The man who lives in the future, lives a counterfeit life. He does not really live, he only pretends to live. He hopes to live, he desires to live, but he never lives. And the tomorrow never comes, it is always today.
And whatsoever comes is always now and here, and he does not know how to live now-here; he knows only how to escape from now-here. The way to escape is called "desire," tanha — that is Buddha's word for what is an escape from the present, from the real into the unreal.
The man who desires is an escapist.
Now, this is very strange, that meditators are thought to be escapists. That is utter nonsense. Only the meditator is not an escapist — everybody else is. Meditation means getting out of desire, getting out of thoughts, getting out of mind.
Meditation means relaxing in the moment, in the present. Meditation is the only thing in the world which is not escapist, although it is thought to be the most escapist thing. People who condemn meditation always condemn it with the argument that it is escape, escaping from life. They are simply talking nonsense; they don't understand what they are saying.
Meditation is not escaping from life: it is escaping into life. Mind is escaping from life, desire is escaping from life.
HE NEVER GIVES IN TO DESIRE…. HE MEDITATES.
He brings himself again and again to the present. Again and again the mind starts functioning and he brings it back to the present. Slowly slowly, it starts happening: the window opens and for the first time you see the sky as it is. And for the first time you feel the wind and the rain and the sun, in their immediacy, because you become meditative.
You start touching life. Then life is no longer a word but a tangible reality; then love is no longer a word but an overflowing energy. Then blessing is no longer just a desire, a hope — you feel it, you have it, you are it.
HE MEDITATES…. Buddha is not for prayer, he is for meditation, because prayer is again somehow a kind of desiring. When you pray, you desire. Prayer is always for the future; prayer means you are asking for something.
You may not be asking for money, you may be asking for God himself, but it is the same. Ask, and you have moved away. Meditation is a state of nonasking, nonquestioning, nonthinking. Prayer is still part of thinking — a beautiful thinking, but thinking is thinking; a beautiful prison, but a prison is still a prison.
And the mind who prays is greedy, and the mind who prays goes through no transformation. It remains the same mind. And the prayer is born out of the same mind; it cannot have a very different quality. How can you pray for something which is different from you? — it will be your prayer.
It will reflect your mind, it will come out of your mind, it will sprout out of your mind. How can it take you beyond the mind? Prayer cannot take you beyond the mind. Only meditation can take you beyond the mind.
Meditation is a state of no-mind. Prayer is a state of religious mind, but mind is there. And when it has the beautiful garment of religiousness around it, it becomes even more dangerous.
OSHO
