Business

 

 

Question 4

Osho,

I am a businessman. can i also meditate and become a sannyasin?

 

 

One has to do something in life. Somebody is a carpenter and somebody is a king, and somebody is a businessman and somebody is a warrior. These are ways of livelihood, these are ways of getting bread and butter, a shelter. They can't change your inner being. Whether you are a warrior or a businessman does not make any difference: one has chosen one way to earn his livelihood, the other has chosen something else.

 

Meditation is life, not livelihood. It has nothing to do with what you do; it has everything to do with what you are. Yes, business should not enter into your being, that is true. If your being also has become businesslike, then it is difficult to meditate and impossible to be a sannyasin... because if your being has become businesslike, then you have become too calculative. And a calculative person is a cowardly person: he thinks too much, he cannot take any jumps.

 

And meditation is a jump: from the head to the heart, and ultimately from the heart to the being. You will be going deeper and deeper, where calculations will have to be left behind, where all logic becomes irrelevant. You cannot carry your cleverness there.

 

In fact, cleverness is not true intelligence either; cleverness is a poor substitute for intelligence. People who are not intelligent learn how to be clever. People who are intelligent need not be clever; they are innocent, they need not be cunning. They function out of a state of not-knowing.

 

If you are a businessman, that's okay. If Jesus can become a meditator and a sannyasin, and ultimately a christ, a buddha... and he was the son of a carpenter, helping his father, bringing wood, cutting wood. If a carpenter's son can become a buddha, why not you?

 

Kabir was a weaver. He continued his work his whole life; even after his enlightenment he was still weaving; he loved it! Many times his disciples asked him, prayed to him with tears in their eyes, that "You need not work anymore -- we are here to take care of you! So many disciples, why go on in your old age spinning, weaving?"

 

And Kabir would say, "But do you know for whom I am weaving, for whom I am spinning? For God! -- because everyone is now a god to me. It is my way of prayer."

 

If Kabir can become a buddha and still remain a weaver, why can't you?

 

But business should not enter into your being. Business should be just an outside thing, just one of the ways of livelihood. When you close your shop, forget all about your business. When you come home, don't carry the shop in your head. When you are home with your wife, with your children, don't be a businessman. That is ugly: that means your being is becoming colored by your doing. Doing is a superficial thing. The being should remain transcendental to your doing and you should always be capable of putting your doing aside and entering into the world of your being. That's what meditation is all about. [....]

 

You have come here, you have been listening to me; even the desire to become a sannyasin has arisen in you. That is a good indication that business has not yet poisoned your soul totally. A part of you is still available for love, a part of you is still available for God. A part of you is still not businesslike -- otherwise you would not be here.

 

Businesslike people can't come to me; it is impossible for them to have any communion with me. They can't understand a single word uttered here -- and what to say about the silence that is present here? They live in a totally different world, in a very mundane world. [....]

 

There is a certain mind which functions always in a businesslike way; in every dimension of life he is always a businessman. If you are that kind of businessman, then this is not the place for you.

 

This is the place for gamblers. This is the place for people who can risk -- who can risk all for nothing. Yes, exactly all for nothing, because meditation will bring you to nothingness. But those who arrive at the nothingness of meditation, immediately become aware that they have arrived at the fullness of God, too. Nothingness of you is the fullness of God, it is the other aspect. YOU become nothing, and suddenly a great plenitude descends in you -- you are overflowing with God. By becoming nothing you become spacious, you become a host to the great guest.

 

But if you are continuously calculating you cannot become nothing. How can you drop all for being nothing? You will always be calculating: you will move cautiously.

 

Then this is not the place for you. Then you go to some old, traditional, pseudo teachers. They will console you. They will tell you that you can remain a businessman and still can open a bank account in paradise. Be charitable, give some charity: donate to the poor; donate to the temple, or the church, or the synagogue; to the hospital; to the school -- and you will be rewarded in your afterlife. Just do virtuous things which you can afford. If you exploit people, you can always give a portion back to them.

 

I have heard:

 

In a church the priest was telling the people, "The building is getting very old and we need money."

 

Nobody responded -- all businessmen! Everybody was looking at each other; everybody was waiting and expecting that somebody would be foolish enough.

 

And then a woman stood up -- the prostitute of the town! -- and she said, "I donate ten thousand dollars to the church."

 

The priest could not believe his ears, his eyes! For a moment he was in shock, and then he said, "But I cannot accept your money -- I cannot accept any wrong money."

 

One businessman stood up and said, "You don't worry, that is our money! It is only coming via her -- you can accept it!"

 

You can donate a little bit to the church, to some charitable institution, you can give some money to the poor people. These are the consolations. And a place for you will be reserved in heaven.

 

Don't be such a fool -- heaven is not so cheap. In fact, there is no place like heaven anywhere; it is something inside you. No charity can lead you there, but if you reach there your whole life becomes a charity; that is a totally different phenomenon. If you reach there, your whole life becomes compassion.

 

Remain a businessman, but for a few hours forget all about it. I am not here to tell you to escape from your ordinary life. I am here to tell you the ways and the means, the alchemy, to transform the ordinary into the extraordinary. Be a businessman in your shop and don't be a businessman at your home. And sometimes for a few hours forget even the home, the family, the wife, the children. For a few hours just be alone with yourself. Sink deeper and deeper into your own being. Enjoy yourself, love yourself.

 

And slowly slowly, you will become aware, a great joy is welling up, with no cause from the outside world, uncaused from the outside. It is your own flavor, it is your own flowering. This is meditation.

 

Sitting silently, doing nothing, the spring comes and the grass grows by itself. Sit silently, doing nothing, and wait for the spring. It comes, it always comes, and when it comes, the grass grows by itself. You will see great joy arising in you for no reason at all. Then share it, then give it to people! Then your charity will be inner. Then it will not be just a means to attain to some goal; then it will have intrinsic value.

 

And once you have become a meditator, sannyas is not far away! My sannyas particularly is nothing but living in the ordinary world, but living in such a way that you are not possessed by it; remaining transcendental, remaining in the world and yet a little above it. That is sannyas.

 

It is not the old sannyas, Ram Prasad: in that you have to escape from your wife, your children, your business, and go to the Himalayas. That kind of thing has not worked at all. Many went to the Himalayas, but they carried their stupid minds with them. The Himalayas have not been of any help to them; on the contrary, they have destroyed the beauty of the Himalayas, that's all. How can the Himalayas help you? You can leave the world, but you cannot leave your mind here. The mind will go with you; it is inside you. And wherever you are, your same mind will create the same kind of world around you. [....]

 

You can leave the world... you will be the same. You will again create the same world, because you carry the blueprint in your mind. It is not a question of leaving the world, it is a question of changing the mind, renouncing the mind. That's what meditation is and that's what sannyas is.

 

-Osho, “The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol 6, #4, Q4“