Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega Vol 5, Chapter #10, Question 2 Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega Vol 5, Chapter #10, Question 2
Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega Vol 5,... 
turiya
3 y
513
Question #2:
It has been said that in times of great stress - social, economic, religious - that great good is possible. Could we be at such an inflection point of consciousness?
A time of crisis is a very valuable time. When everything is established and there is no crisis things are dead. When nothing is changing and the grip of the old is perfect, it is almost impossible to change yourself. When everything is in a chaos, nothing is static, nothing is secure, nobody knows what is going to happen the next moment -- in such a chaotic moment -- you are free, you can change. You can attain to the innermost core of your being.
It is just like in a prison: when everything is settled it is almost impossible for any prisoner to get out of it, to escape from the prison. But just think: there has been an earthquake and everything is disturbed and nobody knows where the guards are and nobody knows where the jailer is, and all rules have dissolved, and everybody is running on his own -- in that moment if a prisoner is a little alert he can escape very easily; if he is foolish, only then will he miss the opportunity.
When the society is in a turmoil and everything is in crisis, a chaos pervades -- this is the moment, if you want, you can escape from the prison. It is so easy because nobody is guarding you, nobody is after you. You are left alone. Things are in such a shape that everybody is bothering about his own business -- nobody is looking at you. This is the moment. Don't miss that moment.
In great crisis periods, always, much enlightenment has happened. When the society is established and it is almost impossible to rebel, to go beyond, not to follow the rules, enlightenment becomes very, very difficult -- because it is freedom; it is anarchy. In fact it is moving away from society and becoming individual. The society doesn't like individuals: it likes robots who just look like individuals but are not individuals. The society doesn't like authentic being. It likes masks, pretenders, hypocrites, but not real persons because a real person is always trouble. A real person is always a free person. You cannot enforce things on him; you cannot make a prisoner out of him; you cannot enslave him. He would like to lose his life, but he would not like to lose his freedom. Freedom is more valuable to him than life itself. Freedom is the highest value for him. That's why in India we have called the highest value moksha, nirvana; those words mean freedom -- total freedom -- absolute freedom.
Whenever society is in a turmoil and everybody is tending his own business -- has to tend -- escape. In that moment the doors of the prison are open, many cracks are in the walls, the guards are not on duty... one can escape easily.
The same situation was at the time of Buddha, twenty-five centuries before. It always comes in a circle; the circle completes in twenty-five centuries. Just as a circle completes in one year -- again summer comes back, one year's circle and the summer is back -- there is a great circle of twenty-five centuries. Every time after twenty-five centuries, the old foundations dissolve; the society has to lay new foundations. The whole edifice becomes worthless; it has to be demolished. Then economic, social, political, religious -- all systems -- are disturbed. The new is to be born; it is a birth pain.
There are two possibilities. One, one is the possibility that you may start fixing the old falling structure: you may become a social servant and you may start making things more stable. Then you miss, because nothing can be done: the society is dying. Every society has a life-span and every culture has a life-span.
As a child is born and we know the child will become a youth, will become old, and will die -- seventy years, eighty years, at the most a hundred years -- every society is born, is young, becomes old, ha s to die. Every civilization that is born has to die. These critical moments are moments of the death of the past, the old; moments of the birth of the new. You should not bother; you should not start supporting the old structure -- it is going to die. If you are supporting, you may be crushed under it. This is one possibility: that you start supporting the structure. That is not going to work. You will miss the opportunity.
Then there is another possibility: you may start a social revolution to bring the new. Then, too, again you will miss the opportunity, because the new is going to come. You need not bring it. The new is already coming -- don't bother about it; don't become a revolutionary. The new will come. If the old is gone nobody can force it to remain, and if the new is there and the time has reached and the child is ripe in the womb, the child is going to be born. You need not try any Caesarean operation. The child is going to be born; don't bother about it. Revolution goes on happening by itself; it is a natural phenomenon. No revolutionaries are needed. You need not kill the person; he is going to die himself. If you start working for a social revolution -- you become a communist, a socialist -- you will miss.
These are the two alternatives in which you can miss. Or you can use this time of crisis and be transformed, use it for your individual growth. There is nothing like a critical moment in history: everything is tense and everything is intense, and everything has come to a moment, to a peak, from where the wheel will turn. Use this door, this opportunity, and be transformed. That's why my emphasis is for individual revolution.
Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega, Vol 5
Chapter #10
Chapter title: Not answers, no questions
10 July 1975 am in Buddha Hall
Let Your Conscience Be Your Guide vs... turiya
3 y
510
This is the problem. The individual's need is to be happy, to be blissful -- to delight in this small life that has been given. That is the individual need, but that is not the societal need. Society doesn't bother whether you are happy or unhappy: the society wants you to be more productive, the society wants you to be great warriors so that you can protect the society, the society wants you to be great scientists because science is power. The society has its own needs, and the individual has totally different needs.
In a more perfect society there will be no society, only individuals. In a more perfect state there will be no state, no government, only individuals. At the most, a minimal government can be allowed. For example, a postal service has to be looked after by a central agency, or the railway has to be looked after by a central agency. That is all. A government should run railways and look after the post office, and things like that. And a government should be a negative force. In saying "negative force", it is meant that a government should see that no individual interferes with any other individual and any other individual's freedom and life, that's all.
Government should not impose any positive rules on people. This much is enough: that everybody is allowed to live his own life, to do his own thing, and nobody interferes. If somebody interferes, then the government comes in, otherwise not.
But that seems to be just a utopia. The word "utopia" is very beautiful. It means "that which never happens". Utopia means a nowhere-land which doesn't exist, and doesn't seem to exist; the very thing seems to be impossible.
So, to desire for any kind of utopia it not the thing. All that can be done, and all that is practical, is to become alert so you get out of the mess. And you, please, don't be worried about others, because nobody can bring them out of their mess if they don't want to. If they are enjoying, let them enjoy. If they are feeling happy in their misery let them be miserable, that is their freedom. Don't try to impose anything on anybody -- that is transgression, a trespassing - that is a subtle form of violence. Allow everybody his own being and his own freedom; then there will be no need for cathartic therapies. But right now everybody is interfering in everybody else's life; nobody wants to leave you alone.
And such subtle techniques have been used, unless you are very, very alert you will not be able to know what type of techniques have been used to make you a slave. Religions say that wherever you are, God is looking at you. That means nowhere is there any possibility to be alone and to be yourself. This God seems to be a peeping Tom. Wherever you are -- even in your bathroom -- he is there looking at you. Even there, you cannot hum a song, even there you cannot make faces in the mirror, even there you cannot have a little dance of your own, no. God is looking. And "God", to many, means a very serious old man -- white hair, white beard -- and always a long face and serious, and he is looking.
I have heard about a nun who used to take her bath without removing her clothes. So somebody asked, "What are you doing? In the bath you can remove your clothes." But she said, "God is looking everywhere, so how can I be naked? That will be insulting."
But if God is looking everywhere, he must be looking under the clothes. So what is the point? You can be naked anywhere. That means God is looking everywhere: you cannot escape. Just forget about him.
These are subtle techniques. The society has created conscience in you, so whatsoever you do, the conscience goes on functioning in the service of the society. And the society has taught you, "This is your inner voice." This is not your inner voice. If you have been born in a Mohammedan family then you can have four wives, and your conscience will never interfere -- up to four. With the fifth there will be danger. With the fifth wife your conscience will start stirring, and it will say, "This is not good." But if you are a Hindu or a Christian then only one wife is allowed. With the second wife, trouble would arise. Your conscience will start saying. "This is bad, this is not good, this is immoral. What are you doing? You should love only one woman -- and forever and forever."
What is a Conscience?
A Mohammedan has a different conscience from a Christian. And a Hindu has a different conscience either of the others. In my childhood, in my house, tomatoes were not allowed, because I was born in a Jain family, and the tomato looks like meat -- just looks like! There is nothing in it. Hmm?... tomato is so innocent and harmless, but in my childhood I never ate tomatoes because in my family it was not allowed. And when for the first time while visiting a friend's house, I was offered a tomato, I vomited. The whole conscience: I couldn't believe that people are eating tomatoes. Tomato is such a dangerous thing -- looks like meat. How can you eat it?
First of all, a conscience is not yours. It is a programming by the society in which you live. Conscience is nothing but a trickery of the society. It gives some ideas to your inner mind, and from there they start functioning. They are like Delgado's electrodes. Very subtle... wherever you go, the society follows you, hidden behind you, within you. If you do anything against what society has planted, the conscience pricks.
This is not the real inner voice -- because the real inner voice cannot be different for a Hindu and a Mohammedan and a Jain and a Christian - no! The real inner voice will be the same because the real inner voice is not produced by the society. The real inner voice comes from your innermost core of being, but to discover that, one has to pass through all the phases of meditation. Unless all thoughts dissolve, you cannot hear your own voice. Society has filled your mind so much that whatsoever you hear will be society trying to manipulate you from within. From without it manipulates through the policeman and the judge. From within it manipulates through God, conscience, morality, hell, heaven. and a thousand and one things.
Hence, there is a need of catharsis. You are not natural, and only through catharsis will you be able to unburden yourself from the society, will you be free from society. Free from society, you become available to nature; available to nature, you become available to existence. And, to me, existence is God.
Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega, Vol 5; Chapter #10; Question 5 (In Part.)
Chapter title: No answers, no questions
10 July 1975 am in Buddha Hall
