THERE is a vast store of energy which is not centered,
which is not ego's energy at all. It is this energy
which is the centerless dance of phenomena, the universe
interpenetrating and making love to itself. It has two
characteristics: a fire quality of warmth and a tendency
to flow in a particular pattern, in the same way in
which fire contains a spark as well as the air which
directs the spark. And this energy is always on-going,
whether or not it is seen through the confused filter
of ego. It cannot be destroyed or interrupted at all.
It is like the ever-burning sun. It consumes
everything to the point where it allows no room for
doubt or manipulation.
But when this heat is filtered through
ego, it becomes stagnant, because we ignore the basic
ground, refuse to see the vast space in which this energy
occurs. Then the energy cannot flow freely in the open
space shared with the object of passion. Instead it
is solidified, narrowed and directed by the central
headquarters of ego to move outward in order to draw
the object of passion into its territory. This captive
energy extends out to its object and then returns to
be programmed again. We extend our tentacles and try
to fix our relationship. This attempt to cling to the
situation makes the communication process superficial.
We just touch another person's surface and get stuck
there, never experiencing their whole being. We are
blinded by our clinging. The object of passion, instead
of being bathed in the intense warmth of free passion
feels oppressed by the stifling heat of neurotic passion.
Free passion is radiation without a radiator,
a fluid, pervasive warmth that flows effortlessly. It
is not destructive because it is a balanced state of
being and highly intelligent. Self-consciousness inhibits
this intelligent, balanced state of being. By opening,
by dropping our self-conscious grasping, we see not
only the surface of an object, but we see the whole
way through. We appreciate not in terms of sensational
qualities alone, but we see in terms of whole qualities,
which are pure gold. We are not overwhelmed by the exterior,
but seeing the exterior simultaneously puts us through
to the interior. So we reach the heart of the situation
and, if this is a meeting of two people, the relationship
is very inspiring because we do not see the other person
purely in terms of physical attraction or habitual patterns,
we see the inside as well as the outside.
This whole-way-through communication
might produce a problem. Suppose you see right through
someone and that person does not want you to see right
through and becomes horrified with you and runs away.
Then what to do? You have made your communication completely
and thoroughly. If that person runs away from you, that
is his way of communicating with you. You would not
investigate further. If you did pursue and chase him,
then sooner or later you would become a demon from that
person's point of view. You see right through his body
and he has juicy fat and meat that you would like to
eat up, so you seem like a vampire to him. And the more
you try to pursue the other person, the more you fail.
Perhaps you looked through too sharply with your desire,
perhaps you were too penetrating. Possessing beautiful
keen eyes, penetrating passion and intelligence, you
abused your talent, played with it. It is quite natural
with people, if they possess some particular power or
gifted energy, to abuse that quality, to misuse it by
trying to penetrate every corner. Something quite obviously
is lacking in such an approach- a sense of humor. If
you try to push things too far, it means you do not
feel the area properly; you only feel your relationship
to the area. What is wrong is that you do not see all
sides of the situation and therefore miss the humorous
and ironical aspect.
Sometimes people run away from you because
they want to play a game with you. They do not want
a straight, honest and serious involvement with you,
they want to play. But if they have a sense of humor
and you do not, you become demonic. This is where lalita,
the dance, comes in. You dance with reality, dance with
apparent phenomena. When you want something very badly
you do not extend your eye and hand automatically; you
just admire. Instead of impulsively making a move from
your side, you allow a move from the other side, which
is learning to dance with the situation. You do not
have to create the whole situation; you just watch it,
work with it and learn to dance with it. So then it
does not become your creation, but rather a mutual dance.
No one is self-conscious, because it is a mutual experience.
When there is a fundamental openness
in a relationship, being faithful, in the sense of real
trust, happens automatically; it is a natural situation.
Because the communication is so real and so beautiful
and flowing, you cannot communicate in the same way
with someone else, so automatically you are drawn together.
But if any doubt presents itself, if you begin to feel
threatened by some abstract possibility, although your
communication is going beautifully at the time, then
you are sowing the seed of paranoia and regarding the
communication purely as ego entertainment.
If you sow a seed of doubt, it may make
you rigid and terrified, afraid of losing the communication
which is so good and real. And at some stage you will
begin to be bewildered as to whether the communication
is loving or aggressive. This bewilderment brings a
certain loss of distance, and in this way neurosis begins.
Once you lose the right perspective, the right distance
in the communication process, then love becomes hate.
The natural thing with hatred, just as with love, is
that you want to make physical communication with the
person; that is, you want to kill or injure them. In
any relationship in which the ego is involved, a love
relationship or any other, there is always the danger
of turning against your partner. As long as there is
the notion of threat or insecurity of any kind, then
a love relationship could turn into its opposite.
WORK
WHEN YOU SEE ordinary
situations with extraordinary insight it is like discovering
a jewel in rubbish. If work becomes part of your spiritual
practice, then your regular, daily problems cease to
be only problems and become a source of inspiration.
Nothing is rejected as ordinary and nothing is taken
as being particularly sacred, but all the substance
and material available in life-situations is used.
However, work can also be an escape from
creativity. Either you work frantically, filling in
all the spaces and not allowing any spontaneity to develop
or else you are lazy, regarding work as something to
revolt against, which indicates a fear of creativity.
Instead of letting the creative process be, you follow
your next preconception, fearing a spacious state of
mind. Whenever a person feels depressed or is afraid
or the situation is not going smoothly, immediately
he begins polishing a table or weeding the garden, trying
to distract himself. He does not want to deal with the
underlying problem so he seeks a kind of pleasure of
the moment. He is frightened of the space, of any empty
corner. Whenever there is an empty wall, he puts up
another picture or hanging. And the more crowded his
walls are, the more comfortable he feels.
True work is acting practically, relating
to the earth directly. You could be working in the garden,
in the house, washing dishes or doing whatever demands
your attention. If you do not feel the relationship
between earth and yourself, then the situation is going
to turn chaotic. If you do not feel that every step,
every situation reflects your state of mind, and therefore
has spiritual significance, then the pattern of your
life becomes full of problems, and you begin to wonder
where these problems come from. They seem to spring
from nowhere because you refuse to see the subtlety
of life. Somehow, you cannot cheat, you cannot pretend
to pour a cup of tea beautifully, you cannot act it.
You must actually feel it, feel the earth and your relationship
to it.
The Japanese tea ceremony is a good example of action
that is in contact with earth. It begins by deliberately
collecting the bowl, the napkin, the brush, the tea,
and the boiling water. Tea is served and the guests
drink deliberately, with a feeling of dealing with things
properly. The ceremony also includes how to clean the
bowls, how to put them away, how to finish properly.
Clearing away is as important as starting.
It is extremely important to work, as long as you are
not using work as an escape, as a way of ignoring the
basic existence of a problem, particularly if you are
interested in spiritual development. Work is one of
the most subtle ways of acquiring discipline. You should
not look down on someone who works in a factory or produces
materialistic things. You learn a tremendous amount
from such people. I think that many of our attitudinal
problems about work come from a pseudo-sophistication
of the analytic mind. You do not want to involve yourself
physically at all. You want only to work intellectually
or mentally.
This is a spiritual problem. Usually
people interested in spiritual development think in
terms of the importance of mind, that mysterious, high
and deep thing that we have decided to learn about.
But strangely enough the profound and the transcendental
are to be found in the factory. It may not fill you
with bliss to look at it, it may not sound as good as
the spiritual experiences that we have read about, but
somehow reality is to be found there, in the way in
which we relate with everyday problems. If we relate
to them in a simple, earthy way, we will work in a more
balanced manner, and things will be dealt with properly.
If we are able to simplify ourselves to that extent,
then we will be able to see the neurotic aspect of mind
much more clearly. The whole pattern of thought, the
internal game that goes on, becomes much less of a game.
It becomes a very practical way of thinking in situations.
Awareness in work is very important.
It could be the same sort of awareness one has in sitting
meditation, the leap of experiencing the openness of
space. This depends very much upon feeling the earth
and the space together. You cannot feel earth unless
you feel space. The more you feel the space, the more
you feel the earth. The feeling of space between you
and objects becomes a natural product of awareness,
of openness, of peace and lightness. And the way to
practice is not to concentrate upon things nor to try
to be aware of yourself and the job at the same time,
but you should have a general feeling of acknowledging
this openness as you are working. Then you begin to
feel that there is more room in which to do things,
more room in which to work. It is a question of acknowledging
the existence of the openness of a continual meditative
state. You don't have to try to hold on to it or try
to bring it about deliberately, but just acknowledge
that vast energy of openness with a fraction-of-a-second
flash to it. After acknowledging, then almost deliberately
ignore its existence and continue your work. The openness
will continue and you will begin to develop the actual
feeling of the things with which you are working. The
awareness that we are speaking of is not so much a question
of constant awareness as of an object of mind, but it
is a matter of becoming one with awareness, becoming
one with open space. This means becoming one with the
actual things with which you are dealing as well. So
meditation becomes very easy; it is no longer an attempt
to split yourself into different sections and different
degrees of awareness, the watcher and the doer. You
begin to have a real relationship with external objects
and their beauty.
Right Livelihood from THE EIGHTFOLD
PATH
The fifth point is "right livelihood."
According to Buddha, right livelihood simply means making
money by working, earning dollars, pounds, francs, pesos.
To buy food and pay rent you need money. This is not a
cruel imposition on us. It is a natural situation. We
need not be embarrassed by dealing with money nor resent
having to work. The more energy you put out, the more
you get in. Earning money involves you in so many related
situations that it permeates your whole life. Avoiding
work usually is related to avoiding other aspects of life
as well.
People who reject the materialism of
American society and set themselves apart from it are
unwilling to face themselves. They would like to comfort
themselves with the notion that they are leading philosophically
virtuous lives, rather than realizing that they are
unwilling to work with the world as it is. We cannot
expect to be helped by divine beings. If we adopt doctrines
which lead us to expect blessings, then we will not
be open to the real possibilities in situations. Buddha
believed in cause and effect. For example, you get angry
at your friend and decide to cut off the relationship.
You have a hot argument with him and walk out of the
room and slam the door. You catch your finger in the
door. Painful, isn't it? That is cause and effect. You
realize there is some warning there. You have overlooked
karmic necessity. It happens all the time. This is what
we run into when we violate right livelihood.