Inspirational Essays & Lists (Words to Live By)

Flow Unconsciously

Flow Unconsciously

A man sitting opposite Buddha was wriggling his big toe. Buddha said, "Brother, why does your big toe wriggle so?"

The man stopped immediately. He was surprised. "I myself do not know," he replied. "Now that you have asked I too am troubled over it, for it was not moving consciously."

"Such is your whole life." said the Buddha.

What have you ever done consciously in the course of your whole life? Have you ever been consciously angry? Have you loved consciously? Have you ever consciously been greedy or obsessed? What have you done consciously? Your life is such – merely twiddling your thumbs unconsciously. You set up a house, raised a family; you gave birth to your children. Did you do anything consciously? Everything has happened to you; you were merely involved in it mechanically. What did you do consciously in your life? Was there any action you did consciously? No! You can't find even one act that you did consciously. Did you fall in love? Love happened, you did not fall in love. If you quarreled, quarrels just happened mechanically; you did not quarrel. You see a person and you decide immediately whether he is good or bad, but in your full awareness, who is good, who is bad?

Whatever you have become is accidental. You have not gone about it in full awareness. Things happen around you and you flow unconsciously with them. You float like a wisp of straw in a river; you go wherever the current takes you. The straw thinks that it is traveling, and so you think you are doing something. How can you be the doer when you are totally unaware?

Knowledge becomes indestructible only when the seed of meditation breaks and gives way to the eternal spring of consciousness. Then even when you sleep, you are not asleep. You are never asleep; you are fully conscious inside. Then when you make love you do so in full consciousness. When you eat, drink, walk or talk, you are completely aware. Then your whole life becomes an expanding consciousness. This is what we call Buddhahood, and it means the state in which a man lives who is in full consciousness.

OSHO