A Question of Wisdom

PAPAJI: [answering a question about the role of the guru. Implied in the question was the fear that some guru could betray the devotee’s trust]

 PAPAJI: Someone has to tell you that you are free. Then only will you hear. So someone has to tell you, otherwise you will not believe it. “I am the body”— you will believe it because many tell you that you are the body, you are the mind. You have accepted it. Who will go against this? You are not the body, not the mind, not the senses, not any of these. Who will tell you? He who knows. He who has this experience and his word you can’t reject. One word is enough. That will land into your inner space. That space that is called experience. That is not through the process of hearing. Word will go into silence and dissolve and become — so that person is fixed and that person is your own Self. So there’s no question of being a traitor. It’s a question of wisdom.

Then there’s a relation from wisdom to wisdom.Your relation is wisdom-to-wisdom, light-to-light, freedom-to-freedom. You have no relationship. Being a traitor is when some others are involved, when you are cheating somebody. Here no one is cheated. You just want freedom. You just want to remove your ignorance. You just want to remove your darkness. If you want to remove your darkness you are not a traitor to the sun. You just want to remove your darkness. You can do it with a candle. Why only with the sun? Do it yourself. Have your own life burning. There’s life inside you also. Do it yourself. This is only a concept. No teacher will tell you. I tell you all those, my children, will come here; all those, my friends, will come here. I tell them “go to everybody, go to everybody, see them.” Even in Rishikesh, I say there are so many swamis. You go and see them. I saw myself. Go and see everybody. Don’t, don’t lock yourself up. Go and see everybody. This whole world is there.

You can get anything from anybody. You can learn from a tree. You can have knowledge from trees. From the tree learn silence; learn compassion from him. And tolerance. If you cut him, he doesn’t speak. Slash him, he doesn’t speak either. Kiss him, he doesn’t speak. We can learn lesson from everything if we want. All is love. All is giving you lessons. Everybody is a lesson. The river is always flowing. Jump into it. The river says, ‘Come with me. We will go to the ocean. That is the source’. This is the source. This is your own source. Go. Go with the mind. Where does it come from? Go with the mind. It will take you to its source.

I don’t think this is very correct understanding. Nobody will become a traitor. Who has become a traitor? There are many people where you are coming from. So many people. Because I don’t give any initiation, I don’t have any rules. I don’t have any rules to make you plan, to give planning. You have not been branded. You are not given a name of any commune, so how you can become a traitor? You are just free. That’s all. That’s what I tell you. You are free. Just remove your tag. Otherwise you are a traitor; even when you say “I am so and so” you are a traitor. I remove that tag from your baggage. I just remove. I don’t do anything else. “I belong to this society,” “I belong to this country.” This is only imagination.

You belong to just your own source.There’s no country. There’s no religion. There’s no caste. There’s no race. There’s nothing else. It’s all imagination. It’s all man’s imaginings. It’s not true. You are already that. You will be that whether you believe it or don’t believe it. You are free. How can a free man be branded with any name? Freedom doesn’t accept it. Freedom is free of everything. So don’t have any kind of fear. Many people come from different, different countries, different lives. Questions dissolve, go back.Nobody stays here, first of all. No one stays here. It’s not an ashram. People come for one week, ten days, fifteen days, one month. OK. That’s all. Finish your work and go on doing your work. Enjoy life as a wise man, not as a foolish man. Enjoy life. Enjoy life better than other foolish people who do not even know how to enjoy life. Return back.

Enjoy everything. Enjoy your food. Enjoy your relationship. Who tells you? Who stops you? I’m not making any monastery. So don’t have any fear.