OSHO
OSHO TALKS: silence shared in words
OSHO International Foundation presents:
OSHO: Spiritual Growth and Enlightenment
Source: The Last Testament Volume 3 # 16
This talk is complete in itself.
These discourses are the foundations of your meditation.
Sitting with me in these discourses is nothing but creating more and more meditativeness in you.
I don't speak to teach something -- I speak to create something.
These are not lectures -- these are simply a device for you to become silent -- OSHO
You have often said that no improvement is needed,
no goal is there to be achieved.
And you have also spoken about how, in the buddhafield,
a person can be helped
by those who are further along the path,
and can help those who are a few steps behind them.
Are there different stages of spiritual growth?
And if so, can you talk to us about them,
and how people in these different stages can be helpful to each other?
In one sense,
it is
indivisible reality.
Because what it is on the first step,
so it is on the last step.
It is pure witnessing.
But on the first step,
you are witnessing
only
the activities of the body.
On the second step, you are witnessing
the activities of the mind.
On the third step, you are witnessing the activities of the heart.
And on the fourth,
you are simply witnessing
your witnessing itself.
So if you look at witnessing,
it is just the same reality --
indivisible.
But if you look at the objects of witnessing,
then you can divide it into steps.
So the person who is witnessing only his bodily activities
can be immensely helped by the person
who has passed that stage,
and is witnessing
his mind,
thoughts,
dreams,
imaginations --
all the activities that the mind is capable of.
The person who is on the third stage
can help both --
the first stage person and the second stage person,
because now he is witnessing very subtle moods,
feelings,
emotions --
very fine,
very subtle,
very slippery.
And the person who has come to the fourth
and the last
can help all the three.
The help is a kind of encouragement.
First,
he can explain to you that whatever hindrances you are feeling
are natural.
He has experienced them himself,
so don't be worried.
Go on working on them,
however hard
they look.
They may be rocks,
and your witnessing may be as soft as water,
but in the long run,
the water wins
and the rock simply disappears into sand.
At the first glance it seems that there is no way for the water to win.
How can it win over the rock?
But finally, that's what happens.
Just somebody who has seen it happen
has to help you, that "Don't be discouraged by the rock,
it's strength. It is nothing before the water. "
Lao Tzu used to call his way the watercourse way --
a beautiful name,
so soft, so liquid,
no rigidity.
You can put it into any form.
It is always ready,
gives no resistance.
You put it in a bottle,
it takes the shape of the bottle.
You put it
into a jar,
it takes the shape of the jar,
with no resistance at all.
Such a non-resistant element
finally destroys the rock.
But somebody has to say to you,
"I have faced the same situation.
Don't be discouraged.
The rock will disappear,
will have to disappear.
That is the way
of existence."
So as far as objects are concerned,
you can divide the way
into three steps:
the body, the mind, the heart.
The fourth happens on its own accord.
Nobody can do it.
If you can fulfill
three steps
totally and completely,
suddenly: a quantum leap.
You find yourself
at the very center of your being.
The seer is there, but there is nothing to see.
The awareness is there, but there is nothing to be aware of.
When awareness
has nothing to be aware of,
it turns upon itself.
It becomes its own object.
And this is what we call realization.
You have known thousands of things;
for the first time, you know
your knowing.
You have been conscious of many things;
for the first time you become conscious of consciousness itself.
You have arrived home.
So remember, whenever I say
that it is indivisible,
I mean witnessing.
And whenever I say
that people can be more advanced, less advanced,
I mean their objects of witnessing...
they can be gross,
can be subtle,
can be very subtle --
or
there may be nothing as an object.
That is the moment of revolution,
and that's the only revolution there is.
It opens the doors of all the mysteries of existence.
It allows you to feel the deathlessness,
the eternity.
It gives you the taste
of pure existence.
Yes, it is a taste --
that's why there is no way to say it,
no way to explain it --
one can only experience.
Your emphasis has always been that every human being
has the birthright to become enlightened,
that it is nothing special.
However, not many people claim this birthright,
or are even interested in it.
Why not? Is there some ingredient, some quality
which makes some people more
interested in the inquiry than others?
Just
because
it is the very birthright
of every human being,
it prevents people.
It gives no challenge.
The ego has no interest in it.
It is your birthright.
It is not something that the ego can
brag of.
It would like to go to the moon,
which is not your birthright.
Howsoever silly it will be,
but it would like to go to Everest.
That is not your birthright,
but the ego gets interested only in things
which make you
superior,
higher,
special,
famous,
celebrities.
The ego is not interested
in something which you are carrying, from the very birth, with yourself.
It is interested in extraordinary things.
The more difficult the job,
the more the ego becomes interested in it.
And enlightenment is the easiest thing in existence,
the most natural thing.
Hence, ego has no interest in it.
This is how the problem arises.
The moment a child is born,
nobody is interested in the child's nature,
his potential,
his
possibilities of growth.
Nobody is interested in the child's birthright.
Everybody is interested in making of the child something
very special --
an Alexander the Great,
a Beethoven,
a Picasso,
an Albert Einstein,
a Mao Zedong --
somebody
who is going to be in the history.
Everybody -- your mother, your father,
your teachers,
your priests --
all are
helping you
to move away from yourself
as much as possible.
And this distance
is the strength of your ego.
The farther you are from yourself,
the bigger is your ego.
I remember
I was
in a very beautiful
place,
Ajanta.
The whole mountain
has been cut,
perhaps it must have taken thousands of years,
and thousands of
artists,
sculptors.
These caves are Buddhist,
so Buddhists must have done that.
Just before you go into the forest and into the caves,
in the city,
a small place,
I was finding somewhere to stay.
Because there are
so many caves -- and I am not
a tourist who can go
within half an hour and come back --
so I wanted to stay for a few days,
because each cave may take days for me....
If the cave has taken
hundreds of years to make --
the carvings,
the statues
of thousands of
meditators --
then it is not
that you just go in and have a look
and you are finished.
It is not a tourist place.
You have to be in that cave one day, two days, three days
to be acquainted with its vibe.
It must be still vibrant
with those thousands of meditators who had worked
for hundreds of years.
Generations of meditators...
and they have not just painted
like modern painters,
they have made those statues
with a certain specific aim in mind:
that they will convey to people something
which cannot be said in words.
Otherwise, there are
so many scriptures, what is the need
to carve these beautiful
statues
in different postures,
lotuses,
flowers.
Seems to be a sheer waste of time.
So I was looking where to stay,
and then I came across a small temple.
I went in and I asked the priest,
"If you allow me to leave my
luggage here,
and -- it will be very kind of you --
if you can allow me
to sleep here for two-three days,
because in your town there is no hotel."
The priest said, "But nobody stays here.
People come
and within an hour, or two hours at the most,
they are gone."
I said, "I am not a tourist.
I am one of those who have carved these statues. "
The man looked at me as if I am mad!
He said, "My God!
Then it is okay,
you can leave your luggage in the temple."
As I entered the temple,
on the door of the temple there was a sentence --
that's why I remembered it --
a very famous
quotation
from the Vedas,
that "The king
is respected in his own country,
but the enlightened one
is respected in the whole world.
So strive to become enlightened."
I asked the priest,
"Please remove this sentence from here.
You have spoiled the whole thing.
'A king is respected in his own kingdom.'
The emphasis is on respect.
'The enlightened one is respected in the whole world,
so strive for it.'
You are making enlightenment also
an object for the ego.
Who cares about respect
except the ego?
And ego is the only barrier which does
not allow a man to become enlightened.
So if a person is trying to become enlightened to be respected
all over the world,
it is impossible
that he will become enlightened, ever."
But I can understand; whoever made that
sutra
must be aware
that unless you make enlightenment an object of the ego,
nobody is even going to try.
I can understand his
idea,
that make enlightenment
so
respectable,
far better than becoming
a world conqueror,
that the ego becomes interested in it.
But whoever made the sutra is a fool.
He does not know
that if ego is interested in becoming enlightened,
then there is no possibility for enlightenment.
The only barrier is the ego.
So, whether one becomes respectable
or not,
whether anybody knows
or not,
whether your name is written in golden letters in the history
or not
does not matter.
Only then, when respectability does not matter at all
and you are perfectly happy
just being yourself,
your very ordinary self....
The phenomenon is very simple,
that's the trouble.
It is your birthright:
that's why
nobody seems to be interested in it.
If it was far away,
as the moon is,
then many idiots would have been trying to reach there.
But it is within you.
You are
carrying it
day in, day out,
wherever you go it is there with you,
within you.
Even while you are committing a crime, a murder,
it is there.
If you can witness your murder,
you will become enlightened.
It does not matter what you are doing.
What matters is: are you doing it
as a witness?
Perhaps as a witness you cannot murder,
you cannot commit a crime.
But that is a separate story.
Witnessing you have brought
with your birth.
But the society,
the educational system,
the family,
all are trying to make you ambitious.
My father never knew --
he had eleven children --
he never knew
which child
is attending,
studying, in which school,
in which class,
and whether he has passed this year or failed.
He never inquired.
Even for our progressive report,
we had to tell him, that "You have to sign it."
And he will say,
"You could have
signed it yourself --
my signature is so simple.
But I will sign." And he will sign without reading whether
I have passed, failed,
any recommendations from the teacher, from the principal?
He will not read it.
When I topped the university,
that was the first time I told him,
"You will be happy to know...
you know me, that I am good for nothing,
but by some coincidence
I have topped the whole university
and received the gold medal."
He became very serious.
I said, "It is not
some crime that I have committed.
You need not be so serious."
He said, "No, I am serious,
because that simply means
in your whole university,
if you can top the university
then the people who are studying there
must be far worse than you!
That makes me serious. I was thinking only you are good for nothing.
This proves that your whole university
is just good for nothing.
And you topped -- that means you are at least
better."
I said, "That's true.
I never thought about it, otherwise I would not have told you.
I thought you will be happy."
To get such a father is very difficult.
He never
imposed any ambition on me.
If some of my brothers failed in a class
and they came home crying and weeping,
he will say, "Don't cry and weep. What is the matter?
It simply means in two years
you will become far more stronger
and far more wiser than you can become in one year.
And what is the loss?
And what is the hurry?
If you cannot come out of the school one year earlier,
there is no problem.
You can take your time, you can fail as many times as you want.
One thing is certain, the more you remain in one class,
the wiser and stronger you will become --
nothing is lost.
Don't unnecessarily cry and weep."
The principal will come
just
to console my father that,
"It is not our fault that your
son has failed,
but he never pays any attention
to the studies. He is continuously interested in games,
and almost always he is absent.
So you just tell him to be present. He is intelligent,
there is no problem about it.
But my father will say, "But what is the problem?
Let him play, let him not be attentive.
Let him not be present,
what is the hurry?
I am still alive.
He can take his time:
one year, two years, three years,
as much as he wants.
He will come out far more mature,
and failure is also
a great experience in life.
In life you cannot succeed in everything.
So this is good,
he will know some taste of failure
and will be able to absorb it in his life.
There is no need to be worried and no need to console me.
Nothing has gone wrong."
But to find this kind of
parents is very difficult.
Ordinarily they are all
ambitious people,
and because they cannot fulfill their own ambitions,
they project their ambitions on their children.
They wanted to become something special,
they could not become --
at least their son will become.
I used to know a very famous politician,
Seth Govinddas.
He had a very ambitious mind
and wanted to become not less than prime minister of India.
And the man who became the first prime minister of India,
they were both friends,
and very intimate friends.
Both have been together in jails,
both have come from very rich families.
The father of Jawaharlal Nehru, Motilal,
in one of his speeches has said, "I have two sons.
One is Jawaharlal, another is Govind Das."
Naturally, he was
thinking to become the prime minister.
If he cannot become the first prime minister,
then after Jawaharlal,
his must be the second chance.
But he could not manage even to become a cabinet minister.
He could not manage even to become
a governor,
a chief minister of a state.
He had tried everything,
but he was not
basically a politician --
very simple, almost a simpleton.
So the desire was there,
burning his heart.
He had two sons,
and he was trying hard that they should
become what he has
missed.
And he had all the connections,
political,
so he helped his first son
to become a deputy minister.
He was hoping that soon he will become minister,
then he will move to the cabinet of the central government,
and then he will become
a prime minister.
If he has not been able to become the prime minister,
at least he can claim to be the father of a prime minister,
which is far better.
But the son died as a deputy
minister in a state council.
He was only thirty-six when he died.
But ambition is such a thing
that this old man tried to commit suicide,
because with the death of the son
all his ambitions
have failed again.
I told him: "You have another son.
Give him a try.
You have all the best connections in the country,
from the lowest to the highest.
It is just very easy for you."
And suddenly I could see his eyes shine
again,
as if life returned to him.
He said, "Yes, I had never thought about it.
I was simply thinking to die,
because what is the point of living?
I missed, my son has died."
So he managed for his second son to enter into the same post --
he became the deputy minister.
But neither of his sons had the
ability
to be politicians.
They were his sons,
just
as stupid as he was,
perhaps a little more.
And you will be surprised that the second son also died.
And the man was now seventy-five or seventy-eight,
and this was too much of a shock.
Again he started talking about suicide.
His wife phoned me
and said: "You come.
Last time you had done something
and he dropped the idea of suicide. Now you do something,
again he is talking of suicide." I said,
"Don't be worried. People who talk of suicide never commit suicide.
People who commit suicide are those who never talk about it.
But I will come."
I went.
He was sitting again in the same posture,
and I said to him: "If you want to commit suicide, commit!
Why do you harass the whole family
by talking about it?"
He said this, "Everybody,
the mayor of the city, the chief minister,
all have come to console me.
Indira Gandhi's telegram has come."
And he was sitting with a pile of telegrams
from all the ministers, and governors and --
India has thirty states -- and chief ministers --
and he was showing them to everybody who was coming.
I told him, "You don't seem to be interested in the death of the son.
You are more interested in these telegrams."
Just one man has not given him a telegram,
and about that he was feeling very hurt.
He was one of his old colleagues,
but then later on they became enemies in politics.
He joined another party,
and became a chief minister.
Only he had not,
so he was continuously telling to everybody,
"Only Dwarka Prasad Mishra...
his telegram has not come.
And I have made the man."
And it is true,
if you think that
Dwarka Prasad lived
in Govind Das' house,
financially was supported by him.
But it is not true that he has made the man.
That man was
capable
on his own
to reach to the post, to any post.
He was a very ambitious, very cunning,
very clever man.
He used him,
he used all his friendships
with all the great politicians.
And I said, "You are so much interested
in telegrams, and you are not interested
in the death of your son.
Can you understand that you have lived your whole life in ambition?
You failed, your first son died,
your second son died, but your ambition --
it continues.
You are ready to commit suicide
but you are not ready to drop the ambition.
As if ambition is far more valuable than life!"
And I said, "If you just want to project your ambition on somebody,
then why not your son-in-law?"
He said, "You are a genius, certainly!
I never thought about my son-in-law."
He had only one daughter and two sons.
And because he was so rich
the daughter was living with him,
and the son-in-law was also living with him.
I said, "He lives with you.
He is just like a son to you.
Make arrangements, make him deputy
minister in the cabinet somewhere
and see whether he dies or not!
Then we will think...
Why have these two sons died?
It seems they were not capable
to withstand the political pressures, challenges, worries.
And they were both young and there was no need to die so soon.
And there was no reason
except that politics proved poisonous to them.
Let us try this one."
And he tried.
And this time things went well.
The man became deputy
minister and Seth Govind Das died!
And the moment he died,
his son-in-law was thrown out of the ministry,
because he was just taken in because of his pressure,
that he will commit suicide.
So all the politicians had known him throughout his whole life.
And he had been in the freedom struggle,
and he was known as "father of the parliament."
He was
the only man
in the whole world, except Winston Churchill,
who has been a member of parliament so long, continuously
from 1916
to '78,
continuously,
without a break.
So he was known as father of the Indian parliament.
Everybody knew him and everybody was obliged in many ways to him.
But the moment he died,
the son-in-law was thrown out.
I said, "This is far better, because if you were thrown out before,
again he would have striven to commit suicide."
And he was not capable of committing suicide either,
because still ambition was there,
some hope, from some corner.
All the parents are ambitious.
The whole educational system is ambitious.
All the religions are ambitious.
They are all promising and giving hope to people
that their ambitions will be fulfilled after death.
That's why people are missing
something which is very simple,
which needs no ambition,
which needs no ego,
which needs no effort,
which needs a simple, very simple understanding --
just a little clarity,
a little intelligence,
and your whole life is transformed.
The whole earth can become enlightened.
Just, we have to change the educational system,
we have to change
the organized religions of the world,
we have to change
the political
structures of the society.
And we have to allow every child his way.
Whatever he wants to become,
let him become.
Even if he turns out to be a beggar,
he will be far more fulfilled
than
when forced to be a king.
He will not be happy to be a king,
that will not go according to his heart.
Let something happen
according to his heart.
If he wants to play guitar, let him play guitar.
He will not become Yehudi Menuhin --
how many people can become Yehudi Menuhin?
But there is no need for everybody to become Yehudi Menuhin.
He can play and enjoy.
If he enjoys himself
without disturbing the neighbors,
there is no problem.
I have heard
that a
man who was practicing Indian classical music,
his neighbor came to him and said,
"Tonight we are going to have a party.
Can we have your harmonium?"
He said, "There is no problem, you can take the harmonium."
Just after a few minutes the neighbor's wife came,
and said,
"It doesn't look good, but we don't have a set of tablas.
Can we have your tablas?"
He said, "Yes, you can have.
But when is the party going to begin?"
The wife said, "What party?"
The man said, "But your husband has taken the harmonium
and he was saying, 'We are going to have a party
so some music will be happening."'
The wife said, "To be true,
tonight we want to sleep.
Music is happening too much!
So he had taken the harmonium, then we
remembered you may start playing on the tabla.
I have come to ask for the tablas
because what will we do with only the harmonium? -- tablas are also needed.
There is no party.
Just for so many days we have not been able to sleep.
Just once in a while, let us have sleep."
So if you are not disturbing your neighbors,
there is no problem.
You can play your guitar, your sitar.
You can play anything you want,
and even if you don't become famous --
I don't understand
what
it is going to give to you, becoming famous.
Twenty people know you,
what are you getting?
Two hundred people know you,
you will be getting ten times more,
but what are you getting with twenty?
Two thousand people know you, then you will be getting
still more, but what are you getting with twenty?
Just think of that: the whole world knows you,
but what will you be getting out of it?
Just start with twenty and go on multiplying
and you will be clearly
able to perceive that it is simple nonsense.
Ambition is a very stupid game
in which there is no victory,
only defeat.
Only defeat because you will never become
what you are born to become.
And you will never know your birthright,
the ultimate bliss of being enlightened.
Often you have spoken about your rebellious
childhood and how it gave you such freedom,
how you insisted on discovering your own individuality.
How did you know the need to rebel at this early age?
What about those people who didn't have the courage to rebel
and who had a hampered childhood?
Is a rebellious childhood necessary for enlightenment?
No, not necessary.
A man can become enlightened
without having a rebellious childhood,
but nobody can become enlightened
without becoming rebellious before it.
If one is fortunate enough to be rebellious in his childhood,
enlightenment will be coming sooner.
I became enlightened when I was twenty-one.
Gautam Buddha became enlightened when he was forty-two,
because up to his twenty-ninth year
he had never rebelled
against his father's wishes.
At the age of twenty-nine,
he had to rebel,
because he could see
that these twenty-nine years have gone just
without any meaning.
Because the astrologers have said to his father
that he should not be allowed to see
a dead body,
a sick man,
an old man,
a sannyasin.
And he was the only son of his father,
and born at his very old age,
so the whole kingdom
belonged to Gautam Buddha.
And the father was very much afraid
because the astrologers said, "If you don't manage
rightly there is every possibility
he may renounce the world
and may become a seeker of truth.
If he remains in the world
and becomes the king,
then there is a possibility he may
even become the king of the whole world,
he has such a great potential.
Either he will become
the great conqueror of the world --
in Sanskrit it is called chakravartin --
or he will become an enlightened one...
between these two.
And we cannot say right now
what will happen, but
if you can manage
to avoid a few things
from his knowledge,
then he will never renounce the world.
Bring the most beautiful girls of the kingdom.
Keep him surrounded with the girls,
with music, with dance, with wine, with good food.
Make beautiful palaces for him
for different seasons in different locations.
In summer he should be in a cold region.
In winter he should be in a warmer place.
So make three palaces."
Because India has very clear cut three seasons:
summer, winter, rains.
And the father was so rich, he managed beautiful palaces.
The gardeners were told that he should not see even
a pale leaf or a dead leaf.
No idea should get into his mind
that things get old or things die.
For twenty-nine years he lived almost
a prisoner in utter luxury.
The rebellion came
because he was going to open
the ceremony, annual ceremony
of the entire kingdom,
some kind of Olympic Games for youth.
On the way in his golden chariot,
he saw an old man
for the first time in his life.
He asked the charioteer,
"What has happened to this man?"
The charioteer said, "I cannot speak a lie to you.
But what has happened to this man
happens to everybody -- he has become old."
Immediately Gautam Buddha asked,
"That means it is going to happen to me also?"
He was at his prime of youth,
a beautiful young man.
The charioteer said,
"I would like it not to happen to you,
but nature cannot be
changed.
It is just the law of nature.
One who is born
will become old,
it cannot be prevented."
And then came a dead man's body
being carried to the crematorium.
And Buddha said, "What is happening?"
The charioteer said, "This happens after old age.
This is the last stage.
After this nothing happens.
This man is dead."
Buddha had not even heard the word death.
And then he saw a sannyasin,
who was just
following the dead man's body.
And he said, "This man looks strange --
shaven head,
orange clothes,
with a begging bowl in his hand --
I have never seen such a type.
What is his profession?"
The charioteer said,
"He has renounced all professions.
He is a sannyasin.
He is a seeker of truth.
Realizing that life becomes one day
death,
he wants to know,
'Is there something
within us which does not die,
or does everything die?'
He's on an immense journey,
a search for himself,
his eternity."
Buddha said to him,
"Return the chariot back to my palace.
I'm not going to open,
inaugurate the function --
because I have already become old,
I am already feeling as if I am dying and suffocating.
You just take me back home.
I have been deceived."
And this was the first time
a great rebellion was born in his mind.
That very night he escaped
from the palace.
But twenty-nine years were lost.
He could have become enlightened long before.
But one thing is certain: whether one
is rebellious in his childhood or not,
nobody becomes enlightened
before it being preceded
by a rebellious approach.
Because he will have to fight against the conditioning of the society,
he will have to rebel against the beliefs of the society.
He will have to rebel against his own ego,
against his own ambitions.
Rebellion is certainly
a necessary part.
It cuts you
from the ordinary social world,
and makes you an individual.
Rebellion is the fire,
passing through which
one gains freedom,
individuality,
integrity.
And only after that one can relax
and be oneself,
be simple,
be innocent.
It is a new birth.
And then enlightenment is not far away.
Hindrances removed,
enlightenment is always there.
It is your birthright.
You've said that your sannyasins live individual lives in freedom.
Doesn't everyone live an individual life?
What is the difference that makes a person a sannyasin?
Is it meditation?
There are many things
that make a person a sannyasin.
One is
a deep frustration
with life
as it is
available in the ordinary world;
a sense of meaninglessness
in whatever one is doing.
A despair
that one does not know even
who he is --
a deep anguish
that "Life is slipping out of my hands.
Death can happen any moment,
and I have not even started the journey yet."
These are the first circles
of a necessary
milieu
that makes one
seek and search for someone
who may have
a different quality of life,
who may have found some meaning,
who may have reached the oasis.
While you are in the desert,
somebody may have found the sources
of living waters.
And if one looks around,
one is always
bound to find someone.
And it is not a question of any intellectual conviction.
Just the meeting of...
such a person,
and there is an instant
communion.
One knows,
one cannot give any explanation why,
but one knows that this is the man.
It is not of the head,
otherwise reason could have been supplied.
It is something of the heart,
almost a love affair.
Once you have found a man
whom you can think of
as one who has arrived --
any name you can give it --
who is enlightened,
awakened,
simply one who has
no more any problems, no anxiety, no anguish,
no boredom --
one's every breath
is full of joy,
one's every moment
is a rejoicing.
This synchronicity
makes you ask and inquire
about the way --
call it meditation,
the journey towards one's own self,
the search for meaning,
for truth.
This meeting is very significant.
It ignites something in you.
Something that was dormant in you
suddenly becomes
active.
The presence of this man
is enough,
it is a catalytic agent,
and you start flying with him
into new dimensions of being.
I had started alone,
and then people went on coming
and my caravan
began
to become bigger and bigger and bigger.
Then everything
becomes
totally different,
because now you are no more
zombies.
The whole world is full of zombies, sleeping people,
somnambulists.
Now something has
awakened in you,
and that something
is enough
as a seed.
It will grow,
it will come to fruition,
to flowering.
And when so many people gather around such a man,
naturally there arises a commune.
All this happens without any planning --
I had never thought of any commune.
I have never thought even
about teaching anybody anything.
I was fulfilled and happy.
But
you cannot avoid --
something like a magnetic force
pulls potential people around you.
And soon it is going to become
a vast
ocean.
And then the work becomes very easy,
because all these people are at different points in the journey
and they start helping each other.
They become sharers of my work,
they relieve me of much work.
They start helping each other.
The commune becomes
almost many bodies and one soul.
Everybody's growth somehow helps your growth.
Everybody's enlightenment
is going to help everybody else's enlightenment.
It is a kind of
invisible sharing of energies.
So communes are immensely important,
otherwise it is very difficult: how can I help millions of people?
And the world needs now
more and more communes.
People can come here,
have a little taste
of what it is all about,
go back to their own commune
and spread
the fragrance.
So this place has already become a world capital of all the mystics,
of all the seekers of truth.
It was
for many reasons that
I declared
that it is not a religion,
not an organization --
because I want it to remain
a very liquid,
free,
flowing,
energy...
not solid,
rocklike,
but like a breeze.
So we can start
these vibrations around the earth
and all our communes can become
both receivers and broadcasters.
If we can create
around the earth
a circle of
conscious energy,
that is the only hope for the world,
for the new man.
Otherwise, this century is going to see the end
of all life on this earth.
But
we are taking the challenge,
and I don't think
that death is more powerful than life,
that hate is more powerful than love,
that nuclear weapons are more powerful
than mystic experiences.
We have to prove it --
and I am certain that we are capable of proving it.
Source: 'The Last Testament Vol 3 # 16'
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