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The supreme self is the same in all men. And not only in all men but in all beings – men, animals, birds, trees, rocks. The supreme self is the center of the whole existence. It is not my self or your self, it is simply the self. It is universal, it is not personal.

And still every individual is different, every individual is unique. This is one of the most paradoxical things, but it is so.

All waves are part of the same ocean. And still each single wave taken, thought about, meditated over, is totally different from any other wave that has ever been, is, or will ever be. Both are true.

Each wave is nothing but part of the ocean, the same ocean: the ocean is the supreme self. But the wave has a form. One wave is so tidal and is trying to reach the stars; another is so small, so humble. They are different: their shape, their form, their manifestation, is different. No two waves are the same, and still the ocean behind each wave is the same.

So I don’t see that there is any difficulty in understanding this simple truth, although it is paradoxical.

The self is one. And still the selves are all different. Self with a capital S is one; selves with a lower-case s are millions. And they are all different – they are waves.

God creates out of the same stuff, but each time he paints differently, he sculpts differently.

I have heard…

An American art dealer traveling in China saw a beautiful hand-carved chair in an artisan’s shop and was enchanted with it. He asked the artisan how much he would charge to make eleven additional chairs.

“All different?” said the artisan.
“No, all exactly like this one.”

“Well,” said the artisan dubiously, “if they must all be exactly alike, I will have to charge you more for each chair.” “More!” exclaimed the American, who had hoped for a better price on a quantity order. “Why more?”

“I would become bored making them all alike,” replied the artisan. “I would be happier making each one different.”

God would have really become bored if he was to go on producing the same type of person again and again. God is not an assembly line. The production is not mass; it is always unique, whatsoever is created.

You cannot find two pebbles alike on the whole of the earth, not even two leaves alike. What to say about two human beings?

But the stuff is the same: it is the same universal consciousness out of which we are all made, sculptured, painted. It is the same, but still each one is given a different form. And the world is beautiful because each individual has a uniqueness – his own face, his own authenticity.

Yet go deeper in him, and you will find the individual disappearing. And when you have reached to his very core, there is no individual left, but only the universal.

So let me say it in this way: on the circumference we are different, at the center we are the same. The center is one, the circumference is millions. And each circumference has its own way of expression, of being.

God is a creator, not a producer. And his creativity is infinite. He never duplicates, he never imitates, he never creates carbon copies. He creates an individual only once – and that is your grandeur, your dignity, your glory.

You ask me, “If the self is the same in all men, does this mean that all men are identical?”

They are not identical.

On the circumference they are absolutely unique. At the center there is no question of identity: it is one. There are not two, so how can they be identical? At the center there is only one universal existence; there is no question of being identical with anything else – there is nothing else.

On the periphery, on the circumference, there is no question of being identical: all waves are different, no two waves are similar.

And you ask, “If so, how can any one man be an essential part of creation?”

Each single wave is an essential part of the ocean; it is not accidental. By essential I mean it is needed by the ocean, otherwise it would not have been there in the first place. God needs you the way you are, he needs you exactly the way you are. So please don’t try to become somebody else.

Don’t try to become a Buddha, don’t try to become a Jesus, don’t try to become a Mohammed. Just be yourself, because that’s how he wants you.

If he had wanted Mohammeds he would have created many more Mohammeds; he does not want them. He is finished with Mohammed, Buddha, Jesus – whomsoever he has created, he is finished with them. Now he has created you. You are needed – not Mohammed, nor Krishna, nor Christ.

You are needed, you as you are.

So don’t try to imitate any great ideal, don’t try to be a copy of somebody else. Be sincere to the form that God has given you, because that is the only way to thank God, to be grateful to God. Be authentically your individual being.

And if you are an authentic individual being you will be able to know the universal too, and more easily, because the universal is not far away from the authentic individual. The ocean is just there in the wave: a look inward, and the ocean is revealed.

But if you have become false, you cannot look inward. The mask cannot look inward. The false cannot look inward, because the false has nothing like an inner side. Only the real has two sides, the outer and the inner.

The false has only one side, the outer. It has no inner side; it is just a mask, there is nothing inside it. It is just a painted face.

Please don’t be Hindus, don’t be Mohammedans, don’t be Christians. Be religious – and by being religious, I mean look inward, search inward. And you will find these two things: first, your authenticity, your individuality, and in the second step you will find your universality.

First the small self has to be true, then you will find the supreme Self.

From the small truth to the ultimate truth, that is the journey, the pilgrimage.