The Touchstone of Truth

[NOTE: This discourse is in the process of being edited for publication. It is for reference use only.]

The first question:

Question 1:

Never think that what you understand from scriptures is your own understanding. Never think what you understand from words has become your own experience.

Hearing Ashtavakra, many people will feel, "Far out, everything is already attained." But it is not attained this way. What connection is there between your listening to Ashtavakra and attaining? It has already happened: this must be your own experience. The recognition, the blessing, must be yours, it is not an intellectual conclusion.

Intellect will quickly accept it. What could be easier than, "It has already happened. Good, our troubles are over. Now there is no need to search, no need to meditate, no need to worship or pray - it has already happened."

Intellect is ready to accept - not because it has grasped the truth. It accepts because the difficulties of the path can be dropped, efforts of sadhana dropped, and the need to continue meditating is dropped. Soon you look around and find that you have not attained. If it could happen merely by the intellect grasping it, there could be spiritual universities. There is no university of spiritual study. It is not attained from scriptures, it is attained by your own spontaneous inspired wisdom.

Listen to Ashtavakra, but don't be in a hurry to believe. Your greed makes you hurry. Your greed will tell you, "This is very handy. We already have the treasure, so the whole botheration of attaining is over. Now there is nowhere to go, now there is nothing to do."

You always wanted to attain without effort. But remember the desire to attain is still there behind all this: attain without doing! Previously you thought of striving to attain; now you think of attaining without exertion - but the desire to attain is still there. This is why the question arises of why has self-realization not yet happened.

For one who has understood: "Forget about self-realization, what's the use?" If you had understood Ashtavakra, no other question could arise. The question "Self-realization has not happened"

indicates that while accepting what Ashtavakra says, you are watching from the corner of your eye:

is it attained yet or not? Your eye is still focused on attaining.

People come to me and I tell them, "Meditation cannot go deep as long as you continue desiring.

As long as you expect to attain something - bliss, God, atma - meditation will not go deep, because thinking of attaining is greed. It is ambition, it is politics. It is not yet religion." They say, "Okay, we'll meditate without thinking about it, but we will attain, won't we?"

There is no difference. They are ready to stop desiring because, "You say this is the way to attain, so we won't think of it - but still, we will attain it, won't we?"

You are not able to rid yourself of greed. Hearing Ashtavakra many people will very quickly accept that it has happened. If it could happen so quickly... and it is not that there is any barrier to it happening. The barrier is the foolishness of your desiring. The happening is so near!

Ashtavakra is right - it has already happened. But only when all desire for attaining disappears then this, "It has happened already," will be understood. Then you will know from your totality that it is attained. But at the moment it is just an intellectual diversion: "If a great master like Ashtavakra said it, it must be right." You are hurrying to believe. Your belief is impotent. Without doubting you have quickly accepted it.

In this country the habit has disappeared of doubting anything stated in scriptures. If it is in the scriptures it must be right.

One day Mulla Nasruddin came carrying a very handsome umbrella. I asked him, "Where did you get it? Such fine umbrellas are not made here."

He said, "My sister sent a gift."

I said, "Nasruddin! You have always said that you don't have any sisters."

He replied, "It is true."

Then I said, "Yet this gift is sent by your sister...?"

He said, "If you don't believe me: here, it is written on the handle, 'A gift for my beloved brother, from your sister.' I was coming out of a restaurant and these letters on the umbrella - I thought it seems I do have a sister. When it is written it has to be believed. And perhaps there is some sister or cousin.... And religious people have always said you should take every woman except your wife as your mother or sister."

When something is published - and in the scriptures... belief in the written word is very strong.

When you tell someone something, he asks where it was this published. If you say where he will believe what you said. It is as if there is some power in writing. Say how ancient it is - people will accept it. It is as if truth is somehow related to age. Who said it? Ashtavakra? Buddha? Mahavir?

- then it must be right.

From your side you haven't made any effort to wake up - not a tiny bit. Someone said it, you believed it - and such convenience: you have attained without doing anything!

Krishnamurti's followers have been listening for forty years - exactly the same people more or less.

They have attained nothing. Sometimes one of them comes to me saying, "I know that everything is already attained, but why hasn't it happened? I listen to Krishnamurti, I understand that everything is already attained."

These people are greedy. They hoped that instead of having to make any effort they should get it free. They have not heard Krishnamurti nor understood Ashtavakra. They have heard their greed.

They have heard through their greed. Then they interpret in their own way.

A friend has asked, "Doing meditations seems irrelevant now. Five meditations a day - and this lecture series on Ashtavakra going on.... It seems stupid."

It is so easy to drop meditation - so hard to do it. What Ashtavakra attained was not attained through doing, and yet it was not attained without doing anything.

Try to understand, this is a subtle point.

I have told you Buddha attained when he dropped all doing. But first he did everything. Six years of untiring effort, he gave everything to it. By giving everything, he experienced that nothing can be attained by doing. It wasn't by reading Ashtavakra... even though the Ashtavakra Gita was available in Buddha's time. He could have studied it - there was no need for six years of effort. He made an untiring effort for six years, and in the midst of this effort he found out it is not attained by effort. He didn't leave a single stone unturned, proving to himself that it couldn't be attained by inner effort.

There was no desire left inside. He did everything, and he saw that he didn't attain. His effort became so crystallized that in this crystallization, doing dropped. Then it happened.

I say unto you, the state of non-doing will come when you have done everything. Don't hurry, otherwise what little meditation you are already doing will be lost, what little prayer you are doing will be lost. Ashtavakra remains far away and the little progress you were making on the journey will stop too.

Before stopping one needs to run totally. Though one does not attain by running, this knowing will be crystallized by it. One day effort will drop, but not from mere intellectual understanding. When every cell, every atom understands it is useless - this is the moment it happens.

Ashtavakra is right in saying that practice is bondage.

But only one who practices will find out.

I am telling you this because I have practiced and found it is a dead end. I am telling you this because I have practiced sadhana and found that no sadhana leads one to the sadhya, to the goal.

I meditated and found that no meditation brings one to samadhi.

When this becomes your deep experience, and one day that moment comes when it boils at one hundred degrees, when you have given everything.... Holding back nothing - you have thrown yourself totally into the fire, the effort has become total, the inner fire is total, the sadhana is total; now existence cannot tell you that you have held anything back, all is given - that day, in that crystallization, in that state of ignited consciousness suddenly everything is burnt to ash. All sadhana, all practices, all meditation, all renunciation - suddenly you wake up and find, "Oh! What I was seeking was already attained!"

But if it could happen just by reading Ashtavakra then it would be very convenient. What is hard about reading Ashtavakra? The sutra is so clear and simple. Remember, to understand simple things is the most difficult thing in the world. And the difficulty comes from within you. You hope you won't have to do anything. It is very hard for people to accept the need to meditate.

This is the acid test - the Ashtavakra Gita. Those who hear Ashtavakra and continue meditating have understood. Those who hear Ashtavakra and stop meditating have not understood Ashtavakra and they lose their meditation too.

Practice, and you will find out that practice is a dead end. This is the final phase of practicing. Don't be in too much of a hurry.

"Through the study of texts like Vedanta and the Ashtavakra Geeta, I have learnt...." Has anyone ever known through study? Has anyone known through memorizing texts? Has anyone ever known through learning scriptures, learning words? This is not knowing; it is information, knowing about.

You can say this information is known: "What is worth attaining is already attained." But when you realize it, everything is finished.

You were informed, you got excited, and it sprouted in greed! Your greed said, "Look, I have been meaninglessly making efforts. Ashtavakra says 'without doing anything,' so I will sit without doing anything." So you sit doing nothing. After a while you observe, "The happening has not happened yet. Why this delay? And Ashtavakra said right now!" You sit looking at the clock, "Five seconds have past, five minutes have past, an hour is almost over - and Ashtavakra said immediately! Right now! There is no need for even a second to pass!" You start thinking he was lying, your trust is broken.

This is not knowing, it is information. Always remember the difference between information and knowing. Information means borrowed. Someone else has known, and listening to him you have become informed. This is information. Knowing is an experience. No one else can know for you; it cannot be borrowed.

I have known - your knowing will not happen from this. My knowing will be mine, your knowing will be yours. Yes, if you collect my words it will be information. Through information one can become a scholar but not a wise man. Knowledge about wisdom can be collected, but not the liberation of wisdom. A whole system of words can be created, but not the beauty of truth. The words will hem you in more, will enslave you more. So you will find scholars very restricted. Where is the open sky?

Knowing that what is worth attaining is already attained - if you know it then what is left to ask?

"... Making efforts is going astray." If you know this then what else is there to ask? "I have deepened this conviction." Either there is conviction or there is not; there is no way to deepen it. How can you deepen it? If there is faith there is faith; if there isn't there isn't - how will you deepen it? What method is there for making faith deepen? Will you suppress your doubts? Will you sit on top of your doubts? What will you do? Will you falsify your doubts? When the mind raises questions will you ignore them?

Inside, the worm of doubt will be gnawing. It will say, "Now listen, is anything attained without doing anything? Has anything ever happened just by sitting? Things happen by doing; does anything happen by sitting idle? Can you get anything for free? What nonsense are you getting into? What illusion are you suffering from? Get up, move, run; otherwise life will run out - life is already running out! Don't waste time sitting here like an idiot."

These doubts will arise: what will you do with them? Will you suppress them? Will you falsify them?

Will you say you don't want to hear about it? Will you throw them into the unconscious? Will you hide them inside, in your basement? Will you avoid looking them in the face?

What will you do to deepen your faith? You will do something like this - you will repress in some way. This faith will be false; disbelief will be smouldering beneath it. This faith is superficial. Above is a threadbare covering; underneath, the coals of disbelief, of doubt. Soon they will burn up your faith. This faith is of no use, you cannot deepen it. Faith is, or faith is not.

It is like someone drawing a circle. If he draws half a circle will you call it a circle? Can half a circle be called a circle? It is an arc, not a circle. It can be called a circle only if it is complete. An incomplete circle is not a circle. Incomplete trust is not trust, because incomplete trust means that distrust is also present. In the empty arc, what will happen? There will be doubt. Doubt and trust cannot move together. It would be like one foot going east, the other foot going west - you won't get anywhere.

It would be like riding in two boats, one going to this shore and one going to that shore - where will you go?

The journeys of doubt and trust are quite separate. You are riding in two boats. What is the meaning of incomplete trust? Does half faith mean half disbelief is also present? If trust exists it is complete, otherwise it exists not.

And remember one important fact: whenever the higher is mixed with the lower, the lower does not lose anything, but the higher does. When you mix the higher with the lower there is no harm to the lower, but the higher is harmed.

A feast is prepared, fine foods are set out. Throw just a small handful of dirt on it. You could say it is a vast feast, what can a small handful of dirt do? But a small handful of dirt destroys the whole feast. The whole feast cannot destroy even this small handful of dirt.

Throw a rock at a flower and nothing happens to the rock, but the flower will be destroyed. The rock is lower, lifeless. The flower is glorious, full of life. The flower is of the sky, the rock is of the earth.

The flower is the poetry of life. When the flower and rock collide the flower is completely crushed, the rocked completely unscratched.

One drop of poison is enough. Remember, doubt is lower. If the rock of doubt falls on the flower of trust, the flower will be flattened and die, the flower will be murdered. Do not think that trust will transform the rock. The rock will destroy the flower.

Either faith is or it is not - there are not two possibilities. When faith exists, it encompasses your whole life, it spreads into every cell. Faith is expansive. But such a faith does not come from the scriptures, it cannot come. Such a faith comes from live experience. It comes when you read the scripture of life, not from reading Ashtavakra.

Understand Ashtavakra, but don't think this understanding is wisdom. Understand Ashtavakra and preserve this inside yourself, put it away. You have received a touchstone. You didn't receive wisdom, but an analyst's experience. And when you do attain wisdom, you can easily test it with the touchstone of Ashtavakra.

The touchstone is not gold. When you go to a goldsmith you see he has a black testing stone. This black stone is not gold. When he receives gold, the goldsmith rubs it on this black stone to find out if it is gold or not.

When you have understood Ashtavakra's words carefully keep them, pack them away and when your experience of life comes you can test it. Ashtavakra's touchstone will be helpful then. You will be able to know what has happened. You will have the language to understand it. You will have a method to understand it. Ashtavakra will be your witness.

This is the way I take the scriptures. The scriptures are witnesses. The path of truth is unknown.

You need witnesses on that unknown path. When you first come face to face with truth, truth will be so vast that you will tremble, you will be unable to grasp it. You will shake to your very roots. There will be fear that you could go mad.

Imagine what will happen to a man who has been searching for a treasure for lifetimes and suddenly he finds that the treasure is buried where he is standing - won't he go mad? "This seeking for many lives was a waste! The treasure is buried right under my feet!"

Just imagine. It will be a tremendous shock for this man: "So many years I have wasted! This whole time has been a meaningless effort, a nightmare. What I have been seeking was waiting inside." Won't a man go mad from such a shock? At that time Ashtavakra's sweet words will soothe you. At that time the Vedanta, Buddha, the Upanishads, the Bible, the Koran, Buddha, will stand as your witnesses. In that situation you will be unable to comprehend the new experiences that are happening to you. In aloneness it is very difficult.

I am speaking on the scriptures - not because by hearing the scriptures you will become wise. I am speaking on them so that as you move on the path of meditation - if not today, then tomorrow it will happen, it has to happen - when the happening takes place it need not be that gold is in front of you and you cannot comprehend.

I am giving you a touchstone.

Test your experiences on these touchstones.

Ashtavakra is the most precise touchstone. Don't have faith in Ashtavakra, use Ashtavakra as a touchstone for your own experiences. Make Ashtavakra a witness.

Jesus said to his disciples, "I will be your witness when you arrive." But his disciples misunderstood.

The disciples understood that when they died and reach God's heaven, then Jesus would bear witness that they were his disciples; "Let them come in - these are mine, they are Christians. Be especially compassionate to them. Let more blessings shower on them."

But what Jesus meant is something completely different. Jesus said, "when you arrive I will be your witness" - this did not mean that Jesus would be standing there, but that what Jesus had said would be there as a touchstone. When your experience happens, immediately you can test it and unravel the knot. As it is, you have wandered around for so long in untruth, your eyes have become used to it. The shock of truth should not break you apart, should not drive you insane.

Remember, many seekers of truth have gone mad. Many seekers of truth have gone mad just as they neared the stage of becoming enlightened, they became deranged, because the happening is so vast, it is inconceivable, unbelievable. It is as if the whole sky has crashed on you.

Your pot is small and the infinite is raining in your pot. You will be shattered - you won't be able to contain it. You are face to face with the sun and your eyes will be dazzled and then go dark. The sun is before you and all is darkness, your eyes will shut. At that moment you can use Ashtavakra's statements to understand the sun. At that time, the voice of Ashtavakra that has been lying in your unconscious will immediately speak. The sutras of the Upanishads will start resounding, the Gita will echo, the Koran will echo - its verses will come forth! Their fragrance will assure you that you have come home, there is nothing to freak out about; this vastness is you.

Ashtavakra says that you are expansive, you are vast. You are omnipresent. You are void of action, uncorrupted. You are the ultimate reality. These statements will immediately give an explanation.

Merely having faith in them, merely holding on to them, will lead you nowhere. And greed is waiting within you, saying self-realization has not happened.

"To control desire, a continuous stream spreads out from the snake charmer's pipe. Dense, impenetrable desire quivers in response...."

Listen to it again: "To control desire, a continuous stream spreads out from the snake charmer's pipe. Dense, impenetrable desire quivers in response like a cobra whose coil is motionless, while the hood dances to and fro."

You want to become free of desire, but still you spread out a net of desire. You want to be completely clean and pure but still you do it by means of greed, still desire goes on quivering.

See how an alone, uncrowded desire quivers. The snake's coil is motionless, now only the hood dances to and fro.

You have gone to attain God, but your way of attaining is the same as for attaining money. You go to seek God but your desire, your passion is the same as the one who is after material things. Your madness is the same as the madness of one who wants to attain the world. The object of desire has changed, but the desire has not changed.

Listening to Ashtavakra your desire says: "Wow, this is great! I never knew that what I am seeking is already attained. So now I will just sit." Then you will wait: "Did it happen yet? did it happen yet?

did it happen yet?..." Desire goes on quivering. "Did it happen yet?" - you haven't understood.

Listen to Ashtavakra again. Ashtavakra says it is already attained. But how can you hear it, how can you understand it? - your desire goes on quivering. Until you have chased after your desires, until you have seen the worthlessness of chasing after them, run and fallen down and scraped yourself, you won't be able to understand. Only through the experience of desire does desire become worthless. Exhausted it falls down broken - in this moment of desirelessness you will understand that what you have been seeking has already happened.

Otherwise you repeat like a parrot. It doesn't make the slightest difference if you are a Hindu parrot or a Muslim parrot or a Jaina, a Christian, a Buddhist - a parrot is a parrot. A parrot may recite The Bible, a parrot may recite the Koran. A parrot is a parrot, he will go on repeating.

"Inside the temple all bathed and rubbed down, in full voice, engrossed, throats open in loud tones, extremely well practiced they go on chanting Ram-Ram. Inside themselves they are all deaf-mutes, repeating meaninglessly without understanding, dwarfs. But outside the most childish, the most loudmouthed."

Look in the temples! "Inside the temple, all bathed and rubbed down, in full voice, engrossed...."

People seem so innocent in the temples. Look in the market at the same faces that you see in the temples. Their coverings appeared different in the temples. "... Throats open in loud tones, extremely well practiced...." You must have seen people taking up a rosary and chanting. Wrapped in a blanket printed with Ram-ram, with sandal paste on the forehead - what a spotless, radiant image! When you meet the same man in the market, in the crowds, you won't be able to recognize him. People have different faces: they wear one face in the market, they wear another face in the temple.

"... Engrossed, throats open in loud tones, extremely well practiced they go on chanting Ram-Ram.

Inside themselves they are all deaf-mutes, repeating meaninglessly without understanding, dwarfs.

But outside the most childish, the most loudmouthed." Information can make you a parrot, can give you a big mouth. It can give you the illusion of being religious, can give deceptions. But don't think it is wisdom. And on the basis of information the conviction that you put forward will be sitting on doubt, riding on the shoulders of doubt. This conviction cannot take you to the door of truth. Don't put much faith in this conviction - it is worthless.

Faith must come from your own experience. Faith must come from the pure formlessness of your own meditation.

The second question:

Question 2:

This is just what I was saying. If a small glimpse of the truth comes to you, you will be upset, you won't be able to understand. Not understanding it, a deep uneasiness will take hold of you; madness too can overtake you.

This is why I speak on these scriptures. This is why I go on explaining every day, so that the information will remain in your unconscious, and when the happening takes place you can figure it out, you can clearly define what happened. Otherwise how will you comprehend it? You won't have the language, the words; you will have no way to understand it, no measuring stick, no scales - how will you weigh it? You will have no touchstone. How can you appraise it?

You have said: "... Your whole lecture of yesterday morning began echoing in every cell of my body.

I was looking as a spectator at the splendor of scenes going by, when the memory of the observer arose. This play of the observer went on for some time, then my legs began wobbling and to keep from falling I sat down at the side of the road."

Certainly this happens. When you first become aware of the observer, you wobble. Your whole life totters, because your whole life is set up without the observer. This new happening will shatter everything. It is like a blind man whose eyes suddenly open: do you think he will be able to walk down the road? He will stagger. Blind for forty, fifty years, he felt his way along with the help of his cane. In his blindness he gradually developed the ability to walk in the dark. He became skillful. He interpreted sounds around him. He got to know the turns in the roads. He had learned the art of seeing with his ears. For fifty years everything had been going well.

This life of the blind - which you cannot even imagine - bereft of light, color, beauty, shape; it depends only on the medium of sound.... He has only one language: sound. He has created his whole life on this basis. If on the way to the market in the morning suddenly his eyes open, think of what will happen. His whole world will come crashing down. His world of sound will go completely topsy-turvy.

This event will be so strong - the eyes opening, seeing peoples' faces, seeing colors, the rays of the sun, sunlight and shadow, this crowd; so many people, buses, cars, bicycles - he will completely freak out! It will be such a great shock to his life: Will the small world he has made with the help of sound disappear, be wiped out, die, be trampled under? He will sit down on the spot trembling, he may stagger and fall. Perhaps he will not be able to make it home... maybe he will faint.

And this example is nothing. When the observer makes its entrance into your life, when just one ray of the observer comes, then this example is nothing - the event is so much bigger. The inner eye is opening. You have created your world without the inner eye and when the inner eye suddenly opens it makes your whole world wrong. You will remain speechless in amazement.

You have asked rightly and asked from experience. Consider the two types of questions. One is theoretical - it has no great value. But this question comes out of experience. If there were no experience this question could not have arisen. If these legs had not staggered, this question would not have arisen. This question is from direct experience.

"... The memory of the observer arose." Ashtavakra's words must have reverberated. An echo must have remained of what I had said in the morning. Its fragrance must have arisen in you, a few threads of what I said must have become entangled in you.

"... The memory of the observer arose. This play of the observer went on for some time...." Perhaps it was only a moment. A moment of the observer seems very long, because the observer is beyond time. Here only a second passes on your watch; there, as the observer, it seems centuries have passed. This watch is of no use there. This watch is not made for the inner eye.

"This play of the observer went on for some time, but then my legs began wobbling and I sat down at the side of the road to keep from falling." This wobbling indicates that it happened. The questioner has not asked a question from his listening or reading - something transpired. "And then neither scene nor spectator remained, nor even the observer." In that wobbling everything dispersed, everything disappeared. In such moments confusion arises if there has been no gradual preparation.

If we are unable to assimilate it drop by drop, if it happens all of a sudden, there can be an explosion.

"Everything disappeared but still something was." Certainly something was. Actually everything was for the first time. Everything of yours ended, your little house of straw fell down. The sky, the moon and stars - the ultimate remained. The boundaries, the lines you had drawn all disappeared - cloudless sky remained. Your conditioning of living in a confined shell was shaken. You were frightened by this wobbling and sat down at the roadside. Certainly something was. The experience makes one speechless. One cannot grasp: what was it, who was it?

Have you noticed? - sometimes something suddenly wakes you up when you were deep asleep. At five a.m. you were sound asleep, at the hour of deepest sleep, and something suddenly awakens you. Some noise, some firecracker goes off in the street, a car crashes into your door: some noise that immediately wakes you up. Instantly! You jump immediately from sleep to wakefulness. You come like an arrow from the depths of sleep. Usually when we come out of deep sleep we come very slowly. First deep sleep drops away, then dreams gradually start floating, then we remain in dreams for a while.

You can remember your morning dreams, but you do not recall the night dreams, because the morning dreams are very light and exactly half way between sleep and waking up. Then gradually dreams disappear. Then there is half broken sleep. Then sun and shadow play a little hide and seek with your eyes: you are one moment awake, one moment again asleep; you roll over as if awake....

In between you hear your wife making tea, a dish falls, the milkman comes, someone passes by on the street, the servant knocks, the kids are getting ready for school. Then you roll over again and start falling into the depths. In this way you very gradually come to the surface. Then you open your eyes.

But if something happens suddenly, you come like an arrow from the depths straight to awakening.

Your eyes open and you wonder: Where am I? Who am I? For a moment nothing is clear.

This must have happened to all of you at some time or other: you wonder, Who am I? Even your name and address will be gone. Where am I? This too will be unclear. It is as if you have suddenly come to some alien world. It lasts only a moment then you come back together, because this shock isn't such a great shock. And then too you are used to it - it happens every day. You get up every morning: you return from the world of dreams into the world of wakefulness. This routine is old, yet sometimes when it happens suddenly you are startled and frightened.

When the real awakening happens you will be completely speechless. You won't have any idea what is happening. Everything will become calm and silent.

But it was good. "... Neither scene nor spectator remained, not even the observer remained.

Everything disappeared but still something was." It is to help you to comprehend this "something"

that I speak on scriptures - so you become capable of interpreting it. You can give meaning to this "something," you can identify it, you can define it. If not, it can drown you. You will be carried away in a flood, you won't have any place to stand. Hence I go on saying so many things.

"Everything disappeared but still something was. Sometimes dark, sometimes light playing hide and seek. But since then anxiety has increased and I cannot understand all this."

Put it away, keep what I say to you. Make a jewelled box for it. Don't take it as wisdom but only as information. Consciously make a box for it. Then gradually you will find, as experiences begin happening, that my words arise from your unconscious, and make clear and comprehensible the experiences that happen. I will be your witness.

But if you argue with me as you listen I cannot become your witness - you listen and you are creating some kind of internal struggle against me, refuting me. If you are not listening sympathetically, lovingly, but go on debating, then I cannot be your witness because then when you put something in your box it won't be mine, it will be yours.

Last night a psychologist from Australia took sannyas. I told him, "You are welcome here even if you don't take sannyas. But then you will not become my guest. You are welcomed. But if you take sannyas you are welcome here and you will also become my guest."

People ask me, "Will your love for us be less if we don't take sannyas?" My love for you will remain total. Be welcome! But the moment you take sannyas you become my guest also. And there is a great difference. Without taking sannyas you listen from a distance. Taking sannyas you come close.

Without your taking sannyas your intellect goes on analyzing, goes on shifting whatever I say.

Whatever fits with your mind you keep, whatever does not fit you throw out. And the possibility is that what doesn't fit with you is what will be useful for you. Whatever agrees with your mind cannot transform you. If it agrees with you it means that it is in harmony with your past. What doesn't fit with your past can spark a revolution within. What doesn't fit with you can transform.

Whatever totally fits you will strengthen you as you are, not transform you. You go on selecting - you think you are intelligent.

Intelligent people sometimes do very idiotic things. They sit here selecting. They go on choosing.

They hold on to things that fit their prejudice, and make no connection with anything that is against their prejudice. But I repeat to you that what doesn't seem to fit you will some day be useful. Now you don't have any way to understand it, because you don't have any experience of it. But still I say unto you, keep it with you. When the experience comes some day, then suddenly it will arise from your unconscious and clarify everything. Then you will not remain speechless, the amazement will not break you apart. And you need not be frightened and uneasy.

"High above what the wind sang and the cedars echoed, what was shining on the snow peaks, what spilled over from the evening sky, who received all this? The one who extended his hand, desiring to attract it? Oh, it has descended into my already given heart. It overflows in my accepted tears.

It came unknown, unrecognized. It has manifested itself by means of all these and me. It has permeated itself. Alone where it is resplendent, eyes are helplessly lowered. Not only sounds, the echoing of the infinite silence is also lost there."

Hear me - with deep tears! Hear me - with the heart. Hear me - with love. Not with intellect, not with logic. This is the meaning of trust and faith.

"High above what the wind sang and the cedars echoed, what was shining on the snow peaks, what spilled over from the evening sky, who received all this? The one who extended his hand, desiring to attract it?" No! Whenever the hand of desire is extended, it shrinks. The hand of desire can only contain alms, not an empire. A heart opened by love is needed to contain an empire. A begging, desiring bowl will not do.

"... who received all this? The one who extended his hand, desiring to attract it?"

You can listen to me in such a way that you take what fits your prejudices and put it in your bag. Then you come to me extending your begging bowl. Desire is a beggar. You can take a little, but what you take are just scraps of bread fallen from the table. You could not become a guest. Sannyas will make you a guest. "Oh, it has descended into my already given heart. It overflows in my accepted tears. It came unknown, unrecognized. It has manifested itself by means of all these and me. It has permeated itself. Alone where it is resplendent, eyes are helplessly lowered."

Where eyes bow down.... "Not only sounds, the echoing of the infinite silence is also lost there." Get ready for this. Fill the heart with love for this. Learn to listen with sympathy. And keep in a treasure box what I am saying to you. Then you will not suffer. Then when the unacquainted, the unknown descends, you can understand it. You will be able to understand its hidden music. You will not drown or be frightened by its silence, you will be liberated; otherwise it seems like death.

If God comes without your understanding, if you have no means to understand him, it will feel like death, that you are finished. If you have a little understanding, some preparation, you have learnt something from a master, have sat in his presence, then God is liberation; otherwise he seems to be death. And once you have freaked out, you will stop going in that direction. Once you have been so frightened, every cell of your body will tremble. You will go everywhere except where there is such fear. Where your arms and legs tremble, where you have to sit at the side of the road, where everything goes dark and all seems to be lost; something unknown, unacquainted remains and you are just freaked out - you won't go back there.

In one of Rabindranath Tagore's poems he says, "I searched for God for many lives... searched but never found. Sometimes I got a glimpse of him among the most distant stars. I kept hoping, kept looking. Then one day by a lucky accident I reached his door. There was a sign: 'This is God's house.' I climbed the steps - in one leap the journey of many lives was complete. Benediction!

"My hand was on the doorbell chain when a fear overcame me: 'What if I meet him? Then? What will I do? My whole work has been to seek God. I live in this hope - it is my life's journey. So if I meet God it will be death. What will happen to my life, my journey? Then where will I go, what will I attain, what will I seek? Then nothing will remain.' So in fright I let go of the chain, slowly let go of it so there would be no noise, so that he would not open the door. I took my shoes in my hand and fled, and since then I have been fleeing."

"Still I go on seeking" - the poem continues - "even now I am seeking God, though I know where his house is. I seek him everywhere except there, because seeking is my life. I keep myself from going near it. I go anywhere except towards that house. I turn away from it. I ask everywhere else, 'Where is God?' - and all along I know where God is."

As I see it, many people have come close to that house many times in their endless seeking, but freaked out. Freaked out and forgot everything; only that fright they cannot forget. This is why people are not readily attracted to meditation. People are scared, and avoid even talking about things like meditation. They make formal use of the word God, but they never let themselves go in a deep search for him. They go to the temple, the mosque - it is a social formality, a convention, a custom.

They go because they are supposed to, but they never let the temple, the mosque, be established in their heart. They won't take on such danger. They keep God far away. And there is a reason for it - somewhere hidden deep in their memory is an experience of fear. Sometime they must have faltered in front of that door.

If the friend who has had this experience does not understand it correctly he will start being frightened. Sitting down freaked out in the street, all limbs trembling, heart pounding wildly, breath coming in gulps, everything every which-way - it is better to stay away from such meditation! It is trouble. It is okay if you come back, but if you don't come back? If you go on sitting at the roadside people will think you are crazy. It is okay for an hour or two; more, and the police will come. More, and the neighbors will take you away, or send you to the hospital to find out what happened. The medics will start giving injections, concerned that you have lost consciousness, that there may be a brain injury.

A friend has written - a sannyasin - that he left here dancing, ecstatic. His family had never seen him dancing and ecstatic. When he danced and was blissed out at home they thought he was insane. They came running, caught him, sat him down, and asked what happened.

He said, "Nothing happened to me. I am very happy, in bliss." The more he spoke of spiritual truths the more his family were sure something was wrong. They took him from the house and forced him to enter a hospital.

A letter has come from him. He says, "I am lying here in the hospital laughing. This is great fun.

When I was sad no one took me for medical help. Now I am happy people have brought me to the hospital. I am watching this drama. But they think I am insane. And the more they think I am mad the more I laugh! The more I laugh the more they think I am mad!"

It is good that you have asked. Don't be frightened. This experience will gradually quieten down.

Witness it. This happening is natural.

The fourth question:

Question 3:

Do you see the difference? The last question came from experience. This question is academic.

"We are part and parcel of God, and indestructible too." Do you know this? You have heard it, you have read it - and as it gives your ego satisfaction, you believed it. What could give the ego more satisfaction than saying we are part of God... we are God, we are Brahma, we are indestructible!

This is what you want. This is the search of the ego. This is your deepest desire - that you should become indestructible, a part of God, one who is Brahma, the lord of the whole universe.

"We are part and parcel of God, and indestructible too." Do you know this? If you know this there is no need to ask. If you don't know then writing it is meaningless: asking the question is enough.

"Please explain when, why and how this part got separated from the root?" This is a scholarly question. When? - you want date and time. What will you do with it? If I tell you the date what difference can it make? If I give the year and time, that exactly at six a.m. on such and such a day - what change will that make? What transformation will it bring to your life? What will you attain?

"... When, why and how this part got separated?" If you know you are a part of God then you know you have never been separated. You have had a dream of separation. You have never been separated - how can a part be separated? The part exists only with the whole. You have forgotten.

You cannot be separated but you can forget. There is no way to separate. We are that which exists. Even though we can forget, still we can remember - the whole difference is of forgetting and remembering.

"... When, why and how this part got separated from the root?" If you were separate I could tell you when, why and how. You are not separate. Asleep at night, you dream you are a horse. In the morning you ask, "Why, how, when did I become a horse? It is very difficult - why did I become a horse?" The first thing is that you never became a horse. If you had, would there be anyone left to ask? Horses don't ask questions. You were never a horse, you only dreamt it. In the morning you wake up saying, "What a dream I had!" Remember, you were not a horse even when you were watching the dream, and even though you may have been completely absorbed in feeling you were a horse. This is Ashtavakra's basic teaching.

Ashtavakra says that you become that with which you identify your "I." Body consciousness - you become a body. You say you are a body and you are a body. Brahma consciousness - say you are Brahma and you are Brahma. You become that with which you identify your "I." In your dream you were identified with a horse - you became a horse. Now you are identified with a body, you become a man. But you never really do, you are always what you are - just the same. There is never any change in your nature.

This kind of question has no meaning. Don't waste time in asking such questions. And those who answer questions like these are even more idiotic than you.

There is an anecdote about the Zen monk, Bokoju. One morning he woke up and immediately called his chief disciple, telling him, "Listen, I have had a dream. Can you analyze it for me?"

The disciple said, "Wait! I will bring a little water. First wash your face."

He brought a pot full of water and helped the master wash his face and hands. While he was doing that another disciple was passing by. The master said, "Listen, I had this dream. Will you analyze it for me?"

He said, "Just wait... it is better I bring a cup of tea for you" - and he brought him a cup of tea.

The master had a good belly laugh. He said, "If you had analyzed my dream I would have beaten you and thrown you out!"

What analysis can a dream have? Now you have seen it, you are awake, now drop the whole circus!

The disciples gave the correct answer. It was a test, their examination - the moment of testing had come. One disciple brought water to wash the master's hands and face. "The dream is gone, now be finished with it! What more analysis? - the dream was a dream, it is finished. What analysis?

The truth can be analyzed, but a dream? Can the false be analyzed? Can what never happened be analyzed? It is enough to know it was a dream; now wash your face. Now you have come back, just come out of it."

The other youth also did well, bringing a cup to tea: "You've washed your face, but it seems there is still a little sleep left. Enjoy a cup of tea and you will be completely awake."

This is what I am telling you: "Wash your face, drink your tea! You were never separate - there is no way to be separate."

Then you ask, "And re-uniting the part to the root - is it possible there is a union that cannot be separated?" When you are not separate, to talk about union is nonsense. This is why Ashtavakra says practice for liberation prevents liberation. What is he saying? He is saying, "You want a method to unite you with that from which you have never been separate? Does madness have no limit? This very method will prevent union."

Think a little. If you never left your house then efforts to return home will prevent you from waking up.

A drunk returned home one night. He had drunk too much. He managed to knock on the door but didn't know that it was his own house. His mother opened the door. He said, "My dear old woman, can you tell me where my house is?"

The old woman replied, "You are my son, I am your mother, idiot! This is your home."

He said, "Don't try to fool me. Don't confuse me. I am sure my house is somewhere around here, but where?"

The neighbors gathered around and they tried to persuade him. But it is no use arguing with drunks.

One who argues with drunkards is also drunk. They told him, "This is your house!" They began proving it, showing him proof: "Look at this," "Look at that." They didn't understand that this man is drunk - what proof is needed for anything? Who knows all that he is seeing? Something you cannot imagine. He is not seeing what you see, he is in some other world. He doesn't even recognize his own mother; can he recognize his home? He does not recognize himself; can he recognize anyone else?

Another drunk came along. He arrived with his bullock cart all hitched up. He said, "Climb on my bullock cart, I will take you home."

The drunk said, "This man seems to be right. I've found my guru! These others are all idiots: I ask them where my house is and they just go on repeating that this is my house. What, am I blind? This man is a perfect master."

Remember: if you ask wrong questions you will fall into the snares of wrong masters. Once you ask a wrong question you will meet someone or other who will give you a wrong answer. This is the law of life. Ask and someone is waiting to answer. The fact is that even if you don't ask, someone is ready to answer. They are looking for you. When you ask a question like this you only put yourself in trouble.

"And reuniting...." You were never separated, you never left - how can you be reunited? And you ask "Is it possible there is a union that cannot be separated?" What if union happens but somehow it separates again? These things all look real because we don't remember who we are. If God is separate then all these things are true.

God is our nature, but we can forget our nature. This too is our inner nature, that we can forget our nature.

A friend has asked, "If the atma is uncorrupted, freedom, and infinite energy, supreme independence, then how does desire arise?" This too is the independence of our being - that if it wants to desire it can desire. If our being could not desire it would be dependent. Think about it.

This world is your freedom. You wanted it, so it happened. Your desire is free. If you wish, it ceases right now. If you wish, it is back immediately.

So I cannot say to you there is a union that cannot be broken. You have never been separated, but your being's ultimate freedom is that when it wants, it can forget something, and when it wants it can remember. If this possibility did not exist, the being would be confined, its freedom would be limited.

Something would be projected on it; it would have characteristics.

There was a philosopher in the West, Diderot. He proved that God is not omnipotent, not all powerful.

He gave arguments that seem to be right. For example, he says, "Can God make two plus two equal five?" It seemed difficult for even God to make two plus two equal five. So how could he be omnipotent? Two plus two equal four. "Can God make a triangle a rectangle? How can he do it? If he makes it a rectangle, it will no longer be a triangle. If it remains a triangle, then he couldn't make a rectangle out of it, so God is limited."

Diderot gave a shock to the Christian idea of God. But if Diderot knew the Indian ideas he would have been in difficulty. They say that this is the whole trouble - that God has the freedom to make two plus two equal five, two plus two equal three. This is what we call maya, illusion - it can make two plus two equal five, two plus two equal three. When two plus two equals four we are out of maya.

Here triangles look like rectangles. Here great deceptions go on. Here someone understands something, someone else understands something else. Only what actually is, that is unknown to anyone. This much is certain, that two plus two will be anything, but not four. This is what we call maya.

We have called maya the power of God. Have you ever thought what this means? We call maya the power of God: it means God has the power even to deceive himself. If not, he would be limited. What sort of God would he be if he couldn't dream? Then he would be limited because he is incapable of dreaming. No, God can see dreams.

You are dreaming. You are God seeing dreams. He can wake up, he can dream - and this ability is yours. Hence when you want you can dream, and when you want you can wake up. This is your choice: if you want to stay awake, you can remain awake; if you want to stay in dreams, you can continue dreaming.

Man's freedom is unrestrained.

The power of your being is unrestrained.

Truth and dream - they are the ultimate's two streams. Everything is contained in these two streams.

You ask is reuniting possible? First, don't say "reunite." If you say "remember," it will be the right word.

And you ask, "... THAT CANNOT BE SEPARATED...." I cannot guarantee it, because it depends on you, it is your choice. If you want to renounce, to forget, then no one can stop you. If you want to remember, no one can stop you. And don't be troubled by this. Take it as a blessing that your freedom is so great that even when you want to forget God there is no objection. God does not harass you at all. If you want to oppose him, there is no objection. He still remains with you. When you want to go against him, he still goes on giving you energy.

The Sufi monk, Hassan, has written, "One night I asked God, 'Who is the most religious person in the village?' God told me it is my next door neighbor."

Hassan had never even thought about him. He was a simple, straightforward man. No one thinks about simple folk. Thinking is about troublemakers. His neighbor was a simple fellow, living quietly.

An ordinary man, in his own joy - nothing to do with anyone else. No one had taken any notice of him. Hassan said to himself, "This man is the most virtuous?"

The next morning he inspected him carefully and found what radiance the man had. The next night he asked God, "Now, another question. It is good what you said. I will worship this man, I will bow down to him - he has become my guru. Now tell me one more thing: Who is the worst man in this village? - so I can avoid him."

God said, "The same neighbor."

Hassan said, "This is really confusing!"

God replied, "What can I do? Last night he was in a beautiful mood, now he is in a lousy mood. I cannot do anything. I cannot say what state he will be in by the morning. He could be in a good mood again."

Your being is ultimate freedom. Nothing limits it. This ultimate freedom we call moksha, liberation.

Moksha includes the freedom to forget. If you want to forget no one can stop you. What liberation would it be if you weren't free to come out of it when you wanted to?

I have heard, a Catholic priest died and when he reached heaven he was surprised to see many people bound in chains and irons. He said, "What's going on? Chains and irons in heaven?"

He was told, "They want to return - they are Americans, and they want to go back to America. They say it is more fun there. They had to be put in irons because it would be a scandal for heaven. They say, 'We don't want to stay in heaven, we'd rather return to America. It is juicier there. We have better women than these heavenly damsels. Liquor? - we have better liquor. Buildings? - they are taller than this. What's with all these ancient buildings?'

The buildings in heaven are old-fashioned now. They are completely out of date. The architects and engineers designed them 25,000 years ago and they are still standing. "They say they want to return to America. We had to chain them. If they run away and make it back to America it will be a great disgrace for heaven. How will anyone want to come here?"

But what heaven is this, where you can be put in irons? Hell would be better; at least there aren't chains. Remember this: heaven is independence. Moksha is freedom. Liberation is where you are independent. And this is the ultimate experience. It is ultimate and unconditional; there can be no conditions on it.

If some liberated soul has the feeling to return to the world, no one can stop him. Liberated ones won't return, this is another matter. But if a liberated being wanted to return no one could stop him.

And who would stop him? And if someone can stop a liberated being, then what liberation is this?

If you start leaving heaven and someone says, "Stop! You can't leave. This is heaven, where are you going?" - heaven is finished that very moment. I am not saying that liberated beings return. I am saying that no one can stop them. Hence I cannot give you a guarantee. If you want to return, what can I do? If you want to avoid God, what can I do? I can only make a declaration of your total freedom.

"If it is possible then please join this part to the root...." Your hope is very cheap. You are saying that you don't really want to be joined, someone else should take the trouble to do it. How can this be?

Union can happen only if you want it... only if it is your desire, your will, your yearning, your thirst....

No one else can unite you. There is no way freedom can be forced - neither outer nor inner. You go by your own choice.

And if I manage somehow to join you, you will still escape, because a happening brought from outside cannot be connected with your being. It will be forced. It is not possible; otherwise one enlightened person could enlighten the whole world. One enlightened one would be enough. He would liberate everyone, unite everyone with God. Are enlightened ones lacking in compassion? No they are not, but nothing can be done against your wish. And if you wish it, it can happen right now, this very moment. Be happy! Right now!

And this desire you have, that someone else should unite you with God - this is your means of returning to the world. Any desire for the other is a way of returning to the world. Someone else should make you happy, should love you, should respect you - now these old habits are saying someone should liberate you, should unite you with God... but someone else. How long are you going to remain weak, powerless, impotent? When will you awaken to your own power? When will you declare your virility? When will you stand on your own two feet? Sometimes you lean on your wife's shoulders, sometimes on the government's shoulders, sometimes on politicians' shoulders....

I have heard that near Delhi some laborers were sent to do some work on the street. They arrived there only to find they had forgotten their picks, they hadn't brought their picks and shovels. They phoned the engineer to say they had come without their tools, and to send them right away.

He said, "I'll send them. until then you'll have to manage by leaning on each other's shoulders."

This is what laborers do. To rest they lean on their picks and shovels. The engineer said, "I'll send them as fast as I can, but in the meantime you'll just have to lean on each other's shoulders."

We are leaning, we go on changing shoulders. Then we drop all this and lean on the guru's shoulders. Now some guru should take us across, take us beyond.

When will you make your own declaration, your individual proclamation? With your own declaration comes the potential of your own being to flower, to blossom. How long are you going to be dependent? How long are you going to insist on being a beggar? Are you going to attain god as alms too? Wake up from this sleep.

"... so that I don't have to be frightened in this chaos again and again." You wanted to enter this chaos, so you entered. And the strange thing is, if you are put in solitude you will be frightened there too. Who is stopping you? Run away to the Himalayas, sit in isolation: there you will fear aloneness and you will come running back to this chaos. We remain in this chaos because we are afraid to remain alone, we cannot live alone. And we feel bad in the crowd. It is very difficult: we cannot live alone, we cannot live in the crowd.

Have you noticed what happens when you are left alone? What happens when you are alone in the forest on a dark night? What happens? Does bliss come? The chaos seems better. "If I could only meet someone, talk to someone...." Alone, you become very afraid of dying. Alone, you feel death. When you dissolve into God you will be completely alone. There are not two gods here - there is only one. Dissolve and you are alone. Dissolving into God you don't remain you, God does not remain God - only one remains. This is why the preparation of meditation is needed, so you start enjoying the taste of being alone. Before entering into ultimate aloneness, let the joy of aloneness begin, let its melody play, its song resound. Start enjoying aloneness; then you can drop into ultimate aloneness. It is a training so you can endure the experience of God.

If you ask me I will say that meditation is not a method to attain God; God can be attained without meditation too. Meditation is a training to endure God. Meditation gives you the capacity to withstand. When you enter ultimate aloneness you will be completely alone. No radio, no television, no newspaper - no friend, no club, no society - nothing at all. You will be completely alone. Prepare for that aloneness.

I am ready to take you out of this chaos, but are you ready? When you sit alone your head starts creating this same chaos. The friends that renounce their homes start talking to themselves. In their head they start talking to the wife they left behind. The whole crowd is collected again. Webs of imagination are woven. You cannot remain alone; hence you return again and again. You do not return to the world without cause. You return on your own accord. You want this chaos, hence you return.

"The life of man is nothing at all. The matter is this: it doesn't matter at all." "The life of man is nothing at all... man's life is not life. Life belongs to the whole. "The matter is this: it doesn't matter at all"...

man is just meaningless.

Yesterday, Mulla Nasruddin's falling off the bed - just meaningless. He was making space for a child that doesn't exist when he fell and broke his leg.

There was a case in court in which two men had been fighting. The judge asked what happened.

Both of them hesitated. They said, "What can we say? If we say what happened we will be very embarrassed. You give whatever punishment is needed."

He said, "I still want to know what happened. Who should I punish?"

They looked at each other saying, "You tell him." When the judge started getting angry, and said, "Are you going to tell me or not?" they were forced to speak, and they said, "This is the situation: we are friends, and we were sitting in the sand on the river bank. This friend said he was going to buy a buffalo. I said, 'Don't buy a buffalo because I am buying a field, and if your buffalo comes into my field then our life-long friendship will be spoiled.'

"He said, 'Get lost! Because you are buying a field I shouldn't buy a buffalo? Don't buy a field then!

And a buffalo is a buffalo - if it gets in it gets in. I'm not going to spend my whole day chasing after him. And what is the value of this friendship? - that just because my buffalo enters your field you make such a fuss about it?'

"I too mounted my throne and said, 'Good, I will show you my field, show me the buffalo you bought.'

Then with a stick I drew a field in the sand - and this idiot made his stick drawing of a buffalo enter!

We quarreled, we came to blows. What can we say to you? Give us the punishment. We are embarrassed to say anything more."

"The life of man is nothing at all. The matter is this: it's no matter at all. You have given man everything such that man's person is nothing at all. Except this joy of heart and liver the messengers of pleasure are nothing at all. The /kaynat of beauty is everything, the /kaynat of love is nothing at all. Man changes clothing: this life-death /mayaat is nothing at all."

Man goes on changing his clothes. Neither life is anything, nor death is anything. "Man changes clothing: this life-death /mayaat is nothing at all. The life of man is nothing at all. The matter is this:

it's no matter at all." If you understand this, that you are a matter which doesn't matter, then you have understood everything.

The last question:

Question 4:

Dulari has asked. It is absolutely true: I have known her for years, and she has never asked anything.

Very few people have never asked. This is the first time, and still she doesn't ask anything: "For ages I have wanted to ask: please, you tell me, what should I ask?

The real question of life is such that it cannot be asked. A question you can ask is not worth asking.

What you cannot ask - that is worth asking. The real question of life cannot be put into words. Life questions can only be said with eyes thirsting for rain, eyes filled with the longing to know.

I know Dulari. She has never asked, but I have heard her question. And her question is not hers, because what you are able to ask is yours. What you are unable to ask is everyone's.

The same question is inside every one of us. And this question is: all this is happening, all is going on but still nothing seems real. All this running around, this hubbub - but nothing makes any sense.

So much is attained and lost; still nothing is attained, nothing is lost. This vast journey birth after birth where no destination is visible. We are - why? What is this being of ours? Where are we going, and what is going on? What is our purpose? What is the meaning of this music?

This existential question is inside everyone: What is the purpose of existence? And in words there is no answer. A question that cannot be asked in words, cannot have an answer in words. That which is inside us - call it the witness, observer, river of life, consciousness, whatever name you like. It is nameless so give it any name you want - God, liberation, nirvana, being, non-being, whatever you like - fullness, emptiness, whatever; it is nameless within - submerge yourself in this. By your just dropping into it questions start gradually disappearing.

I am not saying you will find answers - the questions just dissolve. And when the questions dissolve your very consciousness becomes the answer. I am not saying you get an answer. When you become questionless the joy of life, the great auspicious blessing comes raining down. You dance, you shout and sing. Samadhi has flowered. Then you don't ask anything - there is nothing to ask.

Then life is not a question, life is a mystery. It is not a problem to be solved, but a mystery to be lived, to be danced, to be sung. A mystery to be celebrated.

Go in. Beyond the body, beyond the mind, beyond emotions - go in deeper and deeper! "Life long I could not find out, What is affection? Where is love? And where do the flowers spread their perfume?" A fragrance seems to be arising - where does it come from? Life is, its shadow falls here, but where is its root? Reflections are shimmering, but where is the original? Echoes reverberate in the mountains, but where is the original sound? "Life long I could not find out, What is affection?

Where is love? And where do the flowers spread their perfume? A bride of sighs I met and for my grief a laugh. Life long I could not find out, What is fragrance? Where is the pollen? And where do the clouds rain?"

But the clouds rain - in your deepest interiority. Flowers give off their perfume - in your innermost center. The fragrance is in the musk deer's navel. This fragrance that surrounds you and has become a question - where does it arise? This fragrance is yours, it is no one else's. If you look for it outside it will become a mirage, it will spread the net of maya, taking you on an endless journey.

The day you look within, the door of the temple opens. That day you will reach to your fragrant center. Love is there, divinity is there.

The mind gets caught up outside. Mind says, "I'll go inside, but a little later on." "Supported by some desire, I stand long alone on the bank of the river, keeping silent. It is a pleasant evening, seems a gathering of the happy. This weightless twilight overwhelms my thinking. I am reminded, this is the evening of my life. It looks stupid but in life, hopelessness too clings to some hope. Cry out a little longer, O heart! Receive the embrace of the charmed twilight with a smile, there is still plenty of time before night falls."

Mind goes on suggesting, a little more, a little longer - just forget yourself in dreams. Go on running after mirages a little more. Such beautiful dreams! And there is still plenty of time before death comes.

People think we will take sannyas, we will pray, we will meditate - in old age, when death has come and stands at the door. When one foot is already in the grave we will lift the other foot for meditation.

"Cry out a little longer, O heart! Receive the embrace of the charmed twilight with a smile, there is still plenty of time before night falls."

We go on postponing. Night is drawing near. There isn't plenty of time, night has already fallen.

Many times we have wasted this birth, this life. We are waiting for death - and death comes before meditation has come. One more life spoiled, one more chance wasted. Don't let it happen this time.

This time don't postpone. This fragrance is your own. This life is hidden within you. The veil has to be opened within you.

Don't ask questions without. No answer is going to come from there. Enter within, from where the question arises. Don't bother if the question is unclear. Enter this unclear half-light of questioning.

Gradually enter inside this faint dusky light.

Seek that place where questions arise. Don't bother much what the question is - just watch where are they coming from. Find that place, that deep place, within yourself where the seeds of questioning sprout, where questions take leaf. There is the root, there you will find the answer.

"The answer" does not mean you will find some fixed answer, some conclusion. The answer means you will experience blessedness, gratefulness, life. Where life is not a problem, where it becomes a celebration.

"A screaming silence in which voiced burning desires burn up, are dissolved. From this your rhythm pulsates, your season is known. A screaming silence in which voiced burning desires burn up, are dissolved."

No, there is a silence within, a peace in which all the fire of desiring is gradually lost and becomes calm. "From this your rhythm pulsates...." Then no melody is heard only the rhythm echoes - a rhythm without words, without tone. Pure rhythm reverberates. "From this your rhythm pulsates, your season is known." Here the truth of life manifests: "your season is known."

"A black roundish night in which form, statues, icons are all melted down and fade away. A deep sleep beyond dreams, beyond forms, sacred: within it extend your hand and immediately draw him near and embrace him!"

God is hidden within you. Go in a little. Leave your idols, your thoughts, icons, beliefs... soap bubbles of the mind! Enter the depths. Where there are no waves, no words, where silence is.

Where ultimate silence takes voice. Where only silence resounds. "From this your rhythm pulsates, your season is known."

Enter there. "You extend your hand and immediately draw him near and embrace him!"

This is the meeting, the union.

What you seek is hidden within you. The question you are searching for, its answer is hidden within you. Wake up! Celebrate it right now! All of Ashtavakra's sutras give this one message: it is not to be attained, it is already attained. Wake up and celebrate.

Hari Om Tat Sat.