THE WAKING HAVE ONE WORLD IN COMMON;

 

SLEEPERS HAVE EACH A PRIVATE WORLD OF HIS OWN.

 

 

Dreams are private, absolutely private! Nobody can enter into your dream. You cannot share a dream with your beloved. Husbands and wives, they sleep on one bed but dream separately. It is impossible to share a dream because it is nothing — how can you share a nothing? Just like a bubble, it is absolutely nonexistential; you cannot share it, you have to dream alone.

 

That’s why, because of sleepers, so many sleepers, there exist so many worlds. You have your own world; if you are asleep you live enclosed in your own thoughts, concepts, dreams, desires. Whenever you meet another, two worlds clash; worlds in collision — this is what the situation is. Watch!

 

Look at a husband and a wife talking; they are not talking at all. The husband is thinking about the office, the salary; the wife is thinking about her dresses for Christmas. Inside they have their own private worlds, but their private worlds meet somewhere — clash rather — because the wife’s dresses will depend on the salary of the husband, and the husband’s salary has to provide for the wife’s dresses. The wife says, “Darling”, but behind the word darling are dresses; she is thinking about them. The “darling” doesn’t mean that which is written in the dictionary, because every time a woman says “darling” this is now just a facade and the husband immediately becomes afraid. He does not show it, of course, because when someone says “darling” you cannot show it. He says, “What is it, dear? How are you?” But he is afraid because he is thinking of his salary, and he knows Christmas is coming and there is danger.

 

Mulla Nasruddin’s wife was saying to him, “What has happened? Lately I even cry and weep and tears roll down my face and you don’t even ask, ‘Why are you weeping?'”

 

Nasruddin said, “Enough is enough! — it costs too much to ask. And in the past I have committed that mistake so many times, because those tears are not just tears — dresses, a new house, new furniture, a new car, many things are hidden behind those tears. Those tears are just a start.” No dialogue is possible because there are two private worlds inside. Only conflict is possible.

 

Dreams are private, truth is not private. Truth cannot be private — truth cannot be mine or yours, truth cannot be Christian or Hindu, truth cannot be Indian or Greek. Truth cannot be private. Dreams are private. Whatsoever is private, remember, it must belong to the world of dreams. Truth is an open sky, it is for all, it is one.

 

That’s why when Lao Tzu speaks, the language may be different; Buddha talks, the language is different; Heraclitus talks, the language is different — but they mean the same, they indicate towards the same. They don’t live in a private world. The private world has disappeared with their dreams, desires — with the mind. Mind has a private world but consciousness has no private worlds. The waking have one world in common… All those who are waking, they have one world in common — that is existence. And all those who are asleep and dreaming have their own worlds.

 

Your world has to be dropped; that is the only renunciation I require of you. I don’t say leave your wife, I don’t say leave your job, I don’t say leave your money; leave your anything, no! I simply say leave your private worlds of dreams. That is sannyas for me. The old sannyas was leaving this world, the visible. One goes to the Himalayas, leaves the wife and children; that is not the point at all. That is not the world to leave. How can you leave it? Even the Himalayas belong to this world. The real world which has to be renounced is the mind, the private dreaming world. If you renounce it, sitting in the market you are in the Himalayas. If you don’t renounce it, in the Himalayas also you will create a private world around you.

 

How can you escape yourself? Wherever you go you will be with yourself. Wherever you go you will behave in the same way. Situations may be different but how can you be different? You will be asleep in the Himalayas. What difference does it make whether you sleep in Poona or you sleep in Boston or you sleep in London or in the Himalayas? Wherever you are you will be dreaming. Drop dreaming! Become more alert. Suddenly dreams disappear, and with dreams all miseries disappear.

 

- Osho, “The Hidden Harmony, #2”