Realization/meditations

[Tara E Girod]

BELOVED OSHO, RECENTLY YOU SPOKE ABOUT THE WILL TO POWER. YOU EXPLAINED THE IMPORTANCE OF HAVING THIS WILL, THIS LONGING, TO BECOME A MASTER OVER ONE’S SELF. YOU ALSO OFTEN DECLARE THAT EVERY DESIRE IS THE BASIC REASON FOR MAN’S FRUSTRATION. CAN YOU PLEASE EXPLAIN THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WILL AND DESIRE?

Gyan Saahaba, the difference between will and desire is great, although they appear almost similar. Desire is always for things. More money, more prestige, more respectability, more knowledge, more virtue, a better place in the afterlife — these are all desires. Desires can be millions, because there are millions of things in the world which can become objects of desire. A desire always needs an object. Will is not objective; it does not want something else to be added to it. Will is simply your very life force, which wants to assert itself in its totality, in its wholeness, to bring all the flowers that are hidden in you, to be yourself. The will knows only one thing and that is you and your golden future. You, right now, are only seeds. But you can become great trees, reaching to the stars. Vincent van Gogh, one of the most significant Dutch painters, was also thought of just like Nietzsche — a madman. He also had to live in a madhouse, and he was not a harmful man; his paintings were just not according to the ideas of people. Strange… in this world you are not even free to paint something according to your own idea, which is not harming anybody. He had painted his trees so tall that stars were left far behind — they go above the stars. Naturally people used to ask him, “This is sheer madness. Where have you seen these trees going beyond the stars?” And what was always his answer is immensely significant. He used to say, “To me, trees represent the will of the earth. The earth is trying to reach beyond the stars, and you will see one day that the earth has succeeded. It is just the beginning, that’s why you don’t see the trees that high. But I can see far away in the future.” But we cannot even forgive poets, we cannot forgive even visionaries for their harmless visions. But what a beautiful idea — that the earth wants to reach beyond the stars. That defines will. Desire is always for possessions. Will is always for consciousness. Will is a lifeforce; a flame of your very being. It does not want anything else — it simply wants itself to be actualized in its totality. It does not want to remain a seed, it does not want just to remain a dream; it wants to become a reality, it wants to become an actual phenomenon.Gyan Saahaba, I can understand your problem. It may have arisen in many people’s minds, because I have always spoken against desire, and while speaking on Friedrich Nietzsche’s ZARATHUSTRA I supported totally his idea of the will. When on a rosebush flowers blossom, it is the will. They were hidden inside the bush and they were trying to come into manifestation — just as a Gautam Buddha is hidden in you, or a Zarathustra is hidden in you and is trying to come out. You are a seed. Once this idea settles in you, you will find inside the seed a serpent starts uncoiling itself — that is the will. Nietzsche has called it will to power. I myself would like to call it will to realization, will to actualization, will to become absolutely yourself. Desire is a very dangerous thing, because you can get lost in desire and millions are lost. The jungle of desires is very thick, and there is no end; one after another you will find desires and desires and desires. And no desire is fulfilling. Every desire only gives you a new frustration, every desire gives you a new desire. But this whole process of desiring takes your energy away from becoming a will to realization, a will to bring your potentialinto flowering, into its ultimate expression. Desire is going astray from will. My effort here is to pull you back from your desires to one single-pointed will — the will that wants to know yourself, the will that wants to be yourself, the will that wants whatever is hidden in you to become manifest. Mendel saves up for years to buy a really fine tailor-made suit, his very first, but after he has been out in it for an hour or so he notices there are things wrong with it. He goes back to the tailor. “The arms are too long,” says Mendel. “No problem. Just hold your arms out further and bend at the elbows.” “But the trouser legs are too long.” “Right, no problem. Walk with your knees bent.” “The collar is too high; it is halfway up the back of my head.” “Okay. Just poke your head out further.” So Mendel goes out into the world with his first tailor-made suit. As he is passing acouple in the street the woman says, “Look at that poor man, he must have had polio.” The man says, “But what a fine suit he is wearing!” Your desires may give you a fine suit, but they will also make you suffer from polio; everything will be wrong. Your desires will not allow you to be simply yourself, to be exactly your destiny. Will is a longing to achieve one’s destiny.

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