Creativity And Meditation
I would like my sannyasins to live life in its totality, but
with an absolute condition, categorical condition: and that
condition is awareness, meditation. Go first deep into meditation,
so you can cleanse your unconscious of all poisonous seeds, so there
is nothing to be corrupted and there is nothing inside you which
power can bring forth. And then do whatsoever you feel like doing.
If you want to become a painter, become a painter. Your painting
will have a difference; it won't be like Picasso. Picasso's
paintings are insane - he IS insane! In fact, if he had been
prevented from painting he would have been in a madhouse. Through
his paintings he is catharting, throwing out his insanity onto the
canvas, getting rid of it. Yes, he feels better - it is a kind of
vomiting! After vomiting you feel better, but what about others who
look at your vomit! But the world is so stupid that if Picasso
vomits, people say, "What a great painting - something never seen
before, something unique!"
Vincent van Gogh really went insane, had to be hospitalized for one
year, and then he committed suicide. And he was not more than
thirty-seven. Now, what kind of paintings had this man been doing?
Certainly he had the art, the skill, but the art and the skill were
in the hands of a madman, suicidal. Watching his paintings you will
feel restless, uneasy. Keep a Picasso painting in your bedroom and
you will have nightmares!
A meditator can become a painter, but then something totally
different will come out of him - something of the beyond, because
he will be capable to receive God. He can become a dancer; his dance
will have a new quality to it: it will allow the divine to be
expressed. He can become a musician... or he can go into political
action, but his political action will be rooted in meditation. Hence
there will be no fear of a Joseph Stalin or Adolf Hitler or Mao
Zedong coming out of it; that is impossible.
I don't tell anybody to go in a certain direction; I leave my
disciples totally free. I simply teach them meditation. I teach them
being more alert, more aware, and then it is up to them. Whatsoever
their natural potential is they will find it, but it is going to be
with awareness. Then there is no danger.