Unfortunately, society has placed that goal before us as the ideal goal, because a selfless man will be a great asset to the society, and the society is interested only in continuity -- the status quo. So all those values, which we have accepted as values that one should cultivate, are invented by the human mind to keep itself going.
The goal is what is making it possible for you to continue in this way, but you are not getting anywhere. The hope is that one day, through some miracle or through the help of somebody, you will be able to reach the goal. It is the hope that keeps you going, but, actually and factually, you are not getting anywhere. You will realize somewhere along the line that whatever you are doing to reach your goal is not leading you anywhere. Then you will want to try this, that, and the other. But if you try one and you see that it doesn't work, you will see that all the other systems are exactly the same. This has to be very, very clear, you see.
Whatever pursuit you are indulging in, somewhere along the line it has to dawn on you that it is not leading you anywhere. As long as you want something, you will do that. That want has to be very, very clear. What do you want? All the time I ask you the question, "What do you want?" You say, "I want to be at peace with myself." That is an impossible goal for you because everything you are doing to be at peace with yourself is what is destroying the peace that is already there. You have set in motion the movement of thought which is destroying the peace that is there, you see. It is very difficult to understand that all that you are doing is the impediment, is the one thing that is disturbing the harmony, the peace that is already there.
Any movement [of thought], in any direction, on any level, is a very destructive factor for the smooth and peaceful functioning of this living organism which is not at all interested in your spiritual experiences. It has no interest in any one of those spiritual experiences, however extraordinary they may be. When once you have one spiritual experience there is bound to be a demand for more and more of the same, and ultimately you will want to be in that state permanently. There is no such thing as permanent happiness or permanent bliss at all. You think that there is, because all those books talk of eternal bliss, permanent bliss, or permanent happiness. Yet you know jolly well that it [the pursuit] is not leading you anywhere. So, the mechanism that is involved, the instrument that you are using, is the one that keeps you going because it does not know anything else. It has come into being through so many years of hard work, effort and will. Your wanting to be in a state of effortlessness through the use of effort is not going to succeed. So forget about the effortless state -- it doesn't exist at all. You want to achieve an effortless state through effort -- how the hell are you going to achieve that goal? You forget that everything that you are doing, any movement that is there, any want that is there, for whatever reason, is effort.
Effortlessness is something which cannot be achieved through effort. Anything that you do to stop the effort, is itself an effort. It's really a maddening thing. You have not really pushed yourself into that corner. If you do, then you will really go crazy; but you are frightened of that. You have to see that everything that you are doing to be in that effortless state, for whatever reason you want to be there, is effort. Even wanting not to use effort also is effort. The total absence of will and the total absence of effort, all and every kind, may be called an effortless state; but that effortless state is not something that you can achieve through effort.
If you ever understood the meaninglessness of what you are doing -- you can change the techniques, you can change the teachers, but basically and essentially, the very teaching that you are using to reach your goal is the obstacle. It doesn't matter what teacher you follow. If you question the teaching, unfortunately, you have to question the teacher himself -- but then comes the sentiment: "Something is wrong with me, one day I am going to understand." If it is not possible for you to understand today, you are not going to understand at all. So the understanding is the absence of the demand for understanding -- now or tomorrow.
Now, there is no understanding necessary. The understanding is only for the purpose of understanding something tomorrow -- not today. Today you don't have to understand a thing at all.
It may sound funny to you, but that's the way it is. So what do you want to understand? You can't understand me at all. I have been talking for 20 days and I can go on, but you are not going to understand anything at all. It's not that it is difficult. It is so simple. The complex structure that is involved is the very thing that does not accept the simplicity of it. That is really the problem. "It can't be that simple," you think. Because that structure is so complex that it doesn't want even to consider the possibility that it could be so simple. So you are going to understand tomorrow, not today. Tomorrow it is the same story, and then after 10 years it is the same story. So what do you do about this situation? We all have been through that. Either you flip or fly. The chances of flipping are really good if you push yourself into a corner. You are not going to do that.
What do you want to understand? I am not saying anything profound. I have been repeating the same thing day after day, day after day. Basically, it sounds very contradictory to you. What I am doing -- you don't understand what I am doing -- is I make a statement; and the second statement negates the first statement. Sometimes you see contradictions in what I am saying. Actually they are not contradictions. This statement does not express what I am trying to express, so the second statement is negating the first statement. The third statement is negating the first two statements, and the fourth statement is negating the previous three statements. Not with the idea of arriving at any goal. Not with the idea of communicating anything to you. There is nothing to be communicated. Only this series of negations. Not with the idea of arriving at any goal. Your goal is understanding. You want to understand, you see. There is nothing to understand here. Every time you make some sense out of it, I try to point out that is not it. It is not the doctrine of neti-neti.
You know, in India they have evolved this negative approach. But the so-called negative approach is a positive approach, because they are still interested in reaching a goal. They have failed through the positive approaches, so they have invented what is called the negative approach. "Not this, not this, not this." The unknown cannot be reached, you see, nor can it be experienced through the positive approach. The so-called negative approach is not really a negative approach because there is still the positive goal of knowing the unknown, or wanting to experience something -- which cannot be experienced. It's only a trick. That's all it is -- playing with itself. As long as the goal is a positive goal, no matter what the goal is -- whether it is called positive or negative -- it is not a negative approach, it is a positive approach. It's all right to play games, it's interesting, but there is no such thing as "the beyond," no such thing as "the unknown." If you accept that there is such a thing as the unknown, you will do something or the other to know the unknown. Your interest is to know. So this movement is not going to stop as long as it is interested in experiencing something that cannot be experienced.
There is no such thing as the unknown at all. How can I say that there is no such thing as the unknown? How can I make such a dogmatic assertion -- you will find out. As long as you are pursuing the unknown, this movement is in operation. There is something that you can do -- that gives you the hope -- maybe one day you will stumble into this experience of the unknown. How can the unknown ever become the known. Not a chance. Even assuming for a moment that this movement (which is demanding to know the unknown) is not there, what is there you will never know. You have no way of knowing it at all, no way of capturing that and experiencing that or giving expression to it.
So to talk of that bliss, the eternal bliss, love -- all of that is romantic poetry. Because you have no way of capturing that and containing it and giving expression to it. So it may dawn on you that this is not the instrument that can help you to understand anything, and there is no other instrument. Then there is nothing to understand.
I don't want to give a talk. You help me.
You see, if you translate what I am saying in terms of your values, in terms of particular codes of conduct, you are really missing the point. It is not that I am