A parable…

 

Once in the garden of a Master there lived a monkey. And, as monkeys are curious people, he became very curious about the Master. He saw the Master sitting silently, doing nothing, and by and by he started coming close to him – what is this man doing? It was a mystery. Certainly, to a monkey, the most mysterious thing is somebody sitting silently, doing nothing.

 

Restlessness is just natural to a monkey, so resting in silence…? Has this man gone mad? By and by he started coming closer to watch him. The closer he came, the more he was surprised. Not only was the man silent but the space around him was tremendously quiet. Even the monkey could feel the vibe as he came closer.

 

Then he started loving the man, and just to be close to him became one of his hobbies. Whenever he could find the time and whenever the Master was sitting in the garden, he would come close and sit by his side.

 

One day he said to the master, ’What do you do? Please tell me also. I surrender to you. Accept me as a disciple.’

 

The Master looked at the monkey, felt great compassion for him, and said, ’I don’t do anything. You can also do it. It is non-doing. Sitting silently, the spring comes and the grass grows by itself. You simply sit silently. When the right moment comes, suddenly you are full of tremendous joy and peace and God. You are not supposed to do anything. Anything done on your part is a disturbance, creates ripples, creates waves. And when your mind is wavy God cannot enter. When the mind is a quiet surface, when everything is silent and calm, God enters. He enters through the door of silence – but that is possible only when you are not a doer. So you can do it, you can try it.’

 

The monkey shook his head. He said, ’It is impossible. I thought that if there was something I could do I would do it, but this is impossible. If you told me to fetch the moon I could bring it; if you told me to remove the Himalayas I could do it; if you told me to force the Ganges to run up-current I could do it – because in the old ancient days other monkeys like Hanuman have been known to do it. I am a monkey, I have the potentiality, I can also do it – but sitting silently, doing nothing? Sir, that is impossible. It is against my nature, it would drive me crazy. If God comes through silence then God is not for me and I am not for God.’

 

Human mind is nothing but a monkey. Man has not changed much. Charles Darwin says that man has evolved only on the surface – deep down man is as restless as other monkeys. Man has not evolved much. The real man is born only when your inner monkey completely disappears, utterly disappears.

 

To be a man means to be a no-mind. The constant chattering of the mind inside, the inner talk, the monologue, continues day and night, year in, year out, from birth to death. Whatsoever you are doing is irrelevant, it continues deep inside you. That chattering is the only thing that is irreligious, the only sin, the original sin. Once that chattering stops, miracles start happening to you. Such great mysteries become revealed that you cannot contain them. Such a vast sky starts pouring into you that you cannot believe it. It is incredible. You start expanding. Then the whole universe is something within you. Then you are not within the universe but the universe is within you. Then stars and moons and suns circle within your heart.

 

But if this happens without a Master you will go mad. It is mind that is holding you together. Whatsoever you are – even if you are a monkey – it is mind that is holding you together. The mind is your illness and also your normality. Because of the mind you are tethered to the earth. Without the mind you would not be tied anywhere. You would be so loose and so free you might disperse. Who would hold you? What would be your definition then? Mind gone, ego goes. The ego is the centre of the mind, the very heart of the monkey . Mind gone, greed is gone. Mind gone, ambition is gone. Mind gone, competition is gone. Mind gone, future and past are gone. Mind gone, Islam, Christianity, Hinduism, are gone. Mind gone, Indian, German, Chinese – nationalities are gone. Mind gone, the body is no more you. Your own mother is not your mother, your own father is not your father, your own son is no longer your son. All relationship disappears because the relationship exists in the mind.

 

Just think of a moment with the mind suddenly gone – where will you be? What will you be? You will lose all identity. You will simply melt and disappear, evaporate. It will be maddening… hence without the Master the path is very risky. And when the glimpse of the beyond comes to you for the first time it will shatter you and you will not be able to see the positivity of it – you will see just the negativity of it. You will see what it has taken away from YOU, YOU will not be able to see what it is giving you. Naturally you are acquainted with your past and the past is going away, fast You will simply see yourself as disappearing.

 

And for the new that is being born you don’t as yet have any language; for the new that is being born you don’t as yet have any concept. The new that is being born is invisible cannot be touched, cannot be heard, cannot be smelled cannot be tasted. It is beyond senses. You have never before known the new that is happening so how will you recognise it? The new will not be recognised and the old will be disappearing so you will feel yourself going mad, falling apart dying. Death will be your experience or madness will be your experience. You will think that this is a curse that has happened to you. The blessing will look like a curse because you cannot yet see it as a blessing, your eyes are not trained or it. You can only see the curse, you can only see the negative part of it. This is what Christian mystics call ’the dark night of the soul’ – the light is so blinding it almost looks like darkness.

 

Have you not looked directly into the sun sometimes? Within seconds you will go blind, you will not be able to see It will be so dazzling. It is not dark but the light is too much for you and your eyes are not able to take it in, they cannot absorb it. And, after looking at the sun for a few seconds if you look around everywhere, you will find a tremendous darkness. If you look long enough at the sun you will go blind.

 

Why is light blinding? Why? Because we have certain capacities. Only in tiny capacities can we allow the light to enter in – and we can recognise only that much. Beyond that we lose recognition. That’s how it happens that when you first enter into the world of no-mind it looks like madness – the dark night of the Soul, the mad night of the soul.

 

All the religions have noted the fact, hence all the religions insist on finding a Master before you start entering into the world of the no-mind – because he will be there to help you, to support you. You will be falling apart but he will be there to encourage you, to give you hope. He will be there to interpret the new to you. That is the meaning of a Master: to interpret that which cannot be interpreted, to indicate that which cannot be said, to show that which is inexpressible. He will be there, he will devise methods and ways for you to continue on the path – otherwise you might start escaping from it.

 

And remember, there is no escape. If you start escaping you will simply go berserk. Sufis call such people the MASTAS. In India they are known as mad PARAMAHANSAS. You cannot go back because it is no longer there, and you cannot go ahead because it is all dark. You are stuck. That’s why Buddha says, ’Fortunate is the man who has found a Master.’

 

I myself was not as fortunate as you are; I was working without a Master. I searched and I could not find one. It was not that I had not searched, I had searched long enough, but I could not find one. It is very rare to find a Master, rare to find a being who has become a non-being, rare to find a presence who is almost an absence, rare to find a man who Is simply a door to the divine, an open door to the divine which will not hinder you, through which you can pass. It is very difficult .

 

The Sikkhas call their temple the GURUDWARA, the door of the Master. That is exactly what the Master is – the door. Jesus says again and again, ’I am the gate, I am the way, I am the truth. Come follow me, pass through me. And unless you pass through me you will not be able to reach.’

 

Yes, sometimes it happens that a person has to work without a Master. If the Master is not available then one has to work without a Master, but then the journey is very hazardous. For one year I was also in the same state that this parable talks about. For one year it was almost impossible to know what was happening. For one year continuously it was even difficult to keep myself alive. Just to keep myself alive was a very difficult thing – because all appetite disappeared.

 

Days would pass and I would not feel any hunger, days would pass and I would not feel any thirst. I had to force myself to eat, force myself to drink. The body was so non-existential that I had to hurt myself to feel that I was still in the body. I had to knock my head against the wall to feel whether my head was still there or not. Only when it hurt would I be a little in the body.

 

Every morning and every evening I would run for five to eight miles. People used to think that I was mad. Why was I running so much? Sixteen miles a day! It was just to feel myself, to feel that I still was, not to lose contact with myself – just to wait until my eyes became attuned to the new that was happening.

 

And I had to keep myself close to myself. I would not talk to anybody because everything had become so inconsistent that even to formulate one sentence was difficult. In the middle of the sentence I would forget what I was saying in the middle of the way I would forget where I was going. Then I would have to come back. I would read a book – I would read fifty pages – and then suddenly I would remember, ’What am I reading? I don’t remember at all.’ My situation was such.

 

The door of the psychiatrist’s office burst open and a man rushed in.

 

’Doctor!’ he cried. ’You’ve got to help me. I’m sure I’m losing my mind. I can’t remember anything – what happened a year ago, or even what happened yesterday. I must be going crazy!’

 

’Hmmmmmmm,’ pondered the headshrinker. ’Just when did you first become aware of this problem?’

 

The man looked puzzled, ’What problem?’

 

This was my situation! Even to complete a full sentence was difficult. I had to keep myself shut in my room. I made it a point not to talk, not to say anything, because to say anything was to say that I was mad. For one year it persisted. I would simply lie on the floor and look at the ceiling and count from one to a hundred then back from a hundred to one. Just to remain capable of counting was at least something. Again and again I would forget. It took one year for me to gain a focus again, to have a perspective.

 

It happened. It was a miracle. But it was difficult. There was nobody to support me, there was nobody to say where I was going and what was happening. In fact, everybody was against it my teachers, my friends, my well-wishers. All were against it. But they could not do anything, they could only condemn, they could only ask what I was doing.

 

I was not doing anything! Now it was beyond me; it was happening. I had done something, unknowingly I had knocked at the door, now the door had opened. I had been meditating for many years, just sitting silently doing nothing, and by and by I started getting into that space, that heartspace, where you are and you are not doing anything, you are simply there, a presence, a watcher.

 

You are not even a watcher because you are not watching – you are just a presence. Words are not adequate because whatsoever word is used it seems as if it is being done. No, I was not doing it. I was simply Lying, sitting, walking – deep down there was no doer. I had lost all ambition; there was no desire to be anybody, no desire to reach anywhere – not even God, not even nirvana. The Buddha-disease had completely disappeared. I was simply thrown to myself.

 

It was an emptiness and emptiness drives one crazy. But emptiness is the only door to God. That means that only those who are ready to go mad ever attain, nobody else. But if you have a Master things are simple. He can hold your hand when you are losing all track of your being. He can become your support. If you love your Master that love Will be the last link. Every link disappears but that link remains. It disappears only when you have attained your own perspective, your own clarity. It is just like an umbilical cord. The child lives through the mother in the womb for nine months and if you cut the umbilical cord he will die He lives through it. That is the only link.

 

In exactly the same way, if you love the Master, a subtle silver cord arises between you and the Master – a very invisible phenomenon to others but very visible to the disciple. He can almost touch it. You become joined together with your Master from your navel. The Master is your mother, the Master is your womb. And this umbilical cord, this invisible silver cord, remains nursing you until you are ready and the pregnancy is ripe, until you are ready to be reborn and you can breathe on your own.

 

The Master is a must. If you can find one you are fortunate. Then he will interpret to you and the darkness will look like light, the illness will look like a new well-being; the curse he will transform into a blessing. In fact, it is a blessing but you interpret it as a curse. He is not doing anything, he is simply showing you what the case is.

 

- Osho, “Tao: The Pathless Path, Vol 2, #9″