Chapter 9

[A sannyasin says things are going better]

There is no end to it. Things go on bettering and bettering, and that's the beauty of it. That's why life is eternal and has no death. Once a thing is perfect, finished, it is dead. Love remains unfinished.

Imperfection is intrinsic to it, and that's its eternal life.

It is just like God - God is never finished. There is always more to be done, and the more you do, the more possibilities open. And each moment can bring so much bliss and peace, that ordinarily we cannot even dream about it - because our dreams are also part of our tense mind.

There are a few things that once you have become certain about them, you start relaxing. Once you have chosen a lover and it has become a commitment, a decisive moment has come. Until you decide, there is wavering. Once you have decided then there is no going astray. By and by the mind also leaves the fantasy part; it settles. Once you have decided that this is a commitment, that you are to be in it, remain in it, and there is no other alternative; when you have closed all the doors and only one door remains open, you simply relax, because there is no tension. Tension is always of choice. All tension, all worry, is because of possibilities, alternatives. Then there is madness, mm?

because infinite possibilities are there....

There are millions and millions of people on the earth, and each one is a potential lover to you. Each one I say, because from any of these millions of people, anybody could have become a lover to you.

If you keep thinking about it, you will simply go crazy.

That's how the West is going crazy. Now neurosis is not a disease there, it is a normal thing. And as I understand it, neurosis arises when you miss love - it is an absence of love. There are many lovers but love is missing. And love asks for you totally - less than that won't do.

So once you are certain and you have chosen, wavering stops. Once the mind knows that the decision is ultimate, final, suddenly you will find that the thinking and the fantasies disappear. Then there may be millions of people, but there is no man except your lover; there is no woman except your beloved. Others are all on the periphery, and are no longer potential lovers. Then love takes a deep jump into being. Then you need not stand on the bank and waver - you can jump. Then things better on their own accord, and they go on bettering.

Every day more and more and higher and higher peaks will be available, but they are available only to those to whom love is a commitment.

Now the new generation is uncommitted. They would like to be in love, related, but they don't want to make a commitment. Unless you make a commitment, love remains casual: two surfaces meet, or in fact pretend to meet. Two persons remain two: two circles with just their peripheries meeting, there is no overlapping. This is my definition: if there is only a superficial touch it is a casual relationship - two strangers meet for the time being, and tomorrow morning they go on their own way. They don't care about each other in any way. They use the opportunity and then move. They use the other as a means. The other is not an end, not of value in himself.

But when two circles overlap, love arises. Then you are part of your lover and your lover is part of you. You penetrate each other; you get involved, entangled - then your beings are hooked. Depth meets with depth, and then it is no longer casual; it takes a different dimension. Now if your lover goes away, something from your depth will be missing... you will miss a part of you.

It is beautiful. Keep that part like a shrine, pure and virgin. Once you start celebrating this overlapping of beings - that's what love is - then by and by more and more overlapping happens.

There is overlapping, but there are still two different centres. Sometimes, in rare moments, there will be a jump as if two flames jump and become one. In those rare moments the two centres are not two. It is not simply overlapping; the two circles fit exactly over each other.

If you ask me, that's what I call love-making: not two bodies on each other, but two beings on each other. There is a rhythm in which both are lost, and something greater than both of them surrounds them. These are the rare moments. I call these moments prayer.

The first is just a sexual contact - two peripheries meeting. The second is love - two centres meeting. And when there are no circles, or when the two circles have become one and the centres are one, there arises prayer. Prayer is the highest function of love, sex is the lowest, and love is just in the middle. You can fall down and become sexual, or you can rise and become religious.

So remember that the mind is addicted to wavering. With no wavering you will enjoy more and more. More and more you will become relaxed, calm and quiet. A certain coolness will settle within; nothing can distract it, nothing can disturb it. One becomes a cool pool of energy.

[A sannyasin says: I feel that every time I come, I come with the same question but I give it a different shape... ]

It is bound to be the same because it comes out of your mind, and the mind is a repetition. It is never original, and cannot be by its very nature. It will go on repeating the same thing again and again, of course in different words - that's the delusion mind creates, as if a new question has arisen.

But still, ask.

[She answers: I feel that whatever I do, even in beautiful things, there is always something missing, something that is somewhere out of tune.

Even in my relationship - I have been now one year with Chinmaya - and still even in the beautiful moments I feel that something is tense somewhere, something is fighting somewhere.... ]

You can make a problem out of it, and then there will be no solution. In the first place don't make a problem out of it. It is not a problem. If you understand it well you will feel it to be a blessing.

Every lover feels that something is missing, because love is unfinished. It is a process, not a thing.

Every lover is bound to feel that something is missing - but don't interpret it wrongly. It simply shows that love in itself is a dynamic thing. It is just like a river, always moving, always moving. In the very movement is the life of the river. Once it stops it becomes a stagnant thing; then it is no longer a river. The very word river shows a process, the very sound of it gives you the feeling of movement.

Love is a river, it is not a thing, a commodity. So don't think that something is missing; it is part of love's process. And it is good that it is not completed. When something is missing you have to do something. That is a call from higher and higher peaks. Not that when you reach them you will feel fulfilled... love never feels fulfilled. It knows no fulfillment, but it is beautiful because then it is alive for ever and ever.

And you will always feel that something is not in tune. That too is natural, because when two persons are meeting, two different worlds are meeting. To expect that they will fit perfectly is to expect too much, is to expect the impossible, and that will create frustration. Something will always be out of tune. If you fit completely and there is nothing out of tune, the relationship will become stagnant.

At the most there are a few moments when everything is in tune, rare moments. Even when they come you may not be able to catch them they are so swift, so rare. They have not come and they are already gone - just a glimpse. And that glimpse will make you more frustrated, because then you will see more and more that things are out of tune.

This is how it has to be. Make all efforts to make that in-tuneness, but always be ready if it doesn't happen perfectly. And don't be worried about it, otherwise you will fall more and more out of tune.

It comes only when you are not worried about it. It happens only when you are not tense about it, when you are not even expecting it - just out of the blue. It is a grace, a gift of God.

Love is not a thing you can do. But by doing other things, love will happen. There are small things you can do - sitting together, looking at the moon, listening to music - nothing directly to do with love.

Love is very delicate, fragile. If you look at it, gaze at it directly, it will disappear. It comes only when you are unaware, doing something else. You cannot go directly, arrow-like. Love is not a target. It is a very subtle phenomenon... it is very shy. If you go direct, it will hide. If you do something direct, you will miss.

The world has become very stupid about love. They want it immediately. They want it like instant coffee - whenever you want, order, and it is there. Love is a delicate art; it is nothing you can do really.

Sometimes those rare blissful moments come... then something of the unknown descends. You are no longer on the earth, you are in paradise. Reading a book with your lover, both deeply absorbed in it, suddenly you find that a different quality of being has arisen around you both; something surrounds you both like an aura, and everything is peaceful. But you were not doing anything directly. You were just reading a book, or just going for a long walk, hand in hand against the strong wind - suddenly it is there. It always takes you unawares. So learn to do things together.

I have watched so many people, thousands of couples. People have completely forgotten the language of doing things together, or not doing anything, just being together, just being. People have forgotten that. If they have nothing to do they make love. Then nothing happens, and by and by they are frustrated by love itself, and then the whole of life loses meaning, because if love loses meaning, life loses meaning.

Man and woman are different - not only different, they are opposite, they cannot fit together. And that's the beauty - when they fit together it is a miracle, a magic moment. Otherwise they conflict and fight. That's natural and can be understood, because they have different minds. Their outlooks are polar opposites. They cannot agree on anything, because their ways are different, their logic is different.

To fit in a deep tune, to fall in deep harmony, is almost miraculous. It is like a kohinoor, and one should not ask for it every day. One should not ask for it as part of a routine. One should wait for it. Months, sometimes years pass, and then suddenly it is there. And it is always out of the blue, uncaused, mm?

Do you follow me? Don't be worried - it will take care of itself. And don't become a seeker after love, otherwise you will miss it completely.

[A sannyasin said that she was very upset during the visit of a friend of hers, as she felt he had attacked her about sannyas and Osho very aggressively. She said she felt very inadequate in trying to convey her feelings to him.

Osho said how useless it is to try and communicate to someone what you are experiencing here....]

This is something that cannot be intellectually communicated. It is just as if you have fallen in love.

You cannot convince anybody about why you have fallen in love; there is no why to it. If you try to argue about it you will be in difficulties, because you will feel that you cannot convince. And the other person will start defending himself.

[Osho went on to say that when the friend had come to darshan he had not been aggressive towards Osho. Osho said the aggression wasn't in fact against him or sannyas but in defence of himself, that he was unconsciously getting ready to take sannyas himself.... ]

Leave these people to me... I have my ways! I am here for these people, so don't be worried! You just give me the hint that you want this person to be a sannyasin, and I will do!...

[Another sannyasin expressed his feelings by quoting an italian proverb to Osho: All smoke, no fire.]

(a chuckle) Right! One day will come when you will be all flame and no smoke. I will turn the proverb upside down!

Thoughts are like smoke and you are the flame. When there are too many thoughts the flame is lost in the smoke. Then one feels that one is just smoke - but I know that wherever there is smoke, there is bound, to be a flame... smoke cannot exist on its own.

In India we have another proverb - just like that but better. We say: Wherever there is smoke, there is bound to be a flame.

So don't be worried.... go back and smoke a little more!

[A sannyasin said that he had two problems, one of which concerned sex. He asked Osho what he could do. He also said he would like to go and play the traditional sadhu baba game.]

Then sex will remain a problem - that is part of old sadhu baba. Don't try to solve it because all old sadhu babas are so; that is part of it, that is part of the game.

If you really want to get rid of the sexual problem then that nonsense won't do. The whole past of humanity has suffered from sexual problems, and only modern man is becoming a little alert about solving it, and that too, only a little. The future will solve it - the past was too sex-obsessed. So now I understand where the problem is; it is clear. Either you drop that old game - be modern - or suffer.

[The sannyasin asked: What does it mean to be modern?]

For that you will have to be here for a few months, and do a few therapies. I cannot say anything that will solve it immediately.

It is not an intellectual problem. It has to do with your body, your mind, your whole system - so a few therapies will be needed. Work will have to be done on your body and your mind. You have been suppressing, and when you suppress, things become problematic. You are too complex inside.

So you can go on playing the game, but you are wasting your whole life. You are not befooling anybody else; you are befooling yourself. Don't waste life. Use it to solve your problems, because unless you are completely clear of problems, you cannot know what life is. And much work is needed... so think about it. If you want to be here then work can be started, mm?

Prem means love, and prasant means silent - silent love. Love is always silent... and I will teach you what silent love is.

[A sannyasin says he is fighting: It's in the body. In the lectures I feel more, and my body becomes chaotic. I become frightened because I feel I am going to scream and so I go out.]

You are escaping, and unless you give in, that pain won't disappear. Simply surrender to it, let it take over: It will come to a climax and will become almost unbearable. But don't escape, allow it. Even if you feel you are going to die, die. Don't stop it.

A scream will come - so go to the river far away, and just let it happen. Lie down on the bank and let the scream come. Don't force it. First allow the pain to take over. . . it will spread and will take over your whole body. You will be almost in hell. It will become more and more intense, and you will feel that you are going to explode and die.

Then a scream will come that you will not be able to believe is yours. It will be almost like an animal, a lion's roar. It will be an unearthly scream, as if ghosts are being released. Allow it, be totally with it, and it will disappear.