Love does not force anybody to follow: love wants to make you free, love wants to give you freedom.
In fact, the person who is forcing you to follow him may be on an ego trip himself, may be trying to dominate you, may be trying to destroy you, may be trying to cripple you.
No, people who have known don't destroy you. They help you to be yourself, they don't force you to follow them. They only want you to understand them. That's enough. Understanding is more than enough. Nothing else is needed.
Imitation is a substitute for understanding, and a very poor substitute. If understanding is there, there is no question of imitating or of following: you will follow understanding. Keep this very clear: if you follow your understanding, you will be following me.
By and by you will see that your path and my path are running parallel. By and by you will see that you are following me if you follow your understanding. If you follow me and forget your understanding sooner or later you will see that I am gone and you are left in darkness. The real way to follow me is not to follow me but to follow your understanding — then even when I am gone you will be following me.
Be thankful, be grateful, but there is no need to follow them or imitate them.
Gratefulness is a totally different thing. Thankfulness is a totally different thing than following a person. Gratitude is needed, it is good to be grateful, it will help you to flower.
Gratitude never cripples anybody, but if just because of gratitude you think that you have to follow, then already you have destroyed gratitude, already you have destroyed the freedom, the flowering that gratitude gives to you, already you have started to pay.
If you think by following, you are paying a debt, then you are not grateful, you are bargaining.
One day suddenly you will see that you have paid enough. Or you may even get annoyed that you have paid more than enough.
And if you are paying your Master in any way trying to pay the debt — then you don't love your Master, because these things cannot be returned back, there is no way. You can pay everybody else back but you can never pay your Master back — because it is not a bargain, it is not a commodity.
He gives you out of his fullness, he gives you because he has too much and he does not know what to do with it, he gives you because he has to give — in fact, he is grateful to you that you accept it, he is grateful to you that you didn't reject his gift. You could have rejected it. It is such a deep exchange that the Master is grateful to the disciple that the disciple accepted his gift, and the disciple is grateful to the Master that he thought him worthy. But there is no returning, you cannot pay it back. That would be almost profane, a sacrilege.
Be grateful, be thankful forever and ever, but don't try to make it a duty — that because you are grateful you have to follow — otherwise sooner or later you will get very angry. If you are grateful towards me because you have to be, then sooner or later you will be angry also.
Duty is not a good word, it is a four-letter dirty word. Love is religious; duty is social. Love is spiritual; duty is moral. Love is of the transcendental; duty is legal. You serve your mother because you say,'This is my duty.' Better not serve her, leave her and let her die, but don't call it duty, it is ugly. If it is love, from where does this word 'duty' come in? Duty is something forced upon you; reluctantly you have to do it, it is a social obligation, a commitment.
It is because she is your mother that you have to do it — not because of love. If you love her then you serve her, but then service has a fragrance. You are not burdened, deep down you are not thinking about when she is going to die, deep down you are not planning that when she dies you will be finished with this burden. You are flowing, flowing while you are serving her; you are enjoying it, it is a delight that your mother is still alive. When your wife is just your wife and not your beloved, then it is a duty, but when you love your wife, then it is different.
We don't love each other, we have forgotten the language of love.
Feel thankful, feel loving, deep in gratitude, but go on your way. Try to create more awareness and understanding and intelligence. Radiate with intelligence to express your gratitude — there is no other way.
OSHO