Osho - The Empty Boat
Chapter 4. Apologies
If a man steps on a stranger's foot
In the marketplace,
He makes a polite apology
And offers an explanation:
"This place is so crowded."
If an elder brother
Steps on his younger brother's foot
He says, "Sorry,"
And that is that.
If a parent
Treads on his child's foot
Nothing is said at all.
The greatest politeness
Is free of all formality.
Perfect conduct is free of concern.
Perfect wisdom is unplanned.
Perfect love is without demonstrations.
Perfect sincerity offers no guarantee.
All that is great, all that is beautiful, all that is true and real, is always spontaneous. You cannot plan it. The moment you plan it, everything goes wrong. The moment planning enters, everything becomes unreal.
But this has happened to humanity. Your love, your sincerity, your truth, everything, has gone wrong because you have planned it, be-cause you have been taught not to be spontaneous. You have been taught to manipulate yourself, to control, to manage, and not to be a natural flow. You have become rigid, frozen, dead.
Life knows no planning. It is itself enough. Do the trees plan how to grow, how to mature, how to come to flower? They simply grow without even being conscious of the growth. There is no self-consciousness, there is no separation.
Whenever you start planning you have divided yourself, you have become two; the one who is controlling and the one who is controlled. A conflict has arisen, now you will never be at peace. You may succeed in controlling but there will be no peace; you may not succeed in controlling, then too there will be no peace. Whether you succeed or fail, ultimately you will come to realize that you have failed. Your failure will be a failure, your success will also be a failure. Whatsoever you do, your life will be miserable.
This division creates ugliness, you are not one, and beauty belongs to oneness, beauty belongs to a harmonious whole. All culture, all civilization, all societies, make you ugly. All morality makes you ugly because it is based on division, on control.
I have heard that once Baal Shem was traveling in a beautiful coach with three horses. But he was wondering continuously, because for three days he had been traveling and not even once had any of the horses neighed. What had happened to the horses? Then suddenly on the fourth day, a passing peasant shouted at him to relax control of the reins. He relaxed control and suddenly all the three horses started neighing, they came alive. For three days continuously they were dead, dying.
This has happened to you all, to the whole of humanity. You cannot neigh, and unless a horse neighs, the horse is dead, because neighing means he is enjoying, there is an overflowing. But you cannot neigh, you are dead. Your life has not in any way an overflowing song, a dance that happens when the energy is too much.
Flowering is always a luxury, it is not a necessity. No tree needs flowers as a necessity, roots are enough. Flowering is always luxurious. Flowers come only when the tree has too much, it needs to give, it needs to share.
Whenever you have too much, life becomes a dance, a celebration. But society doesn't allow you to dance, to celebrate, so society has to see that you never have more energy than necessary. You are only allowed to live at starvation level. You are not allowed to be too much, because once you are too much you cannot be controlled, and society wants to control you. It is a domination, very subtle.
Every child is born overflowing. Then we have to cut the energy source, we have to prune the child from here and there so that he becomes controllable. And the basis of all control is to divide the child in two. Then you need not bother, he himself will do the controlling. Then you need not bother, he himself will be the enemy of his own self.
So they tell the child: This is wrong. Don't do this. Suddenly the child is divided, now he knows what is wrong, now he knows what part of his being is wrong, and his head becomes the controller.
Through division intellect has become the controller, the master. If you are undivided, you will not have any head. Not that the head will disappear or the head will fall off, but you will not be head- oriented - your total being will be you.
Right now you are only the head, the rest of the body is just to sustain the head. The head has become the exploiter, the dictator. And this has come through conflict, the creation of conflict in you.
You have been taught that this is good and that is bad. The intellect learns it and then the intellect keeps on condemning you.
Remember, if you condemn yourself you will condemn everybody - you will condemn the whole.
And a person who condemns himself cannot love. A person who condemns himself cannot pray. A person who condemns himself, for him there is no God, there cannot be. A condemning mind can never enter the divine temple. Only when you dance, only when you are ecstatic, not condemning, only when you are overflowing with nobody sitting in control, nobody managing, does life become a let-go; it is not formal, it is natural. Then you enter, then everywhere is the door. Then you can reach the temple from anywhere.
But right now, as you are, you are schizophrenic. You are not only schizophrenic when a psychoanalyst says that you are. There is no need for any psychoanalyst to analyze you. Society creates schizophrenics; division is schizophrenia. You are not one. You are born one but immediately society starts working on you, major surgery is to be done, you are continuously operated upon to be divided. Then society is at ease because you are fighting with yourself, your energy is dissipated in the inner fight, it is never an overflowing. Then you are not dangerous.
Overflowing energy becomes rebellion. Overflowing energy is always rebellious, overflowing energy is always in revolution. It is just like a river in flood - it doesn't believe in the banks, in the rules, in the laws, it simply goes on overflowing towards the sea. It knows only one goal - how to become the sea, how to become the infinite.
Overflowing energy is always moving towards God. God is missing in our world, not because of science, not because of atheists, but because of the so-called religious. They have divided you so much that the river keeps fighting with itself. Nothing is left to move, no energy is left; you are so tired fighting with yourself, how can you move towards the sea?
One of the basic laws of Tao, of Lao Tzu, of Chuang Tzu, is that if you are spontaneous it is the highest prayer; you cannot miss God, whatsoever you do you will reach him. So Chuang Tzu never talks about God; talk is irrelevant, it isn't needed. He talks only of how to bring out the wholeness in you. The holy is irrelevant. When you become whole, you become holy. When your fragments dissolve into one, your life has become a prayer. They never talk about prayer, it is not needed.
Spontaneity, living as a whole.... If you want to live as a whole, you cannot plan. Who will plan?
You cannot decide for tomorrow, you can live only here and now. Who will decide? If you decide, division has entered, then you will have to manipulate. Who will plan? The future is unknown, and how can you plan for the unknown? If you plan for the unknown the planning will come from the past.
That means that the dead will control the living. The past is dead, and the past goes on controlling the future, hence you are so bored. It is natural, it has to happen. Boredom comes from the past, because the past is dead and the past is trying to control the future.
The future is always an adventure, but you don't allow it to be an adventure. You plan it. Once planned, your life is running on a track. It is not a river.
When you run on a track you know where you are going, what is happening. Everything is just a repetition. Who will plan? If mind plans, mind is always of the past. Life cannot be planned, because through planning you are committing suicide.
Life can only be unplanned, moving moment to moment into the unknown. But what is your fear?
You will be there to respond; whatsoever the situation you will be there to respond. What is your fear? Why plan it?
The fear comes because you are not certain of whether you will be there or not. You are so unconscious, that is the uncertainty. You are not alert.
You are going to have an interview for a job, so you keep planning in your mind what to answer, how to answer, how to enter the office, how to stand, how to sit. But why? You will be there, you can respond.
But you are not certain about yourself, you are so unalert, you are so unconscious, you don't know - if you don't plan, something may go wrong. If you are alert, then there is no problem. You will be there, so whatever the situation demands, you will respond.
And remember, this planning is not going to help, because if you cannot be conscious, cannot be aware in a situation when you are planning, then that planning is also being done in sleep. But you can repeat it so many times it becomes mechanical, then when the question is asked you can answer. The answer is readymade, you are not needed. It is a fixed pattern, you simply repeat it; you become a mechanical device, you need not be there at all. The answer can be given, it comes from the memory; if you have repeated it many times you know you can rely on it.
Through planning life becomes more and more unconscious, and the more unconscious you are, the more you need planning. Before really dying, you are dead. Alive means responding, sensitive.
Alive means: whatsoever comes, I will be there to respond, and the response will come from me, not from the memory. I will not prepare it.
See the difference when a Christian missionary or a Christian minister, a priest, prepares his sermon.
I once visited a theological college. There they prepare their ministers, their priests - five years' training. So I asked them where Jesus was prepared and trained, who taught him how to speak.
Of course these Christian priests are dead, everything about them is planned. When you say this, a certain gesture is to be made; even the gesture is not allowed to be spontaneous. When you say that, you have to have a certain look; even the eyes are not allowed to be spontaneous. How you have to stand, when you have to shout, and when you have to whisper, when you have to hammer the table and when not - everything is planned.
I asked them where Jesus was trained. He was not a minister at all, he was not a priest. He never went to any theological college, he was the son of a carpenter.
For two thousand years Christian priests have been trained but they have not produced a single Jesus, and they will never produce one again because Jesus cannot be produced. You cannot produce Jesus in a factory. And these are factories, these theological colleges. There you produce priests, and if these priests are just boring, dead, a burden, it is obvious that it is going to be so.
There are two types of religion. One is of the mind - it is dead. That religion is known as theology.
Then there is the other type of religion, the real, the spontaneous. It is not theological, it is mystical.
And remember, Hindus have one theology, Mohammedans another, Christ-ians again another, but religion, the mystic religion, is the same; it cannot be different.
Buddha and Jesus and Chuang Tzu and Lao Tzu, they are the same because they are not theologians. They are not talking from the head, they are simply pouring from their heart. They are not logicians, they are poets. They are not saying something from the scriptures, they are not trained for it, they are simply responding to a necessity in you. Their words are not readymade, their manners not fixed, their behavior not planned.
Now we will enter Chuang Tzu's sutra.
If a man steps on a stranger's foot
In the marketplace,
He makes a polite apology
And offers an explanation:
"This place is so crowded."
Apology is needed because there is no relationship, the other is a stranger. Explanation is needed because there is no love. If there is love then there is no need for an explanation, the other will understand. If there is love, there is no need for apology, the other will understand - love always understands.
So there is no higher morality than love, there cannot be. Love is the highest law, but if it is not there then substitutes are needed. Stepping on a stranger's foot in the marketplace an apology is needed, and an explanation also:
"This place is so crowded."
With reference to this, one thing has to be understood. In the West even a husband will offer an apology, a wife will offer an explanation. It means that love has disappeared. It means that everybody has become a stranger, that there is no home, that every place has become a marketplace. In the East it is impossible to conceive of this, but Westerners think that Easterners are rude. A husband will never give an explanation - no need, because we are not strangers and the other can understand. When the other cannot understand, only then apology is needed. And if love cannot understand, what good is apology going to do?
If the world becomes a home, all apologies will disappear, all ex-planations will disappear. You give explanations because you are not certain about the other. Explanation is a trick to avoid conflict, apology is a device to avoid conflict. But the conflict is there, and you are afraid of it.
This is a civilized way to get out of the conflict! You have stepped on a stranger's foot, you see the violence in his eyes - he has become aggressive, he will hit you. Apology is needed, apology will calm his anger - it is a trick. You need not be authentic in your apology, it is just a social device, it works as a lubricant. You give an explanation just to say: I am not responsible, the place is so crowded, it is a marketplace, nothing can be done, it had to happen. Explanation says: I am not responsible.
Love is always responsible, whether the place is crowded or not, because love is always aware and alert. You cannot shift the responsibility to the situation, YOU are responsible.
Look at the phenomenon.... Apology is a device, just like a lubricant, to avoid conflict; and explanation is shifting the responsibility onto something else. You don't say, "I was unconscious, unaware, that is why I stepped on your foot." You say, "The place is so crowded!"
A religious person cannot do this, and if you go on doing this you will never become religious, because religion means taking all the responsibility that is there, not avoiding, not escaping. The more responsible you are, the more awareness will arise out of it; the less you feel responsible, the more and more unconscious you will become. Whenever you feel that you are not responsible you will go to sleep. And this has happened - not only in individual relationships but on all levels of society.
Marxism says that society is responsible for everything. If a man is poor, society is responsible, if a man is a thief, society is responsible. You are not responsible, no individual is responsible. That is why communism is anti-religious - not because it denies God, not because it says there is no soul, but because of this: it shifts the whole responsibility onto society, you are not responsible.
Look at the religious attitude which is totally different, qualitatively different. A religious man thinks himself responsible: If someone is begging, I am responsible. The beggar may be at the other end of the earth, I may not know him, I may not come across his path, but if there is a beggar, I am responsible. If a war goes on anywhere, in Israel, in Vietnam, anywhere, I am not participating in it in any visible way, but I am responsible. I am here. I cannot shift the responsibility onto society.
And what do you mean when you say society? Where is this society? This is one of the greatest evasions. Only individuals exist - you will never come across society. You will never be able to pinpoint it: This is society. Everywhere the individual is in existence, and society is just a word.
Where is society? Ancient civilizations played a trick. They said: God is responsible, fate is responsible. Now communism plays the same game saying that society is responsible. But where is society? God may be somewhere, society is nowhere; there are only individuals. Religion says:
You are... rather, I am, responsible. No explanation is needed to avoid this.
And remember one thing more: whenever you feel that you are responsible for all the ugliness, for all the mess, anarchy, war, violence, aggression, suddenly you become alert. Responsibility penetrates your heart and makes you aware. When you say, "This place is much too crowded," you can go on walking sleepily. Really, you step on the stranger's foot not because the place is crowded, but because you are unconscious. You are walking like a somnambulist, a man walking in his sleep.
When you step on his foot, you suddenly become aware, because now the situation is dangerous.
You make the apology, you fall asleep, and again you say, "The place is crowded!" You resume your walk, then you start moving again.
I have heard of a simple villager who had come to the city for the first time. On the platform at the station someone stepped on his foot and said, "Sorry." Then he went into a hotel, someone again clashed with him and said, "Sorry!" Then he went into a theater and someone almost knocked him down, and he said, "Sorry."
Then the villager said, "This is beautiful, we never knew this trick. Do whatever you want to do to anybody and say sorry!" So he punched a man who was passing and said, "Sorry!"
What are you really doing when you say sorry? Your sleep is broken, you were walking in a dream - you must have been dreaming, imagining, something was on your mind - and then you stepped on someone. Not that the place was crowded - you would have stumbled even if no one had been there, even then you would have stepped on someone.
It is you, your unconsciousness, your unconscious behavior. A buddha cannot stumble even if it is a marketplace, because he moves with full consciousness. Whatsoever he does, he does knowingly.
And if he steps on your foot it means he has stepped knowingly; there must be some reason for it.
It may be just to help you awake, he may have stepped on your foot just to wake you up, but he will not say that the place is crowded, he will not give any explanation.
Explanations are always deceptive. They look logical, but they are false. You give explanations only when you have to hide something. You can watch and observe this in your own life. This is not a theory, this is a simple fact of everybody's experience - you give explanations only when you want to hide something.
Truth needs no explanation. The more you lie, the more explanations are needed. There are so many scriptures because man has lied so much, then explanations are needed to hide the lie. You have to give an explanation, then this explanation will need further explanation, and it goes on and on. It is an infinite regression. And even with the last explanation nothing is explained, the basic lie remains a lie - you cannot convert a lie into a truth just by explaining it. Nothing is explained by explanations. You may think so, but it is not the case.
Once it happened that Mulla Nasruddin went on his first air trip, and he was afraid but he didn't want anybody to know. It happens to everybody on their first flight: nobody wants this to be their first.
He wanted to behave nonchalantly so he walked very bravely. That bravery was an explanation: I always travel by air. Then he sat down in his seat and he wanted to say something just to put himself at ease, because whenever you start talking, you become brave; through talk, you feel less fear.
So Nasruddin spoke to the passenger next to him. He looked out of the window and said, "Look, what terrific height! People look like ants."
The other man said, "Sir, we have not taken off yet. Those ARE ants."
Explanations cannot hide anything. Rather, on the contrary, they reveal. If you can look, if you have eyes, every explanation is transparent. It would have been better if he had kept quiet. But don't try silence as an explanation. As an explanation it is of no use. Your silence will be revealing, and your words will reveal - it is better not to be a liar! Then you need not give any explanations. It is better to be truthful - the easiest thing is to be true and authentic. If you are afraid, it is better to say, "I am afraid," and accepting the fact your fear will disappear.
Acceptance is such a miracle. When you accept that you are afraid and say, "This is my first trip,"
suddenly you will feel a change coming over you. The basic fear is not fear, the basic fear is the fear of the fear: I don't want anyone to know that I am afraid, I don't want anyone to know that I am a coward. But everybody is a coward in a new situation, and in a new situation to be brave is foolish. To be cowardly only means that the situation is so new that your mind cannot supply any answers, the past cannot give the answers, so you are trembling. But this is good! Why try to supply an answer from the mind? Tremble, and let the answer come from your present consciousness. You are sensitive, that is all; don't kill this sensitivity through explanation.
Next time you try to give an explanation, be aware of what you are doing. Are you trying to hide something, trying to explain away something? Nothing like this will be of any help.
A man who had become newly rich went to a beach, the most expensive, the most exclusive, and he spent madly just to influence the people around him. The next day, while swimming, his wife drowned. She was carried to the shore and a crowd gathered, so he asked, "What are you doing now?"
A man said, "We are going to give your wife artificial respiration."
The rich man said, "Artificial respiration? Nothing doing, give her the real thing. I'll pay for it."
Whatsoever you do, whatsoever you don't do, whatsoever you say, whatsoever you don't say, reveals you. Everywhere mirrors are all around you. Every other person is a mirror, every situation is a mirror - and whom do you think you are deceiving? If deception becomes a habit, ultimately you will have deceived yourself and no one else. It is your life you are wasting in deceptions.
Chuang Tzu says: Explanations show that you are not true, you are not authentic.
If an elder brother
Steps on his younger brother's foot
He says, "Sorry,"
And that is that.
Two brothers... when the relationship is more intimate, when you are close, the other is not a stranger.
Then no explanation is needed, the brother simply says sorry. He accepts the blame. He says, "I have been unconscious." He is not shifting the responsibility onto somebody else, he accepts it and that is that. The relationship is closer.
If a parent
Treads on his child's foot
Nothing is said at all.
There is no need, the relationship is even more intimate, closer. There is love, and that love will do.
No substitute is needed, no explanation, no apology.
The greatest politeness
Is free of all formality.
Perfect conduct is free of concern.
Perfect wisdom is unplanned.
Perfect love is without demonstrations.
Perfect sincerity offers no guarantee.
But all these perfections need one thing - and that is spontaneous awareness; otherwise you will always have false coins, you will always have false faces. You can be sincere, but if you have to make any effort then that sincerity is just formal.
You can be loving, but if your love needs effort, if your love is of that type which Dale Carnegie talks about in How to Win Friends and Influence People, if that type of love is there, it cannot be real. You have been manipulating it. Then even friendship is a business.
Beware of Dale Carnegies; these are dangerous people, they destroy all that is real and authentic.
They show you how to win friends, they teach you tricks, techniques, they make you efficient, they give you the knowhow.
But love has no knowhow, it cannot. Love needs no training, and friendship is not something which you have to learn. A learned friendship will not be a friendship, it will just be an exploitation - you are exploiting the other and deceiving him. You are not true, this is a business relationship.
But in America everything has become business, both friendship and love. Dale Carnegie's books have sold millions of copies, hundreds of editions, next in popularity only to The Bible.
Now nobody knows how to be a friend, it has to be learned. Sooner or later there will be colleges for love, training courses, even by post, lessons you can learn and apply. And the problem is that if you succeed then you are lost forever, because the real will never happen to you, the door is completely closed. Once you become efficient in a certain thing, the mind resists. The mind says: This is the short cut, and you know it well, so why choose another path?
Mind is always for the line of least resistance. That is why clever people are never able to love. They are so clever they start manipulating. They will not say what is in their heart, they will say what will appeal. They will look at the other person and see what he wants to be said. They will not say their heart, they will just create a situation in which the other is deceived.
Husbands deceiving wives, wives deceiving husbands, friends deceiving friends.... The whole world has become just a crowd of enemies. There are only two types of enemies: those you have not been able to deceive and those you have been able to deceive. This is the only difference. Then how can ecstasy be in your life?
So this is not a learning process. Authenticity cannot come through schooling, authenticity comes through awareness - if you are aware, if you live in a conscious way. Look at the difference: to live consciously means to live openly, not to hide, not to play games. To be alert means to be vulnerable, and whatever happens, happens. You accept it, but you never compromise, you never purchase anything by giving up your consciousness. Even if it means that you are left totally alone, you will accept being alone, but you will be consciously alert, aware. Only with this alertness does real religion start happening.
I will tell you a story. It happened once, in ancient times, that there was a king who was also an astrologer. He had a very deep interest in studying the stars. Suddenly he felt panic in his heart because he became aware that it was going to be dangerous to eat the coming year's harvest.
Whoever ate it would go mad. So he called his prime minister, his adviser and counsellor, and told him that this was certain to happen. The stars are clear, and because of the combination of cosmic rays, this year's harvest would be poisonous. It happens rarely, once in thousands of years, but it was going to happen this year, and anyone who ate of this year's harvest would go mad. So he asked his adviser, "What should we do?"
The prime minister said, "It is impossible to provide for everybody from last year's harvest, but one thing can be done. You and I can both live on last year's harvest. The remainder of last year's harvest can be gathered, requisitioned. There is no problem, it will be enough for you and I."
The king said, "This doesn't appeal to me. If all my devoted people go mad, women, saints and sages, devoted servants, all my subjects, even children, it doesn't appeal to me to be an outsider.
It would not be worth saving myself and you; that won't do. I would rather be mad with everybody else. But I have another suggestion. I will mark your head with the seal of madness and you will mark my head with the seal of madness."
The prime minister asked, "How is this going to help anybody?"
The king said, "I have heard that it is one of the ancient keys of wisdom, so let us try it. After everyone has gone mad, after we have gone mad, whenever I look at your forehead I will remember that I am mad. And whenever you look at my forehead, remember that you are mad."
The prime minister was still puzzled; he said, "But what will it do?"
The king said, "I have heard from wise men that if you can remember that you are mad, you are mad no more."
A madman cannot remember that he is mad. An ignorant man cannot remember that he is ignorant.
A man who is in a dream cannot remember that he is dreaming. If, in your dream, you become alert and know that you are dreaming, the dream has stopped, you are fully awake. If you can understand that you are ignorant, ignorance drops. Ignorant people always believe that they are wise, and mad people think that they are the only really sane ones. When someone becomes really wise, he becomes so by recognizing his ignorance. So the king said, "This we are going to do."
I don't know what happened, the story ends here, but the story is meaningful.
Only alertness can help when the whole world is mad, nothing else. Keeping yourself outside, going to the Himalayas, will not be of much help. When everyone is mad, you are going to be mad, because you are part and parcel of everybody; it is a totality, an organic totality.
How can you separate yourself? How can you go to the Himalayas? Deep down you still remain part of the whole. Even living in the Himalayas you will remember your friends. They will knock in your dreams, you will think of them, you will wonder what they are thinking of you - you go on being linked.
You cannot go outside the world. There is nowhere outside the world, the world is one continent.
Nobody can be an island - islands are joined deep down with the continent. You can just think superficially that you are separate, but nobody can be separate.
The king was really wise. He said, "It is not going to help. I am not going to be an outsider, I will be an insider, and this is what I will do. I will try to remember that I am mad, because when you forget that you are mad, then you are really mad. This is what is to be done."
Wherever you are, remember yourself, that you are; this consciousness that you are should become a continuity. Not your name, your caste, your nationality, those are futile things, absolutely useless.
Just remember that: I am. This must not be forgotten. This is what Hindus call self-remembrance, what the Buddha called right-mindfulness, what Gurdjieff used to call self-remembering, what Krishnamurti calls awareness.
This is the most substantial part of meditation, to remember that: I am. Walking, sitting, eating, talking, remember that: I am. Never forget this. It will be difficult, very arduous. In the beginning you will keep forgetting; there will be only single moments when you will feel illuminated, then it is lost. But don't get miserable; even single moments are much. Go on, whenever you can remember again, again catch hold of the thread. When you forget, don't worry - remember again, again catch hold of the thread, and by and by the gaps will lessen, the intervals will start dropping, a continuity will arise.
And whenever your consciousness becomes continuous, you need not use the mind. Then there is no planning, then you act out of your consciousness, not out of your mind. Then there is no need for any apology, no need to give any explanation. Then you are whatsoever you are, there is nothing to hide. Whatsoever you are, you are. You cannot do anything else. You can only be in a state of continuous remembrance. Through this remembrance, this mindfulness, comes the authentic religion, comes the authentic morality.
The greatest politeness
Is free of all formality.
If you are not formal, then nobody is a stranger. Whether you move in the marketplace or in a crowded street, nobody is a stranger, everybody is a friend. Not only a friend, really, everybody is just an extension of you. Then formality is not needed. If I step on my own foot - which is difficult - I will not say sorry, and I will not say to myself, "The place is very crowded!" When I step on your foot, I am stepping on my foot.
A mind which is fully alert knows that consciousness is one, life is one, being is one, existence is one, it is not fragmented. The tree flowering there is me in a different form, the rock lying there on the ground is me in a different form. The whole of existence becomes an organic unity - organic, life flowing through it, not mechanical. A mechanical unity is a different thing - it is dead.
A car is a mechanical unity, there is no life in it, and that is why you can replace one part by another.
Every part is replaceable. But can you replace a man? Impossible. When a man dies, a unique phenomenon disappears; disappears completely, you cannot replace it. When your wife or your husband dies, now how can you replace them? You may get another wife, but this will be another wife, not a replacement. And the shadow of the first will always be there; the first cannot be forgotten, it will always be there. It may become a shadow, but even shadows of love are very substantial.
You cannot replace a person, there is no way. If it is a mechanical unity then wives are replaceable parts, you can even have spare wives. You can keep them in your storeroom and whenever your wife dies, you replace her!
This is what is happening in the West. They have started to think in terms of mechanism. So now they say nothing is a problem - if one wife dies you get another, if one husband is no more you get another... So marriage in the West is a mechanical unity, which is why divorce is possible. The East denies divorce because marriage is an organic unity. How can you replace a live person? It will never happen again, that person has simply disappeared into the ultimate mystery.
Life is an organic unity. You cannot replace a plant because every plant is unique, you cannot find another, the same cannot be found. Life has a quality of uniqueness. Even a small rock is unique - you can go all over the world to find a similar rock and you will not be able to. How can you replace it? This is the difference between organic unity and mechanical unity. Mechanical unity depends on the parts; the parts are replaceable, they are not unique. Organic unity depends on the whole, not on the parts. Parts are not really parts, they are not separate from the whole - they are one, they cannot be replaced.
When you become alert to the inner flame of your inner being, suddenly you become alert that you are not an island, it is a vast continent, an infinite continent. There are no boundaries separating you from it. All boundaries are false, make-believe. All boundaries are in the mind; in existence there are no boundaries.
Then who can be a stranger? When you step on somebody, it is you; you have stepped on your own foot. No apology is needed, no explanation is needed. There is no one else, there is only one.
Then your life becomes real, authentic, spontaneous; then it is not formal, then you do not follow any rules. You have come to know the ultimate law. Now no rules are needed. You have become the law - there is no need to remember the rules now.
The greatest politeness
Is free of all formality.
Have you looked at people who are polite? You will not find more egoistic people than them. Look at a polite person, the very way he stands, the way he talks, the way he looks, walks; he has managed to make everything look polite, but inside the ego is manipulating.
Look at the so-called humble people. They say they are nobodies, but when they say it, look into their eyes, at the ego asserting. This is a very cunning ego, because if you say, "I am somebody,"
everybody will be against you, and everybody will try to put you in your place. If you say, "I am nobody," everybody is for you, nobody is against you.
Polite people are very cunning, clever. They know what to say, what to do, so that they can exploit you. If they say, "I am somebody," everybody is against them. Then conflict arises because everybody thinks that he is an egoist. It will be difficult then to exploit people because everybody is closed against you. If you say, "I am nobody, I am just dust on your feet," then the doors are open and you can exploit. All etiquette, culture, is a type of sophisticated cunningness, and you are exploiting.
The greatest politeness
Is free of all formality.
It happened that Confucius came to see Lao Tzu, Chuang Tzu's master. And Confucius was the image of formal politeness. He was the greatest formalist in the world, the world has never known such a great formalist. He was simply manners, formality, culture and etiquette. He came to see Lao Tzu, the polar opposite.
Confucius was very old, Lao Tzu was not so old. The formality was that when Confucius came in, Lao Tzu should stand up to receive him. But he remained sitting. It was impossible for Confucius to believe that such a great master, known all over the country for his humbleness, should be so impolite. He had to mention it.
Immediately he said, "This is not good. I am older than you."
Lao Tzu laughed loudly and said, "Nobody is older than me. I existed before everything came into existence. Confucius, we are of the same age, everything is of the same age. From eternity we have been in existence, so don't carry this burden of old age, sit down."
Confucius had come to ask some questions. He said, "How should a religious man behave?"
Lao Tzu said, "When the how comes, there is no religion. How is not a question for a religious man.
The how shows that you are not religious but that you want to behave like a religious man - that is why you ask how.
"Does a lover ask how one should love? He loves! Really, it is only later on that one becomes aware that he has been in love. It may be that only when love has gone does he become aware that he has been in love. He simply loves. It happens. It is a happening, not a doing."
Whatsoever Confucius asked, Lao Tzu replied in such a way that Confucius became very much disturbed: "This man is dangerous!"
When he returned, his disciples asked, "What happened, what manner of man is this Lao Tzu?"
Confucius said, "Don't go near him. You may have seen dangerous snakes, but nothing can compare with this man. You may have heard about ferocious lions, they are nothing before this man. This man is like a dragon which walks on the earth, can swim in the sea, can go to the very end of the sky - very dangerous. He is not for us little people, we are too small. He is dangerous, vast like an abyss. Don't go near him, otherwise you will feel dizzy and you may fall. Even I felt dizzy. And I couldn't understand what he said, he is beyond understanding."
Lao Tzu is bound to be beyond understanding if you try to understand him through formality; otherwise he is simple. But for Confucius he is difficult, almost impossible to understand, because he sees through forms and Lao Tzu has no form and no formality. Nameless, without any form, he lives in the infinite.
The greatest politeness
Is free of all formality.
Lao Tzu is sitting, Confucius is waiting for him to stand up. Who was really polite? Confucius waiting for Lao Tzu to stand up and welcome him and receive him because he is older, is just egotistical.
Now the ego has taken the form of age, seniority.
But Confucius could not look directly into the eyes of Lao Tzu, because Lao Tzu was right. He was saying: We are of the same age. Really, we are the same. The same life flows in you that flows in me. You are not superior to me, I am not superior to you. There is no question of superiority and inferiority, and there is no question of seniority and juniority. There is no question, we are one.
If Confucius could have looked into the eyes of Lao Tzu he would have seen that those eyes were divine. But a man whose own eyes are filled with laws, rules, regulations, formalities, is almost blind, he cannot see.
Perfect conduct is free of concern.
You conduct yourself well because you are concerned. You behave well because you are concerned.
Just the other day a man came to me. He said, "I would like to take the jump, I would like to become a sannyasin, but I have my family, my children are studying at college and I have a great responsibility to them."
He is concerned. He has a duty to fulfill, but no love. Duty is concern; it thinks in terms of something that has to be done because it is expected, because "What will people say if I leave?" Who thinks about what people will say? The ego. So: "What will people say? First let me fulfill my duties."
I never tell anybody to leave, I never tell anybody to renounce, but I insist that one should not be in some relationship because of duty - because then the whole relationship is ugly. One should be in a relationship because of love. Then this man would not say, "I have a duty to fulfill." He would say, "I cannot come right now. My children are growing, and I love them, and I am happy working for them."
Then this will be a happiness. Now it is not a happiness, it is a burden. When you carry a burden, when you even turn your love into a burden, you cannot be happy. And if you have turned your love into a burden, your prayer will also become a burden, your meditation will also become a burden.
Then you will say, "Because of this guru, this master, I am caught, and now I have to do this." It will not come out of you, your totality; it will not be overflowing.
Why be worried? If there is love, wherever you are, there is no burden. And if you love your children, even if you leave them, they will understand. And if you don't love your children, and you go on serving them, they will understand, and they will know that these are just false things.
This is happening. People come to see me and they say, "I have worked my whole life and nobody even feels thankful towards me." How can anybody feel thankful towards you? You were carrying them like a burden. Even small children understand well when love is there, and they understand well when you are just doing your duty. Duty is ugly, duty is violent; it shows your concern but doesn't show your spontaneity.
Says Chuang Tzu:
Perfect conduct is free of concern.
Whatsoever is done, is done out of love - then you are not honest because honesty pays, you are honest because honesty is lovely.
Businessmen are honest if honesty pays. They say: Honesty is the best policy. How can you destroy a beautiful thing like honesty and turn it into a best policy? Policy is politics, honesty is religion.
An old man was on his deathbed. He called his son and said, "Now I must tell you the secret, now I am dying. Always remember two things - this is how I succeeded. First, whenever you give a promise, fulfill it. Whatsoever the cost, be honest and fulfill it. This has been my basis, this is why I succeeded. And the second thing, never make any promises."
For a businessman even religion is a policy, for a politician even religion is a policy - everything is a policy, even love is a policy. Kings, queens, never marry ordinary, common people. Why? It is part of politics. Kings marry other princesses, queens, and the concern is about which relationship will be the most profitable for the kingdom. Two kingdoms will become related so that they will become friends and will not be antagonistic. So with whom should the marriage be made?
In India, in the olden days, a king would marry many women, hundreds, even thousands. It was part of politics: he would marry the daughter of anyone who had some power, so that he could create a network of power relationships. Thus the person whose daughter you have married will become your friend, he will help you.
In Buddha's time India had two thousand kingdoms, so the most successful king was the one who had two thousand wives, one wife from every kingdom. Then he could live in peace because now he had no enemies. Now the whole country became like a family. But how can love exist in such a concern? Love never thinks of consequences, never hankers for results. It is sufficient unto itself.
Perfect conduct is free of concern.
Perfect wisdom is unplanned.
A wise man lives moment to moment, never planning. Only ignorant people plan, and when ignorant people plan, what can they plan? They plan out of their ignorance. Unplanned they would have been better, because out of ignorance only ignorance arises; out of confusion, only greater confusion is born.
A wise man lives moment to moment, he has no planning. His life is just free like a cloud floating in the sky, not going to some goal, not determined. He has no map for the future, he lives without a map, he moves without a map; because the real thing is not the goal, the real thing is the beauty of the movement. The real thing is not reaching, the real thing is the journey. Remember, the real thing is the journey, the very traveling. It is so beautiful, why bother about the goal? And if you are too bothered about the goal, you will miss the journey, and the journey is life - the goal can only be death.
The journey is life and it is an infinite journey. You have been on the move from the very beginning - if there was any beginning. Those who know say there was no beginning, so from no beginning you have been on the move, to the no end you will be on the move - and if you are goal-oriented, you will miss. The whole is the journey, the path, the endless path, never beginning, never ending. There is really no goal - goal is created by the cunning mind. Where is this whole existence moving? Where?
It is not going anywhere. It is simply going, and the going is so beautiful, that is why existence is unburdened. There is no plan, no goal, no purpose. It is not a business, it is a play, a LEELA. Every moment is the goal.
Perfect wisdom is unplanned.
Perfect love is without demonstrations.
Demonstration is needed because love is not there. And the less love there is, the more you demonstrate - when it is there, you don't demonstrate. Whenever a husband comes home with a present for his wife she will know that something is wrong. He must have stepped out of line, he must have met another woman. Now this is the explanation, this is a substitute; otherwise love is such a present that no other present is needed. Not that love will not give presents, but love itself is such a present. What else can you give? What else is possible?
But whenever the husband feels that something is wrong, he has to put it right. Everything has to be rearranged, balanced. And this is the problem - women are so intuitive that they know immediately, your present cannot deceive them. It is impossible, because women still live with their intuition, with their illogical mind. They immediately jump. And they will understand that something has gone wrong, otherwise why this present?
Whenever you demonstrate, you demonstrate your inner poverty. If your sannyas becomes a demonstration you are not a sannyasin. If your meditation becomes a demonstration you are not meditative, because whenever the real exists, it is such a light that there is no need to demonstrate it. When your house is lighted, when there is a flame, you need not go to the neighbors and tell them, "Look, our house has got a lamp." It is there. But when your house is in darkness you try to convince your neighbors that light is there. Convincing them, you try to convince yourself. This is the reason why you want to demonstrate. If the other is convinced, his conviction, her conviction, will help you to be convinced.
I have heard that once Mulla Nasruddin had a beautiful house, but he got bored, as everybody gets bored. Whether it was beautiful or not made no difference; living in the same house every day, he got bored. The house was beautiful, with a big garden, acres of green land, swimming pool, everything.
But he got bored, so he called a real estate agent and told him, "I want to sell it. I am fed up, this house has become a hell."
The next day an advertisement appeared in the morning papers; the real estate agent had inserted a beautiful advertisement. Mulla Nasruddin read it again and again and he was so convinced that he phoned the agent: "Wait, I don't want to sell it. Your advertisement has convinced me so deeply that now I know that for my whole life I have been wanting this house, looking for this very house."
When you can convince others of your love, you yourself become convinced. But if you have love, there is no need, you know!
When you have wisdom, there is no need to demonstrate it. But when you have only knowledge, you demonstrate, you convince others, and when they are convinced, you are convinced that you are a man of knowledge. When you have wisdom, there is no need. Even if not one person is convinced, you are still certain that you alone are enough proof.
Perfect sincerity offers no guarantee.
All guarantees are because of insincerity. You guarantee, you promise, you say: This is the guarantee, I will do this. While you are giving the guarantee, at that very moment the insincerity is there.
Perfect sincerity offers no guarantee because perfect sincerity is so aware, aware of many things.
First, the future is unknown. How can you make a guarantee? Life changes every moment, how can you promise? All guarantee, all promising, can be only for this moment, not for the next. For the next moment nothing can be done. You will have to wait.
If you are really sincere and love a woman you cannot say, "I will love you for my whole life." If you say this, you are a liar. This guarantee is false. But if you love, this moment is enough. The woman will not ask for your whole life. This moment, if love is there, it is so fulfilling that one moment is enough for many lives. A single moment of love is eternity; she will not ask. But now she is asking because this moment there is no love. So she asks, "What is the guarantee? Will you love me always?"
This moment there is no love and she is asking for a guarantee. This moment there is no love and you guarantee for the future - because only through that guarantee can you deceive at this moment.
You can create a beautiful picture of the future and you can hide the ugly picture of the present. You say, "Yes, I will love you forever and forever. Even death will not part us." What nonsense! What insincerity! How can you do this?
You can do this and you do it so easily because you are not aware of what you are saying. The next moment is unknown; where it will lead, no one knows, what will happen, no one knows, no one can know it.
Unknowability is part of the future game. How can you guarantee? At the most you can say, "I love you this moment and this moment I feel - this is a feeling of this moment - that even death cannot part us. But this is a feeling of this moment. This is not a guarantee. This moment I feel like saying that I will always and always love you, but this is a feeling of this moment, this is no guarantee. What will happen in the future nobody knows. We never knew about this moment so how can we know about other moments? We will have to wait. We will have to be prayerful that it happens, that I love you for ever and ever, but this is not a guarantee."
Perfect sincerity cannot give any guarantee. Perfect sincerity is so sincere that it cannot promise: it gives whatsoever it can give here and now. Perfect sincerity lives in the present, it has no idea of the future.
Mind moves in the future, being lives here and now. And perfect sincerity belongs to the being, not to the mind. Love, truth, meditation, sincerity, simplicity, innocence, all belong to the being. The opposites belong to the mind and to hide the opposites the mind creates false coins: false sincerity, which guarantees, promises; false love, which is just a name for duty; false beauty, which is just a face for inner ugliness. Mind creates false coins, and nobody is deceived, remember, except yourself.
Enough for today.
