An Explosion of Insight

Life is a paradox. It exists through the paradox; that's its very way of existence. the moving wheel moves on and unmoving axle, and at the very center of a cyclone there is silence. At the very core of life there is death. This is how things are, existence is through contradiction.

Existence continuously contradicts itself, and out of contradiction is born the energy to live. Out of the tension between the contradictions is this whole play, the game. This is the dialectics - the thesis and the antithesis. And the constant conflict between the thesis and the antithesis creates energy, generates energy. Out of the friction the energy is created.

You can look around, and everywhere you will find contradiction functioning - between man and woman, between day and night, between summer and winter, between success and failure, between birth and decay. Continuously, everywhere, the game is based on the very foundation of paradox. If you don't understand this, you will live a life of misery. If you don't understand this, if it doesn't get deep into your heart and become a luminous understanding to you, you will live a life of anguish.

Because you will never be able to accept this contradiction - you will never be able to see that this contradiction is not really a contradiction; the opposites function as complementaries.

Once seen in that light, life becomes enlightened. Then you are full of awareness. Then you know that there is nothing wrong in death - not only that, you know that without death life will not be possible at all.

So life owes its all to death. Then death is not against life; it is not the enemy, it is the friend. Seeing this, the fear of death disappears. Seeing this, anguish disappears, anxiety disappears. Seeing this, a great rejoicing arises in your being. Not seeing this, there is conflict. Misunderstanding is what your misery is. Understanding is bliss, misunderstanding is the cause of misery.

Now try to penetrate into your innermost core and see how things are there, and what you are doing with them. If man looks withinwards he finds there, at the very core, just pure nothingness. That's why people don't look withinwards.

Socrates goes on saying, 'Know thyself.' The Upanishads go on shouting, 'Go within! Withinwards is the journey.' Buddhas go on persuading you to go in, and you continuously go out. You don't bother what Buddhas say. Even if you listen, you listen only with half your ear - you listen one moment, you forget next moment. Because deep down you know that to look withinwards is to look into nothingness. There is nothing. And that is scary, that frightens.

At the very core there is nothingness. The wheel of all moves on that axle of nothingness. So, afraid of the inner nothingness, we go on rushing into the world. The fear of one's own non-being takes you on a thousand and one journeys. That's what Zen people call 'the world of a thousand and one things'. You go on rushing into this direction, into that. You have to rush, because if you don't rush you will stumble upon your nothingness... and there is fear. You are frightened of that - you don't want to see that you are not.

Your being is non-being: you are not ready to look into it, to accept it. You are death living. Death is there, and at the very core of your being there is just emptiness - what Buddha calls anatta. There is no self, there is no being, there is no '1'. And somehow everybody knows it - hence nobody goes inwards, everybody goes outwards. Outwards you can befool yourself, you can deceive yourself.

You can create a thousand and one games, you can play with those games - they are not going to help, but still you can pass your time with those games. You can become so engrossed in them that for those engrossed moments you can forget your inner nothingness.

But this inner nothingness is not like an accident. It is not accidental, it is your very being. So you cannot escape from it, do whatsoever you want to do. Nobody has been able to escape from it. You can go on postponing, you can go on delaying that experience, but one day or other, that experience has to be gone through.

And that day is the day of great blessing, when you come to know your inner non-being. Because with that experience all fear disappears. When you know you are not, how can you be afraid - of what? for what? And WHO can be afraid? When you know you are not, where can desire exist?

with whom? for whom? from whom? Tanha disappears, becoming disappears.

When you are not, how can you become somebody? Knowing one's non-being, there is great rest.

The seeker has disappeared, the desirer is no more, the becomer has not been found. So the foundation has disappeared - and the whole palace made of playing-cards simply shatters to the ground.

Unless you come to know this inner non-being - anatta, non-existence, or death.... Zen people call it 'the great death'. It is no ordinary death. Ordinary death does not make much difference - here you die, there you are born immediately. You leave one body - you have not even left it, and already you are entering into another womb. It does not make much difference.

The real death is when you come face to face with your inner non-being, the abyss. One gets frightened, one wants to go away from it. One wants to keep it at the back, one wants to fill it. That's what people go on doing.

SANSARA, the world, is nothing but an effort to fill this inner vacuum. Fill it with money, fill it with women, fill it with men, fill it with power, fill it with anything - big houses, fill it with fame - but fill it.

Go on throwing things into it - so one day you can feel you are not just nothing, you ARE somebody, you ARE something. But it never happens, it CANNOT happen. Because the abyss is bottomless - you can go on throwing things into it, they go on disappearing.

There is a very famous Sufi story. A beggar came to an emperor. Just by chance, the emperor was coming out of his palace for a morning walk. And the beggar was standing there, so the emperor asked, 'What do you want?' The beggar laughed. He said, 'You are asking as if you can fulfill my desire! "What do you want?" you say!'

The king was offended, challenged. He said, 'Yes, I can fulfill your desire. What is your desire? you just tell me.' And the man said, 'Think twice before you promise anything.'

The beggar was no ordinary beggar, the beggar was the emperor's past-life master. And the master had promised, 'I will come and try to wake you again in your next life. This life, you have missed - but I will come again.'

But the king had forgotten completely - who remembers about past lives? So he insisted, 'You just tell me, and I will fulfill it. You just tell me. I am such a big emperor - what can you desire that I cannot give YOU?'

And the beggar said, 'It is a very simple desire. You see this begging-bowl? Can you fill it with something? Anything will do. I don't ask diamonds, and I don't ask gold - anything! Can you fill it?'

And the emperor said, 'Yes! You seem to be mad! Why can't it be filled?' He called one of his viziers and told the vizier, 'You fill this man's begging-bowl with money.' And the vizier went. It was a small begging-bowl, but soon the king was getting afraid. Money was being poured, and the moment you would pour it, it would disappear. And the begging-bowl remained empty, and remained empty, and remained empty.

The whole palace gathered together. By and by, the rumour went into the capital; people started coming from all corners. There was a huge crowd, and the prestige of the emperor was at stake.

And he was a man of his word. He said to his viziers, 'If the whole kingdom is lost I am ready to lose it, but I cannot be defeated by this beggar. The bowl is something magical - but I will have to prove to him that I also have something to fill it.'

His treasuries started becoming empty. And people are running and rushing out of the palace, trying to pour into that begging-bowl - and that begging-bowl seems to be bottomless, everything immediately disappears into it. You cannot see it again; once it has gone in, it has gone out of existence. It simply dematerializes - or what?

Then diamonds and pearls and emeralds... and they started disappearing. Soon the vizier said to the king, 'This seems tO be impossible. You will have to accept defeat. And this man does not seem to be an ordinary beggar, he cannot be. There is some message in it. You surrender to this man!'

It was evening, and the whole capital had gathered there, and people were standing there in utter silence. There was such great excitement: 'What is going to happen?' Finally, the king dropped at the feet of the beggar and said, 'Sir, excuse me. It was wrong of me to pretend that I have anything. I have nothing to fill your begging-bowl. Just one thing - what is the secret of this begging-bowl? Just tell me one thing. I am defeated, you are victorious - before you leave me, just fulfill my curiosity.

How has this begging-bowl been made, of what?'

And the beggar laughed. And the beggar said, 'Don't you remember me at all? Have you forgotten me completely? Look into my eyes! I am your old master. And this is what I was teaching you in the past life too, but you didn't listen. This begging-bowl has no magic! It is simply made out of the human heart. There is no secret in it; this is how the human heart is.'

The mysterious begging-bowl. Go on throwing things into it - you go on throwing worlds into it, and they dematerialize and they disappear. And one is never satisfied, never never.

Have you ever seen a man who is satisfied? If you have ever seen a man who is satisfied, then that will be the man who has accepted his nothingness. That's what we mean by a Buddha. That's what we mean by enlightenment - whose emptiness has become luminous, full of light. He knows, 'It is me, it is my being. This non-being is my being.' And he has accepted it. And now there is no effort to destroy it, no effort to fill it. It is beautiful as it is.

This understanding transforms life. Otherwise we go on rushing. Go into one desire: what is the mechanism of the desire? When you go into a desire, great excitement comes into your being, great thrill, adventure. You feel a great kick. Something is going to happen, you are on the verge of it.

You will be having this big house, this big garden, this beautiful woman, this yacht, this car - you are going to have this, and there is great excitement. And then you have the car, and you have the yacht, and you have the house, and you have the woman... then suddenly all becomes meaningless again.

What happens? Your heart has dematerialized it. The car is standing in the porch, and suddenly there is no excitement any more. The excitement was only in getting it, because in getting it you became absorbed. You became absorbed, you forgot your nothingness. You became absorbed so much that your mind became overpowered by the desire. You became so drunk with the desire that you forgot your inner nothingness. Now, the desire fulfilled, the car in the porch, the woman in your bed, the money in your bank-balance - again, excitement disappears. Again the emptiness is there, yawning within you, ready to eat you up.

Again you have to create another desire, to escape from this yawning abyss, from this death that is waiting for you there. It can swallow you in a single moment - if you don't cling to something, it will swallow you. So you start again. You start thinking of other houses, of other women, of other places, of other towns.... That's how, from one desire to another desire, one goes on moving. That's how one remains a beggar. From one desire to another desire, one goes knocking on a thousand and one doors. And nothing ever is fulfilled.

Have not you seen, the rich people are the most bored people in the world? Why? Their desires are fulfilled - and nothing is fulfilled. They have the most beautiful house that they wanted - now what?

Now they cannot think of anything more beautiful. I know a few rich people who have all that they can have. Now what? Now suddenly they come to a dead end.

Once an astrologer said to Alexander the Great: 'Sir, you are going to win the whole world. It is in your destiny, you will win. But let me remind you of one thing: when you have won the whole world, what will you do? Because there is no other world.'

And it is said, Alexander became sad in his life for the first time. Suddenly, the idea, the very idea is frightening - 'You will win the whole world, then what?' You can understand, in that moment suddenly he is thrown back to his emptiness.

Yes, you can win the whole world, but your heart is such; the whole world will become meaningless.

The moment you have it, it becomes meaningless. See this logic: the moment you have something, it immediately becomes meaningless. If you are intelligent enough you will see it immediately. The car in the porch, and meaningless. The woman in your bed, and meaning has already disappeared.

I have heard about Lord Byron, one of the greatest poets of the English language, that he fell in love with many women - nearabout sixty in his whole life. He would fall in love one day, and the next day he was finished - he would make love to a woman once, and finished. Must have been a man of great intelligence. To make love to the same woman again, needs a kind of stupidity. He must have been a man of great intelligence - if he had been in India, he might have achieved Buddhahood.

One woman finally persuaded him for marriage, because she wouldn't allow him to make love to her unless he got married to her. She knew that many women had come into his life: once he makes love to the woman, the woman becomes meaningless. He turns away, as if he has not known the woman at all. All his energy and all his love and all his romance simply disappears, as if it has never been there.

Listening to all these stories, one woman insisted that she would not allow him to touch her-body unless he got married to her. And he became more and more excited - the more he was denied, naturally, the more he desired. He became almost crazy about that woman. Finally he agreed to get married.

One has to be very crazy to get married - real crazy, mad. And women have some intuitive understanding about this. They don't allow anybody to come too close unless they feel they are settled in a marriage, unless the law protects them. Otherwise love disappears like a dewdrop in the morning sun, unless solid law is there. Marriage IS solid law, you can depend on it. It has the court and the policeman and the magistrate - everything behind it.

Just love is a very vulnerable dewdrop - in the morning sun it can disappear any moment. One moment it is there, another moment it is gone; you cannot depend on it. Women are very earthly, they have an intuitive feeling that love won't last long. Before it disappears, have the solid law to help you.

This woman was really intelligent, she forced marriage. Byron got married. While they are coming out of the church - the church-bells are still ringing, the guests are greeting, congratulating.... Hand in hand, Byron comes out of the church, descends the steps - and suddenly the woman feels he is not there. He sees a beautiful woman passing by on the road. He has moved, his energy is no more there. His hand is there, but dead - that throb of love is no more there, his heart is not there in the hand. And the woman says, 'What are you thinking? Where have you gone?'

Byron was a very honest man that way. He said, 'Sorry, but it seems the marriage is finished. That woman has taken all my heart. And I know that just a few hours before, I was hankering for you, I was ready to do anything. I was ready to die, if that was going to solve the thing. But suddenly, knowing that you are mine, it doesn't feel that much of an adventure. Now your hand is in my hand; suddenly I possess you. And any desire to possess you has disappeared.'

This is great intelligence. I love this man Byron. He has been condemned by his own country very much - he was expelled from his country, because people became very much afraid of him. It is said that when Byron would enter into a hotel, into a restaurant, people would just escape with their wives from there. He was really a lovely man! Then all husbands gathered together against him, and all fathers gathered together against him, and finally he was forced to leave England. And it is said, when he was leaving and was saying goodbye to his country, thousands of people gathered to see him. And in those thousands of people there were hundreds of women pretending to be men, in men's clothes - even from the royal family, from rich families - to see the last of Byron.

He was really a beautiful man - very very intelligent, very very handsome. He was REALLY a poet; the poetry was throbbing in his very being. But he was expelled - the country could not afford him, he was too dangerous. But his insights are very very significant. Look at this insight: he says to the woman... must have had great courage to say it to the woman - and just now they have got married!

And the bells are still ringing and the guests have not even departed, and they are coming out of the church and he says, 'Sorry, but I am no more interested in you.'

Such authenticity, such sincerity, is the quality of a religious man. Byron was unfortunate that he was born in England, he should have chosen India. He would have become a Buddha - this very understanding makes a man a Buddha. If a man of such intelligence finds the right path, he will simply jump into a flame, will become a flame of Buddhahood.

Whenever you are attaining something, you immediately start losing interest in it. You all know it, it has happened to everybody in one way or other. You may not say it, you may not even say it to yourself, you may not accept it. Because it is so frightening, that you had been working for seven years to raise enough money to purchase a house - now you have purchased the beautiful house in the mountains, and suddenly, the moment the house is yours and you have the papers in your hands, you are no more in-terested.

But this is how things are - an intelligent person will see it immediately. A stupid person will take a few months, a few years, but that is not the point - he will also see one day that there is nothing. It proved an illusion. Your whole life proves it again and again - every desire frustrates, every desire lands you into frustration. And the only way you know how to get out of that frustration is to create a bigger desire.

Now, this is foolishness. This is what Buddha calls avidya - ignorance. Seeing all desires fail, you don't see that desire as such is going to fail. The day you understand that the desire as such is going to fail, comes the turning-point in your life - a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree turn. That's what Christians call 'conversion' - it means 'turning inwards'.

Buddha has the right word for it, he calls it PARAVRITTI - turning back. PARAVRITTI - a one- hundred-and-eighty-degree turn: seeing that every desire is going to fail, no desire can succeed - it cannot succeed, by its very nature. Desire is just a postponement; when you have the thing it becomes meaningless. It exists only while you are waiting, it exists only while you are searching, it exists only on the path. When the goal is achieved you are finished - you will need another desire.

I have heard a very ancient parable. There was a valley in the Himalayas, a very rich valley. People were affluent, there was more than they needed - more fruits than they needed, more crops than they needed, more milk, more butter, than they needed - everything was more. And the valley was so fertile that one man would work and the whole family would rest. That was enough, one man working was enough for the whole family.

Soon they got very much bored. There was nothing much to do - everybody had everything that was available, everything that was needed. They got so bored, they started thinking what to do with life; life seems to be meaningless. Remember, whenever a society becomes rich, you will immediately find schools of philosophers arising who w ill say life is meaningless.

That's what is happening in the West; existentialists say life is meaningless. Sartre, Kafka, Camus - they say life is meaningless, life has no meaning. It happens only when the society is rich, it is the symbol of a rich society - immediately, philosophers bubble up who say life is meaningless.

In a poor society, nobody ever says life is meaningless; life has infinite meaning. Small things have meaning - to have a shelter, to have food for your children, to have clothes for your wife, to have a new sari for your woman, or a new ornament, is enough to have meaning. There are so many things you don't have, and because you don't have them there is much meaning around you - you can have this, you can have that, you can have thousands of things, and you don't have them. So you go on from one desire to another, and meaning goes on existing.

When you have all, meaning falls flat on the ground. That happened in that valley, that's what is happening in America; people have become very bored. Boredom has settled in America.

In that valley, people became very bored. And of course the king was the most bored man. And the king asked the people: 'Find out some way, find out some adventure, find out some way that the valley can start working for it. Anything will do.'

Many proposals came. One young man stood up and he said, 'Look, that peak of the Himalayas, towering high in the sky above the clouds - we should climb that.' People laughed. They said, 'Nobody ever heard of it. And how can we climb it? It is dangerous. And the gods will be very angry.'

And the priest was very against it. He said, 'We worship that peak. How can we climb it? That will be sacrilege.'

But the king was very much interested. He said, 'This appeals to me.' It was pointless - but when you are bored, anything is good. That's how human beings are reaching to the moon it is pointless, utterly pointless, but... anything to give you a thrill, to give you a kick.

Have you not seen it? When the first man walked on the moon, the whole of humanity was thrilled.

People were glued to their chairs before their T.V.'s. But do you know? - within half an hour they were finished too. Within half an hour they were tired, finished! There is nothing much on the moon.

And now nobody talks about the moon much - now they are talking about Mars, and other things.

The king was interested, and he said, 'You arrange it. Arrange a group, and I will give you all the money needed. Yes, this peak HAS to be conquered. Standing there, just in front of us, it is a challenge.'

The priest tried to convince the king that it is futile - 'Even if we climb it, what is going to happen?'

He said, 'That is not the point. Who bothers about what is going to happen? The climb itself is going to be beautiful.' And the valley was agog. And the people started working hard, making things to go up the peak - because nobody had tried it before, so no instruments existed.

Years passed, people by and by started succeeding in going up. One generation passed, another generation passed, the third generation managed to reach. When they were reaching just close to the peak, one old man, who had lived through all these three generations and had helped them, and was one of the most prominent guides - he said, 'Wait, I am afraid. If we reach to the top - and now it is within reach, within an hour we will reach - what will we do next?'

And they all fell silent and sad. And the boredom was back. For three generations they had not known any kind of boredom. For three generations they were really in a great enthusiasm - the spirit of adventure was roaming around, they were overwhelmed by the idea. It was meaningless, it was futile, but it was keeping their boredom away. Suddenly....

And the story says this was the same man, who had become old - this was the same man who had proposed in the first place: 'We should go and conquer the Himalayan peak.' He said, 'My sons, it is better we should go back and try again. Because there are no more peaks around; this is the biggest. Once you have conquered it, what will you do, tell me?'

And it is said they thought over it, they contemplated - and by and by, they came back to the valley and started trying to climb the peak again.

That's how it goes, that's how it is. You must have heard the Greek myth of Sisyphus, that the gods punished him. And the punishment is very strange - he has to carry a rock to the peak of a mountain. The rock is heavy, and as he goes up it becomes heavier and heavier. It is a very arduous task to bring it to the peak, it takes years. By the time he reaches to the peak, the rock rolls down.

That is the punishment - he has to go back to the valley, pick up the rock again, and move it.

In the Greek mythology, it is said the gods were very angry and they punished Sisyphus. To me, it doesn't look so. In fact, a better punishment would have been if the rock never came back to the valley. Then what would Sisyphus do, do you know? He would commit suicide on that rock.

The Greek gods don't seem very intelligent. You should learn from Indian gods. If it was an Indian myth, the punishment would have been this - that he climbs, as he comes higher the rock becomes lighter, things become easier - easier and easier and easier. Because when things are hard, there is joy. When things become easy, your ego is not challenged, there is no more joy. As he comes to the top, finished. What is Sisyphus going to do now? The Indian gods would leave him there with his rock on the top of the mountain. What will he do? He will hit his head against the rock and die.

The Greek myth does not seem to be like a punishment, it seems to be a reward. It looks like punishment because we don't understand life. The moment he reaches, the moment he has just arrived, the rock slips back, goes down to the valley. Sisyphus has to run down, find the rock again - that is his punishment. Again he starts carrying it.

This is how it is happening in life. Every time you bring one desire to completion, it slips back into the valley, you have to go back. You have to desire again, you have to desire afresh. Again life has a thrill, again you can avoid your inner nothingness. This is called sansara - the world. Avoiding yourself is what sansara is all about - escaping from yourself, keeping your innermost core at the back. Getting lost in the cyclone and never looking at the silent center. Getting caught in the wheel and the spokes, never getting centered in the unmoving axle.

But the wheel moves on an unmoving part, and the cyclone exists on a silent center. So is life, life is like a wheel. And deep at the innermost core there is non-being - anatta, no-self. Shunyata, nothingness. And remember, 'nothingness' does not just mean mere nothingness; it is the source of all. All has come out of it, it is the seed of all. 'Nothingness' simply means no thing-ness - there is no thing-hood there. It is a formless space, it has no boundaries.

Once you start getting in tune with this formless void, once you start getting in harmony with it, once you stop escaping away from it, the journey towards home has started. The day you arrive into this empty space.... And you rejoice in it - you don't feel alien, strange to it, you rejoice in it. And it is a blessing.

The Western mind feels very very embarrassed with the idea - 'How can nothingness be a joy?' You have always been trying to BE; nothingness seems like death, annihilation. How can nothingness be a joy? That's why the Western philosophers think that Buddha is the greatest pessimist in the world. He is not; this is an interpretation. The Western mind thinks, 'To move into a nothingness, what joy can be there?'

But you don't understand. When you find you are not, there cannot be any anxiety. Now even death cannot make you afraid. You are already not, so death cannot destroy anything. You are free of death. When you find you are not, you are no more concerned with success or failure; there is nobody to succeed, nobody to fail. Equanimity arises, all is equal. When you come to see this nothingness, how can you be tense? How can there be stress and strain? There is nothing to create any tension; no ripple arises in nothingness. You become non-tense, you relax.

This nothingness is a great rest, utter rest. Everything has stopped, everything has come to a halt.

Now whatsoever happens makes no difference, you are not stirred by it. You become rich, you are not stirred. You become poor, you are not disturbed. You succeed, it is okay. You fail, it is perfectly okay. Everything remains good - equilibrium has arisen in your being. Now you are balanced, utterly balanced. Life goes left, okay. Life goes right, okay. It doesn't matter; nothing matters any more.

This is what we call joy. Joy is not synonymous with happiness, joy is FAR transcendental. Joy is neither unhappiness nor happiness. Joy is a state of being which remains unperturbed, undisturbed, whatsoever happens around. The cyclone goes on thundering, but at the innermost core everything is silent. Tranquility has arisen.

This is what we call SAMADHI. And there are only two ways in the world: one is to go away from yourself, one is to come to yourself. To go away, there are a thousand by-paths. Somebody may go away through money, somebody may go through power, somebody may go through sex, somebody may go through alcohol, drugs - a thousand paths, by-paths. But they basically belong to one direction - going without, going withoutwards, going outside. Going farther and farther away from the center towards the periphery. And that periphery exists not.

So you go on and on and on - more and more discontent, more and more dissatisfaction, more and more anguish. The ultimate result is madness. If the West goes to its logical conclusion, the whole Western society is going to be mad. If this outgoing mind is stretched to its very extreme, then only madness can happen, nothing else. The ultimate result is madness.

The other journey is inwards. Come back home, move inwards. As you start moving inwards, more silence, more tranquility, more equanimity, more equilibrium, more centeredness, more groundedness - they start happening on their own accord. The day you have arrived home, suddenly there is joy.

Listen to these words. Christmas Humphreys says:

'Then comes the jump.... But the abyss into which we fall is found to be the plenum/void. The leap is from thought to no-thought - from the ultimate duality of illusion/reality to a burst of laughter and a cup of tea. But with what new eyes do we view the saucer! and in what serenity of mind do we clear the table away!'

Everything remains as it is. You drink tea, and you have to clear the table too. But with what serenity!

with what silence with what grace!

The dance continues, but now there is no longer any dancer. And when the dancer is not, dance has a grace. When the dancer is not, all self-consciousness disappears, because there is no self. When all self-consciousness disappears, dance becomes total, utterly total. Then there is only dance - no dancer. The presence of the dancer is always a disturbance in the dance. The more you are self-conscious, the less your life will have joy, because the more it will be fragmented, divided - it will be more schizophrenic, it will be more split.

When you are total - so total that the action is all, and there is no actor behind it - then grace, then a new beauty, a new benediction, enters into your life.

You go on living the same way - that's what Zen goes on emphasizing. You still carry water from the well, you still chop wood, you still cook food - but with what serenity, with what grace! How miraculous! to go on continuing in this beautiful world without a self. Then trees communicate to you, then birds communicate to you, then rocks communicate to you.

It is the self that is always going against communication, it is the self that always comes in-between.

It is the self that does not allow you to flow; it keeps you confined.

Empty-handed and vulnerable we come into the world, empty-handed and vulnerable we are going to leave it. Empty-handed and vulnerable must we be in it too. And then life is religious. Empty- handed we come, that is true. Empty-handed we will have to go, that is true. Then why, just in between these two, should we start being possessive? When empty-handed we come and empty- handed we go, why not remain empty-handed in between too? If you can remain empty-handed in between too, a nothing - non-possessive, non-acquiring, non-ambitious, with no self hankering for becoming - your life is religious.

A religious person is not one who wants to become spiritual, no. His spirituality is still part of the world - it is a new desire. A religious person is one who has understood the nature of desire - and in that very understanding, the desire has disappeared. A religious person is a desireless person.

And remember, let me remind you again: Don't start desiring desirelessness.

A religious person is one who has known 'I am not'. When 'I am not', then what is the point of going on collecting things called MINE? It is 'I' that goes on collecting things which are mine - 'my house, my wife, my husband, my money, my prestige, my respectability, my church, my country, my religion, my God, my scripture....' We go on: MY.

This 'my' and 'mine' arise out of the idea of '1'. And the 'I' exists not - it is a presumption, you have simply assumed. The whole game is shadowy, very false; the basic thing exists not. Before you start moving into the world of 'my' and 'mine', at least have a look to see whether you are. Otherwise your whole effort will be futile. It will be making castles in the sand... castles of Spain.

That's why Zen says - Hui-neng's words: 'All doctrine by nature is dark. Even zazen can be a trap. It is best to pursue no discipline at all. Habit deadens. As for sacred texts, they ought to be destroyed.'

This Hui-neng, what is he saying? He is saying: 'All doctrine by nature is dark.' If you make a doctrine of desirelessness, as Buddhists have made, if you make a doctrine out of the concept of detachment, as Jainas have made, then you will be caught in a new trap. Detachment is not against attachment, desirelessness is not against desire. Desirelessness cannot be desired, and non-attachment or detachment cannot be practised - because if you practise it, you will get attached to it.

Detachment or non-attachment arises out of the understanding of attachment. Just seeing into the very process of attachment, you see it is meaningless, futile. When it is meaningless, futile, it drops.

Not that you drop it, no - if you drop it, you are still there. Now you become a renunciate - you start claiming: 'I am a great renunciate, I am a great saint, I have renounced the whole world.'

If you have renounced the whole world, Buddha says, you have not renounced anything. Because the basic disease still exists. It used to claim money before, now it claims renunciation. But the 'I', the ego, is still there.

Hence, Hui-neng is right: 'All doctrine by nature is dark.' Don't create doctrines; Zen is against all doctrines. Zen says: Just look into reality, that's enough. That's why no scripture is needed. Zen says: Burn all scriptures - because scriptures will just put new ideas into your head, for new peaks to be climbed. Scriptures will give you new desires, new objects, for your becoming, for TANHA.

Here you get finished - one day you understand that it is meaningless to rush for money - but then you start rushing for meditation.

One day you start seeing the pointlessness of this world. Then you start thinking of God. Desire has moved, but not disappeared. Desire has taken a new form, but has not dropped. Desire has now assumed a new object, a new territory, a new direction - but desire remains. And if desire remains, the world remains.

Hui-neng's words are: 'Insight is freedom.' Tremendously pregnant are these words. Insight is freedom: you need not do anything, you simply need insight. You simply have to look into things - how they are, how they function, how desire functions - that's all. Let this be very very clear, that insight is freedom. You have not to strive for freedom, you have only to look into things, how they function. How you have lived up to now, look into it. How you are still living this moment, look into it!

For example, you are listening to me. You can listen with desire, and then you will miss the point.

Then, listening to me, you will inside be gathering some ideas, how to find a new peak to climb. You will be listening to me in order to practise; then you will miss. You are listening to me, and by the side you are taking notes in your mind: 'This seems to be right. Yes, I should practise it.' Now a new desire is arising, now a new idea is getting hold of you. You are moving again into the world - the world of a thousand and one things.

No, just listen to me with insight. Nothing has to be practised. Let it be decided for ever with me:

nothing has to be practised, practice is not the point. Understanding, insight - just look into it. While I am talking to you, forget all about practising, forget all about notes. Forget that you are to do anything with these words that I am saying to you. You are not to do anything, you have just to look into these words as deeply as possible, right now! If you look into these words right now, something will start changing in you. You will see that 'Yes, this is true' - not that you have to practise it, but 'this is true'.

And when truth dawns on you, it transforms you. That's what Jesus means when he says: Truth liberates, nothing else - not doctrines, not theories, not dogmas, not scriptures. Only truth liberates.

But don't ask how to get truth. If you bring the 'how' in, you have brought desire in. The 'how' is the manager of your desiring mind. It always says, 'How? How to do it?' It is not a question of doing at all. Just see it, just see the way it is. See how your mind goes on functioning, how you have functioned up to now. With no motive, have a look into it - with no motive.

'Insight is freedom. Clarity brings choicelessness.' Tremendously beautiful words of Hui-neng:

Clarity brings choicelessness. When you are clear, you need not choose; you choose only because you are confused. Choice is out of confusion - choice means, 'Should I go this way, or that way?'

You are confused, you cannot see, so you are wavering - 'Should I take sannyas, should I not take sannyas? Should I meditate, should I not meditate? Should I love this woman, should I not love this woman? Should I do in this direction, should I do in that direction?'

These things exist because you are not clear. And your so-called religious teachers, your so-called religious priests, go on giving you what you should do. That is not the work of a real master; these are the pseudo-masters. You go to them with a confused mind, and you say, 'I have two alternatives, a and b. What should I do?' And they say, 'You do a - a is right, b is wrong.' They don't help you to be clear, they don't give you clarity. They simply give you something to cling to, they give you the idea of right and wrong.

Now, life is very mysterious - something is right in the morning, by the afternoon it becomes wrong.

Then go to the priest again; then go on following the priest.

A real master never gives you any idea of right and wrong, he simply gives you INSIGHT. Because in the afternoon I may not be with you....

Just the other day, Chinmaya was with me. He has become afraid of death. Good, very good.

Doctors have told him that there is some danger for his life, so he is shaking, trembling, for three days he has not been able to sleep. A rare opportunity - because death will come to everybody, but it never comes with such information beforehand.

So he was there last night, and he is very much afraid. And I told him, 'Look into it: What do you have to lose? What have you gained in your life? The fear means that you have much in your life, and death will take it away. What have you got? If you look deeply, and you find that you don't have anything, then what is the fear? You are not going to lose anything.'

I told him to look into the fear of death and get into it as deeply as possible, don't avoid it. Everybody is telling him, 'Forget about it, it is nothing, don't be worried. Some medicine, some operation, something will be done.' Everybody is consoling him, he is consoling himself - finding ways and rationalizations.

I told him to look into the face of death. Death exists at the very center of our being; it is nothing AGAINST US. We are closer to death than we are close to life. Death is closer to us than life is, because life is the wheel revolving, and death is the hub.

And I told him, 'You are fortunate that death is coming with a message, that death has a date with you. And you are also fortunate because I am here, and I can help you to look into death.'

While I was saying these things, I could see he was waiting for some consolation. He didn't want to hear these things, to look into death. He wanted me to say something to him, promise him something. I should say, 'Don't be worried, I will protect you.' He was waiting, in the comer of his eyes, for me to say something consoling.

But a master is not to console you, a master is to awake you. If death is coming, death is coming.

Accept it, go into it, have a great insight into it. It may not come - because doctors are not reliable - but why miss this opportunity? It may not come - but if the idea has arisen, then why not go into it?

and why not have a taste of it? If it doesn't come, good. If it comes, good - but you be ready for it.

You go into it, you go with deep acceptance and receptivity. And in that acceptance and receptivity, something will be revealed to you: your innermost core.

And feeling in tune with this innermost core, all fear disappears.

And I told him, 'You may not die this time - some day you will die. Next time I may not be here to tell you, next time I may not be here to console you. So if I really love you, I will not console you - because next time what will you do when I am not here and you die? Then you will not be able to find a way.'

Consolation is not the way. Insight - what Buddha calls VIPASSANA, looking into. A master gives you clarity to look into things. And when you look into things, the obvious is SO obvious that there is no question of choice. You don't choose then, your clarity leads you - it becomes a lamp, it directs you.

And this is what Buddha says, these were his last words when he was departing from the world. His monks started crying and weeping. He said, 'Stop all this nonsense! Listen to me: Be a light unto yourself. Remember, these are my last words. Be a light unto yourself: APPO DEEPO BHAVA.'

What is this light? This clarity to see into things. If it is death, see into death. If it is love, see into love. If it is life, see into life. If it is anger, see into anger. It is ONE thing: see into it. In the morning it is love, in the evening it may be death. In the afternoon it may be something else, in the night something else again. But if you have the capacity to see into things, you will be able to see the obvious. Once the obvious is known as the obvious, choice disappears.

That's what Krishnamurti means when he says, 'Be choiceless.' But you cannot be choiceless, you cannot CHOOSE choicelessness. You cannot decide one day: 'Now, from now onwards I am going to be choiceless' - this is a choice.

Choicelessness cannot be chosen, desirelessness cannot be desired, non-attachment cannot be practised. This is the message of Zen: Look into things, and the obvious reveals itself. And when you know this is the door and this is the wall, you need not choose from where to go, you go through the door. You don't ask the question: 'Should I go through the wall or through the door?' - you simply go through the door.

Now the story. The story is simple but tremendously beautiful; all beautiful things are always simple.

Very obvious, very clear. This is a parable Buddha used many times. In fact it happened; it is not only a parable. Buddha was passing by the side of a river, and he saw these children playing and he saw this whole thing. Next morning he talked about it - he made a parable out of it. A great parable it is. Go into it with insight into each single word.

If you are still playing, you are a child. Your play may be called love, your play may be called politics, your play may be called money. You may be playing in the market, or in New Delhi or in Washington - but if you are still playing then you are childish. If you are still involved in games and taking games very seriously - taking games so seriously that you are ready to fight, kill or be killed - then you are very childish, you are not a grown-up.

SOME CHILDREN WERE PLAYING BESIDE A RIVER.

And the river is the symbol of life. Life flows like a river - and by the side, on the bank, children go on playing a thousand and one games. Life goes on flowing - and we become so engrossed in our games that we forget life completely. Life is flowing within us - but we are engaged in our games, preoccupied.

Preoccupation is a fundamental disease of the mind; it is a way to avoid the river of life. What do I mean by 'preoccupation'? Preoccupation means either you are in the past or you are in the future.

Preoccupation means you can be anywhere except herenow. When you are herenow you are not preoccupied. Then there is no occupation - then there is simple clarity, vulnerable openness.

And an unpreoccupied mind is the alert mind, the intelligent mind. And the intelligent mind is in tune with the river of life, flows with it. A preoccupied mind is playing games, and playing them very seriously. You can go into the marketplace and see people playing the game of money, and very seriously. And they will die and all the money will be left here - and while they were here they played the game so seriously.

Go into a capital town and see how people are madly playing the game of power. This word 'capital'

is very beautiful, it comes from a root-word 'capita' which means 'head'. So 'capital' means a head city, or a mad city. All kinds of mad people have gathered in capitals.

If God wants to save this world, he can do a single miracle and it will be saved: just let capitals disappear. Suddenly, no New Delhi, no Washington, no Moscow, no Peking, no London. Suddenly all capitals disappear; you will be surprised to see that all mad people have disappeared. They are found in the capitals - if they are not in the capitals, they are moving towards the capitals.

A great game. Millions of people are killed in that game - nationality, and this and that, 'isms'.

Communism, fascism, nazism, socialism. China and Russia and America, and India and Pakistan and Bangladesh. And they go on fighting: and very seriously, their very life is at stake. All children, just juveniles; they have missed growing up.

And they go on missing the river of life because they are so preoccupied. Everybody is so confined with his game.... Have you watched people playing chess? They forget the whole world. In chess, people become so absorbed, even if the house gets caught in fire they will not be aware of it. They are down-focused with their false elephants and horses - just symbols!

Everybody is playing a game of preoccupation. If you are listening to me and you have come here as a Christian, you are preoccupied. Or as a Mohammedan, you are preoccupied. Or as a Buddhist, you are preoccupied. Even if you believe in Zen you are preoccupied. All beliefs create preoccupation. If you listen to me and inside your head you go on saying, 'Yes, this the holy Koran also says,' then you are not holy at all. Or, 'Yes, this is what Jesus also says in the New Testament,'

then you have not known Jesus at all. You have missed Jesus, and you will miss me too.

'Preoccupation' means: in the past, in the future, never herenow. When you are herenow, there is no game. Games stop, then you flow with the river of life. Then there is spontaneity and there is great intelligence and there is great celebration. Games stop, you don't take things seriously. If you win, good. If you fail, good. It makes no difference. That's what I mean by 'games disappear' - I don't mean that when you become alert, awakened, you don't live life, the ordinary life. You still live the ordinary life, you still chop wood, you still carry water - but with great serenity. You still laugh, you still love - but with a totally different quality.

Now nothing matters. If the woman leaves you, you say good-bye with great gratitude. If your money is stolen, you say, 'Okay, somebody must have needed it.' You are not serious any more, that's all.

That seriousness has disappeared. You still continue to play, but you know that these chess-horses and elephants and the king and queen and this and that, they are all just symbols. a metaphor.

And the serious game comes with the 'my' and the 'mine'. THIS IS MINE - the seriousness comes through possessiveness, clinging. Through 'mine' we create an 'I'. The more you have, the more you can call 'my', the bigger 'I' you will have. The bigger the territory of the 'my', the stronger will be the 'I'.

So when you are a president of a country, you have an 'I' like a tower touching heaven. When you are no more a president of a country, you shrink; that tower disappears, you become just a stump of a cut tree.

When you have money you walk with strength. When the money disappears you start wavering.

When you have money in your pocket you don't feel so cold, money gives such warmth. When the money disappears from the pocket, suddenly you feel cold and shivering. The warmth is gone, the heat is gone, the energy is gone.

Those children are playing, and each is defending his castle, and the castle is made of sand. All castles are made of sand. There are only sand-castles; there are no other castles. A sand-castle is bound to fall, there is no way to protect it. All protection is meaningless - its very nature is to fall and disappear, it is a sand-castle.

How many castles have you made and they have disappeared? And still you go on making bigger and bigger castles. When a smaller castle disappears, you think maybe a bigger one will be more stable. How many people have lived on this earth before you? And how many millions of millions of castles have disappeared? Castles made by Alexander the Great, and castles made by Nadirshah, and castles made by Akbar - all have disappeared. And it is the same sand - they made them in this same sand, and you are again making them in the same sand.

Seeing it, one drops the idea of 'my' and 'mine'.

Obviously. When you depend on your castle, you have to keep it separate. You have to mark it, you have to fence it. You have to say, 'Don't come in here. This way, the door is closed. This is a private road. Trespassers will be prosecuted. This is mine.'

Everybody has his own nameplate, and protects the castle very much. And the same castle belonged to some people before you, and the same castle will belong to some people when you are gone. In fact the same castle belongs to nobody; it belongs only to the sand. That abides; people come and go. Games start and disappear, and the sand goes on and goes on. The sand is eternal, castles are momentary.

Watch, next time you are in a rage - somebody must have destroyed your castle. Remember - next time you are in anger remember this parable and suddenly you will start laughing. There is NO POINT in being angry, there is no point at all in being in a rage. There is no 'I' and there is no 'mine'.

And if the sand-castle has fallen, it had to fall. It was a sand-castle.

That's what your law, your court, your police, go on doing. Somebody has destroyed your castle:

you say, 'Come on, all of you! and help me to punish this man.' And yes, people will come and help you, because they have to protect THEIR castles too.

So this is an agreement; that's how you punish the criminal. That's how thousands of people are in the prisons being punished by you all, because they disturbed somebody's castle. Somebody has stolen somebody's money, or somebody has taken somebody's cow, or somebody has done some small thing - has stolen a few fruits from YOUR tree. All trees are God's trees. But somebody stole a few apples from your tree and you got into a rage, because you think you are the owner.

Anger comes out of ownership. If you really want to get rid of anger, you will have to drop ownership.

Many people come to me and they say, 'We suffer very much from anger. How to drop it?' They think as if anger can be dropped directly - they don't know; it is complicated. Unless you drop ownership you cannot drop anger.

Anger is just a leaf on the tree of ownership. If you own, you cannot drop anger. You own your wife, and somebody goes by and winks at her: anger. How will you avoid anger? Because you own the wife, she is YOUR wife - how can somebody else dare to laugh at her or smile at her? or throw a kiss at her? She is YOUR wife - you own her, she is a property. The wife becomes mad the moment she sees some woman is trying to play any game with HER husband.

We own people, we own things, we own. Out of ownership comes anger and rage. If you really want to be beyond anger and rage - and who will not want to be, unless you are in deep love with your neurosis? - if you really want to drop your neurosis, ownership has to be dropped. The very idea that 'I OWN anything' is stupid. And then others are there to help. They are afraid about THEIR properties. If somebody trespasses your property and is not punished, then people will start destroying others' properties very easily.

So you are all angry - if you see a thief, you all jump on him. He has not taken your money, he has taken somebody else's money - but all those who are there will jump on him, will beat him, throw him on the ground and stamp on him. And they will say, 'He is a thief. We have to punish him.' But why are you punishing? - he has not taken your money. No, he has not taken your money, but he is a danger - if you allow him to take somebody else's money, some day he is going to take your money too. Then.

So it is better to be cautious, it is better to prevent it from the very beginning. Hence the law exists.

The law is always in favour of the owners, the law is always in favour of the people who have property, the law is always capitalistic. It makes no difference - even in Russia, where capitalism has disappeared, the law is all for the state, because now the state owns everything. Whoever owns, the law is the servant of the owner. If the state owns, then the law serves the state. The magistrate, the law, the policemen, the courts, they are in the service of those who HAVE - against those who don't have. The law serves 'haves' against 'have-nots'.

The world cannot be very good where the law itself serves 'haves'. How can law be just? - impossible. It is against the people who have nothing, it is for the people who have everything.

It is always in favour of the haves - it is MADE by the haves, it is a conspiracy of the haves against the have-nots. In all societies it has been so, the law is always unjust. Your so-called justice is just a pretension. The world where ownership exists cannot be a just world.

Hence Zen is very anarchistic. I am an anarchist: I believe in a world where law will disappear, I HOPE for a world where law will disappear. Law can disappear only when ownership disappears; it cannot disappear by changing the ownership. In Russia they have changed the ownership - now the have-nots have become the haves, and the haves have become the have nots. But that doesn't make any difference. Whoever owns will own the law and the law will be with him. Law serves. It serves the powerful, it never serves the weak.

Can't you see? - the same game being played in a thousand and one ways, all over the world, down the ages: 'THIS IS MINE; NO ONE ELSE MAY HAVE IT. KEEP AWAY! DON'T TOUCH MY CASTLE!' This is the whole game called the world.

Evening always comes; you cannot avoid the evening.

This does not happen, unfortunately, to everybody's life. Evening comes, but you go on clinging to the morning. Evening comes, even death comes - but you go on clinging to life and birth.

Evening comes to everybody, but there are very few fortunate ones who USE the evening and start seeing that nothing belongs to us, and all castles are sand-castles.

And now they are no more concerned what happens to these castles. Not only are they not concerned that nobody should spoil them, they themselves jump upon them and spoil them. It is finished; evening has come. The world is finished. Now the time has come to go back home.

In Zen, 'going back home' means going inside your own being. Use the evening whenever it comes.

It comes many times in a life - sometimes it comes as a failure, sometimes it comes as a frustration, sometimes it comes as a sadness, sometimes as depression. Use it. Sometimes as fear, anguish, sometimes as death, illness - but use it. Whenever evening comes, try to see that nothing belongs to you, that you don't belong to anything, that the whole idea of belonging is absurd. See it. And whenever you start feeling that the world outside is meaningless, don't create new meanings in the outside, start moving inwards towards the home.

Whenever you feel it is getting dark, it is getting sad, it is getting ugly, whenever you feel it is getting to be an unhappy affair, remember - it is a call from the home: 'Come back home; you have played enough.'

Go home. Search, seek your inner home. And it is the home of non-being, anatta - nothingness, absolute void. It is formless, it is nameless, it is what nirvana is.

Once you have come home, you will have a totally different vision of things. Then there is joy, celebration. And then there is no evening. Then it is always morning, because then it is always spring. Then it is always a song, and then it is always a dance, it is always a feast.

So next time you feel evening coming and things getting darker, use that opportunity as a jumping- board. Jump into your own being. Disappear there.

Enough you have moved into things; now start moving into nothing, into no-thing. Enough you have looked at others; now start looking into your own self. We are so foolish that even when we look at ourselves, we look at ourselves, not into ourselves. Yes, sometimes you stand before a mirror and look at yourself, but that too is looking at yourself, as if you are somebody else - looking from the outside, looking at the face, at the skin, at the outer.

Enough you have looked at others, and enough you have looked at yourself as the other. Now the time has come - the evening has arrived, darkness is settling. Start looking in. Let there be an explosion of insight. That explosion of insight will transform you... from a caterpillar to a butterfly.