Empty Mind: Is it Devil’s Workshop?

It is said that If a falsehood is repeated again and again, it appears as truth. A big example is the mere existence of this phrase “empty mind is the devil’s workshop”, let alone its identity as PROVERB. You may rise your eye brow first, let me explain why you need not.

 

Let’s see the first two words- empty mind. What is mind packed with? With the stream of unceasing thoughts. So the straight meaning is that thoughtless mind is the devil’s workshop. What a thrill and bless to acquire such state! Certainly the devil can not stand there to continue his workshop. If there is no tools and business to do, how the workshop exists!

 

Being little liberal with the proverb, redefine the words empty-mind as state of mind with no especial business to engage with, the state at which we can feel our mind as being bored and seek something to engage with that kills boring. Then, is bored mind the devil’s workshop? Plainly speaking yes.

source

With gross classification, mind is in three states; grief, happiness and the intermediate - neither happy nor grieve but bored. Grieve or pain never weaken a person, they rather strengthen. Without grief, a thrill of insecurity, restlessness of some unknown challenge, we seldom grow. However, the bored mind finds the situation boring and seeks something to escape from it. Out of curiosity we practice many things which later becomes the habit. All the addictions and the bad habits and their psycho-somatic effect are what we welcome during our boring state. I like to acknowledge that The matter that describes US best is not our career, actions or belief, but our choices and the motives during the free time of the unengaged mind. At that state we seek something pleasing and embrace the quick source which unmistakably happens as the Devil.

 

But in deep, the devils is not outside. Neither it is binding us and making victim. It is within us and nurtured by the energy we feed as INTEREST. Perhaps the following story better describes it than the many logics.

Junaid was going through the market-place of the town with his disciples. And it was his way to take any situation and use it. A man was dragging his cow by a rope, and Junaid said ’Wait’ to the man, and told his disciples ’Surround this man and the cow. I am going to teach you something.’

The man stopped – Junaid was a famous mystic – and he was also interested in what he was going to teach these disciples and how he was going to use him and the cow. And Junaid asked his disciples ’I ask you one thing: who is bound to whom? Is the cow bound to this man or is this man bound to this cow?’ Of course, the disciples said ’The cow is bound to the man. The man is the master, he is holding the rope, the cow has to follow him wherever he goes. He is the master and the cow is the slave.’

And Junaid said ’Now, see.’ He took out his scissors and cut the rope – and the cow escaped.

The man ran after the cow, and Junaid said ’Now look what is happening! Now you see who is the master; the cow is not interested at all in this man – in fact, she is escaping.’ And the man was very angry, he said ’What kind of experiment is this ?’ But Junaid said to his disciples ’And this is the case with your mind. All the nonsense that you are carrying inside is not interested in you. You are interested in it, you are keeping it together somehow – you are becoming mad in keeping it together somehow. But you are interested IN it. The moment you lose interest, the moment you understand the futility of it, it will start disappearing; like the cow it will escape.

Are you feeling bored? it is the precious gift, an inner space created to feel ourselves. Watch your impulses to choose as an escape.

Bored + aware = God’s workshop.

Bored + unaware = Devil’s workshop.

What do you think?

 

Technorati Tags: Empty mind,Devil's workshop

Judgment by Intention or Action?

The real masters are not bound to any disciple and not after exposing good character to impress other. They follow the spontaneity encountered on the context. If there is any tool to judge them, it is the intention behind their action. They are motivated by love/compassion.Others are guided by fears. Here goes the three stories. Contexts are same. Actions may be different, the indicator is the intention. Enjoy!

One

A very rich woman served one monk for thirty years. The monk was really beautiful, always aware, disciplined. He had a beauty that comes naturally when your life is ordered – a cleanness, a freshness. The woman was dying, she was very old. She called a prostitute from the town and told the prostitute, ”Before I leave my body I would like to know one thing – whether this man I have been serving for thirty years has yet attained or not.” The suspicion is natural, because the man has not yet abandoned the whip and the rope. The prostitute asked, ”What am I supposed to do?”

The woman said, ”I will give you as much money as you want. You just go in the middle of the night. He will be meditating, because he meditates in the middle of the night. The door is never closed because he has nothing which can be stolen, so you just open the door, and just watch his reaction. Open the door, come close, embrace him, and then come back and just tell me what happened. Before I die, I would like to know whether I have been serving a real master or just an ordinary, mediocre being.”
The prostitute went. She opened the door. A small lamp was burning; the man was meditating. He opened his eyes. Seeing the prostitute, recognizing the prostitute, he became afraid, a slight trembling, and he said, ”What! Why have you come here?” And when the woman tried to embrace him, he tried to escape. He was trembling and furious.

The woman came back and told the old lady what had happened. The old lady ordered her servants to vacate the cottage that she had made for this man, and be finished with him. He had not reached anywhere. The old woman said, ”At least he could have been a little kind, compassionate.” This fear shows the whip is not yet abandoned. This anger shows awareness is still an effort, it has not become natural, it has not become spontaneous.

 

Two

Once a monk on the way to collect his daily food came across a house of wealthy prostitute.  Those days, the prostitutes used to have great respect and called as Nagarbadhu. The prostitute are always attracted by the monks. They have glow in the face and the carefree in walk. Such a charm! While giving him food, she requested to enter her house and take rest. The monk looked deeply in her eyes, sensed the lust, replied

 

“It is my honor to be with with you. This time, very famous, wealthy and handsome people are in way to enter your house. Wait for some time. I will come to you when everybody will ceases to visit you”.

 

Then the monk left. Time passed, the woman getting older, and the whole bodily charm in her vanished away, not to mention her illness. In such state of utter helplessness and grief, there was knock in the door. She surprised years passed no body cared to look to her house, let alone visit her. She did not trust her ear. Suspiciously, she opened the door and saw the monk with ever glowing beauty in his face. He came to her and fulfilled his promises. There was no lust in her expression, she had known every facade of the lust, its meaninglessness. Then said,

“ Do you like to walk in the peace and painlessness?”. It was like oasis. She bursted into tears, “yes”.

“Come with me. It is right time for you. Last time, I did not entered you house as there was no use. The cloud of desire had surrounded to you. I had waited the right time to visit you”. Then he taught the path.

 

Three

In Gautam Buddha's time there was one beautiful woman -- she was a prostitute, Amrapali. One Buddhist monk was just going to beg when Amrapali saw him. She was simply amazed because kings have been at her door, princes, rich people, famous people from all walks of life. But she had never seen such a beautiful person -- and he was a monk, a beggar with a begging bowl. She was going on her golden chariot to her garden. She told the bhikkhu,

"If you don't mind, you can sit with me on the chariot and I will lead you wherever you want."

She was not thinking that the bhikkhu would be ready to do it, because it was known that Buddha did not allow his bhikkhus to talk to women, or to touch any woman. And to ask him to sit on a golden chariot in the open street where there were thousands of people, hundreds of other bhikkhus, other monks...She was not hoping that he would accept the invitation, but he said, "That's good," and he climbed on the chariot and sat by her side. It was a scene. She was one of the wealthiest women the world had known.

The world knows only two women -- one in the West, Cleopatra, and one in the East, Amrapali -- who are thought to be the world's most beautiful women. And a bhikkhu with a begging bowl...!A crowd was following the chariot,

"What is going on there? Nobody has ever heard..."
And then the bhikkhu said, "My camp has come. Thank you for your being so kind to a poor man. You can drop me here."

 

But Amrapali said, "From tomorrow, the rainy season is going to be here." In the rainy season the bhikkhus, the monks, don't move. They stay in one place -- only for the rainy season. The remaining months they are always on the move from one village to another village. "From tomorrow, the rainy season is going to begin. I invite you to stay with me. You can ask your master."

He said, "Jolly good, I will ask the master. And I don't see that he will object, because I know him -- he knows me, and he knows me more than I know him."

But before he reached, many others had reached and complained that the man had broken the discipline, the prestige, the respectability... that the man should be expelled immediately. The bhikkhu came -- Buddha asked him, "What happened?"

He told the whole thing and he said, "The woman has asked me to stay with her for the coming four months' rainy season. And I have said to her, `As I know my master I don't think there is any problem, and my master knows me better than I know him.' So what do you say?"
There were ten thousand monks, and there was pin drop silence. Gautam Buddha said, "You can accept her invitation."

 

It was a shock. People were thinking he would be expelled, and he was being rewarded! But what could they do. They said, "Just wait. After four months Buddha will see that he has committed a grave mistake. That young man will be corrupted in that place, in a prostitute's house. Have you ever heard of a monk staying for four months...?"

The man stayed for

four months, and every day rumors were coming that "this is going wrong" and "that is going wrong." And Buddha said, "Just wait, let him come. I know he is a man who can be trusted. Whatever happens he will tell himself. I don't have to depend on rumors." And when the monk came, Amrapali was with him. He touched Buddha's feet and said, "Amrapali wants to be initiated."

 

Buddha said, "Look, about all these rumors... When a real meditator goes to a prostitute, the prostitute has to change into a meditator. When a repressed person who has all the sexuality and is sitting on a volcano goes to a prostitute, he falls down. He was already waiting for it -- not even a prostitute was needed. Any woman would have done that”.

Source:  "The Sword and the Lotus "  and other discourses by Osho

 

Technorati Tags: Inspiring stories,way of masters,Intention or Action

Common Myths on Spirituality

Last week, I could not post. Actually I was slightly in low ‘energy state’ and could not lift my energy to write something on the topic this blog devoted to. Without tuning with the proper ‘mood’, trying to express/write is difficult, and if could able to do so, the authenticity seems to be lost and the action also becomes less enjoyable to the doer. It was how I felt! Just like this. One of the notion I collect during the blogging is that- what is written or appeared in the post is important, however, the emotional state and the intention behind the writing are the king; the emotional state affects the outcome of the writing in doer,  and the intention wrapped over words catches the attention and attracts similar vibration from the reader.

 

Ae! let me come to the track. Today is birthday of Buddha. Ah! i love to pray my favorite.

 

Buddham saranam gachchami (surrender to buddha)

sangham saranam gachchami (Surrender to the sangha)

Dhammam saranam gachchami (surrender to the Dhamma)

 

 

I like to share few thing thing this time as continuation of the previous post delusions of spirituality. Let me add few others in this post.

 

Spirituality is for searching god

People from every generation and race believe that spirituality is related to the search of the God. The god which is ultra-powerful, capable of solving any problem and creating any liked situations. Therefore there are different images of the god in different cultures. However, the quest of spirituality is pure exploration within and has less to do with the god. The purpose of spirituality is to find out the witnessing state; the observer behind the observation. This is what Buddha said- Appo deepo bhava (be light unto yourself). With this notion, the duality of atheism/theism is vanished. There can be debate on whether god exists or not, but nobody debates on the existence of him/herself (It is funny how can it be hehe). If needed ‘god’ can be used as the tools for worship  and the prayer, and so are the idols, temples, mosques and churches. The authenticity of teaching and the quality of true-master lie in the effectiveness in making the seeker realized the witnessing state.  However charming and convincing they could be - the discourses and teachings in the name of the god/spirituality- lack the true essence, if they miss the sutras of witnessing. Therefore Kabir says- All the pilgrims, vedas, devotions, worship, prayer etc are of no use without the knowledge of Naam (the witnessing essence).

Spirituality is for developing High moral and Character in a person

Many people believe that spirituality is for being good person, creating high moral and good characters in a person. Because of this belief, many people struggle hard and try to show these ‘values’ in their personality, suppressing dark emotions and negative energy within as a consequences. The spirituality has nothing to do with these attributes. A true seeker quietly accepts whatever feeling and the energy encountered during the journey of witnessing. By doing so, the dark aspects in the personality come into surface and the evaporates.

 

I recall a story of Mao. Once when he was a child, his mother told him to take care of the flowers in the garden as she had to visit her relatives for few days. He responded his mother not to worry, he would perfectly look after the flowers. His mother left and returned back to home after a week. To her surprise, all the flowers in the garden were pale and dying. Upon enquiring him, he worriedly replied  it happened in spite of his good care and watering them everyday. What he did was to clean the flower and wash the leaves only. He missed the very important action- watering  the root. 

 

Searching the observer is like watering the roots. Good morals, love and character appear as consequences, not by directly working with them.

 

On this auspicious day, I pray for the wellbeing for all. May this day give the energy and the motivation for the Journey Within.

 

Buddham Saranam Gachchami!

 

Technorati Tags: Myth of Spirituality,Witnesser