Take the risk

Question 1

The ego is the greatest dilemma, and it has to be understood. Otherwise you can go on and on, ad infinitum, creating a new ego fighting with the old.

What exactly is the ego? It is topdogging yourself. It is creating a division in yourself -- the division of the topdog and the underdog, the division of the superior and the inferior, the division of the saint and the sinner, the division of good and bad, the division, basically, of God and devil. And you go on getting identified with the beautiful, with the hither, with the superior: and you go on condemning the lower.

If this division exists, then whatsoever you do there is an ego: you can drop it, and by dropping it you can create a superego. Then by and by the superego will start creating trouble for you, because all division is misery. Nondivision is bliss: division is misery. It will create new problems, new anxieties. Then again you can drop the superego and you can create a supersuperego -- ad infinitum you can go on. And this is not going to solve the problem. You are simply shifting it.

You are simply forcing it back. You are trying to avoid the problem.

I have heard about one Catholic who was a fanatic believer in the Virgin Mary and God and the Catholic theology. Then he got fed up, and then he dropped it and he became an atheist; and then he started saying, "There is no God, and Mary is his mother."

Now the same old thing, and it has become even more absurd.

I have heard about a Jew, a very simple man, a tailor in a small town.

One day he was not found in the temple. It was a religious day, and he had always been there, but lately rumors were spreading in the town that he has become an atheist. So the whole town was agog. It was a great event the tailor has turned atheist. It has never happened in that town; nobody has ever turned atheist. So the whole town went to the tailor's shop. They asked him, but he didn't say anything. He remained silent.

Another day they again approached him, because it became almost impossible to do anything in the town. The whole town was concerned about the tailor -- Why has he become an atheist? So they made a deputation, and the shoemaker of the town, who was a little aggressive, became the leader. They came to the tailor's shop, and the shoemaker went to him and asked. "Have you become an atheist?"

The tailor simply said. "Yes, I have become an atheist."

They could not believe their ears. They were not hoping that he would give such an outright answer, so they said, "Then why did you remain quiet yesterday?"

He said, "What! What do you mean! Should I accept that I have become an atheist on the day of the sabbath?"

Even if you become an atheist your old pattern continues.

I have heard about one atheist who was dying. The priest had come, and the priest said to the atheist, "Now this is time. Make peace with your God."

The atheist opened his eyes, said, "Thank God that I am an atheist."

It continues. You remain almost the same; only labels change.

Please, try to understand the ego. Don't create a superego. Just try to understand what this ego is.

Ego is a separation from the whole: thinking of yourself that you are separate from the whole. It is just a thought, not a reality. Just a fiction, not a truth. It is just a dream that you have created around yourself. You are not separate from the whole. You cannot be, because once you are separate you cannot exist. Then the life energy goes on flowing in you whether you think you are separate or not.

The whole doesn't bother about it. It goes on feeding and nursing you. It goes on "fueling" you.

But your idea that you are separate creates many anxieties in its wake. Once you think you are separate from the whole, immediately, you create a division inside also. All that is natural in you becomes inferior -- because it seems to belong to the whole. Sex becomes inferior because it seems to belong to the organic unity of the whole.

That's why all religions go on condemning sex. And I say to you unless sex is totally accepted nobody can become really religious, because religion is the transformation of the same energy. It is not a denial; it is a deep acceptance. Yes, it is a transformation. But transformation comes through deep acceptance.

Nature accepted becomes totally different. Nature denied, and everything goes sour and bitter in you; and then you create a hell.

The ego is always happy to condemn something because only by condemnation can you feel superior.

It happened:

Once in a church, the vicar in the pulpit said, "Stand up all who sinned last week." Half the congregation stood up. Then he said, "Stand up those who would have sinned if they had had the chance." The remainder of the congregation stood up.

A woman whispered to her husband, "It looks as if the vicar is the only good person here."

The bloke said, "Don't you believe it. He stood up before any of us."

The superego, which goes on condemning: the superego, which goes on telling you this is sin, this is evil, this is wrong, this is bad: is itself the only evil in the world, the only sin. So what to do? You can start condemning ego itself: then you will create a superego. Drop condemnation -- all condemnation -- and ego disappears without creating any superego in the wake. Drop all condemnation.

Who are you to judge? Who are you to say what is right and what is wrong?

Who are you to divide existence in two? Existence is one -- one organic unity. It is all one: day and night -- one: good and bad -- one. These divisions are of the ego, of man they are man-made. Just don't condemn.

If you condemn you will go on creating something or other. Stop condemning and see you will find there is no ego left. So ego is not the real problem. The real problem is condemnation, judgment, division. Forget about the ego, because whatsoever you will do with the ego will create another ego.

There are as many egos as there are persons. Somebody has a very worldly ego, and then somebody has a very religious ego. Somebody goes on saying how much he possesses, and then somebody says how much he has renounced.

A so-called saint was dying, and the disciples had gathered. Those were the last moments, and they were talking near the bed, talking about their Master.

Somebody said, "Never again will there be a man who was so moral." Then somebody else said, "I have learned much. I have never come across a man who knows so much. We will miss him for ever and ever." Then somebody else said something else: somebody said that "he has renounced the whole world". And in this way they were talking, talking about their Master who was going to die. They talked about his knowledge, they talked about his renunciation, they talked about his ascetic ways, they talked about his disciplined character: and then the dying Master opened his eyes and he said, "Nobody is saying anything about my humbleness?"

Then humbleness becomes the ego. Then humility becomes the garb of the ego.

Then ego becomes pious. And when any poison becomes pious it becomes more poisonous.

So if you understand me rightly, please don't start condemning the ego.

Otherwise you will create a superego, and then you will feel a disquiet because divided, continuously topdogging yourself, how can you be at ease? Drop condemnation. Stop topdogging yourself. Accept yourself as you are. Not only accept, welcome. Not only welcome, rejoice in it. And suddenly you will see there is no ego, there is no superego. They have never been there. You were creating them: you were the creators of them.

Man has created only one thing, and that is ego. Everything else is created by God. 

 

 

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