BELOVED OSHO,

OF BLISSFUL ISLANDS

O AFTERNOON OF MY LIFE! WHAT HAVE I NOT GIVEN AWAY THAT I MIGHT POSSESS ONE THING: THIS LIVING PLANTATION OF MY THOUGHTS AND THIS DAWN OF MY HIGHEST HOPE!

ONCE THE CREATOR SOUGHT COMPANIONS AND CHILDREN OF HIS HOPE: AND BEHOLD, IT TURNED OUT THAT HE COULD NOT FIND THEM, EXCEPT HE FIRST CREATE THEM HIMSELF.

THUS I AM IN THE MIDST OF MY WORK, GOING TO MY CHILDREN AND TURNING FROM THEM: FOR THE SAKE OF HIS CHILDREN MUST ZARATHUSTRA PERFECT HIMSELF.

FOR ONE LOVES FROM THE VERY HEART ONLY ONE'S CHILD AND ONE'S WORK; AND WHERE THERE IS GREAT LOVE OF ONESELF, THEN IT IS A SIGN OF PREGNANCY: THUS HAVE I FOUND.

MY CHILDREN ARE STILL GREEN IN THEIR FIRST SPRING, STANDING CLOSE TOGETHER AND SHAKEN IN COMMON BY THE WINDS, THE TREES OF MY GARDEN AND MY BEST SOIL.

AND TRULY! WHERE SUCH TREES STAND TOGETHER, THERE BLISSFUL ISLANDS ARE!

BUT ONE DAY I WILL UPROOT THEM AND SET EACH ONE UP BY ITSELF, THAT IT MAY LEARN SOLITUDE AND DEFIANCE AND FORESIGHT.

THEN IT SHALL STAND BY THE SEA, GNARLED AND TWISTED AND WITH SUPPLE HARDINESS, A LIVING LIGHTHOUSE OF UNCONQUERABLE LIFE.

YONDER, WHERE STORMS PLUNGE DOWN INTO THE SEA AND THE MOUNTAIN'S SNOUT DRINKS WATER, THERE EACH OF THEM SHALL ONE DAY KEEP ITS DAY AND NIGHT WATCH, FOR ITS TESTING AND RECOGNITION.

IT SHALL BE TESTED AND RECOGNIZED, TO SEE WHETHER IT IS OF MY KIND AND MY RACE -- WHETHER IT IS MASTER OF A PROTRACTED WILL, SILENT EVEN WHEN IT SPEAKS, AND GIVING IN SUCH A WAY THAT IN GIVING IT TAKES --

THAT IT MAY ONE DAY BE MY COMPANION AND A FELLOW-CREATOR AND FELLOW-REJOICER OF ZARATHUSTRA -- SUCH A ONE AS INSCRIBES MY WILL UPON MY TABLETS: FOR THE GREATER PERFECTION OF ALL THINGS.

AND FOR ITS SAKE, AND FOR THOSE LIKE IT, MUST I PERFECT MYSELF: THEREFORE I NOW AVOID MY HAPPINESS AND OFFER MYSELF TO ALL UNHAPPINESS -- FOR MY ULTIMATE TESTING AND RECOGNITION....

TO DESIRE -- THAT NOW MEANS TO ME: TO HAVE LOST MYSELF. I POSSESS YOU, MY CHILDREN! IN THIS POSSESSION ALL SHOULD BE CERTAINTY AND NOTHING DESIRE....

... THUS SPAKE ZARATHUSTRA.

A man like Zarathustra is almost a gardener, looking after people with love and care and waiting for the time when they will be able to bring forth flowers and fruits.

Consciousness has its own flowering, but most of the people go on living like robots, not even thinking about the immense possibilities of consciousness and its growth. You don't get it just by being born. Birth brings you life; now it is up to you to transform your life energies into a higher phenomenon -- that of consciousness.

Consciousness is exactly like a flower. And unless your inner being blossoms, you will never feel contented, never feel fulfilled, because your seed remains just a seed. The seed is the imprisonment of thousands of flowers. The seed has to be broken; the seed has to merge into the soil so that those flowers which are hidden in it as a potential, start becoming actual.

All great masters are nothing but gardeners of humanity. So is Zarathustra. He is talking to himself:

O AFTERNOON OF MY LIFE! WHAT HAVE I NOT GIVEN AWAY THAT I MIGHT POSSESS ONE THING: THIS LIVING PLANTATION OF MY THOUGHTS AND THIS DAWN OF MY HIGHEST HOPE!

ONCE THE CREATOR SOUGHT COMPANIONS AND CHILDREN OF HIS HOPE: AND BEHOLD, IT TURNED OUT THAT HE COULD NOT FIND HIM, EXCEPT HE FIRST CREATE THEM HIMSELF.

He is saying that once he was looking for the superman, wandering amongst the valleys where humanity lives with a searching eye, that there may be someone who has attained his potential, who has transcended being a man and has become a superman. But he failed; he could not find a single man who has transcended himself.

And in the afternoon of his life he has realized the fact that the superman has not to be found somewhere else, you have to create it. The superman is not a finding but a creation, and you have to create it, just the way a gardener creates a beautiful garden.

ONCE THE CREATOR SOUGHT COMPANIONS AND CHILDREN OF HIS HOPE. His hope is very single-pointed. And his hope is not only his hope, it is the hope for the whole of humanity. Unless the superman appears, man is doomed. Either man has to create the superman in his consciousness or man's days are over.

There are only two alternatives: either suicide or superman.

Man cannot go on lingering the way he has been for thousands of years. For thousands of years there has not been any evolution as far as man's consciousness is concerned. Yes, once in a while a Gautam Buddha, a Zarathustra, a Lao Tzu have blossomed; but they are not the rule, they are the exceptions.

But even their existence has been of tremendous help -- to go on hoping that if it can happen to Zarathustra it can also happen to you. One has to create the superman. One has to become a womb; one has to become pregnant with the idea of superman.

... AND BEHOLD, IT TURNED OUT THAT HE COULD NOT FIND THEM, EXCEPT HE FIRST CREATE THEM HIMSELF. The only way to find them is to create them. This is a tremendous change of direction. He was wasting his time in looking for them -- as if they are somewhere already in existence, you have just to find out where they are. They are nowhere in existence.

One of the great mystics of this century, George Gurdjieff, has shocked the whole spiritual world by a very significant statement: all men don't have souls. Never before has anybody said that. It has been taken for granted that everybody has a soul. But Gurdjieff's meaning was misunderstood; hence the shock.

He was not saying that you don't have a soul, he was saying you have only the possibility of a soul. You don't have the actual soul unless you create it. You can have it, but you don't have it right now. You will have to be a creator -- a creator of yourself. And that is the highest creation in the world.

Creating a painting is one thing; creating a statue, creating poetry, or creating music are all trivia in comparison to creating yourself. That is the hardest work, the most arduous, but the most fulfilling, most blissful.

In the depths of your silences the superman is asleep as a seed. You have to find the right soil; you have to find the right season; you have to take every care, and you have to wait. Wait with deep love, with great hope, with patience.

Zarathustra finds that now in the afternoon of his life he has to begin his work again from a totally different angle: he has to create superman.

THUS I AM IN THE MIDST OF MY WORK, GOING TO MY CHILDREN AND TURNING FROM THEM: FOR THE SAKE OF HIS CHILDREN MUST ZARATHUSTRA PERFECT HIMSELF. You cannot create the superman unless the creator himself is perfect. So this new dimension of his work changes many things. First, he was just looking, without ever thinking that he himself is not perfect, and unless you are perfect you cannot give birth to perfection.

FOR ONE LOVES FROM THE VERY HEART ONLY ONE'S CHILD AND ONE'S WORK; AND WHERE THERE IS GREAT LOVE OF ONESELF, THEN IT IS A SIGN OF PREGNANCY: THUS HAVE I FOUND. This statement has to be understood as deeply as possible, because unfortunately humanity has lived under the influence of all kinds of wrong people.

They have used humanity, they have exploited humanity. They have given good words, like toys, to play with, but they have not done anything to perfect man. They themselves were not perfect. Just look at your priests who have dominated you for centuries, who have been your spiritual guides. They are utterly hollow people.

Just the other day Anando brought me a few pieces of information. One was about one great Christian American preacher who preaches on the television. He collects almost one hundred and twenty million dollars per year from his listeners for God's work, and just now he has been found to be having a love affair with a woman; and his wife was having a love affair with another man. And all that money that he was collecting in the name of God was being used by himself.

Another Christian preacher in Oklahoma threatened his listeners. He has a two-hundred-foot high tower from where he preaches to his television viewers. He threatened, "God has asked me to collect eight million dollars within two months, and if I don't collect eight million dollars I will be dead." Naturally people started pouring money in. He collected eight million dollars in two months, and now somebody is suing him in court as a representative of God.

In fact he is suing God for blackmail. This is pure blackmail: threatening that He will kill the preacher if they don't give Him eight million dollars! Americans are very much interested in suing people. Now they are suing God -- of course God cannot be found, but this preacher....

These kinds of people have dominated humanity. They were not interested in human consciousness evolving, they were interested in their own power trips. In fact it is good that human consciousness has not evolved... because the superman is not going to be a Christian -- that much is certain. The superman is not going to be a Hindu, the superman is not going to be a Mohammedan; the superman is going to be a god himself, a divine being, a divine realization.

Perhaps, without being conscious, all the priests of all the religions have conspired against the coming of the superman. They want human beings unconscious, blind, groping in the dark, weak, afraid of death, afraid of God, greedy for rewards... listening to all kinds of nonsense these preachers go on telling them. And these preachers are not in any way superior consciousnesses; otherwise it would be impossible for them to do such stupid things.

It happened one day.... In the middle of the night, a woman was making love to a man in her bedroom and suddenly she heard her husband's car enter the driveway. She knew the noise; she recognized it immediately. He was not supposed to come at this hour, but perhaps some urgent work... so she pushed the man who was lying with her in the bed, and said, "Do something, my husband is here. He will simply kill you!" He said, "What can I do?"

She said, "You just jump out of the window." By that time the husband was knocking on the door, so there was no time to think. He jumped out of the window, naked... and it was raining.

Just by chance he found a group of joggers, so he joined them; otherwise standing there naked on the street would be very embarrassing. He was jogging in the crowd of joggers, and the man by his side looked at him. Seeing that he is naked -- and it was raining also -- he could not resist the temptation and he asked, "Do you always jog naked?" He said, "Always."

He said, "Strange, you are the first jogger I have seen jogging naked. But why are you wearing the condom? Do you also always wear the condom when you are jogging?"

He said, "No, not always. Only when it is raining."

But the man who was talking to him remembered... his voice seems to be familiar. He looked more closely and he said, "Father, I had never thought that you love jogging so much. I come every Sunday to the church; I am one of your congregation."

These are your priests. They have dominated humanity, and every day they are being caught either molesting children, or raping women, or having homosexual relationships. They don't seem to have any consciousness which is superior to yours; it may be inferior, but it is not superior. They will not allow you to evolve because your evolution will destroy their whole profession. You have to remain retarded in order that their profession continues; and they have the greatest profession in the world.

The superman will be absolutely free from all these stupid people who know nothing, who are just like parrots, repeating scriptures. Their knowledge may be much but their wisdom is nil.

These people have taught one thing consistently all over the world, in all the religions, and that is: Don't love yourself. That is condemned as selfishness. Love others, even love your enemy, even love your neighbor, but nobody says, love yourself.

Unless you love yourself... Zarathustra is right: WHERE THERE IS GREAT LOVE OF ONESELF, THEN IT IS A SIGN OF PREGNANCY. Your love for yourself is the only alchemy that is going to produce the superman. Unless you love yourself, you will not refine yourself.

They have been telling you that you are a sinner, not worthy of receiving any acceptance. They have poisoned your mind against yourself -- that is their strategy to prevent the superman from coming into the world. They have put man against himself; they have condemned everything that you have: all your desires, all your longings, all your instincts, your body, your mind. They want you to be a sacrificial animal on some fictitious altar.

And they have succeeded up to now. Man has remained just a sacrifice to some fictitious God. They have not helped you to be creators, they have not helped you to be aware of yourself and love yourself so much that you become pregnant with your future, with your own superman -- which is just a seed within you, but can become a great flower with great fragrance given the right time, the right space, the right tenderness, and the art of a gardener.

MY CHILDREN ARE STILL GREEN IN THEIR FIRST SPRING, STANDING CLOSE TOGETHER AND SHAKEN IN COMMON BY THE WINDS, THE TREES OF MY GARDEN AND MY BEST SOIL.

AND TRULY! WHERE SUCH TREES STAND TOGETHER, THERE BLISSFUL ISLANDS ARE!

Zarathustra loves the individual. He hates the crowd, he hates the mob. He is against the whole mob psychology, because the mob is the lowest as far as the evolution of man is concerned.

The mob does not allow anybody to go higher; they all pull his legs back down into the same mud in which the mob is living. It is against their egos that anybody should become an individual. They respect those people who sacrifice their individuality -- they call them saints. And all those saints are nothing but shadows, corpses, fulfilling the expectations of the crowd.

The more you fulfill the expectations of the crowd, the more respectability, the more honor they give to you; they make you a great saint. Just you should not be on your own -- that is what the crowd hates. You should not assert your individuality -- that is what the crowd hates. And unless you assert your individuality, you cannot be pregnant with the superman.

The superman is an individual.

Zarathustra is saying, AND TRULY! WHERE SUCH TREES STAND TOGETHER, THERE BLISSFUL ISLANDS ARE! But they will have to be separated; then they will become blissful islands. Every gardener knows: he sows the seeds, the trees grow up, and they are a crowd. Then he starts making them separate -- planting them, giving them their own territory, their own space. He makes them individuals. He makes them islands.

BUT ONE DAY I WILL UPROOT THEM AND SET EACH ONE UP BY ITSELF, THAT IT MAY LEARN SOLITUDE AND DEFIANCE AND FORESIGHT. Three things he is saying: THAT IT MAY LEARN SOLITUDE.... The crowd never allows you to learn the beautiful space of solitude. They are always surrounding you everywhere. They don't allow you to be silent, they don't leave you alone. They are very resentful of such people who are silent, remain alone, love solitude. The crowd feels they are enemies -- they are not one of them, they are outsiders, they don't belong to them.

But solitude is one of the most fundamental things needed for anybody to feel his own consciousness. In the crowd you feel the collective consciousness but not your own consciousness, and there are everyday instances all over the world where you can see how the collective consciousness works.

Just a few days ago, four teenagers in America closed the doors of their garage and kept the car engine running. Its exhaust gases are carbon monoxide, and the doors were closed. All four teenagers were found dead in the morning. As the news came on the television and in the newspapers, you will be surprised... all over America, in fifteen other places, similar incidents immediately followed. This is the collective mind.

When one of the actresses of America, Marilyn Monroe, died, the rate of suicide rose to fifteen percent. Just one woman committed suicide, and the collective mind is so contagious....

The University of California has been studying for one year why there is a fluctuation in the crime rate, and they have found that the fluctuation is because of football matches, boxing matches. Whenever there is a football match or a boxing match, immediately the crime rate goes seven percent, eight percent, and sometimes fourteen percent higher. All over California people suddenly start murdering, committing suicide, raping women -- it takes two weeks for the crime rate to come back to normal. It is almost like a wave that touches many people, and many people are affected.

The collective consciousness functions as one whole. It does not allow individuals to be decisive on their own. People don't have space.

Scientists have discovered that even animals have their territorial imperative. For example, lions have a territory, and to make their territory known to everybody in the forest -- all the animals do the same thing -- they go on urinating on certain spots. The smell of their urine makes other animals not enter inside.

It has been observed that if you go and just remain outside the territory, the lion will not be disturbed. If he is resting he will go on looking at you, and he will be resting; you will not see any restlessness, but just one step within his territory and he stands up -- you have interfered in his space. Dogs go on doing the same thing: making their own territory by urinating on this pillar, on that god, on this temple, on that church. And other dogs recognize it.

All the animals are more sensitive than you are. Horses can smell from two miles away. If there is a lion, they can smell it from two miles away and they will stop moving; they will become reluctant to move on.

Trees have their own territories, and if you look.... The African trees grow highest in the world for the simple reason that they cannot find space enough around themselves. The forests are so thick that they can find a free space only if they grow very high in the sky. Grow the same tree here and it will not go to that height, there is no need, but in Africa it will grow to two hundred feet high, to feel the space and freedom and individuality.

Man has forgotten it completely. And perhaps most of the tensions of man are because of the crowd. Solitude is a spiritual necessity. But the crowd goes on becoming bigger and bigger; wherever you are, you are in a crowd.

Slowly, slowly you forget completely that there was a need for solitude. You remain pygmies, you don't grow your souls. There is no space for those souls to expand.

The first thing is solitude.

The second thing is defiance.

One has to be a rebel, one has to learn to say no to the crowd. One has to decide for himself. One has to make it clear to everybody that nobody is going to decide for him.

I was staying in a home and a small child was playing... I was sitting on the lawn and he was playing around me, so I started talking to him and I asked him, "What you are going to become in your life?"

He said, "As far as I can see, I will become insane."

I said, "From where did you get this idea?"

He said, "My mother wants me to become a doctor, my father wants me to become an engineer, my uncle wants me to become a scientist. That's why I am saying that all these people are going to drive me insane. And nobody asks me what I want to become. They are deciding, they are quarreling, they are continuously arguing. I am the only son, and they are all wanting to project their ambitions onto me."

I said to the boy, "Learn to say no. There is no need to become insane. Assert what you want to become and risk everything for it, and you will never be miserable. You may not become very rich, you may not become very famous, but who bothers about fame? And money cannot buy anything that is really meaningful. If you have a deep contentment that whatever you wanted to become you have become, you will be the richest person in the world."

Richness does not consist of your bank accounts, richness consists of your contentment, of your fulfillment, of your innermost joy -- a feeling that you have come to be what was your destiny.

Defiance means disobedience.

Unless somebody is saying something with which you feel a deep rapport, a harmony... you can say yes, but let your yes be total; if something in you does not want to say yes, it is better to say no. It is one of the basics of life that only a man who can say no is capable of saying yes. Those who cannot say no, their yes is impotent; it means nothing, it has no strength in it.

The crowd wants you to be very obedient -- about everything, the smallest things, you have to be obedient.

In my childhood I used to go wherever I wanted to go, and my father would ask, "Why do you create trouble for us? We search for you and we cannot find you, and we worry about you. You could have told us, you could have asked if you could go. Why did you not ask?"

I said, "Because I wanted to go. I have seen and experienced that whenever I ask it is always `no.' And I don't want to hurt you unnecessarily or go against you; it is better to go silently, without any problem. I will go anyway, whether you say go or not."

From the very beginning they started thinking that I am a little crazy, because I never obeyed anything unless it suited my own idea. And I have learned so much by defiance. It has given me a great strength to stand on my own, and it has made me free from the crowd. In my whole life I have never listened to anybody's order.

While I was doing my postgraduate studies the government passed a law that every student has to go for army training, and unless you receive a certificate from the army you will not be given your postgraduate degree.

I went directly to my vice-chancellor and I said, "You can keep my postgraduate degree, I will not need it. But I cannot go to any kind of idiotic training."

The army training is basically to destroy your intelligence, because you cannot say no, and if you cannot say no your intelligence starts dying. In the beginning it is a little hard to say yes, but reluctantly you say it. Slowly, slowly you become accustomed to saying yes without thinking at all what you are saying yes to.

I said, "I am not going to any army training. I don't care about the postgraduate degree, but I cannot conceive myself with somebody ordering me, `Left turn!' and I have to turn left -- for no reason at all. `Right turn!' and I have to turn right. `Go forward!... Come backward!' This I cannot do. And if you want me to do it, then inform the military officer that he will have to give me an explanation for everything. Why should I turn left? What is the need?"

The vice-chancellor said, "Don't create trouble. You just remain silent. I will manage, I will tell the military officer that he has to give you attendance -- but don't create trouble, because if you start creating trouble others may start creating trouble. Right now you are the only one who has come to me; others have filled in the forms."

I said, "It is up to you. If I am to go to the army training I am going to create trouble there, because I am not a person who can obey something without sufficient reasons."

But the society in every way teaches you to be obedient, to be humble, to be meek, to be respectful to the elders. That is not the way of spiritual growth, that is the way of committing spiritual suicide.

And the third thing is foresight.

You all have hindsight -- somebody says something and later on you figure it out. But it is too late; now you know what you should have said. A situation arises and you don't know how to face it, how to respond to it. You are never immediate. All your responses are haphazard; all your arrows fall short, they miss the target.

A man, to be independent and free, needs foresight. He needs to see ahead of himself -- because it is pointless to look backwards; nothing can be done about that which is past, you cannot undo it. But something can be done for the time that is coming. If you have foresight you can respond to situations in a more relevant and graceful way.

The superman is the most graceful man that can be conceived. His grace comes from his foresight. He is a very relaxed person, and his relaxedness comes from his foresight. He knows what is going to happen; he is ready to respond.

You cannot find him in a state of unreadiness. Even if death knocks on his doors he will welcome it with joy -- because life he has known; now death is going to be a new adventure.

THEN IT SHALL STAND BY THE SEA, GNARLED AND TWISTED AND WITH SUPPLE HARDINESS, A LIVING LIGHTHOUSE OF UNCONQUERABLE LIFE.

YONDER, WHERE STORMS PLUNGE DOWN INTO THE SEA AND THE MOUNTAIN'S SNOUT DRINKS WATER, THERE EACH OF THEM SHALL ONE DAY KEEP ITS DAY AND NIGHT WATCH, FOR ITS TESTING AND RECOGNITION.

Each situation for the individual, however difficult and hard, is a test. He joyfully goes through it. He blissfully accepts any danger, because only that danger will make him stronger, will bring him recognition -- not from the crowd, but from existence itself.

IT SHALL BE TESTED AND RECOGNIZED, TO SEE WHETHER IT IS OF MY KIND AND MY RACE -- WHETHER IT IS MASTER OF A PROTRACTED WILL, SILENT EVEN WHEN IT SPEAKS, AND GIVING IN SUCH A WAY THAT IN GIVING IT TAKES.

The superman, the man who has integrity and individuality, and a consciousness around himself, is silent even when he speaks. Deep inside him is nothing but silence. His words come out of silence, not out of the gibberish of the mind.

Your words can come from two sources: either from the silences of your heart or from the noises,

mad voices, of your head. Mostly they come from your head, because you have never entered into your own silences of the heart. And when a word comes from the head it is meaningless.

When a word comes from your silences it is very pregnant with meaning. It carries something of silence within it. And if you have ears to hear, you will not only hear the word, you will also hear the wordless message.

The man who is conscious, alert, individual, also knows how to give a thing -- not to insult someone, not to hurt somebody's pride; he gives in such a way that it is as if he is not giving at all. On the contrary he is taking something. He enhances your pride, your dignity.

THAT IT MAY ONE DAY BE MY COMPANION AND A FELLOW-CREATOR AND FELLOW-REJOICER OF ZARATHUSTRA -- SUCH A ONE AS INSCRIBES MY WILL UPON MY TABLETS: FOR THE GREATER PERFECTION OF ALL THINGS.

AND FOR ITS SAKE, AND FOR THOSE LIKE IT, MUST I PERFECT MYSELF.

One has to begin with oneself.

One has to be utterly selfish.

Only out of this selfishness will grow the flower that can share its fragrance with others.

The old traditions have been teaching you to be unselfish, but you don't even know how to be selfish -- how you can be unselfish? You don't even know what the self is. Begin from the beginning. All old teachings about being unselfish are absolute nonsense. And the people who have been trying to be unselfish are only superficially so; deep down they are selfish.

I have always loved a beautiful story: In a Chinese city there used to be an annual festival and a great fair. In old China the wells were without any walls, so it was very easy to fall in a well; there was nothing to prevent you. A man fell into a well, and there was so much noise from the festival and the fair that he shouted but nobody heard. Just a Buddhist monk who was accustomed to deep silence heard him shouting, "Save me!"

He went to the side of the well and he said, "What is the point? What will you be doing if you are saved -- the same repetitive life? It is better to die silently, that's what my master has taught me."

The man said, "I don't want any philosophy at this moment. I am dying and you are talking philosophy!"

The Buddhist monk said, "Nobody dies, the soul is eternal. One only changes houses. See you in some other house." And he went away.

The man was very angry but he could not do anything, he was in the well. Then there came a Taoist monk -- these people heard him because they were accustomed to meditation and silence. He looked down and said, "What is the matter? Why are you shouting? At such a moment, when one is dying, one should meditate. Listen to the great Lao Tzu, he says: Never fight against the current, go with the flow -- relax!"

The man said, "This is a strange place. First let me out and I will show you what relaxation is."

The monk said, "My master's teaching is never to interfere in anybody's life. I cannot interfere, just excuse me. The only advice that I can give to you is, go with the flow."

Just behind him there was a Confucian monk, and he said, "This proves that my master was right."

But the man said, "Nobody is bothered about saving me."

The Confucian monk said, "It is not a question of saving you. The question is, Confucius has said that every well should have a protective wall, and I am going to preach in every place to create walls around the wells so that nobody falls in. One person dying or not dying does not matter, it is a social question. Think of your children -- they will not have to fall into wells.

"And anyway, what are you going to do if you are saved? You are old enough, you look nearabout fifty, you have lived enough and your time has come. According to my master Confucius, nothing happens before its time. But you have proved my master's statement that every well should have a wall. A great revolution is needed in the whole country so that people start creating walls. Your falling in the well is a great thing; you have provoked me. Now I will go to every place, I will move around the country; you don't be worried."

But the man said, "Even if all the wells have walls, that will not save me. First do something to save me!"

The man said, "I am a believer in social reform; I don't waste my time and energy in small things. This saving you anybody can do, but the social reform.... I cannot wait here long, I will go right now into the crowds and preach to them. And you are a very good example. If they ask any questions I will say, `Go and look in that well.' By taking you out, I would destroy my own example. So keep quiet and wait."

The man said, "I never thought that all kinds of idiots would come to the side of the well... not a single sensible person."

Then came a Christian missionary, and he had a bucket and a rope. He immediately threw the bucket and the rope down and told the man, "Just sit in the bucket, hold the rope, and I will pull you up. This is the teaching of the great, only begotten son of God, Jesus Christ: service is religion. Serving you, I am earning great virtue."

He came out. He was very happy, and he said, "It seems your religion is the only true religion." The Christian missionary said, "Of course." "But," the man said, "I wonder why you were carrying a bucket and a rope?"

He said, "We remain ready for any emergency. Service is our motto, because only through service can we reach paradise. Now, you did a great thing by falling in the well. If you had not fallen in I would have missed my virtue.

"And stop that idiot, that Confucian, who has gone into the crowd and is telling people to create walls around the wells. That will prevent people serving others; he has to be stopped. Teach your children, and help others also to fall into the well. I am ready here with my bucket and my rope. The more people fall into the well, the more virtue is earned by taking them out."

It seems that the people who are serving others are serving for a reward. They are hoping to be welcomed at the pearly gates of heaven. They will go with their whole list -- how many orphans they saved, how many people they dragged out of wells, how many people they helped to be educated, how many people they provided with medicines... but their basic interest is still selfish. It cannot be otherwise, it is the very nature of man.

Zarathustra is not against the nature of man. Be selfish. Let your self grow to its ultimate potential, let it blossom; and then out of it the fragrance will go to all sides -- that will be your unselfishness. And it won't ask for any reward anywhere, here or hereafter, it will be a reward unto itself, it will be a joy to share your fragrance.

Zarathustra is not for unselfish service. No man of intelligence can say, "Serve others." You don't know yourself. Your serving others can only be dangerous. First know thyself. First be thyself.

First grow as much as you can, and then sharing will happen on its own accord. It is not something to be done. You will become a raincloud and you will shower on many lands, and you will not think that you are giving something to anybody. On the contrary, you will think you are taking something from others.

A raincloud showering on the thirsty earth does not think that he is showering because of the thirsty earth. He is thankful to the earth because it allowed him to be unburdened; he was too full of rainwater. He will not make the earth feel obliged; on the contrary, he will be obliged to the earth.

And that is the dignity of man.

THAT IT MAY ONE DAY BE MY COMPANION AND A FELLOW-CREATOR AND FELLOW-REJOICER OF ZARATHUSTRA -- SUCH A ONE AS INSCRIBES MY WILL UPON MY TABLETS: FOR THE GREATER PERFECTION OF ALL THINGS.

AND FOR ITS SAKE, AND FOR THOSE LIKE IT, MUST I PERFECT MYSELF: THEREFORE I NOW AVOID MY HAPPINESS AND OFFER MYSELF TO ALL UNHAPPINESS -- FOR MY ULTIMATE TESTING AND RECOGNITION.

He is saying, "I am no longer interested in small pleasures, happinesses. My only concern is to offer myself for the final test, the fire test, which will give me the recognition of existence -- that my consciousness is immortal, that my consciousness is divine, that I have come to fulfill my destiny."

TO DESIRE -- THAT NOW MEANS TO ME: TO HAVE LOST MYSELF. I POSSESS YOU, MY CHILDREN! He is saying, "I am not only desiring the superman, because I have desired the superman long enough. Just desiring will not help."

TO DESIRE -- THAT NOW MEANS TO ME: TO HAVE LOST MYSELF. I possess you, my children! IN THIS POSSESSION ALL SHOULD BE CERTAINTY AND NOTHING DESIRE. It is not a desire; I am absolutely certain that I possess you within me. All that is needed is their assertion, their growing, their becoming individuals, their rising to the stars.

IN THIS POSSESSION ALL SHOULD BE CERTAINTY AND NOTHING DESIRE. Desire is not anything certain; you desire a thousand and one things. He says, "I possess it. I have got hold of my soul and I am going to change it. And it is not a desire, it is a certainty. I am absolutely and unconditionally devoted to only one thing: to creating the superman, because the superman is going to be the very salt of the earth."

... THUS SPAKE ZARATHUSTRA.

Okay, Maneesha?

Yes, Osho.