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Many questions are
there.
The first:
WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TRADITIONAL
YOGA AND TANTRA? ARE THEY THE SAME?
Tantra and yoga are
basically different. They reach to the same goal; however, their paths are not only
different, but contrary also. So this has to be understood very clearly.
The yoga process is
also methodology; yoga is also technique. Yoga is not philosophy, just like tantra -- yoga
depends on action, method, technique. Doing leads to being in yoga also, but the process
is different. In yoga one has to fight; it is the path of the warrior. On the path of
tantra one does not have to fight at all. Rather, on the contrary, one has to indulge --
but with awareness.
Yoga is suppression
with awareness; tantra is indulgence with awareness. Tantra says that whatsoever you are,
the ultimate is not opposite to it. It is a growth; you can grow to be the ultimate. There
is no opposition between you and the reality. You are part of it, so no struggle, no
conflict, no opposition to nature is needed. You have to use nature; you have to use
whatsoever you are to go beyond.
In yoga you have to
fight with yourself to go beyond. In yoga, the world and MOKSHA, liberation -- you as you
are and you as you can be -- are two opposite things. Suppress, fight, dissolve that which
you are so that you can attain that which you can be. Going beyond is a death in yoga. You
must die for your real being to be born.
In the eyes of
tantra, yoga is a deep suicide. You must kill your natural self -- your body, your
instincts, your desires, everything. Tantra says accept yourself as you are. It is a deep
acceptance. Do not create a gap between you and the real, between the world and NIRVANA.
Do not create any gap. There is no gap for tantra; no death is needed. For your rebirth,
no death is needed -- rather, a transcendence. For this transcendence, use yourself.
For example, sex is
there, the basic energy -- the basic energy you are born through, born with. The basic
cells of your being and of your body are sexual, so the human mind revolves around sex.
For yoga you must fight with this energy. Through fight you create a different center in
yourself. The more you fight, the more you become integrated in a different center. Then
sex is not your center. Fighting with sex -- of course, consciously -- will create in you
a new center of being, a new emphasis, a new crystallization. Then sex will not be your
energy. You will create your energy fighting with sex. A different energy will come into
being and a different center of existence.
For tantra you have
to use the energy of sex. Do not fight with it, transform it. Do not think in terms of
enmity, be friendly to it. It is your energy. It is not evil, it is not bad. Every energy
is just natural. It can be used for you, it can be used against you. You can make a block
of it, a barrier, or you can make it a step. It can be used. Rightly used, it becomes
friendly; wrongly used, it becomes your enemy. But it is neither. Energy is just natural.
As ordinary man is using sex, it becomes an enemy, it destroys him; he simply dissipates
in it.
Yoga takes the
opposite view -- opposite to the ordinary mind. The ordinary mind is being destroyed by
its own desires, so yoga says stop desiring, be desireless. Fight desire and create an
integration in you which is desireless.
Tantra says be
aware of the desire; do not create any fight. Move in desire with full consciousness, and
when you move into desire with full consciousness you transcend it. You are into it and
still you are not in it. You pass through it, but you remain an outsider.
Yoga appeals much
because yoga is just the opposite of the ordinary mind, so the ordinary mind can
understand the language of yoga. You know how sex is destroying you -- how it has
destroyed you, how you go on revolving around it like a slave, like a puppet. You know
this by your experience. So when yoga says fight it, you immediately understand the
language. That is the appeal, the easy appeal of yoga.
Tantra can not be
so easily appealing. It seems difficult: how to move into desire without being overwhelmed
by it? How to be in the sex act consciously, with full awareness? The ordinary mind
becomes afraid. It seems dangerous. Not that it is dangerous; whatsoever you know about
sex creates this danger for you. You know yourself, you know how you can deceive yourself.
You know very well that your mind is cunning. You can move in desire, in sex, in
everything, and you can deceive yourself that you are moving with full awareness. That is
why you feel the danger.
The danger is not
in tantra; it is in you. And the appeal of yoga is because of you, because of your
ordinary mind, your sex-suppressed, sex-starved, sex-indulging mind. Because the ordinary
mind is not healthy about sex, yoga has an appeal. With a better humanity, with a healthy
sex -- natural, normal -- the case would be different. We are not normal and natural. We
are absolutely abnormal, unhealthy, really insane. But because everyone is like us, we
never feel it.
Madness is so
normal that not to be mad may look abnormal. A Buddha is abnormal, a Jesus is abnormal
amidst us. They do not belong to us. This "normalcy" is a disease. This
"normal" mind has created the appeal of yoga. If you take sex naturally -- with
no philosophy around it, with no philosophy for or against -- if you take sex as you take
your hands, your eyes; if it is totally accepted as a natural thing, then tantra will have
an appeal. And only then can tantra be useful for many.
But the days of
tantra are coming. Sooner or later tantra will explode for the first time in the masses,
because for the first time the time is ripe -- ripe to take sex naturally. It is possible
that the explosion may come from the West, because Freud, Jung, Reich, they have prepared
the background. They did not know anything about tantra, but they have made the basic
ground for tantra to evolve. Western psychology has come to a conclusion that the basic
human disease is somewhere around sex, the basic insanity of man is sex-oriented.
So unless this sex
orientation is dissolved, man cannot be natural, normal. Man has gone wrong only because
of his attitudes about sex. No attitude is needed. Only then are you natural. What
attitude have you about your eyes? Are they evil or are they divine? Are you for your eyes
or against them? There is no attitude! That is why your eyes are normal.
Take some attitude
-- think that eyes are evil. Then seeing will become difficult. Then seeing will take the
same problematic shape that sex has taken. Then you will want to see, you will desire and
you will hanker to see. But when you see you will feel guilty. Whenever you see you will
feel guilty that you have done something wrong, that you have sinned. You would like to
kill your very instrument of seeing; you would like to destroy your eyes. And the more you
want to destroy them, the more you will become eye centered. Then you will start a very
absurd activity. You will want to see more and more, and simultaneously you will feel more
and more guilty. The same has happened with the sex center.
Tantra says, accept
whatsoever you are. This is the basic note -- total acceptance. And only through total
acceptance can you grow. Then use every energy you have. How can you use them? Accept
them, then find out what these energies are -- what is sex, what is this phenomenon. We
are not acquainted with it. We know many things about sex, taught by others. We may have
passed through the sex act, but with a guilty mind, with a suppressive attitude, in haste,
in a hurry. Something has to be done in order to become unburdened. The sex act is not a
loving act. You are not happy in it, but you cannot leave it. The more you try to leave
it, the more attractive it becomes. The more you want to negate it, the more you feel
invited.
You cannot negate
it, but this attitude to negate, to destroy, destroys the very mind, the very awareness,
the very sensitivity which can understand it. So sex goes on with no sensitivity into it.
Then you cannot understand it. Only a deep sensitivity can understand anything; only a
deep feeling, a deep moving into it, can understand anything. You can understand sex only
if you move in it as a poet moves amidst flowers -- only then! If you feel guilty about
flowers, you may pass through the garden, but you will pass with closed eyes. And you will
be in a hurry, in a deep, mad haste. Somehow you have to go out of the garden. Then how
can you be aware?
So tantra says,
accept whatsoever you are. You are a great mystery of many multidimensional energies.
Accept it, and move with every energy with deep sensitivity, with awareness, with love,
with understanding. Move with it! Then every desire becomes a vehicle to go beyond it.
Then every energy becomes a help. And then this very world is nirvana, this very body is a
temple -- a holy temple, a holy place.
Yoga is negation;
tantra is affirmation. Yoga thinks in terms of duality -- that is the reason for the word
`yoga'. It means to put two things together, to `yoke' two things together. But two things
are there; the duality is there. Tantra says there is no duality. If there is duality,
then you cannot put them together. And howsoever you try they will remain two. Howsoever
put together they will remain two, and the fight will continue, the dualism will remain.
If the world and
the divine are two, then they cannot be put together. If really they are not two, if they
are only appearing as two, only then can they be one. If your body and your soul are two,
then they cannot be put together. If you and God are two, then there is no possibility of
putting them together. They will remain two.
Tantra says there
is no duality; it is only an appearance. So why help appearance to grow stronger? Tantra
asks, why help this appearance of duality to grow stronger? Dissolve it this very moment!
Be one! Through acceptance you become one, not through fight. Accept the world, accept the
body, accept everything that is inherent in it. Do not create a different center in
yourself, because for tantra that different center is nothing but the ego. Do not create
an ego. Just be aware of what you are. If you fight, then the ego will be there.
So it is difficult
to find a yogi who is not an egoist. And yogis may go on talking about egolessness, but
they cannot be egoless. The very process they go through creates the ego. The fight is the
process. If you fight, you are bound to create an ego. And the more you fight, the more
strengthened the ego will be. And if you win your fight, then you will achieve the supreme
ego.
Tantra says, no
fight! Then there is no possibility of the ego. If we understand tantra there will be many
problems, because for us, if there is no fight there is only indulgence. No fight means
indulgence for us. Then we become afraid. We have indulged for lives together and we have
reached nowhere. But for tantra indulgence is not "our" indulgence. Tantra says
indulge, but be aware.
You are angry...
tantra will not say do not be angry. Tantra will say be angry wholeheartedly, but be
aware. Tantra is not against anger, tantra is only against spiritual sleepiness, spiritual
unconsciousness. Be aware AND be angry. And this is the secret of the method -- that if you are aware anger is
transformed: it becomes compassion. So tantra
says anger is not your enemy; it is compassion in
seed form. The same anger, the same energy, will become compassion.
If you fight with
it, then there will be no possibility for compassion.
So if you succeed in fighting, in suppression, you will
be a dead man. There will be no anger because you have suppressed it, but there will be no
compassion either because only anger can be transformed into compassion. If you succeed in
your suppression -- which is impossible -- then there will be no sex, but no love either,
because with sex dead there is no energy to grow into love. So you will be without sex,
but you will also be without love. And then the whole point is missed, because without
love there is no divineness, without love there is no liberation, and without love there
is no freedom.
Tantra says that
these same energies are to be transformed. It can be said in this way: if you are against
the world, then there is no nirvana -- because this world itself is to be transformed into
nirvana. Then you are against the basic energies which are the source.
So tantric alchemy
says, do not fight, be friendly with all the energies that are given to you. Welcome them.
Feel grateful that you have anger, that you have sex, that you have greed. Feel grateful
because these are the hidden sources, and they can be transformed, they can be opened. And
when sex is transformed it becomes love. The poison is lost, the ugliness is lost.
The seed is ugly,
but when it becomes alive it sprouts and flowers. Then there is beauty. Do not throw away
the seed, because then you are also throwing the flowers in it. They are not there yet,
not yet manifest so that you can see them. They are unmanifest, but they are there. Use
this seed so that you can attain to flowers. So first let there be acceptance, a sensitive
understanding and awareness. Then indulgence is allowed.
One thing more
which is really very strange, but one of the deepest discoveries of tantra, and that is:
whatsoever you take as your enemies -- greed, anger, hate, sex, whatsoever -- your
attitude that they are enemies makes them your enemies. Take them as divine gifts and
approach them with a very grateful heart. For example, tantra has developed many
techniques for the transformation of sexual energy. Approach the sex act as if you are
approaching the temple of the divine. Approach the sex act as if it is prayer, as if it is
meditation. Feel the holiness of it.
That is why in
Khajuraho, in Puri, in Konark, every temple has MAITHUN, intercourse sculptures. The sex
act on the walls of temples seems illogical, particularly for Christianity, for Islam, for
Jainism. It seems inconceivable, contradictory. How is the temple connected with maithun
pictures? On the outer walls of the Khajuraho temples, every conceivable type of sex act
is pictured in stone. Why? In a temple it doesn't have any place, in our minds at least.
Christianity cannot conceive of a church wall with Khajuraho pictures. Impossible!
Modern Hindus also
feel guilty because the minds of modern Hindus are created by Christianity. They are
"Hindu-Christians" -- and they are worse, because to be a Christian is good, but
to be a Hindu-Christian is just weird. They feel guilty. One Hindu leader, Purshottamdas
Tandon, even proposed that these temples should be destroyed, that they do not belong to
us. Really, it looks like they do not belong to us because tantra has not been in our
hearts for a long time, for centuries. It has not been the main current. Yoga has been the
main current, and for yoga Khajuraho is inconceivable -- it must be destroyed.
Tantra says,
approach the sex act as if you are entering a holy temple. That is why they have pictured
the sex act on their holy temples. They have said, approach sex as if you are entering a
holy temple. Thus, when you enter a holy temple sex must be there in order that the two
become conjoined in your mind, associated. Then you can feel that the world and the divine
are not two fighting elements, but one. They are not contradictory, they are just polar
opposites helping each other. And they can exist only because of this polarity. If this
polarity is lost, the whole world is lost. So see the deep oneness running through
everything. Do not see only the polar opposites, see the inner running current which makes
them one.
For tantra
everything is holy. Remember this, for tantra EVERYTHING is holy; nothing is unholy. Look
at it this way: for an irreligious person, everything is unholy; for so-called religious
persons something is holy, something is unholy.
For tantra,
everything is holy.
One Christian missionary was with me a few
days ago and he said, "God created the world." So I asked him, "Who created
sin?" He said, "The devil."
Then I asked him,
"Who created the devil?" Then he was at a loss. He said, "Of course, God
created the devil."
The devil creates
sin and God creates the devil. Then who is the real sinner -- the devil or God? But the
dualist conception always leads to such absurdities. For tantra God and the devil are not
two. Really, for tantra there is nothing that can be called "devil", everything
is divine, everything is holy. And this seems to be the right standpoint, the deepest. If
anything is unholy in this world, from where does it come and how can it be?
So only two
alternatives are there. First, the alternative of the atheist who says everything is
unholy. This attitude is okay. He is also a non-dualist; he sees no holiness in the world.
Then there is the tantric's alternative -- he says everything is holy. He is also a
non-dualist. But between these two are the so-called religious persons, who are not really
religious. They are neither religious nor irreligious because they are always in a
conflict. Their whole theology is just to make ends meet, and those ends cannot meet.
If a single cell, a
single atom in this world is unholy, then the whole world becomes unholy, because how can
that single atom exist in a holy world? How can it be? It is supported by everything; to
be, it has to be supported by everything. And if the unholy element is supported by all
the holy elements, then what is the difference between them? So either the world is holy
totally, unconditionally, or it is unholy; there is no middle path.
Tantra says
everything is holy, that is why we cannot understand it. It is the deepest non-dual
standpoint -- if we can call it a standpoint. It is not, because any standpoint is bound
to be dual. It is not against anything, so it is not any standpoint. It is a felt unity, a
lived unity.
These are two
paths, yoga and tantra. Tantra could not be so appealing because of our crippled minds.
But whenever there is someone who is healthy inside, not a chaos, tantra has a beauty.
Only he can understand what tantra is. Yoga has appeal, an easy appeal, because of our
disturbed minds.
Remember, it is
ultimately your mind which makes anything attractive or unattractive. It is you who is the
deciding factor.
These approaches
are different. I am not saying that one cannot reach through yoga. One can reach through
yoga also, but not through the yoga which is prevalent. The yoga which is prevalent is not
really yoga, but the interpretation of your diseased minds. Yoga can be authentically an
approach toward the ultimate, but that too is only possible when your mind is healthy,
when your mind is not diseased and ill. Then yoga takes a different shape.
For example,
Mahavir was on the path of yoga, but he was not really suppressing sex. He had known it,
he had lived it, he was deeply acquainted with it. But it became useless to him, so it
dropped. Buddha was on the path of yoga, but he had lived through the world, he was deeply
acquainted with it. He was not fighting.
Once you know
something you become free from it. It simply drops like dead leaves dropping from a tree.
It is not renunciation; there is no fight involved at all. Look at Buddha's face -- it
doesn't look like the face of a fighter. He has not been fighting. He is so relaxed; his
face is the very symbol of relaxation... no fight.
Look at your yogis.
The fight is apparent on their faces. Deep down much turmoil is there -- right now they
are sitting on volcanos. You can look in their eyes, in their faces, and you will feel it.
Deep down somewhere they have suppressed all their diseases; they have not gone beyond.
In a healthy world,
where everyone is living his life authentically, individually, not imitating others but
living his own life in his own way, both are possible. He may learn the deep sensitivity
which transcends desires; he may come to a point where all desires become futile and drop.
Yoga can also lead to this, but to me yoga will lead to it in the same world where tantra
can lead to it -- remember this. We need a healthy mind, a natural man. In that world
where a natural man is, tantra, and yoga also, will lead to transcendence of desires.
In our so-called
ill society, neither yoga nor tantra can do this, because if we choose yoga we do not
choose it because desires have become useless -- no! They are still meaningful; they are
not dropping by themselves. We have to force them. If we choose yoga, we choose it as a
technique of suppression. If we choose tantra, we choose tantra as a cunningness, as a
deep deception -- an excuse to indulge.
So with an
unhealthy mind neither yoga nor tantra can work. They will both lead to deceptions. A
healthy mind, particularly a sexually healthy mind, is needed to start with. Then it is
not very difficult to choose your path. You can choose yoga, you can choose tantra.
There are two types
of persons basically, male and female. I do not mean biologically, but psychologically.
For those who are psychologically basically male -- aggressive, violent, extrovert -- yoga
is their path. For those who are basically feminine, receptive, passive, non-violent,
tantra is their path. So you may note it: for tantra, Mother Kali, Tara, and so many
DEVIS, BHAIRAVIS -- female deities -- are very significant. In yoga you will never hear
mentioned any name of a feminine deity. Tantra has feminine deities; yoga has male gods.
Yoga is outgoing energy; tantra is energy moving inwards. So you can say in modern
psychological terms that yoga is extrovert and tantra is introvert. So it depends on the
personality. If you have an introverted personality, then fight is not for you. If you
have an extroverted personality, then fight is for you.
But we are just
confused, we are just in a mess; that is why nothing helps. On the contrary, everything
disturbs. Yoga will disturb you, tantra will disturb you. Every medicine is going to
create a new illness for you because the chooser is ill, diseased; so the result of his
choice will be illness. So I do not mean that through yoga you cannot reach. I emphasize
tantra only because we are going to try to understand what tantra is.
Another question:
ON THE PATH OF SURRENDER, HOW DOES THE
SEEKER COME TO THE RIGHT TECHNIQUE OUT OF ONE HUNDRED AND TWELVE METHODS?
On the path of will
there are methods -- these one hundred and twelve methods. On the path of surrender,
surrender itself is the method, there are no other methods -- remember this. All methods
are non-surrendering, because a method means depending on yourself. You can do something;
the technique is there, so you do it. On the path of surrender, you are no more, so you
cannot do anything. You have done the ultimate, the last: you have surrendered. On the
path of surrender, surrender is the only method.
All these one
hundred and twelve methods require a certain will; they require something to be done by
you. You manipulate your energy, you balance your energy, you create a center in your
chaos. You do something. Your effort is significant, basic, required. On the path of
surrender only one thing is required -- you surrender. We will go deep into these one
hundred and twelve methods, so it is good to say something about surrender because it has
no method.
In these one
hundred and twelve methods there will be nothing about surrender. Why has Shiva not said
anything about surrender? Because nothing can be said. Bhairavi herself, Devi herself, has
reached Shiva not through any method. She has simply surrendered. So this must be noted.
She is asking these questions not for herself, these questions are asked for the whole
humanity. She has attained Shiva. She is already in his lap; she is already embraced by
him. She has become one with him, but still she is asking.
So remember one
thing, she is not asking for herself; there is no need. She is asking for the whole
humanity. But if she has attained, why is she asking Shiva? Can she herself not speak to
the humanity? She has come through the path of surrender, so she doesn't know anything
about method. She herself has come through love; love is enough unto itself. Love doesn't
need anything more. She has come through love, so she doesn't know anything about any
methods, techniques. That is why she is asking.
So Shiva relates
one hundred and twelve methods. He also will not talk about
surrender because surrender is not a method really. You surrender only when
every method has become futile, when you cannot reach by any method. You have tried your
best. You have knocked on every door and no door opens, and you have passed through all
the routes and no route reaches. You have done whatsoever you can do, and now you feel
helpless. In that total helplessness surrender happens. So on the path of surrender there
is no method.
But what is
surrender and how does it work? And if surrender works, then what is the need of one
hundred and twelve methods? Then why go into them unnecessarily? -- the mind will ask.
Then okay! If surrender works, it is better to surrender. Why go on hankering after
methods? And who knows whether a particular method will suit you or not? And it may take
lives to find out. So it is good to surrender, but it is difficult. It is the most
difficult thing in the world.
Methods are not difficult. They are easy; you can train
yourself. But for surrender you cannot train yourself... no training! You cannot ask how
to surrender; the very question is absurd. How can you ask how to surrender? Can you ask
how to love?
Either there is
love or there is not, but you cannot ask how to love. And if someone tells you and teaches
you how to love, remember, then you will never be capable of love. Once a technique is
given to you for love, you will cling to the technique. That is why actors cannot love.
They know so many techniques, so many methods -- and we are all actors. Once you know the
trick how to love, then love will not flower because you can create a facade, a deception.
And with the deception you are out of it, not involved. You are protected.
Love is being
totally open, vulnerable. It is dangerous. You become insecure. We cannot ask how to love,
we cannot ask how to surrender. It happens! Love happens, surrender happens. Love and
surrender are deeply one. But what is it? And if we cannot know how to surrender, at least
we can know how we are maintaining ourselves from surrendering, how we are preventing
ourselves from surrendering. That can be known and that is helpful.
How is it that you
have not surrendered yet? What is your technique of non-surrendering? If you have not
fallen in love yet, then the real problem is not how to love. The real problem is to dig
deep to find out how you have lived without love, what is your trick, what is your
technique, what is your structure -- your defense structure, how you have lived without
love. That can be understood, and that should be understood.
First thing: we
live with the ego, in the ego, centered in the ego. I am without knowing who I am. I go on
announcing, "I am." This "I-am-ness" is false, because I do not know
who I am. And unless I know who I am, how can I say "I"? This "I" is a
false "I". This false "I" is the ego. This is the defense. This
protects you from surrendering.
You cannot
surrender, but you can become aware of this defense measure. If you have become aware of
it, it dissolves. By and by, you are not strengthening it, and one day you come to feel,
"I am not." The moment you come to feel "I am not," surrender happens.
So try to find out whether you are. Really, is there any center in you that you can call
your "I"?. Go deep down within yourself, go on trying to find out where is this
"I", where is the abode of this ego.
Rinzai went to his master and he said,
"Give me freedom!" The master said, "Bring yourself. If you are, I will
make you free. But if you are not, then how can I make you free? You are already free. And
freedom," his master said, "is not your freedom. Really, freedom is freedom from
`you'. So go and find out where this `I' is, where you are, then come to me. This is the
meditation. Go and meditate."
So the disciple
Rinzai goes and meditates for weeks, months, and then he comes. Then he says, "I am
not the body. Only this much I have found." So the master says, "This much you
have become free. Go again. Try to find out." Then he tries, meditates, and he finds
that "I am not my mind, because I can observe my thoughts. So the observer is
different from the observed -- I am not my mind." He comes and says, "I am not
my mind." So his master says, "Now you are three-fourths liberated. Now go again
and find out who you are."
So he was thinking,
"I am not my body. I am not my mind." He had read, studied, he was well
informed, so he was thinking, "I am not my body, not my mind, so I must be my soul,
my ATMA." But he meditated, and then he found that there is no atman, no soul,
because this atma is nothing but your mental information -- just doctrines, words,
philosophies.
So he came running
one day and he said, "Now I am no more!" Then his master said, "Am I now to
teach you the methods for freedom?" Rinzai said, "I am free because I am no
more. There is no one to be in bondage. I am just a wide emptiness, a nothingness."
Only nothingness
can be free. If you are something, you will be in bondage. If you are, you will be in
bondage. Only a void, a vacant space, can be free. Then you cannot bind it. Rinzai came
running and said, "I am no more. Nowhere am I to be found." This is freedom. And
for the first time he touched his master's feet -- for the first time! Not actually,
because he had touched them many times before also. But the master said, "For the
first time you have touched my feet."
Rinzai asked,
"Why do you say for the first time? I have touched your feet many times." The
master said, "But you were there, so how could you touch my feet while you were
already there? While you are there how can you touch my feet?" The "I" can
never touch anybody's feet. Even though it apparently looks like it touches somebody's
feet, it is touching its own feet, just in a round-about way. "You have touched my
feet for the first time," the master said, "because now you are no more. And
this is also the last time," the master said. "The first and the last."
Surrender happens
when you are not, so YOU cannot surrender. That is why surrender cannot be a technique.
You cannot surrender -- you are the hindrance. When you are not, surrender is there. So
you and surrender cannot cohabit, there is no coexistence between you and surrender.
Either you are or surrender is. So find out where you are, who you are. This inquiry
creates many, many surprising results.
Raman Maharshi used
to say, "Inquire `Who am I ?'" It was misunderstood. Even his nearest disciples
have not understood the meaning of it. They think that this is an inquiry to find out
really "Who am I?" It is not! if you go on inquiring "Who am I?" you
are bound to come to the conclusion that you are not. This is not really an inquiry to
find out "Who am I?" Really, this is an inquiry to dissolve.
I have given many
this technique, to inquire within "Who am I?" Then a month or two months later,
they will come to me and say, "I have still not found `Who am I?' The question is
still the same; there is no answer."
So I tell them,
"Continue. Someday the answer will come." And they hope that the answer will
come. There is going to be no answer. It is only that the question will dissolve. There is
not going to be an answer, that "You are this." Only the question will dissolve.
There will be no one to ask even "Who am I?" And then you know.
When the
"I" is not, the real "I" opens. When the ego is not, you are for the
first time encountering your being. That being is void. Then you can surrender; then you
have surrendered. You are surrender now. So there can be no techniques, or only negative
techniques like this inquiry into "Who am I?"
How does surrender
work? If you surrender, what happens? We will come to understand how methods work. We will
go deep into methods, and we will come to know how they work. They have a scientific basis
of working.
When you surrender
you become a valley; when you are an ego you are like a peak. Ego means you are above
everyone else, you are somebody. The others may recognize you, may not recognize you --
that is another thing. You recognize that you are above everyone. You are like a peak;
nothing can enter you.
When one
surrenders, one becomes like a valley. One becomes depth, not height. Then the whole
existence begins to pour into him from everywhere. He is just a vacuum, just a depth, an
abyss, bottomless. The whole existence begins to pour from everywhere. You can say God
runs from everywhere to him, enters him from every pore, fills him totally.
This surrender,
this becoming a valley, an abyss, can be felt in many ways. There are minor surrenders;
there are major surrenders. Even in minor surrenders you feel it. Surrendering to a master
is a minor surrender, but you begin to feel it because the master begins to flow into you
immediately. If you surrender to a master, suddenly you feel his energy flowing into you.
If you cannot feel energy flowing into you, then know well you have not surrendered even
in a minor way.
There are so many
stories which have become meaningless for us because we do not know how they happened.
Mahakashyap came to Buddha, and Buddha just touched his head with his hand, and the thing
happened. And Mahakashyap began to dance. So Ananda asked Buddha, "What has happened
to him? And I have been for forty years with you! Is he mad? Or is he just fooling others?
What has happened to him? And I have touched your feet thousands and thousands of
times."
Of course, to
Ananda, this Mahakashyap will either look like he is mad or as if he is just deceiving. He
was with Buddha for forty years, but there was a problem. He was his elder brother,
Buddha's elder brother; that was the problem. When Ananda came to Buddha forty years
before, the first thing he said to Buddha was this: "I am your elder brother, and
when you will initiate me, I will become your disciple. So allow me three things before I
become your disciple, because then I cannot demand. One, I will always be with you. Give
me this promise, that you will not say to me, `Go somewhere else.' I will follow you.
"Secondly, I
will sleep in the same room where you sleep. You cannot say to me, `Go out.' I will be
with you like your shadow. And thirdly, if I bring anyone at any time, even at midnight,
you will have to answer him. You cannot say, `This is not the time.' And give me these
three promises while I am still your elder brother, because once I become your disciple I
will have to follow you. You are still younger than me, so give me these promises."
So Buddha promised,
and this became the problem. For forty years Ananda was with Buddha, but he could never
surrender, because this is not the spirit of surrender. Ananda asked many, many times,
"When am I going to attain?" Buddha said, "Unless I die, you will not
attain." And Ananda could attain only when Buddha died.
What happened to
this Mahakashyap suddenly? Is Buddha partial -- partial to Mahakashyap? He is not! He is
flowing, constantly flowing. But you have to be a valley, a womb, to receive him. If you
are above him, how can you receive? That flowing energy cannot come to you, it will miss
you. So bow down. Even in a minor surrender with a master, energy begins to flow.
Suddenly, immediately, you become a vehicle of a great force.
There are thousands
and thousands of stories... just by a touch, just by a look, someone became enlightened.
They do not appear rational to us. How is this possible? This is possible! Even a look
from the master into your eyes will change your total being, but it can change only if
your eyes are just vacant, valley-like. If you can absorb the look of the master,
immediately you will be different.
So these are minor
surrenders that happen before you surrender totally. And these minor surrenders prepare
you for the total surrender. Once you have known that through surrender you receive
something unknown, unbelievable, unexpected, never even dreamed of, then you are ready for
a major surrender. And that is the work of the master -- to help you in minor surrenders
so that you can gather courage for a major surrender, for a total surrender.
One last question:
WHAT ARE THE EXACT INDICATIONS TO KNOW THAT
THE PARTICULAR TECHNIQUE ONE IS PRACTISING WILL LEAD TO THE ULTIMATE?
There are
indications. One, you begin to feel a different identity within you. You are no more the
same. If the technique fits you, immediately you are a different person. If you are a
husband, you are no more the same husband. If you are a shopkeeper, you are never again
the same shopkeeper. Whatsoever you are, if the technique fits you, you are a different
person; that is the first indication. So if you begin to feel strange about yourself, know
that something is happening to you. If you remain the same and do not feel any
strangeness, nothing is happening. This is the first indication of whether a technique
fits you. If it fits, immediately you are transported, transformed into a different
person. Suddenly this happens: you look at the world in a different way. The eyes are the
same, but the looker behind them is different.
Secondly, all that
creates tensions, conflicts, starts dropping. It is not that when you have practiced the
method for years, then your conflicts, anxieties, tensions will drop -- no! If the method
fits you, immediately they start dropping. You can feel an aliveness coming to you; you
are being unburdened. You will begin to feel, if the technique fits you, that gravity has
become reversed. Now the earth is not pulling you down. Rather, the sky is pulling you up.
How do you feel when an airplane takes off? Everything is disturbed. Suddenly there is a
jerk, and gravity becomes meaningless. Now the earth is not pulling you, you are going
away from gravity.
The same jerk
happens if a meditative technique fits you. Suddenly you take off. Suddenly you feel the
earth has become meaningless; there is no gravity. It is not pulling you down, you are
being pulled up. In religious terminology, this is called "grace". There are two
forces -- gravity and grace. Grace means you are being pulled upwards; gravity means you
are being pulled downwards.
That is why in
meditation many people suddenly feel they have no weight. That is why many people feel an
inner levitation. So many have reported this to me when the technique fits them:
"This is strange! We close our eyes and we feel that we are a little bit above the
earth -- one foot, two feet, even four feet above the earth. When we open our eyes we are
just on the ground; when we close our eyes we have levitated. So what is this? When we
open our eyes we are just on the ground! We never levitated."
The body remains on
the ground, but you levitate. This levitation is really a pull from the above. If the
technique fits you have been pulled, because the working of the technique is to make
available for you the upward pull. This is what the technique means: to make you available
for the force which can pull you up. So if it fits, you know -- you have become
weightless.
Thirdly, whatsoever
you will now do, whatsoever, howsoever trivial, will be different. You will walk in a
different way, you will sit in a different way, you will eat in a different way.
Everything will be different. This difference you will feel everywhere. Sometimes this
strange experience of being different creates fear. One wants again to go back and be the
same, because one was so attuned with the old. It was a routine world, even boring, but
you were efficient in it.
Now everywhere you
will feel a gap. You will feel that your efficiency is lost. You will feel that your
utility is reduced. You will feel that everywhere you are an outsider. One has to pass
through this period. You will become attuned again. You have changed, not the world, so
you will not fit. So remember the third thing: When the technique fits you, you will not
fit into the world. You will become unfit. Everywhere something is loose, some bolt is
missing. Everywhere you will feel that there has been an earthquake. And everything has
remained the same; only you, you, have become different. But you will be attuned again on
a different plane, on a higher plane.
The disturbance is
felt just like when a child grows and becomes sexually mature. At the age of fourteen or
fifteen every boy feels that he has become strange. A new force has entered -- sex. It was
not there before, or it was, but it was hidden. Now for the first time he has become
available for a new kind of force. That is why boys are very awkward; girls, boys, when
they become sexually mature, they are very awkward. They are nowhere. They are no longer
children and they are not yet men, so they are in between, fitting nowhere. If they play
with small children they feel awkward -- they have become men. If they start making
friendships with men they feel awkward -- they are still children. They fit with no one.
The same phenomenon
happens when a technique fits you. A new energy source becomes available that is greater
than sex. You are again in a transitory period. Now you cannot fit in this world of
worldly men. You are not a child, and you cannot yet fit in the world of saints; and in
between one feels awkward.
If a technique fits
you these three things will come up. You may not have expected that I would say these
things. You may have expected that I would say you will become more silent, more quiet,
and I am saying quite the contrary: you will become more disturbed. When the technique
fits you will become more disturbed, not more silent. Silence will come later on. And if
silence comes and not disturbance, know well that this is not a technique; this is just
getting adjusted to the old pattern.
That is why more
people go for a prayer than for meditation because prayer gives you a consolation. It fits
you, adjusts to you, to your world. Prayer was doing virtually the same thing that
psychoanalysts are now doing. If you are disturbed they will make you less disturbed,
adjusted to the pattern, to the society, to the family. So by going to a psychoanalyst for
one, two or three years you will not get better, but you will be more adjusted. Prayer
does the same thing, and priests do the same thing -- they make you more adjusted.
Your child has died
and you are disturbed, and you go to a priest. He says, "Do not be disturbed. Only
those children die early whom God loves more. He calls them up." You feel satisfied.
Your child has been "called up." God loves him more. Or the priest says
something else: "Do not be worried, the soul never dies. Your child is in
heaven."
One woman was here
just a few days before. Her husband had died just during the past month. She was
disturbed. She came to me and she said, "Only assure me that he is reborn in a good
place and then everything will be okay. Just give me a certainty that he has not gone to
hell or he has not become an animal, that he is in heaven or he has become a god or some
such thing. If you can just assure me of this, then everything is okay. Then I can bear
it; otherwise I am miserable."
The priest would
say, "Okay! Your husband is born as a god in the seventh heaven, and he is very
happy. And he is waiting for you."
These prayers, they
make you adjusted to the pattern... you feel better. Meditation is a science. It is not
going to help you in adjustment, it is going to help you in transformation. That is why I
say these three signs will be there as indications. Silence will come, but not as an
adjustment. Silence will come as an inner flowering. Then silence will not be an
adjustment with the society, with the family, the world, the business -- no! Then silence
will be a real harmony with the universe.
Then a deep harmony
flowers between you and the totality, then there is silence -- but that will come later.
First you will get disturbed, first you will become mad.
If a technique
fits, it will make you aware of everything that you are. Your anarchy, your mind, your
madness, everything will come to light. You are just a dark mess. When a technique fits,
it is as if suddenly there is light and the whole mess becomes apparent. For the first
time you will encounter yourself as you are. You would like to put the light off and go to
sleep again -- it is fearful. This is the point where the master becomes helpful. He says,
"Do not be afraid. This is just the beginning. And do not escape from it."
At first this light
shows you what you are, and if you can go on and on, it transforms you toward what you can
be.
Enough for today. |
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