I FEEL A STRONG URGE TO CREATE SOMETHING IN MY LIFE. I WRITE SONGS AND WOULD LIKE TO SING THEM. THEY EXPRESS MY FEELINGS AND MAYBE BECAUSE I FEEL YOU INSIDE ME, THEY ALSO EXPRESS A LITTLE BIT OF YOU. CAN YOU PLEASE SAY SOMETHING ABOUT THE DIVIDING LINE BETWEEN EXPRESSING NEUROSES AND THE CREATION OF SOMETHING OF BEAUTY? IS IT GOOD FOR ME TO GO ON THIS TRIP?
The urge to create anything is the first ray of light in the dark night of your soul. The urge to create is the urge to participate in the work of God.
There is no God as a person, but there is tremendous creativity going all over the place. God is not a creator to me, God is all this creativity — and whenever you feel some urge to create, it is an urge to meet God. It is an urge to be a small God in your own right. Only by creating something, you can feel fulfilled.
You write songs — it is beautiful. You want to sing. For whose permission are you waiting? — sing and sing madly! But remember only one thing, creativity has two possibilities. One is that it arises out of your silence, love, understanding, your clarity of vision, your intimate friendliness with existence — then creativity is healthy. But if it does not arise out of meditation, out of silence and peace and understanding and love, then there is a danger. It may be arising out of your confused mind. It may be arising out of your insanity.
Anything that comes out of your tense mind, helps you anyway. It gives a relief. Something that was going round and round inside you — you have released it, but it will torture somebody else. It may torture many… because the song that was imprisoned within you was a personal matter; you have made it public.
And if the song has come out of some kind of madness, some kind of confusion, you will certainly feel good, but at a cost which is too big. Millions of people for thousands of years can be affected by it. You are relieved but you have not behaved responsibly. You have not behaved sanely, you have not behaved humanely. Your songs, your paintings, your dance will have all the qualities of your mind, from which they came.
Look at the paintings of Picasso. That poor fellow does not need worldwide recognition as a painter, as a creator — he needs psychiatric treatment. His paintings are like vomitings, he's sick. He is a genius; he has great insight into color. But he is not at ease. He is not feeling joyful. He's not feeling life as a gift. His paintings show his rejection of life. His paintings show his utter frustration, despair, anguish, confusion — you cannot figure out what the painting is all about. But because he is a genius, even though his creativity is not that of a Gautam Buddha, he has a great artistic, aesthetic sensibility.
He has everything except a little meditation. Instead of a little meditation, there is a little madness.
Almost all the great painters of the contemporary world have been, one or two times at least, sent into psychiatric hospitals, and they lived — all of them — one year, two years, three years in madhouses. Great poets have been in madhouses. Great dancers, like Nijinksy, have been in madhouses.
It is strange that the West is not yet aware that something is wrong.
Why do your scientists, your artists, your painters, your singers, your poets, your dancers — all creative geniuses — fall victim to madness? This has never happened in the East. And it is not that we have not created — we have created more than any other country in the world. But there has not been a single instance of a great artist, a great novelist, a great poet, a great mystic going mad. This is absolutely unknown in the East.
On the contrary, you will be surprised that in the Far East, particularly in Japan, mad people are brought into the Zen monasteries to be treated. They are given a beautiful place, a small cottage by the side of a pond, with swans in the pond, birds, flowers, trees, rocks, rock gardens — which is especially Japanese. Nobody has ever thought that rocks can make a garden. People throw away rocks to create a garden. In Japan, they collect rocks to create a garden! Unless you can create a garden out of rocks, what kind of an artist are you?
They put the madman in the most comfortable place. If he's a painter, they give him all facilities to paint… but he's not allowed to talk to anybody, he is not allowed to show his paintings to anybody. There is a fireplace — after painting, he has to put it into the fireplace. For three weeks he has to remain silent, and the master in the Zen monastery goes every day to look at his paintings — whether the paintings are changing, whether they are becoming more and more sane. The day he sees that a painting is perfectly sane, the man is released.
They have used paintings to release his madness, but the paintings have all gone into the fireplace. They are not to go to the public — you are mad and you would be spreading your madness.
Before you start making your songs and singing and dancing, create the right consciousness, the right awareness, so whatever comes out of you is a blessing for humanity, not a curse. That is the criterion. Unless it can be a blessing, throw it into a fireplace. You are released, but don't burden somebody else.
Life is an interconnected whole. Everything is interconnected. If you want to sing, just look into yourself — why? If you want to dance, just watch within yourself — from where is the urge coming and why?
I am not preventing you. You can dance, you can sing, you can do whatever you want, but remember not to interfere in anybody's life — even with a song, even with a dance.
Life is very delicate and very fragile.
A small thing can become a great disturbance.
My suggestion is, your urge is beautiful. Just now, what you need is a little more silence, a little more peace, a little more relaxation, a little more no-mind, so that you can become just a hollow bamboo. And the song that wants to come out of you can come, and the dance can come, but they are not your creations. Your mind has not contributed anything to them, they are coming from the beyond.
You have put the mind aside.
Meditation simply means putting the mind aside, opening the door to your consciousness, an immediate relatedness to existence.
Out of this, let the songs come, let the dances happen. They will be blessings to you and they will be blessings to the whole world. Share them.
But share only when it has come out of silence, out of health, out of an integrated being.
OSHO