Attachment
We become too easily attached, we become attached to everything. Life is a flux, nothing remains the same, but we hope and we desire that it will remain the same. There is so much frustration in the world because all our expectations remain unfulfilled. Each expectation brings a disaster.
Attachment means clinging to something, wanting it the way it is forever. That is asking for the impossible. The young person wants to remain young forever, and that is impossible, sooner or later he has to become old. But then old age, rather than bringing joy, brings suffering. Otherwise old age should be the very crescendo of life. It should be the highest peak, snow-covered -- but it is a dark hole. It is a dark hole because we have been clinging to youth. We cling to the body, but the body has to go one day. Live in it, love it, respect it, take care of it, but don't become attached. Remember it is a caravanserai, an overnight's stay. But in the morning we have to go.
And so is the case with everything. You fall in love with a person, you become attached, and immediately misery starts. You become possessive, you are afraid he may fall in love with somebody else. You start hindering, obstructing his freedom, you start reducing him to a thing. All respect and love starts disappearing. It becomes only a continuous fight between two egos. You want to possess him and he wants to possess you. How can love exist in such a constant war? Attachment destroys love. It is poison to love.
Love deeply, profoundly, but don't bring possessiveness and jealousy in. They are bound to come in if you become attached. The greatest art to learn in life is to float unattached. Pass through life but be untouched by anything. Things will come and go, you remain centered in your being, undistracted, undisturbed. That's what sannyas is. And if a person can manage this state all bliss is his. He can have the whole universe.
This is a miracle: the universe belongs to those people who are non-possessive. Love belongs to those who are non-jealous.
-Osho, “Dance Til the Stars Come Down From the Rafters, #31”