Focus on fire
rising through your form
from the toes up
until the body burns to ashes
but not you.

Meditate on the make-believe world as burning to ashes and become being above human,

As subjectively,
letters flow into words and words into sentences,
and as, objectively,
circles flow into worlds and worlds into principles,
find at last these converging in our being.

All the enlightened ones, all the religions, agree on one thing only. Their disagreements are many, but there is one agreement amongst all, and that is that man, because of his ego, is closed to the reality. The ego is the only barrier; the feeling that I am.

On this point Buddhas and Christs and Krishnas all agree. And because they all agree it seems to me that this is the basic thing in all religious endeavor. All else is accidental; this is essential – that you are debarred because of your own ego.

What is this ego? Of what does it consist? How does it arise? And why does it become so important?

Look at your mind – because you cannot understand the phenomenon of ego theoretically; you can only understand it existentially. Look at your mind, observe it, and you will come to a deep understanding. And if you can understand what the go is, there is no problem; it can be dropped easily. Rather, there is no need to drop it. If you can understand it, the very understanding becomes the dropping, because the ego is created through your non-understanding, it is created through your sleepiness.

If you become alert about it, if you focus your consciousness towards it, it disappears. It disappears – just as when you bring light in a room and the darkness disappears. Even if you bring light to look at darkness, to see what darkness is…if you bring light it disappears. The ego exists because you have never been alert to your existence; it is a shadow of your non-alertness. So really, there is no need to drop it. If you can look at it, it drops by itself.

What is it? Have you ever felt any moment when there is no ego? Whenever you are silent, the ego is not. Whenever your mind is in turmoil, chattering, restless, the ego is there. Whenever you are relaxed, silent and calm, the ego is not. Just now, if you are silent, where is the ego? You will be there, but no feeling of “I.” So try to understand it existentially.