Research - Joy of doing it

Archimedes was one of the most important scientists of his time and of all times.


Archimedes was puzzled for months because the king had told him, ”If you are really a scientist you should find out one thing. Somebody, another king, has presented me with a crown of gold. I want to know whether it is pure gold, or if there is some mixture in it. Is any other metal mixed in with it? And I don’t want the crown to be cut. I don’t want you even to touch it. You have to find the answer without spoiling the beautiful present.”


For months Archimedes was troubled: how to find out?


If he were allowed to cut a little piece of the crown it would have been possible to find out whether other metals were mixed in or not. When a question remains continuously with you for twenty-four hours, it takes you, by and by, close to the answer.


The answer comes in a moment of relaxation. The question is a tension, but you can get the answer in relaxation only if the tension has been to its uttermost climax.


It had been so for months, and the king was asking every day. Archimedes was starting to feel embarrassed: a well known scientist cannot find such a small thing?


People had started laughing at him. He could not sleep, he could not do anything – only one question.... That day, relaxing in his bathtub – which was full of water, completely full – as he sat in the tub, naturally some water flowed out to make a space for him. And something clicked in his mind. He weighed the water that had flowed out, and he found the principle.


If pure gold is put in water, then a certain amount of water will come out. If some other metal is mixed in it, then a different amount of water will come out, because that certain metal will not have the same effect on water as the gold if it is pure.


Now the crown need not be destroyed; it has just to be put in water, and another piece of pure gold of the same volume can be put in water and you can see how much water comes out from both. If it is exactly the same then the crown is of pure gold; if it is not, then there is a mixture.


The finding was not something great. He had not found a master, or truth; he had not realized himself. He had not entered into nirvana. But such a small finding.... The question is not of small or great; the question is of finding yourself.


The joy comes from finding, not what you find.


Archimedes jumped out of his bathtub, ran out of his bathroom, and rushed into the street shouting,”Eureka!” A crowd followed him. They thought, ”We were always thinking this man is crazy, now he has gone completely crazy; naked, he is going towards the palace!”


He reached the court naked, shouting ”Eureka, I have found it!”


The king said, ”It seems you must have found it. But where are your clothes?” That moment Archimedes became aware that he was naked.


The king said, ”Your coming naked shows that you must have found it, because when someone finds something it is such a joy. Who cares about clothes? Who remembers about manners? You need not say anything to me; just your coming in this way has given me proof that you must have found it.”


Researchers have you ever shouted, ”Eureka!” have you found anything that could have driven you into the street naked,shouting.


This is why such a question arises about research.


You have been living on borrowed things. You can borrow things but you cannot borrow things which is not found.



- Excerpt from the false to the truth

FATE AND DESTINY

There is no fate, no destiny. You are just trying to dump your responsibility on something that does not exist.  And because it does not exist, it cannot resist you; it cannot say, "Please don't dump your responsibility on me!"

God is silent, you can dump anything on him-no resistance, because there is nobody to resist.

Certainly you cannot throw your garbage on somebody who is actually there. There is a limit to patience. You just try throwing your garbage onto the property of your neighbor. Perhaps for one day he may not say anything; perhaps for two days he may wait but how long? Sooner or later he is going to grab you by the neck and prove to you: "I exist! You cannot go on throwing your garbage in my yard." But if there is nobody in the house, you can continue to throw the garbage in the yard as long as you want. Nobody will resist, nobody will come out and say, "What is going on? Don't you have any sense of decency in you?" 

Fate is again the same. You fail in love, you fail in other matters. It hurts that you have failed. 

You need some kind of ointment for your wounded heart. "Fate" is a beautiful ointment,and freely available. You don't have to pay for it You can say, "What can I do?  Everything is decided by fate.

 "Success or failure, richness or poverty,  sickness or health, life or death,  everything is in the hands of an unknown power called fate "I am doing my best,  still I go on failing. I am following all the moral principles preached to me, still I am poor. And I see all kinds of immoral people becoming richer,  getting ahead, becoming famous. It is all fate." It gives you solace.  It gives you solace that you are not reaching your goals.

It also gives you solace that if others have achieved success, there is nothing much in it it is just decided by fate. So, on the one hand, you are saved from feeling inferior; on the other hand, your jealousy enjoys the idea that the successful person is successful only because fate has determined it that way: "It has nothing to do with him; he's not superior to me. "God,  fate, destiny--they are all in the same category: throwing your responsibility onto something that does not exist.

If God existed he would not remain silent. I am continually saying he does not exist. If he existed, it is time he should have appeared and announced, "I am here! Why do you go on saying that I don't exist?" But he will never come.

God, fate, destiny--these are bogus words, mumbo jumbo, nothing more than that. Drop them completely, because dropping them will make you an individual fully responsible for your acts. And unless you take the responsibility on yourself, you will never become strong, you will never become independent, you will never taste freedom.

Forget words like destiny, fate,Luck,God. And don't allow yourself to be cheated by

astrologers, mind readers, palmists, predictors of your future.There is no future if you don't create it! And whatsoever is going to be tomorrow is going to be your creation.And it has to be done today,now- because out of today, today's womb, tomorrow will be born.

Take the responsibility totally on yourselves--that's my message to you . by OSHO

LOVE II

There are two kinds of love. 

C.S. Lewis has divided love into these two kinds:

’need-love’ and ’gift-love’

Abraham Maslow also divides love into two kinds. 

’deficiency-love’ and  ’being-love’. 

The distinction is significant and has to be understood.

The ’need-love’ or the ’deficiency-love’ depends on the other; it is immature love. In fact it is not truly love – it is a need. You use the other, you use the other as a means. You exploit, you manipulate, you dominate. But the other is reduced, the other is almost destroyed. And exactly the same is being done by the other. He is trying to manipulate you, to dominate you, to possess you, to use you. To use another human being is very unloving. So it only appears like love; it is a false coin. But this is what happens to almost ninety-nine per cent of people because the first lesson of love that you learn is in your childhood.


A child is born, he depends on the mother. His love towards the mother is a ’deficiency-love’: he needs the mother, he cannot survive without the mother. He loves the mother because mother is his LIFE. In fact, there is no love; he will love any woman – whosoever will protect him, whosoever will help him to survive, whosoever will fill up his need. The mother is a sort of food that he eats. Itis not only milk that he gets from the mother, it is love also – and that too is a need.

Millions of people remain childish all their lives; they never grow up. They grow in age, but they never grow in their minds; their psychology remains juvenile, immature. They are always needing love. They are hankering for it like food.

Man becomes mature the moment he starts loving rather than needing. He starts overflowing, sharing; he starts giving. The emphasis is totally different. With the first, the emphasis is on how to get more. With the second, the emphasis is on how to give, how to give more, and how to give unconditionally. This is growth, maturity, coming to you.

A mature person gives. Only a mature person can give, because only a mature person has it. Then love is not dependent. Then you can be loving whether the other is or is not. Then love is not a relationship, it is a state.

What will happen if all the disciples disappear and only I am here? Do you think there will be any change? What happens when a flower blooms in a deep forest with nobody to appreciate it, nobody to know its fragrance, nobody to pass a comment and say ’beautiful’, nobody to taste its beauty, its joy, nobody to share – what happens to the flower? It dies? It suffers? It becomes panicky? It commits suicide? It goes on blooming, it simply goes on blooming. It does not make any difference whether somebody passes by or not; it is irrelevant. It goes on spreading its fragrance to the winds.It goes on offering its joy to God, to the whole.

If I am alone, then too, I will be as loving as when I am with you. It is not you who are creating my love. If you were creating my love, then naturally, when you are gone, my love will be gone.

 You are not pulling my love out – I am showering it on you: it is ’gift-love’, it is ’being-love’.
And I don’t really agree with C.S. Lewis and Abraham Maslow. The first love that they call ’love’ is not love, it is a need. How can a need be love? Love is a luxury. It is abundance. It is having so much life that you don’t know what to do with it, so you share. It is having so many songs in your heart that you have to sing them – whether anybody listens or not is not relevant. If nobody listens,then also you will have to sing it, you will have to dance your dance.

The other can have it, the other can miss it – but as far as you are concerned, it is flowing, it is overflowing. Rivers don’t flow for you; they are flowing whether you are there or not. They don’t flow for your thirst, they don’t flow for your thirsty fields; they are simply flowing there. You can quench your thirst, you can miss – that’s up to you. The river was not really flowing for you, the river was just flowing. It is accidental that you can get the water for your field, it is accidental that you can get water for your needs.


A Master is a river, the disciple is accidental. The Master is flowing; you can partake, you can enjoy, you can share his being. You can be overwhelmed by him, but he is not FOR you. He is not flowing for you in particular, he is simply flowing. Remember this. And this I call mature love, real love,authentic love, true love.


When you depend on the other there is always misery. The moment you depend, you start feeling miserable, because dependence is slavery. Then you start taking revenge in subtle ways, because the person you have to depend upon becomes powerful over you. Nobody likes anybody to be powerful over them, nobody likes to be dependent; because dependence kills freedom, and love cannot flower in dependence. Love is a flower of freedom – it needs space, it needs absolute space.The other has not to interfere with it. It is very delicate.

When you are dependent, the other will certainly dominate you, and you will try to dominate
the other. That’s the fight that goes on between so-called lovers; they are intimate enemies – continuously fighting. 

Husbands and wives – what are they doing? Loving is very rare; fighting is the rule, loving is an exception. And in every way they try to dominate – even through love they try to dominate. If the husband asks the wife, the wife denies – she is reluctant. She is very miserly: she gives, but very reluctantly; she wants you to wave your tail around her. And so is the case with the husband. When the wife is in need and asks him, the husband says that he is tired.

 In the office there was too much work, ’really overworked’, and he would like to go to sleep.


I have read one letter written by Mulla Nasruddin to his wife. 

To my dear, ever-loving wife,

During the past year I have tried to make love to you 365 times, an average of once per day, and the following is a list of the reasons you gave for rejecting me:

• Wrong week 11
• It will wake the children 7
• It is too hot 15
• It is too cold 3
• Too tired 19
• Too late 16
• Too early 9
• Pretending to sleep 33
• The window is open, neighbors might hear 3
• Backache 16
• Toothache 2
• Headache 6
• Not in the mood 31
• Baby restless, might cry 18
• Watched late show 15
• Mud-pack 8
• Grease on face 4
• Too drunk 7
• Forgot to visit chemists 10
• Visitors sleeping in the next room 7
• Just had hair done 28
• Is that all you think about?’ 62

Dearest, do you think we can improve on our record during the forthcoming year?

Your ever-loving husband,


Mulla Nasruddin.


These are ways how to manipulate, how to starve, the other, how to make him more and more hungry so that he becomes more and more dependent.

Naturally, women are more diplomatic about it than men, because man is already powerful. He need not find subtle and cunning ways to be powerful, he is powerful. He manages the money – that is his power.

Muscularly, he is more strong. Down the centuries he has conditioned the mind of the woman that he is more powerful and she is not powerful. 

In every way he has always tried to find a woman who is in every way lesser than him. 

• A man does not want to be married to a woman who is more educated than him, because then the power is at stake. 

• He does not want to marry a woman who is taller than him, because a taller woman looks superior. 

• He does not want to marry a woman who is too much of an intellectual, because then she argues, and argument can destroy power. 

• A man does not want a woman who is very famous, because then he becomes secondary. 

• And down the centuries man has asked for a woman who is younger than him. Why can’t the wife be older than you? What is wrong? But an older woman is more experienced – that destroys power.

So man has always asked for a lesser, in every way a lesser woman – that’s why women have lost their height. There is no reason for them to be of lesser height than men, no reason at all; they have lost their height because only the smaller woman was always chosen. By and by the thing has entered in their minds so deeply that they have lost their height. 

They have lost their intelligence, because an intelligent woman was not needed; an intelligent woman was a freak. You will be surprised to know that just in this century their height is increasing again. And you will be surprised... even their bones are becoming bigger, and their skeleton is becoming bigger. Just within fifty years... particularly in America. And their mind is also growing and becoming bigger than it used to be: their skull is becoming bigger.

With the idea of freedom, some deep conditioning has been destroyed. Man already has power so he need not be very clever, need not be very indirect. Women don’t have power. When you don’t have power, you have to be more diplomatic – that is a substitute. The only way they can feel powerful is that they are needed, that the man is continuously in need of them.

This is not love – this is a bargain. And they are continuously haggling over the price; it is a
continuous struggle. C.S. Lewis and Abraham Maslow divide love in two. I don’t divide in two. I say that the first kind of love is just a name, a pseudo coin; it is not true. Only the second kind of love is love.


Love happens only when you are mature. You become capable of loving only when you are a grownup. When you know that love is not a need but an overflow: being-love or gift-love, then you give without any conditions.

- Excerpt from Tantra vision Vol II

CONSCIOUSNESS

In Zen they say: 

Find out your original face. The face that you are using is not original; it is cultivated. It is not your face; it is just a facade, just a device. You have many faces, each moment you change your face. You go on changing it. The changing has become so automatic by now that you don't even observe it, you don't notice it.

When you meet your servant you have a different face from when you meet your boss. If your servant is sitting on your left side and your boss is sitting on your right, you have two faces. The left face is for the servant and the right face is for the boss. You are two persons simultaneously. How can you have the same face for your servant? Your one eye has a certain quality, a certain look. Your other eye has a different quality, a different look. It is meant for the boss and the other one is meant for the servant. This has become so automatic, so mechanical, so robot like that you go on changing your faces, you have multi-faces, and not a single one is the original.

In Zen they say: 

Find out your original face, the face you had before you were born, or the face you will have when you are dead. What is that original face? That original face is your consciousness. All your other faces come from your mind.

Remember well that you don't have one mind; you have multi-minds. Forget the concept that everyone has one mind. You don't have, you have many minds: a crowd, a multiplicity; you are poly-psychic. In the morning you have one mind, in the afternoon a different mind and in the evening still a different mind. Every single moment you have a different mind.

Mind is a flux: river like, flowing, changing. Consciousness is eternal, one. It is not different in the morning and different in the evening. It is not different when you are born and different when you die. It is one and the same, eternal. Mind is a flux. A child has a childish mind, an old man has an old mind; but a child or an old man have the same consciousness, which is neither childish nor old. It cannot be.

Mind moves in time and consciousness lives in timelessness. They are not one. But we are identified with the mind. We go on saying, insisting, 'My mind. I think this way. This is my thought. This is my ideology.' Because of this identification with the mind, you miss that which you really are.

Dissolve these links with the mind. Remember that your minds are not your own. They have been given to you by others: your parents, your society, your university. They have been given to you. Throw them away. Remain with the simple consciousness that you are Pure consciousness, innocent. This is how one moves from the mind to meditation. This is how one moves away from society,religion etc. from the without to the within. This is how one moves from the man-made world, the maya, to the universal truth, the existence.



- Excerpt from " The New Alchemy "

Health

Try asking a medical practitioner what health is. 

It is very strange, but no doctor in the world can tell you what health is! With the whole of medical science concerned with health, isn’t there anyone who is able to say what health is? 

If you ask a doctor, he will say he can only tell you what the diseases are or what the symptoms are. He may know the different technical term for each and every disease and he may also be able to prescribe the cure. 

But health? About health, he does not know anything. He can only state that what remains when there is no disease is health. 

This is because health is hidden inside man. Health is beyond the definition of man.

Sickness comes from the outside hence it can be defined; health comes from within hence it cannot be defined. 

Health defies definition. We can only say that the absence of sickness is health. 

The truth is, health does not have to be created; it is either hidden by illness or it reveals itself when the illness goes away or is cured.

 Health is inside us. Health is our nature.

FOOD - MIND - DIGESTION

Digestion of food is depends upon the  state of our mind

when we eat is much more important than what we eat. Food will affect you differently if you eat joyously, happily, or if you eat when you are filled with sadness and worry. If you are eating in a worried state, then even the best food will have a poisonous effect. And if you are eating with joy then it is possible that sometimes even poison may not be able to have its total effect on you. It is very possible. So what state of mind you eat in is important.

In Russia there was a great psychologist called Pavlov. 

He did some experiments on animals and he reached an amazing conclusion. He experimented on some dogs and some cats. He gave food to a cat and he observed the cat through an X-ray machine to see what happened in her stomach after she ate her food. When the food went into the stomach the stomach immediately released digestive juices. At the same time a dog was brought to the window of the room the cat was in. When the dog barked, the cat became afraid and the X-ray machine showed that the secretion of digestive juices within her stopped. The stomach closed. It shrunk. Then the dog was taken away, but for six hours the stomach remained in the same condition.

 The digestive process of the food did not begin again and the food remained undigested in the stomach for six hours. After six hours, when the juices started flowing again, the food was not in a digestible state, it had become solid and had become difficult to digest. When the cat’s mind became worried about the presence of the dog the stomach stopped its work.

Then what about our situation? We live in worry for twenty-four hours a day. It is a miracle how the food we eat gets digested, how existence manages it in spite of us! We have no wish to digest it.

It is absolutely a miracle how it gets digested. And how we remain alive! This is also a miracle! 

Our state of mind should be graceful and blissful,The more happily and joyously and the more relaxed and without worry a person can take his meal, the more his food starts becoming the right food.

A violent diet does not only mean that a man eats non-vegetarian food. It is also a violent diet when a man eats with anger. Both of these things are violent. While eating in anger, in suffering, in worry, man is also eating violently. He does not realize at all that just as he is violent when eating the flesh of something else, so when his own flesh burns up inside due to anger and worry, violence is present there too. Then the food which he is eating cannot be non-violent.

The other part of right food is that you should eat in a very peaceful, a very joyful state. If you are not in such a state, then it is better to wait until you are and not to eat for a while. When the mind isabsolutely ready, only then should one take his meals. For how long will the mind not be ready? 

If you are aware enough to wait then at the most it can remain hungry for only one day – but we have never bothered to listen to it. We have made eating food a completely mechanical process. 

One has to put food into the body and then leave the dining table. It is no longer a psychological process – that is dangerous.

On the body level, the right food should be healthy, non-stimulating and non-violent; on the
psychological level the mind should be in a blissful state, graceful and joyous; and on the level of the soul there should be a feeling of gratefulness, of thankfulness. 

These three things make food the right food.


- Excerpt From Inner journey 

Love - Light cannot shed the light,unless It has light.

        

     Love is the greatest experiment in life, and those who live without experimenting with love energy,will never know what life is, you will only remain on the surface without going into the depth of it. 

·       Are you loving  yourself ? 

If a man cannot love himself, he cannot love anybody else , A man who loves himself takes the first step toward real love. A man who loves himself respects himself. And a man who loves and respects himself respects others, too, because he knows: “Just as I am, so are others.

The man who loves himself enjoys the love so much, becomes so blissful, that the love starts overflowing, it starts reaching others. It has to reach! Slowly the ripples start reaching farther and farther. You love other people, then you start loving animals, birds, trees, rocks. You can fill the whole universe with your love. A single person is enough to fill the whole universe with love, just as a single pebble can fill the whole lake with ripples—a small pebble.

It is like throwing a pebble into a silent lake: The first, circular ripples will arise around the pebble, very close to the pebble—naturally, And then they will go on spreading; they will reach the farthest shore. If you stop those ripples arising close to the pebble, there will be no other ripples at all.

·       

·    Right now, what you call love is addressed to someone, confined to someone. And love is not a phenomenon that can be confined. You can have it in your open hands, but you cannot have it in your fist. The moment your hands are closed, they are empty. The moment they are open, the whole of existence is available to you.

·     Love is the only freedom from attachment. When you love everything you are attached to nothing.

·    The real love is a nourishment, it strengthens your soul , The ordinary love is a demand, the real love is a sharing. It knows nothing of demand; it knows the joy of giving. The ordinary love pretends too much. The real love is no pretentious; it simply is.

·    Love never waits to be rewarded, even to be thanked. If the thankfulness comes from ,the other side, love is always surprised—it is a pleasant surprise, because there was no expectation.

·    You cannot frustrate real love, because there is no expectation in the first place. And you cannot fulfill unreal love because it is so rooted in expectation that whatsoever is done always falls short. Its expectation is too great, nobody can fulfill it. So the unreal love always brings frustration, and the real love always brings fulfillment.

·    Love is one of the most precious experiences, but before you can love someone, you have to find yourself; otherwise, who is going to love? You don’t know anything about yourself. You are absolutely unconscious. In this unconsciousness, whatever you do is going to be wrong. ·     

·    You must have heard the parable of Narcissus. He had fallen in love with himself. Looking into a silent pool of water, he fell in love with his own reflection

-        --  Story --

The Myth of Narcissus and Echo

Narcissus ( son of cephisus river god) was a handsome hunter who broke the hearts of the many women. Despite their love, he remained  unfriendly and arrogant.

Meanwhile, the beautiful forest nymph Echo had incurred the ire of the goddess Juno, who punished Echo for talking too much by depriving her of free expression. From then on, she could only repeat the last words of others. Echo spotted Narcissus and became infatuated. She longed for his attention, but he was fixated on himself. She tried to call out to him, yet couldn’t.

One day, Narcissus became separated from his hunting companions and called out, “Is anyone there?” Echo could only repeat his words. Startled, he said, “Come here,” which Echo repeated. Echo jubilantly rushed to Narcissus, but he spurned her, saying, “Hands off! May I die before you enjoy my body.” Humiliated and rejected, Echo fled in shame. Nevertheless, her love for Narcissus grew.

To punish Narcissus for his arrogance, Nemesis, the goddess of revenge, put a spell on him. When Narcissus next noticed his reflection in a pool of water, love overtook him. He believed that he’d finally found someone worthy of his love and became entirely absorbed with his own beautiful image, not realizing it was actually himself.

Unable to get Narcissus’ attention, Echo’s obsession and depression grew. As the years passed, she lost her youth and beauty pining away for unattainable Narcissus until she wasted away, only leaving behind her echoing voice. He eventually committed suicide, consumed by his impossible love, leaving a flower in his place.

·    Narcissus fell in love with his own reflection—not with himself. That is not true self-love. He fell in love with the reflection; the reflection is the other. He had become two, he had become divided. Narcissus was split.

When you fall in love with a woman, watch, be alert—it may be nothing but narcissism. The woman’s face, and her eyes, and her words, may be simply functioning as a lake in which you are seeing your reflection. My own observation is this: Out of a hundred loves, ninety-nine are narcissistic. People don’t love the woman that is there. They love the appreciation that the woman is giving to them, the attention that the woman is giving to them, the flattery that the woman is showering on the man. The woman flatters the man, the man flatters the woman—it is a mutual flattery.

·     Real love is always in the present. Egoistic love is always either in the past or in the future In real love there is a passionate coolness. It will look paradoxical, but all greater realities of life are paradoxical; hence I call it passionate coolness. There is warmth, but there is no heat in it. Warmth certainly is there, but there is also coolness in it, a very collected, calm, cool state. Love makes one less feverish. But if it is not real love but egoistic love, then there is great heat. Then the passion is there like fever, there is no coolness at all.

       If you really want to know love, forget about love and remember meditation. If you want to bring roses into your garden, forget about roses and take care of the rosebush. Give nourishment to it, water it, take care that it gets the right amount of sun, water. If everything is taken care of, in the right time the roses are destined to come. You cannot bring them earlier, you cannot force them to open up sooner. And you cannot ask a rose to be more perfect. Have you ever seen a rose that is not perfect? What more do you want? Ever rose in its uniqueness is perfect. Dancing in the wind, in the rain, in the sun . . ....can’t you see the tremendous beauty, the absolute joy? A small ordinary rose radiates the hidden splendor of existence. Love is a rose in your being. But prepare your being—dispel the darkness and the unconsciousness. Become more and more alert and aware, and love will come on its own accord, in its own time. You need not worry about it. And whenever it comes it is always perfect.

        Love is a spiritual experience—nothing to do with sexes and nothing to do with bodies, but something to do with the innermost being. But you have not even entered into your own temple. You don’t know at all who you are, and you are trying to find out how to love better. First, be thyself; than know thyself, and love will come as a reward. It is a reward from the beyond. It showers on you like flowers . . . fills your being. And it goes on showering on you, and it brings with a tremendous longing to share.

·    In fact, before you attain to it you will have to disappear. When love will be there, you will not be there. - Hence when you are filled with LOVE you are GOD ,  LOVE is GOD

You are Something Eternal

A very wise king wanted his son -- the only son, who was going to be his successor -- to be a wise man before he succeeded him and became the king of a vast kingdom. 

The old man chose a way which was very strange: he sent the son away from the kingdom, told him that he was abandoned, that he should forget completely that he was a prince -- "He is no longer a prince and I am not going to make him my successor."

All his beautiful clothes, ornaments -- everything was taken away. He was given the clothes of a beggar and sent away in the middle of the night in a chariot to be thrown out of the kingdom. And there were strict orders that he should not be allowed back in the kingdom from anywhere.

Years passed; the prince really became a beggar. He really forgot that he was a prince. In fact there had been no effort on his part to forget -- he was a beggar. He was begging for clothes, for food, for shelter, and he had slowly accepted the condition he was in.

After many years, one day he was sitting outside a hotel, begging. It was hot summer and he wanted enough money to purchase a pair of shoes -- secondhand of course -- because the earth was almost like fire, and to walk without shoes was becoming impossible. He had wounds on his feet, and he was crying out for just a few coins. At that very moment a golden chariot stopped before the hotel, and a man descended. The man said, "Your father has called you back. He is very old and dying, and he wants you to be his successor."

In a single split second the beggar disappeared. The man was totally different; you could see it in his face, his eyes... the clothes were of the beggar still, but the man was totally different. A crowd gathered -- the same crowd before whom he had been spreading his hands for a few coins -- and they all started showing great friendship.

 But he was not even paying attention to them. He went up to the chariot, sat in the chariot and told the man who had come to get him, "First take me to a beautiful place where I can have a good bath, find clothes worthy of me, shoes, ornaments... because I can go before the king only as a prince."

He came home, and he came as a prince. He said to his father, "Just one thing I want to ask: Why did I have to be a beggar for so many years? I had really forgotten... If you had not called me back, I would have died as a beggar, never remembering that once I was a prince."

The father said, "This is what my father did to me. It was not done to harm you, but to give you the experience of the extremes of life -- the beggar and the king. And between these two, everybody exists.

"That day I told you to forget that you were a prince; now I want you to remember that being a prince or being a beggar are just identities given by others. It is not your reality, it is not you -- neither the king, nor the beggar. 

And the moment you realize that you are not what the world thinks of you, you are not what you appear to be, but you are something so deeply hidden in yourself that except for you, nobody else can see you, then a man becomes wise. Knowing it, wisdom follows.

"I was angry with my father and I know you must have been angry with me. But forgive me, I had to do it to make it clear to you: don't get identified with being a king, don't get identified with being a beggar, because in a split second these identities can be changed.And that which can be changed is not you. You are something eternal, something unchangeable."

- Excerpt from Beyond psychology