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‌CHAPTER 22

22 February 1977 pm in Chuang Tzu Auditorium

Deva means god, the divine element – not exactly god, but godly. God is more of an energy than a person, so in the east, rather than saying that god exists, we have been saying that the world is divine. God is not a separate element from the world but is its intrinsic quality, an inner presence – not somebody who has created the world and then either has forgotten all about it or is no more interested, or has become interested in some other projects.

In the east we have not looked at god as a creator but as creativity – and that is far deeper. So god is immanent. In each fibre of existence, in each wave, in each ripple of life, he is there. That is the meaning of deva: the divineness.

It is the human will that creates disturbance, interference. When this will is completely gone, there is harmony. Mm? that’s what Lao Tzu calls ‘tao’.

When the person has lost his will and has dissolved himself into the universal will, he has fallen in harmony with tao.

And anupada means one who is following that divineness very closely, who has no will of his own, who drops his will, becomes a deep let-go and allows god to do whatsoever he wants to do with his being – or if he wants not to do anything, that too is perfectly good. If something happens, good; if nothing happens, good.

Whatsoever is, is good. There is no hankering, no planning, no projection of any desire on one’s own part. One is simply surrendered. That is the meaning of anupada – following so closely that one has no will to go anywhere else. Wherever god leads, one goes. If he stops, one stops; if he runs, one runs; if he walks slowly, one walks slowly. The exact literal meaning of anupada is ‘just as the shadow follows you’.

If you run, the shadow runs; if you stop, the shadow stops. If you walk slowly, the shadow walks slowly; if you sway, the shadow sways. If you dance, the shadow dances – the shadow has no will of its own; it simply follows you.

When a man starts following god in the same way as the shadow follows you, he has become an anupada.

So this is going to be your work – that you have to by and by drop your own will. The more your will disappears, the more you will find that a higher will has entered in you. And you will start living a totally different quality of life, tremendously beautiful and blissful.

Deva means divine, anuprabha means glow, luminosity, light – divine glow. And you have to get in tune with this idea of luminosity. Start thinking about yourself as if deep down in the heart a small flame is burning and the light is spreading. Your whole body is full of light, and not only that, light is oozing out around your body and creating a glow. Sitting silently in the night in your bed, imagine it for ten minutes and then go to sleep.

Do this every night and soon you will start feeling a great peace surrounding your body – light and peace, and a subtle fragrance that you have never known before. This will become by and by a very natural thing.

Deva means divine, anurati means in love – in love with the divine.

This is just the beginning... much has to be done. Life is a great adventure – one should not simply waste it. One can go to such heights – unimaginable, incredible heights – but people go on crawling on the earth; they have completely forgotten that they have wings. They have completely forgotten that they were never meant to just crawl on the earth.

By giving you this name I am reminding you about your wings. Unless one falls in love with god, one is never really satisfied. You can feel in love a thousand and one times, but unless you fall in love with god nothing is going to satisfy. Each love will simply make you more thirsty for god. Each love will simply push you ahead into the journey for the eternal. Each love will become a stepping-stone... and that’s how it should be.

Love should not become a bondage – it should become a stepping-stone. If you love a man, you should love him so deeply that his man-part almost disappears from your vision and his god-part is revealed. If you love a woman, the woman-part, the circumference, should disappear; at the centre should be god.

So whatsoever is your love, let each love be the shrine of god, and sooner or later you will start finding great experiences coming to you... out of the blue, uninvited. You don’t know from where they come but they suddenly come like lightning. All darkness disappears and one feels perfectly at home.

In the beginning these will be just moments: they will come and go, and again the darkness – even darker than before, because now you will have the comparison and the contrast, but they will be coming more and more.

If one can go on deeply looking for god through all one’s love affairs in life, these moments will be coming automatically; their gap will be reduced to small intervals.

One day it happens that the darkness has really completely disappeared. Then the whole existence becomes your love-object. Then you love the trees and the rivers and the dogs, men and women and the stars. In fact, you don’t make any distinction then of who is who – you simply go on loving and sharing.

This man – who loves unconditionally, who simply loves – is a holy man, because he knows that whomsoever you love, you always love god. All love is directed towards god. Whatsoever the address, all love letters reach him. That is the meaning of your name... remember it!

Deva means divine, anuvida means ‘who really knows’ – one who really knows god. To know about god is not to really know. To really know him means not to know through somebody else but to know directly, immediately. Unless it is your experience, it is not real knowledge.

False knowledge is more dangerous than ignorance, because at least ignorance is innocent ... at least ignorance is yours. Knowledge is borrowed. So a person who goes on borrowing from others, by and by completely forgets that he does not know and starts thinking that he knows. That is the plight that the whole humanity is in.

So this is my suggestion through the name – that all that you know about god, forget; it has nothing to do with knowing – and start from abc, from the very beginning.

First, unlearn whatsoever you know about god. Be empty, a clean slate – not knowing at all, only knowing this much: ‘I don’t know.’ Then there comes a great revolution. Out of this innocence, real knowledge is born. To know that one does not know is the first step towards real knowledge.

That is what the word ‘anuvida’ means: one who really knows... one whose knowledge is not second-hand, one whose knowledge is first-hand. It is not that he knows through somebody else’s testimony, but he himself is a witness.

Never be satisfied unless you have come to know. All else is pseudo and very dangerous, because one can get deceived by it. So make it very clear in your mind – whatsoever is learned is useless... at least about the inner world. It is not true about the outer world. Whatsoever you know about science is second-hand. It is good – it can be used. But anything about the inner world should not be second-hand. It should be first-hand, fresh and virgin. Once this is understood, things start changing.

To understand the false as the false is to begin the journey for the real.

[A sannyasin, who is a talented professional ventriloquist, says: I feel everything in my back. Sometimes when there are a lot of vibrations, it hurts me so much that I have to lie down... but everything comes from my back.

Osho checks his energy.]

It is something very valuable, and you should not start thinking about it, because thinking can become a sort of repression. Simply allow it.

The backbone is the channel of all energies. On one end is the sexual energy and its conservation, a reservoir of sexual energy – just at the lowest end – on the topmost is what hindus call ‘sahasrar’, the ultimate flowering of energy.

The backbone functions as a channel, so the energy comes up to the middle and there it has started being accumulated – that is the point from where you feel it coming to you. But good! – it is exactly in the middle, and that’s a very good experience. By and by it will shift upwards; but don’t think about it, because thinking can become a sort of repression.

Don’t analyse it – enjoy it. Don’t analyse it – fall in tune with it... be ‘en rapport’ with it. When you feel it is there, you feel the vibe and it is coming, simply close your eyes and sway.

Let it be a dance of energy, and you will feel by and by that the centre will go higher and higher. Then it will come to your neck... and then it will come to your head. When it comes to the head it is an incredible experience. From there is the door through which one goes beyond, one goes into god.

So simply allow it, and not only allow, but welcome, receive it with joy. If you think, you receive it with suspicion. Thinking has a doubt element in it. When you analyse, you are antagonistic – you dissect like a surgeon. Then you kill it, because this is an energy which cannot be dissected, cannot be diagnosed. One has to be ‘en rapport’ with it.

So whenever you feel it, just go into it – close your eyes, forget everything. Become that point – feel that you are being dominated by it... you are completely possessed by it. Now you are no more in control, it is in control. And let it do things. Sometimes you may feel like standing... sometimes you may feel like your hands are being pulled up – allow it!

That’s what is used as a meditation technique in a particular school called ‘subud’ – they call it ‘latihan’. It is latihan functioning through you. Sometimes you will feel like making gestures, movements, jumping, dancing, jogging – allow it!

By and by you will see it is going higher. And as it goes higher, you will feel everything in your life going higher, because whatsoever the point of the energy is, everything in life comes to that point – your love, your art, your intelligence, your awareness, your morality; everything will go up.

Once this energy goes higher, it takes everything with it. But something beautiful is happening.

The mind can become frightened, because once the mind loses the control it starts becoming frightened. It does not want to give the control to anybody else – and this is something which will happen from the beyond; you will not be in control.

Once it has reached the head, everything will subside. A great quietude and silence will descend. So simply allow it... receive it with great gratitude. And make it a point, whenever it is happening, to go into it just for fifteen minutes.

Or you can make it an everyday point, in the night before you go to sleep, for fifteen minutes just stand in the room, loose, relaxed. Wait for it... invite it, provoke it. You can actually provoke it – you can say, ‘Now I am ready – come!’

[A sannyasin describes an experience he had at a full-moon party when his mind became clear and he saw that people are in difficulty. He wanted to make himself useful, but he closed up again.]

No, you cannot do anything about it. You cannot retain it... you cannot bring it. Whenever it comes it comes, and whenever it goes it goes. One has to simply be a host to it. When the guest comes, be a host – when the guest goes, say good-bye.

You cannot do anything about it. It has nothing to do with your doing – it is a natural phenomenon. And on the full moon night, sometimes it starts. That is the night when it starts.

The full-moon night has a very alchemical impact on the human consciousness. Buddha became enlightened on the full-moon night – not only that, he was born on the same full moon night, he became enlightened on the same full-moon night, he died on the same full moon. His birthday, his death day, his enlightenment day, all fall on one day – the full-moon night... the same month, the same night.

The full moon has tremendous importance, so just do one thing: you can remain available, that’s all. If it happens, good; if it doesn’t happen don’t feel worried about it.

Next time again you try – when the full-moon night comes, start at least five days before, sitting in the night, just waiting. Wait one hour every night for five days, then the full moon will come. That night wait for at least two, three hours – not that you have to do anything: you are just there, available.

If it happens, you are ready; if it doesn’t happen, nothing to be worried about. If it doesn’t happen don’t feel frustrated, because it has nothing to do with your doing. If it happens, don’t feel that you have done a great thing, otherwise it will never happen again. If it happens, feel grateful; if it doesn’t happen, simply wait again.

Each full-moon night start waiting. It will be coming more and more and it will be staying more and more. And when it comes, don’t try to control it. Don’t try to be in that state a little longer; don’t bring desire in, because those are all disturbances and they poison the whole thing. It is a door of the beyond. Just start waiting for it... waiting but with tremendous patience, with no hurry. Don’t try to drag it.

It is beyond human control but one can manage to invite it in a very indirect way. Take a bath, sing a song, sit silently in the night – wait for it. Sway with the moon, look at the moon, feel full with the moon... feel the moon showering on you, dance a little, sit again, wait.

Let the full-moon night become your particular night for meditation – it will be helpful.

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