Don't be too much concerned about money, because that is the greatest distraction against happiness. And the irony of ironies is that people think they will be happy when they have money. Money has nothing to do with happiness. If you are happy and you have money, you can use it for happiness. If you are unhappy and you have money, you will use that money for more unhappiness. Because money is simply a neutral force.
When you are in relationship with people, in a thousand and one ways you are provoked, challenged, seduced. Again and again you come to know your pitfalls, your limitations, your anger, your lust, your possessiveness, your jealousy, your sadness, your happiness all moods come and go, you are constantly in a turmoil. But this is the only way to know who you are.
Only disciplined people become free, but their discipline is not obedience to others: their discipline is obedience to their own inner voice. And they are ready to risk anything for it.
The word `ecstasy` is beautiful; it simply means `standing out.` Out of what? Standing out of your ego, your personality, your mind; getting out of the whole structure in which you have lived - not only lived but with which you have become identified. Standing out of all this, just a pure witness, a watcher on the hills - and everything is left deep down in the valley.
Being is so significant that it is irreplaceable. You are just yourself. Do something that comes out of you - not to assert, but to express! Sing your song, dance your dance, rejoice in being whatever nature has chosen you to be.
I love this world because it is imperfect. It is imperfect, and that's why it is growing; if it was perfect it would have been dead. Growth is possible only if there is imperfection. I would like you to remember again and again, I am imperfect, the whole universe is imperfect, and to love this imperfection, to rejoice in this imperfection is my whole message.
Freedom means the capability to say yes when yes is needed, to say no when no is needed, and sometimes to keep quiet when nothing is needed - to be silent, not to say anything. When all these dimensions are available, there is freedom.
A totally different attitude is needed: the attitude of love. Christ brings love to the world. He destroys law, the very basis of it. That was his crime; that's why he was crucified - because he was destroying the whole basis of this criminal society; he was destroying the whole foundation rock of this criminal world, the world of wars, and violence, and aggression. He gave a totally new foundation stone.
Man is afraid, the world is a strange world, and man wants to be secure, safe. In childhood the father protects, the mother protects. But there are many people, millions of them, who never grow beyond their childhoods. They remain stuck somewhere, and they still need a father and a mother. Hence God is called the Father or the Mother. They need a divine Father to protect them; they are not mature enough to be on their own. They need some security.
Never imitate. The mind is an imitator, because imitation is very easy. To be someone is very difficult. To become someone is very easy - all that you need is to be a hypocrite, which is not much of a problem. Deep down you remain the same, but on the surface you go on painting yourself according to some image.
This mind goes on continuing. This mind will go on continuing, unless you become aware. And this is a miracle: that the moment you become aware the continuity is broken. Now you will be, but not of the past. Now you will be of the moment - fresh, young, new. Now each moment you will die, and you will be reborn.
If you are angry you will share anger, if you are greedy you will share greed, if you are full of lust you will share your lust. We can share only that which we have, we cannot share that which we don't have. This has to be the fundamental thing to be remembered; hence the first step is meditation and the second step is compassion.
The ultimate meditation is: surrender to reality.
The more you fight, the more you are in conflict with it, the more you will be a loser.
In deep surrender, the ego disappears.
And when the ego is not there, for the first time you become aware of that which has always been there.