Awareness
Mind can never be intelligent - only no-mind is intelligent. Only no-mind is original and radical. Only no-mind is revolutionary - revolution in action.
This mind gives you a sort of stupor. Burdened by the memories of the past, burdened by the projections of the future, you go on living - at the minimum. You don't live at the maximum. Your flame remains very dim.
Once you start dropping thoughts, the dust that you have collected in the past, the flame arises - clean, clear, alive, young. Your whole life becomes a flame, and a flame without any smoke. That is what awareness is.
Osho A Sudden Clash of Thunder Chapter 1
Maturity
The distinction between the grasses and the blossoms is the same as
between you not knowing that you are a buddha, and the moment you know
that you are a buddha. In fact, there is no way to be otherwise.
Buddha is completely blossomed, fully opened. His lotuses, his petals,
have come to a completion.... Certainly, to be full of spring yourself
is far more beautiful than the autumn dew falling on the lotus leaves.
That is one of the most beautiful things to watch: when autumn dew
falls on the lotus leaves and shine in the morning sun like real
pearls. But of course it is a momentary experience. As the sun rises,
the autumn dew starts evaporating.... This temporary beauty cannot be
compared, certainly, with an eternal spring in your being. You look
back as far as you can and it has always been there. You look forward
as much as you can, and you will be surprised: it is your very being.
Wherever you are it will be there, and the flowers will continue to
shower on you. This is spiritual spring.
Osho No Mind: The Flowers of Eternity Chapter 5
Fighting
One moment it was there, another moment it is gone. One moment we are
here, and another moment we have gone. And for this simple moment, how
much fuss we make! How much violence, ambition, struggle, conflict,
anger, hatred, just for this small moment! Just waiting for the train
in a waiting room on a station, and creating so much fuss: fighting,
hurting each other, trying to possess, trying to boss, trying to
dominate - all that politics. And then the train comes and you are
gone forever.
Osho Take it Easy, Volume 1 Chapter 13
Creativity
Creativity is the quality that you bring to the activity that you are
doing. It is an attitude, an inner approach - how you look at
things....
Not everybody can be a painter - and there is no need also. If
everybody is a painter the world will be very ugly; it will be
difficult to live! And not everybody can be a dancer, and there is no
need. But everybody can be creative.
Whatsoever you do, if you do it joyfully, if you do it lovingly, if
your act of doing is not purely economical, then it is creative. If
you have something growing out of it within you, if it gives you
growth, it is spiritual, it is creative, it is divine. You become more
divine as you become more creative.
All the religions of the world have said God is the creator. I don't
know whether he is the creator or not, but one thing I know: the more
creative you become, the more godly you become. When your creativity
comes to a climax, when your whole life becomes creative, you live in
God. So he must be the creator because people who have been creative
have been closest to him. Love what you do. Be meditative while you
Sorrow
This pain is not to make you sad, remember. That's where people go on
missing.... This pain is just to make you more alert--because people
become alert only when the arrow goes deep into their heart and wounds
them. Otherwise they don't become alert. When life is easy,
comfortable, convenient, who cares? Who bothers to become alert? When
a friend dies, there is a possibility. When your woman leaves you
alone--those dark nights, you are lonely. You have loved that woman so
much and you have staked all, and then suddenly one day she is gone.
Crying in your loneliness, those are the occasions when, if you use
them, you can become aware. The arrow is hurting: it can be used. The
pain is not to make you miserable, the pain is to make you more aware!
And when you are aware, misery disappears.
Osho Take it Easy, Volume 2 Chapter 12
Existence
You are not accidental. Existence needs you. Without you something will be missing in existence and nobody can replace it. That's what gives you dignity, that the whole existence will miss you. The stars and sun and moon, the trees and birds and earth - everything in the universe will feel a small place is vacant which cannot be filled by anybody except you.
This gives you a tremendous joy, a fulfillment that you are related to existence, and existence cares for you. Once you are clean and clear, you can see tremendous love falling on you from all dimensions.
Osho God is Dead: Now Zen is the Only Living Truth Chapter 1
Breakthrough
To transform breakdowns into breakthroughs is the whole function of a master. The psychotherapist simply patches you up. That is his function. He is not there to transform you. You need a meta-psychology, the psychology of the buddhas.
It is the greatest adventure in life to go through a breakdown consciously. It is the greatest risk because there is no guarantee that the breakdown will become a breakthrough. It does become, but these things cannot be guaranteed. Your chaos is very ancient - for many, many lives you have been in chaos. It is thick and dense. It is almost a universe in itself. So when you enter into it with your small capacity, of course there is danger. But without facing this danger nobody has ever become integrated, nobody has ever become an individual, indivisible.
Zen, or meditation, is the method which will help you to go through the chaos, through the dark night of the soul, balanced, disciplined, alert. The dawn is not far away, but before you can reach the dawn, the dark night has to be passed through. And as the dawn comes closer, the night will become darker.
Osho Walking in Zen, Sitting in Zen Chapter 1
Transformation
A master in Zen is not simply a teacher. In all the religions there are only teachers. They teach you about subjects which you don't know, and they ask you to believe because there is no way to bring those experiences into objective reality. Neither has the teacher known them - he has believed them; he transfers his belief to somebody else.
Zen is not a believer's world. It is not for the faithful ones; it is for those daring souls who can drop all belief, unbelief, doubt, reason, mind, and simply enter into their pure existence without boundaries. But it brings a tremendous transformation.
Hence, let me say that while others are involved in philosophies, Zen is involved in metamorphosis, in a transformation. It is authentic alchemy: it changes you from base metal into gold. But its language has to be understood, not with your reasoning and intellectual mind but with your loving heart. Or even just listening, not bothering whether it is true or not. And a moment comes suddenly that you see it, which has been eluding you your whole life. Suddenly, what Gautam Buddha called "eighty-four thousand doors" open.
Osho Zen: The Solitary Bird, Cuckoo of the Forest Chapter 6
The Creator
There are two types of creators in the world. One type of creator works with objects - a poet, a painter, they work with objects, they create things. The other type of creator, the mystic, creates himself. He doesn't work with objects, he works with the subject; he works on himself, his own being. And he is the real creator, the real poet, because he makes himself into a masterpiece.
You are carrying a masterpiece hidden within you, but you are standing in the way. Just move aside, then the masterpiece will be revealed. Everyone is a masterpiece, because God never gives birth to anything less than that. Everyone carries that masterpiece hidden for many lives, no knowing who they are and just trying on the surface to become someone.
Drop the idea of becoming someone, because you are already a masterpiece. You cannot be improved. You have only to come to it, to know it, to realize it. God himself has created you; you cannot be improved.
Osho Ah, This! Chapter 1
Participation
Have you ever seen night going? Very few people even become aware of
things which are happening every day. Have you ever seen the evening
coming? The midnight and its song? The sunrise and its beauty?
We are behaving almost like blind people. In such a beautiful world we
are living in small ponds of our own misery. It is familiar, so even
if somebody wants to pull you out, you struggle. You don't want to be
pulled out of your misery, of your suffering. Otherwise there is so
much joy all around, you have just to be aware of it and to become a
participant, not a spectator.
Philosophy is speculation, Zen is participation. Participate in the
night leaving, participate in the evening coming, participate in the
stars and participate in the clouds; make participation your lifestyle
and the whole existence becomes such a joy, such an ecstasy. You could
not have dreamed of a better universe.
Osho Zen: The Miracle Chapter 2
Politics
Anybody who can be a good pretender, a hypocrite, will become your
leader politically, will become your priest religiously. All that he
needs is hypocrisy, all that he needs is cunningness, all that he
needs is a facade to hide behind. Your politicians live double lives,
your priests live double lives--one from the front door, the other
from the back door. And the back-door life is their real life. Those
front-door smiles are just false, those faces looking so innocent are
just cultivated. If you want to see the reality of the politician you
will have to see him from his back door. There he is in his nudity, as
he is, and so is the priest. These two kinds of cunning people have
dominated humanity. And they found out very early on that if you want
to dominate humanity, make it weak, make it feel guilty, make it feel
unworthy. Destroy its dignity, take all glory away from it, humiliate
it. And they have found such subtle ways of humiliation that they
don't come in the picture at all; they leave it to you to humiliate
yourself, to destroy yourself. They have taught you a kind of slow
suicide.
The Rebel
People are afraid, very much afraid of those who know themselves. They have a certain power, a certain aura and a certain magnetism, a charisma that can take out alive, young people from the traditional imprisonment....
The enlightened man cannot be enslaved - that is the difficulty - and he cannot be imprisoned.... Every genius who has known something of the inner is bound to be a little difficult to be absorbed; he is going to be an upsetting force. The masses don't want to be disturbed, even though they may be in misery; they are in misery, but they are accustomed to the misery. And anybody who is not miserable looks like a stranger.
The enlightened man is the greatest stranger in the world; he does not seem to belong to anybody. No organization confines him, no community, no society, no nation.
Osho The Zen Manifesto: Freedom from Oneself Chapter 9
Morality
Bodhidharma ... far transcends moralists, puritans, so-called good
people, do-gooders. He has touched the very rock bottom of the
problem. Unless awareness arises in you, all your morality is bogus,
all your culture is simply a thin layer which can be destroyed by
anybody. But once your morality has come out of your awareness, not
out of a certain discipline, then it is a totally different matter.
Then you will respond in every situation out of your awareness. And
whatever you do will be good.
Awareness cannot do anything that is bad. That is the ultimate beauty
of awareness, that anything that comes out of it is simply beautiful,
is simply right, and without any effort and without any practice. So
rather than cutting the leaves and the branches, cut the root. And to
cut the root there is no other method than a single method: the method
of being alert, of being aware, of being conscious.
Osho Bodhidharma, The Greatest Zen Master Chapter 15
Innocence
Zen says that if you drop knowledge - and within knowledge everything is included; your name, your identity, everything, because this has been given to you by others - if you drop all that has been given by others, you will have a totally different quality to your being: innocence. This will be a crucifixion of the persona, the personality, and there will be a resurrection of your innocence. You will become a child again, reborn.
Osho Dang Dang Doko Dang Chapter7
Celebration
Life is a moment to celebrate, to enjoy. Make it fun, a celebration,
and then you will enter the temple. The temple is not for the
long-faced, it has never been for them. Look at life--do you see
sadness anywhere? Have you ever seen a tree depressed? Have you seen a
bird anxiety-ridden? Have you seen an animal neurotic? No, life is not
like that, not at all. Only man has gone wrong somewhere, and he has
gone wrong somewhere because he thinks himself to be very wise, very
clever. Your cleverness is your disease. Don't be too wise. Always
remember to stop; don't go to the extreme. A little foolishness and a
little wisdom is good, and the right combination makes you a buddha.
Osho I Celebrate Myself Chapter 4
Aloneness
When you are alone you are not alone, you are simply lonely - and there is a tremendous difference between loneliness and aloneness. When you are lonely you are thinking of the other, you are missing the other.
Loneliness is a negative state. You are feeling that it would have been better if the other were there - your friend, your wife, your mother, your beloved, your husband. It would have been good if the other were there, but the other is not. Loneliness is absence of the other.
Aloneness is the presence of oneself. Aloneness is very positive. It is a presence, overflowing presence. You are so full of presence that you can fill the whole universe with your presence and there is no need for anybody.
Osho The Discipline of Transcendence, Volume 1 Chapter 2
Integration
The conflict is in man. Unless it is resolved there, it cannot be resolved anywhere else. The politics is within you; it is between the two parts of the mind. A very small bridge exists. If that bridge is broken through some accident, through some physiological defect or something else, the person becomes split, the person becomes two persons and the phenomenon of schizophrenia or split personality happens.
If the bridge is broken - and the bridge is very fragile - then you become two, you behave like two persons. In the morning you are very loving, very beautiful; in the evening you are very angry, absolutely different. You don't remember your morning...how can you remember? Another mind was functioning - and the person becomes two persons. If this bridge is strengthened so much that the two minds disappear as two and become one, then integration, then crystallization, arises.
What George Gurdjieff used to call the crystallization of being is nothing but these two minds becoming one, the meeting of the male and the female within, the meeting of yin and yang, the meeting of the left and right, the meeting of logic and illogic, the meeting of Plato and Aristotle.
Osho Ancient Music in the Pines Chapter 1
Comparision
Comparison brings inferiority, superiority. When you don't compare, all inferiority, all superiority, disappears. Then you are, you are simply there. A small bush or a big high tree--it doesn't matter; you are yourself. You are needed. A grass leaf is needed as much as the biggest star. Without the grass leaf God will be less than he is. This sound of the cuckoo is needed as much as any Buddha; the world will be less, will be less rich if this cuckoo disappears. Just look around. All is needed, and everything fits together. It is an organic unity: nobody is higher and nobody is lower, nobody superior, nobody inferior. Everybody is incomparably unique.
Osho The Sun Rises in the Evening Chapter 4
Exhaustion
A man who lives through conscience becomes hard. A man who lives
through consciousness remains soft. Why?--because a man who has some
ideas about how to live, naturally becomes hard. He has continuously
to carry his character around himself. That character is like an
armor; his protection, his security; his whole life is invested in
that character. And he always reacts to situations through the
character, not directly. If you ask him a question, his answer is
ready-made. That is the sign of a hard person--he is dull, stupid,
mechanical. He may be a good computer, but he is not a man. You do
something and he reacts in a well- established way. His reaction is
predictable; he is a robot. The real man acts spontaneously. If you
ask him a question, your question gets a response, not a reaction. He
opens his heart to your question, exposes himself to your question,
responds to it....
Osho Take it Easy, Volume 1 Chapter 13
Awareness
Mind can never be intelligent - only no-mind is intelligent. Only
no-mind is original and radical. Only no-mind is revolutionary -
revolution in action.
This mind gives you a sort of stupor. Burdened by the memories of the
past, burdened by the projections of the future, you go on living - at
the minimum. You don't live at the maximum. Your flame remains very
dim.
Once you start dropping thoughts, the dust that you have collected in
the past, the flame arises - clean, clear, alive, young. Your whole
life becomes a flame, and a flame without any smoke. That is what
awareness is.
Osho A Sudden Clash of Thunder Chapter 1
We Are The World
When thousands and thousands of people around the earth are
celebrating, singing, dancing, ecstatic, drunk with the divine, there
is no possibility of any global suicide. With such festivity and with
such laughter, with such sanity and health, with such naturalness and
spontaneity, how can there be a war?... Life has been given to you to
create, and to rejoice, and to celebrate. When you cry and weep, when
you are miserable, you are alone. When you celebrate, the whole
existence participates with you. Only in celebration do we meet the
ultimate, the eternal. Only in celebration do we go beyond the circle
of birth and death.
Osho I Celebrate Myself Chapter 4
Mind
This is the situation of your head: I see cycle-handles and pedals and
strange things that you have gathered from everywhere. Such a small
head...and no space to live in! And that rubbish goes on moving in
your head; your head goes on spinning and weaving - it keeps you
occupied.
Just think what kind of thoughts go on inside your mind. One day just
sit, close your doors, and write down for half an hour whatsoever is
passing in your mind, and you will understand what I mean and you will
be surprised what goes on inside your mind. It remains in the
background, it is constantly there, it surrounds you like a cloud.
With this cloud you cannot know reality; you cannot attain to
spiritual perception.
This cloud has to be dropped. And it is just with your decision to
drop it that it will disappear. You are clinging to it - the cloud is
not interested in you, remember it.
Osho The Sun Rises in the Evening Chapter 9
We Are The World
When thousands and thousands of people around the earth are celebrating, singing, dancing, ecstatic, drunk with the divine, there is no possibility of any global suicide. With such festivity and with such laughter, with such sanity and health, with such naturalness and spontaneity, how can there be a war?... Life has been given to you to create, and to rejoice, and to celebrate. When you cry and weep, when you are miserable, you are alone. When you celebrate, the whole existence participates with you. Only in celebration do we meet the ultimate, the eternal. Only in celebration do we go beyond the circle of birth and death.
Osho I Celebrate Myself Chapter 4
The Fool
A fool is one who goes on trusting; a fool is one who goes on trusting
against all his experience. You deceive him, and he trusts you; and
you deceive him again, and he trusts you; and you deceive him again,
and he trusts you. Then you will say that he is a fool, he does not
learn. His trust is tremendous; his trust is so pure that nobody can
corrupt it.
Be a fool in the Taoist sense, in the Zen sense. Don´t try to create a
wall of knowledge around you. Whatsoever experience comes to you, let
it happen, and then go on dropping it. Go on cleaning your mind
continuously; go on dying to the past so you remain in the present,
herenow, as if just born, just a babe.
In the beginning it is going to be very difficult. The world will
start taking advantage of you...let them. They are poor fellows. Even
if you are cheated and deceived and robbed, let it happen, because
that which is really yours cannot be robbed from you, that which is
really yours nobody can steal from you.
And each time you don´t allow situations to corrupt you, that
opportunity will become an integration inside. Your soul will become
more crystallized.
Osho Dang Dang Doko Dang Chapter 2
Adventure
Zen says truth has nothing to do with authority, truth has nothing to
do with tradition, truth has nothing to do with the past - truth is a
radical, personal realization. You have to come to it.
Knowledge is certain; the search for personal knowing is very, very
hazardous. Nobody can guarantee it. If you ask me if I can guarantee
anything, I say I cannot guarantee you anything. I can only guarantee
danger, that much is certain. I can only guarantee you a long
adventure with every possibility of going astray and never reaching
the goal. But one thing is certain: the very search will help you to
grow.
I can guarantee only growth. Danger will be there, sacrifice will be
there; you will be moving every day into the unknown, into the
uncharted, and there will be no map to follow, no guide to follow.
Yes, there are millions of dangers and you can go astray and you can
get lost, but that is the only way one grows.
Insecurity is the only way to grow, to face danger is the only way to
grow, to accept the challenge of the unknown is the only way to grow.
The Source
Zen asks you to come out of the head and go to the basic source.... It is not that Zen is not aware of the uses of energy in the head, but if all the energy is used in the head, you will never become aware of your eternity.... You will never know as an experience what it is to be one with the whole. When the energy is just at the center, pulsating, when it is not moving anywhere, neither in the head nor in the heart, but it is at the very source from where the heart takes it, the head takes it, pulsating at the very source--that is the very meaning of Zazen. Zazen means just sitting at the very source, not moving anywhere, a tremendous force arises, a transformation of energy into light and love, into greater life, into compassion, into creativity. It can take many forms. But first you have to learn how to be at the source. Then the source will decide where your potential is. You can relax at the source, and it will take you to your very potential.
Osho The Zen Manifesto: Freedom from Oneself Chapter 11
Abundance
In the East people have condemned the body, condemned matter, called matter "illusory," maya - it does not really exist, it only appears to exist; it is made of the same stuff as dreams are made of. They denied the world, and that is the reason for the East remaining poor, sick, in starvation.
Half of humanity has been accepting the inner world but denying the outer world. The other half of humanity has been accepting the material world and denying the inner world. Both are half, and no man who is half can be contented. You have to be whole: rich in the body, rich in science; rich in meditation, rich in consciousness. Only a whole person is a holy person, according to me.
I want Zorba and Buddha to meet together. Zorba alone is hollow. His dance has not an eternal significance, it is momentary pleasure. Soon he will be tired of it. Unless you have inexhaustible sources, available to you from the cosmos itself...unless you become existential, you cannot become whole. This is my contribution to humanity: the whole person.
Osho Communism and Zen Fire, Zen Wind Chapter 2
