Zen Buddhism, Talks on the Faith Mind of Sosan, Hsin Hsin Ming: The Book Of Nothing Chapter 7: All dreams must cease

REST AND UNREST DERIVE FROM ILLUSION; WITH ENLIGHTENMENT THERE IS NO LIKING AND DISLIKING.

ALL DUALITIES COME FROM IGNORANT INFERENCE.

THEY ARE LIKE DREAMS OR FLOWERS IN THE AIR: FOOLISH TRY TO GRASP THEM.

GAIN AND LOSS, RIGHT AND WRONG: SUCH THOUGHTS MUST FINALLY BE ABOLISHED AT ONCE.

IF THE EYE NEVER SLEEPS, ALL DREAMS WILL NATURALLY CEASE.

IF THE MIND MAKES NO DISCRIMINATIONS, THE TEN THOUSAND THINGS ARE AS THEY ARE, OF SINGLE ESSENCE.

TO UNDERSTAND THE MYSTERY OF THIS ONE-ESSENCE IS TO BE RELEASED FROM ALL ENTANGLEMENTS.

WHEN ALL THINGS ARE SEEN EQUALLY THE TIMELESS SELF-ESSENCE IS REACHED.

NO COMPARISONS OR ANALOGIES ARE POSSIBLE IN THIS CAUSELESS, RELATIONLESS STATE.

MIND HAS ONLY ONE capacity and that is to dream. And this dreaming continues even while you are awake. That's the reason Sosan or Jesus won't believe that you are ever awake, because dreaming has one quality: that it can happen only in sleep.

These two things have to be understood first: mind is the source of all dreaming, but dream can happen only in sleep. And if you are dreaming twenty-four hours a day, one thing is absolutely certain: that you are fast asleep. Close the eyes any moment and the dream is there; it continues as an undercurrent. Even while you are engaged, for all outward purposes you seem to be awake, but deep down a current of dreaming goes on and on and on.

Any moment close the eyes and it is there. It is not interrupted by your occupations. You walk on the street, you drive the car, you work in a factory, in the office -- it continues. You go to sleep, then you can feel it more because, unoccupied, the whole attention comes to the mind.

It is just like the stars. In the day you cannot see stars in the sky. They are there, because where can they go? But because of the light of the sun you cannot see them. If you go in a deep well, two hundred feet down, from there you can see stars in the sky even in the day. They are there, but because of so much light you cannot see them. Darkness is needed for them to be revealed.

The same happens with dreaming; dreams are there in the day also, but darkness is needed so that you can see them. It is just like when you go to a theater. If the doors are open the film may continue but you cannot see. Close the doors, make the room dark, and you can see.

Dreaming is your continuity, and unless this continuity is broken you cannot know what truth is. The question is not whether truth is very far away or near, the question is whether the mind is in a dream or not.

So the basic problem is not how to seek the truth; you cannot seek with a dreaming mind, because whatsoever will come before you, your dreams will be imposed on it. Your dreams will be projected on it, you will interpret it. You will not be able to see as it is. You will see according to your dreams, you will falsify it. Truth IS there, because only truth can be -- untruth cannot be.

So another thing before we enter the sutra: Shankara has divided reality in three categories, and those categories are beautiful to understand. One category is the category of the truth: that which is. In fact nothing else is possible; only truth is and only truth can be.

The second category is of that which is untruth, which cannot be. No possibility of its being there, because how can untruth be? For being, truth is needed. So untruth is non-being, truth is being. Then Shankara finds a third category that he calls dreaming, appearance, illusion, maya: that which appears to be but is not.

So three categories. Truth, that which is. If your eyes are clear, unclouded, if the mind is not dreaming, then there is only one category -- truth. But if your mind is dreaming then two other categories come into existence.

Dream IS, in a certain sense, because you dream it. And it is not, in a different certain sense, because it corresponds to no reality. You dream in the night that you have become a king. In the morning you find you are just the same beggar. The dream was false, but the dream was, so it HAS a quality of truth about it because it happened. And in those moments when it was happening you completely believed in its truth, otherwise it would have stopped immediately.

If you become aware that "I am dreaming and this is false," the dream is broken, you are awake already. The dream existed for a few hours; it had one quality of truth, that it existed. But it is not true because in the morning you find it was not. It was just a thought, a wave in the air, a flower in the sky -- appeared to be true but was untrue.

Truth is being, untruth is non-being, and between the two there is a world of dreaming -- it carries the qualities of both. And mind is the source of dreaming, so mind IS illusory. Mind is the source of all MAYA.

You may be thinking that if you leave the world and go to the Himalayas you will attain to truth. You are wrong, because your house is not MAYA, your wife is not MAYA, your children -- no. Your mind is MAYA. And how can you leave the mind here and go to the Himalayas? The mind is within you. If you CAN drop it, you can drop it anywhere. If you cannot drop it, you CANNOT drop it whether you go to the Himalayas or not.

The wife, the children, the house, the world, is called MAYA, illusion, in a secondary sense -- because the wife exists, she has a being. She is a BRAHMA in her own right, she is truth -- not as a wife, but as a soul.

Your mind interprets her as wife: "She is my wife." Then a dream is created. She is there, absolutely true! You are here, absolutely true! And between the two a dream happens. You call her your wife, she calls you her husband. Now a dream exists between the two, and dreams always become nightmares. So all relationships ultimately become nightmares, because you cannot tolerate an illusion very long. An illusion is temporary; sooner or later it has to disappear. It cannot be eternal, it cannot be permanent.

You love a woman, a dream is created. But how long can you dream? By the time the honeymoon is finished the dream is gone -- even before. Then what will you do? Then you will pretend, because now you are a slave of your own promises.

You will pretend that you still love, you will pretend that "You are still beautiful," you will pretend that "There exists no person like you." But now everything is a pretension. And when you pretend, and the dream is broken, and you still carry the dream, it becomes a burden and nightmarish. That's why you live in such suffering.

The suffering is nothing but broken dreams, broken rainbows, broken illusions, appearances. And you have invested in them so much you cannot look at the truth: that from the very beginning they were dreams.

Rather than looking at the truth you will throw the responsibility on the other. You will say, "This wife has deceived me. She was not as good as she appeared. She deceived me, she didn't reveal her true reality." And you will not see that that is not the point at all. YOU were creating a dream around her, and because of that dream you couldn't see the reality. She was also creating a dream around you.

So whenever two persons fall in love there are not two persons, there are four: one the lover, another the beloved, and between these two the beloved that is a creation of the mind of the lover, and the lover that is a creation of the mind of the beloved. These two are dreams, and these two go on moving.

Sooner or later, when the dream is broken, you are two not four. Whenever you are two there will be difficulty. Then you would like to throw the responsibility on the other: "It is because of the other." You have missed the point again. That means you will create the same dream around another woman because you will think, "THIS woman is not going to deceive me, and now I am more clever also."

But mind is never clever. The essence of mind is foolishness, so mind can never be clever. It can be cunning cunning in its foolishness, but it can never be wise. That is not its nature, because wisdom happens only when dreaming leaves. So if dreaming is the basic reality of the mind then it can never be wise.

A Buddha is wise because now there is no mind. A Sosan is wise because now he lives in no-mind, now all dreams stop. He looks at things as they are. You never look at things as they are; you mix with your illusions. And you are so afraid to look straight because you know, unconsciously, deep down somewhere you know, that things are not as you look at them.

But you think if you look at the reality of things it will be too much, too heavy -- you may not be able to stand it. You mix it with dreams just to make it a little sweeter. You think it is bitter so you coat it with sugar. You coat a person in dreams and you feel the person has become sweet? No, you are simply deceiving yourself, nobody else. Hence so much misery.

It is out of your dreams that the misery has happened, and one has to be aware of this phenomenon. Don't throw responsibility on the other, otherwise you will create other dreams. Look that it is you who are projecting, but it is difficult to look.

In a theater, in a cinema hall, you look at the screen, you never look at the back -- the projector is at the back. The film is not there really on the screen; on the screen it is just a projection of shadow and light. The film exists just at the back, but you never look at that. And the projector is there.

Your mind is at the back of the whole thing, and the mind is the projector. But you always look at the other because the other is the screen.

When you are in love the person seems beautiful, no comparison. When you hate, the same person seems the ugliest, and you never become aware of how the same person can be the ugliest and the same person can be the most beautiful.

When you are in love the same person is a flower, a rose, a rose garden with no thorns. When you dislike, when you hate, flowers disappear, there are only thorns, no more a garden -- the ugliest, the dirtiest, you would not like even to see. And you never become aware of what you are doing. How can roses disappear so soon, in a single minute? Not even a gap of a single minute is needed. This moment you are in love and the next moment you are in hate; the same person, the same screen, and the whole story changes.

Just watch and you will be able to see that this person is not the point, you are projecting something. When you project love the person looks lovely, when you project hate the person looks ugly. The person is not; you have not seen the real person at all. You cannot see the reality through the eyes of the mind.

IF YOU REALLY want to know what the truth is, scriptures won't help. Neither will going to the Himalayas be of any help. Only one thing can help: start looking at things without the mind. Look at the flower and don't allow the mind to say anything. Just look at it. It is difficult because of an old habit of interpreting. You go on interpreting and interpretations differ. Interpretations depend on the mind.

Mulla Nasruddin asked the court for a divorce. He said to the judge, "Now it is impossible. Every day I come back home and I find my wife is hiding some man or other in the closet."

Even the judge was shocked and he said, "Every day?"

Nasruddin said, "Every day! And not the same person eithers -- every day a new person."

Just to console Nasruddin the judge said, "Then you must be very much hurt. You come home tired and you think the wife must be waiting for you, to receive and welcome and be loving. And you come home and you find a new man is hiding in the closet every day. It is very

Nasruddin said, "Yes, I feel very hurt -- because I never had any room to hang my clothes."

It depends on the mind how you interpret things.

Then Nasruddin deserted his wife and ran away. He was caught, again brought to the court. The judge said, "You are a deserter and you have to be punished."

Nasruddin said, "Wait! Before you decide you must see my wife. If you see my wife you will never say that I am a deserter. You will simply say, 'Nasruddin, you are a coward!' And that I accept. I am not a deserter, simply a coward. But first look at my wife."

How you look at things depends on you, not on things. Unless you come to a point where you drop the interpreting mind and look direct, look immediate, mind is your mediator. It brings you things distorted, it brings you things mixed with interpretations. They are not pure.

So the only way to reach to truth is: how to learn to be immediate in your vision, how to drop the help of the mind... This agency of the mind is the problem, because mind can create only dreams. But beautiful dreams mind can create, and you can get so excited. Through your excitement the dream starts looking like reality.

If you are too excited then you are intoxicated, then you are not in your senses. Then whatsoever you see is just your projection. And there are as many worlds as there are minds, because every mind lives in his own world. You can laugh at others' foolishnesses, but unless you start laughing at your own you will not be able to become a man of Tao, the man of nature, the man of truth. So what to do?

Try in small things not to bring the mind in. You look at a flower -- you simply look. You don't say, "Beautiful! Ugly!" You don't say anything! Don't bring words, don't verbalize. Simply look. The mind will feel uncomfortable, uneasy. The mind would like to say something. You simply say to the mind, "Be silent! Let me see. I will just look."

In the beginning it will be difficult, but start with things in which you are not too much involved. It will be difficult to look at your wife without bringing words in. You are too much involved, too much emotionally attached. Angry or in love, but too much involved.

Look at things which are neutral -- a rock, a flower, a tree, the sun rising, a bird in flight, a cloud moving in the sky. Just look at things with which you are not much involved, with which you can remain detached, with which you can remain indifferent. Start from neutral things and only then move towards emotionally loaded situations.

People start from the loaded situations; they fail, because it is almost impossible. Either you love your wife or you hate, there is no in between. If you love you are mad, if you hate you are mad -- and both ways the words will come. It is almost impossible not to allow the words, difficult, because of so much practice in saying something continuously.

One day I was at Mulla Nasruddin's house in the morning. They were taking tea when I arrived. The wife said, "Darling, in the night while you were asleep, you were saying many nasty things about me."

Nasruddin looked at me and said, "Who says I was asleep? I cannot say things while awake, that's why I was pretending sleep."

Even in sleep, or awake, when you are emotionally too much involved, it is difficult to put the mind aside. It will come in. So look at unloaded situations first. When you HAVE the feeling that, yes, you can look at certain things without the mind coming in, then try with loaded relationships.

By and by one becomes efficient. It is just like swimming: in the beginning you feel afraid and in the beginning you cannot believe how you will survive. And you have been working with the mind so long you cannot think that without the mind you can exist for a single moment. But try!

And the more you put the mind aside, the more light will happen to you, because when there are no dreams, doors are open, windows are open, and the sky reaches to you, and the sun rises and it comes to the very heart, the light reaches you. You become more and more filled with truth as you are less and less filled with dreaming.

And if while you are awake dreaming stops, by and by when you are asleep dreaming will stop there also, because it can exist only as a continuous circle. If it is broken anywhere, by and by the whole house disappears. You take out one brick and the whole house is already on the way towards being a ruin.

If during the day you can look at things without dreaming, then in the night less and less dreams will be there, because your night is nothing but a reflection of the day, a continuity of the same. When the day is different the night is different. When you are awake -- and by 'awake' is meant when you are not dreaming, not that you are sitting with open eyes...

Jesus goes on saying to his disciples, "Be awake!" Were they sleeping before him always, continuously? Because he is every day saying, "Be awake!" Buddha teaching his disciples every day, "Be awake!"

Why? They were with open eyes, as alert as you are, but Buddha and Jesus go on saying, "Be awake!" They mean, "Don't dream, just be here! Don't go anywhere else!" In the memories, in the past, and you dream; in the future, in imagination, and you dream. Be herenow -- only then is there no dream.

In the present there is no dream. In the present there is no mind. In the present YOU are there and the truth is there. And then there is no gap between you and truth -- -because both are true and there is no boundary. You melt into truth and truth melts into you. You become BRAHMA, BRAHMA becomes you. Dreaming is creating a fence around you, very invisible but subtle, powerful.

Now, try to enter this sutra.

REST AND UNREST DERIVE FROM ILLUSION; WITH ENLIGHTENMENT THERE IS NO LIKING AND DISLIKING.

WHY DO YOU LIKE and why do you dislike? How does it happen that you like a certain thing and you dislike a certain thing? How does this division happen?

Have you ever penetrated the mechanism of liking and disliking? It is worth trying to penetrate it. You say, "I like this person and I don't like that." Why? And suddenly one day you don't like this person and you have started to like that. Why? What is the mechanism? Why do you like a person?

You like a person if he allows you to strengthen your ego. If he becomes a screen and helps you to dream, you like the person. You like the person if he adjusts to your dreaming. You dislike a person if he is a maladjustment to your dreaming, if he does not allow you to dream. Rather, on the contrary, he disturbs. He does not fit, he does not play the role of a screen. He is not passive, he becomes active -- you dislike. You like a passive screen, so whatsoever you dream the other simply helps it.

Ouspensky, Gurdjieff is greatest disciple, has dedicated his book IN SEARCH OF THE MIRACULOUS to his Master with these words: To the person who destroyed all my dreams." But you will not like a person who destroys all your dreams. Even Ouspensky had to leave Gurdjieff, and in the last years he never came again to see him. He started working on his own. In the end he died an enemy to Gurdjieff.

Even a person of Ouspensky's alertness, who could feel that this man destroys the dreams, had to leave. You may feel, but when somebody really goes on destroying and destroying you feel that this man is an enemy.

A real Master will always look like an enemy, and this is the criterion. A false Master will always help you to dream; he will never disturb your dreaming. Rather, on the contrary, he will give you consolations, tranquilizers. He will console you, soothe you. His teaching will be just like a beautiful lullaby. He will sing around you so you can sleep well, that's all.

But a real Master IS dangerous. To move near him is full of danger. You are moving at your own risk, because he cannot allow you to dream and he cannot HELP your dreaming, because then the whole purpose is lost!

He will destroy. And dreams are very close to your heart. You think your dreams are your heart, and when dreams are destroyed you feel you are being destroyed. It is just as if someone is murdering you. Hindus have been aware of this, so they say a real Master is like death.

When you go to a Master you are going to death. You will have to die only because unless you die you cannot be reborn. When your dreams are destroyed, truth comes into existence, truth becomes revealed.

You like a person because he helps your ego. You like a girl because she says you are the perfect man.

I once overheard two young lovers. They were sitting near the sea and big waves were rolling. And the boy said, "Roll on, beautiful waves! Roll on, bigger and bigger and bigger!" And they became bigger and bigger and bigger.

And the girl said, "Wonderful! The sea obeys you!"

You will like this person. And if somebody helps your ego, you are ready to help his or her ego in the bargain.

You like a person when everything fits. It is a mutual arrangement. The moment the person starts on his own, or something does not fit, or the person is adamant, or the person has started to dominate, or the person starts to possess, or the person starts to hurt your ego...

And that is going to happen, because that person likes you not because your ego is strengthened -- that person likes you because her or his ego is strengthened. He likes you because of his own self, ego, and you like because your self is strengthened. Your purposes are different. So this type of arrangement cannot go on forever. And your purposes are not only different, they are antagonistic, because only one can be the master and both are trying to be the master.

In the beginning they will be very sweet because the territory is unknown. By and by, as things settle, they will become more and more adamant, possessive, dominating, more and more aggressive to the other. And then you start disliking. You hate a person who in any way tries to bring your superiority down. You love a person who makes you superior.

Ego continuously suffers from an inferiority complex. Because of this a man would like to love this woman, that woman, thousands of women. He may become a Don Juan, because every time, in the beginning only, the woman helps. It is a strategy, feminine strategy. In the beginning only the woman helps you. By the time she feels now you cannot go away, you are caught, she starts dominating you.

You would like to conquer many women, but just in the beginning. You see, all love affairs are beautiful in the beginning. It is very difficult, rare to find a love affair beautiful in the end. And if you can find something, then you know this affair has really been a love affair.

The end will prove it, not the beginning, because in the beginning all love affairs are beautiful, but just in the beginning -- because both are diplomatic, both are showing their beautiful faces to the other, alluring, just a part of salesmanship. But when the stuff is sold then faces change, then the real thing comes up, then the aggressive ego starts working. That is the real thing that comes in the end.

The real thing always comes in the end, never in the beginning, because in the beginning both are trying to move nearer and closer. Once close, when everything is taken for granted, then the real thing will erupt.

Why do you like a person? Why do you like a thing? Leave persons aside! -- why do you like a thing? Even things help your ego. If your neighbor purchases a bigger car you have to purchase a bigger car, because it is not a question of the car. The smaller may be more comfortable, more suitable for the modern traffic; less trouble with a smaller car. The bigger car is more trouble, costly, you cannot even afford it -- but if the neighbor has purchased a big car you have to purchase a big car. You like it. Why do you like it? All your liking comes out of the ego: the bigger car has prestige.

It happened:

Once Mulla Nasruddin's boss asked him to come into his office and he was very angry. He put him on the carpet and said, "Nasruddin, this is too much! I understand that yesterday night, after the office party, you took a wheelbarrow and went with the wheelbarrow on the main street of the town. Don't you realize that in such ways the prestige of the company will be lost7"

Nasruddin said, "I didn't pay a single thought to it, because you were standing in the wheelbarrow. We were both drunk, so I thought there was no question of any prestige -- even the boss is there in the wheelbarrow -- so I just went around the main street. Everybody was happy, and the people enjoyed it so much."

Prestige -- you forget prestige only when you are intoxicated. Then you do things which are foolish. But this is beautiful to understand. Then prestige must be something like alcohol, because only when you are under intoxication do you forget it. Otherwise you are always on the lookout for prestige, respect, respectability.

You like a thing because it gives prestige. You like a house because it gives you prestige. It may not be convenient, may not be comfortable. Look at the modern furniture -- not comfortable at all, but who would like to have old furniture in the house? Modern is better, more uncomfortable than the old, but it is modern! It gives prestige. Whatsoever gives prestige is alcoholic, it gives you an intoxication. You feel you are powerful.

But why this hankering after power? And remember, if you are hankering after power then you will never reach to the truth. Sometimes you knock at the door of God also for power -- but then you knock at the wrong door. That door only those can reach who have become absolutely aware that power, the search for power, is mad, it is a madness.

You like and dislike according to the ego. If there is no ego where will likes and dislikes be? They will simply disappear. You won't have that dividing mind that always likes and dislikes and creates alternatives. When you are at ease with yourself... and the ego is never at ease with oneself. It is a constant disturbance, because an ego has to look all around and there are millions of people.

Somebody else buys a bigger car, then what to do? Somebody goes and finds a more beautiful wife, then what to do? Somebody is more healthy than you, then what to do? Somebody has more beautiful eyes than you, then what to do? Somebody is more intelligent, more cunning, has more money... And millions of people all around you, and you are in competition with everybody. You will go mad! This is impossible. You can never come to a moment when you can feel contented. How is that moment possible? Even emperors...

I have heard, once it happened:

Alexander was trying to reach a picture on the wall. The picture was not hanging rightly so he wanted to fix it, but he couldn't reach it because Alexander was a small man, just five five. His bodyguard was almost seven feet, he immediately reached it and fixed the frame. But Alexander was hurt, very much hurt.

The bodyguard said, "sir, whenever you want to do such a thing just tell me. I am a bigger man than you."

Alexander said, "Bigger? No! Taller -- but bigger? No!"

And whenever Alexander would see others taller than him -- and he had to see because many soldiers were taller than him -- he would feel very much offended.

You can have the whole world, but a beggar can be taller than you and then the whole world is lost, you are nothing. You may become the emperor, but a beggar can sing better than you. You cannot possess all and everything. Whatsoever you possess will not give you contentment. The mind, the ego, will always feel unfulfilled.

Liking and disliking is because of the ego, and ego suffers much. When there is no ego it is not a question of liking and disliking. You move in this world like a breeze. You don't choose that "I am going north," you don't have any liking, disliking. Wherever the nature takes you, you are in a let-go. If the nature flows towards north, the wind blows towards north. If the nature changes and starts blowing towards south, the wind blows towards south. It has no choice of its own.

A man of Tao has no choice of his own. Wherever the river takes him he goes with it. He never pushes the river, he never fights with it. He has no choice, he has no like and dislike. You may even feel that he has likes and dislikes because you cannot understand. You may feel that this cloud is moving towards north, you can interpret that this cloud is moving towards north because it has a choice, it has chosen to move north. But you are wrong. The cloud has no choice.

He is not bound to go anywhere, he has no destiny. He is simply moving because the whole nature is going that way. He has not chosen it. The choice remains with the whole; the liking, disliking, remains with the whole -- that is not his business at all. He is unworried. And wherever the cloud reaches is the goal. There is no goal predetermined; wherever he reaches is the goal. Then there is contentment wherever you are.

But the mind will go on interpreting according to its own laws. If you come to a Buddha, you will feel that he also likes and dislikes and you will be wrong, because you will interpret him according to your mind. Sometimes he will be going north and you will say he must have chosen, otherwise why? Why going north? Sometimes he will pay attention to one person more than you -- you will think he must have chosen. "Why? Otherwise why is he not paying the same attention to me?" And I tell you: he has not chosen, it is just the whole that decides. He is no more a deciding factor, he is just like a cloud.

If he is paying more attention to a person, that simply means that attention moves that way as a cloud. That person may be in more need, that person may be more empty and attracts attention more. Just like if you dig a hole in the earth, the hole will attract water towards it, because water flows downwards. If that person is more meditative, Buddha will pay more attention -- but remember, HE is not paying, it has been attracted. It is a simple natural phenomenon. It is not his choice or like and dislike.

Buddha gave a silent message to Mahakashyap. He gave a flower, and then somebody asked, "But why to Mahakashyap? Why not to others?" Because there were others and some more respected disciples. Sariputra was there, he was one of the greatest chief disciples, very well known all over the country. In his own right he was a Master. When he had come to surrender to Buddha he had five hundred disciples with him. They all surrendered because their Master surrendered. And he was a well known scholar. Why not to Sariputra?

Why not to Ananda, who had lived for forty years, just like a shadow, serving Buddha in every way just like a servant, and who was a brother to Buddha, belonged to the same royal family? Why not to Ananda? Why not to Modgalyayan, who was another great scholar and thousands of people respected him?

And why to Mahakashyap who was not known at all, who was an unknown entity? Nobody ever thought about him and nobody knows anything other than this incident, that Buddha came one morning with a flower and stood silently, sat silently looking at the flower and would not speak. People became fidgety and restless because they had come to listen to the sermon. And then Mahakashyap laughed and Buddha called him and gave him the flower and said to the assembly, "All that can be said I have given to you, and that which cannot be said I give it to Mahakashyap."

This is the only incident known about Mahakashyap. Before it he was nobody, after it nothing is reported about him. Why to Mahakashyap?

It is not a choice, because if it was a choice then Sariputra would have got it. It is not a like, because if it was a question of liking then Ananda would have got it. Buddha said there was no alternative. Mahakashyap was the only one who could receive it, he was the only one who was silent and understood.

Buddha is reported to have said, "Even if he had not laughed I would have gone to him and given it to him, because he was the only one vacant, empty here in the whole assembly. There are great scholars but they are filled with their scholarship. Ananda is there, but he is filled with too much affection and attachment towards me. This Mahakashyap is simply empty -- an empty house, he has disappeared." He attracted the cloud.

But look at the disciples' attitude; they must have thought that there must be something. "Why is Buddha so much attached to Mahakashyap? Why didn't he give that which cannot be given in words to us? Why should he make Mahakashyap the greatest?"

But remember, a man of Tao, a man of enlightenment, simply flows like a cloud. He has no liking, no disliking, because those all belong to the dreaming mind, to the dreaming ego.

REST AND UNREST DERIVE FROM ILLUSION; WITH ENLIGHTENMENT THERE IS NO LIKING AND DISLIKING.

ALL DUALITIES COME FROM IGNORANT INFERENCE.

THEY ARE LIKE DREAMS, OR FLOWERS IN THE AIR: FOOLISH TRY TO GRASP THEM.

GAIN AND LOSS, RIGHT AND WRONG SUCH THOUGHTS MUST FINALLY BE ABOLISHED AT ONCE.

THIS PHRASE 'at once' has to be remembered. Let it penetrate deeply, because things can be done in two ways: gradually, or at once. If you do them gradually you will never be able to do them, because if you do them gradually they linger.

For example, you are angry and you are worried about your anger. It has become an old habit and you say, "By and by, gradually, I will leave it." How can you leave it by and by and gradually? Because in the meanwhile you will practice it, and the more you practice the more ingrained it becomes. You say time is needed. So what will you do?

At the most you can make it more refined and cultivated. Nobody may be able to know about your anger, you can hide it. But what will you do with time? If you have understood that it is wrong, then why say gradually? Why not at once? If it has been understood that something is wrong, why take time? And if you have not understood, then without understanding how will you do it gradually? And meanwhile anger will be coming and you will get more and more into the habit.

You can modify at the most, but a modified anger will not be no anger, it will still be anger. You can modify in subtle ways -- it will be there. It may even start becoming just the opposite, but it will be there. Nobody may be able to detect it but you will be always aware it is there.

No, understanding is always at once. Either you under stand or you don't understand. If you don't understand then how can you leave anything? If you understand then why gradually? If you understand, right now, immediately you drop it.

A man came to Buddha once with flowers in his hands. Buddha looked at the flowers and he said, "Drop it!"

So he dropped the flowers in the left hand. He thought, "Maybe it is wrong to bring flowers in the left hand to Buddha" -- because the left hand is thought to be wrong. Right is right and left is wrong, and you don't give with the left hand. So he dropped, feeling guilty.

Buddha laughed and said, "Drop it!" So he had to drop from the right hand also, but then he was puzzled.

And when both hands were empty Buddha laughed loudly and said, "Drop it!" Now there was nothing to drop. So he looked here and there -- what to do?

Ananda said, "Buddha never meant to drop the flowers. The one who has brought the flowers has to be dropped. By dropping flowers nothing will happen. Why not drop yourself?"

The man understood and dropped at Buddha's feet. He never went back to his palace.

His prime minister came and he said, "What are you doing? Even if you want to renounce, give it a little time so everything settles. Come back! Your wife, your children and the whole kingdom and the affairs -- give us a little time! Even if you decide to renounce, why in such a hurry?"

The man said, "When you understand, it is always at once. If you don't understand, it is always postponed."

Only ignorance postpones, and ignorance plays a very great trick by postponing. Then you feel you have understood, but how can you do it at once? You will do it by and by -- this is the trick of not doing it ever. This is the trick: "I will do it tomorrow."

See: when you are angry you do it immediately, but if you feel loving you postpone it. If you want to give a gift to somebody you postpone, but if you want to be angry you do it immediately -- because you know well that if you postpone, things will never be done. Postponement is a trick. So deep down you know now there is no need to do it, and on the surface you can go on believing, "I am going to do it." So you deceive yourself.

Says Sosan:

... SUCH THOUGHTS MUST FINALLY BE ABOLISHED AT ONCE.

Don't give time! If something is wrong, SEE through it, and drop it. Really there is no need to drop it. If you can see through it, and you feel that it is wrong, it will drop automatically. You will not be able to carry it.

You carry it because you are not convinced that it is wrong. If you are not convinced it is better to say, "I am not convinced that it is wrong, that's why I will carry it." At least you will be honest, and honesty is good. Don't be dishonest.

People come to me, they say, "Yes, I know that greed is bad, but by and by..." But how has anybody ever thrown greed by and by? Meanwhile it goes on getting deeper roots into you. And why say greed is bad if you cannot drop it immediately, right now? Say, "I don't feel it is bad, I feel it is good. When I feel it is wrong, I will drop it." At least you are honest and sincere, and a sincere man will reach understanding. An insincere man can never reach understanding.

You all say anger is bad -- then why carry it? Who is forcing you to carry it? Knowledge IS transformation. If you REALLY know that anger is bad, then you will not carry it for a single moment. At once you drop. It is sudden, it happens in no time, not even a single moment is lost. But you are cunning. You think that you know and you don't know. You want to believe that you know and you want to believe that you are trying, by and by, to change yourself. You will never be transformed. Transformation is never gradual, it is always at once.

There is a Jaina story:

A man came home tired after the whole day's work. His wife was giving him a bath -- it is an old story, now no wife gives a bath to the husband. His wife was giving him a bath, and while pouring water on his body and cooling his tired limbs, she talked and she said, "My brother has become a follower of Mahavira, and he is thinking to renounce the world."

The man laughed and said, "Thinking? -- then he will never leave the world!"

The wife felt hurt, because it was a question of HER brother. She said, "What do you mean? And I have never seen you going to Mahavira or to Buddha or anybody, and you think you understand? He is a great scholar and he understands what Mahavira says. And he meditates, worships, and he is a religious man. And you? I don't see any religiousness in you. I have never seen you praying or meditating. And you have the courage and you dare to say such a thing -- that he will never renounce?"

The man stood -- he was naked, taking his bath -- came out of the bath, went onto the street. The wife cried, "Are you crazy? What are you doing?"

He said, "I have renounced."

He never came back. This is the man -- he understood. He never prepared for it; nobody ever knew about him that he was a religious man, but this quality... He reached to Mahavira, he surrendered himself, he became a naked fakir.

The wife came, weeping and crying. Even the wife's brother came to convince him that "There is no hurry. Look at me! I have been thinking for twenty years. And you are a madman -- is this a way to renounce?"

The man said, "I don't bother, is there any other way? For twenty years you have been thinking, for twenty lives you will continue thinking. And whenever you renounce you will renounce this way, because this is the only way -- at once!"

You see a thing clearly and it happens. The question is of clarity. An immediate look into the nature of things, then there is no question of changing somewhere in the future. No one changes in the future -- transformation is always here and now. This moment is the only moment something can happen. There is no other moment.

IF THE EYE NEVER SLEEPS, ALL DREAMS WILL NATURALLY CEASE.

IF THE MIND MAKES NO DISCRIMINATIONS, THE TEN THOUSAND THINGS ARE AS THEY ARE, OF SINGLE ESSENCE.

IF THE EYE NEVER SLEEPS...

THESE TWO EYES will have to sleep because they are part of the body, and the body is not an eternal energy. It is a compound, it is not an elementary force. Many things combine it. It is a mechanical device, a bio-mechanism. It depends on being fed continuous energy: food, water, air. Energy is created, fuel is created and the body runs -- it is a mechanism. Your eyes will get tired because every machine gets tired.

You may be surprised to know that there has been a very great discovery in recent years that machines have to rest. Machines! You would never think it. Why machines? They don't need any rest. You drive a car for twenty hours, thirty hours; the car needs a rest. You will be puzzled. Why? A car is not a mind, a car is not consciousness. Why rest? If everything is functioning okay then you can go on and on, just go on fueling the car.

You are wrong. Now there are methods to judge when the car is tired. And the car is tired because every mechanism is bound to get tired. If you leave the car in the garage for a few hours, there are devices which will show when the car is ready to move again.

Every mechanism needs rest. Not only your body, every mechanism needs rest, then it revives again. Only consciousness needs no rest, because it is not a mechanism. It needs no fuel. It is perpetual energy, it is eternal energy, it is uncaused energy. It is there, always.

That's why Sosan uses a singular word: IF THE EYE NEVER SLEEPS.... Otherwise he would say "if the EYES." It is the third eye he is talking about. Even when your body sleeps, have you watched? -- watch a little, you will be able to know -- something in you keeps awake. Even while you are fast asleep, something, you may not be exactly clear what it is, but a point somewhere within you remains a witness.

That's why in the morning you can say, "Last night it was a beautiful sleep." If you are really asleep, who knows? How can you know, because you were fast asleep? Who watched it to say in the morning that it was deep and beautiful and without dreams? Some days you say it was disturbed -- "Dreams and dreams and dreams and I couldn't sleep well." Who knows? Somebody continuously watches.

This is the third eye which always remains open -- not even any blinking, it always remains unblinking. It has no eyelid, it never closes. This third eye is just a symbolic thing. Third eye means that in you there is an eternal vision, an eternal vigilance, an eternal wimess who never sleeps. And because it never sleeps, it never dreams, because dreaming is part of sleep. That third eye can see the truth, because there is no sleep and no dreaming.

You have to seek and search for that point within you which never sleeps. This is the whole search, the whole effort of a seeker. Truth is not somewhere outside. The whole question is how to seek that point within you which is never asleep, which is never unconscious, which is always alert, aware. That is the ray of God within you.

And once you seek it, the ray of constant watchfulness, from that ray you can travel to the very source. That source is God. If you can catch hold of one ray you can reach to the sun, to the very source. You just have to travel -- that becomes your way and path.

Finding a wimess within, you have found the path. Now become more and more and more and more that awareness. Allow all your energy to move into that awareness. And the more you become aware, the less dreaming... less... less....

A moment comes: suddenly you are only the witness, the mind has disappeared. The whole energy of the mind has been dissolved into the third eye. Two eyes have disappeared, now you are just a witness. This witnessing self is the point from where the world disappears and the divine is revealed.

LF THE EYE NEVER SLEEPS, ALL DREAMS WILL NATURALLY CEASE.

IF THE MIND MAKES NO DISCRIMINATIONS, THE TEN THOUSAND THINGS ARE AS THEY ARE, OF SINGLE ESSENCE.

And when YOU are one.... Remember, right now you have two eyes; even your vision is dual. Jesus says to his disciples, "If you become one eye everything will be set right."

In the body everything is two: two eyes, two ears, two hands, two legs, two kidneys -- everything is two because the body is a dualism. Only one thing in you exists as one and that is the witnessing eye. That is not part of the body because in the body there are always two. Everything is two, divided. The body exists as a polarity between two.

Even your minds are two: you have a different left brain and right brain, and they are divided. If their bridge is broken, and sometimes it happens, then a split personality happens. Somebody falls from a train and the bridge between the right and left brain is broken -- and it is a very delicate bridge. Then the person becomes two, then he is no more one. Then sometimes he is A or sometimes he is B, or sometimes he is both. And you cannot understand what he is doing, what is happening. He is split.

Right-handed persons develop their left brain; left-handed persons develop their right brain. So if a left-handed person is forced to do things with the right hand he will be in unnecessary trouble, because his left brain is not developed at all. So he will write... You try. A few of you must be left-handed because ten percent of people are left-handed whether they know it or not.

Because of the domination of right-handed people in the world, because they are ninety percent, many children are forced continuously to write with the right hand. They unnecessarily suffer; they will remain imbeciles their whole life just because they were forced. They cannot compete with the right-handed people. Their left brain is not functioning well, and if they work with it they will be in difficulty.

If you are a right-handed person, try to write with the left hand. You will write like a small child. Why? Because that part is just like a small child, it is undeveloped.

Even the brain is divided, everything is divided in the body. The only thing which is one is the third eye -- the witnessing. It is one. If you want to be one within you, seek the point of witnessing consciousness. While walking, watch. While eating, watch. While going to sleep, fall asleep watching what is happening.

Sooner or later, one day you will suddenly realize that the body has fallen asleep but you are still watching. The body is moving into sleep, by and by and by and by, going almost dead, and you are still watching. Then you will see the mind dreams dropping, falling, disappearing. You are still watching -- and suddenly you are illuminated. You have achieved the witnessing.

With witnessing, dreams disappear, and with dreams all illusions, the MAYA. And then you see that everything belongs to the one essence. The trees may be different, the form, but the formless within them is the one. The rock is one with the tree, the tree is one with the star, the star is one with you. Everything is joined together.

Right now you see only forms, because with the mind only forms can be seen. With the no-mind the formless can be seen. When you see the formless then the whole world is just like an ocean, and all the forms are just waves. In all the waves the ocean is waving -- the one.

Right now everything is many. It is not that things are many, it is because you are divided within. That's why things look many. It is just as if you break a mirror -- many fragments. Then each fragment will mirror and you will see many faces. You are standing there, you are one, but the mirror is broken -- you see many faces.

I have heard one old story:

A king made a palace. The whole palace was made of small mirrors, millions of mirrors. You enter the palace and you see yourself reflected in a million ways, millions of faces all around you. You are one, but the mirrors are many.

Once it happened, a dog entered the palace and got into much difficulty because he looked and he became scared. He started barking, so all the million dogs all around started barking. He thought, "Now there is no escape. And it is not a question of one enemy -- millions of dogs and all dangerous!" He jumped over them, he started fighting with them. He crashed against the wall and died.

This is what has happened to you, this is what is happening to everybody. The truth is one, but the mind has many fragments. Everything becomes divided and then you become afraid -- enemies are all over. Then you bark, then you start fighting, you become aggressive, you start trying to defend yourself -- unnecessarily, because there is nobody who is attacking you. You become paranoid. And then you crash your being against your own illusion and you die.

You live in suffering, you die in suffering. Become one within and suddenly everything outside becomes one. As you are, so is the universe -- divided you, divided universe; undivided you, undivided universe.

... THE TEN THOUSAND THINGS ARE AS THEY ARE, OF SINGLE ESSENCE.

TO UNDERSTAND THE MYSTERY OF THIS ONE-ESSENCE IS TO BE RELEASED FROM ALL ENTANGLEMENTS.

WHEN ALL THINGS ARE SEEN EQUALLY THE TIMELESS SELF-ESSENCE IS REACHED.

NO COMPARISONS OR ANALOGIES ARE POSSIBLE IN THIS CAUSELESS, RELATIONLESS STATE.

THAT'S WHY nothing can be said about this ultimate illumination -- because it is one and words exist for duality. You can say something, but whatsoever you say will not be the right thing, because it is a different level, a different dimension.

Christmas was coming near, and one tycoon, a very rich man, asked his son, "What would you like for a Christmas present, a gift for you?"

The boy said, "A baby brother."

The tycoon said, "but that doesn't give me enough time. Only two weeks are left."

So the boy said, "So what of it? Can't you put more men on the job?"

Because he was always listening -- if some job was to be done then more men were put on. "So why, what is the trouble? Can't you put more men on the job?" And it is difficult to tell this child that what he is saying is wrong -- he is absolutely logical.

This is the situation. You know the world of the many. The child knows the world of the jobs around the house, every day it is happening. And a rich father is always putting many men on the job and finishing everything within moments. He knows that language, but he does not know the mystery of how a life enters into the world. "Put more men on the job!" He is logical and it is difficult to make him understand unless he grows, grows in understanding.

You know the language of duality, the language of this world. It is impossible to tell anything to you about the one essence. Whatsoever is said will be understood wrongly, misunderstood -- unless you grow. This is the whole problem.

Many times people come to me and they ask questions. Their questions are relevant but I can't answer, because the answer can only be possible when they grow. And they think, "You ask and an answer must be there, readymade." They think, "If you can ask and articulate a question it is enough -- now give the answer!"

But there are answers which can be given to you only when you grow. And this is the problem: when you grow there is no need to give them to you, you simply understand. When this child grows, is there any need for us to tell him that he was foolish? He will laugh, he will say, "Yes, I understand. It is not a question of putting more men on the job. It is not a job at all."

When you grow you understand, but you ask when you are like children. And you think that your question is right, an answer should be given. Nothing of the truth can be said to you, and all that is said is always near about, approximate. And remember, there is nothing like approximate truth. Either it is true or untrue. So whatsoever is said is meaningless. When you know you will laugh. But there is no other way, nothing else can be done.

So all sayings of Sosan or Buddha or anybody are just to allure you towards a growth. What they say is not very important. If you become interested and start growing and moving in a dimension which you don't know anything about, that is the point.

TO UNDERSTAND THE MYSTERY OF THIS ONE-ESSENCE IS TO BE RELEASED FROM ALL ENTANGLEMENTS.

WHEN ALL THINGS ARE SEEN EQUALLY THE TIMELESS SELF-ESSENCE IS REACHED.

NO COMPARISONS OR ANALOGIES ARE POSSIBLE IN THIS CAUSELESS, RELATIONLESS STATE.

There is no cause to the ultimate, because from where will the cause come? The ultimate is the whole. The ultimate is not related, because to whom will it be related? It is alone.

So what to do? How to say? If something is related, something can be said about it; if something is caused then something can be said about it, because at least two enter. Language becomes possible if the two is there. If only one is there all language becomes absolutely absurd.

What to do about this one uncaused? Only one thing can be done and that is: Find within you something which is uncaused.Find something within you which is one, and you are on the right path.

You don't bother about philosophies, you don't go on moving into arguments of this type and that. There are millions of arguments and every argument becomes an entanglement, and every philosophy becomes a new bondage. You don't bother about philosophies, doctrines, scriptures.

You simply do one thing and that is: find something which is uncaused within you, and find something which is one within you -- and that is the same, because only the one can be uncaused.

And once you have a small glimpse within you of the uncaused, of the one, you have found the track. Now the goal is not very far away. And NOW you need not do anything. Now, like gravitation, the goal will pull you; now, like a magnet, you will be pulled towards it. Now you have entered the arena from where the magnet can work. You need only do one thing -- to enter it. Then the center will pull you, then no effort is needed.

The whole effort is how to come in contact with your own life energy. The contact is lost and broken. You are just near, but just near is also a distance. A small turning, just a looking back, and things start changing.

When they happen you will laugh: "Why was it so hard?" But if they are not happening it is difficult. Why do these people like Sosan go on saying that RIGHT now, AT ONCE, IMMEDIATELY it can happen? Try to find one uncaused thing within you. How will you do it? Try with me -- find one thing which remains unchanging within you.

In the morning you get up, the whole day you work -- millions of occupations, meetings, relationships. Everything changes, many moods come and go; sometimes you feel angry, sometimes you feel happy, sometimes you feel sad and sometimes very joyful, and sometimes negative and sometimes positive.

Everything changes -- just like the weather, everything changes. In the day you are awake, in the night you have to go to sleep. In the day you think, in the night you dream. Everything goes on like a flux. Find out one thing in this whole flux which remains the same... that is witnessing.

In the night you witness dreams; dreams change but the witnesser, the witnessing remains the same. In the day you witness moods: sadness, anger, happiness. Moods change but the witnessing remains the same. Healthy, you witness health; unhealthy, you witness illness. Rich, you witness wealth; poor, you witness poverty. One thing continuously remains the same and that is witnessing. And everything else is caused. This witnessing is not caused.

Somebody says something, appreciates you, you feel happy -- it is caused. A friend comes to see you and you feel happy -- it is caused. Somebody says something, insults you, you feel unhappy -- it is caused. The weather is not good, you feel sad and depressed -- it is caused. The weather is sunny, you feel good, vibrating, moving, active -- it is caused. If in the day you have not eaten, in the night you dream that you are eating delicious things -- it is caused.

Look at things which happen to you. Are they caused? If they are caused don't bother much about them; they belong to the world of the illusion. You are in search of the uncaused. Witnessing, you will find, is the only uncaused thing. It is not caused, nobody causes it.

That's why Buddhas say that a Master can only show you the way. He cannot cause any transformation, because the whole thing is to seek the uncaused, so how can a Master cause it? Nobody can cause it. He can simply show you the way -- you have to travel it.

No Buddha can transform you. If a Buddha can transform you that will also be a part of the illusory world, because again you are caused. If you come to me and you feel happy, that feeling is caused. If you go away from me and you feel unhappy, that feeling is caused.

Just look: happiness, unhappiness, sadness, joy, they come and go, they are beggars around you. The witnessing remains the very center, uncaused, unchanging, one. Seek that within you and then everything becomes clear. When you are clear within, everything is transparent. The truth is everywhere around you, only you have to become one.

Zen

HSIN HSIN MING: THE BOOK OF NOTHING

Chapter-7

All dreams must cease