Seeker : Professional people like me make too much use of our intelligence, so much so that we tend to view life through the intellect only… This tends to make life boring and dull and robs it of its lustre.
Osho: The real problem is not the use of too much intelligence but the non-use of emotion. Emotion is completely disregarded in our civilization, so the balance is lost and a lopsided personality develops.
Emotion and intellect are like two wings: when we use only one wing, the outcome will be frustration. Then the bliss that comes from using both wings simultaneously, in balance and harmony, is never attained.
Do not be afraid of using the intellect too much. Only when intelligence is used do you touch the depths; only there is your potential stimulated. Intellectual work does not mean that your intelligence is being used. Intellectual work is merely superficial; no depth is touched, nothing is challenged. That gives rise to boredom; it creates work that is without enjoyment. Enjoyment always comes when your individuality is challenged and you have to prove yourself and respond to the challenge. When challenged, intelligence or emotion both create their own bliss.
Aperson is schizophrenic if only one part of his personality is working and the other is dead. Then even the part that is working will not work really well because it will be overworked. Personality is a totality; it has no division at all. Actually, the whole personality is aflowing energy. When energy is used in a logical way it becomes intelligence, and when it is not used logically but emotionally, it becomes the heart. These are two separate things; it is the same energy flowing through two different channels.
When there is no heart but only intellect, you can never relax. Relaxation means that now the same energy within you is working in a different channel.
A person who follows an intellectual pursuit continuously, never relaxes. He does not divert his energy to another dimension, so his mind goes on working in only one direction, unnecessarily. That creates boredom. But the mind, or the intellect, is not at fault. Because an alternative dimension has not been provided, because there is no other door open to it, the energy keepscircling round and round inside you.
Energy can never be stagnant. Energy means that… which is always flowing. But even though the room may be different, if it is not the very opposite of the room you were in before, the mind will not relax. For example, if you work on a scientific problem, then you can relax by reading a novel. The work is different: to deal with a scientific problem is to be active – a very masculine mode – whereas to read a novel is to be passive, which is an absolutely feminine mode. Even though you are using the same mind, you will be relaxed, because it is the opposite pole of the mind which is being used.
The two poles must be in balance, only then is an integrated and individuated human being born.
Abridged from The Great Challenge, Talk #5, courtesy: Osho International Foundation, www. osho. com
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