Chapter 29

[NOTE: This is a typed tape transcript and has not been edited or published, as of August 1992. It is for reference use only. The interviewer's remarks have been omitted where not relevant to Osho's words]

Q:* I CAN'T HELP SMILING WHEN I LOOK AT YOU. YOU SEEM SO HAPPY.... YOU ARE A HAPPY MAN?

A:* I am.

Q:* YOU KNOW HOW TELEVISION IS, SOMETIMES WE HAVE TO CONDENSE THINGS. SO I WOULD ASK, THAT WE TRY TO GET SOME SHORT ANSWERS....

A:* You just give me the time... so I can give you the short answers. First, give me the time, how much time you want?

Q:* WELL, USUALLY TWENTY SECONDS TO TWENTY-FIVE SECONDS IS THE EDITED DOWN PORTION OF THE ANSWER. BUT IF YOU FEEL THE NEED TO EXPAND A BIT BEYOND THAT, PLEASE FEEL FREE.

Q:* WHAT IS YOUR VISION?

A:* And you want it in thirty seconds....

Just then look at my eyes and you will get the answer. That is the shortest way.

There are things which cannot be spoken, but which can be seen. There are things which explanations only explain away, but they can be felt, and felt so deeply that the fragrance of it remains forever.

So look into my eyes for the shortest answer. The silence, the depth, the joy, and ecstasy all are right now present before you. And I can see that you can see. I would not have answered that way to another journalist.

I can feel your heart. I can feel your loving being. I can feel your lifelong search.

It is full of tears, sometimes of sadness, sometimes of happiness, but it has not come to an end. Still you have to go far. I can be of some help, just as a friend. I am nobody's master. That very word has ugly connotations.

Q:* WHAT ARE YOU? ARE YOU A TEACHER?

A:* I am just a friend.

Q:* THE TERMS ARE VERY IMPORTANT, OF COURSE.

A:* They ARE very important.

Q:* THERE IS NO RAJNEESHISM.

A:* No Rajneeshism.

I hate the word "ism." It has crippled human intelligence. It has destroyed humanity's growth. Once somebody becomes part of a organized theology, ideology, he loses his individuality, which is the most precious thing in the world.

Q:* NATURE DOESN'T LIKE CARBON COPIES?

A:* Nature simply hates carbon copies.

Q:* I SAW ONE DESCRIPTION THAT WHAT IS HAPPENING HERE IS ALL BASED ON "LOVE, SEXUAL FREEDOM WITHOUT GUILT, AND ENJOYMENT OF RICHES." DOES THAT SAY IT WELL ENOUGH, OR IS IT TOO SIMPLE.

A:* It is too simple, and too superficial.

Q:* PLEASE TELL ME THEN, WHAT IS HAPPENING HERE, WHAT IT IS BASED ON.

A:* This is a mystery school.

There are many things happening which, to the outsider may not exist at all. He can see that people are loving, that people are rejoicing, that there is no sexual inhibition, that sex is not a sin here, but just part of human nature, just the way you eat, and there is nothing to be bothered about it.

You take a bath, you have a good sleep. Your biology also needs its own satisfactions. Sex is simply the way of nature to reproduce. And we consider it to be very sacred, in the sense that unless two persons are in deep love, they should not enforce sex upon each other. They may be husband and wife, that does not matter. But if they are in deep love -- they may not be husband and wife, that too, does not matter.

So these things people can see. They can see that my people live comfortably. I am against poverty.

All the religions have been very respectful about poverty. They have made it something spiritual, and because of these people poverty has continued on the earth. If you make something spiritual, how you can destroy it? Spirituality is not to be destroyed.

I call it sickness. It has to be uprooted completely.

Q:* HOW COULD IT BE?

A:* It can be very easily. The first basic thing is that richness should be respected rather than poverty. I cannot accept Jesus Christ's statement, that a camel can pass through the eye of a needle, but a rich man cannot pass through the gates of heaven.

Now, these are the people who are responsible for the poverty on the earth. They are saying, "Blessed are the poor." Are you going to destroy the blessed people?

Are you going to make them rich so they cannot enter into heaven?

I say, blessed are the rich. And a camel may enter through the eye of a needle, but not a poor man.

Q:* IS THERE A REWARD FOR THE RICH IN THE HEREAFTER?

A:* Certainly, because he has been creating riches here. He has been immensely creative. Everybody is not Henry Ford, just like as everyone is not Picasso. And Henry Ford should be respected as much as any creator. Riches can be created, but they should be respected first.

Secondly, once you accept that religions have been the cause of poverty, you can find in what ways they have kept humanity poor.

They are against birth control. They are against abortion. They are against the pill, and the pill is the greatest revolution that has happened in the whole history of man. I call it the greatest revolution because it makes man and woman equal.

Q:* YOU HAVE FELT FOR SOME TIME, ACCORDING TO WHAT I HAVE READ, THAT WOMEN HAVE NOT BEEN TREATED EQUALLY AND HAVE NOT BEEN RESPECTED, AND HAVE NOT BEEN THOUGHT TO BE ABLE TO DO WHAT MAN CAN DO.

A:* No. Here women are doing everything that man can do. There is nothing that women cannot do. There may be few things which men cannot do and only women can do.

For example, they can get pregnant and men cannot, and that is their inferiority that has caused tremendous trouble. Because of that inferiority, they have been repressing women. They cannot allow women to have equality, because they know once they are equal, soon they will be superior. It is better to keep them repressed. The fear is, because man knows that on one point he is inferior. And it is one of the greatest thing. The woman can give birth to life. Nothing can be more creative.

And religions have been teaching against the pill, against the birth control, against abortion, and the world population goes on growing. That means poverty goes on growing.

Thirty years before, when I started speaking for birth control, India was only four hundred million people. Now it is eight hundred million people. It has doubled between thirty years. If they had listened to me, they would not have been poor.

Now fifty percent of India is just surviving, almost on the verge of becoming another Ethiopia any day.

Who is responsible? The Hindu priest, the Buddhist priest, the Jaina priest, the Christian missionaries -- all are agreed on one point: that birth control should not become legal, that abortion should not become legal. These people are creating poverty.

By the end of this century, the world will have five billion people. Right now there are four billion people. Already half of the world is starving. With five billion people you will have every day millions of people dying around. It is going to become a graveyard.

My suggestion is: for thirty years, absolute birth control, so that the population can be reduced to one billion. One billion people can live really comfortably and luxuriously on this earth.

Secondly, there is no need for nations. It is simply out of date, the whole idea.

Nuclear weapons have made it out of date.

Q:* SO, WE HAVE REALLY ONE GLOBAL VILLAGE AND SHOULD ACT AS ONE?

A:* Yes. That's what I want, that it should be one global village, one government.

Then things can be very easily solved, because seventy-five percent income of every nation is going into creating war mechanism. If there are no nations there is no question of any war. Seventy-five percent income of the whole world is released. You can live luxuriously! You are just living stupidly.

Nobody is responsible for it, just an unintelligent way of living. Twenty-five percent income we have to live on, and seventy-five percent income is devoted towards death, to kill people.

Q:* YOU HAD SAID THAT THE WORLD WAS GOING TO END SOMETIME IN THE NEXT FIFTEEN YEARS. DO YOU STILL STAND BY THAT PROPHECY?

A:* It is not a prophecy. It is simply a factual thing.

Q:* HOW WILL THIS COME ABOUT?

A:* The way the idiots, our presidents and prime ministers... and they have now all the power of destruction in their hand, and they go on increasing, piling up more and more nuclear weapons. Already, Soviet Union and America together, have so much nuclear energy that it can destroy this earth seven hundred times.

Now, it seems to be absolutely absurd to go on increasing. For what?

You can kill every man seven hundred times.... So what is the point of creating more and more nuclear weapons? Just a mad race in which you cannot stop because the other is not stopping. And the same is the argument of the other! He cannot stop because you are not stopping. So naturally, these idiots sooner or later are going to crash, and with their crash....

In this vast universe, in this whole solar system, only one planet has life, has consciousness. The most valuable things have happened on this earth. All other planets in our solar system, at least, are dead.

You are destroying something which you cannot create.

And it was not a prophecy; I am not a prophet. It was not even a prediction. It was simply seeing two persons running -- that they are going to crash. How long they can run? I don't think they can go beyond this century, so I had given the time 1999.

(Tape side B) Q:* REGARDING MA ANAND SHEELA AND HER ABRUPT DEPARTURE AND HER ALLEGED CRIMINAL ACTIVITY BEFOREHAND. PLEASE HELP ME UNDERSTAND WHAT KIND OF IMPACT THAT HAS HAD ON RAJNEESHPURAM.

A:* No impact at all.

Nothing has changed. Those criminals are gone, and the crimes have disappeared. But as far as the commune is concerned, everything goes on the same jolly good way.

Q:* THERE IS A CHANGE IN ATTITUDE, THOUGHT, NO DOUBT.

A:* Nothing has changed. The criminals have escaped, now it is government's job to catch hold of the criminals. We have given all the evidences, all the testimonies, all the facts. Now it is their job; we are....

Q:* AND IT WILL ALSO BE THEIR JOB TO DO WITH HER WHAT THEY WILL, IF* SHE IS ARRESTED AND BROUGHT TO TRIAL. WHAT DO YOU WANT TO HAVE HAPPEN TO HER? PUNISHMENT?

A:* No. If it is asked to me, I would like that she should be entered in a psychiatric mental institute. She need treatment, not punishment.

No criminal needs punishment, because punishment has not helped in the whole history. These are the stupidities I have been fighting against. You go on giving punishment without ever looking what is the outcome. No punishment has helped in any way. Crimes to on increasing, murders go on increasing, laws go on increasing, judges go on increasing, imprisonments go on increasing. But that was not the idea. The idea was that punishment should disappear.

Q:* WHAT WOULD BE BETTER? A* FORGIVENESS?

A:* No, I am not saying forgiveness. I am saying treatment.

Q:* IF SHEELA WERE TO SEEK TREATMENT, AND WOULD COME TO YOU AND ASK THAT YOU ACCEPT HER...

A:* I will accept with the same love. There is no question.

Q:* IT IS POSSIBLE SHE COULD COME BACK AND REJOIN AND....

A:* She can come any day....

There is no problem for anybody. Our doors are open. She can come even now.

She can live in the commune, but whatever she has to face with the law, she will have to face. I can ask the court that these people are not born criminals, they just got an opportunity, and I think anybody in their position would have done the same.

I was in isolation and silence, so I was not informed about anything.

Q:* WAS THE SHARE-A-HOME PROGRAM A BIG MISTAKE TO BRING THOSE PEOPLE HERE?

A:* Absolutely a big mistake.

Q:* WHY SO?

A:* For two reasons. First, I would not like that kind of people to mix with my people, because those people are born in crime, have been brought up in crime.

Murder, rape, theft -- these are just casual things for them, nothing special in it.

Uneducated, illiterate, many of them have gone into imprisonment many times, drunkards, drug addicts -- I would not like them for three months to mix with my people. For the first reason this was.

Secondly, she was trying to take over the Wasco County.

I am absolutely a non-political person, and my commune is not a political organization.

Q:* SO SHE WAS USING THESE PEOPLE IN YOUR EYES TOWARDS THAT GOAL?

A:* She was using... She had an idea to take over the Wasco County. These three thousand people she brought, and she kept those three thousand people drugged.

Q:* YOU HAVE EVIDENCE THAT SHE KEPT THEM DRUGGED TO BE BE MORE DOCILE?

A:* One died.

I am not an eyewitness about anything, because I was in isolation and I never knew what is happening outside. When I came out of silence, then slowly I started to know from people that strange things have happened.

They had brought drugs from outside the country. And Sheela was dealing in drugs -- and not in a small quantity -- full planeloads. One of her planes is still there lying down in Latin America, because it was caught.

Q:* WHAT TYPES OF DRUGS?

A:* (Aside) What was the name of the drug? Haldone?

Q:* HEROIN?

A:* That was heroin. And here, that was given to the people was haldol.

Q:* HALDONE, YES, A TRANQUILIZER OF SOME SORT.

A:* A tranquilizer. And it was brought in immense quantity, drums -- because three thousand people have to be kept drugged for at least twenty-one days, so on the voting day they can vote. They become almost like zombies, so whatever you want to do them, they will do.

Q:* I'VE BEEN TOLD TODAY THAT OUT OF THIRTY-FIVE HUNDRED THAT CAME, ONLY TWO HUNDRED DO REMAIN. I HAVE JUST HEARD YOU EXPLAIN HOW A CRIMINAL CAN BE TREATED AND CHANGED. WOULD IT BE YOUR VIEW THAT THESE TWO HUNDRED THAT REMAIN, HAVE GONE THROUGH A TYPE OF TREATMENT.

A:* They have certainly got, because in these days they have been here, they have completely gone through a change. They have not done anything wrong.

Q:* AND WHAT DOES RAJNEESHPURAM OFFER TO THEM NOW, THESE MEN AND WOMEN WHO WERE HOMELESS BEFORE?

A:* We give them home, we give them food, we give them clothes. We offer them therapies -- any kind of therapies that they need, medical help. We give them everything that any person needs.

Q:* YOU HAVE LIFTED THEM FROM THEIR POVERTY?

A:* Yes. They are no more poor. They are just as comfortable members of the commune as anybody else. They have all the rights and all the comforts, all the conveniences. And they are perfectly happy. And I have been thinking to start a adult class for them, so they can become a little educated too.

So that is the only difference that can be destroyed, otherwise, they are perfectly the same. But about education they are missing. They cannot enjoy Tolstoy or Dostoevsky, and that is a missing.

Q:* THERE HAS BEEN QUITE A STRUGGLE FOR THE PAST FOUR YEARS OF THE WORLD OUTSIDE AGAINST WHAT IS HAPPENING HERE. HAVE YOU EVER CONTEMPLATED SIMPLY GIVING IT UP AND MOVING SOMEWHERE ELSE, LEAVING?

A:* No.

Q:* THAT IS NOT A POSSIBILITY?

(Tape side B) A:* Not possibility. I never move away from any challenge. That is not my style of life.

Q:* THIS IS A CHALLENGE OF I WOULD THINK, THE HIGHEST ORDER.

A:* This is a challenge!

This desert was a challenge. We have changed it into an oasis. We have put two hundred million dollars in the desert and change it into an oasis. We have made it productive. Now it is giving food to five thousand sannyasins, vegetables, fruits, milk products -- everything that people need.

The land was for fifty years lying simply dead. Nobody was purchasing it, because what you will do with a desert. And to me, it became a challenge, that this is a good challenge. We should try, make an effort and see what happens.

And we have managed, and we can change the whole. It is one hundred twenty- six square miles; we can change the whole area -- all the mountains in lush green, beautiful holiday home where thousands of people can come. And it can become a pride for Oregon.

Q:* BUT HOW WOULD IT BE A TOURIST ATTRACTION? WHAT WOULD BRING THOSE PEOPLE IN?

A:* We can create everything. Already people are coming, already at least, thirty to forty thousand people per year, come. At the annual function, twenty thousand people come.

I am enough a tourist attraction! You can put by my side Jimmy Carter and Nixon and Ronald Reagan. And once they are no more presidents, they cannot attract twenty thousand people from all over the world. And I have one million sannyasins around the world who would like to be here, at least for a few months per year to be with me. That can help Oregon's economy immensely.

But the politicians are so stupid, that they can't see the point. On the contrary, they are making every effort to destroy the commune. They will not succeed, because the Constitution is in our favor. And the people, who perhaps, they would have been able to catch into some network, have already gone. Now only innocent people are here, who have not done anything, any harm to anybody.

Q:* IS THERE RELIGIOUS FREEDOM AND FREEDOM OF BELIEFS IN THE UNITED STATES IN YOUR VIEW?

A:* The Constitution says it is so, but the politicians don't seem to follow the Constitution. They go against it.

In fact, the American Constitution is the only constitution in the world which has some real high values, but the values are so high, and the politicians are just the same third-grade politicians as everywhere. So in other countries the constitution and the politicians are close.

For example, in Soviet Union, the politicians are not doing anything against the constitution. Their constitution is meant to be dictatorial, and they are doing it.

American Constitution is far above the third rate politician, so there is a gap. The politician has to be an hypocrite, he has to talk about the Constitution and the values and he has to act just the opposite. He has to wear a mask.

They say about religious freedom, freedom of expression, democracy, but whatever they have done with us is just the opposite.

Q:* BUT YOU HAVE SAID YOU ENJOY A CHALLENGE.

A:* I enjoy, and I am enjoying, and I will continue to enjoy. I am going to drag them to the Supreme Court, and I am going to make it clear to the Supreme Court also that if you are really fair and just, then the first act should be: return the land to the Red Indians. This is not your land, you are all foreigners, invaders talking about freedom of democracy and enslaving the people of the land.

So the first thing is: let Ronald Reagan resign with his whole government, and the government goes to the Red Indians. And all the Americans who are foreigners should apply for green card just the way I have applied. Red Indians only can supply green cards if they want, nobody else has the right. The land is theirs.

And it is strange, just because you have come few years earlier, and I have come few years later, you are going to give me the permission to be here or not to be here.

Who are you? And from whom you got the permission to be here? You can be here without anybody's permission. You have been here violently, forcibly. I am just a nonviolent tourist, and I need your permission.

My green card is not going to be a simple matter. It is going to create a world controversy.

The government goes to the Red Indians if you are true to your constitution, otherwise, burn the constitution and drop all this nonsense about democracy and freedom, and respect for the individual, and just be straightforward. Or follow the constitution and then we are in the same boat. I apply for the green card, you apply for the green card.

Q:* IF YOU WERE TO PUT FORTH THAT ARGUMENT TO SOME OF THESE PEOPLE WITH WHOM YOU'VE HAD TO DEAL, THEY WOULD PROBABLY BECOME VERY HOSTILE.

A:* That does not matter. My whole life I have been making people hostile. Once I make somebody hostile, that means I have already won half the battle. He is already proved weak, otherwise, he would not be hostile. Be reasonable, be rational. Hostility means, now you cannot win reasonably.

And this is supposed to be the most cultured country in the world, we can discuss it logically. So there is no need for hostility. If you have some logic against me, I am ready to listen to it. And if I feel that it is right, I am willing to leave the country immediately.

Or, if you feel that you cannot convince me, and you cannot even convince yourself, then you should be ready to leave the country immediately.

(Tape side C) Q:* I WAS SPEAKING WITH SOME RANCHERS OUTSIDE ANTELOPE. THEY WERE MAKING THE POINT THAT, AGAIN THEY WANT YOU TO LEAVE.

THEY HAVE A VERY PERSONAL HOSTILITY TOWARD YOU. BUT INDIFFERENCE IS REALLY THE TRUE ENEMY, AND NOT HOSTILITY AS SUCH, IS THAT CORRECT?

A:* Right!

Q:* WE DON'T HAVE A LOT OF INDIFFERENT PEOPLE WHEN IT COMES TO THIS TOPIC, DO WE?

A:* You don't have... and I don't want to have any indifferent people. Either I want friends or I want enemies. Both are related, emotionally related to me. And those people of Antelope are unnecessarily hostile. Because I have told my people there that whatever Sheela and her group has done, undo it. That city does not belong to us and we don't want to take over anyone's place, so change the name back to Antelope and offer the properties to the people from whom you have purchased and vacate. So we are ready to sell the properties and vacate Antelope.

Now this seems to be unreasonable, that they would like us to vacate and they don't want to purchase their properties which we have purchased from them.

Q:* WHAT DO THEY WISH? HAVE THEY BEEN CLEAR? DO YOU UNDERSTAND WHAT ELSE THEY MAY WISH?

A:* They don't say anything. They just say that the people who have left don't want to come. That is not our problem. You want your city back -- find out those people or find out other people from Oregon. You have so many sympathizers...

this is the time for them to show the sympathy. Purchase all the properties that you have sold to us, and we are willing immediately to vacate and give the government to you -- what more you want?

We have also offered that if you cannot purchase -- because we have two-third of the properties with us and only ten or twelve people are left of the old Antelope - - if you don't have any sympathizers in the whole Oregon to purchase the properties, then we are ready to purchase your properties: you vacate. This way or that, we are ready for both, but no more conflict, no more hostility.

Q:* HOW DOES THAT AFFECT YOU PERSONALLY, THE CONFLICT AND HOSTILITY?

A:* No, it does not affect me.

Q:* YOU DON'T TAKE OFFENSE FROM IT?

A:* No, no. No offense, there is no problem for me.

Q:* THAT IS BECAUSE YOU ARE COMFORTABLE WITH YOURSELF AND YOU HAVE CONFIDENCE....

A:* I am perfectly comfortable with myself!

Q:* DO YOU ENJOY DOING THE INTERVIEWS?

A:* Yes, I enjoy! I enjoy everything!

Q:* HAS THE MEDIA BEEN A GOOD FRIEND?

A:* Very good.

Q:* HAVE YOU WATCHED CAREFULLY THE COVERAGE THAT HAS BEEN?

A:* No.

Q:* BUT THEY HAVE BEEN A GOOD FRIEND IN THAT THEY GET THE MESSAGE OUT TO THOSE PEOPLE WHOM YOU WANT TO...?

A:* Yes, they take the message out and... I can feel you, so I know whatever you will do, you will not be harmful to me, so I need not see what you manage?

Q:* YOU TRUST ME AN AWFUL LOT!

A:* Yes! I trust everybody!

Q:* YOU TRUST EVERYBODY -- YOU HAVEN'T BEEN BURNED BY THAT IN SO MANY YEARS?

A:* And trusting everybody is so beautiful....

Q:* SOME OF THOSE WHOM YOU HAVE TRUSTED TURNED IN YOU, IN THE CASE OF SHEELA....

A:* That does not matter. Still I trust.

My trust is unconditional. I have never put any condition for my trust. I just trust the person and the person may commit some mistake -- those are simple acts which don't count. The whole personality of the person is too big a thing -- few wrong acts, few mistakes don't count. At least it does not make any difference to my trust.

INTERVIEWER WITH MA PREM ARUP Q:* BHAGWAN, IN YOUR OWN LIFE, YOUR ENLIGHTENMENT WAS PRECEDED BY A YEAR OF WHAT YOU HAVE CALLED "NERVOUS BREAKDOWN" AND "BREAKTHROUGH", WHEN YOU WERE SURROUNDED BY NOTHINGNESS AND HAD LOST ALL CONTACT WITH THE WORLD -- DOES THIS STATE HAPPEN TO EVERYONE BEFORE ENLIGHTENMENT, AND ARE THERE OTHER STAGES THAT ONE PASSES THROUGH? OR CAN ONE LIVE A RATHER NORMAL SEEMING LIFE AND ONE DAY JUST BECOME ENLIGHTENED WITH NO WARNING?

A:* Enlightenment is a very individual process. Because of its individuality, it has created many problems. First: there are no fixed stages through which a person necessarily passes. Every person passes through different phases, because every person in many lives has gathered different kinds of conditionings.

So it is not the question of enlightenment -- it is the question of the conditionings -- that will make your way. And everybody has different conditionings, so no two persons' paths are going to be the same. That's why I insist again and again, there is no superhighway, there are only footpaths -- and that too, not ready- made. Not that you find them already there and you have just to walk on them -- no. As you walk you make them. Your very walking makes them.

It is said that the path of enlightenment is like a bird flying in the sky: it leaves no footprints behind it, nobody can follow the footprints of the bird. Every bird will have to make its own footprints, but they disappear immediately as the bird goes on flying. The similar is the situation, that's why there is no possibility of a leader and a follower, that's why I say these people -- like Jesus, Moses, Mohammed, Krishna -- who say that "You just believe me and follow me," don't know anything about enlightenment.

If they had known, then this statement was impossible, because anybody who has become enlightened, knows that he has not left any footprints behind; now saying to people "Come and follow me," is just absurd.

So what happened to me is not necessary for anybody else to pass through. It is possible that one may remain normal and suddenly become enlightened.

It is like here there are fifty people: if we all go to sleep, everybody will have his own dream; you can't have a common dream. That is an impossibility. There is no way to create a common dream. Your dream will be yours, my dream will be mine, and we will be in different places, in different dreams. And when we will wake up, I may wake up at a certain stage in my dream, you may wake up at a certain stage in your dream. How they can be the same?

Enlightenment is nothing but awakening. For the enlightened person, all our lives are just dreams. They may be good dreams, they may be bad dreams; they may be nightmares, they may be very nice and beautiful dreams, but all the same they are dreams.

You can wake up any moment. That is always your potentiality. Sometimes you may an effort to wake up, and you find that it is difficult. You may have had dreams in which you are trying to shout but you cannot shout. You want to wake up and get out of the bed, but you cannot, your whole body is paralyzed, as if.

But in the morning you wake up and you simply laugh at the whole thing, but at the moment when it was happening, it was not a thing to laugh at. It was really serious. Your whole body was almost dead, you could not move your hands, you could not speak, you could not open your eyes. You knew that, now you are finished. But in the morning, you simply don't pay any attention to it, you don't even reconsider it, what it was. Just knowing that it was a dream, it becomes meaningless. And you are awake, then whether the dreams were good or bad does not matter.

The same is the situation about enlightenment. All the methods that are being used are simply somehow to create a situation in which your dream is broken.

How much you are attached with the dream will be different, individual to individual. How much deep is your sleep will be different, individual to individual. But all methods are just to shake you so that you can wake up. At what point you will wake up does not matter at all.

So my breakdown and breakthrough is not going to be for everybody. It happened that way to me. There were reasons why it happened that way.

I was working alone on myself, with no friends, no fellow travelers, no commune. To work alone, one is bound to get into many troubles, because there are moments which can only be called nights of soul, so dark and so dangerous.

It seems as if you have come to the last breathe of your life, that this is death, nothing else. That experience is a nervous breakdown.

Facing death, and nobody to support and nobody to encourage, and nobody to say, "Not to be worried, this will pass away," that "This is is only a nightmare, and the morning is very close. Darker the night, the closer is the sunrise. Don't be worried." Nobody around whom you trust, who trusts you -- that was the reason for the nervous breakdown. But, it was not harmful. It looked harmful at the moment, but soon the dark night was gone, and the sunrise was there. The breakdown has become the breakthrough.

To each individual it will happen differently. And the same is true after enlightenment: the expression of enlightenment will be different. That has created a great difficulty.

The first has created a great difficulty. For example, if I am going to make a religion, then this will be a basic thing in it, that anybody who becomes enlightened first will have to go through a nervous breakdown, then he will have a breakthrough. That is how all the religions are made: individuals imposing their experience on the whole humanity, without taking in consideration the uniqueness of every individual. And then after enlightenment, the same problem. Mahavira remained naked, hence, the followers of Mahavira for twenty-five centuries, who have gone to the final stage of following him, have remained naked. To be naked became absolutely necessary. Jainas don't think that Buddha is enlightened, because he is not naked. A personal phenomenon becomes now a universal criterion -- that too is false, neither before nor after.

What happened to Mahavira was his individual flowering in that way. He was really one of the most beautiful men ever, and it would have been a shame if he had used clothes. His body was just worth seeing.

He was the son of a king, and his father was immensely interested in the art of Indian wrestling, and he prepared Mahavira for Indian wrestling. He wanted him to be the champion in the whole country, and he could have been a champion, his body was solid steel. He has been brought up twenty-four hours were devoted for a single thing, a single theme running: that he has to become the champion wrestler in the whole country. Naturally, his body was prepared.

(Tape side C) It has the proportion, every inch was taken care of. Great wrestlers were giving him training, massagers were massaging him, experts in herbs and medicines were giving them herbs and medicines -- in every possible way. The money was no question at all.

And then he renounced the world. Rather than becoming a wrestler, he became a meditator. And when he became enlightened, he dropped the cloths. He had only one cloth that he used to cover his body. And after his enlightenment, as he was coming down the hill, a beggar asked him something, because it is too cold and he has nothing. And Mahavira looked at himself, he has only one shawl, so he made two pieces out of one shawl and gave half to the beggar, and half he kept himself. It was not enough to cover the body now.

And as he was just descending from the hill into the valley, a rose bush caught hold in its thorns, the one piece of the shawl. He looked back and he laughed, and he said, "This is too much. And I have never refused anything to anybody, so you can take this half also. Anyway it is of no use. I unnecessarily saved it from that beggar because what he will do with the half? It won't cover him if it does not cover me. You can take it. Perhaps after me that beggar will be coming, and he will get this other half also." That's how he became naked.

But he enjoyed the morning sun and the cool air in the hot country, the hottest part of India, Bihar. And it felt so light that he thought, "What is the need?" And he has never asked for anything from anybody. He has given anything that anybody has asked, but he has never asked anything from anybody.

He remained naked, but this is not necessarily a stage that every enlightened person has to go through. Buddha never became naked, Lao Tzu never became naked, Kabir never became naked.

So it has been a very significant problem for religions. They cannot accept other enlightened people for small reasons, because they don't suit with their idea.

They have to fit with a certain concept, and that concept is derived from their own founder. And nobody can fit with that, so everybody else is denounced as unenlightened.

So neither before nor after.... Enlightenment is a very individual song -- always unknown, always new, always unique. It comes never as a repetition. So never compare two enlightened persons, otherwise you are bound to do unjustice with one or the other, or both.

And don't have any fixed idea. Just very liquid qualities should be remembered.

I say liquid qualities, not very determinate* qualifications.

For example, every enlightened person will have a deep silence -- almost tangible. In his presence, those who are open, receptive, will become silent. He will have a tremendous contentment, whatever happens makes no difference to his contentment.

He will not have any question left, all questions have dissolved -- not that he knows all answers, but all questions have dissolved. And in that state of utter silence, no-mind, he is capable of answering any question with tremendous profundity. It needs no preparation. He himself does not know what he is going to say, it comes spontaneously; sometimes he himself is surprised. But that does not mean that he has answers inside himself, ready-made.

He has no answers at all. He has no questions at all. He has just a clarity, a light that can be focused on any question, and all the implications of the question, and all the possibilities of its being answered, suddenly become clear.

So you may find sometimes you ask something, and the enlightened man answers something else. That happens because you are not aware of the implications of your own question. He does not answer only your words. He answers YOU ! He answers the mind which has produced the question.

So many times his question and the answer may look not meeting, but they certainly meet. Just you will have to dig a little deeper into the question, and you will find that that's exactly was the question. It will happen many times that you will understand your question for the first time when it has been answered, because you were not aware that dimension, you were not aware of your own mind, your own unconscious from where those words have come.

But the enlightened man has no answers, no scriptures, no quotation marks. He is simply available; just like a mirror, he responds, and he responds with intensity and totality.

So these are liquid qualities, not qualifications. So don't look on small things, that what he eats, what he wears, where he lives -- those are all irrelevant. Just watch for his love, for his compassion, for his trust. Even if you take advantage of his trust, that does not change his trust. Even if you misuse his compassion, cheat his love, that does not make any difference. That is your problem. His trust, his compassion, his love remains just the same.

His only effort in life will be how to make people awake. Whatever he does, this is the only purpose behind every act: how to make more and more people awake, because through awaking he has come to know the ultimate bliss of life. Okay.