So, don’t you find, when you observe in yourself, that there are two active
principles of fear and pleasure? Don’t you find pleasure in different forms,
whether it is to seek God or to become a great person politically? And don’t you
also find in yourself the active principle of fear going on? These two things exist.
We want more of the one, which is pleasure, and less of the other, which is fear.
Sitting there, you are really not frightened at this present moment; you have no
fear at this actual moment. You may have fear when you go away, but sitting
there, listening, you have no fear. But it’s always there in the background. So you
cannot possibly invite that fear and observe it. You cannot say, “Well, I’m going
to be frightened and look.” But through understanding attachment you can come
upon what it means to be afraid. As we said, fear and pleasure are our main
contradictory movements in life. Being afraid, or not being aware that you are
afraid, you attach yourself; you depend on people, on ideas, on your guru or on
your wife or husband. Don’t you find that you depend on people—not the
postman or the milkman, but people around you or somebody in whom you think
you have confidence? Don’t you find you depend on people?
So, what is involved in this dependence? First of all, there is no freedom
when you depend on somebody; whether it’s your wife or your guru, there is no
freedom. And when you depend on somebody psychologically, inwardly, you are
seeking comfort, sustenance. When you depend on a person, you must possess
that person, you must dominate that person, or submit yourself to that person.
And when you observe that you are dependent, you see that the source of this
dependence is fear—fear of not being able to stand alone, fear of making a
mistake, fear of not following the right path, which is a guru, fear of not having
comfort, not having somebody as a companion, not being able to depend on
somebody. So through dependence you discover, as you are sitting there now,
that you are really frightened. Without inviting fear, you discover that basically
you are frightened. Are we communicating with each other? Communication, as
we said the other day, is to share together a common problem. This is our
common problem. When you depend on a person, there must inevitably be not
only fear but jealousy and anxiety. So all that is involved in dependence. Can a
mind be free of this dependence? Because people like to be possessed by another.
Haven’t you noticed it? They like to belong to somebody, belong to a group,
commit themselves to a certain pattern of action, put on the same kind of yellow
robe, because it gives them a sense of security, a sense that they are leading a
kind of righteous life. So when you look into it very carefully, you will see for
yourself that the basis of all this is fear. Are we going along together?
Then arises the question whether it is possible to be free of that fear, not only
the superficial fear in relationship and dependency, but the deep-rooted fear. Can
you, as a human being, be completely free of fear? When you are afraid, you do
the most extraordinarily stupid things. When you are afraid, you are almost
unbalanced, neurotic; you can’t think clearly, observe truly. Haven’t you noticed
that your life becomes dark, heavy? It becomes a burden, a torture. And not
knowing how to resolve this fear, we run away from it. We run away, doing the
most absurd things. So, you are going to find out whether it is possible to be free
of fear.
michael s
(Michael S)
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