, they are women; second, they have chosen the untrodden path, known to be very dangerous - and still they managed. But before Edmund or after Edmund - and the Himalayas belong to India - no Indian mountain climbers have even thought or planned to climb Everest.

This shows why this country remained for two thousands years under slavery. It does not know how to live dangerously. It does not know how to live - it only knows how to survive. And unless you live dangerously, you cannot sing a song. The man who is just barely surviving has no energy for a song or a dance. And he can be enslaved without any difficulty, because he has no energy to give any resistance.

HE CALLS EARTH AND LIFE HEAVY: AND SO will THE SPIRIT OF GRAVITY HAVE IT! BUT HE WHO WANTS TO BECOME LIGHT AND A BIRD MUST LOVE HIMSELF - THUS DO I TEACH.

The first teaching for one who wants to get out of the prison of gravity is to love oneself. No religion teaches that. In fact, all religions teach just the opposite - hate yourself. They don't say it so clearly, but whatever they say, this is the implication. You are not worthy; you are a sinner; you have to prove your worth by being moral, by being religious, by being a saint. They give you ideals and you have to become carbon copies of those ideals - then they respect you. But a carbon copy is a carbon copy; it is not your original spirit - it is not you!

You can try to become a Gautam Buddha. And for twenty-five centuries millions of people in the East have tried to become Gautam Buddha, but not a single one has reached to that height. At the most they remained Buddhists, followers of Buddha, and that, too, very lukewarm, with all kinds of of hypocrisies - not the sincerity of Gautam Buddha, not the authentic search of Gautam Buddha.

I was in Bodhgaya, the place where Gautam Buddha became enlightened. In the memory of his enlightenment a temple stands there. Still those stones are kept in the same place in which he used to walk - because he had two kinds of meditation. One was the sitting meditation, Vipassana, which he was doing sitting under the bodhi tree, but you cannot sit the whole day, so he was doing it alternately:

one hour he would meditate sitting, and one hour he would meditate walking. Those stones on which he walked are just by the side of the temple, in the same place. The tree is in the same place.

It is not exactly the same tree, but a grandchild of the same tree.

I have seen Buddhist monks from Japan and from Tibet coming to pay homage, because that is their holiest place, but I have not seen them walking on those stones doing meditation. Neither have I seen them sitting under the bodhi tree meditating. I have seen them worshiping the tree, worshiping, inside the temple, the statue of Buddha. And Buddha was not worshiping anybody - he was searching his own soul. By worshiping you cannot find it; to find it you have to go inside yourself. And nobody else can do it on your behalf. You have to go alone, and in a space where you have never been.

It is the most dangerous experience to be alone within yourself, leaving your mind far behind, leaving your heart far behind. You are acquainted a little bit with your mind and a little bit with your love, with your heart, but you are absolutely unaware about your being, which is your very center.

People who are trying to be Gautam Buddhas, at the most, can be become actors. In a drama perhaps they can do an exact act of Gautam Buddha, but in real life... you can be only yourself; you cannot be anybody else.

The Spirit of Gravity teaches you that life is heavy, but Zarathustra is saying, "It is up to you. It is your choice whether life is going to be heavy or life is going to be light. If you don't cling to the crowd, if you don't cling to possessiveness, life can be absolutely light." For that, the first foundation is to love yourself. There is no need to copy anybody, because that is where everybody has gone astray.

Love yourself as you are.

That does not prevent your growth. In fact, the more you love yourself, the more you refine yourself.

The more you love yourself, the more graceful you become. The more you love yourself, the more original and authentic is your individuality. And only an original individual can be so light like a bird that the whole sky of his inner consciousness is available for him to fly in. Then nothing can prevent it.

NOT WITH THE LOVE OF THE SICK AND DISEASED, TO BE SURE. Religions have been telling you, "Love the sick, love the diseased. Go to the hospitals, make hospitals, serve the poor." It seems all religions are concerned with the sick, with the diseased, with the poor. Nobody is concerned with you and your riches and your greatness and your grandeur.

I say unto you: Unless you love yourself, unless you have found your own riches, your own heights, you will not be able to share your love with anybody. Certainly the sick and the diseased need care, but they don't need love. This has to be understood, because Christianity has made it almost a universally accepted truth - that it is the greatest religious thing, the most spiritual thing, to love the sick and the diseased. But it is absolutely against psychology and against nature.

The moment you love the sick you are not helping him to recover from his sickness, because the moment he is healthy nobody loves him. Sickness is a good excuse for others to be provoked to love him.

You may have seen it, but you may not have thought about it. The wife is working the whole day, perfectly healthy, but as the husband comes home, looking from the window, she immediately goes to bed. She has a headache - because unless she has a headache the husband does not show any love. But if she has a headache, reluctantly the husband sits by her side, massages her head, shows some phony kind of love, talks sweet and beautiful words. For months he has not called her "darling," but when the headache is there he has to call her "darling." And that's what she wants to hear, "I love you. And I love you not just today, I will love you forever."

It is strange that you show your love to your children when they are sick. But you don't understand a simple psychology of association - sickness and love become associated. Whenever the child needs your love he has to be sick. Who cares about the healthy child, who cares about the healthy wife, who cares about the healthy husband? Love seems to be something like a medicine; it is needed only by the sick.

I want it to be clear to you - take care of the sick, but never show love. Taking care of the sick is a totally different thing. Be indifferent, because a headache is not something great. Take care, but avoid your sweet nothings; take care in a very pragmatic way. Put the medicine on her head, but don't show love, because that is dangerous. When a child is sick, take care, but be absolutely indifferent. Make the child understand that by being sick he cannot blackmail you. The whole humanity is blackmailing each other. Sickness, oldness, disease have become almost demanding, "You have to love me because I'm sick, I'm old...."

One of the great psychologists of the Soviet Union, Pavlov, has discovered the law of association - that one has to be very careful not to get two things associated unless you want them to be associated. He worked his whole life with dogs. He would give the dog food and he would go on ringing a bell. Now, the bell has nothing to do with food, but the dog every day hears the bell and eats the food simultaneously. He eats, and Pavlov is ringing the bell. After fifteen days Pavlov simply rings the bell and the dog starts hanging out his tongue and his saliva starts flowing.

Now, there is no natural relationship between the ringing of a bell and the saliva and the tongue hanging out, but they have become associated. The ringing bell immediately prepares his whole body ready for food, although there is no food.

There is a beautiful incident that Pavlov proved by these experiments about association. One day he tried the same experiment from another side. He placed the food before the dog but the dog would not eat it. Pavlov could not believe it - he had to ring the bell! And as he started ringing the bell the dog started eating the food.

He said, "My God, now I have got into a difficulty."

He had seventy dogs and, even in the communist revolution when men were dying of starvation, the government had taken care of his dogs. They were living comfortably, in the days of revolution when no man was living so comfortably, because Pavlov had made a great contribution. Pavlov writes in his autobiography, "I was shocked when the dogs refused to eat. They are hungry, but the bell has to be rung. Only then... the association has gone so deep."

When somebody is sick and you show love.... And that's the routine that humanity has followed. To the sick person you don't show anger, even if you are angry. To the sick person, even if you don't feel any love, you show love; if you cannot show love, at least sympathy. But these are dangerous, and very much against psychological findings.

Zarathustra is right: NOT WITH THE LOVE OF THE SICK AND DISEASED, TO BE SURE.

ONE MUST LEARN TO LOVE ONESELF WITH A SOUND AND HEALTHY LOVE, SO THAT ONE MAY ENDURE IT WITH ONESELF AND NOT GO ROAMING ABOUT - THUS DO I TEACH.

You should love yourself without thinking whether you deserve it or not. You are alive - that is enough proof that you deserve love, just as you deserve breathing. You don't think whether you deserve breathing or not. Love is a subtle nourishment to the soul, just as food is to the body. And if you are full of love for yourself you will be able to love others. But love the healthy, love the strong.

Take care of the sick, take care of the old; but care is a totally different matter. The difference between love and care is the difference between a mother and a nurse. The nurse takes care, the mother loves. When the child is sick it is better even for the mother to be just a nurse. When the child is healthy, pour as much love as you can. Let love be associated with healthiness, strength, intelligence; that will help the child a long way in his life.

SUCH ROAMING ABOUT CALLS ITSELF 'LOVE OF ONE'S NEIGHBOUR'. People have been told, "Love your neighbor," and nobody tells you, "Love yourself." You are your first neighbor! Everybody else comes after that. And if you cannot love yourself, how you can love your neighbor?

Jesus says, "Love your neighbor as you love yourself." But in his whole teaching there is not a single statement which shows any indication of how to love oneself. And if you are going to love your neighbor the way you love yourself, you are going to hate him, because you hate yourself. Nobody likes himself: the nose is a little short or a little long, the eyes are not so beautiful as they could have been, the body is not so proportionate as other bodies are. You are continuously comparing yourself, and in comparison you will always find someone better than you. How can you love yourself?

All comparison should stop. You have to accept yourself as you are - this is the way existence wants you to be. And this is the way you have to love yourself - not reluctantly, but joyously. Then perhaps your love will start overflowing to the neighbors, too. It certainly does. When you are so full of love it is bound to overflow; otherwise to love the neighbor is the most difficult thing in the world.

Jesus has two statements: "Love your enemy as yourself." That is easier, because the enemy is far away - he is not a constant nuisance. But the neighbor..."Love your neighbor as yourself" - that is the most difficult thing; he is a constant nuisance. But if you know how to love yourself, your love will give you a great understanding about others. As you have accepted yourself, you will be able to accept people as they are. It is not their fault - just as existence has given you a certain individuality, existence has given them a certain individuality. They are not responsible for it. And if you can love yourself, you can love the whole world. Yes, even the neighbor.

THESE WORDS HAVE BEEN UP TO NOW THE BEST FOR LYING AND DISSEMBLING, AND ESPECIALLY FOR THOSE WHO WERE OPPRESSIVE TO EVERYBODY.

AND TRULY, TO LEARN TO LOVE ONESELF IS NO COMMANDMENT FOR TODAY OR FOR TOMORROW. RATHER IS THIS ART THE FINEST, SUBTLEST, ULTIMATE, AND MOST PATIENT OF ALL. It is not a commandment, it is an art, a discipline; you have to learn it. Perhaps love is the greatest art in life. But everybody thinks that he is born with the capacity to love, so nobody refines it. It remains crude and primitive. And it can be refined to such heights that you can say in those heights, Love is God.

ALMOST IN THE CRADLE ARE WE PRESENTED WITH HEAVY WORDS AND VALUES: THIS DOWRY CALLS ITSELF 'GOOD' AND 'EVIL'. FOR ITS SAKE WE ARE FORGIVEN FOR BEING ALIVE. Zarathustra is saying, "From the very cradle you are forced to accept certain ideas as good and certain ideas as evil. And if you don't accept that, your life will become impossible." The child is so helpless. He cannot live on his own; he is dependent. And the parents, without any bad intention, just unconsciously, go on exploiting the situation of the child by forcing their ideas on him of what is good and what is evil. If you accept them - and ordinarily every child has to accept them... FOR ITS SAKE WE ARE FORGIVEN FOR BEING ALIVE - then you are forgiven for being alive; otherwise, your life becomes a sin which cannot be forgiven.

And the truth is that all our ideas of good and evil are so rotten and so old, so out of date, that they need continuous change. But they are fixed. Life goes on changing, but our ideas of good and evil, they don't change. And because of these ideas we cannot live life in its totality. They prevent us.

There is such a gap between life and our ideologies.

In my village one physician, a high caste brahmin, was known to be a very wise man. I used to go to him with my father. My father was very friendly with him; they were of almost the same age. And whenever he would feel a sneeze coming, he would immediately make a noise with his fingers. I was very much amazed, "What does the sneeze have to do with the noise of the fingers?" I asked him.

He said, "When you are sneezing there is a gap, and ghosts can enter into you."

I said, "My God!" And he was the wisest man in the village. So I said, "I will see."

So whenever I would see him, whether the sneeze was coming or not, I would start. Soon it spread all over the town. And I told my class fellows, "When you pass through his street, if you see him in his shop, just make a noise with your fingers."

He became so angry with me. He started running after people, saying, "Why did you do that?" But the man would say, "A sneeze was coming. If it did not come, what can I do? I just felt that it was coming. Do you suggest first that I should let it come?"

"No," he said, "that would not be right. When you feel it is coming just do it, and ghosts cannot enter."

I told my father, "This is so stupid. Why should ghosts be afraid of such a small noise? And why does the sneeze give them a space to enter?"

But he said, "The physician is a very wise man; he knows all the scriptures. All the saints stay with him in his house. But you are not allowed to go to his house anymore. He has told me, 'Your boy is dangerous - he has corrupted almost one thousand students of the school. I cannot work when I look at the street and see that somebody is standing there.'"

But my father said to him, "They are not doing any harm to you. They just click their fingers; let them do it."

He said, "I cannot tolerate - they are making a mockery of me." And he would run with his staff behind a student. That became even more tempting - even to others who were not students, even neighbors.

I was very much loved by his wife. I could not enter his house from the front door because he was sitting there with his staff, and he had told her that he would beat me if I got... so I had to go from the back to meet his wife. I told his wife, "One day you also try it." She said, "That idea has come to me."

She was very much younger than him. She was his third wife; two wives had died.

She said, "That idea has come to me, but I am afraid that if I try it he may get very angry."

I said, "Don't be worried. What can he do? You are younger, you are stronger; he is old. Don't be worried - and before you do it, hide his stick."

So she did it. Next day, when I was passing in front of his house, he called me and he said, "This is too much. You are corrupting my wife's mind too! Last night I was just going to sleep and she did it!"

I said, "I cannot enter your house." He said, "I know, you came from the back door. But will you let me live in this village or do I have to leave? - because now the whole village is making a mockery of a thing which had come traditionally; my father used to do it, my grandfather used to do it."

I said, "That does not mean anything. You have to prove to me.... I can stop the whole village; I can go to every door and tell them, 'He says that he is sorry and he will not do it again.' But you either give me the scientific explanation for it or suffer."

He said, "I would rather stop doing it myself. Ghosts cannot torture me so much as the whole village is torturing me. My whole profession is disturbed, Even my patients laugh, because I have to leave my patients in the middle and run after people."

It was the talk of the town, "What has happened to this so-called wise man?" His whole wisdom was destroyed by a single thing. Even ordinary people started thinking, "This is stupid. We have seen it before but we never bothered; we thought it was just some eccentric, whimsical idea. We had never asked him if he is preventing ghosts - and now everybody is preventing ghosts all over the city."

Something may be coming from tradition, for centuries may have been thought good or evil. But you have to be in tune with life today. You have to be contemporary. And you have to continuously check whether your ideas of good and evil are still relevant. And you will be surprised that they are not.

Something that is good in one context becomes bad in another context. Something that seems to be evil in one context is not evil in another context. And with the flux of life, where everything is changing, you should also be in tune with the change - only then can you live totally, fully, joyfully.

Otherwise, you are two thousand years behind and the gap is so big that you are already dead; you might as well have been in a grave. Your ideology has become your grave if it is old, if it is not renewed every moment.

AND WE SUFFER LITTLE CHILDREN TO COME TO US, TO PREVENT THEM IN GOOD TIME FROM LOVING THEMSELVES. The mother says to the child, "Love me, I'm your mother." The father says, "Love me, I'm your father," as if just by being the father there is some necessity that he should be loved. The only necessity is that you are loving, whether you are a father or not; whether you are a mother or not. If you are loving, the child will respond with love. Don't say to the child, "I'm your father, that's why you have to love me." That makes his love very small. Then there is no need for him to love somebody else who is not his father.

More understanding parents should try to love the child so that he learns responding with love, so whenever he is loved by anyone he will respond with love. By loving the child you are giving him an indication that he is lovable. And once he starts getting the idea that he is lovable, he will love himself. That is the only way to teach him the right path of loving himself and responding with love to anyone who is loving towards him.

... THE SPIRIT OF GRAVITY IS THE CAUSE OF THAT.

AND WE - WE BEAR LOYALLY WHAT WE HAVE BEEN GIVEN UPON HARD SHOULDERS OVER RUGGED MOUNTAINS! AND WHEN WE SWEAT WE ARE TOLD: 'YES, LIFE IS HARD TO BEAR!'

Life is being made too hard. It is not life itself that is hard. You load the poor camel too much and then you say to the camel, "Life is too hard."

First you force the camel to kneel down, to be humble and meek, to be ready to be enslaved, and then you praise the camel if he allows you to load on him more than he can carry. Then he becomes a saintly camel. All your saints are carrying such great loads that all joy in their life has disappeared.

They cannot laugh, they cannot dance.

You cannot hope that a camel who is loaded so much will dance. Dance for what? For being a slave? For being forced to kneel down? You have shattered his dignity, his pride in himself; now there is no question of dancing. And with such a load... but you are told again and again, "Yes, life is hard to bear."

But Zarathustra has a totally different thing to say to you: BUT ONLY MAN IS HARD TO BEAR! Not life. Life is immensely beautiful and light. Life is simply full of songs and joy. It is man who is hard to bear, and it is man who makes life also hard to bear.

THAT IS BECAUSE HE BEARS TOO MANY FOREIGN THINGS UPON HIS SHOULDERS. LIKE THE CAMEL, HE KNEELS DOWN AND LETS HIMSELF BE WELL LADEN. It is your mentality of a slave, your readiness to become a slave, your readiness to worship, to kneel down, to pray, your readiness to accept ideas that you are things created by God - this is hard to bear. And this makes your whole life a trouble - you make it. Love is light but marriage is hard. But marriage is man's invention; love is not.

Love is a natural breeze. But you are so greedy that when the breeze comes in your room, fresh, you immediately close all the doors and windows to keep the fresh breeze inside. But when all the windows and doors are closed, the fresh breeze is no longer fresh; it becomes stale. Love is fresh, but marriage becomes stale.

If Zarathustra proves right and some day on the earth the superman arrives, many things will disappear. One of them will be marriage - about which I can be absolutely certain, because marriage has made man more miserable than anything else. It is strange: love makes man so happy, so blissful, and marriage just destroys all happiness, all joy - because marriage, behind a beautiful name, is nothing but a bondage, a contract, a lifelong agreement. And any man who understands life cannot promise for tomorrow, because who knows what the tomorrow is going to be, what the tomorrow is going to be like?

I may change, you may change. Love is not within our control; it is not like electricity that you switch it on, switch it off. It comes when it comes and it goes when it goes. But the problem arises when love disappears and you cannot do anything to prevent it. You have promised so many things. Now the only thing left for you is to be a hypocrite, to pretend, and that's what becomes the hardest burden on life.

If you live intelligently and consciously, you will not promise for tomorrow. And people are even promising for the next life - the Hindu wife prays to God, "Give me the same husband in the next life." I have heard such prayers and I have asked those women, "Is your life so blissful that you are asking God, 'Give me the same husband'?" They said, "Blissful? It is hell!"

I said, "But then why are you asking for the same husband again? Don't you like variety? You should pray rather, 'Except this husband give me anyone! Enough is enough, one life is enough.'"

But traditionally the Hindu wife's virtue is that she wants the same husband again and again and again. And life is miserable.

An intelligent man, a man who has a little meditative consciousness, can make his life a beautiful piece of art, can make it so full of love and full of music and full of poetry and full of dance that there are no limitations for it. Life is not hard. It is man's stupidity that makes it hard.

... THUS SPAKE ZARATHUSTRA.

Okay, Maneesha?

Yes, Osho.