Question

Osho,

When you sit silently, we are not able to tune into that silence. but when you are speaking, we are able to get some glimpses of the silence between the words, between the sentences. but it is so tempting to listen to the meaning of your words, that this silence keeps slipping from our hands. so could you please explain to us how we should listen to you.

 

 

It will happen so, it is natural. When I am sitting silently, you are unable to sit silently. An endless internal current of thought flows within you; you are talking to yourselves. The habit of talking has become so deep, so solid like a rock, that you are unable to relax even for a single moment. If I remain completely silent, you will forget me, your inner current will become active, your old habit will catch hold of you and you will drown in your internal conversation. It is a monologue; you are all by yourself but you talk all the same. Also, it is difficult for you to see my silence, because we see only that for which a contrast is present in the background.

 

A psychologist was carrying out some research in a university. He made a small white dot on a big blackboard and asked the students, "What do you see?" Not a single one mentioned the big blackboard; they all said that they saw the white dot. It is the black background, the blackboard, that is making the white dot so prominently visible.

 

If I am sitting silently, that silence is singular, without any opposites. When someone makes a white mark on a white wall, the mark will not be visible. How could it be visible? - The opposite is needed for that. If I am sitting silently, it is a white mark on a white wall; you will not see it, you will miss it.

 

When I am speaking, there is a silence between the words. The words I am speaking for you, while for me still the silence remains. Words are only the surface, internally I am in silence. There is no inner dialogue within me. When I am sitting alone, there is no talk going on inside. The speaking is for you; silence is my nature. So I am present in the gap between every two words; after one word ends and the next one has not begun yet, in this gap is my silence. Like two black lines on two sides, and between them a white line - because of these two black lines, my silence in between will be more manifest for you. While I am sitting silently, the silence will not be so manifest to you, because we see only those things which are on a contrasting background.

 

If all the ugly people disappear from the world, who will be beautiful? If there is no noise in the world, how will you come to know peace? Again, because of the night, full of darkness, the light of the lamp is recognizable. Because death is, hence the taste of life is. Hate exists, hence the abundance of love. The thorns that stab make flowers all the more lovely. You see and experience because of the opposites.

 

So when I am speaking, there is empty space, a void, between the sounds of two words, and that empty space will become more manifest to you. But I can understand your dilemma as to what you should do - whether you should understand the meaning of the words or the silence - because if you concentrate on the meaning of the words the silence slips away. For a moment, silence shines, but if you are full of the memory of the previous word you will miss the silence. If you are waiting for the next word you will miss the silence. If you listen to the words standing on either side of the silence, you will miss the mini-moment of silence; but if your attention is on the silence, the words will not be able to enter you. What should you do?

 

If you listen to your own advice, you will pay attention to the words. If you listen to my advice, don't bother about the words, just attend to the silence, because whatever I am saying is not in the words but in the silences. What I want to point out to you is not in the lines but in between the lines where there is space. And if I am using words at all, it is just like using the blackboard so that you can see the white dot. It is just to show you the white dot - the blackboard as such has no meaning of its own. So when you are listening to me, don't bother yourself searching for the meaning; meaning will manifest itself out of the empty spaces, you will find the meaning in the silences. Listen to the words, but catch the silences. It is to the silences that you should attend. You will be connected to me only when one word has disappeared and the next one has not yet arrived - there is the gap, there is the open door. So you don't worry much about what I am saying, just be involved in what I am not saying between the sayings - find all the emptinesses, because only through emptiness will you enter me. And I also can enter you only through the emptinesses.

 

If I do not speak, you go on talking inside yourself, so you are unable to ride my silences. When I speak, your inner talk stops; you become occupied, so the inner stream shatters. You get interested in listening, so your inner dialogue breaks up. So there is one advantage of my speaking; it is not that I shall be able to convey to you what I want to convey, but that your own inner current of talking will be destroyed. I speak so that you do not talk, that's all!

 

But what I want to say to you is between the words, in the silences. Don't worry about what I am saying, let your attention settle down on the gaps in between the words, and supreme bliss will descend upon you. In that moment neither I shall remain, nor you; in that moment there will be neither speaker nor listener; in that moment the essence hidden within both will become one, will meet and merge. In that moment is a deep embrace, a conjunction of the two rivers. In that moment two consciousnesses throw away their limits and become infinite!

 

Your mind will ask you to listen to what I am saying, but the reality is that whatever is significant cannot be said. All words are empty in themselves, in themselves they have no value. Words are nothing but foam swirling on the surface. From a distance, the foam on the crests of the waves looks lovely, as though the wave in the ocean is approaching wearing a silver crown, as though flowers have bloomed on the waves - an endless number of bright, white flowers - but only from a distance.

 

If you go to there and take the foam in your hands, you will find that it is only bubbles that disappear.

 

Words are nothing more than foam on the ocean of consciousness. And if the consciousness is deep, beautiful foam arises; if the consciousness is full of music inside, the foam too carries a music in it. If the life has come to an inner peace, a kind of poetry is born in the foam. What I speak is foam; if you experience a poetry in it, a beauty in it, understand that this is only an indication. Nothing will be gained by holding the foam in your fist or preserving it in a steel safe. Concern yourself with that emptiness from which the foam is arising, the depths from which it is coming. The words are the foam; in the emptiness is the ocean.

 

So, it is only when I am silent between two words that the doors of the temple are open. That is when you should enter. Your whole gestalt will have to be changed.

 

This word gestalt is worth understanding. It is a German word, used by a school of psychologists - gestalt psychology. You must have come across a certain picture in children's books, of an old woman, and hidden in the same picture is a young woman too. If you look attentively you will be able to see the young woman, and if you continue to look, the young woman will change into the old woman. Both take shape from the same lines, but the thing that is so special about it is that both women cannot be seen simultaneously. You can see both; first you saw the old woman, then you saw the young one, so you are now acquainted with both, but whenever you look, you will see only one woman, even though you know that the other is present. So now there is no question of ignorance, of non-acquaintance; but still, when you look at the young woman you won't be able to find the old one, and when you find the old one, the young one will disappear. You know that both are there in the same lines, but both cannot be seen together. This phenomenon is the gestalt.

 

So when you hear my words, you won't be able to hear the silence; for that, the gestalt will have to change. When the whole of your consciousness is engaged in catching the words, you will be deprived of the silence; and when you catch my silences, you won't be able to catch the words. The old woman will not be visible when you are looking at the young one; and when you catch sight of the old woman, you will lose sight of the young one. Both are present, but you will be able to find only one at a time. Your mind will ask to catch hold of the words, because mind lives only on words; words are its food. Mind grows larger through words, mind is enriched by words, the whole of mind's wealth is words; and if the word disappears, then mind disappears. Let the words go, and mind will go too. So mind will persuade you, "Catch hold of the words, they are valuable. Memorize every word, all truth is contained in them, don't miss even a single word, absorb them all!" This is what the mind will tell you - this is what it has been telling you always.

 

You have learned the scriptures - you may have learned the Gita, the Koran, the Bible by heart, and still you have not the faintest notion of truth. Even if my words penetrate you and crystallize within you, you will not experience a single trace of truth. I am not going to be able to succeed where the Gita and the Koran fail. No word can ever succeed. Your mind will drink in the words and be further strengthened by them. Don't listen to the mind.

 

If you listen to my advice, catch the emptinesses, drink in the silences. Do not bother about what I am saying - I don't bother about what I am saying. I am not concerned today with what I said yesterday, and tomorrow I will not be concerned with what I am saying today. This creates a great difficulty for many friends. They say, "Yesterday you said one thing, today you are saying something else. Which one shall we follow?" I can understand their problem. They are catching hold of only the words. Speaking has no value at all for me, only the empty spaces in between all that I say are valuable. Yesterday I used one blackboard, today I am using another. The blackboard is not the thing that matters; it is the white mark on it that matters. Yesterday I opened the door to my emptiness through certain words, today I am opening it through different words. For me, what is relevant is that emptiness which comes between the words, whether the doors are made of wood or gold or silver, whether they are carved with leaves or flowers, whether they are simple or highly ornamental is all meaningless. All that matters is that open door, that empty space, through which you can enter into me and I into you.

 

One who listens to my words will find many inconsistencies in them; sometimes I say one thing, other times I say something different. Certainly they are right, there are inconsistencies, but that is not the point at all. For me the words are only instrumental to open the emptiness, and the one who looks for the emptiness will find that I am highly consistent. The emptiness that was opened yesterday is the same as the emptiness that is opened today, and it is the same that will be opened tomorrow too. The doors will change - and they should change. There is a function in the changing of the doors. If I use the same words today that I used yesterday - and even the day before yesterday - and again if the same words are going to be used tomorrow and the day after, you will go to sleep and your internal talk will begin.

 

This is why people go to sleep when they are hearing the scriptures being narrated in the temples - the Ramayana or the Mahabharata. There is a reason for it, and the reason is that they know the story already, there is nothing new worth listening to, so why stay awake? They know that Rama's Sita is stolen, they know that she is stolen by Ravana. They also know the end of the story - that Sita is going to come back, that war is going to take place, that Rama is going to win the war - everything is known. It has been heard so many times that now there is nothing worth hearing; and when there is nothing new to be heard, sleep overtakes you.

 

Repetition of the old invites sleep. Mothers know this, even if you don't. When they want to send their babies to sleep they sing them lullabies, and they sing the same lines over and over again. The baby hears it, and after a short time, hearing it again and again and again, he gets bored and goes to sleep.

 

The mantras that are given to you for meditation do the same thing. You are sitting, and you go on chanting, "Rama, Rama, Rama..." and the drone catches hold of you. How long can you go on listening to "Rama, Rama, Rama"? - the same thing again and again. First you become bored, then the boredom takes you into drowsiness, and the drowsiness leads you into sleep. If I tell you the same thing in the same words every day, you will start dozing, and I am here trying to awaken you, not to send you to sleep. So I will go on changing the words every day. For me they are meaningless; there is no question of any consistency or inconsistency in them.

 

I am not interested at all in what I am saying. My interest is in the gaps which I leave between the words: those gaps are my invitation, and if you miss them, you have missed everything. You can learn all my words by heart; there is no sense in that, they will just add to your load. And already your load is ample; already you know much more than you need to know; already your knowledge is killing you. These words will add to your knowledgeability further; you will become a great wordspinner. You will be able to make others understand with your clever argumentation, you will be able to change others' attitudes, you will be able to shatter their intellects. Nobody will be able to defeat you, but you will remain as you are - sick, diseased, one who has not reached anywhere.

 

Wherever you find your mind has disappeared, wherever you find you have been able to hear the silence between words, those are the points where you need to dive deep; those are the junctures from where you go across to the other shore; those are the points from which all the boats sail for the other shore.

 

-Osho, “Nowhere To Go But In, #5”