There can be no regret

Tao is not rational. It is not anti-rational either. Its is superrational. Life is more than reason. Life is more than can be understood by the mind. Life has to give you more than you can learn. It is bigger than your capacity of learning. It is bigger than you can ever know, but it can be felt.Tao is intuitive.

Tao is more total. When you approach life through the head, and only through the head, it is a part approach; misunderstanding is bound to be there. A man who is trying to figure it out is bound to fall into a tremendous trap and will not be able to come out of it easily. Once you start intellectualising about life, you start going astray. Live has to be lived. Life has to be lived existentially and not intellectually. Intellect is not a bridge., but a barrier.

This has to be understood-then the parable is of tremendous importance. And we are going to go into it very slowly, trying to understand each sentence in it, each word actually.

The Confucian approach is a mind approach. The Taoist approach is a no-mind approach.

Confucius thinks about life. Lao Tzu, Chuang Tzu, Lieh Tzu, don't think about life because they say: You can go on thinking and thinking about and about, and you will go round and round and you will never reach to the centre. About and about is not the way. Go directly, be immediate. SEE life, don't think about it.

Always remember, the menu is not the dinner. You can go on studying the menu - that is not going to help. You will have to eat, you will have to swallow, you will have to digest, you will have to be existentially connected with your food, you will have to absorb it into your being, you will have to make it a part of your being. Just studying the menu or the cookbook is not going to help. The scholar goes on studying the menu: the more hungry he becomes, the more he studies the menu; and, naturally, the scholar remains one of the most hungry persons in life. He has never lived, he has never loved, he has never taken any risk, he has never moved, never danced, never celebrated; he has just been sitting there and thinking about it. The scholar has decided that first he has to understand intellectually, then he will move. Now this is no way to move. First you have to move and then comes understanding.

Many people come to me and they say that they would like to become sannyasins. They are attracted by the idea, they are intrigued, but they have to think about it. Naturally, they say that first they have to think about it, then they will decide. How can you think about sannyas? What will you think about? It is an inner experience, it is something of the inner space, it is a contact with me of the inner; nobody can watch it. You can watch sannyasins, but you cannot know anything about sannyas by watching sannyasins. Even if the sannyasin himself tries to figure it out intellectually, he will not be able to. Sannyas has to be tasted - even then it is very difficult to explain it intellectually. But to think about it without moving into it is impossible. It is as if somebody says 'First I will have to know about love and then I will love.' How are you going to know about love? The only way to know about love is to fall in love - there is no other way. You can go to the library, you can ask many people, you can consult books and encyclopaedias, and you will find a thousand and one things about love, but not love. You may become too much of a scholar, your mind may become stuffed with information; but information is not knowing.

Knowledge is not knowing. It can deceive you, but it cannot deceive life. As far as life is concerned you will remain a desert - the flower of love will never bloom in your being. So with sannyas. So with everything that is significant. So with everything that is organic. So with everything that is alive.

This is the basic standpoint of Tao.

Now this parable.

WHEN LIN LEI WAS NEARLY A HUNDRED, HE PUT ON HIS FUR COAT IN THE MIDDLE OF SPRING, AND WENT TO PICK UP THE GRAINS DROPPED BY THE REAPERS, SINGING AS HE MADE HIS WAY THROUGH THE FIELDS.

Lin Lei is a Taoist Master, but as Taoist Masters are, they live a very ordinary life. They don't live in any extraordinary way, they don't claim that they are special beings, talented geniuses, sages, saints, MAHATMAS; they don't claim anything. They simply live a very ordinary life because they are natural beings: natural like the trees, natural like the birds, natural like nature itself. They are not in any way egoistic. For example, if in India you want to find out where the MAHATMAS are you can easily find them. But if you had gone to visit ancient China and wanted to know a Taoist Master, nobody would have been able to tell you where you would find one. You would have had to look, move, wander around the country... and at some time you might have come across one. But there is no way unless you have experienced something of it in your own being. Unless you have the taste, the flavour, you will not be able to recognise a Taoist Master.

Lin Lei is a Taoist Master - very simple, very old, very ancient; a hundred years old and he is picking up the grains dropped by the reapers. Now this is the lowliest job one can find, the most beggarly and yet...

... SINGING AS HE MADE HIS WAY THROUGH THE FIELDS.

The Taoist is always happy because he does not wait for any cause: he does not wait for any special situation in which he is going to be happy. Happiness is like breathing, happiness is like the beat of the heart - happiness is his being, it is not something that happens to him. Happiness is not something that happens and does not happen, happiness is something that is always there. He is full of happiness. Happiness is the stuff that existence is made of; and a Taoist has fallen in harmony with existence - naturally he is happy. Whatsoever he is doing, he is doing it happily. His happiness precedes his action.

Sometimes you are happy and sometimes you are unhappy - because your happiness is conditional.

When you are succeeding you are happy, when you are failing you are unhappy; your happiness depends on some outer cause. You cannot always sing; even if you sing, your song will not always have the singing. Sometimes it will really be a delight and sometimes just a repetition, dead and dull.

Sometimes, when the friend has come, when you have found a beloved, you are happy. Sometimes, when the friend has gone. the beloved is lost, you are unhappy. Your happiness. and unhappiness, is caused from the outside - it is not an inner flow, it is not something that you possess. It is given to you by others and taken away, given to you by circumstances and taken away. This is not of worth because you remain a slave, you are not a Master.

The Taoists call that person a Master whose happiness is absolutely his own. He can be happy irrespective of the situation: young he is happy, old he is happy; as an emperor he is happy, as a beggar he is happy. His song is uncontaminated by circumstances; his song is his own, his song is his natural rhythm.

This man, a hundred years old.... Ordinarily, a man of one hundred years of age will not be able to sing - what is there to sing about now? Life has disappeared, life has oozed out, he is almost as dry as a bone, and there is nothing to hope for only death is to come. Singing, celebrating - for what? A man of a hundred years has no future: his life is spent, he is exhausted, any moment death will knock him down. For whom? For what? For what reason can a man sing like that? And at the age of a hundred years one has to go and do such a beggarly job... one has to pick up the grains dropped by the reapers. That means nobody is there to look after the old man. He is left alone - no family it seems, no son, no daughters, no wife, no brothers; nobody to look after him. What is there to sing about?

But if you have the song - the real song, the song that arises from your intrinsic core, your innermost centre - then it does not matter. You can go on singing even when death is descending. You can go on singing even if somebody is killing you. Your body can be killed, but not your song. Your body can be imprisoned, but not your song. Your song is eternal because it is uncaused.

Remember this very fundamental law of life: That which is caused is never eternal, that which is caused is temporal. When the cause will disappear, it will disappear; it is a by-product. That which is uncaused is going to be forever and forever, because there is nothing that can destroy it. Your body will die - it has been caused; the meeting of your father and mother has been the cause of it.

Your body will die: one day it was caused. It has a certain energy, a certain life-span, then it will be finished. Every day you are dying, one day you will simply disappear into the grave.

But is that all that you have? Is that all that your being is? Is there not something more? There is something in you which was before you were ever born that is going to be there even after you are- gone forever. After you have died, that which was before your birth will remain - that is uncaused.

That's why Taoists don't believe that God created the world, that God created man, that God created souls. If God had created souls then they were caused and one day they would disappear - howsoever far that day might be is not material. If the world were caused and man had been created, then one day the world would be uncreated and man would be uncreated. Taoists say 'That which is eternal, uncaused, uncreated' - they don't have a creator. In fact, nobody has ever reached that peak, that sublime peak, of understanding as have the Taoists. All other religions look juvenile.

The Taoist maturity is so tremendous, is of such splendour, is of such depth and height, that no other religion can be compared to it; they all look like kindergarten schools - made specially for children. Made specially for children, that's why God is 'the Father'; children cannot be independent, they need a father. If your real father has disappeared then you still need an imaginary father in heaven to control you: you are not mature enough, you cannot be on your own, you have to lean on somebody or other.

Taoists have no concept of God - not that they are godless, they are the most godly - but they don't have a concept of God; existence is enough. There is no creator, there is no creation, there is eternity. This has always been so, this will always be so. Once you have come in contact with this eternal continuity inside your being, the substratum, then there is nothing to be miserable about.

You are eternal, you are immortal, there is no death for you because there has never been any birth.

You are uncreated, you cannot be destroyed. Whatsoever the outer circumstances, your inner light goes on burning bright and the song continues.

CONFUCIUS, WHO WAS ON A JOURNEY TO WEI, SAW HIM IN THE DISTANCE. TURNING TO HIS DISCIPLES HE SAID 'THAT OLD MAN SHOULD BE WORTH TALKING TO. SOMEONE SHOULD GO AND FIND OUT U HAT HE HAS TO SAY.'

Confucius was always in search of knowledge. He was always in search of somebody who could say something to him, he was always ready to borrow knowledge. That's how the intellectual functions:

all that he has is borrowed; he never looks within, he goes on looking outside - 'If somebody has it, then I should go and enquire.' The intellectual is imitative, mechanical, parrot-like; for the intellectual, knowledge is something that has to be learned. He never looks within his own being, he never looks into his own inner consciousness; he never tries to understand the knower. He is after knowledge - and there is the difference. The Taoist is not after knowledge, but he wants to know: Who is this knower? What is this knowing? He wants to know the source of this knowing, where this consciousness is arising from.

You are here, you are listening to me. Now, you can be either a Confucian or a Taoist because these are the only two standpoints possible. If you are listening to me and you become more and more interested in what I am saying and start collecting it, then you are a Confucian. But if while you are here listening to me - feeling my presence, looking into my eyes - you become aware of the consciousness that is within you, the attention that is within you and you become intrigued by what it is and a deep enquiry arises: Who am 1...? Not that you have to repeat the words 'Who am l?' but a deep enquiry, a quest arises; a passion to know: Who is this consciousness in me? What is this consciousness in me? What is its nature? What is its quality? Where does it come from? Where is it going...? If this passion to know your consciousness arises, you are a Taoist. And only a Taoist is a religious person.

The Confucian is a scholar, he is a pundit, he is a professor. If you talk to him, he will talk about great things; but if you look into his being, there is nothing. All that he has gathered is borrowed. Again and again the Taoists write stories in which Confucius is going from somewhere to somewhere, always travelling, accumulating, and always looking from where he can get knowledge - as if knowledge were a commodity, as if knowledge were a thing that you could get somewhere, from somebody.

Nobody can give you knowledge. It is not a thing to be transferred. You have to become it, you have to grow into knowing; it is an inner transformation. No university can give you what religions call 'real knowing'. Whatsoever you can get from the universities is information - stale, borrowed, dirty, because it has passed through thousands of hands; it is like a currency note. That's why the note is called 'currency': because it goes on moving like a current from one hand to another, from one pocket to another pocket. But then it goes on becoming dirtier and dirtier. So with knowledge:

down the centuries, it goes on from one generation to another generation, from one generation of professors to another generation of professors.

Knowing is fresh, knowing is from the source. And that source is alive in you, waiting for you to turn in. Don't look for it on the outside - look within. That's what Jesus goes on saying 'The Kingdom of God is within you.'

CONFUCIUS, WHO WAS ON A JOURNEY TO WEI...

He is always on a journey, seeking, searching for knowledge. He goes to everybody. Wherever somebody says that somebody has attained knowledge, he goes there. This is silly, this is stupid, but this is the stupidity all scholars have. They are basically of the mind that knowledge can be purchased. The are basically of the mind that knowledge is a thing, not an experience; a theory, not an experience. So one can learn it from somebody else. Remember one thing: that is the difference between scientific knowledge and religious knowledge. Once somebody has discovered the law of gravitation, everybody has not to discover it again and again - that would be foolish. You cannot go to the world and declare 'What Newton discovered, I have discovered again. Yes, the law of gravitation... I have seen an apple falling, and I have again discovered the law of gravitation.' People will laugh. They will say 'There is nothing now to discover. Discover something else which has not been discovered before.'

Science is information. If one man has discovered, then it can be transferred to everybody. The knowledge that science seeks is of the outside, so it can be learned from the outside. But religion has to be discovered again and again. It is like love: millions of people have loved before you, but unless you love, you will never know what it is. You cannot say Millions of people have loved, so what is the point of me loving again? Why go in the same rut? So many people have loved and they have written their diaries, and their love-letters are available - we can look into the books and have the knowledge.' But no, you will have to love, you will have to rediscover it. Unless you discover it, it will never be a knowing. Religion is like love; it is not like science. Einstein has discovered the theory of relativity, now finished - nobody else is needed to rediscover it now. What may have taken fifty years for a scientist to discover, a schoolchild can learn within five minutes. But that is not the way of religion. What Buddha discovered, what Lao Tzu discovered, Lieh Tzu discovered, you will have to discover again. Confucius is on the wrong track.

Confucius is used in Taoist tales as a laughing stock.

CONFUCIUS, WHO WAS ON A JOURNEY TO WEI, SAW HIM IN THE DISTANCE. TURNING TO HIS DISCIPLES HE SAID 'THAT OLD MAN SHOULD BE WORTH TALKING TO.'

Why? Because a hundred years old, doing the lowliest job - and still singing? 'Go and enquire what is the reason for his happiness - why he is happy, why he is singing, so we will be able to deduce a law; some technique can be discovered.'

'SOMEONE SHOULD GO AND FIND OUT WHAT HE HAS TO SAY.'

T-U KUNG ASKED TO BE THE ONE TO GO - one of the chief disciples of Confucius. HE MET LIN LEI AT THE END OF THE EMBANKMENT AND, LOOKING HIM IN THE FACE, SIGHED 'DON'T YOU EVEN FEEL ANY REGRET? YET yOU PICK UP THE GRAINS SINGING AS YOU GO.'

'DON'T YOU EVEN FEEL ANY REGRET?' - because to the disciple of Confucius this man seems to have nothing to be happy about. He should be crying. that would be logical. He should be weeping, that would be rational. But singing, picking up grains, a hundred years old, waiting for death - what more do you need to be sorrowful? He should be utterly miserable, that would be logical.

This is illogical, but Taoists are illogical people. And I would like you to become illogical because only illogical people are fortunate enough to be happy. The logicians are never happy, they cannot be: they have taken a wrong route from the very beginning. They think that as everything else is caused, happiness has to be caused too - that is their wrong standpoint. Happiness needs only understanding, no other cause. And understanding is also not a cause of it, understanding simply unveils it; it is inside you. It simply removes the veil and suddenly it is there - your beloved is inside you; it has to be unveiled, that's all. Unveiling is not a cause. Cause means it has to be created; unveiling simply means it was already there, but you were foolish enough not to unveil it.

This Confucian approach towards life has to be understood because many of you are bound to be in Confucian company. The whole West is Confucian, logical, intellectual. The Confucian approach is based on the idea that truth has to be learned, that it is only a question of learning: if you learn well you will know what truth is. No, the Taoists say truth has to be LIVED, not learned. Truth has to be experienced: just by becoming more knowledgeable you will not know it. In fact, to have truth you will have to go through unlearning, you will have to wash your mind clean. Whatsoever you have learned is functioning like a block. You will again have to become ignorant, you will have to become innocent, you will have to drop all this nonsense that you are carrying in the name of knowledge.

You don't know anything, but you think AS IF you know; this 'as if' is the problem. Somebody asks you 'Do you know God?' and you say 'Yes.' Have you ever thought over what you are saying? Do you really know? But you pretend. Whom are you deceiving?

I have heard a beautiful anecdote:

The tough guy sauntered into the dimly lit saloon. 'Is there anybody here called Donovan?' he snarled. Nobody answered. Again he snarled 'Is there anybody here called Donovan?'

There was a moment of silence and then a little fellow strode forward. 'I'm Donovan' he said.

The tough guy picked him up and threw him across the bar. Then he punched him in the jaw, kicked him, clubbed him, slapped him around a bit and walked out. About fifteen minutes later the little fellow came to. 'Boy, did I fool him' he said. 'I ain't Donovan.'

Whom are you fooling? You will be fooling only yourself, nobody else. Remember very well what you know and what you don't know. P. D. Ouspensky, in one of the greatest of his books, TERTIUM ORGANUM, says that for the seeker the first thing to decide is what he knows and what he does not know - the first thing to decide. Once that decision has been taken things become very clear.

Do you know God? Do you know yourself? Do you know what love is? Do you know what life is?

But man goes on pretending that he knows, because it is very hurting to know that you don't know, it is very ego-shattering to know that you don't know: The ego pretends, the ego is the greatest pretender there is; it pretends, it says 'Yes, I know.' There are knowers who say God is not, there are knowers who say God is, but both are knowers. As far as knowledge is concerned, neither the theist nor the atheist are in any way different. If you go to India and you ask people - anybody - they will say 'Yes, God is.' If you go to Russia and ask anybody, they will say that they know God is not. But one thing is certain, both 'know' - and that is the problem.

The theist and the atheist are not opposite. They are not enemies, they are partners in the same game, because both are pretending that they know. A real man of understanding will not pretend that he knows, and then there is a possibility some day to know. Begin with ignorance, and some day you may be fortunate enough to know. Begin with knowledge, and this is certain: that you will never be able to know.

The Confucian goes on trying to learn. The Taoist goes on trying to unlearn.

LIN LEI NEITHER HALTED HIS STEPS NOR PAUSED IN HIS SONG. TU KUNG WENT ON PRESSING HIM UNTIL HE LOOKED UP AND ANSWERED WHAT HAVE I TO REGRET?

First he won't even stop his song to listen to what this man is asking. because Taoists are not interested in curious people. They say that curiosity leads nowhere, curiosity is a disease; curiosity is not enough - curiosity is not enquiry. Enquiry means you are ready to put your life at stake.

Enquiry means you are not only a student but a disciple. Enquiry means that it is not just on a whim that you ask; you are ready to go into it whatsoever the cost. You are ready to pay for it; it is not just entertainment.

LIN LEI NEITHER HALTED HIS STEPS NOR PAUSED IN HIS SONG.

He didn't pay any attention to this curious man who was asking 'Why are you singing? What have you got to be happy about?' because if this man really were the man of enquiry. he would not jump upon him so suddenly. He would wait, he would come to the Master, sit by the side of the Master, he would wait.

In Taoist circles this is an accepted norm that when a disciple comes to the Master he has to wait, unless the Master asks him 'For what have you come?' And the Master will only ask when he has tested that you are not just curious, you have enquiry; that you have not just come by the way, that your search is not just lukewarm, but intense - that you are burning, that you are ready to explode.

Only then will the Master ask 'Why have you come? What's your enquiry?'

This is no way to approach a Master - and to ask such a foolish question! The question is foolish:

to ask 'Why are you happy?' The question is foolish; the 'why' is meaningless. If somebody is miserable, you can ask 'Why are you miserable?' But if somebody is happy you cannot ask 'Why are you happy?' Somebody is ill, ask 'Why are you ill?' - the question is relevant; but if somebody is healthy you cannot ask 'Why are you healthy?' - the question is irrelevant. Health is as it should be, happiness is as it should be. If somebody has gone mad, you can ask why he has gone mad, and if he is somebody sane you don't ask 'Why are you sane? What have you got to be sane about?' - that is meaningless. When you approach a happy person, a really happy person, you should look directly rather than create a smoke-screen of questions. You should wait on the Master, you should help the Master, you should drink of the energy that is flowing around the Master; you should taste the celebration that is going on there, you should allow his presence to penetrate your being, you should function like a sponge so that you become full of the presence of the Master - that will be the answer.

Now this is foolish, but I have come across millions of such people.

I used to travel around the country and even at railway stations.... I was going to catch a train when somebody ran after me and said 'Is there really a God? God exists?'

I was going to catch a train and my train was leaving. I said 'You come later on.'

He said 'But just a single answer. One sentence will do.' As if my saying 'yes' or 'no' were going to make any difference. Foolish people, stupid people: they think they are religious, they are making a 'great enquiry'.

That's why, LIN LEI NEITHER HALTED HIS STEPS NOR PAUSED IN HIS SONG. TZU KUNG WENT ON PRESSING HIM UNTIL HE LOOKED UP AND ANSWERED 'WHAT HAVE L TO REGRET?'

Now look at the change. Tzu Kung asks 'What have you got to be happy about?' and the Master says 'What have I got to be unhappy about?' the total change - a one hundred and eighty degree turn. And what he says.... These four sentences are tremendous, you cannot find more rebellious sentences than these anywhere.

Listen.

'A CHILD, YOU NEVER LEARNED HOW TO BEHAVE...'

He says 'These are the things that you should look into...'

'A CHILD YOU NEVER LEARNED HOW TO BEHAVE; A MAN, YOU NEVER STROVE TO MAKE YOUR MARK. NO WIFE NOR SON IN YOUR OLD AGE, AND THE TIME OF YOUR DEATH IS NEAR.'

Try to understand each sentence. Each is pregnant with great meaning.

'A CHILD, YOU NEVER LEARNED HOW TO BEHAVE...'

Ordinarily, if you never learned how to behave as a child, you would be miserable your whole life.

You would repent that you never went to school, you never learned the manners, the etiquette, the ways of society - the formalities; you would repent your whole life. But he says 'There is nothing to regret because when I was a child, I never learned how to behave. I was never a slave. I was free from my very childhood. I never allowed anybody to discipline me. I was never an imitator. I have lived my life as I wanted it. I have never allowed anybody to distract me, so why should I regret?

Why? There is no reason to regret. If I had allowed people - my family, the friends, the society, the priest, the politician, the state - if I had allowed them to discipline me, then there would have been much to be miserable about. But I have lived a free life from the very childhood. I have remained free, I have lived in freedom, so what is there to regret?'

This is of tremendous significance. And when I am saying it to you, this is my own feeling too. I have also lived the way I wanted to live. I have never allowed anybody to distract me. Right or wrong, good or bad, foolish or wise, I have lived the way I wanted to live. I have no regrets. There cannot be any regret. This is the way I wanted to live, this is the way I have lived. And life has allowed me to live the way I wanted to live - I am thankful, I am grateful. Now I know that if I had allowed the dogooders, then I would have been miserable. Not that they were really wanting to harm me, they may have really wanted to help me - that is not the point at all. They may have been well- wishers, but one thing is certain - they were distracting me, they were trying to force me towards some directions which were not coming spontaneously to me. That I have never listened to. I have said to my well-wishers 'Thank you for the trouble that you are taking with me, but I am to go on my own way. If I fail there will be one consolation - that I went on my own way and failed. But following you, even if I succeed, I will always repent: who knows what would have been the result, what would have been the outcome. if I had gone on my own way?'

I have heard about a great doctor, a great surgeon. He had become internationally known, and when he had become old and he was retiring, all his disciples, from all over the world, gathered to celebrate. The day they celebrated. they found that he looked a little sad, he was there but not really. So a disciple asked 'What is the problem, sir? Why do you look so sad? Why? You have lived a successful life - nobody can compete with you, you are unique in your field; you are the topmost man and nobody will be able to replace you for centuries. You have everything to be happy about, and look at your disciples, your students - they are spread all over the world. Why are you sad?'

And he said 'Seeing all this success, I am feeling very sad because I never wanted to be a doctor, I wanted to be a dancer. Now my whole life is spent, wasted, because deep down I still repent listening to others. Yes, I have become successful, but that success does not satisfy me because it is alien. It is as if you were not hungry and somebody has forced you to eat - maybe very nourishing food, but you will feel nauseous. You wanted to drink water and somebody has forced you to drink milk - certainly better than water, but you wanted to drink water. You were feeling thirsty and the milk has not satisfied you, it has deceived.' And I can understand the man. He was sad, his sadness is meaningful; he was sad because now this whole success is nothing but a failure. Deep down he has failed - he has failed himself; he did not trust his own intuition and he allowed others to manipulate him.

Look at this old man Lin Lei's statement:

'A CHILD, YOU NEVER LEARNED HOW TO BEHAVE...'

'... so what is there to regret? I have lived my life, I have lived my life in my own way.'

'A MAN, YOU NEVER STROVE TO MAKE YOUR MARK.'

'And I have never tried to make my mark. I was not ambitious so what is there to regret?'

An ambitious man will always regret. Alexander died sad, in great frustration, because ambition by its very nature is unfulfillable. It is said, when Alexander was in India he went to see an astrologer and he asked the astrologer about his future. The astrologer looked at his hand and said 'One thing I have to say to you: you will be able to win THIS world, but remember there is no other world. d.nd then you will be stuck. Then what will you do?' The astrologer must have been a great wise man and it is said that listening to this, 'there is no other world', Alexander became sad. Now even this idea that 'Once you have conquered this world what are you going to do? There is no other world....'

An ambitious mind will simply feel stuck - what to do then?

And whatsoever you attain, nothing is attained because ambition goes spreading on and on. Only a non-ambitious person can be happy. An ambitious person is bound to be always frustrated. Ambition comes out of frustration, out of ambition comes more frustration, and it is a vicious circle.

This old Master is saying a great truth. He is saying:

'A MAN,YOU NEVER STROVE TO MAKE YOUR MARK.'

'I was not worried to succeed in the world, to prove that I am somebody. I was not interested in becoming part of history. I was not interested in leaving my mark because that is foolish - even if you get some place in history, what use is it?'

I have heard an anecdote:

Moses was leading his people out of Egypt and then they came to the sea, and it was impossible to cross.

The parable is a very modern parable.

He looked at his press agent and he said 'What do you say? I have an idea. What is your opinion?

I can ask the ocean or God to make way for us and the ocean will separate.'

And the press agent said 'If you can do that, then I promise one thing. In the Old Testament you will have two pages.'

But even if in the Old Testament you have two pages, or twenty, or two hundred, what is the meaning of it? And as history grows bigger, those two pages will become smaller and smaller and smaller and one day just a footnote. And then when history will become even longer - and it is becoming longer every day - the footnotes will also disappear somewhere in the appendix, and by and by you are gone. When your life is gone, how long can your mark on life remain? And what is the point of it all?

Great is the insight of this old Master:

'A MAN,YOU NEVER STROVE TO MAKE YOUR MARK.'

So what is there to regret? If you are ambitious you will regret, because ambition is never fulfilled. If you are non-ambitious you are happy, because frustration will have no entry in you.

'NO WIFE NOR SON IN YOUR OLD AGE...'

And he says 'I have no wife and no son, so what is there to be miserable about?' Try to understand his meaning. He says 'I am absolutely alone - nobody to disturb my aloneness. My solitude is unperturbed. I am alone, free, absolutely my own master. Nobody to drag me here and there, no family, no relations - what is there to be miserable about?'

Remember, when you are alone, you are not alone; you are lonely, you miss the company of the other. You miss the company of the other because you have not yet learned how to be in your own company. You miss the company of the other because you don't know how to be with yourself. Loneliness is negative: absence of the other. Aloneness is positive: presence of your own being. Loneliness is solitariness, aloneness is solitude. Loneliness is ugly, aloneness is beautiful.

Aloneness has a luminosity in it.

Buddha is alone, I AM ALONE, Lieh Tzu is alone, this old man Lin Lei is alone. When you are sitting alone you are lonely, you are simply missing. Deep down you are seeking some company - where to go, what to do, how to get occupied so that you can forget yourself. You have not yet learned the way to be with yourself. You have not yet created a relationship with yourself You have not yet fallen in love with yourself.

This man says 'NO WIFE NOR SON IN YOUR OLD AGE...'

'What is there to regret? I am alone, like a great peak of the Himalayas... alone. Everything is beautiful and silent and blissful.'

'AND THE TIME OF YOUR DEATH IS NEAR.'

Death, to the Taoist, is just returning home, the journey is over. Just as you go into a foreign land....

For example, when my sannyasins go back they go into a foreign land. Whenever they can come back - this is their home - they are happy. Death is coming back home, going to the origin, back to the source, returning from where we came.

So the old man said:

'AND THE TIME OF YOUR DEATH IS NEAR.'

'So what is there to regret? I am simply happy, just happy. Everything is simply fine - more one cannot expect.'

But the Confucian disciple could not understand. He repeated his question again. He missed. He heard but he had not listened - it went above his head. Such a great saying, so full of experience.

so utterly revolutionary, but the Confucian missed.

The scholar always misses the truth. The pundit is the man most incapable of listening, his mind is so full of his own ideas. While this tremendous saying is being uttered, Tzu Kung must be thinking a thousand and one thoughts in his mind; must be preparing tor more questions - what to ask next.

He appears to be listening, but he does not listen.

'MASTER WHAT HAPPINESS HAVE YOU HAD THAT YOU SHOULD SING AS YOU WALK PICKING UP THE GRAINS?'

Again the question is meaningful: 'What happiness have you had...?' Remember, if there is a cause to happiness, then the cause is bound to be in the past. Causes are always in the past. If you are happy, the question is 'WHAT has made you happy?' and that which has made you happy has gone into the past. So a caused happiness is past-oriented. Past-oriented means that which is no more; it is fictitious, it is imaginary, it is illusory.

The real happiness is present-oriented: it is never past-oriented. The real happiness arises HERE- NOW, THIS VERL MOMENT, there is no time for it to be caused. IT IS CAUSE AND EFFECT TOGETHER. Try to understand it. If you say 'I am happy because I was born to a rich father' - now this is seventy years, a hundred years back. Your happiness about something which has passed a hundred years back is just a figment in your memory. You say 'I am happy because ten years ago I was given the Nobel prize.' Ten years ago you were given the Nobel prize? - your happiness is very dusty. Ten years... so much dust has accumulated; it is not fresh, it is stale. You are a very poor man: you are eating food that was prepared ten years ago.

The real happiness is here-now. It has no concern with the past, it has no concern with the future.

Sometimes you become happy about the future: you are hoping that you are going to win a lottery, or you are hoping that this is going to happen tomorrow - your girl friend is coming tomorrow and you are getting excited. For what? - for tomorrow, which has not come yet? You are mad. Either your happiness is past-oriented or future-oriented; and both are false because neither the past is, nor the future is. The past has already gone out of existence, the future has not entered yet. The real, authentic happiness is here-now. It arises, this moment, out of nowhere. There are not two moments together - that 'swhy it is uncaused - because for cause and effect to exist, at least two moments will be needed: one to cause it, another to effect it. But only this moment - total, alone, single, is available.

Again the enquirer asks a wrong question:

... WHAT HAPPINESS HAVE YOU HAD THAT YOU SHALL SING AS YOU WALK PICKING UP THE GRAINS?'

'THE REASONS FOR MY HAPPINESS ALL MEN SHARE...'

Again the old man says something beautiful:

' THE REASONS FOR MY HAPPINESS ALL MEN SHARE...'

'It has nothing to do with me; everybody has got it, but they don't recognise it. Not only that they don't recognise it, they seek for that which is already available. Not only that they seek it, '... INSTEAD, THEY WORRY OVER THEM'

The same reasons, for example these four reasons....

'THE REASONS FOR MY HAPPINESS ALL MEN SHARE' SAID LIN LEI SMILING 'BUT INSTEAD, THEY WORRY OVER THEM.'

You worry about your childhood... that you were not well educated - were not sent to Harvard or Oxford or Cambridge, that your parents were poor, that you were not brought up as well as you would have liked, that you were not trained. that you missed many opportunities. You are sorry for it, you worry about it. This should be a CAUSE to be happy - everything should be a cause to be happy, only then can a person be happy. Otherwise the poor person goes on crying and weeping because he was poor, and the rich person also goes on crying and weeping because he was rich.

I have known rich people - they say their parents destroyed them because they were allowed so much comfort in their childhood that they never learned anything. You have seen, you must have observed, that it is very rare to find a rich man's son intelligent, very rare. They are all stupid, they are bound to be, because what is the point in becoming intelligent? Why bother? They already have all that they need; all that they can get through intelligence is already there, so why intelligence? In the universities they fail, everywhere they fail; they don't care a bit.

When I was in the university, I had a student who failed for five years in his BA class. I asked him - five years I waited - the sixth year, when the examinations were coming again, I said 'What are your plans? Are you going to fail again?' He said 'Who bothers? My father is rich. Only the poor bother.'

If you are born into a rich family, then too you are not happy. If you are born into a poor family, of course, how can you be happy? If you are healthy you are not happy, because if you are healthy you never think of health as something to be happy about. A healthy person never thinks about health. If you are unhealthy, you are unhappy. Look at the logic of your mind. Whatsoever you can find to be miserable about you simply jump upon, and whatsoever you can be happy about you simply forget, you don't take any note of it.

'... BUT INSTEAD, THEY WORRY OVER THEM. IT IS BECAUSE I TOOK NO PAINS LEARNING TO BEHAVE WHEN I WAS YOUNG...'

The old man has to repeat. He has said it, but seeing that the person has not listened, has not understood it, he has to repeat.

LT IS BECAUSE I TOOK NO PAINS LEARNING TO BEHAVE WHEN I WAS YOUNG, AND NEVER STROVE TO MAKE MY MARK WHEN I GREW UP THAT I HAVE BEEN ABLE TO LIVE SO LONG.

IT IS BECAUSE I HAVE NO WIFE AND SONS IN MY OLD AGE AND THE TIME OF MY DEATH IS NEAR THAT I CAN BE SO HAPPY.'

This you will find in all the Oriental scriptures again and again: great repetition. The reason is that the truths are such that the Masters have to repeat them, because said once, they are not understood. Buddha used to repeat everything three times - even small things. He would ask a disciple 'Have you heard me? Have you heard me? Have you heard me?' Three times! Out of great compassion. When the Buddhist scriptures were translated into Western languages people were very much puzzled: Why? Was Buddha talking to very stupid people? Why did he repeat so much?

No, they were as intelligent as you are, as people anywhere ever have been. It is not a question of intelligence, it is a question of awareness. They were not aware, they were as unaware as you are.

I have to repeat continuously. My editors get puzzled. You can ask Anurag, you can ask Pratima, they get puzzled why I repeat. They would like to sort it out. I don't allow them, I say 'Leave it as it is.' Because these truths are such that, once, you may miss, twice, I hope that you may pay a little attention, thrice.... I have to go on repeating that is like hammering on your head. How long can you go on missing? It is a war between me and you.

The old man repeated again, but again he was not understood. Tzu Kung said 'IT IS HUMAN TO WANT LONG LIFE, AND HATE DEATH - WHY SHOULD YOU BE HAPPY TO DIE?'

The basic things were missed. Only one thing had he taken out of the four - the last. But the last can be understood only if the three preceding it have been understood, otherwise not. If the first three have been understood....

'A CHILD, YOU NEVER LEARNED HOW TO BEHAVE; A MAN, YOU NEVER STROVE TO MAKE YOUR MARK. NO WIFE NOR SON IN YOUR OLD AGE, AND THE TIME OF YOUR DEATH IS NEAR.'

Just see: the first belongs to the childhood, the second to your youth, the third to your old age, then comes death. It is a very natural corollary, it is absolutely logical - you have to begin from the very beginning. But he had forgotten about the three. He had not listened to the three, he jumped on the fourth. He must have been afraid, a man who was afraid about death. That caught his attention.

But unless the three are understood, the fourth will be missed.

LT IS HUMAN TO WANT LONG LIFE, AND HATE DEATH - WHEY SHOULD YOU HE HAPPY TO DIE?'

It is not human - maybe it is manly, but not human. You have to understand these two words. In the dictionaries they are synonyms, but they are not in reality. Just as I told you 'loneliness' and 'aloneness' are synonyms in the dictionary but not in reality, so 'man' and 'human' are two different things. 'Man' is a static concept like 'dog', like 'buffalo', like 'donkey'. 'Man' is a static concept, just the name of a certain species, one of the species. One species is of monkeys, another of buffaloes, one is of man. Have you watched? For man we have two terms, 'man' and 'human'. For dogs you have only one term: 'dogs', for buffaloes only one: 'buffaloes', for donkeys: 'donkeys'. Why? Why this 'human'? It has a significance: 'man' simply means a biological species; 'human' has nothing to do with biology. 'Human' is a growing concept, an open concept; 'man' is a closed concept, 'man'

means you are a being. 'Human' means you are a process, you are going, you are a journey, you are a pilgrimage, you are ongoing, you are a 'going beyond'.

Friedrich Nietzsche has said: The greatest thing that I love in man is that he is not the goal but the bridge. The most that I love in man is that he is an ongoing process; not an end but a means, a journey.

'Human' means the bridge - a bridge between man and God. 'Man' means just man, there is no opening in it. The word 'human' is open, it goes beyond man. 'Human' is a bridge, 'human' is a journey, a pilgrimage - one is going somewhere, one is seeking something, one is trying to become something. 'Man' is static, 'human' is dynamic. 'Man' is like a thing. 'Human' is a process, river-like, flowing, reaching to the beyond, groping in the dark. 'Man' is sitting, not going anywhere, crippled, dead, like a grave. 'Human' is a river, not knowing where the ocean is but trying hard to reach.

Remember this, 'man' is afraid of death. 'Human'? No, it is not human to be afraid of death. A person who is on a pilgrimage - he is ready to die if that is needed to go on; he is ready to go beyond, he is ready to use the door of death to pass beyond.

The man said 'IT IS HUMAN TO WANT A LONG LIFE...'

No, it is not human to want long life. Yes, it is relevant as far as the concept of 'man' is concerned.

Dogs are afraid of death, buffaloes are afraid of death, donkeys are afraid of death - so is man. But to be human, one is so thrilled with the possibility - one wants to know what death is. As one has lived one's life, one starts feeling 'Now I have known what life is, I would like to know what death is.

Life has been known, it was beautiful. Now let us see what death is, let it be another adventure.'

Socrates was human when he was dying, when he was being given the poison. His disciples were crying and weeping, and he said 'Stop! You can do it when I am gone, but not now. This is wastage, sheer wastage. Such a great thing is happening, I am dying and you are crying!'

And they said 'Master, you are dying, are you not afraid?'

He said 'For what? I have lived my life, I loved it, it was beautiful. I have known it, but there is no need to go on repeating it for ever and ever. Now something new - death is so new. I am enchanted, I am thrilled, the adventure is so great' said Socrates. 'I would like to see what death is now.'

One of the disciples, Crito, said 'But Master, everybody is afraid of death.'

Socrates said 'I don't know. I don't understand why people are afraid of death. If the atheists are right that one dies utterly and nothing is left, then there is nothing to be feared - Socrates will not be there so why be afraid? I was not there before I was born and I don't feel any fear about it.'

Have you ever felt any fear that you were not before you were born? Does any fear grip you?

Nothing. You will say 'Nonsense, because then I was not, so what is the point of being afraid?'

And Socrates said 'I will again be disappearing if the atheists are right, so then what is the fear?

There will be nobody to be afraid. Or maybe the theists are true and I will be there. If I am going to be there, then why be afraid?'

Now this is a man who has lived a dynamic life, a life of growth, evolution. If you have lived a life of evolution, then death comes as a revolution, a sudden change to some unknown reality. Why should one be afraid? No, 'human' - it is not human.

But all men are not human beings, remember. Very rarely... somewhere a Socrates, a Lieh Tzu, a Buddha - these are human beings. Ordinarily there are men and women, but not human beings. To become a human being means to become a process, to become an enquiry, to become a passion for the impossible... a seeker, a seeker of truth.

Said the old man 'DEATH IS A RETURN TO WHERE WE SET OUT FROM WHEN WE WERE BORN. SO HOW DO I KNOW THAT WHEN I DIE HERE I SHALL NOT BE BORN SOMEWHERE ELSE?'

The same Socratic attitude:

'SO HOW DO I KNOW THAT WHEN I DIE HERE I SHALL NOT BE BORN SOMEWHERE ELSE?

HOW DO I KNOW THAT LIFE AND DEATH ARE NOT AS GOOD AS EACH OTHER? HOW DO I KNOW THAT IT IS NOT A DELUSION TO CRAVE ANXIOUSLY FOR LIFE? HOW DO I KNOW THAT PRESENT DEATH WOULD NOT HE BETTER THAN MY PAST LIFE?'

'HOW DO I KNOW...?' See the insistence. He is not saying 'I know', he is not claiming any knowledge. No wise man has ever claimed any knowledge. That's why Socrates says 'Maybe the atheists are true, maybe the theists are true, but that doesn't matter. Let any of them be true, I remain unperturbed.'

The wisdom, the real wisdom is always agnostic. Remember this word 'agnostic'. A real seeker is agnostic. He never claims 'I know', and he never says 'This is the truth'. He is very open, he is not closed. He has no dogma, he has no creed, he is simply conscious and aware, and is ready to face any reality whatsoever. Whatsoever reality comes to be revealed, he is ready to go into it. He trusts life. People who don't trust life they create beliefs, dogmas, theories, to protect themselves. The real wise man is vulnerable; he does not protect. He is open to rains. to winds, to the sun, to the moon, to life, to death, to darkness, to light - he is open to all. He has no protection; his vulnerability is total.

Remember this man's agnosticism. A hundred-year-old man starts feeling afraid of death. One starts thinking 'The soul must be immortal.' One starts imagining 'Now I will be received in paradise with great fanfare. God must be waiting, and a great marble palace must be ready for me.' One starts imagining things, one starts dreaming. But this man says 'How do I know?' He does not claim any knowledge. He simply says 'I don't know this way or that way. I am absolutely ignorant, I have not tasted death yet, so how do I know? Let me know! Why should I be afraid from the very beginning? It may turn out to be better than life, who knows?'

Let it happen. Remember, the real understanding is always waiting for the moment to happen. It never decides beforehand, it never plans beforehand - it is spontaneous.

Tzu Kung listened, but did not understand his meaning. He returned and told Confucius. He could not understand because he was a great scholar, the chief disciple of Confucius. He was already stuffed with knowledge, he could not understand. He reported to Confucius, his master, and what does Confucius say? Listen:

'I KNEW HE WOULD BE WORTH TALKING TO...'

The man of knowledge always goes on claiming. Now he says I KNEW HE WOULD BE WORTH TALKING TO... AND SO HE IS...'

He is trying to say to his disciples 'I am proved right, my inference was valid: this man is worth talking to.' But he cannot accept what the man has said; that is beyond him also. It is beyond his disciple, and it is beyond him also.

He says '... BUT HE IS A MAN WHO HAS FOUND IT, YET NOT FOUND ALL OF IT.'

... HE IS A MAN WHO HAS FOUND IT, YET NOT FOUND ALL OF IT.' Now this is absurd. Truth cannot be divided - either you have found it, the whole of it, or you don't have it at all. It is impossible to have a little bit of truth. It cannot be fragmented, it cannot be cut into slices. Truth is total, truth is whole - either you have it or you don't have it. It is not possible to have a little of truth. It is not possible to have a little of God: it is impossible, the very thing is absurd. But when you come to an expert he has to say something to prove that he knows.

Confucius says that this man has found it. He says it because he had sent the disciple, now he has to prove it - that he was right. But he cannot concede that he knows. so he says 'He knows a little bit, but not all of it.'

This happens. A man of knowledge always goes on protecting his ego. This statement is as absurd as a statement can be. You ask a Buddha, you ask Lao Tzu. you ask Jesus, you ask Krishna and they will all say: Truth cannot be divided. It is not a thing that you can divide. It is an experience - when it happens, it happens. When it happens, it happens totally. You disappear into that experience. But Confucius says 'He has found. but not all of it.' This very statement shows the ignorance, but the expert always has to protect his expertise.

I have heard a beautiful anecdote. Listen to it carefully.

The boy was running around with too many women so the old man decided to send him to the leading psychiatrists. It was a long drawn-out analysis and the bill was very high, but he felt it was worth it if a cure was reached. Finally, when the son returned. he demanded to know what had been covered in the treatment.

'Did you tell the doctors how we caught you with the maid when you were ten?'

The son nodded.

'Did you tell them we couldn't keep a cook for the last ten years because of you? Twenty-three cooks we ran through!'

The son nodded.

'Did you tell them about the five models from the place, the thirty-three girls in college and what happened with the superintendent's wife?'

Again the son nodded.

'So tell me, what did they say?'

'They said I have homosexual tendencies' said the son.

'They said I have homosexual tendencies'! Experts have to say something, they have to show their expertise. Now if this man has homosexual tendencies then nobody can have heterosexual tendencies - impossible! But the experts have to find something, they have to say something, howsoever utterly absurd.

Confucius says 'This man has found it, yet not found all of it.' That's all the comment that he makes, and this old man has spoken such a profound philosophy in these four sentences:

'... What is there to regret?' And,

'THE REASONS FOR MY HAPPINESS ALL MEN SHARE...'

Because happiness is not something that you have to achieve, it is already there, it is in-built, it is your very nature. All men can be happy only if they stop FINDING CAUSES to be happy, one has just to be happy for no reason at all.

And he has given the whole message of Tao in these four sentences. Be anarchic. Be authentically true to your own being. Listen only to yourself. Don't allow anybody to discipline you. Don't allow anybody to make a slave of you. Don't allow anybody to condition you. The priest and the politician - avoid them, avoid the do-gooders. Remember that you have to be just yourself and nobody else.

This anarchy, this chaotic freedom.... And don't be ambitious, because that is just mediocre. Just live your life as totally as possible. Don't try to make a mark on the history pages - that is meaningless.

And don't always be concerned with others. By and by learn how to be alone, enjoy solitude that's what meditation is all about.

And finally, remember that death is not a death, it is a new beginning. And, who knows? maybe it leads you into a higher life. If the cosmos has a rhythm in it, it must be so. It must be leading you into a higher life. You have learned so much, you have become more worthy, naturally death must lead you to a higher plane of being. That seems to be simple: a man who has lived, loved, experienced, meditated, who has gone through so many things in life, has become e more worthy - he has to be given a higher life. If this existence has any compassion, then death is going to be a higher plenitude, a higher peak.

Wait with thrill, with great adventure. Wait with tremendous joy, delight and celebration. Happiness is very natural: one should not seek it, one should simply enjoy it. Such a great message, and what did Confucius say? That this man had found it, yet not found all of it' - as if Confucius had found all of it.

These parables are very subtle. They are a great shattering of the Confucian ideal, but their way is very polite. If you don't go deep you may never understand. Meditate over these parables; they have great messages - decode them. Your life will be tremendously enriched through them.