Osho on Hypnosis

 

 

"Hypnosis is a tremendously beautiful art, and there is nothing wrong in it. But everything can be used in a wrong way or in a right way. You can have a sword and cut somebody's head. That is not the fault of the sword; the sword is neutral. With your sword you can prevent somebody from raping a woman. But the sword is absolutely neutral, neither good nor bad; every energy is neutral."

 

"Hypnosis is a tremendous source of energy. The word itself means deliberate sleep. You know ordinary sleep, you sleep every day; because it is ordinary sleep, it does not go deep enough. Its function is to help your body to recover its energy lost in the day-to-day work, so tomorrow morning you can get up fresh, again able to work. The ordinary sleep only goes so deep that it can help your body to recover, rejuvenate."

 

"Deliberate sleep is the meaning of hypnosis. It is a simple thing, but it goes as deep as you are ready to go. It refreshes your body, it silences your mind, it cleanses your heart, it can reach to your very being. It all depends on your willingness -- nobody can hypnotize you against your will. That also is a greatly fallacious idea prevalent in the world, that somebody can hypnotize you against your will. That is impossible. Nobody can hypnotize you against your will."

 

- Osho, "The Great Pilgrimage"

 

 

 

"Hypnosis is such a simple, innocent experience, that even hearing about it can give you a taste of it. And that's what happened. Even when I am not talking about hypnosis, the same is happening to those who are really listening to me. A softness, a calmness, a silence starts surrounding them. That is a signal that whatever is being said is being heard too, that I am not talking to the walls."

 

"About your experience with Santosh and his dehypnotherapy, I can only say one thing: Santosh knows nothing about dehypnotherapy. He himself is so tense, so continuously worried, has so many problems... but he had studied hypnosis as a student for years in Germany so he knows the technique; but he has never been in those spaces himself. It is just like... you can read the map of the whole world and you have never been to those places, ever. Knowing where Constantinople is does not mean that you have been there. Knowing about it is one thing; being there is a totally different phenomenon. And in the schools only the technique, the know-how, is being taught."

 

"So when Santosh came to me he had the know-how of hypnosis. I engaged him in hypnotherapy, and I tried my best to make him understand that we have first to create a state of de-hypnotherapy -- because every child is being hypnotized, from the very childhood. That's how conditioning happens; that's how you get your mind. Your parents may not know, your teachers may not know, your priests may not know what they are doing: they are practicing hypnotic techniques. By the time you leave the university, you know all the techniques for conditioning others. So whoever comes to me is already conditioned."

 

"I was trying to make Santosh understand, "First dehypnotize these people, let them get rid of what society has forced upon them, and only then will hypnosis be clean, young, fresh, just born."

 

"He was only a student, so he changed the name of his therapy to dehypnotherapy on my suggestion. But what he has been doing is still the same techniques that he had learned in Germany. And those techniques can create horror, because first you are filled with social conditionings, and on top of it you are hypnotized."

 

"In hypnosis you reach to your unconscious mind, where all conditionings exist. You are in a volcanic state. There are going to be horrors because you may remember your childhood, and all that has happened to you since your childhood, which you have repressed. Remember, nobody represses any pleasant experience -- why should one repress a pleasant experience? In fact one tries to exaggerate it, to himself and to others, as much as he can. One represses only things which are unpleasant."

 

"So your unconscious is full of serpents and scorpions and dragons that you have repressed because you did not want to know about them and you did not want others to know about them. Without unconditioning you, if you are lead into hypnosis directly you will reach a hell of your own creation: whatever is repressed will show its true face to you -- and it is natural that you will become terrified."

 

- Osho, "Beyond Psychology # 40"

 

 

 

"The problem of these therapists like Santosh is that they have never gone through the process themselves; they have simply studied from a teacher. They have never been part of a mystery school, which would have cleaned them. And in a mystery school the technique is given to you only when you are able to use it, and not get into dark spots, horror spaces, terrible states. They are all imaginary, but when you are in them they are real."

 

"So with Santosh, what happened with you was a nightmare that was repressed, and he opened the bottle and the djinn came out. These kind of people are dangerous. I told him again and again, to the point that he was angry with me... because he used to think that he was a hypnotist, and he had studied for twelve years in Germany -- what more could anybody teach him? I said, "It is not a question of teaching. You have not gone through these spaces into which you are leading other people, and you don't know what will happen to them."

 

"Hypnosis is really a very soft method... very mellow music. It can happen just sitting by my side in silence. It can happen just by listening so intently that all your worries, tensions disappear, and you start moving deeper into your being. But those worries, tensions, anguishes, anxieties should disappear first."

 

"And `hypnotherapy' is an old word. `dehypnotherapy' is my construction. I told Santosh to make it dehypnotherapy, and he never asked, "What will be the difference between dehypnotherapy and hypnotherapy?" He simply made it dehypnotherapy. Now he has become the director of a dehypnotherapy institute, and he does not know what the difference is between dehypnotherapy and hypnotherapy."

 

"The process is going to be totally opposite. Hypnotherapy can take you into a deliberate sleep; dehypnotherapy can take you into a deliberate awakening. But I was puzzled: he did not even ask what the difference between the two will be."

 

"It is unfortunate, but I will have to make my people aware of the dangers of these therapists, because they will exaggerate their claims, saying that they have been with me for fifteen years. But they have not been with me for fifteen seconds. They were playing their own small role of being a guru to a small group of people. They had come for themselves, but they forgot completely. This is what happens to accidental people: they come for one thing and buy something else."

 

"I have heard about a real estate agent who was thought to be the top man in that profession, in a big city. He was part of a big company. The boss was very angry that day and was waiting for the man. And when the man came the boss burst out in anger and said, "This is too much. The man to whom you have sold land at double price has just gone. That we can understand; you are clever and intelligent and you managed that, and that's why we pay you so much. But the man had come to say, `It has rained, and now the land you have sold me is under eight feet of water. What kind of company is this? This is really cheating!'"

 

"The salesman said, "Don't be worried boss, I will take care of him. I am going." And after an hour he came back, smiling, and he said, "You have to give me some reward today."

 

He said, "First you tell me what happened to that man and his land?"

 

"He said, "Nothing happened. We have had two rotten boats for many days; I have sold them to that man. I told him, `You are a fool. Such beautiful land, which becomes a lake in the rainy season... have two boats. Make a house high enough so you will have both things together. When it is the rainy season you enjoy the lake -- and the boats I have brought with me.' And those boats are so rotten that they will drown the man the first time he sits in them. You don't be worried. They had been lying with the company for no one knows how many years. And we got a good price for them."

 

"The boss said, "This is too much! You have still cheated that man -- and now you have put him in a dangerous situation. Those boats will kill him."

 

"The man said, "This world goes on this way. You don't have to think about what happens to others; you have to just think about your own pockets."

 

"And that seems to be the state of these therapists: they are thinking about their own pockets. They are not worried about what happens to the people. What they are suggesting, they themselves have not lived; it is not their experience. And it is dishonest to tell somebody something that is not your experience, and put him into a state which can drive him crazy."

 

"Hypnosis can be dangerous too. In wrong hands anything can be dangerous; otherwise hypnosis is a simple form of relaxation. But it can be dangerous, because the man, if he is bent upon cheating you, in those states when you are under hypnosis can suggest to you things that you don't want to do. But you will have to do them when you wake up."

 

"I used to work with one of my students. I lived in his house for six months. His brother was my friend, and I was alone and there was no point in getting a house -- and who was going to take care of it? So he said, "You'd better stay with me." And I discovered really a beautiful medium in his younger brother."

 

"I started hypnotizing him. Just to give an example to you: one day I told him, "Tomorrow, exactly at twelve o'clock, you will kiss your pillow madly." The second day, nearabout quarter to twelve, he started looking a little strange, afraid, watching everybody, everywhere, and just in front of him I took his pillow and locked it in my suitcase. I could see tears coming into his eyes. I said, "What is the matter? Why are you crying?"

 

He said, "I don't know, but something like this has never happened to me. It is so strange... I cannot describe." And exactly at twelve he came to me and he said, "Please return my pillow."

 

I said, "What will you do at twelve? In the evening I will return it."

 

He said, "You have to return it to me right now."

 

"I gave him the pillow and before six other people he started kissing the pillow madly, and looking at people thinking that he must look mad... and he himself thinking that he is mad -- what is he doing?

 

"I said, "Don't be worried, that's what everybody is doing. When a man is kissing a woman, a woman is kissing a man, that is a natural hypnosis, a biological hypnosis; the biology has hypnotized your chromosomes. It is not that you are doing it... and feeling so awkward, you don't want to do it before others, you want some lonely place of your own. Don't be worried! It makes no difference whether it is a pillow or a woman. What you are doing, you are not doing -- it is your unconscious which is forcing you to do it."

 

He said, "That is the trouble. That's what I feel. Something in me says, `Kiss,' and I know that this is stupid. This is only a pillow. Why should I kiss it?"

 

"You can, under hypnosis, manage anything if you are a person who is just trying to cheat people. You can even tell the person to murder someone and he will murder -- and he will be punished. He may be sentenced to death, and he will not have any explanation to give.

 

"And nobody can tell you who hypnotized him, because nobody will ever know what you did in hypnosis, while he was asleep."

 

- Osho, "Beyond Psychology # 40"

 

 

 

"This is the danger. He can say to you, "Just take out all your money and hand it over to me," and you will immediately take out all your money and hand it over to him. He can take your ornaments or he can tell you to sign any document that may create trouble for you, for example that you have sold your house, or donated your house."

 

"There is one thing more to be understood, which is very dangerous: he can give a post-hypnotic suggestion. A post-hypnotic suggestion means that he can say to you, "After ten days you will come to me, you will have to come to me, bringing all your money, all your ornaments, anything valuable that you have. Leave it on my table and simply go back."

 

"It is possible to give a post-hypnotic suggestion that after twenty-four hours you will shoot somebody. All these orders will be followed because the person does not know... as far as his consciousness is concerned, he has no idea what has happened under deep hypnosis. Deep hypnosis reaches your unconscious.

 

"These were the dangers that Christianity exaggerated, saying that this is against religion, against morality. A woman can be raped and she will not know, or a woman can be told, "You have fallen in love with me," and a great romance will begin from the moment she wakes up. She will feel a little hesitant because her conscious mind will not understand what has happened, but there is no communication between the conscious mind and the unconscious. The unconscious is so powerful – nine times more powerful – that when the unconscious wants to do something, the conscious may start protesting but that protest is futile."

 

"All these things were spread, wildly exaggerated among man. But the purpose of the church was not to save you from these dangers; the purpose was that hypnosis should become condemned so that nobody can enter from that door into the ultimate realm of satyam shivam, sundram."

 

"Christianity kept people completely ignorant about another kind of hypnosis; that is self-hypnosis, not hetero-hypnosis. Only hetero-hypnosis can be misused; autohypnosis or self-hypnosis cannot be misused. There is nobody; you are alone."

 

- Osho, "Satyam Shivam Sundram # 29"

 

 

 

 

"Hypnosis can be misused. Everything great can be misused. Perhaps that is one of the reasons why most of the countries and cultures have tried to avoid any entanglement with hypnosis. And the word `hypnotism' has become a condemnatory word. But that is not right; it can do immense good too. Somebody who has some difficulty in any subject can be simply hypnotized and told, "You don't have that difficulty. That subject is simple, and you have enough intelligence to understand it." And the man will start behaving differently from the next day -- his unconscious got it. There is no need to fear."

 

"People can be helped with diseases, because almost seventy percent of diseases are mental. They may be expressed through the body, but their origin is in the mind. And if you can put in the mind the idea that the disease has disappeared, that you need not worry about it, it does not exist anymore, the disease will disappear."

 

"I have tried very strange experiments with it. My work was concerned with something else. For example in Ceylon, Buddhist monks every year on the birthday of Gautam Buddha, dance on red-hot burning coal -- and they don't burn. One professor from Cambridge University, a professor of psychology, had gone especially to see it, because he could not believe that it is possible. But when he saw twenty monks just dancing in the flames, and that they were not burned, he thought, "If these people can do it, why cannot I do it?" So he tried... just coming a little closer it was so hot that he ran away. He would have died if he had jumped into the pit where the fire was burning and the monks were dancing. Now, it needs a tremendous effort of hypnosis."

 

"I tried it on the same boy, because he was a good medium. Thirty-three percent of the whole population are good mediums, and you should remember this thirty-three percent. Thirty-three percent of the people are the most intelligent too, and this thirty-three percent is the more creative, most innovative people too. These are the same people who can go into deep hypnosis; it needs immense intelligence. People with greater intelligence -- if they are ready to go into it -- can go to very deep layers. And the deeper the layers are, then things can be done which look almost miraculous."

 

"With this boy -- his name was Manoj -- I tried putting a hot burning piece of coal on his hand and telling him that it is a beautiful roseflower. He saw it and he said, "So beautiful, and so fragrant," and it did not burn. I tried otherwise also: putting a roseflower on his hand and telling him it is a burning hot piece of coal. He threw it immediately, but it burned his whole hand."

 

"Mind has tremendous power over your body. The mind directs everything in your body. Seventy percent of your diseases can be changed by changing the mind, because they start from there; only thirty percent of diseases start from the body. You fall down, and you have a fracture -- now, that fracture cannot be helped by hypnosis saying that you don't have any fracture. You will still have the fracture. The fracture has started from the body and the body cannot be hypnotized. The body has its own way of functioning. But if the process starts from the mind and extends to some point in the body, then it can be easily changed."

 

"Religions have exploited it. There are many religions in India -- Mohammedans do it, Tibetans do it, Burmese do it... dancing in the fire without being burned. But these are not ordinary people, they are monks. For years they have been hypnotized, and this thing has settled in their unconscious -- that fire cannot burn them. But remember, only seventy percent... And that reminds me of a strange phenomenon that physiologists, medical people, and others who are concerned with man's body, are very much disturbed about and have no answer..."

 

- Osho, "Beyond Psychology # 40"

 

 

 

 

"The body does not have beliefs or disbeliefs, but the mind has. And mind has immense control over the body."

 

"One of the greatest sincerities in working with people is to take care that what you are saying or what you are doing is not going to destroy them. And I am afraid all those therapists... While they were working in the commune in my presence there was no danger. I could have put anybody back into his right position. But now they are working without any understanding, they can prove to be very dangerous."

 

"All the sannyasins all over the world have to be informed: beware of the therapists. In my presence I allowed them to do anything because there was no problem; if something had gone wrong I would have taken care. But now if something goes wrong -- and it is bound to go wrong because they themselves are wrong -- then who is going to take care?"

 

"The master's work is not easy. He has to change you, he has to transform you. But he has not to cripple you, he has not to destroy you. It is almost like walking on a razor's edge, because anything that can be helpful can also be used in such a way that it can be disastrous."

 

- Osho, "Beyond Psychology # 40"

 

 

 

 

"Hypnosis was the door, has always been the door to meditation. Once a man enters into the world of meditation, he has such clarity, such a strength, so much life arising in him that he no longer needs any father in heaven. He no longer needs any priest to pray for him. He himself has become prayer – not prayer to any God, but simply a prayerfulness, a gratitude to the whole."

 

"It was absolutely necessary for Christianity to condemn hypnosis and to condemn it as something created by the devil. For the same reasons witchcraft was brutally destroyed; millions of women were burnt alive because they were also doing the same thing. They were trying to contact the ultimate on their own without going through the proper channel of the church."

 

"Your question is very significant, Purna. You are asking, "While using hypnosis in the service of meditation..." Hypnosis in itself can be used dangerously unless it is used in the service of meditation. I will have to explain to you what exactly is meant by hypnosis and how it can be misused if it is not used singularly in the service of meditation."

 

"Hypnosis literally means deliberately created sleep. It is now known that thirty-three percent, that is one third of humanity is capable of going into the deepest layers of hypnosis. It is a strange number, thirty-three percent; strange because only thirty-three percent of people have the aesthetic sense, only thirty-three percent of people have sensitivity, only thirty-three percent of people have friendliness, only thirty-three percent of people are creators. And my only experience is that these thirty-three percent of the people are the same, because creativity and sensitivity are meditation, are love, are friendliness. All need essentially one thing: a deep trust in oneself, in the existence, and a receptivity and opening of the heart."

 

"Hypnosis can be created in two ways. Because of the first, people became impressed by the Christian propaganda that it is dangerous. That is hetero-hypnosis: somebody else hypnotizes you, a hypnotist hypnotizes you. There are so many wrong ideas attached, and the most fundamental is that the hypnotist has the power to hypnotize you. That is absolutely wrong. The hypnotist has the technique, not the power."

 

"Nobody can hypnotize you against yourself, unless you are willing. Unless you are ready to go into the unknown, untraveled darkness, no hypnotist can manage to hypnotize you. But in fact hypnotists don't deny that they have the power; on the contrary, they claim that they have the power to hypnotize people."

 

"Nobody has the power to hypnotize anyone. Only you have the power to hypnotize yourself or to be hypnotized by somebody else – the power is yours. But when you are hypnotized by somebody else it can be misused."

 

"The process, the technique, is very simple. The hypnotist hangs a crystal from a chain just over your eyes, and tells you, "Don't close your eyes until you cannot keep them open. Fight to the last, keep your eyes open! "And the crystal shines in your eyes. Naturally, eyes have to blink continuously to keep themselves from getting dry. They are the most delicate part of your body. You blink your eyes because your eyelids function like windshield wipers on a car: they bring liquid to your eyes and they clean your eyes of any dust, or anything that may have entered. They keep your eyes fresh and always showering."

 

"The hypnotist says, "Stop blinking; just stare at something shiny!" – shiny because anything shiny will soon make your eyes tired. If you are told to look at a powerful enough electric bulb just hanging above your head, naturally your eyes will get utterly tired. And you are told that you are not to close them, unless you feel they are closing by themselves."

 

"This is one part. The other part is that the hypnotist is continuously saying that your eyes are becoming very heavy, your eyelids seem to be utterly tired... Just by your side he is repeating these words continuously, that your eyes are becoming tired, the lids want to close – and to you just the opposite direction has been given so that you go on fighting to the last. But how long can you fight?"

 

"It takes no more than three minutes at the most, because double processes are going on. You are focused on the light which is tiring your eyes, and the hypnotist goes on repeating like a parrot, in a very sleepy voice, that sleep is coming over you. You cannot resist; it is impossible now to keep your eyes open."

 

"Now these suggestions... and the person is fighting, he knows that his eyes are becoming tired, and the eyelids are becoming heavy, burdened. A point comes within three minutes, not more than that, when he cannot resist the temptation to let them close. The moment the eyes are closed, the man starts repeating, "You are going into deep sleep, and you will be able only to hear my voice and nothing else. I will remain your only contact."

 

"The person goes deeper and deeper into sleep, with continuous suggestions. There is a point when he stops hearing anything else except the sleepy voice of the hypnotist saying, "You are going deeper, deeper, deeper" – and then he tests whether you have gone deeper or not. He will prick your hand with a safety pin, but you are so asleep that you cannot know about it, you will not feel it."

 

"In fact, in the Soviet Union they have started hetero-hypnosis even for operations; no anesthesia is needed. A person can go so deep given the right conditions: a very sleepy atmosphere, dim, neither dark nor light, and a shining, forcefully shining light focused on his eyes; a very subtle music in the room, beautiful fragrance... all these help him to go into such a deep sleep that operations can be done, have been done, and the person knows nothing."

 

"So the hypnotist tries a few things: he takes your hand up and lets go of it, and the hand falls because you cannot hold it, you are fast asleep; in sleep you cannot hold it up high. He lifts your eyelids up, he looks into your eyes and only the white of your eyes is seen; your pupils have moved upwards."

 

"The deeper the hypnosis, the higher your pupils will move upwards. That happens in deep sleep every day, and that also happens when somebody dies. That's why all over the world people immediately close the eyelids of a dead person, for the simple reason that it is so frightening to see somebody with completely white eyes. In India it has been known for centuries that when a man is going to die, his eyes start slowly moving upwards, and the sign and symbol is that he cannot see the tip of his own nose."

 

"You can see... Remember: the day you cannot see your nose – because when the pupils of the eyes are moving upwards; they cannot see the tip of the nose – six months at the most."

 

"So the hypnotist opens the eyelid and sees whether underneath it is white, and all that used to be there, your pupil, has moved upwards. Then he is certain that you are no longer capable of hearing anybody, you are no longer capable of disobeying him; whatever he will say, you will do."

 

"This is the danger. He can say to you, "Just take out all your money and hand it over to me," and you will immediately take out all your money and hand it over to him. He can take your ornaments or he can tell you to sign any document that may create trouble for you, for example that you have sold your house, or donated your house."

 

"There is one thing more to be understood, which is very dangerous: he can give a post-hypnotic suggestion. A post-hypnotic suggestion means that he can say to you, "After ten days you will come to me, you will have to come to me, bringing all your money, all your ornaments, anything valuable that you have. Leave it on my table and simply go back."

 

"It is possible to give a post-hypnotic suggestion that after twenty-four hours you will shoot somebody. All these orders will be followed because the person does not know... as far as his consciousness is concerned, he has no idea what has happened under deep hypnosis. Deep hypnosis reaches your unconscious.

 

"These were the dangers that Christianity exaggerated, saying that this is against religion, against morality. A woman can be raped and she will not know, or a woman can be told, "You have fallen in love with me," and a great romance will begin from the moment she wakes up. She will feel a little hesitant because her conscious mind will not understand what has happened, but there is no communication between the conscious mind and the unconscious. The unconscious is so powerful – nine times more powerful – that when the unconscious wants to do something, the conscious may start protesting but that protest is futile."

 

"All these things were spread, wildly exaggerated among man. But the purpose of the church was not to save you from these dangers; the purpose was that hypnosis should become condemned so that nobody can enter from that door into the ultimate realm of satyam shivam, sundram."

 

"Christianity kept people completely ignorant about another kind of hypnosis; that is self-hypnosis, not hetero-hypnosis. Only hetero-hypnosis can be misused; autohypnosis or self-hypnosis cannot be misused. There is nobody; you are alone."

 

"You can do the same thing by yourself. You can put an alarm clock on, and then repeat three times that within fifteen minutes, when the alarm goes off, you will come back from your deep hypnotic sleep. And then the procedure is the same."

 

"You look at the light, and you do what the hetero-hypnotist was doing. Looking at the light, you go on repeating inside, "My eyes are becoming heavy, heavy... heavier, heavier. I am falling into sleep. I cannot keep my eyes open anymore; I am trying my best, but it is impossible" – and it also takes exactly three minutes. That is the maximum; it may happen in two minute, it may happen in one minute, but the longer you struggle, the deeper will be the hypnosis."

 

- Osho, "Satyam Shivam Sundram # 29"

 

 

 

 

"I have heard about a man, an old man, who was torturing his family. Every day he would figure out how many diseases he had. The doctors were tired; they said he had no diseases. He listened to the medical program on the television and learned the names of the diseases. Then he started torturing the family, "I am suffering from this, I am suffering from that. Nobody is taking care of me."

 

"This was simply a way for an old man to attract attention."

 

"Old people have only these methods to attract attention – that they are suffering from migraine, that they have a stomachache. The greater their medical vocabulary is, the more they will manage."

 

"Finally, doctors started refusing, saying, "He is a mad person. He has no sickness, no disease; we have checked him so many times."

 

But the son said, "What can we do? – we should bring the doctor."

 

"So the doctors finally suggested that perhaps a hypnotist may be helpful: "Bring the hypnotist, so he can hypnotize him and tell him that he is absolutely alright. That is the only medicine he needs. If his unconscious grips the idea of being alright, then there is no problem."

 

The sons were very happy, and they brought the hypnotist. He looked like a doctor with his bag and paraphernalia, with his small Sigmund Freud beard, with one glass on one eye – one has to be properly dressed according to his profession, and this is impressive! – and he asked the old man, "What are your troubles?"

 

The old man listed so many troubles. The hypnotist said, "Okay, you just lie down. I will be holding this pendulum which shines because it has a battery attached. You have to keep your eyes on it until you cannot keep them open."

 

"Old people become very cunning and very clever after a long life's experience. The old man thought,"This seems to be a con man by the way he is dressed... and what kind of treatment is going on?"

 

He thought, "Let us see." He did not wait for three minutes, he immediately closed his eyes, and when the hypnotist took his hand, he dropped it. He knew all the tricks... an old man, he has seen everything in the world!"

 

"The hypnotist said, "He is completely at ease and asleep. Now I will give him the suggestion that 'you are perfectly alright, you don't have any disease and you will not harass your children with diseases that don't exist!'" And the old man remained silent. His sons were very happy: "Why have we never thought of the hypnotist? We have been wasting so much money paying the doctors, and all that they say is 'You harass us. Although you give us money, it is sheer harassment. The man is not sick at all.' This man is the right man!"

 

"The old man was lying completely still. All suggestions over, the hypnotist collected his fee. One of the sons went out the door to see him off to his car, but even before he returned, the old man opened one eye and asked, "Has that crackpot gone or not?"

 

"If you immediately close your eyes, nothing will happen because you will remain conscious. Whatever the hypnotist is saying, he will look like a crank: What nonsense is he talking? "Your eyes are becoming heavy" – they will not become heavy. "You are falling deep in a sleep" – you are not falling, you are perfectly alert. And he is cheating; he is saying that you don't have any diseases!"

 

"But if you are doing a session of self-hypnosis, there is no danger. You just go through the whole process, looking at a bright thing that tires your eyes – that is its only function – and you go on repeating what the hypnotist was repeating, but inside your being. Finally, you will find you cannot keep your eyes open; they are closing. You have lost control over them. That feeling of losing control over your eyelids immediately gives you the feeling that you are certainly falling into deep sleep."

 

"As long as you are aware, you go on repeating, "I am going deeper, deeper, "and a moment comes when you have gone deepest into your unconscious. And after ten minutes the alarm will go off, and you will come back from your unconscious to the conscious. You will be surprised how fresh, how young you are feeling within yourself – how clean, as if you have passed through a beautiful garden full of flowers, with a cool breeze."

 

"You can also give yourself post-hypnotic suggestions. They have to be given at the last moment when your eyes are closing and you feel that now you will be going deeper. Before going deeper you start saying, "From tomorrow my health will be better." Just choose one thing, not too many; don't be greedy! And just a fifteen-day session or three-week session just on yourself, whatever you are saying... perhaps that your meditation will go deeper from tomorrow. You will find that your meditation is going deeper and you can create a very beautiful link."

 

"When the meditation goes deeper, then you can suggest to yourself, "Tomorrow my hypnosis will go even deeper." You can use both to bring you to the very depths of your unconsciousness."

 

"Once you have touched the depths of your unconsciousness, then you can start a second suggestion: "Although I will be in the dark unconscious, a slight awareness will remain so that I can see what is happening." And then go on repeating, "My awareness which was slight is becoming bigger and bigger and bigger..." And one day you will find the whole unconscious is lighted with your alertness – and that's what meditation is."

 

"Hypnosis can be used, should be used, without any fear. Either together, by people who trust each other and love each other, so there is no fear that they will exploit... you are with your very intimate friends; you know that they cannot harm you, you can open yourself, you can be vulnerable. Or just yourself... by yourself it will take a little longer, because you have to do two persons' work yourself. That is a little disturbance."

 

"But now, because tape recorders are available you can dispose of the other person completely, and give the suggestion part to the tape recorder. And the tape recorder certainly cannot misuse it; it cannot tell you to kill your wife, unless you have put that on the tape. Then I cannot help; whatever you put in the tape recorder it will repeat!"

 

"You can put the whole process in the tape recorder, all the suggestions of falling into sleep, heaviness of the lids, going deeper. And then when you are deepest – a gap of four, five minutes, so you settle in your deepness, then from the tape recorder comes the voice saying that your meditation will become deeper from today, that you will not have to struggle with your thoughts. The moment you will close your eyes, the thoughts will start dispersing themselves."

 

"The tape recorder can be immensely helpful because there is no question of anybody to trust. You can trust your tape recorder without any fear. And you can lock the door so that nobody plays with your tape recorder – otherwise somebody may trick you!"

 

"Self-hypnosis has to be in the service of meditation; that is its greatest use. But it can serve health, it can serve long life, it can serve love, it can serve friendliness, it can serve courage. All that you want, self-hypnosis can help you with. It can dispel your fears of the unknown, it can dispel your fear of death; it can make you ready for being alone, silent, peaceful. It can make you able to continue an undercurrent of meditation the whole twenty-four hours."

 

"You can even suggest, "While I am asleep my small flame of awareness will continue all through, the night without disturbing my sleep."

 

"Purna, you are saying, "I have noticed that the line between therapy and meditation is dissolving. That has been my deep desire for long. Therapy should dissolve into hypnosis, and hypnosis should dissolve into meditation. Then we have created one of the greatest forces for enlightenment, which has never been used in the past."

 

"Therapy has never been used. Therapy will cleanse you of all garbage, it will take away all your conditionings; therapy will help you to cathart anything that has been there and you have been repressing inside. Therapy will throw it out."

 

"Therapy is a beautiful cleansing process, and a mind cleansed will fall into hypnosis more easily, without any struggle. Perhaps even those who are not easily available to self-hypnosis or to hypnosis – the people who don't belong to the thirty-three percent – With therapy even they may start belonging to the group which is available for hypnosis. Therapy can change one hundred percent of people into authentic candidates for hypnosis."

 

So therapy has to be used in such a way that it slowly dissolves into hypnosis, and then hypnosis has to be used so that it can become steps going towards meditation. These three things together I propose to be my trinity. God and the holy ghost and Jesus Christ... forget all that nonsense. That is not a trinity. But something scientific, something that you can do yourself, something that is possible to be practiced... Except for that, religion is so full of garbage, and people have become more interested in the garbage and forgotten the essential. In fact, the essential has become so small in comparison to the Himalayan garbage that has accumulated on top of it down the centuries that it is even difficult to find where it is."

 

"What I am proposing is a simple thing: you don't need any priest, you don't need any church, you don't need any holy scripture. All that you need is a little understanding and a little courage. Cathart totally in therapy. You don't know how much crap there is inside you. When you start catharting, then you will know – "My God, is this me or somebody else? What am I doing? What am I saying?"

 

"Sometimes what you say does not even make any sense. But it has been there, otherwise it cannot come to you. It has been a hindrance to your meditation, and it will be a hindrance to your going deep into hypnosis. It will become a barrier somewhere in-between."

 

"So therapy has to be the first thing. The second thing is hypnosis, and the third thing will grow out of it – your meditation."

 

"The ultimate in meditation is enlightenment."

 

"When meditation comes to its completion, then your whole being becomes full of light, full of blissfulness, full of ecstasy."

 

- Osho, "Satyam Shivam Sundram # 29"