Now, this U. G. Krishnamurti missed Sri Ramana — and something great was happening. Almost like Buddha giving his flower to Mahakashyap, Sri Ramana giving a joke book to a man who is asking about God, or Ma Tzu giving a terrific kick in the pants. U. G. Krishnamurti missed Ramana. Then he missed J. Krishnamurti too. He lived for years with J. Krishnamurti.
Now, J. Krishnamurti is totally different in his expression, very logical, very rational. The beginning of his work is always with the mind; then slowly slowly he leads you beyond the mind, But there U. G. Krishnamurti thought it was all abstraction, philosophy. He stopped going there because “It is all abstraction.
” He left Sri Ramana because there was no philosophy. He left Krishnamurti because there was too much philosophy. In both the cases he missed.
And he lived with Sri Sivananda of Rishikesh for seven years doing yoga postures. There for seven years he thought, “Something is here.” And there was nothing! Sivananda is a very ordinary teacher. You can find dozens of them all around this country teaching people how to stand on their heads, teaching people stupid things. There he remained for seven years, became a disciple.
Now, he missed two pinnacles… and this is what goes on happening. You have a mind, a certain mind. When you go to a master, you look from your mind. If it fits, you are happy; you start clinging. But that is not going to help — because it fits, it will strengthen the same mind that you had brought with you. If by chance you come across a real master, nothing is going to fit. He is going to disrupt all your ideas about how a master should be; he is going to sabotage you.
He is going to take all expectations.
He is to frustrate you, he is to disappoint you in every possible way — because that is the only way real work can start. And if you still can be with him, then… then you are going to be awakened. Sleep is easy, cheap; awakening is arduous. You will have to renounce your dreams, and you will have to re-nounce much comfort, much convenience. You will have to renounce many ideas that you have always thought very valuable.