https://oshofriends.com/dictionary/57864Alchemy
Meditate on anything negative, and slowly slowly you will be simply taken by surprise – that sadness turns into joy, that anger turns into compassion, that greed turns into sharing, and so on, so forth. This is the science of inner alchemy: how to change the negative into the positive, how to change the base metal into gold.
But remember, never start with the positive because you don’t know anything of the positive. And that’s what is being taught by many people in the world – the “positive thinkers” they are called. They don’t know anything about the inner alchemy. You don’t begin with gold. If you already have gold, then what is the point of beginning at all? You don’t need alchemy. You have to begin with base metal, the base metal has to be changed into gold. And the base metal is what you have, is what you ARE. Hell is what you are; it has to be transformed into heaven. Poison is available; it has to be transformed into nectar. Start with the negative.
All the buddhas have insisted: Go via negativa, because the negative brings the positive, and the negative brings the positive so easily. You don’t drag it, you don’t impose it upon yourself. If you start with the positive, as the so-called positive thinkers are teaching, you will become phony. What will you do? How will you start with joy? You may start smiling, but that smile will be painted: it will be just on the lips, not even skin-deep.
Start with the negative and you don’t need to think about the positive at all. If you meditate on the negative, if you go deeply into it, to the deepest root of it, suddenly an explosion happens: the negative disappears and the positive has arrived. In fact it has always been there, hidden behind the negative. The negative was a shelter. The negative was needed because you were not yet worthy enough; the negative was needed so that you could become worthy enough to receive the positive.
The world is the negative pole of God. You need not renounce it, you have simply to be meditative in it. And one day you will see the world has disappeared and there is God and only God.
-Osho, "The Book of Wisdom, #21"
