I am against all kinds of imitation because I respect the individual. Learn from everywhere. Learn from Jesus, learn from Buddha – they have something great to share with you. Participate in that sharing, but never imitate.
You are here with me – never imitate me! Listen to me, understand me, feel me, feel my love for you, drink this presence that is available to you, participate in this silence, but don't imitate. There is no need for you to wear the same clothes that I wear or to eat the same food. There is no need to follow my lifestyle.
But the idea has become very deeply planted in you. You have been told again and again and conditioned for it. Nobody has ever told you to be yourself. Everybody was giving you an example:
“Be like that. Be like Jesus, be like Buddha, be like Mahavira” – as if your whole purpose here is just to act somebody else's life and not to live your own; as if God has not given you a first-hand life but only a second-hand life. This is disrespectful to yourself and this is disrespectful to God too.