The first question:

"YOU SAID YESTERDAY THAT THE MOTIVATION TOWARDS LIBERATION OR SAMADHI IS ALSO A TENSION AND A BARRIER, BUT IS IT NOT CORRECT THAT IT IS NOT A DESIRE BUT AN ASPIRATION -- THE INTRINSIC THIRST OF THE HUMAN BEING?"

You must understand what desire means, and religions have confused you much about it. If you desire something of the world, they call it desire. If you desire something of the other world, they call it by a different name. This is absurd. Desire is desire! It makes no difference what the object of desire is. The object may be anything -- of this world, material, or of another world, spiritual -- but desiring remains the same.

Every desire is a bondage. Even if you desire God, it is a bondage; even if you desire liberation it is a bondage. And liberation cannot happen unless this desiring goes away totally. So remember, you cannot desire liberation, that is impossible; that is contradictory. You can become desireless, and then liberation happens. But that is not a result of your desire. Rather, it is a consequence of no-desire.

So try to understand what desire is. Desire means that right now you are not okay, you are not at ease. This very moment you are not at ease with yourself, and something else in the future, if fulfilled, will bring you peace. The fulfillment is always in the future; it is never here and now. This tension of the mind for the future is desire. Desire means you are not in the present moment, and all that is there is only the present moment. You are somewhere in the future, and the future is not. It never has been, it will never be. All that is, is always the present -- this moment.

This projection of your fulfillment somewhere in the future is desire. So what that future fulfillment is, is irrelevant. It may be the kingdom of God, heaven, NIRVANA, it may be anything, but if it is in the future, it is desire. And you cannot desire in the present, remember; that is not possible. In the present you can only be, you cannot desire. How can you desire in the present?

Desire leads into the future, into fantasy, dreaming. That is why so much insistence by Buddha for no-desire -- because only in no-desire do you move into reality. With desire you move into dreams. The future is a dream, and when you project into the future you are going to be frustrated. You are destroying reality right now for future dreams, and this habit of the mind will remain with you. It is being strengthened every day. So when your future comes it will come in the form of the present, and your mind will again move to some other future. Even if you could reach God, you will not be satisfied. The way you are, it is impossible. Even in the presence of the divine, you will have moved away into the future.

Your mind is always moving into the future. This movement of the mind in the future is desire. Desire is not concerned with any object, with whether you desire sex or you desire meditation -- it makes no difference. Desiring is the thing -- that you desire. It means you are not here. It means you are not in the real moment, and the present moment is the only door into existence. The past and future are not doors, they are walls.

So I cannot call any desire spiritual. Desire as such is worldly. Desire is the world. There is no spiritual desire; there cannot be. That is a trick of the mind, a deception. You don't want to leave desiring, so you change the objects. First you were desiring wealth, prestige, power. Now you say you don't desire and that these are worldly things. You condemn them, and those who desire them are condemned in your eyes. Now you desire God, the kingdom of God, NIRVANA, MOKSHA, the eternal, SATCHITANANDA, the brahman. Now you desire these, and you feel very good. You think you are transformed, but you have not done anything. You remain the same.

You are just playing tricks with yourself, and now you are in a greater mess because you think that this is not desiring. You remain the same. The mind remains the same; the functioning of the mind remains the same. You are not yet here. The objects of desire have changed, but the running, the dreaming, remains, and the dreaming is the desire -- not the object.

So try to understand me. I say that every desire is worldly because desire is the world. So it is not a question of changing the desire, it is not a question of changing objects. It is a question of a mutation, of a revolution from desire to no-desire; from desire to no-desire, not from old desires to new desires, from worldly desire to otherworldly desires, from material desires to spiritual desires -- no! From desire to no-desire is the revolution!

But how to move from desire to no-desire? You can move only if there is some desire. If some profit motive, some greed, some gain is there, only then can you move from desire to no-desire. But then you are not moving at all. I say that with no-desire you will attain eternal bliss. This is right -- that with no-desire eternal bliss happens -- but if I say to you that with no-desire you will gain eternal happiness, you will make it an object of the desire and then you will have missed the point completely.

It is not a result, it is a consequence of deep understanding. So try to understand that with desire there is misery, and don't think that you know it already. You don't know; otherwise how can you move into desire? You have not yet become aware that desire is misery, desire is hell. Be aware When you desire something be aware. Then move with the desire in full alertness, and then you will reach hell.

Every desire leads to misery, whether fulfilled or not. If fulfilled, it leads sooner; unfulfilled it takes time -- but every desire leads to misery. Be alert of the whole process, and move with it. There is no hurry because nothing can be done in a hurry, and spiritual growth is not possible in a hurry. Move slowly, patiently. Watch every desire and then watch how every desire becomes a door to hell. If you are watchful, sooner or later you will realize that desiring is hell. The moment that realization happens, there will be no desire. Suddenly desires will disappear, and you will be in a state of no-desire. I don't say desirelessness, I simply say "no-desire."

You cannot practice it, remember; only desires can be practiced. How can you practice no-desire? You cannot practice it, you can only practice desires. But if you are alert, you will become aware that they lead to misery. And when each desire leads to misery, when this becomes a realization to you -- not mere opinion and knowledge, but a realized fact -- desiring disappears, it becomes impossible. How can you lead yourself into misery? You are always "leading yourself to happiness" -- thinking that you are -- and always moving into misery. This has been happening for lives and lives. You always think this or that is the door of heaven, and when you have entered you always realize that this is hell. And this has been without any exception; it is always the case.

Move with mindfulness in every desire, and allow every desire to lead you to misery. Then, suddenly, one day the maturity will happen to you, this ripeness will happen to you: you will realize that every desire is misery.

The moment you realize it, desiring disappears. There is no need to do anything now; desiring simply falls away, withers away, and you are in a state of no-desire. In that no-desire NIRVANA is, the perfect, the absolute bliss is. You may call it God, the kingdom of God or whatsoever you choose to call it, but remember well that it is not a result of your desiring. It is a consequence of non-desiring, and non-desiring cannot be practiced.

Those who "practice" non-desiring, they are deluding themselves. There are many all over the world -- BHIKKHUS, sannyasins -- who are practicing non-desiring. You cannot practice non-desiring; no negative thing can be practiced. Underneath they are desiring, they are hankering after God, the peace that will happen, the bliss that is waiting for them somewhere in the future beyond death. They are desiring, and they call only their desiring "spiritual desire."

You can deceive yourself very easily. Words are very deceptive and you can rationalize. You call a poison "ambrosia," and when you call it ambrosia it appears as ambrosia. Words hypnotize; that is one thing. But this feeling, this realization that desire is misery, must be yours.

Mary Stevens has written somewhere that she was visiting a friend's home, and her friend's daughter was blind. Mary Stevens was very puzzled because the girl would say, "He is ugly, I don't like him"; and "The color of this dress is beautiful."

As she was blind, Mary Stevens asked, "How do you feel that someone is ugly and that a color is beautiful?"

The girl said, "My sisters say this to me." This is knowledge.

Buddha has said that desire is misery and you go on repeating. This is knowledge. You are desiring, and you have never seen that desire is misery. You have simply heard Buddha. This will not do. You are simply wasting your life and opportunity. Your own experience can change you; nothing else changes. Knowledge cannot be borrowed. If borrowed, it is just a fake. It looks like knowledge, but it is not. But why do we follow a Buddha or a Jesus -- why? Because of our greed. We look at Buddha's eyes, and they are so peaceful that greed arises, desire arises for how to attain this. Buddha is so blissful -- every moment in ecstasy. A desire arises for how to be Buddhalike. We also desire such states.

Then we go on asking how Buddha achieved this, how it happens. The "how" creates many problems because then Buddha will say that in "no-desire" it happens. And he is right, it HAS happened in no-desire. But when we hear that in no-desire it happens, we start practicing no-desire, we start leaving desires, and the whole effort is a desire to be Buddha-like.

Buddha was not trying to be like someone else; he was not asking to be a buddha. He was simply trying to understand his own misery -- and the more understanding dawned upon him, the more misery disappeared. Then one day he came to understand that desire is poison. If you have desire you have fallen a victim; now there is no possibility of your ever being happy. You can only hope -- have hope and frustration, then more hope and more frustration: this will be your circle. And when you become more frustrated you hope more, because that is the only consolation. You go on moving in the future because in the present you always have frustration, and the frustration is coming because of your past.

In the past this present was the future, and you hoped for it. Now it is a frustration. Then you hope again for the future, and when it will become the present you will again become frustrated. Then you will hope again. Then more frustration, more hope, and with more hope, still more frustration. This is a vicious circle. This is what the wheel of SANSARA is.

But no buddha can give you his own eyes. And it is good that be cannot give them to you; otherwise you will remain a fake always, eternally. Then you will never become authentic. It is good to suffer because only through suffering will you become authentic and real. So the first thing: move with your desires so that you can understand what they really are. Experience whatever suffering is hidden there. Let it be revealed to you. Only that is austerity -- only that is TAPASCHARYA.

Naropa has said that if you can be alert every desire leads you to NIRVANA, and this is the meaning, because if you are alert, you know that every desire is misery. And when you have searched every nook and corner of desiring, suddenly you stop. In that stopping is the happening, and it is always there. That happening is always waiting for you, just waiting to meet you in the present. But you are never in the present, you are always dreaming. Reality sustains you. Because of the real you are alive; because of the real you exist. But you go on moving in the unreal. The unreal is very hypnotizing.

I have heard one Jewish joke. Two old friends met after many, many years. Then one friend said to the other, "I have not seen you in twenty-five years. How is your son, your boy Harry?"

The other said, "There is a son; he is a great poet. All over the land his voice is heard, his songs are sung, and those who know poetry say that sooner or later he is going to become a Nobel laureate."

The other friend said, "Marvelous! And tell me about your second son, Benny. How is he?"

The friend said, "I am so happy about my second son. He is a leader, a great political leader. Thousands and thousands follow him, and I am sure that sooner or later he is going to be the prime minister of this land."

Then the friend said, "My! So fortunate you are! And what about your third son Izzie?"

The father became very sad and said, "Izzie? He is still Izzie. He is a tailor. But I tell you that if it was not for Izzie we would all be starving."

But the father was sad because Izzie is just a tailor. And the poet and the great politician, the great leader -- they are dreams. Izzie is the reality -- the tailor. "But if not for Izzie, we would all be starving," he said.

You could not exist were it not for this moment. THAT is real. But you are never happy about it. You are happy in your dreams for the future about Nobel laureates, prime ministers. Right now, "Izzie is just a tailor." Your reality is where you are grounded; your dreams are not your ground. They are false. Come to terms with your reality in the present moment. Encounter it, face it whatsoever it is, and don't allow the mind to move into the future. The future is desire. If you can be here and now, you are a buddha. If you cannot be here and now, then everything is just dream stuff.

And you will have to come back because dreams cannot lead you anywhere. They can only lead you to hope and frustration, but nothing real happens through them. But remember my point that you cannot imitate. You will have to pass through suffering. Suffering is the path. It purifies you, it makes you alert, it makes you aware. The more you are aware, the less you are desire-filled. If you are perfectly aware, no-desire happens, and meditation means nothing else but perfect awareness.

The second question:

"PLEASE EXPLAIN HOW IT IS POSSIBLE THAT ONE CAN BE SPIRITUALLY TRANSFORMED BY BEING TOTAL IN ACTIONS THAT ARE OF ANGER, HATRED AND VIOLENCE."

Yes, you can be totally transformed through anger, through hatred, through violence. And there is no other way -- because you exist in violence, in anger, in greed, in passion. From where you exist, ONLY from there, does the way start. I will not tell you to create non-greed against your greed; I will tell you to be greedy totally, but with a fully alert mind -- to be violent, to be angry, but be total so that you suffer totally, so that you can feel the whole poison of it. You must pass through this fire. No one else can pass for you; no proxy is possible. You will have to pass through it, and you always think that someone else will do it.

Christians go on thinking that through Jesus there is salvation. It has not happened yet. The world remains the same. Two thousand years have passed since Jesus was crucified, but we go on hoping that someone else will suffer and we will reach to bliss. No! Everyone has to carry his own cross. Jesus was crucified; he reached the goal. You cannot reach. You will have to pass through that crucifixion yourself. And this is the crucifixion -- that anger is there, passion is there, violence is there, greed is there, jealousy is there.

What are you doing with them? The society teaches to create the anti pole. Greed is there, so suppress it and create a non-greedy mind. Anger is there, so suppress it. Don't be angry. Push the energy back and smile. What happens? Anger goes on being accumulated within, and you go on becoming more and more angry, because more and more energy is accumulated within as anger -- suppressed. It becomes your unconscious reservoir, and against this anger you go on smiling. That smile becomes false, because while anger is knocking within how can you smile? You can smile, but then it will be just a false thing.

So you are divided into two -- a false smile and a real anger. The false smile becomes your personality and the real anger remains your soul. You are divided against yourself, and a constant fight will be there. And you cannot be happy with the false smile. No one else is deceived. You cannot be happy with a real anger hidden behind always trying to come out. A false smile and a real anger -- this is the situation. All that is good is false and all that is bad is real. The real you carry within and the false you show outside. This is schizophrenic, and every man has become schizophrenic, divided -- not only divided, but constantly fighting with himself. The whole life and energy is wasted and dissipated in this fight. And the fight is stupid, but this is happening.

What I am suggesting is, don't create any falsity around you. The false will never lead you to the real; the false will lead you to more that is false. Don't do the false, and allow the real total expression. When I say this you may become scared, because violence is there and you may want to kill someone. So do I mean to go and kill? No! Meditate on it. Close your room and allow your violence. You can express it on a pillow, on a picture, on anything. There is no need to go and kill someone, because that is not going to help. That will create more problems and a chain.

On the pillow, write the name of your enemy or your friend -- and remember, we are more angry at our friends than at our enemies. Just put a picture of your wife or husband on a pillow, and bring your violence out. Beat the pillow, kill the pillow, and do whatsoever you feel. And don't feel that you are doing a stupid thing. This is what you want to do with the real object, and that will be more stupid. Don't think that this is silly. This is how you are: you are silly, and you cannot change by just repressing it. Look at this silliness: see that this is how you are. Allow yourself full expression; act it out. And if you can be real, you will realize for the first time what anger, what violence is hidden within you. You are a volcano, and this can erupt from you at any moment.

In any situation, the volcano may erupt. It is erupting every day. Someone kills someone, and just a day before he was as normal as you. No one ever suspected that he was going to be a murderer. No one suspects about you, and you have so many thoughts in your mind to murder. You have thought, you have planned it many times. The idea to murder someone else or yourself has come to you. It has happened to you if you are not absolutely idiotic. Psychologists say that an intelligent man is bound to think of suicide at least ten times in his life -- at least ten times! -- and ten thousand times you think to murder someone. You never do it, that is another thing. But you can do it; the possibility is always there.

Make your anger a total act in meditation, and then see what happens. You will feel it coming from your whole body. If you allow it, then every cell of your body will be in it. Every pore, every fiber of the body will become violent. Your whole body will be in a mad situation. It will go mad, but allow it, and don't withhold. Move with the river, and after the cyclone is over, you will feel for the first time a deep center within you. A subtle calmness will happen. When the anger has gone, there will be no repentance because you have not done it to anyone. There will be no guilt. You will be unburdened. When this anger is thrown out and silence comes, that silence is real -- not forced.

You can sit down like a buddha in PADMASANA, in a yogic posture. You can force yourself, but the monkey within you goes on jumping. Now only the body is static. The mind is more mad than it ever was before. Whenever you sit for meditation, you feel what is happening. You are never so noisy within when you are not meditating, so why does so much noise happen whenever you meditate? Why does the mind go so vagrant? Why do so many thoughts come in a cloud? It is because your body is static, and through this staticness of your body you can feel the monkeyness of the mind more. The contrast is there.

But forced silence is of no use. Either you will not succeed in it or if you will succeed you will move into sleep. A forced silence, if successful, becomes sleep. It is good as far as sleep is concerned; otherwise it is useless. A real silence always happens only when some pent-up energy is released totally. The disturbance was because of that pent-up energy. That forced energy was trying to erupt, that was the problem, that was the disturbance within. When it is released, you are unburdened.

Then every fiber in your being is relaxed. In that relaxedness you can say that you are in a state of no-anger. It is not against anger; it is simply absence of anger. Remember, the real is always the absence, not the opposite -- NOT the opposite! It is always the absence -- an absence of greed, an absence of sex, an absence of jealousy -- but in that absence, your reality flowers because the diseases have gone. Now your inner health can flower. And once it starts flowering you will not accumulate anger. You accumulate anger only because you are missing yourself.

Really, you are not angry at anyone else, you are angry within yourself. But you go on projecting that anger onto others; otherwise you will go mad, so you go on finding excuses. Really, you are angry because you are missing yourself, you are missing your destiny. That which is possible for you is not happening, and that is why you are angry. Nothing is happening to you, and time goes on flowing. Death is coming nearer, and you remain as unfulfilled as ever, and there seems to be no possibility to be fulfilled. Because of this, because you are not realizing your potentialities, because you have not become that which you can become, you are angry, violent. And then you go on finding excuses.

You throw your anger on this, on that. Really, it is not a question of anger, and if you make it a question of anger, your diagnosis is wrong. It is a question of self-realization. Why is one violent? Why is one destructive? Because he is angry against himself, against his very being -- because he is. And then he feels to be against the whole world.

A buddha is silent, non-violent, not because he has practiced it, but because now he has realized himself. Now the flower has come to its total flowering, so nothing is there to release. He is fulfilled. Simple gratefulness to the existence remains. Now there is no complaint; nothing is wrong. When you really flower, everything is okay; all is good. Because of this Buddha couldn't see problems. All is good! That is why Buddha is not a revolutionary. To be a revolutionary, you must be able to see misery, you must be able to feel the whole mess around, the hell. To be a revolutionary, you must have a feeling that everything is wrong. Only then are you a revolutionary. Buddha was here in this land, Mahavira was here in this land, but they were not revolutionaries. Why? This question arises: why?

When one is at ease with oneself, all is good. He cannot be destructive, he can only be creative. His revolution can only be a creative one, and you cannot see anything creative. When someone destroys something, only then does it become news; only then can you see it.

A Lenin is seen as a revolutionary, not as a buddha. All over the world now there are revolutionaries, and they go on growing. And the reason? It is because fewer and fewer persons are realizing their potentiality. They are violent and they want to destroy -- because if there is no meaning in their lives how can they feel that there can be meaning in others' lives? A Mahavira is even aware not to kill an insect, not even to kill a mosquito, because he has realized himself. Now he knows what is possible even for a mosquito. A mosquito is not just a mosquito; this is a possibility. An infinite possibility is there: this mosquito can become divine. He cannot destroy it, it is impossible. He can only help. He is only concerned with how to help so that the potential becomes the actual.

You are just seeds. A great destiny is hidden, but nothing is being realized. The potential is wasted; the seed remains the seed. You feel anger. The modern generation is much angrier than older generations because there is more awareness of the possibility and less fulfillment. Now the new generation knows what is possible much more than the older generation. This generation is alive to the fact that much is possible. But nothing is happening and nothing is becoming actual, so there is more frustration. If you cannot be creative, at least you can be destructive; you feel your power in being destructive. Anger, violence, are destructive forces. They are there because creativity is not there.

Don't go against them. Rather, help them to be released. Don't suppress them; allow them to evaporate from you. Then that which you think is opposite is absent. When they have evaporated, you will suddenly realize that silence is there, that love is there, compassion is there. They are not to be cultivated. They are just like a stream hidden in rocks. You remove the rocks and the stream starts flowing. The stream is not against the rocks, not the opposite of the rocks. Just the absence of the rocks, and an opening happens and the stream starts flowing.

Love is in you like a stream, anger is in you like a rock. Remove it. But you go on forcing it inside, more inside. Then you are forcing the stream as well to go more inside. Throw this rock. There is no need to hit someone with it. You want to hit someone because you don't know how to throw it without hitting anyone. That is what I am teaching: to throw it without hitting anyone. There is no need to hit anyone. And if you can throw this rock without hitting anyone, everyone will profit out of it. You may not be throwing it on others' heads, but it was always there and others feel it.

When you are angry, howsoever you suppress it your anger is felt. You vibrate it; around you a subtle sadness happens. Everyone becomes alert that some disease has entered. Everyone wants to leave you; you become repulsive. Your very attitude gives a bad odor to you.

You may not be aware, but biochemists say that when someone is in love or in anger or in sex, different odors are released from the body -- actually, not metaphorically. When you are in anger, a bad odor is released from your body. When you are in love, the quality is different. In sexual passion, a different odor is released.

Animals are attracted by odor -- because when the female is ready, a subtle odor is released from her sex glands and the male is attracted. Without that odor the female is not ready. That is why you see dogs smelling: they can smell sex. If you are sexual, you are also releasing a subtle odor. If you are angry, then too -- because different chemicals are released in the blood system. Consciously no one may notice, but unconsciously everyone notices it. You are a burden -- repulsive, destructive. Throw this poison out of your system.

So remember this: it is good to release in the vacuum. And the sky is big enough, it will not return it back to you. It will simply absorb it, and you will be released. So do anything meditatively and totally, even anger, even violence, even sex. It is easy to conceive of how to be angry alone, but you can also create a sexual orgy alone meditatively. And you will have a different quality after that.

While all alone, just close your room and move as if in the sex act. Allow your whole body to move. Jump and scream; do whatsoever you feel like doing. Do it totally. Forget everything -- societal inhibitions, etcetera. Move in the sex act alone meditatively, but bring your total sexuality to it.

With the other, the society is always present because the other is present. And it is so difficult to be in such a deep love that you can feel as if the other is not present. Only in a very deep love, in a very deep intimacy, is it possible to be with your lover or beloved as if he is not or she is not.

This is what intimacy means: if you are as if alone with your lover or beloved or your spouse in the room with no fear of the other, then you can move in the sex act totally; otherwise the other is always an inhibiting presence. The other is looking at you: "What will she think? What will be think? What are you doing? Behaving like an animal?"

One lady was here just a few days before. She came to complain against her husband. She said, "I cannot tolerate it. Whenever he loves me, he starts behaving like an animal."

When the other is present, the other is looking at you: "What are you doing?" And you have been taught that there are some things which you can do and some things which you are not to do. It inhibits; you cannot move totally.

If love is really there, then you can move as if you are alone. And when two bodies become one, they have a single rhythm. Then the two-ness is lost, and sex can be released totally. And it is not like in anger; anger is always ugly, but sex is not always ugly. Sometimes it is the most beautiful thing possible -- but only sometimes. When the meeting is perfect, when the two become one rhythm, when their breaths have become one and their PRANA, energy, flows in a circle, when the two have disappeared completely and the two bodies have become one whole, when the negative and positive, the male and female, are no more there, then sex is the most beautiful thing possible. But that is not always the case.

If it is not possible, you can bring your sex act to a climax of frenzy and madness while alone, in a meditative mood. Close the room, meditate in it, and allow your body to move as if you are not controlling it. Lose all control!

Spouses can be very helpful, and particularly in tantra: your wife, your husband or your friend can be very helpful if you both are experimenting deeply. Then allow each total uncontrol. Forget civilization as if it never existed; move back into the Garden of Eden. Throw that apple -- the fruit of the tree of knowledge. Be Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden before they were expelled. Move back! Just be like innocent animals, and act out your sexuality in its totality. You will never be the same again.

Two things will happen. Sexuality will disappear. Sex may remain, but sexuality will disappear completely. And when there is no sexuality, sex is divine. When the cerebral hankering is not there, when you are not thinking about it, when it has become a simple involvement -- a total act, a movement of your whole being, not only of the mind -- it is divine. Sexuality will disappear first, and then sex may also disappear, because once you know the deeper core of it, you can achieve that core without sex.

But you have not known that deeper core, so how can you achieve it? The first glimpse comes through total sex. Once known, the path can be traveled in other ways also. Just looking at a flower, you can be in the same ecstasy in which you are when you meet with your spouse in a climax. Just watching the stars, you can move in it.

Once you know the path, you know it is within you. The spouse only helps you to know it, and you help your spouse to know it. It is within you! The other was just a provocation. The other was just a challenge to help you know something which was always within you.

And this is what is happening between a master and a disciple. The master can become only a challenge to you to show that which has always been hidden in you. The master is not giving you anything. He CANNOT give; there is nothing to give. And all that can be given is worthless because it will only be a thing.

That which cannot be given but which can only be provoked is worthwhile. A master is just provoking you. He challenges you to help you to come to a point where you can realize something which is already there. Once you know it, there is no need of a master.

Sex may disappear, but first sexuality disappears. Then sex becomes a pure, innocent act; then sex also disappears. Then there is BRAHMACHARYA, celibacy. It is not opposite to sex; it is just its absence. And remember this difference. This is not in your awareness.

Old religions go on condemning anger and sex as if both are the same or as if both belong to the same category. They do not! Anger is destructive; sex is creative. All old religions go on condemning them in a similar way, as if anger and sex, greed and sex, jealousy and sex are similar. They are not! Jealousy is destructive -- ALWAYS! It is never creative; nothing can come out of it. Anger is always destructive, but not so with sex! Sex is the source of creativity. The divine has used it for creation. Sexuality is just like jealousy, anger and greed: it is always destructive. Sex is not -- but we don't know pure sex, we know only sexuality.

A person who is looking at a pornographic picture or one who is going to see a film, a movie of sexual orgies, is not seeking sex; he is seeking sexuality. There are persons I know who cannot make love to their wives unless they first go through some dirty magazines or books or pictures. When they see these pictures, then they are excited. The real wife is nothing to them. A picture, a nude picture, is more exciting to them. That excitement is not in the gut; that excitement is in the mind, in the head.

Sex transferred to the head is sexuality; thinking about it is sexuality. Living it is a different thing, and if you can live it you can go beyond it. Anything lived totally leads you beyond. So don't be afraid of anything. LIVE IT! If you think it is destructive to others, move in it alone, do not do it with others. If you think it is creative, then find a partner, find a friend. Become a couple, a tantric couple, and move in it totally. If you still feel that the other's presence is inhibiting, then you can do it alone.

The last question:

"DOES AN ENLIGHTENED PERSON EVER DREAM? CAN YOU TELL US SOMETHING ABOUT THE QUALITY AND NATURE OF AN ENLIGHTENED PERSON'S SLEEP?"

No, an enlightened person cannot dream. And if you like dreams very much, never become enlightened. Beware! Dreaming is part of sleep. The first thing is that for dreaming to happen you have to move into sleep. For ordinary dreams you have to move into sleep. In sleep you become unconscious. When you are unconscious, dreams can happen. They happen only in your unconsciousness.

An enlightened person is conscious even while asleep. He cannot become unconscious. Even if you give him an anaesthetic -- chloroform or something like that -- only his periphery goes to sleep. He remains conscious; his consciousness cannot be disturbed.

Krishna says in the Gita that while everyone is asleep the yogi is awake. It is not that yogis are not going to sleep in the night; they also sleep, but their sleep has a different quality. Only their bodies sleep, and then their sleep is beautiful. It is a rest.

Your sleep is not a rest. It may even be an exertion, and in the morning you may feel more exhausted than you ever felt in the evening. A whole night's sleep, and in the morning you feel more exhausted -- what is happening? You are a miracle!

The whole night was an inner turmoil. Your body was not at rest because the mind was so active. And the activity of the mind is bound to be an exertion for the body, because without the body the mind cannot act. The activity of the mind means parallel activity of the body, so the whole night your body is moving and is active. That is why in the morning you feel more exhausted.

What does it mean for someone to become enlightened? It means one thing: now he is perfectly conscious. Whatsoever goes on in his mind, he is aware. And the moment you are aware, certain things completely stop. Just through awareness they stop. It is just like this room is dark and you bring a candle: the darkness will disappear. Everything will not disappear. These bookcases will be here, and if we are sitting here we will be here. By bringing the candle only darkness disappears.

When someone becomes enlightened, now he has an inner light. That inner light is awareness. Through that awareness sleep disappears -- nothing else. But because sleep disappears, the quality of everything changes. Now whatsoever he is going to do will be in his perfect alertness, and that which needs unconsciousness as a prerequisite now becomes impossible.

He cannot be angry -- not because it is a decision not to be angry; he CANNOT be angry. Anger can exist only when you are unconscious. Now unconsciousness is not there, so the base is not there and anger is not possible. He cannot hate: hate exists only when you are unconscious. He becomes love -- not because of any decision on his part. When light is there, when consciousness is there, love flows; it is natural. Dreaming becomes impossible because dream needs, first of all, unconsciousness, and he is not unconscious.

Buddha's disciple, Ananda, said to him, after sleeping and living in the same room, in the same place with Buddha, "This is a miracle; this is very strange. You never move in your sleep." Buddha always remained in one posture the whole night. The way he would sleep in the beginning, that would be the way he would come out of it, and his hand would remain in the exact place where it was put.

You might have seen Buddha's picture showing him sleeping. His posture is called "the lying posture." He would remain in this same posture the whole night. Ananda watched him for years. Whenever he would look at Buddha sleeping, he would be the same the whole night. So Ananda asked, "Tell me, what are you doing the whole night? You remain in one posture."

Buddha is reported to have said, "Only once did I move in my sleep, but then I was not a buddha. Just before, just a few days before the enlightenment happened, I moved in my sleep. But then suddenly I became aware and I wondered, 'Why am I moving?' I moved unconsciously without any knowing on my part. But after enlightenment there is no need. If I want I can move, but there is no need. And the body is so relaxed..."

Consciousness penetrates even in sleep. But you can have a fixed posture the whole night and you will not be enlightened. You can practice it; it is not difficult. You can force yourself; then within a few days you will be able to do this. But that is not the point. If you look at a Jesus moving, do not think, "Why is he moving?" It depends. If Jesus moves in his sleep, he is conscious. If he wants to move, he moves.

For me, it happens quite the reverse. Before coming to awareness I slept always in one posture the whole night. I do not remember ever moving. But since then I have been moving the whole night. Even five minutes are enough for me in one posture. I have to move again and again. I am so aware that it is not a sleep at all really. So it depends. But you can never deduce anything from the outside. Always, this is only possible from the inside.

For an enlightened one, awareness will remain there even in his sleep, and then dreams are not possible. They require unconsciousness -- that is one thing -- and they require suspended experiences: that is the second thing. And for an enlightened one there is no suspended experience -- no incomplete experience. Everything is complete. He has eaten his food; now he is not thinking about eating again. When he feels hungry he will eat again, but meanwhile there is no thought of eating.

He has taken his bath; now he is not thinking of the bath tomorrow. When the time comes, if he is alive, he will take it. If the situation permits it will happen, but there is no thinking. Acts are there, but not any thinking about them.

What are you doing? You are constantly rehearsing -- constantly rehearsing for tomorrow as if you are an actor and you are to show someone. Why are you rehearsing? When the time comes, you will be there.

The enlightened person lives in the moment, in the act, and he lives so totally that it is not incomplete. If something is incomplete, then it will be completed in a dream. Dream is a completion. It happens because the mind cannot allow anything to be incomplete. If something is incomplete, there is an inner uneasiness. It wonders how to complete it. Then in a dream you complete it, and you are at ease. Even if it is completed in a dream, for the mind it is a relaxation.

What are you dreaming? You are just completing your incomplete acts which you could not complete in the day. In the day you may have wanted to kiss a woman, and you could not kiss. Now you will kiss her in your dream, and your mind will feel relaxed; a tension is released.

Your dreaming is nothing but your incompleteness, and an enlightened person is complete. Whatsoever he is doing, he is doing it so wholly, so totally, that nothing remains suspended. There is no need for any dreaming. Dreaming in the night will cease and thinking in the day will cease.