Question - I feel stuffed with my Stinginess -
And still I hoard, Why?
Osho - The question is from Amida. You must
be feeling empty. And you are not yet courageous
enough to accept that emptiness. Hence one goes on
stuffing in many ways. People stuff with food,
people stuff with knowledge, and people stuff with
many things: money, power.... Deep inside, everybody
is empty. And that emptiness is divine, that
emptiness is God. Buddha calls it SUNYATA --
nothingness. And sooner or later one has to come to
terms with that inner emptiness.There are only two types of people, the worldly and
the other-worldly. The worldly is one who goes on
stuffing the emptiness. And the other-worldly is one
who comes to see the point that there is no way to
stuff it. It remains empty. So why not face it? Why
not BE it? Why not accept it? In that very
acceptance, the revolution. The radical
transformation. The metamorphosis.
And that is the whole art of meditation. But people
ARE afraid -- the emptiness looks like death. So
what I should suggest to Amida, I will suggest:
Stuff a little more. Hoard a little more. Go on
stuffing. So that you can see the foolishness of it.
It seems you have not yet been able to see that the
emptiness is eternal and cannot be stuffed by
anything. Go on in this nightmare a little more,
make it more nightmarish. People change only from
the extreme.
It seems Amida has been doing the thing moderately.
Only lukewarm. The jump comes only from the
hundred-degree point. Go on stuffing as much as you
can. Put your whole energy into stuffing. In that
very stuffing, a moment comes when you see clearly
that the emptiness is eternal, that the emptiness is
your very nature, that there is no way to stuff it.
You can forget it for a moment by stuffing, but it
remains there and asserts itself again and again.
Seeing that, stuffing stops -- not that you stop it.
Seeing that, stuffing stops. And suddenly the
benediction of emptiness spreads all over you. To be
empty is to be divine. To be empty is to have come
home. But do a little more.
I have heard a beautiful story:
A man came to see his Rabbi, to ask his advice. He
said 'Oh Rabbi, my life is so miserable. I have a
small house, just one room, and it is much too
crowded. There are my wife and myself, our twelve
children, her old parents and mine, my deaf uncle
and my crippled sister. I cannot pay for a bigger
house -- what to do?'
The Rabbi thought for a while and said 'Do you have
any animals?'
'Yes' said the man. 'There are five goats, three
cows, ten chickens, two cats, two horses and a dog.'
Said the Rabbi: 'Bring them all into your house and
let them live there for a week.'
The man was very puzzled, but since he respected his
Rabbi very much he went and did as he was told. Life
became nightmare. He had to sleep while standing, it
was so crowded. And it was so impossible to breathe,
it was stinking. He ran to the Rabbi after a week,
completely crazy, and the Rabbi said 'I see that you
have done what I told you. Very good. Now go home
and take all the animals out. You will be surprised
to see how much space is there now!'
Amida, do that.
Source - Osho Book "This very Body The Buddha"
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