"At the most you can forget it but you cannot lose it. And once you recognize it, then life becomes really hilarious; you can laugh at your own efforts and endeavors, at your whole past that you have spent in searching for it.

"And the goal of your search was not away from you, not even close to you. You were the goal; the seeker was the sought.

"And everything that you have done before you became enlightened, everything that you have been before you became aware of your tremendous beauty, of your eternal life, will take a different meaning after your enlightenment. To you and to those who are close to you, the enlightenment will make such a great difference.

"Narendra has known me since he was a child. But if I had not become enlightened he would not have asked me this question or raised this question to himself. Even the very idea of buddhahood might not have happened to him; he would have known me as a friend, he would have known me as a loving companion.

"It is the enlightenment that changes the meaning of all his experiences, gives them a new color, a new light, a new luminosity. The same incidents start having a totally new meaning. I can understand your question. Now you look backwards, but because now you know my enlightenment you can easily conclude that I was always enlightened, that I was born enlightened; otherwise those incidents of love, care, understanding would not have taken such a colorful and meaningful significance. That's why I say you are almost right.

"I myself can look retrospectively, then everything starts taking on a new meaning. It would not have had the same meaning. It is the alchemy of enlightenment that everything has become pure gold, that small and meaningless things have taken wings and have become great.

"I will give you a few examples which could not have been understood in the same way they have been understood; there was no possibility, no hope.

"One of my teachers was very perfectionist, a great disciplinarian, a very beautiful man. Every year he started his class with the same introduction, because the students were new; he introduced himself by saying, 'It is better that I should make clear to you what kind of man I am, so you are not in the dark and you don't do anything without understanding the nature of the teacher."