Compassion
Living in the Present, Resistance, Concentration, Compassion and Pity
A. Living in the Present
The Present is not an object of thought. To live in the Present, first of all you must know what is really ‘Present’. You know what is meant by Present? What really is ‘Presence’? Living in the Present means living in the Truth, because only Truth is Present, everything else is just fascination. Living in the Present does not mean that you must do everything that you want, this moment itself. Living in the present means, ‘living in that which alone is present.’
Living in the Present means that my mind is seated at its Centre, the Truth, i.e. Present. It has nothing to do with time. Living in the Present, you have all the freedom to think of the past and future. You can do that. Living in the Present does not mean that you have lost the capacity to think of the future; you can do that. Why not?
“I can think of the future, but I will not leave my seat.” My seat is in that which is present. My seat is in the Truth, not in some kind of hallucination.
You know what is suffering?
Suffering is displacement from the Present, as simple as that. The more the displacement, the deeper the suffering. If there can be a meter to measure suffering, you will see that as you go more and more away, the suffering meter reading keeps increasing.
How do I know whether I am living in the Present?
Anytime you leave the Present, suffering meter moves. Simple!
Restless, bored, not in the present. Conflict, confusion, not in the present.
Being in the Present has nothing to do with so-called enjoying this moment. Avoid this phrase, “Enjoying this moment.”
It is an immersion into the depth of Truth; that is- ‘Being in the Present’.
B. Resistance
Let nobody say that desire conspires against him – desire or restlessness, they are the same thing. Let nobody say that he is restless. You have to say that you choose to be restless. And then you must answer, “Why do you choose?” I have no solutions to offer. You must tell that why do you invite restlessness. You invite restlessness because you have a false belief that restlessness can take you somewhere, and all those things that you have been fed on since childhood. You have been raised on those things. Nobody just becomes restless out of nothing. All this is concocted restlessness.
Try this. You do not call restlessness, do not send it invitations. Your restlessness will feel uninvited. Its power will subside. But you side with your restlessness. You decide that you want it to stay. Similarly, you often say, “I have a lot of resistance.”
“You know Sir, I listen to this, and I am so devoted to listening to what you are saying, but there arises an inner resistance.” Resistance doesn’t arise, you call the resistance; you want the resistance. You have some selfish stake in resisting me. Resistance is nothing, resistance is false. Restlessness is false, desire is false. And what does it mean for something to be false? That it is actually nothing. That is what falseness means. So, desire, or illusion, or resistance, they are anyway nothing. How can something which is ‘nothing’, attack you on its own? The thing itself is so powerless and helpless, it has no life. How can it invade your mind?
It does not invade your mind, your mind beckons it. You call for it – “Come, come, come, resistance come!”
C. Concentration
When you will meet something that deserves all your immersion, then you will not be left to ask this question. So, till the time you are not meeting that, it is good that you are not hitching up with the wrong kind of things. Is it not?
It is good that you are unable to concentrate. Far worse is the situation of those who are able to concentrate. And see what kind of things people are able to occupy themselves with. Somebody is staring at a computer screen, concentrating terribly hard on the movement of the share prices - he is so concentrated! Somebody is watching pornography. Look at the way his eyes have become glued to the screen - so deeply concentrated! Somebody is going through his bank statement and nothing else matters in this moment.
Do you want to concentrate? Really? On these things? And there are only these kinds of things. What else is there? If you are a student, then you will probably talk of books and such things. But, what else is the knowledge contained in those books? Get That! Get that 'right' thing - which we are calling as a 'thing' for want of a better word. Maybe, it is so attractive, so enamouring that you will be helpless in front of it, that you will be unable to prevent yourself from concentrating, that even concentration will become a meek word. When you are with the Lover, do you need to concentrate? Then you don’t have to concentrate. Then everything is just alright. Whatever you do, you do with a certain rhythm. Everything feels like falling in its proper place, automatically, effortlessly. Don’t force yourself to concentrate. If you can’t concentrate, just know that this is not That.
D. Compassion and Pity
You are acting like a fool right now but you are the Supreme Intelligence itself. You have dressed up like a witch right now but you are the most beautiful being possible. So what do I do? What do I do? I take off all your make up and this is compassion.
What would be pity? Oh! Too bad that this has happened to you. You are so ugly! You are so ugly!
You see this? Pity tells you – please tolerate it. Compassion tells you – why are you tolerating it? You are not this! That’s it. Compassion does not mean that you start crying in front of a crying person.
Compassion means you are such, that there is no need of tears in front of you. Even the crying man stops crying in front of you. All crying is ignorance.
The moment the crying man comes in front of you he realizes that there is no need to cry. That is compassion. Compassion does not mean that he is hurt and sad and I will feel equally hurt and sad. This is not compassion.
It has been a tradition in India that when you donate, you bow down to the one you are donating to, because he has done you a favour by accepting your donation. Being what we are, it is hardly possible for us to do anything for others. Kindly get over this notion that we live for others. That is the privilege granted only to a Buddha. Only in a state of inner fulfilment can one really do something for others.
So the opposite of cruelty is not compassion. The opposite of cruelty is often either attachment or possessiveness or taking care of those who are related to you by way of self-interest. So that's the domain of duality. So yes, it is true that the mind wanders about in duality and then there is hope and there is hopelessness and then there is friendship and then there is enmity. So all these are aspects of duality but compassion does not sit anywhere in the dualistic framework.
No wise man will ever take your problem seriously, believe me. For the wise one, all your problems are bad jokes—not even worthy of a sound laughter. But then he says, "You know, I can see through. You cannot. So, I'll give up my right to laugh at you. I'll instead pretend to be serious." "Yes, yes, yes, of course! We have a problem!" He says, "You know, there was a time I was so much like you. These same things were big issues even to me. But I know they can be outgrown.
