... - because of fear. The orgasmic moment is a death moment. And in death happens the. ultimate orgasm. In that moment you utterly disappear into nothingness. It is the greatest experience. Uwais says, 'I don't know what is going to happen - maybe death.' Death is a door to God. Those who know how to die know how to enter into God. Clingers clinging to life never know what God is because they don't allow...

... a testament. Uwais is saying, 'I am always facing death and waiting for it. And I am thrilled by the possibility of it.' But to face death means to live courageously. People avoid death. They have even avoided the very idea of it. They think that everybody else dies but they are not going to die. If you live in such innocence you live in ignorance. Ignorance is a great religious quality. A man of...

... SAID, 'BUT THIS IS THE SITUATION OF ALL MEN.' Everybody is going to die and nobody knows when he is going to die. The other has not understood the statement of Uwais. We understand only at our own plane. UWAIS SAID, 'YES. BUT HOW MANY OF THEM FEEL IT?' They are going to die. Every moment the unknown penetrates into life - that's what death is. But they don't feel it. They are not aware of it. People...

... more. It is dangerous because it is suicidal... but the suicide is beautiful. To die in God is the only way to live really. Until you die, until you die voluntarily into love, you live an existence which is simply mediocre; you vegetate, you don't have any meaning. No poetry arises in your heart, no dance, no celebration; you simply grope in the darkness. You live at the minimum, you don't overflow...

...? - because they are afraid to commit suicide. Otherwise life has no joy. Or maybe they are so bored that they don't feel that anything is going to happen even in death. They are so bored, nothing is ever going to happen. Nothing ever happens. And the reason? The reason is that they are burdened by the past. Sufism says: don't be burdened by the past and don't be burdened by the future either. This moment...

... moment, without any plan or future. I don't know what is going to happen this evening - maybe death.' By 'death' he simply means that anything is possible, even death is possible. 'I live in surprise, I live in wonder, I live in mystery. And the greatest mystery is death.' There are only two mysteries: life and death. And the greatest is certainly death - because life is spread out and death is very...

... intense. Life happens in seventy, eighty, a hundred years. Naturally it is spread out. Death happens in a single moment, it is very intense. Death is the culmination, the crescendo. Death is the greatest orgasm there is - hence, by the way, people are afraid of orgasm. It is because they are afraid of death. Many people don't have orgasms. Or even if they do, it is a local orgasm, not very orgasmic...

... death. And death comes every day. As each moment passes by, something dies. If you are thirty years old you have been dying for thirty years continuously. If you gather those moments of thirty years, those dead moments that you have already lived, if you gather them then you are burdened. Then you start growing old. Then you are carrying such a load - how can you be in a dance? That load won't allow...

... it. If you can drop that load every day and you are again fresh, again innocent, again a child, then, then you also know death happening every day - life and death happening both together. And then one day comes the ultimate death and one accepts it, welcomes it, celebrates it, disappears into it dancing. How you behave at the moment of death will show how you have lived. Your death moment will be...

... a single moment the fog disappears. Death is there. Or, if you are driving at ninety, a hundred miles per hour and then suddenly at a turn you see that now everything is gone, for a moment the accident seems to be certain, absolutely certain - the fog disappears. Hence the appeal of danger - because only in danger do you sometimes feel that you are. Hence the appeal of war. When people go to war...

... and move into the clutches of death, sometimes rare moments come. But otherwise, in an ordinary comfortable, convenient life, people go on snoring. A traveller enquired the way to the post office from a drunkard. The drunkard was an old inhabitant of the town. 'Well, you go down two blocks and turn right... no, you go down two blocks and turn left... no, that ain't right either, you go up this...

.... The oath should be that a doctor should help the person to live beautifully, and to die beautifully. Life and death should not be separated as enemies; they are one phenomenon. The oath is half. The full oath should be that a physician should serve the man in life and death both. The best he can do for life he will do. The best he can do for death he will do. But no doctor - I was speaking in...

... old men want to die, it is their birthright. I cannot conceive... if I want to die, whose responsibility is it to prevent me? But all over the world, all the laws are against committing suicide. And you can see the insanity of it: if you are caught red-handed committing suicide, then the court will give you a death sentence. Great! In the first place, if the man really wanted to commit suicide, I...

... versa is the case: because they are not doing wrong things, they are poor. Those who are doing wrong things are already rich. That is the reality. But Indian religions have created a beautiful camouflage. Unless India becomes totally free of its religious superstitions, unless India enters into the contemporary world, it is going to die. And it is going to die a very ugly death. It is already...

... Osho From Death to Deathlessness: This moment: The golden key Main Books Headers Help Your browser does not support iframes. < Prev  Osho From Death to Deathlessness   Next > This moment: The golden key From: Osho Date: Fri, 21 August 1985 00:00:00 GMT Book Title: From Death to Deathlessness Chapter #: 16 Location: am in Rajneeshmandir Archive Code: N.A. Short Title: N.A...

... saying two things: birth control - but that is only half the story. The second is death control - which nobody in the whole world has been talking about - because that is the logical end. If you stop people from being born, that is one part of reducing the population. The second part should be that those who are too old, a burden to themselves, a burden to others, and who are simply suffering - relieve...

... them. And there is no need for them to jump into the ocean, or to hang themselves from a tree. The government should provide facilities in every hospital so that these people can come and you can give them a peaceful death - just an injection which takes them into deeper and deeper sleep, into eternity. And make at least their death beautiful - you could not make their life beautiful. Life is a long...

... affair; to make a person's life for ninety years a beautiful phenomenon is difficult. But death comes within seconds. So at least for twenty-four hours, let him do whatever he always wanted to do. Let him enjoy everything that he wanted to enjoy. And for twenty-four hours before his death let him learn how to be silent, how to relax, so that death does not come only as death, but also comes as a deep...

... meditation. So not only will we be helping the population to be reduced, we will be helping old people to die with dignity, with smiles on their faces, and with a deep serenity within them which will change their whole future course of consciousness. But naturally they all were against me, saying that I am preaching suicide, that I am talking against the law. The medical profession was against me, because...

... the doctors have been given an idea hundreds of years old. Hippocrates has created the oath for the doctor. And every doctor - even today, when he passes the examination - has to take the oath that he will always serve life, that he will try in every way to prevent a person dying. That oath is now stupid. But Hippocrates is far more important to them than the whole humanity on the verge of death...

... being given to him, what injections are being given to him. If the doctor wants to take advantage, he can take it now; nobody can prevent him. In fact, the oath protects him. But if you understand the whole situation, he cannot kill a young man; otherwise he will be behind bars. He can help a man to die only when the man has given him his authority and the man's family has made its farewell to the man...

... don't think anybody could prevent him. If he was caught red-handed, that means he was fifty-fifty, wavering. Standing on the hill, looking down into the lake, having another thought - to do or not to do, to be or not to be. That's how he was caught red-handed. He was only fifty percent for death - now the court sends him to one hundred percent death. Great punishment! Man is not asked by anybody...

... teaching death control. And I was teaching that the country should become more scientific, more technological. It should stop all this spinning. Enough! You have done spinning! Now do something else. But their problem is their prejudice. In India they have seen their days of glory in the past. India is an old country. And you have to understand a simple law: the child has no past. He looks ahead because...

... that is old immediately becomes gold. The same happens with countries. India is a very ancient country - perhaps the most ancient country. In the future there is only darkness, death, poverty. The past, you can manage - nobody is going to prevent you from dreaming that in the past you had everything. And that is what Gandhi exploited. He told India, "Go back to nature, back to the past,"...

... this is not in their minds at all, what they are doing. Fifty percent of the people are ready to die any moment and India is selling its wheat, exporting it. Why? - because the Indian government wants nuclear weapons. For that, money is needed. Half the country is ready to die, and you are selling their food to create nuclear weapons! And what are you going to do with nuclear weapons? You cannot make...

... is within you is going to die with the body? While it is alive, you have not made any effort to understand it. So the first thing you have to do is to come to my school of meditation and learn meditation." And anybody in the whole history of man, who has who has been able to meditate cannot deny consciousness. It is such a tremendous experience! It is not a question of logic, it is a question...

... all around the world. Ronald Reagan should understand: it is better to be red than dead! Your nuclear weapons will create only death. And if he had asked that every institution - educational, academic - should have a few moments of meditation, then perhaps the Supreme Court would not have denied him, because meditation has nothing to do with any religion. Meditation is a pure, scientific method. In...

... energy arising in them. Who bothers about God? And who bothers about paradise? We can create paradise here. And when you are in deep silence and meditation, you are a god, not a bit less - a little more, because God is just a fiction and you are a reality. But I could see that India had come to a point where perhaps it could not accept any living truth. Just as people are young, become old and then die...

..., civilizations also are in their childhood.... For example, America is in its childhood. Its whole history is three hundred years. India has a history of almost ninety thousand years. Compared to India's old age, what are three hundred years? Europe is middle-aged. Perhaps India has to die - except that, there is no way out. And there is no harm; just as people die, civilizations die. For thirty years...

... continuously touring all over India, talking to people day in, day out, the only thing I realized was, that I was talking to dead people. The civilization is ready to die any moment. I had come to America - President Zail Singh must know it - for my own health, which India has destroyed. Thirty years' journeying in India, continuously on the train, on the plane - even on the camels.... That reminds me about...

...From Death to Deathlessness...

..., death is a rest. Evening comes, night falls, and you are ready; you lie down and wait. When you live rightly you don't ask for more life because more is already there, more than you can ask is already there, more than you can imagine has already been given to you. If you live every moment to its total intensity, you are always ready to die. If death comes right now to me I am ready, because nothing is...

... am not satiated and time is flowing fast. Give me more time.' This is the meaning of lust for life: lust for more time. What do you mean by life? -- life means more time in the future. What do you mean by death? -- death means no future. If death comes right now, future ends, time ends. That's why you are afraid of death, because it will not give you space and all your desires are unfulfilled...

.... Patanjali is not against life. In fact, because he is not against life he is against lust for life. If you live life to its totality, enjoy it to the deepest possibility, allow it to happen, then there will be no lust for life. Be more sensitive, alive, aware, and then you will not hanker for more time. In fact, for a man who is satiated with life, death looks like rest, great relaxation, not the ending...

... of life. He is not afraid of it, he welcomes it; a full rich life lived, then death comes in the night, as the night. The whole day you worked, now you prepare the bed and go to rest. There are people who are afraid of night. I used to stay in Calcutta with a very rich man who was as afraid of night as people are afraid of death. He could not sleep, and he could not sleep because he was resting the...

... incomplete. I have not postponed anything. I have taken my morning bath and enjoyed it. I have not postponed anything at all for the future, so if death comes there is no problem. Death can come and take me right now. There will not even be a slight idea of future because nothing is incomplete. And you? -- everything is incomplete. Even the morning bath you could not take well because you had to come to...

... can you afford to die right this moment? I can afford to, I can enjoy -- everything is complete! Remember this, Patanjali, Buddha, Jesus -- nobody is against life. They are for life, all for life, but they are against lust for life because lust for life is a symptom of a man who has been missing life. The second question: MANY OF THE EXISTENTIALIST THINKERS OF THE WEST -- SARTRE, CAMUS ETC. -- HAVE...

... dimension. This is the only difference between a materialist conception of life and a spiritualist conception of life -- the difference of world views. Buddha was born into a spiritualist world view. He also realized the meaninglessness of all that we do, because death is there and death will finish everything, so what is the point of doing or not doing? Whether you do or don't do, death comes and...

... finishes everything. Whether you love or not, old age comes and you become a ruin, a skeleton. Whether you live a poor life or a rich life, death annihilates both; it does not bother about who you are. You may have been a saint, you may have been a sinner -- for death it makes no difference. Death is absolutely communist; it treats everybody equally. The saint and the sinner both fall down into the dust...

.... Then he sees a dead man being carried. In the West the story would have stopped here: the old man, the dead man. But in the Indian story, after the dead man he sees a sannyasin -- that is the door. And then he asks his driver, 'Who is this man, and why is he in ochre robes? What has happened to him? What type of man is he?' The driver says, 'This man has also realized that life leads to death and he...

... is in search of a life which is deathless.' This was the milieu: life doesn't end with death. Buddha's story shows that after seeing death, when life feels meaningless, suddenly a new dimension arises, a new vision -- sannyas: the effort to penetrate into the deeper mystery of life, to penetrate deeper into the visible to reach the invisible, to penetrate matter so deeply that matter disappears and...

... sannyasi must be there to follow, to give a new vision that life doesn't end with death. A phase ends, but not life itself. In fact, life starts only when death has come because death ends only your body, not your innermost being. The life of the body is only a part, and a very peripheral part, a superficial part. In the West, materialism has become the world-view. Even so-called religious people in the...

.... The materialist world-view says that with death everything ends. If this is true, then there is no possibility of any transformation. And if everything ends with death then there is no point in continuing to live. Then suicide is the right answer. It is simply wonderful to see Sartre going on living. He should have committed suicide a long time ago because if he had really realized that life is...

... as many Western people sannyasis as possible and send them back home. Many Sartres are waiting there. They have seen the death. They are waiting to see the ochre robe, and with the ochre robe, the ecstasy that follows. The third question: A BUDDHA LIVES WITH THE HIGHEST SENSITIVITY AND SO HE ENJOYS ALL HIS BODILY NEEDS. IS NOT SEX ALSO A BODILY NEED? THEN WHY DOES IT DISAPPEAR IN A BUDDHA? Many...

... things will have to be understood. First: sex is not an ordinary need, like food. It is very extra ordinary. If food is not given to you, you will die, but without sex you can live. If water is not given to you, the body will die, but without sex you can live. If air is not given to you, you will die within seconds, but without sex you can live your whole life. This is the first difference, and why is...

... it so? Because sex is basically not the need of the individual, it is the need of the race. The race will die if sex is not allowed, but you will not die. Man will die; it is not individual, but collective. Sex is a racial need, not individual. If everybody becomes a brahmachari, a celibate, then humanity will disappear, but you will live. You will live for seventy years or even more, because you...

... will save much energy. A man who was going to live seventy years may be able to live a hundred years without sex, because his energies will be conserved. But without sex the race will die. This is the first difference: food is needed for you, sex is needed for others. Sex is needed for the future generations to come. You have already come so there is no problem. Your parents needed sex for you to...

... that sex brings death sooner. So those who wanted to live longer, for their own reasons, they dropped sex completely. For example, Hatha yogis who want to live longer because they have very slow moving methods, bullock cart methods -- they need a very long time to finish them, they need tong life to finish their yoga, to come to the final Enlightenment -- they dropped sex completely. And how did they...

... can absorb the energy back into your own system, you will be very, very strong. You can live longer. In fact, old age can be simply dropped. You can be young to the very end. There are differences. Food is an individual need. If you stop it you will die. Sex is not an individual need, it is a possession. If you can stop, you will gain much out of it. But stopping can be of three types: you can...

... who want to be alive have to decide one thing: they have to decide to accept death. Not only must they accept death, they have to welcome it. Every moment they have to be ready for it. If you don't accept death, you will remain dead from the very beginning. That is the only way to protect -- you will remain a seed. The bird will die in the egg... many birds die in the egg. You are here. If you want...

... life, because only life can die. If you are afraid of death, you will be afraid of life. If you are afraid of falling down, you will be afraid of rising up, because only a wave that rises falls back. If you are afraid of being rejected you will become afraid, afraid to approach any body. If you are afraid of being rejected, you will become incapable of love. Afraid of death, you become incapable of...

... death, all yesterdays die. Then it will not come out of your miseries; then it will be a fresh phenomenon, something which happens for the first time. Then it will not come out of your mind, it will come out of your being. You become dwij, twice born. Try to understand the phenomenon of misery. Why are you so miserable? What creates so much misery? I watch you, I look inside you; miseries upon...

... to a harmony, existence dissolves, there is pralaya, there is de-creation. Your death is nothing but these three elements coming to a harmony in the body -- then you die. If the very tension is not there, how can you live? This is the problem: you cannot live without these three tensions -- you will die. And you cannot live with them because they are opposite and they pull you in different...

... death. All insurances are for death. There can be no life insurance. All insuring is to protect, to secure, to remain closed. Life is dangerous, millions of dangers are around. That's why ninety nine percent of people decide in favor of remaining seeds. But what are you protecting? -- there is nothing to protect. What are you securing? -- there is nothing yet to secure. A seed is as dead as a pebble...

... on the path. And if it remains like a seed, there is bound to be misery. There is bound to be misery because it was not meant to be like that. It was not its destiny to be a seed, but to come out of it. The bird has to leave the egg-shell for the vast, dangerous sky where everything is possible. And with all those possibilities, death is also there. Life takes the risk of death. Death is not...

... against life, death is the very background in which life flowers. Death is not the opposite of life. It is just like a blackboard on which you write with white chalk. You can write on a white wall but then the words will not show. On a blackboard, whatsoever you write with white shows. Death is like a blackboard: the white lines of life show upon it. It is not against; it is the very background. Those...

..., unknown. With the future you feel alien, strange. The future is always a stranger knocking at the door. You always open the door for the future. In fact, you would like your future to be just like your past, a repetition. This is fear. And remember, you always think that you are afraid of death, but I tell you, you are not afraid of death, you are afraid of life. The fear of death is basically fear of...

... resurrection: a second birth in which you break all the shells, all the eggs, all the egos, all the past, the familiar, the known, and you move into the unknown, the strange, the existence full of dangers. Every moment there is the possibility of death. And with the possibility of death, every moment you become more and more alive. In fact, life never dies, but that is an experience of one who knows what...

... life is. You have never gathered courage enough to come out of the egg shell. How can you know what life is, and how can you know that life is deathless? You will die; life never dies. You will live in misery because you are the negation of life ego is the negation of life. Negate the ego and life will happen to you. Hence the insistence of all great ones -- Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, Mahavir...

... of you. From where else can it come? Tomorrow doesn't come out of the clock; tomorrow, your tomorrow, comes out of you. All your yesterdays together, plus today, is going to be your tomorrow. It is simple arithmetic: today you are unhappy and miserable; then how, how is it possible that tomorrow is going to be happy and blissful? -- impossible! Until you die, it is impossible. Because with your...

... too boring.' Yes, it would be too boring. Just think of a place where all priests, prophets, teerthankaras and Buddhas have gathered, and nothing changes, everything remains static -- no movement. It will look like a painted picture, not really alive. How long can you live in it? Russell is right; one will get bored, bored to death. Russell says, 'If this is going to be heaven, then hell is...

... against both. These three elements constitute you. And they are all going in three different dimensions. They are needed, they are all needed in their oppositeness because through their tension you exist. If their tension were lost, if they became harmonious, death would happen. Hindus say that when these three elements are in tension, existence exists, there is creation; when these three elements come...

... directions. You must have felt many times that you are being pulled in different directions. One part of you says, 'Be ambitious'; another part says, 'Ambition will create anxiety. Rather, meditate, pray, become a sannyasin.' One part says that sin is beautiful, sin has an attraction, a magnetic force in it:'Enjoy, because sooner or later death will take over. Dust goes unto dust and nothing remains. Enjoy...

... before death takes over, don't miss.' One part of you says this and another part of you says, 'Death is coming, everything is futile. What is the point of enjoying?' These are not the same parts of you speaking. You have three parts in you. In fact there are three egos, three individuals in you. Patanjali says, as Mahavir says, that man is polypsychic. You don't have one psyche, you have three minds...

... has become a habit, and I cannot remain unoccupied.' Retired people die sooner than they were going to die originally almost ten years sooner. If a man was going to die at eighty, retire him at sixty and he will die at seventy. Unoccupied -- what to do? -- one slowly dies. Habits are formed and mind takes modifications. You are lazy but you had to work, so mind has become habituated to work. Now you...

...?" So twelve criminals from the jail were brought as passengers. Anyhow they were going to die, anyhow they were sentenced to death, so there was no problem if the train was not going to stop. Then the mad driver who thought that it was going to stop, the scientist who had invented it and these twelve passengers who were anyhow going to be killed, they alone would all be killed. "Such a...

... barriers are broken, when inner fears disappear and you are certain that death is the reality. So if you die in meditation there is no fear - death is certain. Even if death occurs in meditation, there is no fear. Only then can you move - and then you can move at rocket speed because the barriers are not there. It is not distance that takes time, but the barriers. You can move this very moment if there...

.... This man is forcing me toward the snake. He may be interested in my death, or something else." If I try to convince you too much that this is a rope, that will only show that I am somehow interested in forcing you toward the snake. If I say to you that theoretically it is possible to see the rope as a rope this very moment, your mind will create many, many problems. In reality there is no...

... mind is not in any danger. The moment you think of meditation, mind becomes alert. Now you are moving in a dangerous dimension, because meditation means the death of the mind. If you move into meditation, sooner or later your mind will have to dissolve, retire completely. The mind becomes alert and it begins to say many things to you: "Where is the time? And even if there is time, then more...

... important things are to be done. First postpone it until later. You can meditate at any time. Money is more important. Gather money first, then meditate at your leisure. How can you meditate without money? So pay attention to money, then meditate later on." Meditation can be postponed easily, you feel, because it is not concerned with your immediate survival. Bread cannot be postponed - you will die...

.... Money cannot be postponed - it is needed for your basic necessities. Meditation can be postponed, you can survive without it. Really, you can survive without it easily. The moment you go deep in meditation, you will not survive on this earth at least - you will disappear. From the circle of this life, this wheel, you will disappear. Meditation is like death, so the mind becomes afraid. Meditation is...

... is not so simple. The mind says, "How can I get up in the morning at six o'clock?" I was in a big city, and the collector of that city came to meet me at eleven o'clock at night. I was just going to my bed, and he came and said, "No! It is urgent. I am very disturbed. It is a question of life and death," he told me. "So please give me at least half an hour. Teach me...

... meditation; otherwise I might commit suicide. I am very much disturbed, and I am so frustrated that something must happen in my inner world. My outer world is lost completely." I told him, "Come in the morning at five o'clock." He said, "That is not possible." It is a question of life and death, but he cannot get up at five o'clock. He said, "That is not possible. I never get...

... up so early." Okay," I told him, "Then come at ten." He said, "That will also be difficult because by ten-thirty I am to be present at my office." He cannot take one day's leave, and it is a question of life and death. So I told him, "Is it a question of your life and death or my life and death? Whose?" And he was not an unintelligent man, he was intelligent...

... goes on without doing it. All the questions arise out of this fear. Feel this fear. If you know it, it will disappear. If you do not know it, it will continue. Are you ready to die in the spiritual sense? Are you ready to be NOT? Whenever anyone came to Buddha he would say, "This is the basic truth - that you are not. And because you are not you cannot die, you cannot be born; and because you...

... you encounter it. That is the only way. Once you encounter your nothingness, once you know that within you are just like a space, shunya, then there will be no fear. Then there cannot be any fear, because this shunya, this void, cannot be destroyed. This void is not going to die. That which was going to die is no more; it was nothing but the layers of an onion. That is why many times in deep...

... meditation, when one comes nearer to this nothingness, one becomes afraid and starts trembling. One feels that one is going to die, one wants to escape from this nothingness back to the world. And many go back; then they never turn within again. As I see it, every one of you have tried in some life or other some meditative technique. You have been near to the nothingness, and then fear gripped you and you...

... requirement." If you say yourself that you are afraid of meditation, then something becomes possible. Then something can be done because you have uncovered a deep thing. So what is the fear? Meditate on it. Go and dig out where it comes from, what the source is. All fear is basically death-oriented. Whatsoever its form, mode, whatsoever its shape, name, all fear is death-oriented. If you move deep, you...

... will find that you are afraid of death. If someone came to Buddha and said, "I am afraid of death, I have found this out," Buddha would say, "Then go to the burning ghat, go to the cemetery, and meditate on a funeral pyre. People are dying daily - they will be burned. Just remain there at the MARGHAT - cemetery - and meditate on the burning pyre. When their family members have gone...

..., you remain there. Just look into the fire, at the burning body. When everything is becoming smoke, you just look at it deeply. Do not think, just meditate on it for three months, six months, nine months. "When it becomes a certainty to you that death cannot be escaped, when it becomes absolutely certain that death is the way of life, that death is implied in life, that death is going to be...

..., that there is no way out and you are already in it, only then come to me." After meditating on death, after seeing every day, night and day, dead bodies being burned, dissolved into ashes - just a smoke remains and then disappears - after meditating for months together, a certainty will arise: the certainty that death is inevitable. It is the only certainty really. The only thing certain in life...

... is death. Everything else is uncertain: it may be or it may not be. But you cannot say that it may be or it may not be for death. It is; it is going to be. It has already occurred. The moment you entered life, you entered death. Now nothing can be done about it. When death is certain there is no fear. Fear is always with things which can be changed. If death is to be, fear disappears. If you can...

... change, if you can do something about death, then fear will remain. If nothing can be done, if you are already in it, then it is absolutely certain that fear will disappear. When fear of death had disappeared, Buddha would allow you to meditate. He would say, "Now you can meditate." So you also go deep into your mind. And listening to these techniques will be helpful only when your inner...

.... But there is a story behind that metaphor, and because millions of people are going to die a dog's death, it is worth understanding. Perhaps you have already heard the story. I think every child has heard it; it is so simple. God created the world: man, woman, animals, trees, birds, mountains - everything. Perhaps He was a communist. Now, this is not good; at least God should not be a communist. It...

... is bound to die like a dog. Obviously you cannot have a death that you have not earned. I repeat: you cannot have a death that you have not earned, for which you have not been working your whole life. Death is either a punishment or a reward; it all depends on you. If you live superficially, then your death will be just a dog's death. Dogs are heady people, very intellectual. If you live intensely...

..., intuitively, from the heart, intelligently, not intellectually; if you allow your whole being to be involved in everything you do, then you can die a god's death. Let me coin another phrase, opposite to a "dog's death": "a god's death." As you can see, "dog" and "god" are made of the same letters, just written differently. The same stuff put backwards becomes "...

... of unburdening; a load disappeared from my heart. He is one of those few people that if I had to die without them becoming enlightened, then I would have had to turn the wheel again, I would have had to be born again. Although it is impossible to turn the wheel... and I know nothing of the mechanics of turning a wheel, particularly the wheel of time. I am not a mechanic, I am not a technician, so...

.... You may not have thought that I would remember it, but I can forget anything except a beautiful story. Even when I am dead, if you want me to speak, ask me something about a story, perhaps just a fable by Aesop, PANCHTANTRA, JATAKA TALES, or just the parables of Jesus. I was saying yesterday... it all began with the metaphor "dog's death." I said that the poor dog had nothing to do with it...

... horse either, a very extra-ordinary horse, loaded with a mountain of worries, but somehow his will is such that he pulls through, and goes on and on. At sixty the dog contributed his ten years, and that is why it is called "a dog's death." This story is one of the most beautiful parables. Between sixty and seventy man lives like a dog, barking at everything that moves. He just finds every...

... excuse to bark. The story does not go beyond seventy because it was originally told before man could expect to live more than seventy years. Seventy is the conventional age. If you are a conventional man then consult a calendar and die at exactly seventy. Any more than that is a little modern. Living till eighty, ninety, or even a hundred, that is ultra-modern, that is rebellious. That is going astray...

... and brought back to life again, cured. They are waiting - poor, rich fellows; there are at least a few hundred people all over America, waiting. This gives "waiting" a new meaning. This is a new kind of waiting; not breathing, and yet waiting. This is really waiting for Godot, and paying too. The story is old, hence the proverbial seventy years. "The dog's death" simply means the...

... death of a man who has lived like a dog. Again, don't be offended if you are a dog lover. It has nothing to do with dogs. Dogs are nice people. But "to live like a dog" means to live just for barking, enjoying the bark, shouting at each and every opportunity. Living like a dog simply means not living a human life but something subhuman, something less than human. And one who lives like a dog...

... different forms. Because for centuries we have accepted an idea, that death should be avoided. That it is something evil. That life is given by god and death comes through the devil. Even the medical profession of the world, every medicine graduate has to take the Hypocrites oath, that he will not help anybody in any way to die. He will help in every possible way to protect life. It was right in the days...

... than forty years of age -- because we have not yet found a single skeleton which were more aged when he died than forty years. So it is right that people believe that in the past the days were so beautiful that no father ever saw the death of his own son. It is natural. If every father is going to die at forty, how he is going to see the death of his own son? But in this, those nine small children...

..., this medical care is to help them to die as beautifully, as silently. My own suggestion is, every death department in a hospital should have a meditator who can help people before they die, to learn meditation so they can die meditatively. Their death can become an immensely valuable experience. Perhaps more valuable than their whole life has been. And they are not committing any sin. You can have...

... doctors cannot do anything, they are helpless. But the law prevents that you should not help anybody to die, otherwise the doctors will be criminals. They will be thought to be murderers. The law is primitive. The law does not understand compassion. That woman needs a mercy-death. She cannot ask even for her death! The sister of the sannyasin cannot ask even for death. But those who love her, should ask...

... you can simply go on helping him just to breathe.... Breathing is not life. Then it is better: help him to die. In both the cases, you are compassionate. Either you serve life or you serve death -- it does not matter. Your compassion should see that the person gets into a better space, into a better life. And every country has to come to pass a law. Just as many countries are now accepting birth...

... be changed. BELOVED BHAGWAN, MY QUESTION IS ABOUT MY SISTER. SHE HAD AN ACCIDENT, AND SINCE THAT SHE CAN'T MOVE, SHE CAN'T SEE, SHE CAN'T HEAR, SHE CAN'T SPEAK. HOW CAN SHE KNOW ABOUT TRUTH? HOW CAN HER CONSCIOUSENSS FUNCTION WITHOUT (*)? IS IT BETTER TO LET HER DIE, SO THAT SHE CAN BE BORN WITH (*)? A: It is one of the most fundamental questions, which is being raised all around the earth in...

... of Hypocrites, because ten children were born and only one survived to become an adult. Nine were going to die. That was the situation. The whole world population in the times of Gautam Buddha was so small you cannot imagine. It was only two crore. Now India alone has ninety crore people. The whole world has now five hundred crore people. From two crore people, in twenty-five centuries, we have...

... gap will be too big. And what are you going to do? You have lived, you have loved. You have seen all that life contains, the failures, the successes; the pains and the pleasures; the days and the nights. You have seen all the seasons. Now there is nothing more. It is now again repetition. The same wheel is moving. We have to think about the whole matter of death again. My own opinion is that if a...

... person comes to a stage where he finds that it is absolutely useless for him to live, he has lived enough, then it should not be illegal. It should be absolutely permissible. In fact, every hospital should have a special arrangement, a special department, for those people who come to die there -- so they can die in peace, in silence, with all medical care. This medical care is not to keep them alive...

... time to think. Perhaps they are emotionally upset at the moment. Perhaps something has happened that has given them the idea, "It is better to finish your life." They should be given a time, that "You enter into the hospital, rest for one month, prepare for your death. We will help. But if in this one month you change your mind, it is up to you. You can get up, and get out! Nobody is...

... forcing you." And remember, no emotion remains more than for a few minutes. Anybody who commits suicide, if he had waited a single minute more, may not have committed. It is a momentary thing. But if somebody for one month continuously enjoys, is happy, is really looking forward to death, as an adventure, then it is our duty to allow these people to drop the body -- as gracefully as possible. About...

... the question, I had to give you this much introduction so that you can understand that death is not something evil, that it is something natural. But the question is about, not an old person. The question is about a younger sister, who cannot move, who cannot see, who cannot hear, who cannot speak. All her senses are absent. Now do you call it life? This is simply vegetation. And she must be in...

.... So her death will not be a calamity. Her death will be a blessing for her. I am simply telling you my approach. I am not telling you to act accordingly, because that may be illegal in your county. You have to approach through law to the government, and make it a point of national discussion, that it may not be your sister only. There may be many other children, suffering in the same way -- for no...

... at least you can be free to chose your death. A little more governments in the world are going to accept soon, that on the other end also we should allow people to move faster. Because the world is too much crowded. On one hand we are preventing people to come. On the other hand we should let them move, so a few move fast and the world becomes less crowded and less poor. And it is not a question...

... alive. For what? Artificial breathing is being given to them. I don't think it is going to be a pleasure to those people. They will never be going back home. They will die in the hospital. And I don't see where is the logic, to keep them breathing artificially. When their bodies are not ready to breathe, please let them not breathe. That is their personal affair. You are interfering too much. You...

... won't let them die. They are dead. You are forcing them to continue. But you are not aware of any purpose. And when you are keeping thousands of people alive, who should be resting in their graves, unnecessary occupying places in the hospitals, the time of the doctors, of so many machines and so much care -- and what is the purpose? After two or three years they will even stop taking the artificial...

... breath in. They will refuse and reject. Nothing else is going to happen. But for three years you will be keeping them unnecessarily in torture. And this is thought to be service. This is thought to be compassion. This is thought to be Christianity. This is simply cruelty. Let those poor people die. And there are thousands of people around the world who are ready to leave the body, because the body is...

... and then put it into the pipe. Have the taste, then put it in the pipe so it goes into your stomach." That man is still alive and doing the same thing! He cannot do anything else, because his body is very delicate, very much fragile. He can die any moment, but he has lived really long. And what he is doing seems to be simply ugly, nauseating, that first you chew your food, then you vomit it in...

....... It is not compassionate. And everybody feels disgusted by him. And he cannot do anything else, because he has no energy. He is living on such a low energy, that if the man is asked, "Would you like to die?", I don't think he will refuse. But right now it is a very strange world. It goes on continuing old laws, which have lost all reality, which have become just shadows of the past...

... red-handed before you commit, then the government will so the job. They will sentence you to death, because you are trying to commit suicide. Strange! Because that is what the man was doing himself! Now, after two, three years of trial and harassment and all kinds of arguments, many advocates involved, judges involved -- and finally you come to the same decision. The poor fellow was doing it without...

... person wants to be a politician. And no politician can be expected to be intelligent. Create a movement in your country for your sister, because in Japan there will be many children in the same position. And make as much uproar about it, only then you will be able to be allowed, that your sister can have a peaceful death. And don't be worried because your innermost being never dies. Q: BELOVED BHAGWAN...

.... That is coming close to death! In the old Indian scriptures the Master is called death. The Master is a death - and also a resurrection. But first he is a death, and then a resurrection. You have to die in him, and then you are reborn. But the death is the beginning. So when you come close to me, you are bound to feel that I am disappearing. Take the hint and follow me in disappearing. Because you...

... gamble ever; one loses one's self, stakes one's totality. But one is never at a loss. One loses one's self, but the whole is attained. Jesus says to his disciples: 'If you cling to yourself, you will lose yourself. If you lose, you will attain. Whosoever clings to life will die. And whosoever is ready to die goes beyond death, becomes deathless.' I am nowhere. And I am calling you from my no-where-ness...

... is, God waits for you near the door you call death. When you don't know what life is, you are simply afraid - so much afraid that before the door actually opens, you are almost unconscious - you miss. You have missed it many many times. You have been dying many times and missing it. There is only one way not to miss it, and that is: die before death! That's what I call meditation: to voluntarily...

... die before death so that you know the flavour of it. And it is so beautiful, so blissful that you will dance when death comes. You will sing when death comes. You will wait in deep silence and gratitude and trust. You will open your heart to it. You will not be taken away; you will ride on the wave - not as a defeated man, but as victorious. The enlightened being never dies. He has died already and...

... closer.' She is certainly aware that to come close is to die. She does come close, but she hesitates; it is natural. She comes close laughing, enjoying, but also afraid and hesitating. I am calling you to come close, and I will not leave you until you disappear. I will go on haunting you, in your days, in your nights, in your thoughts, in your dreams. Wherever you are, once you have been in contact...

... with me - only once - then I will haunt you. Then you will never be peaceful until you die. It is like coming near a river; the river is there and yet it is not there. Yes, I am there and yet I am not there. If you are far away from me, I am there. If you come close, I am not there. If you come deep within me, you will not find anybody there - just a nobody-ness, a nothingness, a deep emptiness. And...

... you will not be in any time, in any space. And that's the only way to be free. To be and not to be, together, is to attain to total freedom - nirvana, MOKSHA - or whatsoever name you want to give it. Question 5: IF A BEING IS ENLIGHTENED, HOW CAN HE DIE? He never dies because he is already dead. You die because you cling to life. Then life has to be taken away, then you have to die. An enlightened...

... being never dies because he does not cling to life. He has voluntarily given it up; he is already dead. But it appears to you that he also dies like you. That is only appearance - don't be deceived by the appearance. A Buddha dies, of course. A Mahavir dies. Baal Shem will die, Moses will die - everybody will die. And they die just like you on the surface, but that is only the surface. Watch an...

... ordinary man dying. He makes every effort not to die, he clings to life to the very last, he cries and weeps tears of anguish and fear and trembling. A horror surrounds him; he is terror- struck. And then watch an enlightened man dying; it is one of the rarest experiences to watch an enlightened person dying. He dies as if he is the bridegroom going to meet his bride. He dies as if he is going on a...

... faraway, beautiful journey for which he has always been waiting and planning. He dies as if the training period in this world is finished. He is accepted. He has become mature. Now he is going home from school. He dies - but death is not there; God is there. The face of death for an enlightened man is the face of God. The face of God for an unenlightened man is the face of death. When you know what life...

... known that there is no death. Death is a lie. It exists because you cling to life. Feel the difference. When a miserly man gives even one paise to a beggar, the miserly man clings to it. He thinks a thousand and one times whether to give or not. He argues not to give. He rationalizes that these beggars are just cheats, he rationalizes that to give anything to a beggar is to help begging grow. A...

..., you really don't give. When you give lovingly, only then you give. When you give reluctantly, it has been taken away from you, snatched away; you feel robbed. When you give it lovingly, something flowers within you. Somebody accepted your sharing, accepted your gift. You have been blessed. Death for an unenlightened man is a struggle. He surrenders - but only after fighting in every way possible...

...: WHAT IS THE MOST STUPID THING MULLA NASRUDIN EVER DID? It is difficult to say, because he is still alive. And one thing is certain - he will not die before me. So don't ask, because nobody can predict; he is unpredictable. And he will do more and more stupid things; one grows through experience. He is not going to die before me; I cannot afford that. So, I cannot say. When I am gone, he will also be...

... all; nobody alone can claim him. And I say that he is still alive. He may have died in one country but he is resurrected in another. Many times, I myself have seen him dying and the next day he knocks on my door. It is impossible. It seems he cannot die. He is human stupidity. But if you look deep into the stupidity you will see the wisdom also. In all his stupidities there is a germ of hidden...

... Available: N.A. Length: N.A. Question 1: BELOVED OSHO, AS A CHILD, ONE OF MY FAVORITE GAMES WAS TO IMAGINE I WAS GOING TO DIE IN THE NEXT MINUTE. I ENJOYED FEELING THE TENSION BUILD UP UNTIL IT REACHED A PEAK AND THEN SLIPPED INTO RELAXATION, AND I FELT AS IF I WAS BUBBLING WITH HAPPINESS. LATER, WHEN I WAS A TEENAGER, FOR A PERIOD OF SIX MONTHS, I WOULD FREQUENTLY BE AWOKEN BY A FEELING OF PANIC AND FEAR...

..., A SENSE OF IMPENDING DEATH. I WOULD STRUGGLE TO PREVENT MY DYING BY HANGING ON TO THE THOUGHT OF SOMEBODY OR SOMETHING I WANTED TO LIVE FOR. THEN THE PANIC WOULD SUBSIDE AND THE FEAR WOULD GRADUALLY GO. THE LAST TIME THIS HAPPENED TO ME AS A TEENAGER, I WOKE FEELING THE FEAR OF DEATH THE STRONGEST I EVER HAD. BUT THIS TIME, INSTEAD OF PANICKING, WITHOUT ANY CONSCIOUS DECISION, I FOUND MYSELF...

... ACCEPTING DEATH, AND RELAXING. IMMEDIATELY, THERE WAS AN EXPLOSION OF LIGHT AND A SENSE OF BEING UPLIFTED BY BLISS. IT WAS NOT UNTIL SOME YEARS LATER, WHEN I TOOK SANNYAS AND ONE DAY WAS MEDITATING ALONE, THAT THE FEAR OF DEATH RETURNED. I WAS OVERWHELMED BY THE INTENSITY OF IT, AND COULD DO NOTHING TO TRANSFORM IT OR EVEN REPRESS IT: I JUMPED UP IN A PANIC AND TRIED TO SHAKE IT OFF. WHY HAS THIS FEAR...

... BEEN A CONSTANT COMPANION THROUGHOUT MY LIFE, AND WHAT IS ITS SIGNIFICANCE FOR ME? Dhyan Amiyo, meditation and death are very similar experiences. In death, your ego disappears; only your pure being remains. The same happens in meditation too: the disappearance of the ego and the presence only of pure isness, of your being. The similarity is so deep that just as people are afraid of death, they are...

... also afraid of meditation. On the other hand, if you are not afraid of meditation, you will not be afraid of death either. Meditation prepares you for death. Our whole education is only for life. That is only half an education, and the other half -- which is far more important, which comes as the crescendo of life -- is completely missing from all systems of education that have existed before or are...

... now in existence. Meditation prepares you for the other half; it helps you to know death without dying. And once you have known death without dying, the fear of death will disappear forever. Even when death comes, you will be silently watching it, knowing absolutely that it cannot even make a small scratch on your being. It is going to take away your body, your mind, but not you. What more do you...

... want? You belong to the immortal life. Your experience was good; you are saying, "As a child, one of my favorite games was to imagine I was going to die in the next minute. I enjoyed feeling the tension build up until it reached a peak and then slipped into relaxation, and I felt as if I was bubbling with happiness." Unknowingly, you were doing a simple exercise of meditation. Perhaps from...

... from the past life, you were doing a method of meditation. And that's why, as the tension grew... there is a limit, and the next moment is going to be the moment of death. You became totally concentrated. And from the highest peak of your tension, suddenly comes relaxation. In that relaxation, you found yourself bubbling with happiness. If you had continued to do that, your life would have been...

... who is even saying "Love your enemy." But don't love your mother. Dhyan Amiyo, you should start your childhood's accidental meditation, because it will suit you immediately. And it has happened here also: "One day I was meditating alone and the fear of death returned. I was overwhelmed by the intensity of it and could do nothing to transform or even repress it. I jumped up in panic...

... and tried to shake it off." You missed a great opportunity. Again, the same space was opening up but you behaved like a grown-up, not like a child. A child is not afraid. He knows nothing about death: he is so close to life that death is a faraway thing, inconceivable to him. You also remember that "The last time this happened to me as a teenager, I woke feeling the fear of death the...

... strongest I ever had. But this time, instead of panicking without any conscious decision, I found myself accepting death and relaxing. Immediately there was an explosion of light and a sense of being uplifted by bliss." You know the secret: you have to accept the fear. In acceptance, it disappears. In rejecting it, in escaping from it, you are nourishing it. You are feeding it. There is no fear...

..., because there is no death. Death is a fiction and fear is the shadow of the shadow. And you have experienced it accidentally, without doing meditation you have known, that if you remained in the space that was opening up, without fear and without panicking but accepting it, accepting even death and relaxing -- immediately there was "an explosion of light and a sense of being uplifted by bliss."...

...; You need not be told; you know already what has to be done. So when meditating, if you come close to the same space again and fear arises, rejoice that you are close to the death of the ego. The death of the ego is another name of relaxation, because the ego is your tension. The ego is your anxiety, the ego is your anguish. The ego is your angst. The moment you are relaxed, you are not. There is...

... not matter whether you die as a sinner or a saint. It does not matter whether you die well-known or unknown, famous or notorious. Death comes and destroys everything. Death is very democratic; it does not believe in hierarchies. It does not bother whether the person was a peon or a prime minister. It simply comes! and dust falls into dust and disappears. It won't help you in any way that you are...

..., SHAKAMUNI, DARUMA, THE CAT AND THE LADLE. WE ARE BORN, WE DIE. ALL ARE THE SAME. The great democracy of death. All are equal. Death is absolutely communist. Life differentiates - death never. Life makes people different; death turns them into oneness, alike. Life depends on boundaries, distinctions, definitions. Death comes and effaces all. WE ARE BORN, WE DIE. ALL ARE THE SAME. And there is no difference...

... ARE BORN, WE DIE. ALL ARE THE SAME, SHAKAMUNI, DARUMA, THE CAT AND THE LADLE. TO HARDEN INTO A BUDDHA IS WRONG; ALL THE MORE I THINK SO WHEN I LOOK AT A STONE BUDDHA. A fable is told of a centipede with arthritis who sought the advice of a wise old owl. "Centipede," the owl said, "you have a hundred legs, all swollen up. Now if I were you, I would change myself into a stork. With only...

... life is there a possibility of transcendence. But people don't want to face life. They are afraid. They are frightened. Deep down they know that life is anxiety. To face it means to become anxious, troubled. To face it means it will become impossible to live. To face it means you will be paralyzed - paralyzed by fear, paralyzed by death, because life is death and nothing else. Everything is dying...

... every moment. All is disappearing into death. Buddhism says escaping into abstractions is not going to help. Going into the details of life is really going to help. It is hard, it is arduous, it needs guts - but that's the only way to face it. Down the ages, priests have been exploiting people. They have been giving people easy routes to escape by. They have been deceiving people. Priests have never...

.... One hope disappears, you create another hope. But you go on hoping. And you go on seeing death happening everywhere, and still you go on hoping. Hoping against all hope: this is the neurosis. Seeing that everything falls into dust and disappears, still you are thinking to become famous, successful. Life is a journey from nowhere to nowhere: a vicious circle, a dream-journey. And that too not a very...

... sannyasin. And Buddha asked, "What has happened to this man? Why is he in ochre?" And the old man said, "This man has become aware of old age, this man has become aware of death - hence he has renounced all that stupidity that everybody lives through. He has become a sannyasin; he has renounced hopes. He is searching withinwards. Before death comes he wants to know what this life is, from...

... stone on the street in the morning sun, and all are thinking that it is a diamond, a very valuable diamond. But when you reach... if you don't reach, of course you suffer. You will always carry the wound. If you reach, then it is just a coloured stone then too you suffer. Failure fails, success fails too. To see this is to let hope evaporate. It does not matter whether you die rich or poor. It does...

... rich; it won't help you in any way that you are famous; it won't help you in any way that you are a great emperor, this or that. If you can see it while you are alive, then something i possible - something which is beyond life and death. I have heard: There was a fellow, an army man, posted in the South Pacific, who happened to contract, in the usual way, a very strong and particularly annoying...

... days." But what consolation is that? Success fails, failure fails - all fails. And the ultimate is death. It is not a consolation that you will be dying rich. It is not a consolation that you will be dying famous. It makes no difference. Beggar or king, poor or rich, death comes and simply effaces your whole life. That is the meaning of Ikkyu's sutra: SINCE THE JOURNEY OF LIFE IS LITTLE BUT...

... that maybe tomorrow things will be different. Ten years they have tried hard. Nothing has happened. But they say, "One day more... who knows?" People go on hoping. And this hope ultimately leads you into death and nowhere else. To drop hope is to become religious. To attain to a spiritual hopelessness is to become free of misery. Remember, the word 'hopelessness' is of infinite beauty. It...

... about: turning nowhere into now here. To be now and to be here... and suddenly you are trans-ported from time into eternity. Then life disappears, death disappears. Then for the first time you know what is. You can call it God, or you can call it nirvana - those are all words - but you come to know that which is. And to know it is to be liberated, to be liberated from all agony, from all suffering...

..., IT IS BUT A DREAM. WHEN WE AWAKE WE KNOW THERE IS NOT EVEN ANYONE TO READ IT. The idea of being remembered in history, having a name, leaving a name behind, is carried by almost everybody. That is a vicarious kind of immortality: you want to live through others' memories. You know death is coming; now the only way to live is: live through others' memories, do something so others will remember you...

... BUDDHA HAS NOT PREACHED THE DOCTRINE - he has simply shown it, not said it. THOUGH WE DO NOT TEACH THE DOCTRINE... because the ultimate truth cannot be preached. t can be shown but not said, it can be indicated. And it is everywhere! It is happening all around. The dead, pale leaf falling from the tree is the sermon - sermon about the whole life, sermon about death. The morning dewdrops disappearing...

... to possess, trying to boss, trying to dominate - all that politics. And then the train comes and you are gone for ever. And you will never be heard of again, and never be seen again. And you will never see those people you were fighting with, and you will never see the woman you tried to possess, and you will never see the man you nagged to death. See it. Buddhism is not a doctrine. It is simply an...

... grass leaf and in every star. Just see: life IS momentary, and death comes, and death inevitably comes. Seeing it, how can you become possessive? Seeing it, how can you become jealous? Seeing it, how can you become money-minded? Seeing it, how can you become a miser? Seeing it, how can you go on killing each other? Seeing it will be a transformation. Life is so momentary. A silence will descend...

... suddenly, and not a practised silence either. There is no need to practise. Just seeing this point, a silence will descend in you, a peace will arise in you. In that very moment of silence and peace you will be able to see, your eyes will become clear. THOUGH WE DO NOT PREACH THE DOCTRINE, UNASKED THE FLOWERS BLOOM IN SPRING; THEY FALL AND SCATTER, THEY TURN TO DUST. WE ARE BORN, WE DIE. ALL ARE THE SAME...

.... SHAKAMUNI - Buddha - DARUMA - Bodhidharma - THE CAT AND THE LADLE, all alike! There is no difference. A dog dies or a Buddha dies, there is no difference. See this penetration of death. It takes all away - then why cling? What is the point of clinging? When death is going to take all away, WHY NOT UNCLING ON YOUR OWN? In that unclinging you will be able to see something which is of absolute value. If you...

... uncling from everything - from the body, from the mind, from the property, from the land, from the wife, from the husband, from the children, from country, from religion, church - if you uncling from everything, then what is left for death to take away? You have dropped them yourself; you have dropped them of your own accord. Then what is left for death? Nothing is left. THIS dying, dying to all and...

... everything, this unclinging, is the meaning of sannyas, renunciation. Then nothing is left for death - you have already dropped it. No work is left for death - you have conquered death. Now death cannot take anything away from you. Whatsoever it could take away has already been renounced. Now what is left in you? - only a witnessing, a silent awareness, uncontaminated by possessions, uncontaminated by...

..., death is coming, one need not possess anything, you start becoming hard - because you think if you are hard enough you will be able to renounce. You are not renouncing by understanding, you are renouncing by hardness. You miss the point. Then again ego arises, because all hardness is ego. That's why monks become too much egoistic. They think they have renounced the world - as if they have done...

... kind of suicide! Afraid of death, he has committed suicide - but what kind of gain is this? Afraid of life, he has not reached to some higher plane of con-sciousness. Afraid of life, he has relapsed back. Out of fear, he has become paralyzed. He will fast because he is afraid that if he eats well then sexuality will arise - because if you eat well, natural energy is created and your biology goes on...