Indecisiveness

 

 

A man is born only when he becomes decisive. With decision is the birth of man. Those who live in indecisiveness are not really men yet. And millions live in indecisiveness; they cannot decide about anything. They always lean upon others; somebody else should decide for them. Hence people hang around authorities.

 

Authoritativeness continues in the world for the single reason that millions of people cannot decide for themselves. They have always to be given an order. Once the order is given, they follow it. But this is slavery, this is how they are preventing the birth of their own soul. Decision should arise in your being, because with decisiveness integrity arises. Remember, make a few decisions. Decisions will make you individual.

 

What is indecisiveness? It means you are a crowd; many voices in you are contradicting each other, and you cannot decide whether to go this way or that. Even in small things people are indecisive: whether to go to see this movie or that -- and they are indecisive. Indecisiveness has become almost their very style of life. To purchase this or to purchase that? Just watch people when they go shopping. See their indecisiveness. Just sit in any shop and just watch people coming and going -- customers -- and you will be surprised: people don't know how to decide. And those who don't know how to decide will remain vague, cloudy, confused. With decision comes clarity. And if the decision is far-reaching, if the decision has something to do with your foundations, certainly, one is born.

 

Now there are many people who come to me, and they say, 'We cannot decide whether to take the jump into sannyas or not.' They want me to tell them to take the jump. But then they miss the whole point. If I say to you, 'Take the jump and become a sannyasin,' you have missed an opportunity, a great opportunity, of taking a decision. Again you have leaned on somebody else, and that is not the way a soul grows. And this is a profound decision, of immense significance, because it is going to change your whole life style, it is going to give you a new vision. You will be moving in a new direction, you will not be the same again. Such far-reaching decisions one should be capable of taking on one's own. One should risk. Only with risk, with courage, is one born.

 

And whenever you take a decision, remember, if you take it then follow it; otherwise don't take a decision, because then it is more dangerous -- more dangerous than being indecisive. To take a decision and not to follow it will make you very very impotent. Then it would have been better not to have decided. There are people who decide and then never follow their decisions. Slowly slowly they lose all trust and confidence in their being. Slowly slowly they know perfectly well that whatsoever they decide they are not going to do. They become split; they become deceptive to themselves. When they are taking a decision, even in that moment they know that they are not going to follow it, because they know their past and their past experiences. Whenever they did decide, they never followed it.

 

And then very small decisions can be very destructive. Just a small decision -- 'I will not smoke from today' -- just a very ordinary decision, nothing much is involved in it... Whether you smoke or not doesn't matter: the existence continues. In twenty years time you may have tuberculosis, but that can be cured. Or you may die two or three years earlier. So what? -- you never really lived.

 

-Osho, "The Secret of Secrets, Vol 1, #13“