Chapter 19

[A sannyasin, newly arrived from America, said she was constantly thinking of her husband whom she had left for someone else. She expressed a sense of guilt because she felt she was the reason for their separating.]

Mm, never think much about the past. That which is gone, is gone; you cannot undo it. If you constantly think about it you destroy your present and your future too, because that guilt will always be a barrier on love. Nothing can be done about it, so guilt is absurd. What can you do? All that you can do is please don't repeat the same pattern again, that's all. Whatsoever has happened had to happen. The situation was such that it had to happen; it was impossible to avoid it. If it was possible to avoid it, it would have been avoided.

This feeling of guilt is also part of the egoistic mind; it is nothing spiritual. Religions have been exploiting it, but it has nothing to do with spirituality. It simply says that you could have done otherwise. It is an ego feeling; as if you are not helpless, as if you were in control, as if it were your decision that you do this, as if it were in your hands not to do this and to do otherwise.

Nothing is m your hands. You yourself are not in your hands. Things are happening; nothing is being done. Once you understand this, guilt disappears. Sometimes you can cry and weep for something, but deep down you know it had to happen because you are helpless, a part of such a great totality - and you are such a tiny part. It is like when there is a leaf or a tree and a strong wind comes and the leaf is separated from the tree. Now the leaf thinks a thousand and one things - that it could have been that way and not this way; that this separation could have been avoided. What can a leaf do?

The wind was too strong.

The guilt goes on giving you the wrong notion that you are powerful, that you are capable of doing something. Guilt is the shadow of the ego: you could not change it, and now you are feeling guilty

for it. If you look deep into it you will see that you were helpless, and the whole experience will help you become less egoistic.

If you go on watching the shape things take, and the forms that arise, and the happenings that happen, by and by you drop your ego. Love happens - separation too. In fact man cannot do anything. The very notion that we can do is wrong, and out of that wrong concept many more wrong concepts arise. So look at the base. And this I call a spiritual attitude - when you understand that nothing can be done; when you understand that you are just a tiny part of such a tremendous vastness... such a tiny part of such a vast mechanism.

It is as if a screw in a big car thinks to avoid an accident. What can that screw do? Drop that idea - and with that idea the guilt will disappear. I am not saying don't do it again. I am saying that you have not done it.

Now let me tell you something else. The same ego that is creating the guilt is the same ego that may have been the cause for separating. The ego creates conflict; it does not allow love to flow. It does not allow surrender; it is always fighting and trying to possess. And the other is also trying to do the same. We are all travelling in the same boat - the boat of the ego. Everybody is trying to enforce his ego against others, trying to dominate, manipulate - that may have been the cause for the separation.

Now the same ego says that you are guilty. Drop that ego. Then you will see that love has a different quality in it. It is no longer possessive, no longer dominating, jealous; there is no more conflict. It is a beautiful sharing, very silent, soundless... it has a grace. Without the ego love is graceful. Only without the ego can love exist as love. With the ego it is corrupted, poisoned. Any love that is based on the ego is always on the rocks.

Now this is the dilemma: the ego creates the problem, and then the ego goes on thinking about guilt. Somebody says something and you become angry - it is the ego that becomes angry. Then later on you repent and you feel guilty - it is also the same ego. Now you are in a trap. First the ego becomes anger, and then it becomes repentance. When it becomes repentant. you think that now it is not the ego. You think that you have become very religious, spiritual, beautiful. It is nothing of the sort - it is a trick of the ego. Now the ego is deceiving you in a subtler form.

So drop the guilt. Now nothing can be done about that separation - gone, gone forever. Drop the ego, and learn the lesson that this has been the cause. The real problem is not the separation; the real problem is the ego. And if you go on playing games with it, the same pattern will go on and on being repeated.

In the beginning every love is beautiful, but that's not the point. If love is beautiful in the end, only then is it really beautiful. In the beginning every love is beautiful - that's a pretension. When reality is encountered, ugliness comes up. When your depth is stirred, the ugliness comes up; otherwise everybody is beautiful.

So now drop the ego. Be watchful and allow things. Don't try to dominate and manipulate. Don't be a manager - that's the ugliest thing in the world. Don't manage; let life flow through you. Remain open and floating... and trust wherever it leads, mm?

Much is going to happen ....

[A sannyasin said that since Osho had told her not to lead Encounter groups with Veeresh: I've been feeling angry, and angry against people like you; people like you and Laxmi (the secretary) and the ashram and anybody who waves a thing at me. But there's been nobody to react to.

I just feel really afraid...

Just a few times, very rarely, a spontaneous thing happens which I don't really know how it happened; don't know why. And there's a melting, a physical feeling.]

You remain with the state that you are in - don't try to avoid it. If you feel angry, feel angry. Remain with it. Because if you try to do something, you will suppress it. Remain with it; it will go by itself.

Nobody can remain in anger forever. It is hell, so how can one remain in it?

By and by you will be able to see that it has nothing to do with anybody else - those are just excuses.

You are angry with yourself. Deep down, whatsoever we are with others, we are with ourselves.

[She adds: It isn't the anger that predominates, it's the fear.]

They are the same. Fear is the feminine form. of anger, anger is the male form of fear; these are the two alternatives.

For example, watch a dog when a bigger dog comes. He shows anger and at the same time he goes on wagging his tail - he is showing both anger and fear. He has not yet decided. He is not certain what the situation is - whether the other dog is really bigger than him. If he is bigger, then the dog will drop the anger and catch hold of the fear. If the other is just bogus, only looks bigger and is not really, he will stop wagging his tail and will become angry. He is catching hold of both alternatives; they are always there.

If you can be angry, you will be. If you cannot be angry then you will be afraid. For example, if you are angry with me, what can you do You cannot do anything; fear will come. If you are angry against Veeresh you can fight and be nasty and things, but if you are angry with me you cannot do anything.

So, impotent anger becomes fear - they are both the same.

This time do one thing: remain with them. It will be a little arduous, but let it be this time. When they go, they go. If they don't go, you have to remain with them. If one can learn the knack of remaining with states, then sooner or later they will disappear on their own. That's why sometimes you feel a melting. That is bound to happen, because no one can remain in fear for long. It is such a negative state; it becomes too much, one needs a holiday from it. One cannot remain in anger for long; one needs a break, a tea-break.

And that's how the spontaneous thing is happening. When it becomes too heavy, suddenly, automatically.... It is an inner mechanism. When something becomes too much the mind automatically moves away; it looks in some other direction. Suddenly the gloomy clouds are there no more - just the open sky, the sunlight. But that is going to be momentary. Again you are fresh, the holiday has helped you. Again you are ready to be angry, to be sad. You will fall in the same trap again.

But let it be so. By and by you will become aware of what is happening; why these moments come and go. Once you understand the mechanism you become master of it. Not that you start manipulating it. Just the very understanding is the mastery. Not that one starts mastering it; there is no need. One simply understands - and laughs.

Then you will see that this anger has nothing to do with me, with Laxmi or with anybody else. You are really unsatisfied with yourself. You are not happy with yourself. You are missing something - and you go on throwing the responsibility on somebody else, as if someone is barring the path.

You are missing - no one is hindering you. Nobody can hinder anyone; that's impossible. But this is very defeating and makes one very depressed and desperate - if you feel that it is you who alone is responsible for it. In the first place you are unhappy, but then to feel that only you are responsible becomes double heavy. At least share the weight; you are unhappy and somebody else is responsible.

This is a trick of the mind - but it is not going to help. You will have to take one hundred percent responsibility, because that is how it is. And whenever you accept one hundred percent responsibility, you become free, and then there is no bondage in this world.

Tn fact anger is a bondage. I am not angry with you because I am not in a bondage. I have not been angry with anybody for years because I don't make anybody responsible. I am free, so why should 1 be angry? If I want to be sad, it is my freedom. If I want to be happy, it is my freedom.

Freedom cannot be afraid, freedom cannot be angry. Once you know that you are your world, you have penetrated into a different kind of understanding. Then nothing else matters - all else are games and excuses.

This time remain with it and suffer it. This suffering will be very very purifying... it will be a cleansing of the heart. Soon you will realise that you are playing a game of being unhappy. If you want to, that's perfectly okay; it's nobody else's business. If you are happy playing the game of being unhappy, be happy that way. Let it be your way.

But if you decide that when one has to play, and the decision is one's own, then why not play the game of being happy? If one has to play a game, then better play a game of being happy. If one has to play the game, play the game of being enlightened rather than ignorant - that's what I'm doing.

Mm? Why be a disciple? (chuckle) When there is a choice, be a master (She smiles)

[A sannyasin says: Since I arrived a week ago I've been feeling very negative, very unhappy. I've also been ill almost constantly. I didn't do the group you told me to do as I was too ill.

But I've also been feeling a lot of sort of hatred towards you - and I don't know why. When I left England I was very happy, happier than I've ever been in my life. And then I felt like I'd lost everything.

I felt very disillusioned and very sad. Now I feel a lot better and more positive.]

It happens, mm?... because first you create illusions in your mind, and then disillusion follows. First you create an imaginary world, a fantasy. That fantasy has to be destroyed.

Your positivity was false; it led you to a very extreme negativity. One moves from one extreme to another, but now the pendulum is settling, so don't be worried. If you love too much, you will hate too much. One should be a little moderate; a balanced attitude is needed.

The body also reacted because of the mind; they come together. The body helps the mind to become negative, and the mind helps the body. But wait, just a little time is needed for healing, and then you will be on level ground - not at the peak and not in the valley.

It is natural. If people come to me with too many fantasies, with a romantic attitude, this disillusionment happens. If you come very realistically, then this is not a problem.

But you have to pass through it. You have chosen it and nothing can be done. But it will go.

[A couple talk about relationship problems: she feels Osho has let her down; the boyfriend says she is telling lies and too possessive when he smiles at other women. They want to separate. The boyfriend says: But in a way we both had the feeling that we could create happiness for each other.]

Mm mm. No, if you feel that you can create happiness, then create it right now, not for tomorrow.

Tomorrow is very fallacious. In the hope of tomorrow you will create misery today.

Tomorrow never comes; it is always today - and you go on hoping for tomorrow.

[Osho said that if he loved her, he had to love her lies too; he would have to tolerate her nagging and possessiveness and the constant conflict.

The boyfriend said he couldn't do that, so Osho told him to decide for himself, saying that people rarely change, and that... ]

When you fall in love, you decide for yourself, and when you want to separate you come to me - so you can throw the responsibility on me. No one ever comes to say that they are falling in love. They come only when they are falling apart.

And she says I am putting her down. If I say separate, you will both be angry. If I say live together you will both be angry....

If I say live together, then whenever there will be conflict - and there will be twenty-four hours a day - you will be angry with me. You will say that this man is forcing us to live together - and of course you trust me, so you are living together.

But that is not the point. You are living together because you are infatuated - but the responsibility goes on me. If I say separate then you will miss her and she will miss you, and then you will be angry.

In fact for me there is nowhere to hide my head. You never leave any space for me - and whatsoever I say is going to be against me. And you come only when something is going wrong. Nobody comes to tell me that they are falling in love and to ask whether they should fall or not.

[The sannyasin replies: Yes, today I was aware that coming to you in a way was tiring you - with our problems.... ]

No, that is not the point. I would have stopped you then and there, because whenever two fools fall in love, there is going to be trouble. (laughter) And only fools fall in love, otherwise who bothers?

Now you decide (chuckling) - don't throw it on me....

I am also learning! You just go and decide, and whatsoever you decide to do, I bless! Right?

[Another sannyasin says: I'm a fool too... I'm in love. And this time I don't want to sabotage it, and I'd like you to say something.]

So don't repeat the old pattern, that's all. Be alert from the very beginning....

You know very well how you have been sabotaging your old relationships.

Take twenty-four hours and write down everything that you can remember of how you have been sabotaging - everything in detail. Look at it from every angle, and then don't repeat it. It will become a meditation, and whether love remains or not is immaterial. If you can remain aware in it, that will be worth something.

You know well, everybody knows - because it is impossible not to know what you do in your relationships. In your saner moments you know well. In your insaner moments you forget - that I know. So before these insane moments come, decide, and keep that copy with you. Whenever something is coming, look into it.

One should become alert by and by, and then everything is beautiful. Love is tremendously beautiful - but it can become a hell. So first you pinpoint all these things, and then don't do them. And you will feel very very happy; just being able not to do them, you will feel a certain liberation. Those things arc obsessive; they are like a neurosis, a sort of madness.

And whenever two people are in love they are there to be happy: nobody is there to be unhappy. And this is how everybody goes on being stupid. Sooner or later they start making each other unhappy, and then the whole point is lost - all dreams are shattered and again and again it becomes a wound.

Just try this time... mm? I will be watching.... Just continue. And very good - that you became aware from the very beginning is very good. It makes me happy.