Truth Of Life

Someone asked Osho – DOES TO BE HOPELESS INCLUDE BEING HOPELESS ABOUT YOU. HOW IS GROWTH POSSIBLE WITHOUT THIS HOPE?

Osho’s Answer: Hope is one of the greatest barriers because through hope dreams are created, through hope the future is created, through hope time exists. When I say become hopeless, I mean be here and now. If you hope, you have moved away from the herenow.

You postpone life through hope: you say, “Tomorrow I will live, when everything is put right.” When everything exists as you would like it to exist, when you have enough riches, power, money, prestige – then you will live. And you hope tomorrow it is going to be there. If not tomorrow then the day after tomorrow. If not this year then next year. And if not in this life then in the next life. In the East hope has been extended to its very logical end: thousands of lives waiting for you in the future. This is a trick of the mind. Once you allow the mind to hope, he has tripped you.

Life is only in this moment. Life has no other tense – it has only one tense: the present. Past is memory; it is not part of existence. It has gone; it is no longer there. Just imprints on the mind are carried, scratches in memory. Future does not exist; it has not come yet. Only this moment, this narrow moment, this small, atomic moment exists. If you have to live you have to live in this. If you want to miss life then you can live in hope.

When I say “hopeless” you can misunderstand me, because by “hopeless” you always mean: when some hope fails, you become hopeless. But when I use the word “hopeless” I am not meaning that some hope has failed: I am saying all hope, hope as such, has failed. Then you become really hopeless, and that is a beautiful moment. It is not a depressed state of affairs. It is not that you are sad.

You have felt hopeless many times – one hope fails. You were in love and the woman betrayed, or the man betrayed – one hope failed. But there are other women, other men; the hope can exist. It can search, seek; it can create new illusions. One illusion has failed – but you have not become disillusioned. You move on one path. There comes an end to it, there is nothing further, an abyss faces you: one path has failed, but there are millions of paths. Life is a labyrinth; you can move in other paths. You have not really become hopeless.

A man becomes hopeless when he faces the whole life in its totality and sees that there is nowhere to go, nothing to dream, nothing to hope for. In that hopelessness there is no sadness. One simply realizes the truth of life as it is. Not that life has failed! One simply realizes: “My hoping has failed.” And life does not allow anybody’s hopes. It does not follow anybody’s hopes; it does not fulfill anybody’s dreams. Life has not failed; only your hoping mind has failed. The mind stops functioning. For a moment it seems a disaster, everything collapses; but if you can live with this disaster, suddenly a new life arises in you – fresh, young, of this moment.

That life belongs to here-now. It does not move anywhere else. It has no motivation in it; it is, in a way, desireless. Not that it doesn’t enjoy – only it enjoys. When there is no desire, your whole energy becomes delight. You throb with happiness. You start participating in the celebration that is continuously going on; it is a continuum.

You were missing it only because you were dreaming. You were not part of it because you had created your private hopes. You had become an “idiot”: “idiot” means one who has private hopes. One who is not moving with the whole, who is trying to move alone in his own way, who is trying to put his will against the whole – he is the idiot. The root of the word “idiot” means private. Hopes are private; life is universal. Hopes are individual. Existence does not belong to any individual. All individuals belong to existence.

Have you observed that your dreams are the most private things in the world?

You cannot even invite a friend. You cannot even invite your beloved in your dreams. You have to be alone there. Why are dreams thought to be unreal?

Because they are private. You cannot call anybody else to become a witness to your dreams, that is impossible.

I have heard that one Pharaoh of Egypt, who was a little eccentric, as kings are almost always, a little neurotic – one day he dreamed and he saw one of his ministers in his dream. He was very angry. The next day he had an order proclaimed all over the kingdom that nobody is allowed to enter in his dreams.

This is trespassing; and if somebody is found trespassing, entering in his dreams, he will be immediately killed. And many people were killed later on because they entered in, his dreams.

Your dreams are yours – nobody can enter. And if somebody enters, it is you dreaming; not that he has entered. Dreams are private, absolutely private. That’s why they are unreal. Anything private is going to be unreal. The reality is universal. I can see the trees, you can also see the trees, but my dream-trees only I can see. I cannot ask you to come and become a witness. That’s why in the morning I myself feel it was just a dream, not real.

Your hopes are your hopes. When you become hopeless…. When I say “become hopeless,” “drop all hopes,” what I am saying is: let the whole hope; don’t create private desires. Otherwise you will always be in misery, always be in frustration.

Your hopes will never be fulfilled, because the whole has its own design. The whole has its own planning; the whole has its own destiny. The river is going towards the sea: and every drop in the river dreaming of going somewhere else.

How can that be fulfilled? The river will reach the ocean. Those drops will suffer frustration because they will not reach the destination that they were dreaming of.

A wise man is nothing but the drop who does not dream a private dream. An enlightened man is the man who flows with the whole, with the river. He says, “Wherever you are going, I am also going there. And why should I worry? The river is flowing; it must be going somewhere. That is not my worry.” The drop drops its worry: that is the moment of hopelessness, desirelessness. In that moment the drop became the river. In that moment, basically, the drop has become the ocean. In that moment the drop became the whole.

“Does to be hopeless include being hopeless about you?” Yes. If you hope, if you create hopes around me, you are creating your dreams. I am not a party to them.

It has to be remembered: I am not a party to them. You may be creating your dreams and desires, that is for you to decide. If you create you will be frustrated.

If you don’t create you start floating with me. That’s what surrender means, that’s what to be a disciple means: to float with the Master. If I say, “Drop hopes,” you drop; you float with me. If you have your private hopes then remember – when you are frustrated don’t blame me. I am not responsible.

Otherwise this seems to be very easy: you come hoping from the world where you have been frustrated, then you start hoping around me – desiring, dreaming, around me. I become an excuse for you to hope again. Then you start desiring again the same desires – now, with my help. No, I don’t help in that way. I help only if you want to become desireless, if you want to drop all hopes, if you want to drop yourself, the ego. That’s the only way I can help. I am not here to fulfill anybody’s desires and hopes. Drop them before frustration takes over; otherwise you will be unnecessarily angry at me. Remain alert about it; otherwise you will feel that I wasted your time, I destroyed your energy. If you don’t reach your private goals, of course, you will never be able to forgive me; but I am not a party to it.

If you are ready to float with me…. I am floating with the whole. If you are ready to float with me you will learn the way how to float with the whole. Then you can forget about me. A Master has to be dropped, finally. A Master, at the most, can be a door; he is not the goal. You pass through him, and you forgive and forget him. You move with the whole. Near a Master, in the presence of a Master, you learn the knack of floating with the whole.

Yes, I am included. When I teach you hopelessness I am included in it. Don’t hope about me, around me. I will never be a party to your private dreams, to your idiotikos.

“How is growth possible without this hope?” Growth is possible only without hope. You have not grown up because you have been hoping. You have remained children, childish. A child is allowed to dream – he is ignorant – to hope, to create the future. He is foolish. When maturity happens dreams have to be dropped; or, you drop the dreams, and maturity happens. What is maturity?

Maturity is to see the reality. Do not live in wish fulfillments.

Even religious, so-called religious, people live in dreams: they think of paradise for themselves and hell for others. Dreams… good dreams for themselves and nightmares for others. They are also childish.

Growth is possible only when there is no hope. Why? Because the same energy that moves in hopes has to be converted. The same energy has to be released for growth. That’s why all Buddhas say, “Don’t desire.” Not because they are against desiring, no – because they are for growth and the energy has to be released, freed from desires. Only then can it become inner growth.

Growth is in the present and desiring is in the future – they never meet. You grow here and now, never tomorrow. The trees are growing now and you are thinking, to grow tomorrow. The growth is always here-now. At this very moment growth is happening if it is happening at all. If it is not happening at this moment, how can it happen the next moment? From where will it come? Out of the blue? This moment will become the foundation for the next. Today will become the foundation for tomorrow. This life will become the foundation for the next life. If growth has been happening this moment, the next moment will take over; and you will start the next moment from that point, from that stage, that state and plane where this moment leaves you. That is the only way to grow.

This moment is the only moment to grow.

Have you watched that in the whole world – plants, birds, animals, mountains – only one moment, this moment, exists; and they are growing? Only man thinks of the future, and that’s how growth stops. The more you think of the future, the less is the possibility to grow. Growth is coming to terms with the reality that is happening this moment. And there is no other reality.

“How is growth possible without this hope?” Growth is possible only without hope.

I understand your problem. You are saying, “If we don’t hope then we will not hope about growth also. Then how will growth happen if we don’t hope and don’t desire?” Growth does not need your hoping, your desiring. Growth needs your understanding; growth needs your awareness. Awareness is enough. If you are aware in this moment, to whatsoever is happening, that awareness becomes the sun, and the tree of your being grows. That awareness becomes the water, the rain; and the tree of your being grows. That awareness becomes the food, the nutrition. That awareness is all that is needed for growth. A man grows because of awareness, not because of hopes.