Whenever you are healthy you don’t know anything about your body – the body is forgotten. When there is some illness, only then can you not forget the body. Do you know if there is any head without a headache? When there is a headache you cannot forget the head. When the shoe is pinching then it doesn’t fit. When you don’t have any headache, where is the head? You completely forget about it. Whatsoever is healthy is forgotten but whatsoever is ill is remembered – it becomes a continuous note in the mind, a continuous tension in the mind.
A perfect man of Tao does not know himself; YOU know, because you are ill. Ego is illness, a
substantial illness, because you continuously have to remember that you are somebody. This shows
that you are in a deep ’dis-ease’. Disease creates the ego; a perfectly healthy natural being forgets
completely. He is like a cloud, like a breeze, like a rock, like a tree, like a bird – but never like a man.
He is not, because only illness, like a wound, has to be remembered.
Remembering is a mechanism for safety and security: if there is a thorn in your foot, you have to remember. The mind will go continuously again and again to the spot because the thorn has to be thrown out. If you forget it, the thorn will remain there and it will become dangerous; it may poison the whole body. When there is a headache the body tells you to remember it, something has to be done. If you forget it, the headache may become dangerous.
The body tells you whenever there is some illness, something wrong – it attracts your attention. But when the body is healthy, you forget it; you become ’body-less’ when the body is healthy. And this is the only definition of health: health is when there is no consciousness of the body. If there is any sort of consciousness of the body, then that part is not healthy.
The same applies to the mind. When your consciousness is healthy, there is no ego – you don’t know anything about yourself. You don’t go on reminding yourself that ’I am something,’ you simply relax. You are, but there is no ’I’. It is a simple ’am-ness’, an ’is-ness’, but there is no ’I’, no crystallised ego. The self is not there.
SO, WHEN THE SHOE FITS, THE FOOT IS FORGOTTEN; WHEN THE BELT FITS, THE BELLY IS FORGOTTEN; AND WHEN THE HEART IS RIGHT, ’FOR’ AND ’AGAINST’ ARE FORGOTTEN.
This is one of the deepest things to be understood. When the heart is right, all ’for’ and ’against’ are forgotten. When the heart is wrong, ill, then you go on continuously being burdened, worried: this is right and that is wrong – and the right should be followed, the wrong should be avoided. The whole of life becomes a struggle how to avoid the wrong and how to achieve the right. And this is not the way to achieve the right! This is the way to miss it forever.
Look.... You have anger, sex, greed. If you say anger is wrong then your whole life will be passed in an angry state. Sometimes you will be angry, and sometimes you will be angry because of your anger – that will be the only difference. Sometimes you will be angry, and when the anger is gone you will be angry because of the anger; you call this repentance. And then you will decide never to be angry again, but you will be angry again, because both states are anger. Sometimes you are angry against someone else, sometimes you are angry against yourself because you were angry.
If you are against sex and you say that it is wrong, – as the whole world has said – then you will be sexual, and, after your sexuality has passed, you will feel guilty. In that guilt you will ponder and think about sex again and again; it will become cerebral. So sometimes you will be physically sexual, and sometimes cerebrally sexual – sometimes sexual in the body, sometimes sexual in the mind.
Once you make a distinction, once you make a conflict, you will be divided.
Once I was staying with Mulla Nasrudin. A very beautiful widow came to see him to ask for his advice. She said: I am in trouble, and you have to help me. I am in love with a very handsome man, younger than me, but he is poor. And an old man who is very, very rich and very ugly is in love with me. So what should I do? Which one should I marry? Mulla Nasrudin closed his eyes, pondered, and said: Marry the rich man, and be good to the poor.
This is how all conflict arises, this is how you choose both the alternatives. Then you become divided. Whenever you say that this is right and that is wrong you are already divided, and your whole life will be a conflict – from this polarity to the other you will move like a pendulum.
Don’t be against anything. Why? Because whenever you are against anything it means that deep down you are for it, otherwise why be against it?
A man who is not angry deep down will not be against anger. Why should he be? A man who is not greedy deep down will not be against greed. Why should he be against it? There is no problem for him, it is not a choice, he has not made any distinction. Remember, it is always greedy persons who are against greed, sexual persons who are against sex, angry persons who are against anger, violent persons who are against voilence. Then what do they do? They create an opposite goal.
If you are violent, non-violence will become the goal. And how can a violent man become non- voilent? What will he do? There is only one possibility, he will be violent towards himself, that’s all. What else can he do? A violent man... how can he be non-violent? An angry person... how can he be without anger? And if an angry person cultivates non-anger, in his non-anger there will also be anger because you cannot cultivate anything without you entering it. The anger will enter the non-anger; the violence will enter the non violence.
If you look around, if you watch rightly, you cannot find more violent people than those who have non violence as their goal. And you cannot find more sexual, pervertedly sexual people than those who have BRAHMACHARYA, celibacy, as their goal.
Chuang Tzu says: Don’t make distinctions, otherwise you will be divided. Once divided, you are two, split.
A person who is split cannot be natural. Nature exists in unity, it is a deep harmony, there is no conflict at all. Nature accepts everything – there is no choice, it is a choiceless let-go. Don’t choose. And this is the miracle: if you don’t choose to be against anger, then when anger comes you are simply angry. Don’t choose against anger. When anger comes simply be angry, and when anger goes, let it go. Don’t repent, don’t let it continue inside the mind, don’t make it a continuity, don’t be against it. When anger comes, it comes! What can you do? When it doesn’t come, it doesn’t come! You have no choice.
Then a miracle happens. Without choice you become so alert that your energies are divided no longer. And when energies are undivided they are so powerful, so tremendous that anger becomes impossible – because anger is part of weakness. Remember this... the weaker you are, the more angry; the stronger you are, the less angry. If you are absolutely strong, there will be no anger. Remember this... the weaker you are, the more greedy – really, the weak has to be greedy to protect himself – and the stronger you are, the less greedy.
When the energy is total in you, not divided, not split, you are a unity. Greed disappears, because greed belongs to a weak mind, a split mind. And when you are split, there will be anger, and you will fight against it, and a bigger split will be created and more energy will be dissipated. And you will become full of inner turmoil, anarchy, not one harmonious note anywhere. Everything will be out of tune.
And the more you make an effort to bring it to a tuning, the more trouble there will be – because you have missed the first step, and you will go on missing it to the very last.
Remembering is a mechanism for safety and security: if there is a thorn in your foot, you have to remember. The mind will go continuously again and again to the spot because the thorn has to be thrown out. If you forget it, the thorn will remain there and it will become dangerous; it may poison the whole body. When there is a headache the body tells you to remember it, something has to be done. If you forget it, the headache may become dangerous.
The body tells you whenever there is some illness, something wrong – it attracts your attention. But when the body is healthy, you forget it; you become ’body-less’ when the body is healthy. And this is the only definition of health: health is when there is no consciousness of the body. If there is any sort of consciousness of the body, then that part is not healthy.
The same applies to the mind. When your consciousness is healthy, there is no ego – you don’t know anything about yourself. You don’t go on reminding yourself that ’I am something,’ you simply relax. You are, but there is no ’I’. It is a simple ’am-ness’, an ’is-ness’, but there is no ’I’, no crystallised ego. The self is not there.
SO, WHEN THE SHOE FITS, THE FOOT IS FORGOTTEN; WHEN THE BELT FITS, THE BELLY IS FORGOTTEN; AND WHEN THE HEART IS RIGHT, ’FOR’ AND ’AGAINST’ ARE FORGOTTEN.
This is one of the deepest things to be understood. When the heart is right, all ’for’ and ’against’ are forgotten. When the heart is wrong, ill, then you go on continuously being burdened, worried: this is right and that is wrong – and the right should be followed, the wrong should be avoided. The whole of life becomes a struggle how to avoid the wrong and how to achieve the right. And this is not the way to achieve the right! This is the way to miss it forever.
Look.... You have anger, sex, greed. If you say anger is wrong then your whole life will be passed in an angry state. Sometimes you will be angry, and sometimes you will be angry because of your anger – that will be the only difference. Sometimes you will be angry, and when the anger is gone you will be angry because of the anger; you call this repentance. And then you will decide never to be angry again, but you will be angry again, because both states are anger. Sometimes you are angry against someone else, sometimes you are angry against yourself because you were angry.
If you are against sex and you say that it is wrong, – as the whole world has said – then you will be sexual, and, after your sexuality has passed, you will feel guilty. In that guilt you will ponder and think about sex again and again; it will become cerebral. So sometimes you will be physically sexual, and sometimes cerebrally sexual – sometimes sexual in the body, sometimes sexual in the mind.
Once you make a distinction, once you make a conflict, you will be divided.
Once I was staying with Mulla Nasrudin. A very beautiful widow came to see him to ask for his advice. She said: I am in trouble, and you have to help me. I am in love with a very handsome man, younger than me, but he is poor. And an old man who is very, very rich and very ugly is in love with me. So what should I do? Which one should I marry? Mulla Nasrudin closed his eyes, pondered, and said: Marry the rich man, and be good to the poor.
This is how all conflict arises, this is how you choose both the alternatives. Then you become divided. Whenever you say that this is right and that is wrong you are already divided, and your whole life will be a conflict – from this polarity to the other you will move like a pendulum.
Don’t be against anything. Why? Because whenever you are against anything it means that deep down you are for it, otherwise why be against it?
A man who is not angry deep down will not be against anger. Why should he be? A man who is not greedy deep down will not be against greed. Why should he be against it? There is no problem for him, it is not a choice, he has not made any distinction. Remember, it is always greedy persons who are against greed, sexual persons who are against sex, angry persons who are against anger, violent persons who are against voilence. Then what do they do? They create an opposite goal.
If you are violent, non-violence will become the goal. And how can a violent man become non- voilent? What will he do? There is only one possibility, he will be violent towards himself, that’s all. What else can he do? A violent man... how can he be non-violent? An angry person... how can he be without anger? And if an angry person cultivates non-anger, in his non-anger there will also be anger because you cannot cultivate anything without you entering it. The anger will enter the non-anger; the violence will enter the non violence.
If you look around, if you watch rightly, you cannot find more violent people than those who have non violence as their goal. And you cannot find more sexual, pervertedly sexual people than those who have BRAHMACHARYA, celibacy, as their goal.
Chuang Tzu says: Don’t make distinctions, otherwise you will be divided. Once divided, you are two, split.
A person who is split cannot be natural. Nature exists in unity, it is a deep harmony, there is no conflict at all. Nature accepts everything – there is no choice, it is a choiceless let-go. Don’t choose. And this is the miracle: if you don’t choose to be against anger, then when anger comes you are simply angry. Don’t choose against anger. When anger comes simply be angry, and when anger goes, let it go. Don’t repent, don’t let it continue inside the mind, don’t make it a continuity, don’t be against it. When anger comes, it comes! What can you do? When it doesn’t come, it doesn’t come! You have no choice.
Then a miracle happens. Without choice you become so alert that your energies are divided no longer. And when energies are undivided they are so powerful, so tremendous that anger becomes impossible – because anger is part of weakness. Remember this... the weaker you are, the more angry; the stronger you are, the less angry. If you are absolutely strong, there will be no anger. Remember this... the weaker you are, the more greedy – really, the weak has to be greedy to protect himself – and the stronger you are, the less greedy.
When the energy is total in you, not divided, not split, you are a unity. Greed disappears, because greed belongs to a weak mind, a split mind. And when you are split, there will be anger, and you will fight against it, and a bigger split will be created and more energy will be dissipated. And you will become full of inner turmoil, anarchy, not one harmonious note anywhere. Everything will be out of tune.
And the more you make an effort to bring it to a tuning, the more trouble there will be – because you have missed the first step, and you will go on missing it to the very last.
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