in agony and in hell.

The mind is the hell.

Be aware suddenly of this

and then there is a new opening:

the opening of the present,

the opening of that-which-is.

The present is the only existence

or, it is the existence.

Be in it and you are liberated.

Live in it and there is bliss.

274. Love.

No ideology can help to create a new world

or a new mind

or a new human being,

because ideological orientation itself

is the root cause of all the conflicts and all the miseries.

Thought creates boundaries,

thought creates divisions

and thought creates prejudices.

Thought itself cannot bridge them;

that is why all ideologies fail.

Now man must learn to live without ideologies:

religious, political or otherwise.

When the mind is not tethered to any ideology

it is free to move to new understandings.

And in that freedom flowers all that is good

and all that is beautiful.

275. Love.

A disciple of Rinzai met a party

of three men on a bridge.

One of the three asked him: How deep is the river of meditation?

Find out for yourself, he said,

and offered to throw the questioner from the bridge.

But unfortunately the man ran away from him in time

and escaped.

If you meet such a man, who can throw you in the river,

be fortunate enough to be thrown!

And you have met such a man!

Now be thrown.

276. Love.

You possess only that which will not be lost in death.

All else is illusion –

even the possessor,

because that too will not be able to stand the final shipwreck.

Then find out what is left.

Turn in and meditate.

Discard all that is vulnerable to death.

Say: Not this, not that,

and go deep to the point where nothing more remains to be discarded

– and the illumination.

277. Love.

Nothing great is ever accomplished without going mad,

that is, without breaking through

the ordinary level of consciousness

and letting loose the hidden powers lying further below,

and also penetrating to the realm that is further above.

And it may not be true for any other great thing,

but it is absolutely true as far as meditation is concerned.

Meditation means madness –

of course, with a method!

278. Love.

Detach yourself from all fixed ideas:

they are the killers of all aliveness and innocence –

which are musts for illumination.

Beware of the trap of preconceptions;

they make a stagnant pool of your consciousness,

and to meet the ocean you need a dynamic one.

Be alive and fluid and flowing –

then the goal is not far off.

279. Love.

Meditation is the disciplined opening of the self to God.

Because of fear we are closed, and only love

can become a door.

So love more –

or rather be loving, then there is less fear and less tension,

and you are more open.

This helps meditation as nothing else.

Meditation plus love is the path.

280. Love.

Truth is never secondhand,

it cannot be transferred.

One has to know it and be it oneself.

That is why all tradition falsifies it,

and all scriptures,

and all words,

and in the end it is nothing

but the soup of Mulla Nasruddin…

But first I must tell you the story.

A relative from the country

came to see Nasruddin and brought a duck.

Nasruddin was grateful,

had the bird cooked, and shared it with the guest.

Presently another visitor arrived.

I am a friend, he said, of the man who gave you the duck.

Nasruddin fed him as well.

This happened several times.

Nasruddin's house had become like a restaurant