Jonas Anger

Be Ignorant

Trusting oneself and stop doing Imitation

It is better to be ignorant; at least the ignorance is yours. It is authentic, it is real, sincere and honest! Don’t go on with borrowed knowledge. Otherwise you will forget that you are ignorant, and you will remain ignorant.

Always try to know something in a way that is fresh, direct, immediate. Don’t believe in anyone. Your belief will lead you astray. Trust yourself – and if you cannot trust yourself, how can you trust anybody else?

Sariputta came to Buddha, and he said, ”I have come to believe in you. I have come! Help me to build faith in you.”

Buddha is reported to have said, ”If you don’t believe in yourself, how can you believe in me? So forget me. First have trust in yourself, believe in yourself. Only then can you have trust in someone else.”

So remember this: you cannot trust anybody if you cannot even trust yourself. The first trust is always within. Only then can it flow; only then can it overflow, it can reach to others. But how can you trust if you don’t know anything?

How can you trust in yourself if you don’t have any experience? Try to trust in yourself. Don’t think that this experience of looking through others’ eyes is only with the absolute. It is with ordinary experiences also. But let them be your own. They will help you to grow, they will make you mature, they will make you ripened.

This is really strange: you look with others’ eyes, you live with others’ lives. You call a rose beautiful. Really, is it your feeling or just a teaching that is spread around you that a rose is beautiful? Is this – your knowing? Have you – known it? You say that moonlight is good, beautiful. Is it your knowing, or is it just that poets have been singing about it and you are repeating it? If you are like a parrot, you cannot live your life authentically.

Whenever you assert anything and whenever you say anything, first check within whether it is your knowledge and your experience. Throw out all that is not yours – it is of no use – and cherish and mother all that is yours, because only through that will you grow.

Always remember “in reality.” Do something. Have you done anything ever, or have you been just following others, just following orders? “Love your wife”: have you really loved her? Or are you just doing a duty because it has been said, because it has been taught, “Love your wife – or love your mother, love your father, love your brother,” so you are loving and you are following!

Have YOU really loved any time when you were there? Was it ever the case that no teaching was working and no other was being followed? Were you ever authentically in love? You can deceive yourself; you can say, “Yes!” But find out before you say anything. If you have loved, you would be transformed; the particular act of love would have changed you. But it has not changed you because your love is false.

Always remember, no matter what you are doing, observe whether your center is involved in it or not, because if it is not involved it is better not to do a thing. Don’t do it! No one is forcing you to do anything. Don’t do it! Preserve your energy for the moment when something real happens to you; then do it. Don’t smile, preserve the energy.

The smile will come, and then it will change you completely. Then it will be total. Then every cell of your body will smile. Then it will be an explosion – nothing painted.