life in terms of goal or destination

[Guest guest]

Question

I keep thinking of my life in terms of goal or destination, waiting

to wake up some day and find myself enlightened, and I worry that

others will reach before me. Today is a tension. Why is eternity so

difficult to feel and remember? You keep reminding me but I keep

forgetting and lose patience. Why am I such a fool? And then I

think, "so what?" And then I want to scream, "no more!" but go on.

Osho:

Man has been conditioned down the centuries for goals, destinations,

purposes, meanings -- that's how man has lived hitherto, with the

goal-oriented ideology. Hindu, Christian, Mohammedan, communist, it

doesn't matter -- all ideologies are goal-oriented. It is always

tomorrow that you have to look to, or the next life. It is always

somewhere else: the goal, the meaning, the bliss, the paradise -- it

is never now here.

Because of these ideologies you cannot allow yourself to relax in the

moment. They go on goading you...you have to attain something, you

have to achieve something. Your whole education system is a strategy

of poisoning your consciousness; it is a strategy of driving you

crazy after goals, it is a strategy of creating ambition in you. And

ambition is neurosis. But this has been done for so long that it has

become part and parcel of the human mind.

That's why you go on thinking in terms of goal or destination. It is

not you: it is the society that goes on thinking in you, through you;

it is your parents, it is your priests, it is your politicians, it is

your pedagogues, who go on thinking through you, and you are

identified with them. You don't know that you are separate.

The first thing that you will have to learn is to be a witness to all

that goes on in the mind, because the mind is a social phenomenon --

it is not a God-given gift. It is social exploitation; it is society

that makes a mind in you, and through that mind controls you, keeps

you imprisoned, chained, reduces you to a slave. And you are not the

mind! You are the witness who can see the mind very easily. You can

see the thoughts moving in your consciousness -- those thoughts are

the content of the consciousness but they are not consciousness

itself.

And this is what meditation is all about: creating a distance between

you and your mind.

Once the distance is there, you will be surprised that the whole mind

structure is your imprisonment -- you are free from it because you

are separate from it. Once you start enjoying the freedom from the

mind all goals will disappear, all destinations will disappear.

Mind can only live in goals, because mind can only exist in the

future. Mind cannot exist herenow -- try to be herenow and try for

the mind to continue. You will find it impossible. Either the mind

continues, then you are not herenow; or, you are herenow and the mind

is no more there. Mind has no present tense at all; either it is past

or it is future -- it is always in the non-existential. And God is

that which exists. God is not a goal, nirvana is not a goal,

enlightenment is not a goal, it is not an achievement -- just the

contrary. When you have forgotten all goals, when you have dropped

the whole achieving mind, enlightenment is -- enlightenment is a

state of no-mind.

And enlightenment is nothing special. It is the most ordinary,

natural phenomenon. It looks special because you make a goal out of

it. Buddha is the most ordinary human being -- ordinary in the sense

that he has no mind, he exists in the sheer present. He has no ego,

how can he be special? He cannot compare himself with anybody else,

he cannot be inferior or superior.

In the present moment, he is not -- but a totally different kind of

presence happens, which does not belong to the person; it is only a

presence, not a person at all. And how can he be special? -- Because

in the present moment he finds that there is no purpose in life. The

whole purpose is mind-imposed.

The trees are there for no purpose at all, and the stars are there

for no purpose at all. Purpose is a man-created concept. Rivers are

not flowing for any purpose, and the oceans are there not for any

purpose. Except for man there is nothing like purpose anywhere else.

Life simply is. Existence utterly is -- it is not a means to some

end; it is an end unto itself.

That's what I mean when I say there is no purpose.

I am not saying that it is purposeless, because to use the

word "purposeless" brings the purpose in. It is simply

transcendental -- neither purpose nor no purpose, neither meaning nor

no meaning. It is not going anywhere. There is no goal to life, and

if you have a goal then you are going against life, and you will

suffer -- because you will be trying to go upstream. You will have to

struggle, and all struggle is dissipation of energy, and all struggle

is stupid, because all struggle is destructive. It simply destroys

you. You cannot win against the whole. Relax...there is no goal to be

achieved. Simply, there is no goal!

I am not telling you, "Don't try to achieve goals" -- I am telling

you there is no goal whether you try or not. If you try you will be

simply wasting your time and energy. If you don't try you will start

feeling ecstatic, because the whole energy that is wasted in struggle

becomes available to you. And energy is delight. Just to have it is

enough to be full of joy. When there is energy, overflowing energy,

you are a dance, you are a celebration.

There is no meaning in life. Life is utterly beyond meaning. So don't

bother about the meaning. Don't ask the question: "What is the

meaning of a roseflower?" -- There is none. "And what is the meaning

of the sunrise?" -- There is none. There is beauty, but no meaning.

There is immense beauty, but no meaning at all.

Life is not a logical process. It is poetry, it is a lovesong --

without any meaning, yet it is utterly beautiful. In fact, when

something has a meaning, it can't be beautiful -- it is utilitarian.

The rose is beautiful because it has no utility at all. Its sheer

being is enough; it need not have any other significance. But a

hundred-rupee note has no beauty; it has utility, it has meaning, it

has purpose, it is a means to some end.

Live a life which has no idea of purpose, which has no search for

meaning.

Live a life of sheer joy and ecstasy -- that is the only way to live.

Every other way is only to commit a slow suicide.

That's what happens when you are too much interested in goals: today

goes by without being lived, and tomorrow remains important -- and

tomorrow never comes. Whenever it comes it is today. And you learn a

wrong habit of losing that which is and of thinking of something

which is not. Every day it will happen: each tomorrow will come as

today, and you will not be interested in it and you will be

interested in the tomorrow, and the tomorrow is never going to come.

This is how people are simply wasting away. Their lives could have

become great oases, but they remain deserts. And the basic reason for

people's dryness is goal-orientation.

You say, "I keep thinking of my life in terms of a goal or

destination, waiting to wake up some day and find myself enlightened."

Why "some day?" Why not now? Why postpone it? Is it not a trick of

the mind to avoid it? Postponing is a way of avoiding. Don't you want

to be enlightened right now? If you look deep down, if you watch, you

will see the point -- you don't want to become enlightened right now.

If I say to you I can make you enlightened right now...you will

say, "Just give me a little time to think. I will come tomorrow,

because I have to do many more things before I become enlightened. My

girl may be waiting, my children, my shop has to be opened.... So

many investments -- let me finish things first! Yes, I want to be

enlightened, but not right now."

In fact you don't want to become enlightened. It is a very diplomatic

way of avoiding, so that you can go on deceiving yourself that you

are interested in becoming enlightened, that you want to be

enlightened, but not today. It is only a question of time. Not that

you are not interested in enlightenment...tomorrow, when all other

things have been finished, completed, when nothing else is left.

But do you think a day will come when all your investments and all

your worries and all your acts are complete?

Will there ever come a day when you are finished with the activities

of your so-called life, and you can come and say, "Right now I am

ready"? It will never come, because life is such a complexity. It

never begins, it never ends. You are always in the middle.

It is like reading a novel from the middle. The beginning part is

missing and the end part is missing -- you know only the middle. That

is the mystery of life! Try some time reading a novel from the middle

and you will find that even an ordinary novel becomes very

mysterious. Intrigued you will be, and many times you will be tempted

to look back, "What is the beginning?" But resist the temptation, go

on reading in the middle.

That's how it is: we are always in the middle of life. Life has been

there before you ever entered into the stream, and life will be there

when you are gone. You will know only a few glimpses in the middle.

You come suddenly into the film-house, you see a few scenes on the

screen; the film was going on before you entered, you will be gone

and the film will continue. You will never know the beginning and you

will never know the end because there are none. There is no

beginning, no end. Life is an eternal continuum. Hence you cannot

ever complete things, but you want to avoid.

You are afraid of enlightenment, just as everybody else is afraid.

But nobody wants to accept that "I am a coward." Nobody wants to

accept the fact that "I would like to sleep a little longer because I

am seeing beautiful dreams, colorful dreams." Nobody wants to accept

that "I am so stupid that I don't long for enlightenment." So

everybody goes on saying, "Yes, I would like to become enlightened --

but tomorrow, the day after tomorrow, in my old age."

How to postpone? The best way is to become goal-oriented. That is the

most beautiful deception that you can give to yourself Hence you

say, "Some day I hope to find myself enlightened." Why "some day?"

The river is flowing now...you can drink.

You are thirsty and you say, "Some day I will drink." If you are

thirsty, drink right now. Nothing else is more important. And because

there is no goal, all goals are private dreams, life will not support

you in your goal-orientation.

Life will try in every way to destroy all your goals.

You will have to learn ways of relaxing in the present. Enlightenment

is not an effort to achieve something. It is a state of

effortlessness. It is a state of no-action. It is a state of

tremendous passivity, receptivity. You are not doing anything, you

are not thinking anything, you are not planning for anything, you are

not doing yoga exercises, and you are not doing any technique, any

method -- you are simply existing, just existing. And in that very

moment...the sudden realization that all is as it should be. That's

what enlightenment is!

Enlightenment is not an experience in which you will see great light

and kundalini rising up and God standing in front of you telling

you, "You can ask any three wishes and I will fulfill them." Don't be

foolish.

Enlightenment is not an experience at all. It is not that you will be

able to walk on water, that you will be able to raise the dead back

to life, that you will be able to cure the blind and the deaf and the

dumb, that you will be able to do miracles. Enlightenment has nothing

to do with any such thing.

Enlightenment is a simple realization that everything is as it should

be.

That is the definition of enlightenment: everything is as it should

be, everything is utterly perfect as it is. That feeling...and you

are suddenly at home. Nothing is being missed. You are part, an

organic part of this tremendous, beautiful whole. You are relaxed in

it, surrendered in it. You don't exist separately -- all separation

has disappeared.

A great rejoicing happens, because with the ego disappearing there is

no worry left, with the ego disappearing there is no anguish left,

with the ego disappearing there is no possibility of death any more.

This is what enlightenment is. It is the understanding that all is

good, that all is beautiful -- and t is beautiful as it is.

Everything is in tremendous harmony, in accord.

The stars are in accord with the grass leaves, the earth is in accord

with the sky, the rivers are in accord with the mountains. Everything

is in such accord that existence is an orchestra. Everything is

rhythmic, in tune. Existence is music. That experience is

enlightenment. And you are not separate from it like an observer,

like a spectator. The observer and the observed are one, the seer and

the seen are one -- you are it!

It is a great participation. You have fallen into the whole and the

whole has fallen into you. The drop has dropped into the ocean and

the ocean has dropped into the drop. It is impossible to say anything

more about it. It is impossible to say, in fact, anything about it.

It can only be experienced.

But, please, don't go on postponing it, because it is available now.

Now or never, remember.

I know you have been taught continuously -- this is a kind of

hypnosis in which you are living; you have been hypnotized by the

society -- you have been made goal-oriented, you have been forced to

become ambitious, you have been taught to be competitive, so you are

afraid. You are afraid, "I worry that others will reach before me."

You are not much concerned with your own enlightenment; you are much

more concerned that "Nobody else should reach before me." Now, in the

world of enlightenment such a competitive mind cannot even enter,

will remain thousands and thousands of miles away. It needs a non-

competitive spirit. It needs that you drop all comparisons, because

when you become enlightened you will be totally alone, nobody else

will be there -- not even your beloved, not even your friend. Nobody

can be there; you will be utterly alone.

And it is not a question of who attains "before", because

enlightenment has no before or after. Those are time phenomena.

Enlightenment is always now -- why think of before and after? This

very moment...let it sink in you. And all that is needed on your part

is total receptivity.

Fling all doors open, let the sun come in, and the wind and the rain.

Enlightenment is not like money, is not like political power. It is

not like anything that you know in life -- it is absolutely unlike

anything that you have known or will ever know. It is unique in the

sense that nothing like it exists in existence. It is just itself; it

cannot be compared with anything. It is its own comparison.

But the problem is: how to drop this hypnosis? How to drop this

conditioning? Watch it. See how it is torturing you, how it is making

you more and more miserable every day, and how it is creating

barriers between you and that which is. Just go on seeing it!

No other positive method is needed -- just an insight that your whole

mind is a misery-creating factory, that it manufactures misery and

nothing else. Once you have seen it through and through, that very

seeing becomes a transformation. You simply turn in. You drop the

mind, or it drops of its own accord because you have seen the

futility of it. And even if for a single moment the mind is not

there, enlightenment is there.

In the beginning it will come only in moments, but those moments are

of eternity. Then, slowly slowly, more and more moments will be

coming, because you will become more and more a host. And one day the

guest and the host disappear into each other -- then it never leaves

you. And on the outside you remain just the same old person: doing

your work, chopping wood and carrying water from the well.... You

remain just the same, and yet nothing is the same any more.

I teach you this relaxation. I teach you the way of non-action. I

don't teach you arduous efforts, because they are all ego-gratifying.

No effort can help you to become enlightened; it will be a

distraction. Only an effortless silence -- just sitting, doing

nothing, and the spring comes, and the grass grows by itself.

[Guest guest]

"Keep your mind on the present, the future will take care of

itself." Paramahansa Yogananda.

 

Yes, it is the human ego-centered mind that sets goals, attempts to

understand, analyses, quotes, and wallows in its achievementsor

failures - ie it is in DOING mode. The Truth however only IS ..

doesn't do anything. For those who truely want to experience the

Truth, they will need to learn the skill of tuning their minds on

and off according to the needs of the moment.

 

_/\_ Tat twam asi

 

Uma

[Guest guest]

, "Tatwamasi" <tatwamasi> wrote:

> "Keep your mind on the present, the future will take care of

> itself." Paramahansa Yogananda.

 

This reminds of one of the sayings I read earlier. ( I don't have the

exact text and I'm writing it in my own words)

 

The past is over and you cannot change it. The future is yet to come

and you cannot do anything it in now. What you have now is the

present and that is God's gift to us. That is why it's called

*present*.

 

- Sai Baba

 

So let's utilise it wisely.

 

Hari Aum !!!