THE DHAMMAPADA: THE WAY OF THE BUDDHA, VOL. 9-12 The ...

THE DHAMMAPADA: THE WAY OF THE BUDDHA, VOL. 9-12 165
DELIGHT IN MEDITATION AND IN SOLITUDE. COMPOSE YOURSELF, BE HAPPY. YOU ARE A
SEEKER.
Enough for today.
The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vole 10
Chapter 10 Love is its own reward
The first question:
Question 1
BELOVED MASTER, WHY DO I TAKE MYSELF AND EVERYTHING SO SERIOUSLY?
Prembodhi, the ego can exist only if you take yourself and everything seriously. Nothing kills the ego like
playfulness, like laughter. When you start taking life as fun, the ego has to die, it cannot exist anymore. Ego is
illness; it needs an atmosphere of sadness to exist. Seriousness creates the sadness in you. Sadness is a necessary
soil for the ego. Hence your saints are so serious, for the simple reason that they are the most egoistic people
on the earth. They may be trying to be humble, but they are very proud of their humbleness. They take their
humbleness very seriously.
The real saint cannot be serious. The really religious person has to be a celebrant. Just look around... look
at the trees are they serious? Look at the birds, listen to them are they serious? Look at the stars, the moon,
the sun are they serious? Existence is utterly nonserious; it goes on dancing. It is an eternal celebration, it is a
festivity.
Only man is serious, because only man has been trying to create a separation between himself and existence.
He doesn’t want to be part of the whole, because then he disappears. He wants his own identity, his own name,
his own form, his definition. Even if it creates misery it is okay, even if he has to live in hell he is ready for it.
Once George Bernard Shaw was asked where he would like to go after he dies to hell or to heaven. He said,
”Wherever I can be the first, I don’t want to be the second” and in heaven there is no chance to be the first,
because so many saints have already reached there: Jesus and Zarathustra and Mahavira and Buddha. Who will
take note of poor George Bernard Shaw? He is willing to go to hell if he can be the first there.
Ego wants to be the first, ego wants to put everybody below itself; hence it takes itself seriously. Hence it is
perfectionist: it demands perfection, which is impossible. Nobody is perfect; nobody can exist for a single moment
if he is perfect. Imperfection is the way of life, because it is possible to grow only if you are imperfect. If you
are perfect there is no more growth, no more evolution. If you are perfect you are stuck. Perfection means death;
imperfection means flow, growth, movement, dynamism.
The ego demands perfection of oneself and of others too. It asks for the impossible, and because the impossible
cannot be achieved it can go on living. It is not happy with the ordinary; it wants the extraordinary, and life
consists only of the ordinary. But the ordinary is beautiful, the ordinary is exquisite. There is no need of anything
extraordinary. The ordinary life is sacred, but the ego condemns it as mundane. It demands extraordinary life.
Hence all the religions go on inventing stories about their founders which are all untrue: Moses separating the
sea, Jesus walking on the water... all these stories are inventions, lies, created by the followers just to prove that
their master is extraordinary; he is not an ordinary human being.
In fact, the truth is that you cannot find a more ordinary human being than Buddha, Mahavira, Jesus, Moses,
Zarathustra, Lao Tzu. They are so simple! They have accepted themselves as they are. They live in suchness,
in tathata. They don’t hanker for any perfection. They are perfectly at ease with the imperfect world, utterly
contented with it. And they don’t take themselves so seriously that they have to attain to great heights, great
peaks, that they have to surpass everybody. They are not insane! They are beautiful people, and their beauty
consists in having accepted the ordinary as the extraordinary, the mundane as sacred.
Prembodhi, you ask, ”Why do I take myself and everything so seriously?”
Everybody takes himself and others seriously. That’s the way of the ego to exist. Start being a little more
playful and you will see ego evaporating. Take life nonseriously, as a joke yes, as a cosmic joke. Laugh a little
more.
Laughter is far more significant than prayer. Prayer may not destroy your ego; on the contrary, it may make
it holy, pious, but laughter certainly destroys your ego. When you are really in a state of laughter, have you
observed? the ego disappears for a moment. You are again a child, giggling. Again you have forgotten that you
are special. You are no longer serious; for a moment you have removed your fixation.
That’s why I love jokes they are poison to your ego! You would like me to talk about serious things: astral
planes and how many bodies men have, seven or nine, and how many chakras. And every day there are questions
esoteric, occult. These are the serious people. They have fallen in a wrong company!