Upanishads, Discourses on the Mandukya Upanishad, These discourses are based on the sutras of the Mandukya and Isa Upanishads. Philosophia Ultima Chapter 6: You Transcend Duality, Question 2

The second question

Question 2

OSHO: I AM COMING ACROSS SOME CONDITIONING THAT OFTEN MAKES ME FEEL TENSE AND FRUSTRATED. IT IS PERFECTION, HURRY, EFFORT, ET CETERA. IS THIS A SPECIAL GERMAN CONDITIONING? I AM GERMAN!

Dhyan Gyanam

CONDITIONING AS SUCH is always German, more or less, because conditioning means the desire of your parents, of your society, of your state, of the past, to make you perfect. And once the seed, the ambition to be perfect enters into you, you cannot remain sane.

Perfectionism is neurosis. Of course, Germans are far ahead of others -- they are the epitome of perfectionism -- but everybody has the same kind of desire. ALL parents have failed, and because of their failure they load their children with the desire to be perfect. They have not been able to be perfect; now they want to live a vicarious life through their children. They don't love the children -- if they love them they will not condition them. That will be the only sign of their love. If you love somebody you cannot condition the person.

If your parents love you, the first thing that they will never do is to load you with their own ambitions. But they have been loaded by their parents and they have tried to live according to those desires -- the desires of their dead parents -- and they have failed. Now they think maybe there was not enough time, maybe circumstances did not allow: "Perhaps what has not been possible in my life may be possible in the life of my children." So they live through their children.

Conditioning means they know they have to die, but still they can live in a subtle way through the children. It is a desire for immortality. They know their bodies are going to die, that's why there is so much obsession for children. "And the child has to be MINE, not anybody else's, so that a part of me, a cell of me, a seed of me, will be living. I will NOT be there, but at least something of me will go on living."

Hence all the societies have insisted on the virginity of women at least, to make certain that the child is yours, not somebody else's. Why this obsession? In a better world, in a more understanding and human world, if the father feels that he can find a better man and a better seed for his children, then certainly he will go for the best. If he is crippled and if he is carrying some disease, hereditary, it will be a sign of love not to give that disease to the child. It is better to find somebody who can give HIS child a better body, better health, longer life, more intelligence.

And that is possible, now it is very easily possible. Just as we donate blood, each genius dying can donate all his semen cells; they can be preserved. Albert Einstein can be preserved. He donated his head -- that is stupid. He should have donated his semen cells, because then millions of children could have had the same capacity as Albert Einstein. People who love will find the best. And the same is true about the mother: there is no necessity for the mother to give birth to the child only through HER womb; it can happen in a scientific lab.

We can create a totally different kind of humanity once these old, idiotic obsessions are dropped. These are all egoistic obsessions. But not only do we give our bodies to the children, we insist on giving our minds too. That's what conditioning is all about: trying to give your mind to your children.

Never give your mind to your children! You have lived it and you know its misery, still you insist on giving it to your children. You have been a Catholic, a Protestant, a Hindu, a Mohammedan -- what have you achieved? Where are you? What is your meaning, significance? What poetry has arisen in your being? And still you are insisting on giving the same rotten pattern to your child? You are the enemy of the child, not a lover. You don't love! If you love, you cannot give your ideas to the child. You will insist, "Remember, avoid at least these ideas that I have lived. Do whatsoever else you want to do -- just don't be a Christian, don't be a Hindu, don't be a communist. I have been, and this way of life at least is absolutely meaningless. So avoid this."

Each mother, each father should make the child aware that they have tried a certain pattern of life and it has failed. "So don't make the same mistake again. Try some other door, try some other way, explore on your own." But this has not happened yet, that's why humanity is living in such misery and hell.

Gyanam, perfection is bound to bring hurry because life is short, and perfectionism means you have to do thousands of things quickly, otherwise who knows? You may be incomplete before death comes. And particularly in the Western societies where religions have insisted on only one life, there is more hurry. In the East people are not in such a hurry for the simple reason that they believe that there are many lives, so what is the hurry for? There is no need, one can wait.

That's why the East is lazy: it has a psychological reasoning for its laziness. And the West is speedy: "Be quick, because there is only one life, and if you are not complete in this life then there is no other opportunity. No chances are given, no choices are given -- only THIS life." Naturally hurry arises and effort. You have to make tremendous efforts to be perfect.

And in this whole rush for perfectionism you are not a gainer, you become a loser. There is no time to think, there is no time to be silent, there is no time to feel, there is no time to love. All is devoted to one goal: how to be a perfect man, a superman.

It is not an accident that Friedrich Nietzsche was born in Germany. He talked about the superman, and Adolf Hitler believed that he was the superman about whom Friedrich Nietzsche was talking. Adolf Hitler is not even human -- he is sub-human, below humanity, but he thinks that he is super-human. And he was trying to create a race of super-human beings. He brought the whole German ideology of perfectionism to its logical end. And you ARE conditioned, whether you know it or not, by that fascist, Nazi idea.

With me you have to relax. With me you have to drop your being a German or being an Indian or being an Italian. Whatsoever you are you have to drop it. You have to be just silent, blissful. You have to be just human -- there is no need to be super-human.

An Englishman thinks seated, a Frenchman standing, an American pacing, and a German afterwards.

There is no time, so it is always afterwards.

It was a tough spot and bullets flew from all sides. The tough German sergeant was not going to allow his men to retreat. "Stay here!" he shouted. "And keep firing, even if you run out of ammunition!"

Wolfgang, the blacksmith, came in with a badly damaged foot. The doctor was surprised, for Wolfgang was a careful man. "What happened to you, Wolfgang?" he asked.

'Well, thirty-three years ago I was a young apprentice to an old blacksmith."

"But what about your foot?"

"This is about my foot. The old man had a daughter and your eyes could gaze on her like the way a bullock would eat good grass. The first night I was there she came in when I was in bed and asked if I was comfortable and if I wanted anything, and I said I didn't. The next night when I was in bed she came in wearing her nightdress and she asked me if there was any single thing she could get me or do for me, and I told her I was as comfortable as a bug in a rug. The next night she came in and the girl had not a thing on her, and she asked me if she could do anything for me, and, not wanting to keep her standing in the cold, and she without a shift I said there was nothing."

"What has that got to do with your foot, Wolfgang?" asked the doctor impatiently.

"Well, it was only this morning that I finally thought of what she meant, and I was so annoyed with myself that I threw my ten-pound hammer against the wall, and it rebounded and broke my ankle!"

Gyanam, now being a sannyasin, drop being German. Enough of it! You have suffered long, your parents suffered and their parents; it is time to stop this suffering. Relax a little bit -- there is no need to be perfect. If God wanted you perfect he would have created you perfect! He has created you so beautifully imperfect. It is so clear -- he never creates a perfect man, he always creates imperfect people, because only imperfect people can grow. The perfect man will be dead from his very birth, because there will be nothing to do; there will be no POSSIBILITY of growing.

Growth is possible because of imperfection, and growth is the whole joy of life; it is the only ecstasy there is. And God goes on creating imperfect children, but we don't listen, we don't see that God loves imperfect people. And there is no end to growth, so in fact there is no perfection ever.

I don't call Buddha a perfect man or Jesus a perfect man or Krishna a perfect man. I call them WHOLE men, but not perfect. They were total but not perfect -- and remember the difference between these two words.

My sannyasins have to learn how to be total -- total in each act, passionately in it, intensely in it, utterly involved, not holding back. That's what totality is. If you are dancing you are dancing; then the whole world disappears. Even you are not there, only the dance remains. That is totality. The dance may be perfect, may not be perfect, that is irrelevant. It can always be improved so it cannot be perfect. Everything can be improved so it cannot be perfect.

A Zen story is:

A king was learning gardening from a Zen Master. The Master was teaching him and telling him to go on creating a garden in his palace. After three years he would come to see the garden, and if it was total, then he would have passed the examination.

But the king misunderstood the word'total' -- and we all misunderstand it. He thought total meant perfect, so he made the garden perfect. He had thousands of gardeners to work upon it, and it was really the most perfect thing that had ever happened in Japan.

After three years the Master came, and the king was very happy and very satisfied with the garden. But the Master looked very serious and sad -- and he was not a serious man at all. The king started feeling afraid -- was he going to fail? Three years' effort, and the garden was so perfect you could not improve upon it. And the silence of the Master was getting heavier on him.

Finally he asked, "What is the matter? Why are you not saying a single word? Don't you like the garden?"

The Master said, "It is too perfect, hence it gives the feeling of artificialness. In nature nothing is so perfect. It is so perfect that it cannot be improved upon, that's why I am looking so sad. And I had told you,'Let it be total,' but you misunderstood me. I don't see even a single dry, dead leaf in the whole garden! How is it possible?"

The king said, "We have removed all the dead leaves -- there were many. Just to receive you we have removed them all!"

The Master said, "Give me a bucket!"

A bucket was given. He went out of the garden where the leaves had been thrown. He collected a bucketful of dry leaves, came in, and threw them on the path. And the wind started playing with the leaves... and the sound and the song of the leaves. He started smiling and he said, "Now it is perfectly okay! It is no longer perfect, hence it is perfectly okay! Now it looks more natural. Without these leaves there was no song, it was dead."

Be total, don't bother to be perfect. But this misunderstanding is one of the ancient ones.

The German missionary was preaching to the African tribe: "And I tell you that you must love your fellowmen."

"Moolagumbi!" shrieked the natives.

'White men and black men must learn to cooperate."

"Moolagumbi!" chanted the crowd.

The missionary was very pleased and he told the chief how pleased he was with the reception.

"I am glad, O man of Germany," said the chief, "but be careful as we pass my cattle that you do not step into the moolagumbi!"

All perfectionism is nothing but moolagumbi!

Upanishads

PHILOSOPHIA ULTIMA

Chapter-6

You Transcend Duality