Witnessing is not a technique, it is your nature.

 

 

Question 1

Osho,

You spoke the other morning about rising through the different levels of consciousness and bringing light to their respective counterparts in the unconscious. are special techniques needed for this, or will watchfulness of the mind, the body, and the emotions simply bring us through these different levels?

 

 

The watchfulness of body, mind and heart is more than enough. No other special techniques are needed, although there are techniques. But as I see them, they are not necessary; on the contrary, they complicate the whole phenomenon. And spiritual growth is not a technological phenomenon, so any technique can become a hindrance. You can start clinging to the technique. That has happened to millions of people.

 

Searching for spiritual growth they come across a teacher who gives them a technique. The technique helps them to become more silent, more calm, more quiet, to have a great well-being, but then the technique becomes absolutely essential. They cannot leave the technique. If they leave the technique, all those experiences start disappearing. Even if the technique has been practiced for years, just within three days all the experiences will disappear. The techniques don't really give you spiritual growth, but they create an hallucination which looks spiritual because you don't know what spiritual growth is.

 

It happened that one Sufi master was brought to me. He was master of thousands of Mohammedans, and once a year he used to come to the city. A few of the Mohammedans of his group had become interested in me and they wanted a meeting. They highly appreciated that their master sees God everywhere, in everything, and he is always joyful: "We have been with him for twenty years and we have never seen him in any other state except ecstasy."

 

I told them, "It will be good that he becomes a guest in my house. For three days you leave him with me. I will take care of your master." He was an old man, a very good man.

 

I asked him, "Have you used any technique for this constant ecstasy, or has it come on its own without any technique?"

 

He said, "I have certainly used a technique. The technique is to remember, looking at everything, that there is God in it. In the beginning it looked ridiculous, but slowly slowly the mind became accustomed: now I see God everywhere in everything."

 

Then I said, "You do one thing... How long have you been practicing it?"

 

"Forty years" - he must have been nearabout seventy.

 

I asked, "Can you trust your experience of ecstasy?"

 

He said, "Absolutely."

 

Then I said, "Do one thing: for three days you stop the technique... no more remembering that God is in everything. For three days look at things as they are; don't impose your idea of God. A table is a table, a chair is a chair, a tree is a tree, a man is a man."

 

He asked, "But what is the purpose of it?"

 

I said, "I will tell you after three days."

 

But not even three days were needed; after only one day he was angry at me, ferociously angry that, "You have destroyed my forty years' discipline. You are a dangerous man. I have been told that you are a master, and rather than helping me... Now I see in a chair nothing but a chair, in a man nothing but a man; God has disappeared, and with the disappearance of God my ecstasy that I am surrounded by an ocean of God has also disappeared."

 

I said, "This was the specific purpose. I wanted you to understand that your technique has produced an hallucination; otherwise forty years' discipline cannot disappear in one day. You had to continue the technique, so it would continue to create the illusion. Now it is up to you: if you want to live your remaining life in an hallucinatory ecstasy, it is up to you. But if you want to wake up, then no technique is needed."

 

And remember, witnessing is not a technique, it is your nature. Watching is not a technique, because you are not imposing anything, so there is no possibility of creating an illusion; you are simply watching. Even if God comes in front of you, you are not supposed to fall on the ground and touch his feet: you have simply to watch. Watching is not a technique.

 

A technique creates something; watching simply reveals that which is. It does not create anything; on the contrary, it may destroy a few illusions that were hanging around because you were not watchful enough, so you had never noticed that they were illusory phenomena.

 

An illusion can be created so easily that mind always enjoys techniques. Who is going to use the technique? The mind will be the master of the technique.

 

Watchfulness is beyond mind. Mind cannot watch. That is the only thing in existence that mind cannot do. That's why mind cannot pollute it, mind cannot lead it astray.

 

I used to live with one of my father's sisters for a few years. One of her friends used to visit her once in a while; they were very close. I used to read late till three o'clock in the night and then I would go to sleep. And that woman, the friend of my father's sister, had a problem with sleep: she could not sleep. So when the whole house went to sleep, she would come and sit in my study room and talk to me or just sit there. At least I was going to be awake till three o'clock, and that was the time when she also felt sleepy; in the morning she would fall asleep.

 

My father's sister's husband had a habit of grinding his teeth in the night two or three times.

 

Something was wrong with his stomach but he ground his teeth and the noise was very clear.

 

One day I was talking to this woman, and she asked, "Do you believe in ghosts?"

 

I said, "Why do you ask that?"

 

She said, "I live alone." She was a widow, and she was very rich. "I live alone and I always think about my being alone. If ghosts exist I am in danger; there is nobody else in my room."

 

I said, "Ghosts not only exist, they are present in this room, in this house."

 

She said, "What do you mean?"

 

I said, "I will tell you. When this house was made, a washerman lived here with his very beautiful wife who had only one eye. Her face was very beautiful - the only trouble was that she had only one eye. The washerman was recruited into the army during the first world war, and he died there.

 

The shock was so much to the washerwoman that she did not believe it. She refused to believe that he was dead; she waited for him day in, day out. And in this condition, continuously waiting for him, she was not eating well, she was not taking care of her body. Everybody tried to convince her: ?He is dead, he cannot come. You need not sit at the door the whole day.'

 

"But she was absolutely incapable of thinking that he could leave her. There was a bond between them that they would live together and they would die together. They loved each other so much.

 

Finally she died, but because of her desire for the husband to come in search of her, she became a ghost. And she still lives here.

 

"After she died, her small hut was removed and this building was made, but she still lives here and she still waits. Every night she comes, and when she comes... you have to understand a signal:

 

she makes a noise as if somebody is grinding his teeth. Why she does that, I don't know - nobody knows - but two or three times she comes in the night. And particularly when somebody is a guest in the house, she is absolutely certain to come - thinking, hoping, that perhaps her husband has come back because a guest is in the house.

 

"She comes and she takes the blanket off and looks at your face. She is a very beautiful young woman, but she has only one eye."

 

She said, "Nobody told me about it."

 

I said, "Then don't tell anybody; otherwise nobody will stay in this house, and even to sell this house will become impossible. They want to sell this house and they are keeping quiet about the reality.

 

Once it is sold they can purchase another house, and then it is somebody else's problem; it is not their problem. So they are completely silent about it. But I told you because you asked me, and I have nothing, no investment in this house or anything. I simply say whatever is the case - and this is the case.

 

"Just if she comes to your bed and uncovers your face, don't be afraid because she is a very innocent woman; she has never harmed anyone. She just looks at your face, and finding that it is not her husband, she throws the blanket on your face and goes away. And before she comes you will hear the grinding of the teeth."

 

She said, "My God! This is a dangerous house - and I have stayed so many times. Perhaps I was asleep when she came. But now I cannot sleep."

 

I said, "You try; you go and sleep." Nearabout one she went into the room inside, and the moment she went there and put her light off, a great coincidence: she heard the teeth grinding and she shrieked. I rushed in.

 

Everybody woke up: "What has happened?" She was flat on the ground; she could not even reach the bed! She was flat on the ground, unconscious.

 

And they told me, "We have been telling you not to create stories which have no foundation at all.

 

Now it is your duty, your responsibility to take care of her. First bring her to consciousness."

 

I said, "I will try, but I don't think that she is going to come to consciousness so easily; it is going to take time. And even if she comes, she will go back again."

 

They said, "But what have you done to her?"

 

I said, "Tomorrow morning I will tell you the whole story when she is okay." I tried. I threw cold water in her eyes.

 

She came to consciousness and just pointed in the corner: "She is standing there!" And again she gave another shriek and went unconscious.

 

The family asked, "Who is standing in that corner?"

 

I said, "I don't know. Somebody must be standing there. I have heard there is a ghost."

 

They said, "We never heard any ghost. You have been here only two months and you have heard that there is a ghost? Who has told you?"

 

I said, "Tomorrow morning... First thing is to bring this woman to consciousness and put her to sleep."

 

But three or four times it happened: she would come to consciousness, just look in the corner and point, "She is standing there... one eye!" The whole night they all had to remain awake - only I slept.

 

In the morning, the woman told them what story I had told her. They said, "Don't listen to him. He goes on telling things to people, and it is strange that people believe - even older people."

 

One man used to live next door to me, and he was a constant visitor. He was very respected - he was sixty-five, older than anybody else in the house - and he was a very loving man. He had the best shop in the city for food. You could not get any better food anywhere; he had the best quality.

 

He was alone - no wife, no children - and he conceived his profession as a service to thousands of people. So it was not only his profession, it was something like a religious duty: everything had to be the best and for the very minimum profit.

 

I had told him about this woman. He said, "I don't believe in ghosts; I am a believer in God. I don't believe in ghosts at all."

 

I said, "It is not a question of belief, it is a reality. Just one day you can come and sleep in this room."

 

He said, "Why should I come and sleep in this room?"

 

I said, "That shows that certainly you are afraid; just one night... You sleep just in the house next door. You are alone so there is no problem; you can sleep here. I will give you the evidence."

 

He said, "But why should I try it?"

 

I said, "You said that you don't believe in ghosts, and I said they exist and there is a woman who comes, but she comes only when there is a new guest, so if you are willing you can do it."

 

And the same thing happened to that man. He went to bed but he could not sleep because he was waiting for the woman to come - and then came the grinding of teeth. That was certain; it was guaranteed that at least three times in the night he was going to grind his teeth.

 

And as he ground his teeth, the man simply threw off his blanket and rushed into my room, woke me up, and said, "She has come!"

 

I said, "Who?"

 

He said, "The woman you were talking about. I believe in ghosts; just this is enough. But no more than this! I have heard the sound, and I don't want to get into all that trouble that that other woman had" - because the story had spread all over the city that that woman... She stopped coming to the house because she became so afraid. She had a constant fever for three or four days; even after she became conscious and went to her home she had a fever, the fear went so deep.

 

And the old man said, "I don't want to get into that trouble. Just open the door and let me go to my home!"

 

I said, "You are such a God-believing person. This is the time to test your God."

 

He said, "I am not going to listen to you; you are a dangerous fellow. God? I don't know whether he exists or not, but the ghost certainly exists! I have heard just now... she is grinding her teeth!" And he was an old man and a very religious person, every day going to the temple and chanting mantras and all that.

 

He said, "I can say... but you just open the door and let me go to my home! I will never say again that God exists; I will always say the ghost exists. But let me go! I have enough evidence. More than that... I am an old man. Something may happen to my heart or..."

 

The whole family gathered: "What is happening?"

 

I said, "Nothing, but he has heard that ghost again, and I have been telling him, ?You are such a God-loving person: a ghost cannot do anything to you.' "

 

My family said, "You are... why do you talk about these things?"

 

I said, "I don't talk... he himself started it. And it became a question of God versus ghost. So I said I don't know that God exists but I know that the ghost exists."

 

And the whole family knew that it was my own fiction but they all started believing in it. They said, "Perhaps there is something in it. Once was okay... that woman was influenced because she was listening to him alone deep in the night. But this old man is a religious man and he is respected, and he is behaving like a child!"

 

Nobody would sleep in that room where these things had happened - not even the people who were living in the house. Nobody was ready to; they would say, "If you want to, you can sleep there."

 

And I said, "But I have my room and that room is not better than my room so I don't want to change."

 

But in the night if they wanted something from that room - it became just a place to collect things because nobody was ready to live there - they would tell me, "You go first, then we will follow."

 

I said, "You don't understand: even if the ghost is there she is not afraid of me."

 

They said, "We don't want to listen to anything. If we see you going there then we are certain that there is no danger, but first you have to go in; take the torch and enter." When they wanted something from the room in the middle of the night, or even in the day, they could not go by themselves. Nobody was ready. Even children would run through that room, they would not walk. That room became so famous that when they wanted to sell the house, nobody was ready to purchase it, and they said, "Now you find a purchaser. You have destroyed this house's value. It is a beautiful house and people call it a ghost house."

 

And I said, "You know that there is no ghost."

 

They said, "We know, but knowing is not enough in these matters; the feeling is the point. The fear of two persons... neither of them has come back again to the house. We call the old man sometimes to come but he says, ?Never again in that house! I remember that night when he would not open the door - because the key was with him - and I am feeling so guilty that I had to confess, out of my fear, that God does not exist and ghosts exist. Now I am doing prayer twice - morning and evening - convincing God that I believe in him: You exist. These ghosts etcetera don't exist. ' "

 

Mind can project any experience. That woman really saw the washerwoman as I had described. In the morning she described her exactly: a beautiful woman with long hair and one eye, wearing a red sari with a black border. She said, "If I was a painter I could paint her exactly. I can close my eyes and still see her."

 

The techniques used for spiritual growth are not different. The Sufi master could not stay with me for three days, but leaving me he finally said to me, "I am grateful. I will have to start my journey again.

 

I can see what has happened: first I just started projecting. I knew that a table is a table, a chair is a chair, but I started projecting that it is God, that it is luminous with God's existence. And I knew that it is just my idea. But forty years! Slowly slowly it became the reality. But you have shown me that that technique was simply creating an hallucination."

 

There have been many people - many so-called great saints, prophets, messiahs - who have lived in hallucination, who never knew about the simple natural process of watchfulness.

 

It is better that you don't get involved with any technique. Watchfulness is so pure; don't pollute it with anything else. And it is so entire, so complete, that it needs no other support. But mind always wants some technique, because mind can control the technique. Mind is a technician; technology is its field. But watchfulness is beyond its control. It is beyond it, it is above it, and in fact it is the death of the mind.

 

If watchfulness grows in you, mind will die.

 

And all these people, like Maharishi Mahesh Yogi teaching transcendental meditation, are giving techniques which mind feels perfectly good with. The mind can use it. But there is not going to be any growth. The technique is not bad, but it simply gives you an illusory feeling of well-being - as if you are evolving... and you are standing where you have been; there is no evolution, no growth.

 

All these people are exploiting humanity by giving techniques - and this is the worst exploitation because it stops evolution.

 

I am against all techniques.

 

I am for a simple, natural process, which you already have, which once in a while you use.

 

When you are angry, how do you become aware that you are angry? If there was only anger and nobody watching it, you could not become aware of the anger. Anger itself cannot become aware.

 

So you are aware when you are angry, when you are not angry, when you are feeling good, when you are not feeling good. But you have not used this watchfulness consistently, scientifically, deeply, totally in every phase of the mind. And to me this word contains the very essence of meditation.

 

-Osho, “The Path of Mystic, #12, Q1”