The Fish in the Sea is Not Thirsty Talks on Kabir

And the animal is your base, it is your very foundation. You are born as an animal; you are not different from any other animal. You CAN be different but you are not -- just by being born you don't become different. Yes, you have a different kind of body, but not very much different. You have a different kind of intelligence, but not very much different. The difference is only of quantity, not of quality.

Now modern research into plants says that even plants are intelligent, sensitive, alert, aware -- what to say about animals? A few researchers say that even metals have a kind of intelligence of their own. So the difference between man and the elephant. between man and the dolphin, between man and the monkeys, is not of quality, it is only of quantity, only of degrees. We have a little bit more intelligence, that's all.

It is not much of a difference, at least not a difference that makes any difference. The qualitative change happens only when a man becomes fully awakened, when a man becomes a Buddha -- then the real difference happens. Then he is no more an animal. Then he is simply divine -- but how to attain it?

That ninety-nine percent of religious people has been doing something utterly wrong -- just the same logic. The same logic that is being followed by the violent people, the sexual people, the alcoholics. The same kind of logic: forget the animal. Many techniques have been developed to forget the animal: chant mantras so that you can forget the animal, become occupied in chanting; go on repeating "Rama, Rama, Rama, Rama." Repeat it so fast that your whole mind be-comes full of the vibe of this single word 'Rama'. This is simply a way to avoid the animal -- and the animal is there.

You can go on chanting Rama for centuries... the animal is not going to be changed by such a simple trick. You cannot deceive the animal. It will remain only a very superficial religiousness. Scratch any religious man and you will find the animal inside; just scratch a little. It is not even skin-deep, the so-called religiousness. It only pretends, it is only a formality, a social ritual.

You go to the church, you read the Bible, you read the Gita, you do chanting, you do prayer, but it is all formal. Your heart is not in it. And your animal inside goes on laughing at you, he ridicules you. He knows you perfectly well, who you are, where you are. And he knows how to manipulate you. You can go on chanting for hours, and then a beautiful woman passes by and suddenly all chanting disappears and you have forgotten all about God. Just the smell from the bakery... and all is gone; Hare Krishna Rama, all is gone.

Just any small thing is enough! Somebody insults you and there is anger, and the animal is ready to take revenge, you are in a rage. In fact, religious people become more angry than anybody else -- because others don't repress. And religious people are more sexually perverted than anybody else, because others don't repress. The religious person's dreams have to be watched, because in the day he can go on repressing, but what about the night when he is asleep?

Mahatma Gandhi wrote that even at the age of seventy he was having sexual dreams. At the age of seventy, why sexual dreams? He said, "In the day I have become disciplined -- the whole day not even a single thought of sex comes to me. But in the night I am incapable, I am unconscious, so the hole discipline and control disappears."

Sigmund Freud's insight is very valuable, that to know about a man you have to know his dreams, not his waking life. His waking life is pseudo. His real life asserts itself in his dreams, because his dreams are more natural -- no repression, no discipline, no control. Hence, psychoanalysis does not bother about your waking life. Just see the point: your waking life is so pseudo that psychoanalysis docs not believe in it at all. It is worthless. Psychoanalysis penetrates into your dreams because dreams are far truer than your so-called waking life.

This is ironical that the waking life, which we think is real life is not thought by psychoanalysis to be real; it is thought to be more unreal than your dreams. Your dreams are far more real, because you are not there to distort, you are fast asleep; the conscious mind is asleep and the unconscious is free to have its say. And the unconscious is your true mind, because the conscious is only one tenth of your total mind. Nine tenths is the unconscious -- nine times more powerful, nine times bigger than your conscious mind.

And what will you do when you are fighting with your sexuality, anger, greed? You will go on throwing them into the unconscious, into the darkness of the basement, thinking that by not seeing them you are getting rid of them. You are not getting rid of them. Not even a man like Mahatma Gandhi... what to say about small mahatmas like Morarji Desai etc.

A man like Mahatma Gandhi continued to have sexual dreams. That simply shows that his whole effort in the waking life was futile, that whatsoever he was trying to do in the waking life was of no use. And he recognized it -- at the very end of his life he recognized the whole futility of his discipline. His whole life had been a wastage; he recognized it. And in the end, just before he died, for two years he was experimenting with the science of Tantra. It is not talked about, not at least by the Gandhians -- they are very much afraid of those two years. He was advised by his followers, "Please, don't do such experiments."

You will be surprised: even Morarji Desai had advised him, "Don't do such experiments!" Why? They were afraid about the prestige of the Mahatma. They were afraid about themselves too. But he was a man of courage; howsoever wrong, he was a sincere man. He had the courage to accept that his effort of disciplining according to the traditional way had failed. In the last two years he was sleeping with naked women -- just for the first time not repressing but expressing, being loving, open, for the first time not on guard.

My own understanding is that those two years of his life which are not talked about are the most important -- not only were they not talked about: the followers deny, hide those facts. And those two years are the most important in his life. In those two years, for the first time he became aware that sexual energy need not be repressed: it can be transformed.

His life was cut short because a fanatic from this very city, Poona, killed him. Otherwise it would have been a totally different story. If he had lived ten more years, then all these so-called Gandhians would have left him. Many had already left when he started experimenting with Tantra. If he had lived ten more years it would have been a great boon to humanity, because he would have been able to say, "My whole life's effort of repression failed while Tantra succeeded."

Ninety-nine percent of religious people go on repressing, and whenever you repress something it goes deeper in you, it becomes more a part of your being. And it starts affecting you in such subtle ways that you may not even be aware of it. It takes very devious routes: it cannot come in direct ways because if it comes directly, you Repress it. Then it comes in such subtle ways, such devious ways, such deceptive ways, with masks, that you cannot even recognize that it is sexuality.

It can even use masks of prayer, of love, of religious ritual. But if you go deep down, if you allow yourself to be exposed to somebody who can observe and who understands the inner functioning of your mind, you will be surprised that it is the same energy moving through different channels. It has to move through different channels, because no energy can ever be repressed.

Let it be understood once and for all: no energy can ever be repressed. Energy can be transformed, but never repressed. The real religion consists of alchemy, of transforming techniques, methods. The real religion consists not of repressing the animal but of purifying the animal, of raising the animal to the divine, using the animal, riding on the animal to go to the divine. It can become a tremendously powerful vehicle, because it is power.

Sex can be used as a great energy -- you call ride on it to the very door of God. But if you repress it you will become more and more entangled. This is a very modern approach, but the sutras of Kabir will say to you that what Sigmund Freud discovered is not a discovery -- it is only a discovery in the West. As far as the East is concerned, it is an ancient truth. The sages have always known about it.

These sutras are very beautiful, very scientific. Meditate over each sutra:
FRIEND PLEASE TELL ME WHAT I CAN DO ABOUT

THIS WORLD

I HOLD TO AND KEEP SPINNING OUT!

The original is:

AVADHU LITERALLY MEANS A FRIEND, but it has a special meaning, not just a friend. In English there is no word to give the real meaning of AVADHU, but it can be explained. AVADHU means a friend, a companion, a comrade, on the way towards the divine -- a special kind of friendship. The friendship of two seekers, the friendship of those who are in search of the unknown and the unknowable, the friendship of those who are ready for the ultimate venture, who are ready to go into the uncharted sea. AVADHU means friends in the search for truth. It is risky; such a friendship needs guts. It is no ordinary friendship -- it is utterly extraordinary, it is not of this world.

This friendship means SATSANG: when many seekers gather together around a man who has known, because such a friendship is possible only around a man who has known, such a gathering is possible only around a Buddha, around one who has awakened -- because he will function as the center of the commune. Without the center, the commune will not have any significance; it will be an ordinary crowd.

Without Christ, Christians are just a crowd, an ordinary crowd. With Christ, it is a communion, it is satsang -- it is the ultimate friendship. Christ can call his disciples AVADHU -- friends, comrades, companions, soulmates -- that's exactly the meaning of AVADHU. The friendship is not worldly, has no motive. The friendship is not that of dependence. The friendship has no relationship which can be explained in any worldly way -- but two souls in a deep rhythm, two soulmates.

It is difficult to search alone -- the path is arduous, hazardous. dangerous; there is every possibility of getting lost. It is easier it people move with friends. It is like Gurdjieff used to say... when he was travelling in Sufi countries, a Sufi Master gave him a technique. The technique was that twenty friends of Gurdjieff had to go deep into the desert, but at least one person had to remain awake. Including Gurdjieff, there were twenty-one persons. Twenty persons could go to sleep, but one had to be awake constantly, twenty-four hours a day. When he WAS tired he had to wake somebody else; he could go to sleep, then the other had to remain awake. But one had to be awake!

If you are alone you will have to fall asleep once in a while, but if you are moving with friends at least one can always be awake. And in a desert, or in a forest, in a jungle, it is needed that at least one should be awake.

And when you go on the journey, the ultimate pilgrimage to God, it is good to have a few friends with you, because at least one can always be awake. And the person who is awake will become your protection, and the person who is awake will help you not to go astray, and the person who is awake will keep you together, and the person who is awake will become a kind of glue which will integrate your energies.

But if you can find a man who is awake, twenty-four hours awake -- that's the meaning of being a Buddha -- then naturally a commune of friends gathers around him. His light, his under-standing, slowly slowly permeates their being too.

Kabir is not talking to the public -- he is talking to a few friends. Hence he says:
AVADHU, FRIENDS, MAYA TAJI NA JAI.

It is very difficult to drop this mind -- it is very difficult to drop this mind because who is going to drop it? Even the idea of dropping is part of the mind. It is very difficult to drop the mind, because even if you drop it the one who drops it will remain -- that will become your mind. It is a very vicious circle. How to come out of it?

This mind is illusory, hence he calls it 'maya -- all illusion. It is NOT really there; it has no substance, but still it persists continuously -- day in, day out, your mind continues. Thoughts, dreams, desires, imagination, memory... the traffic goes on and on. All is non-substantial! If you wake up, suddenly you will find all the dreams, all the desires, all the thoughts, have disappeared. But how to drop this mind? Who is going to drop it? If you try to drop it, you are the mind.

You can escape to the Himalayan caves but the mind will go with you, because really the mind will be going to the Himalayan caves -- who else? You can renounce the family, but who will renounce? You can stand on your head, but it will be the same mind -- you are simply being stupid. It has to be understood.

Nothing has to be done on your part, because anything done is done always by the mind. Doing is the very function of the mind. So nothing can be done with the mind to drop it.
AVADHU, MAYA TAJI NA JAI.

So Kabir says: It is very difficult, friends, to drop this mind and its illusions. In the first place they are so non-substantial -- if they had been substantial it would have been easy. You can Leave the house, you can renounce your wife, your children, you can go away from the world -- it is very substantial! But how will you leave your mind? It will be with you.

The Master looked at Bayazid and looked around and said, "And why have you brought this crowd with you?"

Bayazid was surprised. He looked back -- there was nobody else. Has this man gone mad? He said, "What crowd are you talking about?"

And the Master said, "Don't look back -- look in. All those people that you have left behind are there."

And Bayazid closed his eyes... and the Master was right, he was not crazy. The wife was still crying, the children were telling him, "Daddy, don't go." The friends were holding his hands to the very last. When he said goodbye to them, they all followed him as far as possible; he had to persuade them again and again, "Please go back. I have decided, and my decision is absolute." And when he closed his eyes they were all there.

And the Master said, "Bayazid, it is easy to renounce the world, but how are you going to renounce the mind? Because the mind is the real world! They are all there. You will sit meditating, and you will remember your wife; you may not have ever remembered her when you were with her -- that's how mind functions. That which is, it takes it for granted; that which is not it hankers for. Now you will be more and more involved with your wife, your children. More and more memories will come: 'What is happening to my children? What is happening to my wife? Has she betrayed me? Has she gone with somebody else? Can she do that?' Jealousy, possessiveness, and all kinds of things are bound to arise."

There is a beautiful story in Jaina scriptures:
A great king, Bimbisar, went to see Mahavira, the last Jaina teerthankara -- the last Jaina prophet. On the way, he met one of his old friends. They had studied in the same school; he was also a son of a king, but he had renounced and he had become a Jaina monk -- he was standing naked underneath a tree.

Bimbisar was overwhelmed with tremendous respect for this man and started feeling a little guilty also about himself: "I am still involved in the world -- money, power, prestige, war. And look at my friend: he was also a king, he would also have been a king like me, but he has renounced -- a man of courage." He bowed down, he touched the feet of his old friend. Then he went to see Mahavira.

Just a few yards further away was Mahavira, sitting underneath a tree. Bimbisar asked him, "One question arose in my mind -- when I saw my old friend Prasannachandra, who has become a monk, a disciple of yours, a question arose in my mind: if he dies right now, where will he be born?"

Jainas say there are seven hells and seven heavens -- "Into what heaven will he be born?" Bimbisar asked. "Of course, there is no question of his being born in hell -- he has renounced such a great kingdom and all -- in what heaven?"

And Mahavira said, "He would have gone to the seventh hell -- if he had died the time you touched his feet."

Bimbisar was shocked. He said, "Into the seventh hell? Then what about me? There are no other hells below the seventh. My friend, who has renounced all and looks so pious and so silent and so serene, he is going to be born into the seventh hell?"

Mahavira said, "Don't be worried: if he dies now, he will be born into the seventh heaven." And just a few minutes had passed.

Bimbisar said, "You puzzle me very much. Now you have confused me even more. What has happened within these few minutes that he will be born into the seventh heaven?" Mahavira said, "You don't know the whole story. Just before you, your prime minister had passed. He had come to accompany you just to see that everything is safe. Your prime minister, your generals and your guards, they passed just a few minutes before you. And your prime minister said, 'Look at this fool, this Prasannachandra! He would have been a great king and he has become hypnotized by this Mahavira. And now standing naked in this heat, wasting his life.... He used to be a beautiful man -- now look at his body. And he is an utter fool, because he has trusted his prime minister and has given the whole kingdom to him till his children are grown up enough to take possession of it -- and the prime minister is a cheat. And by the time the children are grown up, there will be nothing left in the treasury.'

"Hearing this, Prasannachandra forgot completely that he has become a monk -- completely! He was so shocked and be-came so angry, and he said inside his heart, 'I am still alive.' And his hand, just out of old habit went to his sword -- which was not there. He pulled the sword out of the sheath and said, 'I will go and kill this man immediately.' And in his imagination he cut the head of the prime minister.

"When you touched his feet," Mahavira said, "he had just killed the prime minister. Hence, I told you that in that moment if he had died he would have gone to the seventh hell -- he was in a murderous attitude. Now, things have changed. When he put his sword back into the sheath, he recognized, 'What am I doing? Where is the sword, and where is the sheath? And what have I done? Killed my prime minister in imagination! It is as much a crime as actually killing a person.

" 'Mahavira says, "Whether you think of killing or you kill, it makes no difference -- it is the same, psychologically it is the same." What have I done? When I have renounced, have renounced! Who am I to interfere now? If he cheats that is HIS business; if he breaks the trust, HE will suffer for it. But who am I to punish him? I am finished with all this. And who are my children, and what is my kingdom?'

"And a great understanding came to him. He became quiet, silent, serene, detached. Right now if he dies, he is in such a beautiful space that he will be born in the seventh heaven."

The question is of the mind, not of the world. You can go to the Himalayan caves, but what are you going to think about? You will think of the world. That's why Kabir says:
AVADHU MAYA TAJI NA JAI.

It is very difficult to drop this mind.

THIS WORLD...

the world of the mind

... I HOLD TO, AND KEEP SPINNING OUT!

BUT I NOTICED ONE DAY THE CLOTH WAS WELL WOVEN.

I have dropped those beautiful clothes and now I am wearing a single robe, but it doesn't matter -- the mind can project in the same way." The screen makes no difference: the film continues the same. You can use the wall as the screen, and you can project the same film. You need not have a perfect screen. The film is the same, even projected on the wall; the wall may be rough, may be a poor man's house wall, but it makes no difference -- the film is the same.

Kabir says: I recognized it, "Mind is still functioning in the same way. I still walk in such a way that people should recognize me, that I am no ordinary man. I used to walk in my beautiful clothes -- why do people use beautiful clothes? So that they look special. Now I am wearing a robe, but still, deep down, the same desire persists."

The original is:

BASTAR TAJ KE FERI.

I have left the house, I have moved to the cave, with only a small bag, but then one day I recognize that the cave has become the home, the cave has become the house. And the small possession that I brought with me can function perfectly well for my possessiveness. My possessiveness remains the same! Now if somebody enters into the cave, I am going to say, "Get out! This is my cave."

You can go and see this. Go to the Himalayas, enter into some cave and some yogi will be sitting there, and he will say, "Get out! What are you doing here? This is my cave. I have lived here for thirty years. If you want to live in a cave, find your own."

BASTAR TAJ KE FERI.

Now I have become a vagabond, but great pride has arisen in me.
SO I BOUGHT SOME BURLAP, BUT I STILL

THROW IT ELEGANTLY OVER MY LEFT SHOULDER.

Seeing that the robe was well woven, I purchased coarse canvas and made a shawl out of it -- BUT STILL I THROW IT ELEGANTLY OVER my LEFT SHOULDER. The same mind.

You can stand naked in the sun -- it doesn't matter: it will be the same mind. How is one going to drop the mind? It comes from the backdoor; it finds new ways to enter back into you.

AND NOW I DISCOVER THAT I'M ANGRY A LOT.

THIS IS OF TREMENDOUS IMPORTANCE TO UNDERSTAND. Kabir has looked deep into the human mind and its workings, its subtle cunning ways. And he has found exactly the whole process of inner alchemy. If you repress, this is how things happen.
I PULLED BACK MY SEXUAL LONGINGS,

AND NOW I DISCOVER THAT I'M ANGRY A LOT.

If you repress sex you will become angry; the whole energy that was becoming sex will become anger. And it is better to be sexual than to be angry. In sex at least there is something of love; in anger there is only pure violence and nothing else. If sex is repressed, the person becomes violent -- either to others he will be violent, or to himself These are the two possibilities: either he will become a sadist and will torture others, or he will become a masochist and will torture himself. But torture he will.