... - if by chance somebody dies in great suffering like cancer, the suffering of the cancer does not allow the person to fall into unconsciousness. So just before death when the body separates from the soul, a tremendous experience happens which happens only to the mystics, to the meditators. To them it does not happen by accident, they have been preparing for it. Their meditation is nothing but an...

... effort to disidentify themselves with the body. Meditation does prepare them for death, so they can die without being unconscious; otherwise in ordinary cases one dies in unconsciousness. So one does not know that he was separate from the body, that he has not died. Only the connection between himself and the body has disappeared, and his consciousness is so thin that the separation of the body from...

... the soul breaks that small thread of consciousness. But the meditator goes many times into the same position consciously, where he stands out, away from his own body. In other words the meditator experiences death many times consciously, so that when death comes it is not a new experience. The meditator has always died with laughter. You were trying to teach your sister meditation. But it is...

... difficult because when one is in such suffering all your talk seems to be nonsense. But when she really died, just a moment before, as the separation happened, she must have realized, "My God, I was thinking I am the body and that was my suffering. My identification was my suffering." Now the separation, the thread is cut - and she smiled. Certainly you must have been puzzled about what happened...

..., because she was fighting with death, fighting with suffering, was not listening to you or making any effort to learn meditation. Still she died in a very meditative state. This happened accidentally. The most important thing in life is to learn that you are not the body. That will give you such freedom from pain and from suffering. Not that suffering will disappear, not that there will not be any pain...

... or cancer, they will be there but you will not be identified with them. You will be just a watcher. And if you can watch your own body as if it is somebody else's body, you have attained something of tremendous importance. Your life has not been in vain. You have learned the lesson, the greatest lesson that is possible for any human being. My own approach is that meditation should be a compulsory...

... your body. You are not the body. That's what your sister understood at the last moment. And she must have smiled at her own misunderstanding, and she must have smiled that she resisted death. She must have smiled that she was not willing to learn meditation. Her smile contains many strains, and I can understand that you have been puzzled. Do not forget it. Her smile may become a tremendously...

... wants to? It is fighting with yourself, with your innermost core of being. It is as if you are cutting your own body. Who wants to fight with a mother? But if you don't fight when the need is there, you will never be independent. And if you don't fight, you will never give her an opportunity to let go. If you give a good fight,.you are fulfilling your sonhood; if she lets you go she is fulfilling her...

... mind, and my feeling is that your mind goes up and down so much that it can create trouble in the body. The body cannot change as much as the mind. The mind can change in a second, but the body is very slow-going, very orthodox. It does not change so easily and so fast. If you change your mind so many times, the body has to linger, and sometimes the alignment will be lost. For example you are happy...

.... The body parallels your happiness - the body is happy. Then you become unhappy. The body cannot change so fast. It remains happy, you become unhappy, the adjustment is lost. By the time the body becomes unhappy, you become happy again; again the adjustment is not there. So Rolfing may be helpful. And the second thing I will suggest is that even if you cannot remain happy for long, remain unhappy...

..., but remain that for a long time; make it permanent. Give the body a chance to adjust. [The group leader said he did feel high when people were working in the group, but when the group was finished, he went down.] Then that may also be one of the things to be considered - because in the West you were working continuously. Here sometimes you work and sometimes there is no work. That too can create a...

... misalignment in the body. If a person has become accustomed to activity and activity brings you happiness, then inactivity will destroy you. There are types. There are inactive people to whom activity is just a burden. They carry it somehow, but they become unhappy when they are active. When they are not doing anything they are happy. Then there are the active types; they are happy only when they are doing...

... me in the air. You have felt me more closely than ever before. And in your songs, I was present. In your meditations, remember, I was more present than physical presence allows. I had to come out today for a special reason. A few months ago in Bombay, Govind Siddharth had a vision that Gautam Buddha's soul has been searching for a body. And he saw in his vision that my body has become a vehicle for...

... the woman. She never praises anyone; her insight is clear. He was afraid to ask about me, but finally he decided to ask and without any hesitation she said, "I was waiting for a messenger. You have come at the right time. Gautam Buddha is using Osho's body. "Right now take these twenty-one very precious real pearls as a present to Osho with my congratulations that a soul that has been...

... wandering around in search of a vehicle has found it." The sannyasin was a little doubtful, because he said, "Osho's body has been poisoned in America. Will Gautam Buddha accept a vehicle which has been poisoned?" The sincerity of the woman reminds me of Almitra of Kahlil Gibran's PROPHET. She said, "Have you ever heard that a Satan or a devil has been poisoned? It has been the destiny...

... of the Buddhas. Don't think that the body has become impure by poisoning. This has been a fire test, and Osho has come out of it. You take these pearls and my message, and I will be coming myself to pay my respects." By the way, I have been calling myself "Bhagwan" just as a challenge to this country, to the Christians, to the Mohammedans, to the Hindus. They have condemned me, but...

... rebelliousness - in twenty-five centuries, too much dust has gathered. Behind the dust the mirror is absolutely clean. Question 1: Maneesha has asked: WE HAVE HEARD YOU HAVE BEEN VERY SICK. WOULD YOU LIKE TO TALK ABOUT IT? No, Maneesha. Being sick is enough. To talk about it is being more sick. And remember, my body can be sick, I am never sick. I watch everything, whatever happens. I will watch my death as I...

...; "Sure," says Fine. "It is like love in a canoe because it is fucking close to water!" Now, Nivedano... (Drumbeat) (Gibberish) Nivedano... (Drumbeat) Be silent. Close your eyes. Feel your body to be completely frozen. Now look inwards with your total consciousness and with an urgency as if this is the last moment of your life. The totality of consciousness and such urgency is bound...

... to bring you to the very source of your being. Suddenly you have disappeared from the circumference and you are sitting deep at the center like Gautam the Buddha. Flowers are showering, a new breeze, a fresh fragrance, an open sky full of stars, a sense of eternity. To know this is all there is to know. To make it clear, Nivedano... (Drumbeat) Relax. Just be a witness of the body and the mind. You...

... are not the body, you are not the mind, you are just a pure watcher, a witness. This witnessing is the very essence of existential religion. This is not a mere teaching, this is Gautam Buddha's sharing, his own experience of the eternal, giving you freedom from the body and the mind. The Buddha Auditorium suddenly has become a lake of consciousness; personalities have disappeared, there is not even...

..., shesho means that which is always left behind. When all is gone, when all is dropped, when all that you can drop has been dropped but still something remains behind, that is god, that is divine. Thoughts are dropped, the body is dropped, the feelings are dropped. All that one can possibly drop has been dropped, but still something remains. That cannot be dropped - that something is god! That which can...

... be dropped simply shows that it is not you, it is just property. My hand can be cut; that simply means that I am not it. The child disappears one day, becomes a young man; the body is no more there, the same body is no more there. Physiologists say that in seven years time the whole body completely changes - completely, not even an iota of the old remains in it. Each single cell has gone through...

... change. If a man lives for seventy years he gets a new body ten times. So that which changes you cannot be because you are the unchanging one. You were a child, you became a young man, you became old; you are continuum, but the body goes on continuously changing. The body is like a wheel that goes on moving, but you are something on which the wheel moves. You are unmoving. You are the centre of the...

... everything but you cannot drop the witness. That's why it is impossible to imagine one's death... impossible. There is no way to even imagine your death, because you will be a witness. You can think that your body is Lying dead like a corpse in the room, but you are seeing it so you are not dead. There is no way to imagine one's death. That's why we see death happening every day, but still somewhere deep...

... has come.' These are reminders to prepare for death. Now don't go on clinging to the body; drop that old, foolish programme. It was good once but it is no more valid. It was good to live that way, but now you cannot live that way. Now something new is emerging in the future - the phenomenon of death - and you have to be ready for it. In a really civilized world, just as we prepare children for life...

... full name will mean: god of the juice of bliss. Bliss is an inner juice, an inner nectar. It really starts flowing; one tastes it. It circulates in one's being just as blood circulates in the body. It is a very very alive flow. Bliss is not just a thought - it is a reality. And bliss is not just a make-believe - it is a truth. It is not imagination, it is not dream. In fact when all imagination and...

... with regard to the integrity of man. In Islam there is the concept that if a man has any part of his body maimed - whether a finger is cut off or he has undergone an operation - he is unfit to reach the feet of God. Therefore the Muslims are very fearful of operations; if they have to have one they feel guilty and fearful of becoming unfit for God. In Pakhtoonistan if a limb has to be removed it is...

... attendant went hunting one day. They lost their way in the jungle and were captured by avdhoots, a group of ascetics who were looking for a human being to sacrifice. first they caught hold of the prince, but found that all his parts were not complete - the one finger was missing. He would not do, so they seized the servant and found his body intact. As they were preparing him for sacrifice the prince...

... enjoyment you find yourself a little more broken in body and in spirit, a little uglier and more deformed. You had hardly anything to call your own, but whatever little you possessed is lost, and you are left a beggar, wanting more. And still the mind urges you on for more and more pleasures telling you that time is running out. Who knows whether this opportunity will come your way again? The mind never...

... difficult initially. How difficult it is to get up at five o'clock in the morning. The whole body revolts, the mind refuses and offers excuses: "It is too cold to get up today, and you need the sleep. You can get up early tomorrow." You gain nothing by sleeping that much longer, but the mind coaxes you into thinking how lovely it would be. You have no idea of the happiness outside: the sun is...

... worthy of it. How will I bear His grace? And how will I express my gratitude to Him?" He was mad with joy and danced round and round the tree, and danced around Narada. He could not contain his joy. The story goes that thus dancing, he attained samadhi. His body fell away. What was to have happened after infinite years happened immediately. For him who has such patience, attainment does not take a...

... knowledge, just rubbish. Genuine knowledge is that which is attained from our own experience. The intellect is filled with borrowed knowledge; everything is stale. Nanak says, however, that intellect is the anvil and knowledge is the hammer. Nanak says knowledge is the blow of the hammer. Whenever you attain knowledge, howsoever infinitesimal, every hair of your body trembles with its impact. This is why...

... severed all their connection with the body. This knowledge has caused their whole world to reel and fall to pieces. This is the knowledge that initiated them into sannyas. This knowledge has made them as good as nobodies in the mundane world. It has uprooted them completely from samsara. It came as a hurricane and swept them away completely. What has your knowledge done for you? It is like a lullaby...

... meaning of austerity. Suppose you have decided to fast today. It is not that you want to do it to go to heaven; if this were possible, going to heaven would be an easy matter. You are not fasting because you want to perform a good deed. Your fasting involves a process of austerity and resolve. You have resolved not to eat today. The body will make its daily demands when the mealtimes come. You will hear...

... its hunger cries without letting them pass unheeded. You will not deny the hunger, but say to the body: I agree that you are hungry; it is time for your food, but I have decided to remain hungry today. Sorry, but you'll have to go without food. You will not abandon your resolve for the sake of the body. This requires a good deal of awareness. The body's demand is not wrong, but today you are going...

... to live by your resolve. What does this mean? It means you are placing yourself above the body. You are becoming bigger than your body; you are making the body obey you. The mind will think of food, but you say: That's all right. You may think what you please, but I shall only witness it, and not join in. I abide by my decision; that is my resolve. Then you will experience a heat, a kind of fire...

..., an energy being born within you, an energy you have never known before. This power comes by the mastery of resolve. You are now your own master. Then you will get up the next morning in quite a different way. You will find you can rise above your body. A new experience - you can rise above the mind. You will get a new experience that you are apart from both body and mind. You will get a faint...

... glimpse of this experience. This is austerity. It is neither for gaining salvation nor going to heaven. Austerity is meant for knowing that one's life and consciousness is beyond the body and the mind. But he who thus raises himself above the mind and body invariably finds the door to beatitude opened wide for him. What Nanak means when he says that austerity is the fire and fear the bellows, is that...

... to be dullards. At best they will be mediocre. You will not see the luster of consciousness in them or the sharpness of understanding, and never the brilliance of genius. Their servants need to be brilliant, but what need is there for the master to be clever? Nanak says to make fear the bellows. Wake up in fear; it is a wonderful state. Your whole body trembles; each hair of your body stands on end...

.... At that time, when the whole body trembles, your consciousness should be stable and unmoving like a steady flame. Then fear becomes the bellows. Austerity is the fire. Wherever there is suffering in life, take it as an exercise in austerity. Accept your suffering fully and openly, and be resolute. When you fall ill accept the illness. Do not fight against it. Then you will find that not only does...

... the body get well but also the mind attains a new kind of health. When you fall ill, don't fight the illness; rather look it straight in the face and accept it: You have come? Welcome! Don't quarrel with it; don't avoid it. Don't involve your mind in other things, or you will miss the opportunity. Each condition in life that we encounter can become a path that leads to Him. Remember this: each event...

... of life will go on. They would bow with both hands and thank him for his kindness to them. As they stood with hands folded they drank in the light of the sun, and a feeling of gratitude would thrill their hearts. When they went to the river they would bow to it before stepping into the waters; thus they would establish an emotional relationship with the river. Truly the river washes the body, but...

... silence will be of no value. You have to forget completely that there is something called a heart within you. I have heard: It is said that in the very near future all parts of the human body will be readily available, just as we now get spare parts for our cars. Already there are blood banks and eye banks and kidney banks. So it once happened, in this story of the future, that a man's heart was not...

... there, that too will go out. Those who liberate others cannot be taken captive. How can you bind the very person from whom you seek liberation or beatitude? WIND IS THE GURU; WATER IS THE FATHER; THE GREAT EARTH IS THE MOTHER; Your body cannot exist without the earth; the mother is absolutely necessary. No birth can take place without the earth, but the earth is the grossest of matter. Birds and...

... animals have mothers but no fathers. Fatherhood requires a higher level of culture and conditioning. The mind is the father, the body is the mother; wherever there is a body, there is mother. The father begins where the mind is born, so the institution of fatherhood is a very new happening. Only man has fathers, and they too are not very ancient if you measure human history. Before that there was no...

.... All men reach up to the level of the father. There are very few who reach up to the guru. And as long as you do not reach the guru, you will not attain your full stature, because the mother is the body relationship, the father is the mind relationship, whereas the connection with the guru is the relationship of the soul. This latter relationship is the greatest of all; there is no connection deeper...

.... The body needs attention. It becomes ill, it is prone to suffering. The body is continuously struggling to survive because, for the body, there is death. The body is in a continuous struggle with death, so constant attention has to be paid to it. The body is always in a state of emergency because at any moment death can occur. You have to be continually aware and continually conscious of this fight...

...; you become aware that you have a head. If there is no ache in the head, you forget your head. You become headless - as if you have no head. The body is felt only when it is ill. If your body is absolutely healthy you will not feel it. You will become weightless. Really, you will become bodiless. This is the only criterion of authentic health: that the body is not felt at all. Whenever the body is...

... nature. You have been taught again and again that the body and soul are two, that God and the world are two. And you have been taught that you have to find God against the world, you have to go beyond the world to find God. I am giving you a totally new message you are not to go beyond, you are to go within. The beyond is within, and the within is the beyond. All is herenow. In this very moment the...

... real man of understanding will say that God can be looked at as the world, the world can be looked at as God. William James is reported to have said, "Mind is one way in which the world is assembled and things put together; matter is another" - just ways of putting and assembling things together. Neither does matter exist against mind, nor does mind exist against matter. You are body - this...

... cannot conceive how Buddha can be a God, how Christ can be a God. When Christ declares "I am God", he's simply saying to you "You are God. Look! I have the courage to declare. You also participate. See the point. I am as much of the flesh as you are, I am as much the body as you are." There is nothing special about Christ; the only special thing is his courage. Otherwise he is just...

.... And the moment you become God, the whole existence becomes God. If somebody says "I am God and you are not God", then he is a cheat, he is a charlatan, he is playing a game, he is on an ego-trip. The second question: Question 2: SINCE RETURNING TO POONA TWO WEEKS AGO I FEEL MYSELF BECOMING ATTACHED TO YOU. BEFORE, I NEVER GAVE MUCH THOUGHT TO HOW LONG YOU WOULD REMAIN IN YOUR BODY AND NOW...

.... BEFORE I NEVER GAVE MUCH THOUGHT TO HOW LONG YOU WOULD REMAIN IN YOUR BODY AND NOW I AM WANTING YOU TO STAY A LONG TIME." Disciplehood is born. And the Master is not only his soul, he is his body too. And when you come close to the Master, the first thing that starts changing you is his body. You will be surprised to know this, I have never said it before: his very matter starts changing your...

... matter. His very matter becomes contagious. Your soul will be changed later on, it cannot be changed in the beginning. Things have to move from the outer towards the inner, from the exterior towards the interior. First the temple has to be changed, only then the deity. So there is naturally a deep attachment with the Master's body. It is not just accidental that many Master's bodies have been protected...

... down the ages. In Tibet they have protected ninety-nine bodies down the ages. The very matter, the very body where enlightenment has been recognized and has happened, transforms its quality. It vibrates in a new rhythm. To be close to it is to be permeated by its vibration. To touch the body of the Master is to partake of his body. That is why Jesus says, "Eat me, drink me." A Master has to...

... be eaten, drunk. A Master has to be digested, chewed, so he enters into the deepest matter of your being. The body is the beginning and the beginning has to be transformed. Only a transformed body will know a transformed being. Only in a different rhythm of the body will you know God, because the gestalt will change. So it is very natural that disciples become attached to the body of their Master...

.... Even when the Master is gone the body will be worshipped. Just a hair of Mohammed is kept in Shrinagar, in a mosque - just a single hair! - and it has tremendous effect on those who know how to be in the presence of that single hair because that single hair has the same vibe as Mohammed. It continues to vibrate in the same way. It contains the subtlest message: the real Koran is contained in that...

... vibrates in the same way. Still, to sit under the Bodhi Tree is a tremendous experience - but only if you know. If you are aware and alert and in love with Buddha, then the secret of the tree will be revealed to you. Even while a Master is alive only those who are perceptive, feel; but those who are really perceptive go on feeling even when the Master is gone. Any small thing from the Master's body - the...

... I am ready to go, or the next moment any moment is perfectly okay now. But if you need me, your very need will sustain me in the body. If you desire me and my presence, if your thirst is strong enough, that can keep me in the body. ONLY that can keep me. My own roots in the body are no longer there. But your need, your desires, your longing, your search for truth - if it is strong enough, big...

... you enter into something which is non-sexual, non-sensuous. This is the mystery of life: that sensuality leads to non-sensuality, sexuality leads to non-sexuality. The body leads into soul, and the world becomes the door to the divine, to God. "I HAVE NEVER EXPERIENCED," you say, "DEEP LOVE." How can you experience deep love? First, all that you experience you call superficial...

... things in life. Decode the surface and you will reach to the profound depth. Get into the body and how long can you avoid the soul? People have great ideas about love, how love should be; they have impossible ideals about love. Then they cannot fulfill that ideal and they feel condemned. Drop all ideals of love. You don't know what love is! All that you know you call superficial, and all that you don't...

... hormones, then falling in love is nothing but chemistry. Then all that you do and all that happens to you becomes very mundane, very ordinary, very superficial, not worth doing really. Just think... you are falling in love with a woman because of your chemistry. Because certain chemicals are released in your body, certain hormones are moving in your blood, that's why you are feeling sexual, attracted. If...

.... What does it mean? The mother gives you matter, she supplies you with matter. The mother is your matter, she is your body. The mother is the earth, the Master is the sky. But remember, without the earth the sky cannot happen. Without the temple the deity is not possible. So the mother has given you an opportunity. but that is only an opportunity. You will have to find a Master to transform the...

... dispassion, she was trying to create some passion in him. If he could be angry, then he could be loving too. But he was not angry. He used it as a device: he became even more calm and quiet. He allowed that hot water to burn his body, but he remained a witness. Now this must have driven the wife more crazy. How can you forgive such a husband who will not jump and hit you back? If he had hit the wife back...

... most sexual doors into your body. It is through smell that animals start feeling whether a male is in tune with the female or not. The smell is a subtle hint. When the female is ready to make love to the male she releases a certain kind of smell. Only through that smell does the male understand that he is acceptable. If that smell is not released by the feminine sexual organism, the male moves away...

... wife is walking with you and there is no smell from her body, and suddenly a man passes by and she gives the signal. And those are very unconscious signals; you cannot control them suddenly. Then you will become aware that she is interested in the other man, that she is welcoming the other man. That will create trouble. So down the centuries man has destroyed smell completely. It is not just...

... accidental that in cultured countries much time is wasted in removing all kinds of smell from the body. The body odour has to be completely destroyed by deodorants, deodorant soaps. It has to be covered by layers of perfume, strong perfume. These are all disguises; these are ways to avoid a reality that is still there. When you make love, both male and female release a certain kind of smell. That smell has...

... wind - and the deer is alert. You would not have noticed it at all. And great music surrounds life, subtle music surrounds life, but we are absolutely unaware of it. There is great rhythm - but to feel it you will need more alert ears, more alert eyes, a more alert touch. So the first layer is of corrupted physical senses. We see only what we want to see. Our whole body mechanism is poisoned. Our...

... body has been made rigid. We live in a kind of frozenness; we are cold, closed, unavailable. We are so afraid of life that we have killed all kinds of possibilities through which life can make a contact with us. People don't touch each other, they don't hold hands, they don't hug each other. And when you hold somebody's hand, you feel embarrassed, he feels embarrassed. Even if you hug somebody, it...

... feels as if something wrong is happening. And you are in a hurry to get away from the other's body, because the other's body can open you. The warmth of the other's body can open you. Even children are not allowed to hug their parents. There is great fear. And all fear is basically, deep down, rooted in the fear of sex. There is a taboo against sex. A mother cannot hug her son because the son may get...

... corrupted. We have not been allowed to be natural - -hence man has lost dignity, innocence, grace, elegance. This is the first layer. And because of all these repressions the body has become non-orgasmic. There is no joy - it has happened both to man and woman, in almost the same way, but man has gone deeper into corruption than woman - because man is perfectionistic, neurotically perfectionistic. Once he...

... body alive, sensitive, young again, to give your senses their maximum functioning. Then one functions with no taboos around; then lucidity, grace, beauty flow. Warmth arises again, openness - and growth happens. One is constantly new, young, and one is always on an adventure. The body becomes orgasmic. Joy surrounds you. Through joy the first corruption disappears. Hence my insistence to be joyous...

..., to be celebrating, to enjoy life, to accept the body - not only to accept it, but to feel grateful that God has given you such a beautiful body, such a sensitive body, with so many doors to relate to reality: eyes and ears and nose and touch. Open all these windows and let life's breeze flow in, let life's sun shine in. Learn to be more sensitive. Use every oppor-tunity to be sensitive so that that...

... on being released by the grass. Feel the dewdrops on the grass - that they are on you. Feel the sunrays playing on the grass. For a moment be lost into it and you will have a new sense of your body. And do it in all kinds of situations: in a river, in a swimming pool, lying on the beach in the sunrays, looking at the moon in the night, lying down with closed eyes on the sand and feeling the sand...

.... Millions of opportunities are there to make your body alive again. And only you can do it. Society has done its work of corruption, you will have to undo it. And once you start hearing, seeing, touching, smelling, then you smell the reality. The second layer is of conditioning: social, political, religious, ideological - belief systems. Belief systems make you non-communicative. If you are a Hindu and I...

... a beautiful Italian woman took sannyas. I gave her the name 'Prem Nishanga'. She was a woman of the heart, something rare. She was so happy she almost started dancing. There was no need to say anything, her whole body said it. She went into such ecstasy that you can go on saying in a thousand ways, shouting with joy, and it will not be as deep as just by going into ecstasy. I don't know what she...

... was saying because she was saying it in Italian, but her face, her eyes, her hands, her whole body was saying it. There was no need to understand her language; the language was irrelevant. When you say from the heart, no language is needed. When you say from the head, only language can say; there is no other way to say it. Watch and observe. Let the head function as reason, let the heart function as...

... feeling, let the sex centre function as sex. Let everything function in its own way. Don't allow mechanisms to mix into each other, otherwise you will have corrupted instincts. When instinct is natural, untabooed, spontaneous, without any inhibition, there is a clarity in your body, a harmony in your body. There is a humming sound in your organism. The fifth layer is also male expertise. The sixth layer...

... chaos in the body. The same has happened in the mind. You don't want to think, and the mind goes on thinking. You want to sleep. You are Lying down on your bed, changing your sides; you want to go to sleep, and the mind continues, the mind says, "No, I am going to think about something." You go on saying, "Stop" and it never listens to you. And you cannot do anything. Mind is also...

... will have to be understood. Now we should enter the sutra. First: THE MODIFICATIONS OF THE MIND ARE FIVE. THEY CAN BE EITHER A SOURCE OF ANGUISH OR OF NON-ANGUISH. First thing to be understood: that mind is not something different from the body, remember. Mind is part of the body. It is body, but deeply subtle - a state of body, but very delicate, very refined. You cannot catch it, but through the...

... body you can influence it. If you take a drug, if you take LSD or marijuana or something else, or alcohol, suddenly the mind is affected. The alcohol goes in the body, not in the mind, but the mind is affected. Mind is the subtlest part of the body. The reverse is also true. Influence the mind and the body is affected. That happens in hypnosis. A person who cannot walk, who says that he has a...

... paralysis, can walk under hypnosis. You don't have paralysis, but if under hypnosis it is said that "Now your body is paralyzed; you cannot walk," you cannot walk. A paralyzed man can walk under hypnosis. What is happening? Hypnosis goes into the mind, the suggestion goes into the mind. Then the body follows. First thing to be understood: mind and body are not two. This is one of the deepest...

... discoveries of Patanjali. Now modern science recog- nizes it; it is very recent in the West. Now they say odyandmind -  b -totalkinthisdichotomyisnotright.Nowtheysayitis"psychosoma" : itismind - The body has five organs of activity - five indriyas, five instruments of activity. The mind has five modifications, five modes of function. Mind and body are one. Body is divided into five functions...

... happened? Alcohol cannot create things. Alcohol is doing something within your body and brain. The alcohol starts working the center Patanjali calls viparyaya. The mind has a center which can pervert anything. Once that center starts functioning, everything is perverted. I am reminded... Once it happened that Mulla Nasrudin and his friend were drinking in a pub. They came out, completely drunk, and...

... more and more agitated, excited, disturbed. A trembling enters within you. The drunkard cannot even walk rightly. His balance is lost. Not only in the body, but in the mind also balance is lost. Meditation means gaining the inner balance. When you gain the inner balance and there is no trembling, the whole body-mind has become still, then the center of right knowledge starts functioning. Through that...

... through imagination. First you have to imagine something. And then you go on imagining it, and then through imagination you create an atmosphere around you. You try it, that through imagination what is possible. Even impossible is possible. If you think you are beautiful, if you imagine you are beautiful, a certain beauty will start happening to your body. So whenever a man says to a woman that "...

... start dreaming. The silence of sleep, the blissful music of sleep, has become unknown. You have destroyed it. Even natural sleep is destroyed. You are so agitated and excited that the mind cannot fall completely into oblivion. But Patanjali says natural sleep is good for the body health, and if you can become alert in sleep it can become samadhi, it can become a spiritual phenomenon. So there are...

... techniques - we will discuss them later on -how sleep can become an awakening. Gita says that the yogi doesn't sleep even while he is asleep. He remains alert. Something inside goes on being aware. The whole body falls into sleep, the mind falls into sleep, but the witnessing remains. Someone is watching - a watcher on the tower goes on. Then sleep becomes samadhi. It becomes the ultimate ecstasy. And the...

... nine times more than the conscious, the unconscious layer of the mind. Not only that, man has the body, the soma, in which this mind exists. The body is absolutely unconscious. Its working is almost non-voluntary. Only the surface of the body is voluntary. The inner sources are non-voluntary; you cannot do anything about them. Your will is not effective. This pattern of man's existence has to be...

... understood before one can enter into oneself. And the understanding should not remain only intellectual. It must go deeper. It must penetrate the unconscious layers; it must reach to the very body itself. Hence, the importance of abhyasa - constant inner practice. These two words are very significant: abhyasa and vairagya. Abhyasa means constant inner practice, and vairagya means non- attachment...

... just that understanding won't do. You can understand easily anger is bad, poisonous, but this understanding is not enough for the anger to leave you, to disappear. In spite of your understanding the anger will continue, because the anger exists in many layers of your unconscious mind - not only in the mind, but in your body also. The body cannot understand just by verbal communication. Only your head...

... can understand, but the body remains unaffected. And unless understanding reaches to the very roots of the body, you cannot be transformed. You will remain the same. Your ideas may go on changing, but your personality will persist. And then a new conflict will arise. And you will be in more turmoil than ever, because now you can see what is wrong and still you persist doing it; you go on doing it. A...

.... Now your body has learned it. Now the whole mechanism knows it. It has become an unconscious learning. Whenever something becomes so deep that you need not be conscious about it, it falls into the unconscious. And once the thing has fallen into the unconscious, it will start changing your being, your life, your character. And the change will be effortless now; you need not be concerned with it...

... unconscious habit. For many, many lives you have been carrying it. It has become your heredity. It is in your cells; the body has taken it. It is now chemical and physiological. Just by your dropping your desires your body is not going to change its pattern. The pattern is very old. You will have to change this pattern also. For that change, repetitive practice will be needed. Just to change the inner...

... mechanism, repetitive practice will be needed - a reconditioning of the whole body-mind pattern. But this is possible only if you have dropped desiring. Look at it from another point of view. One man came to me and he said, "I don't want to be sad, but I am always sad and depressed. Sometimes, I cannot even feel what is the reason why I am sad, but I am sad. No visible cause, nothing that I can...

... something. It is a giving, wholehearted giving of all that you have, your being also. He cannot give love, he cannot receive love. Then what to do? But he hankers, as everybody hankers for love. It is a basic need just like food. Without food your body will die and without love your soul will shrink. It is a must. Then he has created a substitute, and that substitute is sympathy. He cannot get love...

... whatsoever you are because you have certain desires, a group of desires. Patanjali says, "First thing is non-attachment." Drop all desires; don't be attached. And then, abhyasa. For example, someone comes to me and he says, "I don't want to collect more fat in my body, but I go on eating. I want to stop it, but I go on eating." The wanting is superficial. There is a pattern inside, why...

... he goes on eating more and more. And even for a few days he stops, then again with more gusto he eats. And he will collect more weight than he has lost through few days fasting or dieting. And this has been continuously, for years. It is not just a question of eating less. Why he is eating more? Body doesn't need, then somewhere in the mind food has become a substitute for something. He may be...

... countries where divorce is not prevalent, women don't bother at all about their figures, because if divorce is possible then the women will have to find new lovers; they are figure conscious. The search for love helps the body figure. When love is settled, it is finished in a way. You need not worry about the body; you need not take any care. So this person may be afraid of death; may be he is not in any...

... will make your body also alert, because more oxygen in the body, the body is more alert. In this alert moment, suddenly you will feel that the anger has disappeared. Secondly, your mind can be only one-pointed. Mind cannot think of two things simultaneously; it is impossible for the mind. It can change from one to another very swiftly, but it cannot have two points together in the mind simultaneously...

.... "I am not the doer. I am just a vehicle or an instrument." And the moment this gap grows, all that is evil falls. You cannot do evil. You can do evil only when there is no gap between the actor and the action. Then good flows automatically. Greater the gap between the actor and the action, more the good. Life becomes a sacred thing. Your body becomes a temple. Anything that makes you alert...