
Comparison is Meaningless
Osho on Comparison
Jesus has told a small anecdote. One day a very rich man engaged some laborers in his garden. Then at noon time, some more laborers approached the rich man and they said they wanted work. The rich man engaged them also to work in the garden. When the sun was going down some more laborers came to the rich man and asked for work. The rich man engaged them also to work. Then just as the sun was about to set some other laborers came and the rich man engaged them too to work. Then the day was over and the wages were given to all the laborers for that day. The rich man gave equal wages to all of them. Those who had come in the morning, they stood up in anger. They said, “It is unjust. We have been working since morning. Some people came in the afternoon and a few came just when we were about to finish the work, and equal wages to all — it is unjust!” The rich man asked, “What you have received, is that too little for your work?” They said, “No, that’s more than enough for our work. But what about those who came so late?” The rich man said, “In the kingdom of God, neither is anybody early nor anybody late, all are equal.”
Yoga is saying the same thing. What it is saying is that even a particle of dust has no reason to grieve, and God himself has no reason to be filled with ego. In the play of this life, neither is anybody ahead nor anybody behind; neither is anybody big nor anybody small. Yoga shows the supreme in the trivial and the trivial in the supreme, shows the ocean in the drop and the drop in the ocean. This is the truth also, as I said. And now science too is saying very strange things.
When Rutherford first split the atom, a very strange experience came to light, which was that even the atom of least mass is similar to the solar world of the great suns. In the smallest atom there is a center and there are electrons that go on spinning around the center. The speed of this spinning is similar to the high speeds of the planets Earth and Mars and Jupiter going around the sun. And the energy hidden at the center of the atom is similar to that of the energy of the sun. It is as if a miniature solar family resides in the atom. The difference is of the quantity only, there is no difference in quality.
So, science has started saying what the oldest sutra of Yoga says. Perhaps you remember it: “The macrocosm is in the microcosm.” This is what the scientist Rutherford and his colleagues say. The whole cosmos is present in a tiny microcosm. That cosmos is in such a small form in the microcosm that even seeing it is not possible. It is only inferred that it is. It is only through inference that we know that it spins.
The difference is quantitative. It is like saying, the difference between two and four is the same as the difference between twenty and forty. The same is the difference between two hundred and four hundred. The same is the difference between twenty million and forty million. The proportion is the same between all the figures. Only the figures have expanded, the proportion remains the same. Exactly in the same manner, the difference between the macro and micro is that of proportion.
Understanding this truth one should keep in mind two things: an inferiority complex is madness, a superiority complex is greater madness. One should understand it well. It is madness to think of oneself as nothing, it is also madness to think of oneself as something.
Yoga says: Inferiority or superiority have no access to that which you are. You should know only this much — that you are. This much is enough. Its other meaning is: do not compare yourself. There is no sense in it. Do not compare at all. There is no point in comparing. If you compare two and four to twenty and forty or twenty million and forty million, it makes no difference, they are equal; their proportion is equal. Hence, comparison is meaningless.
Hence Yoga says: Do not compare a drop and the ocean because a drop is nothing but a small ocean.
Source:
Listen to complete discourse at mentioned below link.
Discourse Series: Sun of Consciousness Chapter #3
Chapter title: Home – Temple
18 October 1970 pm in Poona, India
References:
Osho has spoken on ‘comparison, complexes, ego’ in many of His discourses. More on the subject can be referred to in the following books/discourses:
- The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha
- The Divine Melody
- The Empty Boat
- From Personality to Individuality
- The Transmission of the Lamp
- Zen: The Path of Paradox
- Socrates Poisoned Again After 25 Centuries
- Tao: The Pathless Path
- Sermons in Stones
- Om Mani Padme Hum