This is the inner alchemy - a problem disappears if you accept it, and a problem grows more and more complex if you create any conflict with it. Yes, fear is there, accept it, and suddenly you will feel it has disappeared, says Osho, the Zen master.
When Ordinary Work Becomes Sacred The Times of India (What’s Hot), New Delhi - 25 th july, 2008
We could be clinching deals or cleaning toilets… If we do it without complaint and with whole-hearted acceptance, it becomes uplifting. But most people live in misery; they don’t like their work or find it below their dignity.
In Malaysia, I met an Indian friend who owns a restaurant chain. I asked him: “Why don’t you open a restaurant in India?” He said: “No! Here I can be as ordinary as a worker. I can take orders from clients and nobody will recognize me. But in India, I’d hesitate. As owner, I won’t be expected to do it.”
Another friend, a therapist in Denmark, wasn’t getting any clients. One day, he answered a wanted notice for a school cleaner and got the job. Now, he goes to school cleaner and got the job. Now, he goes to school in the evening, cleans up and feels good. As a therapist, he wasn’t too happy listening to the sick-minded. Their problems affected him too.
I give these examples to convey that we need to do our work—any work—without ego issue. If we bring in ego, work becomes poison. Let us respect labourers just like we respect corporate honchos. We are all interdependent. You have a good time in office only if someone cleans it before you reach!
Osho illustrates with a Taoist story: “A Chinese emperor had a butcher, and he loved to watch him kill animals. The emperor would watch because the whole proceedings, though ugly, were made beautiful by the butcher. He worked as if he were praying. For 30 years, the Emperor watched, and was never fed up. One day he asked the butcher, ‘I’ve watched you for years… I don’t wait so excitedly for anything else in the day. What’s your secret?’ The butcher said, ‘It is my mediation. I’m a butcher; that’s what God willed me to be. This is my life, and I’ve made it my meditation. If God wanted me to be a butcher, so be it. But I should be meditative. So, I go into deep ecstasy. It isn’t just a chore, but an act of love. God is in the animal and in me. God wants to kill himself. Who am I to interfere? I’m simply a vehicle.”
There are legends of robbers and butchers, who have attained enlightenment. Because whatsoever they did was meditative. And I know of some people who have lived in a Himalayan retreat for a lifetime but not attained anything! It isn’t about how much you do. It’s how you do it, what quality you bring to it. You can just walk and it can be meditative. You can just sit or eat or take a shower… and it can be meditative!
A Zen master used to chop wood like an ordinary woodcutter but when visitors came to his monastery, he’d teach them how to meditate. Zen exults in the ordinary.
Life is ordinary but, if we accept it totally, it can become extraordinary. Acceptance makes it so. Accept any work with joy—it becomes sacred and satisfying. Work done grudgingly out of a mere sense of duty is burdensome but work done with love has glow of freedom.
Guru & Disciples: A unique Bond The Times of India, New Delhi - 18 th July, 2008
Today (July 18) will be a full moon night and all disciples will celebrate in reverence to their guru. Full moon nights are considered helpful for deep meditation, as many meditators, chef being Gautam Buddha, attained Enlightenment on such a night. July’s full moon night has become most significant, however, for it is dedicated to the guru.
People translate the Sanskrit word guru as ‘master’ but that isn’t accurate. Nor is ‘teacher’ correct. Osho explains: “The very word ‘guru’ is meaningful. ‘Master’ doesn’t carry that significance. A master is someone who’s mastered some thing, become disciplined… A guru is different. Guru is like a heavy cloud, waiting to pour down on your thirst, a perfume-laden flower, waiting to penetrate your nostrils. Guru is heavy with energy and the divine.”
A guru hasn’t mastered anything in fact. He has not gone through training or disciplined himself. Instead, he has lived life in its totality—natural, free-flowing, unforced. And through millions of experiences of suffering and bliss, he has matured. A guru is a ripe fruit, waiting to fall. If you are ready to receive, he will fall into you.
When a disciple with total trust bows at the feet of his guru, something happens, which is invisible to the eye. Energy falls from the master, enters the disciple. The guru is heavy with infinite divine energy, which he can pour into infinite disciples. Alone, he can work with millions of disciples. He is never exhausted because he is connected with the whole. He has found the source. Through him, you too can leap into the whole. Surrendering to god is difficult because you don’t know where god is. But a guru can be found. And if you ask me, the guru is the address of god! Osho explains the guru-disciple relationship: “First of all, a guru isn’t a teacher but a person who attains a religious mode of living. Thus, religion is not information but a way of living. The guru’s very presence is a communion. To one living in contact with him, something is communicated, but not through words. The relationship is very intimate, less like teacher-pupil and more like lover-beloved. The guru must himself be enlightened, because one cannot communicate that which one has not realized. A teacher need not be self-realized but a guru must be. A teacher can give second-hand information from scriptures or traditions but a guru cannot. A guru is one who has realized truth, encountered reality.
Second, a guru is not aware of his guruship. He cannot claim that he’s a guru. A person can only know whether or not he has fulfilled the condition of egolessness, else he cannot encounter truth. Truth is encountered only when the ego falls.
In spirituality, only disciples exist. The guru is not present, he is only a presence. His non-egoistic attitude and his ability to live the truth are forms of communion.”
Karma Without The Bondage The Times of India, New Delhi - 11th July, 2008
Life creates situations. Like them or hate them but you have to live them. You can’t escape. Accept them intelligently. Say, you choose to travel with friends and expect a good time but then realise it was a bad idea! You repent. The trip becomes a bitter memory. If you think about it repeatedly, you keep inviting the bitterness back… You create karmic bondage. Why not accept the situation and move on? You lived it. It’s over. Why let it haunt you? Let it die so you can become alive fully to welcome your next trip!
In a poetic statement, Guru Gorakhnath said: “Marau he jogi marau.” (“Die, O yogi, die!”) Die each moment to all that is past, welcome the new. This is the real yoga – to un-unite with the past every moment. Then we don’t create any karma of bondage. We are free. With freedom comes total awareness.
Osho elaborates: “Mulla Nasruddin was pulled out of a river; after he attempted suicide. He said: ‘Yes, I tried to kill myself. Determined not to fail, I bought rope, matches, kerosene and a pistol and went to the river. I threw the rope over a tree, tied it around my neck, poured kerosene over myself, lit the match, jumped off, put the pistol to my head and pulled the trigger… Guess what? The bullet hit the rope before I could choke, so I fell into the river, which put out the fire before I could burn. If I hadn’t been a good swimmer, I’d have drowned!”
People are contradictory. They don’t know how to do a thing totally. When they try to commit suicide, they cannot be total because they’ve never been total in life. A total act liberates while a half-hearted one creates bondage.
Take death, for instance. Nobody weeps for somebody’s death – you weep for a lost opportunity to love. Say, your mother dies. If you’ve loved her totally, then you bid her goodbye in peace. Of course, you’re sad but you don’t carry a wound. You loved her, respected her, supported her fully. Now, it’s over. You accept her passing on with fortitude.
Take food. If you don’t eat mindfully and think about 1,000 other things at dinner time. If you’re only physically present there but not psychologically, your hunger will never be satisfied. Then, food will become an obsession.
That’s why sex becomes an obsession with some people. While you make love, your mind wanders. And since it isn’t a total act, you feel unfulfilled. You try to fulfil your desire in many other ways – pornography, blue films fantasies… Sad! When you eat, you aren’t there so you binge later! While making love, you aren’t there so you watch porn later!
You’re never in tune.
Osho concludes: “When you’re total, God is there. When you’re divided, God is unavailable. God is inner harmony. God is tremendous creativity. A painter paints a picture, a singer sings a song….A religious seeker creates God! And there’s only one way to do so – to become total so the act becomes whole.”
