... is just like when you are being operated on: anaesthetic has to be given to you. The operation can be done when you are awake but it will be too horrible, it will drive you crazy, and it will be too painful. Surgeons have learned it from nature; nature has a built-in process: whenever something is too horrible or too painful the person immediately falls into a swoon, becomes unconscious. You can...

... bear pain only up to a certain limit. If the pain becomes more than that, you simply become unconscious. So in fact, to call any pain unbearable is not right because the moment it is unbearable, you are not conscious; if you are conscious it is bearable. It is a built-in phenomenon, you have nothing to do with it. No pain is unbearable; when it is unbearable you simply pass out. And that's the...

... phenomenon with dreams also: much rubbish is being thrown out in dreams and when the unconscious really starts pouring the rubbish which has been accumulating for so many lives, down through the centuries, if you can see it, you will never be sane again. So it has to be released in dreams. But even when it is released in dreams, in the morning you will feel bad, mm? because the dream also happens in you...

... the anger will also dissolve. And once the anger has gone, the dream has done its work; you have vomited out your garbage from the unconscious. Then you will feel really unburdened. So something beautiful has started. And it is good that you have come because here it will be easier for things to settle. [A sannyasin says: I don't know what's happening. I feel such fear and I feel as if I can't love...

... fell on the earth. And on top fell the skeleton. His wife came, "What is happening?" Seeing the skeleton on her husband, she screamed and became unconscious. And the neighbors woke up because of her scream, and everybody was coming there - but they were all standing far away, seeing the situation. The wife was lying flat, the husband was lying there, and the skeleton was on top of him. And...

... I was hiding behind the tree. And I thought, "Now what to do?" We had not conceived of such a situation. I had just thought that he will freak out. But the situation had become so complex. And his son was looking from far away. I called to him, "This is not the time to be afraid." Somehow he picked up the skeleton, left those two there - both were unconscious - and put the...

... heart attack already. And if these skeletons start coming in the middle of the night knocking on the door...!" I have always been puzzled why people are so afraid of skeletons, because they are very poor people - with no life, they cannot do anything. But there seems to be some unconscious current, "We are also skeletons." Seeing a skeleton, you are seeing yourself without the skin. And...

... well-covered skeletons. And this will be the situation when death comes. So it reminds you of death. So nobody opens the cupboards in their unconscious where they have many skeletons, of many kinds. You yourself have put them there and now you are afraid of them. But the reality is that they are dead; just open the doors, bring light, clean your closets, clean your mind of all the dead luggage that...

... looking for his mother and he never finds his mother in the wife. It is very frustrating. Every woman is looking for her father and she never finds her father in the husband. It is a disaster. They have married each other for some unconscious reasons which they are not aware of. Each man has been jealous of his father from his very childhood. He wanted to possess the mother, and the father was the enemy...

.... And each girl has been jealous of the mother: she wanted to possess the father but the mother was always coming in between. All those memories have gone deep into the unconscious mind. That's why when you fall in love with a woman or a man, you cannot say why, why this woman particularly - because you are not aware. Your love cannot be a conscious decision; it is an unconscious phenomenon. You are...

... just a puppet in the hands of the unconscious. And before the marriage, when you are meeting each other you are bringing your best mask, the most beautiful personality - not only the best tie and coat, but your best personality- and the woman is doing the same. There are four persons meeting... on Chowpati Beach, wherever you find two persons meeting, remember there are four persons. The real two...

... are exploiting your tremendous greed, in the name of virtue, in the name of unselfishness. As a fundamental principal, I want you to remember that an unconscious man cannot act without motivation, and motivation is selfishness, whatever you do. I used to live in a city, teaching in the university, and a beautiful marble temple was being made there. For years I used to pass it on the road. Nine years...

... of his great spiritual father." He said, "For this stone the whole temple is being created. Krishna is just an excuse." The unconscious mind cannot do anything without motivation. What will I get? And religions promise that in the future life, when he reaches to the pearly gates, Saint Peter will be standing there with all the angels singing "Alleluia!", playing on their...

... different from your unconscious mind. Hence it has been called no-mind, just to show the difference, otherwise you will get confused. Mind is what you have. No-mind is the search of meditation. And from no-mind blossom flowers of unselfishness, of love, of compassion, of sharing. I repeat Basho, the great Zen master, and one of the greatest poets of the world: "Sitting silently, doing nothing, the...

... early morning sun. You will come out without a self, just as a pure presence. Out of this pure presence radiates all that is virtuous. Without meditation there is no virtue; there cannot be any virtue! And when I say anything like this, I say it with absolute authority, and I challenge every religion of the world to prove that unconscious people, sleepy people, can do any act without motivation...

... humanity -- the unconscious humanity. They never understand that receiving is far greater, it needs a far greater heart than giving. Anybody can give. For receiving you need such a consciousness that cannot be humiliated. You need such greatness of being that 'Who can insult me?'" I disagree absolutely with this good Christian teaching: "It is better to give than to receive." And I will...

... at least half a dozen cases of people who remember their past life. Somebody has been a Krishna, somebody has been a Rama. It seems everybody in his past life has been a great historical figure -- the founder of a religion. These are all imaginations. These are all people's wishfulfillments, and people's unconscious minds are such that they can supply any idea to console you. If you are very...

... inferior in this life, it is hurting. You are not rich, you are not beautiful, you are not a great celebrity; you are just nobody. It hurts. It starts hurting so much that the unconscious mind creates an imagination, a projection that "Don't be worried, in the past life you were Cleopatra -- the most beautiful woman ever born. You have enjoyed it, now let others enjoy. Don't suffer, just remember...

... no need to say. I trust." But Yakusan was far greater a master than Ungan: "THAT HORSE IS OF THE BEST QUALITY," ADDED YAKUSAN. UNGAN REPLIED, "IF THAT IS SO, I WILL TAKE IT." A strange dialogue. But I would like you to know that everybody who is unconscious has horns -- horse or man, it does not matter. Your anger, your violence, your rage, your tendency to destroy -- that...

... nuclear weapon. So Yakusan said, "THAT HORSE IS OF THE BEST QUALITY." UNGAN REPLIED, "IF THAT IS SO, I WILL TAKE IT." This whole dialogue is not what it appears. It is a dialogue about your unconsciousness, out of which all that is violent, all that is destructive, all that is ugly, arises. Your unconscious has horns. In other words, your unconscious is the only devil; there is no...

... other devil anywhere else. But when Yakusan said, "THAT HORSE IS OF THE BEST QUALITY ..." Your unconsciousness has two possibilities: if it remains unconscious, it is destructive, dangerous to you and to others. But if you bring light to it, if it turns into consciousness, that is its other possibility. Then it has the best quality in the world. You become a buddha. That's why Ungan said...

... men like Krishna were first made, they were not meant for worship. In fact, these statues came in the wake of an esoteric science which has become almost extinct. Before leaving their physical forms, the awakened ones had given a promise and a technique to their lovers, their disciples, that they could contact their oceanic life by meditating on unconscious mind that whenever you repeat the process...

... he will go into sleep, and then his unconscious mind will begin to operate on him. The power of our unconscious mind is enormous; what we cannot do in our conscious state we can do with the help of the unconscious mind. Man's unconscious mind is much more sensitive than his conscious. What we cannot hear in the conscious state becomes audible to the unconscious. In deep hypnotic sleep you can see...

... the innermost depth of your unconscious in such a way that its very remembrance can bring about a mutation in you. The names of men like Krishna and Buddha and many other words and mantras have been used for this purpose. But now people are repeating them meaninglessly. You repeat "Rama, Rama" a thousand times and it doesn't work. If it were a seed word it would work at the first chanting...

.... And it is not necessary that only names like Rama and Krishna can be used; any word can be transformed into a seed word and implanted in the depth of your unconscious. But unless a word or a mantra is charged with meditative energy, it won't work as a transforming factor in your life. The difficulty is that very often the basic know how is lost and we are left with empty words and superficial...

... unconscious. Otherwise it would not have been possible for us to live under their dead weight for so long. If you treasure some trash, it simply means you once had a glimpse of a diamond hidden behind it. If a wrong custom perpetuates itself, it means sometime in the past it embodied some truth which now is no more. That is why many outdated names and mantras and statues are still in vogue. Question 3...

... other is more important than your own being: God is more important, father is more important, mother is more important, society is more important, the priest is more important, the politician is more important. Except you, everybody is important; the OTHER is important, you are still not there. It is a very unconscious state. The majority of the people are stuck there; they remain camels. Almost...

... what God is, they have never felt anything like that; they only believe. Their magic of belief goes on doing certain things to them, but that is all make-believe, a kind of dream-world. They are not out of the unconscious, out of their sleep. And remember, I am not saying that this stage is not necessary; it is necessary, but once it is complete one has to jump out of it. One is not here to remain a...

... be able to drop it. Each individual has to come to a very crystallized ego; only then is the dropping of any help, otherwise not. The first state, of the camel, is unconscious. The second state, of the lion, is subconscious - a little higher than the unconscious. A few glimpses of the conscious have started coming in. The sun is rising, and a few rays are entering into the dark room where you are...

... asleep. The unconscious is no more unconscious. Something is stirred in the unconscious; it has become subconscious. But remember, the change is not very great - from the camel to the lion - as it is going to be from the lion to the child. The change is a kind of reversion. The camel starts standing on its head and becomes the lion. The camel says yes, the lion says no. The camel obeys, the lion...

... carried unconscious to his home. And it was almost an everyday thing that he would have to be forced to leave the museum - because the museum has to close sometime, it cannot remain open for twenty-four hours. He had never heard about meditation; he knew only thinking and thinking. But still in a way he is right, that the old religiousness has served as a kind of opium. It has helped poor people to...

... create the space for real religion to exist on the earth. The second question: Question 2: BELOVED MASTER, WHY ARE THE FRAUDS WORSHIPPED BY PEOPLE, AND PEOPLE LIKE JESUS, BUDDHA AND SOCRATES CONDEMNED, STONED AND KILLED? Saroj, the buddhas have always been condemned by the ordinary masses, but the ordinary masses are not responsible for it. They are unconscious. We cannot make them responsible for it...

.... They can't help it - they are fast asleep. And the buddhas disturb their sleep; the buddhas make every possible effort to wake them up. Nobody wants to be disturbed in one's sleep, and one may be having beautiful dreams, sweet, nice dreams.... People want to remain unconscious. Consciousness is unknown to them and they are naturally afraid of the unknown. With the known they are secure, safe, and...

... remain in the middle you will need awareness. Moving from one extreme to the other you don't need awareness. You were unconscious before as an indulgent person, now you are unconscious as a great ascetic. First you were stuffing yourself with food and you were unconscious, now you are starving yourself and you are unconscious. The man of consciousness stays in the middle: neither too much nor too...

... MECHANISM BY WHICH TO DO AWAY WITH DISTRACTION. INDOLENCE OF WHICH MAN IS CONSCIOUS, AND INDOLENCE OF WHICH MAN IS UNCONSCIOUS, ARE A THOUSAND MILES APART. UNCONSCIOUS INDOLENCE IS REAL INDOLENCE; CONSCIOUS INDOLENCE IS NOT COMPLETE INDOLENCE, BECAUSE THERE IS STILL SOME CLARITY IN IT. DISTRACTION COMES FROM LETTING THE MIND WANDER ABOUT; INDOLENCE COMES FROM THE MIND 'S NOT YET BEING PURE. DISTRACTION IS...

... unconscious - then you are a man. Or if you are a woman that means that the anima is in the conscious, the feminine part is predominant, and the male part, the animus, is in the unconscious. But both are always present together.Just as electricity cannot be without two poles, positive and negative, no being can be without two poles. Man and woman, yin and yang, positive/negative, Shiva/ Shakti - you can...

... powerful, immensely powerful; it takes roots in your unconscious. Do you think the old stories of Indian seers - old people they were, all old and almost dead, shrunken, just bones, skeletons, because they were fasting and living in forests... And, suddenly, one day they see Urvasi, the most beautiful dance-girl of the god Indra, dancing around them. What does Urvasi see in these skeletons? How does she...

... centre and there is no distraction. This is success. And why is this called success? - because this is the point where you know that you are a god, that you have never been anybody else, that you had fallen in a dream and dreamed that you had become a beggar. INDOLENCE OF WHICH MAN IS CONSCIOUS, AND INDOLENCE OF WHICH MAN IS UNCONSCIOUS, ARE A THOUSAND MILES APART. UNCONSCIOUS INDOLENCE IS REAL...

... a celibate.' He was a true man in a sense - truer than other so-called saints. At least he accepted that in his dreams he was not yet celibate. But unless you are celibate in your dreams you are not yet celibate, because the dream reveals whatsoever you are repressing during the day. The dream simply brings it back to your consciousness. Dreaming is a language, a communication from the unconscious...

... beyond your control. There are people who try to control dreams also. tn the East methods have been invented to control dreams. That means you are not even allowing the unconscious to convey any message to you. You can do that too. You can cultivate dreams if you work hard. You can start planning your dreams. You can give a story to your own unconscious to unfold in your dreams. If you do it...

... consistently, every day, by and by you will be able to corrupt the unconscious. For example, once a devotee of Krishna stayed with me. He said, 'I always dream of Krishna.' I asked him, 'How do you manage it? A dream is not something that you can manage. What method have you tried?' He said, 'A simple method which my guru gave to me. Every night when I go to sleep, I go on thinking and thinking about Krishna...

..., fantasising. After three years of continuously practising fantasy while falling asleep, one day it happened. Whatsoever I had fantasised continued in my dream and it became my dream. Since then I have been having tremendously religious dreams.' I said, 'You just go into the details - because you may have managed the story but the unconscious will be sending messages in the story itself, the unconscious can...

... that man is hankering after. You can manipulate your dreams, you can destroy the purity of your unconscious's messages but still the unconscious will go on giving you messages. It has to. It has to scream to you because you are destroying your own nature, your own spontaneity. This dream happened AFTER MANY YEARS OF GREAT POVERTY WHICH HAD NEVER SHAKEN HIS FAITH IN GOD. HE DREAMED THAT SOMEONE BADE...

... they come the child is still inside the circle. Gurdjieff started wondering how it happened, why it happened, and soon he was able to figure out that it is just a question of your unconscious accepting the idea. Once your unconscious accepts the idea, then your body and your conscious mind have no power to go against it. In his own exercises that he developed later on when he became a Master...

... go almost crazy; so drunk that they would forget completely who they were. And he would go on giving it to them. If they fell he would shake them, sit them up and pour them some more, because there is a moment when the person has come to a point where his whole body, his whole consciousness is completely overtaken by the intoxicant. In that moment his unconscious starts speaking. Freud took three...

... years, four years, five years of psychoanalysis to do this. Gurdjieff did it in a single night! Your unconscious would start speaking, would give all the clues about you of which you have not even been aware. And you would not know that you had given those clues to Gurdjieff - but he would know. And then he would work according to those clues: what exercises would be right for you, what dances would...

... be suitable for you, what music was needed for you. All the clues have been given by your unconscious. You were not aware of it because you were completely intoxicated. You were not present when he worked on the unconscious and persuaded it to give all the clues about you. Those were the secrets about you - then he had the keys in his hands. So if somebody refused, "Now I cannot drink any more...

... when you sleep you feel so restful, because you come back to your primitive state, horizontal; and the mind moves into the collective unconscious, far back when you were also moving on four feet. Animals, if you look at their faces, you will find graceful. Have you seen any animal in the same kind of states as you see in man's changing faces? No, because there is no emotion, no sensibility, their...