Question – How to be Creative while doing jobs which seem not to leave any space for Creativity, like cleaning etc.?
Osho – It is from Krishna Radha. She cleans. But I also do the same thing: every morning, every evening, twenty-four hours — cleaning your mind, cleansing. But I never feel that there is any need for any other creativity. Cleaning a floor can be a tremendously creative act.
Remember, creativity has nothing to do with any particular work. Creativity has something to do with the quality of your consciousness. Whatsoever you do can become creative. Whatsoever you do can become creative if you know what creativity means.
Creativity means enjoying any work as meditation; doing any work with deep love. If you love me and you clean this auditorium, it is creative. If you don’t love me then of course it is a chore, it is a duty to be done somehow, it is a burden. Then you would like some other time to be creative. What will you do in that other time? Can you find a better thing to do? Are you thinking that if you paint, you will feel creative?
But painting is just as ordinary as cleaning the floor. You will be throwing colours on a canvas. Here you go on washing the floor, cleaning the floor. What is the difference? Talking to somebody, a friend, and you feel time is being wasted. You would like to write a great book; then you will be creative. But a friend has come: a little gossiping is perfectly beautiful. Be creative.
All the great scriptures are nothing but gossips of people who were creative. What do I go on doing here? Gossiping. They will become gospels some day, but originally they are gossips. But I enjoy doing them. I can go on and on for eternity. You may get tired some day, I am not going to get tired. It is sheer delight. It is possible that one day you may get so tired that you disappear and there is nobody — and I will be talking. If you really love something, it is creative.
But this happens to everybody. Many people come to me. When they come for the first time they will say, ‘Any work, Osho. Any work — even cleaning!’ Exactly they say, ‘Even cleaning! — but your work and we will be happy.’ And then after a few days they come to me and they say, ‘Cleaning…. We would like to have some great creative work.’
Let me tell you one anecdote:
“Worried about their lacklustre sex life, the young wife finally persuaded her husband to undergo hypnotic treatment. After a few sessions his sexual interest was kindled again, but during their lovemaking he would occasionally dash out of the bedroom, go to the bathroom and come back again.
Overcome by curiosity, the wife followed him one day to the bathroom. Tip-toeing to the doorway she saw him standing before the mirror staring fixedly at himself and muttering, ‘She is not my wife. She is not my wife.”‘
When you fall in love with a woman, of course she is not your wife. You make love, you enjoy, but then things settle; then she is your wife. Then things become old. Then you know the face, you know the body, you know the topography, and then you get bored. The hypnotist did well. He simply suggested, While making love to your wife, you go on thinking, “She is not my wife. She is not my wife.”‘
So, Krishna Radha, while cleaning, you go on thinking you are painting. This is not cleaning. This is great creativity. And it will be. It is just your mind playing tricks. If you understand, then you bring your creativity to every act that you do.
A man of understanding is continuously creative. Not that he is trying to be creative. The way he sits is a creative act. Watch him sitting. You will find in his movement a certain quality of dance, a certain dignity.
Just the other day we were reading the story of the zen master who stood in the hole with great dignity — dead. Even his death was a creative act. He did it perfectly well; you cannot improve upon it. Even dead he was standing with dignity, with grace?
When you understand, whatsoever you do — cooking, cleaning…. Life consists of small things; just your ego goes on saying these are small things. You would like some great thing to do — a great poetry. You would like to become Shakespeare or Kalidas or Milton. It is your ego that is creating the trouble. Drop the ego and everything is creative.
I have heard:
“A housewife was so pleased with the promptness shown by the grocer’s boy that she asked him his name. ‘Shakespeare,’ replied the boy.
‘Well, that is quite a famous name.’
‘It should be. I have been delivering in this neighbourhood for almost three years now.”‘
I like it. Why bother about being Shakespeare? Three years delivering in a neighbourhood — it’s almost as beautiful as writing a book, a novel, a play.
Life consists of small things. They become great if you love. Then everything is tremendously great. If you don’t love, then your ego goes on saying, ‘This is not worthy of you. Cleaning? Krishna Radha, this is not worthy of you. Do something great — become Joan of Arc.’ All nonsense. All Joan of Arcs are nonsense.
Cleaning is great. Don’t go on an ego-trip. Whenever the ego comes and persuades you towards some great things, immediately become aware and drop the ego, and then by and by you will find the trivia is sacred. Nothing is profane; everything is sacred and holy. And unless everything becomes holy to you, your life cannot be religious.
A holy man is not what you call a saint. A saint may be just on an ego-trip. And also he will look a saint to you because you think he has done great deeds. A holy man is an ordinary man who loves ordinary life. Chopping wood, carrying water from the well, cooking — whatsoever he touches becomes holy. Not that he is doing great things, but whatsoever he does, he does it greatly.
The greatness is not in the thing done. The greatness is in the consciousness that you bring while you do it. Try. Touch a pebble with great love; it becomes a kohinoor, a great diamond. Smile, and suddenly you are a king or a queen. Laugh, delight…. Each moment of your life has to be transformed by your meditative love.
When I say be creative, I don’t mean that you should all go and become great painters and great poets. I simply mean let your life be a painting, let your life be a poetry.
Always remember it, otherwise the ego is going to land you in some trouble. Go to the criminals and ask why they have become criminals: because they could not find any great thing to do. They could not become a president of a country — of course, all persons cannot become presidents of a country — so they killed a president; that is easier. They became as famous as the president. They were in all the newspapers with their pictures on the front page.
A man, just a few months ago, killed seven persons, and he was asked why — because those seven persons were totally unrelated to him. He wanted to become great, he said, and no newspaper was ready to publish his poems, his articles; they were refused from everywhere. Nobody was ready to publish his picture, and life was fleeting, so he killed seven persons. They were not related to him, he was not angry with them; he just wanted to become famous.
Your politicians and your criminals are not different types of people. All criminals are political and all politicians are criminal — not only Richard Nixon. Poor Richard Nixon was caught redhanded, that’s all. Others seem to be more clever and more cunning.
“Mrs. Moskowitz was bursting with pride. ‘Did you hear about my son Louie?’ she asked her neighbour.
‘No. What is with your son Louie?’
‘He is going to a psychiatrist. Twice each week he is going to a psychiatrist.’
‘Is that good?’
‘Of course it is good. Forty dollars an hour he pays. Forty dollars! — and all he talks about is me,’ said the mother. ” The mother is feeling very happy.
Never allow yourself this tendency for being great, famous, someone bigger than life-size — never. Life-size is perfect. To be exactly life-size, to be just ordinary, is perfectly as it should be. But live that ordinariness in an extraordinary way. That is what a nirvanic consciousness is all about.
Now let me tell you the last thing. If nirvana becomes a great goal for you to achieve, then you will be in a nightmare. Then nirvana can become the last and the greatest nightmare. But if nirvana is in small things, the way you live them, the way you transform every small activity into a holy act, in a prayer, your house becomes a temple, your body becomes the abode of god, and wherever you look and whatsoever you touch, is tremendously beautiful, sacred; then nirvana is freedom.
Nirvana is to live the ordinary life so alert, so full of consciousness, so full of light, that everything becomes luminous. It is possible. I say so because I have lived it so, I am living it so. When I say it, I say with authority. When I say it, I am not quoting Buddha or Jesus. When I say it, I am quoting only myself.
It has become possible for me; it can become possible for you. Just don’t hanker for the ego. Just love life, trust life, and life will give you all that you need. Life will become a blessing for you, a benediction.
Source – Osho Book “Nirvana: The Last Nightmare”
Even Osho agrees