is not boring, but the mind is boring. And we create such a mind, such a strong mind, like the Wall of China around ourselves. It does not allow life to enter into us. It disconnects us from life. We become isolated, encapsulated, windowless. Living behind a prison wall you don’t see the morning sun, you don’t see the birds on the wing, you don’t see the sky in the night full of stars. And, of course, you start thinking that life is boring. Your conclusion is wrong. You are in the wrong space; you are living in the wrong context.
You must be a religious person, because to make life boring one has to be religious. One has to be very scholarly. One has to know Christianity, Hinduism, Islam. One has to learn much from the Vedas and the Koran and the Bible. You must be very well-informed. A man who is too well-informed, too knowledgeable, creates such a thick wall of words, futile words, empty words around himself so that he becomes incapable of seeing life. Knowledge is a barrier to life.
Put aside your knowledge! And then look with empty eyes. Life is a constant surprise. I am not talking about some divine life; the ordinary life is so extraordinary. In small incidents you will find the presence of godliness; a child giggling, a dog barking, a peacock dancing. But you can’t see if your eyes are covered with knowledge. The poorest man in the world is the man who lives behind a curtain of knowledge.
The poorest are those who live through the mind. The richest are those who have opened the windows of no-mind and approached life with no-mind.
This is not only your experience. You are not alone in it. In fact, the majority of people will agree with you. They don’t find any surprise anywhere. And each moment there are surprises and surprises because life is never the same. It is constantly changing and it takes such unpredictable turns. How can you remain unaffected by the very wonder of it? The only way to remain unaffected is to cling to your past, to your experience; to your knowledge, to your memories, to your mind. Then you cannot see that which is. You go on missing the present.
Miss the present and you live in boredom. Be in the present and you will be surprised that there is no boredom at all. Start by looking around a little more like a child. Be a child again! That’s what meditation is all about, being a child again – a rebirth, being innocent again, not-knowing. That’s what we were talking about the other day. The master said: “Not knowing is the most intimate.”
Yes, you must have become very alienated from life, hence boredom. You have forgotten the intimacy, the immediacy. You are no longer bridged. Knowledge functions as a wall, innocence functions as a bridge.
Start looking around like a child again; go to the seashore and start collecting seashells again. See a child collecting seashells, as if he has found a mine of diamonds. So thrilled he is! See a child making sand castles. How absorbed he is, utterly lost, as if there is nothing more important than making sand castles. See a child running after a butterfly…and be a child again. Start running after butterflies again. Make sand castles, collect seashells.
Don’t live as if you know. You know nothing! All that you know is about and about. The moment you know something, boredom disappears. Knowing is such an adventure that boredom cannot exist. With knowledge, of course it can exist. With knowing it cannot exist.
Let me remind you, I am not talking about some divine knowledge, some esoteric knowledge; I am simply talking about this life. Just look around with a little more clarity, with a little more transparency, and life is hilarious!
A downtown store in New York featured a plaque in its window reading “Buy American.” Printed in small letters at the bottom was “Made in Japan.”
Just start looking around a little more carefully.
A German in the Soviet Zone reported to the police that his parrot was missing. He was asked whether the parrot talked.
“Yes,” he replied, “but any political opinions he expresses are strictly his own.”
Molly, aged seventy-nine, complained of abdominal swelling and pain to the doctor. He examined her thoroughly, put her through a series of laboratory tests, and then announced the results.
“The plain fact, madam,” said the medical man, “is that you are pregnant.”
“That’s impossible!” said Molly, “Why, I am seventy-nine years old and my husband, although he still works, is eighty-six!” The doctor insisted. So the aging mother-to-be pulled over his desk telephone and dialed her husband’s office. When he was on the line she shouted, “You old goat, you have got me pregnant!”
“Please,” quavered the old man, “who did you say was calling?”
The third question:
Osho,
I know you want us all to rid ourselves of our egos and minds, and in my case, I know that this is very necessary, but for those of us who will be returning to the West, would not a total absence of mind or ego make life much more difficult?
Joyce, when I say to drop the ego, drop the mind, I don’t mean that you cannot use the mind any more. In fact, when you don’t cling to the mind you can use it in a far better, far more efficient way because the energy that was involved in clinging becomes available. And when you are not continuously in the mind, twenty-four hours a day in the mind, the mind also gets a little time to rest.
Do you know, even metals need rest, even metals get tired? So what to say about this subtle mechanism of the mind? It is the most subtle mechanism in the world. In such a small skull, you are carrying such a complicated bio-computer that no computer made by man is yet capable of competing with it. The scientists say a single man’s brain can contain all the libraries of the world and yet there will be space enough to contain more.
And you are continuously using it, uselessly, unnecessarily! You have forgotten how to put it off. For seventy, eighty years it remains on; working, working, tired. That’s why people lose intelligence, for the simple reason that they are so tired. If the mind can have a little rest, if you can leave the mind alone for a few hours every day, if once in a while you can give the mind a holiday, it will be rejuvenated. It will come out more intelligent, more efficient, more skillful.
So I am not saying that you are not to use your mind, but don’t be used by the mind. Right now the mind is the master and you are only a slave.
Meditation makes you a master and the mind becomes a slave. And remember, the mind as a master is dangerous because, after all, it is a machine. But the mind as a slave is tremendously significant, useful. A machine should function as a machine, not as a master. Our priorities are all upside down. Your consciousness should be the master.
So whenever you want to use it, in the East or in the West, use it! Of course you will need it in the marketplace. But when you don’t need it… When you are resting at home by the side of your swimming pool or in your garden, there is no need. Put it aside. Forget all about it! Then just be.
And the same is the case with the ego. Don’t be identified with it, that’s all. Remember that you are part of the whole, you are not separate from it.
That does not mean that if somebody steals from your house, you have simply to watch because you are just part of the whole and he is also part of the whole, so, what is wrong? And somebody takes money from your pocket, so, there is no problem. The other’s hand is as much yours as his! I am not saying that.
Remember, you are part of the whole so that you can relax, merge. Once in a while you can be utterly
