Art is older than production for use, and play older than work. Man was shaped less by what he had to do than by what he did in playful moments. It is the child in man that is the source of all his uniqueness and creativeness, and the playground is the optimal milieu for the unfolding of his capacities and talents. Wherever man becomes more of a utilitarian he loses the capacity to explore. Wherever man starts condemning things of luxury he becomes dull, stupid.
You will see it in the East: people have become dull, people have lost all joy of invention — because all luxury has been condemned; it is a sin to seek comfort. But if you are not seeking comfort then there is no point in exploring, if you are not seeking luxury then all search stops. Then all that you need is a shelter, food, clothes — but there you are finished.
And when you don't explore you don't become rich, when you don't explore you stop growing. In the East it has happened, it has happened terribly: because the so-called priests and religious people condemned all luxuries, man became uninventive. The East is poor because of the saints — because people are bound to remain poor if they don't explore. If people are satisfied with just whatsoever is the case they become more and more poor every day, because every day more and more people are born and the place becomes more and more crowded. And they cannot find any way out of it; they take it for granted as their fate.
Man is a luxury-loving animal. Take away play, fancies and luxuries, and you will turn man into a dull sluggish creature, barely energetic enough to obtain bare subsistence. A society becomes stagnant when the people are too rational or too serious to be tempted by baubles.
When I say playfulness is the source of all discoveries, I mean it. The greatest calamity that can happen to a man is that he becomes too serious and too practical. A little bit of craziness, a little bit of eccentricity, is all for the good.
OSHO
