Darshan 16 September 1978

[A sannyasin asks what to do to help herself in the west. She likes the kundalini meditation most.]

Then continue Kundalini, but make it regular; never miss it even for a single day. If you are traveling and it is not possible, then too for one hour just sit silently and do it inside in fantasy, and the same will be the result. Because as far as the result is concerned, whether you do it physically or just mentally, it is the same.

[A sannyasin says: When you gave me the mala you told me, "From this moment you are in the service of God." I want to know what that means - to be in the service of God.]

That simply means to live a life of love. Let love become the source of all your acts. There are people who do everything for money - their source is that; there are people who do everything for their egos - that is their orientation. To be in the service of God means: let love be the orientation.

Everything has to be sacrificed to love and love has not to be sacrificed to anything else. Love has to be the summum bonum - the highest good, the supreme value.

So whenever you are deciding to do something, just remember: are you doing it out of love or not?

If it is out of love it is an offering unto the divine. If it has some other considerations then it is not in the service of God. Slowly slowly you will become very very capable of knowing immediately; even before you have moved in any act you will know from where you are moving. And it is so self-evident that it needs no other proof from the outside.

It is just as when you are feeling ill, you know. There may be no symptom on the outside, the physician may not be able to find any symptom, but you know deep down that you are no more in a state of well-being. And when you are in a state of well-being, you know that too.

Just like that, when you act out of love you will feel a great well-being arising in you. You will feel uplifted; you will feel weightless. And when you act out of anything other than love you will feel dragged down to the earth. Slowly the feeling will become so clear that there will be no need to make a mental question. The heart will know even before the mind has questioned. And I can see your energy moving in the right direction.

Paravrati means turning-in. It is one of the most significant words; it is the whole secret of life, of love, of light. All the religions are based on this single secret, paravrati: how to turn in.

The mind is always moving outwards. It flows outwards, that's its natural flow. Just as water flows downwards, the mind flows outwards. The mind cannot tum in. You can tum in, the mind cannot; it is impossible for the mind, hence when you tum in, the mind disappears. In the very process of turning in, no-mind arises. The mind simply means energy moving outwards. No-mind means energy not moving outwards. Energy is just there, at the center, unmoving, and that unmoving energy is the door to the divine.

God is not there, God is not like a goal. God is not where you are going - God is from where you are coming. God is your original space. God is at the very beginning; it is the source. But we go on and on searching, and the more we search, the farther away we are, because every search takes us on long joumeys. Each joumey is going away from yourself, so no joumey brings you to yourself.

All journeys are distractions.

The person who is searching for money is distracted from his being, and so is the person who is searching for God. Their objects are different but their process is the same. The man who desires power has to run out, and the man who desires heaven has also to run out. Hence, in non-desiring the turning-in happens. Desire is turning-out; no-desire is turning in.

One has to understand the process of desire; it is the process of extroversion. Once you have understood the process of desire, in that very understanding desire disappears. One cannot drop desire, remember, because if one wants to drop desire, that again is a desire. If somebody thinks, "Enlightenment will be attained if I drop desire," then this is a new desire - for enlightenment; it is a vicious circle. You carmot drop desire; desire will come in from the back door again. Desire can only be understood. That's all there is. You have to see that desire takes you farther and farther away from yourself. Seeing it, desire stops.

It is instantaneous - just as when you see a snake on the path and you jump. Not that you decide logically, "Here is a snake, and snakes are dangerous, and they can bite and I can die - therefore jumpl" There is no logical process. You see the snake... and the jump. There is not a gap between seeing and jumping. It is simultaneous; not even a split second divides the act from the understanding.

Exactly like that, when you see the futility of desire - that it takes you away from yourself, that it takes you away from your original source, from your original face, that it takes you away from your nature, from your spontaneity - seeing it... paravrati, turning-in!

So watch desire... just watching, observing, seeing the ways of the desire and the subtle, cunning strategies of it and how it always comes. It even starts thinking "How to drop desire?" - it starts desiring the state of no-desire too. See this whole game, and seeing it one day, suddenly one is sitting alone and there is no desire, no desire around - in that very moment suddenly one finds oneself at home. That's what enlightenment is, and that's what the experience of God is.

Chinmatra. It means: only consciousness. All else is appearance - the reality consists only of consciousness. This has been the experience of all the mystics down the ages - of a Christ, of a Buddha, of a Krishna. But for the first time in this century, even science is coming very close to this understanding, because now science says there is no matter. One tremendously significant step has been taken by physics: the recognition that there is no matter. This is half the journey. If there is no matter, then sooner or later the other part is going to be revealed to the scientific vision also, because this has been the dichotomy down the ages: matter and consciousness.

The scientist has been continually denying consciousness and believing in matter, and the mystics have been denying matter and believing in consciousness. Now science is agreeing more with the mystics than with its own predecessors. They have taken half the step - that matter doesn't exist.

The other half has yet to be realized, but it is not very far away, because if matter does not exist then what does? Science calls it "energy," "electricity," but they are coming closer. Energy is closer to consciousness than matter ever was. Consciousness is a form of energy; energy is a form of consciousness.

"Chinmatra" simply means: only consciousness is true... and this has to become your foundation.

Remember it continuously: only consciousness is true and all else is just a dream. And I am not saying to deny the dream or to renounce the dream, but only to remember; just remembering it is enough. The dream still continues. It is like a film on the screen: sometimes you get lost in it, sometimes you forget that this is just a film projected on the white screen, the empty screen; there is nothing in it. Sometimes you get lost in it, you become identified. Sometimes you cry and weep, or laugh, but sometimes you remember suddenly, "This is just a film, a story, with no substance iII it." Then you start feeling embarrassed, looking ridiculous to yourself. It happens exactly the same way. But when you remember this is just a film, still the film continues; just by your remembering it does not stop.

So is the case with the world: the world continues; even for a Buddha the world continues as it continues for everybody else. The only difference is that the Buddha continuously remembers that this is just a dream, a play of consciousness, nothing to be attached to, nothing to be obsessed with, nothing to possess, nothing to be possessed by. Hence the man who remembers it remains aloof, detached, cool moves in the world and remains unaffected by it And that's the whole beauty of a religious man: being in the world and yet not affected by it, being in the marketplace and yet continuing one's meditation, being in the thick of the dense affairs of the world and yet in a very playful mood, knowing perfectly well it is a dream, a part to be fulfilled, a role to be played, but nothing to be serious about.

This awareness unburdens, this awareness liberates.

Prem means love, dasi means a servant - a servant of love. And to be a servant of love is to become a master. Only one who serves love becomes a master, and only that person. Others remain slaves.

Others pretend to be masters but are not. They think they possess their possessions but the reality is that their possessions possess them. They are slaves of a thousand and one desires. Their life is a continuous life of slavery. They live imprisoned in their own desires.

Love liberates. Love is not a desire. Desire is begging. Love gives, hence the mastery that comes through love. Love gives unconditionally; love knows only how to give. Desiring is just the oppOSite process: it begs, snatches, steals, exploits; it is always trying to get more and more from others. So love is not a desire but just the opposite of desire. And if love is also a desire, then it is lust; it is not love.

Many people are very confused between lust and love. Love is a totally different dimension. Love is not of the mind; love is divine. It comes from the beyond - it is not of the world. And once you have started serving love you are rich, because the more you give, the more you receive from the beyond. And only the giver can be the emperor.

My message is basically of love. That's what I teach as meditation and I teach as prayer and I teach as God. If a man knows how to be loving he has known all that is worth knowing. If a man has come to know the flavor of love his life is fulfilled. He has come to bloom and his fragrance is released to the winds. Now there is no grudge, no complaint, only gratitude.

[A sannyasin is in love and says: I feel so dependent. I feel love, ready to love, but whenever I don't get it back I feel so alone, so empty. I know it's an old conditioning and I want to get rid of it.]

It is a natural process. The beginning of love is always muddy. It is full of jealousy, possessiveness, bargaining. It is of dependence, and because there is dependence, there is anger too. Nobody wants to be dependent. To feel dependent on somebody naturally creates anger towards the person, because he becomes your imprisonment. But in the beginning love is always dependent. In the beginning the love is exactly like the love of a child for the mother. The child is dependent, and completely helpless, and knows perfectly well that his survival is in the mother's hands. That is the first experience of love, and whenever you move in love that will always be the first experience again, because that's how you have leamed love.

Millions of people remain stuck at that first love and they miss all the beauties and the heights of love. The lotus is never born; they remain in the mud. So this is nothing wrong in itself; it will become wrong only if you become confined to it. Otherwise it is a good beginning; in itself there is nothing wrong. You follow me? If you remain confined in it, if your love does not grow beyond it, then it is ugly. But it can grow beyond it, and you are conscious about it - that it should grow beyond it - so you can help it grow.

This is how one has to pass through these phases of suffering. Those painful moments that come are needed; through them you are cleansed, purified; through them you become integrated. Through them you become an individual.

Hence the second thing: whenever you are in love, only then do you start feeling lonely. The person who has never loved never feels lonely. Why should he feel lonely? He has never felt togetherness.

So only the lover knows what loneliness is. The non-lover never knows any loneliness because he does not know the opposite of it; he has nothing to compare with. If you have never seen light you will never see darkness. How can you see darkness without seeing light? Once you have seen light, even as lightning, just for a moment, then suddenly there is darkness. It has always been there but now you become aware of it.

Man is born alone, but is not aware unless love happens. When love happens like lightning, suddenly you start feeling very lonely. It looks very paradoxical, because people think, "When we are in love we will not be lonely." That is all nonsensel When you are in love then only will you know that you are lonely. But that loneliness has to be transformed into aloneness. That loneliness has to be respected, loved, nourished. That loneliness has not to be taken as an enemy but as a friend.

So when it happens, just close your eyes and go into it. Make it a meditative space, and you will be surprised: slowly slowly you will start enjoying it, because it is beautiful, because it has freedom, it has space, it has infinite space. Loneliness has to be transformed into aloneness through meditation; meditation is the bridge which takes you from loneliness to aloneness. But one has to be very patient; these are delicate phenomena.

The people who live a gross life never become aware of these things. The grossest people are those who are not even aware of loneliness. They have never loved - they may know something about sex but they know nothing about love. Sex is using the other person like a machine. You are not together with the other, you are just using the other; and when the use is finished, the other is finished.

That's why prostitution exists in the world - because millions of people live at that stage. They don't want love; in fact they are afraid of love. They want only sex. Sex is no problem for them because it never gives them the taste of togethemess; hence they never feel lonely. That is their strategy to avoid loneliness. Unless people become more loving, prostitution is not going to disappear from the world. These are very complex problems: prostitution exists because there is no love and the priests have helped prostitution in the world because they have been teaching people things which go against love. If people are unloving, prostitution is going to exist.

It is not that prostitution exists only with the prostitutes. Even your so-called marriage is nothing but prostitution - a long-term arrangement, that's all, a lifelong arrangement, that's all. It is prostitution; the base is economic, financial. A person goes to the prostitute only for one night, pays the fee and is finished. To the wife he goes on paying for his whole life. It is simply a permanent kind of prostitution - but love is not there... and only love can destroy prostitution in the world.

If what I am teaching here spreads, if it becomes epidemic, then prostitution can disappear from the world, otherwise not.

People want sex because it never gives them the taste of togethemess, hence no fear of being alone; that is the very gross level of life. The second stage is: people have a little affair with love, just a little affair of love. They are afraid of going deep into it so are just on the threshold; but then they start feeling lonely. That's where you are. Now there are only two ways: either you fall back to the gross level where sex is the only reality and love is just a poetic fantasy - all nonsense, fiction - or you go beyond this threshold into the temple of love and go beyond loneliness towards aloneness.

Meditation will be of immense help; in fact only meditation can be of any help. It is only through meditation that one's love grows higher and higher. Meditation is the fire that purifies the gold of love. And when you have started feeling alone, then there will be no dependence. You know aloneness is absolute; there is no way to be other than it. And it is beautiful because it is freedom.

And out of aloneness you can love. Then love is a sharing. Then you don't hanker for the return; all dependence disappears. But these higher peaks of love have to be searched for. In fact, temples should exist in the world where this is taught - where the art is taught. In the ancient temples it was part of the process, that love was taught, and people were brought to the climax of what love can be at its peak.

So don't be afraid - go into it. And remember: love brings great ecstasy but also brings great agonies; they come together. They are like the two wings of a bird. Accept both....

[A sannyasin is going back to the West. He hopes that doesn't mean he'll be going back to sleep.]

No, it will not be so easy. To be with me and then to fall back is almost impossible. You will not be able to manage itl You are in for a great surprise! The process has started. The process of awakening has taken roots; there is no way to destroy it. It will go on growing, in spite of the situations. And you will feel enhanced, benefited by going away; you will become more confident of yourself.

When you are here, you are never certain whether it is really happening to you or whether it is the whole impact of the atmosphere. Here it is almost as if you are in a hothouse. Going to the West, going to the world, is a little fearful, but it is always beneficial because soon you will see that whatsoever has happened to you cannot be taken away. So it has really happened to you - it was not just the atmosphere, the climate of so many sannyasins and so many meditators; it was not just a certain psychic sphere but something has really happened in you. And the only way to know about it is to go far away from me.

Suddenly you will be surprised - that not only can the world not destroy it, but on the contrary it enhances it. Because of the contrast you become more aware of it, more crystal-clear aware of it; the world defines it. Here you remain in a kind of undefined state because so many things are happening to so many people. And it is a commune. A commune means where people are communing with each other, so one is never certain what is happening to one and what is happening to others. People go on pouring their energies into each other - it is all one phenomenon, a tidal wave.

There you will be alone, and you will be more clearly aware of what has happened to you, what is yours. And once you start feeling this is yours, you are grounded. You can stand on your own, you can face the world, and the world cannot destroy you. The world is very poor, it is very weak; it is not a strong thing. It is strong because we are weak. Once we are a little strong in our being, the world is just impotent; it can't do a thing.

And the process has started: you have moved from your old state. Something new has taken shape - it will become more clear.