Boredom

 

 

Question :

Osho,

Don’t you get bored, bored and fed up, day after day answering the same questions, while we sit there with ears blocked, eyes tight, mouth sealed, never ever getting the message — that there are no answers? You continually astound me in your dewdrop freshness in the early morning light, and still i am blind, deaf and lame, cut off from sharing in your radiance except for brief moments.

 

 

The first thing: I am not, so I cannot be bored and fed up. First you have to be to be bored. The more you are the more you will feel bored. The less you are the less bored. That’s why children are less bored than old people. Have you not observed it? Children are almost not bored. They go on playing with the same toys, they go on running after the same butterflies, they go on collecting the same seashells. They are not bored.

 

Have you ever told a story to a child? After listening to it he says, “Tell it again… and again.” And whenever you will meet him again he will say, “Tell me that story. I loved it.” Why is a child not bored? — because he is not. Or he is in a very rudimentary way; the ego has not evolved yet. The ego is the factor that creates boredom.

 

Animals are not bored, trees are not bored, and what novelty is there in the life of animals and trees? The rosebush goes on producing the same roses year in, year out, and the bird goes on singing the same song every morning and every evening. The cuckoo knows not many notes, just a single note. It goes on repeating it; it is monotonous. But not a single animal is bored, not a single tree is bored. Nature knows nothing of boredom. Why? — because nature has no ego yet.

 

A Buddha is not bored, a Jesus is not bored, because they have dropped the ego again. Nature has not evolved it yet, Buddha has dropped it. Buddha and nature are almost the same. I say almost because there is only one difference — of great significance, but only one difference. The difference is that of awareness. Nature is without ego but unaware, Buddha is without ego but aware.

 

Once you know you are not there, who is going to be bored? who is going to be fed up? That’s why I can come every morning and go on answering your questions. I am not bored. I cannot be bored. For almost twenty-five years I have not tasted boredom. I have started forgetting the very taste of it, how it feels.

 

The second thing: the questions are not the same. They cannot be — they come from different people, how can they be the same questions? Yes, sometimes the words may be the same, but the questions are not the same. Two persons are so different from each other — how can they ask the same question? Even if the words are the same, even if the construction of the question is the same, yet I would like you to be reminded — they can’t be the same.

 

Now this question is asked by Anand Shaila; nobody else can ask it. Nobody else upon this big earth can ask it. To ask this question a Shaila will be needed. And Shaila is only one; there are not many Shailas. So remember, each individual has such uniqueness. To call those questions the same is disrespectful. I respect your questions. They are not the same. They have nuances of their own, colors of their own, but you need very penetrating eyes to see the difference, otherwise you may not be able to see.

 

When you look around and you see all the trees are green, do you think it is the same green? Then you don’t know how to look at color. Then bring a painter, then ask the painter and he will say, “They are all different greens. There are thousands of types of greens — different shades, different nuances. No two trees are the same green.” Just look around and you will see — yes, each green is a different green.

 

So are questions. And even if the same person asks the question again and again, then too it cannot be the same, because you go on changing. Nothing is static. You cannot step in the same river twice, and you cannot meet the same person again. Shaila cannot ask this question tomorrow, because there will be no more the same person tomorrow. The Ganges will have flowed, much water will have gone down. This moment it is relevant, tomorrow it may not be relevant, something else may surface in the consciousness.

 

No two persons can ask the same question, and not even the same person can ask the same question again, because the person goes on changing. A person is like a flame, constantly changing. But again you have to look very deep. I have never come across the same questions. I am always thrilled by your questions. I always wonder how you manage to ask. “Don’t you get bored, bored and fed up, day after day answering the same questions while we sit here with ears blocked, eyes tight, mouths sealed, never ever getting the message that there are no answers?”

 

Just because you sit there “ears blocked, eyes tight, mouth sealed, never ever getting the message,” it becomes a challenge to me. It is a great adventure. You persist, I also persist. The question is: Who is going to win? Whether you will remain always closed or some day you will take pity on me and you will listen… open your ears, your heart, a little bit? It is a struggle. It is wrestling that goes on between the master and the disciple — a constant fight.

 

And the disciple cannot win. It has never been heard that he can win. He can postpone, he can delay, but he cannot win. And the more you delay the more your defeat becomes certain. I am encroaching on your being in different ways. You just go on sitting there with your closed ears and closed eyes and closed heart — you just remain there, that’s all. You just be here. Sooner or later, one day, you will have heard the message.

 

How long can you go on remaining closed? They say if a man persists in his folly he becomes wise. You persist. Some day, in spite of you, you will have heard. That’s why I go on speaking every morning, every evening, year in, year out. And you say, “… never ever getting the message — that there are no answers.” You will get that message only when there are no questions in your mind, never before that. How can you get the message that there are no answers if you have questions yet? The very question presupposes an answer. The question is the search for the answer. The question has taken it for granted that the answer exists, otherwise how will the question exist? The question cannot exist on its own, it depends on the answer or at least on the possibility of the answer.

 

The day you realize that there are no longer any questions in you, only that day will the message be heard that there are no answers. And that day you will see that neither you have asked nor I have answered. There has been utter silence. All that questioning and answering has been like a dream.

 

But because you question, I have to answer. That is the only way to help you to get rid of your questions. Remember, my answers are not answers but only devices. My answers are not answering your questions, because I know perfectly well that there are no questions. All questions are false. You have dreamed about them. But when you ask, I respect you. I answer. My answer is just a respect to you, and my answer is a device. It will help you to see that the question by and by disappears.

 

One day suddenly you will be awake with no questions. That day you will see that I have not answered a single thing. Nothing can be answered because there is not a single question in existence. Existence exists without any questions. It is a mystery — not a problem to be solved but a mystery to be loved, a mystery to be lived.

 

And Shaila says: “You continually astound me in Your dewdrop freshness in the early morning light and still I am blind, dead, lame, cut off from sharing in Your radiance except for brief moments.”

 

Those brief moments will do. Those brief moments are the hope. In those brief moments I will enter in you. Those brief moments will become bigger and bigger slowly. One day you will find those brief moments have won over you. Even if for a single moment there is a contact between me and you, it is enough, it is more than enough. Even that small insight will become a fire in you. That small spark is going to burn your whole mind utterly, to the very roots, root and all.

 

–Osho, “The Diamond Sutra, #8, Q2”