In the buddhist scriptures they mention the name of a very great enlightened person, Arya Asangar.
He's one of the greatest buddhist masters after Buddha.
For three years he meditated in a himalayan cave.
He devoted his whole energy to becoming aware. For three years, day in, day out, he did nothing else; just every effort that he could make to be aware.
He became aware but something deep down remained unsatisfied. It was very difficult to feel from where this discontent was coming, because he was absolutely silent, still, alert, but something was frozen. Warmth was not there, it was not cosy. It was alien, as if one was lost in a desert.
After three years he left the cave and wanted to go back to the world. The whole effort towards meditation seemed futile, fruitless. Outside the cave he was waiting to move, deciding whether to go or not and what to do. He saw a small bird bringing straw and leaves to make a nest.
The leaves and the straw kept falling down and there was no possibility to build a nest in that place; it would not hold the nest. But the bird was continuously going away and bringing more leaves, putting them there, and they would fall down. It was almost impossible but the bird was happy and enthusiastically he would go and bring more leaves again. Watching that bird, Arya thought,
'Three years is not enough; may be a little more effort. And if this bird is hopeful, why not me? And the mind has millions of lives' conditioning,
so three years cannot be too much!' He went back into the cave and for three years again meditated. He tried even harder than before... became even more silent, became full of light, but the warmth was missing. This happened again and again.
After three years he would decide to leaveand then something would happen outside the cave again and he would comeback.
After twelve years he decided that this was foolish. 'I go outside and some bird or squirrel or sparrow or something gives me a new hope and then I come back again.
This time I am not going to look at all. I will simply run back to the world.' So he ran, not looking around him, and arrived on the plains outside his village where he rested.
He saw there a dog almost dying. It had many wounds on its back and there were maggots, and he felt much compassion for that dog.
For twelve years there had been nosituation in which he had felt any warmth for anybody. There was nobody; he was, and his cave was, cold... a himalayan coldness.
He washed the dog's wounds and tried to help it, and suddenly all that he was missing was there.
He looked inside and Buddha was standing there.
He said to Buddha, 'Master, where have you been for twelve years?
When I was really working hard, meditating continuously day in, day out, year in, year out, for twelve years, where have you been? And why are you suddenly here now?'
Buddha said to him, 'I have always been there, but you can see only when you melt in love.'
Meditation is good but not enough --compassion, love. Said Buddha to him,
'I have always been here with you just waiting, but you wouldn't look' -- because this vision of deep fulfillment ispossible only when there is compassion and love flowing.
So remember that. Meditate, but never get frozen. Be alert, but never get cold. Meditate, but continuously remember that the fulfillment is love -- that love is going to be the criterion of all meditation, that love is going to be the flowering.
By
Osho
