GRATEFULNESS IS THE PATH TO BE TRANSFORMED.''OSHO''

 Be grateful to everyone, because everybody is creating a space for you to be transformed – even those who think they are obstructing you, even those whom you think are enemies. Your friends, your enemies, good people, and bad people, favorable circumstances, unfavorable circumstances – all together they are creating the context in which you can be transformed and become a buddha. 

Be grateful to all. To those who have helped, to those who have hindered, to those who have been indifferent. Be grateful to all, because all together they are creating the context in which Buddhas are born, in which you can become a buddha

LIFE SATISFACTION IS FINDING A CENTER .''OSHO''

Only with finding your center does that process stop, that wheel moves no more. Coming home to your center, all desiring disappears - you are utterly satisfied, and forever. It is not a momentary satisfaction. It is contentment, absolute contentment. Coming home inside yourself satisfies, really satisfies.

Without finding your center, there is no satisfaction possible. You can go on searching and you will find many things in life, but nothing is going to satisfy. Just a moment´s illusion when a desire is fulfilled. For a moment you feel good, but only for a moment. As one desire disappears, ten desires arise in its place. Again the whole turmoil starts, again the whole trip. And it is a non-ending process.

Everything else in life is promises, but only false promises. The goods are never delivered. Money promises that if you have it you will be helped. But people go on becoming richer and richer and happiness never arrives. It is always there like the horizon - very elusive. Relationships give you the idea that everything will be good now and you will live in happiness forever, but it never happens.

Only with finding your center, satisfaction happens.

INTELLIGENCE BLOSSOM IN COMFORT.''OSHO''

 My commune is a totally different phenomenon. It is neither an ashram, modern or ancient, nor a monastery, Christian or Mohammedan. My commune is, in the first place, non-ascetic.

It basically tries to destroy all psychological sicknesses in you – in which sado-masochist ideas are included. It teaches you to be healthy and not to feel guilty for being healthy. It teaches you to be human, because my experience is that people who have been trying to be divine have not become divine, but have fallen far lower than humans. They were trying to go up beyond humanity – yes, they have gone beyond humanity, but below it.

In the monasteries, people are almost animals, because the more you torture yourself, the more you start losing your intelligence; intelligence needs comfort. Intelligence is a very delicate flower. Don´t try to grow roses in the desert. Intelligence is a very delicate flower. It grows in luxury. It needs a luxurious ground, fertile, creative, full of juice; only then can it blossom. And without intelligence, what are you?

My effort is first to help your intelligence become a flame, and to help that flame to consume all that is not your authentic self. You become a fire and you burn everything that is rubbish, thrown by others onto you.

So first intelligence, and second meditation. Meditation comes out of intelligence – burning all crap from your being. Then you are pure, alone, just the way existence wants you to be

INTERNATIONAL MEDIA ON OSHO.

 "Osho advocated meditation for everyone, but his technique was revolutionary, beginning not with stillness and silence but with violent activity to release pent-up energy and emotions, leading to a state of calmness in which meditation can flourish. ...This is an ideal place for people to learn the dozens of meditations he designed. There's swimming meditation, dancing and martial arts meditation, smoking meditation, walking meditation, breathing meditation and meditation for couples."

Washington Post

"Remarkable books."
Nicholas Mosley, Daily Telegraph, UK

"He was a guru unencumbered by tradition, an enlightened master who could quote Heidegger, and Sartre, and who furthermore believed in technology, capitalism and sex..."
The Washington Post

"Osho continues publishing very good spiritual texts indeed. These on Zen are direct and whimsical. ...Osho has a no-mind to his comments, sudden bursts of insight, novel ways of putting together images so that you read in an enchanted wonder."
The Book Reader, USA

"Many subjects of interest to psycho-historians are taken up by (Osho) in this fascinating series of talks - from esoteric topics to more familiar subjects like sex, child rearing, and the place of mind in understanding the world."
The Journal of Psychohistory, USA

"Osho has a no-mind to his comments, sudden bursts of insight, novel ways of putting images together so that you read in enchanted wonder. Any spiritual teacher who has such bad publicity must be saying some wonderfully terrible things. Tune in."
The Book Reader, USA

"Osho is one of the most influential spiritual teachers of the second half of the 20th century and many thousands of people -- of all ages, from all countries and all spiritual backgrounds -- have been inspired by the simplicity and directness of his teachings."
Penguin Books

"In this volume on Bodhidharma, Osho brings him to modern sensibilities but in a contemporary and interesting manner. Nearly 400 fascinatingly intelligent pages of questions and answers, lectures, writings, etc. A revolutionary, contemporary, utterly irreverent way to the spirit."
The Book Reader, USA

"Irreverent, wise, humorous, crazy, and ultimately very sane."
The Book Reader, USA

"You just don't read Osho, you undefine yourself."
The Book Reader, USA

"Osho's position as an important mystic and philosopher is supported by an international following and a host of publications. His work is that of all great religious leaders-bringing God to man...Osho's lively appeal: jokes, limericks, verse, and tales combined with traditional religious themes."
Library Journal, USA

"In a language simple but yet profound, the master Osho indicates the art of 'dying' by learning how to live in the here and now, the eternal life."
Livres Hebdo, France

"Now that religion has become just a formality, and the burning messages of the buddhas who have been on earth degraded to mere formal faith, the message of Osho, who has reached to such dazzling heights of human consciousness through his own experience, is incomparable in its strength to pierce the beauty within our hearts."
Boston Club, Japan

"The way Osho is using language -- casual, provocative, iconoclastic -- is really new."
Parmita, Buddhist Newsletter, Italy

"Remarkable discourses...wise and clear."
Book Review, De Kaarsvlam

"He quotes Jesus, Buddha, Mahavira, Lao Tzu, Sufis and old Zen masters with stupendous memory, interpreting them with a freshness and directness as if they were speaking today, as if they wore jeans."
Die Zeit, Germany

"One of the ten people; along with Gandhi, Nehru and Buddha; who have changed the destination of India."
Sunday Mid-Day, India

"He wanted to be called simply Osho, because Osho is a sound that heals, and reminds us about the ocean with its infinite wisdom and mystery.
In fact Osho is the greatest guru of the 20th century. As Gandhi did, he had a commune in India. Osho's commune in Pune still exists and is visited by 100,000 people every year. Osho died in 1990 aged 59, but for all the people that come close to him his spirit keeps inspiring love, consciousness, and joy."
Vera, Italy

"Osho is not trying to purvey information, but a truth that bypasses conscious thought and all that belongs to it, just as the most important activities of human beings bypass the mind."
Bernard Levin, The Times, UK

"Of all the great blessed spiritual masters, Osho is the one who speaks most clearly on the role of energy expanding and fulfilling people's consciousness."
Gabriel Rosenstock, Irish Book Review

"Osho has the ability to make the esoteric seem instantly appealing and utterly obvious."
Meditation Magazine, Canada

"Osho is a thoroughly modern man as much at home with Marx and Engels and humanistic psychology as with the mystical traditions of the East. Indeed, he uses Marx and Maslov, Plato and Heidegger, Freud and Beckett and Lenny Bruce, Playboy jokes as well as Zen and Sufi teaching stories, to make telling critiques of political and religious, psychological and sexual orthodoxies."
James Gordon, Washington Post, USA

"Without question the most inspired, the most literate and the most profoundly informed speaker I have ever heard anywhere. Everything he says in his philosophy of life has the unmistakable ring of truth: a new experience."
Jean Lyell, Vogue, UK

"Osho could keep his audience in thrall, knitting prescient anecdotes culled from various sources."
Sunday Mail, India

"With Osho as a guide, Tantra can give you a new perspective, a new way of looking at yourself and at life, a new way of living in harmony with existence...for Tantra is not an intellectual proposal, it is pure experience."
Penguin Books

"Osho is a living master who has died. His words turn normal ideas on their head and if he can't reach right through you to the divine void, well...tough luck. Osho is definitely alive in a fast breathing, shaking sort of vividness."
The Book Reader, USA

"No other master is known to me who is working as universally as he is."
Esotera, Germany

"These are fundamental works on knowing oneself and the world. Osho's comments are truly unique."
Corriere de la Serra, Italy

"Throughout Osho's teaching runs a golden thread of sparkling humor."
Vogue, UK

"Osho's speech just flows. It's not the 'what' but the 'how' that captures you."
Bunte, Germany

"As a former orthodox Christian, I felt a continual sense of both joy and apprehension at this new possibility for approaching Jesus. Doubt and trust pulled me in two directions, until finally I fell in love with the words of this Indian Master and his view of Jesus."
Glenn Moyer, Yoga Journal, USA

"In his five-volume set on Zen, Osho is at the top of his form. He talks about Gurdjieff, Gertrude Stein, drugs, Aldous Huxley, and everything under the sun."
The Book Reader, USA

"There are many readers of his books in Japan. What is special about Osho is that he dares to make statements on subjects which are related to society, subjects the old Zen masters tried not to touch."
Zen Bunka, Japan

"Osho delivers his theses with humor and rhetoric brilliance, indeed complacent, but with an irony that actually enhances and exhilarates."
Der Spiegel, Germany

"But who was this man who was enchanting these young people, and teaching them how to get rid of all their conditionings -- political, religious and family -- without giving them any new beliefs?
His knowledge of the West was as formidable as his knowledge of the East. From Buddha to Jesus, from Heraclitus to Marx, from the Indian mystic Tilopa to Jung, from Zen to the Sufis, from Yoga to Tantra, he would point out the strengths and weaknesses of each doctrine…. [He] was the Master who would not give solutions, but simply provide a space to let go of the madness caused by living a life where the body, mind, being and soul were not connected…. Like Socrates he [Osho] was considered a corrupter of the morals of young people; like all true philosophers he demolished a belief system that produced only unhappiness, not joy. His greatness was that he didn't give solutions, only tools for people to realize themselves... Talking about an India that we don't often remember, the India where meditation and looking inwards were priorities, Osho shows that those qualities belong not only to India from the days of Buddha but are part of our present too."
Elle, Italy 

"This is the message: Osho promises that through meditation everybody can become a buddha. This means, one can awaken, become conscious of oneself and of the secret of life and so, not suffering any more, find final peace. This is the Zen teaching, but with something more."
Vera, Italy

"Two other meditation techniques practiced in more and more groups and seminars are relatively new. The 'Dynamic Meditation' and a shaking meditation which goes by the somewhat esoteric name 'Kundalini Meditation' (nothing to do with Kundalini Yoga). These meditations have been created by the Indian mystic, Osho."
Halsa, Sweden

"What is left is Osho's teaching about life as "Zorba the Buddha," to be as free as Alexis Zorba and as aware as Buddha. Obviously Osho's cocktail, a mixture of religious science, philosophy, psychology and meditation, is in accordance with the zeitgeist at the end of the millennium. …Osho broke with social taboos, rattled at ideologies, moral views and at the image of respected political and religious leaders such as Gandhi or Mother Teresa."
Facts Magazine, Switzerland

"The present generation has come to acknowledge that Osho was one of the greatest minds produced by our country. It was befitting that the 50th year of Indian Independence should have been celebrated by the publication of an anthology of articles of tributes Osho paid to the spiritual legacy of his country."
Mid-Day, India

"He was for religiousness, not religion and he was the rich man's guru, because they could contemplate after meeting their needs."
Times of India

"For those who think that Osho is the guide and they must become his followers, there is a bad news. Servility, the staple food that most other gurus insist on feeding their "disciples," is not encouraged by Osho. There are no -isms, only thinking and self-meditation can really take you beyond the shallow and self-destructive existence that Osho criticizes."
The Asian Age, UK

"Summarizing the thoughts of a man whose transcribed teachings fill an entire bookstore and have sold a purported 15 million volumes worldwide is not easy. Perhaps the kernel is Osho's notion that the perfect human being combines the earth zest of Zorba the Greek and the transcendental spirituality of Buddha."
L.A. Times, USA

"What he (Osho) says is couched in language of great power and fluency; he is one of the most remarkable orators I have ever heard, though there is no hint of demagogy in his style, and no oratory or pedagogic feeling about the content of what he says...."
Bernard Levin, The Times, UK

"Here was a guru unencumbered by tradition, an Enlightened Master who could quote Heidegger and Sartre, and who furthermore believed in technology, capitalism, and sex... (Osho) was a brilliant lecturer.... One of his lectures ended with a description of a dewdrop sliding off a lotus leaf and being carried down a stream to the ocean. It put virtually everyone in his audience into an alpha-wave state at ten in the morning."
Francis Fitzgerald (Pulitzer prizewinner), The New Yorker, USA

"Drawn from a variety of ideologies and religious traditions, but bearing their own stamp, Osho's teachings are uncompromisingly radical, anti-rational and capricious. They invite the individual to free his or herself from all the social conditioning: the only commitment is to be open and honest, to enjoy life, love oneself."
The Sunday Times: '1000 Makers of the Twentieth Century'

"This man fascinates the Western elite in a way nobody else does."
Sueddeutsche Zeitung, Germany

"The novelty of Osho's teachings is the adaptation of Eastern spiritual wisdom for the Western audience. This may explain the success of his books, ranked among the top-ten best-selling non-fiction."
La Republicca, Italy

"What Osho has to say about the rights of man is 'must' reading for anyone sincerely interested in human welfare and progress because he debunks the conventional wisdom. Anyone who reads this book will understand why so many governments have refused to grant him permission to live within their borders. What he says are the truths that politicians cannot have people hear. If Osho were heard, national boundaries would dissolve, and power would leave the hands of elites and politicians. Celebration of life, love and laughter would become the dominant mode of life on earth."
New Frontier, USA

"The story of Osho's life makes fascinating reading."
The Book Review, India

"Imagine a world where life is fun, where 'play' has replaced 'work' and where creative self-expression is always encouraged. Imagine a world where joy and laughter are the norm, where life is fully celebrated and where love is the highest ideal. Imagine the world of Osho..."
Spirit Magazine, UK

"A Quiet, Spiritual Place To Find yourself... The 3,500-square-foot space at 570 Lexington Avenue reflects the spirit of Osho, who taught meditation and Zen principles..."
New York Times, USA

"For me the important fact that rang out loud and clear was that Osho was a rare mystic. He was a feminist. Spiritualism has invariably become associated with men. Women are seen as devotees, men as seekers. Osho put an end to all that. He realized that liberation was not merely of body and mind but also of the soul."
Farzana Versey, The Sunday Observer, India

"Osho is one of the ten people who have changed the destiny of India: for liberating the minds of future generations from the shackles of religiosity and conformism. He was a deeply spiritual man who denounced all religions."
Khushwant Singh, Mid-Day, India

"Some people call it the 'buddhafield' of an enlightened master. Others say it's the world's largest spiritual single's club. One thing is certain: the Osho Commune International --founded nearly 25 years ago by Osho is not your typical Indian ashram. A New Age Xanadu that attracts thousands of visitors every day, the commune is a self-contained personal growth conglomerate, offering an astonishing variety of classes and workshops in everything from organizational development to tantric sex. And if the courses don't interest you, you can spend your days romping in the swimming pool, sauna, "Zennis" courts, and bistro of the commune's "Club Meditation."
Anne Cushman and Jerry Jones, Yoga Journal, USA

"The Osho Commune, founded in 1974, claims to be the world's largest growth center for meditation and spiritual growth. It attracts more than three percent of all foreign tourists to India - more than the Taj Mahal - and is the most widely visited destination in the country. In January, celebrations of the seventh anniversary of founder Osho's death attracted record numbers of visitors. Osho's followers insist that he merely 'left his body'. The inscription by his ashes reads: 'OSHO: Never Born, Never died; only visited this planet Earth, between Dec. 11, 1931 and Jan. 19, 1990.' For one who was never born, he certainly made a massive impact on the world."
Emma Levine, Asia Magazine, USA

Osho Commune International is a kind of spiritual park -- the world's largest meditation commune.
"Every year thousands of people visit this luxurious commune.... A very comfortable paradise where you can stay a long time with low-budget hotels nearby and very good food in the Commune, with meditations free... The atmosphere is really like a fairy tale. A paradise where all your emotional, bodily and spiritual needs are met. I can advise everybody to visit for a few days and walk around that beautiful garden where everybody is friendly."

Elle, Holland

"More and more so-called meditation tourists are coming. These are lawyers and doctors, as well as teachers, police officers and housewives. Some are sannyasins, most of them in fact aren't. All of them are attracted by what the new ashram has to offer: With a mixture of spirituality and holiday camp one can experience how to keep the soul in balance."
Bild am Sonntag, Germany

"The commune in Pune is the biggest tourist attraction in India, second only to the Taj Mahal."
Brigitte, Germany

"They have constructed pyramids of marble and a pristine Zen garden. Thousand of men and women pour through the gate every day, from Europe, America, Australia, and Japan."
Wall Street Journal, USA

"The Osho Commune International has created a stunning landscape, a vista of gurgling streams, curving paths, and quiet, shady corners ideal for meditating. It is an admirable attempt to fashion a self-sufficient eco-stystem, and it may be the only community in India where the tap water is totally safe for foreigners to drink. The grounds are immaculate..."
Conde Nast Traveler, USA

TEACHING OF BUDDHA; BE YOURSELF.''OSHO''

All great religious teachers, compared to Gautam Buddha, fall very short. They want you to become followers, they want you to practice a certain discipline, they want you to manage your affairs, your morality, your lifestyle. They make a mold of you and they give you a beautiful prison cell.

 

Buddha stands alone, totally for freedom. Without freedom man cannot know his ultimate mystery; chained he cannot move his wings into the sky and cannot go into the beyond. Every religion is chaining people, keeping some hold on them, not allowing them to be their original beings, but giving them personalities and masks – and this they call religious education.

 

Buddha does not give you any religious education. He wants you simply to be yourself, whatever it is. That is your religion – to be yourself. No man has loved freedom so much. No man has loved mankind so much. He would not accept followers for the simple reason that to accept a follower is to destroy his dignity. He accepted only fellow travelers. His last statement before dying was, “If I ever come back, I will come as your friend.” Maitreya means the friend.

BE UNOCCUPIED;MEDITATION WILL FLOWER.''OSHO''

 "When people come to me and they ask, 'How to meditate?' I tell them, 'There is no need to ask how to meditate, just ask how to remain unoccupied. Meditation happens spontaneously. Just ask how to remain unoccupied, that's all. That's the whole trick of meditation – how to remain unoccupied. Then you cannot do anything. The meditation will flower.'

"When you are not doing anything the energy moves towards the center, it settles down towards the center. When you are doing something the energy moves out. Doing is a way of moving out. Non-doing is a way of moving in. Occupation is an escape. You can read the Bible, you can make it an occupation. There is no difference between religious occupation and secular occupation: all occupations are occupations, and they help you to cling outside your being. They are excuses to remain outside.

 

"Man is ignorant and blind, and he wants to remain ignorant and blind, because to come inwards looks like entering a chaos. And it is so; inside you have created a chaos. You have to encounter it and go through it. Courage is needed – courage to be oneself, and courage to move inwards. I have not come across a greater courage than that – the courage to be meditative

WHAT IS DIALOGUE AND DISCUSSION?''OSHO''

Dialogue means trying to understand the other with an open mind. Dialogue is a rare phenomenon and it is beautiful, because both are enriched. In fact, while you talk, either it can be a discussion – a verbal fight, trying to prove that I am right and you are wrong – or a dialogue. Dialogue is taking each other´s hand, moving together towards the truth, helping each other to find the way. It is togetherness, it is a cooperation, it is a harmonious effort to find the truth. 

It is not in any way a fight, not at all. It is a friendship, moving together to find the truth, helping each other to find the truth. Nobody has the truth already, but when two persons start finding out, inquiring about the truth together, that is dialogue – and both are enriched. And when truth is found, it is neither of me, nor of you. When truth is found, it is greater than both of us who participated in the inquiry, it is higher than both, it surrounds both - and both are enriched.

RESPECT YOUR OWN INDIVIDUALITY AND RESPECT OTHERS INDIVIDUALITY.''OSHO''

Stop fulfilling expectations of others, because that is the only way you can commit suicide. You are not here to fulfill anybody´s expectations and nobody else is here to fulfill your expectations. Never become a victim of others´ expectations and don´t make anybody a victim of your expectations.

This is what I call individuality. Respect your own individuality and respect others´ individuality. Never interfere in anybody´s life and don´t allow anybody to interfere in your life. Only then one day you can grow into spirituality.

Otherwise, ninety-nine percent of people simply commit suicide. Their whole life is nothing but a slow suicide. Fulfilling this expectation, that expectation... some day it was the father, some day it was the mother, some day it was the wife, husband, then come children – they also expect. Then the society, the priest and the politician. All around everybody is expecting. And poor you there, just a poor human being – and the whole world expecting you to do this and that. And you can´t fulfill all of their expectations, because they are contradictory.

You have gone mad fulfilling everybody´s expectations. And you have not fulfilled anybody´s. Nobody is happy. You are lost, wasted, and nobody is happy. People who are not happy with themselves cannot be happy. Whatsoever you do, they will find ways to be unhappy with you, because they cannot be happy.

Happiness is an art that one has to learn. It has nothing to do with your doing or not doing. Instead of pleasing, learn the art of happiness.

WHAT DO YOU WANT TO SAY YOURSELF; INTELLIGENT OR INTELLECTUAL? ''OSHO''

 Mind is not your intelligence.

It may sound strange but this is a truth, that mind is not your intelligence. Mind can be intellectual, which is a very poor substitute for intelligence. Intellectuality is mechanical. You can become a great scholar, a great professor, a great philosopher – just playing with words which are all borrowed, arranging and rearranging thoughts, none of which are your own.

The intellect is absolutely bankrupt. It has nothing of its own, all is borrowed. And that´s the difference between intelligence and intellect. Intelligence has an eyesight of its own, a capacity to see into things, into problems.

Intelligence is your born quality.

FROM THE CIRCUMFERENCE TO THE CORE.''OSHO''

When you start relaxing, start from the circumference – that is where we are. We can start only from where we are. Relax the circumference of your being - relax your body, relax your behavior, relax your acts. Walk-in a relaxed way, eat in a relaxed way, talk, listen in a relaxed way. Slow down every process. Don´t be in a hurry and don´t be in haste. Move as if all eternity is available to you - in fact, it is available to you. We have always been here and we will be here always. Forms go on changing, but not the substance. Garments go on changing, but not the soul.

The first step in relaxing is relaxing the body. And you will be surprised that if you approach any part of your body, it listens, it follows you - it is your body! With closed eyes, go inside the body from the toe to the head searching for any place where there is tension. And then talk to that part as you talk to a friend. Let there be a dialogue between you and your body. Tell it to relax, and tell it, "There is nothing to fear. Don´t be afraid. I am here to take care - you can relax." Slowly slowly, you will learn the knack of it.

RECEPTIVITY LEADS TOWARDS TRUTH.''OSHO''

Truth cannot be sought - one can simply be receptive, that´s all. One can open the doors and wait. One can say only this much, “If the divine guest comes, you will be received, welcomed. I don´t know who you are, and I don´t know your address and I cannot even send an invitation. But whosoever you are, and whomsoever it concerns, if you come, my doors will be open - you will not find them closed.” That´s all that a seeker can do. And that´s all that is needed to be done. More than that is not possible and is not needed.

So let this posture be your deep attitude. One has to become receptive. The search for truth is not a male search. It is a feminine search - just like feminine energy - receptive. Not like a male - aggressive.

Meditativeness is simply a deep receptivity, a readiness, an open door.

CROWD IS THE REASON FOR CRIME.''OSHO''

I don´t want any crowds in the world. Whether they have gathered in the name of religions, or in the name of nationality, or in the name of race, it does not matter. The crowd as such is ugly, and the crowd has committed the greatest crimes in the world, because the world has no consciousness. It is a collective unconsciousness.

Consciousness makes one an individual - a solitary pine dancing in the wind, a solitary sunlit mountain peak in its utter glory and beauty, a solitary lion and its tremendously beautiful roar that goes on echoing for miles in the valleys.

SOME OF THE WORLD FAMOUS FRIENDS OF OSHO.

 Osho gave his country and the world a vision, which one can be proud of."

Former Indian Prime Minister, Chandra Shekhar.

"Enlightened people like Osho are ahead of their times. It is good that more and more young people are now reading his works."
K R Narayanan, President of India

"Osho is an enlightened master who is working with all possibilities to help humanity overcome a difficult phase in developing consciousness."
The Dalai Lama

"I've been charmed from reading his books."
Federico Fellini

"I really got into Osho's books. I have always loved his books. They were top notch."
Marianne Williamson, author

"These brilliant insights will benefit all those who yearn for experiential knowledge of the field of pure potentiality inherent in every human being. This book belongs on the shelf of every library and in the home of all those who seek knowledge of the higher self."
Dr Deepak Chopra, Author of: Ageless Body, Timeless Mind; Quantum Healing and Unconditional Life

"I found No Water, No Moon one of the most refreshing, cleansing and delightful books I could imagine. It is a book which will never cease to be a comforting companion."
Yehudi Menuhin

"I read all his books."
Shirley MacLaine

"I have read most of [Osho's] books and listened to tapes of his talks, and I am convinced that in the spiritual tradition, here is a mind of intellectual brilliance and persuasive ability as an author."
James Broughton, poet, and author

"He is the rarest and most talented religionist to appear this century." Kazuyoshi Kino, Professor of Buddhist Studies,
Hosen Gakuen College, Tokyo, Japan

"Osho makes you free from the existing mind set...he is inclusive, not exclusive."
The High Commissioner for India to Singapore

"I have never heard anyone so beautifully and playfully integrate and then dissolve the psychological problems which, for generations, have sapped our human energies."
Rev. Cain, Chaplain, Churchill College Cambridge

"Osho is the most dangerous man since Jesus Christ... He's obviously a very effective man, otherwise he wouldn't be such a threat. He's saying the same things that nobody else has the courage to say. A man who has all kinds of ideas, they're not only inflammatory - they also have a resonance of truth that scares the pants off the control freaks."
Tom Robbins, author of Even Cowgirls Get the Blues, Still Life with Woodpecker and Jitterbug Perfume

"As a result of reading The Golden Future (and many other works by Osho) I would like to let you know that I completely and heartily support the vision of Osho. As a writer I hope that his words will reach the hearts of those who need them most. I have every faith in this result, because the words of Osho are loaded with the power of love."
Douwe de Groot, writer

"These books are really what people are looking for...they are even more relevant now than when they were spoken."
Michael Mann, Chairman of Element Books

"He Osho is the greatest incarnation after Buddha in India. He is a living Buddha."
Lama Karmapa, late head of the Kargyupta, (or Red Hat) Sect of Tibetan Buddhism

"Within a few years from now Osho's message will be heard all over the world. He was the most original thinker that India has produced: the most erudite, the most clear-headed and the most innovative. And in addition he had an inborn gift of words, spoken and written. The like of him we will not see for decades to come...He has to be judged as a thinker, and as a thinker he will rank amongst the giants."
Khushwant Singh, Former editor of The Times of India; author and historian

"No one is more qualified to introduce the mystics than Osho, a man who stands out even in their exalted company. He speaks from his own experience, bringing his mystic predecessors to life, making them his contemporaries."
John Lilly

"Never before or after have I encountered anybody having such a harmonious and immensely creative view encompassing art, science, human psychology and religiousness. Certainly we would lack substantially without his vision of the new man."
Dr. A. Schleger, Ph.D., Institute of Technology, Switzerland

"Osho is the rarest and most talented religionist to appear in this century. His interpretations are saturated with the truth of Buddhism."
Kazuyoshi Kino Professor of Buddhist Studies, Tokyo

"His incredible taped discourse lectures and books have inspired me, and millions of others, on the path of self-evolution... He is like a great bell tolling, Awaken, Awaken, Awaken!"
James Coburn, actor

"With Osho, words flow endlessly. Provocatively. Challengingly. In a hundred years more copies of Osho's works will have been printed than the Bible itself, till now the outstanding best-seller."
M. V. Kamath, Former Editor of The Illustrated Weekly, India

"As you savor the chapters, you'll discover that Osho is like a Zen archer. Almost poetically he circles his target, surveying it over and over again from many positions before he draws back his bow and lets the arrow fly."
Robert Rimmer, USA. Author of The Harrad Experiment and Proposition 31

EXCEPT CHANGE,EVERYTHING ELSE CHANGES.''OSHO''

 Misery arises because we don´t allow change to happen. We cling, we want things to be static. If you love a woman you want her tomorrow too, the same way as she is yours today. That´s how misery arises. Nobody can be certain about the next moment – what to say about tomorrow?

A man of awareness knows that life is constantly changing. Life is change. There is only one thing permanent, and that is change. Except change, everything else changes. To accept this nature of life, to accept this changing existence with all its seasons and moods, this constant flow that never stops for a single moment, is to be blissful. Then nobody can disturb your bliss. It is your hankering for permanency that creates troubles for you. If you want to live in a life with no change – you are asking the impossible.

A man of awareness becomes courageous enough to accept the changing phenomena. In that very acceptance is bliss. Then all is good. Then you are never frustrated.

THE MEANING OF MONEY.''OSHO''

 I have heard:

Two men were walking along a crowded sidewalk in a downtown business area. Suddenly one exclaimed, "Listen to the lovely sound of that cricket!" But the other did not hear. He asked his companion how he could detect the sound of a cricket amidst the din of people and traffic. The first man had trained himself to listen to the voices of nature, but he did not explain.
Instead he took a coin out of his pocket and dropped it on the sidewalk. Low and behold, a dozen people were suddenly looking at them!

"We hear," he said, "what we listen for."

There are people who can listen only to the sound of a falling coin on the ground - that´s their only music. Poor people! They think they are rich, but they are poor people, whose whole music consists only in the sound of a coin falling on the ground. Very poor people... starving. They don´t know what life consists of. They don´t know the infinite possibilities, they don´t know the infinite melodies surrounding you - the multidimensional richness.
You hear only that which you listen for.

BUDDHA'S DO THE BUSINESS OF ISNESS.''OSHO''

First the buddha will be a shadow behind you, and then you will be a shadow behind him. That will be the greatest blissful day in your life.

Yakusan says, "Isness is my business."

That is my business also. That has been the business of all the buddhas - a single business, bringing people to isness, to here and now, and the doors are flung open to all the mysteries and all the miracles of existence.

WHO AM I?''OSHO''

 "Who am I?" has no answer to it; it is unanswerable. Your mind will supply many answers. Your mind will say, "You are the essence of life. You are the eternal soul. You are divine," and so on and so forth. All those answers have to be rejected: NETI NETI - one has to go on saying, "Neither this nor that."

When you have denied all the possible answers that the mind can supply and devise, when the question remains absolutely unanswerable, a miracle happens: suddenly the question also disappears. When all the answers have been rejected, the question has no props, no supports inside to stand on any more. It simply flops, it collapses, it disappears.

When the question also has disappeared, then you know. But that knowing is not an answer: it is an existential experience.

NO SELF;NO EGO.''OSHO''

When thoughts cease, who are you? An utter emptiness, nothingness, no-thingness. It is because of this that Buddha has used a strange word. Nobody has ever done such a concept before, or since. The mystics have always used the word “self” for the interior-most core of your being. Buddha uses the word “no-self.” And I perfectly agree with him. He is far more accurate, closer to truth. To use the word “self” - even if you use it with a capital “S,” does not make much difference. It continues to give you the sense of the ego. And with a capital “S,” it may give you an even bigger ego.

Buddha does not use the words atma, atta - "self". He uses just the opposite words: “no-self” - anatma, anatta. He says that when mind ceases, there is no self left. You have become universal, you have overflowed the boundaries of the ego. You are pure space, uncontaminated by anything. You are just a mirror reflecting nothing.

YOU ARE WHOLE TO YOURSELF.''OSHO''

 My approach to your growth is basically to make you independent of me. Any kind of dependence is slavery, and the spiritual dependence is the worst slavery of all. I have been making every effort to make you aware of your individuality, your freedom, your absolute capacity to grow without any help from anybody. Your growth is something intrinsic to your being. It does not come from outside; it is not an imposition, it is an unfolding.

All the meditation techniques that I have given to you are not dependent on me – my presence or absence will not make any difference – they are dependent on you. It is not my presence, but your presence that is needed for them to work. It is not my being here but your being here, your being in the present, your being alert and aware that is going to help.

The whole past of man is, in different ways, a history of exploitation. And even the so-called spiritual people could not resist the temptation to exploit. Out of a hundred masters, ninety-nine percent were trying to impose the idea that, "Without me you cannot grow, no progress is possible. Give me your whole responsibility." But the moment you give your whole responsibility to somebody, unknowingly you are also giving your whole freedom.

And naturally, all those masters had to die one day, but they have left long lines of slaves: Christians, Jews, Hindus, Mohammedans. What are these people? Why should somebody be a Christian? If you can be someone, be a Christ, never be a Christian. Are you absolutely blind to the humiliation when you call yourself a Christian, a follower of someone who died two thousand years ago?

The whole of humanity is following the dead. Is it not weird that the living should follow the dead, that the living should be dominated by the dead, that the living should depend on the dead and their promises that `We will be coming to save you.´?

None of them has come to save you. In fact, nobody can save anybody else; it goes against the foundational truth of freedom and individuality.

As far as I am concerned, I am simply making every effort to make you free from everybody – including me – and to just be alone on the path of searching

DO YOU KNOW WHERE HEAVEN AND HELL IS?''OSHO''

Hell and heaven are within you, both gates are within you.

When you are behaving unconsciously there is the gate of hell; when you become alert and conscious, there is the gate of heaven.

THE GAME OF PRIEST AND POLITICIANS.''OSHO''

Atomic war is on the horizon, the deadly disease aids is spreading fast, and scientists say the earth will change its axis by the end of this century.
But why are the priests, politicians and governments not aware of these facts? And why are they not interested in making the public aware? Please comment.

It is one of the most significant questions that can be asked, but you will have to understand some deeper implications, which you may not be aware of.
The politicians and the priests have a vested interest in keeping the people of the world unaware of the future. The reason is very simple: if the people are aware of the future and the darkness ahead, the death that is coming every moment closer, there is going to be a tremendous upheaval in the consciousness of man all around the world. And the politicians and the priests, who have dominated humanity for millennia, know perfectly well they cannot solve any problem that is going to be faced by humanity in the future. They are absolutely impotent. The problems are too big and they are too small. The only way for them to save their faces is not to let the people become aware of what is happening tomorrow.

I have to make it clear also that politics attracts only the most mediocre minds in the world. It does not attract Albert Einsteins, Bertrand Russells, Jean-Paul Sartres, Rabindranath Tagores... No, it attracts a certain kind of people. Psychologists are aware of the fact that people who are suffering from some inferiority complex are the people to be attracted towards politics, because politics can give them power. And through power they can convince themselves and others that they are not inferior, that they are not mediocre.

But just attaining power makes no difference to their intelligence. So the whole world is ruled by mediocre people when we have a large number of intelligent people -- scientists, artists, musicians, poets, dancers, painters -- all kinds of sensitive, creative people, the very cream of humanity, but they are not in power. They can change the whole fabric of human history, they can change the darkness of the future into a beautiful morning, a sunrise. But the misfortune is that power is in the hands of the wrong people, and the people of intelligence are devoid of power. I will tell you a small story to make it clear....

A great mystic heard that one of his friends, a childhood friend -- they had played together, studied together -- had become the prime minister of the country. Just to congratulate him, the mystic came down from the mountains. It was a long journey, tiring. By the time he reached the prime minister's palace, the prime minister was getting ready to go somewhere.
He recognized the mystic, but he said, "I'm sorry, I have some appointments. I have to go to three places, and I would love it if you can come with me. On the way we can talk and remember the golden old days."
The mystic said, "I would love to come with you, but you can see my rags are full of dust. It would not look right to sit by your side on a golden chariot."

The prime minister said, "Don't be worried. The king has presented me with a very costly overcoat. I have never used it; I have been keeping it for some special occasion. I will give you the coat. You just put it on; it will cover your clothes, the dust and everything." The coat was given to him.
They reached the first house. They entered the house. The prime minister introduced his friend: "He is a great mystic. He lives in the mountains.
Everything that he has is his own, except the coat -- that is mine."
The mystic could not believe it: "What kind of stupidity is this?"
Even the family was shocked, to insult the mystic in such a way.
Outside the house the mystic said, "It is better I do not accompany you. You insulted me. What was the need to say that it is your coat? They were not asking."

He said, "I am sorry, forgive me. And if you don't come with me to the next appointment, I will think you have not forgiven me."
The mystic was a simple-hearted man. He said, "Then it is okay, I am coming."
Entering the second house, the prime minister introduced him: "He is a great mystic who lives in the mountains. Everything is his -- even the coat is his!"
The mystic could not believe that this man had any intelligence at all. Outside he simply refused: "I cannot go to your third appointment. This is too much."

But the politician said, "I have said that the coat is yours!" The mystic said, "It is unbelievable how unintelligent a man can be. Your assertion, emphasis, that the coat is mine, creates suspicion: there is something you are hiding. What is the need to mention the coat at all? I don't see the point that in any introduction coats need to be introduced."
And the politician said, "Forgive me, but if you don't come to the third appointment I will never forget that I have hurt you. Please, there is only one more appointment, and I will not say that the coat is yours or the coat is mine. Don't be worried about it."
The simple mystic, innocent, agreed to go with him. At the third house he introduced the mystic in the same way, "He is a great mystic from the mountains. All the clothes are his, but as far as the coat is concerned, it is better not to say anything!"

The politician is not the most intelligent part of humanity. Otherwise there would not have been five thousand wars in three thousand years. The politician has destroyed, but has not created anything. It is the politician who is creating the atomic weapons, the nuclear missiles. With what face can he make the people of the world aware that the future is dark, dismal?
Perhaps there is no future anymore, perhaps we are sitting on a volcano which can erupt any moment. Already we have so many nuclear weapons that we can destroy seven hundred planets of the size of our earth. In other words, we can kill everyman seven hundred times over.
Can you think of the stupidity of it? A poor man simply dies one time. There is no need to kill him seven hundred times. For what is all this nuclear arrangement being made?

There is a certain madness behind it. The madness is that the politician can live only if there is war. In his autobiography, Adolf Hitler has made many significant statements. One of the statements is that if a politician wants to be a great hero, a great historical figure, then the only way is to create a great war. Without war you don't have heroes.
Just think of all your heroes, they have been created by war: Alexander the Great, Napoleon Bonaparte, Nadirshah, Tamerlane, Genghis Khan, Joseph Stalin, Benito Mussolini, Adolf Hitler, Winston Churchill... And what have these people got, except that they lived at the time of a great war? The war brings them to the pinnacle of their glory. And your whole history is full of these idiots.

If we have any sense we should completely stop studying this kind of history in the schools and universities. Can't you study beautiful people, creative people? We have produced great musicians. We have produced great scientists. We have produced great poets. We have produced great painters. Our history should remember them. Our history should remind us that they are our real forefathers, not Genghis Khan, not Tamerlane, not Nadirshah. These are accidents, and they should not even have a place in the footnotes of history books. They should be simply ignored. They were mad people and there is no need to go on studying them and creating the same kind of desire in the new generation.
The priests are also in a deep conspiracy with the politicians. It is a thousands-of-years-old conspiracy: the priest protects the politician; the politician protects the priest. It has to be understood.

REMEMBER YOURSELF,FOR YOUR OWN PATH.''OSHO''

I would simply like to be forgiven and forgotten. There is no need to remember me. The need is to remember yourself! People have remembered Gautam Buddha and Jesus Christ and Confucius and Krishna. That does not help. So what I would like: forget me completely, and forgive me too – because it will be difficult to forget me. That´s why I am asking you to forgive me for giving you the trouble.

Remember yourself.

And don´t be bothered about historians and all kinds of neurotic people – they will do their thing. It is none of our concern at all

DEATH PENALTY IS A CRIME.''OSHO''

The death penalty is a crime committed by the society against a single individual, who is helpless. I cannot call it a penalty, it is a crime.

And you can understand why it is committed: it is a revenge. Society is taking revenge because the man did not follow the rules of the society; the society is ready to kill him. But nobody bothers that when somebody murders it shows that man is psychologically sick. Rather than sending him to imprisonment or to be executed, he should be sent into a nursing home where he can be taken care of – physically, psychologically, spiritually. He is sick. He needs all the compassion of the society; there is no question of penalty, punishment.

WHAT IS THE RIGHT PARENTING ?''OSHO''

A child is trying to climb a tree; what will you do? You immediately become afraid – he may fall, he may break his leg, or something may go wrong. And out of your fear you rush and you stop the child. If you had known what joy it is to climb a tree, you would have helped so that the child could learn how to climb trees! And if you are afraid, help him, go and teach him. You also climb with him! Help him learn so he doesn´t fall. Your fear is good – it shows love, that the child may fall, but to stop the child from climbing the tree is to stop the child from growing. There is something essential about climbing trees. If a child has never been doing it, he will remain in some way poor, he will miss some richness – for his whole life. You deprive him of something beautiful, and there is no other way to know about it! And once in a while, falling from a tree is not so bad either. Rather than being deprived forever.

Or, the child wants to go out in the rain and wants to run around the streets in the rain, and you are afraid he may catch a cold or get pneumonia or something – and your fear is right! So do something so that he is more resistant to colds. Take him to the doctor; ask the doctor what vitamins should be given to him so that he can run in the rains and enjoy and dance and there is no fear that he will catch cold or will get pneumonia. But don´t stop him. To dance in the streets when it is raining is such a joy! To miss it is to miss something very valuable.

If you know happiness and if you are aware, you will be able to feel for the child, how he feels.

EGO REALLY DOESN'T EXIST.IT IS THE ABSENCE OF SELF-KNOWLEDGE.''OSHO.

It is impossible. The ego cannot be sacrificed because the ego exists not. The ego is just all idea: it has no substance in it. It is not something – it is just pure nothing. You give it reality by believing in it. You can withdraw belief and the reality disappears, evaporates.

 

The ego is a kind of absence. Because you don’t know yourself, hence the ego. The moment you know yourself, no ego is found. The ego is like darkness; darkness has no positive existence of its own; it is simply the absence of light. You cannot fight with darkness, or can you? You cannot throw darkness out of the room; you cannot take it out, you cannot take it in. You cannot do anything with darkness directly. If you want to do anything with darkness, you will have to do something with light. If you put the light on, there is no darkness; if you put the light off, there is darkness.

 

Darkness is only the absence of light, so is ego: absence of self-knowledge. You cannot sacrifice it.

It has been told to you again and again: “Sacrifice your ego” – and the statement is patently absurd, because something that does not exist cannot be sacrificed. And if you try to sacrifice it, something which is not there in the first place at all, you will be creating a new ego – the ego of the humble, the ego of the egoless, the ego of the person who thinks he has sacrificed his ego. It will be a new kind of darkness again.

 

No, I don’t say to you sacrifice the ego. On the contrary, I say try to see where the ego is. Look deep into it; try to locate it, where it exists, whether it exists at all or not. Before one can sacrifice anything one must be certain about its existence.

 

But don’t be against it from the very beginning. If you are against it, you cannot look deep into it. There is no need to be against anything. The ego is your experience – maybe it is just apparent, but it is still your experience. Your whole life moves around the phenomenon of the ego. It may be a dream, but to you it is so true.

 

There is no need to be against it. Dive deep into it, go into it. Going into it means bringing awareness into your house, bringing light into darkness. Be alert, watchful. Watch the ways of the ego, how it functions, how it manages at all. And you will be surprised: the deeper you go into it, the less it is found. And when you have penetrated to the very core of your being, you will find something totally different which is not ego, which is egolessness. It is self, supreme self – it is godliness. You have disappeared as a separate entity; you are no more an island. Now you are part of the whole