The Cypress in the Courtyard

Talks given from 29/5/76 to 27/6/76

Darshan Diary

CHAPTER 1

29 May 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin returning to the West, said that he was feeling ’okay’ about himself.]

Okay is not enough... feel blessed. Okay is not a very ecstatic word; it is just lukewarm. So feel blessed – and it is a question of feeling. Whatsoever you feel, you become. It is your responsibility.

If you are not feeling good, that’s how you have created it in the past. If you feel miserable, it is your own work. That’s what we mean in India when we say, ’It is your own karma.’ ’Karma’ means your own action. It is what you have done to yourself.

And once you understand that this is what you have done to yourself, you can drop it. It is your attitude; nobody is forcing you to feel that way. It is your choice. You have chosen it – maybe unconsciously, maybe for some subtle reasons which feel good at the time but which turn out to be bitter, but you have chosen it.

It feels hard when it is said that you have chosen your misery, because the consolation that somebody else is creating it, is taken away too; even that is not allowed. But if you understand it, it is a great freedom. Then it is up to you. If you want to carry it, you carry it. If you want to drop it, not for a single moment are you forced to carry it.

Just the other day I was looking at an account of Bennett’s memoirs. He was one of the oldest disciples of Gurdjieff; he remained longest with Gurdjieff. He recalls that one day he had worked really hard – and Gurdjieff used to force people to work as hard as possible; almost to the point of their falling with exhaustion. Bennett had worked hard and he was just thinking to rest when Gurdjieff gave him some new work to do – to go into the forest and cut wood.

It was almost impossible. He could not even walk! He was so tired and feeling so sleepy that he felt he would fall anywhere on the road. But when Gurdjieff said to do it, he had to. That was a deep commitment between Gurdjieff and his disciples – that whatsoever he said, they would do. He was dictatorial. And that is the only way to work; there is no other way. If one is lenient, nothing will happen.

So Bennett went, against his own wishes, somehow just dragging himself. While he was cutting wood, suddenly he had a very great satori... a great energy rushed into him. All tiredness went and he felt more alive than ever before in his life. He was as alive and as vital as if he had been resting for many days. He felt so elated, so happy, so vibrating, that an idea came into his mind, that if in this tremendous energy he were to desire anything, it would happen immediately.

So he said to himself, ’Let me feel sadness,’ and immediately he became as sad as if the whole of the world had become dark; he was surrounded with darkness. He started slipping into a hell. He could not believe it – in just a single moment!

He immediately pulled himself out and said, ’Let me be happy,’ and he was happy again. Then he tried it with all the emotions – with anger, love, compassion, Jealousy. An idea would just come to his mind and his whole being would become that.

That day he realised what masters have always been saying: that it is you who create all your emotions – your hell and heaven, your love and hate.

But if you don’t understand that it is your creation, you remain in the bondage. Once you understand that it is you, why settle for okayness? That is not much. And your life will not be a life of song and dance and celebration. Just by being okay, how will you celebrate? Just by being okay, how will you love? Why be so miserly about it?

But there are many people who are stuck at okayness. They have lost all energy just because of their ideas. Okayness is like a person who is not sick but who is also not healthy; he is so-so. You cannot call him ill and you cannot call him healthy. He is standing just between these two. He is not ill and cannot be hospitalised but he is not alive and healthy. He cannot celebrate. That’s what okayness is.

So drop that. I will suggest that if it is too difficult for you to feel blissful, at least feel miserable. That will be something; at least energy will be there. You can cry and weep. You may not be able to laugh, but tears are possible. Even that will be life. But okayness is very cold. Either be miserable or happy... and if there is a question of choosing, why choose misery when you can choose happiness?

Back home, continue to meditate – at least one meditation each day. And this is going to be your moment-to-moment meditation: remember to feel blessed. If you can do that much, when you come back next time much will be possible.

[A sannyasin said that she had been in Nepal for two months. When she left Poona, after the Enlightenment day celebration, she felt very open and good; then later became very afraid and paranoid of people]

It can happen sometimes that if you suddenly feel open, you can feel fear coming. Openness is vulnerability. When you are open, you feel at the same time that something wrong can enter you.

That is not just a feeling; it is a possibility.

That’s why people are closed. If you open the door for the friend to come in, the enemy can also come in. Clever people have closed their doors. To avoid the enemy, they don’t even open the door for the friend. But then their whole life becomes dead.

... It is just the idea; just the idea that something wrong can enter you. There is nothing that could happen, because basically we have nothing to lose – and that which we have cannot be lost. That which can be lost is not worth keeping. When this understanding becomes tacit, one remains open.

Let winds come, let the sun come – everything is welcome. Once you become attuned to living with an open heart, you will never close. But a little time has to be given to it. You went immediately after the enlightenment day so you must have been feeling very open. It can happen on those days.

That’s why I insist on people being here then. You can ride on the wave and something can open.

But then you have to maintain that opening, otherwise it will close again.

Only fear has to be feared, nothing else. And people are not afraid of fear; they are afraid of a thousand and one things. But fear is the only enemy, because with fear you start being crippled.

You stop moving, expanding, contacting, relating, because of the fear. Who knows? – something may go wrong.

You don’t love people because that will be a commitment, an involvement, so you keep aloof, remain away – never go too far in so that you cannot come out. But then you never touch any depth, you never touch anybody’s heart. If you don’t allow some-body to touch your heart, how will you be able to touch his? So people remain protected, defensive.

I can see that even lovers are defending themselves. Then they cry and weep because nothing is happening. They have closed all the windows and are suffocating. No new light has come in and it is almost impossible to live, but still they drag on somehow. But they don’t open because fresh air seems to be dangerous. It brings messages from the outside and disturbs your pattern. You have lived in a closed cell, and anything from the outside gives you a certain feeling of apprehension that now you will have to change your pattern. A guest comes and now you will have to change your pattern. You will have to make up a bed for him; you will have to share. Fear arises.

So this time, just remain alert. When you feel open, try to enjoy it. These are rare moments. In these moments move out so that you can have an experience of openness. Once the experience is there, solid in your hands, then you can drop the fear. You can say that it is nonsense. You will see that being open is such a treasure which you were losing unnecessarily. And the treasure is such that nobody can take it away. The more you share it, the more it grows. The more open you are, the more you are. One becomes rooted, grounded.

Just think of a tree. You can bring a tree inside the room and, in a way, it will be protected; the wind will not be so hard on it. When storms are raging outside, it will be out of danger. But there will be no challenge; everything will be protected. You can put it in a hot-house, but by and by the tree will start becoming pale, it will not be green. Something deep inside will start dying – because challenge shapes life.

Those strong winds that hit hard are not really enemies. They help to integrate you. They look as if they will uproot you, but fighting with them you become rooted. You send your roots even deeper than the storm can reach and destroy. The sun is very hot and it seems it will burn. but the tree sucks up more water to protect itself against the sun. It becomes greener and greener. Fighting with natural forces, it attains to a certain soul.

The soul arises only through struggle.

If things are very easy, you start dispersing. By and by you disintegrate, because integration is not needed at all. You become like a pampered child. So when it happens, live it courageously. And I am here.

That’s what the whole purpose of my being here is – to help you to be courageous, to inspire you in moments when, if alone, you would have closed; to push you in directions where you won’t go willingly on your own... to push you beyond yourself, and to help you to expand your boundaries so that by and by you start cherishing freedom. Then one day comes when you drop all boundaries and simply move into the open sky.

Mm? Try it!

[Previously Osho had advised a sannyasin to meditate on her relationship. She now reports back that she is not in love with her boyfriend. She has become aware of how closed she is.]

Right. You could see something – and that’s beautiful. Much can happen....

... Every insight, even if it is very hard to accept, helps. Even if it goes against the grain, then too it helps. Even if it is very ego-shattering, it helps. Insight is the only friend. And one should be ready to see into any fact, without just trying or rationalising in any way. You did well... I am happy.

Out of this insight, many things happen. If you don’t love a person and you go on pretending that you do, then you will never be able to love because you are taking something for granted that is not there. You have missed the first insight into the matter and now you will be puzzled and confused.

Many problems will be there, but there will be no solution in sight, because from the very first step a truth has not been accepted. So you are falsifying your own being.

There are many people who have so many problems, but those problems are not real. Ninety-nine percent of problems are false. So if they are not solved, you are in trouble, and even if they are solved, nothing will happen because they are not your real problems. When you have solved some false problems, vou will create others. So the first and foremost thing is to penetrate into what is the real problem and to see it as it is.

To see the false as false is the beginning of the vision of being able to see truth as truth. To see the false as false is on the way. Then one can see what is true.

If you see that there is no love, the problem takes a totally new turn. Then it is not a question of the other person. It is a basic question about you. Why can’t you love? It can become a self-growth.

Then you have to find ways of loving. It is not a question of one person – because you can change the person but you will remain the same. You will go on playing the same game.

The real question is why love is not flowering in you.

Once you understand this, the right question has been caught red-handed and things start moving.

Just go on watching it and whenever you see that you are doing something which is against love, drop it; don’t do it. That is the beginning. It is difficult to Love in the beginning, but even if we can drop unloving acts, that will be a great help.

We don’t love. But that is not the only problem. We unlove: a negative energy moves.

So first start dropping anything that you feel is unloving: any attitude any word that you have used out of habit but which now suddenly you feel is cruel – it is not loving, it is not kind. Drop it! Feel sorry that you used it. Always be ready to say, ’I am sorry.’

Very few people are capable of saying, ’I am sorry.’ Even when they appear to be saying it, they are not. It may be just a social formality. To really say ’I am sorry’ is a great understanding. You are saying that you have done. something wrong – and you are not just trying to be polite. You are withdrawing something. You are withdrawing an act that was going to happen. You are withdrawing a word that you had uttered.

So withdraw unlove, and as you do you will see many more facts – that it is not really a question of how to love. It is only a question of how not to love. It is just like a spring covered with stones and rocks. You remove the rocks and the spring starts flowing. It is there.

Every heart has love, because the heart cannot exist without it. It is the very pulse of life Nobody can be without love; that is impossible. It is a basic truth that everyone has love – has the capacity to love and to be loved. But some rocks – wrong upbringing, wrong attitudes, cleverness, cunningness and a thousand and one things – are blocking the path.

Withdraw unloving acts, unloving words, unloving gestures, and then suddenly you will catch yourself in a very loving mood. Many moments will come when suddenly you will see that something is bubbling – and there was love, just a glimpse. By and by those moments will become longer. So for one month you try.

[A normally extrovertive sannyasin: I feel that as my energy is turning inwards, it is getting lower and lower.

I don’t see it as you do. It is not low energy. The energy is moving with a low speed but it is not low energy.

You were moving at a mad speed.

For your whole life you have been a doer: managing,

manoeuvering, active, male. That’s why I said to you to relax, not to do anything and to let things happen. I wanted you to become feminine. I wanted you to become passive, relaxed.

When a person who has lived in an active mood starts becoming passive, he experiences it as low energy. By calling it low energy you are condemning it. The active mind says, ’What are you doing?

You are simply dying! Get hold of yourself and become the doer that you have always been. Perform

– just don’t be a watcher. This way you will disappear into death.’

I knew that it would happen to you one day.-When energy really moves slow, it is felt by the old active mind as if it is low energy. It is just slow movement... a river flowing so slowly that you cannot even feel that it is flowing.

A shallow river makes much noise. A deep river makes no noise. If the river is really deep, you cannot even guess that it is moving. The movement is very very slow, very subtle, very silent, with no noise.

That’s what is happening: the energy is moving slowly. But you compare it with your past, hence the problem. If you can remain in this mood and drop the judgement, a totally new being will arise out of you. Then I will tell you to become active again. But one should be active only if one has attained to passivity, not before it. Then you can do many things and yet remain a non-doer.

That is what Lao Tzu calls ’action through non-action’. You still do but there is no one as the doer.

There is no hankering to do. You simply do it because it is needed. Life needs it – you do it.

So I don’t see it as a problem; rather I see it as a solution. But I understand your difficulty. If one has lived on a higher pitch and only in the marketplace with noise noise noise, then when you move into a more silent place, you feel it is almost like a cemetery.

I used to live in a house outside a town. The bungalow belonged to a very rich friend, but nobody lived in it because it was so silent and so lonely that people thought there might be ghosts there; it was called a ghost bungalow.

I told the friend that I would like to live in it. He said, ’Have you gone mad? Nobody wants to live there !’ But I said, ’I am going. Don’t be worried ! Just give me the key.’

It was really a beautiful place... on a small lake with big forests all around it and hills, and it was ten miles from the town. I lived there for a few months, and by and by the friend and his wife started to come and see me because they became aware that there are no ghosts and that the house is not haunted or possessed.

They decided to move in with me, so I said it was perfectly good because it was a big place. They came but the wife could not live there. They had always lived in the marketplace. She said, ’It is so dead. I cannot live here, I cannot sleep at night.’

They used to live exactly in the middle of the town and almost all night the t would continue. They were accustomed to living in that noise, so when they came to that silent place they could not sleep.

They were disturbed – disturbed by the silence. I tried to convince the woman that it was a beautiful place, but they had to return to the town.

For a few more days I would like you to continue to relax. Stop condemnation, stop judgement, and start enjoying this en-ergy. It is a rare blissful state – this silence, this state of slow movement that looks like sadness to you.

We don’t see facts; we always compare. That’s why we miss many things. For one week simply look at it as it is. Don’t compare and don’t call it names. Don’t call it low energy and don’t call it sadness.

Why bother about labelling it? Whatsoever it is, let it be so. Simply watch it.

We are too addicted to words. If a stone is lying there and somebody says, ’A diamond!’ immediately you become interested. The stone was lying there before he had ever said anything, but then it was not a diamond because nobody had said so.

Now somebody suddenly says.

’A diamond!’

and the word rings many bells in your heart.

Immediately, the stone – maybe it was not a diamond – has a value. The word has put the value on it.

This is one of the most basic things for a seeker to understand: not to allow words to distort vision.

Otherwise the perception is contaminated, the clarity is lost and your consciousness becomes polluted. Don’t allow words. Simply enjoy whatsoever is happening.

You look so silent, but still in your silence I can see that deep down you think it is sadness. Your face does not show silence but sadness. I can see it. Inside, deep down in your heart it is a silence, but on your face it becomes a sadness. Between these two – the heart and the face – somewhere the mind interprets it. You look sad. You should look silent but you are interpreting it.

If you are feeling sad, then enjoy that sadness. What can be done? It is there so why not enjoy it?

Sing a sad song or dance a sad dance. If you feel that it is low energy, let it be low energy. Lie down and look at the stars... rest, don’t move. Breathe slowly, move slowly.

Don’t try to change anything in any way for seven days, and then tell me after that. In these seven days, no interpretation, no commentary, no judgement, no comparison whatsoever. Be as if you are moving into a world where you don’t know anything so you cannot label anything. Everything is strange, so you have simply to note that something has happened.

After seven days I will ask about the description, not about your judgement. You will have to describe it to me. If energy is moving low... I say that energy is moving slow; you say energy is low. Whatsoever it is, simply describe it after seven days.

There is a very famous story about a zen master, Chou Chou. A monk asked him, ’What is true religion?’

It was a full-moon night and the moon was rising.... The master remained silent for a long time; didn’t say anything. And then suddenly he came to life and said, ’Look at the cypress in the courtyard.’ A beautiful cool breeze was blowing and playing with the cypress and the moon had just come above the branch. It was beautiful, incredible... almost impossible that it could be so beautiful.

But the monk said, ’This was not my question. I’m not asking about the cypress in the courtyard, nor about the moon or its beauty. My question has nothing to do with this. I am asking what true religion is. Have you forgotten my question?’

The master again remained silent for a long time. Then again he came to life and said, ’Look at the cypress in the courtyard!’

True religion consists of the herenow. The fact of this moment is what true religion is all about.

So if you are feeling sad, then that is the cypress in the courtyard. Look at it... just look at it. There is nothing else to be done. That very look will reveal many mysteries. It will open many doors. So for seven days look at the cypress in the court-yard and whatsoever the cypress is in any particular moment, look at it. Try, mm? Good!

[A sannyasin says: I’ve come because I feel so tense with you. At the lecture in the morning I feel only tenseness and closedness and no love. I would like this to break.]

I understand .... Don’t try to do anything about it; just wait. One day it will explode of its own accord.

If you do anything it may explode before its right time and then it will not give much to you. Let it mature.

This tension is like a pregnancy. For nine months the child has to grow in the mother’s womb. If the child is born before its time, it will always remain weak and his health will always be a hazard. This tension is a spiritual pregnancy. So don’t do anything.

In the morning enjoy it. It is just as a woman when she is pregnant feels heavy in the stomach and breathing becomes difficult. She cannot digest food well; she feels nauseous and sometimes she vomits. She feels uneasy but still she feels happy because she is carrying a new life. She is going to become a mother.

So it will be difficult and you will feel many times to get rid of it, but that will be an abortion. Or, if you become too concerned, there may be a miscarriage. So don’t do anything; protect it. That tension is good. It will become more and more intense and become almost like a burning fire in you. It will be imploding and will become smaller and smaller and smaller. It will become almost unbearable, but you have to bear it and bear it blissfully.

One day it starts exploding – but then it is a rebirth. When the right moment comes it will happen.

So forget all about it.

One should not be too conscious of these things, otherwise the very consciousness becomes a disturbance.

[The sannyasin adds: And I’ve had this big dream about getting enlightened... ]

Mm, leave it.

That dream is also okay.

Unless you dream, how are you going to become

enlightened? Before one becomes enlightened, one has to dream many things !

Very good [chuckling]. Dream well... and make it more colourful and musical!

[An indian sannyasin, said that she was aware of feelings of anger that were coming up directed towards her husband. She then went on to tell Osho that she would be going to the States for a short time.]

I think it is not really anger; it is something else. You have always been suppressing anger. You were just holding things in because of fear. You are becoming truer, more authentic. When somebody becomes truer, many problems arise.

That’s why people are false. They are false because of their cleverness. The husband is saying something, and the wife remains in control because it is too risky and there is already too much trouble. Why create more? One simply swallows it.

But that is not good because that makes you false. And if you cannot be angry with your husband, love will disappear – because when one emotion disappears, others also disappear; they exist together.

When you meditate, by and by you will become true. Sometimes when you feel angry you will say that you are angry. Of course he will feel offended because he was not expecting it, but don’t be worried about that. Simply say that now you will be true, sincere, and that whatsoever is happening to you, you will say. Say to yourself that you will not go on repressing – whatsoever the cost.

I’m not saying to be angry. I’m saying that when anger is there, don’t hide it. When love is there, don’t hide that either. You will become more angry, more loving, more quarrelling, more kind – all together.

An authentic person is alive, and whatsoever happens, he allows it to happen. It is risky – that’s why people become inauthentic. That is less risky but then life loses all meaning. One is simply dragging oneself, somehow pulling.

For three months you will be in America, and that will be good. So for three months be true and be alive. It will be easier to be alive in America than in India. India is so dead and has remained dead for so long that it is almost difficult to become real, flowing, authentic, here. In America it will be easier for you to become real, authentic, flowing. Forget all the nonsense that has been conditioned into your mind. Then come back and whatsoever happens, face it.

I am here to help you to face reality.

I am not here to help you to adjust with all sorts of things. I am not in favour of adjusting. If something is becoming ugly between two persons and it is impossible to come to a loving relation-ship, then separate. Why cripple each other? Why destroy each other’s life? That is very very bad. It is not compassion – it is murder.

If I cannot live with someone and the whole twenty-four hours have become poisoning, then I am poisoning the person and it will be a friendly act to remove myself so I am not poisoned and the other is not poisoned. Either come to a loving relationship or separate. No relationship is, in itself, the end.

Love is the end.

If the relationship is fulfilling love, then good, beautiful. If it is destroying love, there is no point in it.

These three months will be very helpful. Meditate and be free. Try to become a person in your own right. The indian woman has lost personality. She never thinks in terms of her own life. She simply thinks in terms of being a wife, of being a daughter, of being a sister, and all sorts of things. But she never thinks in terms of being a person – and that is the most basic thing.

The first thing to think of is that you are a person in your own right. Of course you are a mother, but that is secondary. You are a wife, but that is secondary. You are a sister, a daughter, but those are secondary things. The basic thing is that you are a person, intrinsically valuable, an end in yourself.

Nothing of that can be sacrificed; this personality cannot be sacrificed for anything. And everything can be sacrificed for this personality. You will have to be courageous.

I don’t say to separate. If love can flower.... It may flower. But don’t avoid anything. Take the whole situation into account. Come back and talk to your husband. Lay all the cards on the table; don’t hide anything. Say that this is the situation: either we love each other and we live together, otherwise, what is the point? Why should we carry on?

Be there and meditate and then we will talk about it. There is nothing to worry about, mm?

[A sannyasin says: I use the I Ching and I was wondering if there is anything wrong with this sort of thing?]

You can continue to use it, mm? There is nothing wrong in it because nothing is right in it [laughter].

It is just a game. If you enjoy it, you can play. Right and wrong are relevant when something is real, but when something is a game it is right if you enjoy it. If you feel it helps, it is right. In itself it has no meaning; it is absurd.

But it can suit you and you can find ways through it. That simply shows that you are not clear about your own ways and you need some help to find them out. The I Ching makes it easier. You can throw the responsibility on it. You can say that the I Ching has decided this, so now you have to do it. It may have been difficult for you to decide to do so or not and it would have created much conflict in you. Now the I Ching has decided and you trust it. Decision becomes easier. It makes your life a little smoother. It functions like a lubricating oil.

But ultimately one has to come out of all games. It is your life – why leave it for someone who has written a book five thousand years ago to decide for you? It is better to decide on your own. Even if you err and go astray, then too it is better to decide on your own. And even if you don’t go astray and you have a more successful life through the I Ching, then too it is not good because you are throwing the responsibility. And through responsibility, one grows.

Take the responsibility in your hands. These are ways of avoiding. Somebody throws it on God, somebody on karma, somebody on destiny, somebody on the I Ching, but people go on giving it to somebody else.

A person becomes spiritual when he takes the whole responsibility on his own shoulders.

The responsibility is tremendous and your shoulders are weak, that I know. But when you take on the responsibility, they will become stronger. There is no other way for them to grow and become stronger. If you play and feel good, nothing is wrong in it. But I must say that there is nothing right in it either. It is just a game... enjoy it.

... A mind game. And one day you will have to come out of it.

... Yes, whenever you are feeling difficulty in deciding, when you feel that it is too much to decide on your own, decide with the I Ching. You can decide by throwing a coin; that will do the same. But it is not so reliable, because the I Ching has authority a five-thousand-year tradition – and so many interpreters who say that everything in it is beautiful, perfectly right. If you throw a coin, you know that it is you who is throwing it.

... the past gives much significance. But your moment that you are deciding for is right now, here, and you are deciding it by the past. That’s basically wrong. Don’t decide it by the past, don’t decide it by the future. Decide it exactly right now. Respond to this moment. That’s what responsibility is.

In this moment, face it and decide.

A girl says that she would like to get married to you. Now you are puzzled as to whether to say yes or no, so you go to the I Ching. You are shirking a responsibility. Then if something goes wrong, it is the I Ching; if something goes right, it was the I Ching – but you are avoiding.

This is not the way of spiritual growth. If you want to say no, say no. If you want to say yes, say yes.

If you cannot decide, say both yes and no. You can say that this is how you feel: fifty percent yes, fifty percent no [laughter] – that that is how you are, mm? But be true.

[The Nadam music group was at darshan tonight.]

Music helps to bring you in tune with yourself. If you are really involved in the outer music, it brings you in contact with the inner music. Just be totally possessed as if you are not there but just a vehicle for something unknown, for something from the beyond.

[The group leader says: When there’s cathartic energy around, it’s difficult; it’s a disturbance and a conflict. So we feel that we are seeking for a very fine sensitivity but it keeps getting lost.]

Mm, I understand.

That is possible only with a permanent group. New people will be coming and they will not be able lo be so sensitive in the beginning. But try.

Later on we can do two things. For one hour just the permanent group can meet and then after that others are allowed for an hour. So you can have two groups really – a permanent group and a casual group. With the casual group it will always be a trouble. The people who are working together every day will start feeling a part of the collective, so nothing will go astray and nobody will be out of tune.

But for that a very deep intimacy is needed and long work.

After six months when you have a group of thirty people who are permanent, then we will make two groups. The permanent group can become a base, and others can fall into it. But this will be a trouble right now. When we say to be spontaneous, a few people immediately think that that has to be cathartic – being spontaneous means being cathartic.

Arrange that a few people who are living in the ashram and who will be here permanently – twenty or thirty – can form the base. You can have twenty in the group and ten dancers. If thirty people are working in tune, it will be difficult for a newcomer to get out of tune. The group’s energy will work as a vortex and the newcomer will be pulled in.

But things will settle by and by. Things are going well...

CHAPTER 2

5 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin said: I experienced something very strange after the Enlightenment Intensive group. I felt I was disconnected from myself – I was here and my body was down there. It was very scarey. I ate a sandwich and that made me feel better but it was a very strange feeling.]

The first time it happens it is always very, strange because you cannot figure out what it is.

Whatsoever happens, we can figure it out only if we have had some acquaintance with the same experience in the past. But when it happens for the first time, you don’t have any past, You don’t have any knowledge about it. Or, it will be more accurate to say, you don’t have any mind about it.

So when it comes, suddenly the whole mental mechanism stops. It cannot function. It is so new for it that it cannot digest it. And it scares you because whatsoever you know already is never scarey.

That’s why death is so scarey – because we don’t Know anything about it and we cannot know before it happens. That is the whole fear of death. If there were some way to know about it, to experience it a little bit, then the fear would disappear. In fact meditation is a way to experience death before it happens.

That’s what happened when you felt your body separate from yourself. For a single split moment all connection is lost. You are disconnected; no bridge exists between you and your body. It is tremendous, terrible. A terrific fear. arises.

You did well that you ate something. That is helpful, because the moment food enters the body you are reconnected to yourself. Either food or a woman who can lovingly touch you can be helpful.

That will be better than food. It is food plus something more. If a woman can touch you lovingly, immediately you will be reconnected. It is through the woman, through the woman’s womb, that you become connected with the body for the first time.

If next time when it happens some woman is near you, just tell her to hold you. If that is not possible, then food is good. But sometimes it can happen that the body will not be able to take the food in.

You may feel nauseous; you may feel like vomiting. That’s possible, because the body is in no mood to eat. The body is on the verge of death and you are trying to eat something. That is contradictory.

Deep breathing is good because that also reconnects you.

When the child is born from the womb, the first thing that he has to do is to breathe deeply. If within three minutes he has not cried and taken a breath in he will be dead, because the body cannot exist for three minutes without breath.

So in such an experience you are unconnected, as if you are being born again. So crying, breathing, food, can be used – milk will be the best, war n milk. That again reconnects you to the mother But try to remain in that terrific moment for a little longer. Don’t be in a hurry, because if you are you will miss many things that can happen through it. When it becomes too much and you cannot tolerate it, or you think it is almost going to be the last moment of your life, when you feel that it is going to be a death and you are so terrified that you cannot bear it, then use any device to bring yourself back to the body. If you cannot do anything else, start running and jumping.

Any activity needs you to be connected to the body. That’s why meditators all over the world have insisted that you sit silently, not moving the body – because in that unmoving state it is easier for the soul and body to separate, to disconnect. When you are doing something, it is difficult to disconnect.

Action is not possible without you and your body being together, but inaction is possible.

Next time it happens, try to be in it more. There is nothing to be afraid of. It is going to be a tremendously valuable experience and by and by you will see the beauty of it. The more you taste it, the more you will desire it. Soon it will become a blessing.

Once you can remain in your body, but unconnected with it, meditation has happened. This is the first satori. Many hours may pass but you will not feel the passage of time. But this happens only when fear has disappeared and your mind has become acclimatised to the new experience and it is not too terrified by it but becomes curious. Your mind will become so interested that it wants to know more about it and the fear will become transformed into a witnessing of what has happened.

Go into it more and more, little by little, and if you start feeling that you will go mad, absorb that madness also by and by. Many people have gone mad. If they are working without a master and not knowing what to do, they land themselves in something which they cannot manage, and they can go mad. Then it is very difficult to bring them back because this madness is no ordinary madness.

It is not something like a neurosis or psychosis. Psychiatry will not be of any help in it because it is not below normal mind. It is above normal mind. It is a breakthrough, not a breakdown.

But a breakthrough can be maddening. The current may be too much and your readiness not enough. You may be able only to carry a one-hundred-voltage current and it is a thousand-voltage current, so a fuse goes off or something burns.

So don’t carry it too much. Just remain alert and go into it more and more. One day if you can go through the whole of it, there will come a moment when you will feel that everything is revolving, becoming maddening, everything becoming illogical, absurd, but you go through it; you go on witnessing. Suddenly everything is set back into place again. Again there is order and the chaos has disappeared. You have passed through madness.

This is satori: to go into madness and yet not be mad. It is risky, but everything valuable is risky.

It is like a tunnel. You pass into the darkness but you know that sooner or later you will come out of it. Just remember me whenever you are in it and go a little further into the tunnel. One day the tunnel will be finished. You will be in the open sky – and this will be a new sky, a new space that you have never known before.

[Osho asks a visitor about sannyas and he replies: There is so much in me that is not yet surrendered.]

I know... everybody has to tackle that part which is never ready to surrender. If you wait for the moment when you are ready totally, you will have to wait forever because the mind is never total.

That is the very nature of the mind. It cannot be total, because whenever it is total it disappears.

Totality is the death of the mind. It is to commit suicide.

The mind exists in the tension between polar opposites. It is really a tension between contradictions.

One part says do this, and another continuously says don’t do this. This is how the mind manages itself. It exists between the thesis and the antithesis and it never allows synthesis to happen.

Even if you feel sometimes that the synthesis has happened, that moment it becomes thesis and antithesis again. This is the dialectics of the mind. It has to create the opposite continuously.

If the opposite is not there, the mind simply cannot function. It is just like two pedals of a bicycle.

One goes down, the other comes up; the other comes up, the first goes down. That’s how they maintain the momentum of the bicycle. Once you understand this, you have to take the jump in spite of the part that says no.

Yes is never going to be total. It has to accept the no and to absorb it. And that’s the beauty of the yes: it can also absorb the no. Then yes becomes very strong. Just think of it in this way: if there is no no in you and only yes, that yes will be impotent. It will have no energy because it will have no challenge. If the yes is there in spite of the no, then it is powerful; there is energy.

Never try to kill the no otherwise you will1 lose all energy. You will lose all zest, enthusiasm, all possibility to grow. The yes has not to be total – in a certain way it has to absorb the no also. It has to understand the no – to feel it, listen to it and absorb it, because nobody can live in a no. One has to live with a yes, because yes means life and no means death.

But one can use the no to define the yes. Then it is beautiful. It becomes like a field and a figure; it becomes a gestalt. The no becomes the field, the darkness, and the yes becomes like a lamp, a flame – the figure. The no is no longer against it. In fact it enhances it, so it gives a contrast; it gives it life.

That’s why in the night the stars are so beautiful. In the day they disappear because there is only light and the background is not there.

So I would not like a total surrender, because that will be a dead surrender. I would like a surrender which is not total but very creative, which will use the no in defining the yes. Then you will have a more beautiful vision. And you will never be against yourself. Otherwise you will always be trying to drop this no-part – and that is you !

That’s how all the religions have crippled humanity. They make something the enemy. Sometimes they say sex is the enemy, and then people try to drop sex. Sometimes they say love is the enemy, and then people try to become unloving, cold, because love brings attachment. Sometimes they demand total surrender. Then what will you do with your no-part which is very active, throbbing and kicking? This is what gives you life.

Never try to drop it; rather, try to use it in a higher synthesis. Try to use it in a greater creativity.

Make it part of a higher harmony, because it is needed in the orchestra; it gives contrast. So when you surrender in spite of the no, surrender is more alive. And that is the only way to surrender.

If somebody waits until they feel total they will find it never happens, because totality is just an ideal; it is never actual. It can never be actual, because the moment it becomes actual you will drop dead.

That’s why in the East we say that whenever a person has become a totality, this is his last life. He will never be coming back again because he has attained to ultimate death. That is what nirvana is. Buddha will not come back because he has come to such a total synthesis that now nothing is lacking. Perfection is death. He will have to disappear.

This world exists for the imperfect. This world exists in dialectics.

So don’t try, otherwise that will be a suppression. Accept that no-part. I accept it. When I give sannyas to people I know, and I am not in any way befooled that their surrender is total. They are taking a risk. Maybe at the most fifty-one percent of their being is saying yes and forty-nine percent is saying no; that’s enough. I say that’s enough. There is no need for ninety-nine or one hundred percent. That type of purity is impossible.

[The Vipassana group is present. The group leader said they had been trying unsuccessfully to do something about people’s posture. The photographer had taken photos of the group and when people saw them they became more aware of their posture. He asks if they should do that in each group.]

No, no need. It may be helpful but it will be against the Vipassana mood, which is that the person should rely on his own inner feelings.

Even a mirror can deceive. In fact when your photograph is being taken, even that can change you. It is very difficult to take a photograph which is natural. When you go to the mirror you are not the same person, and when you look into it you are not the same person. There is a very subtle change, because you can observe yourself, and the observation changes the observer. You start being deceptive; you start looking the way you are not. You can manipulate yourself.

That’s why the mirror is loved so much. It helps you to manipulate your own body. But it is looking at yourself from the outside, and the whole Vipassana attitude is to feel yourself from the inside. This is an extrovert thing.

So it is better to tell them and to let them see from inside how they are sitting, how the body is feeling, what the body language is saying, where there is pressure or tension, whether they are relaxed or not. Teach them to feel from within.

In fact buddhist monks are not allowed to look in the mirror, because to look in the mirror means that you are preparing for others.

You are taking a bath and suddenly you become aware that somebody is watching from the keyhole.

You are not the same person any more; you have changed. We live through reflections – and a photograph is a reflection.

[The group leader then said that in every group a couple of people found their attention drawn to the third eye.]

This will happen to one or two percent of people. Whenever it happens, tell the person to do this.

[The group assistant] can do it. Tell the person to make the concentration on the third eye as tense as possible and then press the third eye for one or two minutes. So tell him to bring it to as focused a point as possible so that the whole body becomes intent upon it, and then tell him suddenly to relax.

If the person notices it happening every day, then do it every day and it will help tremendously –

particularly for a person who feels the energy rising there.

Every person is different in many ways. For example, in his past life [this sannyasin] has done some meditation which works on the third-eye centre, and has done it very very deeply. Whatsoever you have done in the past, it will start functioning again if the right opportunity arises. His third eye can be easily opened.

But only do this if somebody comments that it is happening to them. The same thing can happen at other centres also. If somebody feels a very intense tension in the navel, then do the same with the navel. It will be felt at these two centres more.

[The group leader asks if there is a connection between the third eye and the hara.]

Yes, there is a connection. These are the two poles and they are both deeply related. There are two types of persons. More will feel tension at the navel than at the third eye.

The yogic analysis divides persons into two types: the navel type and the third-eye type. There are more navel types, because the third eye starts functioning only when somebody has been working on it. The natural functioning is at the navel.

[A member of the Vipassana group said she went very deep and was afraid of losing this if she goes out towards people and activity.]

This difficulty arises, but don’t create any conflict or any duality. Don’t think of these two things as being inimical to each other; they are not. But if you start thinking in that way – that getting lost is against that space that sometimes you come to feel and live in – then you will create very great anxieties for yourself. And that anxiety will be just your wrong interpretation.

Being lost is part of the rhythm. The more lost you are, the deeper you will come back to yourself.

The space will be more empty, more deep, if you move further away. So go out as far as you can –

then you will go in as far as it is possible. This is always in proportion. If you go three feet outside, you go three feet in. If you go three miles out, you go three miles in. If you go out to the farthest corner of existence, you go to the innermost core of your being.

This is one of the basic things I want to contribute. Religions have always created trouble because they think that if you go out too much, you become incapable of coming in or you may be lost. So one becomes afraid and goes on avoiding people, relationships, work. One starts condemning all that is extrovert, worldly, this-worldly. One starts keeping oneself in one’s inner space. You can remain there but the inner space will remain very shallow because the pendulum has to swing both ways.

If you want the pendulum to stay always at the left, sooner or later you will not be able to even keep it there, because when it goes to the right, then it comes to the left. The bigger the swing the better.

So be a swinger !

[Osho said that through moving into opposites, depth would come more easily. He said that if you practice sleeping the whole day so that you sleep better at night, you will find that you cannot sleep at all.

Sleep comes more easily and will be deeper if one has gone as totally as possible to the other polarity of work.

Osho said that this fear of losing oneself in the external world came to everyone who had gone inwards deeply, but that outer things should not be regarded as distractions.]

Nothing is a distraction: this is my message. Every distracting factor has to be used in a creative way.

So when you are lost, be so lost that when you come home you really come home. And never create any conflict with any rhythm of life. All rhythms only appear opposite, but they are complementaries

– yin and yang, male and female energies, outer and inner.

So, good... your growth has been going very smoothly in the time that you have been here.

[A group member says: It went very deep for me. Now I feel like going inside rather than going out with people. Is that right for me?]

Yes, right now it will be good. This is not going to be a permanent thing but right now something is coming up. The more time you give to the inside, the better. After a few days you will be free to move; This is just a transit period. Right now you will be helped more if you don’t mix with people too much.

And continue &zen either in the group or alone. When you feel that there is no problem and that you can move and meet with people, can move into relationships, then don’t avoid, move.

It is just as when somebody has been ill and is recuperating. He needs rest, more rest than ordinarily.

Something new is coming up and it is very fragile. If you move in the world, it may be disturbed.

When you become certain of it, when you feel that you possess it, and when you can go into the world and come back home again and there is no trouble, then move and do whatsoever you like.

[Another group member said that she found her stomach had become very distended with air and that it had happened when she was breathing shallowly.

Osho suggested that Rolfing (Structural Integration) would be helpful as, like many people, she had learned to breathe shallowly since childhood in an attempt to control feelings. By doing this, an air-strip is formed just near the diaphragm, so the body becomes divided.

Osho has talked about the benefit of working through both groups and Rolfing. Once patterns have been identified and dropped from the mind, they often need to be worked on at a bodily level too.

Osho said shallow breathing had become a habit.... ]

Now it has entered into your musculature. Rolfing will help tremendously. And tell [the Rolfer] to be hard because that is the only way the musculature can be changed. It is a whole life’s structure and it will be painful, but allow it.

And after ten sessions, when you have started breathing naturally, for at least twenty-one days continuously remember to breathe naturally – otherwise you can fall back into the old pattern. After twenty-one days you will never fall into the old gap because you will have such a flowing life. The whole body will be vibrating.

[A group member says: I’ve been feeling a lot of emotions of a man and child, but I noticed I don’t feel the emotions of a woman.]

There is nothing to be worried about. The emotions of the child will soon become the emotions of the woman; just wait. You have repressed the woman so much that it cannot surface directly. It is surfacing through the child.

Have you watched that whenever you love a woman, you start calling her names that indicate childhood – ’baby’? The face of a woman is more like that of a child and it retains that childhood to the Very end. It has no beard or moustache and is more soft, more like a child, than anybody else.

You have repressed the woman part so deeply that the woman cannot face you directly now. It is coming via media now; it is coming from the child. The child is the woman. Soon you will see a change coming and the child will turn into a woman.

Women are childish – that’s their beauty and their aliveness. A real woman never matures, in a way.

She remains and retains something of the virginity, the purity and innocence of the child. Once a woman becomes mature, her face starts becoming ugly. She becomes cunning and clever.

So this child is just a symbol. When the unconscious is repressed too much, it can communicate only through symbols. For example in a dream, if you want to kill your father, you will kill your uncle, not your father – because the uncle looks like the father but is not. To kill the father even in a dream is difficult, so you kill the uncle.

Our censor has gone so deep and we have repressed so much that even the unconscious mind has to take some garb, some mask. Otherwise, even in your dream your hand will be slapped. What are you doing? Killing your father? That is the most criminal act in the world !

All societies think that patricide – the murder of the father – is the worst crime that a man can commit. Why do all the societies have that idea? There is a possibility that if people were allowed, many children would like to kill their father. That idea arises naturally because the father tries to discipline you, to prohibit you, to order you – so he looks like the enemy. It is very difficult for any child not to think of killing the father. You grow up, but the idea remains inside.

Certainly patricide is one of the most criminal acts, because the father has given birth to you and you kill him. He gives you life and you give him death.

[Osho said that as a child, if one is a boy one is condemned for doing anything girlish, so that attitude of condemnation becomes part of one in growing up and the feminine side of one becomes more and more repressed... ]

So a part suffers, because a man and a woman are each both man and woman. That part is trying to communicate to you. It is afraid that you may not accept it as a woman so it has taken the garb of a child. Accept it, allow it.

The more you allow these emotions, the sooner will the day come when the child has disappeared and the woman has come in. That will be a great experience, a satori – when your inner woman and man meet and you become, for the first time, indivisible. Right now you are divided into two parts.

When they meet and there is an inner orgasm of these two energies, you become one, indivisible, undivided.

So allow it. It has been very good.

[A sannyasin said that during the group she had felt different sensations in the left and right sides of her head, and felt like she was going mad. Osho checked her energy.]

You can sit silently by yourself and press your own eyes. Press the eyeballs until you start seeing lights. Don’t hurt the eyes too much; a little hurt is allowed. Just go on watching those lights.

That will settle many things. Do this for four or five minutes – pressing the eyes – and then relax for five minutes, then again press them. Do this for forty minutes and then just splash cool water over them. Close your eyes and feel the coolness.

Do this for fifteen days and then tell me. Both your minds are functioning separately. Everybody’s does this, but when meditation hits you deeply, the separation and the difference become exaggerated.

This exercise will settle many things in the brain and you will feel very collected and sane. Then I will give you a meditation.

CHAPTER 3

6 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin says: I don’t want to miss while I’m here. Is there any direction or anything that you see for me ?]

The only thing that can be done is to allow, to let it happen. Positively there is nothing to be done and nothing can be done. But negatively you can do much.

It is almost as if you are sitting in the room with closed doors and the sun has risen and beautiful winds are blowing and the fragrance is carried by the winds but you are sitting in a closed room. The winds knock on the door, the sunrays knock on the door, but you are sitting in a closed room; you don’t listen. The knock is very subtle. Even if it is very gross you are too engaged, preoccupied with yourself. The sun cannot enter forcibly. It cannot coerce you. It will wait. If you open the door, it will come in.

So when I say that negatively much can be done, I mean you can let it happen, you can let it come in. You can permit it to come in. You can open the door and it will come. But if you don’t open the door, the sun will be there and yet it will not be available to you. If it is not there you cannot bring it in. That’s why I say that positively nothing can be done. But the light is there; you don’t have to produce it. The energy is there.

The total is surrounding you. You live in the totality just like a fish lives in the ocean. Nothing is to be done. You just have to open.

So in fact it is not an effort. Rather it is more like effortlessness. It is passive. You are not to be aggressive towards the whole, because the part cannot in any way conquer the whole; that’s impossible. The part can only allow the whole to overwhelm, to overflow, to pass through it from this end to the other... to fill you, the part, so that you are soaked in it. A passive effort is needed.

And you are exactly right. I am not an entity and I am not a person. Never think about me like a person or an entity but just as being symbolic. You have to learn the A-B-C of surrender with me.

Once you have learned it you are on your own. Then you move in the totality. At the most I can just be a passage so you can learn how to surrender. It will be difficult for you to surrender without a symbol in the beginning. That too is possible but very very difficult and the ego can play many more tricks.

So this is all you have to do. There is no need to physically relate with me, to write letters or to come

[to darshan] more often. That’s not the point at all. Just don’t allow the ego to stand between you and me, that’s all. And that you can do anywhere, in any part of the world or on any other planet, because it has something to do with you, not with me. I am just symbolic. Sitting in your room you can remember me, and the remembrance will become tremendously penetrating if the ego is not standing there, if the door is not closed.

By remembering me, by and by you will forget me and you will start remembering something which is the whole, the total. The symbol has to be forgotten, but it acts as a link.

Just today I was reading a story.... An aeroplane crashed and a young woman died, but she couldn’t understand what had happened. It happens in many accidents; the story is significant.

When you die suddenly and you were not thinking about death, you cannot believe what has happened because you are still there. The gross body disappears but the subtle body is there, and it is exactly the same, a replica. Or it is just the other way round: the gross body is a replica of the subtle body. You go on feeling the field of energy in the same way. You see your hand – in fact more beautiful. You feel your body – in fact more alive.

So the woman couldn’t believe what had happened. The only thing that she remembered was that she was going to London, so that desire pulled her there. She hovered over London and could not believe it. She had never seen this town so beautiful; she had always thought it horrible. Now it was really tremendously beautiful – psychedelic, so many colours. Even the Thames which she had always thought of as an ugly, dirty and polluted thing and the sewerage system for the whole town, looked very beautiful.

She came to the Thames bridge but she could not see anybody. Many people were passing but she could not see them, because when you have lost your gross body you cannot see another’s gross body. It is difficult because we only see that which we are. So the bridge seemed completely empty.

Houses were there but they were all empty. She was becoming a little terrified. What had happened to this town?

Then suddenly her husband passed over the bridge. She could see him because he was the only man she had ever loved and that love remained a link. Because of the love she could see the gross body of her husband. Then when she could see him, she remembered her home, her dog, her husband’s friends, and then by and by she could see more and more people. The husband functioned as a link so that by and by the whole town was repeopled.

I function for you just as a link. Through me, if surrender happens, your inner world will be peopled with the whole. It will be difficult for you to see the whole directly. Through me it will be possible. So I am a symbol, and your surrender to me is symbolic. It is towards the whole through me. At the most I am instrumental, a bridge to be passed. Don’t make your home on me.

Everything is going well. Just remember one thing: don’t help the ego in any way. And whenever you see that the ego is too much then you can come to me, otherwise there is no need. You can come to me so that I can push it a little aside. That’s all that has to be done. Push the ego aside, open the door, and everything happens.

Nothing specifically is to be done. Rather it is a sort of undoing. Undo the ego, that’s all. Things are going well... I am happy!

[A sannyasin asked Osho if he and the woman he was living with should marry once she had obtained a divorce from her husband.]

First let the divorce happen and then come here. You are already married, so marriage is just going to be formal. You can do it later on if she wants to.

Don’t be in a hurry, because sometimes the very fact of marriage changes the quality of the relationship. People start taking each other for granted; that’s the difficulty of marriage. Without marriage you are lovers and love is more fluid, more flowing. Because you cannot take each other for granted, you have to renew your love every moment.

Once you are married, once love has become legal, once the law has entered into love, then logic has entered; economics and politics have entered love. Love is a private phenomenon between two persons and marriage is a social affair. Once society enters, it is already public.

Then there is trouble, because sooner or later you start thinking in terms of the past, not in terms of the future. Then you are a husband and she is a wife. You have certain roles and those roles become so fixed that people are forgotten; only roles remain. Then there is the responsibility of being a husband and a father, of being a wife and a mother. There are duties to perform, but the joy, the playfulness, is lost.

So don’t be in a hurry. First come here together.

[The Tathata group is present. The group leader said that he saw through the group how the harmony that comes about through conflict works.]

The whole pattern of Tathata is such that you go on forcing so that the negative surfaces. When the negative is released on the surface, the positive will be left there. You need not create it. You have simply to make way for it. The negative gone, the way is open. The negative leaves the inner space and that empty space simply attracts the positive. You are not to do anything else.

It is just as if a seed is in the earth and a rock is sitting on top of it so the seed cannot sprout. You remove the rock and immediately the seed starts sprouting. It was ready to sprout but there was no way for it; the rock was in the way. So anger, hatred, jealousy, possessiveness – all negativities are just rock-like, sitting on top of your positive seed. Remove them and the seed sprouts.

You need not worry about the seed. Your whole effort is to remove the rock – so concentrate on that. If you start thinking about the seed, your effort will be divided and you will be half-hearted in removing the rock your mind has already moved to the seed – the sprouting of it, the flower and the fragrance. You will not be total in removing the rock. If half the rock is removed, the remaining half will still be enough to destroy the seed.

Even a single drop of poison is enough to make you sad, to make you ill, to kill you. So your whole effort is to bring all the poison out of the system. Go on forcing... and that’s why I say that you have to be hard.

Softness will not be of any help. The rock won’t listen to softness. You have almost to be like a ghost haunting them. They have to be stirred so deeply that all their defense mechanisms are broken. You have to hit hard because they all have hard shells around them. Their anger is not just available. On top of the anger there is a personality, a character, a structure, that defends the anger inside. You have to be hard to destroy this structure. You have to bring them to a state of characterlessness.

Then only will they reveal their reality.

And once it starts, go on pushing; don’t relax. And don’t be bothered about the positive. It will follow.

Be hard!

[A group member says: I’ve been a doctor for the past ten years in Canada, working as a general practitioner and also an anesthetist. I don’t know whether to return to that or to be here.]

It is good to continue the work and to continue working on yourself side by side. It is always good to be in the world. Never be an escapist because escape is not going to help. The best arrangement is to work in the world but don’t be lost in it. Work for five or six hours and then forget all about it. Give at least two hours for your inner growth, a few hours for your relationship, love, children, friends, society.

Your profession should only be a part of life. It should not overlap into every dimension of your life, as ordinarily it does. A doctor becomes almost a twenty-four-hour doctor. He thinks about it, he talks about it. Even when he is eating he is a doctor. While he is making love to his woman, he is a doctor. Then it is a madness; it is insane.

To avoid this, people escape. Then they become twenty-four-hour sannyasins. Again they are making the same mistake – the mistake of being in anything for twenty-four hours.

My whole effort is to help you to be in the world and yet to be a sannyasin.

Of course it is more difficult because there will be more challenge and situations. It is easier to be either a doctor or a sannyasin. It will be difficult to be both because that will give you many contradictory situations. But a person grows when there are contradictory situations. In the turmoil, in that clash of the contradictions, integrity is born. You become more centred.

My suggestion is that you go back but with this decision: that you work for six or eight hours and then for the remaining sixteen hours you are not a doctor at all. Use those sixteen hours for other things: for sleep, for music, for poetry, for meditation, for love, or just fooling around.

That too is needed. If a person becomes too wise and cannot fool around, he becomes heavy, sombre, serious. He misses life.

So a wise man has to be so wise that he can allow himself a little foolishness also. That is the greatest wisdom: to use foolish-ness also as a part of life so that you can laugh – not only at others but at yourself also; so that you can play for no profit, no motive; so that you can simply relate to people for no reason whatsoever. You can do many things that are not economical, not political; things that are just for pleasure.

One should also remain a child. If you can find an old man collecting stones on the seashore, then he has understood life. If he can still enjoy collecting seashells just like a small child, with reverence and awe, full of as much wonder and surprise as if he has come across treasures, then he is really wise. He has matured.

Real maturity always retains something of childhood, and a real wise man always remains available to foolishness also.

So my suggestion is that you be here for as long as you want, and then go. Continue your profession back there as a sannyasin. Move in orange and let people laugh. You can also laugh with them.

Life should be multi-dimensional; then it is rich. A doctor is monotonous; a politician is monotonous.

Just one tone, just one note, they go on repeating, repeating, repeating. So seek, discover, investigate new realms and make life as rich as possible.

Life should be of many colours, rainbow-like. All the colours should be there. One can face God only when one has become like a rainbow, with all the colours absorbed – nothing sacrificed, nothing excluded, everything included.

Whenever you can come here, come, and then go back. Later on, finally you can settle here, but here also you have to be a doctor, mm? Good!

[A group member said she had been feeling negative and closed to people. Osho suggest it was time for her to move into a relationship. She replied that she didn’t feel anything happening with anyone.]

You may not be allowing it to happen, because it seems that you are happy with the ’no’.

That will be a difficulty – because a relationship is not something than can happen out of the blue.

You have to at least help it to happen. It is not the sound that can be created by clapping one hand.

Both hands are needed. If one person is unwilling deep down, he will not allow it. You can always throw the responsibility on others: that nobody is coming to you or nobody is worthwhile bothering with, and that you don’t feel for anyone so what can you do? But these things are very deeply related. If you move, you will start feeling. If you feel, you move more. They go on helping each other, and one has to start from somewhere.

My suggestion is that you find somebody. The world is full of so many beautiful persons who are available. Everybody is seeking and searching for love, so I don’t see that it cannot happen. Just be available. Be a little outgoing, available, otherwise it will not happen.

With meditation there is a deep necessity for love. They are both like wings and you cannot fly with one wing. If meditation is going well, suddenly you will see that love is missing. If love is going very well, suddenly you will see that meditation is missing. If nothing is going well, then it is okay.

One settles with one’s sadness, one’s closedness. But right now, because of this group, one wing has started moving. You felt very positive in the group because meditation has worked and some catharsis has happened. Now the other wing is needed.

So seek somebody. And have you booked for other groups? [she shakes her head.] First seek a lover. Let that be your group right now, and then we will see. And when you have found him, bring him !

[A sannyasin said that she was in the middle of a law course... she would like to remain here and discontinue her studies but she did not want to upset her mother for whose sake she was studying law.]

My feeling is that one should always listen to one’s heart. No other considerations are significant.

It is your life. If you don’t want to go into law, then don’t go. Once you enter into something which you don’t like, your whole life is distracted. One can manage to persuade the mother and the father; that’s not a big thing. But if you don’t want to do it, then don’t. Do something else that you want to do.

Life is very precious. One should not waste it on formalities. This is just a formality – that your parents will be happy. And I cannot see how they can be happy if you are not; I cannot see. If you are unhappy and you don’t want to do it but are doing it as a duty, they cannot be really happy. They can be happy only if you are happy.

[She replies: My mother doesn’t feel the same.]

But that is not the point. That is her problem. If you want to finish the course, then go. But be alert.

You may be simply throwing the responsibility on your mother. I want you to become responsible.

If you want to do it, go. It is better to join the studies and not to waste one year. You can come here again; that’s not a difficulty. But if it is just because of the mother and you don’t really want to do it, then I don’t think that it is necessary. Then just be here, meditate, do the groups. And when you go back, mothers can always be managed. That’s not a problem.

If you cannot manage your mother, you will be in difficulties. You will not be able to manage anything in the whole of your life. Mothers are the simplest things to manage!

[A couple ask about their relationship. He says that their love-making is explosive, but not a healthy sort of madness. This is the first time he has felt like with with a woman.

She says that she does not feel intense – more melting.]

She has touched something very deep in you. The relationship is going to be very healthy and good for you, but you will have to do a few things.

Before you move into love, just sit silently together for fifteen minutes holding each other’s hands cross-wise. Sit in darkness or in a very dim light and feel each other. Get in tune. The way to do that is to breathe together. When you exhale, she exhales; when you inhale, she inhales. Within two to three minutes you can get into it. Breathe as if you are one organism – not two bodies but one.

And look into each other’s eyes, not with an aggressive look but very softly. Take time to enjoy each other. Play with each other’s bodies.

Don’t move into love-making unless the moment arises by itself. Not that you make love, but suddenly you find yourself making love. Wait for that. If it does not come, there is no need to force it. It is good. Go to sleep; no need to make love. Wait for that moment for one, two, three days.

It will come one day. And when that moment comes, love will go very deep and it will not create the madness it is creating now. It will be a very very silent, oceanic feeling. But wait for that moment; don’t force it.

It seems you have been forcing it. You have been bringing it, trying to manipulate that moment.

Then you will go neurotic, because she has touched a very deep point in you, so love has to go still deeper. And there are many layers.

Gestalt psychologists say that the first layer is the cliche layer: Hello, how are you, good morning.

This is the most superficial layer. Behind it, just below it, is a very repressed layer: all that you have denied to yourself – the neurotic layer. So if you go into love immediately – just saying ’Hello, how are you?’ – and then you move, that neurotic layer will function and it will not be healthy.

It will be weird and you will feel tired and tense, and love will not be fulfilling. You will miss something.

It has not been the same for her. She has moved deeper than that layer. So you have to move more slowly and more naturally. If the moment does not arise that you naturally fall into love-making, then wait; there is no hurry. The western mind is too much in a hurry – even while making love. It is something that has to be done and finished with. That is a completely wrong attitude.

Love is something which has to be done like meditation. It is something which has to be cherished, tasted very slowly, so it suffuses deeply into your being and it becomes such a possessing experience that you are no more there. It is not that you are making love – you are love. Love becomes a bigger energy around you. It transcends you both... you are both lost in it. But for that you will have to wait.

Wait for the moment and soon you will have the knack of it. Let the energy accumulate and let it happen on its own. By and by, you will become aware when the moment arises. You will start seeing the symptoms of it. the pre-symptoms, and then there will be no difficulty.

But right now, as I see it, you don’t know the symptoms of the right moment. Somehow you are not in tune with your innermost core. That is creating the neurotic experience. But it will happen; nothing to worry about.

Love is like God – you cannot manipulate it. It happens when it happens. If it is not happening, there is nothing to be worried about. Don’t make it an ego-trip that somehow you have to make it. That is also there in the western mind; The man thinks he has to manage somehow. If he is not managing, he is not manly enough.

This is foolish, stupid. Love is something which is transcendental. You cannot manage it. Nobody has ever managed it and those who have tried have missed all the beauty of it. Then at the most it becomes a sexual release, but all the subtle and deeper realms remain untouched. So try it, mm?

CHAPTER 4

7 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin says: Since I’ve been doing Zazen, I find I’ve been resisting the body wanting to move... I’ve been wondering if I should go on with allowing the movements or should resist them ?]

Both are good, so make a synthesis out of both. First for twenty minutes allow all movements.

Whatsoever happens – sway, move, let the energy have its play. Then for forty minutes sit silently.

That swaying is very significant. It helps the energy to melt and rise. It helps your blocks to be broken.

But if you continuously do it and you never sit silently, then too you will miss something. When the energy has started moving, one should become absolutely silent, otherwise the movement remains gross. The body movement is good but it is a gross movement, and if the whole energy remains in the gross movement, the subtle movement will not start.

One has to come to a point where the body is completely still like a statue, so all gross movements stop but the energy is there ready to move and there is no opening for it in the body. It seeks a new opening inside that is not of the body. It starts moving in the subtle layers.

But the first movement is needed. If the energy is not moving, you can sit like a stone and nothing will happen. The first thing is to help the energy to move, and the second thing is that when it is really moving, stop the body. When the energy is throbbing so much and ready to move somewhere, then it will have to move into the subtle layers because the gross is no more available.

So first make it dynamic and then let the body be still so the dynamism will go deeper, to the very roots, to the very core of your being. Make a synthesis: twenty minutes of body movement, and after twenty minutes, suddenly stop. You can have an alarm, and when it goes off, suddenly stop.

Not a single moment is to be lost. Come into the middle and freeze. The body is full of energy but now when the body has frozen, the energy will start finding new ways.

This is the method to work inwards. It is good that you told me.

[A sannyasin who is leaving says he will return whenever Osho brings him back.]

Mm! That’s good. But don’t resist me. When I call, come immediately.

Because sometimes it is very difficult. The ego always goes on resisting in subtle ways. Sometimes it will say that now there is no need to come, or it will find other excuses. Sometimes it may say that this is not Osho calling you, it is just your own mind.

Make it a point for at least two minutes every day to sit silently and put this box on your head. [Osho hands him a small wooden box.] Just say, ’Osho, do you have any message for me?’ And then simply listen. If there is no message, there will be none. If there is a message, you will be able to know immediately that it is not from you. The voice will be mine, not yours. It will have an absolute certainty, but one has to learn how to listen to it. There will never be any doubt as to whether it is your own mind playing tricks on you or not.

The doubt arises because you have not learned the art of how to listen. So every night just before you go to bed, do this. Listen in a deep passive mood. Any activity on your part will be a disturbance.

Just listen as if you are a thief and you are entering somebody’s house. Remain very alert, because if there is any noise you have to get out of the house and run !

Listen just like a cat when he is ready for the mouse and just waiting – alert, listening, ready to jump any moment at a small hint. So be a thief, be a cat, and listen. By and by you will understand what I mean. By and by the passivity will deepen and you will start feeling something that is not of you.

You will be able to feel my presence – and don’t be scared if it happens.

If you suddenly become aware of me surrounding you, in just the same atmosphere that is here right now this moment, if you are transported into a different space, don’t be scared, mm?

[To a sannyasin, who had just arrived from the States, Osho recommended the Tathata group, describing it as ’suchness’ – just being totally in the moment... ]

... as if all bridges are broken and there is no past and no future. Time is only this moment, herenow. And whatsoever happens is the only way that life can happen to you. There is no ’should’, no ’oughts’, no goal, no ideal... just being existential, almost like an innocent animal: not knowing any memory, any imagination. Animals don’t know that they have been yesterday and they don’t know that they are going to be tomorrow. They just live this day. The only life they have is of the moment.

Tathata is a group in which you have to live like an animal, in the immediate, in the pure present, and without any ’should’, because all ’shoulds’ bring in the future. Have no idea of improving yourself, as if there is going to be no improvement.

In fact that’s how it is. There is no possibility of improving. The whole effort to improve oneself creates much anxiety and tension. It disturbs one’s energy and destroys much.

Once ’shoulds’ have been dropped and you don’t live in a utopia, in an ideal in the future of your having to become this and that, once you simply accept whomsoever you are or whatsoever the whole wills you to be, once you don’t want to change a single thing and you have no complaints, but you simply want to live and enjoy and delight in it, whatsoever it is, then suddenly a totally new dimension opens. Then you are not moving in linear time – from past to present and from present to future. Suddenly you start dropping, sinking, drowning in the present.

Ordinarily in the mind, movement is horizontal. When you live in the moment a great revolution happens: your movement becomes vertical. Either you go high or you go low but there is no horizontal, linear process. Then a great intensity arises. One becomes aflame, aglow.

The moment is so intense that one moment is almost like an eternity. It is – but because you have lost contact with it and you don’t know how to make contact with the present, you are continuously thinking about the past – that which is no more – or about that which is not yet. And between these two the real is crushed.

The real is very narrow, atomic. The past is big and the future is also very big. Between these two big rocks, the small aliveness, the atomic plant of life, is crushed.

So Tathata means suchness, to be herenow in the suchness in a deep acceptance. So first do Tathata... and be totally here. That means, leave everything to me. Don’t decide; leave everything to me. The more you grow in trust, the more you will come in contact with your own being.

Every child is born with a deep trust, but then many experiences go against it and destroy it. Still, it is never absolutely destroyed. It remains repressed. Every child comes with the potentiality to trust.

He trusts the mother, the father, the brother, the sister; everything that is around him, he trusts. But by and by he comes across many things which are against the trust. He trusts people who are not trustworthy. Then by and by he becomes sceptical, doubtful, uncertain. Then the capacity to trust becomes repressed. That capacity has to be regained, reclaimed.

That’s all sannyas is about: to regain that childhood capacity of trusting. If I can help you that much, that’s enough.

If you can trust me, that is just a device. Your trust, the quality, the mood, will arise, and then you can trust the whole of life. Once you know how beautiful it is to trust.... Even when people are not trustworthy, then too, it is beautiful to trust. Even when people are not trustworthy, then too, to doubt is to destroy one’s own being, because one grows in a climate of trust.

Once you know that the beauty of trust is unconditional... whether others deceive you or not, that is not the point; that is their problem. If you can trust even when people are not trustworthy, you have come home. Then you start growing.

And this growth is not an improvement. It has no ideals, no ’shoulds’. You simply accept yourself, and in that acceptance you start sprouting new leaves, new flowers.

[At a previous darshan Osho suggested to a sannyasin that he was too dependent on his girlfriend and that they should have some space to themselves to sort out their feelings for each other. The sannyasin reports back that they see each other very little and when they do talk it is always angry.]

Mm mm... it is good to pass through it. It is hard – and I am making it as hard as I can, because if it remains lukewarm you will never get out of it. It has remained that way for a long time. So this way or that, some decision has to be arrived at.

And all decisions are hard; that’s why people go on drifting. Any decision and the mind tries to escape from it, because decisions mean commitment. People think that if they don’t decide, somehow things will settle by themselves. But then you waste much time. Things do settle by themselves but they take muck time unnecessarily. So it is better to see the whole conflict and to suffer it. There is nothing to be worried about.

The only point is to realise deep down if you love her or not. This will be- the deciding factor; all other considerations are irrelevant.

[The sannyasin replies: I have both voices though.]

Then pass through a little more suffering. Suffering will help you come to the point where only one voice remains. You will have to go a little deeper because at the deepest level, at the heart, it is always one voice. The two voices simply indicate that the mind and the heart are speaking, so you have not gone yet deep enough. You have not yet suffered enough and you are still hoping.

Drop all hope so that you can come to realise the facticity of it. Then decision is simple. If you love her, the whole suffering is worthwhile. Then whatsoever happens is good. If you don’t love her, there is no point. Why should one suffer?

Love makes everything beautiful, even suffering, because there is something to suffer for. But if there is no love and you are suffering, it is pointless, futile. And nobody else can make you realise it. You have to realise it.

I can tell you what is happening but that won’t help, so I will have to wait until you come to the point yourself. If I say something you will start thinking about it, for and against, resisting it. If I say the truth you will be against me. That’s what you have been passing through. The last time I was hard and I was trying to say some truths to you. That disturbed you. People want to listen to lies, and they don’t help – lies don’t help.

People want things to be made comfortable. They come to me for consolations, and truth is not a consolation. But only truth helps... and only truth liberates. All consolations are just postponements.

Again today I can console you that everything will be alright, but again tomorrow the problem will be there.

[The sannyasin says: What I really want to do is to break the problem.]

Don’t try to do anything. Simply try to know exactly where you are, what you are, and what your deepest desire is. Because whatsoever you want to do may not be the deepest. It may be again an effort to avoid the deepest truth. Simply try to see the fact of whether you love. Let this question be there like a mantra: Do I love her?

And everything else is irrelevant. If you love then it is okay. Even if she is hard, tough, even if she misbehaves and there is conflict and she nags and never leaves you in peace, then too it is okay.

Because if love is there, all these things do not matter, and love is capable of surviving them. But love must be there.

If it is not there, you are believing in a gun which has no bullets and any moment you are going to be in trouble. The gun is empty, so the sooner you realise that, the sooner you can make some other arrangements. Otherwise it will be too late.

Come to a point where you can be absolutely clear and certain about whether you love or not. If you don’t love there is no point in being together: separate. Other considerations should not be brought in; they are all cowardly arguments.

You are not here to suffer for your whole life and she is not here to suffer. So why create suffering for each other? It is pointless. Separate – and separate in a friendly way. What is the point of continuously fighting?

Since you have been here there has been continuous fighting. I have never seen you happy, and I have never seen Arya happy. I know that she is unhappy; you are unhappy. When happiness happens, it happens to the couple. It does not happen to one person. When you are in love, happiness happens to the couple; they are both happy. If one is unhappy, the other is bound to be unhappy. Unhappiness happens to the couple. People can be happy alone, but when you are in a relationship you cannot be unhappy or happy alone.

Whatsoever happens to the other is going to affect you because you are vulnerable, open, and you are continuously exchanging energy with the other person – so if she is unhappy, you become unhappy. When you are unhappy you make her unhappy, and then this unhappiness accumulates.

Then it bursts and explodes. Even if it doesn’t explode, it is there like a wall. You have both been unhappy but somehow you go on clinging. There is every possibility you are clinging to the unhappiness itself.

If you are clinging to the unhappiness itself, you are in a morbid state, a perverted state. One has to come out of it, otherwise this state will become a permanent thing in you. And the danger is there that even if Arya leaves you and you leave her, whenever you find another woman you will repeat the same pattern because it will become habitual. You will know only one way to relate to a woman

– by being unhappy. You will force the other woman also to be unhappy and the same thing will be repeated again.

This happens to millions of people: they go on repeating the same pattern, they go on playing the same record. So stop playing that tape. If you really want to be happy, you have to be truthful.

If you love her, be happy and don’t allow any unhappiness, at least from your side. Let her be unhappy. Then it is her problem and if she cannot be happy with you, she leaves.

If you don’t love and you have other considerations – economical, political, formal, egoistical – then you will suffer. It is difficult. You have lived with someone for so long and it is difficult to just get out of it – but a man of insight is always ready. If he sees that the whole point is missing, he gets out of it.

It will be a compassionate act for her also because she will be able to live her own life and you will be able to live yours. If you feel like being alone, it will be good for a few months to be alone so that the whole of the old pattern is washed away.

Then you can find another girlfriend. There is no problem. The world is vast, and whenever one door closes, another opens. Why cling? Life is very precious. But this you have to decide about.

One thing that one should always retain – and it is the only duty – is to be happy. So make it a religion to be happy. If you are not happy, then whatsoever you are doing, something must be wrong and some drastic change is needed. Let happiness decide.

I am a hedonist. And happiness is the only criterion man has.

There is no other criterion. Happiness gives you the clue that things are going well. Unhappiness gives you the indication that things are going wrong; so some great change is needed somewhere.

[Osho said couples can go on repeating the same argument again and again, for years. As soon as they are with each other, something is triggered off and they mechanically begin arguing about the same issues.

Osho said he could explain the situation as he saw it, but then the sannyasin would regard him as inimical to him. He had to discover the situation for himself.]

And you can go away and cathart; there is nothing wrong in it. Let the sexual energy accumulate. It will help, because that too becomes almost a release of anger, violence, conflict. It almost always happens that couples will fight and then make love, because when anger is too much, what to do?

So they throw their fire, and their sexual orgasm becomes just a relief. It is not orgasm; it is just releasing energy. Rather than being an orgasm it is more like a leakage, a safety-valve. So that there is not too much energy, you release it; the vapour is released and you feel a little relaxed.

Again tomorrow you are in the same boat.

Try not to release it. That will bring a built-up state inside and it will bring up many things and help you to see them. Let it be there and don’t be in a hurry.

Because of this constant conflict, your growth has been continuously postponed. I have never found you in a situation where I can start working on you. It seems that you are always completely preoccupied with Arya and she is preoccupied with you. One hundred percent of your energy is engaged there. So if that problem is solved, I can start working with you; otherwise that has become a barrier.

Be courageous and come to realise what is the real fact inside you. Don’t try to deceive yourself.

Am I am here. If you cannot, then I will bring the fact to you. It is already there. I can see it; there is no hesitation about it. But I will wait.

The Soma group was present tonight.

[A group member says: After one of the meditations I felt vibrations of so much joy and happiness coming right up through my body. It felt so fantastic... just vibrating and vibrating. I’m just so full of love and gratitude towards you.]

Very good. This has been a breakthrough. But make it a point to relive it again and again. Just sitting silently, remember it; don’t remember it, relive it. Again start feeling the same. Let the vibrations surround you. Move into the same space and allow it to happen so it becomes by and by very natural to you. You become so capable of bringing it that any moment you can do it.

Many valuable insights happen in the groups but they need follow-up. Otherwise they become just memories and you will lose contact and will not be able to move into the same world. By and by, one day you yourself will start disbelieving them. You may think that it was a dream or a hypnosis, or some trick of the mind. That’s how humanity has lost many beautiful expriences.

Everybody comes around some beautiful spaces someday or other in his life, but we never try to make a path to it so that it becomes natural, so that it becomes just as when you eat every day, you take your bath or go to sleep, and whenever you close your eyes you can be in it.

[Osho gives him an energy darshan.]

Very good. You will be able to get into it easily. It has been tremendously valuable. So every day, just sit and try to bring this. Do it for ten minutes and you will be completely drowned in it.

[A sannyasin said: I feel that I’m stuck in a space which is neither pleasant nor unpleasant but which seems like a limbo.

Osho suggested he simply go on being a witness, saying that by and by this would go. He said he should not judge it as stupid but maintain a pure, unjudging, uncondemnatory witnessing. If what was happening was of any significance, useful, it would remain; otherwise it would naturally drop away sooner or later.]

And the second thing is very significant. You are still not aware of the meaning. You call it limbo, but it is one of the most beautiful spaces, better than the space you call pleasant.

The state you call pleasant cannot be permanent; it has to be lost again and again. It has a certain excitement, a certain tension. One cannot remain in that tension forever. It can only be momentary.

The state that you call painful is also momentary; one cannot remain in it permanently.

The only state in which one can become a permanent dweller is the space which is neither this nor that. It is a quality of silence and calmness, tranquillity.

Of course in the beginning it feels very tasteless because there is no pain and no pleasure. But all pain and all pleasure is just excitement. The excitement that you like you call pleasure. The excitement that you don’t like you call pain.

Sometimes it. happens that you can start liking a certain excitement and it may become pleasure, and you can start liking another excitement and it may turn into pain. So the same experience can become pain or pleasure; it depends on your likes and dislikes. But this space that you are feeling is the best.

Don’t call it a limbo. Calling names is bad, because the moment you call it limbo you have condemned it and you are already trying to get out of it, you are hankering to get out of it. No, relax in it. That’s the most natural state of relaxation. Once you start being in it, feeling it, you will learn the taste of it. That I call the taste of tao.

It is just like wine. In the beginning it will be very bitter. One has to learn. And it is the deepestthere is, the greatest alcoholic beverage of silence, of tranquillity. One becomes drunk with it. By and by you will understand the taste of it. In the beginning it is tasteless because your tongue is too full of pain and pleasure.

You know only two tastes – pain and pleasures – and you don’t know anything beyond that.

It is not a limbo state. It is a beyond state. So enjoy it, delight in it. Feel happy and grateful about it. Then it will grow and you will come to see that pleasure is nothing before it. It is very blissful; not pleasant but blissful. And it does not know any pain because it does not know any pleasure. They are two aspects of the same coin. This is beyond both.

So feel happy and move into it more and more. Whenever you have time, simply sit and enjoy it...

delight in it.

[The sannyasin adds: I seem to want to be alone most of the time. When I have people around me, I somehow resent their presence.]

That resentment is again a choice. A few people are only happy when they are with others. Then one gets fed-up with people and wants to be alone; then one feels happy. But these are polarities.

Soon you will get fed-up with your aloneness if you are left alone. You will hanker for relationship, for friends and people. I will suggest that you simply drop the resentment.

When you are with people, enjoy them. When you are alone, enjoy aloneness. When you can have both, why choose one? You can keep the cake and eat it too, mm? And that is more jewish.

... I am an old Jew and I know [laughter]. Enjoy both and don’t make a choice; there is no need. You can have both – this world and that. Try! It will happen.

CHAPTER 5

8 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Anand means bliss and prashantam means a very very deep silence, peace.

To be deeply peaceful is going to be your sadhana that you have to create around you. It is just a knack. Whenever you remember, just be deeply relaxed and feel peaceful as many times in the day as possible. The more you do, the better. After a few days you will feel, without any doing on your part, that peace has been established. It follows you like a shadow.

There are many levels of peace. There is one that you can produce just by feeling it, just by giving yourself a deep suggestion that you are peaceful; that is the first layer. The second layer is that of which you suddenly become aware. You don’t create it. But the second happens only if the first is there; otherwise it never happens.

The second is the real thing but the first helps to create the way for it to come. Peace comes. but before it comes, as a pre – requisite you have to create a mental peace around you.

The first peace will just be mental. It will be more like an auto-hypnosis; it is created by you. Then one day suddenly you will see that the second peace has surfaced. It has nothing to do with your doing or with you. In fact it is deeper than you. It comes from the very source of your being, the unidentified being, the undemarcated being, the unknown being.

We know ourselves only on the surface. A small place is identified as you. A small wave is named, labelled, as you. Just within that wave, deep down, is the great ocean.

So Prashantam – to be deeply peaceful – is going to be your method. Sitting, walking... one can walk in a tense way, one can sit in a tense way. One can sit in a peaceful way, one can walk in a peaceful way. So whatsoever you are doing, always remember to create peace around it. And this is not the goal; it is just the means.

Once you have created peace, something of the beyond will fill it. It will be nothing out of your effort.

Once that comes you can drop the auto-hypnotic method. There is no need for it.

That second is called anand – bliss. It is not only peace. The first is just peace, and in a way it is negative. There is no turmoil in it, no sickness or neurosis in it, but it is just a negation of the wrong.

The second is a positive something; not that it is only an absence, it is a presence. That will come....

[A sannyasin asks: Is there a conflict between sannyas and Judaism?]

No, no, there is no conflict because sannyas is not a faith, it is not a religion. There is no conflict between sannyas and any other religion jewish, christian, mohammedan, hindu. There is no conflict because in the first place it is not a religion. Rather it is a sort of religiousness; not exactly a religion.

It is not that you belong to a certain sect, a certain creed – because I have no creed – but that you fall in love with me. It is just a love-affair. It is more like a trust than a faith.

You would like to be open to me, that’s all. You would like to walk a few steps with me into the unknown, that’s all. You remain a jew if you are a jew. You remain a christian if you are a christian.

If a moment comes in your life when you drop your creed, that is for you to decide. It has nothing to do with me; it is your trip. But for me there is no problem.

All that I can do is to help you to become more religious. I impart a certain quality, not a creed.

I would like you to see a few glimpses through my eyes. Then you go on your way, but those glimpses will become very fundamental to you. Wherever you are, whatsoever you are doing, your inner quality, your being, will have changed tremendously through those glimpses.

So if you go to the synagogue to pray, you will be praying in a very deep and tremendously new way.

If you go to a mosque or to a church, it makes no difference.

I don’t give you a prayer, I give you the quality of how to pray.

So the prayer is for you to choose – christian, jewish, hindu, mohammedan; you can choose any. I simply impart to you a quality, a knack of praying. So what language you use, what terminology you use and what framework of philosophy you use, it is for you to decide. That’s none of my business.

So I am not in any conflict with any faith, in a way. In a way I am in conflict with every faith because all those faiths have lost what you call prayer, they have lost what you call meditation. They have forgotten the whole language of ecstasy. They have all become intellectuals: creeds, dogmas, systems. There are many words but the meaning is missing, the significance is lost. And that is natural. I don’t complain about it. It has to be so.

When a Jesus is alive, religion walks on the earth, and those few who are fortunate enough to recognise him, live in the impact of a living religion. They are face to face with God.

Jesus is nothing but a word uttered by God. That’s what christians say – ’The word embodied; word has become flesh.’ That’s beautiful. Through Jesus, God approaches you. If you are fortunate enough to recognise it and to walk a few steps with Jesus, you will be transformed. It is not that you become a christian – that’s superficial – but something of Christ enters you. Something transpires between you and Christ. You become prayerful. You have different eyes to see with, a different heart that beats. Everything remains the same but you change.

The trees are green but now in a different way. The greenery has become alive. You can almost touch the life surrounding you. But when Jesus is gone, whatsoever he says, or has said, is formulated, systematised. Then people become christian intellectually, but the living God is no more there.

It is the same when a Moses is here; it is something different.... A tremendous volcano of energies...

a man who transforms a whole race; makes a whole race totally different – so different that the race almost becomes a chosen race of God.

But when a Moses is gone, things resettle. Then man again starts moving on the earth with material things, and the Poetry is no more there. Words are there but the poetry is no more there.

So in a way I am not in any conflict because I am not giving you a faith. Faith is a dead trust. In fact you don’t trust but you still believe. That’s what faith is: given by birth, by accident. It is just accident that you are a hindu or a mohammedan or a jew; just coincidence that you were brought up as a jew. You could have been been brought up as a hindu and then you would never have thought about Moses and Abraham; never. Even in your dreams they would not have entered. They would have remained outside your world. You would have thought of Krishna and Rama, and if you were a buddhist, of Buddha, or of Mohammed if you were mohammedan. But these are accidents of life.

How can you believe just by being born in a certain family? The belief is just in the mind because you have been conditioned. Trust is something alive.

It is not just an accident that you are with me here for these moments. You have chosen to be here.

You have travelled long... thousands of miles. You have waited for many months. You have thought about me... you have dreamed about me. So here you are by your own choice. When you choose something it is totally different. When it is just given to you as a gift by the father and the mother and the society, then of course it is nothing.

Trust is alive. It is just like love.

Or see the difference this way. You have a sister. This is an accident that you are a brother to her.

You love her, of course, because she is your sister. But when you fall in love with a woman which has nothing to do with your birth, that love has a passion in it which you can never feel for your sister or for your brother – because it is just by birth that someone is your brother. You feel for him, you care for him, you love him. But when you fall in love with a woman, you are ready to die for her. You know that if you cannot get her your life will be a sheer wastage, and if you can get her then you have attained and your dream is fulfilled.

This cannot happen between a brother and a sister, because it is just because of birth that you love.

Your love is formal. If you were not told that she was your sister, you may not even have looked at her. But this woman, who suddenly in the first glimpse captures your heart, is not a sister; she has no relationship with you. She has come just out of the blue and suddenly you are no more the same person.

Trust is like love and faith is just like being brother and sister.

So I am not against any faith. But in a deep way, if you come with me, you are going to change, and then everything that you are associated with is going to change. But on the formal level you can continue. Why disturb formal things? You are a jew, so perfectly good. There is no need to disturb anybody.

Let my relationship with you be of the heart.

You can go to the synagogue and you can go to the church or wherever you will, but I will give you something which will give you a new quality to see old things too. You may read the Talmud but you will read with new eyes. Many things that you have been reading but which you have always missed, and which have never . penetrated you, suddenly will become significant... will jump out of the pages and hit your heart. And a new meaning arises. You have read that passage many times, you can repeat it by memory, but it has never been significant because significance cannot be learned by rote.

Significance is not in the words. Significance is something that you bring to the words. You pour it into the words and the words become alive again. They start moving, beating, pulsating.

So the question is perfectly right. Everybody has to think about it.

[The sannyasin, who is a conjourer and magician, shows Osho some card tricks.]

So some other day you can show many more tricks. I liked it!... Good! And these can be very helpful, because in India many so-called religious people – Satya Sai Baba and others – are simply doing magic tricks and befooling the whole world and saying that they are doing some miracles. All they are doing are ordinary magic tricks. Magicians can do far better things than them.

So one thing can be done – and can be of much help to many people’s growth. You can make a small group and tour all over the world showing to every place these tricks that Satya Sai Baba and others are doing. Just tell people that these are tricks and this is an art and has nothing to do with any miracles. Many people are caught because of these tricks. That can be very very helpful to the world.

... Mm, but do it with this idea – to expose these charlatans. Then it can be very very creative. There is no need to tell them how you do it. Simply tell them this much, that these are all just artful tricks and nothing to do with miracles.

[The sannyasin replies: One of my subjects is the real and the unreal.]

Mm! That’s what you have to do. It can be very very useful. Think about that.

And Mukta [by Osho’s side], any day before he leaves, he can show his many more tricks. One day you can call all the sannyasins so they can enjoy. That will be better. One evening in the auditorium, all the sannyasins can come and he can show. And I will be there! Good! [chuckling]

[A sannyasin says: I’m pregnant. It’s very difficult because I feel I cannot be a mother for many reasons. I feel I am not listening to you.]

No, you are listening, and you will become ready for being a mother also. But this time if you are not, abortion is good.

One should be perfectly ready to be a mother – only then give birth to a child. It is a great responsibility. One should not simply go on reproducing, because then there is no love. One should be caring.

If you are going to give birth to a child, before you give birth to the child, you must give birth to your being a mother. Otherwise who is going to take care of the child? You may be able to nurse but that is not the point of being a mother.

It is the greatest creative work in the world – to be a mother. Man has always felt jealous of women because he cannot become a mother. So if you are not feeling it is the time, don’t force it; get an abortion. The soul can find some other womb. There is no problem about it so don’t feel guilty about it.

And next time when you are ready, mm? Good.

[The Encounter group was at darshan tonight.

A group member said: In meditation today I had a lot of movements and twitching in my head.]

No, there is nothing to worry about. It is a good thing. Energy is moving; allow it.

Even a slight worry about it and a sort of repression immediately happens. If you worry about anything you immediately start stopping it. You may not knowingly do it but the very worry functions like a stoppage. It puts the energy off.

Cooperate with it. It will disappear when the work is done.

Ratnakara means the ocean and anand means bliss – an ocean of bliss. Start feeling that way from this moment, because whatever we think we become. All becoming is a project. Once you have the idea deep-rooted in your being, it is going to sprout and spread all over. Whatsoever you are is nothing but yesterday’s ideas, and whatsoever you are going to be will be nothing but today’s ideas.

Each idea projects its own being and makes a path for you to move. It gives a passage to your being to follow.

The word ’project’ is good. It means throwing yourself ahead: project. So the idea is nothing but throwing yourself ahead. It clears the way. It becomes the vanguard and then you follow.

So from this very moment, remember yourself as an ocean of bliss. If anger comes, remember that you are an ocean of bliss and suddenly you will see that the anger seems to just be foolish. It does not belong to you. You are separate from it so how can you be angry?

If something comes as a distraction, remember that you are an ocean of bliss, and that very remembrance will cut you away from that distraction.

In India, sannyas names have been given for centuries with a deep purpose. Whenever somebody calls you or you sign your name, again and again, again and again, a certain idea is emphasised, enforced, so that becomes a feedback continuously.

[The new sannyasin says the group was good but scarey.]

Right! very good... because if it’s just good and not scarey, then it is not good enough.

Whenever something is really good it is scarey also, because it brings you some insights. It forces you towards certain changes. It brings you to a brink from where, if you go back, you will never forgive yourself. If you go ahead, it is dangerous. That’s what scares. If you can go back easily, there is no problem. But these are insights from which you cannot go back. If you go, you will never be able to forgive yourself. You will always remember yourself as a coward.

And if you go ahead there is danger, because it is something new – something so totally new that you have no acquaintance of it. It is unfamiliar, strange – moving in a foreign land where the people, the territory, everything, is unknown. So a certain fear arises.

If somebody says that a group was good, then I know that not much has happened. He enjoyed the group so it proved a sort of spiritual amusement or a psychological game. He enjoyed it as one enjoys a movie or a good novel. But then he is finished. It has not done something drastic to his being so he is not afraid. But it has done something to you; you will never be the same. In these three months many more points will come and you will become even more scared. Wait for them.

Whenever there is some fear, always remember not to go back, because that is not the way to solve it. Go into it. If you are afraid of the dark night, go into the dark night – because that is the only way to overcome it. That is the only way to transcend the fear. Go into the night; there is nothing more important than that. Wait, sit there alone and let the night work.

If you fear, tremble. Let the trembling be there but tell the night, ’Do whatsoever you want to do. I am here.’ After a few minutes you will see that everything has settled. The darkness is no more dark. It has come to be luminous. You will enjoy it. You can touch it – the velvety silence, the vastness... the music. You will be able to enjoy it and you will say, ’How foolish I was to be afraid of such a beautiful exprience!’

Whenever there is fear, never escape from it. Otherwise that will become a block and your being will never be able to grow in that dimension. In fact, take hints from fear. Those are the directions in which you need to travel. Fear is simply a challenge. It calls you – ’Come !’

So in these three months there will be many fearful spaces. Take the challenge and go into them.

Never escape and never be a coward. Then one day, hidden behind each fear, you will find treasures.

That’s ,how a man becomes multi-dimensional.

And all that’s alive will always give you fear. Dead things don’t give you fear because there is no challenge in them. So it has been good. I will be working now.

You are a sannyasin. I am involved with you now. Now, whatsoever you do, I am also responsible.

[A group member says: I don’t feel that I did much work in the group but a lot of changes seem to be happening.]

Very good. Sometimes it happens even without your work. If you are available, then, even not doing much, much happens. If you are not available, you may do much and nothing may happen –

because the basic thing is availability, openness.

Sometimes if you are really open, nothing is needed to be done. You just remain open and things happen and they take you in their stride. You simply rise with the wave. With the group consciousness expanding, you expand. With the group moving into certain spaces, you move. You simply move with the group, not doing anything on your own part – as if you have left your boat to the sea, to the winds, so wherever the winds go, you go.

A group is like a wind... so many people and moving tremendously in a certain direction. If you are available, that’s enough.

Sometimes I see people doing much, they try hard, and nothing happens. They are trying hard but they are not open so they don’t allow the group to take them, to possess them. They are closed people.

So the most basic thing is to be open. And if you can also do – opening plus doing – then there will be much more.

[A sannyasin says: When I’m at darshan I feel I am really surrendering, but when I’m in the ashram, I’ve lots of doubts about the ashram. I don’t feel as surrendered as when I’m here.]

Mm mm, possible, and nothing to feel guilty about. In a way, it is natural. But the whole concern should be with me, not with the ashram. Your whole attention should be towards me. You are not to surrender to the ashram, so that is not the problem. The surrender is going towards me. The ashram only comes in from the back door. You surrender to me and now I say to you to surrender to the ashram also, but that is nothing for you to worry about. You are not to decide to do it.

I have to create many situations in this ashram which will test your trust and which will create many doubts in you. They are there as devices, because if everything is completely in agreement with your mind and then you surrender, that surrender is bogus. That will be my surrender to you, not your surrender to me. If everything is according to your mind and then you surrender, it is my surrender to you.

Remember, nothing is going to be according to your mind. If I find something which is according to your mind, I will disturb it. I will not allow that [laughter] because that becomes a challenge to you.

And if you still surrender, then surrender is a transforming force, otherwise not.

But that is not the point at all. You need not be worried about the ashram or other people. There are hundreds of sannyasins so it is going to be in hundreds of directions. But that’s natural. You have only to think about me and about you. It is a personal, an absolutely personal relationship.

Sannyas is not becoming part of an organisation. It is becoming part of me.

When I am gone it will be, of course, becoming part of the ashram. But while I am here, don’t waste time. Once I am gone you will repent and then there will only be the ashram. Right now, don’t waste your energies in any other distractions. Right? Good !

[A group member said she felt very closed. Osho asked if she wanted to open or not. She replied that she was not sure, but did want to.]

Mm, mm... no, deep down you don’t want to. Otherwise there is no problem. I don’t see any problem in you.

There are a few people who want to open and cannot because there are certain blocks and their energy is blocked. They want to come out of the room but there is no door, or the door is locked, or has remained unopened for so long that now it is almost impossible to open it. They want to come out. They beat hard on the door.

But you don’t have any block; you don’t have any problem. It is just that you don’t want to open.

Once you decide to open, there will be no trouble. Nobody can help you to open – because if you don’t want to come out of it and then you simply pretend the game of trying to come out of it but deep down you don’t want to, nobody can help. That’s why you are saying it is hopeless. You are saying it to convince yourself that it is hopeless so nothing can be done. That is not the real state.

You can do it immediately, right now. You can save Teertha all effort. If you decide, you can open right now. It is just a decision on your part – so simple and so easy. But if you want to remain closed, if you have certain vested interests in remaining closed, then of course nobody can open you; there is no way. Even if you are brought out, you will run. Even if the door is broken, you will not come out. Or, even if the walls are removed, you may close your eyes and sit there and say, ’How can I come out?’ If you are not ready to come out, nobody can bring you out.

These groups can help people if they are ready to come out. So you will have to meditate upon it.

What is at stake? What is your vested interest in remaining closed? Why are you enjoying it? Why are you helping it to be so? Are you afraid of certain things if you become open? Are you afraid that if you become open you will become vulnerable, and that if you become open you will be exposed to the world? Then who knows? – somebody may do harm. Are you afraid that if you open and start relating with people, people may reject you or might take advantage of you if you are open? These must be considered, mm? You have to just meditate upon it.

If you feel you have some vested interest in your closedness, and if you decide to remain closed, then there is no problem. But remember, closedness is to nobody’s benefit, and closedness can never become a blissful state to anybody. Closedness is slow suicide. You may not feel the poison right now because it is in very mild doses, but closedness is a slow suicide. And because of being closed you will not be able to love. You will not allow anybody to love you. You will miss the greatest mystery of life.

Love is the greatest mystery, and it happens only to very rare people who are open.

It can happen to everybody, because everybody can be open. It is just like a bud not opening. If the bud is not going to open, how is it going to become a flower? And how is it going to release the fragrance to the winds? Unless it releases its fragrance to the winds, unless it shares its being with the whole, it is going to remain unfulfilled.

You are like a bud, afraid that if you open you may lose your fragrance; afraid that if you are open, then who knows?

People remain closed as a safety measure. It is more secure. You can avoid people. You can always remain at a distance so that nobody can approach you and nobody can harm you, and before anybody rejects you, you can always reject. You are always the first to reject, so the ego feels very very fulfilled. But it is a very very morbid enjoyment, perverse.

Real life is always in danger. The more danger, the more life. The more insecurity, the more life.

So meditate over it. It is not a question of any blocks; you have none. It is simply a pure decision.

If you have the intention to open, you will open immediately. So don’t play the game ! Otherwise you are trying to play a game with yourself. You are trying to convince yourself – ’I am trying hard to open but what to do? I seem to be hopeless, so nothing can be done.’ You are in a double-bind: you don’t want to open but you don’t want to recognise the fact that you don’t want to open.

On the one hand you are playing the game of trying to open yourself and on the other hand you go on tightening yourself. So you can be happy both ways. All that you think is good in being closed is there, and all that you think is good in at least pretending one is trying to be open is there too.

But that’s not the way, the right way, the healthy way. Never be in a double-bind, because it is self-destructive.

I am giving you a tremendous power: the power to change yourself just by intending to change.

After seven days, come back and tell me what you have decided. If you decide to remain closed, I can find devices for how to close completely so that there is not even a small leakage. I can give you a small cave, and you can enter it and die. But if you decide to open, there is nothing to be done...

just the decision.

Man is so absolutely free to be whatsoever he wants to be. It is all our choice. So never say

’hopeless’. That is a trick – a trick to avoid your own responsibility, your own power. Man is absolutely free to be whatsoever he decides to be.

Existentialists have a very particular terminology for it, and it is beautiful. They say that man is born just as pure existence, not as essence. You don’t bring any essence with you. You are simply born as pure existence. What your essence is you decide later on by your acts. So whatsoever you want to be, you become. It is not that you are born with a certain ideal in you, a certain destiny.

For example a seed has a certain destiny. It can become a certain flower, that’s all. It cannot change, it cannot become anything else. The seed has a certain destiny hidden in it. The essence is there already. It has just to unfold. But man is totally different. He is not like a seed.

You are simply pure existence. Whatsoever you decide, you become. If you decide to become a rose, you become a rose. If you decide to become a lotus, you become a lotus. It is not that you carry a seed within you. Man is total freedom.

Realise that. Meditate on it, and after seven days tell me how you are feeling. If you come across this point – that it is you who is deep down resisting the opening – then there is nothing to be done.

Simply relax. And this can be done in a single moment. No process is needed. If you understand what I am saying you can even move immediately, right now, and open. Nobody is hindering you.

These are your petals which you are keeping closed. Relax !

It is almost like this.... [Osho looked down at his hand and held it fistshaped, tightly.] I am keeping this fist closed. To keep it closed, effort is needed. If I want to keep it closed I will have to make an effort, give it energy. For opening, no effort is needed; I simply don’t try to keep it closed and it opens. Opening is natural, closing is unnatural. So you are wasting much energy in trying to keep yourself closed.

Once you see the point, you simply relax and it opens.

[A group member says: Today I really got in touch with not feeling compassion towards other people... seeing them and judging them and not feeling compassion.]

That’s a good realisation. People simply think they have compassion. Compassion is a very rare quality. It comes only to a very high, developed soul. Sympathy is possible, but compassion is a very very high-level thing.

So this is a good insight – that you have come to feel that you don’t have any compassion. Now there will be a possibility of your having it. First one has to realise that one is carrying a counterfeit, a false coin, which is not compassion but which one has been thinking is compassion. When you realise that it is not compassion, you drop it. And by dropping it you create an absence in you where it is possible for compassion to enter.

So don’t feel sad about it. It is a tremendously valuable insight that you don’t have any compassion.

Of course it makes you sad. You feel depressed. You feel as if you have lost something – but you never had it. Still one feels one has lost something; at least in the dream one had it.

Meditate more, and one day by and by you will see that the compassion is arising. But don’t try to have that false compassion again.

That is the trouble with false things: they take up space in you, and they don’t leave space for the real thing to enter. If your pocket is full of false coins and you think that you are rich, why worry?

Once you come to know that you are a beggar and all coins are false, suddenly you become sad because the whole money is lost. But now you can find out ways where and how one gets real money.

The false money is gone – good. Half the work is done. Now the other half has to be done. The real money has to be searched for, mm? Soon glimpses of compassion will be coming. When the first glimpse comes to you, come and report to me, mm ? Good !

[A group member says: I found out in the group that all my feelings seem to be wrong or just games.]

... So you do Aum and Tathata. And in those groups don’t be worried about whether it is a game or a role. Even if it is a game, play it well. Even if it is a game, make it real. Even if it is a role, let it be, but know it so deeply that it becomes a reality.

Right now you cannot make the distinction between what is real and what is unreal, but only later on when a very integrated consciousness arises, can you have the distinction between what is real and what is unreal; not before it.

It is just as if you are in a dream. In the dream, the dream seems real, and you cannot make a distinction in the dream between what is real and what is unreal. All is unreal, but in a dream everything is real. Only in the morning when you are awake, you suddenly become aware that the whole dream was unreal.

So it is not that a few things are real in your life and a few things are unreal. In this state, when man is unaware, everything is unreal like a dream, but everything looks real.

In another state, when man becomes awakened, becomes a Buddha, then everything is real; nothing is unreal. So it is not that a few things are real and a few unreal. If you are not aware then everything is unreal. If you are aware, everything is real. But you will be able to know only what was unreal when you are awake, not before that.

So right now, don’t make any trouble. Whatsoever is, is. You are in a dream, and you have to fulfill the dream as efficiently as possible because once the dream is fulfilled and the dreamwork fulfilled, you will be awake. When the sleep is complete and the body satisfied, you will awake. Then you will be able to know that the whole thing was unreal. It was not that a few things were real in the dream and a few things unreal – the whole lot !

So simply do these two groups as totally as you can – real or unreal, don’t be bothered. Even if it is unreal, it is real for you. And then tell me, remind me again, mm? Don’t be worried.

[A visitor says: I do not know what is real and what is unreal. I do not know what is true and what is untrue.]

Mm mm. A blind man cannot see darkness. To see darkness, eyes are needed.

Never think that blind people are in darkness. They cannot see so they cannot see darkness either.

If you can see darkness, eyes are there. The same eyes can see light, so there is no problem.

And the two doors in the room both lead to illusion. It is not a question of choosing between truth and illusion, because all doors that are outside you, lead into illusion. The truth is within you. It is in the very heart of the seeker.

So if on one door is written ’illusion’ and on another is written ’truth’, don’t bother to choose between them. Both are illusory.

You are truth. Truth is your very consciousness.

Become more alert and more conscious. It is not a question of choosing between doors. The darkness is there because you are unconscious, so-no light from the outside can help. I can give you a lamp right now but it won’t help. By the time you have reached your room, it will be out. You have to become more conscious, more and more conscious and alert so your inner flame, only that, will enlighten your surroundings. In that light you will see that all doors have disappeared. The door that was illusion and the door that was truth – both have disappeared. They were both in conspiracy.

In fact, they both lead to the same place. They just give you an illusion of choice. So whatsoever you choose, you always choose the same thing. They both lead to the same passage. Eventually you end up in illusion. So that is not the problem.

The problem is how to become more alert. These groups are just to help you to become more alert. Anger is there, so become more alert about it. Fear is there – you say that you are afraid of the darkness. Become more aware of the fear. I’m not going to give you a prescription of how to overcome the fear. No, that is not going to be of any help.

My prescription is to become more aware of it and to live with it. Don’t try to escape from it. Once you start living with it, fear will disappear. If you run, it increases. The more you run, the more afraid you will become. And then it is a vicious circle. The more you become afraid, the more you run. The more you run, the more you become afraid. Then there is no end to it. Stop! There is no need to run. If it is dark, let it be. Start looking into the darkness.

Have you watched sometimes that if you come into your room it looks dark? Then you sit and rest and by and by the darkness disappears. The room is full of light. It is not that something has happened. It is just that your eyes have become accustomed to looking into the darkness.

It is said that thieves start seeing in the dark more clearly than anybody else because they have to work in darkness. They have to enter unfamiliar houses and on every step there is danger. They may stumble upon something. By and by, they start seeing in the dark. Darkness is not so dark for them. It becomes almost light enough for them to move about and do things.

So don’t be afraid. Be like a thief. Sit with closed eyes and look into the darkness as deeply as possible. Let that be your meditation.

Every day for thirty minutes sit in the corner, close your eyes, and create darkness – as dark as you can imagine – and then look into that darkness. If it is difficult just think of a blackboard in front of you, so dark and so black. By and by you will be able to imagine more darkness. You will be tremendously surprised that the more you look into darkness, the more clear your eyes become.

And if fear is there, allow it. In fact, one should enjoy it. Let it be there; start trembling. If the fear starts a certain vibration in you, allow it, tremble. Get as much frightened as possible. Almost be possessed by fear... and see how beautiful it is. It is almost like a bath ... and much dust will go with it. When you come out of that trembling you will feel very very alive, throbbing with life, pulsating with a new energy, rejuvenated.

So these two things – darkness and fear – you have to work on. Make them great companions.

Create a friendship between you and darkness, between you and fear.

CHAPTER 6

9 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Deva means divine and anuragi means lover – a lover of God.

And that is going to be your path. Love is going to be your path. It is easy and yet it is difficult. Easy if you can allow yourself to surrender. Difficult if the ego goes on resisting, showing defense. It is in your hands.

And when I say that love is your path, I mean change every moment of your life into a loving energy.

If you are walking on a street, feel as if you are full of love, diffusing love. Nobody is there; you are not addressing your love to anybody in particular, just unaddressed... just as a flower sends its fragrance unaddressed. The bees, the birds, the stones, all need love. Every situation can be converted into a love situation. If you are sitting in your room alone, fill the whole room with love.

Sometimes even touch things with a deep love, gratitude, as if they are persons.

Ordinarily just the opposite is happening in the world: we touch persons as if they are things. We should touch things as if they are persons.

That will start a transformation in your energy. By and by, you will see that you are riding on a great wave. It is the same energy that we are diffusing unnecessarily, sometimes as anger, sometimes as jealousy, sometimes as possessiveness, sometimes as anxiety. All these things, negativities, are nothing but energy unused because we have not been able to direct the energy to its fulfillment and to its destiny. It needs some ways to release itself otherwise it will become too heavy.

God goes on giving you infinite energy every moment and we don’t know how to use it. That unused energy has somehow to get out of your system, otherwise you will be dead. It has to move so that God can pour new energy into you.

Once you start pouring your energy as love, anxiety disappears automatically. It is not a problem.

This word ’anxiety’ is very good. It comes from a latin root ’augustus’ which means narrowness.

When your energy has no way to move or you have so much energy and the way is too narrow so that the energy feels confined, hemmed in, tension is created. Then you find some way or other –

even if it is destructive – to throw it somehow.

So to me, anger, hatred, anxiety, are not problems. They are there because you have not yet enjoyed love. So forget all about them and just move into love. Suddenly you will see that your anger is no more there. Anxieties have disappeared because the whole energy is being used by love, and love is never narrow. It is as big as God, as infinite as God, and once you are in deep love you are divine.

Love makes everybody divine.

If you don’t love, you are not even human: If you love, you are divine.

So this has to be your path and the name Anuragi will remind you continuously.

[The new sannyasin says he is a law librarian.]

Very good. So treat books as persons. They are, mm?

[Osho suggested groups that he should do, first Tathata – the total acceptance group.... ]

Total acceptance is the very base of love. Rejection creates hatred and acceptability creates love.

When you love somebody, you accept them totally and unconditionally. You don’t want them to become somebody else. You love them as they are. You delight in the way the other is. You don’t have a ’should’. You don’t try to improve. And when you love yourself, then also you stop improving upon yourself because all improvement shows a deep rejection.

So I don’t teach improvement. I teach transformation.

Anand means bliss and smaran means remembering, remembrance.

It means a constant

remembrance; what Sufis call ’zikr’ – a constant remembrance of being blissful. Don’t forget it.

Nothing else is needed, just a remembrance that one is blissful. One is blissful, only one has forgotten it. Only the language has to be reclaimed.

Bliss is not something to be achieved. It is already there, because you have never been away from it. One cannot be away from it because bliss is one’s nature. It is the deepest core of one’s being, so one can forget. It is very easy to forget because it has always been there; so much so that one tends to forget it.

It is just like a fish in the ocean. The fish cannot feel or know the ocean because it has always been in it. Once it has been thrown on the bank, for the first time it comes to know the ocean. When we are separated from something, we come to know it; that is the problem.

We are never separate from our nature... we are never separate from God. That’s why, how, we have forgotten all about God and we go on asking, ’Where is God?’ And you are God. The seeker is the sought.

This name I give to you to continuously remember. Walking, sitting, eating, talking, alone or together, always remember again and again, ’I am blissfuL’ Let it become a chanting inside – ’I am blissful.’

Let it move in with the breath and out with the breath – ’I am blissful’ – so that it becomes almost like breathing. By and by, something will explode within you and there will be no need to remember.

You will know.

Remembrance is needed just to clear the way for knowing. Once you know, there is no need to remember. This constant remembering is just like a hammer. So keep this in the memory...

[The new sannyasin says: I’m having a hard time loving myself. I’m always putting myself down. It’s something that I’ve just learned to do.]

That’s a very significant insight – to know that one does not love oneself, to know that it is very hard to love oneself.

This is not only the case with you. This is the case with the whole humankind; the whole of humanity suffers from it. We never think about it. We always think in terms of loving somebody else. The man thinks to love the woman, the woman thinks to love the man; the mother thinks to love the child, the child thinks to love the mother; friends think to love each other. But unless you love yourself it is impossible to love anybody else, because the very thing will be missing.

You can love somebody else only when you have love within you. You can share something only when you have it.

But the whole humanity has lived under this wrong ideology, so we take it for granted – as if we love ourselves and now the whole question is of how to love the neighbour. It is impossible! That’s why there is so much talk about love and the world remains ugly and full of hatred, war and violence and anger.

This is a great insight to come to – that you don’t love yourself. It is really hard to love oneself because we have been taught to condemn ourselves and not to love. We have been taught that we are sinners. We have been taught that we are not of any worth. Because of that it has become difficult to love. How can you love a worthless person? How can you love somebody who is already condemned?

But it will come. If this insight has come, there is nothing to be worried about. One window has opened. You will not be inside the room for long – you will jump out. Once you know the open sky, you cannot remain confined in a stale world. You will come out of it.

[A sannyasin said that she had been doing something which was like Yoga but not as structured or as formal. She simply allowed her body to move and take postures that it felt good in.

Osho said this exercise was good and could be very helpful.]

That is not what is ordinarily called Yoga, but there is a very esoteric tradition in India which they call Sahaj Yoga – spontaneous Yoga. There is no need to follow any form, any rigid discipline, but just allow the body to have its way. The body knows more than the mind, so if you fix some pattern and try to force it on the body. it is the mind dominating the body and the mind does not know as much as the body does.

The mind is a very late arrival. The body has existed for almost three million years and the mind has not existed for more than twenty-five thousand years a very late arrival. If we divide the whole of history into twenty-four hours, the mind came only two minutes ago. So the mind is very immature, childish. To try any discipline through the mind on the body is putting things topsy-turvy.

I’m perfectly in favour of spontaneous postures. Allow the body to have its own way. Listen to the body and what it says. The needs differ from moment to moment. Today the need is something different and tomorrow one never knows. Today the body may like to move in a certain posture and tomorrow it may not like it; the need may not be there. But if you are trying to enforce something from the mind, you go on enforcing it without listening to the body. Then the whole thing becomes formal, and a mind-trip.

So, good... but one thing I would like to add to whatsoever you are doing is to remember that the mind is very tricky. What you call your feelings may again just be a mind thing. It may not really be of the body, because thought is of the mind and feeling is also. The mind has become so predominant.

It monopolises; it doesn’t allow anything. Even if you feel, you feel through the mind. As in this, the mind interprets everything.

Have you heard anything about Subud? It will be very helpful for you. What Subud people call Latihan will be exactly the thing for you. So after the camp I will tell you how to move into Latihan.

You don’t need to do anything with the mind. Simply stand in a loose posture and wait for God, for the whole, to work in you. Then you do whatsoever you want to do in a deeply prayerful mood – ’I am at Thy will’ – and just relax.

It is just like when people do automatic handwriting. They just keep the pen in their hand and wait.

Suddenly some energy possesses the hand and the hand starts moving. They are surprised – their own hand is moving and they are not moving it! Wait exactly like that, and after three, four minutes, suddenly you will see a few jerks coming to the body and energy descending in vou. Don’t get scared because It Is very scarey You are not dolng It. In tact you are just a witness; it is happening.

Move with it. The body will start taking many postures – moving, dancing, swaying, trembling, shaking; many things will happen. Go on allowing; not only allowing but cooperating. Then you will come exactly to what we call Sahaj Yoga.

Latihan is nothing new. The word is new. Subud is not something new. It is just a new version of Sahaj Yoga – spontaneous Yoga. You leave everything to the divine, because the mind is tricky.

Soon you will see the difference because you will just be a watcher. You will be surprised because your hand will be moving and you are not moving it at all. After a few days of relaxing into it, even if you want to stop, suddenly you will not be able to; you will see that you are possessed. So one has to pray in the beginning and say, ’For twenty minutes take possession of my being and do whatsoever you want to do: Thy will be done; Thy kingdom come.’ Let that attitude be there and just relax. God will start dancing in you and will take many postures. The body needs will be fulfilled, but not only that – something higher- than the body, greater than the body, some deep needs of consciousness will be fulfilled.

I can see that you have been seeking and searching. You don’t know exactly what you are seeking but nobody knows unless one finds. One goes on groping in the dark.

Much is going to happen. First do the camp as totally as possible.

[An elderly sannyasin says: I have quite spontaneous experiences and sometimes they happen slowly, but also sometimes they are quite ferocious, quite violent.]

Sometimes they can be, but everything is alright. God is both beautiful and ferocious, mysterious and terrible. He has to be because He is all. He is the day and the night, summer and winter. He is life and He is death, so all contradictions are doing in Him.

Sometimes experiences can be very very ferocious. Enjoy that too. That is going to help.

... You have to let it go. Whatsoever the experience, you are not to create any resistance; you have simply to go into it. Even if it is ferocious, move into it and suddenly you will see the beauty of it. The ferocious is also beautiful once you allow it.

It is just like a cyclone in the ocean – ferocious, dangerous – but once you know that that too belongs to God, you are on the shore. You can enjoy it... it is beautiful. The very wildness gives it a certain depth.

So both are beautiful. Simply relax and enjoy. Your experiences are going very very well and in the right direction. Much more is going to happen... but you are resisting a little. You are a little afraid.

That fear has to be dropped. In these few weeks that you are here, we will try so you can drop the fear. Even if sometimes you feel that it is almost maddening, don’t be afraid.

It happens because of our capacity. Our capacity is small and sometimes God pours so much into us that it is maddening. It is almost two hundred volts in a one-hundred-voltage wire, so everything goes crazy.

Allow it, because that is the only way to increase your capacity. It will happen many times, because more experiences will be coming. The more ready you become, the more will be coming, and there is no end to it.

In God there is only the beginning of the journey. There is no end to it.

He goes on becoming more and more wild, the more you allow. But it is tremendously beautiful.

Once you can enjoy it, you are simply grateful. You should be grateful.

[A young woman says she has always been afraid of the dark... afraid to sleep on her own in a room.]

Do a few groups here... things will change.

It is just through wrong associations from childhood. Many children have them because parents are not alert, so children suffer for the whole of their life. Sometimes parents even make them afraid of the dark. They use it as a technique, a device to make the child afraid, because when the child is afraid he can be controlled. But it can create deep problems inside.

Darkness is one of the most beautiful things in the world, so you are missing a lot. And to be alone has such beauty. That too you are missing, because if you are afraid of darkness, you will be afraid of aloneness. Darkness is very silent. It has nothing in it to create fear in you. It is just through an association from childhood. Aloneness is very very pure. The greatest experience of life happens in aloneness and in darkness.

So this fear has to be dropped. We will find ways how to drop it, because you are missing much.

Because of the fear you will not be able to love, because these are associated problems. If there is too much fear, the whole of your energy becomes concerned with fear. And love is the opposite of fear. So if fear is there, you will not be able to love. Once fears disappear you will be able to love. ...

it will go don’t be worried.

[Osho gives her sannyas.]

Now I will protect you. Don’t be afraid of any darkness or anything.

This will be your new name: Ma Prem Chidambara.

Prem means love, because when fear goes, love will appear. Once fear is dropped, the same energy that is involved in fear will be released in love. Prem means love.

And Chidambara is one of the most beautiful names in India. It means sky of consciousness, expansion of consciousness. So get in tune with this new name. It will mean the sky of love and consciousness. That is the goal of the whole of humanity and they both come together.

When you love, you become more conscious. If you become more conscious, you love more. Love is the only religion, but it appears only when fear is completely dropped.

But it will go. I can see that there is no trouble. And change to orange !

[A middle-aged visitor explained that she works for a dutch airline and while she doesn’t particularly enjoy it, she needs the money. She said she had trouble communicating with young people.]

So I can make you younger! That will be easier. Don’t leave, because you will have to earn money and you have only five more years to go. I will make you a little younger and you will be able to relate. It is just some attitude that is creating the trouble, not the job.

Always remember that whenever there is a gap, it is the older person’s responsibility to bridge it because you are more mature and more understanding. Young people are too young. They don’t know anything about life yet, so if they don’t create any bridge, it can be forgiven. But you can create a bridge more easily. But it will happen.

You can do a few groups here. My young people will pull you back.

[She answers: I have no difficulty with young people if they are not narrow-minded.]

That is difficult. How can one change them? We can only change you. You are here, so something can be done.

Whether they are narrow-minded or not, that is their problem. It should not create a problem for you.

That is their problem and they will suffer for it. Why should you be worried?

So do a few groups here. Only in a Group will you be able to see how you are creating your problem.

By leaving your job you will create problems. You will always feel that you have not taken the right decision if you leave. It will be like an escape because you could not cope with it and you will never be able to forgive yourself. It will linger in your mind continuously. If you want to leave the job, you can, but first settle this problem.

Once there is no problem and you want to leave, leave, but to leave because of the problem is not good. My suggestion is always that if you want to leave a certain thing, be successful in it and then leave it, but never leave it as a failure.

When you are winning, leave. But when you are feeling that you are defeated, stick to it. Wait for the right moment – when you are winning – and then leave. Then you will come out of it cleanly.

[Osho gives her sannyas.]

Deva means divine and Vibhuti means gift – God’s gift. Look at yourself in that way. Our life is a gift, a tremendously valuable gift. We may realise it, we may not, but it is an infinite gift.

So think in terms of life being a gift from God and then you will take more care of your life. You start loving your life. Then you don’t waste it. It is precious... each moment is tremendously precious, and once it is gone it is not going to come back.

[A visitor says: My husband divorced me two years ago and my children are grown up and have left home.]

Mm! So this is an opportunity! Don’t take it wrongly. If you are left alone you can grow. Many people are suffering because the husband has not left yet [laughter].

So feel happy. This is a great opportunity to use. People say to me, ’What can we do – so many children and the husband....’ They have to devote their lives to them. You are simply alone. So don’t take it wrongly.

[She adds: But there are difficulties for my children. I feel very sorry for them.]

One should be sorry for oneself, because we cannot do anything else. All that you can do is about you. You will be gone soon but the children will be here.... And nobody can manage anybody else’s life.

’... though they are with you,

yet they belong not to you.

You may give them your love

but not your thoughts,

for they have their own thoughts.

You may house their bodies but not their souls,

for their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow,

which you cannot visit even in your dreams.’

God will take care. It is none of our business to be too concerned. Whatsoever we can do, we do, but one should not hanker about things going the way one wants. That is very egoistic. You have given birth to a child, but once he is out of the womb, he is free of you.

First he depended for his breath on you when he was in the womb. Then he will take his own breath.

You don’t say. ’What are you doing? Are you trying to be free of me? Trying to be independent?’

You feel happy that your child is breathing.

First he will take milk from you, then one day he will start eating on his own. First he will go on clinging to your apron and then one day he will leave it.

You will be happy because the child is growing, becoming mature. Then finally one day he falls in love with a woman. He has found his woman, so he will go on his own way. Bless them, and whatsoever happens, they have to find their own life and their own meaning to life.

Now you are free. Just try to find your meaning, your life, your goals, and devote the few days that are left to the search of the ultimate. Don’t be concerned with ordinary things.

I have never seen a single parent who is happy about their children. I have heard a jewish joke....

A jewish woman died and the first thing she asked when she got to heaven was if she could see Mary. So it was arranged She went to see Mary and she said, ’I have only one question to ask. You must be the happiest woman in the world. Your son is worshipped by millions.’

Mary said ’What! I always wanted him to become a doctor!’ [laughter]

Nobody is ever happy. Even the father of Buddha was not happy. He was very very annoyed because his son turned out to be a beggar. He became a sannyasin and the father was hoping he would become an emperor. He crushed all his father’s hopes.

Whatsoever happens to the children – good or bad; even if they become saints – it doesn’t matter.

One thing is certain – that the child is not here to fulfill your expectations. That much is certain. The child is here with his own destiny, and he will unfold his own destiny. You are trying somehow to direct his destiny and that is going to be frustrated.

So if the child becomes a thief or a murderer, of course the parents feel bad, and it looks logical. But even if he becomes a Jesus or a Buddha, then too they feel frustrated because they have their own ideas and the children try to do their own thing.

Don’t be concerned; it is okay. Accept it and bless them. They have to find their own ways. Who are we to interfere? And how can we? Pray for them but leave them on their own. You try to grow yourself.

And this is my feeling: if you change, much will change. Even in your relationship with your children, much will change. When you change, the relationship cannot be the same. There is a possibility that they will look at you again with a different view, with different eyes. But you change. It is irrelevant what they do.

For one month just be here with me and allow me to work a little. If you are preoccupied with the children and your problems there, you will not be here. Forget all about Holland. It doesn’t exist for one month. Meditate, enjoy, celebrate and be happy for this one month.

[The ashram Rolfer says: I’ve been here for over a year now and a lot of things have happened to me and yet now I feel that I’m back in an old space where everything just seems futile... ]

Everything is futile. One has to understand this. If you don’t understand it, you will always remain in illusion. Everything is futile and in life there is no progress, no improvement, because life is eternally there. Life is already perfect.

All that you try to do to make it more perfect is futile, but it takes time to realise it. Now you are feeling stuck. You can do two things. You can change your style of life and then for a few days again you will be on a honeymoon – hopes and desires and ambitions... and the possibility of tomorrow again becomes alive. But after a few days that tomorrow never comes. Again you are stuck and the whole thing again becomes routine.

It is just like when you love a woman. The honeymoon over, the love is over. By the end of the honeymoon you are again seeking and searching for another woman. But you can go on in this way from one honeymoon to another but it is not going to help in any way. You have to realise that there is nothing to achieve in life. Life is not goal-oriented. Life is eternally herenow. It is already perfect.

It cannot be improved upon.

Once you realise this, then there is no future, no hope, no desire, and no ambition. You live this moment; you enjoy and delight in it.

The feeling of stuckness is coming because you still have ambition left in the mind. That ambition is creating the frustration that nothing is improving – but there is nothing to be improved! The trees are happy because they don’t try to improve. They don’t listen to any foolish sermons of Vincent Peale or others. They don’t bother at all about the future.

Look at life. Everything is so delighted, right this moment. So be delighted. This time, don’t change and don’t create another illusion. If you are feeling stuck, feel stuck. But tell the mind, ’Now I am not going to create another dream for you so that you are riding on the wind again for a few days. No more !’

Live with this stuckness and try to understand why you feel it. You are feeling it because you are always keeping a goal ahead. You have to reach somewhere, you have to go somewhere. Where?

Life is here – where are you going? There is nowhere to go.

Once you understand that, the stuckness will melt away. It is created by you, by your idea that one should be always growing, always growing. Where will you reach by always growing? Now you are mature enough to understand that life has no meaning in the future. The meaning is intrinsic, herenow, in the present.

So enjoy your food, enjoy the woman you love, enjoy your work, enjoy your sleep, and forget all about the future. Then the stuckness will melt by itself. Nothing is to be done. It is not a problem.

The problem is deeper than your stuckness. The problem is that you are still hankering; the mind is greedy.

One day everybody has to come to that point and to realise, ’What nonsense am I doing with my life? – wasting it in improving it while it is already perfect.’

That’s what I mean when I say that you are gods – nothing is to be done.

Delight in the fact of your being. Enjoy the way you are and enjoy the world that’s available to you.

Then each moment becomes a diamond in itself. Life is no more a means. Each moment is an end unto itself. That’s what Jesus means when he says ’Think not of the morrow’.

For one month, live in the moment, and even if you feel that stuckness, let it remain there. Nothing is to be done. Tell it, ’Okay, I accept you, but I am not going to do anything. I am going to live moment to moment.’ And enjoy yourself. For one month, without any goal, without the achieving mind constantly boiling within, without any desire, simply live. That’s what a religious man is.

[The Hypnotherapy group is present. Osho has said about hypnotherapy:

’Hypnotherapy touches the fourth body, the body of consciousness. It simply puts a suggestion into your mind – call it animal magnetism, mesmerism or whatsoever you like. It works through the power of thought, not the power of matter. If your consciousness accepts a certain idea, it starts functioning.

’Hypnotherapy has a great future. It is going to become the medicine of the future, because if just by changing your thoughtpattern your mind can be changed, through your mind the vital body, and through the vital body your gross body, then why bother with poisons and gross medicine? Why not work through thoughtpower?’

A group member says: I went to the music group and I was dancing and I thought I was Shiva dancing with Devi and then I was Devi dancing with Shiva. Then I didn’t know if I was Shiva or Devi or... And is it my imagination?... Is it real?]

Yes, it is real. And it will get realer ! [much laughter] If there is some problem, Shiva will get worried about what happened to his Devi! Don’t you be worried. Enjoy it!

Never analyse happiness. If you are feeling happy, feel happy so it grows. Once you start analysing it and thinking whether it is real or unreal, a mind game or imagination, this or that, then the whole thing is disturbed. What does it matter if it is real or unreal? If you are happy, you are happy.

Happiness is real. You understand me?

You felt happy – that happiness is real. What does it matter whether Shiva was dancing with you or Devi was dancing with you or not? It is irrelevant, because happiness is real. If you analyse it there is every possibility that the happiness will disappear. Analysis is very antagonistic to happiness.

So when you are unhappy, analyse [laughter]. When you are happy, never analyse. Just accept it as a gift of God and enjoy it. Enjoy it more.

[A sannyasin says: It seems difficult for me to live without problems.... I don’t know what to do!]

Go on creating! Create big problems! [much laughter]

... If you get tired, you will drop it; you won’t create problems. You are not yet tired! [laughter] These groupleaders will tire you. These groups are only for this – to tire you! So when you are really tired

[chuckling] and you don’t want to do any more groups, you will have to drop the problems. If you bring problems I will have to send you to a group !

CHAPTER 7

10 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A visitor said that while he was very happy to be here, he was missing his girlfriend.

Osho said that it was good in a love relationship for lovers to sometimes be apart so an appetite arose to be together.]

In fact the very word ’love’ simply means to desire. You may not be aware but the word ’love’ comes from a sanskrit root; the word is not basically english. It comes from a sanskrit root ’lobha’. It means to desire. Then it became loofa, and from loofa, love. But now the roots are forgotten. Lobha means to desire, to desire intensely. Love grows when you desire intensely. When you are together too much it starts dying.

Meditate while you are here, because I can give you something which is much higher than love, and without which no love can ever become real love. That’s what I call meditation.

Love is a relationship between you and somebody else. Meditation is a relationship between you and you. Love is out-going, meditation is in-going. Love is a sharing. But how can you share if you don’t have it in the first place? What will you share?

People have anger, people have jealousies, people have hatred, so in the name of love by and by they start sharing these things, because that’s what they have. Once the honeymoon is over and you put down your masks and the reality comes into being and you become actual, then what will you share? You will share that which you have. If anger, then anger, if possessiveness, then possessiveness. Then there is fighting and conflict and struggle, and each tries to dominate the other.

Meditation will give you something which can be shared. Meditation will give you the quality, the energy, that can become love if related to somebody. Ordinarily you don’t have that quality. Nobody has it. You have to create it. Love is not something that you are born with. It is something that you have to create, it is something that you have to become. It is a struggle, an effort and a great art.

When you have overflowing love within you, then you can share. But that can happen only when you relate to yourself.

And meditation is nothing else but how to relate to yourself. If you cannot relate with yourself, how can you expect that you will be able to relate with somebody else? So the first love is to oneself.

Then the second is possible. People rush into the second love without knowing anything about the first.

So don’t be worried. Remember her. Write beautiful letters, mm? And don’t be worried about whether they are true or untrue. They should be beautiful. Write poems to her. And give one hour to her every night. From ten o’clock to eleven o’clock, turn off the lights, sit on your bed and remember her, feel her. In your visualisation touch her body, kiss her, embrace her, and go berserk! She will never be as beautiful as in your fantasies. Real persons are never as beautiful, very rarely. Sooner or later they start stinking. But fantasy is simply wonderful. In fantasy the beloved never perspires, never argues, never nags, nothing.

But be here and meditate. Much is possible. And after the camp do a few groups.

... A few groups will be tremendously helpful. You will come to many insights about your growth, about the state you are in. Because one never knows oneself rightly, and that is the first thing to be done.

[A visitor said she gave up her job teaching art in a museum because it was dull, and she wanted to come here.... I began to try to do your meditation with the breathing and I became a little frightened so I stopped and waited till I cam out.]

Yes, it can be so. The mind makes you very much afraid of going into the unknown. The mind has cleared a small spot and it clings to it. It is familiar, known, so there is no fear. But just beyond the fence of the mind is the wild existence. My meditations are just devices to lead you to the wilderness, to the wild existence, so the mind starts feeling frightened. It is good that you have come here.

Much can be done.... And it is always good to break bridges with the past. In fact many times in life one should do that. Then one retains an aliveness, an innocence, and one never loses one’s childhood. Many times one needs to break all the bridges and to be clean and to start again from ABC. Again you are a child.

Whenever you begin a thing you are a child. The moment that you start thinking that you have arrived it is time to break the bridges again, because that now means that a deadness is settling.

Now you are becoming just an entity, a commodity in the market.

And of course for an artist to break his bridges is needed more than for anybody else. Anyone who wants to be creative has to die every day to the past, in fact every moment, because creativity means a continuous rebirth. If you are not reborn, whatsoever you create will be a repetition. If you are reborn, only then can something new come out of you. Unless you are new, the new cannot come out of you.

So it happens that even great artists, poets and painters come to a point from where they go on repeating themselves again and again and again. Sometimes it has happened that their first work was their greatest.

Kahlil Gibran wrote ’The Prophet’ when he was only twenty-one or twenty, and that was his last work also. Then he wrote many books, but nothing comes to that peak. In a subtle way, he goes on repeating ’The Prophet’. He tries to say the same thing in many ways – and there is no improvement even. If all the books are lost and only ’The Prophet’ is saved, it is enough. He has done his life’s work. He could not die to it. He could not forget that book. It remained continuously chattering inside. He enjoyed it because it brought world fame. It became a vested interest.

If he had disowned the book and said, ’I am finished with this book and it does not belong to me and I don’t belong to it,’ if he had broken the bridge.... He was a rare genius and he would have given many books to the world of the same calibre as ’The Prophet’ – or even better, because that was his first book. He was very immature – just twenty; you can’t expect much. But by and by he settled with the book and started copying himself. Other books are just carbon copies, echoes of the first.

He could never transcend that because he was caught up with it too much.

So an artist, a painter or a poet, a musician or a dancer, one who has to create something new every day, has a tremendous necessity to forget the yesterdays so completely that there is not even a remembrance of them. The slate is clean and out of that newness, creativity is born. It has nothing to do with your doing. If you are new, you are creative. It is a reflection of youth, of virginity, and it is in our hands to become virgin again and again. On the contrary, we go on hoarding the past. That corrupts.

So good. You dared – that’s very good ! Now become a sannyasin ! [she nods, smiling.]

... this will be your new name. Forget the old name; this is your rebirth. This is the name: Ma Deva Anupam. Deva means divine and anupam means unique – unique divineness. Each person has unique divineness, because God is not repetitive. He creates every person absolutely unique, incomparable. There has never been a person like you before and there never will be again. So there is a tremendous responsibility on your part of being unique.

Once a person understands this – that God has destined a unique career for him – then everything changes. You are not to become a robot and you are not to become like anybody else. You have to become yourself. And that is the greatest courage in the world – to become oneself – because the whole society tries to force you to become somebody else.

[A visitor said he had been interested in Subud prior to hearing of Osho.]

Subud only goes up to a certain extent, because it is not a device. It happened to Bapak and he was not searching or seeking for anything; he was not making any effort. It simply happened out of the blue like lightning and he could see clearly.

But when you are not prepared and suddenly it happens, you can never see the whole. You are taken aback. You are so full of awe, in fact terrified, because you are not waiting or expecting, and suddenly like a jolt, an electro-shock, your whole being turns one hundred and eighty degrees. It is so much that unless you are ready for it, waiting for it, you will never be able to see the whole of it.

So Bapak found a clue, but the clue is fragmentary. It doesn’t have a philosophy around it. It is not a whole. It is valuable, very valuable, but incomplete, fragmentary. So Bapak may help many people, but finally every Subud person has to go somewhere else. He will start many people on a path, but eventually everybody will have to leave that path. It is a great service to humanity because you start looking in some direction. Sooner or later you will become dissatisfied with Subud, but that is its purpose.

God has been working through history in many ways. Sometimes when it is needed He reveals many things to people who are not in any way ready for it. Those people are innocent, pure of heart, but they were not in any way concerned. They were not searching for God. Good people... Bapak is a good person, a very pure person, and hence it happened – but he has no way to comprehend the whole of it. He can just tell you in what situation it happened to him. So you stand in the same situation. Maybe it happens to you, but it remains a ’perhaps’.

And if you relax and you surrender, something will start happening to you also, but sooner or later you will see that it remains superficial. It does not touch your heart. It does not transform you. But he has put you on the path. God has used him in a certain way. He has become a window. Even if it is just a fleeting glimpse, something is changed. You are here because of him, because of Subud.

So always remember that finally everything helps. Even Subud has helped. Even sometimes we go astray, and sometimes we choose wrong paths; they too help. When you attain to your own experience, you will be able to see that everything falls into line. Even those goings astray, even those things which you were thinking were a wastage of time, of energy, even those things where you were feeling stuck and nothing was happening, also helped in a certain way.

But to see that is only possible when you have arrived and you can look back and can see the whole of it. Then everything fits like a jigsaw puzzle and one is grateful for everything that has happened.

A real saint is even grateful to the sins that happened in his life because they have also led him on.

[The visitor said that he had a weak heart so felt restricted in what meditations he did.]

I don’t think it is weak, but it is very soft. Any method, any hard method, will not be helpful, so keep that in mind. We will use your softness of the heart. Everything can be used. But once you call it weakness, you cannot use it.

I call it softness. Then it makes a great difference. It can be used. You can move on the path of love very easily, very easily.

[A sannyasin says: I would like to speak about the book that I started. I made it personal and alive, but then it changed from what I had planned in the beginning into almost a daily journal of events.

The only thing is that I don’t know how to stop.]

No, I think it has taken the right shape. A journal is the right shape. And there is no need to stop it. It can go on – first volume, second volume. That is the beauty of a journal – it can continue. So there is no need to end it.

No book in fact has a natural end, cannot have, because life has no end. It goes on and on and on.

It is always in the middle; there is no beginning and no end to it. Somehow we have to manage to end it, but that end is abrupt, artificial and arbitrary. That’s the beauty of a journal – that it need not end. It can continue to the very last day of your life. It will become very very rich and very useful.

A book is like a child. You can give birth to a child but you never know what the child is going to turn into. Nobody knows – not the father, not the mother, nobody. Once you have given birth to the child, the child takes its own course. A book is always like a child.

You can start it but you have no power over it. By and by, it starts dictating its own terms. It happens sometimes when people are writing novels that a certain character will start dictating his own terms and the writer will have to write it down. The character will become very stubborn if you don’t take note So a writer can open a door, that’s all. What will come out of it, even the writer never knows.

Then the book is alive; otherwise it is dead.

If you can manage everything that you want, the book will not have its own life. The child will be a dead child.

A journal is a good shape. I was going to say to you to let it be a journal but I was waiting for the day that it would take that shape. It is growing every day, and nothing is definitive. Things are growing, you are growing. And with me, nothing is certain. I go on changing, so I am not predictable.

You can go on moving with the river. Sometimes it flows to the south and sometimes it starts flowing to the north. You have just to keep track. You need not worry, because a journal is a personal thing.

You are not in fact writing for somebody else. Write as if you are writing for yourself, so you can have more freedom.

When you are writing for somebody else then that other and the idea of the other is always heavy.

Writing to yourself, the journal is more fluid, more personal, more of the heart. It is just like a letter you are writing to yourself. Then it is useful for others also, because it will not only say something about me, it will not only say something about you. In fact it will say something about the miracle that is transpiring between you and me.

We both will be just like two banks. The real thing will be the river that is flowing. It will say more about the love, not about the lovers – and that’s the real thing. So you have to talk about me and about you, but that is just to create the banks so that the river can flow. And there is no end to it.

When you have come to a manageable size – three, four hundred pages – then the first volume goes; then the next series, third series, fourth series – you can continue. And never think of any consistency. Let it be as it is, even sometimes with contradictions. Life has contradictions; it is very contradictory.

If you try to keep something very consistent, it becomes dead. Then it is only a concept. If it is alive, it is paradoxical. So with all the paradoxes and contradictions, with all the absurdities, you go on flowing with it.

[A German sannyasin with his Japanese girlfriend says: Never has a woman confused me like she!

He asks if he should take her to Europe with him as he also felt a need for distance sometimes.]

Then for the first time you have come across a woman ! A woman is only a woman when she is capable of confusing a man.

... That will settle. It is always so. If you love a person, it is very difficult to be with him or with her. If you love a person, both things are difficult. Love is such a wild thing.

If you don’t love a person, then there is no problem. You can be with the person or without them.

But some love has happened between you so it is going to be rough. Sailing will be rough, but enjoy it – it is a challenge.

[The Primal group are present. The leader says: There’s a lover inside me that’s been asleep and the lover is coming up. When it awakens, something very sad is joined with it at the same time.]

Mm, I understand. If love arises, you will also feel sad because love is deathlike. It is a death. When love arises, you will have to disappear – that is the sadness of it. Love will be there but you will not be. The ego feels sad because love is just a deathbed and now your ego cannot exist. The ego will try in every way to cling, resist, to remain.

Now it is for you to help love, and to help the ego to drop and disappear. Don’t strengthen the ego.

And whenever you feel sad, remember me. You have not learned that yet and you are missing much.

Just the other day I was reading a very small anecdote, and I love it.

A father is sitting in his garden and his small child is playing – trying to pull up a rock which is too big for him. It is almost impossible. He is trying hard, and in every way possible from this side and that. He is puffing and breathing hard but he is still trying and perspiring.

The child feels frustrated and tired and sits on the rock. The father says, ’Have you tried all your strength?’ And the child says, ’Yes certainly I have tried all my strength.’ The father says, ’No, because you have not asked me.’

I loved it... because that is also part of the child’s strength.

So start asking me when you feel sad. Just don’t go on pulling on the rock. Sometimes it will be too heavy and you may not be able to pull it up.

It is part of your strength to ask me. That is my whole function in being here.

Just remember me. Whenever you feel sad, remember me. The very remembrance will clear the clouds. And just leave it to me. It is natural that whenever a love arises, sadness also arises.

Now it is up to you. If you choose the ego, the sadness will disappear but love will also disappear.

You will again be back in your rut. If you choose love, the ego will disappear and with the ego’s disappearance, the sadness will disappear. But then you will be reborn.

You will be reborn as love, as loveenergy. Remember me more. These are the moments you will need me.

[A group member said:... I felt that the only way to be with you, was to be total. And I felt this conflict with my wife and you... I decided to be with her. Something was telling me that in order to be with you I had to drop everything.]

No, no, not my sannyasins. You are not to drop her.

... If you could have allowed this idea that you can drop everything for me, even the woman, the very idea would have helped. Not that I am going to tell you to. I am not going to tell you to drop anything.

It has nothing to do with dropping, but just the very idea that if I say to, you can drop everything, that you can even drop your beloved – that every idea would have done tremendous work within your soul. It would have given you an integration.

If you drop something which is worthless for you, it is not dropping anything at all. If you drop something which you cannot, which is almost like a death for you, then through that idea you become integrated, you become centred.

Not that I am going to tell you to; I would be the last person. But you missed the point. Now it will not be of any use because you know I am not going to tell you to drop anything. So we will have to wait for another opportunity.

But there is nothing to be worried about. It is natural. And I can see it has been hard....

CHAPTER 8

11 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

It means divine awareness. Deva means divine and bodhi means awareness. Only awareness is divine, and all awareness is divine. The moment you are not aware, you are in the world, unconscious, moving like a somnambulist in deep sleep, doing things with no awareness of why...

as if you are being driven by the unconscious.

Once you become aware these unconscious forces start withering away and a centre arises in you.

Then you can say that you are awake.

So this is going to be your work, your sadhana. Become more and more alert. Whatsoever you are doing – very ordinary things: eating, walking, sleeping bring one quality to them, the quality of awareness.

Don’t move like a somnambulist, not like a drunkard, but like somebody who is moving in tremendous danger, as if one is moving near a precipice and the danger is so much that you cannot afford to be unconscious. At each step you have to be aware because one mistake and you are gone forever.

So start moving in life as if every step can become a step towards death. And we are in danger.

Death is all around. That is what surrounds you.

I am not against any activity. Do whatsoever you feel like doing. Just this one thing has to be added to it – and that is awareness. If you want to be angry, then be angry. I am not against anger – but plus awareness. Then whatsoever is beautiful in anger will be saved and whatsoever is ugly will be dropped on its own accord.

If you are in a love relationship, I am not against it – I am all for it – but bring the plus of awareness to it. Then whatsoever is ugly in love will disappear... and there is much that is ugly in love. Greed is there, possessiveness is there, jealousy is there; even hatred is there. Only the purest gold will survive.

Awareness functions like a fire. Only that which has to be destroyed is destroyed, and that which has to be saved is saved.

You need not worry. Just go on becoming more and more aware. I don’t give you any other commandment. I don’t say, ’Do this, don’t do that.’ That is not my way.

I allow you total freedom, with just this one quality – awareness.

With awareness, nobody has been ever able to do anything wrong, and without awareness, nobody has ever been able to do anything good.

People may think that they can do good without being aware, but the path of hell is paved with well-wishers. Their good wishes are not much help, because in the hands of unconsciousness every good wish is poisoned. So there are many good-doers all around the world – puritans, religious people, missionaries, servants of the public – and all destroying humanity.

So I don’t say anything else – that you do this or you don’t do that, because life cannot be structured.

A fixed pattern cannot be given to life. Once a fixed pattern is given, you are already dying. Once the pattern settles you are dead. Either the pattern can live or you can live; both cannot live together.

I would like you to remain fluid, flowing, with no structure... with just an inner light burning. That inner flame I call bodhi – awareness.

Forget the old name as if it never belonged to you, as if it was a dream you had dreamed, something you had read about in a novel or seen at the movies. Disconnect yourself from the past so utterly that it cannot have any shadow on your future, because the past corrupts. It is a dead weight, and the very shadow of it corrupts your present and your future.

So from this moment, think of yourself as being reborn. Let this day now be your birthday and forget the whole of the past. Of course it will remain in the memory, but just as if you have dreamed about it.

And it was a dream, because unless one is aware, there is nothing else than the dream. Only awareness brings you to reality; otherwise we go on fantasising.

Deva means divine. The word divine comes from the same root ’deva’. And Ritambhara means the ultimate law; what Taoists call Tao, or what Christians call God. But in the Vedas they have a more scientific word for God – that is Ritambhara. they call it the ultimate law, the cosmic law. It is not a person but a law; very impersonal.

To think about God as a person is a little childish, because He is the whole and cannot be somebody.

If He is somebody then He cannot be everybody. And if He is all then He cannot have any form of His own. He cannot have any identity of His own. He is the whole.

So the word ’ritambhara’ means the innermost consistency of the whole, the very thread that holds the whole. Everything seems to be so separate, individual – the trees, the animals, the birds, the man, the woman, millions of galaxies and stars – but something holds them all together as if like a garland. You may not see the thread running through the flowers but it is there. That thread is known as ritambhara.

[The new sannyasin says she is studying her doctor’s degree, and doesn’t know whether to finish it.]

It is better to finish it. It may not give much to you but still it can give you a background to understand many things. In itself it may not be worth anything, because in itself it is nothing but data and information, but information can be used in a very creative way. If you don’t become an addict to it, it can be used tremendously. But one should not think that information is knowledge. That has to be remembered.

Knowledge is something that happens to you. Information is something that you borrow. But nothing is wrong in it. We have a very limited expanse of life and millions of people have lived before. They were just like us and they have lived and experienced and known many things so it is good to be connected to them.

The problem arises when you think that now this is all. A Ph.D. is a good beginning but not the end.

But I would like you to finish it; it will be helpful. The more you know, the more you become aware of your ignorance. Information helps in a way. It makes you aware of your ignorance; that is its creative part.

The negative part is if you are lost in it and you think that you have known; then it is very dangerous.

Then one goes on living on borrowed information. It can never reveal anything to you. It can give you a very good respectability but it can also be very dangerous. You may miss aliveness. That happens to almost all learned people. By and by they become dead – just as dead as their knowledge.

It is dangerous to keep company with dead things because one tends to become like the company one keeps. But if you are alert, it can be used. And my feeling is always that there is nothing in life which cannot be used. So never condemn anything. Try to find out a way to use it. Your Ph.D. can be very helpful to understand meditation and to help people to understand meditation.

And in another way it is always good to finish things, otherwise they always hang on the mind.

The mind has an intrinsic tendency to complete things. Any incompletion and the mind feels it continuously. That can become an inner burden. So if you are in something, do it. Leave it after doing it. Become a Ph.D. and forget all about it. That’s good.

But if you drop out, somewhere deep inside your mind you will carry the idea for the whole of your life that maybe it was good. Many times you will remember it again and again. There may be opportunities where you will feel that it would have been helpful now. There may be trouble, some crisis – financial or otherwise – and you will think about it again and again. It is better to finish it My idea is never to renounce anything while you are in the middle of it, and never renounce anything when you are failing. Always renounce a thing when you are winning. Then you can drop it completely and it will never trouble you; it is finished. Otherwise one part of your mind will continuously say, ’Continue.’ If you take the decision with the major part of your mind, the minor part will remain there, always ready to take revenge.

Once you do a thing it is complete and finished. So do it, mm? and don’t get lost in books !

[A sannyasin says: I feel that everything I do is always done with a reluctance about it. It’s like a weight and it keeps me from fully being there in anything – in meditation, in work, in relationships....

I used to label it fear... ]

They are related things. Maybe a part is also fear. Just because you label emotions, they are not separate. They are all interrelated.

If you are reluctant to do something, a part of it may be fear because you are afraid to abandon yourself in anything completely. You are afraid to lose control. You are afraid to commit yourself. You only go to a certain extent and then you stop, because going further than that can be dangerous.

You may not be able to come back again. It may be going beyond the point of no return. A part must be fear.

Fear is very very basic, just like love. These two are the very basic things – love and fear – and both are opposite polarities. If there is much fear, there will be less love. If you drop fear, then there will be more love. It is the same energy. When it is negative, it is fear. When it is positive, it is love.

If you love, you will abandon yourself; you will go to the furthest point possible. You don’t bother then about control or controlling. You are streaming, flowing. You are liquid and you can melt with the surroundings. You are not afraid to melt. You are not afraid of life, not afraid of death. You love.

You love life, you love death. You love whatsoever happens and there is no reluctance.

It is not that you go only to a certain point. Now you go the whole way. You go so far that you disappear. And that’s how abundant life happens.

So there must be fear, otherwise why should one be reluctant? And if you are reluctant in one thing, you will be reluctant in all things. In fact if happiness comes, you will be reluctant to allow it. You will allow it only up to a certain point, just so far, and then you will stop and close yourself, because if happiness is too much, you are no more there. You will not allow laughter. You will not allow crying and weeping. You will not allow anything. You will remain lukewarm in everything that you do.

This can be very dangerous because this is losing contact with life. This is crippling yourself. It is a sort of paralysis so you cannot move, and you are not free to move. A certain inner mechanism clicks and you stop, you close.

Life happens only when you have forgotten how to control. Controlled people are dead people. They control everything – not only of the mind but of the body also.

You must not be breathing as totally as you should breathe, because there also the control comes in. So start by breathing. It is always good to start with the body. The work is easier because it is with the gross. The body is more visible and you can feel it easily. Then we will start working with the mind.

Whenever you remember, have a deep breath. Never start by inhaling; start by exhaling. Exhalation is going into the world. You breathe out... you pour yourself into the world. Then you breathe in; the world enters you. This is a beautiful dialogue with the world. Breathing is a miracle. The world comes into you continuously and you go into the world. It is a continuous love making with the world.

The vitality flows in you and then you pour the vitality back into the world.

Start by exhaling, because if you exhale deeply, the reluctance will go. If you exhale deeply, you will inhale deeply automatically; there is no problem in it. You create the situation: exhale so deeply that the whole is poured out. Then the body will suck deeply. So don’t start by inhalation.

If you inhale deeply that may not be a really deep inhalation because the air that is already inside may function as a barrier.

[Osho said that she should take care to breathe by the belly rather than the chest, and that she should be aware of her breathing throughout the day. She could make it a point at times during the day to exhale and then inhale deeply, and then to tell Osho after three weeks what was happening.]

And if subtle tremblings arise in the body, don’t be afraid. If a certain tingling sensation goes through the body, don’t be afraid. If by deep breathing suddenly you feel a great upsurge of sexuality, don’t be afraid. That will happen.

Deep down you have been suppressing. You have been trying to be tough, hard. You have learned a wrong lesson somewhere in your childhood – that the world is a deep struggle. It is in a way. Many people learn the lesson that it is a very hard struggle and that you have to be tough and you have to fight. So you have learned how to fight, but you have forgotten how to love. Even in your love, fight is more emphatic than love.

So start this breathing. And enjoy it. Just by sheer breathing you can come to a subtle orgasm in the whole body. The whole body can be infused with new energy. You can vibrate all over and you can see many parts of your body that you have denied. becoming alive again.

So enjoy that, because the more you enjoy it, the more the body will fall into a pattern. Many people, millions of people, are not totally in their bodies. Some have denied some parts, some others have denied some other parts. People are living partial lives.

When you feel that the body is really alive, then tell me after three weeks how you are feeling. Is your reluctance the same, or is there a change? Have you become more outgoing? Have you become more capable of uncontrolling yourself? Is the rigidity the same or less?

Then I will give you another exercise and for two or three months you will have to work with it. You will become perfectly alive. There is nothing to be worried about, mm? Good!

[A sannyasin says: I feel helpless. In the outer world I’m unable to earn a living and in the inner I’m stuck in complete darkness...

I had a book published about fantasy, dreams, imagination. I poured my whole madness into it.]

You have a copy of the book with you? Find a copy for me....

It will be helpful to understand you, because a book is never out of the blue. It grows out of a person.

And each book, knowingly, unknowingly, is autobiographical. Whatsoever you write, whatsoever you sing, whatsoever you do, is going to be autobiographical. It comes out of you. It is you expressed.

So don’t be afraid. If it is mad there is nothing wrong in it. You enjoyed writing it?

[He answers: Very much. I have very good concentration and can work all day, but it is an ego investment.]

Don’t be worried about the ego, because that is not the way to drop the ego. In fact the work may be helpful for dropping the ego. Anything that you want to drop has to be brought to the surface. I think you should continue writing. Make it a living; it will be good.

And there is no need that one should be able to visualise, no need. There are different types of people and all writings are different. There are a few people who are capable of visualising. They write a certain type of book – more pictorial, more depictory, more imaginary. By reading their book you can almost see what they have written about. But that is not the only way.

There is a different type of person who cannot visualise. If you cannot visualise you can become tremendously efficient in language.

Visualisation is the language of childhood. It is not the language of the mature mind. It is a primitive language. That’s why in children’s books you have to put many pictures. You have many pictures, coloured pictures, and a few lines of text. He will only read the text to understand the picture, otherwise not.

So you may be able to write a very crystal-clear prose. It may not be poetry. It cannot be poetry if you cannot visualise, but there is nothing to be worried about.

[The sannyasin answers: I’m only interested in spirituality now, and I cannot write about it because I have had no experience about it.]

Start writing about it. Write that you have not had any experience but write about it. By and by you will start getting the experience also.

It happens that many times in talking to a person, suddenly you become aware that you are saying things that you have never said before; not only that, you have never thought of them before, And not only that; you were not even aware that you could make this type of statement ! Many times it happens that by writing something you will become aware that it was within you. It was lying there like a seed and now it has sprouted.

Writing is a good way to know many things about yourself. And if you really want to learn something, teach it. Don’t be bothered that you don’t know it. Teach it, and by teaching, you will learn.

Never does anybody learn anything unless one starts teaching it.

[The sannyasin replies: But it will be like philosophy.... But it’s a dead end.]

Let it be ! If you start worrying about everything like that, you will never be able to find a living! So don’t be worried – let it be philosophy.

Start working and put your energy into some expressive way. And writing can be a good medium.

Start and then we will see. And always remember that you don’t know your own potentiality. You are not even aware of a fragment of your being, and unless you do something you will never know what you can do. This is a paradox but this is how it is.

You don’t know that you can be a runner in the Olympics unless you run. How is one to know that one can be a runner? There is only one way to know: to run and see. One can never know that one is a singer unless one sings. If you are making an effort to be completely certified before singing that you are a singer, then it is impossible. Who is going to certify you? Even the person who is going to certify you would ask you to sing. You would say, ’I cannot sing before it is certain that I am a singer.’

By doing we come to know who we are. And the more you do, the more of your inner potentialities are actualised. So do millions of things so you can see who you are. There is no other way. That’s why, groping in the dark, you will find your medium, your element. Nobody can say who you are by reading your hand or your stars. You will have to find out. And it is good. It is not something very fixed.

Man is a very very fluid being. He is more like a process than a thing. So who knows? Try – write, sing, compose; go on doing things. Do whatsoever you feel like. You will come to feel through trial and error what suits you. You will come to feel what brings you to a harmony and inner joy. You will feel tremendously happy just by doing something. Not that it will be because of the result, not that it will give you respectability and you will become famous. That is irrelevant. Just by doing it, suddenly you will feel a deep harmony arising in you. You will feel simply delighted – just singing a song. Then you have found the element. Don’t be bothered then about what people say. That is none of your business. You go on doing your thing. If they like it, good. If they don’t like it, that’s for them to decide.

The way that you are thinking right now is suicidal. If you think like this you will never be able to move in anything. Even if you fail in something, just understand one thing – that this is not your way.

You failed in this so this is not for you. One door is closed.

This too is a great benefit. Now you will never try this door. You will try another! And just by groping, one comes to find one’s door. If you sit and don’t grope and you say, ’It is very dark, and who knows whether there is a door or not ? and which door is mine?’ if you simply sit and brood over it, this is philosophical and very suicidal.

Stand up, walk around. Even if you stumble against the wall sometimes, perfectly good, because that is the way one learns. Watch a small child when he starts walking for the first time. He gropes, stumbles, falls, cries and weeps and decides, ’Never again will I walk! It is too dangerous!’ But again after half an hour he is trying once more.

If he is as philosophical as you are, then no man will ever walk. They will all sit silently in Zazen

[laughter]. Nobody will do anything. But the child forgets again. The challenge comes to his mind again and he ventures. It is difficult. For months together he will fail. He will bruise his knees and the blood will come out, but again and again he will try. And almost all succeed ! [laughter]

And that’s how it continues to be in the whole of life. You will grope like an author, writer, composer, musician. And who knows? The destiny is not written somewhere, and there is no way to know it beforehand.

Destiny is something we create by doing. In fact you create yourself by doing. A man is a constant process of self-creation. One perpetuates oneself continuously. So never stop. If you fall, nothing is wrong. Get up again and be moving. Sooner or later everybody finds, one has to find one’s destiny.

Otherwise the whole life becomes meaningless.

People ask what the meaning of life is – as if there is some meaning and you have just to uncover it and the meaning is there. Or you have to find the right person to show you the path, or find the right book and the right map and you will find the meaning. Meaning is not a thing. You have to create it; it is not there. And each person has to create his own soul.

Gurdjieff used to say that man is not born with a soul, only with a possibility. If you create it, you will have it. And it is hazardous. It is the greatest courage and adventure there is to create oneself. And how to create oneself? – through work, through relationships, through love, through meditation.

Find as many ways as possible, because each dimension will reveal one aspect of your being, and the more dimensions you have to your life, the richer you will be. If you don’t create a meaning outside, inside you will also feel dark. That’s why you are feeling dark inside. If you create meaning outside, simultaneously, and parallel to it, inner integration happens.

A man who can sing well and can enjoy it, delight in it, will have something inside burning like a small lamp. The song will go outside and the lamp will be lighted. The more you do, the more you become. And when you find the right way – and only you can find it – in which you fit perfectly as if you have been made for it .... That’s what destiny is: to discover something about which you can feel, yes, this is for what you can live and die.... Then immediately inside there is no darkness.

Suddenly a light is burning. The inner shrine is full of light. And these two go together.

So if you can find anything that you feel like trying, try. And only a creative person can be happy.

People who are uncreative can never be happy. Only creativity brings happiness. I would like to say that happiness is a function of creativity. You create – just as God created the world and said, ’So beautiful, so good,’ and He felt happy. Since then He has been happy.

You create something, whatsoever it is – a small painting, a small poem, or you just make a doll – but when your heart feels fulfilled and you can say ’So beautiful, so good’, suddenly there is meaning in your life. Now life is not empty.

So do something, mm? And after one month, tell me. Start from tomorrow and do whatsoever you like but bring your energy to it.

[The Enlightenment Intensive group is present. The leader says: It was dynamite. Just very strong.

But I wonder what you’re doing to me because it seems that my ego is just expanding.]

Let it expand. I am here, don’t be worried. I will take care of that. I can burst it any moment [laughter].

And the bigger it is, the easier it is to burst it !

[She continues: There are times when people could be pushed along, but I’m afraid that if I do that, they’ll get angry with me.]

No, no, you push them. And the more you push them, the more they will like you. The whole work of a groupleader is to push them. If you don’t push them they will not reach a breakthrough. If you go on pushing them and the breakthrough comes, they will like you tremendously ! That is the only way.

So if you love them and you want that they should love you, push them hard. Don’t be kind if you have any compassion.

[A group member said: I keep going into my childhood a lot, and I find it difficult sometimes to be spontaneous.]

So now you do Primal. Everyone’s childhood has almost in some way or other been wrong. It is rare to find a person whose childhood has been as it should be because the world is not as it should be; the parents are not as they should be. The parents were conditioned by their parents; they were conditioned by their parents. So dead people are controlling the living people. People who have died centuries ago are still controlling you through your parents. They will control your child also if you don’t ,change.

If you don’t come to an understanding of your own childhood, then you will just be transferring the same disease again and again. These diseases are traditional, transferred by one generation to another. But there is no point in complaining because they were also victims; they suffered much.

They could not have any opportunity to change their childhood. They were never aware in fact. You are fortunate.

This century is in many ways fortunate because many things have become available to you that were not available to past generations. Now there are methods and ways that you can go back and reform your childhood. That’s what Primal Therapy is. First you go back, you regress and you come to that point where something went wrong and you undo it. Then you start growing again.

Once childhood is put right, you have a base. Otherwise you will always remain uprooted because in the childhood you have always missed your roots. Somehow you go on but you don’t grow. At the most you go on like a pile but not like a tree. The growth is not organic. You may be a structure like a building but not like a tree, not organic, not alive, because something went wrong in the childhood, something went dead. That deadness functions as a constant inhibitory force. It has to be reformed.

The old has to be destroyed and the new begun.

Once you go back, once you can see with full awareness what the problem is, just the seeing becomes the reformation. Just the vision of it and it is released; you are freed by it. Awareness is liberating.

[A group member said: I found that I got very angry about being told what to do.]

You must have been controlled from the outside too much in your childhood so the resistance is still there. And you are not very sure of yourself, that’s why you don’t like being controlled. A person who is sure about himself is ready to play any game. This is just a game !

[The therapist] is not your enemy. She is not even your mother! [laughter] She has no grudge against you. It is just a game and you have agreed to play the game. That’s what it means to book for a group – that you are ready to be manipulated, controlled, dragged here and there, humiliated. You were playing a role and she was simply fulfilling her role.

But you must be unsure about yourself; you are not very confident. You are afraid that if somebody is allowed to control you,, somebody may really control you; that’s the fear. If you are not afraid of control, you are not reluctant. You say, ’Okay, let the game be there. It is a question of two days; you control me,’ and you relax.

If you had relaxed, the same energy that became anger would have led you very deep inside yourself. It took a wrong turn – and you helped it to be wrong. I will suggest that you do the Intensive again, and this time [the therapist] has to be really hard! You have just to accept the game.

Let it be a game! She has really to be hard. This time she was nothing because she herself was afraid [laughter]. But now I give her total freedom and you are going knowingly.

When you go knowingly there is no problem. This is not going to be your whole life’s pattern. She is not going to control you or manipulate you for always and always. This is just a game, a two or three days’ game. Allow her. If you allow her, much can happen. It will give you much insight into your being. It will make you almost new and will give you the capacity to trust. You don’t trust. that is the trouble. You were not trusting her.

If you trust then there is no point You don’t resist Watch a small child walking hand in hand with his father. The father may be afraid of the dark night and the unknown path but the child is perfectly happy. He knows the father is with him. He trusts. That’s how participants should be with the groupleader.

She may be afraid. She may not know where everything is going and what is going to happen and where you will land. That is her problem ! Don’t you be worried. Simply relax.

So immediately after the camp, you repeat it, mm? Good.

CHAPTER 9

12 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin actor said that in rehearsing for a play, one encountered many emotions which one had to deal with, so he felt he had been doing a similar sort of thing to what happens in groups.]

... but it is, in a way, totally different. In acting you falsify. It is not your emotion. You pretend that it is yours but deep down a gap remains. Deep down you remained uninvolved. You may be showing love to a woman, but how can you show love if you don’t have it for her? So you remain uninvolved.

You just show. By and by you become efficient in pretending. The whole art of acting is pretension.

You can pretend so well that sometimes the natural act may not be so impressive.

Have you heard one joke about Charlie Chaplin?

To celebrate his birthday they arranged a

competition. Somebody who was going to play the best Charlie Chaplin act would be given the first prize. So one hundred actors from all over the world participated in the competition. Just to play a joke, Charlie Chaplin himself participated in somebody else’s name. He was hoping that he was going to come first but he didn’t. He came second!

Reality can always be less than the pretension because when you pretend you put all your energies into it. When you are real, you are relaxed, and when you are pretending you put everything at stake. When you are real, nothing is at stake. So acting is not really similar to a therapy group. It is exactly the opposite.

In a therapy group you drop all pretensions and you allow your innermost being, whatsoever it is –

good, bad, hatred, anger, greed; whatsoever it is. It is exactly the opposite... and every actor needs it.

In fact every human being needs it, but it is needed more by an actor because his whole profession is pretension. In a way it will by very difficult because by and by we become so efficient, so clever in pretending, that we completely forget who we are.

An actor is bound to get lost, because one day he is somebody, and another day he is somebody else. He goes on pretending and changing his roles, his masks, and by and by his identity is completely lost. He does not know who he really is. At the most he can remember many roles that he has played, many names that he has assumed, many phases that he has passed through. But what is his original face?

I have heard a joke. A man is sitting with his wife in the theatre where a drama is being played. The main actor is showing tremendous love to the lady. The woman says to her husband, ’You never loved me so much.’

The husband said, ’You don’t understand. He is paid for it! I consider that he is a great actor !’

And the wife said, ’It is not only a question of profession. They are husband and wife in real life.’

Then the husband said, ’It is a miracle! He is really an actor then ! If he can show so much love to his wife, he is really an actor !’

Acting is a falsification of your emotions. You are paid for it.

... Once you can reenter into your being and find out who you are, there is no harm in being an actor. It is beautiful. Continue it.

And once you know your real being, you will also become a better actor because then it is just a game. Deep down you remain a witness and you don’t get coloured by it. You retain your identity, which is beyond all roles and transcends all games, and can only be found by being a witness, never by being an actor.

I can see that much can be done. You have a very pure heart... much can be done. Just a small effort can be tremendously beneficial.

And help my work there. In your profession, also help. Now you belong to me !

[A resident sannyasin says: I have much energy which I use in talking a lot... I don’t sleep much.

And the more I work, the more energy I get and I don’t know what to do with it.]

You are an active type so you have to make your activity itself your meditation. You are not a passive type, so passivity will create problems for you. You have to use your energy creatively.

Do more physical work – as much as you can. Even when there is nothing to do, walk, run, jog, and when you are doing something, move into it as totally as possible. And don’t avoid it, don’t withhold yourself. Go into it as deeply as possible and make activity your love. Soon you will have ripples of pleasure arising from your action. Whenever you are deeply in activity, suddenly you will see an orgasm spreading over your body. You will come in contact with the universe, with the cosmos, only through deep action.

In India they divide the path into three paths. One is of karma – that is action. Another is of knowledge – gyan. And the third is of bhakta – devotion, love. You belong to the first type, the path of karma, the path of action. So remember it. Activity is going to give you much, so never avoid it. Go as deeply into it as you can. The more you go, the more energy you will get and the more capable you will become of going into it. There will be no end to your energy.

A passive type is tired immediately. He does a little thing and he is tired. He is almost always retiring, withdrawing, renouncing. That is not for you. You are still not putting your total energy into work.

That remnant of energy goes on moving in the mind. If you don’t put it into physical activity it will become mental activity because that then is the only release.

These are the two possibilities: either you release energy through action, or if you don’t release it through action, it becomes a mind thing. The mind then goes on around and around and around and dissipates energy that way. That will become restlessness. Then your sleep will be restless and you will toss and turn.

Never sleep more than seven hours; six will be even better, and by and by, five. You will be fresher with less sleep because whenever your mind starts moving, that simply shows that sleep is over.

The energy is available to act and you are still sleeping.

So for one month work hard and as totally as possible. That’s your meditation. Then tell me. These problems will disappear. They are very superficial, and nothing to be worried about.

[A sannyasin says: I feel happy – happier than I have ever been before.]

Very good. Now don’t lose track of it. It is very difficult to be happy and very easy to be unhappy.

People almost always choose the easiest thing – and to be unhappy is very easy. It needs no talent to be unhappy. Have you watched?

To be happy is a great talent. Great intelligence, great awareness – almost a genius is needed to be happy. To be unhappy is nothing. Even stupid people are unhappy. It is nothing.

And it is very easy to be unhappy because the whole mind lives through unhappiness. If you remain happy for a longer time the mind starts disappearing, because there is no connection between happiness and the mind. Happiness is something of the beyond. That’s why the mind will create some problems sooner or later. Even when there is no problem, the mind will create them – fantasy problems, out of the blue, to make you unhappy. Once you are unhappy, the mind is happy. You are back on earth then and things start moving in the rut.

The mind is the root cause of unhappiness and whenever you are happy you are mindless. Watch a moment of tremendous happiness. Suddenly there are no thoughts. You are simply happy; not even the thought of unhappiness is there. That too you have to recapture later on. Later on you suddenly realise, ’Ah, so I have been happy for so many minutes without any unhappiness arising, popping up!’

You recapture it only when it has passed. But in a really intense moment of happiness there is no thought. It is pure. It is completely empty of thoughts, so the mind is disturbed very much. It lives through unhappiness. It has a great investment in unhappiness.

So watch that. Once one has learned how to be happy, one should by and by start dropping habits of being unhappy. And they are simply habits, nothing else.

It is unbelievable that people are unhappy just because of habits. There is no causality for being unhappy. The world is absolutely ready to make you happy. Everything is as it should be, but somehow one goes on missing. One goes on living in one’s own cloud – dark, dismal. By and by one gets too attached to it. One almost starts liking it. In fact without it, one will feel at a loss as to what to do. People are wed to unhappiness. It is almost like a marriage unknowingly.

So you have found a track; a window has opened. Now don’t lose that track. Whenever you see that the mind is arising again with its old tricks, immediately jump out of it. Immediately do something to distract yourself. Even jogging will do. A good jerk to the body will do or slapping your face. Anything that gives a shock just a cold shower or running around the house – anything that simply changes the trend, and you will find that you have regained the track. This is only for a few days.

Once you start living in happiness, once you know the taste of it and it enters deeply into your being, there is no need then. It is simply there.

CHAPTER 10

13 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[To a newly initiated sannyasin, who said he was a Primal therapist, Osho spoke about the difference between groups here and in the West, adding that it would be helpful for to be a participant rather than a leader for a little while.... ]

... and the milieu here is totally different. In the West it is a therapy and the relationship is between a doctor and a patient, the healer and the healed. But here it is not really a therapy. The relationship is not between a doctor and a patient. The relationship is more integral, more intimate. And the question is not that a person has to be healed. The question is that he has to attain to something more than health. That ’more’ is the basic thing in the East.

The West stops at health. The East says that health is necessary but is not the goal. Even if you have health, what will you do? You will be at a loss. You will not know what to do now. In fact to become healthy is to take a very great risk, because before you were occupied with your illnesses.

While you are ill, worried, anxious, nervous, and a thousand other things, you are preoccupied, well occupied.

Once everything is healed and there is nothing left to do, then the basic problem arises: the meaning of life. Up to now there was a certain meaning. You were working hard, fighting hard and struggling against the odds, and now you have achieved.

Camus has written that the only and the most fundamental problem of philosophy is suicide. It is. If you are really healthy and you don’t know what to do now, life loses all meaning. When a society is poor, it is happy. When a society becomes rich, it becomes sad.

You fight with poverty and with poverty you can hope that someday, somewhere in the future, the dream will be fulfilled and you will enjoy it. But with richness the hope is gone. You can enjoy right now but you don’t know how to enjoy. You do4’t really know what enjoyment is. It was a sheer dream. It was good as a dream, but when every opportunity is there, suddenly you are at a loss.

And the same happens with an ill mind and a healthy mind.

An ill mind has something to do: to go to this therapist, to that therapist, to follow this guru, to follow that guru. He has something to do; he has a problem to solve. But when the problem is solved, immediately all meaning disappears because the meaning was somewhere between the problem and the solution. Now it is no more there.

So the West is facing affluence and sooner or later the West is going to face health. By the time you have helped people to be healthy the people will start committing suicide. They have started already. Suddenly there is nothing to do. In the East the emphasis is health plus something – and on the ’something’ everything depends.

That is the difference between religion and therapy. Religion is the plus. Therapy is a risk. It is good if there is a religion waiting for you and you are healthy and now you know how to enjoy the moment of health. For centuries the mind has learned how to live in unhappiness. Happiness is absolutely alien. Health is absolutely alien.

There is a parable in Jesus’ life, not told by Christians, but reported by other sources, particularly mohammedan sufi sources.

[Osho recounted how it is said that Jesus came across a man lying drunk in the middle of the road.

When he rebuked him, the man reminded Jesus that it was he who had brought him back to health when he was ill, years ago, and that now he did not know what else to do with himself.

Jesus, somewhat disturbed, made his way into the town where he saw a man running after a prostitute. Having bidden him stop, Jesus asked him what he was doing. The man reminded Jesus that it was he who had given him his eyesight when he was blind. Now he had eyes, what was he supposed to do with them?

Much perturbed, Jesus moves away from the town. On the outskirts he encounters a man trying to hang himself and begs him to stop and look at what he is doing with his life. The man says that he had died once before but Jesus brought him back to life – to a life that he did not know how to enjoy.]

Christians have completely left the parable but it seems to be the most meaningful parable of all about Jesus. But it must have been a little difficult to absorb, to swallow, so they left it. But this is the problem....

So the meaning here is totally different. These groups are here but they are not the end. They are just basic necessities. They help you to unburden. But unburdening in itself is nothing unless you have to go further, unless you have to reach to the peak, and then unburdening is very helpful. You will feel light and movement will become easier and you can move on a higher and higher altitude.

So do a few groups. And forget all that you know, because your knowledge will be a hindrance.

Simply move as an ignorant person, a layman, and it will give you a new perspective. It is good sometimes to again and again become ignorant. One gets a fresh outlook on life. It is very good sometimes to look in ways you have never looked before and to sometimes mix with the mob, in the crowd; to sometimes lose your identity and your degrees and whatsoever you know. Otherwise that knowledge always functions as a censor and it does not allow you to relax and be open.

So forget yourself as a therapist and simply do it as a layman. It will help tremendously.

[A sannyasin said: The other day you said that a man can only love one woman, and I got very angry because women are expected to – they just do – love their children and their husband. They just love.... But a man – why can’t he love more?]

There is a difference. To love a child and to love a woman is different. There is no conflict in that.

[She answers: And Mohammed says to take four wives and to love them equally.]

He says that because there were reasons. There were four times as many women as men because those foolish people were continously fighting and the whole country was almost full of widows. It was just an arbitrary thing, just an emergency method to avoid corruption because the whole country was going corrupt. If there were four women to one man, you can think what would happen. It was just an emergency measure.

Emergencies should not become laws; they are not. But Mohammedans have made that a law. It is foolish and now there is no problem. Women and men are almost equal in number in the world and nature always keeps balance. It is only because of man’s foolish wars that sometimes the balance is lost. Then too immediately nature tries to keep the balance. Immediately after the war, more boys are born than girls.

Ordinarily the ratio is one hundred girls to one hundred and fifteen boys, because girls are more stubborn in trying to exist than boys. So by the time of marriage, fifteen boys are dead and the number becomes equal. Boys are weaker than girls. Girls live longer, are more resistant to illness, more capable of persisting. And that’s how it should be because they have great work to do in the world – to give birth to children. Man is dispensable, woman is not.

After the first and second world wars, psychologists everywhere were simply surprised about what was happening. Immediately the ratio of boys was doubled. Then again it settled back to the norm.

In the times of Mohammed, in the countries that he was working in they were all quarrelling people, fighting, violent people, killing each other for no reason, so there were many widows. He himself married nine women. But that should not be the law.

You can love, and you can love many people, but love has many dimensions. One loves one’s mother, one loves one’s father, but there is no competition in it. You cannot love two fathers. If you have two mothers, you will start choosing. Even a mother starts choosing between children. It is impossible to love all the children equally. One becomes the pet.

You cannot love two women or two men simultaneously. If you do, that simply shows that you are split, that you have two personalities, that you are not one. So half of your personality loves one person and half of your personality loves another.

And it is happening in the West that people who are loving two or three women, two or three men, become split. It is bound to be so. You love your wife and you have a mistress. You come home and you have to manage this affair. Then you run to your mistress and you have to manage that affair then. The conflict, the hide-and-seek, the lies and everything goes on and then by and by you become split. You have two faces: one for your wife and one for By and by those two faces will go far away from each other and there will be a rift; a man can go crazy. Love is not a small thing, it is not a trifle. It is very essential. If you love one person totally you will become integrated. Your very love to one person will make your life focused; the division will disappear. But only very rare people are able to become one, so the conflict continues.

But always remember that if it is possible, if it is at all possible, then pour your love in one direction, to one person.

It has nothing to do with the other person; it has something to do with you. You will become integrated by pouring your love into one person, in one direction, because love is your deepest core of being.

So don’t fool around with it !

Deva means divine and yamini means a very silent, peaceful night; a divine night. In India we don’t have the idea about night that you have in the West. We don’t have any wrong associations with darkness. We accept darkness and light as two polarities of the divine. Light is beautiful, darkness also. Light has its benefits – darkness has its own benefits.

And in a deeper way, darkness is more substantial than light. So in India we call woman the night, the dark night, because woman is more substantial than man. Man comes out of the woman. The day is born out of the night.

Light has to be created. Darkness simply exists; there is no need to create it. So light comes and goes; darkness remains. Light always has a limitation. Darkness is unlimited.

So get in tune with the night. Whenever there is a dark night, look into the darkness and just feel as if you are melting into it. Let the night penetrate you, and you penetrate the night. Get more in tune with night and much will happen to you.

[Another visitor from America, said he had been a therapist for fifteen years and had himself taken part in numerous groups – Arica, Gestalt therapy and Encounter therapy.

Osho said that everything he had done would be useful, and that everything one does becomes pan of one’s future growth so nothing is lost. He recommended that David try the meditations and do a few groups here.... ]

... right now the weather is cloudy. You have many things inside but not integrated – like islands, separate; many things but not synthesised. Once they fall into line, come together, once they are glued together, you will feel tremendous energy arising. You have done many things but they are not integrated.

It happens to many Arica people because Arica itself is not yet an integrated science. It is just on the way. From many schools, techniques have been chosen but those techniques have not yet become part of one whole; they have not melted into each other. So there are many beautiful techniques but it is still technology; still not a science of the self. But this is how it happens in the beginning.

By and by, when many more people work in it, many more experiences and things will be added and one day it will become a science. Right now people working in it work hard in many directions and many things happen. But it is as if you are going in many directions together and then suddenly you don’t find where you are going. Up to a certain point things seem to happen and then everything seems to stop. You come to a plateau.

But whatsoever you have done is valuable. It is just waiting for a right synthesis. Once the right synthesis happens, you can become one of the most happy persons on earth.

Prem means love, and purantana means ancient, beginningless – beginningless love.

And we are ancient people. Nobody is new here. From the very beginning, we are. And this is the whole search: to find out your love. So remember it.. .this name will become a help in remembering.

The whole effort is to find out where our love is, where we are holding our love energy and how to use it so it becomes a flowering.

[In a previous darshan Osho suggested to a sannyasin who had relationship problems to meditate on whether he really loved his woman or not. (see June 7) Tonight the sannyasin says:... there’s something very vast, and I even hesitate to all it love but it’s larger than anything I’ve ever experienced. It was a great device. It turned me into myself.]

Good. In fact love is almost impossible in the ordinary state of the human mind. Love is possible only when one has attained to being, not before. Before that it is always something else. We go on calling it love but sometimes it is almost stupid to call it love.

A person falls in love with a woman because he likes the way she walks or her voice, or the way she says ’hello’ or her eyes. Just the other day I was reading that a friend of Jerry Brown’s of California said, ’He has the most beautiful eyebrows in the world.’ Nothing is wrong in it – eyebrows can be beautiful – but if you fall in love with eyebrows then sooner or later you will be deceived, because eyebrows are a very non-essential part of the person.

And for such non-essential things people fall in love: the shape the eyes. These are non-essential things, because when you live with a person, you are not living with a proportion of the body. You are not living with the eyebrows or the colour of the hair. When you live with a person, a person is a very great and vast thing... almost indefinable, and these small things on the periphery. sooner or later become meaningless. But then suddenly one is surprised. What to do?

Every love starts in a romantic way. By the time the honeymoon is finished, it is finished, because one cannot live with romance. One has to live with reality – and the reality is totally different. When you see a person, you don’t see the person’s totality; you just see the surface. It is as if you have fallen in love with a car because of its colour. You have not even looked under the bonnet; there may be no engine at all or maybe something is defective. The colour is not going to help finally.

When two persons come together, their realities, their inside realities clash, and the outer things become meaningless. What to do with eyebrows and with hair and the hair style? You almost start forgetting them. They no more attract you because they are there. And the more you know the person, the more you become afraid because then you come to know the madness of the person, and the other person comes to know your madness. Then both feel cheated and both become angry.

Both start taking revenge on the other as if the other has been deceiving or cheating. Nobody is cheating anybody, although everybody is cheated.

One of the most basic things to realise is that when you love a person, you love because the person is not available. Now the person is available, so how can the love exist?

You wanted to become rich because you were poor. The whole desire to become rich was because of your poverty. Now you are rich you don’t care. Or think of it in another way. You are hungry so you are obsessed with food. But when you are feeling well and your stomach is full, who bothers, who thinks about food?

The same happens with your so-called love. You are chasing a woman and the woman goes on withdrawing herself, escaping from you. You become more and more heated up and then you chase her more. And that’s part of the game. Every woman knows intrinsically that she has to escape so the chase is continued for longer. Of course she is not to escape so much that you forget all about her. She has to remain in view, alluring, fascinating, calling, inviting – and yet escaping.

So first the man runs after the woman and the woman tries to escape. Once the man has caught the woman, immediately the whole tide turns. Then the man starts escaping and the woman starts chasing – ’Where are you going? With whom were you talking? Why are you late? With whom have you been?

And the whole problem is that both were attracted towards each other because both were unknown to each other. The unknown was the attraction, the unfamiliar was the attraction. Now both know each other well. Both know each other’s topography – the body, the mind. They have made love to each other many times and now it has become almost a repetition. At the most it is a habit, a relaxation, but the romance is gone.

Then they feel bored. The man becomes a habit, the woman becomes a habit. They cannot live without each other because of the habit, and they cannot live together because there is no romance.

This is the real point where one has to understand whether it was love or not. And one should not deceive oneself; one should be clear. If it was love, or if even a fragment of it was love, these things will pass. Then one should understand that these are natural things. There is nothing to be angry about. And you still love the person. Even if you know the person, you still love him or her.

In fact if love is there, you love the person more because you know. If love is there, it survives. If it is not there it disappears. Both are good. To an ordinary state of mind, what I call love is not possible.

It happens only when you have a very integrated being. Love is a function of the integrated being.

It is not romance. It has nothing to do with these foolish things. It goes directly to the person and looks into the soul.

Love then is a sort of affinity with the innermost being of the Other person – but then It is totally different. Every love can grow into it, should grow into it, but ninety-nine loves never grow to that point. These turmoils and troubles are so much that they can destroy everything.

But I am not saying that one has to cling. One has to be alert and aware. If it were just these foolish things, it will disappear. It is not worth bothering about. But if it is real, then through all turmoils it will survive. So just watch ....

Love is not the question. Your awareness is the question. This may be just a situation in which your awareness will grow and you will become more alert about yourself. Maybe this love disappears but the next love will be better; you will choose with a better consciousness. Or maybe this love, with a better consciousness, will change its quality. So whatsoever happens, one should remain open.

So just watch. Everything is going well.

CHAPTER 11

14 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A newly arrived sannyasin says: So much has happened in the past few months. I just don’t understand. Everything’s changed.]

Once it starts happening, and if you don’t create any obstacle for it, it goes on happening. It is a chair. thing. You only have to take the first step and then things follow. You have simply to allow and one thing leads to another. It is a non-ending process, a chain reaction. Only the first step is yours and all others are taken by the whole. Once you allow the whole to function within you through you.

things start happening.

Man’s whole power is negative. Man has no positive power – so you can hinder it. You can withdraw and then things will stop happening. Or you can allow it and surrender to it. But the greatest secret is to learn how to allow. All that is beautiful happens. You cannot do it.

And that’s why you cannot understand it either. That which you can do, you resist. That which happens you cannot resist because that comes from the beyond.

You are at the receiving end. It is bigger than you. Understanding will not be of significance. It is incomprehensible and the effort to understand it can create a disturbance because then your mind starts becoming active. When you become active, the whole stops because your activity is negative.

Whatsoever you do will create a problem.

If man can learn just simply to be, not doing anything, then everything that we always wanted to happen and about which we were always frustrated because it never happened, starts happening on its own.

We simply become a witness. We are simply in wonder and awe. It is unbelievable when it happens because you are not doing anything – and it is happening! It is bigger than you – and there is only contentment when something bigger than you enters your heart.

If something smaller than you enters your heart, sooner or later you will be dissatisfied with it again because there will still be space left which will be empty: it is smaller than you. When the whole enters into the part, when the ocean falls into the drop, only then is there contentment. But then there is no understanding because understanding is yours.

There is a certain feeling, but not understanding. You relate to it but not through the mind. You relate to it through your total being. The mind is a small part, a very small part. In fact, animals are doing perfectly well without it so it is not very essential to life; almost superfluous, almost a luxury.

Animals do without it, birds do without it, trees do without it. The whole existence is doing without it. The mind is a very small part, but man has become obsessed too much with the part because it gives a certain feeling of power; that is the obsession. No other part of your being gives you the feeling of power.

If you are in love, you become powerless. Somebody else becomes powerful over you. You cannot manipulate when you are in love; all manipulation stops. Even to think of manipulation is sacrilege.

But the mind is something which can give you a very pseudo-feeling of power – that you are powerful, because you can manipulate through it.

By and by, the mind has become the power-trip, the ego-trip, of man. Man has repressed all his being, sacrificed his whole being, for just this minute part, this dictatorial part. This is the neurosis of man. Whenever one part becomes so powerful, out of all proportion, so powerful that it starts dominating the whole, there is neurosis.

When the whole functions and every part functions in proportion and is not dominating, no part is dominating and the whole functions in a deep inner unity and harmony, then man is healthy and not neurotic.

To me, neurosis means a part gone crazy and trying to dominate the whole. That has happened inside man, and man is trying to do the same thing to the whole universe. The whole scientific attitude is based on a very neurotic fixation – to conquer. That’s why science finally leads to destruction and may finally destroy the whole ecology of existence. Man’s neurosis is now being spread through science all over existence. It is very destructive.

So there is no need to understand. The very need to understand is an acquired need; it is not natural. If you love a person, you don’t bother to understand. If you are happy, you don’t bother to understand what happiness is. If the flower is beautiful, the flower is beautiful. You don’t bother to analyse why it is beautiful. The moment you dissect the flower, the beauty disappears. The sunset is beautiful, but once you question why, it is no more beautiful. The question brings an awareness into it.

The question is good if vou are suffering. Then ask why vou are suffering, because then the question will help the suffering to disappear. Try to understand suffering but never try to understand happiness, otherwise that will disappear. If you are ill then go to the doctor, take medicine. For health, no physician is needed. If you are healthy, no medicine is needed. If you are ill, surgery is needed.

So whenever you feel some moments of happiness, aliveness, something tremendous happening around you, incomprehensible, unbelievable, beyond you, watch in deep awe.

That is the meaning of ’respect’. It comes from a root ’spectare’ – to see, to look at and relook at,

’re-spectare’. Respect is to look again and again... something so beautiful that one would like to look again and again with no mind to understand but just to be filled with it, just to be with it, flow with it. Then much more will happen. But one becomes more and more capable.

The more you drop your mind and start living and enjoying and delighting in things, the more things will happen to you. You are creating a passage. You are inviting God. Once you start trying to understand Him you are becoming philosophic, and religiousness will be lost.

So watch it with awe, with great enthusiasm, with respect, but don’t try to understand it intellectually.

It cannot be done. When many people see that they cannot understand something they start denying it, because they think that if something cannot be understood it doesn’t exist.

Somehow this feeling has caught hold of the human mind deep down – that if you can understand something, only then is it there. If you cannot understand it, then how does it dare to be there? It cannot be there – deny it.

The scientist says, ’God is not, because we cannot understand how God can be. Beauty, love, are not, because they are all incomprehensible.’ But if you deny God, beauty, love, then what is left?

The whole personality disappears from existence, the whole mystery. There will be only things then and life will be absolutely meaningless, horrible.

So keep a little shrine in the heart for the incomprehensible, for that which cannot be understood, for that which should not be understood.

[A sannyasin says: You told me to be in the moment for twenty-one days... I think my mind is more visible to me than it has ever been. It was even more ridiculous than I could ever imagine.]

It is, mm? It is not only your mind. The mind as such is ridiculous. We can go on tolerating it because we never look at it. To be in the moment is to encounter it continuously. Then one can see the whole stupidity of the mind. It is just absurd. We are wasting much time and energy with it. As a master the mind is the most terrible thing there is. As a servant it is useful.

Watching, becoming aware, first will make you recognise the fact that the mind as such is mad, and one starts laughing at oneself. That is the beginning of wisdom. Ordinarily, people laugh at others.

Then they have not yet known what laughter should be. When you see your mind, you start laughing at your own situation. And when one laughs at oneself, it is a breakthrough.

Once you understand that the mind is ridiculous, the mind is losing control over you already –

otherwise you would not have been able to see the ridiculousness of it. It is very clever in hiding itself, in rationalising itself. In deception it is very clever, but if you have seen it, it is a very good indication. And to live moment to moment is the only way to get out of the mind.

The mind can exist only with the help of the past and future. It is either of the past or of the future.

When you live moment to moment, it becomes ridiculous. It is continuously running into the past or into the future and is never here.

You want to be here because the moment is here, so you see the whole foolishness of it. You are eating and the mind is going somewhere else. You are looking at the stars and the mind is going somewhere else; it is never here.

It is always missing, always desiring, and when the moment comes, it never enjoys. It is always fragmented and jumping from one thing to another, never completing anything and creating a mess around itself. Looking at these antics, one starts laughing.

So now the second thing for you is that whenever you feel it is ridiculous, laugh. Don’t just visualise a- laugh, but really laugh, a good laugh. Don’t be worried that others will be surprised at why you are laughing. They don’t know the joke; they don’t know what is happening to you. So just start laughing whenever you feel it.

There is nothing like laughter to help you to get out of the mind. People go on doing these things, but at a very cheap price laughter was possible.

Physiologists say that if you frown, two hundred and fifty muscles are involved. It is a great strain. If you laugh, only seven muscles are involved. It is the most economical act that can be done, the most relaxed; the least musculature is involved. The more you learn how to laugh, the less important are even those seven muscles. A moment comes when nothing is involved. Laughter simply spreads all over you like a ripple, just like a passing breeze. Then it becomes very subtle, but it helps you to go as far away from the mind as possible.

So now add this second step and continue to live moment to moment. Whenever you feel the ridiculousness, have a good laugh.

[A sannyasin says: I feel so much energy sometimes that I just feel lost in it. I don’t know if I can use it.]

Yes, when it comes, one always wonders whether there is any possibility to use it or not. One is so overfilled, almost overflowing.

We have lived at the minimum so we know the use of only minimal energy. We have lived at the very poorest level of our energy, like beggars. We could have been emperors but we have been very miserly so we have lived like beggars. Now suddenly you become aware of your empire, your treasures, and you don’t know what to do because you know only beggarly habits. You will have to learn new habits – the habits of an emperor – and how to use the energy and to use it creatively.

Otherwise too much energy can become heavy.

If you don’t know how to use it, you start being destructive. If you don’t know what to do, at least jog, run, sing, dance. Get into the whirl of the dance as deeply as possible. Put all your energy at stake and start overflowing.

Once meditation starts working and energy is released, one has to be creative. If one is not creative, one will go mad; too much energy will drive you mad. So before the energy is so much that you cannot control it, start putting it to some use creatively.

That’s the criterion. If meditation is going rightly, the meditator will become a creator. And if the meditator is not creative, that simply shows that somewhere he has missed.

If he becomes creative, not only he will be enriched. He will enrich the world. When he leaves the world, he will leave a better world – at least a little more beautiful, a little kinder, a little more human.

He will do something – whatsoever he can. He will paint, he will sing, he will dance, he will play on an instrument or do something, but he will not leave the world as he found it. He will leave it a little better... a few strokes here and there.

When you use your energy you feel fulfilled. Unless energy is expressed, there is no fulfillment. So this is the moment to start dancing. And when you dance, don’t be a miser. Miserliness is a very deep-rooted habit. We always go only to a certain extent and then no more: to this extent and no more, so far and no more.

Break that old habit – go the whole way. Don’t hoard and you will feel relieved. When the energy has been dispersed in a creative way, has been returned to the universe, you are in a deep connection with the universe.

Ordinarily that is what is missing in life. You go on taking from the universe and then you never give back, so the circle is disconnected. That’s what I mean when I say it is like a beggar: he simply takes, never gives. He knows how to beg and does not know how to share.

We breathe; the universe is constantly pouring energy into us. We eat, the trees, the plants, are preparing food for you, the sun and the moon, the ocean and the earth, the clouds and the sky, are all preparing food for us. You eat but you never return anything; not even a single song. At least trees give a few flowers, a few fruits, back to the earth. Look at the circle: they take from the earth, then give back to the earth.

Man has disrupted this circle; that’s why he is miserable. Hence the insistence of all the great masters of the world to share, to give, to love, so that whatsoever you have been given, you return.

And not only that you return it, you return it enriched. You return it transformed. You return it transfigured.

If the air has given you oxygen, you sing a song. The sky itself cannot sing a song; it waits for you.

The air cannot itself sing a song; it waits for you. The earth has given you food. It cannot dance itself but it waits for you.

Some day the energy that has been released by food, air, water, will become a dance, and that energy will fall back again, now enriched, transformed. This is the alchemy of sharing.

So start, mm? Enjoy and share.

[A couple said they would like to do the Encounter group. Osho said they could do it, but not together... ]

Couples are a disturbance, particularly in Encounter. They cling to each other because they are afraid of each other and they would not like to say something that might hurt the other. Not even knowingly, but unknowingly, you will not say something that will hurt her and she will not say something that will hurt you. So the whole point of Encounter is lost.

You have to be completely free – and it is very difficult to be free with people to whom you are related. In fact it should be just the otherwise, just the reverse. If you love a person, you should be totally free to say everything. But that is the ideal state: ordinarily it never happens. We hope some day between two lovers it can happen, otherwise each lover becomes a censor on the other.

In groups it almost always happens that if couples are there they remain together in the group also.

They become like an island. Others are meeting and merging but those two persons will remain like an island. They will not meet and merge – so that will create a disturbance.

[The swami says: We’re on different paths. I feel towards Zen, she feels towards love.]

That’s no problem. It’s good in a way. If you were both on the same path you would not be attracted to each other. Only polar people are attracted to each other. It is perfectly good. Be on the path of meditation and let her be on the path of love and then you can be very fulfilling to each other, because...

[The ma says: Can you tell us how, because at the moment it seems that we only hit – or miss; miss, in fact. There’s just a lot of conflict.]

That conflict has nothing to do with your being on the path of love or the nath of meditation. So don’t try to throw it on that. That conflict has to do with your minds. That’s a natural conflict that comes to every couple. Either the conflict wins or your love wins and the conflict disappears.

It is a crisis and one has to face it. One day or other, every couple has to face it. And it is good, because if love survives, it will move on a higher altitude, and if it disappears, then it was not worthwhile. In both ways the conflict helps.

I’m not saying to go on struggling and conflicting forever. If the conflict is there, come to an understanding now and try to see what the problem is. Encounter can help you both. Either you come to understand that the love is not there – hence there is conflict – or you will come to understand that the love is there and that’s why there is conflict. But you have to come to an understanding. I cannot say because my saying will not help. You have to find out.

These are the two possibilities. People who are in deep love are also in fight but their fight has a different quality. They will fight but they will not separate. They will fight but they will try to understand each other. So they will fight but they will know that this is only a critical state; it will pass. They will fight but still love. The fight may continue parallel to love, but love will not be distracted by it. In fact they will love more, because they will start feeling compassion for the other – so much conflict, so much fight, so much suffering. Love will be there and a new compassion will arise.

But if love is not there, then too there can be fight, but that fight is not going to be very long. Sooner or later one gets fed-up with it because there is nothing to fight for. Just fighting cannot continue unless by chance one in the couple is a sadist and another is a masochist, only then. It is rare. It is very difficult to find a sadist and a masochist together. They can fight for no love because they love fight. Then they can torture. They need somebody to torture and they need to be tortured. They are a neurotic couple and they need psychological treatment.

But I don’t see that you are neurotic. So there are only two possibilities. Either you are fighting because love is not there so fighting is creating a distance so you can move away, or you are fighting because you love each other and the fight is trying to give you an opportunity to go to a higher altitude. But first you have to find out, mm?

Encounter will help. It will make things clear, mm? Good.

CHAPTER 12

15 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[To a new sannyasin who had told Osho of the various groups and therapies she had experienced in the States]

No method is for all persons – and no method can be. For each person something suits, but something else does not. Sometimes the method that suits somebody may be very destructive to somebody else. A method is like medicine. It may suit somebody, may be of tremendous benefit, and to somebody else it may become poison.

Just a few years before, physicians used to think that the medicine relates to the disease and not to the person. Now they have changed that idea. Two persons may be suffering from the same disease... and still the medicine may not work. So now they say, ’Don’t treat the disease, treat the person. Two persons suffering from the same disease... it looks logical that the same medicine may work. But the disease is a small part and the whole gestalt of the person is very big.

So the disease is different – maybe the symptoms are the same, but two persons cannot suffer from the same disease because two persons are not the same. As our fingerprints are different, exactly like that everything else is different and unique, individual. So each individual has to be regarded as an individual and cared for individually.

The West is too technology-oriented. Technology does not bother about individuals. It does not believe in individuals; it believes in the technique. So the technique becomes very important, and in reality the individual is supreme.

So, many times it will happen that something does not suit you; so then don’t try to fit with it. It can be destructive. Listen to your heart. If it does not fit with you, then it is not for you – whatsoever the authorities say.

The authorities have their own vested interests in it. They try to make you feel guilty that something is wrong with you. They throw the whole responsibility on you and save the technique. They say the technique is perfect; you are defective. The technique is perfect; you are not okay. The technique is perfect; you are not allowing it to work. Then one starts feeling guilty, as if one is not dOing the right thing.

So never feel guilty. Let that be my message for your sannyas day: never feel guilty and never think in terms of your being made for some technique, some method or means. No man is made for anything and everything is made for man.

So the ultimate decision has to come from your innermost core. If it suits, then go headlong. If it doesn’t suit, then watch. Whatsoever others are saying, don’t be bothered. It may be suiting them.

There is no need to contradict them, no need to distract them, no need to convert them to your own way. Simply remember that it may be suitable for them; it is not suitable for you. And forget all about it.

Now so many techniques are about and people are moving from one technique to another, doing this and that. Much confusion is going to be created out of it. People will be left without roots. One technique you uproot, with another technique you uproot something else. Unless something suits, it will not get roots. Now this is a trend that even when a technique suits, then too people go on looking for sensation, for some thrill – maybe something more can happen somewhere else.

This vagrant mind, this mind of the wanderer, is not good, because a tree has to remain in one spot lo get more deeply rooted. A person should do many things before selecting a spot for himself. But once you see that something is fitting, then forget all about what others are saying, what others are doing. Move into it, otherwise there will be no time left for finding roots.

[The sannyasin adds: I go on and on about my path, wondering which is the right one. I feel it is meditation and yet I wish it were love.]

No, don’t worry, and don’t wish against it. Love will come. There is no need to be concerned about it.

When I say love will come, I don’t mean that you have become unloving or that you don’t love people.

You love people, you are loving, but you are not following love as the path to the divine. Human love is perfectly okay. It is good, it is helpful, but technically you are not moving towards God through love. You enjoy love, you share love. That’s perfectly good. That has nothing to do with God. That’s your delight.

But technically you are moving on the path of meditation. Soon you will see more and more love arising. Go on loving People, dispersing love, sharing your life, your being, with others, but always remember that is not the path for you to be on. That may be your expression of meditation but not the means to the goal.

When meditation is going well, suddenly love will bloom forth like flowers in the spring. So you need not think about it, and don’t create any anxiety about it. It is not a question of our wishing, because wishes are very deceptive. The question is of feeling, not of wishing. If you feel that meditation helps you – you become more quiet, more calm, collected – then that is your path. Love is not negated. It is not chosen as the path, that is all.

Love will follow like a shadow.

Deva means divine and amitabh means infinite light – infinite divine light. Amitabh is also a name of Buddha, because of his infinite light. In Japan, Amitabh has become Amida. They call Buddha

’Amida’, but it is a form of Amitabh.

[The new sannyasin says: And all my life I’ve felt like my path was the path of love, and yet I get so much from the meditations. I’m not really struggling with the two, but I heard you say about one path or the other... ]

No, no need to struggle. And no problems are ever solved. People who are trying to solve them are moving in a false direction. They may find some solutions but those solutions will be homemade because problems are existential and solutions will be mind-products. So for a few days you can concern yourself with the solution, but sooner or later they wear out and the problems reassert themselves again, or the solutions will give birth to more problems. Every solution creates more problems than it solves.

The right path is to grow out of them, to grow beyond them, to transcend them. Problems can never be solved, but they can be dissolved. My whole effort here is to dissolve them, not to solve them.

A moment of pure consciousness comes where no problem exists – and no solution. You are settled there with no problem to solve, and no solution to carry and to remember. Everything has simply fallen, withered away. This state is what satori is.

So the whole effort here is not to solve anybody’s problems. We are not working philosophically. We are working existentially.

Existence knows no problems. Problems are man-created. In fact, problems are because we are tense. It is not the other way around – that we are tense because there are problems, no. Because we are tense, there are problems. So once the tension is relaxed the problems disappear.

People ordinarily think that there are problems and that’s why we are so anxious and worried. Not so. You are worried, anxious, so you cannot live without problems. You create them. Your worry needs some problems to hang on. So if one problem is solved, immediately you create another.

Just solving problems is not going to help. It will be a sheer wastage. So I try to cut the very root, the grass-root – and that is the state of a tense mind. Once that state relaxes, all problems simply disappear as dewdrops disappear in the morning.

Once you have known that moment – even for a single time – you have the key in your hand, and whenever you want to you can open the door of the temple and enter. If you want to enjoy a little worry and problems, that’s up to you ! But now it is not a problem really, it is a game. If you want to sharpen your mind against anxieties, do it. But then you know that it is a game and you enjoy it.

In fact, anxiety is not anxiety then. It is as if you are solving a crossword puzzle. It creates anxiety but that’s just a game. Or you are playing cards or chess. You know that the whole thing is created by you. Don’t play the game – get out of it! Nobody is forcing you to play it. You enter it on your own initiative, voluntarily, because you enjoy that sharpening, that state of tense consciousness. There is nothing wrong in it.

But then the whole life is nothing but a chessboard and any moment you want to get out of it you can throw the board and finish the game. You have the key and you can move. Then problems are like toys and you play with them. So that is exactly the point to be understood.

When you move into deep meditation everything becomes tremendous, because so much energy is released – the same energy that is getting caught in many nets and knots, anxieties, problems, tensions, worries, depressions, sadness, this and that; so many knots around you.

I have heard one joke....

Visitor: What happened to the fellow in this cell?

Attendant: He went crazy trying to untie a knot in a string.

Visitor: What is this other fellow’s trouble?

Attendant: He went nuts trying to help the other fellow untie the knot.

Visitor: And who is the raving maniac in the padded cell?

Attendant: He’s the guy that tied the knot.

Through the whole of life we go on making many knots around us, unknowingly, unconsciously. The way we live is so unalert that those knots are created automatically. Then we try to solve them.

Then we get caught and the whole energy becomes diversified, divided and blocked everywhere.

So when you start meditating, you start becoming loose from your preoccupations, and the energy that was involved in it falls back on you... a tremendous upsurge – unbelievable. Then everything becomes tremendous. If you are angry, you are tremendously angry, or if you are loving, you are tremendously loving. If you are sad, you are tremendously sad. If you are happy, you are tremendously happy. This is the first step into meditation.

By and by, you start seeing that when with the same energy you can be tremendously happy, then why be tremendously sad? It is the same energy, and it is so easy to change it from sadness to happiness, from anger to compassion, from violence to love. It is so easy just as if you are putting the light on and off. But if you don’t know the button, it looks difficult.

A friend of Sigmund Freud, who was a poor man but had been childhood friends with Freud, came to visit him from his village. He had never seen electricity and it was for the first time that he saw it in Freud’s house. Just so as not to look ignorant, he didn’t ask what it was.

In the night when he was left in his bedroom, he tried hard to figure out how to put it off. If you have never seen electricity, it is almost impossible for you to conceive that somewhere just behind the door there is a knob which yon just have to push and the electricity will be off. He had known only lamps, kerosene lamps and other things, so he stood on a chair and studied the light but it seemed impossible to extinguish it.

He tried the whole night but he couldn’t put off the light. In the morning Freud asked, ’You slept well?’

The man said, ’Everything was okay but I couldn’t sleep because of this light. Tell me – it’s miraculous – how do you put it off?’

Freud said, ’Why didn’t you ask me?!’ And the man said, ’I am just foolish and I didn’t want to look ignorant, so I tried to find a way but I couldn’t.’

So if you don’t know, it is very difficult to think that the same energy can become anger, and the same energy can become love. The same energies can move the fan, can give you light, can run your car, can do a thousand and one things, on the surface completely unrelated to each other.

What is the relationship between a fan and a lightbulb? On the surface there is no relationship, but deep down it is the same current.

So the second step will be to look deeply and see that it is the same energy. Then it is foolish to waste it in anger and sadness. Why not be happy? A moment comes when one is simply happy.

Not that one becomes happy; one is simply happy... happiness becomes one’s climate. In fact one completely forgets that one is happy. Then only is one happy. Happiness is then so engrained, so natural, so spontaneous, just like breathing.

If there is some trouble you become aware of your breathing; otherwise there is no need. It goes on functioning so smoothly. It is just like when you have a headache then you remember your head, but otherwise why? If your body is perfectly healthy you forget the body. Only an ill person knows that he has a body. A healthy person forgets. He becomes bodiless.

In indian medicine, health is defined as the feeling of bodilessness. I have never come across a better definition. Western medicine defines health as an absence of illness. That is not a true definition. If you have to bring in illness to define health it is a very negative definition. Absence of illness is not much of a health because there is no positive element in it.

It is possible that a man may not have any illness and may not be healthy either, because health has a positive well-being in it. The indian definition seems to be very refined: the feeling of bodilessness.

When the shoe fits, one forgets the feet. When the shoe is not fitting, then you remember it. When the body fits completely, you forget all about it. Then you are a nobody.

To be a somebody is to be ill. The very feeling that ’I am somebody’ is ill. To be nobody is perfectly healthy.

And much is going to happen... leave everything to me. Now I will be responsible. You can be absolutely irresponsible.

[To a visitor from Israel who was unable to stay much longer, Osho suggested he do meditation regularly, saying that dancing, particularly would be helpful for him... ]

You can create a small group of friends who can dance together. That will be better, more helpful.

Man is so weak that alone it is difficult to continue anything. Hence, schools are needed. So if you are not feeling like doing it one day and others are, their energy moves you. Someday somebody else is not feeling like it but you are, so your energy comes through.

Left alone, man is very weak and willless. One day you do it and another day you feel that you are tired and have other things to do. Meditations bring results only when they are done in a persistent way. Then it sinks inside you.

It is just as if you are digging a hole in the earth. One day you dig in one place, another day in another place. Then you can go on digging for the whole of your life but the well will never be ready.

You have to dig in the same place continuously.

So make it a point, at the same time every day. And if in the same place it is possible, very good; the same room, the same atmosphere, burn the same incense... so the body by and by learns and the mind by and by gets the feel of it. The moment you enter the room you are ready to dance. The room is charged, the time is charged.

That’s how temples, churches, synagogues came to exist in the world. In the beginning they were beautiful places. People came again and again to the same place, to the same atmosphere. Once they entered the synagogue or the temple, they entered a different world from their ordinary world.

That very feeling helps to change the mood.

So if you can find a place where you can go every day, every night or morning, do it, mm?

[A sannyasin reports back to Osho after being advised to accept his mind (see ’Beloved of my Heart’

May 10th.):

I feel more conscious of what I’m doing... but I’d like to be able to do what I’m doing, rather than thinking all the time what I’m going to do next.]

Everybody is trying to improve and to become somebody – and that’s absurd. Nobody ever becomes anybody. Everybody remains himself or herself, so the whole effort is a wastage. It is good for you to accept yourself, but I still think something is lurking in the mind. Just accept and don’t create any tension.

I want you to be completely rid of your guilt feelings so that the division is no more there. You are two [of you]. One is trying to manipulate the other; the top dog continuously trying to manipulate the bottom dog. The bottom dog is also very cunning; he has to be. He goes on saying, ’Yes sir, yes sir,’

but he goes on doing his own thing.

Drop this division. Whatsoever happens is good. Don’t judge. Just remain with whatsoever is. There is no other way for it to be. It is very difficult because it is against the ego. The ego says, ’Something better is possible. Something more is possible. I can do this and that, and I can become somebody.’

The ego does not feel good with deep acceptance. In fact deep acceptance will become a death to the ego. The ego thrives on conflict.

So just float. You are looking better. You have not looked so good for many months . . . relaxed.

If you feel like doing something, do it but don’t make it a drive. When you have completely relaxed and there is no guilt, then I will tell you to do many things. But first this guilt has to go. If it remains it will again jump and will possess you again.

So there is nothing to do right now – simply float. When you feel like meditating, meditate, otherwise simply be.

[A sannyasin said:... a thought came into my head that only God is important. And then somehow the word ’important’ dropped and I had to say ’God is only’.

He goes on to ask about dropping his attachment to his mother who has passed over.]

Good... very good. Good things are happening. Nothing is important, and when nothing is important, that which is left is important – call it God. Better not to give it any name because once we give it a name we start having some idea, some definition, some limitation. No need to give it a name.. This much is enough: nothing is important.

And if one can remember that nothing is important, one becomes detached spontaneously, by and by. No need to practise detachment. Just in the very realisation that nothing is important, one becomes detached. That detachment is beautiful.

If you practise detachment it is ugly, because deep down the attachment continues. You go on fighting with it and you create the opposite but the conflict continues. And wherever there is conflict there is ugliness. And wherever there is no conflict there is beauty. Beauty is energy moving into deep harmony without any conflict.

Nothing is important, but when you repeat this, remember that nothing is unimportant either.

Unimportance is a byproduct. If something is important, only then is something unimportant.

Nothing is important because nothing is unimportant. Things simply are. If we are attached to them we call them important. If we are not attached to them we call them unimportant.

Importance and unimportance come because of our attachment. Once the attachment is not there, things simply are – unlabelled, unclassified. They don’t belong to any category: important, unimportant, valuable, not valuable, profane, sacred. The world is simply there then in its total nakedness and its total beauty.

Sheer purity is there... one is surrounded by innocence. It has been good. Continue to remember it.

[A sannyasin asks: I feel somehow detached from feeling hungry and eating. Before, it used to be that feeling hungry meant to eat, and now I’m very confused about eating and taking food.]

One has to feed the body. It is a great vehicle. It is a shrine, a temple of God. So one has to take every care – more care than you have ever taken before.

It is through the body that we are going to experience many more things. This moment comes if you go on meditating. When this moment comes, one day suddenly one realises, ’I am not the body, so why bother?’ You are not the body, that’s true, but you are in the body. You are not this house but you keep it clean. Just because you are not the house you don’t make it dirty. Your body is just like the house.

You are in it; you are not it, that’s true. But when this realisation arises that ’I am not the body’, this problem is natural. One feels, ’Why bother? Why feed it? Why take so much care? Why bathe it?

What is the need? If it disappears, it disappears.’

The understanding is good but can become suicidal. Many people have moved into a suicidal line from this point. It is a cross-road. You have to take care. This experience has come because of the body, it has come through the body. You have to be deeply grateful. You will attain to many more things through the body. One day you will attain to the deathless also but then too it is through the body.

When St. Francis was dying, at the last moment he opened his eyes and started thanking his body.

People thought that he had gone mad or something. What was he doing? He started thanking his body and saying, ’You have been my vehicle. You have been my medium, my instrument. And you have brought me to this point where I am ready to meet my God. Many many thanks.’

A really religious mind is thankful to the body also. But there are religious people who are against the body and they go on destroying the body. They are really psychotic; they are not religious.

Something went wrong.

So this moment is critical. From this moment, start taking care of the body. The body is becoming more important than it ever was.

[A sannyasin said that he was feeling much turmoil and pain in his third eye when he was doing certain meditations or exercises.

Osho told him to stop the exercises that were provoking the pain... ]

One should be alert about what one is doing and what is happening. You must be doing many things.

There is no need to do many meditations because you can do confusing things, contradictory things, and then pain will arise.

Choose two meditations and stick to them. In fact I would like you to choose one; that would be the best. It is better to repeat one that suits you, many times. Then it will go deeper and deeper. You are trying many things – one day one thing, another day another thing. And you are inventing your own, so you can create many confusions.

In the book of Tantra there are one hundred and twelve meditations. You can go crazy. You are already crazy! [laughter] Just do two for a few days and then tell me. And don’t invent your own.

No, meditations are not fun. They can sometimes be dangerous. You are playing with a subtle, a very subtle mechanism of the mind. Sometimes a small thing that you were not aware you were doing can become dangerous.

For example, I told a couple to sit in front of each other and to look into each other’s left eye. They thought, ’What is wrong with trying the right eye?’ They tried and both had terrific headaches. And they never told me that they were trying it with the right eye !

If you look into the left eye it is good, because the left eye is connected with the right brain, and the right brain is the meditative part of your brain. But if you look into the right eye, it is connected with the left brain and that is for reason, thinking, the scientific brain and it can create trouble.

So never try to invent, and don’t make your own hotch-potch meditation. Choose two and just try them for a few weeks. Even if you are tempted to do others, don’t. And then tell me. This pain will go.

CHAPTER 13

16 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Anand means bliss and Samadhan means one whose problems are all solved. So from this moment this is going to be your constant awareness: that there is no problem. And in fact there is none.

All problems are our illusions. First we create a problem and then we start seeking solutions. The first step is wrong. And once you have taken a wrong step, the second step cannot be right. One has to come back to the very beginning.

There is no problem. There cannot be, because we are not separate from the reality. How can there be any problem for the wave? It is one with the ocean. Who is going to create a problem for the wave?

There is no antagonism in nature; it is deep harmony. We create the problem and then we try to solve it... but then there is no solution.

The real learning is how to drop problems, how not to help them arise. So catch hold of yourself whenever you start creating problems; catch yourself red-handed and immediately drop it then and there. Don’t look for a solution.

The problem is the only problem. And the dropping of the problem is the only solution. So when you see that the mind is creating a problem, relax. Let it unwind. And you will start laughing – the problem disappears if you don’t fall into the trap. If you create a problem, you divide yourself. A part of your being you interpret as problematic, and the other part starts trying to solve it. For example, if you think sex is a problem, the mind starts trying to solve it. Now you are divided. There is going to be constant struggle and conflict now.

The english word ’agony’ is very beautiful. The original root means conflict, struggle, division, a constant wrestling with oneself; that’s what agony is. Once you stop creating problems, agony disappears. Suddenly you find yourself tremendously beautiful, tremendously blissful. And it has always been so! From the very beginning it has not been otherwise. But the mind has learned a trick and that trick has to be unlearned.

[The new sannyasin says: I turned from a psychologist to the spiritually-oriented person.]

If everything goes right, every psychologist has to turn towards the spiritual.

Psychology at the most can clarify problems, questions. It can analyse the situation more, but that is not enough – necessary, but not enough. One has to seek the transcendental. Psychology can give a very good background if rightly used. If it is not rightly used then the psychiatrist is as mad as the people he is treating or trying to help. He himself is in the same boat. Then one can just go on playing a game.

Otherwise, basically everybody has to turn towards some transcendental source, because mind is not the source of contentment. At the most it reflects your life, but it is not the real life. It is just a mirror in which to see your face. But if you constantly go on seeing your face in the mirror and never turn to yourself, that mirror has become your enemy. That’s what happened to Narcissus.

He looked into the pool and fell in love with his own mirror-image – so much so that he forgot that he existed separately and this was just a mirror. Then he started looking for this person who was hiding there in the lake. Whenever he stepped into the water, the image would disappear. Whenever he came back to the shore, the image was there.

He died there... waiting and waiting and waiting and looking into the mirror. He became a plant.

That plant is known as narcissus. It grows by the side of a river or a lake, so still Narcissus goes on looking.

Psychology only gives you a mirror-image. It is looking into your mind. It is good, but then one has to turn back. One has to seek the original, the one who is looking into the mind. Then religion, spirituality, starts.

The christian word ’repent’ is very good. It means a returning, a one-hundred-and-eighty-degree about-turn. It does not mean – as it has come to mean – that one repents for one’s sins. The original meaning is simply ’returning’.

Jung has written in his memoirs that from observing all his patients through his life, he noticed that those who are at the age of forty, or close to it, deep down have no psychological problems but religious problems. And unless they can find a religious value in their lives, they cannot be happy.

It is how it should be. The age of forty-two, in the indian calculation, is the turning-point, the point where one repents. It is just as at the age of fourteen one becomes sexual.

In indian Yoga they say that each seven years there is a change in the body, in the mind, in the structure, in your gestalt, because every seven years the circle is complete. So by the time one is seven, one is no more a child. Childhood is gone; one circle is complete. That moment one starts becoming homosexual.

Up to seven, the child is masturbatory, completely self-contained, narcissistic. He himself is his whole world and he is the centre of it. After seven, the centre starts moving out. He starts becoming friendly with people. If he is a boy, he finds boys; if she is a girl, she finds girls to be friendly with.

The boy is not interested in the opposite sex yet. He still remains oriented to his own sex. That’s what homosexuality is. This is up to fourteen.

Then suddenly another circle is complete. He becomes heterosexual. Now he is not content with boys. He would like to know the other – the absolute opposite. Now he is no more confined to his own sex. He would like to see the other shore of the river.

And in this way it goes on changing. Forty-two is again a turn, a returning.

So it is good that psychology has not become your confinement. Now you will be free to use it in a very deep and creative way.

[A visitor says: I’m very interested in the synthesis here. It’s been an interesting experience to feel it coming together with Yoga.]

Yoga is significant, but many more things have to be added to it.

The discipline is very ancient and man has changed a lot. It is one of the most ancient things in the world, but the discipline was created for a certain type of man who no more exists. A rift has come.

Man has changed tremendously and the discipline has remained very orthodox. It is necessary in a way, otherwise the purity of discipline cannot be protected. So guardians of every school protected the purity. But the problem is that they succeeded in protecting the purity of the discipline, but then the rift became bigger and bigger between man and the system – because man goes on changing.

Tremendous change has happened – not only in the mind of man, but in the biology, in the physiology of man – and Yoga has to keep pace with it. So, many more things have to be added to it. Many people try Yoga but few succeed. At the most it can become a sort of exercise. It is good as far as it goes. It gives you a certain health, a certain well-being, but that was not the aim of Yoga.

It is as if you have an aeroplane and you are using it as a truck.

You can use it as a truck and it is good as far as it goes, but you could have flown in it. So Yoga is just a means towards the ultimate. The physiological part is not the most essential part, but it has become the most essential. Many people are lost in it. For their whole life they go on practising in the body and they feel good. But to feel good is not enough.

Unless you feel God, to feel good is not enough. Unless you become a god, nothing is enough.

And one should continuously remember that one has still far to go, so much more work is needed.

Whatsoever physiology has discovered in the human body, whatever new insights have come to biology, to genetic science, whatsoever new lights have been thrown on sexual energy by Freud, whatever has become much more possible through acupuncture – all these things have to be added to Yoga. Then Yoga can really become the supreme science.

And that synthesis is going to happen somewhere in the West – not in the East, because the latest developments are happening in the West. Much has to be done. I would like you to come back for a longer time and be here, because unless it happens within you, you cannot have the vision. It is absolutely subjective. So if you come to an integration inside – and you can feel that the integration has happened within you and everything is clear – then you can have your own approach as to how to integrate with the ancient science of Yoga all that the modern mind has done. What has happened to the modern mind has always to be kept in view.

When Patanjali was working, a totally different quality of man existed in the world – very simple, primitive, unrepressed, with no neurosis, no enforced pattern; natural, more spontaneous, more in tune with nature. Trust was easy, doubt was difficult. In fact, to find a doubter was almost impossible.

Trust was as natural as breathing.

Now just the opposite has happened. Trust is almost impossible, doubt is as natural as breathing.

And the whole energy is repressed. Man is no more streaming. He is no more a flow, but frozen; many limbs are completely cut or paralysed.

Those things have to be considered. Otherwise, if you give Yoga to the modern man and he is repressed too much, Yoga can become a repressive system in him and it will not help him to grow.

He will start shrinking. Bodily he may feel good. Spiritually he will disappear.

First a great and intense catharsis is needed. That’s why I insist so much on cathartic methods.

Once catharsis has happened, only then can Yoga techniques be used, because then there is nothing to repress. Otherwise Yoga is such an intense control that if you have something to repress and you practise Yoga, that repressed energy will fall to the very bottom of your unconsciousness and it may take lives for you to come back to it.

So all repressions have to be released. Before one enters on the path of Yoga, at least now, one has to drop all repressions whatsoever. So new growth methods can be of tremendous help. Encounter, Gestalt, Marathons, can be of tremendous help. But yogis seem to be against them and new growth people seem to be against Yoga. Growth-group people think that Yoga is a Son of repression and yogis think that this is a sort of indulgence. And I think that both are wrong.

Before a repressed mind can move on the path of Yoga, he has to go almost through indulgence.

Only then can those repressions be thrown out and his system can be purified. Then he can move into Yoga.

[A visitor says: I find it difficult for me to stay here and I wanted to ask you if you think I am too young to be here. I feel too young.]

In fact if you are young, it is easier to be here. If you are old it becomes difficult, because the older you are, the more smug you become. The older you are, the more you think you know – and nothing satisfies the ego like knowledge. To be young, to be naive, in a way is very good. You are clean.

Much can happen to you right now.

And while one is young, to drop the ego is easier. The older you become, the more investment is in it, because the older you become, the bigger a past you have. That’s what old age means. And the bigger the past, the more difficult it is to drop, because you have much to lose. The whole of the past is associated with the ego.

Young persons can drop the ego easily because they are young, full of energy, courageous and can take to an adventure. It is an adventure.

And to me, religion is the greatest courage in the world. Going to the moon is nothing. Going to yourself needs more courage than that.

I understand your problem. What you mean is that you would like to live more, experience many more things.

... But I’m not against life. My whole effort is to intensify your living.

Be here, and in three months you can live as much as you cannot live anywhere else in three years

– and that is an understatement. If you are ready, within three months you can live as much as most people ordinarily live in three lives, because everything can become intensified. I’m not against living. I’m all for life.

But that’s why I say to drop the ego, because the ego will not allow you to live. It will always be a hindrance. If you fall in love with a woman, the ego won’t allow you to love. It will always be standing there like a wall. If you drop the ego, you can love. If you drop the ego, you can laugh. If you drop the ego, you can be. Otherwise the ego disrupts everything, corrupts everything, poisons everything.

The ego is not life, remember. The ego is the anti-element in life. The ego is anti-life. Because the more you think yourself the centre, the less and less you become capable of moving to others.

Life means relationship. The ego means remaining confined to oneself. Life means moving, melting.

The ego is an imprisonment. Life is a merger.

So if you really want to live, you will have to drop the ego – and the sooner, the better. Once you become attuned with the ways of the ego, it will become more and more difficult.

If you can stay here right now for a few weeks, it will be good. But if you have a sort of fear.... That’s what I see – you are completely afraid to be here a little longer. You are afraid of sannyas. You will become a sannyasin if you are here. So I must make you alert – if you are here for a few more days, you will become a sannyasin. So if you want to escape, escape immediately ! [laughter] Don’t think twice; simply escape.

You will not go very far [laughter]. You will come back. But you can try.... You are also afraid of life... and travelling is not life. Travelling is a substitute. Many people think of travelling as life, that going from one place to another is life. Maybe sensation, maybe a thrill, a kick – but not life. Going from one space inside to another space is life. And going from one space to another is just a poor substitute for it.

If you really want to become a traveller, I am here. I can take you on the longest journey – that starts and never ends.

But that has something to do with your inner map, your inner territory. You move from one space to another. You will be going east, that’s true. You will be moving towards the east farther and farther, but inside – not towards Japan. Japan is no more a part of the east. If you want to go to the west and don’t want to go to the west, go to Japan. It is almost the west now, and sooner or later India will also be the same.

In a way it is good because then whenever one wants to go to the east. one will have to close the eyes and go inwards. That’s where the real east is, because that is where the sun rises... and such a sunrise that it never sets again.

There is no western horizon inside. Just the east... just the beginning of light.

So if you are too much afraid, you can go, but it will be cowardly.

... Nobody knows about tomorrow; nobody knows. And particularly for the modern man it is even more difficult to say, because the modern man. has become almost accidental. You go and you meet a woman and fall in love. She does not want to come to India, then what to do? She wants to go to California, so you go to California, and so things go on....

Modern man is a driftwood. You are here – that too is accidental. You have not come for me. You had never thought about me. You have not planned to come here; it is accidental. So just see it.

But I’m not against your going. If you want to go, go and be finished with your travelling. But remember that man, modern man particularly, is very accidental.

Anything can change your

direction, any small thing that even feels unbelievable can change your direction. A piece of paper on the road and you look at it and it has a little writing on it. It can change your whole life and you will never be the same again.

So if you feel that there is some urgency in going and that there is something to be done, you can go. Otherwise it is better that, rather than postponing me, postpone Japan. For a few weeks be here and then go to Japan. Then you will be a totally different man, and you will be able to contact a different Japan. If you enter into meditation here deeply, then when you go to Japan you will be going to a different country, because each country is many countries.

Right now you will go to Tokyo. After two months of being here, you will go to Kyoto, not Tokyo.

Right now if you go, you will go to geisha girls. After two months if you go, you will go to some zen monastery – and that is a totally different Japan. Japan is not one country, India is not one country

– no country is one. A country is a multiplicity of countries – countries within countries.

All people who come to India don’t come to the same India. Somebody will come and he will immediately go to the prostitutes. Somebody will come and will immediately go to Kashmir and to the Himalayas. They are different worlds, but you always find your world wherever you go. That is the only world you can live in. You go on groping for your world.

My suggestion is that if you meditate here for at least two months, and do your groups here and then go to Japan, then you will come in contact with a totally different Japan, very ancient and very beautiful – of Basho and Joshu and Rinzai – a real world, very essential. Right now you will go and you will just see Tokyo, modern cities, modern technology. That you can see anywhere else; there is no need to go to Japan.

But you think, mm? I never want to distract anybody from anything. Even if you are going on a foolish journey, I am the last person to distract you – because who am I? Why should I distract you?

Who knows? – you might be going in the right direction. Just think over it. If you feel like going, go and come back. If you feel like being here, you can go later.

[A sannyasin says: I have a trembling in my body which I had before I came here also. I don’t know if it is related to meditations or not but I can’t sleep very well in the night I think because of it.]

Sometimes it can happen naturally. When it happens through meditation, then too it was just something that was already there and meditation simply hits it. But it is a good thing.

Something will have to be done so the sleep should not be disturbed. Do you feel disturbed for the whole night and tired in the morning?

I think you will have to change your sleeping time. This is one of the problems to be understood.

A child sleeps for twenty-four hours in the mother’s womb. Then the child is born and he sleeps twenty-three hours, then twenty-two, and twenty, eighteen, and it goes on getting less.

By the time the child has come of age, he sleeps seven, eight hours. That continues up to the age of forty-two, but it starts to decline from eight hours to seven, to six, to five. If one lives to around the age of seventy it remains at five hours. And then it drops more – near the age of eighty, ninety, it comes down to three hours. If one lives over ninety or even more, it comes near to two hours or even one hour. And if a person lives beyond one hundred and fifty, sleep totally disappears.

It has something to do with the inner biology. When the child’s body is getting ready, much work goes on inside the body. That work can happen only if the child is asleep. Only in sleep do you not interfere in the inner work of growth. So the child sleeps for twenty-four hours in the womb, and after he has left the womb the work still continues, but not as much. By and by the work is reduced to nil. By the age of forty-two, the work of growth completely stops. In fact, deterioration sets in. The body is no more being built, rather it starts disappearing – so the sleep disappears with it. So there is nothing to be worried about. If you have been sleeping for eight hours and then suddenly you find that you cannot sleep for more than five, you become worried because you think that eight, seven hours is a must. Nothing is a must. Your needs change.

A young man of eighteen or twenty eats much. But by the age of thirty-five, he cannot eat that much, and if he goes on eating because of the old habit then there is danger. He will gain too much fat; a heart-attack and this and that, a thousand and one things can happen. If he does not feel like eating that much, he thinks that his appetite is disappearing. Nothing is happening. It is just that the age is changing. We have to adjust every day, again and again.

So as I see it, it is not a problem. Simply change – because getting up at four, what can you do? Go later to sleep and then you will be able to get up at five. And that is one of the most beautiful times, particularly in India. In twenty-four hours, there is no more beautiful time than then.

Do a little exercise, take your bath, and then you can come to the ashram. By six you start your meditation here. Change your pattern and go to sleep later. That will completely settle things.

And later on, back home, go to bed later. Even twelve o’clock will be good. Go as late as you can so that in the morning when the world is awake, you are awake. Getting up when nobody is awake disturbs the mind very much. Everybody is sleeping, people are snoring, and you are awake. You feel out of sorts, as if you are not in tune with the world, and that worries you.

So you go a little later to bed.

[Osho asked her to raise both her arms and to allow any trembling in them to happen. No trembling was visible, and afterwards she commented that it did not manifest externally.... ]

No, but bring it outside and then it will disappear, otherwise it won’t. Emphasise it, even exaggerate it. I can see it but you are holding it. Just allow it to move and then it will be released. Otherwise it will simply move inside and that can become a habit. It is good to release energy. Then you are unburdened and you will feel very very light.

[A sannyasin said that he had always been an angry sort of person, even when he was a child. He said that the cathartic meditations, rather than helping, seemed to make it more pronounced.

Osho suggested two groups for him saying that he should tell the groupleaders that anger was his problem, and ask them to help him work on that.]

You look angry... but it will go. Once it goes you will be almost flying, because it is a great energy.

Angry people are good people if anger can become transformed. Then it becomes love.

People who cannot become angry are, in a way, ill, because they cannot become loving. People who cannot become angry have no problems, that’s right – but that’s all. They are very low-energy people. Their fire is burning very low, almost at the minimum. They will somehow drag themselves in life but they will not be able to overflow.

Unless your torch burns from both ends, you miss life. So an angry person is good because at least he has a potentiality. Energy is there, now it is a question of the direction – and direction can be given.

[Previously (on June 8th) Osho had advised a sannyasin to think about whether she wanted to open or not.

Tonight she says: I feel deep down I do want to but I also want to hide. I saw very clearly that there is something inside me that wants to hide so it’s more clear now.]

But good – you looked into it, and you felt it from the right direction. That’s how it is. Deep down everybody wants to open, because deep down everybody wants to flower. You cannot flower unless you open. Flowering means opening, so all your petals open and your fragrance is released to the winds.

Man is also a tree, and man’s destiny is also to flower. Unless one flowers, one remains set. So deep down you looked rightly. But, not so deep, the desire to remain closed is also there – in many people, more or less. It differs only in degrees. With opening there is fear. If you become open, you become vulnerable. If you open then you don’t know what is going to happen to you. You don’t trust the winds. What will they do to you? They will simply take your fragrance away.

So one starts thinking in terms of hoarding and one becomes a miser. That’s why people want to remain closed. It seems to be more protected, secure.

So the conflict is between security and opening. You still want to be very secure, safe. You are afraid of moving anywhere where there may be danger. You still want to remain in control.

If you want to control, then you have to remain closed. You can only control a closed being. An open being is at the will of the winds and the rains, the clouds and the sun. An open being is open to everything possible. Life passes through him this way and that. So one is afraid.

Fear makes people closed. But one has to learn to drop fear, because even if you remain secure for your whole life, the whole life will become useless. Just to be secure?... Then there will be no romance. There will be no adventure, no peak. You will simply be moving on an asphalt super-highway. Secure – no possibility of any robbery because you are not in a forest, no problem that you can be looted. There will be no problems in your life if you remain closed, but there will be no life either. So it is a very great risk to settle with fear. One starts dying.

So your insight has been good. Now watch it. There is no need to do anything in a hurry, because nothing can be done in a hurry. One has to follow one’s pace. There is no need to overdo anything or to do it before its time. Let everything ripen. Just go on watching and seeing.

Just keep in mind that the deepest has to be fulfilled because the deepest is you. And that which is surrounding you like a wall, closing you, is nothing but learned fear. You have learned it from others.

Their fears have entered you.

To settle with fear is dangerous. It is better to live for a single moment – but to live – than to live a hundred years of life without any adventure. Because then what is the use? What is the point?

By and by, you will become more aware. By and by, you will see the foolishness of it. It is as if a bird is in the egg and is afraid to come out. His fear is logical, because he does not know the world; inside the egg he is completely secure. Food is supplied, warmth, everything is there and there is no fear of any enemy. Coming out of the egg he will be moving in an alien world. He will be a stranger.

Who knows what is going to happen? He will be moving into the unfamiliar, the unknown.

But if the bird becomes so afraid that he clings and does not come out of the egg, then he will be dead. That egg will become his tomb, his grave. Many people are like that. They live only for the name’s sake.

Come out of that egg. Only then is there life. I’m not saying that there is no danger. I’m the last person to promise you that there are not dangers. There are dangers – but they are beautiful.

[The sannyasin adds: I’ve been afraid of sickness of physical things and above all of cancer... but I’m afraid to have it verified so I don t go to a doctor.]

Fear can take many shapes – of illness, Of death, of cancer. So when you are afraid you cannot go to the doctor to verify it either, but that too is a fear.

Fear is the only cancer. So if you really want to be afraid, be afraid of fear and nothing else. But you will have to learn. Just meditate, dance, sing, and let these things open you by and by. If you fall in love, very good. That will be very helpful, because love is the antidote for fear. If fear is cancer, love is the panacea.

Try it, mm ? It will go.

[A sannyasin Primal therapist says: I received your note that said to go back to the West... I don’t want to.]

Then don’t go. It was only for the work. If you can go happily, only then go. It will be good if you go.

You can work much and you can help many more people. You are ready.

My contact has happened with you, so wherever you are it makes no difference. Whether you are here or in the West, I will go on nourishing you. There is no problem about it now. Just a few days ago I would have not said to you to go, but now there is no problem. Wherever you are, it makes no difference. You will feel me as close as you feel here, or sometimes, even more.

You are ready now. You can take a few groups there, and then many more people can come to me –

because I am not going anywhere, so people who love me and understand me have to go and work for me.

But if you feel that right now you would not like to, then be here and later on we will see. But if you can go it will be very very good. Make it a point to be there for a few months and here for a few months.

Think about it. If you can go happily, only then go, otherwise not.

... you think about it. If you can go happily, go. And either way is good, so don’t feel guilty in any way. If you go, you go for my work. If you stay, you stay for my work.

CHAPTER 14

17 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin, who is returning to Italy, said that his mind had been working less and less so that now he felt he had no centre, that he was dead and had no mental life.]

Nothing to be worried about. It’s nothing to do with life and death. It is just because you have not used the mind for so many months, that’s all. Once you start using it, within a week it will be rolling again, and moving in the same old way. Whatsoever you know your skill – has not been used by you. It is just as if a car has been sitting unused for two years, that’s all. You have to oil it, lubricate it and drive it a little? Everything is good; there is nothing to be worried about.

Whatsoever one knows is never lost. You may not swim for twenty years and you may think that you have forgotten it. But suddenly you are in the water and a few strokes here and there and it is there.

Just go back and you will see. And the mind will run more efficiently now because you will be more detached from it. You will interfere less in it.

You have gained much, but back home you will be able to see what you have gained.

[The sannyasin replied that what he feels now is an emptiness because he knows that the past has always played on his mind but now it is not there any more.]

I know... that’s how it should be. Now you will start working from a new centre – of emptiness. Then action has a purity, a freshness, aliveness. When you act out of your past it is repetition. You feel more efficient because you have done the same thing many times so you can do it more easily, but it has not any freshness in it. It is not knowledge. It is nothing new. And by repeating the old again and again, the capacity to be new is lost. So it is good.

That’s what we want – that a person should become so empty that he does not know who he is, that he does not know from where he comes, that he does not know what his past was. Then suddenly his action will be total because the past will not create any hindrance. It will come directly from his very core of being. And such action never binds. It liberates. It is spontaneous.

[He added that he felt aware of a masked violence in him of which he was afraid.]

It is there, it is still there, because in your past you have been violent and aggressive. The pattern has relaxed, and because the pattern has relaxed you are feeling empty. But very subtly an undercurrent is still there and you will have to be aware and drop it with full awareness.

Once you drop your violence, you will be a totally new man. But now you will have drop it. And you see the point so there is no problem at all.

Going back, start working, and use your mind, but don’t allow the violence to get settled again. At that point remember – whatsoever the cost – don’t get angry, don’t get aggressive, don’t become violent. If you feel it is coming and you cannot bear it, close your room and be violent with a pillow.

Do whatsoever you want to to the pillow and say things you want to say, but never be violent with a person.

This much you have to remember – because when the old mind starts functioning again and you have to go back to your work, the old pattern of violence will also come back. The undercurrent is there so it can take possession of you.

You are feeling empty, but that emptiness can be filled again by the past, so you have to be very alert. When one becomes empty, one is in a very critical stage. Either something of the unknown can descend, or again the past will enter, because one cannot remain empty for long.

Nature abhors emptiness, so something is going to fill it. So beware! Don’t allow it to be filled by the past. And that’s why I see that going back to Italy will be a great help. You will be able to see things more clearly because the whole past will be coming back. You have to choose. All that is technological, useful, utilitarian, choose; and all that is psychological, drop. Knowledge that has to be used in the day-to-day world, make alive again. But there is no need to be violent, no need to become aggressive, no need to remain in anger continuously.

If you are aware you will be able to choose. And when a person becomes capable of choosing from his own past, when one obsession is over, a great slavery is over. Otherwise your past is your totality. You never choose. You never make any discrimination that I will choose this and this I will not choose. You are so identified with your past that you cannot choose. How can you choose? You say, ’This is my past, this is me, so how am I to choose?’

But now that past has relaxed. You are more loose. You can choose. This is the way to transform even the past. By continuous new choice you can go on changing the past. Ordinarily it is said that the past cannot be changed because it has happened and you cannot undo it. There is no way because you cannot go back in time.

Ordinarily that’s true – but just ordinarily. There is a. way to change the past also, and that’s by a constantly new choice.

For example in the past you have been a painter or a football player, a swimmer, a poet or an architect. A thousand and one things you have been: angry, loving, sad, happy, mm? Out of this whole chaos you can always choose a few things. When you choose those few things and drop the rest, you have changed your past, because the total combination is no more the same. You can become a poet. You can drop your being an architect, or your being a dancer or a singer and can choose to be a poet. Next year you can drop being ,a poet and again choose to be a dancer. Then with your choice the whole past goes on changing because you go on getting a new identity.

And once you know this – that even the past is within your hands – you feel for the first time a certain power over your own destiny. Otherwise the past goes on leading you and you are slave.

Just whatsoever the past has destined you to do, you are doing.

My whole effort here is to make you masters of your destiny.

So if you become angry because in the past many times you became angry, then you are just allowing yourself to become a victim. You are allowing yourself just to become a puppet in hands of the dead past.

There is no need. You can change the past. You can choose whatsoever you think is right. The past is not your master; it is just raw material. You can choose many things out of it, you can drop many things out of it, and you can always make a new synthesis to abide in. That new synthesis becomes your house. One has to go on changing it continuously. Then the present starts determining the past.

So just go and don’t be worried. One thing – keep alert !

[A sannyasin said he had done an Enlightenment Intensive group in England but had felt disappointed. He felt he didn’t get a lot out of it and was left feeling frustrated with the constant questioning.]

One gets only that much that one puts in. If you forget to put in, then you don’t get anything. And that is not only so with groups; it is basically so with life itself. You only get that which you put in.

First you have to put it in and then you get. If you come empty-handed, you go empty-handed.

People go on seeking meaning in life, but meaning has to be given to life. There is no meaning in life itself – you have to create it.

So what you gain out of a group is your responsibility, totally yours. You can gain much, you may not gain anything. You may even lose something. But always remember that it is you who is responsible.

There is nobody else to give you anything in the world unless you take it.

In Tibet they have a very old proverb – that a disciple has almost to steal from his master, almost steal. It is good. One has to work hard like a thief in the darkness of the night. And in somebody else’s house without any map, one has to search for the treasure. There is every hazard and danger.

He may be caught. He may lose his freedom, he may be imprisoned, but still he tries to steal it.

If you are not getting anything from life, then remember you must not be putting something into it.

Life is just a response, it is a mirror. You see your face.

It does not give you anything. It gives you an opportunity to create. It is absolutely raw. The canvas is there, the colour tubes are there, the brush is there, but the painting is not. It is you who has to create it.

And of course when a child creates a painting, it is a child’s painting. When a madman creates a painting, it is a madman’s painting. When a Picasso works, of course it is worth a million dollars. It depends. The colours are the same, the canvas is the same.

So always remember it, otherwise the mind has a tendency to expect and then to get frustrated.

Somehow deep down one goes on thinking that one has been cheated. Nobody can cheat you –

except yourself. So this time try again, but this time the responsibility is totally yours. You have to put much effort into it The more you put, the more you get.

If you can put yourself totally at stake, that single effort can bring so much fulfillment that you cannot even imagine, dream of.

[A sannyasin said: Since I was a child I have always been afraid to be alone in the house at night. I get these negative thoughts about evil spirits coming to get me.

Osho checked his energy and the medium, Radha, who helped him, fell backwards.]

Good... come back, Radha. Don’t be possessed by his evil!

It has nothing to do with the evil forces outside. It is a very rare phenomenon. It has something to do with your negative centres.

Just as there are seven centres – what Patanjali calls ’chakras’ – which are seven whirling pools of energy, exactly parallel to them are seven negative chakras. In existence everything exists in polarities. Every plus has a minus and the positive electricity has a negative pole. Magnetism or any energy has polarity. But Patanjali never talked in his Yoga sutras about the negative chakras. In fact nobody has described them because it happens so rarely that it need not be accounted for, but those chakras are there.

Patanjali and others have not talked about them because even the talk about them may make many people curious to know what they are. Black magicians know everything about them. They work on the negative energy, the darker side of man, the night side of man.

Sometimes it happens that both the channels of positive and negative are very close and sometimes energy can leak from the positive to the negative. That’s what is happening. It has nothing to do with the evil from outside.

But something can be done. That’s what happened to Radha. Your negative energy started flowing in her, because a woman can absorb negative energy very easily. If she keeps hold of your hand for almost an hour, she will go almost mad.

But there is nothing to be afraid about. You will have to do a few things. One thing is, start doing shirshasan, the headstand posture. Do you know how to stand on the head? It will be tremendously helpful. Just do it every day in the morning for seven minutes and for seven minutes in the evening.

Standing on the head reverses every process in the body, so whatever energy is leaking to the negative side will fall back to the positive side. Shirshasan is one of the most significant postures to reverse any process. The gravitation and all the energy fields are in a completely reversed position than they are ordinarily, so the whole field of energy changes. This is one thing.

The second thing is, after seven days – not right now – start sleeping alone. Give something to Radha – a handkerchief or anything – and Radha, you keep it with you for seven days and then give it to him. And then keep this handkerchief with you and if you become afraid at night, put your hand on the handkerchief.

So after fourteen days come and see me. It will disappear; there is nothing to be worried about. It is just energy-leaking inside and it happens very rarely so no manual says anything about it. Whenever it happens a master will help the disciple because it is rare, exceptional.

[Another sannyasin said that she had been suffering from epilepsy since childhood and had always needed to take a great many drugs. She said that she had had three individual sessions of divine healing here [see ’Get Out Of Your Own Way’ April 23rd and had stopped taking any drugs now.

She added that she was feeling very, good and asked if there was any special meditation for people who tended to Ft epileptic attacks.]

Healing is the best – and you can have healing wherever you are. Do it the way it happens here.

Have a picture of me, burn incense, have a dim candle in the nighttime, and just lie down and feel the same atmosphere. Create the whole situation and feel healed; that will do. Whenever the trouble arises, that will help.

[A sannyasin said that she had a strong puritan streak in her. When she made love, it was high energy and then the next day she was sick: I feel as if I’m not very good at having Jun or pleasure, and being sick feels like a denial. I don’t feel that I understand enlightenment but I understand pleasure. That’s what I want – more pleasure.]

Mm mm, if you can understand pleasure you will be able to understand enlightenment also –

because it is the utmost pleasure. Enlightenment is not against pleasure. It is the ultimate pleasure.

This is possible – that you have a puritan’s mind hidden somewhere in the unconscious and this pattern can be repeated. Whenever you will have fun, enjoyment, joy, the mind will create a subtle situation to make you suffer. That’s a self-imposed punishment.

Kazantzakis, the greek author, has written about one of his experiences. He was visiting a certain town and he went to the theatre and saw a woman there who was a very beautiful person. He was fascinated by her, but his whole training was that of a puritan, so he became very much afraid. But he approached her somehow and made friends with her. She was willing to meet him after three days.

Those three days were a torture for him. He would decide to meet her and then decide not to. By the third day his face was so swollen that he could not leave his house because it was so ugly. And it had never happened before ! He had to cancel the appointment.

The moment he did, the face started getting better and within hours he was okay. They had decided to meet again after another three days and this happened again. From that morning his face started swelling. By the time he was ready to leave, he couldn’t. Again he changed the appointment and again the face went down. This happened three times, so he went to the doctor and said, ’What is the matter? What is happening to me?’

The doctor said that two hundred years ago there used to exist a certain disease called priest’s disease. It had disappeared from the world because that puritan mind had disappeared. But in fact, he said, this was the same disease. It used to happen to catholic priests – just the idea of enjoying a woman and their whole body would swell. It became automatic.

The mind functions inside continuously. If you have a puritan’s mind, first it will not allow you to have fun. If you force, it will punish you.

So a few groups will be helpful. Do Hypnotherapy. That will help unwind the puritan attitude. The suggestion has to go as deep as the other. suggestion has reached into your unconscious: Other groups will not be of much help because they will remain conscious. They will give you some insight but the unconscious remains unreachable. That can be reached only through hypnosis.

It needs a deep suggestion that there is nothing wrong and no need to punish yourself. Once it reaches to the right source, deeper than the other suggestion – that you have to punish yourself and you have done something wrong so you have to suffer for it it will disappear.

Just do Hypnotherapy and then tell me. It will go, and it has to be dropped, otherwise your whole life will be a continuous repetition, the same pattern, and by repeating it, it becomes more ingrained.

But it will go. Don’t be worried.

[A sannyasin said: I have no motivation, no creativity and no centre, and I don’t know what to db to find a centre or a deep motivation.

Osho asked Him if he was interested in any of the arts, to which he replied he was interested in all of them so he didn’t know from where to start. Osho suggested he do the Aum marathon and then he would make some suggestions.]

The motivation is always there. You have lost contact with it, that’s all. Nobody can live without motivation. It is almost as if a tree can live without roots. A tree may have forgotten about roots but roots are there. We just have to work it out – to dig a little earth and find out where the roots are.

In the Aum marathon if you suddenly have some insight that this or that may be the line for you, remind me when you come and see me with the group. If nothing happens, don’t be worried.

Go through the group as totally as possible so everything becomes topsy-turvy. Leave no stone unturned. We will find something. The root is there because nobody can live without it. One may be aware, one may not be.

Motivation is just like breathing. You cannot live without it.

[He asked if he could take the risk of using drugs to develop some creative direction.]

No need to be so drastic right now. Just wait. There are other ways to find it more easily. Drugs can sometimes reveal and sometimes mislead.

Drugs are not very intelligent; they are just drugs. They can give you a certain feeling which may not be true and you may starting in a wrong direction. Under the influence of drugs, people are almost so intoxicated that they don’t have any capacity to discriminate.

CHAPTER 15

18 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin said that he felt a confusion because whatever he tried to verbalise was never what he really meant. He said he would like some meditation that would help him clarify things.

The problem is a very common one. People have impossible notions of being happy, so whatsoever happens is never satisfactory. Whatsoever happens is just so-so because of their ideas that something extraordinary and great has to happen. Even if this happens they will not be satisfied, because that which happens to you becomes ordinary. It is extraordinary only in imagination. When it really happens, it is ordinary.

You have a very wrong notion about being happy and if you don’t drop that notion, you will remain unhappy for your whole life. It is a very impossible notion of unhappiness. For example two plus two should become five; then only you will be happy. You will never be, because they cannot become five.

One has to find happiness in moderate measures. One has to find happiness in small things. There is nothing great in life. But if you go on living happily in small things, the accumulated happiness is tremendous. It is as if in collecting drop by drop, you collect the whole ocean. You are not collecting the drops because you say these are just ordinary, tiny bits, and what is the use of collecting them?

You are waiting for the ocean to happen. It will never happen because the only way it can happen is to go on collecting tiny drops.

Make it a point to make each dew drop a potential ocean.

Otherwise you have such a notion that you will always remain unhappy. Nothing can be done about it because whatsoever happens, you will say it has happened to you so it cannot be very extraordinary; it is not very great.

I have heard about an actor of Hollywood who was very famous. He was requested to join a very exclusive club in America in which a very few people – only a hundred persons, never more than that – are members. When one person dies, they find another selected from the whole country. This actor was waiting to be asked, because to be asked to join is one of the greatest honours.

When he received the invitation he refused, because he said, ’A club that can accept me as its member is not worth anything. That is not the club I would want to join.’

If something great happens, it will not be great because it has happened to you and you don’t have a very good opinion of yourself. So my idea is: start collecting these drops, pebbles on the shore, seashells. Those things become treasures. There is no way to go directly to the peak of happiness; one goes step by step. The path is like a mountain-path... round about, round and round it goes.

Many times you come to the same point, just a little higher up. It is the same vision, the same world that you will come to again and again before you come to the peak, because the path goes in circles.

So start collecting small pleasures, small joys. You simply say, ’Nothing much.’ That’s why you don’t meditate, because if something happens, it is ’not much’; it is not great. This is a very wrong approach, basically wrong. Many people are unhappy in the world – not because there is so much unhappiness or that there is any need for so many people to be unhappy, they are unhappy because of some impossible notion of happiness.

Bring it down to earth. Bring it down to the very earth where you stand. Real happiness has to be very earthly. As time passes, in each moment you have to be happy in very small things. Sometimes talking with a friend one has to be happy, sometimes just sitting by the side of a tree doing nothing...

[A tibetan cuckoo was filling the evening air with his clear and penetrating call.... ]

Just listen to this cuckoo...

... it is tremendously beautiful. Not that it can be measured. If you try to prove that it is very great, you cannot. But it is tremendously beautiful.

In these tiny moments find out pleasure, happiness, joy, delight, and don’t miss any occasion. If it only brings a small smile and not a great belly laugh, don’t be bothered. A smile is also needed.

One cannot survive only on belly laughter. Smiles are also needed. They give salt to life.

Very small things... just doing something for a friend or allowing somebody to do something for you...

[The sannyasin answers: I like doing everything for myself and it’s difficult to allow anyone to do anything for me.]

That’s very egoistic, very egoistic, but it is there.

There is a christian parable about Jesus carrying his cross to the top of Golgotha hill. He is very tired. The cross is very heavy and he has not slept the whole night; he has been interrogated. His whole life’s mission seems to be shattered, and his disciples have deserted him.

He is in a crowd of enemies and the cross is very heavy and he is going uphill. Not only that people are mocking him and throwing stones and spitting on him. They think him a sort of a clown and have put a crown of thorns on his head They are enjoying it as if it is a circus.

It is hot... he falls and cannot get up. Soldiers whip him and somehow he gets up. But the cross is heavy and it seems impossible that he will be able to carry the cross much longer. A man from the crowd, a stranger, offers himself, saying, ’I can carry your cross for you.’ And Jesus allows him to carry the cross.

Now Christians have continuously pondered over it. Was it right that Jesus should allow the cross to be carried by somebody else? But I feel that the parable is very human, beautiful. Even Christ is not so independent that he can carry his cross all alone. Even he is a human being walking on the earth, fragile, and when somebody offers, he accepts. He allows him to carry his cross. It is very human.

Christians are a little confused about it because how can the son of God not carry his own cross?

Then what about us poor human beings? If he needs somebody else’s help, what about us? If he, who is the saviour of the whole of humanity, needs somebody else’s help, then what about us? How can he be the saviour who himself is in need of help?

But to me the parable is very significant. If he had refused, Jesus would have been just ordinary. It was easy to refuse. He had carried it for so long, he could have carried it a little longer. It was not impossible. And he was going to die any moment so what was the point? When one is going to die, one can do anything; nothing matters. A little harder effort, a little more perspiration; that’s all. But he allowed this man, a stranger, to help, and he showed his humanity in it. He showed that we are interdependent... that nobody is an island, that we are parts of each other.

There are people, so-called religious people, who will say ’No’; who will not allow anybody else to help them. They think that they are very independent people. They may even think that they don’t allow people to work for them because they don’t want that anybody should have to work for them, but deep down it is a very crystallised ego. It is inhuman.

So allow people to help you, otherwise you will become by and by like a stone. When you allow people to help you, you become connected. Then only your help can be accepted. It is a sharing.

Life is a sharing. You cannot live alone; nobody can live alone. Many people have tried, and in their very effort they become almost dead. They shrink, and life oozes out of their beings. So be helpful to people, but when there is an opportunity let them also be helpful to you.

And gather small moments... just as one gathers flowers, small flowers. They become a garland.

Whatsoever you like, do, but enjoy it, delight in it. Don’t wait for some great and extraordinary happiness to come to you. These tiny moments pile up, and one day suddenly that great happiness is also there. It always comes indirectly. You cannot attack it directly. It is the total effect of a rightly lived life. It is not some thing. It is a total effect. It is more like a field that you go on creating and go on creating. One day suddenly you are in it. It surrounds you... it becomes your climate.

Yes, happiness is a climate. For three or four weeks you do the Dynamic and start collecting seashells and pebbles, coloured stones. Ultimately they all turn into diamonds.

CHAPTER 16

19 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Dharma Bodhi. It means awareness of the ultimate law. Dharma means the ultimate law that holds everything together and bodhi means awareness.

The concept of dharma is very very significant and needs to be understood. Something invisible is holding everything visible. It is not a person. It is just the very energy of the cosmos. Everything is interlinked. It is not a chaos – the world is not a chaos. It is a cosmos. That is the meaning of dharma.

You may have heard a very famous saying of Pythagoras – that man is the measure of all things.

It appeals to man because it satisfies the ego, but certainly it is wrong; obviously it is false. Man cannot be the measure of all things because man is so finite and existence is so infinite. How can the finite be the measure of the infinite?

Man is so limited and being is so unlimited. How can the limited measure the unlimited? How can the measure become the definition of the unlimited?

It is false, but it has appealed to man’s mind very much because it fulfills the ego. Deep down, man is so tiny. A little more salt in the blood and the man is gone. A little less sugar and the man is gone.

A temperature a little lower than ninety-eight degrees, or a little higher, and man is gone. He lives seventy years if everything goes well, and on both ends there is nothingness, vastness.

Existence has been there forever and forever and it is going to be there forever and forever. So how can this tiny bit be the measurement of all ? It is not so. It is obviously untrue.

Dharma is the measure of all things. The ultimate is the measure of all things. And by dharma we mean that which sustains everything in its own nature. Fire is hot and ice is cold. Who sustains fire so it remains hot? Who sustains ice so it remains cold? Why don’t they change their nature?

If it is just accidental, then one day fire can be hot and another day cold. One day water is flowing downward and another day it will start flowing upwards if there is no law behind everything.

That law is called dharma in the East. And to be aware of it is going to be your practice, your sadhana. Dharma Bodhi means constant awareness of the ultimate law. So wherever you see things – the trees, the birds, the animals, man, earth, sky – always remember that there is order everywhere. Sometimes you may not be able to comprehend it, sometimes you may not be able to figure out what it is, but it must be there, otherwise existence becomes impossible.

So go on watching for that. It will help many things in you. It will give you a centring, because watching the law all around, you will become aware of your innermost law, the law of your being.

And it is not separate. It is the same law just reflected in your mirror – mm? – just as the moon rises in the sky and is reflected in so many oceans and so many rivers, in ponds and lakes, in millions of reflections; that ultimate law is one... is reflected by every consciousness.

You also reflect that same law. So watch it both inside and out, and by and by become more and more aware of that which sustains. That’s what God really is.

[The new sannyasin said he was in a kind of informal therapeutic relationship with a woman in Germany and he felt a responsibility to her. She had written recently that she was missing him, so he felt some concern.]

It is good to help people but it is not good to make them dependent on you. Then rather than helping her, you are being distracted, and finally she will become so dependent on you that you will start feeling the burden of it. She will not be helped in this way, because real help helps the person to be on his or her own feet.

Real compassion helps people to be independent.

[The sannyasin answers: This was my goal with her.]

But the goal has to be remembered from the very beginning because the first step is going to be the last. Everybody thinks that way – that that is the goal but somewhere from the very beginning things start going wrong. If you feel a certain responsibility towards her now, you are in a bondage

– and she is in a bondage because she misses you. This is dangerous. This game can be very dangerous.

My suggestion is that you write to her, saying, ’Whenever I come back I will be helping you but there is no need to become so dependent, and it is good that for a few days you will be alone and independent.’

Never become responsible in that way, because tomorrow you can die, and your ghost will haunt her.

The only responsibility that one has is towards oneself.

No other responsibility is in fact a

responsibility. You help because you enjoy it, but now that enjoyment is becoming a bondage. It is going too far. Now you are also caught in it because you and your ego feel very much enhanced.

It feels good that somebody is dependent on you. It feels tremendously good that somebody is missing you. There is a great need inside man to be needed. One has to transcend that need because it is an ego-need.

One can get into many traps. Sympathy creates many traps for you. I have come across so many cases when a person starts with sympathy and then one day forgets that in the beginning it was sympathy and finds it is love. But that which starts as sympathy cannot really become love. In fact you start enjoying that you are being needed, and she starts enjoying feeling that she is so valuable that you constantly look after her and take care of her. It becomes a mutual enhancement of the ego.

This ego affair can be thought of as a love affair and then both will be frustrated. It is good to help but never be a helper. It is good to do whatsoever you can do in the moment, but never promise anything. It is good to be helpful, but it is not good to feel enhanced by the need of the other, because then exploitation starts.

Just think if she writes that she is feeling perfectly good and she is not missing you in any way, how will you feel? Think about it. I’m not asking you... just think about it. If she writes that she is feeling perfectly well – even better than she ever felt when you were there – and that she is not missing you at all, that you can remain in India forever if you want and that you need not be bothered about her, you will feel hurt.

Remember this much – that if you make somebody dependent on you, you will become dependent on them also because dependence is always double-arrowed. I cannot make you dependent on me without becoming, in a subtle way, dependent on you. There is no way. It is not one way traffic.

So help by all means, remain available by all means, but never make it too much of a thing. When you go back, try to help her. She will be coming sooner or later. She has to learn how to be on her own. Whenever you are there, you will be helpful, but this should not become a subtle affair of egos.

When you go back, help her. Help others also, but constantly keep alert. Otherwise sometimes it happens that you had gone to help and you become so caught up in it that you need help.

It happened once that I was sitting on the bank of the river and another man was lying there too.

A boy started drowning so I ran to save him, but before I could reach the bank, the other man had already jumped. So I stopped myself. There was no point – one man was enough. But the other man started drowning, so I had to jump in and save the two !

I asked him, ’Why did you jump?’ He said, ’I completely forgot that I don’t know how to swim. The child was drowning – I completely forgot!’ Just the urge to save – but just the urge to save is not enough.

So remember that, mm? And there is nothing to be worried about....

[A sannyasin asks: I want to ask you – how is it possible to love people a little more and not sometimes to be so afraid of them?... that they won’t like me.]

It has nothing to do with you personally. Everybody is afraid of love. To feel fear is a natural ingredient of love – just as shadows follow light. One has to understand the whole mechanism of it; that understanding helps.

Whenever you love somebody you are moving out of yourself, moving towards him. Of course you can never be certain that the other will receive you, that the other will welcome you. You can never be certain that he will not reject you. Fear is natural. It is a danger. You are in the dark, groping.

The other is also groping in the dark and is also afraid because the situation is the same for him. He is also afraid of whether he will be liked, loved, desired, needed, or that he may recoil. That hurts.

Even the idea that he will be rejected hurts tremendously.

Many people, because of that fear, and to avoid that fear, stop taking any initiative towards love, because they think it is better to be lonely. At least nobody can reject them, at least they are on their own and are not helpless. They are not at anybody’s will, they are their own masters – not very happy, sad, depressed, but it is okay. At least they are not rejected. They never take the risk and they become very defensive. Even if somebody else takes the initiative in moving towards them, they become so defensive that before he can reject them, they reject him.

So this is a simple mechanism of love and everybody who goes into love will have to encounter it.

It has nothing to do with you. It has nothing to do with your personality. It has something to do with love itself. It is a dangerous thing, and the danger is real, the fear is real, because there is every possibility that the other may not like you. There is no necessity that he should like you. Why? Just because you like him there is no necessity that he should like you. And it is true, the vice versa also.

Somebody likes you; there is no necessity that you should like him. If sometimes fortunately it happens that two persons come in contact with each other and they both like each other, it is beautiful. But there is no necessity that it should be so. And out of one hundred, ninety-nine miss, because the world is vast and you don’t know who is going to fit with you. You must have a partner somewhere who will fit with you tremendously, who is simply waiting for you, but how to find him?

Millions of people all around – how to find?

They have a very old legend in Sumatra that in the beginning God created man and woman together so that each was a couple; the bodies were joined. But then it became burdensome. The husband wanted to go to the north and the wife was not willing and so the bodies would have to be dragged together. Or the wife wanted to go to the south and the husband was not willing, so what to do?

It became such a great problem and there were so many complaints that God said, ’Okay, I will divide you.’ So He divided the couples. But then they became lost... it is such a big world. The sumatran legend says that everybody has his partner or hers, somewhere, and that’s how people are seeking and searching for the original companion from whom they have been separated.

But all are not original companions. Only one somewhere. And nobody knows. It is a groping in the dark and of trial and error. If you sit still because of fear and you don’t go and search for him, then there is no possibility of finding him. And even if you search, there is no necessity that you will find him.

So this is the risk of love. The risk is beautiful.

But there is a person for you. He will be tremendously happy meeting you. But before you can knock on the right door, you will have to knock on many wrong doors. If you are afraid of knocking, afraid that somebody may not open the door, then you will never be able to find the right door. So take courage. It is worth it. Taking all risks is worth it because that is the only way to grow.

Knock on many doors. If the person there says, ’I am waiting for somebody else,’ just thank him.

Perfectly good. There’s nothing wrong in it. Why do we take it as a personal offence? I go to somebody and I like the person, but the person does not like me. Why should I take it as a personal offence? There is no problem in it. We simply do not fit – we are not made for each other.

And it is good that a person says so. If the person does not say so and just being polite says, ’Yes, I love you very much,’ then your whole life will be wasted, because he will have only said it; he will never be able to love. So that will not be compassionate. It will be a great cruelty. It is compassion that he says, ’Sorry, I don’t feel any love for you.’ He is a good man. At least he’s not deceptive. At least he will not waste your whole life or much of your time. He makes you free.

He says, ’Knock somewhere else. Find somebody else. I am also looking but you are not the person for me. Something does not click in me that makes two persons fall in love.’ He may even say, ’I like you but love is not arising.’ Nothing can be done about it. It cannot be forced. And it is good that he is true. You also be true.

Don’t hide – remain available. Not only that, go on positively searching. When you feel that somebody does not like you, nothing is wrong. What can he do? What can anybody do? He is helpless. This happens so many times in the world – that another woman loves this man but he loves a woman who loves somebody else.

One woman was here who could not love a certain person, and that person was deep in love with her. Even the mention of that person’s name, and she would feel horrible. Then she fell in love with somebody else and that person was doing the same to her. Even the name of that woman and the man would recoil back.

Now if it happens that way, one is helpless. So one understands the helplessness, the absurdity of the whole effort. One moves, finds someone else. Life is big and God has taken so many forms.

Why stick to one? If that is not the form for you, and he is not feeling for you, move somewhere else.

God is waiting for you in some other form.

And don’t think that it is something personal. I can’t see that it is. You are a beautiful person, so there is no problem in it. From the very beginning, don’t be afraid. Be bold, because bold initiative is needed. These are the subtle nuances. If you are afraid and hesitating, the other feels that maybe you don’t love him. You are hesitating just to see whether he loves you or not, but your hesitation will be conveyed to him and he will think that love has not happened.

Because when love happens, there is no hesitation at all. One falls into it headlong like a fool. Love is not calculating or cunning. Love is very naive. It has a naivete, a simplicity of God.

So if you hesitate – and you may be hesitating only because you don’t know yet whether the ground is sure.... You don’t know whether this man will like you or not so you move cautiously. Because of your caution he becomes afraid. You are so cautious.... love cannot exist there. So he becomes cautious.

Seeing that he is moving very cautiously, not going in headlong, you become even more afraid, so your fear feeds his fear and his fear feeds yours. And something which could have happened, never happens.

Much trouble and turmoil can be avoided if people are sincere and simply go to the person, take him to a comer and say, ’Wait. I have fallen in love with you. What do you think?’ And give him time.

Say, ’Think and then tell me.’ Say, ’Be sincere. I’m feeling tremendous love for you, but there is no necessity for you to feel any love for me. This is my problem. But I must say so to you because you are also involved in it, so you have to think about it and decide.’

But people go on playing games. Those games are just security measures. You invite the person to a party and he invites you to the movies By and by, very slowly, he will touch your hand and wait to see whether you are going to reject him or not. And you are doing the same. In this way much politics goes on because everybody is afraid and defensive. He will touch your hand for the first time as if by mistake so he can say ’Sorry’, if he sees that you are becoming angry. If you don’t get angry, he can hold your hand.

You will be rejected many times. I cannot guarantee you that you won’t be. Everybody has to go through that, but it is worth it. If you are rejected ninety-nine times and accepted one time, it was worth it.

[She answers: At the moment I’m not in love with anybody else except you, so I have to knock at your door – and that’s very difficult.]

[chuckling] But my door is open and there is no need to knock ! I have accepted you so there is no need to ask.

Find some door that is closed and knock there.

... Right now you need a closed door. My love won’t be of much help. My love will be too cool. It is already there so there is no need to seek it. I am giving it, sharing it, without even anybody’s asking for it. I go on giving to strangers. So about that there is no problem.

You will need somebody like you. This may again be a trick to avoid. One can fall in love with me and that can become an avoidance. Then you don’t want to encounter a human being real, like you.

I am almost unreal. You are falling in love with a ghost. You will need a man of blood and bone.

... You will just have to gather courage and start. Once you start moving you will find many more people. If you stand there closed, people will avoid you, because who wants a closed person?

Become flowing... and don’t look serious. Laugh, mix and mingle with people, and within a week you will find somebody.

[A sannyasin who is in love with an ashram rolfer says she is always jealous in case his patients fall in love with him.]

No, you are simply foolish – because people like Rolfers become finished with women. Ask any gynaecologist. Continuously working with naked women, massaging them, one is finished with them. All romance is gone. He will never be able to love any woman – not even you. Don’t be worried! He will be finished with women as such.

When you come in contact with so many bodies, bodies become ordinary. You don’t have that poetic and romantic fascination towards bodies. If people live naked, much romance will disappear because romance depends on clothes.

Don’t be worried... you have found the right job for him. He will become a brahmacharya, a celibate.

So just wait and don’t create any trouble. Your nagging or trouble-creating may drive him towards some woman, that’s possible. Many women go on driving their lovers towards others because who wants nagging and constantly quarrelling and jealousy and this and that? People love each other to be happy, not to be unhappy. They can be unhappy on their own. What is the need for another?

They can live in their hell themselves; your help is not needed.

He loves you to be happy with you. You love him to be happy with him. But once people take it for granted that the other belongs to them, they forget completely. They start creating misery and hell and everything and they destroy the whole thing. Then if he starts searching – because I don’t think that he is yet enlightened, so he will start searching for some girl because he will need some happiness somewhere – then your fears will be fulfilled. You will say, ’Yes, so I was right,’ but you are forcing it in fact.

This is how there are self-fulfilling predictions. A woman becomes jealous and starts creating defences and starts controlling the husband or the lover. Because of this, the man feels that the whole beauty is gone, the whole happiness is gone, so he starts seeking some oasis somewhere.

You become a desert. Whenever he comes home there is misery, so he wants a few moments somewhere of an oasis. There is nothing unnatural in it. You are driving him to it. And when you find out, you say, ’Yes, I was right.’ This is how your prediction fulfills itself. And when you feel that you are perfectly right, you have found proofs, then you create more hell, so you drive him out completely.

If you love a person, don’t create hell for him, because that is not the purpose of being together. If you feel that hell cannot be avoided, separate, because we are not here to create hell for each other.

If you cannot trust him, separate, because without trust what is the point of continuing? If you trust him then forget all about it.

Even if he meddles sometimes here and there a little, it is nothing to worry about. That is not destructive to the relationship. It is human. Sometimes he laughs with some woman, talks with some woman. Nothing to worry about. That simply shows that he is still interested in women.

Hence he will remain interested in you.

But this is how it happens: women either create so much trouble that the man is driven to some other woman, or if the man is a very understanding type, and a little alert, he is finished with women.

Then he is finished with you too. Both ways, you lose. You follow me?

If you create such a situation that he cannot take an interest in any other woman, anywhere, then who are you? You are a woman. If he drops all his interest in all women, he will drop his interest in you also because he was interested in you as a woman. Now you have destroyed that interest, so he will not be interested in you either. Then you are unhappy. So either you drive him towards some other women and you are unhappy, or you destroy all his interest in women, and of course you are included in it.

The real understanding is this – that we are together to be happy. Why waste time in quarrelling?

So completely drop that. And when I say completely drop it, I mean never raise it again. Even if the idea comes to you, you should immediately drop it. It is worthless. If he goes, he goes. Who can prevent anyone from going anywhere? And if he does not go, he doesn’t, so why be worried? Just remain happy.

If you are happy and you make him happy, that will keep him with you. It is not that you keep him with you. It is happiness that keeps him with you. So the whole thing to be remembered is to make more happiness, so that when he comes home he feels like running towards you. He waits the whole day working hard and remembers many times, ’Prem will be waiting for me and I should finish my work and go.’

If you cannot do that, then it is better to separate. Don’t create any misery, mm? Good.

CHAPTER 17

20 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A visitor says that before he came here he found it difficult to cry. Over the past few days he has been crying a lot.]

Mm mm, something has broken inside and you should be happy about it. Some ice has broken, some coldness has broken, some dead layer has broken. Whenever it happens, one starts crying because one again becomes a child. The cry is the first thing that the child does. That is his first entry into the world. Everybody enters the world crying.

So if you can really cry deeply, it can become a rebirth. That’s why you are feeling so full of change.

Your old self will dissolve into crying. So don’t stop it – allow it, and on the contrary, enjoy it. It has a tremendous beauty in it.

Tears are one of the most beautiful things in the world; sometimes even better than laughter because laughter can never go so deep. At the most it remains on the surface, or even if it goes a little deeper, it never touches the very core. But crying can touch the very core because it is an unlearned thing.

The child learns laughter afterwards, but he comes ready for crying.

Crying is more natural than laughter. If you are brought up by people who never laugh, you will not laugh because you will not know that laughter exists. It is a certain learning. That’s why animals cannot laugh. Or even if sometimes human children are brought up by animals – wolves or monkeys

– they don’t laugh. They can cry but they don’t laugh. Laughter is social. Crying is natural, very deep, unlearned, original.

So it is even more meaningful and significant than laughter, but it can disturb because it is deep.

Because it is deep, that’s why it disturbs you. It can disturb you tremendously. It can make you almost chaotic inside. You will start feeling that you are a mess because your identity and the fixed attitude, and the shell that surrounded you, will not be there. You will become more and more vulnerable and open and you will not know who you are. The old identity will drop.

Before the new arises there will be an interval of time when you will feel completely lost and the mind will say, ’Stop crying!’ because the mind has been taught that there is something wrong in crying. People cry and weep only when something goes wrong, so crying is like a complaint against existence. Somebody dies and you cry. Crying seems to be helplessness, so everybody has been taught not to cry because that shows weakness.

Man particularly has been taught not to cry because that is womanish, feminine – ’Don’t be a sissy!

Don’t cry. Keep control. Be a man.’ These are all foolish teachings but they have been conditioned into the mind. You have been fed on them – everybody has – so crying becomes more and more difficult. One immediately controls oneself. Whenever there is something within you that wants to cry, you repress it.

So the layer that surrounds your being becomes more and more dead, dry. It has no tears in it. And tears are the very shape of being... the very juice of life. Crying has nothing to do with sadness, depression. It has something to do with aliveness.

So whenever you are tremendously alive, you will feel a volcanic eruption within you and you will want to cry. That crying will be beautiful, blissful. You would like to weep and to allow the tears to drop in torrents. They will unburden you and the whole rubbish of your mind will go out through your tears. You will become more fragile, more delicate. You will lose that egoistic attitude of always remaining in control. You will become more free, spontaneous, more childlike. That is the first thing to happen. If meditation goes deep, it happens.

Only afterwards laughter is possible. A man who really knows how to cry and weep will become able to laugh one day. He has earned it. Laughter that has no tears is very. superficial, imposed, painted. If you can cry and allow your total being to go into it and dissolve into it, you will have a totally different quality of laughter arising in you.

Allow it... it is beautiful.

[A sannyasin said that through meditating she was feeling more and more like being alone, which was very unusual for her as she had always been outgoing.

Osho said that a balance between moving out to others and retiring into oneself is needed, and that one should be fluid enough to be in this rhythm. One should not remain in a fixed mode because then either pole becomes an imprisonment. An extrovert becomes so dependent on others that he loses contact with his own centre, while an introvert who wants only to be alone and is scared of making contact with others, misses much because you come to know yourself only through others.

Relationships act as mirrors which reflect the multi-faceted nature of each person’s being.... ]

So, to me, the total man is the only way to be. And by a total man, I mean a man who has no fixed mode of life. He is fluid. He is not like stone but like water, and he can take any shape. Whatsoever the circumstance demands, the situation demands, he can take that shape with no difficulty, no struggle. He is just like water.

You can pour water into a jar and it takes that shape. You can pour it into a glass and it takes that shape, because deep ’down it has no shape of its own. It has simply a fluidity, a flow of energy, that’s all. But if there is a rock, it has a fixed shape, a persistent shape, and it will fight you if you want to try to change its shape. And it will not be easy to change its shape. Hammers will be needed, and then too it may shatter into pieces, but it will not flow. So never be rocklike. Be like water.

That’s what Lao Tzu says, ’Never be like a rock. Be like a river.’ And he says, ’Remember, a rock may appear very strong but in the end, water wins over it. The soft wins over the strong, the liquid wins over the solid. The child wins over the old man, and life goes on conquering death.’

One needs to be completely without any mode. In fact to put it absolutely correctly, one needs to be without any character because character is a mode, predictable. Somebody is a sinner and somebody is a saint; they both have characters. You can rely on their characters but they are not total men. A total man is unpredictable. He has no character. He is freedom... just freedom, nothing else. So he is available, that’s all.

If the situation demands him to be a sinner, he becomes a sinner. If the situation demands him to be a saint, he becomes a saint. He has no character. And that is the most beautiful thing in the world

– not to have any character, but just to live moment to moment, flow-like. Then you are true to the moment.

A man of character cannot be true to the moment because he has to persist with his own character, irrelevant of the situation. He cannot take note of the situation. He cannot respond to it. He has a past – his character – and he has to live according to that. He is a dead man. A man of character is a dead man.

A total man has no character because he has no mode, no fixed style of life. He simply waits, allows, moves, but all his movements -are herenow. It is not coming out of the past.

So don’t be an extrovert, don’t be an introvert. Both these directions have been tried. The East has tried the direction of introversion and has suffered tremendously. The poverty, the horrible ugliness, the unhygienic life, is because of introversion. Nobody was willing to be scientific, nobody was willing to be technological. Nobody was at all concerned with what was happening in the outside world. All the great people of the East were too much obsessed with introversion. Close your eyes and go into meditation. Forget the world and be unattached to it because it is just a passing dream and it will not be there forever.

The whole teaching has been that you are in life just as if you are in a waiting room on a railway station. So who cares? – someone spits, okay. You don’t bother about it. You are just waiting there for a few minutes and your train will come and you will go. Somebody is throwing banana peels.

Who bothers? It is nobody’s house; it is just a waiting room.

That has happened to India, to the whole of the East. It is nobody’s house and nobody cares.

Everybody is waiting for his own death, for the train to come. So why bother to make a beautiful world when you will have to leave some day? Pull on somehow, somehow tolerate things....

The whole aesthetic sense of life was destroyed. People became spiritual and then they became non-aesthetic. Beauty was lost, sacrificed, at the altar of truth.

Just the opposite has happened in the West. People are so extroverted that they are wasting their whole life in preparing a house, in planning a garden, in purchasing a car – and then they are gone.

They leave the world a little more beautiful than they found it but their whole life has been wasted on doing such things. They miss.

So technologically the West has become affluent, rich, but the inside has become very poor.

Everything is available on the outside, but inside man is completely forgotten. They have learned to live only on the outside, and they have forgotten how to make any contact with their own vital centre of being.

East and West are both lopsided. My whole vision is of a whole earth, neither eastern nor western...

of the whole of humanity undivided, and of a whole man without any modes.

So you start moving and make a balance. Sometimes when you are aone, close the door and forget all about the world. Just go deep inside, with no excitement and no thought of the outside. And sometimes go outside – enjoy dance, sing, have fun. Just keep it fifty-fifty. And report to me about how you feel in three weeks.

[A sannyasin asked about his experience in the Nadabrahma meditation:... when I lay down during it, I got really scared and I felt that I just had to get up and move, and that I would die if I lay there.]

Mm mm, that’s very significant. That means that that meditation will be helpful...

Wherever you find death, there is the door. Death is the door. The mind becomes afraid obviously.

Seeing that there is some danger, the mind makes you alert to escape from there, so you start avoiding that door. But in fact that is where one should put all effort. It usually happens later on to people. It has happened to you very early, and it is beautiful.

After years of meditation it happens that people become aware of which meditation can give them death. Once you know that this meditation can give you death, then that is your meditation. Then nothing else is needed for you. Others you enjoy – good. Do them; they will be helpful. But the real thing is going to happen through Nadabrahma, the humming meditation.

At home, start doing Nadabrahma alone. And I will help.

[A sannyasin said he couldn’t attend the meditations because he had stomach pains after eating a chinese meal.]

That can be, but ordinarily it will not happen if you are not doing meditations; it will not affect you.

When you are meditating and there are subtle changes happening inside the stomach, then any food that doesn’t suit with the meditations will create a little trouble, because then your body energy starts moving into two diametrically opposite directions.

So for the remaining time that you will be here, be very choosey about food. Depend more on fruits, vegetables – simple things. Once the stomach has settled into the new way – and it will settle with the meditations....

The stomach has to change continuously with the mind. If you ”are angry, you have a certain type of stomach. If you are loving, you have a different type of stomach. When you are angry you can immediately feel a great tension in the stomach, hot, boiling. When you are loving, you can feel a certain relaxation in the stomach. When you are happy, you have a certain stomach, and when you are unhappy, you have a different stomach.

That’s how people who are continuously in stress and tension, start having ulcers in the stomach.

That simply says that a continuous strain in the mind creates wounds in the stomach. There is no other way for them unless they change their minds.

We have an expression – ’I cannot stomach it.’ That’s exactly the right expression.. There are things you cannot stomach. Everything has to go into the stomach. Somebody insults you and you say, ’I cannot stomach it. I cannot swallow it.’ But whatsoever you swallow goes into the stomach, and it will have its reactions.

When the mind starts changing, parallel to it, the stomach starts changing. This is my observation, that people who are doing meditation will have to come to a moment where their stomachs will have to be readjusted.

That’s why great meditators came to believe in vegetarianism. That was not a philosophy. It had nothing to do with any philosophical attitude. Just through deep meditation they came to understand that they could not stomach many things. It was impossible.

Vegetarianism is nothing but a by-product of deep meditation. If a person goes on meditating, by and by he will see that it has become impossible to eat meat. Not that somebody says not to; at least I don’t. Whatsoever you feel like eating, eat. But if you go deep in meditation one day you will simply not to be able to stomach it. It will be nauseating. The very idea to eat meat will be vomit-inducing and will not be tolerated by your stomach. Now you are feeling that you are in such a smooth world, so subtle and refined that you cannot believe how you used to eat meat before. It looks impossible

– and for what?

We can stomach meat and things like that because many animal instincts are there in the mind: anger, greed, hatred, violence. Once those things disappear from the mind, then the parallel will disappear also from the stomach.

Your stomach has given you indications. Don’t rationalise that it was just the food. It was not just the food. Ordinarily it would not have affected you at all. Because you were meditating it was not in tune. It was disharmonious.

[A sannyasin said she was not sure whether she wanted to continue her nurse training or not...

Osho checked her energy. He said he thought it would be good for her to continue nursing as it is creative work and one of the best occupations one could choose.

He said nursing was not an ordinary job, but one in which one could share one’s love and compassion and that it would be a help to meditation. He added that once she had completed her training she could return and become a nurse here because we would need a hospital one day for the ashram.]

[A sannyasin said: I got very scared in Kundalini. I felt that something was happening – I just can’t say what it was – so I stopped.]

You shouldn’t have done that.

That’s what we are trying to do really, and when it happens, we stop! You should not do that again.

Continue Kundalini.

Whenever something great is going to happen, fear arises, because it has never happened before and the mind cannot comprehend it. The mind feels impotent before it and that’s why fear arises.

Fear is just because of the impotence of the mind encountering something vast, wild, something infinite. The mind recoils and wants to escape. That’s what fear is. But we have to choose the unknown and not choose the mind.

The mind means the known, and the whole search is for the unknown, for that which we have not known yet. And when we come to it, we escape. We run away from it.

There is a poem of Rabindranath Tagore – one of the greatest poets of India – in which he says he was searching for God for many lifetimes. Sometimes he was able to find His footprints on the sands of time, and then he was overjoyed, thrilled, and he followed those footprints, but they were always far away and distant. Sometimes he had even glimpsed Him somewhere near a star but it was so far away that by the time he had reached the star, it had gone. That went on for many lives.

Then one day suddenly he found himself standing at His door. He was overjoyed and was just going to knock when a sudden fear came to him... the fear of the unknown... the fear of facing God. He escaped, not even looking backwards to see if He had opened the door.

Now, he said, he still goes on searching, but he searches on other paths where he knows God is not. He avoids that path particularly ’where he knows Him to be, because if he goes there again, he may not be able to escape.

It’s really so. We come close many times. Just a little more courage, a little more stamina, and it would have happened. But we miss and then the wheel moves on, and it takes much effort to come to the point again. The problem is that we may unconsciously start avoiding. We may not even go in that direction.

So you have to continue Kundalini – that’s where your satori is waiting for you. And I am here, so don’t be afraid. That’s my whole functioning in being here. Otherwise how will you do it alone?

I am here... leave it to me. Just go headlong, and whatsoever happens – if fear arises – just remember me and go on. Just call my name deep inside and say, ’Now you look after me Osho, I am going’ – and just go.

CHAPTER 18

21 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin said that he was a high school counsellor and teacher of Karate...

Osho suggested he do some groups while he was here as they provided a balance, being just the opposite to Karate.... ]

One needs to move between the polarities because then life becomes more intense. Otherwise if you remain at one pole, life becomes monotonous and richness is lost. The opposite pole also has some truth in it, but ordinarily the mind tends to get stuck at one point.

Karate is a very significant training but it is only half of the truth. The whole method depends on a great repression. Knowingly, unknowingly, it is a great control, and by and by it becomes so effortless that you don’t even feel that you are controlling. One can become controlled very much through it, but then the spontaneity is lost.

The method is basically a military method. It was created for a certain reason because Japanese are, in many ways, smaller in the body, weaker in the body. For centuries they have remained undernourished, because people who live only on rice become undernourished. Their height never rises to the average. Just within ten years, in Japan the height has risen two inches – just because of american food.

So they were small people, weak, undernourished, and they needed many techniques to overpower stronger people. They developed them, and they developed beautiful methods. They became one of the powerful races. They depended more on the control of energy, the preservation of energy, and a subtle skill of centring. They did well, but one thing also happened simultaneously – they became very phoney.

The Japanese are phoney. If they smile, you cannot distinguish whether their smile is true or just polite, just formal. And they smile so beautifully that it is very difficult to make a distinction. They have learned it. They will never fight and in situations where anybody else would become irritated, they don’t. Anybody else can be easily provoked, but the Japanese not so easily.

There is a very famous story about a foreigner who came to Tokyo a few hundred years ago. He saw a great crowd gathered as he entered the town, and the people were watching something very eagerly. Two people were fighting – shouting at each other and screaming. He couldn’t understand what they were saying of course, but they were very very angry. They looked as though they would kill each other, but neither of them was even hitting the other. He waited for a few moments and while there was nobody trying to stop them, neither of the n hit the other. They were ready to hit but somehow they managed not to. He asked what was going on.

Somebody said, ’That’s how we fight. The person who hits first shows that he is the weaker man.

Once one has hit the other, the crowd will disappear immediately because there is no point in continuing; we know who is the weaker. The one who hits first is the weaker so the fight is finished.

That’s why they are both provoking each other but nobody is hitting. They are both controlling themselves.’

The Japanese have managed a great control, but the by-product has been a very phoney personality.

The growth groups are just the opposite. You are not to control, you are not supposed to control.

In fact you are supposed to uncontrol and bring out whatsoever is inside, and to relax. You are not supposed to remain disciplined. Just the contrary: you are supposed to be spontaneous and true, whatsoever it is – anger, then anger; love, then love; irritation, then irritation. If you like to cry, you can cry, but you float with the moment. This is just the opposite from the eastern systems of Karate, Aikido, Judo, which all depend on control; even Yoga depends on control.

So I would like you to do a few groups here, and in those groups become completely uncontrolled.

Then you can have both the visions. Both have their benefits and both have their dangerous shadows. If a person becomes trained too much in eastern methods, he will be controlled, still, silent, but something will be untrue. You will never find fault with him. He will be able to manage himself in every situation, good or bad, but deep down he will become too much of a personality.

He will become too much of a performer, so much so that he himself can forget that he had some original face of his own before this discipline started.

It is good to remain controlled and disciplined. It gives you a certain grace, a certain charm, and you become more capable of being with people, moving in relationships, moving in the world. You are always controlled. You look at least mature.

These growth groups have one beautiful thing about them in that they bring out your true essence –

good or bad – because they are not moralistic. They are chaotic. The whole chaos has to be brought to the surface. But then if one knows only these groups, one becomes just a victim of momentary things, moods. One becomes almost like a driftwood... unreliable, irresponsible.

That too is dangerous, because if you become irresponsible, unreliable, you become useless; you become uncreative. You create so many problems for others and for yourself for nothing, for things which could have been avoided with a little discipline. There was no need for them. This type of man continuously runs into problems unnecessarily. Where a simple polite smile would have helped, he creates such a turmoil. Where just a ’hello’ would have helped... but he is not feeling like saying

’hello’, and that creates a chain, unnecessarily. It is good to be authentic, but it is not good to become just a victim of momentary moods.

So I always suggest that people who are doing groups should do eastern methods also so that they attain to a certain discipline. A person is very rich when he is true and yet disciplined, authentic yet disciplined. When these two polarities meet together, you become more total. Then it is up to you.

Whatsoever the situation demands, you respond that way.

There are situations where discipline is needed; you remain disciplined. There are situations where discipline has to be put aside, then you become spontaneous. You don’t have a fixed mode. You don’t have a character. You are more fluid, flowing, more alive. Life is circulating in you and you don’t carry dead parts around you.

So do these groups. Much is going to happen just be ready.

CHAPTER 19

22 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Deva means divine and tanmaya means absorbed; absorbed in the divine. That is going to be your continuous work on yourself. Feel, wherever you are, that you are absorbed in the divine. Everything is divine. The air that surrounds you, the clouds that move in the sky, the trees, the earth, the people, the stars; everything is divine. Once we start getting in tune with it, by and by many more things will be revealed. So the only thing is how to fall in tune with the whole.

Ordinarily we are very resistant and we go on trying to prove that we are separate. That’s how the ego exists – in separation, in your creating a fence around yourself, insisting that you are not the tree, you are not the cloud, that you are not the earth, that you are not the other; you are separate.

That continuous undercurrent makes you an island, and naturally one feels alienated. One starts feeling miserable, because happiness is a function of the whole.

Whenever you are in tune with the whole you are happy; when you are out of tune with the whole you are unhappy. So happiness is simply symptomatic that knowingly or unknowingly you are coming closer to the whole.

So let this become a constant remembrance. Whenever you remember, relax and feel that you are one with it and that the whole is absorbed in you. You are not separate, apart, but just a small part, a very tiny part, an atomic part. It is really mysterious. The whole is very mysterious, once you start getting in tune with it – otherwise life is just meaningless. Left alone there is no mystery. With the whole, everything is beautiful. Alone, everything becomes miserable. Hell is to be alone... to be so alone that you cannot find any way how to relate, how to create bridges.

Tanmaya means ’absorbed in’. It is a feeling, so by and by it will start working on its own. First it will be needed to be remembered again and again. By and by, you will see that even without your remembering, suddenly you are aware that it is there. Then it has moved to the heart. So allow it to sink in.

Once you start feeling that way – that’s the way of a religious mind – then you are in the temple.

Wherever you are, whatsoever you are doing, everything then has an inner glow. Small acts become worship when you feel absorbed into the divine. If you don’t feel absorbed, then even prayer is nothing but a futile, impotent gesture. You can pray in the church, but it will not help unless the whole existence becomes your temple.

So wherever you sit, you sit prayerfully because the earth is divine and one has to be respectful.

Wherever you are moving, you are moving on sacred ground . The jewish story says that when Moses reached to the top of the hi11, Sinai, God shouted to him, ’Take your shoes off! This is holy ground.’ But this should be so wherever you are.

We are walking on holy ground. Eating, we are eating God. Drinking, we are drinking God.

Whatsoever we are doing is sacred – there is nothing profane. The profane cannot exist; there is no place for it. The existence is so full of the divine that the profane cannot exist. Where will it exist?

Hindus in the East have no concept of the devil, because they say that the divine is so vast, how can the devil exist? It must be in the imagination of man. It cannot be true. It can only be just a nightmare that we have seen but which is not. And that is how it is.

So just allow this vibration to surround you... many things are going to happen.

[The Tathata group is present. The group leader, Kabir, said he was much softer than Pujari, the previous leader: I feel that being hard is what the group demands and so I’m in a sort of a conflict. I don’t feel it is the group for me.]

No, it is the group for you, and you are going to learn many things through it. It is not only going to be a help to others; it is going to be a growth to you also.

One should become capable of playing roles and then one becomes free of roles. What is the difficulty in playing a role? The difficulty comes because you are fixed with another role and you think that that is your personality. You have been playing one role, and you have become so identified with it that the contrary role seems to be impossible. You will have to loosen yourself from the past and move into the new role.

But it is good to move into new roles. And just think – it is just a role, a game that you are playing.

It is not going to be your permanent character. Just for three or four days you are in a certain role.

Play it as perfectly as you can. Once you become capable of playing this role you will see that the other was also a role. Pujari is a role; Kabir also is a role. Maybe you have been playing that very long so you have forgotten and you think that that is your personality. All are personas.

Your essence has no personality. Your essence has no roles. It can play all the roles, but it has no character. That’s how inner freedom is beautiful.

So just be an actor. In one film the actor is working in one role in another film in another role. Maybe in the morning he is in one role and in the evening he is in another. He simply slips from one role to another – and there is no problem because he knows it is just acting.

The whole of life should be like that. One should be so capable of slipping out and in that nothing holds one. You will start feeling a freedom arising in you and you will start feeling your real essence.

Otherwise it is always confined in a role.

So this is very good... it is going to help you tremendously. But you have to work hard. The problem is not with Pujari’s role. The problem is with the old role of Kabir. That is holding you. It goes on saying that you are Kabir, you are not Pujari. You are none! You are simply nobody.

And if you play many games, you will start feeling that you are a nobody. That’s why you can become somebody very easily. You can become anybody very easily because you are nobody. You are just a tremendous emptiness. It can take any shape, any form, but it has none.

But we get fixed, we get structured, because it becomes easier and one becomes efficient in playing the same role. You feel that you are soft; somebody feels that he is very hard. Softness and hardness don’t belong to your essence. They belong to a certain game that has been imposed on you or which you have chosen. They are just surfaces.

Go deeper into the surface and nobody is soft and nobody is hard. One simply is. That isness has to be tapped, that isness has to be reached.

So don’t make it a strained thing, because a strain will make it difficult. It will create a tension in you.

For half an hour before you start Tathata, just meditate. Sit alone, close your eyes and say good-bye to Kabir and accept Pujari. Start feeling that you are Pujari. Make gestures, walk like him, sit like him. You will be tremendously surprised that you can get into that role. Say to Kabir, ’It is only for a few days, so don’t be worried. After a few days I will be coming back. I am very grateful that you are ready to use me.’ Tell Kabir, ’You are tired. For twenty-eight days of the month you have to work hard, so I give you two days holiday – enjoy it. Let me be Pujari for a few days.’

After two days, again sit silently for half an hour and say good-bye to Pujari. Again get back into your ordinary role of being Kabir. Thank the outgoing personality and the incoming personality. And just watch for three or four groups, and then report to me how you feel. But make it easy. It should not be done by any willpower or you will create trouble. It should be done by auto-hypnosis, not by willpower. Simply suggest it, that’s all. Do you know the difference?

When you try by willpower, you start forcing somewhere. So Kabir remains there – you never say good-bye to him – and you start becoming Pujari. Then there is a conflict, and of course Kabir starts fighting, resisting. You are divided, tense, and anguish arises. No, that is not the way. Willpower is not the way for anything.

Auto-hypnosis is the way. Auto-hypnosis means simply suggesting, that’s all; not trying to do anything. It is so easy; the suggestion works.

Emile Coue, one of the most penetrating thinkers and scientists in the world of hypnosis, found a law. He called it ’the law of reverse effect’. If you will something, the opposite will be the result. If you try to become something with effort, with strain, just the opposite will be the result. You will not be able to become that.

Have you watched somebody learning cycling? The whole road, sixty feet wide, is empty and the person goes and crashes against the milestone! What happens? The whole road was open, so why did he go to the milestone and crash into it ?

The man who is learning is very afraid, so he is trying to force himself by willpower. When he sees the milestone he becomes afraid that it is going to be trouble. He starts trying not to go there.

In that very effort not to go there, he forgets the whole road. His whole attention is fixed on the milestone, because you have to be aware of it if you don’t want to crash into it.

In his mind’s eye, everything else is excluded, and only the milestone is there. It produces an almost crazed state in his mind because that is the only thing he is focused on. He tries to avoid it, but somehow he is being pulled. Not that the milestone is doing something; the milestone is absolutely innocent. It is not even aware of the cyclist, but the cyclist will go towards the milestone. It would have been difficult even for a blindman to bump into it, but the cyclist has hit it with open eyes!

If you are afraid of an illness, you start avoiding it. You start thinking, ’No, I am never going to have cancer or tuberculosis, or this and that. No, never.’ Now you are becoming focused. You are playing a dangerous game with yourself. Only tuberculosis or cancer will continuously flash into your mind, and you will avoid it. The more you avoid it and the more you want to forget it, the more you will remember it, because every time you try to forget it, you are remembering it.

There is no way to forget anything without remembering it. And every time you remember, it is emphasised, and every time you remember, you feel you have failed again; it is there. So you lose confidence. This is how you may create the whole illness out of your own mind.

Many people suffer from the law of reverse effect. What they want to do, never happens, and what they always wanted not to do, always happens. Will is not the way. Beware of willpower. To reach reality, one needs to use more persuasion, less coercion. Persuasion is the right thing.

Persuade the mind. The whole methodology of hypnosis is persuasion. A thousand and one things can happen through persuasion. You can simply persuade somebody out of his unhappiness.

Miracles are possible if you can persuade. So learn more to persuade and less to coerce. You may not be aware, but through deep hypnosis, hypnotists have come to know that the whole personality can be changed just by a small suggestion. Sometimes very strange phenomena have happened.

Somebody is hypnotised and he has never known any Chinese. The hypnotist says, ’You are Chinese and you know the language. Now speak Chinese!’ – and the person starts speaking Chinese.

Back again to his consciousness, he cannot even remember what happened. He has spoken Chinese and he never knew anything about it. How could he? But it has happened many times.

The East has an explanation for it. A man has lived many lives, in many races, in many countries.

Maybe he was Chinese sometime in the past. Somewhere the seed is there; you have simply to persuade the person to take that role again, and he can become Chinese again.

In China they are working on a special method for students. For example, somebody is learning music and they hypnotise him. They say to him that he is no ordinary person, but a great musician

– a Wagner, a Mozart. They give an association to the deep unconscious and say, ’You are a great genius’ – and the man is just ordinary, mediocre. But the next day his capacity to be a musician is increased because that confidence has increased. Now deep down a great trust has arisen in himself that he is a Mozart. He does not know consciously but deep down a subtle thing has started working.

They have come to find that a person can be taught anything very easily and in a very short period.

If you can hypnotise him and persuade him that he is a genius in that art – that he is not ordinary, mediocre, but very talented – then he starts taking that role.

So just persuade yourself and for the two or three days that you are in the group forget all about Kabir. Just be Pujari and even tell the people in the group to call you Pujari – and see. You will be hard and without any effort; there will be no strain. You will enjoy this trip of being Pujari. You have learned a great secret and then you can try with other personalities also.

Once you know that you are absolute freedom and that all personalities are accepted roles and nothing is fixed, you become liquid. You are not like a rock. You become like water. Then you can take any shape, any form. That’s what freedom is. Good, Kabir.

[A group member says: I enjoyed this group very much but I don’t know if I have changed or if I am any better.]

In fact never think in terms of getting better. That’s a wrong evaluation. Always think in terms of enjoying more, of making life more of a joy, more of a play, more fun.

This idea of getting better is very dangerous but it has been planted by the society – ’Improve yourself.’ If you get that into your head, you will never be happy. These improvers are never happy because whatsoever happens, they are always thinking in terms of getting better and better and better. And there is no end to it. You can never come to a point where you can think, ’Now the better has happened.’

Enjoy life more. Become capable of enjoying it, that’s all, and the betterment will come on its own accord; you need not worry about it. You can completely forget. Don’t make life a sort of ambition.

Rather, enjoy whatsoever is available. Don’t say that ’When I am better then I will enjoy.’ You will never enjoy. Enjoy and then you will be better – but you need not worry about it. You need not think about it. It is not worth a penny.

Whatsoever is happening in this moment, be capable of being with it – flowing, wondering, loving. Be intrigued by this moment. The next moment you will find that you have become better automatically, because a happy person becomes better. So my evaluation is totally different.

You have been taught, ’If you become better, you will be happy.’ And my teaching is, ’If you are happy, you will become better.’ You have been taught, ’If you are good, you will go to heaven.’ My teaching is, ’Be in heaven and you will be good.’

If you want to be in heaven by becoming good, you will be in hell. You will be already creating hell for yourself because you will become a condemnatory mind. You will go on condemning. You will become an enemy to yourself: ’I am not good – not good enough.’ You will start punishing yourself, because how can a bad person be allowed to enjoy life? You will become miserable.

Enjoy life. Nobody is barring your path. Life is as available to you as it is to me. Exactly in the same proportion, life is showering its blessings on you as it is showering its blessings on me. It is just that you are not accepting it. You are looking somewhere in the future to when you are better.

Drop the future completely. Enjoy life. The future will arise out of your present. A happy moment brings another happy moment – happier. The more you taste of happiness, the more you become capable of tasting it. You become a connoisseur. You start knowing all the nuances of it.

So drop that idea of bettering yourself. That’s one of the basics of the neurotic mind. A person who is trying in any way to become better is going to become neurotic. He is neurotic. The seeds are there... the crop will follow. If you enjoy, that’s all. Don’t ask more... and more will be given to you.

If you can learn only one secret key here – that life is an art of how to enjoy more – tremendous possibilities surround you and infinite doors are ready to open for you.

You are standing there, worried, thinking how to better yourself, how to become a saint, how to become a god and how to become heavenly – and heaven is passing in front of you. This is the way to remain in hell. Drop it !

The group has been good. It has brought up something very deep inside you – this idea of getting better. This is a criminal idea. This is one of the most dangerous ideas that a person can get hooked with. Drop it immediately. It is like a disease and it can become chronic.

[A sannyasin who has been practising massage for some time, suggested to Osho that someone set up a ’Living Love’ workshop. Osho said he should do it as it would help give him the confidence that he lacked... ]

... and there is no other way to gain it unless you do something. When you see that your work helps people to flower, and that something is happening to people, you feel tremendous, because that has become creative work. There is only one way to participate with God, and that is to be creative.

That is the whole meaning of the story of creation – that God is the creator of the world. So whenever you become a creator of anything, in a small measure you participate in God’s being. The more creative you become, the more divine you become.

The greatest creation that is possible is to help people to flower. When the gardener looks into the garden and the trees have bloomed, he feels happy. A great joy arises in his soul.

When the mother looks at the child and the child is growing and laughing, running around the house, a great joy arises in her heart. When the painter sees that his painting is complete, he stands with tremendous awe before his own creation. He cannot believe his own eyes... that it was possible that he has done this. It is unbelievable.

But the greatest creation in the world is to help another human being to flower into a spiritual being, or into a spiritual life and dimension. It will give you tremendous happiness, and it will give you a great confidence, a centring.

I would like you to start a group, but you think about it, mm?

[A sannyasin asks: if it would be possible to do Dynamic and Kundalini meditations with students...

they’re sixteen seventeen-year-olds.]

Yes, do it. It succeeds with children as it succeeds with nobody else.

... Yes, perfectly good. They will enjoy it tremendously. In fact fourteen is the right age to start meditation. That is the age when sex becomes mature and life is at a very critical moment. Energy becomes available, and the girl or boy does not know what to do with it, so the only natural safety-valve is sexuality.

That is the right moment to introduce meditation, because then immediately they have another dimension also. Their energy can move higher, to higher chakras and centres, and then their sexuality will not be so much of a problem to them and they will not waste their sexual energy.

They will become more loving persons, and less sexual persons.

So that is exactly the right time to introduce meditation – because they are on a great wave. You can use that wave for anything. They will never again be as energetic as they are at that time, so the later you introduce meditation, the less energy is available. People have a very stupid notion about religion – that it is something to do with old age, and that when you are going to die you have to pray or become religious and go to church or something; that it is not for young people.

It is especially for young people because it is such a great adventure, and so much energy is needed, that when you are spent, you will not be able to move more easily. It will be very very difficult and against all odds.

But a child growing into a sexual being is at the crossroads. Tremendous possibilities open. So introduce all meditations and they will be tremendously happy.

[To a sannyasin who had left the group, because she was so afraid.

Osho said not to worry about the experience, but that it had been good as an indication for him to see what type of work she needed. He suggested she do the Encounter group, as it was softer, saying... ]

You need these groups but you are afraid. If you go through them, the fear will drop. There is no other way to drop the fear, otherwise you will always carry it.

The only way to get rid of it is to pass through a situation where you think that there is some danger and then you pass through it and nothing happens. You come out of it completely open. It is finished, gone. If you are afraid of the night, go into the darkness of the night.

... I think you should try the Encounter, and if you don’t feel like it, drop out. Just tell [the groupleader]

that if you start getting too frightened, he has to allow you to leave. But do your best and don’t be in a hurry to leave. If you feel that it is impossible to tolerate it, he will allow you to leave. But try.

It is better to try, because otherwise how will you get rid of this fear?

Even if you do three or four days of Encounter, that will do, mm? Good.

[Osho mentioned her in the morning discourse the following day, saying that she had an overwhelming fear of madness, but that this is in everyone.... ]

If you are too afraid of madness, you cannot be in love, you cannot meditate, you cannot pray, because all these dimensions are, in a way, mad dimensions; because you will be going beyond the normal boundary of humanity, the normal routine work-a-day world, the normal logic, reason, the so-called ’normal’ humanity. You will be going beyond it. You will be transcending it. It will look mad.

Madness is possible in two ways: either you fall below the normal or you go above the normal. In both ways you become mad. If your madness brings you more sanity in life, then don’t be afraid.

Remember, the madness that is below normal is always non-voluntary... and the madness that is above normal is voluntary. You can do it, and because you can do it you remain the master of it.

In these meditations here, our whole effort is to give you a taste of the madness that is beyond the normal, but you remain the master. Any moment that you want to come back, you can come back.

This is the indication that you don’t need any psychiatric help. This is totally different from ordinary madness. You are going on your own. And remember, if you go on your own, you will never be neurotic because you will release all possibilities of madness. You will not go on accumulating them.

Ordinarily we go on repressing them. The sannyasin who was afraid has repressed much sadness in her. Now she is afraid to do meditation. That can create trouble some day. One day the cup can be too .full and overflowing. Then she will not be able to control it. Right now is the moment to allow it, to move into catharsis, to throw it out, to act it out, so that she is cleansed of it and her system is cleansed of it. But then she interprets and fear arises.

Whenever God approaches you, you will see that you are going mad. You will vibrate with a new rhythm. Your whole body will be full of shivering, shaking. You will feel a new energy pouring into you and the energy is so tremendous and your capacity is not so much. By and by your capacity will grow. By and by, you will be able to absorb it. By and by, the shaking and trembling will disappear.

By and by, you will become perfectly silent... but it takes time.

Prabhunivasa. It means abode of God, a house of God. Everybody is a house of God. In the innermost core of being, on1y He resides. God lives in every being. Every being is an abode of God. We may know Him, we may not know Him, we may have completely forgotten Him, but it is He who lives in us. We live through Him... our life is His life. That you have to start remembering.

When you feel hungry, feel as if God is feeling hungry. When you feel thirsty, feel that God is feeling thirsty. And of course you have to serve Him and arrange for food and drink. When you are feeling tired, God is feeling tired and of course He needs to go to sleep.

Just become a servant of the innermost essential being. Just serve Him whatsoever His need. By and by you will start feeling an inner light, an inner glow. Tremendous will be your enjoyment when you start feeling that. But first one has to remember. It is there – remembering helps it to become revealed. Remembering just allows you to see it. Good, Prabhunivasa.

[A group member said that he has a spinal complaint for which he has been having treatment from a mesmeriser for fifteen years. He said that for two days after each session, there was no pain but then it would return again.]

But for two days it remains alright? Then there is nothing wrong with the spine. It is just that the idea has entered very deeply into your unconscious.

If there is something wrong then mesmerism cannot do anything. But it helps. Out of almost one hundred cases, seventy-five cases will be helped because seventy-five cases are more of the mind and less of the body. There may have been something wrong in the beginning, but then the idea entered, and now it is the idea that is holding it. So through mesmerism something can be done for two or three days and the impact of the suggestion remains with you. When that withers away, again your old idea asserts itself.

So do one thing. Tonight, just put this [a handkerchief of Osho’s] under your back, and go to sleep.

Don’t wash it but leave it there for seven days, and then burn it. Then tell me how things are.

Do Hypnotherapy and then later we will see. Within seven days this back trouble will be gone so there will be no need to go to the mesmeriser any more, mm?

[A sannyasin said that unless he was in Osho’s presence, he felt distrustful of people. He added that when he liked a woman, because he was not sexual. he always lost her because ’the first sexual man who comes along takes her away’.]

About trust something has to be done, because if you can’t trust people you will miss many things in life and you will never be able to relate. And that may be the real cause why your women are taken away by other men. It may not really be sex. It may just be because deep down you cannot trust.

You think that it is because you are not very sexual, that’s why they are taken away. That’s not the point – unless a woman is really oversexual, but ordinarily it is not so. Ordinarily nobody bothers much about sex. People want love. People want trust. If it is there, there is no problem. But if it is not there, everything else may be, but it is not worth anything.

You are in the head too much, that’s why you cannot trust people. You are sceptical, doubting, thinking too much, rationalising. But you have to understand that it is your choice. If you love this, then forget about people. There is nothing to worry about. But if you miss relationship.... Because a relationship is very nourishing. When you trust people you really live in a richer world. Maybe sometimes a few people will take advantage of your trust, but that’s nothing to be worried about.

What can they take? What have you got?

Empty-handed we come and empty-handed we go. We bring nothing into the world, and we take nothing out of it. So who can cheat you? Who can deceive you? There is no one who can cheat, no one who can be deceived. Even if they play deception, that is up to them; it is their problem. But you have to choose. You have to see it and meditate over it.

If you live without trust, you will live alone. And that aloneness cannot be real aloneness. It will be loneliness. You will miss people, because you are not yet capable of enjoying your solitude. You would like to mix with people but you mistrust so you cannot mix. Even if you mix you remain distant.

And if you are distant, who bothers? People feel offended and then they are also distant. Then you may be close physically but a great distance exists between you and others. Then it is not possible for you to love a woman.

Hitler never allowed himself to get married because he was so distrusting. Once you love a woman, it means you have to trust her. In the night she will be in your room. He was so distrustful and so suspicious. Who knows? – the woman may kill him or spy on him. She may just be playing a trick on behalf of the enemies. He never allowed himself to get married. He was in love with a few women but he was always distant. He used those women, but it was not love.

Not a single woman was allowed to sleep with him in his room. It was said that there was not a single man who was friendly towards him, or to whom he was friendly. Nobody was allowed to put his hand on Hitler’s shoulders; he wouldn’t allow that closeness. He married a woman that he had wanted to marry for at least ten years, but he married her just before he committed suicide – three hours before – because then there was no danger. Just three hours before – seeing that Berlin was bombed and that everything was lost and now there was no hope – he called a priest in the middle of the night. A priest was rushed, dragged, out of his sleep, and immediately the ceremony was done in the basement. After the ceremony, the first thing they did was to both kill themselves; they committed suicide.

There was not even a chance to love that women or to kiss her. But only then could he decide to marry, because now there was nothing to lose. So just think of such a man. What type of life must he have lived? Can you think of a more hellish life? Not a friendship, not a love, no relationship with anybody. And he was continuously afraid of shadows. He was not able to sleep well. Just a small noise and he would jump out of his bed; somebody might be going to kill him. He lived in a nightmare.

So you decide. There are two ways: either one should start enjoying one’s aloneness.... Then one moves in a totally different direction. Right now I don’t think it will be possible for you.

That is possible only when you have lived with people, loved people, been enriched by them. Then, fulfilled, you say, ’Now it is enough.’ One moves, and then solitariness has a beauty. It is solitude.

Then loneliness is aloneness. You don’t miss anybody. You are so full... your own presence is so much. You are a world unto yourself. But that happens only after much experience, much maturity.

Right now you need to go into the world, to have many experiences, good and bad, all. Many times you will be deceived, but that too is part of life. But never drop your trust. Even if you are deceived, continue to have trust in trust. Deceiving is others’ problem: don’t make it yours.

Never lose the respect for others, because only through respect is there a bridge. One man has deceived you? It is only one man. Don’t think that the whole humanity is deceptive. Two men have deceived you? Only these two men... but humanity is a vast phenomenon. One or two men have deceived you, but don’t condemn them for the whole of their life. It may have just been a moment of deception.

The person who deceived you may right now be repenting or may be feeling bad, guilty; may be feeling that it was not good. So don’t condemn the whole man. Just say that at a certain moment he was tempted. But we are so ready to mistrust that one man deceives you and his whole life is condemned. Not only him, but the whole of humanity. One man is enough and you say that the whole of humanity is not worth trusting. This is bad mathematics.

So be a little more mathematical, and never lose your trust in trust – whatsoever happens. For a few years move in the world, in love, in friendship. Then one day you will be able to be alone also, but you have to wait for it.

CHAPTER 20

23 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin says: When I look at you a reflection always comes back to me. I see myself.]

That’s right. That’s the only way to see me – if you go on seeing yourself. My whole functioning is to be a mirror to you. That’s the only way. If you know yourself, you know me. I am not here to make you involved with me. That would be a bondage. You must be thrown back to yourself again and again. The other is the bondage.

It is necessary to pass through the other because there is no other way to know oneself unless one comes via the other. To know the ’I’, one has to move through the ’thou’. If you don’t do that you will never be able to know who you are.

Love helps, but it is a very delicate, fragile phenomenon. If you love me, you pass through me. And if I love you, I am not to hold you. I have to allow you to go back to yourself. That’s why love is not possessive. If love is possessiveness, it is very destructive.

If I am possessive, you will come to me and I will not allow you to go back to yourself. I will create all sorts of barriers, blockades, so that you cannot go back and so you remain with me as a possession.

But then I don’t love you.

If I love you, I allow you to pass through me and help you to go back home. Passing through the

’thou’, one comes to realise what the ’I’ is.

There are two ways to know this ’I’ One is through the relationship with things. That’s what Buber calls the ’I-it’ relationship: the car, the house, the money. But they are all dead things. Another way to know the ’I’ is through the world of ’I-thou’: through love, through persons.

If you know your ’I’ through the ’I-it’ relationship, you will never know your totality. You will know only your dead part which is like a thing – your body at the most – but your spirit will remain untouched.

One has to move through the ’I-thou’ relationship. In that contrast your ’I’ becomes clear. ’Thou’

becomes a background and your ’I’ becomes the figure. It is just as when you write on a blackboard with white chalk. That becomes the figure and the blackboard becomes the background.

I cannot hold you with me. The more you come to me, the more I will throw you back towards yourself. Then there is a continuum, a flow. Energy is blocked nowhere. It is just as when the river falls into the ocean. The ocean is not going to keep the water. It will evaporate... it will be thrown to the clouds and the clouds will rain again, and again the river will flow and will come to the ocean.

It is a circle. That’s what ecology is. And it is not only so in nature, it is so in consciousness also.

There is an ecology of consciousness.

So if you give love to me, I have to return it to you. In a relationship, two persons become mirrors facing each other. Nobody holds – and the circle is complete. In that circle is life. In that throbbing, in that process, in that dynamism, is life. Once the circle is broken anywhere, the continuity is blocked and death happens.

So it is perfectly as it should be. Just go on looking at me, and let me throw you back again and again. One day you will realise that we are all one. That comes only when you become one with the whole circle. You will not be a polarity there, and I will not be a polarity here, but we will both merge in the circle.

Then the ocean is not just the ocean, and the river is not just the river. The river is on the way to becoming the ocean, and the ocean is on the way to becoming the river. They are both part of one pole. That too will happen.

You are on just the right track, so don’t be worried. When you are back home, just go on looking at my picture. It will do the same. Once you have understood the process of being a circle, you can do it anywhere. And that’s the whole purpose of giving you the picture and the locket. Just hold the locket in the hand and you will immediately see that the circle is there.

Once felt, it becomes so easy to feel it again and again; and the more you feel it, the easier it becomes. And I am going to work through you there, so you go... and you are not going alone. You came alone. Now you are not going alone.

And much has to be done. One thing I was going to tell you, is not to be afraid of publicity. Don’t try to keep your sannyas a secret, otherwise you will not be able to reach many people. So try to approach people in all ways. All the modern media have to be used. There is no need to be afraid about it. The fear comes because of the possibility that you may become very egoistic, but that is no more a problem. I have taken care of your ego. Now you work for me. Just become a vehicle.

The circle is good but very small. You have much potential. Why work only with fifty people? You can work with five thousand. With the same energy, the message can reach to many people... and they need it. They are in tremendous need. They are almost hungry and thirsty for it, so it is not good to make it a very esoteric thing. Make it as widespread as you can. Spread it far and wide.

[Previously a sannyasin had asked Osho about her health and fasting to clear dysentery contracted while travelling. Osho talked to her about taking care of the body and not just fasting irregularly – if one had to do it at all.

Now, before leaving, she asks Osho if he has anything to say to her.]

The first thing is that you have to take care of your body. You have not been good to it in the past.

Now be friendly to it. Almost start a love affair with your body, because unless you love your body, nothing can happen. Hatred is very deep-rooted in everybody all over the world because all the religions have been teaching one to be negative, to be anti-body. The body is your base. It is your earth. You are rooted there. If a tree is against the earth, it is going to be suicidal; it will commit suicide.

So feel happy with the body. Enjoy the feel of it and become more sensitive. Let the body become more alive, and don’t be afraid. Those feelings are just the beginning of life and much more will happen, much higher than the body, but it will be rooted in the body.

The tree will go very far away from the earth. It will flower in the sky, but it will remain rooted in the earth. Even if it is going high into the sky, it is part of the earth. And the higher a tree goes, the deeper it has to send its roots into the earth.

So people who are not going to evolve spiritually, need not worry about the body because they don’t need very deep roots. They are not going to fly very high. They are like seasonal flowers – just a few inches of root are enough. But for a big tree which is going to be for thousands of years and is going to spread far and wide, the same proportion has to go inside the earth.

It is the same with spiritual growth. Ordinarily people who are not interested in spiritual growth can remain as they are. But once you want to grow spiritually, you will have to take care, much care, of the body. This is almost the opposite to what religions have been teaching you. They have been teaching you that if you want to be spiritual, you have to be against the body. I teach you just the reverse.

If you want to be spiritually developed, grown-up, mature, you will have to love your body very very deeply. It has to be used, and when you want to use it for higher things, you have to create higher qualities in the body so it can sustain you. It has to be refined, loved.

So take care of it as if it is a gift from God – and it is. For one year, just take care of your body.

In eating, choose that which is nourishing, chew well, take some exercise, go for walks, meditate.

And don’t be a victim of foolish things – of fasting and this and that. You have already done much damage.

For one year forget everything. Just take care of your body to help it revive, and then come back.

[She asked if she should return to her studies or do any other kind of work. She added that she felt her parents would pressure her to do some kind of work.]

It is good to do something. Choose something that you like. Parents are right – something has to be done. Just doing nothing is not good, because the body is made in such a way that if you use it, it remains alive, vibrant. The mind is also made in that way. If you use it, it remains sharp. If you don’t use it, it gets rusted.

That’s the difference between a machine and an organic unity, a body. If you don’t use a machine, it lasts longer. If you don’t use the body, it breaks down. That’s why I say that the body is not a machine. It functions totally differently. If you don’t use a clock, it can last for centuries. But if you don’t use the body, within years it will be gone, withered away. Use it more, and you will have more of it.

It is the same with the mind. These are faculties to be used continuously. Then you become more and more skillful and you come to know more and more and deeper possibilities. It is just as when one is playing on the piano or sitar or guitar. The more you play, the more you practise, the more subtle nuances become available to you. You start hearing sounds which nobody else will ordinarily hear. And the same happens with the body. It is a great musical instrument.

So do something. If you feel like studying, study, but don’t waste time. Just sitting, you become more and more lazy... and laziness is not good. Laziness is not relaxing. A lazy person cannot relax. Only a person who is doing hard work can relax. Relaxation has to be earned.

Doing is always good because it helps the integration of the being. And whatsoever profession you choose, remember it has to be basically your vocation also. Your love should be there. Whatsoever you choose – singing, educating children, dancing, plumbing, or whatsoever – it has to be your love.

Then it gives growth, inspiration, impetus, and it creates a nucleus in your being around which, by and by, you start crystallising.

[A sannyasin said he was feeling happy but was unable to start a love relationship. Osho suggested he simply continue to be happy and love would happen.]

There are only two things in life that people are afraid of: love and death. And both are beautiful and both have something similar in them. Love is like death because you will have to surrender. Your ego will have to be surrendered. That is like death.

And death is also like love because you are moving into the arms of the unknown. It is a deep orgasm with the universe.

So both are similar. In love, first you start moving towards someone to have a deep merger and then you have to die in that merger also. In death, death happens first and that there is a great merger.

But both are the same.

So love/death is the basic fear in the world. Don’t be afraid. Both are nothing to be afraid of; both make life rich. Just think of a life if there were no death. How ugly life would become. It would be impossible to tolerate it; it would become ugly. It would become so monotonous.

Just think of yourself living forever and forever and forever. Just imagine it.... It would become such a tedious pilgrimage... so tiring, so boring. And remember one thing: if life has no death, then suicide is not possible. You cannot commit suicide. You have to live... yoU have to live... on and on and on.

Just the thought will give you some idea of how beautiful death is. It never allows life to become a boring thing. By the time it becomes boring the curtain is dropped – another drama starts. By the time it is becoming tedious you are taken away – a fresh life starts. Without death, life will be very very tedious – impossible to live.

And think of life without love. It is pointless. For what will you live? So these two things are the most cherished things, and people are the most afraid of them. These are the two things for which people should live ! But these are the two things of which they are most afraid. Naturally everybody lives in misery and hell.

So remain happy, and after three weeks, report to me. For these three weeks, just remain happy, with no problems, no other questions about love or this and that – nothing. Simply be happy, purely happy, and then I will see, mm? Good !

[A 70-year-old sannyasin asks if he is too old to meditate. Osho says he is not old. The sannyasin replies:... once I very nearly did meditate unconsciously. That was in the war. I was lying on my bed and twice I stopped breathing – and I was frightened. I didn’t breathe in or out.]

That’s perfectly how it should be.

... If meditation goes deep, breathing stops, completely stops. But there is nothing to be afraid of. In fact, in those moments when breathing completely stops, you are in eternity. You are no more part of time. Those moments are very nourishing because you are closer to God than ever. You are alive but in a different way.

Ordinarily we depend on breathing. That is the natural way to be alive. When breathing stops, that is the supernatural way to be alive. Then you are not connected with nature. You are connected with God. Those are rare moments. But whenever they happen, everybody gets afraid, because we think that breathing is life. It is not. It is just a fragment of life, and that, too, a very lower fragment.

But there are higher ways to be alive.

This is very good – if you can become so silent by sitting or lying down that the breathing stops.

Then there is no need to do any other meditation. Simply go on doing this twice a day. And don’t be afraid. Those moments will give you the first glimpses of the deathless. And once you get in tune with them, then there is no death. Then the body will die, but You will live.

So that’s very good – that it happened naturally. Allow it to happen. Sitting against the wall is very good. You can also lie down but sitting is better, because in Lying down, there is the possibility that you may fall asleep. When the breathing is so slow that it has almost stopped and thinking is silent, the possibility is that you may fall asleep. It is good – there is nothing wrong in it – but if in those moments you remain aware, then many more things will be revealed to you.

The benefit will be there if you fall asleep too, but it will be an unconscious benefit. It will be as if a person is asleep and we take him on a stretcher into the garden. Of course he is benefited by the fresh air but he is fast asleep. He cannot enjoy it.

So it is better to sit. That’s why for centuries all the meditators have been sitting. That’s an effort to avoid sleep. And a few meditators – one, the founder of Jainism, Mahavir – used to meditate standing. For his whole life, Mahavir stood and meditated. When you sit for many years you become so accustomed to sitting, that you can fall asleep – even sitting.

[Osho described how he should meditate – sitting facing the wall, either looking at the wall with eyes opened or closed. Breathing should be as slow as possible.... ]

... and allow the breathing to stop. When it stops don’t be afraid, because nobody has ever died in that state. That state is so beautiful and so alive and you are so close to the very source of life that you cannot die. It has never happened.

Down through the centuries, millions of people have meditated and millions of people have come to this point where breathing stops completely, but nobody has ever died. So the fear is just unbased

– but it comes and one has to tackle it. This will be very beneficial. And you are young so you can do it.

Only young people come to me. Old people cannot come. It is not a question of physical age. It is a freshness of the mind.

I can see that you have a fresh mind, an open mind. Hence you are here; otherwise there is no possibility. You are young as these people [indicating the small group around him] Some of the people may be even older than you !

[The sannyasin says he has a confession: I drink too much. I need to stop it?]

No, no, no need to stop it now. It has become such a long habit that stopping it will create trouble.

It has gone into the body. There is no need to be worried about it. Just take it for granted and don’t feel guilty about it.

Give at least two hours every day for meditation and then by and by you will become so silent and so happy, so unworried, that the desire to drink will start disappearing. When the desire starts disappearing, you start reducing your intake; not before it. If you do it before, it will be destructive to the body. If you force it, it will create a conflict inside. And whatsoever we repress is going to take revenge.

So if for two or three days you repress it, on the fourth day you will drink, and you will drink too much.

It is futile. So don’t be worried about it. Rather than fighting with it, start meditating. Drinking simply shows that there have been problems, problems that you could not solve... worries from which there was no escape. The only way you could find is to become unconscious. That is a shortcut to get out of the problems and the worries. And there are worries and problems in life.

So now the only thing that can be helpful is to forget all about it. Even this idea – that one has to drop it – drop that too. Accept it. It has happened, and now the past cannot be changed, so don’t be worried. Don’t create a new worry. Simply meditate and become more and more silent. Then you will see that the desire to drink by and by disappears.

I have seen it disappear in many people. A moment comes when you cannot drink – only then drop it, not before. In fact you are not dropping it; it is dropping on its own accord then.

I am always for a very natural way about everything. I am against all guilt feelings and I don’t want to create guilt feelings in anybody. This is how life has happened to you. What can you do? There is no point in fighting with it, but there is a way to change the inner vision.

For example. if you become more happy and more silent you will not be able to drink much, because for drinking one needs to be very very unhappy. Deep down some unhappiness is needed; only then can we drown it in drinking. The drinking feels as if it gives a certain happiness. It doesn’t. It simply drowns the unhappiness so a false happiness is created. But if you become happy you will stop drinking, because then drinking will drown your happiness and it will make you unhappy. Then the whole process reverses.

So don’t think about it in terms of confession. It is not a sin. There are errors in life, mistakes, but nothing is a sin. And everybody has to pass through many mistakes because that is the only way to learn and to grow. So simply accept yourself. In these last days of your life there is no need to create any conflict inside. Just accept whatsoever is. Be natural about it and don’t try to change yourself in any outward way. Continue to meditate and many things will start happening. When they happen, then it’s okay.

If you continue to meditate before you leave this body, you will be completely free of drinking and other things. There is no problem about it. But if you try to leave them, you will never be free. You may condition your mind so much that in your next life you may be drinking.

A conflict divides you. One part of you wants to drink and another part of you says, ’Don’t drink.’ It is as if I am trying to fight with both my hands. Sometimes I can let the right hand win, and sometimes I can let the left hand win because both are my hands. Victory is not possible. And it is simply foolish to fight because both are you. The one who drinks and the one who says that you would like to leave it or who feels guilty, both are you.

Don’t divide. Division is not going to lead anywhere. It will create friction and dissipation of energy.

Now in these last days of your life, you will need more energy, so dissipation is not good. And it is foolish also. It has helped nobody.

So simply accept both and let them be one. Simply say, ’This is the way I am.’ Don’t make it a confession, because the very word carries some sort of guilt in it. There is no need to confess. This is the way you are or this is the way God made you and you accept it.

My whole emphasis is on meditation, not on character, because character is an outward thing. If the inner changes, the outer follows it, but not vice versa. You can change the outer but the inner will not follow, because the inner is more powerful than the outer. It is just as when you walk, your shadow follows. The character is like a shadow. But the vice versa is not possible – that the shadow walks and you follow. That’s not possible. The shadow cannot walk, in the first place. And in the second place, even if it walks there is no necessity that you should follow it. Why?

Ordinarily religions have emphasised character. That’s why they have created hypocrisy and nothing else. People cannot change their character – and religions go on forcing them to. So the only thing that is possible, humanly possible, is that they show one face and have another. They drink, and they will never say in public that they do. They do things in their private life and they have a public face.

This is how the whole of humanity has become hypocritical – a crowd of pretenders, inauthentic, insincere – and the responsibility is with the churches and religions and the priests. My emphasis is not on character at all. I say that character will take care of itself. Simply try to contact your innermost core, your essential being. That is the most basic thing. Once you are in contact with it, things start changing in your life – and without any effort; that’s the beauty. If you change with effort, it is forced. It is as if you are forcing a bud to open. You can force it and it will look like a flower!, but it will not be a real flower.

So let the flowering be spontaneous; you simply meditate. And I will go on helping you.

[The previous sannyasin’s elderly wife says that she enjoys the nature and dancing and lovely things, but she can’t bear the idea of dying and leaving all the beautiful things in life.]

I understand... I understand. But the problem arises because you can’t see that even more beautiful things are waiting. When you leave life, one door closes, but another opens which leads into a far more beautiful world. But because we cannot see that... we can only see this door that closes and cannot see that there is any other life beyond that – that is creating the trouble.

The world is so beautiful.... This cuckoo singing... it is beautiful. It makes one sad that one day one will not be able to listen to this cuckoo singing. ’Cuckoos will be singing and I will not be here to listen. The sun will rise and the moon will be there; the world will remain as beautiful, and I will not be here.’

We cannot see that death is just a door. It is an opening of a new life.

We can only see the crucifixion, we cannot see the resurrection; that’s the trouble. Unless you try hard to go deep inside yourself, you will not be able to see it. But a greater life is waiting. A higher life is waiting. A more blissful life is waiting. And this is just a preparation for it. But just by my saying you will not feel it. That’s why my insistence on meditation.

If you can see something within you which cannot die, then all fear disappears. Ordinarily we are too attached with the body. The body is going to die – that’s certain. You will not be in this body, that’s certain. But there is nothing to be worried about. Just as you change your clothes and there is no worry, bodies are changed. But you have to find existentially something within you which you can separate from the body, which you can see is absolutely separate from the body. Then that fear disappears.

Do a few meditations – they will help tremendously. You have such a good heart. That’s why you feel so sad for all the beautiful things of life. You have a very sensitive heart. Good. It can be a help in moving inwards.

[Osho suggested that she do the same meditation that he had described to her husband, saying not to be perturbed when thoughts came, but just to watch them, unconcerned.... ]

... but if for a few moments thoughts don’t come, you will be able to see – and it becomes so transparent – that you are not the body. You are something transcendental. In that moment the certainty is so absolute that fear never grips again. That certainty is so total that you cannot die.

Once that point has been touched, then another door becomes visible. Then one waits for death, and when death comes one welcomes it. That too is beautiful.

In fact death is not the end of life – it is the very pinnacle. It is the very peak. It is life at its climax.

There is a turning then... another world starts.

So it is good to enjoy the beautiful things of life, but not enough. One has to go a little deeper.

[Osho recounted the story of two sufi mystics – Rabiya and Hassein.

Hassein was staying in Rabiya’s hut and one morning called to Rabiya to come outside to where he was enjoying the early morning sun, the flowers, the cool breeze; to come and join him in seeing the beauty of what God had given them that morning.

Rabiya, meditating inside her hut, replied that rather than her going outside, Hassein should come into the hut and discover the beauties of another world. ’You are seeing the day that God has created. I am seeing Himself. I am seeing the creator.’]

The world is beautiful... the sunset and the sunrise are beautiful. The dewdrops, the ocean, are beautiful, but nothing compared with the beauty of the creator.

This is just poetry. You have not seen the poet yet. This is just the song. You have not seen the singer yet. This is just the rumour. You have not seen the real yet.

So try to meditate, and some day it dawns and a new door opens.

CHAPTER 21

24 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Prem means love and vedika means the innermost shrine of the divine; love, the innermost shrine of the divine.

And love is the innermost shrine of the divine. That is going to be your path. Just be loving. Make it the very climate of your being. Whatsoever you are doing just touching something – make it a deep love. Whatsoever is touched by love is transformed into the divine. Just sitting silently, feel full of love, but not addressed to anybody in particular... just unaddressed love... just ripples of love arising out of you and moving towards the whole universe. That will be very helpful to you.

Vedika... will it be easy to pronounce? It is one of the most beautiful words.

And I know that you are worried about [your husband’s] drinking, but don’t be worried, and in no way nag him about it. No, not at all. Just help him, but never nag, because nagging can create trouble

. and that gives a reaction to the mind. So if he drinks, it is okay... one accepts it. By and by, it will drop.... And I will do something, mm?

... It will go... nothing to be worried about. But never say anything about it; never raise the subject.

Just love him, serve him, and if he is a drunkard, he is! [a chuckle] One loves, that’s all.

[A sannyasin said she was going from one extreme to another – very high to very low: I suppose I need to just be a little more detached from it.]

No, that will not be good right now, because that can be done but then you will feel very dull. It can be done – there is not much trouble in it – but then you would even like the low, because even the low has a certain excitement in it.

So what I will suggest is not that you neutralise it, but that you start enjoying the low also, because it has certain qualities which can be enjoyed. Otherwise you will become very dull. There will be no high and there will be no low. You will be moving on plain ground but then there will be no adventure.

You will feel lethargic, depressed, almost dead. Right now that will not be good. It will not be real detachment, it will become an indifference.

Real detachment cannot be practised. It is a byproduct. So my suggestion is: first start finding some beautiful things which are hidden in the low moment. There are a few beautiful things. For example, it is silent, sad, and one does not want to go out. One wants to be alone. Use this energy of the low. When you feel you are low, immediately forget aU about the high. Forget all about pleasure, joy. Then use sadness as your meditation – ’Now this is a low moment. I’m going to relax.’ So relax, don’t move with people, don’t go outside too much. Just go deep inside yourself. That’s how one can use the low. Then you will feel tremendously beautiful in the low also. There will be no excitement, but there will be a sort of silence, a deep silence.

It may not feel light, but there will be a deep darkness. It is very soothing. And one needs it – that’s why it comes immediately after the high. In the high you are so excited that the whole body-system gets tired. The energy moves so high that it has to come back, otherwise you will go mad. That low is preventing your madness, otherwise you would react to it.

Right now you simply feel as if you are going to explode, but you cannot because an inner mechanism prevents it. You can only go to a certain extent and then suddenly the inner mechanism comes to life. It is automatic. It is not left to your will, otherwise sometimes you can forget and you can get too much energy and go mad.

Many people go mad when their inner mechanism is not functioning well. Then they go to a high and they don’t know how to come back to a low. The automatic mechanism is not functioning so they are stuck there. That’s why they are mad. If somehow they can be brought low they will be perfectly normal.

Everybody goes to those peaks, but people know how to come down. In fact, you are not needed to know. Your system works in such a way; it has its own inner economy. It goes only so far, it allows that much freedom, and then immediately everything is pulled back and you have to move to the extreme opposite, otherwise there will be no relaxation.

It is just as when you have been working the whole day and in the night you fall asleep. Nobody complains: ’I am awake for the whole day and in the night I fall asleep and become unconscious.

These are extremes. I would like to be in a balance.’ That means you will not be either awake or asleep; you will be in a limbo – a little awake and a little asleep. That will not be worth anything. You will move like a ghost – neither in nor out – and in everything you will be in a limbo, hanging. But nobody complains about it, because we know that it is natural.

This too is natural. That’s, why it follows immediately. It is just like a wave and the wake; it follows immediately. It is just like the peak and the valley; it follows immediately, and there is no gap really.

It is one movement. The wave and the wake, the peak and the valley, the high and the low, are one movement, are one unit. So just to to find some beautiful things in the low which you can enjoy. And enjoy them to your heart’s desire.

And the second thing: try to find beautiful things in the high moments – because everything is not beautiful there either. That’s why you feel like exploding. A high has fifty percent beautiful things and fifty percent ugly things, just as a low has fifty percent beautiful things and fifty percent ugly things. So what I am suggesting is to choose the fifty percent beautiful things in the high and the fifty percent beautiful things from the low moments. And there is no problem of neutralising it. When you go to the high and the low you enjoy both. Waking, you enjoy waking; sleeping, you enjoy sleep.

Hungry, you enjoy hunger, and satisfied, you enjoy being satisfied.

When you are high, excitement is the wrong thing. That can make one nervous. It can give you an inner shaking, a trembling. It can give you a sort of haziness. So when high, be joyful, be blissful, but drop that excitement part. Breathe silently when you are high... slow down the breathing. If you are walking, slow down the walking. If you are doing something, slow down. Then the high will be prolonged and you will enjoy it more. It will be more nourishing and will not give you a feeling as if you are going crazy.

So let that ecstasy be there but don’t make it an excitement. Excitement is the wrong part of the high, and getting depressed is the wrong part of the low. So while low, don’t get depressed. Rather, feel very silent, alone. And when too high, feel very very silent. . .enjoy – but let it be joy, not indulgence. When there is no excitement, the joy spreads all over your being. Then it is not intense.

It is spread more and you don’t feel that you are going crazy.

If you can enjoy both, by and by, one day you will find that they have been coming closer and closer and closer. One day they are just there. There is no high, no low. You are walking just in the middle.

But then it is a byproduct. You have not done anything directly to achieve it. It is not indifference. It is non-attachment. Then it has a very mutable quality. It has all that is good and beautiful in the high and low, both together.

But if you to to practise it, then it will have all that is wrong in the low and all that is wrong in the high, both together. It will be one hundred percent wrong. So don’t to to practise it. Just enjoy both.

[She also said that she was too elated when offered praise for her work and too depressed when offered criticisms.

Osho said the same principle applied here. When praise is given one should not become too excited, but it is good to feel pleased that one’s work is appreciated. He said to always listen carefully to criticism, to take note of it, and to thank the person; to use it as an opportunity to improve.]

[A sannyasin reports: For two weeks I’ve been doing this method you told me to do. You told me to wake up in the morning and whatsoever mood I was in, to be the opposite... It’s made me feel much better and more alive. I enjoy everything more. And it put me in touch with a fear of being total. I’m thinking perhaps I need to become more and more aware.]

No, don’t bring that in right now. Things are going very well and your energy is flowing. Continue your meditation and rather than becoming more aware, become more happy.

Right now if you become more aware, you will become unhappy. When awareness does not bring unhappiness, then it is the right time to work on it. Right now you are in such a state that if you to to be aware, you will be aware only of unhappiness and fear. So first change this space. And it can change because you have changed these last fifteen days. If you decide to be happy, you can be. If you wake up in a bad mood, you have to be happy. If you wake up in a happy mood, then you have to be unhappy. One day you will find yourself in difficulty because you will feel happy. Then there will be the real problem ! [laughter]

For two weeks continue this and I will wait for the day when you start getting up happy and you have to be unhappy. Then we will start awareness.

[The Enlightenment Intensive group is present. The groupleader says: I found myself doodling and saying, ’Osho, am I doing a good job?’ And you said to me, ...’are you having a good time?’ [much laughter]

[chuckling] Right! And that is the right thing that you have understood: that you have to learn the game. You are not to be serious about it. It is a game... the whole of life is a game. Seriousness is a disease. So enjoy the game while it lasts and don’t be worried too much about it.

It is natural in the beginning to be concerned about what people are thinking, whether they appreciate you or not. It is natural, but by and by you have to drop that. It should become absolutely a game. Then you will not be tired at all. If you are not serious, it will not become such a head-trip.

No theory in fact is needed. No need to rehearse it, no need to think about it. Just go into it.

People are there, you are there... something is bound to happen. Trust that. Trust friends, people, trust yourself. Soon I am going to start a group without a leader. There will be no leader, but something is bound to happen with people being together for three days. Something will start on its own.

So don’t be serious; simply float. Seriousness can become infectious, so if the leader becomes serious then the participants will become serious. If it gives you a headache, it will give headaches to others. So your head has to be clean – no headache.

[A group member says: it was the most beautiful experience I have ever known... I felt my whole life had changed. But today it feels as if it has gone – all of it.]

Mm, I understand. If a group takes you high, you are bound to fall very low. That is the price one has to pay for going very high. People who have not gone so high are not so unhappy. But this is good. One should be happy about it.

One should be happy that one has something which can be lost. You should be happy that you are feeling frustrated, because something has happened. In comparison to that, you are feeling unhappy and frustrated. If nothing had happened there would have been no frustration. That’s the whole attitude of how to look at things.

And what has happened will happen again. What has happened in the group can happen out of the group, because in fact it is not the group that is making it happen; it is you. You are allowing it to happen. And if you can learn how to allow it to happen, it can happen anywhere.

The whole of life is so tremendously beautiful and so tremendously graceful....

[The monsoon had started only the day before.]

... listen to those rains and clouds. Life is such an ongoing, continuous bliss. Just be happy... be open to it.

Do one thing. When you go back home, just sit silently and allow it to happen again And don’t be worried It has nothing to do with the group. A group is just an opportunity to help. It has shown you the path. Now you know that it is possible, now you know that it can happen. Now you know that you are capable of it. This confidence is all that the group can give to you. It has been given to you.

The group has worked tremendously well for you. It has functioned at its very peak.

All that the group really has given to you is a confidence that this can happen to you – a possibility, a vision of your own potentiality Now try it on your own. The frustration will disappear. So back home, just allow it to happen. Just remember exactly what you enjoyed so much – your blissfulness, being full of energy. Start dancing – move, shake, laugh. For one hour try to create it on your own. It will come. It may take a few minutes to bring it out, but by the end of one hour you will be able to.

And I will go on working on you, so don’t be afraid.

[A group member says: I enjoyed the group and I feel completely changed. But I feel confused. I’m not clear at all.]

That is the first clarity. People are unclear, but they are not even clear about their being unclear.

People are confused, but they are so confused that they don’t even know that they are confused.

This is the first clarity – that one starts feeling the whole confusion. It is good... very good, because this will become the very base of your future clarity. It is a beginning.

First a person starts feeling clear about his confusion, clear about his ignorance, clear that he does not know who he is. This is the first clarity. The group has done something very beautiful. You may not be alert about it right now, but later on you will be able to recapture it and to recognise it.

Just close your eyes and feel yourself deep in your belly... as if you are there, just below the navel....

Every night before you go to sleep, do this for ten minutes – go into the belly, just like this. You did it well. The whole body will tremble and shake. Your hands were flowing with energy so beautifully. It simply shows that much change in the brain is happening, because the hands are the visible brain.

The right hand is connected with the left brain, and the left hand is connected with the right brain.

The hands are trembling with energy so much and much is happening in the brain.

So for ten minutes every night, just go berserk, and allow whatsoever happens, but remain in the belly. If you are in the head, nothing will happen. Move the head completely and this will remove the disturbance in the head. Simply go into the belly and remain there near the navel, and enjoy it.

This is entering one’s womb, and it is one of the most ancient exercises for changing a man’s mind.

So do this every night and then go to sleep...

[One of the ashram Rolfers says: I’ve started Rolfing here – and it’s as if I’ve never Rolfed before.

My perception is staggering – I’m seeing things I never saw before. And I’m just amazed, because it didn’t feel as if I were doing anything... ]

You are entering a totally different dimension. The milieu is different, and you will be moving in completely unknown territory. Many more things will be revealed to you, so just remain open – and never become an expert.

Always remain open to learning more, otherwise when people become expert in something, they close. That is the misfortune of all experts. Once you know that you know Rolfing; then finished!

You go on repeating what you know but no more learning happens. In life nothing ends.

Real learning never becomes knowledge. Knowledge is a dead thing. Knowledge is when a learner has come to conclusions; then there is knowledge. Knowledge is conclusion. A learner is always on the way, moving, turning, finding new sources and new worlds.

A learner never becomes knowledgeable. That is the beauty of learning – it is alive. Knowledge is dead. Many more things will be revealed to you. That’s my whole purpose of being here. If you remain a learner and never become an expert, there is no end of knowing. One can go on and on, and the more you know, the more you become capable of knowing. The more knowing you have, the more humble you become.

And Rolfing is a tremendously beautiful technique. If you really move into it deeply, it will do more for you than for the person you are Rolfing. If it is not doing something for you, then it will not do anything for the person you are Rolfing. Maybe a little, but nothing very substantial. But if while Rolfing a person you are transformed and transfigured, then only something will happen to him also, because you are in it together. It is not that you are manipulating his body. You are not a manipulator.

You are participating in his being... you are becoming one with him. It is like love.

It is not that the man is doing something to the woman, as it has always been thought... or some day it can become just the reverse – that the woman starts doing something to the man. It is not that one is doing something to the other. Both are moving in a world where no one is a doer and yet much happens. Both are part of a great energy that takes possession. Both are moving in a whirlwind. Two are moving, are in movement, but nobody is doing anything.

So that is the most essential thing to learn: while Rolfing, don’t become a manipulator. By and by, forget that you are Rolfing. Just become part of one process and then it will do as much for you as for the person rolfed and both will be benefited and enriched by it.

[A sannyasin says: The group was very good, and I’m tremendously full and with a lot of excitement, but it’s very patient.]

Very good. That’s how it should be. When there is great excitement and patience, it is beautiful. If patience is there and no excitement, one is dead. And if excitement is there and no patience, one is mad.

These two things together is the best combination that can happen in energy. So, very good.

[A sannyasin says: I have Feelings of ambivalence. My feelings are two – anger and love and sadness at the same time – and it is the same in my thoughts too. If I have one thought lying there, immediately the opposite thought comes.

Osho checks his energy.]

Nothing to be worried about. Both the hemispheres of the mind are working fifty-fifty. It rarely happens; usually one brain works more. If you are a rightist, the left brain functions more. If you are a leftist, the right brain functions more. But sometimes it can happen, as it is with you, that both brains are functioning perfectly parallel, almost fifty-fifty. You will feel ambivalent, but there is nothing to be worried about. This can be turned into a great blessing, because this ambivalence can become a neutralising force.

When one brain is functioning more, one is always a little lop-sided. When one loves, one goes to the extreme. When one hates, one goes to the extreme. You cannot go to the extreme...

Both your hemispheres are functioning in a very balanced way – that’s why the ambivalence One thought from the right side and one thought from the left side arise simultaneously and both have similar ways. It will be difficult in a way to know how to decide, but it can be done. Simply wait. .

.the decision will come. And it will not come from the mind, because the mind is divided so similarly, so symmetrically. The decision will come from the beyond If you can wait the decision will always come, because one cannot exist without decision.

So this can be used as a very good jumping-board to the beyond. It rarely happens. Very few people are so symmetrical. Every mind is asymmetrical. But don’t think of it in any way as a difficulty. Be neutral and simply enjoy the ambivalence.

[A group member said: Nothing very fantastic happened, but a lot of awareness came to me. I got in touch with a lot of pain and grief.]

That is more valuable than any fantastic thing.

... Never long for the fantastic. Long for the real. The fantastic is not going to give you nourishment.

It comes like lightning and it goes. A small candle is better. You can do many things with a small candle. Lightning is fantastic but you cannot do anything – you cannot read, you cannot move.

Fantastic experiences are like lightning in the sky – beautiful, but not of any real value. Light a small candle. That will go for long and will do much for you.

The path is walked not by fantastic experiences but by real, small, atomic experiences. They go on accumulating and they give you a reality. It has been tremendously good. What I call fantastic is this

– a small candle. If you go and sell it you will not get much, and nobody is going to write a poem about it, and if you brag about it people will think that you are mad – because it is so small. But it is useful. Its utility is tremendous. It will nourish you.

So just go on creating it again and again inside you. Struggle always pays. Friction always pays. It makes you more alert. It gives you a sharpness, and one starts feeling more alive, more solid.

So whatsoever has happened to you, go on reliving it again and again so it becomes almost a style of life. Because it is not fantastic, it can be done very easily. Don’t allow it to become just a memory.

Make it an everyday occurrence.

Just before going to sleep, for ten minutes sit silently and recapture the whole of it. Hold it inside and go to sleep. In the morning before you open your eyes, again recapture it. Hold it in the stomach.

In the day also, whenever you remember that you are losing contact with it, sit silently for a few seconds and recapture it. But don’t lose sight of it and it will grow. One day it will become a light.

CHAPTER 22

26 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin had written a letter about relationship with his girlfriend, who was living in London, and who wished to be married to him. He was uncertain as to what was the best thing to do as he had reservations about marriage but was in love with her.]

One thing – don’t get married. That will be very destructive. You will never be able to forgive her –

that will be the destructive element in it – and you will start taking revenge.

There is no need to get married, but you should start feeling a sort of commitment, that’s another thing. There is no need to get married, but because there is no need to get married there is a great need to feel committed, and more than when one gets married.

In marriage, in fact, you can avoid commitment. Marriage is an avoidance. Legally, formally, you are committed, that’s right, but the responsibility is avoided. When you are not married to a woman, commitment is greater because there is no legal bind in it. Responsibility is deeper because she simply trusts you.

So marriage and commitment are not both the same thing. Marriage is an avoidance of commitment, of real commitment. It is a bogus commitment, a pseudo-commitment, just to show that one is committed. If you avoid marriage then you are able to take the whole responsibility personally. Then the society is not in it; the law and the court and nobody else are in it. It is absolutely personal, and the commitment is very great.

I suggest that you don’t get married – not because I would not like you to be committed, but because I would like you to be committed really deeply.

Her attitude is understandable. A woman always wants to belong. That has nothing to do with any particular individuals; it is something to do with the very nature of womanhood. It is part of the feminine mind to lean to somebody, to possess and to be possessed. So it is not a question of somebody being like that. All women, more or less, are like that. That is their intrinsic quality. And when a woman loses that quality, she loses something of her womanhood. Then she is not worth much. She is almost like a man; she has a male mind. You will not feel that softness, that fragileness that gives grace and beauty to a woman.

It is just like a creeper. The creeper needs some tree to belong to, to creep upon, to be supported by. The creeper cannot stand on its own. But that is one of the most beautiful experiences – that somebody belongs to you and you belong to somebody. Belonging is one of the most desired states of the human mind. You feel rooted when you feel that you belong to somebody.

Now many things have disappeared in the world which used to give a feeling of belongingness –

the nation, the church, the society. Those are in fact gone; only shadows are existing. Nobody is english now in the sense of being english two hundred years ago. Nobody is indian in the sense that people used to be indian. That looks sort of foolish. Man is man. Nobody is white and black. Even if it persists it persists just as a habit, but it has lost its grip.

So all other belongings have disappeared. Now the only belonging is personal, a personal love.

Otherwise one feels very lonely – and woman more so, because her whole love is receptive, passive.

She waits... but she is not aggressive. If there is nobody to belong to, then waiting simply becomes waiting for Godot. It is a waiting and waiting and waiting, and it is heavy.

So her attitude can be understood. She is perfectly right, but she is in a deep misunderstanding – as almost all are. She thinks marriage will be a commitment. That’s where she is wrong. So you have to write to her from me about everything that I am saying to you. But give her your commitment.

Make her feel that she belongs to you and you belong to her.

Two months of the year is not enough to spend with her [as the sannyasin had suggested in his letter]. Make it at least six months. Two months is not enough. By the time you start going deep, intimate, you are gone and she simply hangs there. That can become very miserable. Then you come again but the gap is big and before you become acquainted again, the time to go has come.

So you come and go but you never establish roots with her and she cannot have time to be really intimate with you. More time is needed. So if you are not going to England more often then make your home in Poona, but be here for at least six months. Or be in England, but make it at least six months you are with her and then for six months you can be a wanderer. You can come and be with her for two months and then go for one, but be with her for at least six months in the year.

By and by, you will also need a home. By and by, you will feel the need arising more and more. As one becomes older one needs it. When one is young it is very simple to be a wanderer; it fits. But as you become a little older you would like some place to rest, to be yourself, and not to be bothered by so many things which one has to go through if one is travelling and going here and there. You will need a home.

My suggestion is that you make it Poona, so that for six months you are with me too, and then for six months you can go anywhere you want and do your thing. She will also feel happy here and she will not miss you because I will be here. But make some arrangements.

She loves you, and if she is forced to marry somebody else she will never be happy. You also will not be happy about that. That too will create a problem deep inside and again you will not be able to forgive yourself. You will feel a little guilty that she was ready to be with you and you could not allow it.

If you get married you will not be able to forgive her. If you don’t marry and you are not committed and she has to marry somebody else, you will not be able to forgive yourself; you will feel a certain guilt. Guilt can become a very great problem. There is no way then to go back. Once she is married to somebody, there is no way to go back and then things become very complicated.

So my understanding is that there is no need to get married – legally, that is. No need to make any formal commitment, but make a deep commitment so that she doesn’t feel a lack of commitment and she is not just hanging in the air. Women become more afraid as they get older that their charm, their beauty, will be lost – and who will love them in their old age? Who will be there to love them when they are not so lovable? That fear creeps inside the mind of a woman.

If you don’t get into a commitment with her she will be forced to marry somebody else, but she will not be able to love them. You will haunt her and she will haunt you, and both your lives will be destroyed in a subtle way.

I understand that there is no romance now in it, no fantasy in it, but that’s how it should be.

My understanding about two people getting into deep waters is that it is only possible when the honeymoon is over, not before it. If my suggestion someday becomes prevalent, then people should go on their honeymoon before they get married. The honeymoon should precede marriage, and when a love relationship has survived the honeymoon then people should get married, otherwise not. My understanding is that ninety-nine marriages are finished by the time the honeymoon is over.

So it is just foolish to be committed, and to be in a hypocritical relationship is a pseudo-pretension.

It is good that your honeymoon is over. Now there is no emotional urge to be committed. There is no fantasy around it. Things are simple and natural. Now you are no more in a fever, a passion, and neither is she. You are both alert. To be committed in a feverish state of mind is almost as if you are drunk and you get committed to something. By the morning when you come back to your senses you don’t even remember, and you cannot believe that you have given your word.

When two people are deep in fantasy, in a romantic mood – as it always happens in the beginning

– it is not time to get committed. It is the worst time to get committed, and people get committed then! They talk about things which are just foolish, and they say, ’We will be together forever and forever.’ When the fever is gone and their normal temperature has returned, then they will not be able to believe what they have done. But then it is too late.

So it is good that in this moment your relationship is no more moving in the peaks or the valleys. It is just on the plain ground. This is the right time to take any decision. So think over it – no marriage, but great commitment. And at least six months are hers. More, if you can manage – good – but not less.

And write to her.

[The sannyasin answers: She wants to have babies and she will want them to be legitimate. And she wants to settle down.]

That I can manage. When she comes I will manage it that she does not ask for babies. It is not good right now. Later on if it feels good and she is ready to become a mother, then we will see, but not now. It will be an unnecessary burden.

If you both need to grow, it is good to remain without children. If you don’t want to grow, then there is nothing else to do – have children. That’s one of the most easily available occupations for people who don’t know how to be more creative in any other way. That is the simple course: to become a father or mother and get worried about children so that one day they can become mothers and fathers and the whole nonsense continues.

But I will manage that; don’t you talk about it at all. And if she talks about babies, tell her that when she comes here, that is up to me. If I say have babies, then something can be done. But right now I don’t see that it will be good for you both.

... Just bring her here. You are not to say anything about babies, otherwise she will not accept it.

That has to be left completely to me. When she comes I will talk to her. I have my own powers over women, don’t be worried. I manage quite a lot.

[A sannyasin said that in his work he was afraid of losing confidence in himself.]

In fact, we don’t need as much confidence as we think we need.

Confidence can either be a great quality or it can be a disquality to some. For example, foolish people are always more confident than intelligent people. Stupidity has a certain confidence to it.

Foolish people are more stubborn, and because they are blind, because they can’t see, they rush anywhere – even where angels fear to tread.

A man who is intelligent is bound to have a little hesitancy in him. Intelligence is hesitant. That simply shows that there are millions of opportunities, millions of alternatives, and one has to choose. Every choice is arbitrary so a certain lack of confidence is bound to be there. The more intelligent you are, the more you will feel it.

So not all confidence is good. Ninety-nine percent of confidence is foolish. Only one percent is good, and that one percent is never absolute. That one percent is always hesitant because there are really so many alternatives. You are always standing on the cross-roads, not knowing which road will really be the right one. How can you be confident? Why do you expect to be confident?

All roads look almost the same but one has to choose. It is a gambler’s choice. But that’s how life is – and it is good that it is that way. If everything was clean-cut, preplanned, prefabricated, and you were just given instructions – ’Move right and left and do this and that’ – there would be confidence but of what use would it be? The thrill would be lost. There would be no light in life then. It would be a dead routine.

Life is always thrilling because each step brings you to another cross-roads... again so many roads, again you have to choose. You start trembling. Will the choice be right or not? How to be rightly confident then? To h rightly confident is to think about all the alternatives and whatsoever you feel is a little better than the others....

Don’t ask for absolutely good and absolutely wrong. In life there is nothing like that. It is only percentage; one is only a little better than the other, that’s all. Life is not divided like two polarities

– good and bad. There are a thousand and one situations between good and bad. So just look around objectively, silently, feelingly, see every possibility, unworried, and whatsoever feels a little bit better than others, move on it. Once you decide to move, forget about other alternatives, because they don’t matter now. Then you move confidently.

This is really intelligent confidence. It does not destroy hesitation completely. It uses hesitation. It does not destroy alternatives. Alternatives are there. It consciously broods and contemplates over all the alternatives as silently as humanly possible. Intelligence never demands anything inhuman.

These are the paths. Many are moving to the right; they think it is better. You still feel that to move to the left is better, so of course there is going to be hesitation because you know that many intelligent people are moving in the opposite direction. How can you be confident? You are not alone here.

Many intelligent people are going that way and still you feel that this is right for you.

Stand on the cross-road, think, meditate, but once you decide then forget all other alternatives –

move. Once you decide to move, your whole energy is needed there. Don’t be split and don’t let half of your mind think about alternatives. This is how one has to use hesitation.

And there is no certainty that you are bound to be right. That I am not saying. There is no way to be certain. You may be wrong, but there is no way to know it unless you goon the road to the very end, all the way.

But my understanding is that one should think rightly. The very thinking gives you growth. You move on the road – right or wrong is irrelevant. The very movement gives you growth. To me it is not a question of where you go. To me the most important thing is that you are not stuck, but going.

Even if this road comes to a dead end and it leads nowhere and you have to come back, nothing to worry about. It is good that you went. The very movement has given you much experience. You have known a wrong road. You are acquainted with wrong now more than before. Now you know what is false; it will help you to find out the truth.

To know the false as false is a great experience because that is the only way that one comes by and by to know what truth is. To know truth as true, the path moves from the experience of knowing false as false. And one has to move on many wrong roads before one comes to the right one.

So to me, even if you are going towards hell, I bless you, because there is no other way to know hell.

And if you don’t know hell you will never be able to know what heaven is. Go into the dark because that is the way to know light. Go into death because that is the way to know life.

The only thing that is important is not to be stuck somewhere. Don’t just stand on the cross-road, hesitating, not going anywhere. Don’t make hesitation your habit. Use it – it is a good device. Think about all the alternatives. I’m not saying don’t think, don’t hesitate at all, move like a stupid man and run with closed eyes, blindfolded, so there is no problem and you don’t know that other roads exist.

That’s why stupid people are more confident, but they have done much harm in the world. The world would be better if there were less confident people.

Look at the Adolf Hitlers – they are very confident. They think God has given them great work to change the whole world. They are stupid people but very confident. Even Buddha is not as confident as Adolf Hitler, because Buddha is not stupid. He understands the complexity of life. It is not so simple as Hitler thinks, but he just rushes and people follow him.

Why do so many people follow such stupid leaders? Why do so many people go on following politicians? What happens? Rarely it happens that a politician is intelligent – because if he is intelligent he will not be a politician. Intelligence never chooses such a stupid thing. But why do so many people follow them?

The reason is that people are not very confident. They don’t know where to go, so they are just waiting for some messiah, somebody to tell them that this is the right path and to tell them with such certainty, with such obsessive certainty, that their fears are dissipated. So they say, ’Yes, here is the leader. Now we will follow him. Here comes the right man – so confident!’

That confidence of the leader – which is because of stupidity – helps him to gather a great following, because people are lacking in courage, in confidence. They are stuck. They are afraid to move.

They are almost paralysed because of their hesitations. They need somebody who can become a torch and who is so confident that their own fear and unconfidence does not trouble them. Now they can move with this man. They can say, ’Yes, we are not confident, you are. Your confidence becomes a substitute for- us.’

So confidence is not always a virtue. Intelligence is always a virtue. So insist on intelligence.

Sometimes it will make you very hesitant, nervous. It has to be so... it is natural. Life is so complex and one is moving in the unknown continuously. How can one be confident? The very demand is absurd.

So make intelligence your goal and then hesitation, nervousness, everything, can be used in a creative way.

[The sannyasin answers: I was making results my goal.]

No, try to become more intelligent, because the results may never happen. Intelligence is herenow.

Results may frustrate you. Intelligence never frustrates. Even if you do wrong, you become more intelligent. So make such a goal which is never frustrated, mm ? Good !

[The Aum marathon is present.

Osho has recently described the emphasis in this group as being on allowing rather than doing.]

... To the western mind, doing comes very easily. Allowing comes with difficulty because we have been trained to do so many things. Even things which cannot be done we have been taught to do.

The whole emphasis is on allowing things to happen to you, so the basic effort is not positive but negative. The basic effort is not to debar anything, but just to remain receptive and open. Wherever energy is moving, move with it, unafraid, fearless.

The greater the venture, the greater is the pay-off. The more you go with the energy, wherever it leads, the more you become capable of coming back home, thrilled with new energy, because for the first time the constant pressure of doing dissolves and you start floating – not even swimming.

You start floating in the stream, and the stream takes you over and takes you to the farthest sea.

You simply go with it. No effort is needed of your own.

[The group leader said: I dropped expectations and just tried to be there and help.]

Mm mm, that’s how it should be.

... It always helps. If you are happy and doing the thing that you like to do, you always create a climate where others start feeling happy and accepted and feel that they can do or be whatsoever they are. That makes the group very relaxed.

If the leader is very tense and trying to perform something, he creates tension all around.

Tremendous tense vibrations are created and people are very susceptible. They catch them and then they become tense. When they are tense, they start defending themselves. When they start defending, you try to perform more and you start becoming aggressive. Then you set a trend which is self-defeating, suicidal.

When the leader is relaxed, at home, at ease, he helps others to relax. When others are relaxed, they don’t resist, they don’t defend. They are not in any way afraid of you. In fact they fall in love with you. They feel accepted... they come close, and then much can be done without any effort. Much happens without your doing it.

You looked good and relaxed... very good. Remember this... don’t forget it.

[The group leader then asks: I see around all the time indian people with open hands, and when I don’t give them anything, when I say ’No!’ I feel angry. I’m wondering if this is my projection or if I’m holding onto something. But it makes me very nervous sometimes.]

Again you have some expectations from yourself, so whenever you are not filling your expectations, you will feel this tension.

For example, someone is begging. Now your super-ego thinks that [you are] a very sharing person; a giver, always ready to give and help people. You don’t give because you see that if you go on giving to these people, you are not helping anybody. They have become just exploiters. They are exploiting your super-ego.

You can give something to them; they will give you some ego in return. So the problem is between your reason and your ego. Your reason says, ’Don’t give, because this is foolish,’ and your ego says,

’Now you will not get in return the good image that you have of yourself.’

Yes, so something is inside you. It has nothing to do with the beggars. The beggar is just a situation.

The beggar is trying to exploit you. The beggar says, ’The one who gives is a great man, moral, religious, a real sannyasin.’ If you don’t give, then his eyes have condemnation for you and he thinks you are a miser, a materialist. So the beggar is playing tricks with your ego.

And now if you give, you feel bad. If you don’t give, you feel bad. If you give, you feel you have been cheated. You give and you feel that this man has been very cunning. You know – it is so clear! All his praise and everything is just out of cunningness, just diplomacy. He would touch your feet and say things in your praise – that you are a very superior human being – just for one rupee !

If you don’t give him that one rupee then he will look at you as though you are not even a man. You are just a dog. So he is creating a situation. Now the question is that if you have a super-ego you will be caught. If you don’t have a super-ego you will not be caught. It is a game and you are not caught in it. And then there is a possibility that if you see somebody who is really in need, then you can give

The problem arises when somebody is really in need and you give – but not because of your super-ego. Then it is good, virtuous, to give. If you give because of the super-ego then it is criminal to give, because you are strengthening your ego and nothing else.

If the person does not need it and you give, you are destroying the person. You are giving him a bad habit, a bad structure. He will never work. If you give to somebody who is really in need, then you are not destroying that person; rather, you are helping him to come out of his critical situation. You are putting him back on his feet so that he can work again, he can move again. And he is human and needs all help that can be given to him.

But now deep inside you the centre is different. You give because of compassion, love, but not because of the ego. When you give because of love and compassion – because you feel that the situation is that whatsoever you can do, you have to do, and you are not trying to enhance your ego in any way – then it is beautiful to give. Give it and forget all about it. You are not obliging anybody.

You are simply doing something that is human.

But out of a hundred beggars, you will find only one who is in real need. Ninety-nine are playing a game with you. So don’t be caught in that game. But if you are, then just try to contemplate more about your ego. You have a certain ego, mm? A beggar really creates a great problem inside. If you give to him you feel bad. He is a dilemma. If you give to him, you know that he has cheated you. He played a trick with you and you are defeated.

If you don’t give, then you feel bad. Your image is not fulfilled and so you feel fallen in your own eyes. So you start thinking. ’Vedanta, what are you? You can’t help a human being? And he was not asking for a kingdom – he was just asking for a cup of tea, and you could not give even that. So what about your great ideas about yourself?’ So a beggar creates a dilemma.

But one has to be very alert. In every situation one has to be very intelligent and very alert. Then you will find a way. Nothing to be worried about, mm? Good.

[One of the assistants says: I feel I go on smiling when I don’t want to smile, giving when I don’t want to give.]

For one month, be as false as you can... no effort to be true. This is your sadhana – be as false as you can. Find situations where you can be false. Pretend as much as you can, lie as much as you can. If you are feeling happy and somebody comes, become unhappy immediately – because happiness is true. If you are feeling unhappy and somebody comes, become happy, smile, laugh.

Just give the impression of that which you are not in that moment.

For one month it will be hard but it will be a tremendous learning. Just be false, because that is the beginning of being true. First one has to be perfectly aware of how false one can be – and there is no other way to know it other than to be it. So for one month, consciously, deliberately....

Up to now you have been false many times but that was not deliberate. You cannot get rid of anything which is not deliberate, which is unconscious. What can you do about it? So first make it deliberate.

So when you are not feeling loving, love. When you are not angry, become angry. It has to be all the way and in all sorts of things. When you are talking to somebody and you find that you are being true, immediately drop it. Bring in some falseness.

If you can falsify for one month deliberately, then next month I will give you something else, because then that which can be done deliberately can be dropped. There is no problem about it. You follow me? And don’t try to be true. Right now that will not be good. The fellow who said to you that you are gullible... if you are really gullible you have taken his idea.

If you are really gullible and somebody says that you are, you take that idea. Somebody says that you are not true, so you take that idea. Then you start being true, but how can you be? Every effort to be true is going to be a pretension – because truth needs no effort. Truth is that which is there without any effort on your part. So nobody can be true. If you try to be true you will be false. Truth is that which you are without any effort about it. You simply are – that is true. Now people can make you alert that you are false, so you will start being true. What will you do? The very effort will create more subtle layers of falsity. You will become more clever about being false, that’s all. You may become more skillful about being false, that’s all. Never do that.

Start by being false. It will be hard because many times you will slip into the truth. You will forget that you have to be false. I have never come across a man who is not ninety percent true. Almost always every person is near about ninety percent true. The falsity, at the most, is ten percent and that too with very skillful people, because to be false continuously is such a strain that ordinarily it is not possible. Ordinarily you are true. Only rarely sometimes, when it pays to be false, one becomes false.

Whenever you catch yourself red-handed being true, immediately become false. Even when you are alone walking in a street and feeling good, suddenly say, ’You are being true. This is not right,’ and immediately become unhappy.

[Another group assistant says: I want to be with people and I want to be alone. I want to be with a man and yet I want to be able to stand on my own feet.]

Mm, I understand. That absurd notion is getting into many women’s minds – to stand on one’s own feet, to be independent. Particularly the ’Lib movement’ is creating that nonsense. It is possible. You can stand on your own feet but you will never be happy because you will never be a real woman; that’s how the trouble will arise.

In fact you stand on your own feet only when you lean on somebody so deeply that you need not stand on your feet alone. Then only do you stand on your feet. That is part of the feminine mind and nothing can be done. It is not a question of politics. It is something natural.

It is just like a creeper. If the creeper tries to stand on its own, it will fall on the ground, that’s all.

It may never be able to rise in the sky and to dance m the wind. to enJoy the sun and the and the moon, no. It can be on its own but then it will be Lying down, messed up on the earth.

The feminine mind is made in such a way that it needs to belong to somebody very deeply. Then only is there rest. You can try whatsoever you want, but then you will never be happy. And I have never come across any ’Lib’ woman who is happy. If you come across one it will be a miracle. They cannot be happy because the whole idea is nonsense. Not that what they say is wrong – man has exploited woman very much, and that exploitation should stop – but they are moving to the very opposite pole, which is foolish.

They can be fulfilled only together. They are half-half and together they become one and whole.

So drop that foolishness. That’s what’s troubling you. Find someone to whom you can surrender deeply, mm?

Anybody!... that’s not the point. Remember that deep surrender will be fulfilling to you, otherwise you will always be miserable.

[A sannyasin says: I got in touch with anger which I hadn’t seen since I was a child, but which has always been there.]

Good. The realisation that anger has been there like an undercurrent is a great revelation. A great change starts from that very moment of realisation, because if you can throw some anger that has been there for many years and that you have forgotten about, then you are getting rid of a great poison from the system. Your whole system will feel cleansed, purified, more alive, weightless.

In one effort, one can never throw out the whole of the anger. Many efforts will be needed because anger is a great problem. It goes on spreading inside the whole system. One is never aware of how deep it can go.

It is just like a tree. On the surface you don’t know how many roots there are and how deep and how far they go into the earth. When somebody becomes angry you just see the surface of the tree. You don’t know the roots. Those roots are all inside the whole nervous system.

Once the whole tree can be uprooted, roots and all, you will be a completely different being. You will not be able to even recognise yourself, it will be so new. But it has begun... I can see it.

CHAPTER 23

27 June 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Deva Salila.

Salila means a river and deva means divine – a divine river. And I give you this name to help you remember always that life should never be allowed to stagnate. It should always remain riverlike, flowing. Flow should be the motto. And whenever you feel that something is getting stuck, something is beginning to stagnate, then do whatsoever you can do to break it, to go beyond it, whatsoever the cost, but never surrender to stagnancy.

If one can remember this much, then the river one day reaches to the ocean. There is no other barrier: The barriers come from within us, because to be stagnant seems to be more comfortable, more secure. One is always afraid of the unknown the unfamiliar. the strange, and if one remains riverlike one is always moving into the unfamiliar.

One would like to become a pond. Then one remains in one place. It seems comfortable but it is suicidal. Even if it is inconvenient to continuously move, it is good. It is religious to remain moving.

So never stay in one place and never allow any staleness to gather around you.

This name will always remind you. The very word ’salila’ means a continuous flow, swimming, moving. In fact the river does not know where the goal is. She knows only flow; the goal is unknown.

The ocean may be there or may not be there. Nobody can guarantee it but the river trusts and goes on moving. And one day trust is always fulfilled. It has never been otherwise.

In life also it is the same. One never knows what the goal is, but if you have trust, you move. If you don’t have any trust, you become stale, stagnant. If you have trust you remain unafraid, daring, courageous. If one doesn’t have trust and one is so scared that one closes one’s eyes and becomes like an ostrich, then one is closed into oneself. Then there is no ocean and no expansion.

An expansion of consciousness is the very purpose of life. The river should become the ocean. The bound must move towards the unbounded. The finite should lose itself in the infinite.

And were you in the group? [the Encounter group present this evening]

[She answers: Yes. It’s fine, but I feel stuck. I’ve been stuck and things are starting for me now.]

They will move. Just remain conscious, because when they start moving one becomes afraid. Then sometimes one even clings to miseries because they look familiar. So many people go on clinging to miseries, diseases, illnesses, a thousand and one sorts of madnesses, because they are familiar with them. At least they know them. They have lived with them long enough.

Growth is always a gamble. One has to lose that which one knows for that which one has no way to know yet. One has to lose that which one has in one’s hand for that which is not yet.

That’s why I say that religion is for those who are courageous enough to be gamblers. It is not for businessmen. A businessman is always thinking in terms of what he has. He has to protect that and, if possible, he will get more. A gambler puts all he has for something which may happen, may not happen. There is no certainty.

In real life there is no certainty, no promise, no guarantee. And that’s the beauty of it. That’s why there is so much thrill.

So don’t listen to the old. If you have become aware that you are feeling stuck – I can see it; that’s why I have given you the name – get more identified with movement, flow, streaming. And help the new to happen... just a little help, and tremendous is the possibility. And when one loses the past one loses nothing, because it is already dead and gone. It is only in your memories and nowhere else. It is just in the mind, an imprint, an image; that’s where one is stuck. It is not real. The real is always happening. That which has happened has become unreal.

The real is that which is happening right now, this very moment. Once it has happened it is unreal.

But that goes on accumulating in the mind. That which has happened, the experienced, we go on accumulating; we go on treasuring our dead selves.

Then the more dead selves you have, the more difficult it is to move, to become new; the more difficult to die and resurrect. But just a little understanding – not much, just a little understanding –

that that which has happened has happened.... Now there is no point in clinging to it, so lose your grip on the past.

Open your hands for the future.

There are only two types of people: people who are clinging to the past with clenched fists, and people who are open, with hands open, prayerful, waiting for the unknown to happen.

So never be of the first category. Those people go on missing whatsoever is beautiful. So never be of the clenched-fist type. Open in prayer, as flowers open, and remain open.

[A sannyasin says: I’m leaving tomorrow.... Sometimes I feel very unrooted... I feel fear with making contact with people, communicating with them... Sometimes I feel unsure in my legs, especially in my left leg.]

It is one of the most prevalent problems for the modern man. It is not only your problem. The whole of humanity is suffering from uprootedness. When you become aware of it, you will always feel that wavering in the legs, uncertainty, because the legs are really the roots of man. Through legs man is rooted in the earth.

So you have observed it exactly rightly. You have diagnosed your own problem very accurately. Half the work is already done, because once you understand a problem directly, it is already on the way to being solved. Now you have to do two or three things.

One: every morning, if you are near the sea, go to the beach and run on the sand. If you are not near the sea, then run anywhere barefooted, with no shoes on, just on the naked earth, and let there be a contact between the feet and the earth. Soon, within a few weeks, you will start feeling a great energy and strength in the legs. So running and barefooted – one thing.

Second thing: before you start running and after you have run, starting and ending, do this – stand on your feet, just six or eight inches apart, and close your eyes. Then put your whole weight first on the right foot, as if you are standing only on the right. The left is unburdened. Feel it... and then shift to the left foot. Have the whole burden on the left and relieve the right completely, as if it has nothing to do. It is just there on the earth but it has no weight on it.

Do this four or five times – feeling this shift of energy – and feel how it feels. Then try to be just in the middle, neither on the left or the right, or on both. Just in the middle, no emphasis, fifty-fifty. That fifty-fifty feeling will give you more rootedness in the earth. Start and end running with this, and it will help very much.

And the third thing: start taking deeper breaths. Your breathing must be shallow. With shallow breathing that happens – one feels uprooted. The breath must go to the very root of your being, and the root is your sex centre.

Man is born out of sex. The energy is sexual. Breathing should go and make contact with your sex energy so there is a continuous message of the sex centre by the breathing. Then you feel rooted.

If your breathing is shallow and it never goes to the sex centre, then there is a gap. That gap will give you a wavering, uncertainty, confusion – not knowing who you are, not knowing where you are going, not knowing what your purpose is, why you exist... just drifting. Then you will by and by become lustless, no life – because how can life be when there is no purpose? And how can there be a purpose when you are not rooted in your own energy?

So first, grounding in the earth – which is the mother of all. Then grounding in the sex centre – which is the father of all. Once you are grounded in the earth and the sex centre, you will be completely at ease, tranquil, collected, centred, grounded. These three things. And breathe as deeply as possible.

Running will help that too.

But ordinarily, sitting, if you are not doing anything, close your eyes and have deep breaths. When you breathe, let the belly function, not the chest. Let the breath go in, belly go up, exhale and belly goes down. The whole emphasis should be on the belly, and the chest should be left. It will move a little but that will not be the basic thing. The basic thing is the belly.

So do these three things, mm? And you will be able to come back soon!

[The Encounter group leader says: When the group has been stuck for two, three or four days, there’s a temptation to use little techniques. But if the patience is there to wait, it seems to go much deeper.]

No, in the Encounter methodology you have to be a little technical and active. If you remain passive, things will happen, but it will take a very long time. Five or seven days won’t be enough. It will take a very long time. Things will happen and they will go very deep but people are so suppressive and so inhibited that they may take months.

But the very technique of Encounter groups is active – because the evil is already there; you have to bring it out. It is as if one thorn is already in your foot, so just passivity won’t do. You have to take out that thorn with another thorn. Then you can be passive. . The poison is already there. Society has done that poisoning already, so you have to suck it out. And much effort is needed.

So my suggestion is that for the first three days you can go on moving slowly, patiently. Those who can come out through passivity will come out, and on those who cannot, you have to work hard.

For the remaining four days, you have to force them. If they were natural there would be no need to force them. But in fact then there would have been no need for the Encounter group itself.

The need exists because they are not natural. They have been corrupted, crippled. They have become crooked and you have to straighten them out. And they will resist effort. They will not bother about passivity at all. They will resist even your effort. They will try to protect themselves and to defend themselves, so you have to grab their defence – all their suppressed, inhibited ideas, desires – otherwise they will not come out.

People will come out who are really deeply desirous of coming out. But people who are not so desirous of it, or who are ambiguous about their desire – one part wants to come out and another part goes on repressing – they will need to be forced, cornered.

Passivity is virtue. That is the whole ideology of tao – just to be passive, just to be natural – but for that a very long time is needed. A seven-day group will not be of any use for that. Even seven years may not be enough! So in taoist monasteries where they don’t do anything active, twenty years is nothing. If a person has been meditating with taoists for twenty years, he is thought to be just an amateur.

By the time people are very aged, almost ancient, they start flowing – because the process is so passive that it does not give any fight and it does not give any enforced struggle against the inhibitions. So inhibitions have to be corroded by and by through just waiting... just waiting for years.

Then they go. They go, certainly, but for that groups will not be helpful. For that the whole lifestyle has to be taoist, and that is very difficult now.

In the contemporary world the taoist cannot exist. Monasteries have disappeared even in China.

Now taoists are gone – because who will support a monastery of five hundred monks just sitting there waiting? Who is going to feed them? They appear to be exploiters. Communists have killed them. They have burned their monasteries or have made hospitals and schools out of them. They have forced taoist monks to work in the fields and in the factories.

With the modern concept it is very difficult. In ancient times it was possible because the very economics of the society was such. In India just a hundred years ago it was possible to support thousands of sannyasins. In fact, in every family you could have found one or two people who were not doing anything. But nobody was against them, because even if one person was a working member in the family – a family of thirty, forty people – that was enough. So lazy people were not condemned. And if a lazy person became religious, he was worshipped. There was no problem about it. He was almost thought to, be a great holy man.

Passivity is being completely at ease, with no goal, no effort, nothing to be done. If something happens, it happens. If it doesn’t happen, it doesn’t happen. One has no choice about it. One is not bothered at all. Things happen but then they take a very long time.

In this modern world where speed is so valuable and time seems to be so short and people need everything immediately, it will be very difficult. It can become a lifestyle but not a group-style. In a group it will be difficult.

But I am thinking later on when people have done many groups – for example seven, eight or nine groups – then we can develop a group in which nothing is to be done and there is no leader, because the leader is not needed. It will be a ten or fifteen-day group with no leader, with no programme, with no technique. People will be just sitting there and nobody will be there to tell them what to do.

They can sleep, they can take their bath, they can sit, they can dance, or whatsoever they feel like.

Nobody is there to goad them.

Much will happen out of that. Sometimes tremendous happenings will bubble up, but that is possible only when one has been forced in all the groups and has come to a point where one understands one’s own responsibility.

Right now, the people you are working with are not even aware of what their responsibility is.

They are looking for somebody to guide them. They have always been guided from their very childhood. They have always been told to do something or not to do something. They were never left alone. Nobody trusted them and everybody was ready to give them advice, so they have become dependent.,

If you don’t say to them to do it, they won’t, because they are waiting for somebody to say something.

They are looking for a father-figure. That’s why catholics call their priests ’father’ and they call their head priest ’pope’. Pope means papa. They also call God ’father’. The whole search seems to be for a father-figure – somebody who seems to be powerful, somebody who at least pretends to know, somebody who has the aura around him that he is in the know.

Then People are ready to listen to him. They are ready to follow him. They are always ready to fall in the queue. In fact, when there is nobody to say to them to do something they are at a loss, because they don’t know. They have lost their own moorings. They don’t have any heart of their own, and no conscience, no consciousness. They are simply bewildered about what to do, if you don’t tell them.

They need each detail: where to sit, how to sit, what to do and what not to do, in detail. Then too you cannot rely on them. If you don’t give them details and you don’t force them, they are irresponsible.

Passivity is wonderful when one is responsive. If you understand your responsibilities then nobody is needed to goad you because it is your life and you feel responsible. So whatsoever you want to do with it, you do. It is nobody else’s life. If you waste you waste your life. If you are creative, you are creative in your life. It is your misery, it is your blessing.

Once a person understands this, he has become mature, ripe But ordinarily people are not ripe.

They are stuck somewhere in their childhood. So the groupleader is a father-figure and he has to force them, but knowing that this is just a device. Sooner or later we have to leave them to their passivity and to their own life. But you have to work and to force them.

[A group participant says: I’m not planning to do any groups after this. I’ve done many groups in Holland and also led groups.]

Everything, mm! But I don’t see that you have really participated. You may have been a participant but you have not really participated. You have done it because it was in fashion. People have done it so you have, but I don’t see that you have really participated. You may have even become a leader.

That is easier than to become a participant, very much easier.

To become a guru is the easiest thing in the world. To become a disciple is very hard.

So just find out if you want to do any more groups here. Anything else to say?

[The sannyasin answers: I feel that it’s very easy to be a guru and it’s very difficult to be a disciple.]

Yes, exactly so, because being a guru you need not lose anything. In fact it is so in tune with the ego that you can gain something rather than losing. The ego feels very good to lead, to advise, to order, to command. Knowledge gives the ego satisfaction such as nothing else can. So to be a guru is very easy. There is a sufi story....

A man came to a master and said, ’I would like to be your disciple.’ The master said, ’Are you really ready to be a disciple?’ The man looked a little puzzled and he said, ’Difficult to say, but I would like to know what one has to do to become a disciple.’

The master said, ’For a few months you will have to cut wood in the forest for the ashram. Then you will have to work in the kitchen. And when you are ready – and that is not up to you to decide; it may be a few months or a few years – then I will start working on you.’

The man said, ’It seems to be a very long process and hard.

Would you help to enlighten me on one more point? This is what the disciple does. What is required of a master?’

The master said, ’The master is required to sit here and just order people.’

Then the man said, ’It will be better if you can make me a master. That seems to be easier.’

It is always easier, but one loses out, because once you are in the grip of the ego, you are on the wrong track. To be a disciple means to surrender the ego. To say, ’I don’t know,’ to say, ’I am ready to learn,’ to say, ’My whole life up to now has been meaningless and I am ready to learn from A-B-C,’

is a great effacing One effaces oneself completely. utterly. Then one becomes a disciple.

But if you have never really been a disciple, you can never be a master. So if somebody becomes a master without having ever been in the long process of disciplehood, then he is a pseudo-master.

The long process of learning and disciplehood ripens you integrates you. Then the moment comes when you have something to impart. It is no more ego. It is just that you have so much to share that you would like to share it. But it is learned the hard way and there iS no shortcut., So meditate here, and find out what groups you want to do Or if you feel like asking me, you can ask what groups to do, mm? Good.

[A sannyasin said that he had at one time an explosion of anger and then of pleasure. He felt very happy about it but wondered what he could do outside the group.

Osho said the anger needed to be released and he could do the anger meditation every day.... ]

Deep down, your anger is hooked with pleasure. In your childhood, whenever you were going to be happy, your parents or somebody else, some authorities, stopped you. You were never allowed to be happy, to enjoy yourself, and you became angry.

Naturally when a child is feeling happy and somebody says, ’Don’t make a noise. Don’t jump. Don’t shout,’ he feels great anger arising, but you could not be angry either. How can you be angry with your father and your mother? They are powerful and you are helpless. So deep inside the pleasure was there and the anger came; they got hooked.

So now when you become angry you feel pleasure, and if you want to feel happy and pleasant, immediately you feel a certain anger arising. That has to be settled. That hooking has to be dropped, and pleasure and anger have to be disconnected. The only way to disconnect it is to go through that experience which has been stopped. It has remained incomplete in your being and it can be dangerous. It can create many sorts of diseases, so it has to be finished with.

Continue as you are in the group and, out of the group, make it a point every day – the evening is good, because by the time evening comes one has become more and more angry – just close your door, put a pillow in front of you, have a little talk. Get very heated up, say things to the pillow and then start beating. Go really mad for at least twenty minutes. You can do anything to the pillow and no karma happens out of it [laughter]. Pillows are like Buddhas; they don’t retaliate, they don’t react.

When you start feeling ripples of joy arising, just sit silently and enjoy that feeling of bliss. Once you start feeling that there is no more pleasure arising out of the anger, then stop being angry.

There is no need to continue then. Your pleasure is free.

[A group member said: In the group I’m not taking any risks... I’m just crippled with fear and I hate myself.

Osho said that he would benefit from a tougher group and recommended that he do the Aum marathon. He said that he needed to be forced so much that the fear became anger, because they were the same phenomenon, reversed – fear is negative anger, anger positive fear, and if one goes on swallowing anger, it becomes fear.

Osho said that he was afraid that if he released any anger it would be uncontrollable so he was sitting on top of it. Osho told the groupleader to work hard on him for the remainder of the group.]

... a beautiful energy is there just waiting to be tapped, just waiting to be broken. Once his life-energy starts flowing, he will flower like a lotus.

So just have compassion on him and be hard !

[A sannyasin who is pregnant says: I’m taking a few risks but I’m still holding back on some anger and my sexual energy is not really flowing. I think I’m hiding behind being pregnant, but I’m not sure.]

You are ! Just take a few more risks. Risk-taking is the only way to grow. The more you risk, the more you grow. Life is attained only at a price. Risk is the price. So if you don’t want to be only lukewarm alive, then take risks, live dangerously. There is nothing to lose because empty-handed we come, empty-handed we go.

Be ready to lose, because nothing is lost. All that belongs to you is yours; there is no way to lose it.

And that which doesn’t belong to you, there is no way to keep it. It will go. Death will take everything.

So before death takes you, you should be able to play all sorts of games. And the riskier the game, the better, because it gives you a sharpness of being.

That’s why people go mountaineering. Risk... hanging between life and death one becomes very sharp. People take many types of risks. They go at high speed in their autos. A moment comes when you are nearing seventy, eighty, ninety miles per hour and each moment is dangerous. At one hundred miles per how each moment is just pure risk, but in that risky moment one feels tremendously aware. You cannot afford to be sleepy in that moment. You cannot dream – you cannot even think. Thinking stops, dreaming stops. The risk is such that you are suddenly so full of awareness. That’s why people like speed so much.

If you watch people you will see that everybody is seeking a risky sort of life in his own way. These are the only alive people. Others are already dead. They may be buried later on but they are dead.

People die near about thirty and then they are buried near about seventy or eighty. It takes fifty years for others to understand that this man is dead.

Take a few more risks !

[A newly arrived sannyasin says: I would like to know how I can serve you.]

You will be able [smiling gently]. Just the very idea creates its own reality. The idea functions like a seed. If you want to serve, you will. The very wanting is enough. In fact there is no ’how’ to it.

Serving is a very deep phenomenon of love. There is no ’how’ to love.

So if the idea is there, just let it be. Feel it and let it sink in deep down. The idea will find its own reality. Ideas are very potential realities. Whatsoever you are is nothing but the ideas of the past, and whatsoever you will be is nothing but your ideas of the present. Each idea becomes a seed and becomes its own crop. So just let the idea be there.

Service is a great humbleness. It is great receptivity. It is great passivity. In fact it is not an act at all, because it has no aggression in it. It is a sort of waiting. They also serve who just stand by the side and wait. They just wait, and whenever the need is there they will be called. They trust and they wait. They are ready.

This is one of the most important things to understand – that all that is good is passive, and all that is bad is very active. Evil is active virtue is very passive. If you try to make virtue active then it serves evil ends.

You can play with the words ’devil’ and ’god’ and much can be understood there. ’God’ is ’good’ but one ’o’ is dropped. ’Devil’ is ’evil’ but one ’d’ is joined to it. ’D’ plus ’evil’ becomes ’devil’, ’good’ minus

’o’ becomes ’god’. Something is very indicative there – that evil has something positive added to it and God has something negative deleted from it – God is good but not actively. Evil is bad but active. Evil is very positive in the world. That’s why you can see war, fight, violence, but you cannot see love.

Evil is very visible. God is very invisible. You cannot see God anywhere. There is no need to prove the devil. The devil is all too apparent. There is no need to prove that evil exists because there is so much evil, it is so obvious. But there is no way to prove God, and all the proofs that the saints have been trying are just foolish. God cannot be proved. He is so invisible, so passive.

Service is a passive quality... a deep awaiting and patience. So meditate and be more loving, mm?

And you will be called....

Premdas. It means servant of love... and that is the service of God also. Jesus says ’God is love’, and I say ’Love is God’. Even if we forget God completely and remember love, nothing is forgotten.

And even if we go on repeating the names of God and we forget love, then nothing is remembered.

For the modern mind, the contemporary mind,.love is more relevant than God. Somehow God has become associated with wrong things – the church, the dogmas, the priests. God suffers from the effect of bad company. Love is still human, pure, innocent. Love is not theological; it is still natural.

So become a servant of love.

That means always remain in the service of something that is love or akin to love, or in tune with love. Never seNe anything which is against love. Never seNe any conflict or violence or struggle.

Table of Contents

CHAPTER 1

CHAPTER 2

CHAPTER 3

CHAPTER 4

CHAPTER 5

CHAPTER 6

CHAPTER 7

CHAPTER 8

CHAPTER 9

CHAPTER 10

CHAPTER 11

CHAPTER 12

CHAPTER 13

CHAPTER 14

CHAPTER 15

CHAPTER 16

CHAPTER 17

CHAPTER 18

CHAPTER 19

CHAPTER 20

CHAPTER 21

CHAPTER 22

CHAPTER 23