[A new sannyasin says: I’m a nursery school teacher, I teach children of fouranda-half to five years old. Is there anything you can say to help me to do this job as beautifully as possible?]
Very good work. To be with children is one of the most beautiful things. But one has to learn it, otherwise it can be the most tedious thing in the world. One has to love it, otherwise it is one of the most boring things. It can drive you crazy. It can bring a nervous breakdown, because children are so noisy, so uncivilized, uncultured… animals; they can drive anybody crazy. One child is enough to drive anybody crazy, so a whole lot of children, a whole class of children is really difficult. But if you love, it is a great discipline.
So don’t only teach them — learn, too, because they still have something which you have lost. They will also lose it sooner or later. Before they do, learn from them. They are still spontaneous, they are still fearless. They are still innocent. They are losing it fast faster.
The more civilization grows, the sooner childhood ends. Before, it used to end somewhere near fourteen, fifteen, sixteen. Now even a child of seven years is no more a child. He starts becoming mature. Maturity comes sooner now because we know better methods to condition, to structure.
So it is good, with four and five-year-olds, to become four or five years old. And don’t think that you know and they don’t know. Listen — they know something. They know more intuitively. They are not knowledgeable, but they have a vision, a very clear vision. Their eyes are still unclouded and their hearts are still streaming. They are still unpolluted. The poison has not yet started. They are still natural.
So with them don’t be knowledgeable. Don’t be a teacher — be a friend. Befriend them and start looking for cues for innocence, for spontaneity, for intelligence. You will be helped tremendously and your meditation will go very deep.
-Osho, "The Passion for the Impossible, #21"