Yoga Sutra 35 Life Is Fantastic

The same happens to sound: THIS PRINCIPLE ALSO EXPLAINS THE DISAPPEARANCE OF SOUND.

When the yogi concentrates on the innermost tanmatra of his ear, all sounds are absorbed. And when sounds are absorbed, the very presence of the yogi will give you a certain hunch of silence around you. If you go to a yogi suddenly you will see you are entering into silence. He creates no sound around him. On the contrary, all the sounds that fall on him are absorbed. And this happens to all his senses. He becomes invisible in many ways.

These are the criterions when you come to meet a yogi. These are the criterions.

Not that he is trying to do them. He will not do them; he avoids them. But sometimes they happen. Sometimes sitting with a Master….

It has happened to many people who are with Osho; they write to him. Just the other day there was a question, “Watching you, what happens? Am I going crazy? Sometimes you disappear.” Osho’s answer: If you go on watching me there will be moments when you will see me disappearing. Listening to my words, if you go on concentrating on them, suddenly you will become aware that they are coming out of silence. And when you feel that, then you have felt me, not before it.

Not that anything is being done. In fact the yogi never does anything. He simply remains in his being and things go on happening. In fact he avoids, but still, sometimes, things happen. Miracles follow. There are no miracles, but miracles follow one who has attained to samadhi; they go on happening. Like a shadow they follow the man who has attained to inner space.

This is what I call the science of religion. Patanjali has laid the foundation. Much has to be done. He has just given the bare structure – much has to be filled in the gaps. It is just a concrete structure. The walls have to be raised, rooms have to be made. You cannot live in a bare, concrete structure. It has yet to be made into a house, but he has given the basic structure.

Five thousand years and the basic structure has remained basic: it has not yet become the abode of man. Man is not ready yet.

Man goes on playing with toys, and the real goes on waiting – waiting that whenever you become mature enough you will use it. Nobody else is responsible for it; we are responsible. Each human being is responsible for this vast sleepiness that surrounds earth. As I see it it is like a fog surrounding the whole earth, and man is fast asleep.

I have heard, one day it happened. One very diligent reformist inquired of a man who was staggering blindly drunk along the road, “You poor man, what drives you to drink this way?”

The happy drunk slurred, “No one drives me, lady. I am a volunteer.”

Voluntarily, man is in the darkness. Voluntarily, you are in the darkness.

Nobody has forced you to be there. This is your responsibility to come out of it.

Don’t go on blaming Satan and the devil that they have been corrupting you.

There is nobody who is corrupting you. It is you. And once you are sleepy everything that you see is distorted – everything that you touch is distorted everything that comes in your hands becomes dirty.

Two drunks were walking home along a railway line, stepping unsteadily from sleeper to sleeper. Suddenly the one in front said, “Ah, Trevor, damn it if these aren’t the longest flight of stairs I ever did crawl up.”

His friend called back, “I don’t mind the stairs, George, but the low banisters are hell.”

We go on drunk, drunk with the ego, drunk with possessions, drunk with things, ignorant of the reality; and whatsoever we see is distorted. This distortion creates the world of illusion. The world is not illusory. It is because of our drunk minds the world is illusory. Once our drunkenness disappears, the world shines forth as a tremendously beautiful phenomenon – the world becomes God.

God and the world are not two. They appear as two because we are asleep. Once you are awake they are one. And once you see the marvelous beauty that is surrounding you, all sadness, all despair, all anguish disappears. Then you live in a totally different dimension of benediction.

Yoga is nothing but a way to look at the world with alert eyes… and the world becomes God. There is no need to search for God anywhere else. In fact forget about God – just become more alert. In your alertness God is born; in your sleep he is lost. God is not lost; only you are lost. In your sleep you forget who you are.

Samadhi is awareness, coming to its crescendo. Samadhi is a silence, coming to flowering. Everyone can attain it because it is everyone’s birthright. If you have not claimed it, it is for you. It remains unclaimed, waiting.

Don’t waste more time anymore. Use every little bit of life and time that you have for one purpose constantly that you become more and more aware.

I will tell you one story: Two Jewish women, Sarah and Amy, met after twenty years. They had been together in college and they had been great friends, but for twenty years they had not seen each other. They hugged each other, they kissed each other.

And Sarah said, “Amy, how have you been?”

“Just fine. And it is good to see you. How has the world been treating you, Sarah?”

“Would you believe that when Harry and I got married he took me on a honeymoon for three months in the Mediterranean and a month in Israel? What do you think of it?”

“Fantastic,” Amy said.

“We came back home and he showed me the new house that he bought for me – sixteen rooms, two swimming pools, a new Mercedes. What do you think of that, Amy?”

“Fantastic.”

“And now for our twentieth anniversary he gave me a diamond ring, ten karats.”

“Fantastic.”

“And now We are going to go on a cruise around the world.”

“Oh, that’s fantastic.”

“Oh, Amy, I have been talking so fast about what Harry did and has been doing for me. I forgot to ask what your Abe has done for you.”

“Oh, we have had a good life together.”

“But what has he done special?”

“He sent me to charm school.”

“Sent you to charm school? What did you go to charm school for?”

“To teach me how to say ‘fantastic’ instead of ‘bullshit.’” That’s all yoga is all about – to make you aware of the fantastic. It is right by the corner waiting for you, and you are drowned in bullshit. Unhook yourself, loosen yourself out of it. Enough is enough.

And this decision cannot be taken by anybody else. You have to decide. It is your decision the way you are. It is going to be your decision if you want to change and be transformed.

Life is fantastic; only that much can I say to you. And it is just around and you are missing it. There is no need to miss anymore.

And yoga is not a belief system. It is a methodology, a scientific methodology, how to attain the fantastic.