The second question:

Question 2

I AM ALWAYS FEELING GUILTY AS IF I HAVE COMMITTED GREAT CRIMES. HOW CAN I DROP THIS GUILT? IT IS DESTROYING ME AND ALL THE POSSIBILITIES TO LIVE MY LIFE JOYOUSLY.

THAT'S what I was saying just now. You have been programmed in such a way that you cannot live joyously. All joy has been contaminated, all joy has been poisoned, all joy has been condemned. And you have heard it repeated so many times -- from the priest, from the parent, from the teachers, from everybody -- that it has he come a very very ingrained Idea in you that there is something wrong in being joyous.

Go back, remember your childhood days. Whenever you were happy somebody was bound to come across and say 'What are you doing? Why are you shouting? Why are you dancing? Daddy is reading his newspaper, it will be disturbed.' Daddy and his foolish newspaper, and suddenly your joy is crippled. You wanted to run in the sun and it was not allowed; you were forced to sit in the room in a dark corner. You wanted to climb the trees but that silly homework was there and it had to be done. You wanted to talk to the birds and play with the dogs and the children and you were forced to sit in a prison-like school for six hours, seven hours...

You don't see what you are doing to your children, you don't see what has been done to you. Small children are being forced to become prisoners; their life starts being crippled from there. They are not allowed to move -- and they are bubbling energies. They would like to sing, they would like to burst into songs and dance and they would like to climb trees and mountains and they would like to swim in the rivers and the oceans. But that dance is not allowed, that celebration is not allowed. What is allowed is unnatural and what is not allowed is natural.

We have to find a human kind of education in the world; the education that exists is very inhuman. We have to find ways so that children can play in the sun and still learn a little arithmetic. That can be done -- once we know that arithmetic is not so important as playing in the sun, once that thing has been decided, then we can find ways. A little arithmetic can be taught, and a little is needed. Everybody is not going to become an Albert Einstein. And those who are going to become Albert Einsteins, they won't bother playing in the sun -- their joy is arithmetic, that is their poetry. Then it is different, then it is totally different; then the growth is not hindered and guilt is not created.

I myself was never interested in my childhood in playing any games, but nobody was preventing me. I was more interested in great poetry, I was more interested in great philosophy, I was more interested in religion -- that was my game, that was my play. That is another thing. If somebody enjoys poetry let him enjoy poetry, and if somebody enjoys working in a carpenter's workshop let him enjoy that -- each according to his need.

And there should be no evaluation as to who is high and who is low. The carpenter is not low and the mathematician is not high; the mathematician is enjoying his thing an;l the carpenter is enjoying his thing. If anything has to be said, this is the thing -- that the joyous person is right and the sad person is wrong.

So whatsoever brings joy to your life is virtue. But just the opposite has been taught to you: Whatsoever brings joy to you is a sin, and whatsoever makes you miserable is virtue. The priest depends on it, the church depends on it; all kinds of exploitations are possible. Once a man has been distracted from his being, his joy, then all kinds of exploitations are possible.

You ask: I AM ALWAYS FEELING GUILTY AS IF I HAVE COMMITTED GREAT CRIMES.

You have not committed, nobody has committed great crimes. All crimes are small. Yes, the so-called great crimes are also small; great crimes don't exist. Man cannot do great things -- neither great virtues nor great crimes. All that man can do is small. Man is small and limited. Great things can be done only by God -- you forget about it. All that you can do with your small life is to have a little joy, to have a little light, to have a little laughter.

The priests, the popes, the so-called saints, are all against you. And if you look deep down into their beings you will be surprised: they are the same kind of people as you are. If they are courageous enough to confess you will be surprised: they are as human as you are. Their dreams are as much full of sexual fantasy as your dreams are -- in fact more so, because they are more repressive. Their dreams are absolutely sexual; you may have non-sexual dreams too, but priests cannot have anything else. When you fast, you have to feast in your dreams -- the body wants it.

I have heard:

Two brothers died at the same time and arrived at the Pearly Gates together, where they were interviewed by Saint Peter. He said to the first brother 'Have you been good during your life on earth?'

And he replied 'Oh yes, Your Saintliness. I have been honest, sober and I industrious and I have never messed around with women.'

'Good lad' said Saint Peter and gave him a beautiful gleaming white Rolls Royce. 'There is your reward for being a good boy.' Then he said to the other brother 'And what about you?'

He said 'Well, I have always been very different from my brother. I have been crooked, drunk, idle, and a devil with the women.'

'Oh well' said Saint Peter 'boys will be boys. And at least you have owned up to it. You can have this, then.' And he gave him the keys to a Mini Minor.

The two brothers were about to get in their cars when the one who had been naughty started roaring with laughter. The other one said 'What's so funny, then?'

He said 'I have just seen the vicar riding a bike.'

Your so-called saints ;end priests, they are made of the same clay as you are. And I am not saying that there are not people who have transcended -- there are. But those people are the people who have gone through the world deeply, who have suffer.l all its agonies and who have enjoyed all its pleasures. Those who have been totally in their living -- they transcend. Not through repression but through experience, transcendence comes.

There have been people like Buddha and Christ, Kabir and Krishna -- but these are the people who have not repressed. These are the people who have gone as deeply as possible into life, who have understood all its ways, who have seen all its possibilities. And seeing it, understanding it, becoming aware of it, they have gone beyond it. There comes a tranquility, a stillness, a silence, a purity, an innocence -- but that is not cultivated. Nobody can cultivate innocence. If you cultivate innocence it will not be innocence, it will be something plastic, synthetic. It will be a cultivated innocence; it will not be true, it will not be authentic.

You cannot cultivate saintliness. It comes; it is a fragrance. When you live your life utterly involved, committed, it comes, it certainly comes. One day suddenly you see all has passed -- days and nights, summers and winters, all has passed. You have looked all around, you have seen everything, you have understood all: in that understanding is transcendence. That understanding is transcendence.

Otherwise you can go on repressing. And repression is out of fear, not out of understanding. You are afraid of hell, you are afraid of being punished. You are afraid of greater sufferings, so you avoid pleasure. Here you suffer, and there you will also suffer. One who suffers in this world will suffer in the other too, because the other world arises out of this world. The other world is a continuity with this world -- if you suffer in life you will suffer after death too. In fact you will have become so skillful in suffering that even if you go to heaven you will find some ways and means to suffer. You may stand on your head and do sirshasan there.

Nobody can prevent you from standing on your head, you can do it anywhere. You will find ways and means to torture yourself again. One becomes habituated if it becomes your style of life -- and it becomes so.

My approach is Dionysian, I am a disciple of Dionysius: Live and love life. Enjoy this occasion as deeply as possible, as totally as possible, and out of this living experience you will grow. A maturity will come to you; you will ripen and you will carry the fragrance with you. That fragrance is heaven. Nobody goes to heaven -- those who go to heaven, they have to carry their heaven in their heart. Nobody goes to hell -- those who go to hell, they have to carry their hell in their heart.

I have heard:

A man died -- a very rich man, a very politically powerful man, very cruel, very ambitious. The whole town went to give him the final send-off. People were feeling really happy that the calamity was gone, that this plague was gone -- the procession was big. And when the procession was moving slowly towards the cemetery a truck full of fuel, wood, coal, by accident somehow got in the middle of the procession and started following; it was also moving in the same direction -- it started following the dead man's body.

People started laughing. Somebody said 'This is too much. We know that he is going to hell, but we never knew that you have to carry your fuel too!'

But that's how it happens; you have to carry your fuel too. The hell type is one who lives constantly in misery, in guilt, in the fear of punishment. Whatsoever you fear will happen -- because when you fear, you think about it constantly: you will make it happen.

Love life, don't be afraid. You belong to this universe, this is your home; you are not outsiders here. Relax -- don't feel alien and don't be afraid. Forget that old God of the Old Testament. That God has died -- that God died with the people who wrote the Old Testament; that form of God has disappeared. If you watch, observe, the growth of the Bible you will be surprised. First, the God is very cruel; the God of Abraham and Moses is very cruel. That is man's first glimpse of God -- very crude, primitive. God says 'I am a jealous God, I am very revengeful. If you don't obey me you will suffer in hell.'

A God who is revengeful? God -- and revengeful? That has nothing to do with God. That is the idea of the people who were creating it; that shows something about the people who created it. They must have been revengeful people, they must have been angry aggressive people. That is a primitive concept.

Then, slowly slowly, God is no longer so revengeful. He becomes a just God, the God of justice -- not revengeful but just. And by the time God reaches Jesus He becomes love -- not even just, but loving.

In the Bible, God passes through three stages between the Old and the New Testament. Revengeful, violent, first. Then just. And then love, loving.

In the future, a new vision of God has to penetrate human consciousness: God as non-personal, God as no person. The world is full of godliness, but there is no God. This is the new concept I bring to you: The world is full of godliness, from rocks to the stars, but there is no personal God. There is nobody to punish you -- the idea of punishment is an invention of the priests to exploit you, to make you afraid. Remember, this is the mechanism: if you want to exploit somebody make him afraid. Make him tremble, let fear enter his soul, and he will never be a free man. Once fear enters into your soul you cannot be a free man. Then you are constantly afraid to do that which you want to do but for which there is punishment. And you go on doing that which you never wanted to do, just in order to get some rewards.

I have heard;

Six friends went on a hunting trip. One of them would have to do all the cooking. The appointed cook would stay in the cabin, handle all the chores, and of course be excluded from the day's fun. The arrangement would hold until someone complained about his cooking. Then the complainant would be obliged to become the cook.

There was great excitement when lots were drawn to determine just who would be saddled with the disagreeable task. Joe became the unfortunate one.

For two days, Joe fretted and sweated. On the third day he thought he'd go berserk. The other five were frolicking, shooting and having fun, and he was shut up in the hot stuffy room of the little cabin. Joe decided that a desperate situation demanded a desperate remedy. So he flung a turd into the soup and stirred it till it was dissolved.

That night he served brown onion soup. Sam took a spoonful. As he put it to his lips and tasted the noxious liquid he blurted out 'My God! This tastes like shit!' Then, suddenly realizing what the penalty would be, he added 'Tastes just like shit -- but I like it!'

That's what is happening to you. The fear of hell... So it tastes just like suit but you go on saying 'I like it.'

Be courageous and drop all this nonsense. There is no hell and there is no heaven; you create your heaven and you create your hell. There is nobody anywhere to punish you or reward you. Forget those childish ideas of God -- that if you are good Daddy will come with toys, and if you are bad then you will have to miss your lunch or your dinner and you will be locked into the bathroom or something will happen. There is nobody. You are free.

But I am not saying that you cannot create hell for yourself -- you can. The fundamental has to be understood; whether you want to create heaven or hell, the fundamental is the same.

Love, enjoy, celebrate, and you will be creating heaven -- because whatsoever you are, if you are happy, if you are joyous, you share your happiness and your joy. You can share only that which you are -- and when you share it, it rebounds on you. That is the law. Life reflects and echoes whatsoever you throw at life -- it comes back, a thousandfold it comes back. Smile, and the whole existence smiles at you. Shout and abuse, and the whole existence shouts and abuses you. And you are the root cause; you create the whole process.

It is not that the existence is interested in shouting and abusing you. The existence is neutral; it simply reflects, it is a mirror. You make an ugly face, and you see an ugly face in the mirror. And you smile, and the mirror smiles.

And remember, the rewards and punishments don't come from the outside; you create them. You are the occasion for them, you are the soil. You are free -- but by freedom I don't mean that you are irresponsible. In fact, in freedom you become utterly responsible -- because you are responsible for yourself; nobody else is. No god is responsible for you, you are responsible. If you are miserable, remember, you must be creating it. Find out how. And you will find the reasons -- try to search for the reasons and you will find them. If you are happy, then too, look within for why you are happy. And go on creating those situations more and more: you will become more and more happy.