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Part X : 1987-1990 Poona-Two : Osho is ill
again, and nearly dies
From mid-September 1987, for two weeks Osho is again too ill
to give discourses. On 29 September, he returns to give discourses
for 5 days.
All these days that I have not been coming, I have been watching.
An ancient tree, just by the side of my house, has been dancing
in the rain, and its old leaves are falling with such grace and
such beauty. Not only is the tree dancing in the rain and the
wind, the old leaves leaving the tree are also dancing; there
is celebration.
Except man, in the whole existence nobody suffers from old age;
in fact, existence knows nothing about old age. It knows about
ripening; it knows about maturing. It knows that there is a time
to dance, to live as intensely and as totally as possible, and
there is a time to rest.
Those old leaves of the almond tree by the side of my house
are not dying; they are simply going to rest, melting and merging
into the same earth from which they have arisen. There is no sadness,
no mourning, but an immense peace in falling to rest into eternity.
Perhaps another day, another time they may be back again, in some
other form, on some other tree. They will dance again; they will
sing again; they will rejoice the moment. pilgr20
During the days you were not speaking, I was in a total emotional
and mind crisis. I got so much love, juice and energy from sitting
two times a day in discourse—and after you stopped speaking
my energy broke down.
It is going to happen to you—it is natural. But you have
to learn to transcend it. I cannot be always with you. I would
love to, but existence does not allow it. Existence gives only
so much rope, and it is good; otherwise you will start taking
me for granted.
One day I will not be amongst you. It is good that once in a while
I am absent, so you can start learning that what happens in my
absence is your reality. When I am with you, you become overwhelmed
with me. You forget yourself.
And you have not to forget yourself!
You have to remember yourself, because only through remembrance
you will be able to transform yourself.
It is natural; hence I am not condemning it. But you are in search
of something beyond—beyond the normal, the natural—something
transcendental. You have to learn the way, and the way has to
be traveled alone.
I cannot come with you. I can show you the way, I can show you
the moon. But my fingers are not the moon, and I cannot continue
to show you the moon. Sooner or later you have to forget my fingers
and you have to look at the moon yourself. You have to follow
the path alone.
Naturally when I was not coming daily, morning and evening, to
be with you, you started feeling a kind of breakdown. It was not
a breakdown; it was simply that your reality was surfacing. It
had not been getting the opportunity to surface. I was so much
with you that you had gone into the shadow, into the background.
I had become more real to you than yourself.
When I was not coming, in my absence your reality was exposed
to you. It is good, because unless you know what you are, where
you are, your pilgrimage cannot begin. So those days were of great
importance.
Remember: whatever you find within yourself, however much rubbish
it may be, it is your reality. It can be cleaned, it can be dropped;
you can move away from it. But before anything can be done about
it, you have to know it. That is the first and the most significant
thing. pilgr26
Never take me for granted.
I am simply alive just for you.
My work is finished and my boat has been waiting for long to take
me to the other shore, but your love and the fear that without
me, you may be lost…and you are coming so close, that if
I can manage to wait a little longer on this shore, I can give
all of my people what I have received from existence. But the
moment you take me for granted, immediately you forget, become
unconscious, create distance. pilgr18
I am laughing for you, speaking for you, living for you, but
it is not in any way making you obliged to me. It is just my joy.
You need not even be thankful towards me. It is out of my own
joy that I will continue to rejoice with you as long as existence
goes on giving me a little more time to linger on this shore.
My time is up, that is certain. It has been up for almost thirty-five
years. But existence is very understanding and very intelligent
and very compassionate. It knows that I am not living for myself.
And to take me away is not just taking me away, it is taking away
millions of people's laughter, their joy, their possibility of
flowering; and existence will not do it. It will allow me a longer
holiday. Nor am I in a hurry to reach to the other shore, because
I know both the shores are the same; one is on this side of the
river, the other is on the other side of the river. When you reach
the other side you know it is the same shore, there is nothing
different.
And existence understands certainly that my body or my mind
are no more a bondage to me. I am no more confined to them. I
am already free. Death is not an urgency to make me free. I will
continue until I penetrate into the deepest core of your being.
All that I have experienced I would love you also to experience.
Hence I am not keeping anything secret. chit21
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