The Grass Grows By Itself

The first question:

Question 1:

Ashoka, conscious ignorance is not ignorance at all. It is the ultimate state of consciousness - how can it be ignorant? It is pure knowing. Of course, there is no knowledge, hence it is called ignorance. But there is knowing, utter knowing, clarity, transparency. No knowledge is gathered, but all is known.

Conscious ignorance means innocence AND conscious. If innocence is unconscious, sooner or later it will be corrupted by knowledge. Unconscious mind is always ready to be corrupted, polluted, distracted.

Consciousness means centering, awareness - you cannot be distracted. You remain in your knowing, but you don't accumulate knowledge. Knowledge is always of the past: knowing is in the present, is of the present. Like a mirror: the mirror reflects if something comes before it, but when it passes the mirror is empty again. This is conscious ignorance - not that the mirror does not reflect: it reflects, but it doesn't gather. It is not like a photo plate.

A photo plate becomes knowledgeable. The moment something is reflected in it, it catches hold of it.

It becomes attached to it. The mirror remains unattached - available, open, vulnerable, unprotected, with no defense, yet ALWAYS virgin. This is virginity: when nothing corrupts you. Things come and pass.

You ask me: WHAT EXACTLY DO YOU MEAN BY 'CONSCIOUS IGNORANCE'?

It is consciousness, KNOWING consciousness. Ignorant I am calling it because it cannot claim any knowledge - that's why. It cannot say "I know."

When the Emperor Wu asked Bodhidharma, "Who are you?" he simply said, "I don't know."

This is conscious ignorance. We misunderstood him. He thought, "Then what is the point? If you don't even know who you are, then what is the difference between me and you? I also don't know who I am."

We is simply ignorant. Bodhidharma is consciously ignorant. And that word 'consciousness' makes all the difference - all the difference that there is in the world. It transforms the whole quality of ignorance. Ignorance becomes luminous. It is full of light - not full of knowledge but full of light.

You ask: IS IT THE RECOGNITION THAT ONE IS ULTIMATELY, FUNDAMENTALLY IGNORANT?

No. ONE IS not, so how can one be fundamentally and ultimately ignorant? To think that one is you have already gathered knowledge, you have already claimed. You have already declared to the world that "I am!"

Those who know, they know something totally different. They know that "I am not - God is." They know that "My existence is arbitrary. My existence is a make-believe. 'I' as a separate entity has never existed. I am just a wave in the ocean."

But when the wave is arising and reaching to the clouds, it can believe that "I am." And the ocean meanwhile is laughing and roaring, and knows that this wave has gone crazy. Soon the wave will disappear in the ocean again. Even when it IS there, it is not separate from the ocean. You cannot separate a wave from the ocean! Can you exist even for a single moment without the universe surrounding you? Not for a single moment.

So who are you? what are you?

IS IT THE RECOGNITION THAT ONE IS ULTIMATELY, FUNDAMENTALLY IGNORANT?

No. The conscious ignorance knows that one is not. There is utter silence inside. Nobody has ever been there. You have dreamt about it; it is your dream. You are nothing but a construct of your dreaming mind.

And, secondly, ignorance does not mean that one is ignorant. It simply means that life is ultimately mysterious. The emphasis is not on your ignorance, remember it, because the ego is very cunning.

It can survive even on the idea of ignorance. It can say, "I am ignorant - fundamentally, ultimately I am ignorant. But I am."

First it was claiming its existence through knowledge: "My knowledge is valid. Nobody else's knowledge is valid." Now it claims, "No knowledge is valid - I am ignorant. But I am." Now, behind ignorance, the I is hiding again. It has taken another face, a new mask, a new persona, but it is the old game being played with new rules. The form has changed but the content is the same - the same dream, the same stupid dream. The same arbitrary ego claiming absoluteness about itself.

No. When I say ignorance, my emphasis is never on 1. My emphasis is on the ultimate mysteriousness of existence. Ignorance is ultimate because existence cannot be reduced to knowledge. It is irreducible. It is a mystery, and remains a mystery. You cannot demystify it.

In fact, the more you try to demystify it, the more and more mysterious it becomes. It gathers new dimensions of mysteries.

Just watch: five thousand years of human mind's evolution - has it helped in any way to demystify existence? Existence has become far more mysterious than it has ever been before. Go back five thousand years: there was a limited number of stars, because by the bare naked eye you cannot count more than three thousand stars in the night. When the night is dark and full of stars and there are no clouds, at the most you can count three thousand stars, not more than that, by the bare naked eye. How many stars are there? Now they say, "We have counted three thousand billion stars. We used to see only three thousand, now there are three thousand billion stars. And this is not the end:

this is just the beginning of the counting."

The existence goes ON and on. There seems to be no possibility that it will be ending somewhere.

When the Vedic mystics looked at the sky, it was mysterious. When you look at the sky it is far more mysterious. Medic mystics will feel jealous of you - but you don't look at the sky.

For thousands of years man believed that life, existence, consists of matter. Now physicists say there is no matter - all is energy. They have not been able to solve the mystery of matter. The mystery has become very deep. Now there is no matter - it is all energy.

And what is energy? Now, even to define it is becoming difficult - because it was possible to define it in contrast with matter. Now there is NO matter. How to define it? Definition is lost. It is there in its sheer mystery. And the efforts that have been made to define it have made it look even more mysterious.

If you go into modern physics, you will be surprised. Mystics look not so mysterious now - with all God and heaven and angels and souls, even then they don't look so mysterious. The modern world of physics is far more mysterious, incomprehensibly mysterious. And the infinite space....

And Albert Einstein says it goes on expanding... into what? And he says, "We don't know yet into what. But one thing is certain: it goes on expanding."

Existence is expanding, into what? Naturally, the question arises. There must be some space beyond it, but that cannot be said. By the very definition of existence that is prohibited, because when we say 'existence', we mean ALL that is, space included. ALL THAT IS. Then how does it expand? into what? There is nothing left outside it!

It is almost as mysterious as one day you go to the market and you keep yourself in your own pocket.

It is possible to keep yourself in your own pocket? It should be - if existence can expand without there being anything to expand into. All space is in, in its pocket, and it goes on expanding into its own pocket! Looks absurd. Zen khans are nothing compared to it.

Albert Einstein says the world is finite. That too is mysterious. If the world is finite, then there must be something to define it. There must be a boundary! If you call it finite, then there must be a boundary to it. But to make a boundary you will have to accept something beyond the boundary, otherwise the boundary cannot be drawn. The boundary can be drawn only between two things!

You can have a fence around your house because of the neighbor . If there is NO neighbor, nothing exists beyond your fence, how are you going to put the fence and where? And how will you decide that "This is the place where we should put the fence," that "This part belongs to me and there is nothing outside it"?

But Albert Einstein says this is how it is: "We can't explain it, but this is how it is. The world is finite and yet there is no boundary to it. Unbounded finiteness!" Absurd! Illogical!

And not only that: this unbounded finiteness is round in shape - because everything is round. How can an unbounded thing be round? Who will give it the shape of roundness?

The mystery has thickened every day. And Albert Einstein is just on the threshold of existence. It is maddening.

So when I say 'conscious ignorance', I don't mean that you ARE ignorant: I mean that life is so vast and existence so infinite that there is no way to fathom it. You cannot measure it; it is immeasurable.

WHAT EXACTLY DO YOU MEAN BY 'CONSCIOUS IGNORANCE'? IS IT THE RECOGNITION THAT ONE IS ULTIMATELY, FUNDAMENTALLY IGNORANT? OR IS THERE MORE TO IT?

If there is not more to it, then the mystery is solved. There is ALWAYS more to it! and there will always be more to it. Whatsoever can be said will never be satisfactory - there will always remain more to It.

And I am not saying that what is not said and you understand inside is enough - even that is not enough. NOTHING IS enough. That is the meaning when I say existence is mysterious. It simply cannot be understood.

To see this point makes one feel humble. To see this point to let it sink in your heart, one feels like bowing down. To bow down before this mystery that is unfathomable - not only unknown but unknowable - is prayer.

The second question:

Question 2:

YES, KAVITA, I AM ENCOMPASSING it all - so can you. Because being is vast. Being is neither male nor female. Bodies are male and female. Psychologies are male and female. But not being.

Being is simply being.

At the very core of your existence, there is no man, no woman. The consciousness is beyond polarity. When you are witness sing your body, if you are a man you will see a man's body there as an object; if you are a woman, you will see a woman's body as an object. But the witness is the witness, man or woman. The witness is neither. The witness is simply there - a witness, that's all.

A consciousness, an awareness.

That awareness comprehends all. When you become a witness, when you become a Buddha, all is comprehended. Then there is no question of polarities.

The world is not just polar. That is the meaning of the Christian idea of the Trinity and the Hindu concept of Trimurti. The world is not divided in two - world is divided in three. The three is very fundamental. The two is on the surface and the three is at the center. Man-woman, on the surface.

Zen-Sufi, on the surface. But as you move deeper, as you dive deep into your being, and you reach the center, all disappears. One simply is. A kind of purity, a pure existence.

Kavita, it is possible - not only possible, it has to be made possible. That's my work here. On the path, be a Sufi or a Zen. When you reach the center, forget all about it. When the goal is reached, the path has to be forgotten. These are divisions of the path.

One can climb up a mountain from many sides, can choose different routes. And when you are moving on different routes, you look as if you are moving in different directions, sometimes opposite also. One is going to the north, another is going to the south, but ultimately, when you reach to the peak, you will have come to the same place.

At the peak, Buddha is Christ, Christ is Krishna, Krishna is Mohammed, Mohammed is Zarathustra, Zarathustra is Lao Tzu. At the peak ALL distinctions dissolve.

So, Kavita, right now be Zen, be Sufi, and when you have roached to the peak be Zen/Sufi - then forget all about it! But on the path... one has to move on some path. And all paths are good, because they all lead to the same goal. All doors are good, because they lead to the same shrine.

You say:

I REMEMBER.

I LET GO.

I forget.

I LET GO.

MY LOVE AFFAIR WITH LIFE KEEPS DEEPENING.

STILL, I AM NOT WITHOUT DOUBTS.

Don't be worried about it! Doubts are perfectly natural on the path. If you are without doubts, that means you have reached the peak. They disappear only at the peak. They have a certain purpose - they goad you, they keep you going.

Doubts are not necessarily hindrances. It depends on you, on how you use your doubts. They can become hindrances. If because of doubt you simply stop moving, you say, "Unless my doubt is dissolved I am not going to move," then the doubt has become a rock. But if you say, "The doubt is there, but in spite of the doubt I am going to move, because that is the only way to resolve it....

Unless I reach higher I cannot resolve this doubt" - a better vision, from a height, will help.

Doubts are not resolved if you remain clinging to the same space where you are, because those doubts are created by THAT state of mind. If you remain clinging to that state, the doubts will persist; they will become stronger every day.

Doubts are not resolved by somebody else answering you. These are not philosophical doubts - these are existential doubts. They are resolved only by experiencing. When you move a little higher, they disappear. You have reached to another state of mind. In that state of mind they cannot exist.

Suddenly they disappear, as if they have never been there.

In spite of the doubt, one has to go on moving. In fact, one has to use the doubt as a goading to move. Listen to the doubt and say to the doubt, "Okay, I will remember you, but the only way to solve you is that I should go a little higher in my consciousness. I should become a little more alert. It is my unalertness that is creating you. It is my unconsciousness that is creating you, that is feeding you, nourishing you. It is my state of mechanicalness that is the cause of it."

If you try to solve your doubts where you are, you can gather many many answers from many many sources. They will make you knowledgeable, but not really - they will fill you with information. But the doubt will remain somewhere. On the surface, you may start pretending that you know, but you will know that you don't know. And it will gnaw at your heart.

You can learn the answers, you can start telling those answers to others, but your very existence, your very life-style, will show that you don't know.

That is the difference between the Western and the Eastern philosophies. They should not be called by the same name, because their approaches are so basically different, so fundamentally different, so diametrically opposite.

The Western philosopher thinks, but never changes his state of awareness. He thinks where he is.

He thinks hard, he thinks VERY logically. He tries in every way to solve the problem, and he finds many solutions. But those solutions don't help his life. If they don't even help HIS life, how can they help somebody else's life?

For example: the English thinker and philosopher, David Hume, arrived at the same conclusion as Gautam Buddha, exactly the same. Had he been in the East he would have become a Buddha, but unfortunately he was in the West, in the very thick of the Western noe-sphere.

He arrived at the same conclusion, not by changing his consciousness, but only by logical argumentation. Buddha became enlightened, Hume remained unenlightened. Buddha arrived at a state of bliss; Hume remained crawling on the earth in the same way as of old. Buddha created a new tradition which has remained alive even today; twenty-five centuries have passed. Many people have bloomed because of Buddha.

What did Hume create? Hume also created great argumentation, and even today books are written on Hume, and the argument continues. But it is only argumentation; not a single human being has been transformed by it.

And the irony is that the conclusion is EXACTLY the same. Buddha came to see that there is no self; that was HIS realization. He meditated. He went deeper and deeper into his being. He searched inside, each nook and corner, and he didn't find anybody there. That was his release. The ego disappeared, and with the ego all its miseries and hells.

The ego was not found, so all the problems that were created by the ego evaporated. When the source evaporated, all the by-products evaporated of their own accord. When the ego was not found, there was silence - and that silence is beatitude, and that silence is benediction.

When the ego was not found, there was all light, radiant. The whole existence flowed in. Buddha became a void capable of containing the whole existence. He himself became transformed . And thousands of other people became transformed from his insight. Remember, it was an insight.

What happened to David Hume? He also came to the same point, but it was not an insight - it was an outlook. Remember these two words. Literally they are significant: insight, outlook. He arrived at the same conclusion, AS an outlook. He discussed, argued, pondered, thought, contemplated, concentrated - did everything on the problem, but never went in.

And he came to the point, exactly the same, at least in appearance the same, that there is no self.

The self cannot exist. But it was not a great revolution in his life; it was just a beautiful conclusion in his treatise. But he remained the same man! Before the conclusion and after the conclusion there was NOT a bit of difference in the man. He continued to behave in the same way.

If you had insulted him he would have become angry, but not Buddha. That is the difference.

He would have become angry, although he says there is no self. He would have forgotten all his philosophy. That philosophy was not his insight. He would have said, "That is philosophy - that is aside. But when you insult me, I am insulted. And I am going to take revenge. You have to be answered!"

When Buddha was insulted, he smiled. He said, "You came a little late. You should have come ten years before, then I WAS there, very much. Had you insulted me ten years before, I would have reacted madly. You come a little late. I feel sorry for you, because now there is NOBODY to react. I hear what you are saying, but it simply passes through me. It comes in through one ear and it goes out through the other ear. There is nobody inside to catch hold of it. I am sorry. I feel compassion for you."

This is the difference between the Eastern and the Western approaches. Western philosophy is rightly called philosophy - love of knowledge, love of wisdom. For Eastern philosophy, Hesse has coined a word which I like. He has coined a new word; he calls it PHILOSIA - it means love of seeing.

SIA means to see. That is exactly the translation of the Eastern term for philosophy, DARSHAN - to see. It is philosia - it is insight, it is seeing in.

Western philosophy is a search for knowledge, and Eastern philosophy or philosia is a search for KNOWING. Knowledge looks out; knowing looks in. Knowledge gathers information; knowing does not gather anything - it simply goes in to see who is there. "Who am I?" Its inquiry is not objective, its inquiry is subjective.

Kavita, doubts will persist. They leave you only on the last rung, never before. Use them creatively.

Each doubt has to be transformed into a goading. The doubt simply says you have to go a little further, a little ahead, a little higher. The doubt says, "I do not feel satisfied - whatsoever you have now is not satisfactory. You have to go a little deeper."

Don't be stopped by the doubt; that is not the function of the doubt. And don't start arguing, and don't start thinking, because by thinking you will become a David Hume, you will remain the same person.

My effort here is to create Buddhas. And unless you become a Buddha, doubts will continue. You can solve one doubt, it will assert itself from another corner. It is the same doubt in a new shape, a new form. You repress it here, it pops up there. You will go mad. No need. Take note of the doubt, thank the doubt, and say, "Okay, so I will go a little further so you can be solved."

It is like this:

A man was sitting on a tree. His friend was sitting underneath the tree. The man on the tree was picking some fruits, and the man underneath the tree was waiting for the fruits and collecting whatsoever was falling. The man on the tree said, "I see a bullock cart coming." He was high on the top of the tree; he could see far away.

And the man underneath the tree looked to the side where the man was pointing and he said, "I doubt - I don't see. There is no bullock cart. What are you talking about? Can you deceive me? I have eyes, I am not blind. There is no bullock cart coming! "

And the man on the top said, "Yes, it is coming!"

And they started arguing. Is the argument going to help? Can the man on the tree convince the man who is not on the tree that the bullock cart is coming? Howsoever clever he is in his arguments, how can he prove to the man who cannot see the bullock cart?

What did the man do? First he argued, tried in every way, saying, "It is coming. It is painted red.

One bullock is black one bullock is white, this and that," and everything he described. "And the man has a beard," and all. But it was in vain.

Then he recognized the truth: "How can he see? His vision is limited." So he called him; he said, "You come up. You climb up the tree, and I will show you the bullock cart."

NOW, if the man underneath the tree says, "I will come up only if you convince me that the bullock cart is there," then there is no way. But he climbed up the tree, and he saw the bullock cart, and the doubt was resolved. And there was no more argumentation. He apologized. He said; "I feel sorry. I unnecessarily argued with you. It was not a question of argument. You had a far better vision from here."

This is what the Buddhas have been doing down the ages. They say, "We have a far better vision from here. From this vantage point you will be able to see what is. Come closer to us. Don't go on arguing."

Not that Buddhas cannot argue - they can certainly argue and they can argue better than you. But it is pointless! They can silence you through their arguments, but they cannot convince you. They can destroy all your arguments, but even that will not help - you will not be able to see the bullock cart. And the whole point is how to see it, because only seeing is believing.

Kavita, go on climbing the tree. I am calling you. I can see. You cannot see yet. Doubts will persist.

Let those doubts help you to climb up faster, sooner. Let it become an urgency, those doubts, make it an urgency. Doubts in themselves are not wrong - it all depends on how you use them. They can become blessings .

The third question:

Question 3:

THE DESIRE IS NOTHING but an escape from the state of anxiety. Desires don't create anxiety, as ordinarily is believed. Anxiety creates desire.

Man is anxiety.

Just the other day I was telling you: animals have no anxiety, because they don't have to become - they are. A dog is a dog, and a tiger is a tiger, and there is no problem! The tiger is not trying to become a tiger. He is! He already is! There is no becoming involved.

In the world of animals there is no anxiety. In the world of Buddhas again there is no anxiety, they have arrived, they have become. They are SIDDHAS - they are beings. Now there is no goal left, no movement. The journey is complete. They have arrived home.

Hence the similarity in the eyes of the animals and the eyes of Buddhas. The same silence! The same innocence. The same depth. The same purity. Yet the difference is also great: animals are' unconscious, Buddhas are conscious. Hence animals' eyes are innocent, but not luminous. There is no anxiety, but there is no celebration Ethel. There is no despair, but no ecstasy either. In the eyes of the Buddhas you will not find anxiety, you will not find agony; you will not find the constant urge to be this, to be that. The fever of becoming you will not find. But there will be a constant overflowing ecstasy - peaceful, blissful, a well-being.

Between these two is man: half animal, half Buddha. And that is where anxiety exists. Anxiety is THIS tension. A part of you wants to go back to the animals. It goes on pulling you backwards. It says, "Come back! It was so beautiful - where are you going?"

The other parts goes on hoping for the future. In some indirect way you know perfectly well that to be a Buddha is your destiny. The seed is there! And the seed goes on saying to you, "Find the soil, right soil, and you will become a Buddha. Don't go back Go ahead...."

This tug-of-war is anxiety. Anxiety is one of the MOST important words to be understood, because it is not only a word: it is the very situation man finds himself in. This is the human dilemma. The MOST fundamental dilemma is anxiety: To be or not to be? To be this or to be that? Where to go?

Man is stuck on a crossroads, all the possibilities open. But if you choose one, you have to choose against other possibilities - hence the fear. You may be choosing wrong. If you go to the right - who knows? - the path going to the left may have been the right path.

And there are people, shopkeepers, who go on calling, hawkers, who go on calling, "Come to the right! This is the right way." "Come to the left - THIS is the right way!" "Come our way, this is the ONLY way!" "Follow Christianity, or Hinduism, or Buddhism... all others are wrong. You will fall in hell."

Man is paralyzed! Standing on the crossroads, listening to all these people, he is paralyzed. Where to go? Whom to listen to? Whom to believe? How to be certain that you are going on the right track? Great suspicion, great doubt, great anxiety.

And deep inside you, something is pulling you back: "Better become an animal again. Fall into drunkenness. Take drugs, or become a sex maniac. Or become violent - kill people!" Why is there so much violence in the world? The animal past goes on pulling you back. Your humanity is only skin-deep. Any moment you can become a wolf, you can become a tiger; you can tear the other into pieces. Any moment! Any moment you can kill.

And not only can you kill others: you can kill yourself too. Suicide and murder, constantly pulling you. Destruction calling you, alluring you.

And then there are Buddhas... once in a while you see a man and you are enchanted. He has that enchanted space in him. He has that magic by which your future suddenly becomes your present.

At least in his presence, at least when you vibrate with him, you forget all your animal past. You start flying like angels in the sky. Those people are also there.

THIS is the anxiety: Where to go? What to do? And whatsoever you do, anxiety will remain. If you become an animal, the Buddha part will go on rebelling against it. Go and do something that your animal part feels good doing, but your Buddha part starts creating guilt in you. Even the greatest murderer, before he murders anybody, feels the pangs; a great pain arises in him. His Buddha part tries to stop him, "What are you doing?" He may listen, he may not listen - but he will repent! For years he will repent for what he has done. He should not have done it.

The thief, before he moves into somebody's house, is again and again warned by the Buddha part, "Don't do it. There is still time - escape!" If you do it, you feel guilty. If you don't do it, you will feel guilty. Because if you don't do it, and you leave and you come home, then you cannot sleep, because the animal part goes on saying, "You are a fool! So much money, and it was so easily available, and there was nobody in the house, and the whole neighborhood was fast asleep, and there was not a single chance of your being caught - you are just an utter fool! Why have you come back? There is still time - go again!"

If you follow one part, the other part makes you feel guilty. And vice versa. This is anxiety. And this anxiety is very existential. It is not that somebody is suffering it and somebody is not suffering - no.

It is existential: everybody is BORN into it. Humanity is born into it. Human beings are born into anxiety. That is their challenge. That is the problem they have to solve - that is the problem they have to transcend.

Now, there are two ways to transcend it. One is the way of the world - you can call it desire. Desire is the way to hide this anxiety. You rush into earning money, madly. You become so absorbed in earning money that you forget all existential anxiety. Then there is no point, no time to think about real problems. Then you put aside everything and you just go into the search for money, more money. And as you get money, more and more desire arises. This desiring for money or political power is nothing but a cover for your anxiety.

That's why people are very much frightened when they are left alone and nothing is there to be done. That's why retired people become very very uneasy, uncomfortable. They die fast. It is said - now psychological research has proved it - that a man who is retired is going to die ten years earlier than he would have died if he had remained employed. Ten years earlier? Why? Because the anxiety that he has been repressing through his job asserts itself. He was running after money, chasing after political power; there was no time to give to anxiety.

Now there is all the time and nothing to do. Sitting in his armchair he does only one thing - anxieting.

Nothing else to do! Now ALL the repressed anxieties of his whole life - that denied existential part takes revenge. It kills. He becomes ill, heart attacks come, he becomes paralyzed. But there is more possibility that all this is happening because of the psychology, not because of the body.

When a person is succeeding and his desires are taking him farther and farther away, he remains healthy. Politicians are almost always healthy when they are in power; when they lose power, they suddenly become old. When a person is earning and earning and earning, he remains healthy.

When he becomes d failure, when he goes bankrupt, then suddenly, yes, in a single night all his hair can turn white - literally.

Desire is a way to avoid anxiety, but only to avoid. You cannot destroy it by desiring. And desire gives you small anxieties, remember, VERY small anxieties, which are not existential. Of course, when you are earning money you will have a few anxieties: the market and the share market, and things like that, and prices. And you have put so much money - are you going to earn out of it or are you going to lose? These small anxieties. These are nothing compared to the real anxiety - these are tricks to avoid the real.

Of course, when you are ambitious for politician power, you will have anxieties, a thousand and one.

But they are nothing! they are play-things compared to the fundamental anxiety.

You ask me: HOW IS ANXIETY RELATED TO DESIRE?

Desire is a cover-up for anxiety. It is a trick, a strategy. And meditation is to uncover it.

That's why people can't sit silently even for a few minutes. Because when they sit silently, anxieties start raising their heads. They become very much afraid. That's why people ask, even in meditation, "What should we do? Can we chant a mantra?" Then it is okay; then the mantra becomes your cover. Then you can repeat, "Ram, Ram, Ram," and you can go on repeating. This repetition keeps your anxiety repressed.

Real meditation is Zen, VIPASSANA. Real meditation is nothing but to sit silently, doing nothing. Just doing nothing, sitting silently, that is real meditation. There is no other technique, no technique at all in it. No mantra has to be repeated. No prayer has to be done, no God's name to be pronounced.

You simply sit... but that is the hardest thing to do in the world. Looks so simple!

When I say again and again:

SITTING SILENTLY, DOING NOTHING, AND THE SPRING COMES AND THE GRASS GROWS BY ITSELF...

You think it is very easy: "We can sit and the spring will come and the grass will grow by itself." This is the hardest and the most difficult and the most arduous thing in the world: to sit silently, doing nothing. And this is the greatest meditation.

What is meditation?Just allowing your existence as it is without covering it in ANY way. So the Transcendental Meditation of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi is not meditation at all. It is neither meditation nor transcendental. It is just a strategy to be fool people.

And America needs such people to be fool them. America needs something to cover its anxiety.

Because money is there now, so money, and the search for money, cannot become a cover-up for long now. Society is affluent. People have all that you can desire. Now what? Now the anxiety is knocking on the doors, and the anxiety is saying, "Okay, now you have a two-car garage - now what? Let me come in! Now you have a house in the hills, another house on the beach, a beautiful yacht, what else?... now let me come in! You were telling me, 'Wait! First let me have a house in the hills, another house on the beach. First let me purchase a beautiful yacht.' Now you have all that - now let me come in. I can't wait any more!"

Anxiety is knocking on the American door. It always knocks when a society is rich. When a society is poor, Transcendental Meditation is not needed. That's why in India NOBODY bothers about Maharishi Mahesh Yogi. Who bothers? People have so many ways to cover up their anxiety so easily.

But when all the desires are coming to a completion, what to do? Something new is needed. Then in many directions new doors have to be opened: Go to the moon! One company is selling tickets for the moon. Of course, it has to be a Japanese company - '85, It January. People are purchasing.

It is already booked. Tickets are being sold on the black market.

"What to do? Let us go to the moon! At least we can cover up with that. We have to go to the moon. We can say to the anxiety, 'Wait! First let me go to the moon, then I will look at you. Wait a little more.'" Or do Transcendental Meditation. Any foolish word, repeat it, call it a mantra. Go on repeating it. That becomes a blanket cover.

REAL meditation is not a technique. Real meditation is just relaxing, sitting silently, letting it happen, whatsoever it is. Allowing the whole anxiety to come up, to surface. And watching it, watching it.

And doing nothing to change it. Witnessing it is real meditation.

In that witnessing your Buddhahood will become more and more powerful. Witnessing is the nourishment for your Buddhahood. And the more powerful your Buddhahood is, the less anxiety there is. The day your Buddhahood is complete, all anxiety is gone.

HOW IS ANXIETY RELATED TO DESIRE? IT SEEMS EASIER TO SEE THAT ONE IS DESIRING THAN TO SEE THAT ONE IS 'ANXIETING'.

YES, IT IS EASIER TO SEE THAT ONE IS DESIRING because this is what you are doing. Anxiety is not something that you are doing: you are born in it. It has nothing to do with YOUR doing. You are BORN anxiety! That's why it is difficult to see - one reason.

And the second reason: you don't WANT to look at it. It is scary. One feels that one will go mad. It is better to avoid it, to keep it at the back, never to encounter it.

It happens every day.

One very beautiful man took sannyas a few months ago. He has been a con man. The moment I looked into his eyes he became afraid of me. I said, "What kind of con man are you? Now I am going to con you." I gave him a few groups - he escaped without those groups. He became so frightened!

For months nothing was heard about him.

Then he sent his lawyer to watch here - a con man is a con man - to find out "What is really happening here? Is it okay to get into things?" The lawyer came here. He watched. He must have reported that "There is nothing to fear, you can go." He gathered courage and came back.

And I told him, "You are a coward. What kind of con man have you been? And this time don't try to escape." And I gave him a few groups again - and he disappeared!

Now I have received a letter from Singapore. He says, "Osho, I am reading your books here and listening to your tapes, but I became so much afraid because you have given me these groups again - and I will have to expose ALL the rubbish that I am carrying within myself. I will have to expose my whole being. I will have to be nude and true and authentic, and that frightens me. But I will come...

I am reading, I am listening, I am gathering courage again, and I will come."

It happens to many people: I give them groups; one day, two days, and they escape from the group.

It becomes too much. What fear arises? The fear of exposure. Not that they will be exposed to others: the fear basically is that "I will be exposed to myself," that "I will have to see what I have been hiding all along." And once you have known it, it will be impossible to hide it again.

That's why before I tell you to meditate, I send you into Primal Therapy, into Encounter - I send you into different groups. So that, the first thing: your cover is taken away; you are left naked, spiritually naked. Then meditation becomes easier, because meditation is nothing but to be with yourself in your totality.

Yes, I understand, to see desire is easy:

IT SEEMS EASIER TO SEE THAT ONE IS DESIRING THAN TO SEE THAT ONE IS 'ANXIETING'.

To see that one is anxieting NEEDS GUTS. It is really only for those who have courage.

IN FACT, THERE IS NO VERB FORM FOR ANXIETY, AT LEAST NOT IN ENGLISH.

Our languages are as false as we are. Our languages are made by us. They reflect us. In fact, a real language will not have any nouns, will have only verbs. If it has to be true to life, it can only have verbs, not nouns.

When you say, "This is a tree," you are falsifying, because there is NO static tree anywhere. A tree is a treeing. It is growing, it is constantly moving! A new leaf has come up, and the old leaf has fallen. A new bud is opening. When you are saying, "This is a tree," it is no more the same tree.

Your statement is already out of date. This is ANOTHER tree!

When you say, "This is a river," what do you mean? River is a riveting; it is constantly flowing. And so is a man and so is a woman. All are processes, dynamic. Everything in existence is a verb. But our languages are as false as we are. They have to be - they are our languages.

It is no wonder that Buddhas always feel it difficult to say the truth to you - because they have to use your language, and your language is so against truth. Why do we use so many nouns when no noun is true? Life is not life but living, and love is not love but loving, and death is not death but dying.

Why do we use nouns at all? It gives us a feeling of control. Nouns can be controlled; verbs cannot be controlled. Verbs are beyond you. Nouns are static, dead, you can manipulate them. Verbs are alive. They will slip out of your fingers; you carrot hold them in your hands.

Loving has to be transformed into love - then it is easy to tackle. If a man says to a woman, "I am in a state of loving towards you," just see how much difference it makes. And then he says, "I love you." When he says, "I love you," he is saying something static. Implied in it is that, "Tomorrow also I will love." It is a static phenomenon: "I LOVE YOU." It is definite, it is absolute. There is not going to be any change in it.

But if a man says, "I am in a state of loving," you will be afraid, because 'state of loving'? - it is a process. Morning it may be there, evening it may be gone. Then what?

And when somebody says, "I love you," the noun is addressed to you. When somebody says, "I am in a state of loving," it is not addressed to you. He may be loving to somebody else too! It is dangerous. You cannot possess it.

Nouns can be possessed, hoarded. You can become masters. But verbs cannot be possessed.

They go on and on... they go beyond you; they go beyond all your comprehension. They remain unpredictable. Nouns are predictable. Verbs are unpredictable. They are like a cloud changing its form every moment.

You cannot depend on a cloud's form. There may be an elephant in the cloud - it looks like an elephant. By the time you call your child, "Come here! Come out! There is an elephant in the sky!"

and by the time the child comes, it is no more an elephant. The elephant has dissolved. The cloud is not a fixed phenomenon. Now what to say to the child? He will say, "You have been lying. Where is the elephant?"

In fact, there was no elephant - the moving cloud was just elephantine. Sometimes it is horsing... it is unpredictable. And we are very much afraid of the unpredictable. And life is unpredictable, so we go on keeping ourselves surrounded by nouns. It feels safe.

Our languages reflect our minds, our ignorance, our unconsciousness, our stupidities, our jealousies, our fears, our obsessions, our neurosis. Our language represents ALL that we are.

It is a reflection of our mind - it is a mind product.

That's why there is nothing like 'anxieting'. 'Anxiety' - then it is fixed. Then you can label it: This is anxiety. You can label: This is love. But if you watch real love, it changes sometimes into hate - REAL love changes into hate. Now it will confuse you, so you label differently: This is hate - this is love. And you bypass the link. You never look into the link. Love becomes hate: hate becomes love.

Friends turn into enemies: enemies turn into friends. Everything is moving into everything else! It is all one! Things are not divided by water-tight compartments.

The earth becomes the tree... the tree becomes the air... it goes on melting into each other... the air is breathed by you... it becomes your blood... everything is moving into everything else. Nothing is unrelated. It is all ONE process.

When you stop manipulating life, when you sit silently and simply watch, you will see all this tremendous beauty, this tremendous up!edict able process of life, this dynamism.

AND this is God! This wholeness. This interdependence. This inter linked existence, where everything is changing into everything else. This fluid energy is God.....

The last question:

Question 4:

VEETGYAN, WHAT ARE YOU talking about? What ashram? I am living in the forest! These people are my trees - orange trees, aflame with flowers. Can you find a more wild jungle than this?

And how can I be bored with so many beautiful people around me? with such a celebrating existence? If you feel bored, that simply shows you must be insensitive, you must be thick. Your skull has to be broken. Otherwise, where can you find a better existence than this? This is the only existence there is, AND the perfect one. All is as it should be. Trees are green, and roses are red.

All is as it should be! How can you get bored?

Boredom comes out of insensitivity. Because you are insensitive you cannot see the subtle changes that go on happening around you. Hence it looks repetitive: "The sun rises every morning, the same sun - how can one remain without being bored?" But it is NOT the same sun! It is constantly changing. It is FIRE - how can the fire remain the same? Watch fire... it is constantly changing.

Flames are changing. It is constant flux. Sun is a liquid fire. It is never the same.

But, thinking that it is the same, you don't look at the morning, and the clouds are new every day.

Their forms are new. They take new colors. Every day they celebrate the coming of the sun. And the birds and the trees and the whole existence every moment is new, AND fresh - as fresh as a dewdrop in the morning. And so are people!

But you are dull, you are insensitive. You think it is the same woman you have lived with for twenty years. You have stopped looking at her. You have not looked at her for MANY years, not into her eyes. You have not touched her. You have forgotten her body smell. Then it is boring; then it is the same woman again and again.

It is NOT really boring - it is just that your eyes have collected much dust. Life becomes boring the more dust you collect in your eyes. The life becomes just formal, a ritual, empty. You go on doing things. Slowly slowly, all your acts become mechanical, robot like. Then life is boredom.

But I have never seen two moments alike. Each moment has its own beauty. Each moment is Only for once. If you miss it, you miss it forever; it will not be repeated again. God is not repetitive. God is very original - he never sings the same song again.

If you hear the same song again, then something must be wrong with you.

It happened:

A woman was singing, it was her birthday. She sang late in the night. Her voice was just horrible, but the neighbors were somehow tolerating it because it was only once in a year that her birthday used to come. So they had become tolerant about it. But that night she continued and continued... it was getting really late, two o'clock in the night. And a man just in front of her house could not sleep; tried in every way - tried all the tricks. Tossed and turned and did TM... etc., but nothing helped.

She was driving him crazy, so he opened his window and shouted at her, "Lady, now it is time. You stop! otherwise I will go mad."

The woman opened her door and said, "What are you talking about? It is almost one hour since I stopped!"

But what happened to this man? He was already mad. One hour before she had stopped, but he was listening, listening, listening... it was something in HIS mind. It was his inner gramophone.

Just watch: when you see a rose flower, your inner gramophone says, "You have seen it before. It is the same rose flower, nothing special about it. I have seen better." You look at the moon and the inner gramophone says, "So what?! This is the same moon, and we have seen it many times."

There are millions of people who never look at the sky. If suddenly one night all the stars disappear, they will not become aware of it. It may take a few days for them; when the news comes in the newspapers that "All the stars have simply disappeared from the world," then they will look at the sky. And then they will miss them, and they will make much fuss and they will say, "How unfortunate!

And we had not seen the stars for many years and they were here."

You are bored because of your inner gramophone. I have none in site me. Each person is fresh, each moment is fresh. They a,Rex not repetitions - they are all unique. And I remain thrilled, I remain ecstatic.

Your life, Veetgyan, must have become an empty ritual. You must be moving through things, dragging. Not even under-standing the meaning, why you are doing these things. You come home and you kiss your wife - you have to, but there is no kiss, there is no kissing, there is no ecstasy in it. Just a dull phenomenon. And if you feel tired and bored, I can understand.

Life, slowly slowly, becomes so mechanical that it loses ALL meaning. All meaning oozes out of it.

Then it is just a dull ritual. To live this way is to live irreligiously. That's my definition of religion: to live joyously, ecstatically, thrilled by each moment that knocks on your door, is to live religiously.

Religion is nothing but the Al chemical process in which all your insensitivity dissolves, and you become utterly sensitive, delicate, vulnerable. Then each moment is samadhi, is God. is enlightenment.