Nothing-ness: a State of Everything-ness
Physics has reached the same point that metaphysics had reached
before it - nothingness. And it seems that nothingness is not
absolutely nothing; on the contrary, we can now understand that
nothingness is a state of 'everythingness', non-being is a state of
being - unmanifest and manifest. When a thing becomes manifest, then
it is matter, when it becomes unmanifest it is space. When something
becomes manifest, it is the ego, and when something becomes
unmanifest it is non-being, Anatta.
Matter is clusters of atoms and ego is clusters of thoughts. If you
go deep into matter, matter disappears, if you go deep into
thoughts, ego disappears. Then who moves? Nobody, but the movement
is there. From one life to another the movement is there, but nobody
is there as the mover, just a cluster of thoughts.
Have you ever watched a man dying? You must have. Next time you hear
that somebody is dying or somebody is dead, go there immediately and
sit, and just try to feel what is happening. If you watch the man
dying you will feel many things happening in you because the dying
man releases all his thoughts. Now this house is no longer safe; the
thoughts start leaving as if the nest is no longer safe, the birds
are on the wing.
This house is no longer useful, it is dangerous to be in it, it
can collapse, any moment it is going to collapse, so everybody is
leaving. All thoughts are on the wing. If a good man is dying,
sitting nearby him you will feel a sudden awakening of goodness
within you; if a bad man is dying, you will feel suddenly an
awakening of badness in you. If a very evil man is dying, you will
feel that you are becoming evil; if a saint is dying, suddenly you
feel an innocence arising in you that you have never known before.
The dead man will create the whole atmosphere around you - his
thoughts are moving; a cluster of thoughts are moving, like a
cluster of birds. Soon they will descend into another womb -
somewhere a couple will be making love. All over the world, every
single moment, millions of people are making love. They are the
opportunities for this cluster of thoughts to enter a womb, to get a
new house. If you have understood before your death that thoughts
are separate, that they have infinite spaces within them, intervals;
if while you were alive the ego has been dissolved, and you have
come to know that there is no ego, nothing like 'me' inside; then
you will die without the desire to be born again because you know it
is futile. All desires disappear when you know that there is no ego.
You don't desire, you simply die. Without the gluing force of
desire, thoughts are released, but they can't make a cluster.
The gluing force is desire, it glues every thought to another and
makes a whole of them. If desire is not there thoughts will
disappear, they will move into the infinite sky but not as a
cluster, as separate atoms, and you have disappeared completely.
This disappearance is Nirvana; but one has to know it before death.
One has to die before death. The whole art of religion is how to die
- but then how to live is implied because you can die rightly only
if you have lived rightly. When I say rightly, I don't mean a good
life, When I say rightly, I mean a meditative life. When I say a
right life, I don't mean a moral life, I mean a very, very
understanding life, aware, alert.