What is the meaning of life?

Life in itself has no meaning. Life is an opportunity to create meaning. Meaning has not to be discovered: it has to be created. You will find meaning only if you create it. It is not lying there somewhere behind the bushes, so you can go and you search a little bit and find it. It is not there like a rock that you will find. It is a poetry to be composed, it is a song to be sung, it is a dance to be danced.

Meaning is a dance, not a rock. Meaning is music. You will find it only if you create it. Remember it. Meaning comes out of creativity.

Meaning comes through participation. Participate in life! Participate as deeply, as totally, as possible. Risk all for participation. If you want to know what dance is, don’t go and see a dancer -- learn dancing, be a dancer. If you want to know anything, participate! That is the true and the right way, the authentic way, to know a thing. And there will be great meaning in your life. And not only one-dimensional -- multi-dimensional meanings. You will be showered by meanings.

Don’t allow your life to become just a dead ritual. Let there be moments, unexplainable. Let there be a few things which are mysterious, for which you cannot supply any reason. Let there be a few doings for which people will think you are a little crazy. A man who is a hundred percent sane is dead. A little bit of craziness by the side is always a great joy. Go on doing a few crazy things too. And then meaning will be possible.

One World

The collective is a very dangerous word. In the name of collective, the individual, the real has always been sacrificed. Nations have been sacrificing individuals in the name of nation – and “nation” is just a word. The lines that you have drawn on the map are not any where on the earth. They are just your game! But on those lines that you have drawn on the map, millions of people have died – real people, dying for unreal lines. And you make them heroes, national heroes! If we want really a world of freedom, then we have to understand that in the name of collectivity so much massacre has happened that now it is time to stop it.

Wisdom and Philosophy

Philosophy, the very word, means love for wisdom, and they have nothing to do with wisdom at all. Wisdom happens only through meditation; it never happens by collecting information. It happens by going through a transformation. Wisdom is the flowering of your consciousness, the opening of the one-thousand-petaled lotus of your being. It is the release of your fragrance, the release of the imprisoned splendor. Real philosophy has nothing to do with thinking; on the contrary it has everything to do with transcending thinking, going beyond and beyond thinking, going beyond mind, reaching to the pure space of no-mind. Out of that space something flowers in you. You can call it Christ-consciousness, Buddhahood, or whatsoever you like. That is true philosophy.

Accept Yourself

Accept yourself as you are. And that is the most difficult thing in the world, because it goes against your training, education, your culture. From the very beginning you have been told how you should be. Nobody has ever told you that you are good as you are.

Don't be obsessed with yourself -- but a natural self-love is a must, a basic phenomenon. Only then out of it, you can love somebody else. Accept yourself, love yourself.

Nobody else has ever been like you and nobody else will ever be like you; you are simply unique, incomparable. Accept this, love this, celebrate this -- and in that very celebration you will start seeing the uniqueness of the others, the incomparable beauty of the others. Love is possible only when there is a deep acceptance of oneself, the other, the world. Acceptance creates the milieu in which love grows, the soil in which love blooms.

Conditioning

Parents should be aware of what they are conditioning their children -- and the children should be given every freedom to experience the good, the bad, so they can decide on their own. Let them find their way. You simply watch carefully that they don't fall in a ditch. Never say anything to your children that is not your existential experience. Accept your ignorance. That will give more respect to you, more trust in you, but the parental ego wants to pretend that they know everything. Be respectful to the child. Parents expect respect from the children, but they forget that this is something mutual. You respect the children and they will respect you. You trust the children and they will trust you. And then there is a possibility of communication.

Ecology

We are all guests, but don't use this beautiful planet as a railway-station guest house. It is not a waiting room. It is our home for the time being and it will remain the home for somebody else. Don't be so miserly that, "I will be gone -- after ten minutes my train is coming, so who cares if I leave the waiting room dirty?"

Leave this earth a little more beautiful, a little more fragrant, for those unknown guests who will be following you.

Ecstasy

Ecstasy is our very nature; not to be ecstatic is simply unnecessary. To be ecstatic is natural, spontaneous. It needs no effort to be ecstatic; it needs great effort to be miserable. That's why you look so tired, because misery is really hard work; to maintain it is really difficult, because you are doing something against nature.

You are going upstream -- that's what misery is. And what is bliss? Going with the river -- so much so that the distinction between you and the river is simply lost. You are the river. How it can be difficult? To go with the river no swimming is needed; you simply float with the river and the river takes you to the ocean.

The river is already going to the ocean. Life is a river. Don't push it and you will not be miserable.

Watching

Watching is meditation. What you watch is irrelevant. You can watch the trees, you can watch the river, you can watch the clouds, you can watch children playing around. The object is not the point. The quality of observation, the quality of being aware and alert -- that's what meditation is.

Whatsoever you do with awareness is meditation. Action is not the question, the quality that you bring to your action. Walking can be a meditation if you walk alert. Sitting can be a meditation if you sit alert. Listening to the words can be a meditation if you listen with awareness. Just listening to the inner noise of your mind can be a meditation if you remain alert and watchful. The whole point is: one should not move in a sleep. Then whatsoever you do is meditation.

Heaven and Hell

Heaven is here -- just you have to know how to live it. And hell too is here, and you know perfectly well how to live it. It is only a question of changing your perspective, your approach towards life. The earth is beautiful. If you start living its beauty, enjoying its joys you are in paradise. If you condemn everything, then the same earth turns into a hell -- only for you. It depends on you where you live, it is a question of your own inner transformation. It is not a change of place, it is a change of inner space. Live joyously, guiltlessly, live totally. And then heaven is no more a metaphysical concept, it is your own experience.

Death

Death is already happening. Whether you face it or not, whether you look at it or not, it is already there. It is just like breathing. With each inhalation you are born; with each exhalation you die. A person who is really living is not in any way afraid of death. Live life. In living life, death is avoided. In living life, you become so fulfilled that if this very moment death comes and the future stops, you will be ready. You will be happily ready. You have lived your life; you have delighted in existence; you celebrated it; you are contented. There is no complaint, no grumbling; you don't have any grudge. You welcome death. And unless you can welcome death, one thing is certain -- that you have not lived.

Life

Give life to things which are beautiful. Don't give life to ugly things. You don't have much time, much energy to waste. With such a small life, with such a small energy source, it is simply stupid to waste it in sadness, in anger, in hatred, in jealousy.

Use it in love, use it in some creative act, use it in friendship, use it in meditation; do something with it which takes you higher. And higher you go, more energy sources become available to you.

At the highest point of consciousness, you are almost a god.

It is in your hands.

Love and Aloneness

The capacity to be alone is the capacity to Love. It may look paradoxical to you, but it is not. It is a existential truth. Only those people, who are capable of being alone, are capable of Love, of sharing, of going into the deepest core of the other person, without possessing the other, without becoming dependent on the other, reducing the other into a thing and without becoming addicted with the other. They allow other absolute freedom, because they know if the other leaves, they will be as happy as they are now. Their happiness cannot be taken by the other, because it is not given by the other.

Then why they want to be together? It is no more a need, it is a luxury. They enjoy sharing. They have so much joy; they would like to pour into somebody. They know how to play their life as a solo instrument. The solo flute player knows how to enjoy his flute alone and if he comes and finds a solo tabla player, they both will enjoy to be together and to create a harmony between the flute and the tabla.

Abundance

To live in abundance is the only spiritual thing in the world.

Just look at existence and its abundance. What is the need of so many flowers in the world? Just roses would have been enough, but existence is abundant: millions and millions of flowers, millions of birds, millions of animals. Nature is not ascetic.

Abundance is the very nature of existence, that richness is the very core, that existence does not believe in poverty. And my effort is to bring man back to his natural self.

Courage

To accept the challenge of the unknown is courage; in spite of all fears. The fears are there! But if you go on accepting the challenge again and again, slowly-slowly those fears disappear, because the experience of the joy that the unknown brings, the great ecstasy that starts happening with the unknown, makes you strong enough, gives you a certain integrity, makes your intelligence sharp. For the first time, you start feeling that life is not just a boredom, but an adventure. Then slowly-slowly fears disappear; then you are always seeking and searching for some adventure.

Courage is- risking the known for the unknown, the familiar for the unfamiliar, for some unknown destination. One never knows whether one will be able to make it or not. It is gambling, but only the gamblers know what life is.

Maturity

A grown-up person is one who does not imitate, who starts feeling his own way, who starts being in his own way, who starts looking into his nature, who am I?

Listen to your being. It is continuously giving you hints; it is a still, small voice. It does not shout at you, that is true. And if you are a little silent you will start feeling your way. Be the person you are. Never try to be another, and you will become mature. Maturity is accepting the responsibility of being oneself, whatever the cost. Risking all to be oneself, that’s what maturity is all about.

Maturity is a rebirth, a spiritual birth. You are born anew, you are a child again. With fresh eyes you start looking at existence. With love in the heart you approach life. With silence and innocence you penetrate your own innermost core.

We are all in the same boat

Remember, each human being, may be the human being is Alexander the Great or just a beggar on the roadside, each human being is as fragile as anybody else. Deep down he is the same-the same consciousness, the same fear, the same death, the same lust, the same love: all exists the same. Accept yourself; allow your unconscious to be revealed to you. This is how each human being is. By knowing it, you become a different kind of human being. By accepting it, cherishing it, you bring a revolution to your life. And when you look at others with that understanding, you will not find strangers; you will find all are friends. Nervousness disappears; what is there to be nervous about? We are all in the same boat.