distortion and therefore a tortured mind. And a tortured mind can never find out
anything. So don’t belong to any system; don’t follow any guru.
You know, once a very famous guru came to see us. It was rather an amusing
incident. Some of us were sitting on a little mattress as big as this, and out of
politeness we got up and we asked the important man to sit on the mattress. He
sat. He had a stick; he put the stick in front of him, sat very dignified, and he
became the guru because he was on a little mattress. He was telling us all what
we should do, because out of politeness we offered the little seat which was an
inch higher—vanity, the demand for power and position and for people to be
followers. Such people will never find what truth is; they will find what they
want which is their own gratification. So there is no system. If you understand
that there is no system then your mind becomes alive, sharp to find out.
Now what is it that you are going to find out? Most of us want to experience
something other than daily experiences. We want to experience a transcendental
state, an experience of enlightenment. The word experience means “to go
through.” When you demand to have greater experiences, that indicates that you
are bored with living. All the people who take drugs, think that through drugs
they will have extraordinary experiences. And they do—they take a “trip” and
their experiences are the expression of their own conditioning. It gives them a
certain vitality, a certain clarity, but that has nothing whatsoever to do with
enlightenment. Through drugs you cannot possibly come upon it.
So what is it that we are seeking? What is it that a person wants? He sees that
his life is boredom, a routine, a battlefield, a fight, a constant struggle with never
a moment of peace, except perhaps occasionally sexually or otherwise. So he
says, “Life is transient; life is changing; there must be something extraordinarily
permanent,” and he wants that permanency, something other than mere physical
daily routine and experience. And he calls that “God.” So he believes in God, and
all the images, rituals are based on belief. Belief is the outcome of fear. If there is
no fear you can see the leaf, the tree, the beautiful sky, the light and the birds and
a face; there is beauty. And where there is beauty there is goodness. Where there
is goodness there is truth.
So, we must understand daily living. We must understand why our lives have
become mechanical, why we follow others, why we are so childish—believing,
not believing, fighting, violence. You know what is going on in daily life, and we
want to escape from it, so we want wider, deeper experiences. And books, gurus,
and teachers promise that enlightenment, that extraordinary thing. And systems
offer you that: do these things and you will get there; follow this path and you
will find yourself there. As though truth is fixed like a station and all the roads
lead to it. The idiotic idea that there is a station with roads means it doesn’t
matter what road you take because they will all come there; therefore be tolerant
of other paths. There is no road, no path, and no fixed truth. There is no path;
therefore you must have a mind that is extraordinarily alive, working, learning.
And there is the whole question of concentration. I don’t know who tells you
that you must concentrate, learn to control thought, that you must suppress
desires, that you must never look at a woman, never look at a man. I don’t know
why you listen to any of that. Have you ever concentrated? That is, focusing your
michael s
(Michael S)
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