Бхагаван Раджниш (Ошо) - Послания любви. 365 писем Ошо
269. Love.
If the present is just continuous with the past
then it is not present at all.
To be present,
the present must be discontinuous with the past,
only then is it young, fresh and new –
and then it is not a part of time
but is eternity itself.
The now is eternal
but we live in the past or in the future –
which is nothing but a faint echo of the past itself.
Our whole activity springs from the past
or the future –
which is the same thing.
Then the present is false and dead:
and if the present is false then we cannot be real,
and if the present is dead then we cannot be alive.
That is why I insist on living in the present
and dying each moment to the past.
Live atomically – moment to moment –
and then your life will have a totally different quality:
the quality of the divine.
270. Love.
To me meditation means –
be playful and transcend all seriousness.
See: life is not serious.
Look around: existence is not serious.
Only disease is serious, and of course death,
and the exploiters of death – the priests!
Life is playful and festive and therefore purposeless.
It is not going anywhere, because there is nowhere to go.
It is always here and here.
It is always now and now.
It is just abundant energy overflowing from here to here
and from now to now,
and once you know it and be it
you are in that ecstasy which is the purpose
of purposelessness!
Don’t be a mind and you will know it and be it.
Meditation is no-mindedness.
Mind is thinking, and thinking is going astray
from the being.
Mind is forgetfulness of “that which is”.
Meditation is coming back home.
So, come back home.
And I create situations so that
you may remember the forgotten,
and I will go on creating situations
until you have returned.
271. Love.
There are things which cannot be proved,
and there is no evidence for them
because they are self-evident.
To try to prove them is ridiculous,
and the effort shows that one
is not acquainted with them.
Such are all the proofs of God.
Sitting one day in the teahouse
Mulla Nasruddin heard the rhetoric of
a traveling scholar –
he was arguing to prove the existence of God.
Questioned by one of the company on some point
the scholar drew a book from his pocket
and slammed it on the table:
This is my evidence. And I wrote it myself!
A man who could not only read but write was a rarity,
and a man who had written a book…!
The villagers treated the pundit with profound respect –
and of course Mulla Nasruddin was impressed.
Some days later Mulla appeared at the teahouse
and asked whether anyone wanted to buy a house.
Tell us something about it,
Mulla, the people asked him,
for we did not even know that you had a
house of your own.
Actions speak louder than words! shouted Mulla,
and from his pocket he took a brick
and hurled it on the table in front of them.
This is my evidence! Examine the quality –
and I built the house myself!
272. Love.
When you are with me be completely at ease and relaxed;
that is, be totally yourself.
If you feel like crying, then cry;
if you feel like weeping, then weep –
but just be continually aware.
Do not think about what you are doing,
just be the doing.
And when your senses are shaken like leaves in the wind,
enter this shaking,
because only in such situations is the being revealed.
If a feeling against someone or for someone arises
do not project it on the person in question
but remain centered in yourself,
and you will know a transcendence
which is not of this world at all.
273. Love.
The past is not
nor is the future,
but the mind exists between these two non-existences,
and therefore – the misery.
To live in the mind is to live in misery,
in agony and in hell.
The mind is the hell.
Be aware suddenly of this
and then there is a new opening:
the opening of the present,
the opening of that-which-is.
The present is the only existence
or, it is the existence.
Be in it and you are liberated.
Live in it and there is bliss.
274. Love.
No ideology can help to create a new world
or a new mind
or a new human being,
because ideological orientation itself
is the root cause of all the conflicts and all the miseries.
Thought creates boundaries,
thought creates divisions
and thought creates prejudices.
Thought itself cannot bridge them;
that is why all ideologies fail.
Now man must learn to live without ideologies:
religious, political or otherwise.
When the mind is not tethered to any ideology
it is free to move to new understandings.
And in that freedom flowers all that is good
and all that is beautiful.
275. Love.
A disciple of Rinzai met a party
of three men on a bridge.
One of the three asked him: How deep is the river of meditation?
Find out for yourself, he said,
and offered to throw the questioner from the bridge.
But unfortunately the man ran away from him in time
and escaped.
If you meet such a man, who can throw you in the river,
be fortunate enough to be thrown!
And you have met such a man!
Now be thrown.
276. Love.
You possess only that which will not be lost in death.
All else is illusion –
even the possessor,
because that too will not be able to stand the final shipwreck.
Then find out what is left.
Turn in and meditate.
Discard all that is vulnerable to death.
Say: Not this, not that,
and go deep to the point where nothing more remains to be discarded
– and the illumination.
277. Love.
Nothing great is ever accomplished without going mad,
that is, without breaking through
the ordinary level of consciousness
and letting loose the hidden powers lying further below,
and also penetrating to the realm that is further above.
And it may not be true for any other great thing,
but it is absolutely true as far as meditation is concerned.
Meditation means madness –
of course, with a method!
278. Love.
Detach yourself from all fixed ideas:
they are the killers of all aliveness and innocence –
which are musts for illumination.
Beware of the trap of preconceptions;
they make a stagnant pool of your consciousness,
and to meet the ocean you need a dynamic one.
Be alive and fluid and flowing –
then the goal is not far off.
279. Love.
Meditation is the disciplined opening of the self to God.
Because of fear we are closed, and only love
can become a door.
So love more –
or rather be loving, then there is less fear and less tension,
and you are more open.
This helps meditation as nothing else.
Meditation plus love is the path.
280. Love.
Truth is never secondhand,
it cannot be transferred.
One has to know it and be it oneself.
That is why all tradition falsifies it,
and all scriptures,
and all words,
and in the end it is nothing
but the soup of Mulla Nasruddin…
But first I must tell you the story.
A relative from the country
came to see Nasruddin and brought a duck.
Nasruddin was grateful,
had the bird cooked, and shared it with the guest.
Presently another visitor arrived.
I am a friend, he said, of the man who gave you the duck.
Nasruddin fed him as well.
This happened several times.
Nasruddin's house had become like a restaurant
for out-of-town visitors.
Everyone was a friend of the friend
of the original donor of the duck.
Finally Nasruddin was exasperated.
One day there was a knock at the door and
a stranger appeared.
I am the friend of the friend of the friend of the man
who brought you the duck from the country, he said.
Come in, said Nasruddin.
They seated themselves at the table
and Nasruddin asked his wife to bring the soup.
When the guest tasted it
it seemed to be nothing more than warm water.
What sort of soup is this? he asked the Mulla.
That, said Nasruddin,
is the soup of the soup of the soup of the soup
of the duck.
281. Love.
Man is not a rational animal,
but only a rationalizing one;
and that is more dangerous than just being irrational.
Give me a shot of bourbon and a shot of water –
said the obviously heavy drinker to the bartender.
When the order was placed before him on the bar
the lush pulled a worm from his pocket
and dropped it into the glass of water.
After watching it swim around for a few seconds
the man drew the worm from the water
and dropped it into the whisky.
It wriggled briefly, then curled up and died.
You see that? said the lush to the bartender.
It proves that if you keep on drinking whisky
you will never have worms.
282. Love.
Life is a sermon;
existence preaches in its own way,
but always indirectly –
and that is the beauty of it.
The harmony in nature teaches,
without any intention,
the lesson of balance in life.
Look at a bird on the wing –
and effortlessly you will go into meditation.
Or listen to its song –
and for no reason your heart will move with it.
And when there is no effort on your part
the meditation goes deep and suddenly transforms you;
and when there is no motivation and you move –
the movement is in the divine.
283. Love.
I know your inner condition
more than you know it yourself
because now your inner is not my outer.
Things that are happening to you unconsciously
and even against your conscious will are good.
Welcome them and be grateful,
because nothing divine can happen to you with your will,
rather, your will is the only barrier.
Say wholeheartedly: Thy will be done!
And feel it
and live it.
Come home soon,
I am waiting for you,
and much is waiting to happen to you also.
I know you are skeptical.
That is not bad
but a good beginning to start with.
Wherever there is mind there is skepticism.
Mind is skepticism
and therefore conflict.
That is the way of the mind
and its nature.
Please do not fight with it
nor be identified with it.
These are the obvious alternatives,
but both are false,
and aspects of the same coin.
You will have to walk in between.
Come and be with me, and you will understand.
284. Dear Mukta.
Love.
Yes, you were related to Yoga Vivek in one of your past lives.
Now many things will be remembered by you soon
because the key is in your hands.
But do not think about them at all,
otherwise your imagination will get mixed up with the memories
and then it will be difficult to know
what is real and what is not.
So always be aware from now on
that you do not think about past lives:
let the memories come up by themselves.
No conscious effort on your part is needed;
on the contrary it will be a great hindrance.
Let the unconscious do the work,
you be just a witness,
and as the meditation goes deeper
many locked doors will be opened to you.
But always remember to wait for the mysteries to reveal themselves.
The seed is broken – and much is to follow.
You need only wait and be a witness.
285. Love.
Just drop yourself into the divine and be purified!
Surrender and be reborn.
Do not resist.
Let go!
286. Love.
See: this is a white paper –
it contains words.
You can look at it as white paper or as words.
Or, listen to the silence which contains a sonata;
you can be aware of the silence or of the sonata.
Or, think of the space which contains a building;
you can be aware of the space or of the building.
Or, imagine an empty house;
you can conceive of it as the walls or as an emptiness.
If you see the words, the building, the sonata and the walls
you are in the mind,
but if you see the white paper or the silence or the space
or the emptiness
then you are in meditation.
287. Love.
From sound to soundlessness is the path.
Intone a sound like A-U-M,
slowly, and as sound enters
soundlessness so do you.
Or: remain in the gap between any two sounds
and you yourself will become soundlessness.
Or: bathe in the continuous sound of a waterfall,
or any other.
Or: by putting your fingers in your ears
hear the source of all sounds –
and there will be a sudden explosion
of the silent music of the cosmos.
Using any way fall into the abyss of soundlessness
and you will achieve the divine.
288. Love.
I am thrilled with great expectations about you.
Much is to happen within you and without also.
You are on the verge of the explosion,
so be alone.
Not lonely but alone,
and live with that aloneness.
Rather, be that aloneness;
that is the only meditation for you now.
Loneliness is negative:
to be lonely is to be aware of the absence of others.
But to be alone is the most positive state of mind:
it is to be aware of the presence of oneself.
Be aware of the presence that is you.
Just be aware and wait,
wait for the happening.
Near, very near is the moment.
And remember that I am always with you.
I have always been with you
even when you did not know me.
And always feel my blessings.
289. Love.
Takuan says: You cannot bathe in solid ice,
nor can you live in a frozen consciousness –
