Question 3

BELOVED MASTER,

I HEAR YOU HAVE BEEN PUTTING IN YOUR OWN QUESTIONS SOMETIMES.

That's true. I cheat sometimes. The question is obviously from Arup. She gathers the questions, so sometimes she comes to hear me answering a question that she has not put in. There are reasons.

There are two types of people: one I call the question-type and the other I call the answer-type. The question-type is one who goes on asking -- he is not worried whether his question is answered or not. He is not concerned what answer is given to his question; his basic concerns it the question. When I am answering him, then too he is preparing some other question. He is not interested in the answer as such -- he is a question-type. He creates questions, he enjoys creating questions. Sometimes he asks absurd questions -- meaningless, irrelevant. Sometimes he asks meaningful questions -- that too, accidentally. He goes on asking: sometimes by coincidence it is a meaningful question, sometimes it is not.

The other type is the answer-type -- who never asks anything, who simply waits for the answer. For this answer-type, even the questions that the first type asks are meaningful, because he listens to the answer. He never asks the question, but he is very attentive to the answer. Now it happens, sometimes the question-type has to ask a question which is irrelevant to himself but may be relevant to somebody else who is an answer-type. And that too is happening: I continuously watch you, mm? -- somebody is sitting there, a question-type, and just by the side an answer-type, and I see a question from the answer-type jumping into the head of the question-type.

The answer-type cannot ask directly; he has to ask through the question-type -- that is the only way. And the question-type feels very good; whenever he can manage a question he is very happy. He is not worried whether it is his question or not -- it may be somebody else's. It is almost always somebody else's; you don't really ask your questions. Many times you ask other people's questions -- not that they have told you; just sitting by your side they are full of a quest, inquiry: that inquiry pulsates in you, creates a question.

I depend on the question-type for those people who are also answer-types. But sometimes it happens... I go on watching: a person has a question and he is not asking, and nobody else is asking for him. Then sometimes I have to cheat: I put a question in. I have to take care of all of you, of all types.

For example, if Arup had not asked this question I was going to insert it. She was a little impatient -- if she had waited just one week more... because it was hovering on her head. At least for two, three weeks she was puzzled by this: to ask or not to ask?

My whole process is to make available all that is needed for you. It does not matter whether you have asked or not -- you ask many questions, I never answer them. I choose -- that too is a cheating. Then I never answer the whole question, I choose parts -- that too is a cheating. But I am not a teacher. I am not here to answer your questions, I am here to create a situation in which you can become more and more aware, alert. I am not to satisfy your questions, I am to satisfy your being -- and that is a totally different matter. Sometimes I see that a question is needed and nobody is asking: I insert it.

You have to ask many questions. Not that just by asking questions you will be able to know the answers; but just by asking questions there is a possibility... the door opens. Just by asking a question something in your being surfaces: it becomes the most important thing. You make it possible for me to tackle that question. It is not an intellectual thing; I am not going to inform you more. Just by tackling that question something deep in your being will be changed -- because that question is a symptom. That question has arisen because you are in a certain state of being.

For example, Arup has asked this question. Somewhere deep in her mind a distrust goes on lurking -- otherwise she would not have asked, the question would not have arisen. She would have said, "Okay, if our Beloved Master feels it right that he has to insert a question, he inserts it." But deep down somewhere, a shadow of doubt: "Why did he insert the question? -- it was not asked. Why?" Somewhere deep, a shadow.... She may not even be aware of it -- that's why she waited for two, three weeks. She could not manage courage; she thought and thought and thought.

Whatsoever you ask is symptomatic: it shows something, it gives an indication. And I am not much concerned about the question; I am much concerned about the real disease about which the question is a symptom. I don't deal with symptoms, I don't treat symptoms -- symptoms are only indications. Somebody has a fever: fever is a symptom, it is not a disease. The disease must be somewhere else. Because of the disease the body is hot: somewhere deep in the body there is a turmoil, a fight going on. Because of that fight, friction, the body has become hot and is feeling feverish. Fever is not the disease; fever is a symptom of some disease inside.

Now if you treat fever directly, you can kill the patient. You can put the patient under a cold shower to make his body cool: you can kill the patient -- this is not treatment. You have to look deep into his body: where is the turmoil? Where is the conflict, the friction? Why has the body become hot? Why has it lost its normal temperature? A normal temperature means the body is moving without any inner friction. With friction the body becomes hot.

Questions are symptoms. Ask them. I would like you to come to a state where no question arises -- but that cannot come by just not asking. That will come by asking, by asking and dissolving. Those people who are not question-types, they too have to make an effort. It is difficult for them because they are not articulate. Try it: whatsoever you feel -- maybe it is vague, nebulous -- try to fix it into words. Just by bringing it into the conscious mind, becoming articulate about it, you have changed something deep in you.

That's the whole of psychoanalysis -- that the patient goes on talking. The psychoanalyst does not do anything in fact, he simply waits and listens. But just by talking the patient becomes more and more articulate about his unconscious feelings, and once those feelings have been expressed the burden is dissolved -- one is unburdened.

So don't be shy about asking questions. Try. And don't feel that they are foolish -- all questions are foolish. But if one is a fool, one is a fool; and just by hiding it nothing is going to change. Express it. When you don't ask a question and I feel it hovering on you, I have to insert it. If you start asking there will be no need for me to insert.

The whole thing to be remembered is: I am here to help you. I am a physician, I am not a professor. The whole focus is how to help you mutate. so ask as many questions as you can. One day you will find that, by and by, those questions have disappeared. Not that I have answered them -- but just that you asked them, became aware of it; I discussed about it, analyzed it. I really don't answer a question, rather, I try to destroy it. Once it is destroyed, dismantled, it disappears. Not that you will get the answer, but one day you will come to a point where there are no questions in your being. A questionless consciousness is the goal: not a consciousness full of answers, but a questionless consciousness. When there is nothing to be asked, you have arrived.

I have heard...

A young woman went to a fortune-teller. The fortune-teller charged her twenty dollars and said she would answer two questions.

The young woman, after considerable hesitation, finally paid the money and then she said to the fortune-teller, "Isn't that a lot of money for only two questions?"

"Yes, it is," answered the fortune-teller. "Now, what is your second question?"

Don't be afraid of such a thing with me. You can ask a s many questions as you want. Ask -- and don't be shy. And remember, all questions are foolish, so there is no need to feel awkward. And one thing more: the people who don't ask have more important questions to ask; and the people who ask go on asking for asking's sake -- they don't have many important questions to ask. They ask because they can ask; they may not have the right question. And the people who don't ask may have the right question -- and I have to answer for those too. So if you don't ask I will have to insert questions for you.

A few more things about questions: one, whenever it arises don't wait for tomorrow, write it immediately -- because no question is going to be relevant tomorrow. If you wait for tomorrow you may not ever ask it, and something very much needed may be missed. The mind goes on changing continuously. the moment you feel the question is there, write it. Don't be worried whether it is relevant or not relevant, whether it will be relevant tomorrow -- "Should I wait? Should I see whether it remains there or simply disappears?" It WILL disappear -- not because it has become irrelevant; it will disappear because you have a mind which is continuously changing. Even a question cannot be retained: your mind is a flux. Write the question -- and sometimes it may be that it is no more relevant for you, but it may be relevant for somebody else.

All questions are human questions. Maybe you are not in any way anxious to know about it anymore -- somebody else may be. And our thoughts are not individual properties; it is a collective mass. Thoughts go on entering into your head and going out -- it is a continuous exchange between you and others. No thoughts is yours: it comes for a while, stays there, and is gone... and enters into somebody else's head. It is almost like breathing: I breathe in -- it is the same breath that was within your chest just a moment before. Now you have breathed it out, I breathe it in. I breathe it out, somebody else is going to breathe it in. Exactly the same is true about thoughts. You breathe in, breathe out: it is a continuous exchange.

So don't be worried. Let questions be asked. Just one thing to remember: questions should not be asked only for asking's sake. They should be asked because somewhere it is hurting you; somewhere in your being, it has some relationship, some relevance, something to do. Something is like a knot in your being, and this question will help it to open, to dissolve. The question should not be just intellectual, it should be existential.

An elderly lady and gentleman who were obviously from the upper crust, found themselves obliged to travel by train one day, and moreover, had to travel second-class as there were no first-class carriages on the train. The compartment was almost full, and the couple sat stiffly in silence for a while. But soon the atmosphere improved and they found themselves exchanging conversation and pleasantries with the other men in the carriage.

The stories became more and more risque, and finally one of the men told a real beauty. "How dare you!" said the elderly gentleman indignantly. "How dare you tell that story before my wife!"

"Sorry, guv," apologized the man. "I didn't know she wanted to tell it herself."