Desires Are Dancing

The desires are dancing. Let us see this dance. This universe is only the dance of desires.

Whatever your desires are, they manifest as objects so you can enjoy this dance. Your own desires are dancing in this samsara, in whatever you see in this manifestation, in all these objects. The rise of this everlasting dance depends upon ignorance. Samsara is just ignorance. We observe this dance because of ignorance. How is it possible to get rid of this dance? Objects attract the mind and we run after these objects — we run after our projections. Then the mind joins company with these objects, with this dance, and forgets how to wake up. This drama and this dance can only end when the sun rises. When the sun rises this drama will be over. This sun is inquiry — vichar. When the sun of vichar rises in your mind this drama immediately ends there, and it can not end otherwise. We have come here for freedom only, to end this drama. Therefore, again and again we are coming and going. We forget why we came and we get lost in the enjoyment of the senses.

I remember a story. There was a king who had no issue, no son. He was getting old so he decided to adopt a prince to succeed him as the king after his death. He fixed a date with his sentries that on a particular day the gates of the palace would be open from eight in the morning until eight at night. The king would be seated in the palace and he would conduct interviews to find the most suitable person to be chosen as his prince. So on this day the gates were opened and people went inside. Everybody was allowed to enter and see the king in person.

When the gates are opened to see the king you have to be looking your best. So a very good shower-bath was arranged for everyone who entered the palace and then there were all kinds of perfumes for people to use. Then there was a place with many different kinds of very expensive dresses. You should be well dressed to see the king, so you could choose your own clothes from a huge variety of different kinds of gold and silver gowns and dresses. Then some lunch was arranged — you should be well fed before seeing the king. And then there was music and then dancing. After all this you are ready to see the king — you are fully satisfied.

Some people who were entering the palace were very fond of showers, so they spent their time in the sauna and taking different kinds of baths and showers. Some were fond of perfumes, so they were trying out all the different perfumes that were there. Some were busy with all the different kinds of dresses. Some were gluttons; they were very fond of eating and drinking, so they were trying all the different varieties of food and different dishes which were there. Here in India when food is served there are a hundred and one types of dishes in a good lunch, and everything was included here. After lunch there was music and then dancing. Everything was provided beautifully by the king.

The time was getting close to eight o’clock so a siren alerted everyone to get ready to leave. The people who were fond of perfumes had collected bottles and had filled their bags with those perfumes. Those who were fond of food had taken something for their wives and other relations and friends; they were packing food to take away. Those who were fond of dresses were carrying bundles of dresses on their shoulders. Some were listening to the music, some were dancing. The sentries of the palace told them, “Now your time is up. You have to leave. You’re not allowed to take anything away with you. You were supposed to only eat and to use the perfumes here and enjoy the music.” But people were so engaged, “Oh let me sit a little longer. It’s such nice music.” Those who were dancing said, “Please let us have some more time for dancing. We cannot leave this company.” But nothing was allowed. They were all pushed out of the gate. The time was 8 p.m.

The king called his secretary and asked, “What happened? No came to me for an interview. What happened? Did you open the gates?” “Yes, yes, the gate was open for twelve hours,” replied the secretary. “How is it that no one has come to see me?” asked the king. “They were engaged in their own luxuries and needs,” came the reply. “We do not know if anyone went to see you or not.”

Samsara is exactly like this. No one went to see the king. If someone had gone and had been accepted, everything would have belonged to him. It is not allowed to take anything away from this. We came here to see the king but we got lost in luxuries, in fulfillment of desires. When the time comes for the gates to be closed we will not be able to carry anything with us. The king is waiting but no one goes. This dance drama is exactly like that. We came here to meet the king and sit on the throne but we forgot why we came and we got lost in infinite distractions.

Palaces, you see, many palaces are here in India. You can go to Delhi, Jaipur and other places. You see how comfortably the kings wanted to live. And they are lying there… they are lying there, dead. Nobody could recreate permanency. The kings had everything — they even had diamonds. No one could take anything, you see. Not even the greatest conqueror of the world, Alexander, who had conquered three-fourths of the world; only China was left. But due to some sickness he had to go back to Greece. On the way, he died. That’s a long story, how he went back. It’s a long story I have told you already. He met some yogi and told this yogi, “I am going. I am waiting for the monsoons. After the end of the monsoons, I will cross the river Jilam (since Punjab had already been conquered by him) and then I will proceed to China.” That was his intention.

And then there was one yogi who was sitting at the bank of river Jilam, meditating. Alexander had never seen anybody in this posture, sitting day and night. So some of his army men informed Alexander, “There is one man who is always sitting like this, not moving.” Alexander said, “Okay, you bring him to me. I will ask him what is this, what is he doing.” And they took one interpreter. They shook the yogi and asked him, “The king of this land, Alexander the Great, wants to see you. You please come.” The yogi said, “The tradition of this country, the tradition of India, is whosoever wants to see someone, it is he who should go to the other person. I don’t need to see him. If he needs to see me let him come and see me.”

That’s what the yogi said. So they said, “Okay, he has to be forcefully removed. So some five or six soldiers tried to lift him by the hands and feet, to take him to the camp where Alexander was staying. And then as one man was carrying him by the hand, the hand came out of the body; then the feet and the legs came out of the body — and the body rested on the ground. The men were carrying only legs. Overcome with fear, they threw the body parts and ran away. This… this has happened.

Now Alexander himself opted to come and see this yogi, and again he was sitting like this thing. Alexander’s teacher (tutor), a disciple of Socrates, had told him, “When you go to India you will see some yogi.” He was not happy to hear these words. He was not happy because when he told his tutor, “I want to conquer the whole world,” the tutor replied, “You conquer the mind. You conquer the mind and everything is conquered.” Alexander said, “You are stupid,” and he put him into prison.

“Okay. When you go to India, please see some saint — some saint in India. And bring me the Gita from this country — Gita, the book of knowledge — and a part of Ganga water,” requested the tutor. That was what he wanted. “Okay, I will do that.”

So this was when he first saw this yogi. The yogi is sitting and Alexander is standing with his army generals, you see. “Who are you?” asked the yogi. “I am Alexander, from Greece,” was the reply. “Why are you here?” the yogi questioned.

“I have conquered all Europe; now I have to conquer India. Because of the monsoon this river is in spate, so I am waiting for the river to come down and then I will go to China.” That’s what Alexander said.

“Listen, listen my dear boy. In twenty days you have to leave this world,” said the yogi. “That’s how it will be.” Alexander, because he was young, only thirty-three years old at the time, said, “Let him be arrested. Let him be arrested, though it may be true. My mother told me, ‘When you’re sick and you feel that your death is coming near, you must come to your own country and die.'”

So then Alexander took very fast horses to reach Greece. On the way at Barbarun, I think that’s where, he had a very simple diarrhea. He was dying, and the generals asked, “What is your will? What is your last will?” Alexander said, “Keep my hands out of the coffin so that the people will know I am not carrying anything with me.”

That’s what his desire was. And this monarch, Alexander the Great, had to leave this drama empty-handed. So coming to the point, as long as your vasanas are dancing, samsara is going to stay forever. You can’t have rest with this dance — you cannot have rest. Who is there in the world, from king to a worker, who says, “I am happy, I am in peace?” No one will tell you, you see. Even if you are a king, no one is happy, you see. Now also you go around and see different countries and the heads of the countries, how happy are they? Tension. So only one thing will help you to be happy, that is to check this vasana, check this vasana, check this desire for enjoyment — perhaps you will have the highest degree of enjoyment if you check your desire. If you don’t give rise to desire, you will have utmost peace, love and beauty. It is the end of desire that gives us peace.

Supposing you need something. “I need a new model car. So I am not happy because I want to have one, so I go to look at it. I have no money so I borrow money from the bank, from friends. Now the car is in front of my house.” You are happy. Has the iron given you this happiness? Or the rubber tires? Or the benzene? What has given you happiness? Because the desire to have the new model Toyota is now over. So then this desire is gone then you are happy. So for all — every desire, in every case, you see — it is not the object that you desire. Having that object will give you happiness only because your desire has ended. After the desire has ended, it is that emptiness that is giving you happiness, you see.

If you know it was the emptiness, it is the desireless-ness, thoughtless-ness that gave me happiness, why not have this happiness here and now by not giving rise to a thought? Any thought, you see. The first thought is, “I am the body, I am mind, I am intellect, I am senses.” Don’t give rise to a thought — but you have to know how to do it — inquire. There can be no any other method, yoga, or anything else, even going on pilgrimages, or chanting the formulas, meditating, practices — nothing is going to help you. Only you have to inquire at the root of the first thought. That is, every day we speak about the I-thought. There is no difference between this ‘I’ and samsara. There is no difference, you see. To create samsara there must be the rise of ‘I’. Only then will you see samsara. And when you don’t give rise to this I-thought — in the sleep there is no samsara, no objects, no birth, no death, nothing ever, you see. So this ‘I’ itself, just ‘I’ is samsara.

To get rid of all these sorrows and troubles and miseries and what is called cycle of birth and death, for kalpas it has to stay — it is going to stay, mind you, billions of years. This samsara is there for billions of years. Eighty-five billion years is the age of this samsara, according to last results. Eighty-five billion years, but these billions of years are also only a concept, you see. Only with the rise of the ‘I’ you count billions of years. When you don’t give rise to simply ‘I’ there are no billions and no millions, because this mind instantly will create past, present, future, and this bondage is mind only. So anyone who desires, can stop it here and now, and those who want to play, they are very, very welcome to play and dance a dance. If they’re happy, let them dance. But I don’t think that gods are even happy in this, no god even is happy.

Sit quiet, make a try. If not for long, spend few minutes and see — just for a minute. Sit quiet — don’t give rise to a thought and first of all you see what’s going to happen. So listening is not going to help you. Immediately you have to get into it. You have to be… be it.

And this happiness is your nature. Consciousness is your nature. Existence is your nature. Love is your nature. Peace is your nature, you see. So you can do whatever you want. The sages suggest that to be happy, we have to get rid of vasanas, you see. Millions of years we have spent with the vasanas and we have been troubled, and now we have a very beautiful human incarnation, very good intention — bromjignasa — very good intention. What more do you need? “Now I want to be free.” Very good, excellent vasana. So you are very lucky, with great merits, therefore, you are here in Satsang, and I don’t think you will lose anything, and or gain anything.

You will return to your own kingdom which is your birthright —not to suffer suffering. We simply imagine that there is suffering because we want to play with the projections of our own mind. We want to have a swim in the mirage, hallucination, illusion. So once we decide, “I want to be free,” it’s enough. “I want to be free.” This decision has to be very firm decision, as firm as this universe is real. Firm decision, firm conviction, “This is real,” you see. So we have this kind of firmness Now. It’s a very new desire, “I want to be free.” This desire we did not desire previously; and now we are here because we have decided to be free this time. Therefore, my dear friends, decide once and for all that we are here and freedom is our right.

And we have to win it — just doing nothing, just to get rid of this one vasana — one vasana — get rid of one vasana only: “I want this.” That’s all. “I want this.” And perhaps if you don’t give rise to this vasana everything will be added onto you. Even if you don’t want it, it will be offered to you. The kingdom of three universes will be offered to you… so?

Om shanti.

18 September, 1992