Self-Centred Love

It is self-Centred love. I am centred in myself. I am not worried about anyone else. I am not worried or affected whether someone loves me or not, respects me or not. I remain myself.
How does seriousness arise? Seriousness comes when we become worried about what others think about us. We become anxious when we want to build an image of ourselves for others. Shall we be able to create that image or not. What will others think of me? Will they start making fun of me? Anxiety starts from there. Seriousness begins to take a grip on us.

Active Love
The moment our love becomes active, we start expecting that the other should also love us back. The other will love us back on certain conditions. It will be conditional love. He will say that he will respect us only if we behave in a certain way. And if we want his love and respect, we have to do all those things that he expects of us. Since we start behaving according to the other person, we do not remain true to our own nature.
I have never cared whether someone respects me or not. I am living in my own freedom and relaxed self. That’s why I am able to live my childlike self even though I am growing old.
All you have to do is not to behave according to others. The child in you is still present there and wants to express itself desperately. But you are not expressing yourself. You are wearing armour. You seek the approval of others for your behaviour, so you act according to them.
Remember that the others are too many. You will never be able to satisfy all of them. Each one will have different kind of expectation from you. How will you satisfy them, whom all will you satisfy? You will become fragmented inside if you do so.

One will want something out of you and the other something else and third person yet another thing. How will you satisfy all of them at one time? It’s impossible. You will become fragmented inside. You will become pretentious. How will you manage showing one face to one and another to someone else?

One day Nassruddin was going to the market with his wife. A beautiful girl going past them smiled. Nassruddin’s wife shouted -‘who is this woman? And why did she smile at you?’ Nassruddin said ‘you try to understand my position. She will ask me who you were. She does not know anything about you.’

Be Integrated
You will become divided if you expect love from too many people. You will be in trouble. You will have as many divisions as you will have the people you are in love with. You will not be able to become integrated. You will have to become pretentious. Integrated and pretentious are opposite to each other. A pretentious person can never become integrated. He is not the same in front of people as he is inside himself. He shows his different face to different people. He becomes like a dog waging his tail in front of his boss and roars like a lion before his subordinates. He is like a mouse in front of his wife but starts roaring in front of the servant.

You will have as many faces as the people you are connected with. Everyone is connected to at least twenty or twenty five people in life. You will have to wear many masks. Your natural self, simplicity, innocence and integrity will be destroyed. You will not remain authentic. If you try to please others you cannot remain honest. And even if you become pretentious, you will not be able to please them. This is interesting. You are living under an illusion that people are happy with you. They are not. Nassruddin is in trouble. Neither the wife who was with him nor the other woman who smiled at him is happy with him. He must be thinking that he will make both of them happy by saying something to one and another thing to the other.

Lies lead to a number of complications. The moment you get into active love you become the slave of the other. Then the other will control you. If you don’t act according to the other, he will withdraw his love.

Only that person can live, as he is, who is not dependent on the other; who is happy with his natural self, whether someone loves him or not.

I was at Yamunanagar recently. Some newspaper reporters came to me there and asked: ‘Did you read the news report that we printed in yesterday’s paper about you?’ I said: ‘Sorry, but I have not read the paper for the past thirty years.’ They were surprised that I did not even read the news about myself. I said: ‘It does not matter to me what you print about me’. And then they asked: ‘Then why do you give press conferences?’ I said: ‘ I enjoy talking. I spoke whatever I liked. Now it’s your freedom what you report on it. Neither do I watch television nor do I read newspaper.’ They asked me if I knew the name of the President of India. And I said: No, neither do I need to. Why should I know his name? And does he know my name?’

If you desire love from the other, you will have to act according to him. And the others are too many. It was all right if there was only one. If there was only one husband or wife it was still all right. We would have been slave to only that one.

I have heard that Nassruddin went for stealing in a house at 2 AM. He could not steal anything but he was caught at 7 AM by the owner of the house and beaten up. The case of theft was filed in the court. The magistrate asked Nasruddin:

“You went to steal in that house at 2 and were there until 7 and you could not steal a thing as the owner of the house says. So what were you doing for so long?” Nassruddun replied: “My lord, there was such an interesting scene in that house. The owner had two wives, each on either floor of the house. Each one was pulling him towards her. And he was getting beaten up in the process. His clothes were getting torn. All this was so interesting that I forgot I had come to steal there. Before I could realise this, it was already morning and I was caught by the owner.” The magistrate said: “ Although you did not steal anything, yet you did go with the intention to steal. So you will be given some punishment.” Nassruddin said, “Yes, I agree I went with the intention to steal but I would like to make a humble request to you. You give me any punishment except asking me to marry two women. If you give me death punishment I will accept it. That will be better than what I saw in that house last night. I would rather accept life imprisonment to that.”

We want to please too many people. And in that process lose our natural self, our integrity, and our authenticity. If you want to save your child like self you must take care that you should be the centre of your love. You love yourself and be AAPTAKAAM. Don’t depend on others for your happiness. Be happy inyour own self. You be at the receiving end of love and then take a step further. Remember the three things I told you –love focussed outside, love with you at the centre, and unfocussed love. It should be pure love, neither focused on any one, nor coming from anywhere. The one who knows this kind of love, only he can become non-serious. This is because he can be himself and live his childlike self

I was conducting an orchestra until some years back. I used to notice something over there that those who were very good singers, who used to be very good during rehearsals, used to start trembling in front of the microphone. Their voice used to choke and they could not sing a word. They were called back then and some other singers used to be sent in their place. Audience were told that that was a joke. It had to be laughed off as a joke.

I used to wonder what happened to these people who were otherwise good singers but the moment they came on stage and had to face 5000 people, would start trembling. From where did this nervousness come? It came from the thought what people might think of them, whether they would be able to sing well or not whether people would clap or hoot at their singing. And this leads to nervousness, rising of the heartbeat and blood pressure and sweating in a person.

There will be a lot of trouble if you expect others to love you. Their love will cost you dearly. Then you will tremble and definitely your blood pressure will go high. Then people will make you sweat. You remain centred in yourself. What difference it makes if there are one thousand, five thousand or ten thousand people in front of you. You sing the way you sing. If someone likes it he will clap, if he does not he will hoot. If someone feels like throwing stones, he will do so. How are you affected? Why do you expect you should have a good image?

The moment you get involved in image making, the complications of active love will start arising. Then there will be sadness and seriousness. So save your childlike self, move from the love flowing outwards to the love flowing inwards- self centred and ultimately to move towards ONLY LOVE- Love flowing neither outwards nor inwards-ONLY LOVE