Existentialism

 

 

Osho,

I believe it was sartre who coined the term "existential nausea" to describe severe alienation. i like to think that what i am feeling is morning sickness -- in anticipation of the birth of my self-realized being. it seems ironic to me that, although i have experienced exquisite mystical insights, i still fall into pits of depression and alienation where words and actions seem only to emphasize a futility in human endeavors.

Worse still is a deep shame that i am full of doubts when so many lovely flowers have been presented to me from the hands of existence.

Words really don't compensate for the alien gap, but just hearing the tenderness of your voice soothes the blown-out craters on the dark side of my moon. would you speak on alienation?

 

 

The philosophy of existentialism has given a few new words tremendous emphasis. One of those words is alienation -- to feel alien to oneself.

 

Man has always felt that he does not know himself. It is not something new; just the name is new and the emphasis is new. Twenty-five centuries ago Socrates was telling people, "Know thyself." He was saying, "You are a stranger to yourself. You don't know your being; you don't know all the dimensions of your being. You don't know, why you are here. You don't know from where you have come, you don't know where you are going. And most important, you don't know whether you are or not."

 

It happened... George Bernard Shaw was traveling from London to a small town in England. The ticket checker came into his compartment. He looked in all his pockets, in the suitcases, but he could not find the ticket. The ticket checker told him many times, "Don't get so worried. You are a world-famous figure, I know you. You must have forgotten the ticket somewhere. When I come on the next run, I can see it. There is no hurry."

 

He was trying to console the agitated George Bernard Shaw, but George Bernard Shaw was perspiring. Listening to his words he became very angry and shouted, "Shut up! I am not looking for the ticket for you. Now the problem arises, where am I going? Can you tell me?"

 

The man said, "How can I tell you?" George Bernard Shaw said, "Then don't talk nonsense. I am not worried about you; I am worried about where I am going. Now what will happen to me?"

 

Everybody is going somewhere, certainly. And nobody is going to ask for your ticket, but still... those who are intelligent are themselves bound to inquire "Where are we going?"

 

But all these questions are secondary. The basic question is "Who am I?"

 

This strangeness about oneself, this ignorance about oneself, if felt deeply creates in existentialist terms a nausea. One starts feeling nauseous. One is here, one is going somewhere, one is coming from somewhere... there seems to be no meaning in all this. And there are so many worries, so much suffering, so much anguish to go through for what?

 

Existentialism is a negative philosophy. But the modern man needs it, just as a shock. Existentialist ideas cannot be fulfilling; they cannot remove the nausea, they can only deepen it. They cannot destroy your alienation, they can only make it sharper. They cannot take away meaninglessness from your life, they can only write it in bold letters. They can surround you with a feeling of sickness. If death is the end, then life is nothing but sickness -- sickness unto death. But existentialism can help intelligent people not to be satisfied with nausea, but to inquire.

 

There have been people who have found themselves. Their serenity is a proof of it, their fragrance is evidence of it, their rejoicing is an argument which cannot be refuted. A Gautam Buddha, a Zarathustra, a Chuang Tzu, a Bodhidharma -- nobody can deny their grace. Nobody can deny that these people have gone beyond worries, beyond anxiety.

 

These people have found something which fills their life with songs of joy. They have found some treasure which is inexhaustible and makes them dance in utter gratitude. Their very presence has convinced millions of people that life need not be a sickness unto death; on the contrary life can become such a dance that death becomes the ultimate culmination of the dance. Life can be transformed so deeply that even death disappears as darkness and becomes a dawn, that even death is no more an end but a new beginning.

 

Existentialism has paralyzed immensely, terribly, the intelligentsia of the Western world.

 

The impact of the existentialists has been great. And the conclusion of their philosophy is nothing but suicide, which can relieve you from all nausea, all alienation, all meaninglessness, all anguish, all suffering.

 

There has never been such a negative philosophy in the whole history of man. There have been atheists, who denied God, but they denied God to support life. They denied God so man can be absolutely free, without anybody dominating him and dictating to him and giving him commandments. Atheists were humanitarians; they raised man as the highest value. To the theists they looked negative because they were negating God, but nobody has seen that they were affirming life.

 

In fact, compared to atheists the theists are negative, because they deny life, they negate life, they teach people to renounce life for a fictitious god, for a hypothetical god for which they don't have any proof, any argument. But theists have been thought of as positive thinkers, and atheists as negative thinkers. This evaluation is totally wrong, according to me. Atheists are very positive; theists are absolutely negative.

 

But the existentialists have far transcended the theists and their negativity; they were at least affirming a fictitious god. Atheism was denying only a fiction. Existentialists are denying the fiction of god and they are also denying the reality of life; not only denying, but giving it such condemnatory colors that it seems it is a calamity to be born, it is a punishment to be born... that life is not a joy, but simply another name of hell.

 

Existentialism has to be understood very deeply, because philosophically it may become the cause of the third world war. It has destroyed all that was beautiful in life. It has negated everything that was valuable -- love, silence, meditation, joy. It has erased them all. Life is only a sickness, and we are clinging to life because we are afraid to die. It is not that we love life; we hate it -- but at least it is known. Who knows, death may be far worse. It is better to remain with the known, although it is miserable.

 

They have created the philosophical background for people like Ronald Reagan to destroy the whole humanity. If existentialism is true, then there is no harm in destroying the whole humanity; in fact it should be taken as a blessing that all sickness disappears, all that is ugly disappears.

 

And all is ugly according to the existentialists. There is not even a single thing which can be appreciated.

 

Unless the West becomes aware of meditation, unless meditation penetrates the Western intelligence, there is a danger. The politicians are creating weapons to destroy, and the philosophers are creating readiness to be destroyed, willingness to be destroyed. It is the greatest conspiracy against life between politicians and philosophers.

 

And these existentialists.... One wonders! I have written letters to Jaspers, to Jean-Paul Sartre and they didn't even have the courage to answer. I asked them, "If your philosophy is right, you should commit suicide. Why are you living? For what? Waiting for death?" According to them, life is nothing but a waiting room and the train that will come, its name is death.

 

Neither Jaspers nor Jean-Paul Sartre ever replied. All these philosophers, from Soren Kierkegaard to Marcel, were living perfectly happily, enjoying Nobel prizes and preaching a philosophy which is itself really sick.

 

Life is not sick. It is the wrong glasses they have on their eyes. Just today I heard some news. A man shot his wife in New York. The police came, and the man was absolutely unafraid. He said, "Yes, I have killed my wife." But his son said, "Father, she's not my mother and she's not your wife." He said, "My God, I forgot to put on my glasses!" He killed some other woman, thinking that she was his wife.

 

Existentialism is giving wrong glasses to people. It is the most anti-human, anti-life ideology ever preached.

 

Prem Padmini, you need not be caught into these sick ideologies. I am here to open new windows for you, and you can see with your own eyes the immense beauty of life, the great blissfulness of life... the tremendous silence which is a song without sounds, and a dance that goes on eternally in the trees, in the rivers, in the mountains, in the stars.

 

The whole existence is full of rejoicing; you just need to open your windows. Your darkness is your own creation, your alienation is your own creation; otherwise you are not a stranger to yourself. You are not a stranger to the trees, to the rivers, to the mountains.

 

It is our existence; we are part of it.

 

Our heartbeat is part of the universal heartbeat.

 

And it is not a dead universe; it is immensely intelligent, conscious, sensitive. It is divine in its every dimension. But you have to learn to participate in the dance.

 

You are sitting like a cripple, and because of your crippledness -- which is just your idea; you are not crippled, you have just been told that you are crippled, you cannot dance, you will fall, so sit silently -- you are not participating in the dance that is going all over the place.

 

The cripple automatically becomes a critic. He starts hating that which he cannot do. He starts calling the dancers stupid, mad, insane -- "What is the point of all this dance? what is the meaning of all these songs and music? It is just noise and nothing else.

 

So as not to see one's crippledness, one starts condemning those who are not influenced by crippled philosophies and religions.

 

Be a participant! In the beginning it may be a little difficult, but step by step start moving a little.

 

A husband asks his wife which she likes most, Christmas or sex. "Christmas," she says. "Why is that?" asks her husband. "Is it more romantic?" "No," she answers, "but it happens more often."

 

Now, if Christmas happens more often, then life will look like a nausea, a sickness.

 

Participate in the small joys of life, and it will open its great treasures. It contains immense riches, but it needs you to explore them. It gives you challenges, because it is one of the parts of understanding that what you find with great difficulty you enjoy more. That which is very arduous brings great rejoicing; that which is obvious, freely available, will not give you joy.

 

Life follows that principle, it keeps its treasures hidden. But it goes on challenging you, calling you. You have to become pilgrims, seekers, searchers. And all the doors are inside, so you don't have to go to the Himalayas. You have just to go inwards. The deeper you go in, the more you know that life is not alien; it is your very heart. You are not separate from it. You have always been part of it, in some form or other, and you will remain always part of it.

 

You belong to this eternal celebration.

 

Existentialism is one of the most dangerous approaches to life -- far more dangerous than your religions, because your religions are very poor in arguments. Existentialism is very rich in arguments, so convincing that once you are caught in its trap, you cannot escape. Just remember one thing: not a single existentialist philosopher has committed suicide. That destroys their whole philosophical approach.

 

Only once before in the past in Greece there was a great philosopher, Zeno. He was not teaching so many ugly things, and making man really feel nauseous, but he was certainly teaching that life has no meaning and only cowards go on living because they don't have the guts to commit suicide. He himself lived a long life of ninety years, and thousands of people committed suicide under his influence. When he was dying, one young man asked, "Just one question more: how come you managed to live ninety years while your followers, particularly young people, have committed suicide according to your philosophy?"

 

He said, "I had to live to teach the philosophy. It was such a suffering to live, but I had to suffer for the sake of humanity."

 

Philosophers can be very cunning. Now this is cunningness, pure and simple. But at least he accepted one thing -- that he lived to teach his philosophy. Jaspers and Jean-Paul Sartre and Marcel did not even answer my question. They could have at least said, "We are suffering greatly, but because we want to awaken humanity to the reality, which is nauseous, we are somehow managing to remain alive." Even that much they were not courageous enough to accept. And strangely enough, when Marcel was given a Nobel prize, he accepted it. Life is a nausea. What is a Nobel prize? A cancer? Happily, he accepted.

 

These are just intellectuals playing games with words, mind games; but they don't know anything of meditation. If they had known just a little bit of meditation not only would their life have been richer, they would have changed the whole West, particularly the Western youth, into a happier, a more radiant, alive generation.

 

But all that they have created is a subtle willingness for suicide, a deep acceptance of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. If life is such, then to destroy it is not evil; then Adolf Hitler is a great prophet and he helped six million people to be relieved from a life which was nausea. He was the greatest servant of the Jews: without him, six million Jews would still be suffering from nausea, anguish, anxiety, meaninglessness. Adolf Hitler is a great savior. And now he has come in a far greater form as Ronald Reagan. Perhaps Ronald Reagan will prove the greatest savior of humanity by destroying all life.

 

Existentialism has to be fought, it has to be destroyed by the roots, because it is in favor of death and against life -- and without knowing life. And to know life there is only one way, the way of meditation.

 

-Osho, "The Golden Future, #38, Q2"