And a perfect liar at that

Question 1

THE first thing to be understood is that the very word "attainment" is nonspiritual. It is part of your greed. The idea to attain is very worldly. Whether you want to attain prestige, power, wealth, or God or nirvana does not make any difference. The desire to attain is worldly; it is materialistic.

The spiritual revolution happens only when you drop this greed, when you drop the very idea of becoming. You arc that. You are already that, so then don't hanker for attainment. You have never been anything else other than that which you are trying to attain.

God is within you this very moment - healthy and kicking. Because God is not something separate from you or from life. But your greed has been a problem; and because of your greed, exploiters have existed who go on showing you ways how to attain.

My whole effort here, my whole work here is to help you to see that you already have it. There is no question of any attainment. There is no question of any future. The moment you think in terms of attainment, the tomorrow comes in, time comes in, future comes in. It is a desire. You would like to be somebody else other than you are - which is impossible. You can only be that which you are.

Becoming is dreaming; being is truth. But because of your greed people have given you many ideas how to attain - -and you accept it. Not because what they say is truth, but because it enhances your greed.

To be close to me all that you have to learn is: unlearn y our greed. Drop it. Right now. Don't postpone it. Don't say, "Yes, we will drop it somewhere in the future, tomorrow." Just try to understand the very misery of greed, the very hell of it. If you see that greed brings hell, then why tomorrow? In that very vision, understanding, it drops. In fact you don't drop it; it drops on its own accord.

And, if the very idea of attainment is stupid, then what is the point of asking whether you are going to attain in a sudden way or in a gradual way? They become irrelevant.

You are already that. Let this be your constant remembrance. Not for a single moment forget that you are gods and goddesses. Don't think in terms of ladies and gentlemen - forget all that nonsense.

Remember you are gods and goddesses. Never settle for less.

So, I have to annihilate your wrong ideas. They Have been oversold to you - centuries and centuries of satesmanship in the name of spirituality.

Let me tell you one anecdote:

A Catholic girl and a Jewish boy fell madly in love. But their religion and their beliefs interfered. The Irish Catholic mother advised her daughter, "Sell him a bill of goods. Teach him the beauty and joys of Catholicism. Make him a Catholic first." The girl did. She sold him and sold him and the wedding date was set. One day before the marriage the girl came home, sobbed, cried, and said to the mother,

"The marriage is off."

"Why?" the mother asked. "Didn't you sell him?"

"I think I oversold him. Now he wants to be a priest."

These salesmen of spirituality, from one century to another, for millennia, have oversold you the idea of attainment. They have exploited you. Just see the point. You can be only that which you already are - nothing else is possible. It is a given fact; it is a gift. So spirituality is not an attainment; rather, it is a recognition - a remembrance. You have forgotten, that's all. You have misplaced it somewhere, that's all, but it is there all the same.

And the second part of the question is: "Is your pathless path for anybody, or only for rare exceptions?"

Only for rare exceptions - but everybody is a rare exception. Because I have never come across any person who is not a rare exception. I have never come across a common man or a common woman. I have been searching hard, looking into everybody who comes to me; I always come across something unique, something incomparably unique, something absolutely unique.

God never repeats. His creativity is original - he does not believe in carbons. He never creates anybody again. He does not believe in the common and the ordinary. He creates only the extraordinary and the unique.

Try to understand it, because the society has again forced on you an idea that you are just a common man. A few people want to prove themselves uncommon. They can prove that only if they prove the whole lot common. Politicians - they cannot believe that everybody is unique. If everybody is unique, then what are they doing by being presidents and prime ministers? Then they will look just foolish. They are unique, the chosen, and the whole lot is common - the mass. Their egos, just to prove themselves extraordinary, have proved another thing also, simultaneously, that everybody is ordinary.

And they say you have to prove your extraordinariness - become rich, become a Rockefeller; or become powerful in terms of power politics, become a Nixon or a Ford; or at least become a great poet, an Ezra Pound or Cummings; become a painter, a Picasso, a van Gogh; an actor. Prove yourself! Become somebody in some direction; prove your talent and genius and your mettle. And, then, those who have not proved in any way are the common mass. You are exceptional.

But I want to tell you that everybody is born exceptional. There is no need to prove it. And those who prove, they simply prove that they are uncertain about their uniqueness. Try to understand it.

Only inferior people, who have an idea of deep inferiority, try to prove themselves to be superior.

Inferiority complex helps you to compete and prove so that you can prove you are superior. But, basically, you are born unique - and there is no need to prove it.

Enjoy if you enjoy creating poetry, but don't make it an ego trip. Enjoy if you enjoy painting, but don't make it an ego trip. Look at your painters, poets; they are so egoistic, almost crazy. What has happened? They are not enjoying their painting, their poetry. They are using their poetry and painting a9 steps to come to the top so that they can declare, "I am unique, and you are not." Because of these ill people.... They are pathological; they need psychological treatment. All politicians need, all poweroriented, egotrip people need treatment. They need to be hospitalized.

Because of their madness, their feverish competition, their tremendous effort to prove that they are somebody, you start feeling that you are nobody, that you are not special, that you are there just to vegetate - live an ignoble life and die an ignoble death.

This is a very dangerous, poisonous idea, deeply planted in you. Throw it out.

But remember, when I say you are unique, I don't mean in any relative way. I don't say that you arc more unique than somebody else. When I say you are unique, I say it in an absolute way - not in a relative, comparative way. I am not saying that you are more unique than anybody else. You are simply unique, as unique as the other - -as unique as your neighbor. Uniqueness is your nature.

You ask: "Is your pathless path for anybody, or only for rare exceptions?" It is only for rare exceptions, but everybody is a rare exception.

I would like to tell you one anecdote:

It happened, there was once a wicked king who could not bear to think that anyone was his superior....

Must have been a pure politician - a pure poison.

... So he summoned all the pundits of the realm as w as the practice on momentous occasions and put to them this question: "Which of us two is the greater, I or God?"...

Because when you start on an ego trip, the ultimate fight is against God - the final. The final has to be with God because one day or other the problem is going to arise: who is superior, God or you? Friedrich Nietzsche has said, "I cannot believe in God, because if I believe in God I will always remain inferior - always." Then there is no possibility to become superior. So Nietzsche says, "Better to drop the very idea of God." Nietzsche says, "How can there be two superior beings, I and God?" This wicked king must have been a Nietzschean.

... The pundits shook with fear - because they knew if they say God is superior they will be killed immediately, murdered, butchered. Being wise by profession they asked for time, and then through old habit they clung to their position and their lives. But they were worthy men who would not displease God. They were therefore deep in grief, when the oldest pundit reassured them, "Leave it to me, tomorrow I shall speak with the Prince."

The next day when the court was gathered, the old man quietly arrived, his hands humbly joined together, his forehead smeared with white ashes. He bowed down low and pronounced these words: "O Lord, undoubtedly you are the greater" - the Prince twirled his mustaches which he wore long and tossed high his head - -"You are the greater, King, for you can banish us from your kingdom while God cannot; for truly all is his kingdom and there is nowhere to go outside him."

There is no way to go outside God. That's your uniqueness - that is everybody's uniqueness. There is no way to be something else other than part of God. That's your uniqueness and that is everybody else's uniqueness. Respect yourself and respect others also. The moment you start proving yourself superior, you are disrespectful to yourself because the very effort shows that you have accepted the idea that you are not unique - hence the effort to prove - and you are disrespectful to others also.

Respect yourself, respect others also, because deep down we are not separate. We are one whole.

We are members of each other. We are not like islands; we are the vast continent of God.

Question 2

They appear contradictions to you. Rather than clearing the contradictions, I would like to clear you.

I would like to clean you so completely that you are not there; then you won't see any contradictions.

To see contradictions is to see through the intellect. Once the intellect is not there interfering and your vision is clear - no thought floats in your consciousness; you are in a state of samyama, absolutely empty - you will never see any contradiction anywhere. All contradictions will look complementary. They are, but the mind has been trained by intellectuals, logicians, by Aristotle.

You have been taught to divide things into polar opposites - day and night, life and death, good and bad, God and devil, man and woman. Watertight compartments.

Then if I say that in every woman there is a man and in every man there is a woman, you will immediately say, "Wait, there is a contradiction. How can a man be a woman, and how can a woman be a man? A man is man, a woman is woman - clear cut." It is not so. Life does not believe in Aristotle; life is bigger than Aristotle. Man and woman are complementaries, not contradictions.

Have you seen the Taoist symbol of yin and yang? - contradictions meeting into each other, dissolving into each other: day into night, night into day; life into death, death into life. And that's how it is. Life and death are not two separate entities. There is no gap between them, no interval. It is life that becomes death, and it is death that again becomes life.

You see a wave rising and moving in the ocean. Just in th. wake of the wave there is a hollow, upside-down wave following. They are not two separate things. You see a great mountain: just by the side there is a great valley. They are not two things. Valley is nothing but mountain upside down; the mountain is nothing but the valley downside up.

Man and woman, and all contradictions, are seemingly contradictory. Once you can see this fact, you will always be able to know that I have to talk in contradictions because I have to talk about the total, the whole. Whatsoever I say covers only part; then the other part is left: I have to say that part also. When I say that other part, you say, "Wait, you are being contradictory." Language is still Aristotelean, and I don't think there will ever be a possibility of a non Aristotelean language. It will be very difficult because for day to day, utilitarian purposes we have to divide things into black and white.

Black and white look so separate, but real life is like a rainbow - the whole spectrum. Maybe on one side is white, on another side is black, but in between there are millions of steps, all joined together.

Life is a spectrum. If you drop the midsteps, then things look contradictory. It is your vision which is not yet clear.

I have heard, it happened one day:

One drunkard burst into the office for registration of births and deaths.

"Gentlemen," he hiccuped, "I want to register the birth of twins!"

"Why do you say 'gentlemen'?" inquired the registrar.

"Can't you see I am here all alone?"

"You are?" gasped the new father, staggering back. "Maybe I had better go back to the hospital and have another look."

Maybe they are not twins, only one. It is your unconsciousness which is giving you a very distorted view of life. And again and again you will come to feel contradictions in me. They are there, but only in appearances. Deep down they meet.

Now, this particular contradiction: "Patanjali says that through ignorance one accumulates ignorance, one accumulates karma; and previously we have heard you say that until one attains to a certain crystallization, one is not responsible for one's actions - rather, the divine is the doer, the one responsible."

These arc two seemingly contradictory paths. One is that you leave all to God - -but all, total. Then you are not responsible. But remember, it has to be total; it is a total sacrifice, surrender, submission.

Then if you do good, God is the doer; if you do bad, of course, God is the doer.

Remember the totality. That totality will transform you. Don't be clever and cunning, because the possibility is there that whatsoever you don't feel is good, you will say God is responsible.

Whatsoever makes you feel guilty, you will throw it on God, and whatsoever enhances your ego, you will say, "It is I." You may not say so visibly, but deep inside you will say so. If you write a good poem, you will say, "I am the poet." If you paint a beautiful painting, you will say, "I am the painter." And if a Nobel prize is going to be given to you, you will not say, "Give it to God." You will say, "Yes, I have been waiting for it - already it is too late. The recognition-the due recognition - has been delayed too long."

When Bernard Shaw got the Nobel prize he refused, saying, "I have waited too long. Now it is below my prestige." He was one of the most egoistic persons ever - -"Now it is below my prestige.

When I was young, I was hankering for it, dreaming for it. Now I am old enough; I don't need it. My recognition in the world is already so great, my applause from people is so great, now I don't need any Nobel prize. It is not going to give any more credit to me."

He was persuaded that it would be an insult to the Nobel prize committee, so he accepted, and then immediately he donated the money that comes with the Nobel prize to some organization.

Nobody had ever heard about that organization. He was the only member and the chairman of that organization.

And when asked later on what he had been doing, he said, "If you get a Nobel prize, your name goes in the corners of newspapers once. I rejected it; so another day I was in the headlines. Then I accepted it again; another day I was again in the headlines. Then I donated it; again I was in the headlines. Then I donated it to myself; again I was in the headlines. I used it to its fullest." He took the whole juice out of it.

So the possibility is your ego will go on choosing. Hmm?... whatsoever you feel guilty about, you will say God is responsible. Whatsoever you feel good about, you will say, "Yes, here I am. I have done it." Totality is needed in that too.

Now, look; and now this is another path, of Patanjali, Mahavir, Buddha. They say you arc responsible - total responsibility; again. Patanjali does not really believe in God. He is too scientific for that. He says God is also a method to attain to nirvana, to enlightenment. That too is a way - just a way, not the goal. He is exactly like Buddha, Mahavir, who denied God completely, who said, "There is no God. There is no need; only man is responsible." But total. Not only for good, but for bad also.

Now see how these two contradictions are joined together in the concept of totality. Both demand totality; that is their interlink. Really, totality works: whether you surrender every. thing to God or you take the whole responsibility on your own shoulders does not matter. That which is really significant is that you are total. So whatsoever you do be total, and that will become your liberation. To be total is to be liberated.

So these two look contradictory but they are not. They both arc based in the same idea of being total.

There are two types of people; that's why two types of methods are needed. It is very easy for the feminine mind to surrender, to submit, to sacrifice. It is very difficult for the male mind to submit, to surrender, to sacrifice. So the male mind will need Patanjali, a path where the total responsibility is yours. The feminine mind will need a path of devotion - the path of Narad, Meera, Chaitanya, Jesus.

All is God's: Thy kingdom come, thy will be done. Everything is his. Jesus goes on saying, "I am his." That is the meaning when he insists, "He is the father and I am the son. As a son is nothing but an extension of the consciousness of the father, so am I."

For the feminine mind, for the receptive mind, for the passive mind, Patanjali w ill not be of much help. Something of love is needed - something of putting oneself totally down, effacing oneself completely, sacrificing oneself completely. Dissolving and disappearing is needed for the feminine mind; but for the male mind Patanjali is perfect. Both are right because both are the minds; and the whole of humanity is divided in these two minds.

The contradiction appears because you cannot understand the whole mind. But through these two paths, whatsoever you choose, whichsoever you choose, you will become total; and by and by the total mind will flower in you.

Question 3

First, compassion is not enough, because compassion is so pure you cannot make an anchorage out of it. It is so pure that the earthly gravitation cannot function on it. The earth needs something more material. The body needs something more material; the body is part of the earth. When you die the earth returns to the earth - the dust unto dust. To remain in the body, just compassion is not enough.

In fact, the day compassion arises, you are ready to leave the body. Compassion gives you a totally different pull - the pull from the high, the pull from the above. You start being pulled from the above. It becomes almost impossible to remain in the body. No, that purity won't be of much help. A little impurity is needed to remain on the earth and in the body, something more material.

Food is perfectly good. Food is part of earth, material. It can give you a weight. People have used different things in different ways, but pure compassion cannot be used. In fact pure compassion is the thing that starts helping you to move upwards. Let me introduce one word to you: grace.

Gravitation is the pull of the downwards and grace is the pull of the upwards. The moment you are full of compassion, overflowing, grace starts functioning. You are so weightless, you can almost fly.

No, a paperweight will be needed to force you to be here on the earth. Ramkrishna used that; food was his paperweight. He has become weightless: something was needed to give him a little weight so the gravitation goes on working.

Now you ask me. I will tell you one anecdote:

Four men of the cloth were having a confidential talk and discussing their vices.

"I like pork," said the rabbi.

"I drink a bottle of bourbon a day," said the Protestant minister.

"I have a girlfriend on the side," confessed the priest.

They all turned to the Baptist minister, who shrugged. "Me? I like to gossip." That's my answer also - -I like to gossip. That's my weight. All these talks are nothing but gossips.

If it hurts your ego, call them cosmic gossips, divine gossips - but they are gossips.

Question 4

The question has to be from an Indian. It is: P. Gangaram. I want it to be noted by you that it is from an Indian because it shows all the qualities of the Indian mind. Try to dissect the question step by step.

"I humbly wish to put the following question and sincerely hope you will answer this tomorrow." No need to say these things, but the Indian mind is formal. It is not sincere. It is not direct. It is always hiding behind rituals, words. It looks polite; it is not. Because a polite mind is direct, immediate.

There is no need to hide oneself behind a screen of formalities. etiquette - at least not here.

God is not a formality, and etiquette is not going to help you in any way to solve life's problems.

It may create trouble. "This morning, Sir, you stated that the ego is the stumbling block and only by overcoming or transcending the ego, the fulfillment of our essential nature could be achieved." First, you have heard something which I have not said. That too is part of the Indian mind. It is very difficult for the Indian mind to hear that which is said. He has his own ideas already; in fact too many. He has a philosophy, a religion, a great tradition, and all that nonsense; and he goes on mixing everything with his own.

Now, I have told you that one can transcend, but I have not said "overcome." Now this gentleman says, "You stated that the ego is the stumbling block and only by overcoming or transcending...." They are not synonymous. Overcoming is a repression: it is "conquering-over." It is forcing something violently; it is a struggle and a fight. And whenever you fight, the ego cannot be transcended, because the ego lives by fight, struggle. So by overcoming, ego is never overcome. The more you try, the more you will become egoistic. Of course, now your ego will be religious, holy, pious. And remember, whenever ego becomes pious it becomes more subtle and more dangerous. It is purified poison.

Overcoming is not the same as transcending. What is the difference? Transcending comes through understanding and overcoming comes through struggle. You fight, you force it down, you jump on the chest of it and you sit there, you wrestle with it; then it is overcoming. But it is always there and you are caught in a trap. Now you cannot leave it, because the moment you get down, it will get up.

So an egoistic person Who tries to overcome his ego will become humble, but now the ego will be there in his humility, in his humbleness; and you cannot find more egoistic people than humble people. They say, "We are nothing," but look in their eyes. They say, "We are just the dust of your feet, sir," hut look into your eyes, look what they are saying.

Let me tell you one anecdote:

"Doctor," complained the patient, "I have been having severe headaches. What can you do about it?"

"Been smoking much?" asked the doctor.

"No," replied the patient. "I never touch tobacco. Furthermore, I never take a drink and I have not had a date in twenty years."

"In that case," said the doctor, "the only thing that could he the matter with you is that your halo is getting too tight."

That will happen by "overcoming" - your halo will get too tight and you will have headaches.

That happens to all religious people. They become up tight, false, unauthentic. When anger arises they go on smiling. Their smile is a painted smile, of course. They go on forcing the anger deep into the unconscious; and whatsoever you repress spreads in your being. It becomes part of you.

It happens that a religious man may not be found guilty of being angry, the incident of anger may disappear from his life, but anger will become his very style of life. You may not be able to catch him red handed angry, but you will be able to see and feet that he is always angry. Anger will circulate into his blood; ego will circulate as an undercurrent in whatsoever he is doing. In fact, he will become much too concerned with whatsoever he has overcome and hc will always be defending. He will remain in a defensive mood.

No, overcoming is not transcending. Transcending has a beauty; overcoming is ugly. When you transcend, you have understood the foolishness, the idiocy of the ego; you have understood the illusion of it; you have understood the baseless desire of it. And then it drops on its own accord. Not that you drop it, because if you drop it then you will attain to another ego, that "I have dropped the ego." It drops through understanding. Understanding functions like a fire; it burns the ego.

And, remember how you will know whether the ego is overcome or transcended. If it is overcome the person will become humble. If it is transcended he will be neither egoistic nor humble. Because that whole point is gone. Only an egoist can be humble. When the ego is not there, how can you be humble? Who will be humble? Then the whole base has disappeared underneath. So whenever ego is overcome it becomes humbleness. When ego is transcended, a man is simply liberated from that trap. He is neither humble nor egoistic. Hc is simple. He is true. He is authentic. He will not exaggerate either this way or that.

Exaggeration is part of the ego. First you exaggerate that "I am the greatest man"; then you exaggerate that "I am the humblest, the last." First you exaggerate that "I am somebody," but special; then you exaggerate "I am nobody" - but special.

First you want the world to recognize your somebodiness and praise you. When you find that that is not being done.... Because all are on the same trip and nobody is worried about your being somebody. They are all somebodies, and they are trying their ways. And When you feel the competition is too tough, and when you feel there seems to be no go in it, then you start the other - the more cunning way, the more sly way. You say, "I am nobody," but you wait: now they will recognize your nobodiness, they will come - you are a great sage. You are so humble, you have dropped the ego completely. And you will smile deep down and the ego will feel buttressed, flattered, and you will say, "Now, so they have come."

Remember, overcoming is not transcending.

"This morning, Sir, you stated that the ego is the stumbling block and only by overcoming or transcending..." - never use "or" between "overcoming" and "transcending"; they are totally different phenomena, absolutely different phenomena - "... the ego, the fulfillment of our essential nature could be achieved."

"Thence you said that by concentrating on the sex impulse...." I have never said that. I said "samyama" - not "concentration" only. samyama is concentration, meditation, samadhi - ecstasy - all together. That's how you go on hearing whatsoever you want to hear. I have to repeat so many times; still you go on missing.

If you remember, yesterday, I repeated so many times the word samyama and I tried to explain to you what it is. It is not only concentration. Concentration is only the first step towards it. The second step is meditation; in the meditation concentration is dropped. It has to be because when you move on a further step the lower step has to be dropped; otherwise how can you move? When you go on a staircase, you go on leaving steps behind you. The first step is left in the second; the concentration is dropped in meditation. Dharana is dropped in dhyan. And then the third step: samadhi, ecstasy. Then meditation is also dropped; then you attain to samadhi. And all these three are called samyama.

When you bring samyama to sex, yes, brahmacharya comes out of it - but not only concentration.

"Thence you said that by concentrating on the sex impulse, one can be enlightened." Yes, by bringing samyama to any impulse, one can be freed from it. Because in deep samadhi you are a tremendous understanding - and only understanding frees. And for an understanding mind there is no need to avoid and escape. You can face it. The problem disappears: your fire of under standing is such, the problem is burned.

Yes, if you bring your samyama to the sex desire, the desire will disappear. Not overcome: you will transcend it.

"Don't you think that the two statements are contradictory...? No, I don't think that. You are absolutely confused, and the confusion comes because of your ideology. Ideologies are always confusing. You always listen hiding behind your ideology and scripture. And it is very difficult to find an Indian who can listen directly - -the Bhagavad Geeta goes on inside continuously, the Vedas, the Upanishads.

The Indians have become like parrots. They go on repeating without under. standing, because if you understand then there is no need for any Bhagavad Geeta. Your own divine song arises; you start your own singing. You start doing your own thing. Krishna did his. Why should you be doing it?

Who is he to be carboned and copied and imitated? And then you will become just an imitation. All Indians, almost all, have become imitators; they have false faces, masks. And they go on thinking the country is very religious. It is not. It is one of the most cunning countries in the world.

"Don't you think the two statements are contradictory, for if you concentrate on the sexual act or impulse you have become the doer and the egoist?" Who has told you that if you do samyama on sex you will become a doer? Samyama means witnessing, pure witnessing. You become a watcher, not a doer. How can you become a doer when you are seeing the sex impulse? When you see it, the seen becomes different from the seer.

You are seeing me here. Certainly you are separate and I am separate. I am seeing you: you are the object of my vision and I am the capacity of my vision. You are separate; I am separate.

The known is separate from the knower, the seer is separate from the seen; and when you bring samyama to any impulse whatsoever - sex, greed, ego - suddenly you are separate because you see it. It is there like an object, and you are there, the onlooker. How can you become the doer? A person becomes a doer when the witnessing is lost; he becomes identified with the object of vision.

He starts saying, "This sex, it is me, it is 1," "This hunger in the body, it is me, it is I." If you watch the hunger, hunger is there in the body and you are far away on the stars.

Just try it. When you feel hungry, sit, close the eyes and watch the hunger. You cannot be identified with the hunger. If you feel identified, in that very moment witnessing is lost; you have become a doer.

The whole art of witnessing is to help you to feel separate from all that with which you are clinging.

No, doer never arises out of samyama. Doer drops, disappears. Suddenly you see that you have never done anything - things have been happening, but you have not done anything. You are not the doer. You are a pure witness, sakshi. And this is the ultimate of all religion.

"We think that only by being detached to the sensual desires, we can achieve the object." This is creating the trouble, that you have some ideas - you "think." If you have some ideas practice them, and you will come to know their falsity. And you have been having them for so long, you are not fed up yet; and what has happened through those ideas to you? What transformation has come to you? What liberation has come to you? Be a little intelligent. Just see: these ideas you have been carrying for your whole life - what has happened? It is like a junkyard inside you. Nothing has happened. Now clean your inner space.

Here I am not trying to give you other ideas and substitutes. My whole effort is to annihilate you utterly, to destroy you utterly - to destroy your mind so completely that you become a state of no- mind, a clear vision, that's all. I don't believe in any ideology, and I don't want you to believe in any.

All ideologies are false. And I say all ideologies - mine included. Because ideas cannot bring you to the real. The real is known only when you have no ideas about it.

The real is there, and you are so full of ideas you go on missing it. When you listen to me, if you listen through your ideas, you will get more and more confused.

Please, for a few minutes while you are here put your ideas aside. Just listen to me. I am not saying believe what I say. I am saying just listen, give it a chance, and then later on think. But what happens: I am saying something and you are repeating something else inside you. Stop that tape.

Stop all old tapes; otherwise you will not be able to understand me, what I am saying. And in fact I am not saying much; rather, I am being here. My saying is just a way of being with you.

So if you put your ideas a little aside.... I am not saying throw them forever - just put them by the side, listen to me, then you can bring them up again if you feel like they are better. But don't get mixed.

One anecdote:

One Jew, a very old man, came to his son in America. He was shocked to find that the young man did not follow the Jewish laws. "You mean," he asked, "you don't keep the dietary laws?"

"Papa, I eat in restaurants, and it is not easy to keep kosher."

"Do you keep the Sabbath, at least?"

"Sorry, Papa, it is tough in America to do that."

"Tell me, son," the old man sneered, "are you still circumcised?"

This is how the old mind goes on working. Put it aside; only then can you understand me. Otherwise it is impossible.

Question 5

First: "Please explain the difference between samyama and the final enlightenment." Don't be worried about final enlightenment. And there is no way to explain it or even to describe it.

If you are really interested, I am ready to give you final enlightenment; but don't ask explanations about it. That is easier - to give it to you - rather than describe it. Because no description will do justice. Nobody has ever described it. Samyama can be described because samyama is the method. Enlightenment cannot be described; that happens out of samyama.

Samyama is like planting a seed, watering the plant, protecting the tree samyama is like that. Then come flowers, they bloom. It is difficult to say anything about the flowers. Every, thing can be said before the flower comes into being because everything else is just a method, technique.

I can talk to you about technique and methods. If you follow those techniques and methods, one day you will wake into enlightenment. That can happen just now, also, if you are ready to sacrifice yourself completely. What do I mean when I say sacrifice yourself completely? That means to surrender yourself completely.

If you allow me, it can happen right now because the light is burning within me. The flame can jump to you, but you don't allow. You are so defensive - as if you have something to lose. I can't see that you have anything to lose. You have nothing to lose, but you are so defensive, as if treasures are hidden there and if you open your heart those treasures may be stolen. And there is nothing - just darkness, just the dirt of many, many Lives.

If you open to me, if you become vulnerable to me, you sacrifice yourself; and unless a disciple sacrifices himself to the Master, the contact has not been made. And the sacrifice has to be utter; you cannot withhold anything. If you are ready for the enlightenment, then don't waste time: sacrifice yourself utterly. Become vulnerable to me.

Difficult. One feels lost. One feels, where is one going? One feels as if all of one's treasures are being taken away. And there is nothing - no treasure - even you are not there to be lost. And one who is there cannot be lost. The one that can be lost is not you; that which cannot be lost is you. By becoming vulnerable you will lose something, that is your ego; you will lose something, but you will not lose yourself. In fact by losing all else you will for the first time attain to your authentic being.

So don't ask about final enlightenment. Buddha has said, "Buddhas can only indicate the path; nobody can tell you." I can show you the water, but don't ask me how it feels when water quenches the thirst. How can I tell you? The water is here. Why not taste it? Why not drink it? Drink me, and let your thirst be quenched. Then you will know how it is, how it feels - it is a feel, and there is no way to describe it. It is like love: if you have fallen in love, you know what it is; but if somebody asks what is love, you will get puzzled.

There is a famous saying of Augustine: "I know what time is, but when somebody asks me, 'What is time?' suddenly I don't know." You also know what time is, and if somebody asks you, it will be difficult to say.

I have heard about one Russian, Leo Tolstoy, a great novelist. He was in London, and he didn't know much English, and he wanted to know what time it is, so he asked a gentleman, "Please, tell me, what is time?" The Englishman shrugged his shoulders, and he said, "Go and ask some philosopher." What is time? You can say, "What is the time?" but you cannot say, "What is time?" You know, you feel it, because you live in time. Continuously it is there and passing, passing by you. You live in time as a fish lives in water, but even a fish cannot define what water is.

In fact I have heard a story that once a philosophic fish became very much worried because she heard the talk, too much talk, about the ocean, and she had never come across it. So she was meditating. The king fish came and looked at the fish, and he thought that there seems to be some trouble, she was very much worried. So the king fish asked, "What is the matter with you? What has gone wrong?" And the fish said, "I am very much worried - I want to know what this ocean is.

So much talk about it and I never come across it." And the king fish laughed and said, "You fool, you are in it!"

But when something is so close, it is difficult to know. You never come across it. You are in time, but you never come across it; you cannot grasp it. Becomes difficult to define it.

You are in God: becomes difficult to define God. You are in enlightenment already! Just a turning, just a clarity, a recognition, a remembrance. That's why I say I am ready to give it to you: because it is already there. Nothing is to be done.

Just if you allow me to hold your hand for a while.

The second thing: "How come Patanjali has not talked about catharsis whereas you strongly emphasize catharsis?"

Let me tell you one anecdote:

A staggering drunk stopped a passerby and asked the time. The passerby looked at his watch and told him.

The drunk looked bewildered, and shook his head. "I just can't work it out," he said drunkenly. "All night I have been getting different answers."

All night! When you start thinking about me and Patanjali, remember the difference of five thousand years. And all night you have been getting different answers?

When Patanjali was here on the earth, man was a totally different being. A totally different quality of humanity existed. Catharsis was not needed. People were primitive, simple, childlike. A child does not need catharsis; an old man needs. A child has not accumulated anything.

Watch a child. When a child is angry he becomes angry - he jumps, screams, yells. And then the anger is gone and he is smiling and he has forgotten - he has been through catharsis. When he is loving, he comes and hugs you and kisses you. And he is not worried about the etiquette and the manners and things like that. And you are also not worried; you say, "He is a child, yet not civilized" - that is, yet not poisoned, yet not educated; that is, yet not conditioned.

When the child wants to scream he screams. He lives in total freedom; there is no need for catharsis.

He is already every moment throwing whatsoever comes up; he never accumulates. But an old man?

The same child will become old after fifty, sixty, seventy years; he has accumulated too much. When he wanted to be angry, he could not be.

There are a thousand and one situations when you would like to be angry but you cannot be - it is "uneconomical," or "financial]y dangerous." When your boss yells at you, you go on smiling. You would like to kill him, but you go on smiling. Now what will happen to the anger that has arisen? It will be repressed.

The same happens in the life of a society. Patanjali was here when people were primitive. If you go to interior parts of India, where primitive tribes still exist, they will not need the Dynamic Meditation, remember. They will laugh at you; they will say, "What?... what are you doing? What is the point?" Every night after the day's work is over they dance, they dance to orgasm. Twelve, one o'clock in the night, they will continue dancing with their drums, primitive, with great energy, with ecstasy. And then they will fall asleep under the trees. And the whole day their work is such... chopping wood; then how can you collect anger inside you? They are not clerks in an office. They are not yet civilized.

They live life as it comes by. Chopping wood they become nonviolent - they need not any Mahavir to teach them. They need not any philosophy of Jainism to be nonviolent.

Yes, a businessman needs a philosophy of nonviolence; that's why all the Jains are businessmen.

Just sitting on the gaddi the whole day, smiling and smiling. Hmm?... one gets almost crazy. Then one needs a philosophy of nonviolence to keep oneself in control. Otherwise one will jump on anybody - for no excuse, for no reason. But when a man is chopping wood, what need has he of any philosophy of nonviolence? When he comes home he has thrown violence so completely, he is nonviolent.

That's why Patanjali never talked about catharsis. It was not needed. Society was just in the childhood stage. People were childlike, innocent; they were living their life without any repression.

Catharsis is needed when repression enters into the human mind. The more repressive a society, the more cathartic methods will be needed. Then you will have to do something to bring it out.

And I tell you it is better to do Dynamic Meditation than to throw your anger on somebody else, because if you throw it on somebody else, your sanchita karma will become bigger and bigger. If you throw it in a Dynamic Meditation, your sanchita karma is being emptied. You are not throwing at anybody. You are simply angry - not at anybody. You are simply yelling - not against anybody. You are simply crying. This simple crying, yelling, screaming, being angry, violent, cleanses you; and it creates no chain in the future.

So what Patanjali says about samyama, I will make catharsis also a part of it; because I am not worried about Patanjali. I am worried about you - and I know you well. If you don't throw it to the sky, you will throw it on somebody somewhere; and then it will create a chain of karma.

Catharsis is a must for days to come. The more man will become civilized, the more catharsis will be needed.

The third thing in the question: "Please explain the preparatory antidote for the misuse of psychic powers."

The only antidote for the misuse of psychic powers is love; otherwise power corrupts. All power corrupts. It may be wealth, it may be prestige, it may be politics, or it may be psychic - it makes no difference. Whenever you feel powerful, if you don't have love as an antidote, your power is going to become a calamity to others, a curse; because power blinds the eyes. Love opens the eyes, love cleanses the eyes... your perception becomes clear. Power clouds.

Let me tell you one anecdote:

A wealthy miserly man never gave to the needy. His rabbi asked him to help a poor family in need of food and medicine. He refused.

The rabbi handed him a mirror and said, "Look into this. What do you see?"

He said, "I see my face in it, nothing else."

"Now," replied the rabbi, "look through that window. What do you see?"

He said, "I see men and women. I see two lovers engrossed in each other. And children playing.

Why? Why do you ask me?"

"You answered your own question," replied the rabbi. "Through the window you looked at life; in the mirror you saw yourself. A mirro is of glass, like the window, but coated on the back with silver.

As this silver concealed your view of life, you saw only yourself; so has your silver, your wealth, concealed all else from your sight so you see and think of yourself."

The rich man hung his head. "You are right," he said. "I have been blinded by silver."

But all power blinds. Whether it is of silver or gold or psychic achievement, all power blinds. Then you go on seeing only yourself. Hence Patanjali's insistence, the moment samyama is achieved, immediately bring friendliness, love. Let that be the first thing after samyama, so your whole energy becomes a flow of love, of sharing, so whatsoever you have you go on sharing. Then there is no possibility of any misuse.

Question 6

It is from Purnima. I have only one thing to say: Purnima I have given you only the appetizer. The wine is still waiting - get ready. Don't get too much drunk by the appetizer.

All that I say to you is just the appetizer.

Question 7

I am a liar, and a perfect liar at that - and this too is a lie.