Brahmacharya cannot be taught. Only meditation can be taught. Brahmacharya is the result. As meditation ripens, brahmacharya comes to fruit by itself. All effort is to be put into meditation. One who puts his effort directly into brahmacharya will sit suppressing sex in the name of brahmacharya. And brahmacharya is not happening – it is only superficial – within the being the worms of desire are crawling.
One has only to live naturally and trust, and everything comes in its time. Celibacy comes, meditation comes, God comes, in its own time. Everything comes — just as you are born and you will die, everything else also comes. But somewhere you go perverted and then natural things don’t happen. Then you remain in a kind of hung-up state.
If you really want not to be angry again don’t decide against anger. Just look into the anger and just look at the shadow of the anger which you think is non-anger. Look into sex, and at the shadow of sex, which you think is brahmacharya, celibacy. It is just negativity, absence. Look at overeating, and the shadow of it — fasting. Fasting always follows overeating; overindulgence is always followed by vows of celibacy; tension is always followed by some techniques of meditation. Look at them together, feel how they are related; they are part of one process. If you can understand this, meditation will happen to you. Really, it is not something to be done, it is a point of understanding. It is not an effort, it is nothing to be cultivated. It is something to be deeply understood. Understanding gives freedom. Knowledge of the whole mechanism of the mind is transformation. Then suddenly the clock stops, time disappears: and with the stopping of the clock, there is no mind. With the stopping of time, where are you? The boat is empty.
People who try to control themselves have chosen a very foolish way. Control will not happen, but they will become cold. That is the only way a man can control himself — to become frozen so that energy does not arise. People who take the vows of celibacy will not eat much; in fact, they will starve their bodies. If more energy is created in the body, then there will be more sex energy, and then they don’t know what to do with it. So Buddhist monks eat only once a day — and then too, not enough. They eat only enough that bodily needs are fulfilled, very minimum needs, so no energy is left. This type of celibacy is not celibacy. When you are flowing with energy and the energy starts transforming itself into love, then a celibacy, a BRAHMACHARYA, which is beautiful, happens.
Life arises out of sex, life consists of sex. You can grow your sex to such a refinement that it can become love, it can become compassion. But if you block the very energy of sex by celibacy, you have destroyed all possibilities of your growth.
Love has its own meditation. But you do not know love; you know only sex and you know the misery of wasting energy. Then you get depressed after it. Then you decide to take a vow of BRAHMACHARYA, celibacy. And this vow is taken in depression, this vow is taken in anger, this vow is taken in frustration. It is not going to help. A vow can be helpful if taken in a very relaxed, deeply meditative mood. Otherwise you are simply showing your anger, your frustration and nothing else, and you will forget the vow within twenty-four hours. The energy will have come again, and just as an old routine you will have to release it.
Celibacy is repressive — you suppress your sex energy — and that suppression never leads to transformation. But there are ways in which your godliness is revealed to you: suddenly, sex disappears. Not that it is suppressed. In that godliness the energy takes a totally different form. You become celibate, with no effort on your part; if there is effort then it is going to be a suppression.
I have come across people who think that without long fasting there is no possibility of meditation. Now, fasting has nothing to do with meditation. Fasting will only make you obsessed with food. And there are people who think celibacy will help them into meditation. Meditation brings a kind of celibacy, but not vice versa. A celibacy without meditation is nothing but sexual repression. And your mind will become more and more sexual, so whenever you sit to meditate your mind will become full of fantasies, sexual fantasies.
Buddha is not for repression. Buddha is for transformation. Repression is very easy. You can repress your sex — that’s what so.many saints are doing. You can drop out of the society, you can run away from women. You can go to the Himalayan caves and sit there, and you can think that you have attained to celibacy — but this is not celibacy. Sitting there in your Himalayan cave, you will still dream about women — even more so, because you will be so far away from women. Your fantasy will become more psychedelic and colourful. Of course, you will fight with it, but by fighting you can force the desire deep into your unconscious — you cannot uproot it. By fighting nobody is ever changed. Only by awareness is a person changed.
People who try to control themselves have chosen a very foolish way. Control will not happen, but they will become cold. That is the only way a man can control himself — to become frozen so that energy does not arise. People who take the vows of celibacy will not eat much; in fact, they will starve their bodies. If more energy is created in the body, then there will be more sex energy, and then they don’t know what to do with it. So Buddhist monks eat only once a day — and then too, not enough. They eat only enough that bodily needs are fulfilled, very minimum needs, so no energy is left. This type of celibacy is not celibacy. When you are flowing with energy and the energy starts transforming itself into love, then a celibacy, a BRAHMACHARYA, which is beautiful, happens.
Kabir says: Repression is not BRAHMACHARYA. Repressing your desires and destroying your desires is not the way of celibacy, because if you repress your desires you will remain hung-up with them. Whatsoever is repressed, you have to repress it again and again and again, and whatsoever is repressed, you have to sit on it continuously; otherwise there is fear — if you move somewhere else, it may bubble up again. Repression can never bring freedom. Repression makes you a slave. Repress anything, and that will become your master.
Remember, to translate BRAHMACHARYA as “celibacy” is not right. The word BRAHMACHARYA simply means living like a god, living with the experience of the Brahma, the absolute, living meditatively. If I am to translate BRAHMACHARYA I Will translate it as “the life of meditation”.
Celibacy comes at the fourth stage, when you have lived with the woman or with the man, and you have gone through all the pleasures and all the pains. You have suffered, you have enjoyed, and you have become ripe enough, mature enough, to see that that too is a game — a beautiful game, very engaging, but a game is a game. Then you start moving beyond it. Then sexuality disappears; then silence descends in you. You relate with people without any sexual idea behind it. Your relating with people then has a pure fragrance of love, and it comes more and more close to prayer. I am all for transcendence.
Celibacy should be brought very slowly. All that brings you again and again to sexuality has to be dropped slowly, in steps. And once you start enjoying the energy that becomes available, when you are not obsessed with sex, just that pure energy becomes a dance in you — that is called enriching. Now, your energy is not wasted. Your energy goes on showering on yourself. Remember, there are two types of celibates. One: who has simply forced celibacy upon himself — he is a wrong type, he is doing violence to himself. The other: who has tried to understand sexuality, what it is, why it is; who has watched, observed, lived through it, and, by and by, has become aware of its futility; by and by, has become aware of a deep frustration that comes after EACH sexual act.
Real awareness always leads you beyond sex, and celibacy happens on its own accord. Because to be in sex you have either to be identified with the male or identified with the female. A real celibate is one who has gone beyond, who is neither.
When you become violent, non-violence comes in. When you become non-violent, violence waits behind. They go together. All dualities go together. When sex disappears, celibacy disappears too — remember it. If you start claiming that you have become a celibate then sexuality still exists, and any day it can explode. You are sitting on a volcano. When sex has gone what is the meaning of celibacy? Then it is simply meaningless, the word is meaningless. ‘Celibacy’ can carry any meaning only in reference to sex. Buddha says: When both dualities are gone you are simply in the middle — silent, calm, pure. The Way is attained. The Way is the middle Way.
Quotes on Brahmacharya – Celibacy
