Meditation Means Watch Without Any Judgement. A State of No Mind

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Do You Really Believe Heaven & Hell are Actual Geographical Places with Addresses? [ego is the drug, the intoxicant that makes you completely unconscious]

BELOVED Bhagwan,

A WARRIOR CAME TO THE ZEN MASTER HAKUIN AND ASKED "IS THERE SUCH A THING AS HEAVEN AND HELL?"

HAKUIN SAID "WHO ARE YOU?"

THE WARRIOR REPLIED "I AM CHIEF SAMURAI TO THE EMPEROR."

HAKUIN SAID "YOU, A SAMURAI? WITH A FACE LIKE THAT, YOU LOOK MORE LIKE A BEGGAR."

AT THIS THE WARRIOR BECAME SO ANGRY HE DREW HIS SWORD.

STANDING CALMLY IN FRONT OF HIM, HAKUIN SAID "HERE OPEN THE GATES OF HELL."

PERCEIVING THE MASTER'S COMPOSURE, THE SOLDIER SHEATHED HIS SWORD AND BOWED.

HAKUIN THEN SAID "AND HERE OPEN THE GATES OF HEAVEN."

Heaven and hell are not geographical. If you go in search of them you will never find them anywhere. They are within you, they are psychological. The mind is heaven, the mind is hell, and the mind has the capacity to become either. But people go on thinking everything is somewhere outside. We always go on looking for everything outside because to be inwards is very difficult. We are outgoing. If somebody says there is a god, we look at the sky. Somewhere, sitting there, will be the divine person. 

One psychologist in an American school asked small children what they thought about God. Children have clearer perception: they are less cunning, more truthful. They are more representative of the human mind, they are unperverted. So he asked the children and the answers were collected. The conclusions were very ridiculous. Almost all the children depicted God something like this -- an old man, very tall, bearded and very dangerous. He created fear. If you didn't follow him he would throw you into hell; if you prayed and followed him he would give you paradise and all the pleasures. He was sitting on a throne in the sky watching everybody. You couldn't escape him; even in your bathroom he was looking.

The outgoing mind projects everything outside. This is YOUR God too. Don't laugh, don't think this is a child's conception -- no, this is you.

This is how you think about God -- as a cosmic spy, always searching to condemn, to punish, to throw you into hell... as very ferocious, revengeful. That's why all religions are based on fear. Religions say if you do this you will be appreciated, rewarded; if you don't do this, you will be punished. The base seems to be fear. God just seems to be a very powerful emperor sitting on a throne in heaven. The whole concept is foolish but human; the human mind is foolish. The whole concept is anthropocentric.

In the Bible it is said God created man in his own image. In reality, it seems to be quite otherwise: man created God in his own image. We have projected God in our own image; he is just a blow-up of the human mind. He is a bigger human mind, that's all. Remember, if you think God is somewhere outside you, you have not even taken the first step towards being religious.

The same happens with all such concepts. We say heaven is without, hell is without; it is as if there exists nothing within. What is within you? The moment you think of the within it seems that everything goes empty. What is within? The world is without, sex is without, sin is without, virtue is without. God, heaven, hell -- everything is without. What is within you? Who are you? The moment you think of the within your mind goes blank, there is nothing. In reality, everything is within; the outer is just a projection. Fear is within you; it is projected as a hell. Hell is just a projected image on the screen -- of the fear that is within you, of the anger, of the jealousy, of all that is poisonous in you, of all that is evil in you. Heaven is, again, a projected image on the screen -- of all that is good and beautiful, of all that is blissful within you. The Devil is the fallen human being, God is the risen human being. God is the ultimate possibility of your beatitude; the Devil is your ultimate fall. There is nobody like the Devil existing somewhere. You will never meet him unless you become him. And you will never encounter God unless you become God.

In the East religions transcended this anthropocentric attitude very long ago, in the past. Eastern religions are non-anthropocentric. They say "you cannot encounter God, you can become God. They say "When you reach to the ultimate point of existence, there will be no God to receive you and welcome you. Only you will be there in your godliness. So this can be said, and I go on insisting: There exists no God -- existence is divine. There exists no one like a person, a super-person, no one. God is nonexistential, godliness is existential. The moment I say godliness... it becomes something inward; the moment you say God, you have projected it.

This story is beautiful. The Zen master Hakuin is one of the rare flowerings. A warrior came to him, a samurai, a great soldier, and he asked "Is there any hell, is there any heaven? If there is hell and heaven, where are the gates? Where do I enter from? How can I avoid hell and choose heaven?" He was a simple warrior. Warriors are always simple.

It is difficult to find a businessman who is simple. A businessman is always cunning, clever; otherwise he cannot be a businessman. A warrior is always simple; otherwise he cannot be a warrior. A warrior knows only two things, life and death -- nothing much. His life is always at stake, he is always gambling; He is a simple man. That's why businessmen could not create a single Mahavir, a single Buddha. Even Brahmins could not create a Ram, a Buddha, a Mahavir. Brahmins are also cunning, cunning in a different way. They are also businessmen -- of a different world, of the other. They deal in business not of this world, but of the other world. Their priesthood is a business; their religion is mathematics, arithmetic. They are also clever, more clever than businessmen. The businessman is limited to his world, their cunningness goes beyond. They always think of the other world, of the rewards they are going to get there. Their rituals, their whole mind is concerned with how to achieve more pleasures in the other world. They are concerned with pleasure: they are businessmen. Even Brahmins could not create a Buddha. This is strange. All the twenty-four Jaina tirthankaras were kshatriyas, warriors. Buddha was a warrior; Rama and Krishna were warriors. They were simple people, with no cunning in their minds, with no arithmetic. They knew only two things -- life and death.

This simple warrior came to Hakuin to ask where is heaven and where is hell. He had not come to learn any doctrine. He wanted to know where the gate was so he could avoid hell and enter heaven. And Hakuin replied in a way only a warrior could understand. If a brahmin had been there, scriptures would have been needed; he would have quoted the Vedas, the Upanishads, the Bible, the Koran, then a Brahmin would have understood. All that exists for a brahmin is in the scriptures; scriptures are the world. A brahmin lives in the word, in the verbal. If a businessman had been there, he would not have understood the answer, the response Hakuin gave, the way he acted with this warrior. A businessman always asks "What is the price of your heaven? What is the cost? How can I attain it? What should I do? How virtuous should I be? What are the coins? What should I do so heaven can be attained?" He always asks for the price.

I have heard one beautiful story -- it happened in the beginning when God created the world. God came to earth to ask different races about the ten commandments, the ten rules of life. The Jews have given so much significance to those ten rules -- Christians also, Mohammedans also. All these religions are Jewish, the source is the Jew, and the Jew is the perfect businessman.

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Bhagwan: Don't Worry About Changing the Situation. Change Yourself. [rebellion]

By Osho. From The Book of Secrets, Chapter 73

From [HERE] The appreciation of objects and subjects is the same for an enlightened as for an unenlighted person. The former has one greatness: he remains in the subjective mood, not lost in things.

There is a very beautiful method. You can start it as you are; no other prerequisite is needed. The method is simple: you are surrounded by persons, things, phenomena – every moment something is around you. Things are there, events are there, persons are there – but because you are not alert, you are not there. Everything is there but you are fast asleep. Things move around you, persons move around you, events move around you, but you are not there. Or, you are asleep.

So whatsoever happens in your surroundings becomes a master, becomes a force over you; you are dragged by it. You are not only impressed, conditioned by it, you are dragged by it.

Anything can catch you, and you will follow it. Somebody passes – you look, the face is beautiful – and you are carried away. The dress is beautiful, the color, the material is beautiful – you are carried away. The car passes – you are carried away. Whatsoever happens around you, catches you. You are not powerful. Everything else is more powerful than you. Anything changes you. Your mood, your being, your mind, depend on other things. Objects influence you.

This sutra says that enlightened persons and unenlightened persons live in the same world. A Buddha and you both live and move in the same world – the world remains the same. The difference is not in the world, the difference happens in the Buddha: he moves in a different way. He moves among the same objects but he moves in a different way. He is his own master. His subjectivity remains aloof and untouched. That is the secret. Nothing can impress him; nothing from the outside can condition him; nothing can overpower him. He remains detached; he remains himself. If he wants to go somewhere, he will go, but he will remain the master. If he wants to pursue a shadow, he will pursue it, but it is his own decision.

This distinction must be understood. By ‘detachment’ I don’t mean a person who has renounced the world – then there is no sense and no meaning in detachment. A detached person is a person who is living in the same world as you – the difference is not in the world. A person who renounces the world is changing the situation, not himself. And you will insist on changing the situation if you cannot change yourself. That is the indication of a weak personality. A strong person, alert and aware, will start to change himself… not the situation in which he is. Because really the situation cannot be changed – even if you can change the situation, there will be other situations. Every moment situations go on changing so every moment the problem will be there.

This is the difference between the religious and the non-religious attitude. The non-religious attitude is to change the situation, the surrounding. It doesn’t believe in you, it believes in situations: when the situation is okay, you will be okay. You are dependent on the situation: if the situation is not okay, you will not be okay. So you are not an independent entity. For communists, Marxists, socialists, and all those who believe in changing the situation, you are not important; really, you don’t exist. Only the situation exists and you are just a mirror which reflects the situation. The religious attitude says that as you are you may be a mirror, but this is not your destiny – you can become something more, someone who is not dependent.

There are three steps of growth. Firstly, the situation is the master, you are just dragged by it. You believe that ‘you are’, but you are not. Secondly, ‘you are’, and the situation cannot drag you, the situation cannot influence you because you have become a will, you are integrated and crystalized. Thirdly, you start influencing the situation: just by your being there, the situation changes.

The first state is that of the unenlightened; the second state is of the person who is constantly aware but as yet unenlightened – he has to be alert, he has to do something to be alert. The alertness has not become natural yet so he has to fight. If he loses consciousness or alertness for a single moment, he will be in the influence of the thing. So he has to stand on his toes continuously. He is the seeker, the sadhak, the one who is practising something. The third state is that of the siddha, the enlightened one. He is not trying to be alert, he simply is alert – there is no effort to it. Alertness is just like breathing: it goes on, he does not have to maintain it. When alertness becomes a phenomenon like breathing, natural, sahaj, spontaneous, then this type of person, this type of centered being, automatically influences situations. Situations change around him – not that he wishes them to change, but he is powerful.

Power is the thing to be remembered. You are powerless so anything can overpower you. And power comes through alertness, awareness: the more alert, the more powerful; the less alert, the less powerful. Look… while you are asleep even a dream becomes powerful because you are fast asleep, you have lost all consciousness. Even a dream is powerful, and you are so weak that you cannot even doubt it. Even in an absurd dream you cannot be skeptical, you will have to believe it. And while it lasts, it looks real. You may see just absurd things in the dream, but while you are dreaming, you cannot doubt. You cannot say this is not real; you cannot say this is a dream; you cannot say this is impossible. You simply cannot say it because you are so fast asleep. When consciousness is not there even a dream affects you. While awake, you will laugh and you will say, “It was absurd, impossible, this cannot happen. This dream was just illusory.” But you have not noticed that while it was there you were influenced by it, you were totally taken over by it. Why was a dream so powerful? The dream was not powerful – you were powerless. Remember this: when you are powerless even a dream becomes powerful.

While you are awake, a dream cannot influence you, but reality, the so-called reality around, does. An awakened person, an enlightened person, has become so alert that your reality also cannot influence him. If a woman passes, a beautiful woman, you are suddenly carried away. Desire has arisen, the desire to possess. If you are alert, the woman will pass by, but the desire will not arise – you have not been influenced, you have not been taken over. When this happens for the first time, when things move around you and you are not influenced, you will feel a subtle joy of being. For the first time really you feel that you are; nothing can drag you out of you. If you want to follow, that is another thing. That is your decision. But don’t deceive yourself. You can deceive. You can say, “Yes. The woman is not powerful, but I want to follow her, I want to possess her.” You can deceive. Many people go on deceiving. But you are deceiving nobody except yourself – then it is futile. Just take a close look: you will know the desire is there. The desire comes first, and then you start rationalizing it.

For an enlightened person, things are there and he is there but there is no bridge between him and the thing. The bridge has broken. He moves alone. He lives alone. He follows himself. Nothing else can possess him. Because of this feeling we have called this attainment moksha – total freedom, mukti. He is totally free.

All over the world, man has searched for freedom; you cannot find a man who is not hankering after freedom in his own way. Through many paths man tries to find a state of being where he can be free, and he resents anything that gives him a feeling of bondage. He hates it. Anything that hinders, that makes him imprisoned, he fights. He struggles against it. Hence so many political fights, so many wars, revolutions; hence so many continuous family fights – wife and husband, father and son, all fighting each other. The fight is basic. The fight is for freedom. The husband feels confined, the wife has imprisoned him – now his freedom is cut. And the wife feels the same. They both resent each other, they both fight, they both try to destroy the bondage. The father fights the son because every stage of growth in the son means more freedom for him. And the father feels he is losing something: power, authority. In families, in nations, in civilizations, man is hankering after only one thing – freedom.

But nothing is achieved through political fights, revolutions, wars. Nothing is achieved. Because even if you get freedom, it is superficial – deep down you remain in bondage. So every freedom proves a disillusionment. Man longs so much for wealth, but as far as I understand it, it is not a longing for wealth, it is a longing for freedom. Wealth gives you a feeling of freedom. If you are poor, you are confined, your means are limited – you cannot do this, you cannot do that. You don’t have the money to do it. The more money you have, the more you feel you have freedom, you can do anything you like. But when you have all the money and you can do all that you wish, imagine, dream about, suddenly you feel this freedom is superficial, because inside your being knows well that you are powerless and that anything can attract you. You are impressed, influenced, possessed by things and persons.

This sutra says that you have to come to a state of consciousness where nothing impresses you, you can remain detached. How to do it? Throughout the whole day the opportunity is there to do it. That is why I say this method is good for you to do. Any moment you can become aware that something is possessing you. Then take a deep breath, inhale deeply, exhale deeply, and look at the thing again. While you are exhaling look at the thing again, but look just as a witness, as a spectator. If you can achieve the witnessing state of mind for even a single moment, suddenly you will feel you are alone, nothing can impress you; at least in that moment nothing can create desire in you. Take a deep breath and exhale it whenever you feel that something is impressing you, influencing you, dragging you away from you, becoming more important than yourself. And in that small gap created by the exhalation look at the thing – a beautiful face, a beautiful body, a beautiful building, or anything. If you feel it is difficult, if just by exhaling you cannot create a gap, then do one thing more: exhale, and stop inhalation for a single moment so the exhalation has thrown all the air out. Stop, don’t inhale. Then look at the thing. When the air is out, or in, when you have stopped breathing, nothing can influence you. In that moment you are unbridged – the bridge is broken. Breathing is the bridge. Try it. It will be only for a single moment that you will have the feeling of witnessing, but that will give you the taste, that will give you the feeling of what witnessing is. Then you can pursue it.Throughout the whole day, whenever something impresses you and a desire arises, exhale, stop in the interval, and look at the thing. The thing will be there, you will be there, but there will be no bridge. Breathing is the bridge. Suddenly you will feel you are powerful, you are potential. And the more powerful you feel, the more YOU will become. The more things drop, the more their power over you drops, the more crystalized you will feel. Individuality has begun. Now you have a center to refer to, and any moment you can move to the center and the world disappears. Any moment you can take shelter in your own center, and the world is powerless.

This sutra says, The appreciation of objects and subjects is the same for an enlightened as for an unenlighted person. The former has one greatness: he remains in the subjective mood, not lost in things. He remains in the subjective mood, he remains within himself, he remains centered in consciousness. Remaining in the subjective mood has to be practised. As many opportunities as you can get, try it. And every moment there is an opportunity, every single moment there is an opportunity. Something or other is impressing you, dragging you out, pulling you out, pushing you in.

I am reminded of an old story. A great king, Bharthruhari, renounced the world. He renounced the world because he had lived in it totally and he had come to realize that it was futile. It was not a doctrine to him, it was a lived reality. He had come to the conclusion through his own life. He was a man of strong desire, he had indulged in life as much as possible, then suddenly he realized it was useless, futile. So he left the world, he renounced it, and he went to a forest.

One day he was meditating under a tree. The sun was rising. Suddenly he became aware that just on the road, the small road which passed nearby the tree, lay a very big diamond. As the sun was rising, it was reflecting the rays. Even Bharthruhari had not seen such a big diamond before. Suddenly, in a moment of unawareness, a desire arose to possess it. The body remained unmoved, but the mind moved. The body was in the posture of meditation, siddhasana, but the meditation was no longer there. Only the dead body was there, the mind had moved – it had gone to the diamond.

Before the king could move, two men came from different directions on their horses and simultaneously they became aware of the diamond lying on the street. They pulled out their swords, each one claiming that he had seen the diamond first. There was no other way to decide so they had to fight. They fought and killed each other. Within moments two dead bodies were lying there next to the diamond. Bharthruhari laughed, closed his eyes, and went into meditation again.

What happened? He again realized the futility. And what happened to these two men? The diamond became more meaningful than their whole life. This is what possession means: they threw away their life just for a stone. When desire is there, you are no more – desire can lead you to suicide. Really, every desire is leading you to suicide. When you are in the power of a desire, you are not in your senses, you are just mad.

The desire to possess arose in Bharthruhari’s mind also; in a fragment of a moment the desire arose. And he might have moved to get it but before he could, the other two persons came and fought, and there were two dead bodies lying on the road with the stone there in its own place. Bharthruhari laughed, closed his eyes, and went into his meditation again. For a single moment his subjectivity was lost. A stone, a diamond, the object, became more powerful. But again the subjectivity was regained. Without the diamond the whole world disappeared, and he closed his eyes.

For centuries meditators have been closing their eyes. Why? It is only symbolic that the world has disappeared, that there is nothing to look at, that nothing is worth anything, even to look at. You will have to remember continuously that whenever desire arises, you have moved out of your subjectivity. This is the world, this movement. Regain, move back, get centered again! You will be able to do it: the capacity is there with everyone. No one ever loses the inner potential, it is always there. You can move. If you can move out, you can move in. If I can go out of my house, why can I not come back within it? The same route is to be traveled; the same legs are to be used. If I can go out, I can come in. Every moment you are moving out, but whenever you move out, remember – and suddenly come back. Be centered. If you feel it difficult in the beginning then take a deep breath, exhale, and stop. In that moment look at the thing which was attracting you. Really, nothing was attracting you, you were attracted. That diamond lying there on the road in the lonely forest was not attracting anybody, it was simply lying there being itself. The diamond was not aware that Bharthruhari had been attracted, that someone had moved from his meditation, from his subjectivity, had come back into the world. The diamond was not aware that two persons had fought for it and lost their lives.

So nothing is attracting you – You get attracted. Be alert and the bridge will be broken and you will regain balance inside. Go on doing it more and more. The more you do, the better. And a moment will come when you will not need to do it because the inner power will give you such a strength that the attraction of things will be lost. It is your weakness which is attracted. Be more powerful and nothing will attract you. Only then for the first time are you master of your own being.

That will give you real freedom. No political freedom, no economic freedom, no social freedom, can be of much help. Not that they are not desirable, they are good, good in themselves, but they will not give you the things which the innermost core of your being is longing for – the freedom from things, from objects, the freedom to be oneself without any possibility of being possessed by anything or anybody.

[full boat] Colliding with 90% of the World's Population Maniac Trump Seeks New Slaves to Board his Overloaded Sinking Slaveship [his ego]

"A Campaign in the Ass." No matter what the votary believes about HRC or Trump and their one party politics, it is clear that Trump (or the character he is portraying in election hoax 2016) is what Chuang Tzo would call a Full Boat; filled with an endless supply of opinions, judging the world like it was his beauty pageant, drawing distinctions among people by the second and on an aggressive hunt for others who want to be dominated and who enjoy feeling necessary to his domination. His boat is much too much - it's more like an overloaded bumper car - purposely crashing into most of the world inhabitants on a hurried pace along an ambitous route to nowhere. In what ways is your boat like Trumps or his supporters? 

The following is by Osho Rajineesh. From [HERE] and [HERE]

The Empty Boat 

HE WHO RULES MEN, LIVES IN CONFUSION;

HE WHO IS RULED BY MEN LIVES IN SORROW.

TAO THEREFORE DESIRED

NEITHER TO INFLUENCE OTHERS

NOR BE INFLUENCED BY THEM.

THE WAY TO GET CLEAR OF CONFUSION AND FREE OF SORROW

IS TO LIVE WITH TAO IN THE LAND OF THE VOID.

IF A MAN IS CROSSING A RIVER

AND AN EMPTY BOAT COLLIDES WITH HIS OWN SKIFF,

EVEN THOUGH HE BE A BAD-TEMPERED MAN

HE WILL NOT BECOME VERY ANGRY.

BUT IF HE SEES A MAN IN THE BOAT,

HE WILL SHOUT TO HIM TO STEER CLEAR.

AND IF THE SHOUT IS NOT HEARD HE WILL SHOUT

AGAIN AND YET AGAIN, AND BEGIN CURSING -

AND ALL BECAUSE THERE IS SOMEBODY IN THAT BOAT

YET IF THE BOAT WERE EMPTY, HE WOULD NOT BE SHOUTING,

AND HE WOULD NOT BE ANGRY

IF YOU CAN EMPTY YOUR OWN BOAT

CROSSING THE RIVER OF THE WORLD,

NO ONE WILL OPPOSE YOU,

NO ONE WILL SEEK TO HARM YOU.

THE STRAIGHT TREE IS THE FIRST TO BE CUT DOWN,

THE SPRING OF CLEAR WATER IS THE FIRST TO BE DRAINED DRY.

IF YOU WISH TO IMPROVE YOUR WISDOM

AND SHAME THE IGNORANT,

TO CULTIVATE YOUR CHARACTER AND OUTSHINE OTHERS,

A LIGHT WILL SHINE AROUND YOU

AS IF YOU HAD SWALLOWED THE SUN AND THE MOON -

AND YOU WILL NOT AVOID CALAMITY.

A WISE MAN HAS SAID:

"HE WHO IS CONTENT WITH HIMSELF

HAS DONE WORTHLESS WORK.

ACHIEVEMENT IS THE BEGINNING OF FAILURE,

FAME IS THE BEGINNING OF DISGRACE."

WHO CAN FREE HIMSELF OF ACHIEVEMENT AND FAME

THEN DESCEND AND BE LOST

AMID THE MASSES OF MEN?

HE WILL FLOW LIKE TAO, UNSEEN,

HE WILL GO ABOUT LIKE LIFE ITSELF

WITH NO NAME AND NO HOME.

SIMPLE IS HE, WITHOUT DISTINCTION.

TO ALL APPEARANCES HE IS A FOOL.

HIS STEPS LEAVE NO TRACE. HE HAS NO POWER.

HE ACHIEVES NOTHING, HE HAS NO REPUTATION.

SINCE HE JUDGES NO ONE,

NO ONE JUDGES HIM.

SUCH IS THE PERFECT MAN -

HIS BOAT IS EMPTY.

You have come to me. You have taken a dangerous step. It is a risk because near me you can be lost forever. To come closer will mean death and cannot mean anything else. I am just like an abyss. Come closer to me and you will fall into me. For this, the invitation has been given to you. You have heard it and you have come.

Be aware that through me you are not going to gain anything. Through me you can only lose all -because unless you are lost, the divine cannot happen; unless you disappear totally, the real cannot arise. You are the barrier.

And you are so much, so stubbornly much, you are so filled with yourself that nothing can penetrate you. Your doors are closed. When you disappear, when you are not, the doors open. Then you become just like the vast, infinite sky.

And that is your nature. That is Tao.

Before I enter into Chuang Tzu's beautiful parable of The Empty Boat, I would like to tell you one other story, because that will set the trend for this meditation camp which you are entering.

I have heard that it happened once, in some ancient time, in some unknown country, that a prince suddenly went mad. The king was desperate - the prince was the only son, the only heir to the kingdom. All the magicians were called, miracle makers, medical men were summoned, every effort was made, but in vain. Nobody could help the young prince, he remained mad.

The day he went crazy he threw off his clothes, became naked, and started to live under a big table. He thought that he had become a rooster. Ultimately the king had to accept the fact that the prince could not be reclaimed. He had gone insane permanently; all the experts had failed.

But one day again hope dawned. A sage - a Sufi, a mystic - knocked on the palace door, and said, "Give me one opportunity to cure the prince."

But the king felt suspicious, because this man looked crazy himself, more crazy than the prince. But the mystic said, "Only I can cure him. To cure a madman a greater madman is needed. And your somebodies, your miracle makers, your medical experts, all have failed because they don't know the abc of madness. They have never traveled the path."

It seemed logical, and the king thought, "There is no harm in it, why not try?" So the opportunity was given to him.

The moment the king said, "Okay, you try," this mystic threw off his clothes, jumped under the table and crowed like a rooster.

The prince became suspicious, and he said, "Who are you? And what do you think you are doing?"

The old man said, "I am a rooster, more experienced than you. You are nothing, you are just a newcomer, at the most an apprentice."

The prince said, "Then it is okay if you are also a rooster, but you look like a human being."

The old man said, "Don't go on appearances, look at my spirit, at my soul. I am a rooster like you."

They became friends. They promised each other that they would always live together and that this whole world was against them.

A few days passed. One day the old man suddenly started dressing. He put on his shirt. The prince said, "What are you doing, have you gone crazy, a rooster trying to put on human dress?"

The old man said, "I am just trying to deceive these fools, these human beings. And remember that even if I am dressed, nothing is changed. My roosterness remains, nobody can change it. Just by dressing like a human being do you think I am changed?" The prince had to concede.

A few days afterwards the old man persuaded the prince to dress because winter was approaching and it was becoming so cold.

Then one day suddenly he ordered food from the palace. The prince became very alert and said, "Wretch, what are you doing? Are you going to eat like those human beings, like them? We are roosters and we have to eat like roosters."

The old man said, "Nothing makes any difference as far as this roos-ter is concerned. You can eat anything and you can enjoy everything. You can live like a human being and remain true to your roosterness.”

By and by the old man persuaded the prince to come back to the world of humanity. He became absolutely normal.

The same is the case with you and me. And remember you are just initiates, beginners. You may think that you are a rooster but you are just learning the alphabet. I am an old hand, and only I can help you. All the experts have failed, that's why you are here. You have knocked on many doors, for many lives you have been in search - nothing has been of help to you.

But I say I can help you because I am not an expert, I am not an outsider. I have traveled the same path, the same insanity, the same madness. I have passed through the same - the same misery, the anguish, the same nightmares. And whatsoever I do is nothing but to persuade - to persuade you to come out of your madness.

To think oneself a rooster is crazy; to think oneself a body is also crazy, even crazier. To think oneself a rooster is madness; to think oneself a human being is a greater madness, because you don't belong to any form. Whether the form is that of a rooster or of a human being is irrelevant -you belong to the formless, you belong to the total, the whole. So whatsoever form you think you are, you are mad. You are formless. You don't belong to any body, you don't belong to any caste, religion, creed; you don't belong to any name. And unless you become formless, nameless, you will never be sane.

Sanity means coming to that which is natural, coming to that which is ultimate in you, coming to that which is hidden behind you. Much effort is needed because to cut form, to drop, eliminate form, is very difficult. You have become so attached and identified with it.

This Samadhi Sadhana Shibir, this meditation camp, is nothing but to persuade you towards the formless - how not to be in the form. Every form means the ego: even a rooster has its ego, and man has his own. Every form is centered in the ego. The formless means egolessness; then you are not centered in the ego, then your center is everywhere or nowhere. This is possible, this which looks almost impossible is possible, because this has happened to me. And when I speak, I speak through experience.

Wherever you are, I was, and wherever I am, you can be. Look at me as deeply as possible and feel me as deeply as possible, because I am your future, I am your possibility.

Whenever I say surrender to me, I mean surrender to this possibility. You can be cured, because your illness is just a thought. The prince went mad because he became identified with the thought that he was a rooster. Everybody is mad unless he comes to understand that he is not identified with any form - only then, sanity.

So a sane person will not be anybody in particular. He cannot be. Only an insane person can be somebody in particular - whether a rooster or a man, a prime minister or a president, or anybody whatsoever. A sane person comes to feel the nobodiness. This is the danger....

You have come to me as somebody, and if you allow me, if you give me the opportunity, this somebodiness can disappear and you can become a nobody. This is the whole effort - to make you a nobody. But why? Why this effort to become a nobody? Because unless you become nobody you cannot be blissful; unless you become nobody you cannot be ecstatic; unless you become nobody the benediction is not for you - you go on missing life.

Really you are not alive, you simply drag, you simply carry yourself like a burden. Much anguish happens, much despair, much sorrow, but not a single ray of bliss - it cannot. If you are somebody, you are like a solid block of stone, nothing can penetrate you. When you are nobody you start to become porous. When you are nobody, really you are an emptiness, transparent, everything can pass through you. There is no hindrance, there is no barrier, no resistance. You become a passivity, a door.

Right now you are like a wall; a wall means somebody. When you become a door you become nobody. A door is just an emptiness, anybody can pass, there is no resistance, no barrier. Somebody...you are mad; nobody..you will become sane for the first time.

But the whole society, education, civilization, culture, all cultivate you and help you to become somebodies. That is why I say: religion is against civilization, religion is against education, religion is against culture - because religion is for nature, for Tao.

All civilizations are against nature, because they want to make you somebody in particular. And the more you are crystallized as somebody, the less and less the divine can penetrate into you.

You go to the temples, to the churches, to the priests, but there too you are searching for a way to become somebody in the other world, for a way to attain something, for a way to succeed. The achieving mind follows you like a shadow. Wherever you go, you go with the idea of profit, achievement, success, attainment. If somebody has come here with this idea he should leave as soon as possible, run as fast as possible from me, because I cannot help you to become somebody.

I am not your enemy. I can only help you to be nobody. I can only push you into the abyss...bottomless. You will never reach anywhere; you will simply dissolve. You will fall and fall and fall and dissolve, and the moment you dissolve the whole existence feels ecstatic. The whole existence celebrates this happening.

Buddha attained this. Because of language I say attained; otherwise the word is ugly, there is no attainment - but you will understand. Buddha attained this emptiness, this nothingness. For two weeks, for fourteen days continuously, he sat in silence, not moving, not saying, not doing anything.

It is said that the deities in heaven became disturbed - rarely it happens that someone becomes such total emptiness. The whole of existence felt a celebration, so deities came. They bowed down before Buddha and they said, "You must say something, you must say what you have attained. Buddha is reported to have laughed and said, "I have not attained anything; rather, because of this mind, which always wants to attain something, I was missing everything. I have not achieved anything, this is not an achievement; rather, on the contrary, the achiever has disappeared. I am no more, and, see the beauty of it - when I was, I was miserable, and when I am no more, everything is blissful, the bliss is showering and showering continuously on me, everywhere. Now there is no misery."

Buddha had said before: Life is misery, birth is misery, death is misery - everything is miserable. It was miserable because the ego was there. The boat had not been empty. Now the boat was empty; now there was no misery, no sorrow, no sadness. Existence had become a celebration and it would remain a celebration to eternity, for ever and forever.

That's why I say that it is dangerous that you have come to me. You have taken a risky step. If you are courageous, then be ready for the jump.

The whole effort is how to kill you, the whole effort is how to destroy you. Once you are destroyed, the indestructible will come up - it is there, hidden. Once all that which is nonessential is eliminated, the essential will be like a flame - aliveness, total glory.

This parable of Chuang Tzu is beautiful. He says that a wise man is like an empty boat.

SUCH IS THE PERFECT MAN -

HIS BOAT IS EMPTY.

There is nobody inside.

If you meet a Chuang Tzu, or a Lao Tzu, or me, the boat is there, but it is empty, nobody is in it. If you simply look at the surface, then somebody is there, because the boat is there. But if you penetrate deeper, if you really become intimate with me, if you forget the body, the boat, then you come to encounter a nothingness.

Chuang Tzu is a rare flowering, because to become nobody is the most difficult, almost impossible, most extraordinary thing in the world.

The ordinary mind hankers to be extraordinary, that is part of ordinariness; the ordinary mind desires to be somebody in particular, that is part of ordinariness. You may become an Alexander, but you remain ordinary - then who is the extraordinary one? The extraordinariness starts only when you don't hanker after extraordinariness. Then the journey has started, then a new seed has sprouted.

This is what Chuang Tzu means when he says: A perfect man is like an empty boat. Many things are implied in it. First, an empty boat is not going anywhere because there is nobody to direct it, nobody to manipulate it, nobody to drive it somewhere. An empty boat is just there, it is not going anywhere. Even if it is moving it is not going anywhere.

When the mind is not there life will remain a movement, but it will not be directed. You will move, you will change, you will be a riverlike flow, but not going anywhere, with no goal in view. A perfect man lives without any purpose; a perfect man moves but without any motive. If you ask a perfect man, "What are you doing?" he will say, "I don't know, but this is what is happening." If you ask me why I am talking to you, I will say, "Ask the flower why the flower is flowering." This is happening, this is not manipulated. There is no one to manipulate it, the boat is empty. When there is purpose you will always be in misery. Why?

Once a man asked a miser, a great miser, "How did you succeed in accumulating so much wealth?"

The miser said, "This is my motto: whatsoever is to be done tomorrow should be done today, and whatsoever is to be enjoyed today should be enjoyed tomorrow. This has been my motto.” He succeeded in accumulating wealth - and this is how people succeed in accumulating nonsense also!

That miser was also miserable. On one hand he had succeeded in accumulating wealth, on the other hand he had succeeded in accumulating misery. And the motto is the same for accumulating money as it is for accumulating misery: whatsoever is to be done tomorrow do it today, right now, don't postpone it. And whatsoever can be enjoyed right now, never enjoy it right now, postpone it for tomorrow.

This is the way to enter hell. It always succeeds, it has never been a failure. Try it and you will succeed - or, you may have already succeeded. You may have been trying it without knowing. Postpone all that which can be enjoyed, just think of the tomorrow.

Jesus was crucified by the Jews for this reason, not for any other reason. Not that they were against Jesus - Jesus was a perfect man, a beautiful man, why should the Jews have been against him? Rather, on the contrary, they had been waiting for this man. For centuries they had been hoping and waiting: When will the messiah come?

And then suddenly this Jesus declared, "I am the messiah for whom you have been waiting, and I have come now. Now look at me."

They were disturbed - because the mind can wait, it always enjoys waiting, but the mind cannot face the fact, the mind cannot encounter this moment. It can always postpone, it was easy to postpone: The messiah is to come, soon he will be coming.... For centuries the Jews had been thinking and postponing and then suddenly this man destroyed all hope, because he said, "I am here." The mind was disturbed. They had to kill this man, otherwise they would not have been able to live with the hope of the tomorrow.

And not only Jesus, many others have declared since then, "I am here, I am the messiah!" And Jews always deny, because if they don't deny, then how will they be able to hope and how will they be able to postpone? They have lived with this hope with such fervor, with such deep intensity, you can hardly believe it. There have been Jews who would go to bed at night hoping that this would be the last night, that in the morning the messiah would be there....

I have heard about one rabbi who used to say to his wife, "If he comes in the night, don't waste a single minute, wake me up immediately." The messiah is coming and coming, he may come at any moment.

I have heard of another rabbi whose son was going to be married, so he sent invitations to the marriage to friends and he wrote on the invitation, "My son is going to be married in Jerusalem on such-and-such a date, but if the messiah hasn't come by then, my son will be married in this village of Korz." Who knows, by the time the day of the marriage comes, the messiah may have come. Then I will not be here, I will be in Jerusalem, celebrating. So if he has not come by the date of the marriage, only then will it be held here in this village; otherwise, it will be in Jerusalem.

They have been waiting and waiting, dreaming. The whole Jewish mind has been obsessed with the coming messiah. But whenever the messiah comes, they immediately deny him. This has to be understood. This is how the mind functions: you wait for the bliss, for the ecstasy, and whenever it comes you deny it, you just turn your back towards it.

Mind can live in the future, but cannot live in the present. In the present you can simply hope and desire. And that's how you create misery. If you start living this very moment, here and now, misery disappears.

But how is it related to the ego? Ego is the past accumulated. Whatsoever you have known, experienced, read, whatsoever has happened to you in the past, the whole is accumulated there. That whole past is the ego, it is you.

The past can project into the future - the future is nothing but the past extended - but the past cannot face the present. The present is totally different, it has a quality of being here and now. The past is always dead, the present is life, the very source of all aliveness. The past cannot face the present so it moves into the future - but both are dead, both are nonexistential. The present is life; the future cannot encounter the present, nor can the past encounter the present. And your ego, your somebodiness, is your past. Unless you are empty you cannot be here, and unless you are here you cannot be alive.

How can you know the bliss of life? Every moment it is showering on you and you are bypassing it.

Says Chuang Tzu:

SUCH IS THE PERFECT MAN -

HIS BOAT IS EMPTY.

Empty of what? Empty of the I, empty of the ego, empty of somebody there inside.

HE WHO RULES MEN, LIVES IN CONFUSION;

HE WHO IS RULED BY MEN LIVES IN SORROW.

HE WHO RULES MEN, LIVES IN CONFUSION. Why? The desire to rule comes from the ego; the desire to possess, to be powerful, the desire to dominate, comes from the ego. The greater the kingdom you can dominate, the greater the ego you can achieve. With your possessions your inner somebody goes on becoming bigger and bigger and bigger. Sometimes the boat becomes very small because the ego becomes so big....

This is what is happening to politicians, to people obsessed with wealth, prestige, power. Their egos become so big that their boats cannot contain them. Every moment they are on the point of drowning, on the verge, afraid, scared to death. And the more afraid you are the more possessive you become, because you think that through possessions somehow security is achieved. The more afraid you are, the more you think that if your kingdom could be a little greater, you would be more secure.

HE WHO RULES MEN, LIVES IN CONFUSION….

Really, the desire to rule comes out of your confusion; the desire to be leaders of men comes out of your confusion. When you start leading others you forget your confusion - this is a sort of escape, a trick. You are ill, but if somebody is ill and you become interested in curing that man, you forget your illness.

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Osho: You Are In Prison and You Think You are Free

George Gurdjieff has said: “You are in prison. If you wish to get out of prison, the first thing you must do is realize that you are in prison. If you think you are free, you can’t escape.”

What are the prisons that I call “home”?

Rama Prem, George Gurdjieff is one of the most significant masters of this age.

He is unique in many ways — nobody has said things in the contemporary world the way Gurdjieff has said them. He is almost like another Bodhidharma or Chuang Tzu, apparently absurd but in reality giving great indications towards the liberation of human consciousness.

You are asking about one of his significant statements. He often used to say, “You are in prison.” Sometimes he was even deeper into the reality, and instead of saying, “You are in prison,” he would say, “You are the prison.” That is more true.

If you wish to get out of prison — or better to say, if you don’t want to be a prison — the first thing you must do is realize that you are in prison… or you are the prison. This is something to be always remembered as one of the first principles for any seeker of truth.

The tendency of the human mind is to deny those things which are ugly, to hide those things which he does not want others to know — to hide in such a way, in such depths of the unconscious that even he himself becomes unaware of them. This way he maintains his superficial personality.

Gurdjieff had a story about it…

There was a magician who used to live in faraway deep forests, and he had many sheep because that was his only food. In those deep forests he was keeping all those sheep just to kill them every day, one by one. Naturally, the sheep were very afraid of the man, and they used to run into the forest being afraid that any day can be their day. Their friends are gone, there is no reliability… tomorrow they may be gone. Out of fear they used to go far away, deep into the forest. And to find them was a tedious job every day.

Finally, the magician did a trick. He hypnotized all the sheep, and told every sheep, “You are an exception; everybody may be killed but you can never be killed. You are no ordinary sheep; you have a divine privilege.” To some he said, “You are not sheep at all; you are lions, you are tigers, you are wolves. Only sheep are killed. You need not hide yourself in the forest; that is very embarrassing, because a lion hiding himself in the forest in the fear that he will be killed… only sheep are killed.” And in this way, he managed to hypnotize all the sheep in different ways.

He even said to a few sheep, “You are men, human beings, and human beings don’t kill each other. You are just like me. Never be afraid and never escape out of fear.” Since that day, no sheep escaped and hid in the forest, although they all saw every day that one sheep was being killed, slaughtered. But naturally everybody thought, That must be a sheep; I am a tiger, a lion, a human being. I am special and exceptional, I have a divine privilege…. So many different stories he put in their minds.

Gurdjieff says that unless you realize the first thing — that you are in prison, that you are the prison — then there is no hope for freedom. If you already believe that you are free, you are a hypnotized sheep which believes himself to be a lion — exceptional, there is no need to be afraid — which even believes he is a human being. He goes on seeing other sheep being killed, and still remains in a hypnotized state, never being aware of his actuality. To be free, if you already know that you are free, there is no problem.

All the religions together, perhaps unintentionally, have created a tremendous hypnotic state. People believe they have immortal souls. I am not saying that they don’t have, I am simply saying that they don’t know what they are believing. And because they believe they have an immortal soul, they never discover that they already have it. They have been told, “You are the very kingdom of God”… and it is so comfortable and so consoling to believe. But then there is no way to seek and search and find whether your hypothetical belief has any truth in it, or is just a hypnotic trick used by the society to keep you unafraid of death, to keep you unafraid of disease, old age, to keep you unafraid of your loneliness.

Your God may be just a psychological hypnosis. It is not your discovery. That is true — that much is absolutely true. It has been implanted in your mind, and because you go on believing in it, your belief prevents any adventure in seeking the truth.

Ordinarily, you have been told continually that unless you believe, you will not find. But the truth is just the contrary. Belief is a barrier, it is not a bridge. Those who believe never find, because they never even begin the search; there is no need.

You are in prison and you think you are free.

You are in chains but you think they are ornaments. You are a slave but you have been told that you are humble, that you are simple, that this is the way a religious person should be. You are surrounded by many hypnotic strategies developed by society down the ages. And those hypnotic strategies are the root cause of your ignorance, of your misery, of your unenlightened state.

Hence the first thing to realize is that you are in prison. The moment you recognize that you are in prison, you cannot tolerate the prison. Nobody can tolerate it; it goes against human dignity. You will start finding ways to get out of it. You will start finding people who have already got out of it. You may start seeking and searching outside help beyond the walls, because there are people beyond the walls ready with every kind of help. But they are absolutely helpless if you believe that you are living in absolute freedom.

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