Astrall
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I feel as if I'm in a trap. The disappointment of boredom only intensifies when I think that all that is within my power is but a meaningless fever. What exactly is boredom?
Boredom is one of the most important things in human life. Only humans are capable of boredom; no other animal can experience boredom. Boredom exists only when the mind begins to come closer and closer to enlightenment. Boredom is merely the polar opposite of enlightenment. Animals cannot become enlightened, and therefore they cannot experience boredom either.
Boredom simply shows that you are beginning to realize the futility of life, its constantly repeating wheel. You have done all these things before — nothing comes of it. You have already embarked on all these journeys — they led nowhere. Boredom is the first indicator that a great understanding of the futility, the meaninglessness of life and its ways is arising in you.
You can respond to boredom in two ways. The first is what ordinary people do — run away from it, not look it in the eye, not confront it. Keep away from it, flee; avoid it by occupying yourself with things that can distract you, that can become obsessions; that take you so far from the realities of life that you never again see that boredom arises.
That is why people invented alcohol, drugs. They are ways of escaping boredom. But running is not so easy; you can only run for a while. Again and again boredom will return, and each time its voice will grow louder and louder. You can run into sex, into overeating, into music — into a thousand and one kinds of things. But again and again boredom will arise. It is not something to be avoided; it is part of human growth. It must be faced head-on.
The other response is to face it, to meditate on it, to be with it, to be it. This is what Buddha did under the bodhi tree, this is what all Zen people have done for centuries.
What exactly is meditation? Facing boredom. What does the meditator continuously do? Sitting in silence, staring at his navel or watching his breath... — do you think these things entertain him? He is unimaginably bored! That is why the Zen master walks with a stick in his hand — because these people will inevitably fall asleep. There are no other outcomes, and only one remains: at least they can sleep. They cannot run away. They have voluntarily taken on Zen training and discipline — they cannot run. But one way of escape is always available: you can fall asleep, and then you forget everything. That is why everyone wants to sleep in meditation.
Herein lies the entire effort of meditation: to plunge into boredom, but not to run from it; and to remain alert, because if you fall asleep, you have run away. Stay alert! Observe it, witness it. If boredom is there, then it is there. You must look into it — to its very core.
If you continue to look deep into boredom, without trying to escape, one day an explosion comes. One day, suddenly, looking deeply into boredom, you penetrate your own nothingness. Boredom was merely a covering, a container holding your inner nothingness. If you run from boredom, you run from your own nothingness. If you do not run from boredom, if you begin to live with it, begin to accept it, welcome it… This is the whole of meditation: to welcome boredom, to enter into it of your own free will; not to wait for it to come, but to go in search of it.
Sitting for hours in a yoga posture, simply watching your breath, one arrives at utter boredom. And the whole training of meditation is such that it helps boredom along. In a Zen monastery, you must get up in the morning at the same time every day — every day, year after year. It doesn't matter if it's summer or winter. You must get up early, at three o'clock, and take a bath. You must drink tea and sit... The same postures follow again and again. And the whole day is also filled with an established routine: you eat breakfast at a certain time, then meditate again, then eat again at a certain time — and the food is always the same! Everything helps boredom.
The same clothes, the same monastery, and the same master walks around with his stick every day. Every evening you come to the master's session. And the questions given for meditation are so boring: "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" Just think about it — it would drive you crazy! What is the sound of one hand clapping? There is no answer, and you know it; everyone knows there is no answer. And the master keeps insisting, "Keep repeating it, keep meditating on it."
And everything is well organized. Boredom must be created — immense, unimaginable. And this boredom must be allowed as totally as possible, helped along, supported in every way. The same evening, the same work, the same chanting of the mantra. At the same time you fall asleep again... and it continues endlessly, like a wheel. After a few days, you arrive at utter boredom, and you cannot run from it. There is no way to escape. You cannot go to the cinema, you cannot watch television; you cannot get anything that might help you avoid it. You are thrown back into it again and again.
To face it requires immense courage. It is almost like death; in fact, it is much harder than death, because death comes when you lose consciousness. But here you are stirring up all possible kinds of boredom. What happens? This is the secret of all meditations: if you keep observing, observing, observing, boredom becomes greater and greater, more and more intense, and then — the culmination. Nothing can last forever — a moment comes when the wheel turns. If you can go to this very extreme, to the very culmination, then a change occurs, a transformation — enlightenment, satori, or call it whatever you like. One day comes when suddenly the boredom is too much. It is choking you, it is almost killing you. You are surrounded by an ocean of boredom. It floods you, and there seems to be no way to escape it. This very intensity and totality... — and the wheel turns. Suddenly boredom disappears, and satori, samadhi, arrives. You have entered your nothingness.
Now there will be no more boredom. You have seen the very nature of the nothingness of life. You have disappeared — who is there to be bored? What could cause it? You no longer exist. You are annihilated.
You ask: "What exactly is boredom?" A great spiritual phenomenon. That is why buffaloes do not experience boredom; they look perfectly happy and joyful. Only humans experience boredom. And even among humans — only those who are very talented and intelligent. Stupid people do not experience boredom. They are quite content with their work, earning money, building a bank account, content with raising children, reproducing, eating, sitting in a cinema, going to restaurants, participating in this or that. They enjoy themselves! They do not experience boredom. This is the lowest type of human development; they essentially belong to the world of buffaloes. They are not yet human beings.
A human becomes human when he begins to experience boredom. You can see it: the most intelligent child will also be the most bored — because nothing holds his interest for long. Sooner or later he comes up against this fact and asks: "And now what? What next? This is finished. I have seen this toy, I have looked into it, I have opened it, I have analyzed it, now it's done — what next?" By the time he becomes a young man, he is already bored.
Buddha experienced unimaginable boredom. He left his kingdom when he was only twenty-nine, at the peak of his youth. He was incredibly bored — women, wine, wealth, the kingdom, everything bored him. He saw everything, and saw it clearly and through and through. He was bored. He renounced the world not because the world was wrong, remember. Tradition says he renounced the world because the world was bad — this is absolute nonsense. He renounced the world because he was bored with it.
It is not bad, nor is it good. If you are intelligent, it is boring. If you are stupid, you can go on. Then the merry-go-round spins; you move from one sensation to another. You are interested in trivialities, and you keep repeating yourself, and you are not conscious enough to see this repetition — you cannot see that you already did it yesterday, and today as well, and you intend to do the same tomorrow. You must be truly intelligent. How can intelligence avoid boredom? It is impossible. Intelligence means: seeing things as they are…
Buddha left the world out of boredom; having arrived at ultimate boredom, he fled the world. And what did he do all those six years, sitting in all those forests? He arrived at greater and greater boredom. What else can one do sitting under a tree? — watching the breath, staring at one's navel, day after day, year after year... He created boredom and brought it to its very culmination, and one day it disappeared. It disappears on its own.
If you reach this culmination... the Turn comes. It comes! And with this turning point, light enters your being — you disappear, only light remains. And with light comes bliss. You are full of Joy — although you are not there, you are full of joy, utterly causeless joy. Joy simply sparkles and bubbles in your being.
An ordinary person experiences joy for some reason — he falls in love with a new woman or a new man, and he or she is joyful. Their joy is fleeting. Tomorrow they will be bored with this woman or man, and they will start looking for others. An ordinary person rejoices because he has a new car; tomorrow he will have to look for a new car. And so it continues endlessly... and he never sees the essence of it: that in the end he always gets bored. Do whatever you like — in the end you will get bored, every action brings boredom. An intelligent person sees this. The sooner you see it, the more intelligence you show.
What remains then? Then only boredom remains, and one should meditate on it. There is no way to run from it. So, enter into it, see where it leads. And if you can continue to do this, it will lead you to enlightenment.
Only humans are capable of boredom, and only humans are capable of enlightenment.
osho
Boredom is one of the most important things in human life. Only humans are capable of boredom; no other animal can experience boredom. Boredom exists only when the mind begins to come closer and closer to enlightenment. Boredom is merely the polar opposite of enlightenment. Animals cannot become enlightened, and therefore they cannot experience boredom either.
Boredom simply shows that you are beginning to realize the futility of life, its constantly repeating wheel. You have done all these things before — nothing comes of it. You have already embarked on all these journeys — they led nowhere. Boredom is the first indicator that a great understanding of the futility, the meaninglessness of life and its ways is arising in you.
You can respond to boredom in two ways. The first is what ordinary people do — run away from it, not look it in the eye, not confront it. Keep away from it, flee; avoid it by occupying yourself with things that can distract you, that can become obsessions; that take you so far from the realities of life that you never again see that boredom arises.
That is why people invented alcohol, drugs. They are ways of escaping boredom. But running is not so easy; you can only run for a while. Again and again boredom will return, and each time its voice will grow louder and louder. You can run into sex, into overeating, into music — into a thousand and one kinds of things. But again and again boredom will arise. It is not something to be avoided; it is part of human growth. It must be faced head-on.
The other response is to face it, to meditate on it, to be with it, to be it. This is what Buddha did under the bodhi tree, this is what all Zen people have done for centuries.
What exactly is meditation? Facing boredom. What does the meditator continuously do? Sitting in silence, staring at his navel or watching his breath... — do you think these things entertain him? He is unimaginably bored! That is why the Zen master walks with a stick in his hand — because these people will inevitably fall asleep. There are no other outcomes, and only one remains: at least they can sleep. They cannot run away. They have voluntarily taken on Zen training and discipline — they cannot run. But one way of escape is always available: you can fall asleep, and then you forget everything. That is why everyone wants to sleep in meditation.
Herein lies the entire effort of meditation: to plunge into boredom, but not to run from it; and to remain alert, because if you fall asleep, you have run away. Stay alert! Observe it, witness it. If boredom is there, then it is there. You must look into it — to its very core.
If you continue to look deep into boredom, without trying to escape, one day an explosion comes. One day, suddenly, looking deeply into boredom, you penetrate your own nothingness. Boredom was merely a covering, a container holding your inner nothingness. If you run from boredom, you run from your own nothingness. If you do not run from boredom, if you begin to live with it, begin to accept it, welcome it… This is the whole of meditation: to welcome boredom, to enter into it of your own free will; not to wait for it to come, but to go in search of it.
Sitting for hours in a yoga posture, simply watching your breath, one arrives at utter boredom. And the whole training of meditation is such that it helps boredom along. In a Zen monastery, you must get up in the morning at the same time every day — every day, year after year. It doesn't matter if it's summer or winter. You must get up early, at three o'clock, and take a bath. You must drink tea and sit... The same postures follow again and again. And the whole day is also filled with an established routine: you eat breakfast at a certain time, then meditate again, then eat again at a certain time — and the food is always the same! Everything helps boredom.
The same clothes, the same monastery, and the same master walks around with his stick every day. Every evening you come to the master's session. And the questions given for meditation are so boring: "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" Just think about it — it would drive you crazy! What is the sound of one hand clapping? There is no answer, and you know it; everyone knows there is no answer. And the master keeps insisting, "Keep repeating it, keep meditating on it."
And everything is well organized. Boredom must be created — immense, unimaginable. And this boredom must be allowed as totally as possible, helped along, supported in every way. The same evening, the same work, the same chanting of the mantra. At the same time you fall asleep again... and it continues endlessly, like a wheel. After a few days, you arrive at utter boredom, and you cannot run from it. There is no way to escape. You cannot go to the cinema, you cannot watch television; you cannot get anything that might help you avoid it. You are thrown back into it again and again.
To face it requires immense courage. It is almost like death; in fact, it is much harder than death, because death comes when you lose consciousness. But here you are stirring up all possible kinds of boredom. What happens? This is the secret of all meditations: if you keep observing, observing, observing, boredom becomes greater and greater, more and more intense, and then — the culmination. Nothing can last forever — a moment comes when the wheel turns. If you can go to this very extreme, to the very culmination, then a change occurs, a transformation — enlightenment, satori, or call it whatever you like. One day comes when suddenly the boredom is too much. It is choking you, it is almost killing you. You are surrounded by an ocean of boredom. It floods you, and there seems to be no way to escape it. This very intensity and totality... — and the wheel turns. Suddenly boredom disappears, and satori, samadhi, arrives. You have entered your nothingness.
Now there will be no more boredom. You have seen the very nature of the nothingness of life. You have disappeared — who is there to be bored? What could cause it? You no longer exist. You are annihilated.
You ask: "What exactly is boredom?" A great spiritual phenomenon. That is why buffaloes do not experience boredom; they look perfectly happy and joyful. Only humans experience boredom. And even among humans — only those who are very talented and intelligent. Stupid people do not experience boredom. They are quite content with their work, earning money, building a bank account, content with raising children, reproducing, eating, sitting in a cinema, going to restaurants, participating in this or that. They enjoy themselves! They do not experience boredom. This is the lowest type of human development; they essentially belong to the world of buffaloes. They are not yet human beings.
A human becomes human when he begins to experience boredom. You can see it: the most intelligent child will also be the most bored — because nothing holds his interest for long. Sooner or later he comes up against this fact and asks: "And now what? What next? This is finished. I have seen this toy, I have looked into it, I have opened it, I have analyzed it, now it's done — what next?" By the time he becomes a young man, he is already bored.
Buddha experienced unimaginable boredom. He left his kingdom when he was only twenty-nine, at the peak of his youth. He was incredibly bored — women, wine, wealth, the kingdom, everything bored him. He saw everything, and saw it clearly and through and through. He was bored. He renounced the world not because the world was wrong, remember. Tradition says he renounced the world because the world was bad — this is absolute nonsense. He renounced the world because he was bored with it.
It is not bad, nor is it good. If you are intelligent, it is boring. If you are stupid, you can go on. Then the merry-go-round spins; you move from one sensation to another. You are interested in trivialities, and you keep repeating yourself, and you are not conscious enough to see this repetition — you cannot see that you already did it yesterday, and today as well, and you intend to do the same tomorrow. You must be truly intelligent. How can intelligence avoid boredom? It is impossible. Intelligence means: seeing things as they are…
Buddha left the world out of boredom; having arrived at ultimate boredom, he fled the world. And what did he do all those six years, sitting in all those forests? He arrived at greater and greater boredom. What else can one do sitting under a tree? — watching the breath, staring at one's navel, day after day, year after year... He created boredom and brought it to its very culmination, and one day it disappeared. It disappears on its own.
If you reach this culmination... the Turn comes. It comes! And with this turning point, light enters your being — you disappear, only light remains. And with light comes bliss. You are full of Joy — although you are not there, you are full of joy, utterly causeless joy. Joy simply sparkles and bubbles in your being.
An ordinary person experiences joy for some reason — he falls in love with a new woman or a new man, and he or she is joyful. Their joy is fleeting. Tomorrow they will be bored with this woman or man, and they will start looking for others. An ordinary person rejoices because he has a new car; tomorrow he will have to look for a new car. And so it continues endlessly... and he never sees the essence of it: that in the end he always gets bored. Do whatever you like — in the end you will get bored, every action brings boredom. An intelligent person sees this. The sooner you see it, the more intelligence you show.
What remains then? Then only boredom remains, and one should meditate on it. There is no way to run from it. So, enter into it, see where it leads. And if you can continue to do this, it will lead you to enlightenment.
Only humans are capable of boredom, and only humans are capable of enlightenment.
osho