Here is a Buddha again living among us!

We have come to V.T. station with Osho, who is leaving for Jabalpur. It is a hot summer afternoon. It is 1969. I am standing behind Him, watching how His perspiration is running like a little stream of water from the middle of His back down to His waist. He is wearing a whit lunghi and a shawl wrapped around the upper part of His body: His back is half naked. He is standing with all his beauty and grace like a lion amongst the crowd of sheep who have fallen in love with Him!

The train is about to leave, yet His luggage has not arrived: it was put in another car. We become worried. He is leaving to conduct a meditation camp, and I start wondering how he will manage there without His clothes. Suddenly He turns back and looks at me. I feel ashamed to disturb Him with my doubting mind--He just smiles at me. His trusting, shining eyes are still floating in the air before me as I write. I relaxed and remember His words, "Trust existence."

The guard blows his whistle again, and Osho gets in the train without His luggage. He stands at the door and looks at everyone with His mischievous smile. Somewhere in my heart I know that the train will not leave till His luggage arrives. We are all waiting there, holding our breath, to see what happens next. How unconsciously we are behaving in the presence of our enlightened master. But His compassion is infinite: He has accepted us as we are and never gives us the feeling of being ignorant or unconscious.

Very slowly the train starts, and to our great surprise we see Ishwarbhai’s driver come running with His suitcase, and pushing everyone aside, he reaches His compartment, and places the suitcase behind Osho, who is still standing at the door to say one more time "Good-bye" to us.

The train pulls out. My heart sinks into silence. I close my eyes and sit at the bench nearby. One of the friends comes and shakes me saying, "Let us go." I open my eyes and wonder where to go: my heart has already gone with Him. I want to shout to the world, "Here is a Buddha again living among us!"

Chapter 10

One Hundred Tales for Ten Thousand Buddhas

Ma Dharm Jyoti

-----------------------

One Hundred Tales For Ten Thousand Buddhas – this is a essential book. There exists no other quite like it. It is a collection of living moments with the living Buddha. It is not some events remembered and then adorned with reactions. These are tales vitally alive.

These tales are a great gift for all of us – those who have sat with the living Master and those who haven’t. It is a book for all seekers. It is also a book for those who are not actively seeking, but surely have the same longing – the longing for a taste of that love which has no bondage.

Ma Dharm Jyoti lived and travelled with Osho in the very early days when Osho left being a professor at universities, and traveled around India giving talks and gathering thousands around him. These are the tales of those days.

Where are the other friends?

I am waiting at a platform at V.T. station to receive Osho who is to arrive from Jabalpur. To my surprise there is no other friend within sight and I start wondering if I have the wrong information about His coming. Still I decide to wait until the train arrives. My eyes are wandering all around for some familiar face, but it is all in vain. I start perspiring--it is very hot. The train will be arriving soon, still no one else has come to receive Him. I doubt that all the friends have decided together to abandon Osho, though there is always controversy around him; He is saying the naked truth, which most people find difficult to swallow. He is mercilessly uprooting everything traditional in India.

I am lost in my thoughts and am shaken by the noise of the train reaching the platform. My heart starts throbbing and my eyes are glued to the air conditioned carriage. One by one passengers start getting down. A few minutes feel like eternity. And there He is! Finally, coming out of the train. I rush toward Him and He gets down from the train. I touch His feet and He blesses me with His hand on my head. I am overjoyed with His presence, and feel as if I am wrapped in an invisible fragrance that is around Him.

He asks, "Where are the other friends?"

I tell Him, "I don’t know why they haven’t come, but I know where you are to stay."I ask Him if He would like to go by taxi.

He simply says, " Let us wait--friends will be coming soon."

I look at His face: there is no sign of any anxiety or hurry. Almost everyone has left the platform except the two of us. Seeing that I look a little worried, He starts telling me jokes and makes me laugh. One part of me is very happy to be alone with Him, and the other part is worrying about Him--having travelled twenty-four hours by train and standing on the platform in such heat. I feel helpless.

Finally, after about half an hour, Ishwarbhai, Lahrubhai and few other friends come running to receive Him. They are also shocked by the whole scene because they were told by railway authorities that the train was half an hour late.

Osho’s great art is to never allow anyone to feel guilty. He greets everyone with such love that no one is serious about what has happened. Laughing and talking with friends He starts walking and I follow Him in wonder, and my heart whispers, "He does not belong to this world."

Chapter 9. One Hundred Tales for Ten Thousand Buddhas

Ma Dharm Jyoti

You have been my secret love

Osho is leaving for Jabalpur from Bombay by train. It is quite crowded and noisy on the platform and there are about fifty of us who have come to see Him off. Some are shaking hands with Him, some are touching His feet, and each time He bends to touch their heads. Some are standing silently, looking at Him with their eyes full of tears, and Osho comes near them and hugs them and tells them not to be sad, He will be coming back soon. Their tears overflow with His touch, but their faces are full of smiles. Tears and smiles is an everyday scene around Osho.

Suddenly we are shaken by the guard’s whistle and there is a signal that the train is about to leave. Osho gets in the train and stands at the door with His hands folded in namaste. He beckons me to come near Him. I get up on the footstep of the train and He shows me with His outstretched hand, pointing to a far away corner where a friend is standing, and ask me to bring her.

I hesitate and say, " Osho, the train is about to leave".

He very firmly says, "No, it won’t leave. Just go and bring her".

I rush to the corner, pushing aside hundreds of people on my way and to my surprise when I reach there, it is Ma Tao standing there weeping and sobbing like a small child who has lost her mother. I grab her by the hand and rush back to the train. It must have taken me at least five minutes to get back to Osho--and there He is standing at the door of His air conditioned compartment to receive her.

He places His hand on her head and assures her that He will be coming back soon, she should not cry. And again, this "tears and smiles" on Tao’s face, her little eyes are shining like stars. I can see how He is pouring all His love just by the touch of His hand, and it is as if we devotees start drinking the water of eternal life from His well.

He looks around at everyone more time and waves His hand in a good-bye and it is as if he tells the train driver, "Now you can start!" The train slowly starts moving and there He is standing at the door, with us all looking at Him, till the train vanishes from our sight. We hug each other and silently start leaving the platform with our hearts heavy but hoping to see Him again soon.

I remember a Zen haiku:

"You, before me standing,

Oh! my eternal self!

Since my first glimpse

you have been my secret love."

Chapter 8 One Hundred Tales for Ten Thousand Buddhas Ma Dharm Jyoti

I am a gardener

Osho has already resigned from the university as a professor. He is traveling around India conducting meditation camps and giving public discourses on open grounds to fifteen to twenty thousand people at a time. He is very fiery. He is roaring fearlessly like a lion, uprooting everything traditional in India. Bombay has become His main centre of work, through he is still staying in Jabalpur. On many occasions He is travelling by train from Jabalpur to Bombay and staying there as a guest in some friend’s home till He gets connecting flights for His destination. He is travelling the same way while going back to Jabalpur. Bombay friends are fortunate to meet Him very often.

Most of the time Osho was travelling alone before I met Him. After meeting Him, I never wanted to miss any opportunity of being with Him, and He allowed it. It is such a blessing to be responds to the different situations clearly shows His love and compassion towards existence.

The way He sits on the chair, as if the chair is a living being and he doesn’t want to hurt it, and when He gets up he looks at the chair with gratitude for making Him comfortable. Just walking, He walks so gently and gracefully, as if not to hurt the earth under His feet. He eats with such gratitude, which is so apparent in His eyes when He looks at the food. What to say about plants, animals and human beings? He is never in favour of pruning the plants, unless it is needed for their growth. He has to stop talking to friends in His garden because they start plucking the lawn while sitting there. Osho is against picking the flowers too.

Once I hear Him say, "You love your children--you don’t remove their heads, If you really love flowers you will never pick them. You murder them by picking them--it is a kind of violence towards flowers. Enjoy the beauty from a distance, but don’t try to possess it."

At another occasion, He is looking out from the window towards the fields--it is evening time. Far away a man is shouting and hitting a cow with a stick. Osho says, "Look at that stupid man! The cow is going by herself, he is unnecessarily torturing her." I can feel His compassion for the cow. I feel Him like a heavy cloud, full of water, showering His love on all those who come in contact with Him.

In one of the discourses I hear Him say, "I am a gardener: I go on throwing seeds all around, without even looking where they are landing. I have in abundance. When the right season comes, some of them will sprout and will become huge trees, full of flowers, spreading their fragrance and giving shadow to whoever passes under them."

Chapter 7

One Hundred Tales for Ten Thousand Buddhas, Ma Dharm Jyoti

Today He has initiated me as His disciple.

It is 8:55 pm. As I am passing through the entrance gate of the building a car coming out of the gate stops near me. I am so engrossed in my thinking I don’t pay any attention to it. Suddenly I hear Osho’s voice calling me from the car. He is sitting in the back seat near the window. I rush towards Him.

He says, "I am going out for about half an hour--wait," and asks me if I know the apartment where He will be. I answer, "Yes, I know it." The car passes by and I stand there a couple of minutes looking at it as it vanishes from my sight. I take a deep breath and enter the building--it has many wings and I don’t know which way to go. Now I realize why He was asking me if I know the apartment. After wandering stupidly in all the wings, I feel angry with myself for not being true to my master in my unawareness. It takes me twenty minutes to find the right wing.

I press the call button and this same woman, whom I spoke to on the phone, opens the door and recognizing me feels very sorry for me, for not telling me the complete address. She hugs me and takes me by the hand into quite a big living room, where eight to ten people are already sitting on sofas, gossiping about different things. The atmosphere is very light; no one looks serious except me I feel myself alien in that group, sitting quietly in a corner waiting for my master.

Exactly after ten minutes Osho arrives and we all stand up. He smiles and greets everyone with folded hands in namaste as He passes into another room. Immediately I am called into the room. Again this unknown fear grabs me as I enter; I feel scared, like a little insect going near a fire which will burn him. But this magnetic pull of fire is much greater than the fear.

I see Him sitting on the bed in the lotus posture drinking some juice, and I sit opposite Him at a little distance, my legs hanging down from the bed. He finishes His drink, puts the glass aside on the little table near the bed and wipes His mouth with a little white napkin, gives me a smile and asks me to come closer.

He places His right hand on my chest and His left hand on my head. My chattering mind stops, I am transported into a space unknown to me. Tears roll down from my eyes and my body starts bending towards Him. I start sobbing like a little kid with my head in His lap.

In a couple of minutes he takes away His hands and asks me," Come back slowly." I calm down, raise my head and look into His eyes. They are shimmering like little stars in the vast blue sky. I feel relieved of this unknown fear and pain of separation.

He chuckles and tells me to do vipassana meditation every morning for an hour, and I can meet Him whenever He is in Bombay. I touch His feet and walk out of the room feeling that today He has initiated me as His disciple.

Chapter 6

One Hundred Tales for Ten Thousand Buddhas, Ma Dharm Jyoti

This waiting seems like eternity

After this meditation camp, when I return to Bombay I find myself lost in the crowd of people. This intense longing to meet Him again has disturbed my sleep. Almost every night I see Him in my dreams, talking to me. I start writing a letter to him every day and expect a quick reply from Him. I have totally forgotten that the letter will take at least three day to reach Him, and even if He replies the same day he receives it , it will take three more days to reach me. Sometimes I feel angry at Him for driving me crazy like this--I don’t know how I am managing to keep myself together and continue my work in the office.

A couple of weeks have passed. Today I am coming down from the first floor to leave my office at 5:00pm when I hear my office peon come running behind me with a letter in his hand, which is very unusual. In the office no one bothers about anybody’s personal letters. I take the letter from him--it is from the "Beloved of my heart."I kiss it and open it with shaking hands.

It reads like this:

"Beloved Pushpa (my name before I take sannyas)

Love. I am happy to receive your letters. Such longing for God is good because it is the totality of longing which becomes the way to reach him.

I am in Bombay on the night of the 17th, meet at 9:00pm, or I will be in Bombay again on the 21st, then you can meet at 3:00pm.

Where I will be staying, you can find from these four phone numbers."I am overjoyed to read the letter. It is the seventeenth today, and I decide to see Him tonight. I rush back to the office to make a phone call. while reading the letter I thought: Why has He written four phone numbers? but this man of awareness knows better! Three numbers don’t work, the fourth does, and the woman on the other end confirms His arrival and gives me the address. It is already 5:10pm. It is a matter of only four hours and I will be meeting Him again. Time passes very slowly. Almost every five to ten minutes I am looking at my watch, and curse it for moving so slowly. This waiting seems like eternity.

Chapter 5

One Hundred Tales for Ten Thousand Buddhas, Ma Dharm Jyoti

I have known this man for eternity

At 2:00pm I reach the bungalow where He is staying. Lots of people have already arrived and are waiting to meet Him. His secretary comes, and people start going to his room, one by one. Mostly, everyone comes out within two or three minutes. Now the woman standing in front of me is going in; my turn is next. Just to see how she meets Osho, I peep in through the window when she walks in. Osho is sitting on a sofa and the floor is carpeted. The woman bows down to Osho, touches His feet and sits on the carpet. I say to myself, “This seems to be the right way to meet Him." My heart is throbbing in excitement, and at the same time is gripped by some unknown fear. In a couple of minutes the woman comes out and I enter the room.

Osho greets me with a big smile. I simply forget everything and am pulled towards Him. I hug Him, and He receives it with such love that I feel it is not only I who has found Him, he has also found a lost child. He looks very happy and makes me sit next to Him on His left side, on the sofa. With His left hand He is caressing my back and places His right hand in my hands. I look in His eyes--they are full of love and light, and I feel that I have known this man for eternity. By His magical touch he is doing some miracle, and I come back to the normal state from that dying experience which had started when I had listened to His discourse the night before.

He asks me what I am doing in my life but I am unable to speak. He says, “Don’t be worried; everything will be okay". By now I am able to talk, and I tell Him I am working in a transport company in Bombay.

He asks, "Will you do my work?"

Not knowing what his work is , I simply nod my head.

He calls His secretary in and introduces me to him and tells me, “Keep in touch with him."

In a couple of minutes I get up to leave, walk two or three steps and again look back at Him. He simply smiles, and I return and sit near his feet on the carpet.

He says, “Close you eyes," and places His right foot on my heart centre. I feel some energy flowing through His foot and entering my body and my mind goes blank, I only hear the sound of my breath. It feels as if time has stopped. Maybe it is just a couple of minutes later that I hear His voice saying, “Come back... open your eyes slowly." He slowly takes His foot away, and when I open my eyes He is sitting with His eyes closed. I slowly get up and slip out of the room with my heart dancing in joy. It is as if I have found some lost treasure.

Chapter 4

Ma Dharm Jyoti, One Hundred Tales for Ten Thousand Buddhas

You wrote that?

In the morning at eight o'clock, we gather again at the same place for his discourse - He will be answering our questions, and many people are handing in pieces of paper to a man who is working as His secretary. I gather courage and write down my experience, asking Him what is happening to me, I hand in my question, and sit a little away, among the others, trying to hide myself.

Here He comes again, with His beauty and grace, namastes everyone, and sitting in the lotus posture starts reading the question. My heart starts beating fast when I see my pink paper in His hand. Somehow, I am feeling ashamed, wondering what He will think about me after reading my question. To my surprise, after reading the question-- actually it is not a question but a description of the experience I felt when I first heard Him... of being pulled by a magnet, a sensation like dying -- He starts looking at the audience from His far left, and when His eyes rest on me, He looks no further. I bow down, frozen, knowing that He knows it is my question. He has read it to Himself, and passes on to other questions.

After the discourse is over, people are going near Him to touch His feet, and He is touching their heads. I am watching all this from the distance, not daring to go near him. Finally, when He gets up to leave, I rush towards Him and as I approach Him He gives me a smile and says, "You wrote that?" I nod my head in affirmation and bow down to touch His feet. He places His hand on my head, and as I get up He says, "Come and see me in the afternoon."

Chapter 3

One Hundred Tales for Ten Thousand Buddhas

Ma Dharm Jyoti

Where is He? I want to meet Him

I start reading His books and find myself totally unburdened of my knowledge. His words leave me alone in utter emptiness. My heart is longing to meet Him. I find the phone number and address of the centre in Bombay called "Jeevan Jagruti Kendre". I call there and inquire about Osho and am told of the coming meditation camp at Nargol where I will be able to meet Him. I am overjoyed and wait impatiently to go to this meditation camp.

Finally, the day of His first close-up darshan-when I will be able to sit near His feet-at nargol has arrived. There are about five hundred people in the camp; it is a beautiful place on the seashore, surrounded by tall trees. I find my tree near the makeshift podium and make myself comfortable underneath it. My eyes are glued to the pathway from where He will be coming, and in few moments I see Him coming in all His beauty and grace, wearing a white lunghi and a shawl wrapped around the upper part of His body. I can literally see some kind of pure light surrounding Him. He has a magical presence, not of this world. He namastes the audience with folded hands and sits in the lotus posture on the little square table covered with a white cotton sheet.

He starts speaking, but His words are slipping away above my head. There is utter silence all around except for His voice and the sound of waves from the distance. I don’t know how long He spoke: when I open my eyes he has already gone. I am feeling something like a dying experience. He has tugged at my heart like a magnet pulling a piece of metal, and I am unable to sleep the whole night. Wandering on the seashore I look around with empty eyes. The sky is full of stars and I have never experienced such silence and beauty before. My heart wants to shout, "Where is He? I want to meet Him!"
Chapter 2
One Hundred Tales for Ten Thousand Buddhas
Ma Dharm Jyoti

It is Sunday, 21st January, 1968

I am twenty-six years old. It is Sunday, 21st January, 1968 and today Osho will be speaking at 4:00pm in Sunmukhananda Hall in Bombay. One of my friends, knowing my quest for truth, advises me to go and listen to Him. I have already heard so many so-called saints and mahatmas that I am disillusioned by this religious game going on in India. But somehow, Osho, who is known as Acharya Rajneesh, attracts me. I decide to go to his discourse.

At 4:00pm I find my way to the second floor balcony of Sunmukhananda Hall, which is over-crowded. Lots of people are standing on the sides near the walls and there is quite and excitement in the air. It is very noisy. This is one of the biggest auditorium in Bombay, with the capacity to hold about five thousand people. I find a seat, make myself comfortable, and try to relax.

Within minutes a man with a beard, wearing a white lunghi and shawl appears on the podium, namastes the audience with folded hands and sits down in the lotus posture. I an sitting quit far away from the podium and can hardly see His face, but my heart is throbbing with excitement in anticipation of listening to this unknown man.

In a few moments I hear His sweet but strong voice addressing the audience as "Mere Priya Atman--my beloved souls." Suddenly there is pindrop silence in the auditorium. I experience His voice taking me into a deep relaxation and I am listening to Him in utter silence. My mind has stopped: only His voice is echoing all the questions which have been bothering me for years.

The discourse is over, my heart is dancing with joy, and I tell my friend, "He is the Master I am looking for. I have found Him." I come out and buy a few books and a magazine called Juoti Shikha. As I open it, I see that the headline on the page reads "Acharya Rajneesh’s 36th Birthday Celebration." I can’t believe it--I am sure it is a printing mistake and it should be "63". I ask the girl at the counter; she laughs and says that "36" is right. I still can’t believe that I have heard the discourse of a man who is only thirty-six years old. from His speech He sounds like an ancient rishi of the times of the Upanishads.

Chapter 1
One Hundred Tales for Ten Thousand Buddhas
Ma Dharm Jyoti

--------------------------

INTRODUCTION

One Hundred Tales For Ten Thousand Buddhas – this is a essential book. There exists no other quite like it. It is a collection of living moments with the living Buddha. It is not some events remembered and then adorned with reactions. These are tales vitally alive.

These tales are a great gift for all of us – those who have sat with the living Master and those who haven’t. It is a book for all seekers. It is also a book for those who are not actively seeking, but surely have the same longing – the longing for a taste of that love which has no bondage.

Ma Dharm Jyoti lived and travelled with Osho in the very early days when Osho left being a professor at universities, and traveled around India giving talks and gathering thousands around him. These are the tales of those days.

They are written in the present tense because, as Jyoti says, that’s how they come to her. And, as the writing was happening, she was reliving them with many tears. When this happens, there is no room for the mind. These tales come from the very being, from the very heart source.

Jyoti was walking with Osho in the twentieth century, but to me these moments transcend time. It could not have been Lao Tzu, Buddha or Jesus. Though the outer conditions and manifestations would vary, the essence of the Awakened Ones is one. And this is where there is no individuality, only universality. And only the universal transcends time.

The simplicity with which they are written is representative of the simplicity of those moments. Jyoti shows us the ease with which Osho transformed any moment of discomfort. The key seems to be to accept the situation, whatever it is. The love and the caring of the Master is unfathomable to the mind. She points out so delicately how Osho never wanted anyone to feel guilty. What a phenomenon! It boggles the mind which is constantly judging and imposing guilt wherever and whenever possible.

While reading these tales, the moments become alive and I was living them – so powerful, so full of life energy. Jyoti tells us that one day, Osho put His foot on her heart centre. I felt that foot for three days.

The phenomenon of Buddhahood is so incomprehensible to the mind. These simple little vignettes are the closest I have ever seen to conveying the fragrance of emptiness.

Ma Satya Priya

Beginning to understand what I am

Throughout life, from childhood, from school until we die, we are taught to compare ourselves with another; yet when I compare myself with another I am destroying myself.

In a school, in an ordinary school where there are a lot of boys, when one boy is compared with another who is very clever, who is the head of the class, what is actually taking place? You are destroying the boy. That’s what we are doing throughout life. Now, can I live without comparison—without comparison with anybody?

This means there is no high, no low—there is not the one who is superior and the other who is inferior. You are actually what you are and to understand what you are, this process of comparison must come to an end.

If I am always comparing myself with some saint or some teacher, some businessman, writer, poet, and all the rest, what has happened to me—what have I done? I only compare in order to gain, in order to achieve, in order to become—but when I don’t compare I am beginning to understand what I am.

Beginning to understand what I am is far more fascinating, far more interesting; it goes beyond all this stupid comparison.

- J Krishnamurti
Talks & Dialogues Saanen 1967, p 86

Even though I'm in Kyoto

Even though I'm in Kyoto,

when the kookoo cries,

I long for Kyoto.

- Issa

How reluctantly

the bee emerges from deep

within the peony

- Basho

Look directly!

What is this?

Look in this manner

And you won't be fooled!

- Bassui

Good and evil have no self nature;

Holy and unholy are empty names;

In front of the door is the land of stillness and quiet;

Spring comes, grass grows by itself.

- Master Seung Sahn

We don't have to beg for help

To follow another, however great, prevents the discovery of the ways of the self; to run after the promise of some ready-made utopia makes the mind utterly unaware of the enclosing action of its own desire for comfort, for authority, for someone else’s help. The priest, the politician, the lawyer, the soldier are all there to “help” us; but such help destroys intelligence and freedom. The help we need does not lie outside ourselves.

We do not have to beg for help; it comes without our seeking it when we are humble in our dedicated work, when we are open to the understanding of our daily trials and accidents.We must avoid the conscious or unconscious craving for support and encouragement, for such craving creates its own response, which is always gratifying.

It is comforting to have someone to encourage us, to give us a lead , to pacify us; but this habit of turning to another as a guide, as an authority soon becomes a poison in our system. The moment we depend on another for guidance, we forget our original intention, which was to awaken individual freedom and intelligence.

J Krishnamurti

Education and the Significance of Life, p 109

There is a story of a man

• There is a story of a man who got the experience from laughing gas; whenever he was under its influence, he knew the secret of the universe, but when he came to, he had forgotten it. At last, with immense effort, he wrote down the secret before the vision had faded. When completely recovered, he rushed to see what he had written. It was "A smell of petroleum prevails throughout."

Bertrand Russell, Book One, Part II, ch. 15: The Theory of Ideas

The real problem is the mind itself

It seems to me that the real problem is the mind itself, and not the problem which the mind has created and tries to solve. If the mind is petty, small, narrow, limited, however great and complex the problem may be, the mind approaches that problem in terms of its own pettiness.

If I have a little mind and I think of God, the God of my thinking will be a little God, though I may clothe him with grandeur, beauty, wisdom, and all the rest of it. It is the same with the problem of existence, the problem of bread, the problem of love, the problem of sex, the problem of relationship, the problem of death. These are all enormous problems, and we approach them with a small mind; we try to resolve them with a mind that is very limited.

Though it has extraordinary capacities and is capable of invention, of subtle, cunning thought, the mind is still petty. It may be able to quote Marx, or the Gita, or some other religious book, but it is still a small mind, and a small mind confronted with a complex problem can only translate that problem in terms of itself, and therefore the problem, the misery increases.

So the question is: Can the mind that is small, petty, be transformed into something which is not bound by its own limitations?

J Krishnamurti

The Collected Works vol X, pp 155-156

Our Language is

Silence

We must capture the whole

I think we must see this very clearly right at the beginning—that if one would solve the everyday problems of existence, whatever they may be, one must first see the wider issues and then come to the detail. After all, the great painter, the great poet is one who sees the whole—who sees all the heavens, the blue skies, the radiant sunset, the tree, the fleeting bird—all at one glance; with one sweep he sees the whole thing.

With the artist, the poet, there is an immediate, a direct communion with this whole marvellous world of beauty. Then he begins to paint, to write, to sculpt; he works it out in detail. If you and I could do the same, then we should be able to approach our problems—however contradictory, however conflicting, however disturbing—much more liberally, more wisely, with greater depth and colour, feeling.

This is not mere romantic verbalization but actually it is so, and that is what I would like to talk about now and every time we get together. We must capture the whole and not be carried away by the detail, however pressing, immediate, anxious it may be. I think that is where the revolution begins.

- JKrishnamurti

The Collected Works vol XI, p 62

The purpose of human existence

Questioner: What is the ultimate reason or purpose of human existence?

J Krishnamurti: Do you know any purposes? The way we live has no meaning and no purpose. We can invent a purpose, the purpose of perfection, enlightenment, reaching the highest form of sensitivity; we can invent endless theories. And we are caught in those theories, making them our problems.

Our daily life has no meaning, no purpose, except to make a bit of money and lead an idiotic kind of life. One can observe all this, not in theory but actually in oneself; the endless battle in oneself, seeking a purpose, seeking enlightenment, going all over the world—specially to India or to Japan—to learn a technique of meditation.

You can invent a thousand purposes but you need not go anywhere, not to the Himalayas, to a monastery, or to any ashram—which is another form of concentration camp—because everything is in you.

The highest, the immeasurable, is in you, if you know how to look. Do not assume it is there; that is one of the stupid tricks we play upon ourselves: that we are God, that we are the ‘perfect’ and all the rest of that childish stuff. Yet through the illusion, through ‘what is’, through the measurable, you find something that is immeasurable; but you must begin with yourself, where you can discover for yourself how to look.

Beyond Violence, pp 106-107

Gentle thou art and therefore to be won

Those petty wrongs that liberty commits,
When I am sometime absent from thy heart,
Thy beauty and thy years full well befits,
For still temptation follows where thou art.
Gentle thou art and therefore to be won,
Beauteous thou art, therefore to be assailed;
And when a woman woos, what woman's son
Will sourly leave her till she have prevailed?
Ay me! but yet thou mightest my seat forbear,
And chide try beauty and thy straying youth,
Who lead thee in their riot even there
Where thou art forced to break a twofold truth,
Hers by thy beauty tempting her to thee,
Thine, by thy beauty being false to me.

- Shakespeare

Thought Process

How can we control the thought process?

Sadhguru: “I want to control the thought,” this itself is a thought. Once you get into this, trying to control the thought process, there is no end to it. It is an endless fight. One way is, the way of Isha Yoga; just let it be. Don’t bother about it. Let it go on by itself. You be aware of it. Slowly it loses its momentum and it falls away. That’s one way.

Another way is what we are doing now. You control your prana. Ultimately, whether it is your thought or your heart or the cellular activity, whatever it is that is happening in the body and within you is primarily supported by the prana. If you control the prana, there is no more thought. If you have sufficient mastery over your prana, you have mastery over your thought, your body and all the organic functions of the body. It is so.

As the the energy level rises a little bit and the flow is steady and there is control over it, thought is not there. See if I sit like this for hours together, I sit without a thought. I am not meditating. I am not doing anything. Simply I just sit there. I thought I would read a book, but generally these days, in the last three or four years, every time I pick up a book, I just read a few sentences or may be one or two pages.

After that I just sit, but that one sentence is enough to convey everything about the mind of the writer. It can be simply seen without the thought process. I’ve always been talking about this, the difference between looking, simply seeing and thinking. Just looking does not need the thought process. Looking does not mean only with physical eyes. Even with eyes closed you can look.

So once you develop awareness, you start looking, not thinking. When you are in full awareness, there is no thought process. The moment you are aware there is no thought. The moment the thought is there, your awareness has gone, generally. May be in meditation you are aware of the thought process, but otherwise it is generally so — unless you walk in the knack of Samyama, where you can be in the thought process and still be fully aware, which I doubt.

- Sadhguru Jaggi Vasudev

Yet we must not be foes

Take all my loves, my love, yea, take them all;

What hast thou then more than thou hadst before?

No love, my love, that thou mayst true love call;

All mine was thine before thou hadst this more.

Then if for my love thou my love receivest,

I cannot blame thee for my love thou usest;

But yet be blamed, if thou thyself deceivest

By wilful taste of what thyself refusest.

I do forgive thy robbery, gentle thief,

Although thou steal thee all my poverty;

And yet, love knows, it is a greater grief

To bear love's wrong than hate's known injury.

Lascivious grace, in whom all ill well shows,

Kill me with spites; yet we must not be foes.

- Shakespeare

A pilgrimage together

If we could take a journey, make a pilgrimage together without any intent or purpose, without seeking anything, perhaps on returning we might find that our hearts had unknowingly been changed. I think it worth trying. Any intent or purpose, any motive or goal implies effort—a conscious or unconscious endeavour to arrive, to achieve.

I would like to suggest that we take a journey together in which none of these elements exist. If we can take such a journey, and if we are alert enough to observe what lies along the way, perhaps when we return, as all pilgrims must, we shall find that there has been a change of heart; and I think this would be much more significant than inundating the mind with ideas, because ideas do not fundamentally change human beings at all.

Beliefs, ideas, influences may cause the mind superficially to adjust itself to a pattern, but if we can take the journey together without any purpose, and simply observe as we go along the extraordinary width and depth and beauty of life, then out of this observation may come a love that is not merely social, environmental, a love in which there is not the giver and the taker, but which is a state of being, free of all demand.

So, in taking this journey together, perhaps we shall be awakened to something far more significant than the boredom and frustration, the emptiness and despair of our daily lives.

J Krishnamurti

The Collected Works vol XI, p 243

When there is intelligence

You may be very clever in your studies, in your job, in being able to argue very cleverly, reasonably, but that is not intelligence. Intelligence goes with love and compassion, and you cannot come upon that intelligence as an individual.

Compassion is not yours or mine like thought is not yours or mine. When there is intelligence, there is no me and you. And intelligence does not abide in your heart or your mind. That intelligence which is supreme is everywhere. It is that intelligence that moves the earth and the heavens and the stars, because that is compassion.

J. Krishnamurti

Mind Without Measure, p 97