A Listening Heart

a story...

The ancient Zen Master, Dogo, had a disciple called Soshin. When Soshin became a novice under Dogo, he doubtless expected that the Master would instruct him in Zen the way a schoolmaster instructs his pupils. But Dogo said nothing special to him, and, indeed, appeared to have no intention of conveying anything unusual to the disciple. Finally Soshin could stand it no longer and reproached his Master for not having shown him anything of Zen. 'But I have been giving you lessons in Zen ever since you arrived, ' said Dogo.

'Oh?' said Soshin, 'When could that possibly have been?'

'When you bring me my morning tea,' said Dogo, 'I accept it. When you serve me a meal, I eat it.

When you bow to me, I acknowledge it. How else do you expect to learn Zen?' Tao can be shared but cannot be divided. Tao can be shown but cannot be said.

The Master lives in Tao. The disciple has to imbibe the spirit of it. It is not a teaching, it cannot be a teaching - all teachings are superficial. It has to be deeper than a teaching. It has to be an energy transfer. It has to be heart to heart, soul to soul, body to body. It cannot be verbal. And the disciple has to see, watch, observe, feel, love the energy that is manifesting in the Master. Slowly slowly, by and by, just sitting by the side of the Master, the disciple learns many secrets, although they are never taught.

One of the greatest secrets is that sitting by the Master's side, the disciple starts breathing in the same way the Master breathes. There arises a synchronicity. And in that synchronicity the two meet. It happens to lovers too. If you are in deep love with someone, sitting side by side, sitting together with your beloved, if you observe, you will be surprised that suddenly, for no reason at all, not cultivated by you, you are breathing in the same way. When the beloved exhales, you exhale.

When the beloved inhales, you inhale. And suddenly you are connected, linked together.

Breath is of immense importance. That's how the mother is connected with the child. And sometimes the distance may even be of a thousand miles between the child and the mother but the mother's heart is immediately affected if the child is in danger. Their breathing is so connected - they breathe alike. And there is an obvious reason for it. The child in the mother's womb was breathing through the mother for nine months. He had no breath of his own. It was his mother's breath, and he was simply following the mother's breathing. The mother was breathing for him, on his behalf; for nine months they lived in a deep synchronicity. Even after the child is born, it continues. If there is real love, it can continue for the whole of their lives.

Now there have been scientific proofs for it, too. In America, in Russia, and in other countries also, many experiments have been done lately with birds, with animals. The child is taken far away and then killed, and they watch the mother with all the sophisticated instruments available. The moment the child is killed - it may be a thousand miles away - immediately the mother's breath changes.

Immediately, in the exact moment, her breath becomes shaken; a trembling arises in her. She feels panic, pain, for no reason, for no apparent reason. Something intuitive, something without any medium between the two - they are not visibly connected by anything, but there are some invisible threads, too.

The disciple has to learn not what the Master is teaching but HOW THE MASTER IS BEING. That's what Dogo means when he says, 'But I have been giving you lessons in Zen ever since you arrived.

When you bring me my morning tea, I accept it. Have you not watched it - the way I accept it? Have you not fallen in deep harmony with me when I accept the tea from you? When you serve me a meal, I eat it. When you bow to me, I acknowledge it. How else do you expect to learn Zen?'

The Master is saying: Watch my gestures - the way I walk, the way I sit, the way I breathe, the way I simply sit with you, the way I look at you, the way I respond in a thousand and one small ways.

Don't wait for a doctrine; the Master's presence is the only doctrine there is. The real teaching is not a teaching at all, it is a transfer - a transfer beyond words and beyond scriptures. And the transfer happens through the harmony of the breath.

I would also like to say to you that I have also nothing to offer to you as a teaching, as a doctrine, as a philosophy, as a religion. I have nothing to teach at all. I have much to share, but nothing to teach - or, ONLY NOTHING to teach! But to feel that nothing that I would like to be transferred to you, you will have to fall in rhythm with me. And small things disturb, very small things. And you have to become aware slowly slowly what the disturbances are.

In evening DARSHAN sometimes I call a few sannyasins to help me transfer energy to somebody. I have been calling Pradeepa many times, but each time I call her afterwards I feel nauseous. I was puzzled. What is happening? She is such a beautiful woman, with great love for me; that's why I call her to help me. But it has been happening each time. Just the last time I felt it so much that I had to look into it, into the whole matter of it. Then I saw the point. She must be eating non-vegetarian food meat, eggs and other things. That is making her breath ugly, that is making her whole inner harmony disturbed. That's why she cannot fall in tune with me. And if she cannot fall in tune, it creates a disturbance. She loves me, but her love is still unconscious. If she becomes a little more conscious, she will see it, she will see that to be with me you will have to change many things in you.

To be with me, and to move deeper with me, to have a heart-to-heart contact, you will have to drop the unnecessary luggage that you carry. Now, there is no need to be a non-vegetarian - it is not for a meditator; otherwise, you are creating unnecessary hindrances. It will disturb your softness - it will create a kind of cruelty in you. You may not be aware of it, because you are not aware at all, but when you come to me I am just a mirror.

Now Pradeepa must be creating a great nauseousness in her own being. She may have become accustomed to it, so she is not aware. But again and again I was feeling nauseous, because when you relate to me with energy it is not one-way: my energy moves into you, your energy moves into me. It can't be one-way. A circle is created; circulation starts happening. This is just an example.

And this is not only for Pradeepa, it is for you all.

If you want to be more and more deeply in tune with me, if you want to share the Tao that has happened to me, you will have to be more conscious, more alert to what you are doing, what you are eating, what you are reading, what you are listening to, where you are going, with whom you are mixing. It has to be a total effort. It has to be a twenty-four-hour awareness, because small things gather together and their impact is great.

If you have been angry with somebody and you have been fighting with somebody and then you come to see me, naturally you will be far away from me. That's why Jesus says if you go to the temple to pray and you remember that you have hurt somebody, insulted somebody, that you are angry at somebody or if you have angered somebody, first go and ask to be forgiven, only then come to pray; otherwise, you will not be able to relate with God. First go and apologize. First clear things.

It happened when Michelangelo was working in the Sistine Chapel... He was making a painting of Jesus. The painting was almost complete - just the last finishing touches - but he was finding those last finishing touches very difficult. Jesus was not coming out Jesus-like; something was missing in Jesus' face - that softness, that feminineness was not there, that love quality was not there. He tried and tried for days, and then he remembered that he had quarrelled with a friend and he was carrying it in himself. And then he remembered the saying of Jesus, that if you go to pray and you are not feeling good about a friend or a brother, then first go and ask forgiveness.

He rushed out of the chapel, went to the friend, asked his forgiveness and told the whole story. 'For days together I have been working, but I cannot bring out Jesus' face as it should be. Something angry remains in it' - because something was angry inside him. If there is anger and hard feeling and you are going to paint, your hands will paint, your painting will represent you, your painting will basically reflect you. And the day he asked forgiveness and was forgiven, he came into a totally different mood. And just a few minutes' work, and the painting was complete. And it is one of the most beautiful paintings of Jesus. Just a few strokes and the painting came alive and Jesus surfaced, because now Michelangelo's heart was in tune.

Tao can be shared. But then you have to learn the ways of sharing it with the Master, and you have to be very watchful about many things. It is simple in a way and yet very complex, too. Simple, because if you are really open and in harmony, it can happen in a single split moment. Complex, because you will have to change your very small habits of which you are not aware at all. You will have to change your total life.

That's why I say I have nothing to offer to you as a teaching, I have some energy to impart to you as a provocation. I am not giving you a system of philosophy, a theology, I am giving you myself. It is a challenge. My effort here is to wake you up. You will have to be open, rhythmic, and you will have to watch small things in your life. And the breath is the most important. You will have to learn how to breathe in SATSANG how to breathe in the company of a Master, how to breathe when you are in love.

The breathing continuously changes with your emotions. When you are angry, your breathing is unrhythmic, asymmetrical. When you are in sexual lust, your breathing is almost insane. When you are calm and quiet, joyful, your breathing has a musical quality to it; your breathing is almost a song. When you are feeling at home in existence, when you have no desires and are feeling contented, suddenly breathing almost stops. When you are in a state of awe, of wonder, breathing stops for a moment. And those are the greatest moments of life, because only in those moments when breathing almost stops are you in utter tune with existence: you are in God and God is in you.

Your experience of breathing has to be more and more profound, scrutinized, observed, watched, analyzed. See how your breathing changes with your emotions, and vice versa, how your emotions change with your breathing. For example, when you are afraid, watch the change in your breath. And then one day try to change the breath to the same pattern as when you were afraid. And you will be surprised that if you change your breath to exactly what it was when you were afraid, fear will arise in you - immediately. Watch your breathing when you are deeply in love with somebody; holding his hand, hugging your beloved, watch your breathing. And then, one day, just sitting silently under a tree, watch yourself again breathing in the same way. Make the pattern, fall into the same gestalt again. Breathe in the same way as if you were hugging your beloved, and you will be surprised; the whole existence becomes your beloved. Again there is great love arising ill yoU. They go together.

Hence in Yoga, in Tantra, in Tao - in all these three great systems and sciences of human consciousness and the expansion of human consciousness - breathing is one of the key phenomena. They have all worked on breathing.

Buddha's whole meditation system depends on a certain quality of breath. He says, 'Simply watch your breath, without changing it. Without in any way changing it, simply watch.' But you will be surprised: the moment you watch, it changes: you cannot help it. Buddha says, 'Don't change your breath, simply watch.' But the moment you watch, it changes, because watchfulness has its own rhythm. That's why Buddha says, 'You need not change it; simply watch.' Watchfulness will bring its own kind of breathing - it comes by itself. And slowly slowly you will be surprised: the more watchful you become, the less you breathe. The breath becomes longer, deeper.

For example, if in one minute you were breathing sixteen breaths, now you may breathe six, or four, or three. As you become watchful, the breath goes deeper, becomes longer, and you are taking less and Less breaths in the same time period. Then you can do it from the other side too. Breathe slowly, quietly, deep long breaths, and suddenly you will see watchfulness arising in you. It is as if each emotion has a polarity In your breathing system: it can be triggered by your breathing.

But the best way is to watch when you are in love, when you are sitting by the side of your friend.

Watch your breath, because that loving rhythm of breath is most important: it will transform your whole being.

Love is where you feel most sharply the absurdity, the falsity, of your position as a separated being.

Yet by this very separation, this absurdity, you are able to express what you could not express in any other way. By your very otherness you are able to celebrate identity. Hence, the paradox of love; you are two and yet you feel one. You are one, yet you know you are two. Oneness in twoness: that is the paradox of love. And that has to be the paradox of prayer too, and meditation too. Ultimately you have to feel as one with existence as you feel with your beloved, with your lover, with your friend, with your mother, with your child, in some rare valuable moments. By your very otherness you are able to celebrate identity.

The Vedas say: TATHVAMASI I am that. This is the greatest statement of love: I am that, or, Thou art that. There is a clear-cut awareness of separation, and yet a deep unity too. The wave is separate from the ocean and yet not separate from the ocean.

Watch your loving moments more and more. Be alert. See how your breathing changes. See how your body vibrates. Just hugging your woman or your man, make it an experiment, and you will be surprised. One day, just hugging, melting into each other, sit at least for one hour, and you will be surprised: it will be one of the most psychedelic experiences. For one hour, doing nothing, just hugging each other, falling into each other, merging, melting into each other, slowly slowly the breathing will become one. You will breathe as if you are two bodies but one heart. You will breathe together. And when you breathe together - not by any effort of your own, but just because you are feeling so much love that the breathing follows - those will be the greatest moments, the most precious; not of this world, but of the beyond, the far out.

And in those moments you will have the first glimpse of meditative energy. In those moments grammar gives up, language expires. In the attempt to say it, language expires, and by its very death does point at last to what it cannot say. And that has to be, on a profounder level, the relationship with the Master. Then only can Tao jump as a flame from the Master to the disciple. You will have to learn the art of breathing.

The sutras.

Master Lu-tsu said: THE DECISION MUST HE CARRIED OUT WITH A COLLECTED HEART AND NOT SEEKING SUCCESS; SUCCESS WILL THEN COME OF ITSELF.

A tremendously significant statement. A key statement: THE DECISION MUST HE CARRIED OUT WITH A COLLECTED HEART...

The first thing: a man is born only when he becomes decisive. With decision is the birth of man.

Those who live in indecisiveness are not really men yet. And millions live in indecisiveness; they cannot decide about anything. They always lean upon others; somebody else should decide for them. Hence people hang around authorities.

Authoritativeness continues in the world for the single reason that millions of people cannot decide for themselves. They have always to be given an order. Once the order is given, they follow it. But this is slavery, this is how they are preventing the birth of their own soul. Decision should arise in your being, because with decisiveness integrity arises. Remember, make a few decisions. Decisions will make you individual.

What is indecisiveness? It means you are a crowd; many voices in you are contradicting each other, and you cannot decide whether to go this way or that. Even in small things people are indecisive:

whether to go to see this movie or that - and they are indecisive. Indecisiveness has become almost their very style of life. To purchase this or to purchase that? Just watch people when they go shopping. See their indecisiveness. Just sit in any shop and just watch people coming and going - customers - and you will be surprised: people don't know how to decide. And those who don't know how to decide will remain vague, cloudy, confused. With decision comes clarity. And if the decision is far-reaching, if the decision has something to do with your foundations, certainly, one is born.

Now there are many people who come to me, and they say, 'We cannot decide whether to take the jump into sannyas or not.' They want me to tell them to take the jump. But then they miss the whole point. If I say to you, 'Take the jump and become a sannyasin,' you have missed an opportunity, a great opportunity, of taking a decision. Again you have leaned on somebody else, and that is not the way a soul grows. And this is a profound decision, of immense significance, because it is going to change your whole life style, it is going to give you a new vision. You will be moving in a new direction, you will not be the same again. Such far-reaching decisions one should be capable of taking on one's own. One should risk. Only with risk, with courage, is one born.

And whenever you take a decision, remember, if you take it then follow it; otherwise don't take a decision, because then it is more dangerous - more dangerous than being indecisive. To take a decision and not to follow it will make you very very impotent. Then it would have been better not to have decided. There are people who decide and then never follow their decisions. Slowly slowly they lose all trust and confidence in their being. Slowly slowly they know perfectly well that whatsoever they decide they are not going to do. They become split; they become deceptive to themselves.

When they are taking a decision, even in that moment they know that they are not going to follow it, because they know their past and their past experiences. Whenever they did decide, they never followed it.

And then very small decisions can be very destructive. Just a small decision - 'I will not smoke from today' - just a very ordinary decision, nothing much is involved in it... Whether you smoke or not doesn't matter: the existence continues. In twenty years time you may have tuberculosis, but that can be cured. Or you may die two or three years earlier. So what? - you never really lived.

Just the other day I was looking at a cartoon.

A man is asking a woman, 'Do you believe in life after death?' And the woman says, 'This is it!'

There is no need to believe in it, this is it. You are living such a dead life, what more can there be after death? It will be just the same. This is what it is!

But a small decision, a very trivial decision not to smoke, and then not to follow it is very dangerous.

You will lose self-confidence. You will lose trust in your own being. You will become mistrustful. It is better not to take such decisions. Go on smoking. And if you decide, then you are committed. Then whatsoever happens you have to do it. And if you can do it, you will find a clarity arising in you, a cloud disappearing, something settling, centring, in you. A decision is tremendously significant and meaningful.

THE DECISION MUST BE CARRIED OUT WITH A COLLECTED HEART...

That's what Lu-tsu means. If you do decide, then let your whole heart be in it. Then make it certain that you are not going back. That's what I mean when I say again and again to my sannyasins, 'Break the bridges.' Because you are not going back, so why keep the bridge? Throw the ladder.

Drown the boat, because you are not going back to the old shore again. If you keep the boat safe, harboured, that means you are still wavering, you are still thinking, 'Maybe some day I have to go back.'

Just a few months ago, Anup went to the USA, and I told him when he was going, 'Break the bridges completely now.' And he said, 'Yes, Osho.'

And now he comes, and I ask him, 'What happened? What about the bridges?' He says, 'I could not do that.'

What does that mean? He will be here only half-heartedly. He has kept the door open to go back, he has kept every security there, safe. And the problem is: if he is not totally here, he will not grow.

And this is the vicious circle: if he does not grow, after a few months he will think, 'It is good that I had not broken the bridges. Had I listened to Osho and broken the bridges, I would now have been in trouble. Nothing is happening to me here! It is good that I have saved everything there, and I can fly back home any moment.' And he will think he has been doing the most clever, intelligent thing.

But because he has kept the bridges safe and the doors open to escape back in the first place, he will be here only in a lukewarm way, in an indecisive way, in an uncertain way - wavering. And with the wavering you will not be with me. You can be with me only if you have taken a decision with a collected heart.

And then growth IS possible. Growth IS possible only then. So see the point: if you are totally here with me growth is possible and there will be no need to go back and there will be no need to have bridges. But if you are not totally here with me, then the bridges will be needed. And you will feel very intelligent - that it was good that you didn't listen to me. 'Now look, nothing is happening here, and I have to go back. Had I broken all the bridges then where would I have ended?'

This is how the logical mind functions. It creates its own suicidal situations.

THE DECISION MUST BE CARRIED OUT WITH A COLLECTED HEART AND NOT SEEKING SUCCESS; SUCCESS WILL THEN COME OF ITSELF.

And the most important thing is: if you are seeking success you are already divided. Then your heart is not in the work, your heart is already in the result. If you are divided, you will not succeed. Success happens only to undivided hearts who are not worried about the consequence, the result, who are enjoying tremendously the journey itself, and are not concerned about the goal. Only those arrive who are not concerned with the goal at all - because their mind is so undivided, each moment of the journey, each step of the journey becomes a goal. Wherever they are, there is the goal. Success comes to those people on the spiritual path who are not concerned about success at all.

If you are concerned about success, success is not going to come to you, because your mind will be somewhere in the future and you will not be working in the present. And success can only come if the work is totally done in the present. This moment is going to give birth to the next moment. If this moment has been totally lived, the next moment is bound to be of a deeper totality, of a higher quality of totality.

But people go on remaining divided. These problems you have to think about, because these are everybody's problems.

Just a few days ago, Ashoka wrote me a letter saying that he is here but he still keeps Satya Sai Baba's picture in his room. Now that is his room - he can keep anybody's picture in it - but it is not only a question of the room. Now he will be in trouble. I told him, 'You go to Satya Sai Baba. And there, please don't keep my picture in your room; otherwise there also you will fail. Either be here or be there, but be with a collected heart, an integrated heart. It is better to be with Satya Sai Baba than to be with me if you are here only half-heartedly. But I understand his problem: I know he will keep my picture there too. So his failure is destined.

One has to choose. One has to decide. At each step in life's journey, there are alternative paths, and you have to choose because you cannot have all the paths and you cannot walk on all the paths.

And I am not saying what is right and wrong, I am saying that whatsoever you choose totally is right for you. Sometimes it has happened that if his total surrender was there, a disciple has become enlightened even with an unenlightened Master. And thousands of times it happens that you may be with a perfect Master and nothing happens.

It is more a question of your totality than of the perfection of the Master. Even with a wrong person you can be transformed. Not that the wrong person can transform you, but if your total decision is there, your total decision transforms you. That is far more important; otherwise you can be with a Buddha and nothing will happen if you are half-half, if you are divided. Any kind of division of the future and the present, of the goal and the journey, this way or that, this Master or that - any kind of division is dangerous. Then your energy will be wasted, and you will throw the responsibility on others.

For example, if nothing happens to Ashoka here - and nothing is going to happen in this way - then, naturally, he will come to the conclusion that he has been in a wrong place. He will not see the point that he has been a divided person, he will only see that he has been in a wrong place, that 'This place was not for me.' But wherever you are, if you are divided, this is going to happen again and again.

Gather courage. I know the mind wants to be clever. The mind says, 'Why not keep both? Who knows? Keep both alternatives open. If this does not work, then that may work.' But this is not how life functions. You want to have the cake and eat it, too. It is impossible.

Lu-tsu says... and NOT SEEKING SUCCESS, because even that will become a division. Be utterly herenow, with no division... SUCCESS WILL THEN COME OF ITSELF. And when success comes of itself, it has tremendous beauty. You need not drag it, it opens like a flower; you need not open the flower forcibly. And if you open the flower forcibly you will have killed it. That will not be right.

And you will have opened it before its right time, and there may be no fragrance, because the flower has to wait for the right moment to gather fragrance, to create fragrance. And when the fragrance is ready, only then does it open of its own accord, because now it has something to share with the existence.

One should enjoy the moment. One should be totally in the moment and forget all. And then, one day, suddenly success has come. One day, suddenly the Golden Flower has opened, and you are transported into a separate reality.

IN THE FIRST PERIOD OF RELEASE THERE ARE CHIEFLY TWO MISTAKES: INDOLENCE AND DISTRACTION.

These two mistakes have to be understood. One is the mistake of the feminine mind, the other is the mistake of the masculine mind.

The feminine mind can create indolence, laziness, because it is passive. And the masculine mind can create distraction because it is too active. It wants to do this and that - and that too. It wants to rush everywhere, in all directions. The feminine mind is passive; it wants to wait, to let things happen. But that too can be a danger if it becomes lethargy, if it becomes laziness, if it becomes a kind of death.

Remember, passivity can be either positive or negative, just as activity can be either positive or negative. The positive passivity means to be alert, awake, yet waiting. The negative passivity means to be asleep, snoring, and to call it waiting.

Your lover is coming; any moment he will knock at the door. Now you can wait in two ways. The positive waiting will be that the door is open, your eyes are fixed on the gate, your ears are alert.

Any sound - the sound of footsteps, a knock on the door - even if a dead leaf flutters in the wind, and you will rush to the door. Somebody passes by on the road, and you rush to the door - maybe he has come. This is positive waiting. It is beautiful. But if you lock the door, and you put the light out and you say, 'When he comes and knocks, then I will see him,' and you start snoring, this is the negative kind of passivity, this is indolence. It is perfectly good to wait for God, but your passivity should be alive, vibrant.

And the second is distraction: that is the quality of the male mind. The male mind is continuously distracted. That's why the feminine mind is monogamous and the masculine mind is polygamous, continuously distracted - any woman that passes by, and he becomes attracted. He forgets completely that he is already married. He forgets completely the woman to whom he has said, 'You are my life, and I will live only for you. You are my joy. My love is forever.' In a single moment he forgets all that nonsense. He is distracted very easily.

The male mind is too active. Activity is good if it is positive. Positive activity means concentrated activity, undistracted activity - digging a well on one spot continuously. Negative activity means digging a well here for a few moments, then in some other place, then in some other place - destroying the whole ground and not reaching the water source anywhere. That's what happens to the masculine mind: he loves this woman and that woman, and never reaches the reality of love.

It remains just a superficial phenomenon. It never becomes intimacy, it never takes depth. It never becomes a real involvement in each other's being - superficial contact, body-to-body at the most, sexual. It never reaches the heart, and, certainly, never the soul. Because to reach the heart, to reach the soul, time will be needed. One will have to wait and dig deep.

These are the two chief possible mistakes. Beware of them. Don't become too active, and don't become too lazy. Remain in the middle: inactively active, actively inactive. Remain in the middle.

Your action should have the quality of waiting, and your waiting should have the quality of action.

And then success is absolutely certain; you need not think about it - it comes of its own accord. But these mistakes can be remedied.

BUT THAT CAN BE REMEDIED; THE HEART MUST NOT ENTER INTO THE BREATHING TOO COMPLETELY.

Master Lu-tsu is giving you one of the most important secrets.

... THE HEART MUST NOT ENTER INTO THE BREATHING TOO COMPLETELY.

You should learn to breathe very silently, as if there were no hurry to breathe, as if you were indifferent to it, aloof, faraway distant. If you can be aloof, faraway and distant to your breathing, you will be able to attain to the middle. In that moment you will be neither masculine nor feminine.

You will be both and neither, you will be transcendental. And then both mistakes will disappear.

BREATHING COMES FROM THE HEART. WHAT COMES OUT OF THE HEART IS BREATH.

AS SOON AS THE HEART STIRS, THERE DEVELOPS BREATH-ENERGY. BREATH-ENERGY IS ORIGINALLY TRANSFORMED ACTIVITY OF THE HEART.

When you are distracted, watch: your breathing will be distracted too. When you are not distracted, when you are sitting silently with no distraction, your breathing will be cool, silent, rhythmic; it will have the quality of a subtle music. And that quality is the exact middle, because you are not doing anything, yet you are not fast asleep. You are neither active nor inactive you are balanced. And in that moment of balance you are closest to reality, to God, to heaven.

WHEN OUR IDEAS GO VERY FAST THEY IMPERCEPTIBLY PASS INTO FANTASIES WHICH ARE ALWAYS ACCOMPANIED BY THE DRAWING OF A BREATH, BECAUSE THIS INNER AND OUTER BREATHING HANGS TOGETHER LIKE TONE AND ECHO. DAILY WE DRAW INNUMERABLE BREATHS AND HAVE AN EQUAL NUMBER OF FANTASIES. AND THUS THE CLARITY OF THE SPIRIT EBBS AWAY AS WOOD DRIES OUT AND ASHES DIE.

Remember, your each breath is not just a breath, it is a thought too, an emotion too, a fantasy too.

But this will be understood only if you watch your breathing for a few days. When you are making love, watch your breathing. You will be surprised: your breathing is chaotic; because sexual energy is very rough, raw energy. Sexual fantasies are rough and raw, animalistic. There is nothing special about sexuality - every animal has it. When you are sexually aroused, you are just behaving like any other animal in the world. And I am not saying that there is anything wrong in being an animal, all that I am saying is just a fact. I am stating a fact. So whenever you are in sexual love, watch your breath: it loses all balance.

Hence, in Tantra, love-making is allowed only when you have learnt how to make love and yet keep your breath cool, rhythmic. Then a totally different quality comes to your love-making: it becomes prayerful; then it is sacred. Now for the outsider there will be no difference because he will see you are making love to a woman or making love to a man, and it will be the same for the outsider. But for the insider, for those who know, there will be great difference. In the old Tantra schools where all those secrets were developed, experimented upon, observed, this was one of the central focuses of their experimentation: if a man can make love without his breath being at all affected by it, then it is no longer sex, then it is sacred. And then it will take you to great depths of your own being; it will open doors and mysteries of life.

Your breath is not just breath, because breath is your life; it contains all that life contains.

SO, THEN, SHOULD A MAN HAVE NO IMAGININGS IN HIS MIND? ONE CANNOT BE WITHOUT IMAGININGS. SHOULD ONE NOT BREATHE? ONE CANNOT BE WITHOUT BREATHING. THE BEST WAY IS TO MAKE A MEDICINE OF THE ILLNESS.

This is the Tantra approach and this is the approach of Tao, too: TO MAKE A MEDICINE OF THE ILLNESS. And this is something special to Tao and Tantra.

Yoga says: Avoid sex. Bypass it - it is dangerous. But Tao and Tantra both say: Don't avoid it.

Transform its energy and then the illness itself can become the medicine.

And you can ask scientists; they are doing exactly that, particularly in allopathy. Injections are prepared out of the illness itself, to be injected, and they become medicinal. What allopathy has discovered recently is a very ancient discovery for Tantra and Tao.

Anything that is God-given must have some tremendous purpose behind it. Don't avoid it. Avoiding it, you will remain poor. Don't escape from it, because then something will remain unlived in you.

That's why the so-called yogi is continuously tortured by sexual fantasies. He cannot sleep well - it is impossible - because whatsoever he has been denying in the day comes with a vengeance in the night. Whatsoever he has repressed in the unconscious, when he goes to sleep and the controls are withdrawn, surfaces again; it becomes dream. The yogi, the so-called yogi, is continuously afraid.

He is afraid of seeing a woman, he is afraid of touching a woman. He is AFRAID. And what kind of freedom is this? This fear can 't bring freedom.

Tao and Tantra have a totally different approach. They say: Whatsoever is God-given, transform it.

It is raw material. Something of a great treasure must be hidden in it.

Sexual energy can be transformed if you can change your breathing system. Anger can be transformed if you can change your breathing system. Just watch how you breathe when you are angry. And the next time you feel angry, don't breathe the way that you have always breathed whenever you were angry, and you will be surprised: you cannot be angry either. If you don't breathe in a certain way, anger is not supported, anger disappears. Instead of anger, compassion arises. And so disappears sex, and instead of sex, love arises. Love is absolutely human. Sex is not just human, it is animal, too, but no animal knows about love.

Sex is animal, love is human, prayer is divine. Sex has to be transformed into love, and love has to be transformed into prayer.

In sex, the breathing goes chaotic. That's why I have chosen chaotic meditation for certain purposes - it is cathartic. Chaotic meditation, chaotic breathing hits all your repressed anger, sex, greed, jealousies, hatred, and brings them out on the surface. It is a great cleansing process.

In sex, the breathing is chaotic. In love, the breathing is musical. In prayer, it almost stops.

SINCE HEART AND BREATH ARE MUTUALLY DEPENDENT, THE CIRCULATION OF THE LIGHT MUST BE UNITED WITH THE RHYTHM OF BREATHING.

When you breathe out, let the light go out of your eyes When you breathe in, let the light go back inside. Make a connection between your breathing and your light circulation. This way you will give some work to your breathing so it need not have any other imagination. This is an imagination - you have given something. That's why Lu-tsu says: Man CANNOT BE WITHOUT IMAGININGS - not in the beginning at least. It is only at the highest peak that imagination can be dropped. But we can use it, we can make a stepping-stone of it.

Imagine that when your breath is going out, your light is going out. When you breathe in, your light goes in. Try it in a simple way: when you breathe out, just feel all the light that was in being thrown out. And when you breathe in, feel all the light of the existence entering you. And soon the imagination will become joined together with your breathing, will be welded with breathing. So you have used imagination. And then slowly slowly, let your breathing become calmer and quieter.

There is no need to practise any particular rhythm as they do m yoga, PRANAYAMA, because each person has to find his own way. The body is different, the mind is different - your breathing cannot be alike; you will have to find your own way slowly slowly. One thing has to be kept in mind: that it has to be made calm and quiet and musical.

FOR THIS, LIGHT OF THE EAR IS ABOVE ALL NECESSARY.

And then Lu-tsu introduces another thing. He says: Just as light enters from the eyes - comes in, goes out - it also enters from the ear - comes in and goes out. You will be surprised, because we don't see any light coming in and going out from the ear. But then ask modern physics. They say that sound is nothing but electricity, a function of electricity. Sound is electricity. That's what in the ancient language Lu-tsu is calling light. Sound goes in and comes out from the car.

The ear is the feminine part of your body just as the eye is the masculine part of your body. Just as the eye is extrovert, the ear is introvert. Hence, there are two kinds of meditations in the world:

either meditations concerned with eye-energy or meditations concerned with ear-energy.

The meditations concerned with ear-energy are feminine meditations, passive - you have just to listen, not do anything. Listening to the birds, the wind passing through the pine trees, or to some music, or to the noise of the traffic - just listening, doing nothing - and great silence comes in, and great peace starts falling and showering on you It is easier through the car than through the eye.

It is easier through the ear because the ear is passive, non-aggressive. It cannot do anything to existence, it can only let it happen. The ear is a door: it allows.

THERE IS A LIGHT OF THE EYE AND A LIGHT OF THE EAR. THE LIGHT OF THE EYE IS THE UNITED LIGHT OF THE SUN AND MOON OUTSIDE. It is extrovert. THE LIGHT OF THE EAR IS THE UNITED SEED OF SUN AND MOON WITHIN. It is introvert. THE SEED IS THUS THE LIGHT IN CRYSTALLIZED FORM. BOTH HAVE THE SAME ORIGIN AND ARE DIFFERENT ONLY IN NAME.

Light and sound are only different in name.

There are stories in India - and possibly true stories; sooner or later science is going to prove them right. There are stories in India that there is a certain kind of melody that can create fire. You can put an unlit candle before the musician, and if he plays a certain melody, a certain RAGA, suddenly the candle becomes lit. Now it looks impossible, it looks just like a story - maybe a myth, or maybe a metaphor - but if sound is electricity, then vibrations falling into a certain pattern can create it.

Now experiments are on the way. And my feeling is, sooner or later, it will be possible to do it again scientifically.

It is a well-known fact that whenever an army passes over a bridge they are told to break their rhythm. Ordinarily they walk in a certain rhythm: left, right, left, right, left, right. Many times it has been observed that when the army is passing in a certain rhythm, the bridge collapses. So now it is a well-known fact that passing over a bridge the army has to drop its rightleft, rightleft rhythm. That certain vibe is dangerous to the bridge.

In Canada they were experimenting with plants and their relationship with music. A small experiment, but immensely significant. They planted the same seasonal flowers in two places, at the same time, with same manure, the same gardener looking after them - everything exactly the same for both plots. But to one plot a recording of Ravi Shankar's sitar was made available - continuously played. And to the other plot, pop music. And it was a very revealing phenomenon. In the plot where pop music was fed, all the plants started moving away from the mechanism. They started leaning away from the mechanism, as if wanting to escape, not wanting to hear it - tired of it. And their flowers were smaller, and they took a longer time to grow - almost double the time of the other plot. In the other plot where Ravi Shankar's sitar was played, the plants started leaning towards the mechanism; they all covered the mechanism, embracing it, hugging it. And the growth was double, the flowers were bigger, and they came sooner than expected.

Even plants feel the difference of sound waves.

These airplanes passing by are driving humanity crazy. And the noise is growing so much every day that if man can survive it, it will be a miracle.

BOTH HAVE THE SAME ORIGIN AND ARE DIFFERENT ONLY IN NAME.

In fact, everything is the same. It is ALL made of the stuff called light, fire, electricity - whatsoever name you choose. Only the forms are different.

THEREFORE, UNDERSTANDING (EAR) AND CLARITY (EYE) ARE ONE AND THE SAME EFFECTIVE LIGHT.

Understanding comes through the ear, and clarity comes through the eye. Clarity is masculine, understanding is feminine. Hence, I always say that a woman finds it easier to become a disciple.

A woman finds it easier to surrender, finds it easier to understand, than a man. The man asks for logical clarity, logical conviction. The woman asks for something else: the rhythmic conviction. The woman listens intuitively. She feels the vibe of the person who is saying it. She does not seem very concerned about what is being said but who is saying it, how it is being said, from where it is arising.

She goes deeper; she catches hold of the very spirit. Man remains concerned with the letter. And because of the printing presses and the scriptures becoming available to everybody in the form of books, a great change has happened.

Originally all the teachings were available only from the mouth of the Master. They were transmitted orally, so the receiving centre was the ear. Now books are available. When Krishna talked to Arjuna, Arjuna listened to it, he functioned from the car. Great understanding happened; he was transformed. But Arjuna functioned as the feminine.

Now you read the Gita. Reading means that it is through the eye, and the eye is not bothered about understanding, the eye wants logical clarity. It is a totally different approach. For centuries, all the religions of the world insisted that their scriptures should not be written. And there was a reason for it: because once they are written, their whole quality changes. Once they are written, the eye becomes important, and the ear is no more important.

Listening to me is one thing, reading is totally another. When you read, you function as male mind.

When you listen, you function as female mind.

IN SITTING DOWN, AFTER LOWERING THE LIDS, ONE USES THE EYES TO ESTABLISH A PLUMB-LINE AND THEN SHIFTS THE LIGHT DOWNWARD. BUT IF THE TRANSPOSITION DOWNWARD IS NOT SUCCESSFUL, THEN THE HEART IS DIRECTED TOWARDS LISTENING TO THE BREATHING. ONE SHOULD NOT BE ABLE TO HEAR WITH THE EAR THE OUTGOING AND INTAKING OF THE BREATH. WHAT ONE HEARS IS THAT IT HAS NO TONE. AS SOON AS IT HAS NO TONE, THE BREATHING IS ROUGH AND SUPERFICIAL, AND DOES NOT PENETRATE INTO THE OPEN. THEN THE HEART MUST BE MADE QUITE LIGHT AND INSIGNIFICANT. THE MORE IT IS RELEASED, THE LESS IT BECOMES; THE LESS IT IS, THE QUIETER.

So listen to your breathing. If you can listen to it, that means it is rough. If it has no tone, that means it is rough. When you can only feel it and you cannot hear it, then it is still and quiet. And that is the right way to be in tune with existence, to be in tune with yourself, to be in tune with reality. And the quieter it is, the deeper you are. When it stops sometimes... It does stop! It is happening to many sannyasins here. They come and report to me, because they become very frightened: when the breathing stops they think they are going to die.

Just the other day there was Saguna's question, that he started feeling as if he were going to die.

He became frightened. Do not become frightened. If breathing stops, allow it, enjoy it. You are not going to die. In that very stopping of the breath you will know the true form of reality, you will know life eternal, you will know something that knows no death.

ALL AT ONCE IT BECOMES SO QUIET THAT IT STOPS. THEN THE TRUE BREATHING IS MANIFESTED AND THE FORM OF THE HEART COMES TO CONSCIOUSNESS.

If you can allow... That's why I told Saguna, 'Saguna, you fool, you missed! Don't miss it again when it happens.'

If the breathing stops, THEN THE TRUE BREATHING IS MANIFESTED, true life is manifested - life that does not depend on breathing, life that is eternal, life that is not part of the body, life that will be there even after the body has fallen into dust and disappeared. And in that moment consciousness is attained. One becomes a Buddha. BUDDHA means utterly conscious, awakened.

IF THE HEART IS LIGHT, THE BREATHING IS LIGHT, FOR EVERY MOVEMENT OF THE HEART AFFECTS BREATH-ENERGY. IF BREATHING IS LIGHT, THE HEART IS LIGHT, FOR EVERY MOVEMENT OF THE BREATH-ENERGY AFFECTS THE HEART. IN ORDER TO STEADY THE HEART, ONE BEGINS BY TAKING CARE OF THE BREATH-ENERGY. THE HEART CANNOT BE INFLUENCED DIRECTLY. THEREFORE THE BREATH-ENERGY IS USED AS A HANDLE, AND THIS IS WHAT IS CALLED THE MAINTENANCE OF THE CONCENTRATED BREATH-ENERGY.

CHILDREN, DO YOU NOT UNDERSTAND THE NATURE OF MOVEMENT? MOVEMENT CAN BE PRODUCED BY OUTSIDE MEANS. IT IS ONLY ANOTHER NAME FOR MASTERY. ONE CAN MAKE THE HEART MOVE MERELY BY RUNNING. SHOULD ONE NOT ALSO BE ABLE TO BRING IT TO REST BY CONCENTRATED QUIETNESS? THE GREAT HOLY ONES WHO KNEW HOW THE HEART AND BREATH-ENERGY MUTUALLY INFLUENCE ONE ANOTHER HAVE THOUGHT OUT AN EASIER PROCEDURE IN ORDER TO HELP POSTERITY.

You know it. If you run, the breath becomes very chaotic, it starts moving faster and faster. Hence, the yoga postures: the full lotus posture - sitting erect, utterly silent, as if you have become a marble statue, with no movement - is just the opposite of running. It is just an outside device to help yom breathing become quiet. If yom breathing can become fast by running, it certainly will become quiet by sitting utterly like a Buddha statue. Sitting like a statue, with no movement in the body, certainly, breathing becomes slower and slower and slower... and stops. In the beginning it is only for a few moments. Don't be afraid that you are having any heart-attack or anything. It is not a heart-attack, it is a God-attack.

'THE HEN CAN HATCH HER EGGS BECAUSE HER HEART IS ALWAYS LISTENING.' THAT IS AN IMPORTANT MAGIC SPELL. THE HEN CAN HATCH THE EGGS BECAUSE OF THE ENERGY OF HEAT. BUT THE ENERGY OF THE HEAT CAN ONLY WARM THE SHELLS; IT CANNOT PENETRATE INTO THE INTERIOR. THEREFORE SHE CONDUCTS THIS ENERGY INWARD WITH HER HEART. THIS SHE DOES WITH HER HEARING. IN THIS WAY SHE CONCENTRATES HER WHOLE HEART. WHEN THE HEART PENETRATES, THE ENERGY PENETRATES, AND THE CHICK RECEIVES THE ENERGY OF THE HEAT AND BEGINS TO LIVE. THEREFORE A HEN, EVEN WHEN AT TIMES SHE LEAVES HER EGGS, ALWAYS HAS THE ATTITUDE OF LISTENING WITH BENT EAR. THUS THE CONCENTRATION OF THE SPIRIT IS NOT INTERRUPTED.

This is not only so with a hen, this is so with every woman, every mother, even the human mother.

There may be a thunderstorm and she will not hear it and she will not be awakened from her sleep.

But let her child just start crying, or just start moving, and she will be awakened immediately as if her ears were continuously focused on the child. The train will pass by and she will not be awakened.

The aeroplane will pass and she will not be awakened. But let the child show a slight restlessness and she is immediately alert. Her whole ears are listening to the child. She is connected heart-to- heart with the child from the ear. She is constantly listening as if she could hear the very heartbeat of the child.

And this is the way for all meditators to be connected with the ear - so deeply that you can hear your breathing, your heartbeat. In the beginning you will be able to hear it because it is chaotic. But if you go on listening, listening, listening, just the very effort to listen makes it quieter. And when your listening is profound, you have - become skillful, and you know how to be aware, all tone, all sound disappears, and there are moments when breathing stops. And those are the great moments of ecstasy, insight, SATORI, SAMADHI.

BECAUSE THE CONCENTRATION OF THE SPIRIT SUFFERS NO INTERRUPTION, NEITHER DOES THE ENERGY OF HEAT SUFFER INTERRUPTION DAY OR NIGHT, AND THE SPIRIT AWAKENS TO LIFE. THE AWAKENING OF THE SPIRIT IS ACCOMPLISHED BECAUSE THE HEART HAS FIRST DIED.

That's why I said that if in meditation you suddenly feel your heart is dying, don't think it is a heart- attack. When the breathing stops, you will feel as if the heart is dying. It is not dying, it is giving birth to your real heart.

WHEN A MAN CAN LET HIS HEART DIE, THEN THE PRIMAL SPIRIT WAKES TO LIFE. TO KILL THE HEART DOES NOT MEAN TO LET IT DRY AND WITHER AWAY, BUT IT MEANS THAT IT HAS BECOME UNDIVIDED AND GATHERED INTO ONE.

This is the secret of the Golden Flower: if the heart can die, the flower will bloom. Die as you are, so you can be reborn. Jesus says, 'Unless a man is born again, he will not enter into my kingdom of God.'