Chapter 7 fifth morning

May 14, 1974 Abandon the ego - immediately Beloved Master, you said that the ego can be abandoned immediately, so can the ego also be abandoned gradually? The renunciation always happens in a moment, it always happens in this moment, it is not gradual, it cannot be, that happens in a moment. You cannot prepare for it, anything you do - I say anything - will strengthen the ego. Any incremental process is going to be an effort, something is being done by you, so you're going to be enhanced more and more through it, you're going to be stronger, every incremental thing will help themselves.

Only something that is not progressive at all, only something that is like a leap and not like a process, only something that is not continuous with the past... Only then does the ego disappear. Problems arise because we do not understand what this self is. The ego is the past, the continuum, everything you have done, everything you have accumulated, all karma, all conditioning, all desires and all past dreams.The whole past is the ego, and if you think progressively, you bring the past in. The abandonment of the ego is 'non-gradual', it is sudden, it is a discontinuity, there is no past, there is no future, you are left alone in the here and now, then the ego cannot exist.

The ego exists only through memory: who you are, where you came from, who you belong to, country, race, religion, family, tradition, and all the trauma and joy - everything that happened in the past, everything that happened in the past It is the ego, and you are the one on which all this happens. This distinction has to be understood: you are the one to which all this has happened, and the ego is that which has happened.The ego is all around you and you are in the center, you are egoless. A child is born completely fresh and young, without a past, without an ego, and that's why a child is so beautiful.They don't have any past, they are very young, very fresh, they cannot say 'I', because from where are they going to bring this 'I'?This "I" has to be developed gradually.They will be educated, they will be rewarded or punished, they will be appreciated or condemned, and then the "I" will slowly coalesce.

A child is beautiful because the ego does not exist.Old people become ugly, not because of old age, but because there is too much past, too much self.If the old man can drop the ego, he can also become beautiful again, even more beautiful than the child, then there is a second childhood, a rebirth. That's what Jesus' resurrection means, it's not a historical fact, it's an allegory.Jesus was crucified, then he rose again, and the man who was crucified is no more—it was Jesus, the carpenter's son.Now Jesus is dead, has been crucified, and then a new entity arises out of that death, a new life is born out of that death, which is Christ - not the carpenter's son in Bethlehem, not a Jew, not even Not a person, this is Christ - a new being, without ego.

The same will happen to you, whenever your ego is crucified, whenever your ego is crucified, there is a resurrection, there is a rebirth.You are born again, and the state of the child is permanent, because it is the regeneration of the soul, not the regeneration of the body. In this way you will never change, you will always be young and fresh, as fresh as the morning dew, as fresh as the first star of the night, and you will always be fresh , stay young, stay innocent, stay like a child, because this is the resurrection of the soul. This happens all the time in a single moment. The ego is time, the longer the ego, the more ego, the ego needs time.If you penetrate a little deeper, you may even be able to imagine that time exists only because of the ego.

Time is not part of the physical world around you, it is part of the spiritual world within you, part of the mind world, time is a space in which the ego can develop and grow.Space is needed, time gives that space. If you are told that this is the last moment of your life, and the next moment you will be killed, and suddenly time is gone, you will feel very disturbed, you are still alive, but suddenly you will feel It's like you're dying, you can't think and say what to do, and even thinking becomes difficult, because even thinking, time is needed, the future is needed.There is no tomorrow, so what do you want, what desire, what hope?There is no time, the time is over.

The greatest pain that can happen to a man is when his death is so certain that he cannot avoid it.Death is certain.A man condemned to death, or put into hell, waiting for death, he cannot do anything about it, death is certain, after a certain time, he will die.Beyond that time, there is no tomorrow for him.And so he cannot desire, he cannot think, he cannot project, he cannot even dream, the block is always there. Then a lot of suffering will follow, and that suffering is the suffering of the ego, because the ego cannot exist without time, the ego breathes in time, time is the breath of the ego.So, the more time there is, the more possibilities there are for the self.

In the East they have achieved quite good results, they have put a lot of effort into understanding the ego, they have done a lot of searching, and one of the discoveries is that the ego cannot be dropped unless time is dropped from you. If there is a tomorrow, the ego will exist; if there is no tomorrow, how can you drag the ego along?It will be like pulling a boat, but without the river it will become a burden.Rivers are needed, and only with rivers can ships perform their functions. For the ego the river of time is needed, and that is why the ego always thinks in "graduals" or "degrees."The ego will say: well, enlightenment is possible, but it will take time because you have to work, you have to prepare.

It is very logical to say so!For everything, time is needed.If you plant a seed, time is needed for the tree to grow; if a child is to be born, if a child is to be created, time is needed.The womb needs time, the child needs time to grow, everything grows around you.For growth, time is needed.So, it seems logical if spiritual growth also takes time. Yet here is an important point that must be understood: spiritual growth is not really like the growth of a seed.The seed has to grow and become a tree.There is a gap between the seed and the tree, that gap has to be passed, there is a distance, you don't grow like the seed, you are already that, it's just a matter of revealing it, what you are now and what you will be There is no distance between you, no distance!The ideal, the perfect, already exists.

So it's not really a matter of growing up, it's just a matter of uncovering it, it's a finding that something is hidden, you pull the curtain back and it's there.It is as if you are sitting with your eyes closed and the sun is on the other side of the horizon, but you are in darkness, and suddenly you open your eyes, but it has become day and the earth is bright. Spiritual growth is not really a growth, that statement is wrong, spiritual growth is a revelation, something that was hidden is now revealed; something that was already there, now you become aware of it There it is; something that was never lost, but only forgotten, and now you remember it.That's why many mystics have been using the word "remembering" and they say that "the divine" is not an attainment, it is just a remembering, something that you have forgotten and now you remember.

Actually it doesn't take time, but the mind will say, the ego will say, everything takes time, everything needs time to grow, and if you become a victim of this logical thinking, you will never achieve it It, then you will go on delaying, you will say tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow and it will never come because tomorrow will never come. If you can understand what I am saying, that the ego can be dropped in the present moment, if so, then the question arises: why is it not dropped?Why can't you ditch it?If there is no question of incremental growth, then why didn't you ditch it?Because you don't want to throw it away. It must shock you when I say this because you've been thinking that you want to drop it, think again, you don't want to drop it, that's why it goes on, it's not a matter of time, it's because you don't want to Abandon it, so there is no way! The way of the mind is mysterious, you think you want to drop it, but deep down you know you don't want to drop it, you might want to polish it up, you might want to refine it, but You don't really want to ditch it. If you really want to drop it, no one is going to stop you, there is no barrier, it can be dropped if you really want to.But if you don't want to abandon it, then there is no way, even if a thousand Buddhas work on you, it will fail, because there is no way to do anything from the outside. Seriously, have you ever thought about it?Have you ever meditated on it quietly?Do you really want to ditch it?Do you really want to become a "non-being" or "nothing"?Even in your religious projection, you all want to be something, you all want to achieve something, or get somewhere, or be something, even when you want to be humble, your humility is nothing but ego A place where secrets hide like no other. Watch the so-called humble people, they say they are humble, they try to prove that they are the most humble in their town, that city, or that place - the most humble!If you argue with him, if you say: No, there are others who are more humble than you.He will feel hurt, and who is feeling hurt? I was reading a story about a Christian saint who always said to God in his prayers: I am the worst person in the world, the biggest sinner.On the surface, he seems to be a very humble person, but in fact he is not.He said: The "biggest" sinner in the world, even if God comes out to refute him, he will argue.His interest, his deepest interest, was to be the greatest, not to be the sinner. If you are allowed to be the greatest sinner, you can be a sinner, you can enjoy it, the greatest sinner -- then you become a pinnacle, virtue or vice does not matter, you have to be something, whether it is For whatever reason, your ego has to be at the top. George Bernard Shaw is said to have said, I'd rather be first in hell than second in heaven.If you are first, first, then hell is not a bad place; if you are just standing in the middle of a line of people, unknown, then even heaven will look boring.George Bernard Shaw was right, that's how the human mind works. No one wants to drop the ego, otherwise that is no problem, you can drop it now, if you feel the need for time, then the need for this time is just for you to understand that you are still attached to it, once you can understand that it is yours Attach, then things will happen. It may take you several lifetimes to understand this simple fact.You have spent many lifetimes, but you have not yet understood. It seems strange that there is something that is a burden to you, it gives you a hell, a constant hell, but you still cling to it, there must be a deep reason for it - a deep The reason, I want to talk a little bit about this, maybe you can become more aware because of it. The way of the human mind is: it always chooses to be occupied rather than unoccupied, even if that occupation is painful, even if it is a suffering, the mind chooses to be occupied rather than unoccupied, because When not occupied, you start to feel like you are melting. Psychologists say that people die very soon after they retire, their lives are cut short by almost a decade, and they start dying before they die.There is no occupation anymore, they become unoccupied. When you are not occupied, you start to feel meaningless, useless, you start to feel that you are not needed, you start to feel that the world is going on just fine without you.When you are occupied, you feel that the world cannot go on without you, that you are a very important part of it, that everything will stop without you. If you are not occupied, suddenly, you will realize that the world goes on beautifully without you, nothing is changing, you are abandoned, you are going to the garbage dump, you are not needed . In the very moment when you feel not needed, the ego becomes insecure because it only exists when you are needed, so the ego goes on imposing this attitude on everyone around you: you must Yes, you are needed, nothing will happen without you, the world will dissolve without you. When you are unoccupied, you learn that the game is going on, that you are not an important part, that you can be thrown out easily, that no one cares about you, that no one thinks of you, on the contrary, they even Feel relieved that such a situation shatters the ego, so people want to be possessed, whatever it is, they just have to stay occupied, they have to go on with the illusion that they are needed. Meditation is a state of unoccupied mind, it is a deep retreat, it is not just a superficial retreat, like going to the Himalayas, which may not be a retreat at all, because again you may be Himalayan Occupied by mountains, where you can create some fantasy that you are saving the world, sitting on the Himalayas and meditating, you save the world from World War II, or because you are creating some vibrations, the world will go to utopia - a peaceful society. You can be there enjoying this possession and no one will argue with you, because you are alone there and no one will argue that in fact you are in a fantasy, you are in a state of hallucination.You can get so involved in it that the ego asserts itself again in a new and subtle way. Meditation is not a superficial retreat, it is a deep, very personal, very real retreat or withdrawal - a retreat from being occupied does not mean that you will not be occupied, but Yes you can keep doing whatever you are doing, but you withdraw yourself and your investment in that which is occupied. In doing so, you start to think that this constant desire to be needed is silly.The world can go on just fine without you, there's nothing depressing about it when you feel that way, you feel good, it's good that the world can go on without you. If you can understand, then it can become a kind of freedom; if you don't understand, you will feel that you are smashed, so people continue to be occupied, the ego gives them the most occupation, the ego can give in 24 hours a day. They occupy.They keep thinking about how to be a member of Congress, they keep thinking about how to be an undersecretary or minister or dean or how to be a president and the ego goes on and on and it gives you a Constant occupation - how to create more wealth, how to create a kingdom.The ego has given you dreams - constant inner occupation, and you feel that there is a lot going on. When you are not occupied.You suddenly become aware of an inner void, and these dreams can fill that inner void. Now psychologists say that a person can live for at least 90 days without food, but if he does not dream within 90 days, he cannot live and he will go crazy.If dreaming is not allowed, within three weeks you will go mad.Three weeks without food will not hurt you, it will even be good for your health; three weeks without food is a good fast, it will rejuvenate your whole system, You will become more alive, younger, but without dreaming for three weeks... - you will go mad. Dreaming must be fulfilling some deep-rooted need in you.That need is that it keeps you occupied, not really occupied, but it keeps you occupied, that you can sit and dream whatever you like, and the whole world moves according to you -- at least in your dreams This is so in that no one creates problems, you can kill anyone, you can murder, you can change as you like, there you are the master. When dreaming, the ego feels very alive, because no one can go against you, no one can say: No, this is wrong.You are all and the only one, anything you want, you can create, and anything you don't want, you can destroy, you are absolutely powerful, in your dreams, you are all-powerful. Only when the ego is abandoned can the dream stop, so this is a sign, it is said in the ancient yoga scriptures, this is the sign of a person's enlightenment; he cannot dream, the dream stops because there is no need anymore, the dream It is the need of the self. You want to be occupied, so you can't abandon yourself unless you are ready to be empty, unoccupied, unless you are ready to be nothing, unless, even when you are not needed, you are ready to enjoy and celebrate life , otherwise the ego cannot be discarded. You have a need to be needed, and someone has to need you to feel good.If more and more people need you, you feel better and better, that's why being a leader is a great pleasure, because there are many people who need you. A leader can become very humble, doesn't need to assert his ego, his ego is deeply satisfied, because many people need him, many people depend on him, he has become the life of many people, he can Humble, he has enough capital to be humble. You must know this fact: Those who overemphasize their ego are the ones who cannot influence others.They become stressed because that's the only way they're saying "don't underestimate me".If they can influence people, if they can persuade, they will never be emphatic, they will be humble, at least on the surface.They will not look as if they are egoistic because, in a subtle way, there are many people who depend on them and they become important because their lives seem meaningful to those who depend on them. . If your ego is your meaning, if your ego is your importance, how can you drop it?Listen to me, you start wanting to drop it, but just by thought, you cannot drop the ego, you have to understand its roots - where it is, where it is, why it is there. These are the unconscious forces that operate within you that you don't know, they have to be made conscious, you have to get all the roots of your ego out of the ground so that you can see clearly. If you can remain unoccupied, if you can remain content without being needed, the ego can be dropped in the present moment, but these "ifs" are big ifs. Meditation can prepare for these big ifs, and the happening will happen in a moment, but the understanding takes time. It's like when you heat water, it gets hotter and hotter, and then at a certain heat, at 100 degrees, it starts to evaporate, and the evaporation happens in a moment, it It's not gradual, it's immediate, there's a "jump" from water to steam, and all of a sudden, the water disappears, but it involves time, because water has to be heated to boiling point, evaporation can happen suddenly, but heating takes time. Understanding is like heating, it takes time, and the phenomenon of abandoning the self is like evaporation, it happens suddenly. So don't try to drop the ego, instead try to deepen your understanding, don't try to change the water into steam, first heat it, the second thing will follow automatically, it will will happen. You will grow and become aware, make it stronger, more focused, use all your energies to understand the phenomena of your being, your ego, your mind, and your consciousness, becoming more and more Be alert, and whatever is happening, you are aware of it at the same time. Someone insults you and you feel angry, don't miss that opportunity, try to understand why, why this anger arises, don't think of it as a philosophy or something, don't go to the library and find out about Anger stuff, anger happens to you, it's an experience, a lived experience, focus all your attention on it, try to understand why it's happening to you, it's not a philosophical question , No need to ask Freud, no need!When anger happens to you, it is foolish to ask other people, you can touch it, you can taste it, you will be burned by it. Try to understand why it happened, where it came from, where its roots are, how it happened, how it works, how it overrides you, how you go crazy in anger.Anger has happened before, it is happening now, but now add a new factor -- the factor of understanding, and then that quality will change. Then, gradually, you will see that the more you understand anger, the less it happens, and when you fully understand it, it disappears.Understanding is like heat. When the heat reaches a certain point -- 100 degrees -- the water disappears. Sex exists, try to understand it. The more you understand it, the less lustful you become. A moment comes when the understanding is perfect and sex disappears. This is my rule: any phenomenon of inner energy, if it disappears when understood, is a sin; if it deepens when understood, it is a virtue.The more you understand, the wrong disappears and the right goes deeper.Sex will disappear and love will deepen; anger will disappear and compassion will deepen; greed will disappear and sharing will deepen. So whatever disappears through understanding is wrong, whatever deepens through understanding is right, that is my definition of good and evil, that is my definition of virtue and vice.A saint is one who has understanding, and a sinner is one who has no understanding, that's all.The difference between a saint and a sinner is not in sin and holiness, but in understanding. Understanding works like a heating process.A moment will come, a right moment will come when the heat has reached the boiling point and the ego will suddenly disappear. You cannot just drop it, but you can prepare for that to happen. It takes some time to prepare for that. . There have always been two schools of thought, one of which is for instant enlightenment, it says that enlightenment happens immediately, it is timeless; the other school of thought is the opposite, it says that enlightenment is gradual, it says that enlightenment comes gradually Yes, it doesn't happen suddenly.Both are right because they both select a part of that phenomenon. Progressives have chosen the first part, the part of understanding.They say it has to go through time, understanding has to come through time, and they are right!They say, you don't need to worry about the immediate, you just follow the process, if the water is heated correctly, it will evaporate, you don't need to worry about evaporation, you just forget about it, you just do the water heating. The other school, the completely opposite school, says that enlightenment is immediate, and it takes the last part, and it says that the first part is not very important, what really matters is that the eruption has to happen in a timeless gap, the first Things are only around, the real second thing is at the core. But I will tell you, both are true, enlightenment happens immediately, it always happens suddenly, but understanding takes time. Both are true, but both can also be misinterpreted, you can play tricks on yourself, you can deceive yourself.If you don't want to do anything, then believe that instant enlightenment is beautiful, then you say: there is no need to do anything.If it happens suddenly, then it will happen suddenly, what can I do?I could just wait, but that might be self-deception. Because of this, religion has disappeared in Japan, and Japan has a long tradition of instant enlightenment.Zen says that enlightenment is immediate, and because of this, the whole country becomes irreligious.Gradually, people start to believe that instant enlightenment is the only possibility, nothing can be done about it, whenever it happens, it happens, if it happens, it happens, if it doesn't happen, it doesn't happen , we can't do anything about it, so why bother? In the East, Japan is the most materialistic country.In the East, Japan exists as a part of the West, which is very strange.Because Japan has a very beautiful tradition—the tradition of Zen, why did it disappear?It disappears because of this idea of ​​instant enlightenment.People start deceiving themselves. In India another phenomenon has happened... that's why I go on and on and on saying that the human mind is very cunning and deceitful, you have to be always on your toes otherwise you will be deceived. In India, we have another tradition—the tradition of gradual enlightenment, and that is the meaning of thauga, and you have to work on it, and you have to work on it for many lifetimes.Training is needed, work is needed, unless you work hard, Otherwise you cannot achieve it.So, it is a very long process, a very long process -- too long; so the Indians say that one life is not enough, you need many lives, and there is nothing wrong with that, as far as understanding is concerned, it is right of. But the Indians therefore believe that if it is that long, then there is no rush at all, why the rush?You just go and enjoy the world, there is no rush, there is plenty of time.It is such a long process that you cannot achieve it today, and if you cannot achieve it today, the interest is lost. No one is so enthusiastic that he can wait many lifetimes, he will forget about it. That gradual idea destroyed India, and that immediate idea destroyed Japan.For me, both are true, because both are half of the process, and your mind has to be constantly on the alert so you don't deceive yourself. It will seem contradictory, but this is what I want to tell you: it can happen this moment, but this moment will take lives; it can happen this moment, but you become Perhaps one has to wait several lifetimes for this moment to come. So work hard as if it is going to happen this very moment, and wait patiently... because it is unpredictable, no one can say when it will happen, it may not happen for several lifetimes. So, be patient, as if the whole process is one long gradual development, work hard, try as hard as you can, as if it could happen in this very moment. Sexuality - A Doorway to Divinity Dear Master, could you please tell us about how to use sexual energy for growth.Because in the West, it seems to be one of the main things that occupy our minds. Sex is energy, so I will not speak of sexual energy because there is no other energy. Sex is the only energy you have, that energy can be transformed, it can become a higher energy, as it goes higher, the sexual component in it becomes less and less, and there is a final peak, at There it becomes love and compassion, that highest flowering energy that we may call divine, but at the base, at the root, it remains sexual. So sex is the energy of the first level and the energy of the lowest level, and God is the highest level, but the same energy is flowing. The first thing that has to be understood is: I don't divide the energy, once you divide, there is a duality, once you divide, there is conflict and struggle, once you divide the energy, you are divided, then you be for or against sex. I'm neither for nor against because I don't divide, I say sex is energy, it's the name of energy, if you call that energy X, then when you just use it as a force for biological reproduction, sex is that X energy, the name of that unknown energy.Once it is freed from the yoke of the living being, as soon as it becomes immaterial, it becomes divine, then it is the love of Jesus, the mercy of Sintra. The West today is very attached to sex because of Christianity. For two thousand years, the suppression of sexual energy by Christianity has made the Western mind too attached to it. First of all, two thousand years ago, the attachment was how to kill it, you cannot kill it, no energy can be killed, energy can only be transformed, you cannot destroy energy.In this world, nothing can be destroyed, it can only be transformed or changed, or into a new realm or dimension, and destruction is impossible. You can't create a new energy, you can't destroy an old one, it's beyond your power to create and destroy, you can't do both, and now, even scientists agree that even Not a single atom can be destroyed. For two millennia Christianity has been trying to destroy sexual energy, the very makeup of religion becomes no sex at all, this creates madness, the more you fight and repress, the more sexual you become and then sex goes into the unconscious, And poison your whole being. So if you read the life stories of Christian saints, you will find that they are all attached to sex, they can't pray, they can't meditate, whatever they do, sex comes in, they think it's a trick of the devil, it's not No one is playing tricks, if you repress you are the devil. After two thousand years of continuous sexual repression, Westerners have had enough, it was too much, and then the whole wheel is turned, and now they are not repressing, but indulging, and indulging in it becomes a new attachment.Moving from one end of the mind to the other, the disease remains the same, before it was repression, now how it is more and more indulgent in it, both attitudes are pathological. Sex has to be transformed -- not repressed, not wildly indulged, the only way sex can be transformed is this: into sex with a deep, meditative awareness. It happens to be the same situation where I'm talking about anger.Enter sex, but with a mindful, alert, conscious state of being.Don't let it become an unconscious force, don't be pushed and pulled by it, act knowingly, understandingly, lovingly, make the sexual experience a meditative experience, meditate in it, that is The East is doing it through Tantric Tantra. Once you can be meditative during sexual experience, the quality of it starts changing, the same energy that goes into sexual experience starts coming to consciousness. You can become very alert during orgasm in a way that maybe you have never experienced in other situations, because all other experiences are not as deep, so focused, so total as the sexual experience.During orgasm you are totally focused, your whole being is vibrating from head to toe, your whole being is involved, both body and mind are involved, thought stops completely, even if only for a second Time, when the orgasm reaches its peak, thinking stops completely, because you are so total you cannot think. 在性高潮当中，你的本质存在，但是没有任何思想，在这个片刻当中，如果你能够变得很警觉，很有意识，那么性就能够变成走向神性之美。如果在这个片刻当中，你能够变得很警觉，那个警觉也能被带到其他的片刻，或是其他的经验，它能够变成你的一部分，那么在吃东西，在走路，或是在工作，你都能够携带着那个警觉。透过性，那个警觉碰触到了你最深的核心，它已经穿透了你，如此一来，你就可以携带着它。 如果你变得很静心，你将会了解到一个新的事实，那个事实是，并不是性在给你喜乐，并不是性在给你狂喜，而是那个没有思想的状态，和那个完全涉入行为之中，使你产生一种喜乐的感觉。 一旦你了解到这个，性的需要就会变得越来越少，因为那个无思想的状态不要性也能够被刨造出来，那就是静心的意思。那个存在的全然性不必性也能够被创造出来，一旦你知道说那个同样的现象不必性也能够同样地发生，那么性的需要就会变得越来越少，有一个片刻会来临，到时候性就根本不需要。 记住，性总是要依靠别人，所以在性里面仍然保持是一种枷锁和一种奴役。一旦你能够不依靠其他任何人，而创造出这个全然的性高潮现象，一旦它变成一种内在的泉源，你就独立了，你就自由了。 那就是在印度，我们说“唯有一个完全禁欲的人才能够完全自由”的意思。因为现在他已经不依靠其他任何人，他的狂喜是他自己的。 性透过静心而消失，但这并不是摧毁那个能量，能量从来就无法被摧毁，只有形式被改变，如此一来，它就不再是属于性的，当那个形式不再是属于性的，你就会变得具有爱心。 所以真正说起来，一个具有性的人无法爱，他的爱只能够是一个展示，他的爱只是一个朝向性的工具，一个具有性的人只是使用爱来作为朝向性的一个技巧，它是一种工具。一个具有性的人无法真正地爱，他只能够剥削对方，他的爱只是要去接近对方的一个方式。 一个已经变成没有性，而且能量向内移的人，会变得自己就很喜乐，他的喜乐是他自己的，这样的人才首度变得具有爱心。他的爱是一种经常的散发，经常的分享，经常的给予。 但是要达到这种状态，你就不应该反对性，要达到这种状态，你必须把性当成生命的一部分，当成自然的一部分，跟着它移动，但是要带着更多的意识。 意识就是那个从这个世界到另一个世界，从地狱到天堂，从自我到神性的桥梁——黄金桥梁。