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There is no need to agree. And how can you agree? When you listen to me, you listen through your preoccupation. When your wife listens, she listens through her preoccupation. When you listen, you listen through your own beliefs, ideas, conditionings. When she listens, she has her own mind. Interpretations are going to be different. Just because you are both listening to me does not mean that you will agree. You will interpret, you will give colours, you will give turns to ideas, according to your mind.

See the fact that with the mind there can be no agreement. There is no need to argue. Rather, try to do what I am saying. Don’t waste your time. I am not here to make you more argumentative. I am not here to make you more logical. I am not here to make you more capable of discussing, analysing, interpreting things. I am here to help you to see. And seeing comes when you are without the mind.

Now this simple fact that you go on quarreling with your wife– and you both love me– should become a great experience. You are here... a thousand people. I am saying the same thing to you all, but there are going to be a thousand interpretations. You can’t agree with the other. The other has looked from a totally different angle because the other is hooked from a totally different angle. That way only he or she can see it. And this is so if you are not related with the person. If you are related with the person, then there are more difficulties– particularly in the relationship of a wife and husband. Their quarrel is eternal. It does not matter about what, but they quarrel. There seems to be only one agreement: to disagree. That is their only agreement; about that they have agreed. That is a tacit agreement in every marriage– that they will disagree.

Mulla Nasruddin goes on fighting with his wife, and the wife goes on arguing. One day I told Mulla ’For thirty years you have been arguing, and there seems to be no possible solution. Why don’t you drop it?’
He said ’How to drop it?’
I said ’Simply agree with your wife! Next time it happens, you simply agree and see what happens.’
He said ’Okay.’
So next time it happened, first, in the heat of it, he forgot. He argued for half an hour. And then he suddenly remembered, so he went out in the garden to cool down. Then he cooled himself, collected himself, decided that he would agree. He went in and he said to the wife ’Okay, you are right. I agree with you.’
The wife looked at him with great surprise, and said ’What? But I have changed my mind!’

And the argument starts again. They have changed sides, but the argument is the same. When you are related with somebody, relationship brings many complexities. There is a constant struggle to dominate. It is not really argument that you are interested in or your wife is interested in; it is really a question of who dominates whom. Each point becomes a power struggle: who dominates whom? See it, and don’t waste your time.

And you ask me: 'What should we do?'

Let her have her opinions, you have your opinions. Rather than wasting time in opinions, start doing something according to your mind and let her do something according to her mind. But do something. If I say meditate– whatsoever you understand by it– start doing something. In the beginning it is always a groping in the dark. But by and by, the gropers reach.

Jesus says: 'Seek, and you will find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you; ask, and it shall be given...'– Start groping, and don’t be worried that you may commit some error or some mistake. Errors have to be committed, mistakes are going to happen. Nobody can reach directly; everybody has to stumble. Many times one goes astray, but if one goes on working sincerely, authentically, then sooner or later the door opens.

You open your door, let her open her door. Don’t make me an excuse for your power struggle. And, remember always, have compassion on other people. They have their minds, they are hooked there just as you are hooked in your own mind. See! Because you cannot see without your mind, how can you expect the other to see it? Watch life, and sooner or later you will see an insight arising in you. In that very insight you will become capable of understanding the other’s standpoint.

I am not saying that you have to agree with the other, but you can understand. There is no need to agree, but you can see why the other is looking at this point in this way, and you can have compassion for the other. If you have compassion, you will be surprised– the other has started feeling compassion for you. If you argue, the other argues. Argument creates argument. It goes on becoming bitter and more bitter; it poisons relationship. If you can understand the other’s standpoint, you will find the other is also more compassionate towards your standpoint.

And people have their own standpoints, because people are not enlightened. Standpoints are bound to be there up to the third mind, the individual mind. With the fourth mind, there is no argument; compassion arises. One can see the other– where the other is hooked and feel sorry for the other, because it is an imprisonment. Only with the fourth... understanding, compassion. And with the fifth, one forgets about others or about oneself; then there is no division.

Listen to a few anecdotes. First...

A housewife complains to the psychologist ’Something is wrong with my husband. At night when he comes back from work, he always first kisses our dog and then me.’
The psychologist thinks about it for a while, then he suggests thoughtfully ’Would you mind bringing a photograph of your dog next time you come?'

You cannot expect this, but this too is a possibility. There are millions of possibilities as to what the response is going to be. Now this psychologist must have been a very logical person– hooked in logic. ’If the husband kisses the dog first, then the dog must be more beautiful than the wife, so bring the photograph.’ That is his standpoint.

And everybody is closed in his own world.

Two Frenchmen are standing on the platform of the train that is pulling out of Paris. One of them waves to a friend at the station, and calls, ’Thanks loads! Had a marvelous time! Your wife was a wonderful lay!’ Then he turns to the man standing next to him and says, ’It’s not true, she’s no good at all. I just wanted the husband to feel good.’

There are different visions. Now, whether the husband is going to feel good or bad... But this man has simply appreciated... Maybe in France it is possible.

In a certain Western city where drivers too often have a way of using only one hand on the steering wheel, devoting the other to the inevitable girl at the side, an ordinance was recently passed, requiring two hands on the wheel of a moving car. As a result of this law, a member of the police force stopped an approaching Ford coupe and severely reprimanded the spooning couple in this manner: ’Young man, do you know the laws of this city? Why not use both hands?’ The derelict at the wheel frankly retorted ’Why, I have to use one hand to drive with too!’

Different visions, different understandings.

The last:
Olga was returning to Czechoslovakia after working for a year in Britain. On the plane she began to writhe and moan, clutching her belly at the same time. The stewardess was quickly at her side to find out what was the matter. ’Have you had a check-up recently?’ she asked Olga.
’No, no’ wailed Olga ’it wasn’t a Czech, it was a Scotsman.’

Enough for today?