Does Nature Dream

[harsi]

From 5 March 2011.

Listen at: https://harimedia.net/downloads/lecture ... eDream.mp3

Ideals, idealism, service, community, security, living life, and organic, sustainable evolution are all discussed in the context of spring!


"And it seems to me the only lasting community is one based on friendship - you like to be there. Your children like to be there, it got all the basic stuff that keeps you there."

"Understand the point of spring, understand it's incredible significance. And instead of simply thinking of this selfless ideal of service first express. Feel the love of life, feel the expression and development of self. And offer the mature fruits of it as service to others. It's nature, it's natural. Without expectation of return but in the cycle of life where we recycle things in such a way that we maintain it sustainably throughout time. Sustainable development, sustainable organic, natural, growth."


Today is part, I would say, of the growth of spring. It's the first day after the new moon. And here anyway spring is very much in full force right now, very powerful, very intense. The pollen is so much that, if you wipe your table outside the next day you can run your finger and make a little pile. If you don't clean it regularly you can use a shovel. I'm not joking.

Gainesville is called the city of trees. There's enormous amount of pollen, especially where I live. My whole backyard is filled with them and they are just bursting with life. They've had some period of winter and now they are just waking up in such a powerful way that they are just producing pollen like anything. Blooms are there on trees, flowers are bursting out on some of the plants, they flower in different cycles, different ways. And really it's the joy of nature, it's an awakening. It's an awakening from a sleeping condition.

Now I wanna to label this lecture: Does Nature Dream. (Yes! Dream. The dreams you have when you sleep.) And to make sense of that I have to go all the way back into all of the thought patterns, all of the concepts that were inspiring me today as I was trying to understand more about what to speak. And my ultimate conclusion was to come to spring as the example. Because spring is what is happening now. It is a very, very interesting thing - spring. Okay, on the surface of it, it's quite normal. If you consider that spring is the start; that the year starts with the spring; that spring comes and summer is there. Spring is the growth the expansion, the reproduction of plants. Summer is the way in which they just grow steadily, maintain their position. Fall is when it gradually starts to close down and winter is when it's all shut down.

You know that, that's obvious but that's not the point of what I'm trying to say. What I'm going to speak about, believe it or not, begins with idealism. (Hari: Stick with me.) Idealism. I love idealism. Let's talk about my..., my spring. When I was born it was three years after the end of the war. And it was the spring for families, for people. It was a time when the dark winter of world wide conflict was over.

Of corse people were struggling very much. They had no place to live really. Because all the people from the war came home all at the same time and they needed somewhere to live. They were getting married. And there weren't enough houses or housing, they had to struggle to find something. It created the springtime of housing in America. Where all this developments and housing projects came up, where many houses which were similar were put in the same place.

And there were communities. For example when I was a child, we lived in the street and on that street all the people around it were basically the same age. I had many friends to live with who were the same age. My parents had people the same age. They were in the exact same situation. They came back from the war; they were trying to start their lives; they were trying to develop a business or work. And they used to get together and associate and have fun, have parties and it was very communal.

I suppose in one sense I'm always looking for that community again. I'm always looking for that community which was developed simply because they shared a common interest.

Was that idealism? Well, let's think about that. Let's put aside dictionary definitions of the word. Because I'm not sure that dictionary definitions do it justice. I think that you could be much more pragmatic about what is idealism. Rather than seeing it as some kind of persuit of an ideal that is not practically attainable. I don't believe that. I think that an ideal can simply be that which you think is something you wish to have or live within or work for - your goal.

An ideal in the sense that: I'm fine with this; this is enough; this is good; I think this is what I should attain, what I should look towards. Why does an ideal have to be something more grandiose, something beyond reach? As if anyone who's an idealist is reaching beyond their capacity, turning it into a metaphysical search for utopia. There's already a word for that: Utopian ideals. Utopia. Utopia doesn't exist - where everything is perfect. So you can use that word to describe the unattainable. But an ideal?

For example, I have an ideal weight. When my body is a certain weight, I feel ideal. It's best for me. It gives me a good balance between strength and fitness - it's ideal. I have ideal circumstances within which to create this broadcast. Okay, I understand there's a difference between ideal and idealism. Idealism is a conceptual mode of philosophical thought. It can bring up ideas of the illusory pursuit of some ideal which is beyond my reach. But I'm just talking about what is ideal first because idealism and ideal must be related - same word. There are differences, sure. Let's get to it.

Now in that community when I was a child it was ideal. The only thing that wasn't ideal was the distance between that community and New York City. Because everyone in the community moved from New York City.

It was actually one of the first kind of communities on Long Island which was very near to New York City. Now, it was ideal. There was a house they could afford, it was together with people they could easily live with. There were stores nearby that you could buy things. It was peaceful, it was new. You could have a lot of fun. Now I grew up in that environment. It felt good to be there. I was dragged out of that environment by my father's need to be closer to work. Not having to spend hours going back and forth to work. I was placed in a less than ideal situation. That didn't last long, I was placed in another situation which also wasn't bad.

Now you may ask: why is that relevant? Because I'm gonna bring up the most significant point. That while this was going on I grew up in the atomic age. When I was in first grade I was thought that if you see the light... You see in my early days the light meant a very different thing than it means now. You see now when I say: "I see the light." You're referring to some wonderful, spiritual experience of that brilliance of the spiritual energy. "I see the light." Or "I'm enlightened." All of a sudden I understand. But when I was a child, if you saw the light that meant... If you saw the light and two or three seconds later you were still there - actually if you saw the light at all - that means you're still alive. Because when the atom bomb goes of, the first thing is the light and the second thing is the explosion, the wall of energy.

So we were told: "if you see the light" - because if you don't see it doesn't matter anyway. Either it didn't happen or you're already dead, vaporized. I'm in first grade, I'm six years old. And the alternative is that it didn't happen or I'm vaporized. Vaporized. That means: The only thing left of me is a little shadow on the pavement. I exist and than I'm vapor. And the only memory of me is a shadow, if I happen to be standing on concrete in the pavement. Because when I'm vaporized the light is busy vaporizing me and the shadow remains.

I'm six years old. Of corse the same thing was there when I was five or four. But you know, the... What it calls? The Rosenbergs hadn't stolen the atomic bomb yet and send it over to you, Russians, over there. So if I saw the light, I was to dive underneath my desk. Now (laughing) in those days my desk was a little piece of wood covered with some Formica on four metal stands. So I was to dive under my desk because the force was gonna come and the roof was gonna fall in. Because after all we were quite close to New York City. I think we were like fifteen miles away. And since New York City was obviously gonna be the first target that we were going to get the roof falling on our head.

So I was to dive under my desk to protect myself from the roof falling in, the walls, the glass being smashed across the room. My oh my, that was amazing! But it was so inconceivable you had to just push it away. It just, it was inconceivable. There's no way you could deal with it. But just because you push it away and there's no way you can deal with it, doesn't mean it's not continuously rumbling in your consciousness, continuously defining your ideas of the future. Because after all there's a very strong idea that your future does not exist. And than simultaneously there was this idea that the communists were going to bury us. We have Khrushchev taking his shoe of in the United Nations and banging it on the podium, stating: "We will bury you!"

And than he was shipping missiles to Cuba - which is just bellow Florida - and he had all this missiles pointed at the United States. And on the eve of my birthday What was it? Sixty one or something like that. Maybe sixty two, I don't know. Sixty one I think. I don't remember. Kennedy comes on the TV - I'm watching it - and says that: "Well, be ready (you know, read between the lines), be ready because tomorrow you may all be dead." I mean he didn't exactly say that. He said: "Well, Russia put all this missiles in Cuba - we have Cuba surrounded - and if they don't remove them immediately we're going to attack Cuba tomorrow." And it's my birthday. And so I'm just sitting there watching this, and like... I said: "Oh my god! I'm gonna die on my birthday." And you know thirteen year old, vivid imagination. So the whole day we were just biting our fingernails. And luckily mister Khrushchev decided that he better use his brain for ones and remove them.

Okay, great! We got through that one. Okay, I'm thirteen and I'm still alive - fabulous. So now you can understand, when I became old enough to do something I was in a group of people who had gone through the same exact experience. So we saw the Vietnam war like we were threatened in this way. "Why are we fighting against this people over there? There was no reason to do so." So we made the ideal. We had idealism, we want the better world. "Make love not war." And so this was our motto - peace. "Make love not war." So we were having this ideal, we were having this feeling, that we wish to do something good, we wanna change things. Because our forefathers, our parents, created a world which is unsafe for people.

We grew up with the idea the world is unsafe to live in. We're not just talking about a country or a political system or economic principles or whatever. We're talking about a very fundamental feeling in the very depths of being. "This world is not safe, we can die at any moment." And even though that's not directly expressed. But it was expressed in: "No war." "I'm not gonna go to that war." "I managed to not get blown up, I managed to not get killed by the bombs and now you want me to go over there and get shut by somebody who is simply defending his own country or whatever it is. Who knows what it is?" "Why should I trust you?" This in the mentality. "Why should I trust anything you say? Look at this problems that made my world unsafe." So therefore we thought like this.

"We have to change it, we have to do something!" And at the same time there were this opportunities to do so. To make strikes, to make opposition, to fight against the evil empire. It resounds very well with youth. The youthful minds says: "Yes, it's a very good thing to do. Because we had our ideal which was based on our imminent destruction - and avoiding it.

Kids today are totally different. As different as you can be. Because first of all they didn't grow up in the atomic age, they didn't grow up with imminent vaporization as a definite possibility, they didn't grow up with this frustration. They grew up in an era of incredible prosperity where all varieties of enjoyment are there for the taking. Unlimited drugs everywhere. You're kidding the drugs nowadays make the stuff in those days that I grew up an kids stuff.

I mean and everybody is into it. And the diversions, the media, the music, the possibilities, the electronic gizmos and devices, the social networking. There's no fear, there's no imminent destruction. Why should the kids today rebel? They have nothing to rebel against. They've got what they want. They're moving into it. They're embracing the digital age, they're embracing the social networking. What's to rebel?! Generally speaking there's nothing. So kids today are very different than kids when I was a kid. You can also go back to when my parents were kids because they were in the middle of the great depression. So they've grown up with different ideals and values. Their ideals are basically: Have enough money so you can eat and have a house that's not taken away. And have what you need and don't bother getting more. Be satisfied with it, you've got it. What's your problem?

All this ideals, and all of this feelings, are very much rooted in our childhood. Very much rooted in how we grew up. What it was that we lived within. The political, economic and social environments. And naturally I'm looking for community that I had when I was a child. Even I don't think about that, I don't remember it. I mean I remember it when I think about it. But in my normal discussions and normal thinking actually I'm looking for that. It had everything. We all had our place to live, we were independent. We all had our sources of income, we were independent. We all could visit each other, we had the facility. We were all basically the same age, just one or two years of difference - it all worked. We had a place to play, it was safe, all our parents were friends with each other, more or less. You know, village politics. Think about that!

And so that's... What more do you want out of community? Do you need more out of community? Now idealism. I had a discussion last week and I asked: "What is the spark that makes community work? What is the spark, what is the thing about community that will bring people together where they haven't been together before? What will inspire them? What will cause them to pick up and move? What will cause them to make this drastic change in their life?" Now, I've been dealing with this problem for a long time. I'm not a beginner. I'm quite advanced in discussing it. I'm not very successful in answering it.

My only answer really is: Create a community like when I was a kid. Which basically is a socio-economic unit of people who find it pleasant to live together. They like the house, they like the place, they like the people. What more do you need? I mean after all, when you think about community, you can think of it as a place to live. Obviously there are other forms of community. A community of minds where you commune together in the sense of you have the same philosophical ideals. Or you're in a club that thinks the same and does something. Or you're in a religion and you gather together on the basis of your religion. Or you share niding as your interests. Or you like to do whatever it is you do together and you make some kind of community around that. That's not what I mean.

I mean a place where you live together because there's a reason to do so. Families do so. Because they've got kids and kids need other kids. When I grew up I was always surrounded by other kids my age where we could do things together. When I moved on Long Island again there was a street, Concord street, we always got together and played there. Either I went down the street one way and had one group of friends, went down the street the other way, we were always playing football and hockey, until they pocket me and the lip (?). My mother said: "Enough with you in hockey." And we played basketball and we played miniature gold and we played volleyball and we played wiffleball, we played wiffleball golf, and we had a blast. Every afternoon we did something together. We had so much fun until we all went to college. Than it all went to hell.

But all my life there were kids. So for me, the number one ideal of community is you're kid and you get other kids. And your parents get together and they talk to each other. The guy across the street was an FBI agent. So my father and him and another guy they used to hang out in a corner and talk about all of the stuff that FBI agents do. He would say: "You see that guy over there in the car. He's stocking that house over there, he's a private detective. Because the wife in that house is having an affair with the guy over there. And the husband wants to make sure that's so before he divorces her."

It's what you do. You know either the woman get together and talk or the man get together and talk and... It's a community, they have fun. What's the point of community? You get together, you have parties, you do stuff. For us the whole centre of it was the fire department. I was in the fire department from when I was sixteen years old, the legal age to join. But before that I was in the fire department since I was twelve. Having a blast together in the fire department. It was just one of the best experiences I've ever had. It was a community. It was fun. What more do you want out of a community?

Now this person who I've talked to last week, was speaking about idealism. A community can only work when it's based on an ideal. Some either philosophical ideal or religious ideal. One of the philosophical ideals he brought up was to change the world. And the religious ideal was: we're gonna work together here to do some preaching or some proselytizing or some presenting or some service with surrounding the church or the temple or whatever.

Now I don't want to get into all the historical business about that because it's a long conversation. But I thought about that. And at this point in time - the way we live - this things don't cut it. You can have all the idealism you want but if your kids are not happy there, if you are not happy there, you leave.

So many communities, if the kids have other kids to play with, and they like them, they have a school that you're happy with, they're happy with, the parents have friends, they can make money there, it's a nice place to live and they have a good house, they stay. If any of those factors are not there they leave. Even if later on the people they live around in that very localized area are not people they have anything to do with. And that happens often because your next door neighbour might start thinking differently than the accepted religious ideal or philosophical ideal. And at that time when they think differently they're no longer part of your community. You somehow just don't deal with them anymore.

And after a while there's communities within community, as it grows bigger and bigger. And sooner or later it just becomes the way it is everywhere else anyway. And it seems to me the only lasting community, is one based on friendship - you like to be there. Your children like to be there, it's got all the basic stuff that keeps you there.

Now why did I talked about spring? The way I change this conversation from spring to idealism to community, it's called a sedgeway amongst comedians. It means you're moving in one direction and all of a sudden, zoop, you go in another direction. And because it's humorous, people are bewildered for a second and they just start laughing because it's so unexpected.

But it's not what I meant. I didn't do it for entertainment purposes. There is actually a reason - spring. What are the characteristics of spring? Now before I get there (sedgeway - Hari is laughing) we are now for a second going to talk about meaning.

What is the meaning of life? What is the meaning of life? I mean you wanna talk about an existential question. I'm not gonna getting into it for hours. But what is the meaning of life? Oh my god! It's something you can chew over and try to digest, research and experience, and struggle over and be heard over or be devastated over or feel good about. Well, what was the meaning of life when I was a child or for the people in my community when I was a child? Well, meaning of life was to live. I know that sounds very casual. "The meaning of life is to live." It's something you would just, you know... The meaning of eating is to eat. The meaning of eating is to eat, or meaning of eating is nourishment. Or, yeah! But the meaning of life is to live. I understand it. It's very deep. And why is it deep? That's related to spring. (Hari: I haven't given up, just wait!) Now, the meaning of life... Well, when I was in that community, our meaning was: we had community. It was a meaning in and of itself.

There was work and there was money and there was family. And taking care of all that. Active doing day after day, minute after minute, and within the context of community. When you had a chance you would enjoy the company of others. Which means you sit down, you eat something together, you drink something together, you play together, you talk together, you enjoy. You also help each other. Somebody needs something picked up, brought over there. You go and help. They need their car pushed to start it. In those days that was a big thing. Okay! Sure, you do it. It was a meaning in and of itself. It was life. This is life.

Now the problem is: people have a struggle with meaninglessness. It's one of the most significant human problems. Meaninglessness; life without meaning. It's a serious problem. Because somewhere deep down somebody wants to feel that there's a reason for doing what they do. So long as one is enjoying life or... I mean nobody enjoys life all the time. Obviously you don't enjoy brushing your teeth; you don't enjoy pooping - I mean, maybe you do, I don't know. You don't enjoy all this different little relevant things, you dust and you clean. It's not like this are like: enjoyment, like laughing and having fun or doing something really pleasurable - eating some great food, playing around. This are things you do sometimes.

Life generally is a process of moving between significantly pleasant or significant experiences that we feel were really good. Now if this experiences leading up or the activities leading up to this pleasant experiences were just work or just okay experiences - they were normal stuff - we have no problem. But if the leading up to the whatever it is experience is painful. Well, than the idea of enjoyment after some austerity or some work may not be relevant because you may not enjoy, you may have just suffering.

Let's say you have a disease; let's say you've lost people you love; let's say you've lost your job and you have no money; let's say there's a natural disaster and your home is destroyed or whatever - your stability is destroyed - or maybe your insane dictator is dropping bombs on you or whatever. So when you're in such pain you often question the meaning of life. Of course if your insane dictator is dropping bombs all of a sudden your meaning of life have a cause. "I'm living for a cause of dragging this man out of power and taking over." Of course what they do afterwards that goes back into the normal way of doing things and the normal problems that occur. But while that cause is there, it's very enlivening, it gives strength, even in times of crises because there's something to fight for. When there's something to fight for pain is expected. When you're fighting for something and pain comes, it's part of the process of the fight - it's expected. In fact it can enliven you to fight through the pain, to fight in spite of the pain, to come out victorious even though you've been hurt. It's one of those experiences where pain is acceptable.

Now there are other times when you have pain where there is no cause. Let's say you're just old. You start thinking about meaninglessness. "What is the meaning of my life." Or let's say you've lost your relationships and you're just in pain and... "what is the meaning of my life?" You question like this. You have existential criseses. "What is the point of my life?" Usually it's a product of pain, in one form or another. That's why Freud concluded: "The purpose of life is to maximize pleasure and avoid pain." You can even see that in peoples discussion about the meaning of life.

Of course there's idealism. Where an ideal is there which you strive to attain. It is in its own sense kind of a fight. Where certain amounts of pain, certain amounts of austerity, are acceptable. Because you have a goal you're trying to attain. An ideal that you 'believe' in. Something you really wish to attain. Something you really feel is good for others or good for the world or good for life. This are important principles. Always important principles, this pain and the way it is seen. Or just even been bored. Can you imagine when you're bored to death, you really wander: "What am I doing in this world. No ideal to live for, no experiences that are giving me pleasure. It's just basically a lot of nothingness or a lot of struggle or a lot of hardship. And what's the point?" That's the worst of all situations. It's the hardest to deal with. This feeling of intense meaninglessness.

In that sense those who have that meaningless do very well with projects. Like the creation of community. Like the creation of something significant, something beneficial, something useful, something valuable. This things are very important - this things actually have some very significant value - for those who have that meaninglessness, this existential crises.

Let's get to spring. Let's see life from the point of view of spring. (Hari: I told you, I get back) What is nature? I would like to define nature as: 'Nature is.' It is being. Not a being, it is being. Nature is not struggling with mind, with the ideals and idealism. It may be affected by politics, it may be affected by economics. It is affected by the human influence over it. The human influence which is harming it or cultivating it or modifying it or whatever. But nature in and of itself simply is. If you wanna talk about nature. The motto of nature is: The purpose of life is to live.

Look at spring, it simply is. The plants that were there before if they survived winter grow. The water if that was flowing continues to flow. The land continues to be there. When there are upheavals, balances are created. It just all follows that. Nature is simply happening, it's simply living. Nature in the spring is joy. The waking up, the joy of consciousness again, the joy of expression. The expression of self, each and everyone of those plants expressing the self - each of them. I know when I go... - I'm very plant oriented - so I remember when I'm in the Northern parts of the world the forest is very much depressed in the winter it becomes very shut down. Every tree - especially the trees - they become very quiet, shut down. And in the spring when they just one day to the next come to life, it's totally different. If I was walking in the forest the day before there's stillness. There's not a consciousness of the trees that is discussing or communicating or speaking to me. But the day when they wake up, all of a sudden it's like incredible communication. Like they're waking up out of sleep and they communicate and they are so grateful for life and they are just reaching out with life. It's just an expression of joyous growth.

Spring is life itself just expressing itself. Later on spring brings us summer, brings us harvest. And when there's harvest, there's the fruit of spring. That the trees, the plants, they grow food or they grow whatever it is they're meant for and they deliver it for harvest. The fruit of my life ready to be taken, ready to be used in service for other creatures. The horses eat the grass, the cows eat the grass, the people it the weed or the other foods, the trees give the fruit or whatever. Everybody is eating, everybody has life. The fruit is offered as service. First there's the spring, the joy of expression. And than there's the offering of service, which is according to that expression which was originally there.

Let's see it in terms of ourselves. We first express the joy of what we are. And when that is mature we offer it in service. In other words, if we were to follow nature we would express in the joy of life and share the fruit of that expression when it is mature.

Therefore I said in the beginning, the theme of this lecture: Does nature dream? Because what is the difference between nature and humans? Humans get messed up by dreams, by ideology, by illusory conceptions of life. Nature never has that problem, nature simply is. Wherever it is it grows or dies - natural process. It grows and expresses itself. And offers it's service when the time is ripe. Nature doesn't have dreams.

Can you imagine all the trees dreaming: "Yeah, we wanna take over the whole planet and get rid of this stupid people?" Trees just grow, they offer their seeds. The other seeds grow - it is what it is. They do what they can. They work with what they are. They work with what they have. The plants grow, create seeds, the seeds drop, it's just the way it is. And than it organically spreads or not. But nature is not in illusion about itself.

Nature doesn't have dreams about life or creation. Nature simply is. Nature does too, don't mistake that. Nature does like anything. Nature is flowing - flowing like mad. And that flowing is a lot of doing. When the earth parts, when the flood comes, when it rains, when it storms, when the tree grows and pushes your rooftop of or grows under the grounds and lifts up your sidewalk - nature does. But all of that doing is intimately and totally - at all times - connected to the being of what is nature. So, does nature dream? No!

If human beings were to take the example of nature, human beings would be in much better shape. What does that mean? We shouldn't dream? How can we not dream? When we sleep we dream. Ah! But that's a different kind of dreaming, that's natural stuff. We sleep, we dream. Even the animals dream. My dog sometimes in the middle of the night is chasing squirrels and he says: wu wu wuu.. Chasing squirrels in his sleep like mad or is running from big dogs. I have no idea. I don't really wanna know what's going on in his head at night. But animals dream. We dream.

It's a way in which we work out stuff. But we wake up. And when we wake up we get back to the reality of being. Nature as such dreams maybe in the same way. Who's to say? But humans have this problem. They fantasize. They dream about situations, about improvements, about themselves and grandiose schemes, about so called even making things better which sometimes makes it much worth.

Human beings dream and act on those dreams. Human beings are generally not at all organic. For example it's okay to use the head, use the brain. But using the brain according to nature is very superior to using the brain counter to nature. To try to lord it over nature, to control nature, to do things in a way which is contrary to nature. For example - just little example - you take oil somewhere from the ground and you burn it to make electricity which is simply consumed and does not return anything. Everything in nature returns. It is the specific characteristic of nature that it is a cycle. (The) Plant grows and deteriorates. It fertilises again. Whatever nutrients it took it gives back. Even if we eat them, you know what happens, it gives back.

Now when we take oil and we burn it in our cars or we burn it in our generators of electricity, we're giving nothing back except exhaust, which takes a way again. So we are not natural. And you look now and you see, this is causing economic problems, political problems, social problems. There are other ways to do it. Of course there's always an economic cost from nature. Like let's say you have wave generation under the sea. The sea waves are moving back and forth. I love this devices. And they are generating electricity by moving buoys up and down under the water. And that electricity is used by man. The ocean moves anyway, whether you're there or not. The ocean doesn't care if there's something - it moves. So there's no cost to it except the cost for the thing itself, which takes some material and so on - I know there's no perfect utopia. But that's a perfect way to do it.

And can you imagine also a system, where you have this buoy making electricity. And than right next to it you have a plant that is separating hydrogen and oxygen and taking hydrogen to fuel cars. And putting oxygen in the air as a byproduct. You know, you take the hydrogen, put out oxygen as your exhaust. The best of all worlds. It's very organic. It's something which works with nature, it's something which is very pure in its concept.

Now man doesn't think like that. Man has this dreaming problem. But I think this spring - this idea of spring - the way in which spring occurs and how spring just inspires, it's just so important for us right now. That instead of being idealistic in an unrealistic way be idealistic in an ideal way. And that means in communion with nature, in communion with life.

The purpose of life is to live. And that living when it's in a harmonious relationship with the environment, the people around you, the world, it's a very enjoyable thing. When there is harmony it's enjoyable. How can you not feel enjoyment when you go out into beautiful nature, blooming beautiful nature? How can you not? And if you don't feel it, you've got to modify your life because you've got, you're so out of touch. Without any harmony with what's real. So I feel that this theme, even though I addressed it in a very short way - does nature dream - actually is the essence. Because it deals with our idealism, it deals with our thought of how life takes place. Other than simply living it right now in the present.

And when you're in the present, you'll feel that it's harmonious or not. Because the present flows. And when it doesn't flow it makes obstacles; it makes dissension; it makes dissonance; it makes distortion; it makes destruction; it creates a situation which is diseased; it creates a situation where the only way out of it is to get drunk or use drugs; it creates a situation filled with D-is. It's the D situation. Every word I used was D-is. And in school if you have grades, you'll find that A, B, C, D. D is just above failing.

If you look at what's going on now in this world, we're just above failing. Trying to rehabilitate ourselves. So let's think of life in terms of the spring time. See the community in terms of spring time. Understand the point of spring, understand it's incredible significance. And instead of simply thinking of this selfless ideal of service first express. Feel the love of life, feel the expression and development of self. And offer the mature fruits of it as service to others. It's nature, it's natural. Without expectation of return but in the cycle of life where we recycle things in such a way that we maintain it sustainably throughout time. Sustainable development, sustainable organic, natural growth.

End of the lecture

I have some questions. I suppose the first one of this is the obvious one: When I say the purpose of life is to live and someone may say: "Well, isn't there some greater purpose than that? Like something to achieve, something to attain, like some spirituality to develop or some goodness to do."

Well, I mean when I say: the purpose of life is to live. Why would you think that when we say "to live" we mean something other than all this things that you do? Like what could I possibly mean when I say "to live"? What could I possibly mean? Obviously I don't mean that we sit like a plant and just grow to the sun - that's not our nature. Could you think I mean you just sleep and eat and work hard to get those things and... Is that living? Let's just analyse what 'live' means. Well if you're a plant, it's according to your nature. You have your nature what you are. You don't have a lot of facilities. You root, your roots grow, your plant grows. You create flowers or whatever it is you do - fruits - whatever.. So you're living organically according to what you are. Human beings are only slightly different because we have greater capacity.

Devas have even more capacity. But everybody's life is an expression of what they are. Now what are we? Well, we are a body, we are an energy, we have personality, we have qualities, we have characteristics, we have particular ways in which we express ourselves - and that is life.

Now when I was speaking, I wasn't just meaning, you can do whatever you want in the sense that there's no better and no worth, no thing which is what you should do and shouldn't do. I didn't even feel like addressing that. I'm only speaking about the fundamental life itself. Obviously we've talked for years about learning the art of expressing self, the natural spirituality of self. Without living in illusion, without living in a dream state, without being artificially engaged in ideals which do not relate to you. So when I say: the purpose of 'your' life is to live 'your' life, that life that you are, that's the natural, organic way to do it.

Why do you think I speak? Some of you have been listening to this broadcast for seven years. Seven years. Think about that! Previous to that, I gave maybe 10 000 lectures. That's not an exaggerated number. 8 000 of them are recorded. So I speak, it's the way I express. I like to express myself, my experience, my feelings, my understanding of life - part of my nature. I like to find out what is my nature and flow with it. I like to avoid things which are not my nature. Or which I can't do because there's some stuff I can't do. Even though I like to do it. Because maybe my body can't or I don't have the money or don't have the time or I'm too old.

So I'm adjusting and adapting in doing that which expresses my energy. It doesn't have to be a verbal expression, it can be in some art or it can be in cooking or it can be in being of assistance. Whatever it is that is my personal nature is my life. So I'm living it. If I'm living it in a dream state or thinking that, you know, this is the way it should be and anything else is inferior: "This is the way life should be, this is my dream of life." And anything else that's not that dream is somehow or another defective. Or if I'm not doing that I am not good enough because if I was good enough I'd be doing that. Or some derivative of that idea that my present reality is somehow or another inferior to this idealistic dream state I have. I say: "Take the dream put it away and live life now according to what you are.

You may say: that's living a life without ideals. I say: it's living a life without illusions. If I have an ideal that I'm gonna be a world champion weightlifter, that is purely illusion. It's not gonna happen, no matter what I do. I just don't got it here, I'm not a muscle guy.

So how would it benefit me to try to achieve something that's not me. If you say: "My ideal is to be a good person." Well, you'd have to define 'good'. Does that mean living according to natural principles or does it mean living according to somebodies philosophy? If you're living according to somebodies philosophy, you may not actually be good, even if they say you being good. You may actually be bad. You may be bad to yourself, if you're living somebody else's life. Or while you're living some philosophical ideal, you may be cruel to somebody else. I used to see so many people in a religious movement, who thought they were being good. Who were actually harming their wifes, harming their children. All with the idea they were following some ideal. Now you could say rightfully so, they weren't doing it right, they were doing something wrong. Yeah, yeah... But they were following what they thought was the ideal they should follow. And yet they were doing bad while doing good.

I say: if they were living a normal life - being normal in the sense that they were living their own life, feeling their own energy, feeling their own personality - they would feel the pain of others because they would feel their own pain. They would feel love from others because they would feel their own love. They would be familiar with the interactions of energy. And they would perceive that pain and modify their behaviour. By feeling what you are and living life as it is you modify your behaviour.

If you have a conscience, if you have feeling, and if you have some understand that you don't want to harm others, you will modify your behaviour automatically. You don't need somebody to tell you to do.

You might need somebody to help you get to the state where you can feel, where you can live. Because you may have been damaged previous to that. Yes, for sure! But that's not really the point that you're talking about here. So therefore I brought up the point of nature. Because it's essential for finding your own nature, feeling your nature of self, and growing within the environment of other who are in nature. Like the plants do. They all adapt accordingly or they die. And since humans have the capacity to move and to consciously change things they can adapt. If you see things from the point of view of reality you have a greater chance of adapting than if you don't. If you live in illusion you can't adapt. You can't adapt to reality from the viewpoint that's illusory. Anyway, I hope that kind of dealt with the question.
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And I get another question with the same issue. I'm not even sure, I understand why one could possibly be bewildered about this? Why you could possibly think, that I was saying something else than that which was related to conscious evolution? I mean it bewilders me that you think I'm saying you should just be like a plant or you should just be like an enjoyer of senses or whatever. It not only bewilders me, I'm not understanding it. I'm not understanding the thought process or the critical analysis. Because as far as I saw, this is like a fundamental principal for evolution. A fundamental principal even more importantly for creating community or for having any social interaction.

And if what you're doing is not from the platform of feeling good about it or feeling good about yourself or interacting with self or interacting with life, than what are you doing? Are you suffering your way through life for some higher goal? Are you just simply doing austerities and penances, and whatever it is, thinking that you're going to than do something good? Is that actually valuable? Is that actually important? I mean, I don't think so. Seems to me that if you have some idea that 'purpose of life is to live' means something opposite than your idea that 'the purpose of life is to suffer until you get to the point of enlightenment', well, than you haven't caught the point of what I've been speaking about all along - and I'm disappointed. Because it's just not that way. But anyway, let's see. Maybe it's just... You know there's a phenomenon: If you go to a meeting with people you have to have something to meet about. So even if you have nothing to meet about you have to discuss things, decide things, and argue about things. Even if there's no real reason to do so. Only because you've come together in a meeting you've got to do that. Whereas you would be perfectly happy in ever having the meeting.

Or if you come to a lecture and there's some questions involved you have to find something where there's a conflict or something to discuss because it's just the nature of these things. Yeah, why not?! I don't mind. I just... maybe I really am getting older because I don't find any enjoyment in arguing a point against somebodies... Now I'm not saying any of you were doing it. I'm just thinking back of my discussion of the previous week. And I know that they seem to be related but it just made me think about it.

That if somebody really has some other idea and they're really fiercely arguing it I take no pleasure in trying to show that I have a better idea. I'm happy with: "Okay, you think like that and I think like this and, you know... hey, fine." I don't care. I mean I like to work together with others, when there's a point of developing something. And developing means there's a growth which is building upon concepts, building upon ideas. And that has value to me. To develop a growth that's build upon. But I don't really see it in relationship to just plain old discussions which are not based on that. Which are polemics more or less.