When I use the word “responsibility” I mean your aliveness,responding aliveness. You are not responsible to anybody else except your own being, this moment. You are responsible to be responsible
You will always feel confused if you lean on somebody else because then the understanding will not be yours, and understanding cannot be borrowed. So you can befool yourself a little while. Again and again the reality will erupt and you will feel confused. So the only way to avoid confusion is not rationalisation. The only way to avoid confusion is to stand on your own feet, to be alert, to be aware.
Whenever you start leaning on somebody, you are avoiding awareness and you have been taught and conditioned for it from the very beginning.The parents,the peers, the society, the educationists,the politicians, they all go on trying to condition you in such a way that you always depend on others.Then you can be manipulated,then you can be dominated. Then you can be exploited and oppressed,then you can be reduced to being a slave. You lose your freedom.
Confusion comes in.. I say something to you, you start believing in it but it is not your vision, it is not your perception.Tomorrow in life something happens and you are in a difficulty. The difficulty arises because you have learned by rote you have memorized me. Now you will try to respond through this borrowed understanding. Life changes every moment.My understanding of this moment will not be of any help to you the next moment. My understanding of this moment cannot be made a permanent reference. And if you take it verbally, intellectually, mentally, and you carry it with you, you will again and again be confused; because life will always sabotage your so-called understanding.
Life trusts only real understanding. Real means your own, authentic, that arises from you. I am not here to give you knowledge,I am not here to give you theories. That’s what has been done for centuries,and man has remained as ignorant as ever. I am here to make you alert to the fact that hidden behind you, within you, is a source of light.Tap that source. Let that light burn bright within you. And then you have something alive. Then whatsoever problems come in life, you will not tackle them from your past knowledge. You will tackle them in the present.You will face them with your present understanding. Whatsoever I say will always become past.The moment I have said, the moment you have heard,it has already gone into the past. And life goes on changing; it is a constant movement. It knows no stopping, it knows no rest.
My meaning of the word “responsibility” is totally different from the dictionary meaning. In the dictionary responsibility seems something like a duty,a commitment,as if you are responsible to somebody else.The word is almost dirty. The mother goes on saying to the child,“You are responsible to me, remember.” The father goes on saying to the son, “You are responsible to me, remember.” The society goes on saying to the individuals, “You are responsible to us, to the society, remember.” And your so-called images of God,they also go on telling people, “You are responsible to us...to me.”
When I use the word “responsibility” I mean your aliveness, responding aliveness.You are not responsible to anybody else except your own being, this moment. You are responsible to be responsible. To respond with an open heart, with vulnerability. Not with closed fists but with open hands. Not hiding and holding something. Opening yourself completely, in deep trust with life.Not trying to be clever and cunning.Then you float with life moment to moment... your response will change because life is changing.
My understanding of this moment will not be of any help to you the next moment. My understanding of this moment cannot be made a permanent reference. And if you take it verbally, intellectually,mentally, and you will again and again be confused; because life will always sabotage your so-called understanding
Sometimes it is hot and you cannot sit outside in the sun and you would need a shelter. Sometimes it is too cold and you cannot sit under the shelter and you would like to sit under the sun. But nobody is going to say to you that you look very inconsistent: “The other day you were sitting in the shelter, and now you are sitting under the sun? Choose!
If you want to sit in the sun, then sit consistently in the sun.” You will laugh at this absurdity, but this is what people have expected of you in life. Everything is changing around you. Don’t get fixed ideas; otherwise you will be confused. And don’t listen to what others say; listen to your own heart.
By Osho
