Question – Osho, I think I have become Enlightened. What do you say about it?
Osho – Nisarga, THE moment one becomes enlightened, one does not think that one is enlightened; one simply knows. Thinking is guessing, it is not knowing. And when one becomes enlightened one never asks ‘whether I have become enlightened’, because it is self-evident; no certificate is needed.
And Nisarga, when you become enlightened I will come to you to bless you. You will not need to come to me and ask.
An old Welsh lady, seventy-five years old, is in the doctor’s surgery.
“Well, I know it is hard to believe, Mrs. Jones, but the tests are conclusive: you are pregnant!” the doctor tells her. “But I am seventy-five years old, doctor, and my husband is eighty-five years old. Are you certain? This will be such a shock for him.”
“Yes, I am certain. You must tell him very carefully because of his age. I suggest you telephone him from my office now.”
Mrs. Jones dials the number, then speaks: “Hello Hughie, darling, I have some news for you. Please sit down before I tell you. Are you sitting? Good. I am pregnant. The doctor is certain and the tests are all positive.”
There was a short pause and Hughie’s quavering voice was heard to say, “Who is that speaking, please?”
Nisarga, that’s what I would like to ask: who is that speaking, please?
If it has happened, you are no more. If it has happened, there will be nobody to ask the question. If it has happened, your fragrance will tell people; you will become luminous.
Mulla Nasruddin had a male child after producing fourteen girls in a row from his four wives. When he heard the good news he went on a week-long celebration that broke several records. On the seventh day somebody asked him, “Who does it look like, you or your wife?”
“I don’t know yet,” the proud father happily chortled. “We have not looked at his face yet.”
When after fourteen girls you give birth to a male child, who has time to look at his face?
After millions and millions of lives, when you become enlightened, who bothers to ask? It is so absolute, and the sheer joy of it is such… yes, one can dance, but one cannot ask; one can sing, but one cannot ask. One will go almost mad: that’s what Kabir says. Again and again he says that those who know God go mad, mad in ecstasy.
Nisarga, you are perfectly in your senses; you have not gone mad. I have been watching you — there is no ecstasy. It may be just a desire, a wish-fulfillment. You would like to become enlightened, you would like somebody to tell you that you have become enlightened. You would like to be certified, but these things cannot be certified. These are not things of the outer world; when they happen there is a totally new phenomenon.
When a Buddha is there, or a Krishna, or a Kabir, or a Jesus, or a Mohammed, something of God penetrates into the very dense earth, something of the sky starts walking here on the earth. Those who have eyes can see it, those who have ears can hear it, those who have hearts can feel it, and those who are intelligent enough will learn the secret of it.
But you need not ask such questions; these questions are meaningless. I understand your desire, but on the way of enlightenment even the desire to become enlightened is a barrier — the greatest barrier.
Forget all about enlightenment! Dance to abandon! Whatsoever you are doing here, do it totally. Forget all about enlightenment — it will take care of itself, it will come of its own accord. You cannot bring it; it is not something that you can manage to do.
If you can be simply lost in the ordinary activities of life, totally lost, utterly lost… one day, when the ego is missing… You may be just cleaning the floor, or chopping wood, or carrying water from the well; when the ego is completely absent, as if there is nobody who is chopping wood — wood is chopped but there is nobody chopping wood — suddenly it is there. It comes as a surprise. And when it comes it brings its own absolute certainty.