"Perhaps they also don't know what they are doing. Perhaps they think they are doing everything for your good. I don't suspect their intentions, but I certainly want you to be aware that they are ignorant, they are unconscious people.

"A small child is born into the hands of an unconscious society. And the unconscious society starts molding the child according to its own ideals, forgetting the one thing which is the most fundamental: that the child has a potential of his own. He has to grow, not into a Jesus or into a Krishna or into a Buddha. He has to grow to be himself.

"If he misses growing into being himself he will remain utterly miserable his whole life. His life will become just a hell and a curse, and he will not know what has gone wrong. He has been put in the wrong direction from the very beginning.

"And he thinks the people who have put him in the wrong direction love him, are his benefactors. Actually they are his greatest enemies. The parents, the teachers, the priests and the leaders of the society are the greatest enemies of every individual who has been born on the earth up to now. Without being aware, they are distracting you from yourself.

"And to distract you, you have to be absolutely conditioned about one thing: that you are unworthy, undeserving, of no use at all as you are. Of course, you can become worthy of respect, dignity, if you follow the rules and regulations given to you by others. If you are able to manage to be a hypocrite you will be a prestigious citizen of the society.

"But if you insist on being sincere, honest, authentic, yourself, you will be condemned by everybody. And it needs tremendous courage to be condemned by everybody. It needs a man with a steel spine to stand on his own and declare: 'I am not going to be anybody else but myself. Good or bad, acceptable or not acceptable, prestigious or not prestigious, one thing is certain – that I can be only myself and nobody else.'

"This needs a tremendously revolutionary approach towards life. This is the basic revolt that each individual needs if he wants ever to be out of the vicious circle of misery."