The relaxed approach towards life is not to be worried about why I am here, who I am, and for what. If you can drop these “What, Why, Who”…these three are the Christian God, Holy Ghost and Jesus Christ. They are haunting you. They have haunted the whole humanity’s past. All your philosophies and all your theologies are born out of these three.

I am not a philosopher. Neither am I a theologian nor am I interested in any kind of stupid mind gymnastics. I simply want you to know I am here, you are here. There is no reason why we are here and there is no purpose, and this is the beauty of existence. Now you can laugh and nobody can ask why you are laughing. You can dance and nobody has the right to ask why you are dancing.

I am reminded of Pablo Picasso; he was painting a beautiful flower growing by the side of a rose bush and a man was watching very intensely, knowing perfectly well that Pablo Picasso is not an ordinary man. But he could not contain his curiosity and finally he asked Picasso, “Forgive me; I should not interfere, but I am helpless. I can’t understand what you are painting and why you are painting – what is the purpose of it?”

Picasso looked at him and said, “Do you think I know?”

The man was even more surprised. He said, “If you don’t know, then why are you doing it?”

Picasso said, “Knowing has nothing to do with doing. Look at the rose bush – nobody asks these flowers, ‘Why are you here? What is the purpose?’ And if you were not here, nobody would have felt your absence. Nobody asks the trees, nobody asks the clouds, and yet all the idiots are after me. Wherever I go they start asking me, ‘What is it?’ If the whole existence has no answer, from where can a poor Pablo Picasso find the answer?”

It looks absurd. But it looks absurd because we are looking for the meaning.

The moment you drop the whole process of asking the meaning of things, everything is perfectly beautiful in its absolute absurdity.

A very rich woman asked Pablo Picasso, “I have never seen a portrait made by you and I am ready to pay any amount you ask. I want my portrait to be painted by you.”

Picasso said, “I have not painted portraits because then I will have to answer so many questions for which I don’t have any answer. If you promise me that you won’t ask any question after the portrait is made, and simply give me the check, then I can do a portrait for you. This will be my first and last portrait.”

The woman was very proud, having the only portrait by Pablo Picasso in the whole world. She was ready to pay any amount and she said, “You need not be worried about the check; I will give it to you in advance and I promise not to ask any question.” Ten million dollars, and the woman gave him the check immediately.