Послание Plovdiv, Bulgaria 19 June 2019

On Buddha’s handkerchief

Once Buddha came to his teaching session with a handkerchief and the students were so surprised because handkerchief is for fashionable people while for him it was a luxury. He surprised them even more by rolling the handkerchief and making five knots one after the other.

Buddha said “It is the same handkerchief and yet not the same. That handkerchief could be used while this cannot be used. There are so many knots. The connection of our body to life is like a plain handkerchief and is really worthwhile. But with the various knots of mind, the separated psyche, the whole thing becomes useless. And this is something that nobody understands; people remain amused with knots. They forget the basic thing which is a beautiful

handkerchief, which can be compared to the living quality of life. These knots are total sacrilege, total sabotage of the living quality of life, which is the joy of life.”

Then, he further said “Now I want to remove these knots.” He started pulling the handkerchief from both sides making a lot of effort.

Then the disciples said “What are you doing, are you mad? You are pulling the knots and they will become tighter.”

Buddha said “Exactly. People make efforts to be free from their mental problems, all their ache, the agony and anxiety, all their content of consciousness. And all their efforts are only tightening the knots.” And the disciples were stunned, tears were rolling.

And people do make efforts; the whole spiritual market is about that, giving techniques for self improvement which actually is the improvement of selfishness.

Then Buddha asked his disciples “What do you suggest to do to untie the knots?” One of them said “You have to go into the knot to find out how the knot has been created, what are the

complications in each knot, carefully consider what is.” Buddha said “That is the beginning.”

This is Sankhya, Swadhyay, looking at the knots. Without looking at the knot, without understanding the knot, and analysing it, one cannot unknot the handkerchief. However, when it comes to the human mind, it is different and understanding is enough because analysis is not

possible. With the knot you can analyse because there is a dichotomy between the knot and your body, but in the inner world it is much more difficult because that ‘un-knotter’ is the

same knot which is now masquerading as the ‘un-knotter’. The analyser is the analysed, there is no dichotomy and therefore any analysis is paralysis. And nobody understands this.

Jai Plovdiv (Historians have discovered that Plovdiv and Varanasi of India are among the 10 oldest continuously inhabited cities in the world)