VIEW WITH INTERNET EXPLORER + SCREEN AT 800 X 600 PIXELS + SMALL ARIAL FONTS | ||
oshothe vigyana bhairava tantra vol one | ||
the book of the secrets : a new commentary : talks given from 01/10/1972 pm to 01/03/1973 pm | ||
the vigyana bhairava tantra vol one chapter eleven | ||
techniques to penetrate the inner centres 14 november 1972 pm in woodlands bombay | ||
CLOSING THE SEVEN OPENINGS OF THE HEAD WITH YOUR HANDS, A
SPACE BETWEEN YOUR EYES BECOMES ALL INCLUSIVE. BLESSED ONE, AS
SENSES ARE ABSORBED IN THE HEART, REACH THE CENTER OF THE LOTUS. UNMINDING MIND,
KEEP IN THE MIDDLE -- UNTIL. Man is as if he is
a circle without a center. His life is superficial; his life is only on the circumference.
You live on the outside, you never live within. You cannot, unless a center is found. You
cannot live within, really you have no within. You are without a center, you have only the
without. That is why we go on talking about the within, about how to go in, how to know
oneself, how to penetrate inwards, but these words do not carry any authentic meaning. You
know the meaning of the words, but you cannot feel what they mean because you are never
in. You have never been in. Even when you are
alone, in your mind you are in a crowd. When no one is there outside, still you are not
within. You go on thinking of others; you go on moving outwards. Even while asleep you are
dreaming of others, you are not within. Only in very deep sleep, when there is no
dreaming, are you within; but then you become unconscious. Remember this fact: when you
are conscious you are never within, and when you are within in deep sleep you become
unconscious. So your whole consciousness consists of the without. And whenever we talk
about going within, the words are understood but the meaning is not -- because the meaning
is not carried by the words, the meaning comes through experience. Words are without
meaning. When I say 'within', you understand the word -- but only the word, not the
meaning. You do not know what within is, because consciously you have never been within.
Your mind is constantly outgoing. You do not have any feel of what the inner means or what
it is. That is what I mean
when I say that you are a circle without a center -- a circumference only. The center is
there, but you drop into it only when you are not conscious. Otherwise, when you are
conscious you move outwards, and because of this your life is never intense; it cannot be.
It is just lukewarm. You are alive as if dead, or both simultaneously. You are deadly
alive -- living a dead-like life. You are existing at the minimum -- not at the maximum
peak, but at the minimum. You can say, "I am," that is all. You are not dead;
that is what you mean by being alive. But life can never
be known at the circumference. Life can be known only at the center. On the circumference
only lukewarm life is possible. So really, you live a very inauthentic life, and then even
death becomes inauthentic -- because one who has not really lived cannot really die. Only
authentic life can become authentic death. Then death is beautiful: anything authentic is
beautiful. Even life, if it is inauthentic, is bound to be ugly. And your life is ugly,
just rotten. Nothing happens. You simply go on waiting, hoping that something will happen
somewhere, someday. At this very moment
there is just emptiness, and every moment has been like that in the past -- just empty.
You are just waiting for the future, hoping that something will happen someday, just
hoping. Then every moment is lost. It has not happened in the past, so it is not going to
happen in the future either. It can happen only in this moment, but then you will need an
intensity, a penetrating intensity. Then you will need to be rooted in the center. Then
the periphery will not do. Then you will have to find your moment. Really, we never think
about what we are, and whatsoever we think is just hokum. Once I lived with a
professor on a university campus. One day he came and he was very upset, so I asked,
"What is the matter?" He said, "I
feel feverish." I was reading
something, so I said to him, "Go to sleep. Take this blanket and rest." He went to the bed,
but after a few minutes he said, "No, I am not feverish. Really, I am angry. Someone
has insulted me, and I feel much violence against him." So I said,
"Why did you say that you are feeling feverish?" He said, "I
couldn't acknowledge the fact that I was angry, but really I am angry. There is no
fever." He threw off the blanket. Then I said,
"Okay, if you are angry then take this pillow. Beat it and be violent with it. Let
your violence be released. And if the pillow is not enough, then I am available. You can
beat me, and let this anger be thrown out." He laughed, but the
laughter was false -- just painted on his face. It came on his face and then disappeared,
it never penetrated in. It never came from within; it was just a painted smile. But the
laughter, even false laughter, created a gap. He said, "Not really... I am not really
angry. Someone said something before others, and I felt very much embarrassed. Really,
this is the thing." So I said to him,
"You have changed your statement about your own feelings three times within half an
hour. You said you were feeling feverish, then you said you were angry, and now you say
that you are not angry but just embarrassed. Which one is real?" He said,
"Really, I am embarrassed." I said,
"Which? When you said you were feverish, you were also certain about that. When you
said you were angry, you were also certain about that. And you are also certain about
this. Are you one person or many persons? For how long a time is this certainty going to
continue?" So the man said,
"Really, I do not know what I am feeling. What it is, I do not know. I am simply
disturbed. Whether to call it anger or embarrassment or what, I do not know. And this is
not the moment to discuss it with me." He said, "Leave me alone. You have made
my situation philosophical. You are discussing what is real, what is authentic, and I am
feeling very much disturbed." This is not only
with some other person -- X, Y or Z -- it is with you. You are never certain, because
certainty comes from being centered. You are not even certain about yourself. It is
impossible to be certain about others when you are never certain about yourself. There is
just a vagueness, a cloudiness; nothing is certain. Someone was here
just a few days ago, and he said to me, "I am in love with someone, and I want to
marry her." I looked into his eyes deeply for a few minutes without saying anything.
He became restless and he said, "Why are you looking at me? I feel so awkward."
I continued looking. He said, "Do you think that my love is false?" I didn't say
anything, I just continued looking. He said,
"Why do you feel that this marriage is not going to be good?" He said by
himself, "I had not really thought it over very much, and that is why I have come to
you. Really, I do not know whether I am in love or not." I had not said a
single word. I was just looking into his eyes. But he became restless, and things which
were inside began to come up, to bubble up. You are not
certain, you cannot be certain about anything; neither about your love, nor about your
hate, nor about your friendships. There is nothing which you can be certain about because
you have no center. Without a center there is no certainty. All your feelings of certainty
are false and momentary. One moment you will feel that you are certain, but the next
moment the certainty will have gone because in each moment you have a different center.
You do not have a permanent center, a crystallized center. Each moment is an atomic
center, so each moment has its own self. George Gurdjieff
used to say that man is a crowd. Personality is just a deception because you are not a
person, you are many persons. So when one person speaks in you, that is a momentary
center. The next moment there is another. With every moment, with every atomic situation,
you feel certain, and you never become aware that you are just a flux -- many waves
without any center. Then in the end you will feel that life has been just a wastage. It is
bound to be. There is just a wastage, just a wandering -- purposeless, meaningless. Tantra, yoga,
religion... their basic concern is how first to discover the center, how first to be an
individual. They are concerned with how to find the center which persists in every
situation. Then, as life goes on moving without, as the flux of life goes on and on, as
waves come and go, the center persists inside. Then you remain one -- rooted, centered. These sutras are
techniques to find the center. The center is already there, because there is no
possibility of being a circle without a center. The circle can exist only with a center,
so the center is only forgotten. It is there, but we are not aware. It is there, but we do
not know how to look at it. We do not know how to focus the consciousness on it. The third technique about centering: 15 15 CLOSING THE SEVEN OPENINGS OF THE HEAD WITH YOUR HANDS, A
SPACE BETWEEN YOUR EYES BECOMES ALL INCLUSIVE. This is one of the
oldest techniques -- very much used, and one of the simplest also. Close all the openings
of the head -- eyes, ears, nose, mouth. When all the openings of the head are closed, your
consciousness, which is continuously flowing out, is stopped suddenly: it cannot move out. You may not have
observed, but even if you stop your breathing for a moment, suddenly your mind will stop
-- because with breathing mind moves on. That is a conditioning with the mind. You must
understand what `conditioning' means, then only will this sutra be easy to understand. Pavlov, one of the
most famous Russian psychologists, has created this term "conditioning" -- or
"conditioned reflex" -- a day-to-day word used all over the world. Everyone who
is acquainted with psychology even a little knows the word. Two processes of thought --
any two processes -- can become so associated that if you start with one, the other is
also triggered. This is the famous
Pavlovian example. Pavlov worked with a dog. He found that if you put dog food before a
dog, its saliva begins to flow. The tongue of the dog comes out and he begins to get
ready, prepared for eating. This is natural. When he is seeing the food, or even imagining
the food, saliva starts flowing. But Pavlov conditioned this process with another.
Whenever the saliva would start to flow and the food was there, he would do some other
things. For example, he would ring a bell, and the dog would listen to the bell ringing.
For fifteen days, whenever the food was placed, the bell would ring. Then on the sixteenth
day food was not placed before the dog, only the bell was rung. But still the saliva
started flowing and the tongue came out, as if the food was there. But there was no
food, only the bell ringing. There is no natural association between the bell ringing and
saliva, the natural association is with food. But now the continuous ringing of the bell
had become associated with it, and even the ringing of the bell would start the process. According to Pavlov
-- and he is right -- our whole life is a conditioned process. The mind is a conditioning.
Thus, if you stop something in the conditioning, every other associated thing also stops. For example, you
have never thought without breathing. Thinking has always been with breathing. You are not
conscious of breathing, but breathing is there continuously, day and night. Every thought,
every thinking process is associated with breathing. If you stop your breathing suddenly,
thought will also stop. And if all the seven holes -- the seven openings of the head --
are closed, your consciousness suddenly cannot move out. It remains in, and that remaining
in creates a space between your eyes. That space is known as the third eye. If all the openings
of the head are closed you cannot move out, because you have always been moving out from
these openings. You remain in, and with your consciousness remaining in it becomes
concentrated between these two eyes, between these two ordinary eyes. It remains in
between these two eyes, focused. That spot is known as the third eye. This space BECOMES
ALL INCLUSIVE. This sutra says that in this space everything is included; the whole
existence is included. If you can feel the space, you have felt all. Once you can feel
inside this space between the two eyes, then you have known existence, the totality of it,
because this inner space is all inclusive. Nothing is left out of it. The Upanishads say,
"Knowing the one, one knows all." These two eyes can only see the finite. The
third eye sees the infinite. These two eyes can only see the material. The third eye sees
the immaterial, the spiritual. With these two eyes you can never feel the energy, you can
never see the energy; you can see only matter. But with the third eye, energy as such is
seen. This closing of the
openings is a way of centering, because once the stream of consciousness cannot flow out,
it remains at its source. That source of consciousness is the third eye. If you are
centered at the third eye, many things happen. The first is discovering that the whole
world is in you. Swami Ramateertha
used to say that "The sun moves in me, the stars move in me, the moon rises in me.
The whole universe is in me." When he said this for the first time, his disciples
thought he had gone crazy. How can stars be in Ramateertha? He was talking
about the third eye, the inner space. When for the first time the inner space becomes
illumined, this is the feeling. When you see that everything is in you, you become the
universe. The third eye is
not part of your physical body. The space between our two eyes is not a space which is
confined in your body. It is the infinite space which has penetrated in you. Once this
space is known, you will never be the same person again. The moment you know this inner
space, you have known the deathless. Then there is no death. When you know this
space for the first time, your life will be authentic, intense, for the first time really
alive. Now no security is needed, now no fear is possible. Now you cannot be killed. Now
nothing can be taken away from you. Now the whole universe belongs to you: you are the
universe. Those who have known this inner space, they have cried in ecstasy, "AHAM
BRAHMASMI! I am the universe, I am the existence." The Sufi mystic
Mansoor was murdered only because of this experience of the third eye. When for the first
time he became aware of this inner space, he started crying, "I am God!" In
India he would have been worshipped, because India has known many, many persons who have
come to know this inner space of the third eye. But in a Mohammedan country it was
difficult. And Mansoor's statement that "I am God -- ANA'L HAK!" -- was taken to
be something anti-religious, because Mohammedanism cannot conceive that man and God can
become one. Man is man -- the created -- and God is the creator, so how can the created
become the creator? So this statement of Mansoor's, "I am God," could not be
understood; thus, he was murdered. But when he was being murdered, killed, he was
laughing. So someone asked, "Why are you laughing, Mansoor?" Mansoor is reported
to have said, "I am laughing because you are not killing me, and you cannot kill me.
You are deceived by this body, but I am not this body. I am the creator of this universe,
and it was my finger which moved this whole universe in the beginning." In India he would
have been understood easily. The language has been known for centuries and centuries. We
have known that a moment comes when the inner space is known. Then one simply goes mad.
And this realization is so certain that even if you kill a Mansoor he will not change his
statement -- because really, you cannot kill him as far as he is concerned. Now he has
become the whole. There is no possibility of destroying him. After Mansoor,
Sufis learned that it is good to be silent. So in Sufi tradition, after Mansoor, it has
been consistently taught to disciples, "Whenever you come to the third eye, remain
silent and do not say anything. Whenever this happens, then keep quiet. Do not say
anything, or just go on formally saying things which people believe." So Islam has now
two traditions. One is just the ordinary, the outward, the exoteric; another, the real
Islam, is Sufism -- the esoteric. But Sufis remain silent, because since Mansoor they have
learned that to talk in that language which comes when the third eye opens is to be
unnecessarily in difficulty -- and it helps no one. This sutra says: The fourth
technique: LISTEN
TO OSHO SPEAK ON THIS MEDITATION BLESSED ONE, AS SENSES ARE ABSORBED IN THE HEART, REACH
THE CENTER OF THE LOTUS. When you feel
suffocated, go on -- unless it becomes absolutely unbearable, because breathing will be
closed. Go on, unless it becomes absolutely unbearable. And when it is absolutely
unbearable, you will not be able to close the openings any more, so you need not worry.
The inner force will throw all the openings open. So as far as you are concerned,
continue. When the suffocation comes, that is the moment -- because the suffocation will
break the old associations. If you can continue for a few moments more, it would be good.
It will be difficult and arduous, and you will feel that you are going to die -- but do
not be afraid, because you cannot die. You cannot die just by closing the openings. But
when you feel now you are going to die, that is the moment. If you can persist
in that moment, suddenly everything will be illumined. You will feel the inner space which
goes on spreading, and the whole is included in it. Then open your openings. Go on trying
it again and again. Whenever you have time, try it. But do not practice it. You can
practice stopping the breath for a few moments. But practice will not help, a sudden jerk
is needed. In that jerk, the flow into your old channels of consciousness stops, and a new
thing becomes possible. Many practice this
even today -- many persons all over India. But they practice it, and it is a sudden
method. If you practice, then nothing will happen. If I throw you out of this room
suddenly, your thoughts will stop. But if we practice it daily, then nothing will happen.
It will become a mechanical habit. So do not practice it. Just try it whenever you can.
Then suddenly, by and by, you will become aware of an inner space. That inner space comes
only to your consciousness when you are on the verge of death. When you are feeling,
"Now I cannot continue for a single moment; now death is near," that is the
right moment. Persist! Do not be afraid. Death is not so easy. At least up until now not a
single person has died using this method. There are built-in
securities, that is why you cannot die. Before death one becomes unconscious. If you are
conscious and feeling that you are going to die, do not be afraid. You are still
conscious, so you cannot die. And if you become unconscious, then your breath will start.
Then you cannot prevent it. So you can use ear plugs, etc. Hands are not necessary. Hands
were used only because if you are falling into unconsciousness, the hands will become
loose and the life process will resume again by itself. You can use plugs
for the ears, a mask for the eyes, but do not use any plugs for the nose or for the mouth,
because then it can become fatal. At least the nose should remain open. Close it with your
hands. Then when you are actually falling into unconsciousness, the hands will become
loose and the breathing will come in. So there is a built-in security. This method can be
used by many. The fourth method is for those who have a very developed heart, who are loving, feeling types, emotional. BLESSED ONE, AS SENSES ARE ABSORBED IN THE HEART, REACH THE CENTER OF THE LOTUS. This method can be
used only by heart-oriented persons. Therefore, understand first what is a heart-oriented
person. Then this method can be understood. With one who is
heart-oriented, everything leads to the heart, everything. If you love him, his heart will
feel your love, not his head. A head-oriented person, even when loved, feels it
cerebrally, in the head. He thinks about it; he plans about it. Even his love is a
deliberate effort of the mind. A feeling type
lives without reasoning. Of course, the heart has its own reasons, but it lives without
reasoning. If someone asks you, "Why do you love?" if you can answer why, then
you are a head-oriented person. And if you say, "I do not know, I just love,"
you are a heart-oriented person. Even if you say
that someone is beautiful and that is why you love, it is a reason. For a heart-oriented
person, someone is beautiful because they love him. The head-oriented person loves someone
because he is beautiful or she is beautiful. The reason comes first, and then comes love.
For the heart-oriented, love comes first and then everything else follows. The feeling
type is centered in the heart, so whatsoever happens touches his heart. Just observe
yourself. In your life, many things are happening every moment. Where do they touch you?
You are passing, and a beggar crosses the street. Where are you touched by the beggar? Do
you start thinking about economic conditions? Do you start thinking about how begging
should be stopped by law, or about how a socialist society should be created so that there
are no beggars? This is a head-oriented man. This beggar becomes just a datum for him. His
heart is not touched, only his head is touched. He is not going to do something for this
beggar here and now -- no! He will do something for communism, he will do something for
the future, for some utopia. He may even devote his whole life, but he cannot do anything
just now. The mind is always
doing in the future; the heart is always here and now. A heart-oriented person will do
something now for this beggar. This beggar is an individual, not a datum. But for a
head-oriented man, this beggar is just a mathematical figure. For him, how begging should
be stopped is the problem, not that this beggar should be helped -- that is irrelevant. So
just watch yourself. In many situations, watch how you act. Are you concerned with the
heart or are you concerned with the head? If you feel that
you are a heart-oriented person, then this method will be very helpful to you. But know
well that everyone is trying to deceive himself that he is heart-oriented. Everyone tries
to feel that he is a very loving person, a feeling type -- because love is such a basic
need that no one can feel at ease if he sees that he has no love, no loving heart. So
everyone goes on thinking and believing this, but belief will not do. Observe very
impartially, as if you are observing someone else, and then decide -- because there is no
need to deceive yourself, and it will be of no help. Even if you deceive yourself, you
cannot deceive the technique, so when you do this technique you will feel that nothing is
happening. People come to me,
and I ask them to what type they belong. They do not know really. They have never thought
about it -- about what type they are. They have just vague conceptions about themselves,
and those conceptions are really just imagination. They have certain ideals and
self-images, and they think -- or rather, they wish -- that they are those images. They
are not, and often it happens that they prove to be just the contrary. There is a reason
for it. A person who insists that he is a heart-oriented person may be insisting only
because he feels the absence of heart, and he is afraid. He cannot become aware of the
fact that he has no heart. Look at the world!
If everyone is right about his heart, then this world cannot be so heartless. This world
is our total, so somewhere, something is wrong. Heart is not there. Really, it was never
trained to be there. Mind is trained, so it is there. There are schools, colleges,
universities to train the mind, but there is no place to train the heart. And the training
of the mind pays, but the training of the heart is dangerous. If your heart is trained you
will become absolutely unfit for this world, because the whole world is run through
reason. If your heart is
trained, you will just be absurd in the context of the whole pattern. When the whole world
will be moving to the right, you will be moving to the left. Everywhere you will feel
difficulty. Really, the more man becomes civilized, the less and less the heart is
trained. We have really forgotten about it -- that it exists, or that there is any need
for its training. That is why such methods, which can work very easily, never work. Most of the
religions are based on heart-oriented
techniques -- Christianity, Islam, Hinduism and many others. They are based on the
heart-oriented person. The older the religion, the more it is based on heart-oriented
persons. Really, when the Vedas were written and Hinduism was developing, there were
people who were heart-oriented. And to find a mind-oriented person then was really
difficult. But now the reverse is a problem. You cannot pray, because prayer is a
heart-oriented technique. That is why even in the West, where Christianity -- which is a
religion of prayer -- prevails, prayer has become difficult. Particularly, the Catholic
Church is prayer-oriented. There exists no
such thing as meditation for Christianity, but now even in the West people are becoming
crazy about meditation. No one is going to church -- and even if someone is going, it is
just a formal thing, just Sunday religion -- because the heart-oriented prayer has become
absolutely unknown for man as he is in the West. Meditation is more mind-oriented, prayer is more heart-oriented. Or we can say that prayer is a technique of meditation for heart-oriented persons. This technique is also for heart- oriented persons: BLESSED ONE, AS
SENSES ARE ABSORBED IN THE HEART, REACH THE CENTER OF THE LOTUS. So what is to be done in this technique? AS SENSES ARE ABSORBED IN THE HEART... Try! Many ways are
possible. You touch someone: if you are a heart-oriented person the touch immediately goes
to your heart, and you can feel the quality. If you take the hand of a person who is
head-oriented, the hand will be cold -- not just cold, but the very quality will be cold.
A deadness, a certain deadness will be in the hand. If the person is heart-oriented then
there is a certain warmth, then his hand will really melt with you. You will feel a
certain thing flowing from his hand to you, and there will be a meeting, a communication
of warmth. This warmth comes
from the heart. It can never come from the head, because the head is always cool... cold,
calculative. The heart is warm, non-calculative. The head always thinks about how to take
more; the heart always feels how to give more. That warmth is just a giving -- a giving of
energy, a giving of inner vibrations, a giving of life. That is why you feel a different
quality in it. If the person really embraces you, you will feel a deep melting with him. Touch! Close your
eyes; touch anything. Touch your beloved or your lover, touch your child or your mother or
your friend, or touch a tree or a flower, or just touch the earth. Close your eyes and
feel a communication from your heart to the earth, or to your beloved. Feel that your hand
is just your heart stretched out to touch the earth. Let the feeling of touch be related
to the heart. You are listening
to music. Do not listen to it from the head. Just forget your head and feel that you are
headless, there is no head at all. It is good to have a picture of yourself without the
head in your bedroom. Concentrate on it; you are without the head, do not allow the head
to come in. While listening to music, listen to it from the heart. Feel the music coming
to your heart; let your heart vibrate with it. Let your senses be joined to the heart, not
to the head. Try this with all the senses, and feel more and more that every sense goes
into the heart and dissolves into it. BLESSED ONE, AS SENSES ARE ABSORBED IN THE HEART, REACH THE CENTER OF THE LOTUS. The heart is the
lotus. Every sense is just the opening of the lotus, the petals of the lotus. Try to
relate your senses to the heart first. Secondly, always think that every sense goes deep
down into the heart and becomes absorbed in it. When these two things become established,
only then will your senses begin to help you. They will lead you to the heart, and your
heart will become a lotus. This lotus of the
heart will give you a centering. Once you know the center of the heart, it is very easy to
fall down into the navel center, very easy. This sutra does not even mention this -- there
is no need. If you are really absorbed in the heart totally, and reason has stopped
working, then you will fall down. From the heart, the door is opened toward the navel.
Only from the head is it difficult to go toward the navel. Or if you are between the two,
between the heart and the head, then too it is difficult to go to the navel. Once you are
absorbed in the navel, you have suddenly fallen beyond the heart. You have fallen into the
navel center which is the basic one -- the original. That is why prayer
helps. That is why Jesus could say, "Love is God." It is not exactly right, but
love is the door. If you are deeply in love -- with anyone, it doesn't matter who... Love
matters; the object of love doesn't matter. If you are in deep love with anyone, so much
in love that there is no relationship from the head, if just the heart is functioning,
then this love will become prayer and your beloved or your lover will become divine. Really, the eye of
the heart cannot see anything else, and that is why it happens with ordinary love also. If
you fall in love with someone, that someone becomes divine. It may not prove to be very
lasting, and it may not prove to be a very deep thing, but in that moment the lover or the
beloved becomes divine. The head will destroy the whole thing sooner or later, because the
head will come in and try to manage everything. Even love has to be managed. And once the
head manages, everything is destroyed. If you can be in
love without the head's management coming in, your love is bound to become prayer and your
beloved will become the door. Your love will make you centered in the heart -- and once
you are centered in the heart, you automatically fall down deep into the navel center. The fifth
technique: 17 17 UNMINDING MIND, KEEP IN THE MIDDLE -- UNTIL. Only this much is
the sutra. Just like any scientific sutra it is short, but even these few words can
transform your life totally. UNMINDING MIND, KEEP IN THE MIDDLE -- UNTIL. KEEP IN THE
MIDDLE... Buddha developed his whole technique of meditation on this sutra. His path is
known as MAJJHIM NIKAYA -- the middle path.
Buddha says, "Remain always in the middle -- in everything." One Prince Shrown
took initiation, Buddha initiated him into sannyas. That prince was a rare man, and when
he took sannyas, when he was initiated, his whole kingdom was just amazed. The kingdom
couldn't believe it, the people couldn't believe that Prince Shrown could become a
sannyasin. No one had ever even imagined it, as he was a man of this world -- indulging in
everything, indulging to the extreme. Wine and women were his whole milieu. Then suddenly
Buddha came to the town, and the prince went to see him for a DARSHAN -- A spiritual
encounter. He fell at Buddha's feet and he said, "Initiate me. I will leave this
world." Those who had come with him were not even aware... this was so sudden. So
they asked Buddha, "What is happening? This is a miracle. Shrown is not that type of
man, and he has lived very luxuriously. Up to now we couldn't even imagine that Shrown is
going to take sannyas, so what has happened? You have done something." Buddha said,
"I have not done anything. Mind can move easily from one extreme to the other. That
is the way of the mind -- to move from one extreme to another. So Shrown is not doing
something new. It is to be expected. Because you do not know the law of the mind, that is
why you are so much taken aback." The mind moves from
one extreme to another, that is the way of the mind. So it happens every day: a person who
was mad after wealth renounces everything, becomes a naked fakir. We think, "What a
miracle!" But it is nothing -- just the ordinary law. A person who was not mad after
wealth cannot be expected to renounce, because only from one extreme can you move to
another -- just like a pendulum, from one extreme to the other. So a person who was
after wealth, mad after wealth, will become mad against it, but the madness will remain --
that is the mind. A man who lived just for sex may become a celibate, may move into
isolation, but the madness will remain. Before he was living only for sex, now he will be
living only against sex -- but the attitude, the approach, remains the same. So a BRAHMACHARI, a
celibate, is not really beyond sex; his whole mind is sex-oriented. He is against, but not
beyond. The way of beyond is always in the middle, it is never at the extreme. So Buddha
says, "This could have been expected. No miracle has happened. This is how mind
works." Shrown became a
beggar, a sannyasin. He became a BHIKKHU, a monk, and soon other disciples of Buddha
observed that he was moving to the other extreme. Buddha never asked anyone to be naked,
but Shrown became naked. Buddha was not for nakedness. He said, "That is just another
extreme." There are persons
who live for clothes as if that is their life, and there are other persons who become
naked -- but both believe in the same thing. Buddha never taught nakedness, but Shrown
became naked. He was the only disciple of Buddha who was naked. He became very, very
self-torturing. Buddha allowed one meal every day for the sannyasins, but Shrown would
take only one meal on alternate days. He became lean and thin. While all the other
disciples would sit for meditation under trees, in the shade, he would never sit under any
tree. He would always remain in the hot sun. He was a beautiful man and he had a very
lovely body, but within six months no one could recognize that he was the same man. He
became ugly, dark, black, burned. Buddha went to
Shrown one night and asked him, "Shrown, I have heard that when you were a prince,
before initiation, you used to play on a VEENA, a sitar, and you were a great musician. So
I have come to ask you one question. If the strings of the veena are very loose, what
happens?" Shrown said, "If the strings are very loose, then no music is
possible." And then Buddha said, "And if the strings are very tight, too tight,
then what happens?" Shrown said, "Then too music cannot be produced. The strings
must be in the middle -- neither loose nor tight, but just exactly in the middle."
Shrown said, "It is easy to play the veena, but only a master can set these strings
right, in the middle." So Buddha said,
"This much I have to say to you, after observing you for the last six months -- that
in life also the music comes only when the strings are neither loose nor tight, but just
in the middle. So to renounce is easy, but only a master knows how to be in the middle. So
Shrown, be a master, and let these strings of life be just in the middle -- in everything.
Do not go to this extreme, do not go to that one. Everything has two extremes, but you
remain just in the middle." But the mind is
very unmindful. That is why the sutra says, UNMINDING MIND... You will hear this, you will
understand this, but the mind will not take note. The mind will always go on choosing
extremes. The extreme has a
fascination for the mind. Why? Because in the middle, mind dies. Look at a pendulum: if
you have any old clock, look at the pendulum. The pendulum can go on moving the whole day
if it goes to the extremes. When it goes to the left it is gathering momentum to go to the
right. When it goes toward the right, do not think that it is going toward the right -- it
is accumulating momentum to go toward the left. So the extremes are right-left,
right-left. Let the pendulum
stay in the middle, then the whole momentum is lost. Then the pendulum has no energy,
because the energy comes from one of the extremes. Then that extreme throws it toward
another, then again, and it is a circle... the pendulum goes on moving. Let it be in the
middle, and the whole movement will then stop. Mind is just like a
pendulum and every day, if you observe, you will come to know this. You decide one thing
on one extreme, and then you move to another. You are angry; then you repent. You decide,
"No, this is enough. Now I will never be angry." But you do not see the extreme. "Never"
is an extreme. How are you so certain that you will never be angry? What are you saying?
Think once more -- never? Then go to the past and remember how many times you have decided
that "I will never be angry." When you say, "I will never be angry,"
you do not know that by being angry you have accumulated momentum to go to the other
extreme. Now you are feeling
repentant, you are feeling bad. Your self-image is disturbed, shaken. Now you cannot say
you are a good man, you cannot say that you are a religious man. You have been angry, and
how can a religious man be angry? How can a good man be angry? So you repent to regain
your goodness again. At least in your own eyes you can feel at ease -- that you have
repented and you have decided that now there will be no more anger. The shaken image has
come back to the old status quo. Now you feel at ease, you have moved to another extreme. But the mind that
says, "Now I will never be angry," will again be angry. And when you are again
angry, you will forget completely your repentance, your decision -- everything. After
anger, again the decision will come and the repentance will come, and you will never feel
the deception of it. This has been so always. Mind moves from
anger to repentance, from repentance to anger. Remain in the middle. Do not be angry and
do not repent. If you have been angry, then please, at least do this: do not repent. Do
not move to the other extreme. Remain in the middle. Say, "I have been angry and I am
a bad man, a violent man. I have been angry. This is how I am." But do not repent; do
not move to the other extreme. Remain in the middle. If you can remain, you will not
gather the momentum, the energy to be angry again. So this sutra says,
UNMINDING MIND, KEEP IN THE MIDDLE -- UNTIL. And what is meant by UNTIL? Until you
explode! Keep in the middle until the mind dies. Keep in the middle until there is no
mind. So, UNMINDING MIND, KEEP IN THE MIDDLE -- UNTIL there is no mind. If mind is at the
extremes, then the middle will be no-mind. But this is the
most difficult thing in the world to do. It looks easy, it looks simple; it may appear as
if you can do this. And you will feel good if you think that there is no need for any
repentance. Try this, and then you will know that when you have been angry the mind will
insist on repenting. Husbands and wives
continue to quarrel, and for centuries and centuries there have been counsellors,
advisors, great men who have been teaching how to live and love -- but they go on
quarreling. Freud, for the first time, became aware of the phenomenon that whenever you
are in love -- so-called love -- you are also in hate. In the morning it is love, in the
evening it is hate, and the pendulum goes on moving. Every husband, every wife knows this,
but Freud has a very uncanny insight. Freud says that if a couple has stopped fighting,
know well that love has died. That love which
existed with hate and fight cannot remain, so if you see a couple never fighting, do not
think that this is the ideal couple. It means no couple at all. They are living parallel,
but not with each other. They are parallel lines never meeting anywhere, not even to
fight. They are both alone together -- parallel. Mind has to move to
the opposite, so psychology now gives better advice. The advice is better, more deep, more
penetrating. It says that if you really want to love -- with the mind -- then do not be
afraid to fight. Really, you must fight authentically so you can move to the other extreme
of authentic love. So when you are fighting with your wife, do not avoid it; otherwise the
love will also be avoided. When the time for fight is there, fight until the end. Then by
evening you will be able to love: the mind will have gathered momentum. The ordinary love
cannot exist without fight because there is a movement of the mind. Only a love which is
not of the mind can exist without fight, but then it is a different thing altogether. A Buddha loving...
that is a different thing altogether. But if Buddha comes to love you, you will not feel
good because there will be no fault in it. It will be simply sweet and sweet and sweet --
and boring, because the spice comes from fight. A Buddha cannot be angry, he can only
love. You will not feel his love because you can feel only opposites; you can feel it only
in contrast. When Buddha came
back to his home town after twelve years, his wife wouldn't come to receive him. The whole
city gathered to receive him except his wife. Buddha laughed, and he said to his chief
disciple, Ananda, "Yashodhara has not come. I know her well. It seems she still loves
me. She is proud, and she feels hurt. I was thinking that twelve years is a long time and
she might not be in love now, but it seems she is still in love -- still angry. She has
not come to receive me. I will have to go to the house." So Buddha went.
Ananda was with him; it was a condition with Ananda. When Ananda took initiation he made a
condition with Buddha, to which Buddha agreed, that he would always remain with him. He
was an elder cousin-brother, so Buddha had to concede. Ananda followed him
into the house, into the palace, so Buddha said, "At least for this you remain behind
and do not come with me, because she will be furious. I am coming back after twelve years,
and I just ran away without even telling her. She is still angry, so do not come with me;
otherwise she will feel that I have not even allowed her to say anything. She must be
feeling to say many things, so let her be angry, do not come with me." Buddha went in. Of
course, Yashodhara was just a volcano. She erupted, exploded. She started crying and
weeping and saying things. Buddha stayed there, waited there, and by and by she cooled
down and realized that Buddha had not even uttered a single word. She wiped her eyes and
looked at Buddha, and Buddha said, "I have come to say that I have gained something,
I have known something, I have realized something. If you become cool I can give you the
message -- the truth that I have realized. I have waited so much in order that you could
go through a catharsis. Twelve years is a long affair. You must have gathered many wounds,
and your anger is understandable; I expected this. That shows that you are still in love
with me. But there is a love beyond this love, and only because of that love have I come
back to tell you something." But Yashodhara
could not feel that love. It is difficult to feel it because it is so silent. It is so
silent, it is as if absent. When mind ceases, then a different love happens. But that love
has no opposite to it. When mind ceases, really, whatsoever happens has no opposite to it.
With the mind there is always the polar opposite, and mind moves like a pendulum. This
sutra is wonderful, and miracles are possible through it: UNMINDING MIND, KEEP IN THE
MIDDLE -- UNTIL. So try it. And this
sutra is for your whole life. You cannot practice it sometimes, you have to be aware
continuously. Doing, walking, eating, in relationship, everywhere -- remain in the middle.
Try at least, and you will feel a certain calmness developing, a tranquility coming to
you, a quiet center growing within you. Even if you are not
successful in being exactly in the middle, try to be in the middle. By and by you will
have the feel of what middle means. Whatsoever may be the case -- hate or love, anger or
repentance -- always remember the polar opposites and remain in between. And sooner or
later you will stumble upon the exact middle point. Once you know it you can never forget it again, because that middle point is beyond the mind. That middle point is all that spirituality means. |
||