... moon inside. Then you have known both the polarities: you have known life, you have known death, you have known the sun, you have known the moon. You have known both the polarities - life and death. And once you have known both you have transcended both. That is why it is called the nectar amrit. Now you will not die. Now you are drunk with elixir; you cannot die. But you will not be alive in the old...

... situation. In his place Buddha happened, and this Buddha did not really happen on the day of his Enlightenment. He had been always there, but it had been recognized only on this day. Gautam had come to recognize on that day something which was always there - the Buddha. This inner phenomenon is beyond birth and death. It is never born and never will it die, because that which is born can die and that...

... which is not born cannot die. Death needs birth as a prerequisite, as a necessary prerequisite. You cannot die if you are not born. With this inner phenomenon - when sun and moon are balanced, when the dialectical process is finished, when the synthesis is complete - you come to feel in yourself something which is eternal. That is why this sutra says, "Accumulation of the nectar of the inner full...

... the heat. Take a wheel that is just moving on the street: the wheel moves, but in the center the hub on which it moves remains still. The movement must have something non-moving in the center, otherwise movement will not be possible. In this world of manifestations, everything exists within polar opposites. You are alive because you have death inside. If you had no death inside, you could not be...

... alive. So do not think that one day it suddenly happens that death comes to you. It is an inner growth. It is not something that you meet, that you encounter - no! It is something toward which you are daily growing. One day the growth is complete, and you are dead. It is an inner phenomenon. You are alive with a death center. You cannot be alive without a death center. Nothing exists without its polar...

... opposite. Life and death are just two positive and negative realities. So it looks logical, dialectical also, but it is not yet proved that the sun has at its center a cold spot, an absolutely cold spot, the polar opposite to the heat on its circumference. It may be true, it may not be true: that is irrelevant. But inside it is absolutely true. When you become aware, the heat begins to travel toward your...

... nearer and nearer to them they will become death-giving, because then they will not be warm: then they will be just pure fire. As it is, the whole body structure is just cold. You feel heat only in anger, in sex, in desire, in passion. That is not light, but simply a feverish phenomenon. Because of this, sex is felt as a release - because you lose a certain quantity of heat, and you are relieved; you...

... light it. The fuel is the same, but the direction changes. The inner fuel, the inner energy, becomes fire - suicidal. It burns you down, and ultimately you are just ashes. In the end, when death comes near you, you are just ashes. Everything is burnt out because you used your energy not as a light, but as a fire. It becomes fire if it is concentrated in the center and is released only temporarily...

... sense either. You have died in the old sense; you are reborn in a new moon. Now death will not be a death and life will not be a life. Now you will be beyond both. I have heard about Tanka. the Zen Master, who one day declared before his disciples that Buddha was never born. He said, "This whole story is just false; this whole Buddha legend is just false. He was never born." His disciples...

... then the body can be preserved, because birth comes through sex and death comes through sex. Your freshness, the youngness of the body, comes through sex, and then deterioration comes through sex. These mummies were preserved not just as historians say or as Egyptologists say, that man has always been thinking in terms of ego to preserve himself. With the kings, the emperors, for example, that is not...

... from the old body. It was a great experiment in old Egypt, and many things were done with the body. They were successful in some things, failures in some things. If you have again a new body, a new laboratory, then if the old is preserved you will not have to begin again from ABC. If the old is preserved, this is a record. Death had interrupted, but now you can proceed. You are not to proceed from...

... the beginning again; you can proceed from the point where death interrupted in the last life. So only Egyptians and Tibetans have preserved bodies for this reason, but only those bodies which were undergoing deep inner experiments. Otherwise it is useless to preserve your old body. Other vise you will not even be able to recognize it. Lenin's body is preserved in Moscow, but he would not even...

... observation it becomes light. And if your every heat phenomenon is transformed into light, you will come to feel the inner moon. And when there is no heat left, then you have accumulated the nectar of the full moon. And through this nectar you become immortal. Not in this body, not with this body: you become immortal because you transcend life and death both. Then you are naivedya: then you are a food...

...? Nobody seems to be ready to die. In fact, people need a Master, not to die but to live for ever. They would like to become immortals. They would like to find the elixir that will make them immortals. They would like to find something so that they can fight with death. Yes, that is found! But you have to fulfill the condition first. And the condition is: only those who are ready to die will attain to...

... smell. Think of that crypt: hundreds of dead bodies around, just licking drops of moisture from the walls, and waiting and praying for somebody to die. He went blind! Years and years in that darkness, but still hoping to live. Such is the desire for life. Such is the lust for life. And to be with a Master one has to be ready to die - not physically: meta-phorically. But even the IDEA of death makes...

... people run away. But to be in contact with a Master, you have to slowly slowly disappear, metaphysically disappear: the ego has to die. Jesus says: Until you are reborn... but how can you be reborn if you don't die? Rebirth has to be preceded by a death. And the death has to be deeper than the bodily death, because the bodily death is not much of a death. Soon you are born again. Here you die and...

... the knowledge of truth to you; he simply makes his truth available to you. If you are courageous, if you are innocent, if you are open, ready to take the jump, ready to die in the Master, then you will know truth - not knowledge about truth but an experience of it. Truth always comes as an experience. It is always existential. Remember: these are the barriers. The man who has followed all the...

... a disciple? And you will find you are too full of knowledge. That's why you cannot be a disciple. A disciple means one who is ready to learn, and a man full of knowledge is not ready to learn. He is ready to teach. He is not .ready to learn. Are you a disciple? A disciple is one who is ready to surrender, to bow down, to drop his head. Are you ready to die? Are you ready to stake all that you have...

... to do? Was he to wait for a death of starvation and thirst, there in the neighborhood of his dead brethren? He began to pray - but was not prayer a supplication that God might grant death to one of his healthy brethren? Because the crypt would be opened only when somebody died in the monastery again. That was the only possibility for him to get out: if somebody died immediately. Against such...

... years. They found the unfortunate man wrapped in cloaks which he pulled out of the coffins, and with his white beard reaching to the ground. He was utterly blind by now, but still alive and still hoping and praying. He was taken out. He lived at least ten years more. Man clings to life - even if when to live is worse than death. Just think of this man! eating insects, living with dead bodies, the...

..., within moments, you have entered into another womb somewhere else. There is not even a gap: one body you lose, another body you immediately gain. But to die in the presence of a Master is to really die, it is real suicide The ego disappears for ever. That is the meaning of surrender It is difficult. The disciple comes, he bows down also, but that bowing is false. He says, "I am at your disposal...

...," but that is an empty gesture. After an hour's lecture on duty to King and Country, putting others before self and so on, the education corps captain pointed to one private and said, "Right - you! Why should a soldier be prepared to die for his country?" The soldier scratched his head for a minute, then grinned and said, "You're quite right, sir - why should he?" Just to...

... think of death frightens. Don't laugh at those people who escaped from Zusya - Zusya was death. A Master k death. That's what ancient scriptures say: A Master is a death. Those people escaped! The children were innocent. They were not afraid because they didn't know what it is to look into the eyes of a Master. People AVOID looking into the eyes of the Master. They avoid getting too close, because to...

... not a disciple. Because it is NOT a question of figuring it out. It is so immense, you cannot figure it out. It is so enormous, you cannot calculate about it. It is bigger than you, so you cannot hold it in your hands. You have to be ready to disappear, to evaporate. You have to die, and only then... the resurrection. The disciple has to become the mythological bird, the phoenix: he has to disappear...

... toilet. Thanking him, the man asked why he had gone to so much trouble. "Because," answered the salesman, "yours was the first genuine inquiry I've had all day." If you really want to be with a Master you will have to become a genuine inquiry. Not philosophic curiosity, but an inquiry in which your life and death are involved. An inquiry which is going to transmute you. An inquiry...

... flower dies. You separate the tree from the earth, the tree dies. You separate the earth from the sun, and the earth dies. Death means separation. Life means no separation. Hence the ego is bound to die because that is your idea of separation. To think of one's self in terms of ego is the only cause of death - because the ego is already dead. You can go on flogging the dead horse, but for how long? It...

... is going to die; it is already dead, that's why it is going to die. That which is alive in you cannot die; life is eternal. But life is not yours, you cannot possess it. Life belongs to all. Life has a vastness, infinity. Death is tiny, death is individual; life is universal. So when you live, you are part of the universe, and when you die you die only because you think you are separate. The more...

... OF THE NATURE OF LIGHT; IT IS THE POWER OF LIGHTNESS AND PURITY. IT IS THAT WHICH WE HAVE RECEIVED FROM THE GREAT EMPTINESS, THAT WHICH IS IDENTICAL INFORM WITH THE PRIMORDIAL BEGINNING. THE ANIMA PARTAKES OF THE NATURE OF THE DARK. IT IS THE ENERGY OF THE HEAVY AND THE TURBID; IT IS BOUND TO THE BODILY FLESHLY HEART. THE ANIMUS LOVES LIFE. THE ANIMA SEEKS DEATH. ALL SENSUOUS DESIRES AND IMPULSES...

... you feel part of the whole, the more life you will have. Jesus says, 'Come to me and I will give you life abundant.' What is the secret of life abundant? The secret is: die as the ego, disappear as a separate entity, and the whole universe and all that it contains is yours. Stop possessing, and all is yours. Possess, and you are tiny and limited, and you are going to die. The secret of becoming more...

... into the whole, is MOKSHA, NIRVANA. It is ultimate freedom. The second thing to be understood: that life is polar. That is also very fundamental to the Taoist approach. But the polarity is not that of opposition. The polarity means that the opposites are complementary to each other, they support each other. Life cannot exist without death, hence death is not the enemy. How can death be the enemy of...

... angry, he lives it right now. If he is loving, he says, 'We will see tomorrow.' All that is stupid he goes on living, and all that is luminous he goes on postponing. The wise man also postpones, but he only postpones stupid things. Gurdjieff used to say to his disciples, 'When my grandfather died I was only nine years old. He called me close to his death-bed and whispered in my ear.' He had tremendous...

... ridiculous. And Gurdjieff was really transformed by this simple message. Sometimes very simple messages can transform you, but you have to live them. Life exists because there is death. Death gives intensity to life. Death challenges life, it provokes you to live, and to live to the maximum, at the optimum, because - who knows - there may be no tomorrow. Death is always provoking you, goading you to live...

..., and to live totally. Then death is not against life but a friend. So is the case with all the polarities: the negative and the positive, love and hate, beauty and ugliness, day and night, summer and winter. And so is the case with man and woman. Man cannot be without the woman, and the woman cannot be without the man. They are part of one dialectical process. Between these two poles there is both...

... about him; if you know about him you can predict him. But you can never predict a woman; she remains unpredictable, hence the darkness. These are metaphors. IT IS THE ENERGY OF THE HEAVY AND TURBID... And the woman, the principle of the feminine, keeps you tethered to the earth; it is gravitation. ... IT IS BOUND TO THE BODILY FLESHLY HEART. THE ANIMUS LOVES LIFE. THE ANIMA SEEKS DEATH. The woman is...

... more like death. Don't feel offended, this is just a description. If the words 'anima' and 'animus', 'man' and 'woman' create some trouble in you, you can replace them with x and Y. But that is what THE SECRET OF THE GOLDEN FLOWER IS doing. These are just metaphors. To make them anthropomorphic helps them to be understood more clearly. Man is interested in life, woman is interested in security. Man...

... is interested in love, woman is interested in safety. Man is interested in adventure, woman is interested in comfort, convenience. Woman is death. By 'death' there is no condemnation meant or supposed, just that the quality of death is security. You are secure only when you are dead. You are secure only when you are not, then nothing can happen to you anymore. But man wants to seek and search, to...

.... There is an ancient saying that the world would be immensely joyful if every man remained unmarried and every woman was married. But how can it be done? It is impossible. THE ANIMUS LOVES LIFE. THE ANIMA SEEKS DEATH. ALL SENSUOUS DESIRES AND IMPULSES OF ANGER ARE EFFECTS OF THE ANIMA. BUT THE PUPIL UNDERSTANDS HOW TO DISTIL THE DARK ANIMA COMPLETELY SO THAT IT TRANSFORMS ITSELF INTO PURE LIGHT. But...

... world. Inside you these two principles are constantly in fight. Call them life/death, darkness/light, man/woman, x/z - whatsoever you will - but these two principles are there, continuously in fight. And that is your anguish, your misery, your hell. Let them become friends. Let your energy circulate in them, not against each other, let them come closer to each other. Let there be an inner orgasm, an...

..., nodded and passed away. This is a beautiful story. A few things have to be understood about it; they will help you to enter into the sutras of Lu-tsu. First: to a man who is in search of truth, even death is an occasion. To the man who is not in search, even life is not an occasion to learn. People live their lives without learning a thing at all. They pass through life but without gaining any maturity...

... lives, and unless you take hold of your life and start changing it from the accidental to the existential, there is going to be no transformation. That's what sannyas is all about: an effort to change the accidental into the existential, an effort to change the unconscious life into a conscious life, the effort to wake up. And then life is learning, and so is death. Then one goes on learning. Then...

... closer and closer to the window called death. But you don't wake up; you start searching for another wife. You go bankrupt but you don't wake up. You are defeated but you don't wake up; you start searching with more vigor, with more vengeance. A woman went to one of those health clinics where they have about seven doctors. After twenty minutes in one doctor's office she ran screaming down the hall...

.... Another doctor who finally got the story out of her called the first doctor. "What is the idea of telling that patient she is pregnant? She is not! You nearly frightened her to death." "I know," the first doctor said, "but I cured her hiccups, didn't I?" If you listen, if you watch, you will see that every suffering that happens in your life is a blessing in disguise. It...

... to him - but what a way to say goodbye! The opportunity of death is used. Yes, only very conscious people can use the opportunity that death makes available. Death looked at unconsciously is the enemy, death looked at consciously is the greatest friend. Death looked at unconsciously is just a shattering of all your dreams, of all your life patterns, of all the structures that you have been raising...

..., of all that you have invested in - an utter collapse. But death looked at consciously is the beginning of a new life, a door to the divine. Ninakawa is dying and Ikkyu asks, "Shall I lead you on?" He is saying that death is a beginning, not an end. "Shall I lead you on? Do you need my help in any way? You are going to learn a new way of being, a new vision is going to arise; you are...

..., more and more attached, more and more rooted in this world from where we have to leave. Use this world as a caravanserai, don't make a home in it. Use it, certainly, but don't be used by it. There is no point in possessing anything because the moment you start possessing something you are possessed by it. The more you possess the more you are possessed. Use! - but remember to be watchful that death...

... is coming, it is always on the way. Any moment it may knock on the door and you will have to leave EVERYTHING as it is. And it is ALWAYS in the middle that you have to leave. One cannot complete anything in life. Ninakawa replied perfectly well: "I came here alone and I go alone. What help could you be to me? How can you help me in death? Maybe in life we can have the illusion of being helped...

..., of being helpers, but how in death?" He's telling a great truth, but there are truths and truths and greater truths. Ikkyu answered with an even higher truth. Remember this: the conflict is not between the untrue and the true. The real conflict is between the lower truth and the higher truth. The untrue is untrue; what can it do, what harm can it do to truth? The problem is never of a choice...

... it is all the same. Time is a peripheral phenomenon. At the center there is no time, no change, no movement. All is eternal there. Just see the point of this dialogue happening at the moment when Ninakawa was dying. These are not the things to be discussed at the time of death. At the time of death people try to help the person, console him, "You are not dying. Who says you are dying? You are...

... going to live." Even when they know - the doctor has said, "Now all is finished and nothing can be done anymore" - then too the family goes on pretending that you are not going to die. The family goes on helping the dream to remain a little longer, and the family goes on hoping some miracle will happen and the person will be saved. This dialogue is immensely beautiful. When somebody is...

... dying, it is better to make him aware that death has come. In fact it is better to make everybody aware, whether the death has come today or not. Whether it is going to come tomorrow or the day after tomorrow doesn't matter; it is going to come. One thing is certain: that it is going to come. In life only one thing is certain, and that is death, so it is better to talk of it from the very beginning...

.... In the ancient cultures every child was made aware of death. Your very foundation should be made on that awareness of death. The man who is aware of death will certainly become aware of life, and the man who is unaware of death will remain unaware of life too - because life and death are two aspects of the same coin. Ikkyu said, "If you think..." But remember, he uses the word 'if...

... there is no coming and no going." What is that path on which there is no coming and no going? Yes, there is a place inside you; that is your eternal home, where nothing ever happens, where nothing ever changes - no birth, no death, no coming, no going, no arising, no disappearing. All is always the same. With his words Ikkyu had revealed the path so clearly that Ninakawa smiled, nodded and passed...

...!" But even up to that point people go on making dates. If there are really ghosts, they must be doing the same things you are doing... the same things. And it continues life after life. I have heard about a couple. They were in deep love with each other and they were both spiritualists; they believed in Christian Science. Just one day, talking to each other about death and profound subjects like...

... that, they decided that if one of them died he had to contact the other on the thirtieth day after death, and the other would be open, receptive and would call on the thirtieth day at a particular time. As it happened, the man died in a car accident. The woman was eagerly awaiting. The thirtieth day came, the right fixed time came. She closed the doors, put the light off, and asked, "John, are...

... questions; in those eleven questions the whole of philosophy is contained: about God, about creation, about reincarnation, about life after death and all that. In those eleven questions the whole possible philosophy is contained. You cannot ask any question if you look at that list of eleven questions. That list was declared in the town: "Please don't ask those questions of the Buddha, because he is...

... truly, authentically, one who has enjoyed it, is always ready to die, is always ready to leave. One who has not enjoyed and celebrated, one who has not lived the moment, the life, is always afraid to leave because "the time has come to leave and I am yet unfulfilled." The fear of death is not the fear of death, it is a fear of remaining unfulfilled. You are going to die, and nothing, nothing...

... to life because your life is unfulfilled. You have not risen against a strong wind. You have not known the morning, and the evening has come. You have never been young, and old age is knocking at the door. You never loved, and death is coming. This unfulfilled state and the coming of death creates the fear. Buddha says that if you have lived you will always be ready to die. And that readiness will...

... who are afraid, they always believe in the eternal soul. Look in this country: the whole country believes that the soul is eternal, but you cannot find a more cowardly country in the world. It is not accidental. Why are Indians so cowardly? In fact, if they know that the soul is never going to die they should be the bravest -- because death doesn't exist! They go on talking about the deathless, and...

... abide so that if this world changes there is nothing to worry about. Your mind says, "Seek the divine and there will be no change, and you will live for ever and ever." The ordinary religious conception -- Hindu, Jewish or Christian -- is basically an ego-trip. Why do you say that change is appearance? -- because with change you are afraid. Change looks like death. You would like something...

... not NOT be? Why are you so afraid of not being? If you are afraid of nonbeing, nothingness, emptiness, death, you cannot know the truth. One knows the true when one is ready to drop oneself totally, utterly. That's why Buddha says, "There is no soul. You are not a self, not an ATMA. You are an ANATTA, a no-self. There is nothing permanent in you, nothing substantial -- you are a flow, a river...

...." Why does Buddha insist on a no-self? He insists because if you accept nonbeing, if you accept nothingness, then there is no fear of death, then you can drop yourself completely. And when you drop yourself completely, the vision arises. Then you are capable of knowing. With your ego you cannot know. Only in an egolessness, in a deep abyss, in the absence of the ego, does the perception happen...

... at all could you experience through life -- no maturity, no growth, no flowering. Emptyhanded you came, emptyhanded you are going. This is the fear! One who has lived is always ready to die. His readiness is not a forced attitude. His readiness is just like a flower. When the flower has flowered, has sent its perfume to the infinite corners of existence, enjoyed the moment, lived it, danced through...

... not be something forced upon you. It will be the thing, it will be a natural thing! As you are born, you die. As you come, you go. This is the wheel of existence. You lived the being part, now you will live the nonbeing part. You existed, now you will not exist. You rose, you manifested, now you will move into the unmanifested. You were visible, embodied, now you will move without the body to the...

... invisible. You had your day; now you will take rest in the night. What is wrong in it? The search for the permanent shows that you remain unfulfilled. The search to have a permanent self is a clinging. You know that death is going to be there, so what to do? The body will disintegrate, disappear; now you have your hopes that some permanent self must be there which will go on and on and on. Remember: those...

... if you watch their life they are more afraid of death than anybody else. Otherwise, how can you explain the one thousand years of slavery of this country? Very small races -- England is no bigger than a small province of India. Three crore people only were able to dominate a country of fifty crore. It seems simply impossible! How did it happen? -- because the country is cowardly. They cannot fight...

..., they are afraid of death. They talk about the deathless -- and this is not accidental, there is a reasoning behind it. Whenever somebody talks too much about the deathless it means he is afraid of death, he is a coward. And India has not lived because of the priests. India has not lived life because of the priests. They have been teaching people to renounce, so everybody is ready, before he has lived...

..., to renounce. Then the fear comes in. If you have lived, lived to your total capacity, to the optimum, the fear of death disappears. Only then does the fear of death disappear, never before it. If you renounce life, if you don't love, if you don't eat, if you don't enjoy and dance; if you simply renounce and condemn and you say, "This is all materialistic. I am against it"... who is this...

... there is no other life? You need a permanent self. You have to believe and console yourself: "Okay, the body dies but the self never dies." If you listen to Buddha and Heraclitus and to me, the self dies even before the body dies -- because the self is of a more dreamy stuff than the body. The body is more substantial -- at least it takes seventy years to die, and the self dies every moment...

... -- the old going out and the new coming in, the gap -- is so subtle that you cannot see it. Buddha says, "The self that is born will not die -- it has died already. The man you were born as and the man you will be when you die are not the same." Buddha says, "It is the same continuum, but not the same thing." The flame in the evening and the flame in the morning constitute the same...

...; The saying is good. Whenever an old man thinks about sex, it IS dirty; it shows that he has not grown. Sex was good at its own stage, but an old man now should be getting ready to leave, now should be ready to die, now should make arrangements -- because soon his ship will be ready and he will be leaving for the unknown shore. He should make arrangements for it now, and he is behaving like a young...

... can be yourself. There is nowhere to go, nothing to do -- you can relax! If an old man cannot relax, that means he has not lived life. And if you cannot relax, how can you die? And those who cannot die, they create desire for a permanent self, for a permanent God. Know well: The only change is the God. Change is the only permanence in the world, only change is eternal. Everything else is changing...

... will be grateful to life in its totality. There will be no choice, because a man who has passed through life and grown and has known what life is, in its suffering, in its bliss, will come to know what Heraclitus says: God is winter and summer, God is life and death, God is day and night. God is suffering and bliss... both! Then you don't say that suffering was wrong. If somebody says suffering was...

... attains to health again, and then the health is fresh. Passing through illness, passing through the opposite, it again becomes new. Have you ever watched? After a long fever, when you are getting well you have a freshness, a virginity; the whole body seems to be rejuvenated. If you remain healthy for seventy years continuously, your health will be like an illness, a death, because it was never...

... like a haze and then you see that death is reaching -- you become afraid. The suppressed part says, "Then when will there be a time for me? I wanted to love, I wanted to be attached, I wanted to be involved and committed to some relationship -- now there is no time!" Then the suppressed part forces itself up and an old man becomes foolish and he starts asking for relationships. He has...

... ...? Then there will be the need to commit suicide. He will have to find ways and means. Maybe he will have to bribe the doctor to cut the connection from the oxygen tank, or not to give him any more medicines. He may have to bribe someone; effort will be needed. Natural death is natural, but man is not natural anymore! So nothing is natural -- not even death. If you die naturally, that will be a totally...

... different thing. But you don't live naturally; how can you die naturally? Death has to be the culmination of whatsoever you have done in your life. If you have lived unnaturally, you will die unnaturally. A natural death is possible only if the life has been natural. So the questioner says, "No effort is required to die." You are true. In a very primitive society no effort is required, but...

... because of the compassion of the missionaries, primitives have disappeared. They have all become educated people now. Now effort is needed to die. Why do so many people commit suicide? And the suicide rate goes on growing every year. Why? Isn't natural death enough ...? Suicide means death with effort. And the suicide rate will go higher and higher if the governments are too adamant to relax and they...

... make him afraid. If he is afraid, you can dominate him. If he is not afraid, why and how can you dominate him? How will he allow you to be the dominator? He will say, "Be gone. Who are you to dominate me?" First make him afraid. And there are two things which make people very much afraid. One is death, so religions have exploited that. That you are going to die, that you are going to die...

..., that you are going to die -- they persist, so they, they create a trembling. So you say, "What, what am I to do now? How should I behave? How should I live?" And then they say there is hell and there is heaven. Greed and profit, punishment and reward. So one is death. But death is not yet, so you can postpone it. It is not much of a problem; you say, "Okay, when we will die we will see...

... God wants you to be, then be this way. Then this is your destiny. Once you start accepting things, tensions disappear, anxieties fall, anguish is felt no more. And to be in a state of no anguish, no anxiety, no tension is to be religious. Question: NO EFFORT IS REQUIRED TO BE BORN. NO EFFORT IS REQUIRED TO DIE. NO EFFORT IS REQUIRED TO FALL IN LOVE WHY IS SUCH EFFORT REQUIRED TO KNOW GOD (THROUGH...

... happen somewhere in the deepest core. And then there is joy and then there is freedom. And then there is bliss and there is no dark valley following it. Then happiness is eternal, then celebration is eternal. But that moment comes. That too comes, remember. So you say, "No effort is required to be born. No effort is required to die. No effort is required to fall in love." I would like to tell...

... pass through great pain, or even the birth may be a Caesarian, the mother may have to be operated on. The doctor is needed, the nurse is needed, the midwife is needed. Why? To undo the wrong that the society has done. You say no effort is required to die? You are wrong again. You can go and look in the American hospitals. Many old people are ready to die, and they want to die; they are not allowed to...

... die. The question of euthanasia has become one of the most important questions for the future because medical science has really evolved and it can help a person to live for two hundred years or even more. He may not have much of a life, but he can hang on; he can hang on in a hospital. He will not be able to move or to talk or to love, but he can be just there vegetating. It will be tremendous...

... misery and hell. Now, if he wants to die, no society allows him to die. They say, "It is illegal; you cannot commit suicide." A person who has become one hundred thirty or one hundred forty years of age wants to die because his existence is simply torture. The society seems to be very sadistic ... they say, "You are not allowed to die; you will have to live." And the doctors will...

... don't allow people to die and they force them into nursing homes and into hospitals and force them to live against their wishes. Then more and more suicides will be there. Man has disturbed all that is natural. And you say no effort is required to fall in love? That too is not true. That too is not true. Looking at the TV continuously, looking at and watching films, reading poetry and novels, they all...

.... And I am not going to die right now. I am going to live fifty years more, at least, so why bother?" And man does not have a very distant -- seeing vision; he does not have radar. He cannot see fifty years ahead. Yes, if you say to him, "Tomorrow you are going to die," he may become afraid, but fifty years? He will say, "Wait, there is no hurry. Let me do my things first." He...

... may even start doing them faster because "Only fifty years are left? So let me do whatsoever I want to do. Eat, drink, be merry." So the second thing, which is more fear-creating, is sex. Sex is already the problem. Death WILL be the problem; it is in the future. Sex has the problem in the present; it is already there. Religions contaminate your sex energy. They start making you afraid...

... that it is wrong, it is ugly, it is sin, it will drag you to hell. They want to dominate you; that's why they are against sex. I have no idea to dominate you I am here to make you absolutely free. And there are only two things needed to make you free. One is that sex is not a sin. k is a God-given gift, it is a grace. And second, there is no death. You will be forever, because whatsoever is remains...

.... Nothing ever disappears. Forms change, names change, but the reality continues. So I take away all fear. I don't want to make you in any way feel guilty, afraid. I want to take all fears from you so that you can live naturally, without any domination, so that you can live according to your own spontaneity. And that spontaneity will bring enlightenment. Then sex disappears, and then death disappears. It...

... such a point - if you don't show up I will die. I cannot remain alive any more without you. ... BIN DEKHE JIV JAYE RE... If I cannot see you, I cannot live any more. I am finished! Either you come or I am going to die. I am breathing my last. AB TO BEHAL KABIR BHAYO... Kabir has come to such a state where only death seems to be possible. Either you appear, or I disappear. And this is the point where...

... Guest waits for you to die. That is the meaning of the Christian symbol of the cross. Jesus says to his disciples: If you want to follow me, you will have to carry your own crosses on your own shoulders. Each one has to carry his own cross, each one has to prepare for his own ultimate death - I don't mean physical death, remember. Physical death has happened to you many times; millions of times you...

...The guest waits for you to die...

... Osho The Guest: The guest waits for you to die Main Books Headers Help Your browser does not support iframes. < Prev  Osho The Guest   Next > The guest waits for you to die From: Osho Date: Fri, 29 April 1979 00:00:00 GMT Book Title: Osho - The Guest Chapter #: 4 Location: am in Buddha Hall Archive Code: N.A. Short Title: N.A. Audio Available: N.A. Video Available: N.A...

... other. Kabir is not talking about that love. You cannot possess God, you can only be possessed by God. To love God means to surrender, to trust, to be ready to die into Him, because dying in God is the beginning of a new life; it is resurrection. Love has to become such an intense flame that it bums you out, that you are not left behind, that you are consumed in it. If you are not, the Guest comes...

... aware of who one is, one is not aware of from where one is, one is not aware of where one is going. One is not aware of why one is at all, why this whole existence is. One simply goes on like a robot, doing things, managing somehow. From birth to death man is a long sleep, sometimes dreaming with eyes closed, sometimes dreaming with eyes open, but dreaming all the same, all the time. This situation...

... love has the quality of intelligence it is not love - not the love that Kabir is talking about. There are two stories to be pondered over.... There is this guy from India and he is walking along a cliff, falls off, grabs the branch and pleads, "Is there anyone up there? Help me!" God answers true to form, "Trust me - let go! " The guy does, and immediately falls to his death on...

... Brahmin by birth. The word 'brahmin' does not mean a caste; it means one who has known the Brahma, one who has known God, one who has become one with God. A Brahmin is never born, a Brahmin is resurrected. One has to die first to all that one thinks one is; then one is reborn, twice-born. With God, your life really begins. You start pulsating on a new plane, radiating joy. Your life takes the color of...

... is the last citadel of the ego, the very last citadel of the ego, where the ego hides. It becomes the seeker, the great seeker; it becomes the devotee. The ego can take any form, remember, and the subtlest form is that of a devotee, a humble devotee, a surrendered devotee. Beware of the subtle ways of the ego! It has to die totally. One has to come to a point where one finds oneself not, where one...

... happened to Kabir. He says: AB TO BEHAL KABIR BHAYO... Now the moment is approaching closer and closer when I know my death is becoming an absolute certainty. Either you or death! Now it is a question of either/or. All other alternatives have disappeared. Everything has become narrowed down to two things: death or God... death or God. AB TO BEHAL KABIR BHAYO HAI, BIN DEKHE JIV JAYE RE... If you don't...

... have died physically. That is not true death because the mind continues, enters into another womb, starts another game; again the whole story is repeated. You go on moving in circles; that is not true death. The true death is known only by the devotee who comes to a point when he CANNOT live without God, it is impossible to live without God. When this impossibility arises, that one cannot live...

... without God... this is what Jesus means, by 'carrying your own cross'. Of course, nobody else can carry it for you. This death is so deep that nobody can help you. This death is so much of the interior that nobody can approach it from the outside. You cannot be murdered, you can only commit suicide - about THIS death, about THIS internal disappearance, about THIS subjective annihilation, cessation...

... A VERY DANGEROUS ONE. The doctor lied. The doctor said something that was not going to happen. But through it something else happened. He said, 'The woman is going to die.' She became so worried. Death became a haunting, a nightmare. She must have thought continuously of death. She couldn't eat. But she didn't die. And after forty days, the doctor said, 'She is cured. Now she will be fertile...

... completely forgot about food. Who eats, who enjoys eating, when death is knocking on the door? Every moment she must have been looking at the clock, at the calendar: One day is gone. Who bothers about food? and how can you enjoy food, when death is there? It was impossible. But she didn't die. Rather, her body was completely renewed. A new lease of life happened. Untrue, but wise - and this is how every...

... Osho Until You Die: Knowledge Is Dangerous Main Books Headers Help Your browser does not support iframes. < Prev  Osho Until You Die   Next > Knowledge Is Dangerous From: Osho Date: Fri, 17 April 1975 00:00:00 GMT Book Title: Osho - Sufis - Until You Die Chapter #: 7 Location: am in Buddha Hall Archive Code: N.A. Short Title: N.A. Audio Available: N.A. Video Available: N.A...

.... Length: N.A. A MAN WENT TO A DOCTOR AND TOLD HIM THAT HIS WIFE WAS NOT BEARING CHILDREN. THE PHYSICIAN SAW THE WOMAN, TOOK HER PULSE AND SAID: 'I CANNOT TREAT YOU FOR STERILITY BECAUSE I HAVE DISCOVERED THAT YOU WILL IN ANY CASE DIE WITHIN FORTY DAYS.' WHEN SHE HEARD THIS THE WOMAN WAS SO WORRIED THAT SHE COULD EAT NOTHING DURING THE ENSUING FORTY DAYS. BUT SHE DID NOT DIE AT THE TIME PREDICTED, SO THE...

... understand the language of fear. Freedom cannot be said to you, but fear - yes, you can understand that. Death you can understand. You cannot understand LIFE. So he says the day of judgment is coming near. And Jesus says, 'There is only one life. Once lost, lost for ever.' That's why Jesus never used the Indian device of reincarnation. All the three religions born in the West - Jews, Mohammedans...

... tricked out. But then you are not angry: you are grateful because that was the only way. And you were so false that even a Jesus has to use a lie to bring you out. But once you are out, you forget about the judgment day and God and the Kingdom; and you forget about death and fear. Once you are out in the world, the open world, of sky and the breeze and the sun shine, you celebrate, you enjoy, you feel...

... a young man, you have to talk differently - because their attitudes have changed completely. A young man always looks towards the future; an old man always looks towards the past, because for an old man there is no future. The death... and then there is no future. An old man looks towards the past; only the past exists for an old man. As you grow old, the past grows more and more, and the future...

... lived too much, and you cannot allure them towards more life. They are bored and finished with life. You cannot tell them that abundance of life will be there. They will say, 'This much has been too much! What will we do with an abundance of life?' No. The Eastern mind wants to be freed from life and death both. The East is bored, as every old man is bored. He lived, groped in every dimension, and...

... everything was found to be futile, fruitless. An old mind is bored. The East is bored with life. You cannot promise more life. That will not be a promise; on the contrary, that will look like a punishment. So in the East we have been using a totally different device, and that device is: the wheel of life and death. We say that millions of times you have been born - we give more boredom to the mind - for...

... millions of lives.... Hindus say that everybody has been in this world, at least before human birth, eighty-four crore times - that is, eight hundred and forty million times everybody has been in the world. And everybody had been repeating the same pattern - childhood, the fantasies of childhood; the youth, the foolishnesses of youth; the old age, the boredom; and death. And the wheel moves and moves and...

... finished with it! Now come out! If you remain inside, this wheel will go on and on and on. Now drop out! - a real drop out. Not dropping out of the society, or of the school, but dropping out of the wheel of life and death. Just drop out and run away! - out of the house. This is the language a bored man can understand. But both are devices. Don't ask me which is true. They are neither true nor false. The...

... religion when it is young and helpful. And when the religion dies, they will do the same as you will do with your father and mother when they die. Of course, with great suffering and pain you take them to the grave, or to the burning GHAT. You burn them with tears in your eyes, but you have to burn them! You know that she was your mother and she gave you birth, and he was your father and he was...

.... Now we will enter into this story. A MAN WENT TO A DOCTOR AND TOLD HIM THAT HIS WIFE WAS NOT BEARING CHILDREN. THE PHYSICIAN SAW THE WOMAN, TOOK HER PULSE AND SAID: 'I CANNOT TREAT YOU FOR STERILITY BECAUSE I HAVE DISCOVERED THAT YOU WILL IN ANY CASE DIE WITHIN FORTY DAYS.' WHEN SHE HEARD THIS THE WOMAN WAS SO WORRIED THAT SHE COULD EAT NOTHING DURING THE ENSUING FORTY DAYS. BUT SHE DID NOT DIE AT...

... cured,' but it would not have been wise. Truth is not always wise, and untruth is not always foolish. The question of knowledge is a very complicated one. The doctor created a situation. He was really a wise doctor. He created a situation: he knew that only the fear of death would be of any help. He shocked the woman by the fear of death; he gave her such worry and anguish and anxiety that she...

...Until You Die...

... birth. And if there is no birth, there is no way to die. Birth must lead to death. So Buddha told the man to seek an end to birth. Find out why birth takes place! The man did not understand. When he asked to be relieved from the cycle of birth, and death he did not have birth in mind. It was death he wanted to escape. He was afraid of death. This was natural since he was an old man. He wanted a birth...

... claim all credit for myself. Every height has its lower depth. Each mountain has its valleys. No peak can exist without an abyss. As a mountain rises higher, its valleys go deeper. When a person scales the peaks of success, he creates deeper valleys of failure below. This process goes on every minute and there is no way of escaping it. We accept birth and we deny death. But death appears together with...

... birth. All life long we strive to keep death away. Our plans invariably fail, for death has happened together with birth. It is not a future happening; it is a part of the past already. Death has happened right with birth; because nothing can have only one pole. The other pole is bound to be there. With birth, there will be death; with honour, there is bound to be disgrace; with success, there is...

... of our search. When you seek honour and acclaim, remember that you are seeking dishonour and disgrace also. When you are avaricious, remember that you are giving rise to fear also. When you go to seek love, remember that you have sown the seeds of hatred also. When you cling to life with both hands, know that you are clinging to death also. To see the opposite is the fundamental sutra of Lao Tzu...

... within my control. We all take the first step, but hope the second does not come into action. But this is not in our hands. I wish for success. I need not have wished. That much was in my hands. But failure is not within my hands. I desire reverence. That is in my hands. But its opposite is not within my control. Buddha has made an interesting statement. He said, "Do not worry about death. Instead...

..., try to escape birth. Once you have taken birth, death is not in your hands." A Brahmin approached Buddha and said, "How can I escape the cycle of birth and death?" Buddha replied, "Leave death unto death. You free yourself from life only." Generally, we ask this question. "Death is not in our hands," you cannot escape it. But birth is in your hands; you can escape...

... where there would be no death. He wanted freedom from death. We all think in this manner. People come and ask me "How can we be freed from pain and misery?" We cannot be, until we also wish to be free from happiness. Happiness is our choice and sorrow is the result. Happiness is in my hands. Not so sorrow. It is as if I were to say that I will run but my shadow should not run behind me. Then...

... I get a glimpse of the oneness of birth and death, then those desires that run towards the mundane world will lose their power to motivate me. Alice entered the Wonderland. The queen stood next to Alice, who was sitting under a tree. It would be wrong to say she was standing, because she and Alice were both running. For hours they ran. Then Alice looked up. She saw the tree as it was. The queen...

...;Shall we attain peace if we shun desires?" He would reply, "This also is a desire. It is a new desire. I do not ask you to renounce desire. I ask you to understand your desires because if you understand them, you will not desire them. Then you will not ask this question. This peace that you desire becomes a subject for your desire. That which remains when all desires die is peace...

... at the first step. I have seen death in birth. Therefore, I cry." Then, when his wife died some years later, the king came to pay condolences to him. He found him sitting under a tree, singing a song. The king was shocked. "What is this you are doing, Chuang- Tse? It is all right if you do not feel sorrow, but this is no occasion to sing and make merry!" Chuang-Tse replied, "At...

... one time I saw death in birth. This time, I have witnessed birth in death." If we begin to see this sutra in the multitudinous facets of life, we will gradually come to find that much has dropped away from us, without any effort on our part. We have done nothing to rid ourselves of the non-essentials, and yet they have fallen off. And one day, suddenly, the person realises that he is no longer...

... are two sides of the same coin, and so are death and sex. Sex is the energy, the beginning of life; and death is the culmination of life. It is no coincidence that millions of people never know what real orgasm is. It is for the simple reason that unless you are ready to go into a sort of death, you cannot know what orgasm is. And nobody wants to die, everybody wants to live, to renew life again and...

... with death. That is the real demarcation line between East and West. It is not a geographical division, but far more important than geography. I told you that the English language goes on taking words from other languages. "Geography" is a word, like many others, borrowed from Arabic. In Arabic it is beautiful, it is jugrafia, not "geography." But whether it is geography or...

... jugrafia, it cannot be the dividing line. Something psychological has to be understood. The East is obsessed with death; the West with sex. A materialist is bound to be obsessed with sex, and the spiritualist obsessed with death; and both are obsessions. And to live a life with any obsession, western or eastern, is to live almost without living... it is to miss the whole opportunity. The East and West...

..., if you are obsessed with anything, whether sex or death - those are the two main categories.... There are thousands of things in the world, but they will fall into these categories. If you are obsessed with either of these two, you are utterly ignorant, and you will remain afraid - in fact, afraid of light, because in your darkness you have created your own imaginary world of theories, dogmas and...

...; Diogenes laughed and said, "I am sorry to say that I could not find him. But I must say one thing: I still have my lamp with me. Nobody has stolen it, and that is great." Sigmund Freud was obsessed, but continues to represent the whole western attitude. That is why Carl Gustav Jung could not stay with him for long. The reason is simple; Jung's obsession was not sex but death. He needed a master...

... it for the first time - was that Jung's obsession was with death, and Freud's was with sex. They could not stay together for long, they had to part. The East, for thousands of years, has been morbidly engaged in somehow getting rid of life. Yes, I call it morbid. I love to call a thing what it is. A spade is just a spade, neither more nor less; I want simply to state the fact. The East has suffered...

... strange; it always visits the simplest, the loving. The East has missed, and the West is missing too. Both are lopsided. I had to talk about it because this is one of my basic contributions, that man should not be worried about either sex or death. He should be free from both obsessions, only then does he know, and he knows that, strangely enough, they are not different. Each moment of deep love is also...

... a moment of deep death. Each orgasm is also an end, a full stop. Something reaches to a height, touches a star, and will never be the same again whatsoever you do. In fact, the more you do, the farther away it is. But man lives almost like a rat, hidden in his hole. You may call it western, eastern, Christian, Hindu; there are thousands of holes available for all kinds of rats. But to be in a hole...

... death, is going to remain morbid, sick. If we want to have a healthy, wholesome humanity, then we will have to think in totally different terms. The first thing I want to say is: accept that which is already there. Sex is not your creation, thank God! Otherwise everybody would be using a different kind of mechanism, and there would be tremendous frustration because those mechanisms won't fit together...

... at all. They don't even fit when they are exactly the same, when they are meant to be in harmony; they don't harmonize. If everybody was inventing his own sexuality then there would be real chaos. You cannot conceive of it. It is good that you came ready-equipped, already what you are potentially going to be. And death too is such a natural thing. Just think for a moment: if you were to live...

... forever, what would you do? Remember, you would not be able to commit suicide. I have always loved Alexander's search for the secret of eternal life.... He finally found it, in the desert in Arabia. What joy! What ecstasy! He must have danced. But just then the crow said, "Wait, wait just a moment before you drink the water. That water is not ordinary water. I drank of it - alas. Now I cannot die...

... state the fact that if I was driving wrongly I would continue to do so. At that moment particularly I did not want to be taught. It was not any egoism. I am simple in that way. You can always tell me where I am wrong, and I am open to listen. But when I am doing something, I hate interference. Even though the intention may be good, I don't want it even for my own good. I would rather die driving...