Mind is friction, understanding is transcendence

Question 1:

BROADLY SPEAKING, AS I UNDERSTAND IT, THERE ARE TWO SETS OF RULES: ONE FOR THE OUTER WORLD - WHICH IS THE MAN-MADE WORLD CONCERNED WITH EARNING MONEY, REARING CHILDREN, DRIVING ON A CERTAIN SIDE OF THE ROAD - AND A DIFFERENT SET OF RULES FOR THE INNER WORLD; FOR EXAMPLE, HYPNOSIS, TELEPATHY, MIND-READING AND SO ON, AND FOR ATTAINING INNER GROWTH OF CONSCIOUSNESS, LEADING FINALLY TO SAMADHI, ENLIGHTENMENT, NIRVANA.

TO LIVE HERE, BOTH RULES HAVE TO BE FOLLOWED, AND SO IT APPEARS TO ME THAT FRICTION IS CREATED.

TO MY SURPRISE, A FUKOUKU OF JAPAN IS DOING WHAT HE CALLS "NO-FARMING,"

OR DOING-NOTHING FARMING - NO PLOUGHING, NO WEEDING, NO FERTILIZATION, NO PESTICIDES; AND HAS HAD THE HIGHEST YIELD IN THE LAST 25 YEARS.

IS SUCH A THING ALSO POSSIBLE IN OTHER AREAS OF ACTIVITY SUCH AS BUSINESS, MEDICAL PRACTICE, LEGAL PRACTICE, SERVICE, ETC? IS SYNCHRONIZATION TO SOME EXTENT POSSIBLE?

OSHO, CAN YOU PLEASE "ENLIGHTEN" ME?

There are many questions in your one question. I will have to take all those questions one by one; only then a satisfactory answer is possible.

First you say "it is my understanding" - it is not. It is only your thinking, and that's the reason why the friction is felt. The friction is symbolic: You are misunderstanding thinking for understanding.

Thinking is of the mind.

Understanding is of the beyond.

So the first thing to be noted is that to attain to understanding one has not to become a very keen thinker. On the contrary, one has to become a no-thinker. In the state of non-thinking blossoms the flower of understanding. Then there is no friction.

Right now you are dividing life into two kinds of rules, the outer rules and the inner rules. But this is not your vision, this is not your seeing; this is your thinking. And thinking is dualistic; the outer and the inner are categories of thinking.

For understanding, there is nothing outer and nothing is inner.

Existence simply is.

Or, you can say the inner and the outer are nothing but two sides of the same coin, inseparable.

The question of friction does not arise, even separation is impossible. But mind lives on friction; its whole existence is that of continuous struggle, struggle against itself.

The man of understanding knows no outer, no inner. He knows only a transcendental awareness in which all outer, all inner is dissolved - and resolved.

A Japanese king went to see Lin Chi, a famous master of his time. Just as he entered the forest in which Lin Chi lived with his disciples, he saw a woodcutter. Naturally he asked him, "Where can I find the master?"

For a moment the woodcutter stopped and told him, "It is here," and again he started cutting.

The man thought, "He looks crazy... I don't see anybody here, and this man cannot be Lin Chi. A world-famous master is not going to cut wood in the hot sun."

Thinking that it was useless to ask him more, the king started moving farther on his way. The woodcutter laughed and he said, "It seems you can only meet him on the inner, not on the outer."

The king was a little afraid. That man had an axe in his hand... and was talking such nonsense. He said, "I will find my way. Please don't get excited about it; you just do your work."

When he reached Lin Chi's house he was surprised. In the master's robe, the man who was sitting there was exactly like the woodcutter. He said, "I am puzzled; do you have a twin brother?"

He said, "Yes, the outer is my twin brother. I am the inner. He cuts wood, I show the way towards the ultimate truth - but in fact we are both one."

There is no friction in Lin Chi. But in the king's mind there is trouble, because he divides according to the categories we have been conditioned for. How can a great master be cutting wood? Or how can a woodcutter be a great master? But can you see that there is any problem? Why can a great master not cut wood - is there any intrinsic, logical difficulty? Why can a woodcutter not be a master? And if a woodcutter cannot be a master then who can be a master? There is no existential difficulty, but only a mind-created duality. There is a transcendental consciousness. Lin Chi has it.

I have both these hands. I can use both these hands because I am beyond both these hands, because I am not identified with the left hand or identified with the right hand. They are both my hands, and my existence is superior to both.

The outer rules and the inner rules are going to create friction if you don't have the master inside you. Then naturally your left hand and right hand cannot function together in harmony - because you are dead, the master is absent.

One very famous Jaina saint died a few years ago. Now, death does not care about anybody, whether you are a saint or whether you are a sinner. The saint died in a posture which is not thought to be right according to Jainism. The Jaina saint, if he is really a master, must die in a lotus posture.

It is significant; it means the man who is really aware will be aware of death coming. And this will be an indication that he has been ready, prepared for death to come: death will find him in the exact posture described by the Jaina scriptures. But out of a hundred, ninety-nine percent of the time it is a problem.

These so-called saints die in all kinds of postures. Then their followers have a difficulty, because if somebody comes to see then they will feel embarrassed that their saint has died in this posture - so they force the dead body into a lotus posture. And this man must have died in the night while asleep, so by the morning the body was so stiff that they had to almost break his bones, and hit him hard to put him in the right shape.

One of my friends was there who took all these pictures - and escaped with the camera, because the followers saw him taking pictures. They would have killed him because he could destroy their whole following, and a great saint. He showed me the pictures. I could not believe... that followers will not leave you even when you are dead! And they were beating him, putting him into the right shape. Ordinarily, even for a person who has never been practicing the lotus posture, it is difficult.

When you are dead, then to practice Yoga is really a miracle!

But they managed; for the photographs to be published in the newspaper, they managed - although you could see that the man was sitting very reluctantly. He had been beaten so hard... it is true, he was dead! But the posture was not a harmony, it was forced; the posture was as dead as the man was dead.

The problem is that by following the outer rules, following the inner rules without knowing who it is, who is being forced to follow the outer rules, the inner rules, you are going to create a thousand and one frictions. On each step there is going to be difficulty. The outer rule says one thing and the inner rule may say exactly the opposite, and you will be torn apart.

The outer rule says: Love your wife, love your children, love your family, love your neighborhood, love the people around you, because that is the only way to live with these people, that is the only way to be related to them. And the inner rule says, "Wife? - she is the sure door to hell!" Now there is friction... how to love hell?

But people are great artists; they manage both. Deep down they know this woman is hell, and on the surface they say, "Darling, I love you. I will die without you." And they are hoping inside that somehow, if this woman dies....

But the women are so strong that every husband pops off, and the woman remains to sit and pop!

Unless he pops off, she is not going to leave the world. Women have a five year longer life span.

I have heard, a woman was dying and the husband was trying to bring tears to his eyes. It is a difficult job when your whole being wants to dance, when you want to burst into a film song. So he was putting some spicy thing into his eyes to bring tears. But you cannot deceive a woman - particularly no husband can deceive a wife; it has never happened.

She said, "Stop all this nonsense. Just promise me one thing, that you are not going to marry the woman who lives in the neighborhood."

The man said, "Don't be afraid. And anyway, your clothes will not fit her. I promise I will not marry her; your clothes won't fit with her."

You cannot hide. Your inner and outer are constantly in friction, everywhere.

You are asked by your elders, by your religious teachers, to be truthful - because lying is one of the worst crimes, a sin for which you will suffer much.

One old swami, a traditional swami, Swami Divyanand, used to stay with my family whenever he would come that way, at least once a year. And truth was his main theme. One afternoon he was resting. He had the body of a Hindu monk, and as you know.... He was resting, but giving as much trouble to the bed as possible.

Hindu monks have a strange way of growing fat. They know no limits. Perhaps they are in the search of the unlimited.

And at that very time a man came to the door, and he was asking the servant, "If Swamiji is awake I would like to see him."

And I was sitting with Swamiji, who was fully awake. He immediately closed his eyes. I said, "Swamiji, this is not right; it is against truth."

He said, "Be silent! That man is such a bore."

I said, "Nobody can be a bigger bore than you are. Year by year you have bored this poor family."

He said, "This is no time to discuss it" - and he was with closed eyes, snoring!

I shook his big belly and I said, "You cannot deceive me by snoring. This snoring is absolutely false."

He said, "It is authentic."

I said, "You are perfectly awake. How can your snoring be authentic?"

He said, "You just.... It is so hot, and that man is so boring, and he will not leave me for hours. You just go and tell him that Swamiji is fast asleep."

I said, "I will go and I will say exactly what you are saying."

And I told the man, "Swamiji is fully awake, yet fast asleep; fully awake yet snoring."

That man said, "How can it happen?"

I said, "You know, these people are miracle-makers. You can come with me, I can show you."

I took him with me inside. Swamiji was snoring very loudly, as loudly as he could manage. But you cannot snore for long if you are awake, it is so tiring. I told the man to sit in a corner where it was a little dark. Swamiji opened one eye, looked at me and said, "Has that bore gone?"

I said, "Swamiji, you continue snoring. He is just sitting here in the dark corner."

He said, "How has he managed to come here?"

I said, "This is no time to discuss it. You simply close your eyes." And he closed his eyes and started snoring.

And that man said, "This swami is continually talking about being true."

I said, "I think he is being true - eyes closed, snoring; what more do you want? Do you want him to die? Will you leave this place only when he dies?" This was too much.

Swamiji stood and said, "I cannot do that."

I said, "You don't come into this. Don't interfere. You simply lie down and rest and snore - whether awake or asleep, that is your business. I am just trying to convince this man that Swamiji is a man of miracles; you have just seen how he can open one eye. It is very difficult, only swamis can do that; otherwise both eyes open together."

He was very angry at me. He talked against me to everybody in the family, that "This boy should not be allowed in my room."

But I said, "I was simply following your teaching."

He said, "Teachings are not to be followed, they are to be taught!"

The mind cannot create a harmony; that is not in the nature of mind. Its nature is dialectical, discordant. But if you can go beyond mind, suddenly all conflict, all friction disappears - not that you have to do something. You simply become alert, whatever you are doing. It is no longer a question of inner or outer, it is a question of being aware.

And with awareness, you cannot do anything wrong. That is impossible. Nobody has been able to manage it yet.

You have been asking about a Japanese farmer who has not been using any scientific technology in cultivating. He calls it 'no-cultivation'. It is in tune with the Zen idea of effortless effort, of no drama.

His cultivation is just an extension of a meditative state of consciousness. He has found harmony within himself, and he has found harmony with nature.

Once you have found harmony within yourself it is not difficult to find harmony with nature. You are part of nature.

You are nature.

Nature is bigger you; you are smaller nature.

There is no difference, no demarcation line.

He used this insight in cultivation without using any technological support. For twenty-five years he has been bringing up the highest crops in the whole of Japan when others are using everything. He has slapped the face of man really badly; his small effort is not small. He has indicated a totally different approach to relating with life.

But your mind is not in any way in contact with harmony. It is shown in the question.

You are asking, can this be done in business? Now, business is not nature. Can it be done in service? Service is not nature; you will create a great rift in yourself, you will create trouble.

If you are a government servant and you say, "I follow the philosophy of no-service, like no- cultivation" you will be thrown out. And it will be very compassionate of your officers if they only throw you out; otherwise they would throw you into a madhouse. No-service? A railway driver saying, "No-driving"; an airplane pilot just in the middle of the air saying, "No-piloting; I am going to leave it to the harmony of nature, and now see the miracles." You will see only dead bodies and a disaster, no miracle - because these things are not part of nature.

Yes, in gardening you can do it. In anything that is not man-made, that is not manufactured by man's mind but is part of natural growth, it can be done. But before you can do it you have to be in a certain state of consciousness; otherwise you are going to fail, even in cultivation.

Do you think the whole world is blind to the fact of this strange cultivator who has not been defeated for twenty-five years - with all your technology, fertilizer, chemical support? No, many others must have tried but nothing happens, because the question is not there in the cultivation; the real thing has to be decided in the cultivator.

He has to come to a harmony with nature first, he has to bridge himself with nature first. That you cannot see. You can only see his crops growing higher than anybody else's, growing thicker than anybody else's, but you can't see that there is something invisible which is the cause of the whole phenomenon. Otherwise, why are other Japanese farmers not using the same method? Why waste money in technology? But you cannot because the essential point is not in the crops; the essential point is the man's consciousness.

He has come to such a silent merger, to such a silent meeting of love, to such an orgasmic experience with nature that it is not nature growing, it is he himself growing. There is no cultivator, there is no cultivation.

You have heard only one thing; no-cultivation. Remember, there is no cultivator either. There is a silent communion, no division between the doer and the doing - both are one, totally one. In their total oneness, the miracle is happening.

The miracle can happen all over the world, particularly as far as existence is concerned. But with man-manufactured things it will not be of any help, because they are dead. You cannot come to a communion with a dead thing.

Existence is alive, vibrating; you just have to get into the same rhythm.

The moment you are in the same rhythm, miracles are possible.

And in fact, if this can happen on a wider scale there is no need for any stupid things like plastic.

Now all over the world the scientists are concerned, "What are we going to do with the plastic?" - because at the bottom, all the seas are full of plastic. Plastic is so cheap that it is disposable, you need not use it twice. Even for an injection a plastic syringe is used only once and then thrown away; it is cheaper, simpler, less dangerous.

But all that plastic goes on into the earth, into the ocean, and it cannot mix. It is one of the most strange things that man has made - it cannot dissolve back into earth, it remains.

It is the only eternal thing you have in the world.

Everything that goes to the earth dissolves sooner or later into its basic constituents, but the plastic remains. Its resistance is immense. And it has started showing its effects: in many places suddenly thousands of fish have died because the plastic poisoned the waters. And there is no way to remove it - and where to remove it to?

The factories go on pouring out more and more plastic. They are really thinking to change your hearts into plastic hearts - because they will be more reliable, certainly. A plastic heart cannot have a heart failure. Whatever you do - you may fail - the heart will continue! It is the strangest thing we have produced: the man dies and the heart is alive. You take the heart, clean it, and fix it into somebody else.

What the Japanese Zen farmer has done, a simple man... can be done all over the earth - just a harmony is needed. And sometimes it happens without your knowing, because you are not alert to the fact, you never take note of it.

In America, when I reached for the first time to the desert that we had purchased, there was not a single bird. It was a strange place, like some modern paintings which give you such a strange feeling. There was not a single bird in over one hundred twenty-six square miles, and only one kind of tree which is called the camel of the desert, the juniper tree. It is really a great tree; no other tree can remain alive in that desert, but the juniper remains. But they were small: the growth was difficult - they were not green, not lush green.

But in five years' time, as thousands of sannyasins gathered there - as we made lakes, as we started cultivating - strangely enough I saw those juniper trees growing thicker, greener, becoming more beautiful.

Birds started coming, waterbirds started coming, and so many deer that in the night it was impossible to move your car on the roads because they were standing, and they would not move; they didn't care about your horn. One thing is certain: they knew that these people were harmless, that they are not going to hurt them. Otherwise, deer immediately run away as they see a man coming, particularly in America where they are continually hunting the deer, killing the deer. Perhaps in the whole history of America, these five years in the commune were the only years when deer were protected.

We had to fight a lawsuit against the government. The people who used to hunt deer filed a suit against us because we didn't allow them to enter and we didn't allow shooting. And we had to convince the court: "We are vegetarians and we will not allow anybody to kill on our ground. They can do anything they want on their own grounds, but these one hundred twenty-six square miles are sacred; they belong to us, and they belong to the deer too. We are newcomers, they are ancient owners of the land. We will be gone, they will remain. We are their guests, and we cannot be so ugly as to kill the host."

The magistrate could not believe what we were talking about! But the deer understood - so from all the surrounding lands they started gathering in thousands, in the mountains, in the forest of the commune. Suddenly, within five years, a desert which had always been a desert became an oasis.

And I was watching the synchronicity of life: when there are people, when there are trees, the birds will come. When there are birds, people, trees, the animals will come.

We had swans, we had ducks. We had three hundred peacocks. It was a dream come true.

Peacocks were dancing and human beings were dancing too, and there was a certain affinity, a friendship. The peacocks were not allowed in the houses because they would make the houses dirty, but they would come to the windows and look inside to see what was going on - the same curiosity, the same consciousness, just the body is different; the same sensitivity, the same desire to relate in some way, to be friendly.

This experiment can succeed as far as nature is concerned; not with machines and not with man- created things like business.

You cannot just sit with a pile of bank notes... sitting silently, doing nothing, spring never comes - and the pile disappears! Because others are watching..."Just let him close his eyes. This idiot is going to close his eyes. How long is he going to sit doing nothing?" Sooner or later he will close his eyes and the pile of notes will disappear. And he was waiting to see the notes grow - notes don't grow.

So remember one thing, that first you need a transcendental self which is neither outer nor inner.

And second, you have to be aware that you can succeed only with nature, with the cosmos, but that is real success.

That poor man in Japan is showing something immensely great, far more important than nuclear weapons - because nuclear weapons can destroy the whole world, still they are not important. This man is showing a harmony which can save the whole of life, can fill the whole of life with new juice, with new love, with new dance, with new song, and that is far more important.

Question 2:

It is not, because as far as your witnessing is concerned.... It may be coming and going, and your answer may be perfectly the same as the sardar who said that the indicator is working, "Yes - no - yes again..."

That is the function of the indicator: to be, not to be; to be, not to be.

But don't laugh at the poor sardarji. As far as his awareness is concerned, he is fully aware.

Whenever it is working he says "yes;" whenever it is not working he says "no." His awareness of the indicator is continuous. The indicator goes on changing, but the sardar remains fully aware of when it is working, when it is not working, when it is on, when it is off. His awareness is a continuity.

If you can give the same answer about your witnessing: Yes I am witnessing, no I am not witnessing, yes I am witnessing, no I am not witnessing," then you have to remember that there is something more behind these witnessing moments which is witnessing all this process. Who is witnessing that sometimes you are witnessing and sometimes you are not witnessing? Something is constant.

Your witnessing has become just an indicator; don't be bothered by it. Your emphasis should be on the eternal, the constant, the continuum - and it is there. And it is in everyone, we have just forgotten it.

But even in times when we have forgotten it, it is there in its absolute perfection. It is like a mirror which is able to mirror everything, is still mirroring everything, but you are standing with your back towards the mirror. The poor mirror is mirroring your back.

Turn, it will mirror your face.

Open your heart, it will mirror your heart.

Put everything on the table, don't even hide a single card and it will reflect your whole reality.

But if you go on standing with your back to the mirror looking all around the world asking people, "Who am I?" then it is up to you. Because there are idiots who will come and teach you that "This is the way. Do this and you will know who you are."

No method is needed, just a one hundred and eighty-degree turn - and that is not a method.

And the mirror is your very being.

You may not have looked at the joke in this light. If you tell the joke to anybody he is going to laugh because the sardar is so stupid, because that is the function of the indicator - to be on, off, on, off.

But you have brought me a joke... I cannot simply laugh at it because I see something more in it which perhaps nobody will see.

The sardar is constant, alert. He does not miss a single point, a single moment.

And when you say "witnessing, yes" and then it disappears and you say "no" - again it appears, you say "yes"... it simply shows that there is something behind all these moments of witnessing and not witnessing. The true witness, which is reflecting the changing process of what you think is your witness, is behind. It is not the true witness, it is only the indicator.

Forget the indicator.

Remember the constant mirroring that goes on twenty-four hours within you, silently watching everything. Slowly, slowly clean it - there is so much dust on it, centuries of dust. Remove the dust.

And one day, when the mirror is completely clean, those moments of witnessing and not-witnessing will disappear; you will be simply a witness.

And unless you find that eternity of witnessing, all other kinds of witnessing are part of mind. They have no value.

Question 3:

Your question has its answer in itself.

First, it happens to every meditator - everyone who is trying to be awake and alert - that sleep in the night becomes difficult. But if it creates no problems for you and the next morning you are not tired; just resting without sleep has rejuvenated your body and you feel fresh, there is no problem. It is good. Sleep is no longer your necessity.

Secondly, it helps you to remain more balanced. You are no more like a pendulum moving between sadness and silence. If you remain awake the whole night just resting, relaxing, it is already indicating to you the way, that you are on the right path.

Silence is a reward.

Tranquility is a reward, being balanced between polarities is a reward.

So unless somebody feels that sleep is still a necessity for him - that without it he finds himself tired, without it he finds himself getting crazy, tense - then only does it become a problem. In that case, only in that case, you are not to meditate in the evening. You have to meditate early in the morning.

Then get up at four and just meditate for two or three hours and drop it. It will continue to work inside you, but it has to be at least twelve hours away from your sleeping time; otherwise, it is such a force that if you are meditating in the night - trying to be aware on the one hand and on the other hand trying to be asleep - sleep cannot win.

Sleep is a poor thing. The awareness that is coming to you is so deep and so great, that in the flood of awareness all your sleep will be gone.

But if it is not creating any problem, then you are blessed. For almost ninety-five percent of meditators it does not create any problem; only in five percent of people does it create some problem. Those five percent of people can be given different suggestions after looking at their different situations. But for ninety-five percent, there is no problem at all; in fact, you will feel younger, fresher, more in tune with yourself and the world, more together.

The third thing that I want to say to you is: don't hate anything. Even hate is included, because it makes no difference what the object of hate is; it may be the hate itself. But don't hate - not simply as a discipline, but as part of an understanding that the same energy which becomes love, becomes hate.

When the same energy can become love, then you are being simply stupid in using that energy as hate - because the hate will create wounds in you. It is not going to harm anybody else except you.

And love would have created flowers in the place of wounds in you; it was not going to help anybody else except you. So it is simply a question of intelligence.

Hate is destructive, self-destructive. Love is tremendous respect for oneself. You may hate anything, anybody, hate itself; but in every way you will find yourself low-energy. Hate sucks your energy, leaves you empty, spent. Love fills you with energy, with overflowing energy; not only healing you, but creating an aura around you in which others may be healed.

It is not a question of religion - that hate is bad or immoral. It is a question of intelligence: hate is stupid and love is intelligent.

Question 4:

There is no harm in becoming more thirsty for truth.

There is no harm in becoming more thirsty for new spaces of experience, new challenges, voyages to new stars in your innermost being.

I call it divine discontentment.

Only the fools are contented. You can see it. Watch a donkey... how contented he looks! He should be worshipped by all religious people. You cannot find a more contented being - having nothing, but you will never see him frustrated, in despair, freaking out. In the world of donkeys even psychotherapies don't exist. Donkeys don't need any psychotherapist. But it is not a quality; it is not to be praised, it is a condemnation.

The man of any worth is discontented.

The smaller men are discontented about smaller things: money, power, prestige. These are not very far away from the donkeys - cousin-brothers.

There is just a difference of a few inches between the donkeys and the presidents and prime ministers.

The higher quality man, the man of superiority, the man who has the potential of growing into a Gautam Buddha, into a Mahavira, into a Zarathustra, will also be discontented - although his discontent is totally different, his dimension is different. He is not discontented because he wants to have more things; he is discontented because he wants to be more - not to have more, but to be more. He wants more being, he wants more awareness, he wants more alertness. He wants more lovingness, he wants more compassion. He wants the whole sky and all the stars within him. His discontent is immense.

These smaller people who are discontented for money and power and prestige may find them, and then they will be utterly frustrated. Their whole joy is in the hope, not in the finding. The moment they find they see that they have been running after shadows.

But the really discontented man goes on becoming more and more thirsty, because each step brings him to such immense ecstasies that he cannot stop searching for more. His search is eternal. It is not that what he finds is frustrating, no. It is because what he finds is so satisfying that naturally he wants to go beyond it; there must be more, existence cannot be so limited.

It is perfectly good that the more you listen to me the more thirsty you become.

Move on. Have an infinite thirst so that your journey towards the truth is unending; you are always, always coming and never reaching.

You have also asked that I say something about meditation and passion. Superficially it will look very strange - why are you putting these two together? - but they are together. It is only the more passionate man who becomes a meditator. His passion is so much that nothing ordinary can satisfy it; everything proves small. His passion is so big....

This has never been said so clearly as I am saying it: as proof, I can tell you that no impotent man in the whole history of man has ever become enlightened. Strange - if your religious people are right, then all impotent people should have become enlightened because they are the real celibates.

Their celibacy is absolutely certain, nobody else's is certain; everybody else's celibacy is uncertain.

It is the more passionate one who cannot be satisfied by toys, who soon gets fed up with money, with men, with women, with being a celebrity, with fame, with name. They soon become fed up with everything that it is not the real thing. They want the real thing. Their passion is such that unless they find the truth they will not be satisfied.

So there is a relationship: only the passionate ones have become great meditators. And the overflowing energy of passion... unless it is too much it cannot move upwards. Otherwise, it is enough for the biological needs of creating children. When it is too much, then it is bound to rise beyond the boundaries of biology - and that's how we have found the stages of where it moves in the inner world of man.

There are seven stages. At the seventh stage, when it reaches to the highest point in the head, it explodes, as if into thousands of suns.

That's what we have called 'enlightenment'. It is the same energy that expresses itself in sex, creates life; it is the same energy, moving upwards in different stages.

For example, when it is near the heart it creates a tremendous power of love. When it is near the throat it creates a great power in music, poetry, the authority of every single word uttered. It is the same energy when it reaches to the third-eye center, between the two eyebrows; then a man becomes hypnotic, without his effort. Just to be in his presence, you suddenly find yourself agreeing with him. It is not a question of argument; you fall into the same rhythm.

This kind of man never tries to convert anybody. Just by chance if anybody comes close to him, he is bound to be converted. And this is true conversion because it is a transformation: the man will never be the same again.

It is when the same energy is moving beyond the sixth center, the third eye, to the seventh, sahasrar that one attains to samadhi. But it is the same energy that we used to call passion; at the lowest level it is passion, at the highest level it is compassion.