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‌CHAPTER 2

20 September 1976 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

[A sannyasin says: I choose to be on my own to work, but then when I am alone I can’t bear it. I’m just tension and terror.

I’ve struggled for so many years with my neurosis, trying to survive, trying to make creative use of it – and everything’s gone.]

Your problem is that you don’t have any problems – you create them. You have got into the habit of creating them – and you enjoy them. This is the problem: if one starts enjoying problems, it is very difficult to get out because you have much investment in them. Otherwise you can get out right this moment. Not for a single moment do you need to wait, because they are your created problems.

There are people who have real problems, there are people who have imaginary problems. Your problems are imagination. There is nothing wrong in their being imagination. You are an imaginative person, a creative person. You not only write novels – you have created a novel around you. It is just a fiction – all your problems are just fictitious, because I can see that your energy is absolutely pure; there is no problem at all. So in a way it is very simple to get out of them; in a way it is very difficult. If there is a problem, something can be done. But there is no problem so nothing can be done. You will have to get out of it.

[She asks: How?]

There is no question of how. Don’t create them! What happens is that the mind gets into a double- bind. For example if a person is negative, he suffers. But by being negative, he enjoys a few things that a positive person cannot enjoy. For example a negative person will be thought to be very intelligent. A positive person will not be thought to be very intelligent because the positive person

will not criticise anybody. The positive person will look shallow, and the negative person will look very deep.

So if you become negative, you suffer – but there is some pay-off, and that is that people think you are very critical, very intelligent, very logical, this and that – and all nonsense! You suffer inside, but you cannot lose this profit that comes out of negativity. All critical people suffer, but they become great leaders, they become great thinkers. They suffer, they want to get out of their suffering, but they don’t want to drop that profit that comes out of being negative.

I looked into your diary. (She had recently submitted to Osho a journal she had been keeping of her experiences here.) It is absolutely negative, and it seems that you enjoy it and you have sharpened the faculty of being negative. So you have to understand it. To suffer for such foolish things – that people will say that you are very critical and very intelligent – is absurd, because you are suffering.

In India it happens that ascetics are worshipped very much; so many people are ready to fast, to destroy their bodies. They suffer very much, they suffer a thousand and one types of inconveni- ences, but still the investment is there, because people worship them – and they worship them only because of these things – so they continue.

Jaina monks used to come to me and they would say, ‘We are in deep misery. What to do? How to get out of it?’ And I would say that it is difficult to get out of it because that is their very trade, their very business. Their being miserable is worshipped. If they start enjoying and become joyous like ordinary human beings, nobody will think that they are mahatmas, saints – nobody. They are saints only because they are miserable. Their whole saintlihood depends on their misery. They have wasted their lives through a wrong attitude.

Look at this: if you are a mischief-maker, you will become famous. You will suffer very much – because a person who creates mischief for others cannot remain in silence and peace; it is impossible. But if you are a mischief-maker, people will talk about you; you will become famous. world famous. What is the fame of an Adolf Hitler? He was a mischief-maker. He was ill-famed, but he had created so much trouble in the world that you had to pay attention. Now, if Adolf Hitler had not been a mischief-maker, had lived a happy life, nobody would ever have known about him.

So this is my feeling – that the ego has a deep investment in negativity, in mischief-making, misery, suffering. The ego cannot exist without creating a hell around it. The ego is an island in the ocean of hell. You want to get rid of the hell but you don’t want to get rid of that island. Then there is trouble.

Just become ordinary. There is no need to be special... it is there. There is no need to be special. All special people suffer. They may be politicians, they may be writers, painters or whatsoever, but all people who in some way try to be extraordinary, suffer. Only ordinary people are happy – but nobody talks about them, that is true.

People talk about a Van Gogh – and he suffered, he simply suffered. You cannot find a more miserable man than Van Gogh. The few years that he lived were a constant hell – and then he committed suicide – but he is talked about even still: he is still a contemporary. Books are being written about him and his paintings are praised like anything – but nobody looks at what happened to this man.

Nietzsche is still praised, discussed, books are written about him – but what happened to this man? Not a single moment of bliss. Always in an immense torture, terrible torture... and finally went mad. Just look! Up to now the whole history has been made by wrong people, and I think that is going to be so always. Right people cannot make history. Right people in fact don’t have any biography. If you are wrong, you have a biography. If you are simply happy, you have no story about you.

People say that no news is good news and bad news is good news. Somehow the whole humanity suffers a great calamity – of masochism, sadism. Nobody is interested if you go on the street and you give a flower to somebody; nobody will talk about it, no newspaper will print anything about it – it will remain out of the record. But go and kill a person and you become instantly famous! If you simply sit and sing and dance, and you are happy alone, nobody bothers about you. Commit suicide and you are the topmost news. It is an ill state of affairs.

My whole teaching is to just be ordinary. And in being ordinary you will be extraordinarily happy.

You have tremendous energy, and once it is taken away from this miserable state, much creation will happen. JuSt a few days before somebody asked a question – that if people become happy and healthy, what will happen to creativity, because only un-happy people seem to be creative. A Van Gogh, a Nietzsche, a Picasso – only unhappy people seem to be creative. Buddha has not painted, Mahavir has not composed a symphony – only unhappy people seem to be creative. What will happen to creativity?

The question is pertinent. I understand what he means. But Buddha has created something which is very invisible. He has not created a painting on a canvas. He created a painting on the universe itself, and those who have eyes can still be thrilled by it, en-chanted by it... can still be transformed by it. He created an energy-field which is still alive. But that work is so hard. It is not gross.

Mahavir has composed a symphony – not a symphony that can be heard, but a symphony that remains unheard and which can be heard only when your ears have a clarity, when they are not burdened by anything else.

When you are transparent, when you are mirror-like, the unheard is heard and the unseen is seen. The unknown becomes known.

The positive and healthy person also creates, but his creativity is very subtle. The unhealthy and ill person creates; his creativity is very gross, but it is like a dagger – it hurts and it makes people aware that something is happening. A flower simply flowers and withers away by the evening – unknown, unheard; a flower is not like a knife. Unless you are really looking for it, you will not look at it. Unless you are really looking for it, you may bypass it. A flower is there, but is not aggressive – a knife is aggressive. Whether you are looking for it or not, it will force you to look at it. That’s why negativity becomes a foundation for the ego so much.

Simply drop it, and don’t ask how, because the ‘how’ is a trick. What I am saying is that you have no problem. So just start, from this very moment, to live without problems – and see. Just from this very moment start living without any problems, and when problems come, simply remember that Osho says, ‘There are no problems.’ Again you may be getting into an old habit, just an old habit. Just remember it, and within a few days you will become aware that there are no problems; they were all created.

You go on playing with your old wounds so that they don’t heal. Stop it! And just be ordinary! There is no point in being anything else. God is very ordinary – that may be the reason why nothing is heard about Him, anywhere. He does not make even a ripple. He is simply here. He never interferes, never trespasses. He never takes any initiative. He is simply there.

Just be very ordinary. Drop this image that you carry with you. Start enjoying. Don’t wait to learn how to en joy. When people are dancing, dance. When people are singing, sing. Without any preparation, start celebrating. If you ask for preparation, if you ask for ‘how’, you will never celebrate. There is no need – everything is ready. From this very moment, try for three weeks without any ‘how’ – just celebrate, enjoy. It will be difficult because it will go against the grain. It will be difficult because it will look ridiculous. It will be difficult because you will ask yourself, ‘What are you doing? Are you a fool? Laughing like a fool?’

Just today I was reading a story. A man who used to work as a joker, as a fool in a circus, got tired of the whole game. He was bored, so he entered a monastery, became a sannyasin. But they were very serious people and he had never known any seriousness. He had lived out of humour, and there he was a misfit. He could not laugh, he could not dance, he could not hop and jog and make people laugh. They were serious, sombre people, long faces, great saints and monks and very ascetic – so he was out of his element. He could not believe it. What to do? How to pray? How to meditate? He was simply a man who could laugh and who could help people to laugh.

For a few days he suffered very much in the monastery. Then he found a small temple in the monastery, far away in a corner. Nobody used to visit it, so he went there. There was a Buddha statue, so he talked to Buddha, saying, ‘Help me. I am a fool and these people are all wise. I have worked my whole life as a fool, and now in the end it is very difficult to change my old habits. I feel you will understand me.’ He said to Buddha, ‘I cannot pray because I don’t know how to – and I don’t think I will ever be able to learn it. The seriousness of it is so much. I cannot meditate, so I will do whatsoever I can. If you enjoy, good. If you don’t enjoy, tolerate me.’

So before that statue of the Buddha he started dancing and doing things – his tricks that he used to do in the circus. He became very happy. The whole monastery was thinking that something had happened to the fool – he was so radiant. Every morning he would disappear, every evening he would disappear, so the head monk became curious. What had happened to this man – he had become almost luminous. What was he doing?

So one day they followed him. What was happening there the head monk could not believe, because the fool was talking to Buddha, joking, dancing and jumping and playing around. The head monk was simply aghast; he could not believe it.

Then the miracle happened. Whether it really happened or not, is not the point. The miracle happened that the statue of Buddha arose and, hand in hand with the fool, he started dancing and joking.

You have a very serious habit of the mind. You are just the reverse of that fool, and you have fallen into wrong company. You have a serious habit of looking at life – and this whole company is non- serious! I am against seriousness, so in contrast you feel very much difficulty. You have not been able yet to mix with the sannyasins, you are still aloof. You have a certain affinity with me but not with the sannyasins.

Start mixing. Forget your old past. Start mixing and playing and be a fool. That is going to be your prayer – and one day you will see that Buddha is dancing with you. Start from right this moment. I am not saying to prepare for it, to get ready for it – yoU are ready for it. Trust me – you are ready for it. Right from this moment, start jumping. When you go out, go happy.

For three weeks you celebrate and then you tell me... I don’t see that there is any problem. Your problem is that you want problems. Good.

[A sannyasin who is leaving says: I feel that you can look through me totally and if I need any advice, you will give it to me.

Osho checks his energy.]

Open your eyes. A little effort towards prayer will be very helpful. And when I say prayer, I mean an openness towards God. Not that you have to say something, not that you have to ask something, but just an openness, so that if He wants to give something, you are available. A deep expectation, but with no desire – that’s what you need. Urgent expectancy – as if something is going to happen any moment. You are thrilled by the possibility of the unknown but you don’t have any desire. You don’t say that this should happen or that should not happen. Once you ask, prayer is corrupted.

When you don’t ask, when you simply remain in silence but open, ready to go anywhere, ready even to die, when you are simply in a receptivity, a passive, welcoming spirit, then prayer happens.

Prayer is not something that one can do – it has nothing to do with doing. It is not an action or an activity – it is a state of mind.

So every night before you go to sleep, just sit in your bed. This is exactly the posture that your energy has taken.

[The sannyasin was sitting, back erect, legs folded underneath him.]

In this posture, sit, close your eyes, and just wait for something unknown. If you wait for the known, then the mind functions, because the known means that which is already an experience; the known means the past. The known means that you want to repeat some thrill, some pleasure; it is a repetition. With the unknown, the mind is simply at a loss, because the unknown is simply out of the mind’s grasp.

Where the unknown begins, God begins. And once the unknown has become known, it is no more God. It has become the mind.

So one has to go on leaving the mind and moving into the unknown again and again. It is an eternal journey. So simply sit, wait for the unknown, and if something starts happening in your body energy, allow it. After a few days you will see tremendous happenings. You will not be able to believe what is happening. Don’t get scared, don’t be scared... allow it. You may feel jolts of energy, shocks of energy shaking your very foundation. You will feel a great trembling arising in you, a great shaking. And it will be coming from nowhere. You will see that you are not doing it. You will be able to see absolutely that you are not in your own control. Something has come and possessed you, something has descended upon you – you are no more yourself. A greater self has come in contact.

So don’t get scared at that moment. If you get scared, the contact is again broken. Not only that, if you get scared the contact will become more and more difficult to make again, because the fear will stand there. When the contact happens, the fear will come and you will be cut off; fear separates, cuts off.

So when this happens, be loving. These are the only two real emotions – fear and love. If you don’t love, you will be in fear. If you are in fear, you cannot love. If you love, fear is impossible. So when this is happening, love it. Pour your energy lovingly. Feel happy that a gift has descended upon you, that there is grace around you, that God has listened to you, that your prayer has been heard. You have not said anything, but it has been heard.

When you don’t say anything, it is always heard. When you speak, it is never heard. Words never reach God because they are not His language. His language is silence, utter silence. So in that utter silence lose all control, because control is of the mind. The control is of the ego and if ego is there, you are not in prayer.

If you are there, you are not in prayer. When you are not, prayer is. That’s why I call it a state, not an activity.

So every night for at least fifteen to twenty minutes, just sit this way, put the light off – darkness is beautiful. Just wait with great expectation, with throbbing expectation. Any moment something of tremendous value is going to happen but what it is you don’t know, nobody knows. And then if the body starts moving, allow it. Go wholeheartedly with it, the whole way.

Within three, four days, things will start happening, and by the third week you will be in a whirlpool of unknown energy. And when you see that the contact has happened, don’t do it for more than twenty minutes, because in the beginning it can be too much. The voltage can be too much, can be disruptive. So not more than twenty minutes – and then go to sleep.

Go into sleep in that very state of prayer. Just fall asleep and the energy will be there. You will be flowing with it, falling into sleep. That will help very greatly because then the energy will surround you the whole night and it will continue to work. By the morning you will feel more fresh than you have ever felt before, more vital than you have ever felt before. A new elan, a new life will start penetrating you, and the whole day you will feel full of new energy; a new vibe, a new song in your heart, and a new dance in your step.

So this is to be done while you are there – then come back. This prayer will prepare you.

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