---
section: Library
booktitle: "The Osho Upanishad"
booktype: "Discourses"
bookcode: "UPAN"
dategiven: "01 September 1986 pm"
place: " in"
chapternum: "Chapter #14"
chaptertitle: "Beyond science is knowing"
acode: "8609015"
shorttitle: "UPAN14"
audio: "Yes"
video: "Yes"
esttime: "111mins"
displaytitle: "The Osho Upanishad: Chapter #14"
---

```style
.sutra {
  font-style: italic;
  white-space: pre-wrap !important;
}
```
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<p class="question">BELOVED OSHO,
THERE IS A STATEMENT BY J. KRISHNAMURTI THAT "THE OBSERVER IS THE OBSERVED." WILL YOU PLEASE KINDLY ELABORATE AND EXPLAIN WHAT IT MEANS?</p>


The statement that "the observer is the observed" is one of the most significant things ever said by any man on the earth. The statement is as extraordinary as J. Krishnamurti was.


It is difficult to understand it only intellectually, because the way of the intellect is dialectical, dualistic. On the path of intellect the subject can never be the object, the seer can never be the seen. The observer cannot be the observed. As far as intellect is concerned, it is an absurd statement, meaningless -- not only meaningless, but insane.


The intellectual approach towards reality is that of division: the knower and the known have to be separate. Only then is there a possibility of knowledge between the two. The scientist cannot become science, the scientist has to remain separate from what he is doing. The experimenter is not allowed to become the experiment itself. As far as intellect is concerned, logic is concerned, it looks absolutely valid.


But there is a knowledge that passeth understanding, there is a knowing that goes beyond science. Only because that kind of knowing which goes beyond science is possible, is mysticism possible, is religiousness possible.


Let us move from a different direction. Science divides the whole of human experience and existence into two parts: the known and the unknown. That which is known today was unknown yesterday, that which is unknown today may become known tomorrow, so the distance is not impossible, unbridgeable. The distance is only because man's knowledge is growing, and as his knowledge grows the area of his ignorance diminishes. In other words, as he knows more, the area of the unknown becomes less and the area of the known becomes bigger.


If we follow this logic, the ultimate result will be that one day there will be nothing left as unknown. Slowly slowly, the unknown will change into the known, and the moment will come when there is nothing left as unknown. That is the goal of science, to destroy ignorance -- but to destroy ignorance means to destroy all possibilities of exploration, all possibilities of the unknown challenging you to move forward.


The destruction of ignorance means the death of all intelligence, because there will be no need for intelligence anymore. It will be simply something which was useful in the past -- you can put it in a museum -- but it is of no use anymore. This is not a very exciting picture.
Mysticism does not agree with science, it goes beyond it.


According to mysticism, existence and experience is divided into three parts: the known, the unknown, and the unknowable. The known was unknown one day, the unknown will become known one day, but the unknowable will remain unknowable; it will remain mysterious. Whatever you do, the mystery will always surround existence. The mystery will always be there around life, around love, around meditation.
The mystery cannot be destroyed.


Ignorance can be destroyed, but by destroying ignorance you cannot destroy the miraculous, the mysterious.
J. Krishnamurti's statement belongs to the unknowable.


I have been telling you that as you meditate... and by meditation I simply mean as you become more and more aware of your mind process. If the mind process is one hundred percent, taking your whole energy, you will be fast asleep inside -- there will be no alertness.


One morning Gautam Buddha is talking to his disciples. The king, Prasenjita, has also come to listen to him; he is sitting just in front of Buddha. He is not accustomed to sitting on the floor -- he is a king -- so he is feeling uncomfortable, fidgety, changing sides, somehow trying not to disturb and not to be noticed by Buddha because he is not sitting silently, peacefully. He is continuously moving the big toe of his foot, for no reason, just to be busy without business. There are people who cannot be without business; they will still be busy.


Gautam Buddha stopped talking and asked Prasenjita, "Can you tell me, why are you moving your big toe?" In fact, Prasenjita himself was not aware of it.


You are doing a thousand and one things you are not aware of. Unless somebody points at them, you may not take any note of it.


The moment Buddha asked him, the toe stopped moving. Buddha said, "Why have you stopped moving the toe?"


He said, "You are putting me in an embarrassing situation. I don't know why that toe was moving. This much I know: that as you asked the question it stopped. I have not done anything -- neither was I moving it, nor have I stopped it."


Buddha said to his disciples, "Do you see the point? The toe belongs to the man. It moves, but he is not aware of its movement. And the moment he becomes aware -- because I asked the question -- the very awareness immediately stops the toe. He does not stop it. The very awareness, that 'It is stupid, why are you moving it?' -- just the awareness is enough to stop it."


Your mind is a constant traffic of thoughts, and it is always rush hour, day in, day out.
Meditation means to watch the movement of thoughts in the mind.


Just be an observer, as if you are standing by the side of the road watching the traffic -- no judgment, no evaluation, no condemnation, no appreciation -- just pure observation.


As you become more and more accustomed to observation, a strange phenomenon starts happening. If you are ten percent aware, that much energy has moved from the mind process to the observer; now the mind has only ninety percent energy available. A moment comes... you have fifty percent of energy. And your energy goes on growing as mind goes on losing its energy. The traffic becomes less and less and less, and you become more and more and more.


Your witnessing self goes on increasing in integrity, expanding; it becomes stronger and stronger. And the mind goes on becoming weaker and weaker: ninety percent observer and ten percent mind, ninety-nine percent observer and only one percent mind.


One hundred percent observer and the mind disappears, the road is empty; the screen of the mind becomes completely empty, nothing moves. There is only the observer.


This is the state J. Krishnamurti's statement is pointing at. When there is nothing to observe, when there is only the observer left, then the observer itself becomes the observed -- because there is nothing else to observe, what else to do? The knower simply knows itself. The seer sees himself. The energy that was going towards objects, thoughts... there are no thoughts, no objects. The energy has no way to go anywhere; it simply becomes a light unto itself. There is nothing that it lights, it lights only itself -- a flame surrounded by silence, surrounded by nothingness.


That is Krishnamurti's way of saying it, that the observer becomes the observed. You can call it enlightenment, it is the same thing: the light simply lights itself, there is nothing else to fall upon. You have dissolved the mind. You are alone, fully alert and aware.


Krishnamurti is using a phrase of his own. He was a little fussy about it... not to use anybody else's phrase, anybody else's word -- not to use anything that has been used by other masters. So his whole life, he was coining his own phrases.


But you can change only the expression, you cannot change the experience. The experience is eternal. It makes no difference whether somebody calls it enlightenment, somebody calls it nirvana, somebody calls it samadhi, somebody calls it something else. You can give it your own name but remember, the experience should not be changed by your words.


And it is not changed by J. Krishnamurti's words. They are perfectly applicable, although they are not so glamorous as nirvana, Gautam Buddha's word, or samadhi, Patanjali's word, or il'aham, Mohammed's word. "The observer is the observed" looks too mundane. It certainly points to the reality, but the words in themselves are not very poetic, are very ordinary. And the extraordinary should not be indicated by the ordinary; that is sacrilegious.


So there are many people around the world who have been listening to J. Krishnamurti. They will listen to these words, "The observer becomes the observed," and they will not have even a far-off notion of nirvana or enlightenment or samadhi.


I don't like this fussiness. I don't want to say anything against that old man because he is dead. If he were alive I would say something against him, certainly. His whole effort -- and he lived long, ninety years -- was somehow to prove that he was original in everything, even in expressions.


I don't feel the necessity. If you are original, you are original. There is no need to shout from the housetops that "I am original," that "I am fortunate that I have not read any sacred scriptures." And this is not true, because even to avoid samadhi, nirvana, enlightenment, you have to know those words; otherwise, how can you avoid them? He may not have read them himself; somebody else may have read them, and he must have heard it.


And that's what actually had happened: from his childhood he was being taught to become a world teacher, so others were telling him.... He was just nine years old, so he was not telling a lie by saying that he had not read the sacred scriptures; but the sacred scriptures were read to him.


This reminds me of a milkman. I was a student in the university and he used to come to the hostel with his small son to give milk to the students. And everybody was suspicious that his milk was at least fifty percent water. Already the purest milk is eighty percent water; then fifty percent more.... So it is just the name milk, otherwise it is all water. So everybody was telling him, "You are mixing in too much water."


And he was a very religious man, worshipping for hours in the temple. And he would say, "I am a religious man. I cannot do this. I can take an oath. This is my son" -- and he would put his hand on his son's head -- "Under oath I am saying that if I lie, my son should die. I have never mixed water into milk."


I listened many times. One day I called him inside my room and closed the door. He said, "What are you doing?"


I said, "You need not be worried, I am also a religious man. Just a little dialogue...."
He said, "But why are you closing the door?"


I said, "It has to be very private; otherwise, you will be in difficulty."
He said, "Strange... why should I be in difficulty?"


I said, "Now just tell me exactly. I have seen you mixing water with my own eyes.... I had to miss one morning walk just to hide near your place to see it. Just this morning I have seen it. And if you don't listen to me... I don't have a son, but I can use your son, under oath."


He said, "Wait! Don't do that. You are a dangerous man. You can do it to your son but not to my son."


I said, "What is the harm? Your son is not going to be harmed; truth is truth."
He said, "That means I will have to tell you the truth."
I said, "You will have to tell me the truth."


He said, "The truth is that I never mix water into milk, I always mix milk into water -- and that makes all the difference. My oath is absolutely correct. But please don't say it to anybody, otherwise they will start asking me to take the oath the other way, and that I cannot do. I mix them, but I always mix milk into the water. I am making the water also milky. I am not destroying milk, I am just changing the quality of the water!"


I said, "You are really a religious man." Now what he is saying is simply the same.


For thousands of years, anybody who has reached to the point of no-mind and only awareness has given names which are far more meaningful than J. Krishnamurti's words. For example, Patanjali's word is the most important and the most ancient: samadhi. In Sanskrit, sickness is called vyadhi, and to go beyond all sickness is called samadhi. It has a beauty -- going beyond all sickness; attaining wholeness, perfection. It has a beauty and a meaning.


Gautam Buddha used the word nirvana... because he was trying to make an effort twenty-five centuries after Patanjali. In these twenty-five centuries Patanjali had been misused. The people who were trying to reach samadhi made it some kind of ego trip. The word 'samadhi' is very positive -- beyond all illness, wholeness. There is a loophole in it: it can give you an idea that "I will become perfect, beyond all limitations, all sicknesses. I will become whole." But the danger is that this "I" may be your ego -- most probably it will be, because your mind is still there.


The samadhi is true when the mind is gone. Then you can say, "I have gone beyond sickness" because the ego was also a sickness -- in fact, the greatest sickness that man suffers from. Now your "I" does not mean ego. It simply means your individuality, not your personality. It simply means the universal in you, just the dewdrop which contains the ocean. The emphasis has changed completely. It is not the dewdrop that is claiming; it is the ocean that is proclaiming.


But because many people became egoistic... and you can see those people even today. Your saints, sages, mahatmas, are so full of ego that one is surprised -- even ordinary people are not so full of ego. But their egos are very subtle, very refined.


Gautam Buddha had to find a new word, and the word had to be negative so that ego could not make a trick for itself. 'Nirvana' is a negative word; it simply means "blowing out the candle"... a very beautiful word. Blowing out the candle, what happens? -- just pure darkness remains. Buddha is saying that when your ego has disappeared like the flame of the candle, what remains -- that silence, that peace, that eternal bliss -- is nirvana.


And certainly he was successful: nobody has been able to make nirvana an ego-trip. How can you make nirvana an ego-trip? The ego has to die. It is implied in the word itself, that you will have to disappear in smoke. What will be left behind is your true reality, is your pure existence, is your truth, is your being -- and to find it is to find all.


But Buddha had a reason to change the word 'samadhi' into 'nirvana'. J. Krishnamurti had no reason at all, except that he was obsessed with being original. What he says describes the fact: the observer is the observed -- but it has no poetry. It is true, but it has no music.


But that is true about J. Krishnamurti's whole philosophy: it has no music, it has no poetry. It is purely a rational, logical, intellectual approach. He was trying hard somehow to express the mystic experience in rational and logical terms, and he has been successful in many ways, but he has destroyed the beauty.


He has brought the mystic experience closer to rational philosophizing; but the mystic experience is not philosophy, it is always poetry. It is closer to painting, closer to singing, closer to dancing, but not closer to logic -- and that's what he was doing. And my opposition to him is based on this ground. My effort is to bring mysticism to your dance, to your song, to your love, to your poetry, to your painting -- not to your logic.


Logic is good for business, it is good for mathematics. It is absolutely useless as far as higher values are concerned.
<p class="question">BELOVED OSHO,
SINCE YOU HAVE SPOKEN ABOUT THE BEARD, IT REMINDS ME ABOUT THE PROBLEM I FACE BECAUSE OF MY BEARD.
DUE TO MY BEARD, MY FACE HAS TAKEN ON SOME RESEMBLANCE TO YOURS. SOME PEOPLE COME AND PROSTRATE THEMSELVES BEFORE ME, MISTAKING ME FOR YOU. IN PUBLIC PLACES, SOME COMMENT, "THERE GOES RAJNEESH!"
I HAVE COMPARED MY EARLIER PHOTOGRAPHS WITH YOURS, BUT I FIND NO RESEMBLANCE AT ALL. AT HOME THERE ARE MANY PHOTOGRAPHS OF YOU, AND ANYONE WHO VISITS MY HOME REMARKS WITH SURPRISE AT WHY I HAVE SO MANY PHOTOGRAPHS OF MYSELF IN MY HOME. EVEN SOME SANNYASINS REMARK ON THE RESEMBLANCE.
IN SPITE OF BEING AWARE ABOUT ALL THIS, AT LEAST AT MY LEVEL, THIS CREATES MIXED FEELINGS IN ME -- LIKE EGO, PRIDE, AND A FEELING OF SUPERIORITY.
IS THIS SOME KIND OF MISCHIEF PLAYED BY THE BEARD, OR IS THERE A PURPOSE?
BELOVED OSHO, I AM EXTREMELY GRATEFUL AND FULL OF GRATITUDE FOR YOUR UNBOUNDED COMPASSION FOR ME.
WILL YOU KINDLY EXPLAIN WHAT THIS IS ALL ABOUT?</p>


Govind Siddharth, the question may sound ordinary to many people; it is not.
Before I answer your question...


I have remembered asking my father in my childhood.... We were visiting a Jaina temple where twenty-four Jaina prophets had their statues in a line. All were exactly the same, and their times were thousands of years apart. The first Jaina master must have lived ten thousand years ago. The last was two thousand five hundred years ago; so many years between those twenty-four tirthankaras, but they all looked exactly the same! -- so much so that even the worshipper in the temple, the professional worshipper who worships every day, could not tell any difference -- who is who? So finally they made symbols; under each statue there is a symbol, a small symbol. You may not even notice it, that underneath Mahavira there is a line. The worshipper knows it; he can tell you that this is Mahavira's statue, this is Adinatha's statue. And you are surprised -- there is no difference at all. You can replace the statues and nobody will be able to find out.


My father was a very sincere man. He never said to me that "When you are older, more mature, you will understand." He never said that to me. He simply accepted that he did not know. And he said that if I ever came to know I should remember to tell him, because he did not know.


What has happened? It is not possible that in thousands of years' time, twenty-four persons were born absolutely resembling each other. You cannot find two persons on the whole earth resembling each other exactly. Even twins are not absolutely the same: the mother recognizes them, their friends recognize them, and their husbands have to recognize them... just small differences.


After my enlightenment it became clear to me, as my clarity became complete, that the reason why those twenty-four statues are exactly the same is not that those twenty-four persons were exactly the same. But those twenty-four persons were doing exactly the same meditation. Their inner being was moving on the same staircase and that was affecting their physical bodies. That is natural. When they became enlightened their outer bodies also started resembling each other a little bit and this fact was noted down by the sculptors.


It is a miracle, and to make it clear to the coming generations they made those twenty-four statues exactly alike. They are indicating a fact: that if your inner being moves in the same direction, your outer expressions are bound to change. Your eyes will start having the same light, your hands will start having the same grace, your words will start having the same authority.


Govind Siddharth, it is not the beard that is creating the mischief. In fact, why you started growing the beard; that is the problem!


People who have been around me slowly start growing a beard. I don't say anything to them, but something happens in their minds. They start realizing that the beard is a natural thing to a man, and to shave it is as ugly as a woman starting to grow a beard. Just think of a woman.... And it is not difficult -- she can just have a few injections, a few hormones that are needed to grow a beard, and she will have a beard! But I don't think that any man would like her, or that anybody is going to say, "What a beautiful woman!" But the beard, to men, is a natural thing.


As you start meditating, your life becomes more and more natural in so many ways. The beard is just a small part of it. You will find it easier to have a beard, more spontaneous. And this is symbolic of other happenings in your life: the way you walk, the way you see, the way you sit.


So don't be angry with those people who prostrate themselves before you. Just bless them on my behalf because they are not prostrating themselves before you, they are prostrating themselves before me -- you are simply a medium. So on my behalf just bless them, and you will be surprised that your blessing reaches to their hearts. You can see the joy, the blissfulness that comes to them by your blessing.


I can understand your embarrassment, but what to do? To be with a man like me you have to go through many sufferings -- these are the sufferings. You have to pay for it.


But there is no need to feel ego, no need to feel pride. Just feel humble that you have become a vehicle, that you have become a medium, that people can see me through you.


And don't try to convince them that they are wrong; don't try to convince them that you are somebody else. You are not! In that particular moment I am absolutely visible, through you, to them. They are not committing a mistake. But you are not aware that you have become transparent.
Your meditation will make you more and more transparent.
Soon, hundreds of my sannyasins will have to face the same problem.


But you should rejoice that your consciousness is growing, that your mirror is getting more and more clean. It is not the beard, it is your growth of consciousness that gives the feel... and the feel is so strong that those people will not be able to see the distinctions that you can see. You can compare photographs, and you can see that they don't resemble each other. Why are people coming to your house and asking why you have your own photographs all around?


It reminds me -- a great painter wanted to paint Ramakrishna; he asked permission. He painted Ramakrishna, and when the painting was complete he brought the painting to Ramakrishna. It was early morning... his usual gathering, his disciples, visitors, and the painting was brought. And Ramakrishna touched the feet of the painting! The painter could not understand, Ramakrishna's followers could not understand. They said, "He is really mad. It is his own painting, his own picture, and the guy is touching his own feet!"


The painter said, "I am not accustomed to the ways of mystics, but this looks like madness. This is your picture."


Ramakrishna said, "But when you made it, I was in samadhi; it is a painting of samadhi too. I am irrelevant. And when somebody brings a picture of samadhi in front of me, that I should not pay respect to it is impossible. Let the whole world call me mad. It is Ramakrishna's body; it could be somebody else's body, that does not matter. What matters is that you have succeeded in catching the spirit. That moment of silence that was inside me, I can see it in your picture."


Even a picture.... A disciple is a living painting of his master. As he comes closer to the heights, more and more people will see the master in him.
So what is happening is perfectly right.
<p class="question">BELOVED OSHO,
FOR YEARS I HAVE NOTICED THAT WHENEVER I BOW DOWN AND TOUCH YOUR FEET, YOU HAVE NEVER PUT YOUR HAND ON MY HEAD, WHICH GENERALLY YOU DO TO OTHERS.
BUT LATE ON THE NIGHT OF YOUR ARRIVAL IN BOMBAY I SUDDENLY FELT YOUR TWO HANDS PUT ON MY HEAD, AND WITH IT A CONTINUOUS LIGHTNING GOING ON IN MY FOREHEAD AT THE THIRD EYE. FIRST I THOUGHT THAT IT MUST HAVE BEEN MY IMAGINATION DUE TO MY DEEP LONGING TO HAVE YOUR HAND PUT ON MY HEAD. BUT AS THE LIGHTNING WAS SO STRONG I WOKE UP, AND BECAME FULLY AWARE THAT IT WAS ACTUALLY HAPPENING.
MY HEART WAS FULL OF GRATITUDE, AND TEARS STARTED ROLLING DOWN. IT WAS ALL SO BLISSFUL AND BEYOND WORDS TO DESCRIBE IT.
IN DEEP GRATITUDE I BOWED DOWN AND TOUCHED YOUR FEET, AND SLOWLY, SLOWLY EVERYTHING BECAME NORMAL.
EARLY THE FOLLOWING MORNING MY FIVE YEAR-OLD DAUGHTER RUSHED TO ME AND WOKE ME UP SAYING, "YOUR OSHO HAS COME TO BOMBAY."
BELOVED OSHO, PLEASE ACCEPT MY DEEP GRATITUDE FOR YOUR UNBOUNDED COMPASSION ON ME. IF YOU FEEL AT ALL THAT IT IS NECESSARY, WILL YOU PLEASE KINDLY COMMENT?</p>


Govind Siddharth, it would have been better if you had not asked the question -- because I always touch the heads of the wrong people. They need it; they need all the support possible.


The people who are growing on their own do not need any support. I put my hands on their heads only when they have done everything that they could do and they need the last push.


Yes, I have been avoiding your head, and avoiding it almost for twenty-five years -- it is difficult to remember whose head to touch and whose head not to touch -- but now you had earned it, deserved it.


There have been very few people who have been with me for so long, with such trust, with such devotion. This is the first time he has asked any questions, and I think the last time -- because he has asked all the questions!


But he has been growing. Many people have come and gone, but he has remained the same -- with the same love, with the same devotion -- and has continued to work upon himself. And I have not been helping him much, not even this much -- putting my hand on his head, which is not a difficult thing. I have been doing it to thousands of heads, but those heads are very thick.


I was waiting... one day I will touch Govind Siddharth's head, but that day will be when he is really in need -- when he has done everything, has not left anything undone and only a small push is needed from my side.
So what happened to you was not your imagination.


And now many more things will start happening, because now the doors are open and you are inside the temple.
<p class="question">SECONDLY, ALL THESE YEARS I HAVE NOTICED THAT YOU ADDRESS CERTAIN SANNYASINS, INCLUDING ME, BY OUR ORIGINAL NAME, NEVER USING OUR SANNYAS NAME. NOT ONLY THIS, BUT YOU AFFIX TO OUR NAME "JI," "BABU," "BHAI" -- A SIGN OF RESPECT SHOWN TO ELDERS.    BELOVED OSHO, YOU BEING MY RESPECTED AND BELOVED MASTER, I FEEL PAINFULLY AWKWARD AND AS IF I MUST BE LACKING SOMETHING WHEN YOU ADDRESS ME THUS. WHY IS THIS SO? WILL YOU PLEASE KINDLY COMMENT?</p>


Govind Siddharth, this is true. There are a few people who I have known long before the initiation into sannyas started. Even before sannyas they were sannyasins by their attitude, by their gratefulness. So when they took sannyas, as far as I was concerned, there was no change. They were already sannyasins to me. They were unaware of it, but to me there was no change. This was the reason that I continued their old names.


For example, I am addressing Govind Siddharth for the first time; otherwise I have always called him Lashkariji. Kakubhai... Falibhai... Jayantibhai... I have known them for so many years before sannyas, and there has been no drastic change. They smoothly moved into sannyas, so smoothly that I don't remember a few of their sannyas names. I don't know what is the name of Falibhai, and there is no need. Falibhai will become enlightened as Falibhai. He must know his sannyas name, but I have forgotten because I have never used it. And that was the case with Lashkariji. Today I have used Govind Siddharth before you all, but from tomorrow -- again Lashkariji!
Names don't matter.


I can understand your embarrassment that I am calling everybody else by the sannyas name and not calling you by the sannyas name -- "Is there something missing?" No, there is not anything missing. Even before you became a sannyasin there was nothing missing. Your sannyas has not been a revolution but an evolution. You have simply grown; you have not taken any jump, there has not been any need.


And you should understand my trouble also: when I see you, I don't remember Govind Siddharth, I remember Lashkariji. So you should be compassionate towards me too; I have my troubles. Now when Kakubhai comes to see me, I don't know his sannyas name. But the important thing is sannyas, not the name. And it is something inner, not something outer. So don't feel that way.


I can see the point, that you respect me. And this has been the human tradition all over the world: that if you respect me then I cannot respect you -- and that is absolutely wrong.


If you go to a Jaina monk and you put both your hands together with deep respect and bow down to him, he cannot do the same to you -- because you are respecting him, you are putting him on a higher pedestal; now from that pedestal he can only bless you. Jaina scriptures, Hindu scriptures, Buddhist scriptures all prohibit it: sannyasins should not be respectful towards non-sannyasins. They should be compassionate -- compassion keeps you above them.


But about everything, my approach is different. I respect all those who respect me. I love all those who love me.


The more you respect me, the more I respect you; it is a mutual phenomenon. There is no question of somebody being superior and somebody being inferior.


In Gautam Buddha's life, he liked to tell stories from his old lives. In one of his lives, when he was not enlightened, he heard about an enlightened man and went to see him. He was a man of great charisma. Buddha had come with all kinds of questions and doubts and skepticism, but as he came close to him he forgot everything. He went down, touched his feet with tremendous respect. But as he stood up, he was surprised and shocked that the awakened man touched his feet. Buddha said to him, "What are you doing? You are awakened, you have arrived. Your journey is finished; I have not even taken the first step. It looks so embarrassing that before this whole crowd you touched my feet."


The man laughed and he said, "Don't be worried. I have not touched your feet, I have touched your future. Yesterday I was not awakened; tomorrow you will be awakened. So what is the difference? -- just a question of time. And it is absolutely necessary that I touch your feet, because I can see that you are going to become a great master. Millions of people will pay respect to you.


"Don't forget that one enlightened man has touched your feet while you were not enlightened -- remember it. Be respectful to those people -- because they may be asleep, but what is the difference between the asleep man and the awakened man? So little.... The asleep will become awakened, will have to become awakened -- how long can he sleep?"


So as far as I am concerned, I am not one of your so-called holier-than-thou saints.
I love you. I respect you. I am grateful, as you cannot conceive.


I am immensely thankful to every person who has come to me to share my joy, to share my being, to be part of my celebration.
<p class="question">BELOVED OSHO,
SINCE SHAKTIPAT ON THAT NIGHT I AM FEELING VERY LAZY. FOR THE WHOLE DAY I LIE DOWN DOING NOTHING. EVEN TO EAT OR TAKE A BATH, I HAVE TO FORCE MYSELF. I CANNOT EVEN DO MEDITATION TECHNIQUES. EVEN IF I FORCIBLY TRY TO DO THEM, I AM FORCED TO LEAVE THEM HALF WAY. ALL THIS IS DROPPING OFF. A STRANGE TRANSFORMATION IS HAPPENING. MY BLOOD PRESSURE FLUCTUATES, THE HEAD REMAINS HOT ALL THE TIME; THE SEX URGE HAS INCREASED. A DIFFERENT TYPE OF UNDERSTANDING -- OR EVEN BETTER TO SAY, EXPERIENCING -- IS HAPPENING.
SO MANY THINGS WHICH I HAD UNDERSTOOD WITH CERTAIN MEANINGS BEFORE, HAVE NOW BEEN GIVEN AN ABSOLUTELY NEW MEANING. A STRANGE ACCEPTANCE HAS COME TO LIFE.
I FIND THERE IS NOTHING GOOD OR BAD, NOTHING NEW OR OLD: PEOPLE ARE AS THEY SHOULD BE, AND CANNOT BE OTHERWISE. I ALSO FEEL NOW THAT PEOPLE WHOM I HAD MET BEFORE AND WORKED WITH -- THERE WAS NEVER A REAL MEETING WITH THEM. I NOW REALIZE THAT ALL OF THEM WERE WORKING WITH THE SAME LOVE AND AFFECTION, IN THEIR OWN WAY, BUT I HAD MY OWN CONCLUSIONS AND OPINIONS ABOUT THEM -- AND THAT WAS THE HINDRANCE IN MEETING AND UNDERSTANDING THEM. FOR THE FIRST TIME I FEEL I HAVE COME TO KNOW THEM, WHAT THEY WERE DOING, AND WHAT THEY ARE DOING CANNOT HAVE BEEN BETTER THAN WHAT IT IS.
WITH THIS ACCEPTANCE I HAVE STARTED FEELING A STRANGE TYPE OF LOVE AND AFFECTION TOWARDS EVERYONE.
BELOVED OSHO, WHAT IS HAPPENING TO ME? AM I REALLY GETTING LAZY OR IS IT A REACTION FROM ONE EXTREME TO ANOTHER EXTREME? -- OR HAS THE TIME COME TO LET THINGS HAPPEN?
THERE IS ALSO A DEEPER AND DEEPER AND MORE INCREASING URGE TO JUST SIT AT YOUR FEET AND LET THE GRASS GROW BY ITSELF.</p>


Govind Siddharth, whatever is happening is absolutely necessary.
It is part of the transformation. Just allow it to happen.
Don't force anything, not even meditations. Slowly slowly, this phase will disappear and you will find a totally new experience in everything, meditation included. It will not be any longer something that you do, it will be something that happens.
Man starts by doing meditation, but ends by meditation happening.


Unless meditation becomes just like breathing -- you don't have to do it -- you are still immature, a beginner. When meditation becomes like breathing, you forget all about it. It is simply there; whatever you are doing becomes meditative, becomes peaceful, silent, loving. Everything that you do starts having a mystifying touch to it.


Small things -- a flower, a dry, dead leaf on the grass -- start having tremendous beauty. New colors, new spaces around you go on opening. But it is not your doing, because whatever you can do will remain smaller than you. And anything smaller than you is not going to be the miraculous we are searching for.


It has to happen. All our efforts are simply a preparation for the miraculous to happen.


We cannot cause the miraculous to happen; there is no cause and effect relationship. It is not that we will do certain things, then the miraculous will happen to us, no. By doing certain things you are not creating any cause, you are simply removing a few hindrances which are blocking the way for the miraculous to shower on you. It is not a question of cause and effect.
And when the blocks are removed, you have simply to wait.


That's why the feeling is arising in you just to sit silently... doing nothing, the spring comes and the grass grows by itself.
			

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> Copyright 1964-1990 Osho (Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh)
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