Help your child – protect him from yourself!
2 March 1985 pm in Lao Tzu Grove
Question 1
BELOVED OSHO,
WHAT IS THE RIGHTWAY TO HELP A CHILD GROWWITHOUT INTERFERING IN HIS NATURAL
POTENTIALITY?
Every way to help a child is wrong.
The very idea of helping is not right.
The child needs your love, not your help.
The child needs nourishment, support, but not your help.
The natural potential of the child is unknown, so there is no way to help him rightly to attain to his
natural potential. You cannot help when the goal is unknown; all that you can do is not interfere. And
in fact, in the name of help everybody is interfering with everybody else; and because the name is
beautiful, nobody objects.
Of course the child is so small, so dependent on you, he cannot object. And the people around are
just like you: they have also been helped by their parents, the way you have been helped. Neither
they have attained their natural potential, nor have you.
The whole world is missing out in spite of all the help from the parents, from the family, from the
relatives, from the neighbors, from the teachers, from the priests. In fact everybody is so burdened
with help that under its weight ... what to say of attaining natural potential – one cannot even attain
unnatural potential! One cannot move; the weight on everybody’s shoulders is Himalayan.
And it is one of the most difficult things, not to interfere. It is not the nature of the mind. Mind is
basically continuously, persistently, tempted to interfere. It lives on interference. The more you can
interfere, the more powerful you are.
How do you measure power? It is not something material, you cannot weigh it – but it is measured,
weighed. The way to measure it is by how much you can interfere in how many people’s lives. Adolf
Hitler is powerful because he can interfere in millions of people’s lives. You are not Adolf Hitler, but
still you can interfere in a few people’s lives ... a little, miniature Adolf Hitler.
At least the husband can interfere in the wife’s life, the wife can interfere in the husband’s life. It is
a mutual game; in this way both become powerful. The husband goes on interfering in his own way,
without being aware why they are interfering. They were supposed to be together to enhance each
other’s life but ....
The husband will come late every day – not that it is essential to come late, but it is a question of
power, ego: if he comes home on time that means he has surrendered. I know husbands who go on
sitting in offices doing nothing, gossiping, knowing perfectly well that their wives will be boiling. They
can reach home in time, but that’s what she wants. Just because she wants, it is impossible for the
man, against his manliness, to be on time; he will come late. And the same scene is repeated every
day.
Nor is the wife ready to drop asking him why he is late, knowing perfectly well that whatsoever he
says is a lie. She knows it is a lie, he knows that she knows that it is a lie – and it is a lie, but it is a
good beginning to a fight, a good start, a good excuse. And then the wife goes on doing the same
....
I have sat with a husband in his car, and he is honking his horn because he is worried; he has to
take me to a particular meeting and I have to be there in time. And I don’t like to waste people’s
time; I am not a political leader. A political leader is supposed to come late. Again, the same power
– you have to wait. And he is not just a nobody; he is so occupied, so busy, that he is bound to be
late.
I know political leaders who were just sitting and gossiping, and I have told them, ”We have to go to
your meeting.”
They said, ”You don’t understand. A politician should not arrive on time. That means he is not a big
shot, just a small fry.”
I am not a politician. I am neither a big shot nor a small fry. I am just a human being, neither anything
more nor anything less. I have been particular about arriving in time.
So the husband is worried, and the wife leans out of the window and says, ”Stop honking your horn!
I have told you one thousand times that I am coming in one minute.”
I looked at the husband and said, ”This is something, ‘one thousand times’ and ‘I am coming in one
minute’! Where did she get the time to say it one thousand times in one minute?” But it is a power
trip. The wife wants it to be known who is the boss. You can go on honking the horn, but without the
boss coming down the car cannot move.
I have a certain rapport with women, so whomsoever I was staying with, soon I became very close
to their mothers, to their wives, sisters. And I asked, ”What is the matter? Every day it happens; the
poor man goes on honking.” And they would say, ”Nothing is the matter. We are not busy, but he
goes on coming home late every day and pays no attention to what we are saying. So whenever we
have the chance .... It is simple give and take.”
All the people around you have been helped, greatly helped, to be what they are. You have been
helped; now you want to help your children too.
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