Osho - Weekly Meditation For The Here And Now
Weekly Meditation - Week 12. Cypress In The Courtyard
March 19
Cypress In The Courtyard
The fact if this moment is what true religion is all about. So if you are feeling sad, then that is the cypress in the courtyard.
Look at it... just look at it. There is nothing else to be done. There is a very famous story about a Zen master, Chou Chou. A monk asked him, "What is true religion?"
It was a full-moon night and the moon was rising. The master remained silent for a long time; he didn't say anything. And then suddenly he came to life and said, "Look at the cypress in the courtyard."
A beautiful cool breeze was blowing and playing with the cypress and the moon had just come above the branch. It was beautiful, incredible. It was almost impossible that it could be so beautiful. But the monk said, "This was not my question. I'm not asking about the cypress in the courtyard, or about the moon or its beauty.
My question has nothing to do with this. I am asking what true religion is. Have you forgotten my question?" The master again remained silent for a long time. Then again he came to life and said, "Look at the cypress in the courtyard."
True religion consists of the here and now. The fact of this moment is what true religion is all about. So if you are feeling sad, then that is the cypress in the courtyard. Look at it... just look at it. There is nothing else to be done. That very look will reveal many mysteries. It will open many doors.
March 20
Doing Nothing
If you can do nothing, that is the best.
One needs much courage to do nothing. To do does not need much courage, because the mind is a doer. The ego always hankers to do something-worldly or otherworldly, the ego always wants to do something. If you are doing something, the ego feels perfectly right, healthy, moving, enjoying itself.
Nothing is the most difficult thing in the world, and if you can do that, that's the best. The very idea that we have to do something is basically wrong. We have to be, not to do. All that I suggest to people that they do is just to come to know the futility of doing, so that one day out of sheer tiredness they flop on the ground and they say, "Now it is enough! We don't want to do' anything." And then the real work starts.
The real work is just to be, because all that you need is already given, and all that you can be you are. You don't know yet, that's true. So all that is needed is to be in such a silent space that you can fall into yourself and see what you are.
March 21
Tomorrow
When you seek, the future is important, the goal is important... And when you don't seek, the present moment is all there is. There is no future.
So you cannot postpone - you cannot say, 'Tomorrow I will be happy.' Through tomorrow we destroy today; through the fictitious destroy the real. So you can say, "Okay, if I am sad today, there is nothing to be worried about-tomorrow I will be happy." So today can be tolerated, you can bear it. But if there is no tomorrow and no future and nothing to seek for and find, there is no way to postpone the very postponement disappears. Then it is up to you to be happy or not to be happy. This moment, you have to decide. And I don't think anybody is going to decide to be unhappy. Why? For what?
The past is no more, and the future is never going to be, so this is the moment. You can celebrate it: You can love, you can pray, you can sing, you can dance, you can meditate, you can use it as you want. And the moment is so small that if you are not very alert it will slip out of your hands, it will be gone. So, to be, one has to be very alert. Doing needs no alertness; it is very mechanical.
And don't use the word wait-because that means the future has entered again from the back door. If you think that you should just wait, then again you are waiting for the future. There is nothing to wait for. Existence is as perfect this moment as it will ever be. It is never going to be more perfect.
March 22
Worship
One need not go to the church or to the temple or to the mosque; wherever you are, be blissful, and there is the temple. The temple is a subtle creation of your own energy. if you are blissful, you create the temple around you.
In the temples we are just doing fake things. In the temples we offer flowers that are not ours; we borrow them, from the trees. They were already offered to God on the trees, and they were alive on the trees; you have killed them, you have murdered something beautiful, and now you are offering those murdered flowers to God and not even feeling ashamed.
I have watched. Particularly in India people don't take the flowers of their own plants: "they pick them from the neighbors, and nobody can prevent them, because this is a religious country and they are picking flowers for religious purposes. People burn lights and candles, but they are not theirs; people burn incense and create fragrance, but all is borrowed.
The real temple is created by blissfulness-and all these things start happening on their own. If you are blissful you will find a few flowers are being offered, but those flowers are of your consciousness; there will be light, but that light is of your own inner flame; there will be fragrance, but that fragrance belongs to your very being. This is true worship.
March 23
Right And Wrong
There is nothing right or wrong. It all depends on your standpoint.
The same thing can be right to one person and wrong to another, because it more or less depends on the person. The same thing can be right in one moment for a person, and in another moment it can be wrong, because it depends on the situation.
You have been taught in Aristotelian categories. This is right and that is wrong. This is white and that is black. This is God and that is the devil. These categories are false. Life is not divided into black and white. Much of it is more like gray.
And if you see very deeply, white is one extreme of gray, and black is another extreme, but the expanse is of gray. Reality is gray. It has to be so, because it is not divided anywhere. There are no watertight compartments anywhere. This is a foolish categorization, but it has been implanted in our minds.
So right and wrong go on changing continuously. Then what is there to do? If somebody wants to decide absolutely, he will be paralyzed; he will not be able to act. If you want to act only when you have an absolute decision about what is right, you will be paralyzed.
You will not be able to act. One has to act, and to act in a relative world. There is no absolute decision, so don't wait for it. Just watch, see, and whatever you feel is right, do it.
March 24
Listening
When friends offer advice, listen carefully. One of the great things to be learned is listening. Listen very silently.
Just don't listen indifferently. Don't listen as if you want others to stop talking and you are just listening to be polite because they are your friends. In that case it is better to tell them not to say anything because you are not in the mood to listen.
But when you are listening, really listen - be open, because your friends may be right. And even if they are wrong, listening to them will enrich you. You will learn more viewpoints, and it is always good to learn. So listen well, but always decide on your own.
Once a person has this relative understanding, things become very clear and easy. Otherwise people are very absolutist. They think in terms of absolutes: This is truth and whatever is against it is wrong. This attitude has crippled the whole earth-Hindus and Muslims and Christians are all fighting because everybody claims the absolute truth. But nobody has any claim on it, It is nobody's monopoly.
Truth is vast. Infinite are its facets and infinite are the ways to know it , Whatever we know is limited; it is just one part.
March 25
Perhaps
Hesitate more. Use the words maybe and perhaps more, and allow others the freedom to decide on their own.
Watch every word that you speak. Our language is such, our ways of speaking are such, that knowingly and unknowingly, 'we make absolute statements. Never do that. Say "perhaps" more. Hesitate more. Say "maybe" more, and allow others the freedom to decide on their own.
Try it for one month. You will have to be very alert, because speaking in absolutes is a deep-rooted habit, but if one is watchful, this habit can be dropped. Then you will see that arguments will drop and there will be no need to defend.
