Because desire means desire for more; how can you quench it? By the time
you have arrived, it asks for more. You wanted ten thousand rupees; by
the time you have ten thousand, the desire has moved ahead of you - it
is asking for one hundred thousand. By the time you achieve that, the
desire has moved. It always moves ahead of you; the distance between you
and your desire always remains the same.
The distance between a beggar and his desire, and the distance
between Alexander the Great and his desire is the same. Both are poor in
the same way. Alexander may have much that does not make much
difference — he is not satisfied with what he has.
It is said that Diogenes once said to Alexander the Great, “Have you
ever thought about one thing? — meditate over it: you want to conquer
the whole world, but are you aware that once you have conquered the
whole world, then what? There is no other world. Then what will you do?”
Diogenes And Alexander
And it is said, just by
Diogenes saying it, Alexander became very sad, and he said, “Please
don’t mention such sad things — let me first conquer the whole world,
then we will see. But don’t talk about such sad things to me; it makes
me feel very sad.”
He had not conquered the whole world yet, but the very idea that if
you conquer the whole world, then what are you going to do? There is no
other world, and you will feel stuck. The mind will ask for more.
The mind lives through more, and the more cannot be fulfilled; that
is impossible. Every desire ends in frustration, because every
expectation is the beginning of frustration. Why does every desire end
in frustration? There are only two alternatives: either you achieve your
object of desire or you don’t achieve it, but in both cases, it will
end in tears. If you achieve it, you will see the utter futility of it
all.
The rich man sees the futility of his riches - how much he has
laboured, and how much he has worked for it! And now, whatsoever he has
attained is absolutely useless, it fulfils nothing. You can have several
houses, but you are the same person, as empty as before. You can live
in a palace, but how can you change your inner meaninglessness?
Make Life Meaningful
In fact, you will be more
meaningless in a palace, because while you are in a hut you can still
hope that one day when you have managed to get into a palace, everything
will be okay. You can hope, but the man who is in the palace, has no
hope, he feels utterly hopeless. And he cannot say it to others either,
because that will be stupid of him.
Just think of Alexander the Great; he devoted his whole life to
conquering the world. And when he had conquered it, if he had said to
the world, ‘It was useless. I wasted my time and my life’, people would
have laughed at him. Could he not see it before?
You go on following others, although you see them living in misery.
You go on following the powerful, the rich, the wealthy, although you
see their faces are sad, their eyes are dull. They don’t seem to be
intelligent either; they don’t have any grace, any joy, any beauty.
If you succeed, you will be in pain, because your success will bring
the truth home: that your whole life has been sacrificed for nothing.
If you fail, you will be frustrated, because you will see that you have
failed, you are not worthy. You will become self-condemnatory.
And no desire simply ends; before it ends, it gives birth to other
desires. So it remains a continuum: one goes on from one desire to
another desire, life after life.
Witness And Watch
Either you will be consumed by
your desires or you have to consume your desires. And consuming means:
witness, watch... The intelligent person lives joyfully, contentedly,
whatsoever situation he is in, whatsoever he has got.