IN MEDITATION, WHEN THE `I' DROPS TEMPORARILY AND AN EMPTINESS IS CREATED WITHIN, AFTER IT A FRUSTRATION IS FELT WHEN THAT EMPTINESS IS NOT FILLED BY THE ENTRY OF THE UNKNOWN. HOW CAN ONE LEARN TO LIVE WITH THAT EMPTINESS?

Emptiness is the unknown. Don't wait and don't hope that something is going to fill the emptiness. If you are waiting, hoping, desiring, you are not empty. If you are waiting that something, some unknown force, will descend upon you, you are not empty -- this hope is there, this desire is there, this longing is there. So don't desire for something to fill you. Simply be empty. Don't even wait.

Emptiness is the unknown. When you are really empty the unknown has descended upon you. It is not that first you become empty and then the unknown enters. You are empty, and the unknown has entered. There is not a single moment's gap. The emptiness and the unknown are one.

In the beginning it appears to you as emptiness; that is only appearance, because you have always been filled by the ego. Really, you are feeling the absence of the ego; that's why you feel empty. First the ego disappears -- but the feeling that the ego is no more creates the feeling of emptiness. Just the absence... something was there, and now it is not there. The ego has gone, but the absence of the ego is felt. First the ego will disappear, and then the absence of the ego will disappear. Only then will you be really empty. And to be really empty is to be really filled.

That inner space which is created by the absence of the ego is the divine. The divine is not to come from somewhere else; you are already that. Because you are filled with the ego you cannot realize it, you cannot see it, you cannot touch it. A filmy barrier of the ego prevents you.

When the ego has dropped, the barrier has dropped. The curtain is no more there. Nothing is to come; whatsoever is to come is already there. Remember this: that nothing new is going to come to you. Whatsoever is possible is already there, actual. So the question is not of achieving; the question is only of discovering. The treasure is there, just covered -- you uncover it.

When he became a realized man, Buddha was asked so many times, `What have you gained? What have you achieved?'

Buddha is reported to have said, `I have not achieved anything. Rather, on the contrary, I have lost myself. And that which I have achieved was already there, so I cannot say I have achieved it. I was unaware of it. Now I have become aware. But I cannot say I have achieved it. Rather, on the contrary, now I wonder how it was possible that I didn't know it before. And it was always there just by the corner -- just a turning was needed.'

The divinity is not a future. Your divinity is the present. It is here and now. This very moment you are that -- unaware, not looking in the right direction, or not tuned to it, that's all.

A radio is there: the waves are passing right now, but if the radio is not tuned to a particular wave, the wave is unmanifest. You tune the radio and the wave becomes manifest. A tuning is needed. Meditation is a tuning. When you are tuned, that which is unmanifest becomes manifest.

But remember, don't desire, because the desire will not allow you to be empty. And if you are not empty nothing is possible, because the space is not there, so your own unmanifest nature cannot be revealed. It needs space to be revealed. And don't ask how to live with emptiness. That is not the real question. Just be empty. You are not yet empty.

If once you know what emptiness is, you will love it. It is ecstatic. It is the most beautiful experience possible to mind, to man, to consciousness. You will not ask how to live with emptiness. You are asking that as if emptiness is something like a misery. It appears so to the ego. The ego is always afraid of emptiness, so you ask how to live with it as if it is some enemy.

Emptiness is your innermost center. All the activity is on the periphery; the innermost center is just a zero. All the manifest is on the periphery; the deepest core of your being is the unmanifest vacuum. Buddha has given it a name -- shunyata. It means nothingness or emptiness. That's your nature, that's your being, and out of that nothingness everything comes, and everything goes back to it.

That emptiness is the source. Don't ask to fill it, because whenever you ask to fill it you will create more and more ego -- ego is the effort to fill the emptiness. And even this desire that now something must descend upon you -- a god, a divinity, a divine power, some unknown energy -- this is again a thought. Whatsoever you can think about God is not going to be God; it is simply going to be a thought.

When you say the unknown, you have made it the known. What do you know about the unknown? Even to say that it is the unknown, you have known some quality about it -- the quality of its being unknown. The mind cannot conceive the unknown. Even the unknown becomes known, and whatsoever the mind says is going to be just a verbalization, a thought process.

God is not the word `God'. The thought of God is not God. Ans when there is no thought, only then will you come to feel and realize what it is. Nothing else can be said about it. It can only be indicated. And all indications are erroneous because they are all indirect.

This much can be said -- that when you are not.... And you are not, only when there is no desire, because you exist with desire. Desire is the food through which you exist. Desire is the fuel. When there is no desire, no longing, no future, and when you are not, that emptiness is the fullness of existence. In that emptiness the whole existence is revealed to you. You become it.

So don't ask how to live with emptiness. First be empty. There is no need to ask how to live with it. It is so blissful -- the deepest bliss it is. When you ask how to live with emptiness, you are really asking how to live with oneself. But you have not known yourself. Enter more and more into it.

In meditation sometimes you feel a sort of emptiness; that is not really emptiness. I call it just a sort of emptiness. When you are meditating, for certain moments, for a few seconds you will feel as if the thought process has stopped. In the beginning these gaps will come. But because you are feeling as if the thought process has stopped, this is again a thought process, a very subtle thought process. What are you doing? You are saying inside, `The thought process has stopped.' But what is this? This is a secondary thought process which has started. And you say, `This is emptiness.' You say, `Now something is going to happen.' What is this? Again a new thought process has started.

Whenever this happens again, don't become a victim of it. When you feel a certain silence is descending, don't start verbalizing it, because you are destroying it. Wait -- not for something -- simply wait. Don't do anything. Don't say, `This is emptiness.' The moment you have said, you have destroyed it. Just look at it, penetrate into it, encounter it, but wait -- don't verbalize it. What is the hurry? Through verbalization the mind has again entered from a different route, and you are deceived. Be alert about this trick of the mind.

In the beginning it is bound to happen, so whenever this happens again, just wait. Don't fall in the trap. Don't say anything -- remain silent. Then you will enter, and then it will not be temporary, because once you have known the real emptiness you cannot lose it. The real cannot be lost; that is its quality.

Once you have known the inner treasure, once you have come in contact with your deepest core, then you can move in activity, then you can do whatsoever you like, then you can live an ordinary worldly life, but the emptiness will remain with you. You cannot forget it. It will go on inside. The music of it will be heard. Whatsoever you are doing, the doing will be only on the periphery; inside you will remain empty.

And if you can remain empty inside, doing only on the periphery, whatsoever you do becomes divine, whatsoever you do takes on the quality of the divine because now it is not coming from you. Now it is coming directly from the original emptiness, the original nothingness. If then you speak, those words are not yours. That's what Mohammed means when he says, `This Koran is not said by me. It has come to me as if someone else has spoken through me.' It has come out of the inner emptiness. That's what Hindus mean when they say, `The Vedas are not written by man, they are not human documents, but the divine, the God himself has spoken.'

These are symbolic ways of saying something which is very mysterious. And this is the mystery: when you are deeply empty, whatsoever you do or speak is not from you -- because you are no more. It comes from the emptiness. It comes from the deepest source of existence. It comes from the same source from which this whole existence has come. Then you have entered the womb, the very womb of existence. Then your words are not yours, then your acts are not yours. It is as if you are just an instrument -- an instrument of the whole.

If emptiness is felt only momentarily, and then it comes and goes like a flash, it is not real. And if you start thinking about it, even the unreal is lost. Not to think in that moment takes great courage. It is the greatest control I know. When the mind becomes silent and when you are falling empty, it takes the greatest courage not to think, because the whole past of the mind will assert. The whole mechanism will say, `Now think!'

In subtle ways, indirect ways, your past memories will force you to think -- and if you think, you have come back. If you can remain silent in that moment, if you are not tempted by the mechanism of your memory and mind.... This is really the satan -- your own mind which tempts you. Whenever you are falling empty, the mind tempts you and creates something to think about -- and if you start thinking, you are back.

It is said that when one of the great masters, Bodhidharma, went to China, many disciples gathered around him. He was the first Zen master. One disciple, who was to become his chief disciple, came to him and said, `Now I have become totally empty.'

Bodhidharma slapped him immediately and said, `Now go and throw this emptiness also! Now you are filled with emptiness -- throw this also. Only then will you be really empty.

You understand? You can be filled by the idea of emptiness. Then it will hover on you, it will become a cloud. He said, `Throw this emptiness also, and then come to me.' If you say you are empty, you are not empty. Now this word `empty' has become meaningful and you are filled with it. The same I say to you -- throw this emptiness also.

Question 2

YOU HAVE TALKED ABOUT TRANSFORMATION AND MUTATION OF MAN'S MIND, OF MAN'S UNCONSCIOUS INTO SUPERCONSCIOUS, AND YOU HAVE SAID THAT SPIRITUALITY IS AN EXISTENTIAL EXPERIMENTATION. BUT LAST NIGHT YOU SAID THAT THE EGO IS A FALSE ENTITY AND IT HAS NO SUBSTANCE AND REALITY TO IT. THEN DOES IT MEAN THAT THE WHOLE SPIRITUAL EXPERIMENTATION IS AN EXISTENTIAL TRANSFORMATION OF THE EGO WHICH IS NON-EXISTENTIAL?

No. The spiritual transformation is not the transformation of the ego; it is the dissolution of it. You are not going to transform the ego, because howsoever transformed, the ego will remain the ego. It may become superior, more refined, more cultured, but the ego will remain the ego. And more cultured; it becomes more poisonous. The more subtle, the more you will be in its grip, because you will not be able to be aware of it. You are not even aware of such a gross ego. When it becomes subtle you will not be aware of it; there will be no possibility.

There are ways to refine the ego, but those ways are not of spirituality. Morality exists on those methods. And that is the difference between morality and religion. Morality exists on methods of refining the ego; morality exists on respectability. So we say to a person, `Don't do this. If you do this, your respect is at stake. Don't do this. What will others think about you? Don't do this. You will not be honored. Do this and everyone will honor you.'

The whole morality depends on your ego, a subtle ego. Religion is not a transformation of the ego, it is a transcendence. You simply leave the ego. And it is not that you leave it because it is wrong. Remember this distinction. Morality always says, `Leave that which is wrong, and do that which is right,' Religion says, `Leave that which is false -- not wrong, but false. Leave that which is unreal, and enter the real.' With spirituality, truth is the value, not right. Because right may itself be false, and in a false world we need false rights to oppose wrongs.

Spirituality is not a transformation of the ego, it is a transcendence. You go beyond the ego. And this going beyond is really an awakening; it is a deep alertness to see whether the ego exists or not. If it exists, if it is a part, a real part of your being, you cannot go beyond it. If it is false, only then is transcendence possible. You can awaken out of a dream. You cannot awaken out of reality, or can you? You can transcend a dream, but you cannot transcend reality.

The ego is a false entity. And what do we mean when we say that the ego is a false entity? We mean that it exists only because you have not encountered it. If you encounter it, it will not exist. It exists in your ignorance; because you are not aware, it is there. If you become aware, it will not be there. If you become aware and some entity disappears just by your becoming aware, it means it was false. The real will be revealed in awareness and the false will disappear.

So really this too is not right to say -- leave your ego -- because whenever it is said to leave your ego, it gives a sense that the ego is something and you can leave it. You can even start struggling to throw this ego. The whole effort will be absurd. You cannot throw it, because only a reality can be thrown. You cannot fight with it. How can you fight with a shadow? And if you fight, remember, you will be defeated. Not because the shadow is very powerful, but because the shadow is not; you cannot defeat it. You will be defeated by your own stupidity.

Fight with a shadow and you cannot win -- that is certain. You will be defeated. That too is certain, because you will dissipate your own energy in the fight. Not that the shadow is very powerful, but because the shadow is not. You are fighting with your own self, wasting your energy. Then you will be exhausted and you will fall down. And you will think that the shadow has won and you are defeated -- and the shadow has not been there at all. If you fight with the ego you will be defeated. Rather, enter and try to find out where it is.

It is said that the Emperor of China asked Bodhidharma, `My mind is very restless. I am in constant inner turmoil. Give me some peace or give me some secret key to how I can enter into the inner silence.'

So Bodhidharma said, `You come early in the morning, four o'clock, when there is no one here. When I am alone here in my hut you come. And remember, bring your restless mind with you. Don't leave it at home.'

The king was very much disturbed, thinking that this man was mad. He says, `Bring your disturbed mind with you. Don't leave it at home, otherwise who am I going to silence? I will make it still, but bring it! Remember well.'

The emperor left, but more disturbed than ever. He had been thinking that this man was a sage, a wise man, and he would give him some key, but whatsoever he said seemed to be foolish -- how can one leave one's mind at home? He couldn't sleep. The eyes of Bodhidharma and the way he had looked at him... he was hypnotized -- as if a magnet was pulling. He couldn't sleep the whole night, and at four he was ready. He didn't really want to go because this man was mad. And going so early, in darkness, when no one was there -- this man could do anything.

But still, he was so attracted that in spite of himself he went. And the first thing that Bodhidharma asked.... He was sitting before his hut with his staff in his hands, and he said, `Okay. So you have come. Where is your restless mind? Have you brought that? I am ready to silence it.' The emperor now said, `What are you talking about? How can one forget the mind? It is always there.'

Bodhidharma said, `Where? Where is it? Show it to me so I can silence it, and you can go back.'

The emperor said, `But it is not something objective. I cannot show it to you, I cannot put it in my hand. It is within me.'

So Bodhidharma said, `Okay, close your eyes and try to find out where it is. And the moment you catch hold of it, open your eyes and tell me and I will still it.'

In that silence and with this madman, the emperor closed his eyes. He tried and tried. And he was afraid also, because Bodhidharma was sitting with his staff -- any moment he would hit. He tried and tried and tried. He looked everywhere, in every nook and corner of his being -- where is that mind which is restless> And the more he looked, the more he realized that the restlessness had disappeared. The more he tried to search... like a shadow it was not there.

Two hours passed, and he was not even aware of what had happened. His face became silent, he became like a Buddha statue, and then with the rising sun Bodhidharma said, `Now open your eyes. It is enough. Two hours are more than enough. Now can you tell me where it is?'

The emperor opened his eyes. He was as silent as a human being can be. He bowed down his head at Bodhidharma's feet and said, `You have already silenced it.'

Emperor Wu has written in his autobiography, `This man is miraculous, magical. Not doing anything he silenced my mind. And I also didn't do anything. I just entered myself and tried to find where it is. Of course he was right: first locate it, where it is. And just the effort to locate it, and it was not found there.'

You will not find the ego. If you go in, if you search for it, you will not find it there. It has never existed. It is just a false substitute. It has some utility, that's why you have invented it. Because you don't know your real being, the real center, and without a center it is difficult to function, you have created a fiction, a fictitious center, and you function through it.

The real center is hidden. You have created a false center -- the ego is a false center, a substitute center. Without a center it is difficult to exist, difficult to function. You need a center to function. And you don't know your real center, so the mind has created a false center. Mind is very skilled in creating substitutes. It always gives you a substitute if you cannot find the real, because otherwise you will go mad. Without a center you will go mad. You will get scattered, you will become fragmented; there will be no unity. So the mind creates a false center.

It is just like in dreaming. You dream you are feeling thirsty. Now if this thirst becomes penetrating, the sleep will be disturbed, because then you will have to get up to drink water. Now your mind will give a substitute: the mind will create a dream. You need not get up, the sleep need not be disturbed -- you dream that you are drinking water. From the fridge you are taking water and drinking. The mind has given you a substitute. Now you feel okay. The real thirst has not been quenched, simply deceived. But now you feel that you have drunk, you have taken water. Now you can sleep; the sleep can continue undisturbed.

In dreams the mind is constantly giving you substitutes just to protect sleep. And the same is happening while you are awake. The mind is giving you substitutes just to protect your sanity; otherwise you will be scattered in fragments.

Unless the real center is known, the ego has to function. Once the real center is known, there is no need to dream about water. When you have got the real water you can drink it. There is no need to dream about it. Meditation brings you to the real center. And with that very happening, the utility for the false disappears.

But this must be kept in consciousness -- that the ego is not your real center. Only then can you start a search for the real. And spirituality is not a transformation of it. It cannot be transformed. It is unreal, it is simply not. You cannot do anything with it. If you are aware, alert, if you watch it within yourself, it disappears. Just the flame of your awareness and it is not there. Spirituality is a transcendence.

Question 3

IF THE EGO IS UNREAL, THEN DOES IT NOT MEAN THAT THE UNCONSCIOUS MIND, THE ACCUMULATION OF MEMORIES IN THE BRAIN CELLS, AND THE PROCESS OF TRANSFORMATION THAT IS THE SUBJECT MATTER OF SPIRITUALITY, IS ALSO UNREAL, A DREAM PROCESS?

No. Ego is unreal; brain cells are not unreal. Ego is unreal; memories are not unreal. Ego is unreal; thought process is not unreal. Thought process is a reality. Memories are real, brain cells are real, your body is real. Your body is real, your soul is real. These are two realities. But when your soul gets identified with the body, the ego is formed -- that is unreality.

It is just like this. I am standing before a mirror: I am real, the mirror is real, but the reflection in the mirror is not real. I am real, the mirror is also real, but the reflection in the mirror is a reflection, it is not a reality. Brain cells are real, consciousness is real, but when consciousness gets involved, attached, identified with the brain cells, the ego is formed. That ego is unreal.

So when you have awakened, when you have become enlightened, your memory is not going to disappear. The memory will be there. Really, it will be more crystal-clear. Then it will function more accurately because there will be no disturbance from the false ego. Your thought process will not disappear. Rather, for the first time you will be capable of thinking. Before that you were simply borrowing things. Then you will really be able to think. But then you, not the thought process, will be the master.

Before, the thought process was the master. You couldn't do anything about it. It continued on its own; you were just a victim. You wanted to sleep and the mind continued thinking. You wanted to stop it, but it would not stop. Really, the more you tried to stop it, the more stubborn it became. It was your master. When you become enlightened it will be there, but then it will be instrumental. Whenever you need it, you will be able to use it. Whenever you don't need it, it will not crowd your consciousness. Then it can be called and then it can also be stopped.

Mind cells will be there, the body will be there, memory will be there, thought process will be there. Only one thing will not be there -- the feeling of I will not be there. This is difficult to understand.

Buddha walks, Buddha eats, Buddha sleeps, Buddha remembers. He has memory, his brain cells function beautifully. But Buddha has said, `I walk, but no one walks in me. I talk, but no one talks in me. I eat, but no one eats in me.' The inner consciousness is no more the ego. So when Buddha feels hungry, he cannot feel like you. You feel, `I am hungry.' When Buddha feels hungry, he feels, `The body is hungry. I am just the knower.' And that knower is without any feeling of I.

The ego is the false entity, the only false entity -- everything else is real. Two realities can meet, and in their meeting, a third epi-phenomenon can be created. When two realities meet, something false can happen. But the false can happen only if there is consciousness. If there is no consciousness, the false cannot happen. Oxygen and hydrogen meet: a false water cannot happen. The false can happen only when you are conscious, because only consciousness can err. Matter cannot err, matter cannot be false. Matter is always true. Matter cannot deceive and cannot be deceive -- only consciousness can. With consciousness is the possibility to err.

But remember another thing: matter is always real, never false, but also never true. The matter cannot know what truth is. If you cannot err, you cannot know what truth is. Both the possibilities open simultaneously. Human consciousness can err and can know that it has erred and can move away from it. That is the beauty of it. The danger is there, but danger is bound to be there. With every growth new dangers come in. For matter, there is no danger.

Look at it in this way. Whenever a new thing grows in existence, a new thing evolves, now dangers come with it into existence. For a stone there is no danger. There are small bacteria. In those bacteria sex doesn't exist in the way it exists in man or in animals. They simply divide their bodies. When one bacterium grows bigger and bigger, when it grows to a certain extent, its body automatically divides into two. The parent body divides into two. Now there are two bacteria. Those bacteria can live eternally -- because there is no birth, so there is no death.

And the reverse process also happens. If food is not available, two bacteria will come nearer and nearer and they will become one, their bodies will become one. No birth, no death. With sex entered birth; with birth entered death; with birth entered individuality; with individuality entered ego.

Every growth has its own potential dangers, but they are beautiful. If you can understand, there is no need to fall into them, and you can transcend them. And when you transcend, you mature and you achieve a greater synthesis. If you fall a victim, the greater synthesis is not achieved.

Spirituality is the peak, the last, the ultimate synthesis of all growth. The false is transcended and the real absorbed. And only the real remains; all the false drops away. But don't think that the body is unreal -- it is real. Brain cells are real, the thought process is real. Only the relationship between the consciousness and the thought process is unreal. That is a tie. You can untie it. And the moment you untie it, you have opened the door.

Question 4

HOW CAN ONE KNOW THAT THE SPIRITUAL SEARCH IN WHICH ONE IS INVOLVED IS NOT AN EGO-TRIP, BUT IS AN AUTHENTIC RELIGIOUS SEARCH?

If you don't know, if you are confused, then know well that this is an ego-trip. If you are not confused, if you know well that this is authentic, if there is no confusion at all, then it is authentic. And it is not a question of deceiving someone else. It is a question of deceiving or not deceiving oneself. If you are confused, in doubt, it is an ego-trip, because the moment the authentic search is there, there is no doubt. Faith happens.

Let me put it in some other way. Whenever you phrase such problems, the very confusion exactly shows that you are on the wrong path. Someone comes to me and he says, `Tell me. I don't know whether my meditation is going deep or not.'

So I say, `If it is going deep, there is no need to come and ask me. The depth is such an experience, you will know it. And if you cannot know your depth, who is going to know about it? You have come to ask me only because you are not feeling the depth. Now you want someone else to certify you. If I say, "Yes, your meditation is going very deep," you will feel very good -- this is an ego-trip.'

When you are ill, you know that you are ill. It may sometimes happen that illness may be very very hidden. You may not be aware of it. But the reverse never happens: when you are perfectly healthy, you know it. It is never hidden. When you are healthy, you know it. It may be that for your illness you may not be so aware, but for health -- if health is there -- you are aware of it, because the very phenomenon of health is a phenomenon of well-being. If you cannot feel your health, who is going to feel it? For your ill-health there may be experts to tell you what type of disease you have; there is no expert to tell you about your health. There is no need. But if you ask whether you are healthy or nor, you are unhealthy; that much is certain. This very confusion shows it.

So when you are on a spiritual search, you can know whether it is an ego-trip or an authentic search. And the very confusion shows that this is not an authentic search; this is a sort of ego-trip. What is the ego-trip? You are less concerned with the real phenomenon; you are more concerned with possessing it.

People come to me and they say, 1You know, and you can know about us. Tell us whether our kundalini has arisen or not.' They are not concerned with kundalini, not concerned really; they need a certificate. And sometimes I play and I say, `Yes, your kundalini has arisen,' and immediately they are so happy. The person came very very gloomy and sad, and when I say, `Yes, your kundalini is awakened,' he is happy like a child.

He goes away happy, and when he is just going out of my room, I call him back and I say, `I was just playing. It is not real. Nothing has happened to you.' He is again sad. He is not really concerned with any awakening; he is simply concerned with feeling good: now his kundalini has awakened, now he can feel superior to others.

And this is how many so-called gurus go on exploiting, because you are for your ego. They can give you certificates, they can tell you, `Yes, you are already awakened. You have become a Buddha.' And you are not going to deny. If I say this to ten persons, out of ten, nine are not going to deny it. They will just feel happy. They were in search of such a guru who would say that they are awakened.

False gurus exist because of your need, because no authentic guru is going to say this to you, or give you any certificate -- because any certificate is a demand from the ego. No certificate is needed. If you are experiencing it, you are experiencing it. If the whole world denies it, let them deny. It makes no difference. If the real experience is there, what does it matter who says that you have achieved and who says you have not achieved? It is irrelevant. But it is not irrelevant, because your basic search is the ego. You want to believe that you have achieved all.

And this happens many times: when you become a failure in the world, when you are in misery in the world, when you cannot succeed there and when you feel that your ambition remains unfulfilled and life is passing, you turn to spirituality. The same ambition now asks to be fulfilled here. And it is easy to be fulfilled here -- easy, because in spirituality you can deceive yourself easily. In the real world, in the world of the matter, you cannot deceive so easily.

If you are poor, how can you pretend that you are rich? And if you pretend, no one is deceived. And if you go on insisting that you are rich, then the whole society, the whole crowd around you, will think you have gone mad.

I once knew a man who started thinking that he was Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru. His family, his friends, everyone tried to persuade him, `Don't talk such nonsense, otherwise you will be thought to be mad.'

But he said, `I am not talking nonsense. I am Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru.'

He started signing `Jawaharlal Nehru'. He would send telegrams to circuit houses, to officials, to collectors, to commissioners saying that, `I am coming -- Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru.'

He had to be caught and chained in his house. I went to meet him. He lived in my village. He said, `You are a man of understanding. You can understand. These fools, no one understands me -- I am Pundit Jawaharlal Nehru.'

So I said, `Yes, that's why I have come to meet you. And don't be afraid of these fools, because great men like you have always suffered.'

He said, `Right.' He was so happy. He said, `You are the only man who can understand me. Great men have to suffer.'

In the outer world, if you try to deceive yourself you will be thought mad, but in spirituality it is very easy. You can say that your kundalini has arisen. Just because you have a certain pain in your back, your kundalini has arisen. Because your brain is feeling a little unbalanced, you think centers are opening. Because you have a headache constantly, you think the third eye is opening. You can deceive and no one can say anything, and no one is interested. But there are false teachers who will say, `Yes, this is the method.' And you will feel very happy.

An ego-trip means that you are not interested in really transforming yourself; you are only interested in claiming. And the claim is easy, you can purchase it cheaply. And it is a mutual thing. When a guru, a so-called guru, says that you are an awakened man, of course he has made you awakened, so you have to pay respect to this guru. This is a mutual thing. You pay respect to him. And now you cannot leave that guru, because the moment you leave that guru what will happen to your awakening, your kundalini? You cannot leave. That guru depends on you because you give respect and honor to him, and then you will depend on him because no one else is going to believe that you are awakened. You cannot leave. This is a mutual bluff.

If you are really in search it is not so easy. And you don't need any witness. It is difficult and arduous; it may take even lives. And it is painful, it is a long suffering, because much has to be destroyed, much has to be transcended, long-established chains have to be broken. It is not easy. It is not a child's play. It is arduous, and suffering is bound to be there because whenever you start changing your pattern, all that is old has to be dropped. And all your investments are in the old. You will have to suffer.

When you start looking inwards for your ego and you don't find it, what will happen to your image that you have lived with? You have always thought you were a very good man, moral, this and that -- what will happen to that? When you find that you are nowhere to be found, where is that good man? Your ego implies all that you have thought about yourself. Everything is implied in it. It is not something that you can throw easily. It is you, your whole past. When you drop it you become like a zero, as if you never existed before. For the first time you are born; no experience, no knowledge, no past -- just like an innocent child. Daring is needed, courage is needed.

Authentic search is arduous. Ego-trip is very easy. And it can be fulfilled very easily, because nothing is really fulfilled. You start believing; you start believing that something has happened to you. You are simply wasting time and energy and life. So if you are really with a master, he will constantly pull you back from your trip. He will have to watch that you don't become mad, that you don't start thinking in dreams. He will have to pull you back.

And it is a very very difficult thing, because whenever you are pulled back you take revenge on the master. `I was going so high, and was just on the verge of exploding, and he says, "Nothing is happening. You are just imagining."' You are pulled back to the earth.

With a real master it is difficult to be a disciple. And disciples almost always go against their masters, because they are on their ego-trips and the master is trying to bring them out of that. And these disciples create false masters. They have a need, such a great need, that anyone who fulfills their need will become their master. And it is easy to help your ego grow, because you are for it. It is very difficult to help your ego to disappear.

Remember well, and check every day and every moment that your search is not an ego-trip. Go on checking it. It is subtle, and the ways of the ego are very very very cunning. They are not on the surface. The ego manipulates you from within; deep down from the unconscious. But if you are alert, the ego cannot deceive you. If you are alert, you will come to know its language, you will come to know its feeling, because it is always going after experience. This is the key word.

The ego is always looking for the experience -- sexual or spiritual, it makes no difference. The ego is greedy to experience this and to experience that: to experience kundalini and to experience the seventh body. The ego is always after experiences. The real search is not a greed for any experience, because any experience is going to frustrate you, is bound to frustrate you -- because any experience is going to be repetitive. Then you will get fed up with it; then you will again demand some new experience.

The search for the new will remain with the ego. You will meditate, and if you are only meditating just to get a new thrill, because your life has become boring -- you are fed up with your ordinary routine life, so you want to get some thrill.... You may get it, because man gets whatsoever he tries to find. That is the misery -- whatsoever you desire, you will find. And then you will repent. You will get the thrill. Then what? Then you get fed up with it also. Then you want to take LSD or something else. Then you go on moving from this master to that, from this ashram to that, just in search of a new thrill.

The ego is a greed for new experiences. And every new experience will become old, because whatsoever is new will become old -- then again.... Spirituality is not a search for experience really. Spirituality is a search for one's being. Not for any experience -- not even for bliss, not even for ecstasy -- because experience is an outer thing; howsoever inner, it is outer.

Spirituality is the search for the real being that is inside you: I must know what my reality is. And with that knowing, all greed for experiencing ceases. And with that knowing, there is no urge -- no urge to move for any new experience. With the knowing of the inner true reality, the authentic being, all search ceases.

So don't move for an experience. All experiences are just tricks of the mind, all experiences are just escapes. Meditation is not an experience, it is a realization. Meditation is not an experience; rather, it is a stopping of all experience. Because of this, those who have really tried to express the inner happening -- for example, Buddha -- they say, `Don't ask what happens there.' Of, if you insist, they will say, `Nothing happens there.'

If I say to you that nothing will happen in meditation, what will you do? You will stop meditating. If nothing is going to happen there, what is the use? -- that shows you are on an ego-trip. If I say nothing happens there, and you will say, `Okay, I have known many happenings and I have known many experiences, and every experience proved to be frustrating....' You pass through it and then you know it was nothing. And then an urge to repeat, and then repetition also becomes a boredom. Then you move to something else.... This is how you have been moving for lives and lives; for thousands and thousands of lives you have been moving for experience. You say, `I have known experience. Now I don't want any new experience. I want to know the experience.' The whole emphasis changes.

Experience is something outside you. The experiencer is your being. And this is the distinction between true spirituality and false: if you are for experiences, the spirituality is false; if you are for the experiencer, then it is true. But then you are not concerned about kundalini, not concerned about chakras, not concerned about all these things. They will happen, but you are not concerned, you are not interested, and you will not move on these by-paths. You will go on moving towards the inner center where nothing remains except you in your total aloneness. Only the consciousness remains, without content.

Content is the experience. Whatsoever you experience is the content. I experience misery -- then the misery is the content of my consciousness. Then I experience pleasure -- then pleasure is the content. Then I experience boredom -- then boredom is the content. And then you can experience silence -- then silence is the content. And then you can experience bliss -- then bliss is the content. So you go on changing the content. You can go on changing ad infinitum, but this is not the real thing.

The real is the one to whom these experiences happen -- to whom boredom happens, to whom bliss happens. The spiritual search is not WHAT happens, but to WHOM it happens. Then there is no possibility for the ego to arise.