The second question:
Question 2
I AM A SCHOOLMASTER, A SORT OF WATERED-DOWN MIXTURE OF PRIEST, POLITICIAN AND SCHOLAR -- ALL THAT YOU ABHOR. IS THERE ANY HOPE FOR ME? ALSO I AM FIFTY-SIX -- HAD I BEST JUST LIVE OUT THE REST OF THIS LIFE IN PATIENCE, AND HOPE FOR BETTER LUCK NEXT TIME?

NO HOPE FOR THE PRIEST, FOR THE POLITICIAN, FOR THE SCHOLAR not even in the next life! But you can drop being a priest, being a politician, being a scholar, any moment -- and there is hope. But NO hope for the priest, no hope for the politician, no hope for the scholar. I am absolute about that. Even in the next life or next to next -- never. I have never heard of any priest ever reaching Nirvana, never heard about any politician ever meeting God, never heard about any scholar ever becoming aware, knowing, wise. No, it is not possible.
The scholar believes in knowledge, not in knowing. Knowledge is from the outside; knowing is from the inside. The scholar trusts information. The information goes on collecting; it becomes a heavy load, but nothing grows inside. The inner reality remains the same -- as ignorant as before.
The politician seeks power -- it is an ego-trip. And those who arrive are humble people, not egoists. Egoists never arrive; by their very egoism they cannot arrive. Ego is the greatest barrier between you and God -- the only barrier. So the politician cannot come.
And the priest... the priest is very cunning. He is trying to become a mediator between you and God, and he has not known God at all. He is the MOST deceptive, the most fraudulent. He is committing the greatest crime a man can commit: he is pretending that he knows God. Not only that: that he will make God available to you, that you come and follow him and he will take you to the ultimate. And he does not know anything of the ultimate! He may know the ritual, how to do the prayer, but he does not know the ultimate. How can he lead you? He is a blind man, and when a blind man leads the blind, they both fall into the ditch.
No hope for the priest, no hope for the politician, no hope for the scholar -- but there is hope, Anand Tejas, for you. The question is from Anand Tejas -- there IS hope for you, EVERY hope for you.
And it is NOT a question of age. You may be fifty-six, or seventy-six, or a hundred and six -- that doesn't matter. It is not a question of age because it is not a question of time. To enter into eternity, any moment is as right as any other moment -- BECAUSE ONE ENTERS HERENOW! How does it make any difference how old you are? Fifty-six or sixteen -- the sixteen-year-old has to enter right now, and the fifty-six-year-old has to enter right now; both have to enter right now. And the sixteen years are not helpful, neither are fifty-six years helpful. There are different problems for both; that I know. When a sixteen-year-old young man wants to enter into meditation or into God his problem is different from that of a man who is fifty-six. What is the difference? But if you weigh them finally the difference is quantitative, not qualitative.
The sixteen-year-old has only sixteen years of past; in that way he is in a better situation than the man who is fifty-six, he has a fifty-six years' past. He has a big load to drop, many attachments -- fifty-six years of life, many experiences, much knowledge. The sixteen-year-old has not that much to drop. He has a little load, less luggage -- a small suitcase -- mm? -- just a small boy's suitcase. The fifty-six-year-old has much luggage. This way the younger is in a better situation.
But there is another thing: the old man has no more future. A fifty-six-year-old, if he is going to be alive seventy years on the earth, has only fourteen years left -- no more future, no more imagination, no more dreaming. There is not much space. Death is coming. The sixteen-year-old has a long future, much imagination, many dreams.
The past is small but the future is big for the young; for the old, the past is big, the future is small -- on the whole it is the same. It is seventy years: both have to drop seventy years. For the young, sixteen years in the past, remaining years in the future. The future has also to be dropped as much as the past. So finally, in the final reckoning, there is no difference.
There is every hope for you, Anand Tejas. And because you have asked the question, the work has already started. You have become alert about your priest, politician, scholar -- that's good. To become aware of a disease, to know what it is, is half the treatment.
And you have become a sannyasin, you have taken a step into the unknown already. If you are going to be with me, you will have to say goodbye to your priest, your politician, your scholar. But I feel confident that you can do it, otherwise you would not have even asked. You have felt that it is meaningless, all that you have been doing up to now is meaningless -- you have felt it. That feeling is of tremendous value.
So I will not say just be patient and wait for the next life, no. I am never in favour of postponement. All postponement is dangerous and is very tricky. If you say, "I will postpone in this life -- nothing can be done," you are avoiding a situation. Everything can be done! You are simply pretending. And this is a trick to save: "Now what can be done? I am so old."
Even on the deathbed, at the last moment, the change can happen. Even when the person is dying, he can open his eye for a single MOMENT... and the change can happen. And he can drop the whole past before death comes in, and he can die utterly fresh. And he is dying in a new way -- he is dying as a sannyasin. He is dying in deep meditation -- and to die in deep meditation is not to die at all, because he will be dying with full awareness of the deathless.
It can happen in a single moment! So please don't postpone. Don't say: "Had I best just live out the rest of this life in patience...?" No. You drop it right now -- it is worthless! Why carry it? Why wait? And if you wait, the next life is not going to be any different -- that's why I say there is no hope for the priest and the politician and the scholar. The next life will start from where you end this life. Again the priest, again the politician, again the scholar. You will have the next life in continuity with this life. How is it going to be different? It will be the same wheel turning again.
And this time I am available to you. Who knows? next time I may not be available. This time, somehow, groping in the dark, you have stumbled upon me. Next time, one never knows.... This time you took fifty-six years to come to a man through whom revolution IS possible. Who knows? next time you may become more burdened, certainly you will become more burdened -- the past life's burden, and the next life's burden... you may take seventy years to come, or to find a man.
That's why I say there is no hope for the politician and the priest and the scholar in the future either. But for you there is every hope -- because YOU ARE NOT A PRIEST, and you are not a scholar, and you are not a politician. How can you be? These are things that gather around, but the innermost core remains always free. Don't think of yourself in terms of being a frog -- be a bee.....