"Are you not tired enough with the mind? Then retire! Has not the mind done enough? Has the mind not created enough chaos in you? Why are you clinging to it? What hope, what promise, makes you cling to it? It has been deceiving you continuously. It said, ‘There – that goal, in that possession, in that house, in that car, in that woman, in those riches – is everything.’ And you moved, and when you reached, nothing came into your hands except frustration. Every expectation led you to frustration. Every desire became in the end a sorry affair, a sadness resulted.

"And this mind has been promising you and promising you – no promise has been fulfilled, but you never say to the mind, "You deceiver, stop! You are afraid of saying that.

"Once it happened…
Mulla Nasruddin came out of the village tavern, and the new priest saw him – he was passing by on the road. The new priest said, ‘Nasruddin, you are a religious man. What do I see? You are coming out of such a place? My son, drink is of the Devil. And when the Devil invites you again, refuse. Why don’t you refuse?’

"Nasruddin said, ‘Reverend, I would like to refuse, but the Devil may get sore and may not invite me again.’

"That’s the problem. You would like to refuse this mind; this mind has never fulfilled anything, but you are afraid – the mind may get sore, will not promise you again. Then…? You cannot live without promises, you cannot live without hope – this is the mechanism.

"Unless you are ready to live without hope, you cannot become religious. Even your so-called religions are nothing but hopes created by the mind. Are you ready to live without hope? Are you ready to live without the future? Then simply there is no need to retire; the mind retires itself. Then there is no clinging with the mind. But you are afraid – the mind may get sore. And the mind is the Devil and may not offer again, then what will you do?

"People come to me, they think their search is religious – their search is still mental. They are still moving in the dark valleys of the mind, they are still listening to the mind, they are hoping. They have hoped through money, and they have failed; they have hoped through sex, they have failed. They have hoped in many, many ways, and they have failed. Now they hope through meditation, now they hope through a master, but the hoping is there. And remember well: if you hope through me, you will miss me. I cannot fulfill your hopes.

"Why not leave hoping? Why do you hope? What is the basis of it? Discontent becomes hope; this is the disguise – because here and now you are so much in discontent, so much in misery, that you need some hope in the future. That hope will help you to move. You can somehow tolerate the present; through hoping, you can tolerate the present; hope is anesthesia. The present is miserable, painful; hope is alcoholic, it is a drug, it makes you unconscious enough so you can tolerate the present.

"Hope means here and now there is discontent. But have you ever looked at the whole phenomenon? Why are you discontented here and now in the first place? Why? – Because you hoped in the past, that’s why here and now you are in discontent. This today was tomorrow yesterday. Yesterday you hoped for today because it was tomorrow then. Now that hope is not fulfilled, so you are in misery, frustrated. And to hide this misery, to somehow pass today, you are again hoping for the tomorrow.

"You are in a rut, and in such a rut that it will be very difficult to come out of it. Tomorrow the same will happen: you will be frustrated because mind can promise but can never fulfill. Otherwise, there was no need for meditation; then Buddha was a fool meditating.

"If mind can fulfill, then all meditators are foolish, then all enlightened persons are fools because mind cannot fulfill. When they come to understand the whole mechanism and the whole misery of it… This is the mechanism: yesterday mind promised you that something is going to be delivered to you tomorrow. Now the tomorrow has come, it is today, and the mind has not delivered. You are in misery, your expectations are frustrated. Now the mind says, ‘Tomorrow I am going to deliver. The mind again promises. And what type of stupidity is this that you again listen to the mind? And tomorrow the same mechanism will be repeated – it is a vicious circle.

"You listen to the mind, you become miserable, otherwise, this today is paradise! And there is no other paradise, this today is nirvana. If you had not listened to the mind… Just don’t listen to the mind, then you are not in misery because misery cannot exist without expectations and without hopes. And when misery exists you need more hopes for it, to hide it, to live somehow. Live hopelessly – then you are a religious man, then you are retired." Osho