All Becoming is Illusory

Anand means bliss, blissful, and daruma is a japanese name; a japanese form of an indian name.

The original name was bodhi-dharma - the founder of zen. The last part of his name, dharma, became in japan, daruma; bodhidharma means awareness nature. Dharma means the ultimate nature - that which is already the case, that which you are, that which you are not to become. There -is no question of becoming... it is your being.

And this is one of the most fundamental things to be understood: all becoming is illusory. All that you can become will be false. All that you are already, to know it, is to know the truth. One has to arrive where one has always been. One has to become that which one is already - and that is dharma. This is the japanese form - daruma; it is more soft, and more loving.

This man, Bodhidharma, was one of the rare flowerings of the world. If you count people of his calibre, they can be counted on the fingers. Not more than a dozen men like him have existed in the whole of human history.

His approach is not that of philosophy - his approach is that of awareness. One is not to learn, one is not to become more knowledgeable; one has simply to be aware of that which is.

When Bodhidharma reached China, the Emperor of China came to receive him on the border. He was expecting much, because many rumours had arrived that a rare being is coming, that a buddha is coming. The Emperor was a Buddhist, and he had done much for Buddhism in China. He was one of the main causes of China being converted to Buddhism.

The moment the Emperor met Bodhidharma, the first thing he asked was, 'Reverend sir, I have done so much for buddhism - so many scriptures have been translated, distributed all over the country, millions of copies, thousands of buddhist monks are fed by treasury, hundreds of monasteries are run by my treasury - and I have been doing whatsoever I can do to bring my country to the buddha feet. What is my merit?'

Bodhidharma looked at him and said, 'Merit? There is no merit in it!'

It was so unexpected - it was a shock. The Emperor must have thought in his mind, 'What type of man is this?' The emperor was on an ego trip in the name of religion, conversion, merit, virtue, he was trying to attain to some paradise - and here comes this man who says, 'No merit at all!'

The Emperor wanted to change the subject. He said, 'Okay. I would like one thing. I have been waiting for you to ask you, "What is the first principle of truth, of holiness?"'

Bodhidharma again looked into the emperor's eyes - and Bodhidharma had very penetrating eyes, dagger-like - and he said, 'It is so vast, it cannot be a principle. Principles are tiny and truth is so vast - it cannot be a principle, it cannot be a theory. And holiness? There is no holiness in it - it simply is!'

Now this was too much! The Emperor was offended. He must have thought in his mind, 'By what authority is this man saying this. The emperor had read all the scriptures and there was not a a single statement to support it!

In anger he asked, 'Then who are you standing before me?'

Bodhidharma laughed - an uproarious laugh, a lion's roar - and he said, 'I don't know, your majesty.'... A very rare man who can say, 'I don't know.'

This is what the taste of ultimate knowing is. To know, is to know that to know, is not to know. And not to know, is to know.

So while you are here, relax into ignorance, into not-knowing, and you will feel very very blessed.

Don't try to learn anything while you are here - unlearn. That was the whole teaching of dharma - unlearn, become unknowledgable.

' The mind is knowledge. When you drop knowledge, you drop the mind also. The mind dropped, there is nothing to attain - you have already attained. And that's what meditation is all about - the dropping of the mind, the dropping of that very project of knowledge. It is the greatest project of the ego - to know.

Once you decide that there is no need to know, then there is no worry. And in fact there is no possibility of knowing. Mystery is the intrinsic nature of things. They cannot be known. All knowledge is illusion.

[The sannyasin says: In the West... I have worked with the sufis... with Ilayat Khan.]

That's very good. So you have been in right hands! That's very good.

[A visitor says: I do not feel very much surrendered to everything and... I'm searching.]

There is no need to feel surrendered - there is no need. How can you feel surrendered? When it comes, it comes. There is no way to bring it. You cannot manage. It is something beyond you.

The surrender that you can do is useless, of no value, because if you do it, you remain the doer, and any moment you can undo it. You remain in control. So I am not interested in any surrender that you can do. Just be here, meditate, do a few groups, dance, feel me - just be in my presence - and one day it happens. When it happens it is like madness. It is not that you do it. How can you manage to be mad? Just think of it.

If you try to be mad, you will not be mad. You can pretend, you can act, but deep down, you will know that you are not mad. Surrender happens exactly like that. It is a madness. It is going berserk.

It is very crazy! It is beautiful! But it has nothing to do with you, your mind, your reason. It is more like infection....

Just be here, mm ? With these many orange mad people you may get infected. If you are searching and if you are open, it is going to happen - you cannot avoid long. Just remain available, so when it knocks at your door, it finds that you are ready to welcome, that's all.

And don't start thinking that you are not surrendered - not very much surrendered - because that creates a guilt! Then you feel that so many people surrendered and so many things happening, why are you not surrendered? How are you to surrender?

[She replies: I have a hard time with the difference between the ashram and outside. People on the street - they seem to me like being in hell and people here are lying around in their orange clothes, and with a lot of money, and it makes me feel very torn.]

Are you here to change other people, or to change yourself? Make it clear. If you are here to change others, then I am not interested in you - you can start doing some public service... something. Help people, become a christian missionary or something. Then it is your trip. I am not interested in people like that. If you are to change yourself, then you can be benefitted. But if you are interested in changing the world, it is your business - I am not interested. I am not a partner in that at all. The world is vast; if you want lo change it, you can.

Nobody has ever changed it up to now, and nobody is going ever to change it. It is so vast - you will simply be wasted. The very effort will destroy your life. What can you do? You have not made the world this way. You have just come in the middle - the drama has been going on for a long time, and when you are gone, the drama is going to continue. It will not stop by your going. There are millions and millions of people - and it is very complicated, and very complex.

If you are interested in changing the whole world, if you think before you can become silent, you have to silence the whole world, before you can enjoy, you have to make the whole world enjoy, then it is your trip - but it is doomed from the very beginning.

And this is one of the tricks of the mind to avoid inner search. You jump on every opportunity to avoid the inner search, so anything becomes a triggering. You start thinking about this and that - the difference, and the poverty and the beggars, and the people, and a thousand and one things. But if you are interested in that, you can be. I never want to change anybody. If this is your happiness, do it, but then you are in wrong company; don't waste your time here.

Because my whole approach is individual. I am not a socialist. I am absolutely individualistic. And I am absolutely unashamed in it. If you are interested in your being, in your transformation, then I am here, totally available... something can be done. So make that very clear in your mind, mm?

These people here are not social workers or social servants. These people are here for their absolutely selfish ends. And I teach them to be selfish, because to me that is the only way to be in the world. And if everybody is selfish, the world will be very very beautiful. These do-gooders are very dangerous people. They themselves are nowhere and they go on interfering in other people's lives.

My approach is very selfish. First, look at yourself. First let the light be there. First let love be there.

First let some inner treasure be available there... and then you can share. How can you share something that you don't have? You want to be loving - good! But do you have love? You would like to be compassionate, but do you have compassion?

Deep inside anger is boiling - and people are trying to be compassionate. Deep down is violence - and people are trying to be of service to others. Deep down is the murderer - and they go on saying, 'Love your enemy.' And they kill! They say, 'We are killing you for your own sake!' They destroy - but they destroy with a very good, happy, heart, because they are destroying you for your own good.

They are sacrificing their life in destroying you... they are martyrs. I don't teach any martyrdom.

My approach is very simple, and my understanding is this - that if everybody is selfish, the world will be very much better. If you can look into your own self, and you can look into your own happiness, if you can create a small pool of happiness within you, you will start vibrating, pulsating with happiness.

Whomsoever will come in contact with you will have a little share of it, because whatsoever we are, we are constantly giving it. Life is a continuous give and take. It is a pulsation, just like breathing - you breathe in, you breathe out.

If you are happy, happiness goes out, happiness comes in. If you are celebrating, your breathing becomes a celebration. You touch somebody's hand and you have transformed that man's being - at least for a moment; you have given him a glimpse, a taste. And of course you are related to many people, in many ways.... They all will start feeling.

Many many people who are selfish are needed in the world - they will become a small broadcasting station of happiness. And then whatsoever you feel like doing, you do. If you want to serve a beggar, serve. But first things first. Otherwise you cannot serve anybody because you have not served even yourself.

And god is not going to ask you, 'Why was somebody else a beggar, and somebody poor, and somebody dying?' - no. He will ask you, 'What have you done with yourself? I had given you an opportunity - has your seed sprouted? Have you flowered? Has your life been a fulfillment? Have you lived?'

If you don't live rightly, your whole energy becomes evil, des-tructive. Have you noticed the interesting fact that if you read the word 'live' backwards, it becomes 'evil' ?

Just spell your life a little wrongly, and everything goes rotten - it becomes evil.

So live truly, authentically, sincerely - that is the most funda-mental thing. I teach you life! I don't teach you service. Service comes as a shadow. A really alive person is continuously sharing his energy - whatsoever he has - because he knows that the more you share, the more you have.

So, that you have to decide, otherwise meditation will not be possible, because meditators are bound to be selfish people.

A meditator is simply forgetting the whole world. There are so many problems in the world - and he is sitting with closed eyes under his bodhi tree, meditating, watching his navel! He is really not a good person at all! There are people dying - you should go and help them to live. There are hungry people. There are orphans, there are wars going on - you should do something! And you are sitting under the tree and gazing at your navel.... Have you gone mad?

But a buddha, a christ, a krishna - they all flowered in deep silence. Of course once you have flowered, your fragrance can go to the winds, but never before! You don't have anything!

So my suggestion is: first be selfish, then altruism will come on its own accord. Then it has a beauty... a totally different quality. Then you are not a do-gooder. You don't impose anything on anybody. You are a sharer, and to whomsoever accepts some-thing from you, you feel grateful, because he has accepted something from you. Then there is no ego trip.

Just be here, meditate a little, do a few groups... and surrender to me is going to happen. If you ask me, it is already there. But you can wait, and think, and whenever you feel ready, come back and become a sannyasin. Or if you feel ready right now this moment, become a sannyasin this moment.

[The encounter group is present. The leader comments: ... many people are saying they know but they don't feel. They get the idea but not the feeling.]

Mm mm. That is one of the problems for the modern man - the feeling and the thinking have fallen very far apart. So it is bound to come again and again.

Tell them to move into some emotion - any will do. Anger will do, crying will do, laughter will do, loving will do, touching will do. So make some devices in which the person can be led slowly into some emotion.

Touching is very very meaningful. In fact, if the mother has not touched the child very deeply, the child will always remain divided between feeling and thought. Much hugging is needed - and that has disappeared. Breast-feeding is needed, otherwise the child never starts feeling. Now in the west, mothers don't like to breast-feed because their breasts will lose shape. They don't want to hug too much... touch is almost a taboo.

I was just reading about one japanese sculptor whose works were being shown in New York. The curators of the american museum were very much confounded, because he insisted on one thing which was never heard of before. He insisted that below each of his statues he wanted a small sign - there was no trouble; they said that he could have a sign - but the sign read: 'Please touch' - statues! He said, 'I won't allow my work if these signs are not allowed in the museum. Then there is no need for my exhibition. Unless somebody touches my statues, how is he going to feel?'

The curators could not believe what this foolish artist was wanting, because in american museums you have the sign, 'Don't touch! Keep aloof!'

And that is not only in the museum - in life also, touching has disappeared. So this is the problem that arises - the person has not been touched in his childhood, so he does not know how to feel, because touch brings the feel.

You can devise methods. If somebody says he cannot feel, then let him lie down - touch him, hug him, let him feel the warmth of the body. Mothering techniques will be needed. If a woman can help, it will be good. If the woman can play the role of the mother, it will be good. Let him move backwards again to his childhood - when he was small and he was hankering for warmth. Warmth is food for the feeling part - that's what is needed.

Then he will start moving into emotions. He may start crying... then help him. He may get angry, may move into a tantrum... then help him. But touch seems to be the gateway, so try with touch methods.

[A group member says: It's a hard group, but a lot of things have happened already.]

I know.... It is hard because a few blocks have to disappear, and whenever a block has to disappear, it feels very very painful. It hurts, because the block has become part of your body, your mind... it is part of you. You have become connected with it, and then you have to drop it - it hurts. But once you have passed through it, it is such a relief and such a freedom.

The group has helped you tremendously. And the harder the group, the more it helps, because whatsoever feels comfortable simply means that it fits with your pattern. And whatsoever feels uncomfortable means it doesn't fit with your pattern, so you have to change the pattern somewhere.

If one becomes defensive, the opportunity is lost. If one remains courageous, and goes into it howsoever it hurts - it cannot kill - one becomes more freed, more flowing.

And one thing I wanted to say to you: last time I deliberately tried to confuse you. It is one of the oldest techniques; I call it the confusion technique. I wanted to see how it affects you. And its purpose is fulfilled, so you can forget whatsoever I said to you in the last darshan, and you can revert back to the first darshan. You need not be worried about forgetting, moving into oblivion; forget about it, mm? Simply remain alert, aware.

I wanted to see how you reacted to it. You tried your best, but it won't fit with your nature. I wanted to see exactly if it can fit with your nature or not, because if it can fit with your nature, awareness won't be of much help - but it cannot fit.

And there is no way to know before you try, because man is not a mechanism - man is a freedom.

All possibilities are open, so one has to try. And it is always good to try the opposite. It imme-diately makes things clear. If you are trying awareness, it is good sometimes to try unawareness. Then things become very clear - whether you can move into it or not.

If you cannot move at all... and you tried, but you cannot move into it at all. It won't come naturally to you. So now we can move to awareness. Follow awareness and remain alert, and watchful, and a witness.

And always remember, whatsoever I say, even if sometimes it feels contradictory, try to do it.