Each Individual is Unique

 

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Each Individual is Unique

The greatest courage in life is needed when we go inwards. Firstly, it is a flight from the alone to the alone, it is going deeper into one’s aloneness. And humans are caught up in such a way that they become accustomed to company, to people, to family. They absolutely forget the joy of being alone; hence there is a fear of being left alone.

That’s why nations and religions exist – they feed of fear, and not on love. All political discourse in all countries is based on people, crowds – they are dependent on crowds for ensuring their political success. People are afraid of being left alone; they have to be part of some crowd — a political crowd, a social crowd, a religious crowd; any crowd will do, but they are dependent on the crowd. They feel good when they are surrounded by people; they start feeling shaky, scared when they find there is nobody and they are alone. That utter aloneness creates great fear because we are conditioned by the crowd, for the crowd, as part of the crowd. We are not brought up as individuals. We are brought up as small units of a great mechanism called the society, the nation, the church.

Meditation is the only phenomenon where there is no possibility of meeting anybody, where one has to go alone, totally alone. Hence only very courageous people can enter into the world of meditation. That’s why so few people have ever entered, why so few people have ever become enlightened.

When we move inwards, we move without any maps. Even if we go to the moon, we have a certain map, a certain route. There have been people before us, their footprints are there, there are milestones everywhere. Even in the sea we are not totally lost, in the sky we are not totally lost, we can communicate with people, we can give messages — even from the moon! We can remain in some kind of relationship; it may be just through radio waves, but we can remain connected. We can still hear the voices of people; we can still see that others are there; we are connected.

But when we move inwards, the people who have gone inside cannot leave any footprints for anybody. It is impossible, because everybody’s inner territory is so different that no Master’s footprints will help us and if we follow any one Master’s footprints literally, we will never find ourselves.

Jesus’ map won’t help us; we cannot follow it literally. It can help in a very indirect way; it can make us aware of certain things inside, but in a very vague sense. It can give us the confidence that ‘Yes, there is a world inside, no doubt about it, because so many people cannot be lying. Buddha, Jesus, Zarathustra, Lao Tzu, Sai Baba, Krishna, Gyaneshwar, Ramana Maharishi, such beautiful people cannot all be lying. They cannot be in a conspiracy — for what? They never existed together — they lived in different ages, in different countries — yet they all speak almost the same language.

But we cannot follow it exactly because Buddha’s inner territory is different. Each individual is unique, so unique that we have to discover our self all alone; hence great courage is needed. This is the greatest adventure in life, and one who goes on this adventure is blessed.