33 Love and the Self
One day a friend who had come to see me at the ashram walked with me on the way. He was a man of longing and fear, caught in a net he had woven himself. We talked together for a while, and then hesitantly he told me his story.
he was a lonely child
like so many others
he hadn’t learned to relate
drugs he had taken
and visions he’d seen
but still something was lacking
later he had married
and though it didn’t last
there must have been some affection
alone he had lived
having few friends
and no place to call his own
he tried to find a home
in this place and that
but still he remained a stranger
he then looked for others
who were of similar mind
whose desire was for destruction
new hating himself
he hated all others
and longed to be free of it all
‘You say that you want to be free of all this, but can you see that every movement is a movement away from the reality, a denial of that reality? But denying it doesn’t make it go away, look at your life and see this for yourself. You think that by being elsewhere you will be free of the problem, but the truth is, many times you have changed your circumstances, but you have not changed. Can you see that you are the author of your own problems? Every time you have been hurt you have turned away from the world, and the more you have withdrawn, the more painful it has become. What, during all this time, if I might ask, were you looking for? You say you were looking for love, but can love be searched for? Or do we look for gratification, the gratification of being told that we are somebody, that our lives are not empty and meaningless? – and that cannot be love. For love to be there must be a revolution inside, a turning away from oneself, and how can that happen if you’ve never got close to yourself in the first place? At the first sign of the emptiness of your life you have sought out distraction, a temporary amusement of consciousness.’
‘The loneliness of a life lived without love is one of the greatest sorrows on earth. For love to be in our lives we must have right relationship, first of all with ourselves, which means we have to be related to our ultimate calling, related to God. It is absurd to seek for God, for truth, because it is all about us; to discover this one doesn’t have to go anywhere, but simply bring the folly of self to an end. If there is no relationship to truth in our lives, then of course they will be empty and meaningless, and we will become full of hatred and violence, so we have to see that it is only when we have found the true inner meaning of life that we can be at one with ourselves. Then we will have a certain confidence about our own value, and we won’t mind being hurt, we can be open to that, and no longer have to flee the pains of life. Being able to talk about these things as you have done this morning is, I would suggest, a step towards being free of the sorrow in itself.’