The first point I want to make has to do with happiness.
I am going to tell you one of my favorite stories.
You know,
Sometimes a story says more than a whole day's lecture because it sort of speaks to the depths within us and this one certainly speaks to mine.
This is a story of a guy who is moving out of the village in India,
Out of his village and he sees what we in India call a Sannyasi.
The Sannyasi is the wandering mendicant.
The Sannyasi is the person who having attained enlightenment understands that the whole world is his home and the sky is his roof and God is his father and will look after him.
So he moves from place to place the way you and I would move from one room of our home to another.
Well,
Here was this wandering Sannyasi and the villager when he meets him he said,
I cannot believe this.
And the Sannyasi says,
What is it you cannot believe?
And the villager says,
I had a dream about you last night.
I dreamt that the Lord Vishnu said to me,
Tomorrow morning you will leave the village and you will run into this wandering Sannyasi.
And here I have met you.
What else did the Lord Vishnu say to you said the Sannyasi?
And the man said,
He said to me,
If the man gives you a precious stone he has,
You will be the richest man in the whole world.
Would you give me the stone?
So the Sannyasi said,
Wait a minute.
He rummages in his little sack,
Knapsack that he had.
He said,
Would this be the stone you're talking about?
And the man couldn't believe his eyes because it was a diamond,
The largest diamond in the world.
Held it in his hands,
He said,
Could I have this?
And the Sannyasi said,
Of course,
You could take it.
I found it in a forest.
You're welcome to it.
Then he went on and sat under a tree on the outskirts of the village.
The man grasped this diamond and how great was his joy.
The way ours is,
Isn't it,
The day we really get something we really want.
Have you ever stopped to ask how long it lasts?
You got the girl you wanted,
Right?
You got the boy you wanted,
Right?
You got that car,
Huh?
You got the degree.
You were first in the university.
How long did the joy last?
Let's measure it.
I mean that.
How many seconds?
How many minutes?
You get tired of it,
Don't you?
Then you're looking for something else,
Aren't you?
Why don't we study this as valuable,
More valuable than studying the scriptures because of what good is it to you to study the scriptures and crucify the Messiah on the basis of them as Jesus was.
If you've not understood this,
If you've not understood what it means to live and to be free and to be spiritual.
The guy has the diamond.
Instead of going home,
He sits under a tree himself and all day he sits immersed in thought and towards evening he goes to the tree where the sannyasi is sitting,
Gives him back the diamond and he says,
Could you do me a favor?
What says the sannyasi?
He said,
Could you give me the riches that makes it possible for you to give this thing away so easily?
Boy,
I love that story.
Could you give me the riches that makes it possible for you to give this away so easily?
The world is full of sorrow.
The root of sorrow is attachment.
The uprooting of sorrow is the dropping of attachment.
The understanding that attachment is a false belief.
The false belief that anything or person can make you happy.
True happiness is caused by nothing.
True happiness is uncaused.
If you ask the mystic why he or she is happy,
The answer will be,
Why not?
No block,
No obstruction,
Why not?
Have you ever thought that if something causes your happiness,
When you lose that something,
Your happiness will be destroyed?
Has it ever occurred to you that if something causes your happiness,
You will become possessive of that thing?
You will become anxious lest you lose it?
Whatever that thing be,
Learning,
Reputation,
Good health,
Life itself.
How interesting,
The rediscovery of life.
You will never live till you stop clinging to life.
Let go.
When you cling,
Happiness dies.
If your happiness depends on anyone or anything,
That is not happiness my dears,
That is anxiety,
That is tension,
That is pressure,
That is fear.
The Japanese have a powerful tale for this.
Oh,
It is so powerful.
There is this guy who is running away from a tiger,
Comes to precipice and quite unwittingly he begins to slide down that precipice and as he is sliding he grabs hold onto the branch of a tree that is growing there,
Kind of a bush and then he looks down.
There is no way of climbing up.
In any way there is a tiger waiting for him there and if he slides down,
He slides down to his death 15,
000 feet.
What does he do?
He has a few minutes to live.
Well,
He looks at that bush he is holding onto and he finds it is a berry bush.
He is holding onto it with one hand and he plucks the berry bush,
The berry from the bush with the other,
Puts it into his mouth and tastes it.
The story goes and it tasted so sweet.
Isn't that marvelous?
I know friends of mine in the past,
Two of them at different intervals who were dying and who said to me,
I began to truly taste life and see how sweet it was when I let go and I realized that life is ending.
It was then that it began to taste sweet.
So paradoxically we are doing all the wrong things to be happy.
We have been programmed to be unhappy.
Anything we are doing is going to make us more unhappy because anything you do to become happy is going to make you more unhappy because what are you going to do?
You are going to change yourself,
You are going to change others,
You are going to acquire something.
You don't have to do anything.
You have to understand.
Drop the obstruction,
Drop the false belief and the attachment will drop then you will know what happiness is.
That is so easily said.
If you would meditate on that for days and you would experience some of its truth then you don't need to listen to me or to anyone else.
You have it.
You have learnt it.
You have seen it.
You are attached only because you falsely believe that without this thing or person or situation or event you will not be happy.
You falsely believe that.
See its falseness and you will be free.
How simple.
And here we are scarring the earth running everywhere in search of it.
We had it right here at home and did not understand it.
We listened to all kinds of sermons and we studied all kinds of books and we went to all kinds of churches but we never heard it.
We never recognized the Messiah.
It was right there.
It was right there staring at us right under our nose.
We didn't see it.
We didn't see it.
