That is the meaning of one of the most beautiful words – which has been contaminated by religions. That word is sin; its root meaning is forgetfulness. If forgetfulness is the sin, then awareness is the only virtue.

You are asking, “There arises great darkness in me and I wish to trade in this intolerable Agama and start afresh, so that somehow I would not grow with my personality so inseparably glued to myself. I remember there was once innocence and I had a sense of myself. Try as I might, I can’t recover it, can’t separate off the witness, can’t trust in my seeing. So long ago I took a shortcut and now I can’t remember where I left the honesty and the innocence and the love, for the false, the trying, the stupid. How can I find my way back?”

Just by being awake! Shake yourself, slap yourself – but wake up. Jump out of the bed – but wake up.

Your suffering is a dream, your darkness is a dream, your going astray is a dream. That’s the meaning of the word maya. Man lives in illusion. The way out of illusion does not exist, because the way out of illusion will be another illusion.

You have simply to wake up.

There is no way, no bridge.

One state is of unawareness, another is of awareness. And from unawareness to awareness the distance is nil…just a little effort, a little jogging.

A man walks into a bar and orders a glass of beer, which he swallows down in one gulp. Immediately he orders another, and again swallows it down in one gulp. Still thirsty, he orders a third and a fourth. By this time he needs the bathroom. The bartender tells him, “down the corridor and first on your right.” The man stumbles down the corridor, misses the turn, goes through another door and falls straight into the swimming pool. When he finally comes to the surface, he yells out to the surprised attendant, “Wait, for God’s sake don’t flush!”

Agama, you are where you have always been; you have not moved even an inch away from your innocence, or your being, or your sincerity. It is not possible in the very nature of things to go away from oneself, just as you cannot run away from your shadow. The faster you run, the shadow runs faster; the slower you go the shadow goes slower. But you cannot run away from it.

If this is the case with your shadow, what about your innermost being? How can you go away from it? Wherever you are, it will be in the innermost shrine of your consciousness – always intact, uncorrupted.

So all that is needed is to sit silently, to close your eyes and to look into yourself. You will find again the same space, that you remembered with such great passion, with such great love. It is still there. And the same is the case with everybody else.