When the Shoe Fits - Oshorajneesh.com

CHAPTER 7. AUTUMN FLOODS
– vast. Life has a source to it, death has no source. Life has banks to it, sometimes flooded – then
it looks vast; sometimes not flooded – then it becomes a tiny stream. But death has no banks to it,
it is oceanic.
And just like every river has to come to the ocean, so every river of consciousness has to come
to death. Wherever you are going, whatsoever path you choose, whichever direction, it makes no
difference – you will reach the ocean. The Ocean surrounds you in all directions. You will reach
death, and near death all your dreams will be shattered – the whole ego will be shaken.
SO DOWNSTREAM HE SWUNG, UNTIL HE CAME TO THE OCEAN. THERE HE LOOKED OUT
OVER THE WAVES TOWARD THE EMPTY HORIZON IN THE EAST, AND HIS FACE FELL.
That is how old men become sad. Their faces fall, happiness disappears, the zest, the enthusiasm,
the dream, everything simply dies. They look and see nothing but a soulless ocean in which they
are going to be merged and dissolved – they will be no more. Every river falling into the ocean feels
the same. And every river, it is said, looks back to the days when she was something; looks back
before she falls into the ocean, remembers the past, the floods, the autumn, the days when she was
somebody. But you cannot go back. There is no possibility of going back in time. One has always
to move further and further; and every river has to fall. It falls crying. Go to the ocean and sit near a
river falling into the ocean – you will feel such sadness in the river.
Every old man, all old persons start looking backwards. Old people always go into memories, the
days when they were something, somebody, the days when they were loved and respected and
honoured. They go on again and again. Just listen to old men and you feel they are very boring.
Why do you feel they are boring? Why do you feel irritated? Because they go on repeating the same
story of the old days. Always they start in the good old days. Why the good? Why aren’t the days
good now? No old man can believe that the days are good now – they were always in the past, the
golden past, the good old days when things were like this and that. This is not a question of things,
or economic situations or political situations – nothing. They were young and everything was good.
They were flooded. It happened that a chief justice of the Supreme Court of the United States went
to visit Paris after he was retired. He had been once before, thirty years before. His old wife was
also with him. Looking at Paris for two or three days, he became very sad and he said: We were
waiting for this, to come and see Paris, but nothing looks like it was before. The wife laughed and
said: Everything is as it was before, only we are not young. Paris remains the same.
But now other rivers are in autumn flood. Your summertime has come, and when you are old
how can Paris be the same as when you were young? Paris is the symbolic city of young people
indulging. There are cities in different seasons: Varanasi is the city of the old people, Paris is the
city of the young people. Paris indulges, Varanasi renounces. In India when people want to die, they
go to Varanasi to live there and to die there – it is the city of the old, the summertime. When you
become old, the whole world seems to be old and dying. But the world remains the same, only you
go on changing.
Look, and drop your mind, then you are neither young nor old, then there are no seasons – because
the innermost spirit has no seasons to it, no autumn, no summer, nothing. It remains the same, it is
eternal. Otherwise, whenever your river comes to the ocean your face will fall, you will become sad
– sad and burdened with old memories, thinking about the past because now there is no future. A
When the Shoe Fits 100 Osho