Just A Quantum Leap
First, don’t console yourself. Consolation is not the way to real understanding. It is true that there is nothing that you can do, but this can be just a consolation, a kind of defeatism. Then it is untrue. Even a truth can be used as a lie; it all depends on you. This is just in your mind: “What can I do? So I have to wait.” But your waiting will be impotent because it will be out of a kind of defeatism, out of a kind of pessimism.
There is another kind of waiting which is not impotent, a waiting which is aflame, a waiting which is passionate, a waiting which is prayerful, a waiting which does not come as a consolation but comes as an understanding.
What is understanding? Understanding is: “I cannot do on my own, but existence can do through me.” And any time is the right time, and any season is the right season. There are not seasons when enlightenment happens, just as it happens that in the spring all flowers bloom. If there were seasons when enlightenment happened, then many people would have become enlightened when Buddha became enlightened, then many people would have become enlightened when I became enlightened. There are not seasons. As far as enlightenment is concerned, it is always spring, it is always the right season. But why is it not happening to you?
And I say waiting is the only thing that can be done. But remember, it has to be a waiting full of prayer, full of longing, of a great intensity – not impotent, not lethargic – waiting with a very, very active energy, not just passivity. These are two different kinds of waitings.
When you wait for your beloved there is no passivity: you are all aflame, you are full of energy. In fact you are never so full of energy as when you are waiting for your beloved. You are all awareness. Just a dead leaf moves in the wind on the road, and you rush, and you open the door – “Maybe she has come?” A postman passes by and his footsteps are heard, and you run – “Maybe she has come!” Everything, every sound, becomes her sound. The wind comes and knocks on the door, and you run – “So she has come!” It is not lethargy, you are not lying down on your bed. You are very, very actively waiting.
My feeling is that the questioner is in a kind of defeatism, pessimism, lethargy. If you are waiting in lethargy it will not happen. Then no season is spring.
The energy has to be totally there, vibrating, pulsating, streaming – and yet you are waiting, you are not doing anything. What can you do? What can be done? Man as himself is tiny, but man can pray, man can cry and weep. Let your waiting be full of tears, let your waiting be full of prayerfulness. Let your waiting be not just passive but immensely, intensely active. That is the doing that is needed. You will have to make the distinction very clearly. The real opposition is not between waiting and doing. The real opposition is between active waiting and passive waiting. Active waiting and passive waiting are the enemies. Doing and non-doing are not the enemies.
Excerpted From The Wisdom of the Sands, Vol. 1 CH: 8
