Question – Osho, Why am I always thinking of Money?

Osho – What else is there to think about? Money is power. Everybody else is thinking of money, don’t be worried. Even those who are thinking of the other world… they have different coins but they are also thinking of money. Money represents power, with money you can purchase power.
Your saints are also thinking of money — they call it virtue. By virtue you can purchase a better house in heaven, a better car, a better woman. A few people are not that greedy, they are thinking only of the money that is current in this world. A few people are more greedy, they think of the other world. And if you are thinking of virtue to attain to paradise, what is it except money?

A man stops thinking about money only when he starts living in the present. Money is the future; money is security for the future, a guarantee for the future. If you have a good bank balance your future is safe. If you have a good character, even life after death is safe.

The whole world is thinking in terms of money. Those who think in terms of power politics are thinking in terms of money, because money is nothing but a symbol for power. That’s why you can go on accumulating more and more money, but the desire never leaves you to have still more — because the thirst for power is unlimited, it knows no end.

And people are thirsty for power because deep down they are empty. Somehow they want to stuff that emptiness with something — it may be money, power, prestige, respectability, character, virtue. Anything will do; they want to stuff their inner emptiness.

There are only two types of people in the world: those who try to stuff their inner emptiness, and those very rare precious beings who try to see the inner emptiness. Those who try to stuff it remain empty, frustrated. They go on collecting garbage, their whole life is futile and fruitless. Only the other kind, the very precious people who try to look into their inner emptiness without any desire to stuff it, become meditators.

Meditation is looking into your emptiness, welcoming it, enjoying it, being one with it, with no desire to fill it — there is no need, because it is already full. It looks empty because you don’t have the right way of seeing it. You see it through the mind; that is the wrong way. If you put the mind aside and look into your emptiness, it has tremendous beauty, it is divine, it is overflowing with joy. Nothing else is needed.

Only then a person stops thinking about money, stops thinking about power, stops thinking about paradise — because he is already in paradise, because he is already rich, because he is already powerful. But ordinarily, Ramdas, it is not just to do with you; everybody thinks in some way or other about money.

Two mothers were talking. One said to the other, “I haven’t seen you in a long time. How is your son and what is he doing?”
She replied, “My son is a famous actor in Hollywood and he’s making a fortune. He just built a new home that cost three hundred thousand dollars. What is your son doing?”
Said the other mother, “My son is doing even better. He is gay and lives in Hollywood; he just moved in with an actor who has a three-hundred-thousand-dollar home.”

A young woman has decided to put aside some money for a rainy day and informs her husband that each time they make love she will expect him to put five dollars in the piggy bank.
That night, as he begins to make advances, she reminds him of her requirement. He finds that he has only four dollars in his wallet and so the wife agrees to only four-fifths of a love affair. However, as her passion mounts, she offers to lend him a dollar until the next day.

Rachel is pregnant and Sammy, her husband, a very temperamental man, suffers from the pains of celibacy. Rachel, who manages the household, takes pity on him and gives him a hundred liras to visit the red-light district. When Sarah, the neighbor, sees Sammy running out of the house, she calls him, “Where are you running to like that? You look so very happy!”

Sammy shows her the money and tells her that he is going to spend it on a beautiful young girl.
“Give me the money!” proposes pretty Sarah. “You won’t regret it, you will see!”

Rachel soon comes to know about it. Very indignant, she explodes, “The bitch! When she was pregnant last year, I did the same for Isaac, her husband, for nothing!”

People are continuously thinking of money and money and money. It is nothing special to you, Ramdas, you are a normally abnormal person, as neurotic as everybody else. But please come out of this neurosis. Live the moment, drop the future, and money loses its glamor. Live the moment with such totality and abandon, as if there is no other moment to come to you again, as if this is the last moment. Then all desire for money and power simply leaves you.

If suddenly you come to know that today you are going to die, what will happen? Will you still be interested in money? Suddenly all desire for money will leave you. If this is the last day, you can’t waste it thinking about tomorrow, having more money in the world; there is going to be no tomorrow.

Because we live in the tomorrows, money has become very important. And because we don’t live, we only imitate others, money has become very important. Somebody makes a house, and now you are feeling very inferior. You were not at all dissatisfied with your own house just a few days before, but now this man has made a bigger house: now comparison arises, and it hurts, it hurts your ego. You would like to have more money. Somebody has done something else, and your ego is disturbed.

Drop comparing and life is really beautiful. Drop comparing and you can enjoy life to the full. And the person who enjoys his life has no desire to possess, because he knows the real things of life which are worth enjoying cannot be purchased. Love cannot be purchased. Yes, sex can be purchased. So one who knows what love is will not be interested in money. But one who does not know what love is, is bound to remain interested in money, because money can purchase sex, and sex is all that he knows.

You cannot purchase the starry night. One who knows how to enjoy the night full of stars won’t bother much about money. You cannot purchase a sunset. Yes, you can purchase a Picasso — but one who knows how to enjoy a sunset will not be interested at all in purchasing a painting. Life is such a painting, such a moving, alive painting.

But people who don’t know how to see a sunset are ready to purchase a Picasso for millions of dollars. They will not even know how to hang it, whether it is upside down or right side up, but they want to show to others that they have a Picasso painting.

I have heard that once a rich man came to Picasso; he wanted two paintings, immediately, and he was ready to pay as much as was demanded. Picasso demanded a fabulous price — thinking that he would not be able to pay it — because only one painting was ready. But the rich man was ready to pay. So Picasso went in, cut the canvas in two, and the rich man thought they were two paintings.

I have heard another story: in an exhibition, a Picasso exhibition, people are appreciating his paintings. All the critics have gathered around a certain painting which looks the most absurd, hence the most appealing — because when something is absurd it is a challenge to your intellect, and every critic is trying to prove that he understands what it is.

And then came Picasso, and he said, “Wait. Some fool has hung it upside down. Let me put it right first.” And they were expressing great appreciation for the painting!

If you know how to enjoy a roseflower, a green tree in your courtyard, the mountains, the river, the stars, the moon, if you know how to enjoy people, you will not be so much obsessed with money. The obsession is arising because we have forgotten the language of celebration. Hence money has become the only thing to brag about — your life is so empty.

I will not tell you to renounce money. That has been told to you down the ages; it has not changed you. I am going to tell you something else: celebrate life, and the obsession with money disappears automatically. And when it goes on its own accord, it leaves no scratches, it leaves no wounds behind, it leaves no trace behind.

Source – Osho Book “The Book of Wisdom”

Question – Why are the boys in the muslim heaven so much more nauseating than the golden apsaras without any perspiration, of the hindu paradise? Your condemnation of homosexuality, not only in this lecture, doesn’t seem very compassionate.

Osho – Truth is never compassionate or is always compassionate. It depends on you, how you look at it. One thing is certain: truth is truth — compassionate or not. This has to be understood.

Homosexuality has grown out of a male-dominated world. Homosexuality is a disease because of male domination; it is not a natural phenomenon. And there is every possibility that homosexuality is going to grow more and more — the possibility that even states and governments and religions will start preaching homosexuality. Within fifty years, you will see it happening. Just as governments are now preaching birth control, abortion, they will preach homosexuality — because the population is impossible, and homosexuality is going to be one of the ways to prevent new people coming to the earth.

Sooner or later, each government of the world is going to allow homosexual marriages — men marrying men, women marrying women. This is going to happen. Already, many more people are moving into homosexuality. The disease has come out of male domination. Just as I said the other day, all the cultures that have come out of the Judaic tradition are homosexual: Mohammedan, Christian, Jewish. The reason is, Judaism is one of the most male-oriented communities — it had to be. They have suffered so much; they have been wanderers, for centuries they had no nation, nowhere to live. Of course, the man became more and more powerful — he had to protect the woman, the children — and the society became more and more centered around the man. Only a relaxed society, when things are going beautifully and there is plenty of food and there is no war, becomes heterosexual. Otherwise, when there is war, continuous struggle, the society leans towards male domination.

In the East, homosexuality has never been a problem. In fact, it has existed only in rare cases. Particularly in India, homosexuality has not been a problem at all. It has been so exceptional, it has not even been discussed. The reason? — the country has lived in tremendous peace, well-being, satisfied. Wars have been there, but India has not fought any war on its own. Somebody came — India was always ready to be conquered; it has not bothered much. Those who came were homosexuals — because the army has to be basically male, and all armies become homosexual. Armies — because only men are there — where are they going to put their love, the energy? They are forced to go homosexual.

So any country that has been continuously in war becomes homosexual. Or, male-oriented communities — for example, monasteries: Buddhist monasteries, Jaina monasteries, Catholic monasteries, all became the breeding grounds of homosexuality because only men were allowed. It has not been researched well, but if one goes deep into it, it will be found always that whenever men will be alone together, homosexuality is bound to be there.

Now the same thing is happening in the world of women also, because the women’s lib movement is the first thing in the world up to now where women are meeting with women and basically women oriented groups are being created. Lesbianism is happening. When women are together and against men, where are they going to put their love? The man is the enemy: they have to love women.

Homosexuality and lesbianism both are growing; these are simple facts. A few things to be understood: I am not saying anything against homosexuality — because I know there are many homosexuals around here. If you are not interested in any higher possibilities, homosexuality is as good as heterosexuality. There is no problem in it. If it is only a question of sexual release, homosexuality is as good as heterosexuality. But if you are interested in higher growth, then you will be in trouble.

Each child born is masturbatory, because the child first learns to love himself. That is the only natural way. He knows nobody else, he plays with his own body. each child born is naturally masturbatory: that is his first love. The second stage of his growth is, he becomes homosexual — naturally so. He has loved himself: if he is a boy, certainly he starts loving other boys — his love is spreading. Girls are very far away, a totally different kind of animal. He loves himself — it is easier for him to love other boys. A girl loves herself — it is easier for her to love other girls; the boys are a world apart. This is the second step, NATURAL step: masturbatory, then homosexuality.

Then the third thing, the third wave, is when you start loving the other — the opposite. Man and woman are polarities, and when polarities meet, only then is there challenge. Yes, there is conflict — and that conflict is the challenge. A homosexual love affair can be more convenient, true, because there is not much conflict. Both are alike: they understand each other, they know each other’s ways and each other’s mind. There is no polarity — and if there is no polarity of course there is no conflict, but there is no growth either. With polarity, conflict arises, challenge — to penetrate and know the other, to understand the ways of the other. And it is part of spiritual growth that a man should come to know the woman and the woman should come to know the man.

Why do I say it is part of spiritual growth? Just the other day, I was saying that at the last moment, at the sixth chakra — AJNA chakra — one has to come to a tremendous meeting of the man and the woman. You are also divided inside into two: man and woman. If you cannot meet with the outer woman, it will be very difficult for you to make space for the inner woman. If you cannot love the other on the outside, it will be impossible for you to create a loving space for the other inside you. A man is not only man, he is man-woman together. He is born out of a man and a woman — fifty-fifty percent he is, and so is a woman. and the ultimate inner meeting, the union, the inner alchemy, is possible only if you have learned the ways in the outside world.

When a man falls in love with a woman he is learning something. When a man falls in love with a man he is not learning anything. When a woman falls in love with a man she is learning something — something of the unknown, something of the opposite, something of the quite other. Man and woman in love, means the right hemisphere in love with the left hemisphere.

So if you are interested in spiritual growth then you have to grow from homosexuality towards heterosexuality. If you are not interested in spiritual growth then there is nothing wrong. You can remain — heterosexual or homosexual, it is all the same. I think I have made it clear. If you are not interested in spiritual growth, then there is no problem. I am not against homosexuality, I am not against anything. It is your life — you have to decide; who am I? I am simply stating a fact that ultimately, inside your being, a meeting is going to happen: be prepared for that meeting. And the outer love with the other prepares you.

The more you understand the woman and the man outside you, the more you will have an understanding of the inner polarity. And one day, at the sixth center of your being — what yoga calls AJNA chakra, and yesterday I called “superconsciousness” — there you will feel that your understanding of the woman and the man helps you tremendously. There, intuition and logic meet, imagination and will meet, initiative and reception meet. You will find it easy. You have learned the ways from the outside world — now you can use them for your inner alchemy.

So let me repeat it. There are many homosexuals here, lesbians too, and that’s natural because there are so many Jews here. And in a way there is some relationship why they are here, why they are attracted towards me; there is some reason in it. Homosexuals, lesbians, they are always inventive people… in fact, they have invented homosexuality. They are always revolutionary people, they are never orthodox. They have discovered a new way in their sexual life. Mm? — they have improved upon nature, they have moved away from nature. They are inventive people, they are not traditional. Hence, more and more homosexuals will be coming to me, because whatsoever I am saying is so untraditional, only very revolutionary minds can come to me. But then there is going to be trouble too. You become attracted towards me because my teachings are so untraditional, so rebellious; you become attracted. My teachings are rebellious, my teachings are unorthodox, but I cannot support any lie. I cannot say to you that your homosexuality is as it should be. I cannot support it… and if you are really revolutionary, try to find out a way.

Go into nature and see. Animals become homosexual only when they are put in a strange situation, otherwise not. In a zoo, animals become homosexual, but never in nature — rarely. In nature they always turn to be heterosexual. In a zoo, they can turn homosexual because they cannot find the female, or the female cannot find the male. That’s an unnatural condition, an artificial condition.

Man also turns homosexual when he is in an unnatural situation. It is not natural — and that is why so many people are turning all over the world, because the whole human situation is very unnatural today; it has never been so unnatural. Everything is artificial. We have gone far away from nature in every other way, so we are going far away from nature in sexuality also. Everything is interlinked and connected. You live in an artificial house, you live with artificial mechanisms, you live in an artificial world — the asphalt roads, technology — everything is artificial. Naturally, your sexual energies will start becoming artificial too.

Man is living in a zoo; it is not a human society, because it is not natural. Hence, sexuality is becoming more and more perverted, finding perverted ways — and I can understand it. The more man has become intelligent, he wants to find new ways: and homosexuality is a new way — so contrary to nature; an invention, a discovery that you can relate man-to-man or woman-to-woman.

There are people who are even more revolutionary. They are relating to false toys. You can make a woman, a plastic woman, and make love to her. That is even more revolutionary — and more convenient too. any moment you can pack her back in your bag, and you can carry her anywhere you want. Homosexuality is more convenient than heterosexuality because the language is the same. But convenience is not the goal: growth is the goal. Growth always happens through inconvenience. Growth always happens through pain, challenge.

If you are interested in spiritual growth, move towards heterosexuality. If you are not interested in that, then there is no problem. If you want to go beyond, if you really want to search your innermost being, the inner space, then heterosexuality will be helpful. Just as I said to you: first stage is masturbatory, second stage is homosexual, third stage is heterosexual, fourth stage is asexual — that is the state of BRAHMACHARYA, celibacy. And only when you have achieved to the fourth stage will you be able to penetrate to the uttermost core of your being — otherwise not.

A masturbatory person remains childish, a homosexual person remains juvenile, a heterosexual person remains animal. These stages have to be passed. Don’t get stuck anywhere. And I am not condemning, remember always; I have no condemnation for anything. Sometimes homosexuals come to me and they say, “But Beloved Master, we feel it is good.” I say, “Okay. If you feel good, it is your life. Who I am to condemn it, and for what? Why should I condemn it? It is your life; if you decide to live it in this way, good. Live it with all my blessings.” But I feel sorry, deep down — sorry because their growth will be hindered, sorry because they will not know what great possibilities they were carrying within themselves.

Sex is not an ordinary thing. It is one of the most substantial parts of your being. One should not be so unalert about it. It is the foundation of your being: you are born through sex, you live through sex; your birth is through sex, your youth is through sex, your love is through sex, and your death is going to happen through sex. Your whole life is a sexual affair. One should be very very alert and watchful of what one is going to do with one’s sex energy.

Source – from Osho Book “The Divine Melody”

Question – BELOVED MASTER, HOW CAN ONE DROP AN OBSESSION? OR IS IT NOT TO BE DROPPED AT ALL, BUT ENJOYED?

Osho – Satya, an obsession simply means a wound in your being, which keeps attracting you again and again, which goes on declaring itself, which wants your attention. You cannot drop it. How can you drop your wound? An obsession is a psychic wound, you cannot drop it. Understand it. Watch it. Pay attention to it. Be meditatively with it. And the more you are meditatively with it, the more it will be healed.

Meditation is a healing force. The words ‘meditation’ and ‘medicine’ are derived from the same root; they both mean healing forces. Meditation is medicine — medicine for the soul. So if you have any obsession, don’t call names. The moment you call it an obsession you have already started condemning it. And if you condemn something you cannot watch it — you are prejudiced against it. How can you watch the enemy? No need to condemn; whatsoever is the case is the case. Just by condemning it you can’t change it; by condemning it you can only repress it.

You can avoid seeing it, but the wound will continue; it will become cancerous, it will go on growing inside. Rather than condemning it, rather than calling it names, giving it labels, watch it — without any conclusion. See what it is. See as deeply as possible, with great friendliness towards it, with intimacy. It is YOUR obsession, YOUR wound! It says something about you, it is part of your biography. It has arisen in you, just as flowers arise in trees. It is essential because it says something about your past.

Go deep into it, with care, with love, and you will be surprised: the more care you show about it, the less it hurts, the less it dominates, the less it forces itself upon you. Yes, in a certain way, enjoy it! But by enjoying I don’t mean become identified with it. If you become identified with it you go insane. If you condemn it, if you repress it, you go insane again. Avoid both the extremes. Keep yourself exactly in the middle, neither condemning nor identifying. Just be a pure witness.

And slowly slowly, it will be healed. Slowly slowly, it will lose all its poison. Slowly slowly, you will see it changing into a positive energy rather than a negative force. It will become helpful. Each obsession is a knot in your being. Once it is opened, great energy is released. And everybody is carrying obsessions; our whole society is obsessive. A few obsessions are accepted by the people; then you don’t call them obsessions. If they are not accepted, then they become obsessions. In one society one thing is thought to be obsessive, in another society it is not obsessive. It may be even respected, may be thought saintly, holy.

For a Jaina monk, to take a bath is an obsession. People who are taking baths every day once or twice are obsessive; they are too much concerned about their body, body-oriented. The Jaina monk condemns them. The Jaina monk does not take a bath. Jaina monks used to come to see me. It was really a difficult time for me — they stink! But they think they are doing great austerity.

They don’t clean their teeth either — that too is an obsession. Morning, evening and before you go to bed… and a few people will clean their teeth after each meal, so four, five, six times a day. This IS obsession! You are madly concerned about your teeth. And all arguments that you can give are pointless to them because Jaina monks will say, “Look at the animals. Without any cleansing, without any toothpaste, without any toothbrush, their teeth are absolutely clean. Nature takes care, there is no need to worry about it. You are obsessed.”

According to them, you are too much concerned about your body odor, about your breath, about your teeth. And this is materialism, and they are spiritual people! But except a Jaina, nobody will think that these are obsessive things.

Remember one thing: that obsessions differ from society to society, from country to country, from religion to religion. What is really obsession? Anything that becomes a dominating force upon you, that dominates you, that becomes master of your being. Anything that reduces you into a slave, that’s my definition of an obsession.

Watch it, meditate. Be silently with it, because that is how you will become master again. Silence makes you a master of everything. Don’t fight, and don’t become identified. If you become identified you are mad. If you fight you are mad from the other extreme.

The director of a well-known mental hospital decided to resign his post after many years of service. This decision brought the local press out for an interview.
“Tell us, Doctor, what are your plans? Will you resume private practice?”
“Well, I have given it some thought,” replied the doctor. “I may go back into private practice, but on the other hand I may become a tea-kettle.”

Now, living with mad people for so long, with so many tea-kettles, he has also become impressed with the idea. If you want to become ANYTHING in your life, that is obsession. It is not a question only of becoming a tea-kettle: if you want to become the president of a country or the prime minister, it is the same — other names for becoming tea-kettles! There are people who are obsessed with the idea that they will not take any rest unless they become the president.

And then they are at a loss when they become the president; they don’t know what to do now because all that they know is how to become the president. Their whole life they have devoted to a single purpose: how to become the president. Now they have become the president and they are certainly at a loss; they don’t know what to do.

There are people who want to become rich; they become rich. If you persist you can fulfill any kind of stupidity. Man has immense powers. Yes, you can become a tea-kettle if you persist; nobody can prevent you. But then? Then you are suddenly empty. Then suddenly you find yourself without any goal, lost.

All obsessive people, when their obsessions are fulfilled, will feel lost. If you become identified with an obsession, sooner or later you will feel lost. If it is fulfilled you will be the loser; if it is not fulfilled, certainly you are the loser. The other way is to repress it, to throw it into the basement of your being, somewhere deep in the unconsciousness, so you don’t come across it. But it goes on growing there, and it goes on affecting you and your behavior; it goes on pulling your strings from the back. And the enemy is more powerful when it is hidden. You don’t see it, but still you have to follow its dictates — it becomes a dictator.

Both extremes, Satya, have to be avoided. That’s what Buddha also would have suggested: Be exactly in the middle, watchful, choicelessly watchful. Neither choose to be identified nor choose to be repressive. Just see. It is a fact of your psychic life, whatsoever it is. Don’t say good, bad, XYZ — whatsoever it is, watch it. And see the tremendous power of watchfulness: how it transforms wounds into flowers, how it releases entangled energy knots into great forces, positive forces, nourishing forces.

Source: from Osho Book “Dhammapada vol 8″

Osho – I understand the type. The only way to bring him out is not to argue with him – the first thing… not to give him any indication that you want to bring him out of his state, otherwise he will defend himself. Even if he suspects, that’s enough, and he will undo all your efforts.

So the first thing: don’t give him any suspicion, any idea, that you want to bring him out. Rather,
when you go, feel very happy – at least pretend to be very happy – and you tell him that he is in
a great spiritual state; that will be the right beginning for him. Sympathise with him. Not only that – respect him; that’s what he needs. Then you can become close to him, he will take you into his confidence, otherwise not.

This type of person is very defensive. So when you go, just tell him that he is in a perfect state,
this is the right state to be in. Ask him to teach you also how to be in it. Be a disciple rather than a teacher; then you can pull him out. He needs to be pulled out. Deep down he will like to be pulled out, but his ego will create difficulty.

So give him the feeling that the parents are wrong, that everybody is wrong – he is right. Once he takes you into his confidence then things will become very easy. By and by you can motivate him to come back to life. For example, how to motivate him? There is no hurry: for one week simply wait, just go and sit by his side, be meditative. Let him feel that you are learning something from him, that he is in some higher state, mm? Pretend it as much as you can – it will be just acting but it will help him to come out.

Then once he starts being close to you and takes you into his confidence, tell him that he has such a great experience – now it is to be shared with people. This is his duty, so he should come out of his lethargy, should share it with people… at least share it with you. Make him talk to you; don’t try to talk to him. Talking to him will be talking to a madman, a deaf man – it will not be of any use. And talking to him you will feel tired, exhausted. When you are talking to a wall, you feel tired. When there is some response, you feel happy – then your effort is bringing some fruit.

When you are talking to a wall how long can you talk? You can go on dissipating your energy and you feel exploited, sucked out. These people who fall into such a neurotic lethargy become suckers unknowingly. They become like a low place, so whenever you are close by, your energy starts flowing towards them – not that they do it knowingly; it happens naturally. They are like a hole. So let him talk to you, provoke him to talk.

Just give provocation, just small starts – that is the whole art of bringing him out. Tell him, ’You have got so much and the world needs it, people are in tremendous need. So come out of it – start at least telling me what you have experienced and where you are going.’ Once he starts talking, things will become very easy. If he can be persuaded to talk, he can be persuaded to do anything. Then by and by tell him to come out, to talk to the family, and tell your parents also that this is the way to bring him out: listen to him.

Mad people enjoy it tremendously if somebody listens to them. If a madman can find a person who listens sympathetically, the madness will disappear. That’s all that psychoanalysis is about. You pay the psychoanalyst to listen to you sympathetically, so that he is at least in sympathy. And just through talking to a psychoanalyst, day by day, you start coming out go through a unwinding process. That boy needs unwinding and you can help.

Once he starts talking with you then sometimes sitting by his side, start meditating. Tell him just by the way, what you have been doing in india… tell him that he is far higher than you. Once that is settled – that he is higher than you – then there is no fear from your side. Then he will not be
defensive: he will ask about meditations and what you are doing; he will start doing them! But the first basic point is that he becomes perfectly confident that you are not the enemy but a follower. Go and try. And this will be very good for you too – if you can bring him out… and you can! One just has to be very very artful.

The greatest art needed in life is to bring a madman to sanity. You will be helped tremendously if you can pull him out. It will help you to understand your own mind, because in fact it is everybody’s mind. People move from one extreme to another: first he was thinking that lsd is divine; now he thinks it is devilish.

These people are extremists – again one day he can start thinking that it is divine. In fact these people have split personalities, they are two persons: the person who was taking LSD was a totally different personality, this is another personality. These people have a spare personality. When one gets tired they start using the other and the other is just the opposite. Go – it will happen!

Source: from Osho book “This Is It”

[A new sannyasin from America, says that she gets high meditating but now and then she slips back into drug-taking. Osho says that drug-taking and meditation are polar opposites though they may appear to be similar.]

[A sannyasin had previously written to Osho about her sexuality, which seemed to have become more intensified lately – mainly been through auto-erotic activity. Guilt feelings surfaced from childhood, about its being a perversion. Osho checked her energy.]

Osho – I told you to remain celibate for a few days specifically for this purpose, because once you are celibate for a few days, energy pools; it becomes a reservoir. And when it is a reservoir, then you can easily know where it wants to move, how it wants to be creative, what direction it wants to take. A person who is using his sexual energy continuously, never knows what the energy itself intends to do. And these are two different things.

What your mind intends to do is one thing – what your energy intends to do is totally different. If they meet, good – if they don’t meet, then there is trouble. It is just a coincidence ordinarily – their meeting and their going hand in hand. Otherwise out of one hundred cases, almost ninety-nine percent of people miss the harmony between their mind and their energy.

The mind goes on bossing, goes on judging, evaluating, condemning, saying, ’This is good – that is bad.’ The mind is a priest, and a catholic priest at that. The mind is a puritan… absolutely a victorian. And energy is just a natural phenomenon. It does not know any man-made moralities. It is amoral. It is neither moral nor immoral; it is amoral. It is beyond morality or below morality. But it has nothing to do with morality and moral inhibitions, condemnations, evaluations, oughts, shoulds; it knows nothing. It is simply like a river rushing towards the ocean.

The energy is continuously rushing towards orgasm. If the mind interferes, there is corruption. Then it is very rarely that the intention of the mind and the intention of the energy will meet. Then there is frustration. You are pulled apart… you are tom apart; a person starts falling into pieces. That’s what has happened to the whole humanity – all have become Humpty Dumptys.

I had this very thing in mind when I told you to remain celibate for a few days. Once you are celibate for a few days, the energy becomes so powerful that the mind cannot control it. The mind remains very impotent before it. And the energy is so much that it carries the mind with it. It has to go with it. Condemning, cursing, but it has to go with it. It is a sheer force, and the mind cannot do anything with it. Whether willing or unwilling, it has to go with it.

So this is the natural spontaneous intention of your energy. Whatsoever is happening, allow it and drop all condemnations, drop all judgements. Simply go with it. With no mind go with it. Remember, energy is always pure. Its purity is invulnerable. The mind is always impure. Its impurity is unchangeable. So drop the mind, drop its bossing, its effort to dictate, dominate. Just go with the energy wherever it leads.

Many things will happen, and you will be surprised that they are happening, but they have to happen, because energy never does anything wrong. It cannot do, because it does not know what is right, what is wrong. It simply does that which is natural. For energy, the natural is right, the unnatural is wrong. It only believes in God’s law. It doesn’t believe in any man-made laws.

This is the first thing to understand – drop your mind. It has no business to interfere. Go with the energy, and whatsoever form it takes, it is good and beautiful. Whatsoever form it takes, never say that it is perverted, wrong, immoral, this and that. These are all mind trips. The mind is trying to force its own ideology on the energy. The energy is innocent – simply go with it.

Once you start going with it, many things will happen and many things will disappear. Soon – within two, three months – your energy will become a sheer delight. But if the mind goes on interfering, it will take a very long time. From your very childhood the mind has been interfering with it. It has never accepted its naturalness. That is the problem – not the form that the energy is taking; that is not the problem.

The problem is coming from the mind, not from the energy itself. The mind wants to have its own way, and now that the energy is there, overflowing, the mind cannot control it. When energy is less, the mind can control it. When you go on throwing your energy every day, then the mind is more powerful. Then the river is like a very small spring and it can be channelised by the mind howsoever it wants. But right now it is like a flood, it won’t listen – and there is no need for it to listen.

In the beginning you will find the mind cursing, condemning, judging, but simply don’t listen – listen to the energy. In the beginning you may find that it is maddening, but that will disappear. That too is because of the mind. Because the mind has never allowed the energy any freedom, when you allow freedom, it is maddening. It is just like when a man who has been forced to fast for many years, or has been given only a very small amount of food, who has been always starving, half-starving, is suddenly given freedom to eat whatsoever he wants to. Then he goes mad. He becomes an obsessive eater.

But the problem is still not with the person. The problem comes from the past. So something may be there like an obsession. You will feel that something is happening obsessively. Don’t be worried. It is just a dam that the mind has built; it is being broken by the flood. So there will be chaos for a few days, but nothing to be worried about. As I am watching, your state is better than ever. You just have to drop this last barrier of evaluation. Simply drop it.

And remember one thing – whatsoever makes you happy is good. The whole criterion of good, is happiness; nothing else. Never forget about it. And whatsoever form the sexual energy takes is never perverted unless it becomes harmful to somebody. To me perversion only means that you become a menace to others. If you hurt and harm others, if you become a sadist or something, then it is perversion. But when you are not harming anybody – you simply delight in your energy – there is no problem at all. It is your energy – you have to be happy with it.

So don’t go as if being dragged. Go dancing. Don’t go reluctantly. Surrender… trust the energy – because it is life, it is God. And trust absolutely. Just one condition has to be remembered – one should not become harmful, violent, aggressive, towards anybody else, that’s all. Otherwise everything is permissible. If you feel happy – it is your energy – feel as happy as you want to. Go with it wholeheartedly.

For one month simply go wholeheartedly with it. Relax completely. And after one month, tell me. Everything is going well. What is needed is happening. Within these two, three months, your energy will come to a real natural flow. All these things that are happening will disappear. They are not going to remain there forever. They are because of past starvation. Will it be possible to trust the energy and to go into it?

Source: from Osho Book “The Passion for the Impossible”