BENGALURU: Silence is not to be cultivated, it is not to be deliberately brought about; it is not to be sought out, thought of, or meditated upon. The deliberate cultivation of silence is as the enjoyment of some longed-for pleasure; the desire to silence the mind is but the pursuit of sensation. Such silence is only a form of resistance, an isolation which leads to decay. Silence that is bought is a thing of the market in which there is the noise of activity. Silence comes with the absence of desire. Desire is swift, cunning and deep.
Remembrance shuts off the sweep of silence, and a mind that is caught in experience cannot be silent. Time, the movement of yesterday flowing into today and tomorrow, is not silence. With the cessation of this movement there is silence, and only then can that which is unnameable come into being.
‘I have come to talk over karma with you. Of course I have certain opinions about it, but I would like to know yours.’
Opinion is not truth; we must put aside opinions to find truth. There are innumerable opinions, but truth is not of this or of that group. For the understanding of truth, all ideas, conclusions, opinions, must drop away as the withered leaves fall from a tree. Truth is not to be found in books, in knowledge, in experience. If you are seeking opinions, you will find none here.
‘But we can talk about karma and try to understand its significance, can we not?’
That, of course, is quite a different matter. To understand,opinions and conclusions must cease.
‘Why do you insist upon that?’
Can you understand anything if you have already made up your mind about it, or if you repeat the conclusions of another? To find the truth of this matter, must we not come to it afresh, with a mind that is not clouded by prejudice? Which is more important, to be free from conclusions, prejudices, or to speculate about some abstraction? Is it not more important to find the truth than to squabble about what truth is? An opinion as to what truth is, is not truth. Is it not important to discover the truth concerning karma? To see the false as the false is to begin to understand it, is it not? How can we see either the true or the false if our minds are entrenched in tradition, in words and explanations? If the mind is tethered to a belief, how can it go far? To journey far, the mind must be free.
Freedom is not something to be gained at the end of long endeavour, it must be at the very beginning of the journey.
Desire is swift, cunning and deep. Remembrance shuts off the sweep of silence and a mind that is caught in experience cannot be silent