Question 3: Beloved Osho, Can a person meditating an hour a day gain enlightenment in this life? It has been found by all the great meditators of the world that just forty-eight minutes, exactly forty-eight minutes, are enough to make you enlightened. But to meditate for forty-eight minutes...

“Meditation is just being delighted in your own presence; meditation is a delight in your own being. It is very simple – a totally relaxed state of consciousness where you are not doing anything. The moment doing enters, you become tense; anxiety enters immediately. How to do? What to do? H...

"If you go to Catholic, Jaina, Buddhist monks you will find them very nervous – maybe not so nervous in their monasteries, but if you bring them out to the world, you will find them very, very nervous because on each step there is temptation. "A man of meditation comes to a point where ther...

"Meditation is not an effort against the mind. It is a way of understanding the mind. It is a very loving way of witnessing the mind -- but, of course, one has to be very patient. This mind that you are carrying in your head has arisen over centuries, millennia. Your small mind carries the ...

“When I say you have to drop thinking, don’t conclude in a hurry. Because I have to use language, so I say, “Drop thinking” – but if you start dropping, you will miss, because again you will reduce it to a doing. “‘Drop thinking’ simply means: don’t do anything. Sit. Let thoughts settle the...

Mentors in Meditation You have often said that no improvement is needed; no goal is there to be achieved. And you have also spoken about how, in the buddhafield, a person can be helped by those who are further along the path who can help those who are a few steps behind them. Are there diff...

“If life goes naturally, beautifully, if there are no life-negative teachers, if there are no politicians and priests to distract you – then nearabout the age of forty-two, exactly as sexual maturity comes, comes meditation maturity. Nearabout the age of forty-two, one starts feeling to fal...

A while ago I realized that it is not situations but rather people that I can react to – Because if someone I feel good about does something, it doesn’t bother me, but if someone I don’t like does the same thing, I may think, “What an awful thing to do.” Intellectually I have come to unders...

Consciousness, Witnessing and Awareness Question: What is the difference between awareness and witnessing? There is much difference between awareness and witnessing. Witnessing is still an act; you are doing it, the ego is there. So the phenomenon of witnessing is divided between the subjec...

"Meditation is not anything of the mind, it is something beyond the mind. The first step is to be playful about it. If you are playful about it, mind cannot destroy your meditation. Otherwise it will turn it into another ego trip; it will make you very serious. You will start thinking, 'I a...

on Watching and Watchfulness The phenomenon of witnessing has no ABC or XYZ. It is a simple phenomenon; it is a single step. It is one process. You can watch the body; the watching is the same. You can watch the mind - the object has changed, but the watching is the same. You can watch the ...

Meditation is not concentration but relaxation — one simply relaxes into oneself. The more you relax, the more you feel yourself open, vulnerable, the more you are less rigid, you are more flexible — and suddenly existence starts penetrating you. You are no longer like a rock, you have open...

"If you feel much resistance against meditation, it simply shows that deep down you are alert that something is going to happen which will change your whole life. You are afraid of being reborn. You have invested too much in your old habits, in the old personality, in the old identity. "Med...

Mind is the Whole Problem The darkness seems so deep, my eyes covered in a haze, my mind never ending noise – except for those moments I am with you – swirling around and around. The light is there but seems so far away in all this darkness. Sometimes I wonder if I am going to make it. Belo...

on Ego Ego Starts Growing as the Child Grows "Ego does not exist anywhere else except in human beings, and ego starts growing as the child grows. The parents, the schools, colleges, university, they all help to strengthen the ego for the simple reason that for centuries man had to struggle ...

Meditation - the Science of Awareness Question 1 : Osho, What is the difference between science, art and religion? Science discovers, art invents, religion does both. The true religion discovers; the pseudo-religion invents. And down the ages it is the pseudo-religion that has prevailed ove...

Question 2 Beloved Osho, The other night during darshan, listening to your answer to Nivedano’s question, I had tears running down my face. For the first time in the seven years I’ve been with you, I could not only intellectually understand, but really feel that to look inside oneself is th...

Meditation: The Science of Awareness This simple methodology of watching the mind, that you have nothing to do with it…. Most of its thoughts are not yours but from your parents, your teachers, your friends, the books, the movies, the television, the newspapers. Just count how many thoughts...

What is the Difference Between No-Mind and My Mind? Question 2 Osho, What is the difference between no-mind and my mind? Milarepa, the difference between no-mind and my-mind is the difference between your mind and my mind. Just drop the "my" and there is no difference between no-mind and mi...

Question Beloved Osho, Please would you say something about the relationship between Let-Go and Witnessing? Prem Vijen, let-go is the atmosphere in which witnessing flowers. They are almost two sides of the same experience -- they are not different. One cannot allow let-go without witnessin...

Meditation Will Make You Awake Meditation will make you awake, strong and humble. Meditation will make you awake because it will give you the first experience of yourself. You are not the body, you are not the mind — you are the pure witnessing consciousness. And when this witnessing consci...

Witnessing is Not a Mental Activity Question 1 Osho, Last night you said that the mind cannot do two things together—that is, thinking and witnessing. It seems then that witnessing is a mental faculty and an act of the mind. Is it so? Please explain. Is there anything like partial witnessin...

Witnessing Has a Beauty How do I come to know when I am really witnessing my body, feelings and thoughts, or when it is only my mind pretending to be a witness? The question is only intellectual; you have not even tried to pretend. When you are witnessing and you start feeling that it may b...

“Growing old is not of any worth, every animal does it, it needs no intelligence. Growing up is a totally different experience. Growing old is horizontal; growing up is vertical, it leads you to heights, it leads you to depths. “And strangely enough, you will be surprised to know that time ...

Question 1 Osho, Is it possible that the no-mind evolves quite naturally out of the mind without struggle and anguish, without exploding, hammering, cutting and such wild acts? Is the very idea of no-mind, which seems to be in the mind and yet transcending the mind, a seed like form of the ...

Concentration is a choice. It excludes all except its object of concentration; it is a narrowing. If you are walking on the street, you will have to narrow your consciousness in order to walk. You cannot ordinarily be aware of all that is happening because if you are aware of everything tha...

What is Unawareness? Question 5 : Beloved Osho, What is unawareness? Dinkar, to be in the mind, to be identified with the mind, is unawareness. To think that “I am the mind,” is unawareness. To know that mind is only a mechanism just as the body is, to know that the mind is separate…. The n...

"Life is purposeless. Don't be shocked. The whole idea of purpose is wrong – it comes out of greed. "Life is a sheer joy, a playfulness, a fun, a laughter, for no purpose at all. Life is its own end, it has no other end. The moment you understand it, you have understood what meditation is a...

Question 1 Beloved Osho, The other day you were telling us the effects of radioactive matter on the body. but i am feeling and experiencing the radiation of a buddha - an enormous energy radiating from you which not only rejuvenates body-mind continuously, but makes us laugh, dance and cele...

Meditate constantly. The person who is a seeker will not really be interested in getting only philosophical answers from others; he will be interested in knowing on his own. He will not be interested in philosophy; he will be interested in religion. That is the difference between philosophy...

Discipline and Meditation Question 1 Beloved Osho, Can you please speak on discipline and meditation? Niten, it is a very strange question because every day, morning and evening, I am speaking on discipline and meditation. If anybody reads your question, he will think that for the first tim...

“For centuries emptiness has been condemned. “Emptiness is beautiful. “And the foolish people have been telling you. “The empty mind is the devil’s workshop.” The empty mind is God’s workshop! The occupied mind is the devil’s workshop. “But one has to be truly empty. Just being lazy does no...

Meditation will make you awake, strong and humble. Meditation will make you awake because it will give you the first experience of yourself. You are not the body, you are not the mind — you are the pure witnessing consciousness. And when this witnessing consciousness is touched, a great awa...

Question 3: Beloved Osho, How to become more aware ? By becoming more aware, one BECOMES more aware. There is no other method to it. It is a simple process. Whatsoever you are doing, do it with such consciousness as if it is a question of life and death; as if a sword is hanging over you. T...

The nature of consciousness is to be just a mirror. The mirror has no choice of its own. Whatsoever comes in front of it is reflected – good or bad, beautiful or ugly – whatsoever. The mirror does not prefer, it does not judge, it has no condemnation. The nature of consciousness, at the sou...

“It is the light of awareness that makes things precious, extraordinary. Then small things are no longer small. When a man with alertness, sensitivity, love touches an ordinary pebble on the seashore, that pebble becomes a Kohinoor. And if you touch Kohinoor in your unconscious state, it is...

Question : Osho, Does Witnessing always bring joy? The moments that I call Witnessing sometimes feel distant -- almost cold in their neutrality. Other times it is like sprouting wings and soaring in joy over the open sea. Deva Abhiyana,The State of Witnessing is neither Cold not Hot. It is ...

Witnessing is Enough Question 3: Beloved Osho, I have always heard you say, “Stop doing; watch.” Several times lately I’ve heard you say that the mind should be the servant instead of our master. It feels that there is nothing to do except watch. But the question still arises: Is there anyt...

The Ultimate in Meditation Question 5 We are to stand and let the waters settle on their own, why all the active meditations? If you can sit, there is no need for meditations. In Japan, for meditation they have the word zazen. It means just sitting, doing nothing. If you can sit, not doing ...

Witnessdogs Question 3 : Beloved Osho, Is there a difference between watching and witnessing? There is a difference. You watch television, you don’t witness it. But, while watching television, if you start witnessing yourself watching television, then there are two processes going on: you a...

Witnessing-The Right Button Meditation is a very simple process: all that you need to know is the right button. The Upanishads call it witnessing’ – the right button. Just witness your mind process, don’t do anything at all. Nothing needs to be done, just be a witness, an observer, a watche...

Question 1 Osho, You say: Go beyond the mind. do not listen to its chatter. discipline it and make it a servant. do not be its slave. but how to know when the mind is being disciplined and when it is being repressed? also, when i took sannyas the other night you said not to get hooked on yo...

Question : Beloved Osho, I have no idea about what 'Right Awareness' is. How to judge that I am going in the right direction? There is no right awareness because there is no possibility of wrong awareness. Awareness is right. So first, drop the wrong question. Once you are asking a wrong qu...

Witnessing is not a Thought Question 1 Osho, it feels that to be a witness is also a kind of thought. So what is the difference between the witness and a thought of the witness? WITNESSING IS NOT A THOUGHT but you can start thinking about witnessing, you can make it a thought. The moment yo...

Question: Beloved Osho, You describe witnessing as a knack. Often, late at night, when I am in a very relaxed state, witnessing happens. At other times, though, it just seems to be mind watching mind watching mind. Please comment on this knack. The moment I say that witnessing is a knack, i...

Can the Mind Commit Suicide Question 4 : Can the mind commit suicide? The mind cannot commit suicide, because whatsoever the mind can do will strengthen the mind. Any doing on the part of the mind makes the mind more strong. So suicide is impossible. Mind doing something means mind continui...

Awareness means that whatsoever is happening in the moment is happening with complete consciousness; you are present there. If you are present when anger is happening, anger cannot happen. It can happen only when you are fast asleep. When you are present, immediate, transformation starts in...

Question 3 You said that noise and disturbances are not outside in the world, but are because of your own minds and ego, but why do the saints and mystics always live in unnoisy uncrowded places? Because they are still not saints and mystics. They are still endeavoring, still working. They ...

Self-Remembering Vs. Witnessing The technique of self-remembering seems easier for me than witnessing. Do they both lead to the same goal? They both lead to the same goal, but the technique of self-remembering is harder, longer and dangerous. Only very few people in the whole history of man...

“Have a very penetrating eye inside your mind, see what its motivations are. “When you do something, immediately look for the motivation, because if you miss the motivation, the mind goes on befooling you and goes on saying that something else was the motivation. For example: you come home ...

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 t...

Osho on Witnessing “Attachment is the food for the mind to continue. Non-attached witnessing is the way to stop it without any effort to stop it. And when you start enjoying those blissful moments, your capacity to retain them for longer periods arises. Finally, eventually, one day, you bec...

Question 2 Osho, What is satori and how to attain it? Pratima, satori is exactly your ordinary nature; it is not anything special. Hence there is no question of attaining it - it is already the case. You are in it, you have just forgotten. You have become too occupied with the outside world...

Meditation: The Only Medicine Question 1 Beloved Osho, What is the relationship between meditation and witnessing? in what way are mind and ego dissolved by them? is surrender possible without attaining complete egolessness? to what extent are orange clothes and the mala helpful for meditat...

Being Is Meditation I thought that meditation was a simple thing. But seeing people doing Vipassana, I am losing all hope of ever becoming a successful meditator. Please give me a little encouragement. Meditation is simple. Precisely because it is simple, it looks difficult. Your mind is ac...

No-Mind is Not Against Mind Question 1 I have been thinking all day of a way to ask the question: How to stop thinking? Thinking cannot be stopped—not that it does not stop, but it cannot be stopped. It stops of its own accord. This distinction has to be understood; otherwise you can go mad...

Watchfullness Not Concentration Question 1: Osho, Please explain how I can meditate over something without using my mind. Meditation has nothing to do with mind; meditation simply means a state of no-mind. The functioning of the mind is the only disturbance in meditation. If you are trying ...

Does Witnessing Always Bring Joy? Question 1 Osho, Does witnessing always bring joy? The moments that I call witnessing sometimes feel distant—almost cold in their neutrality. Other times it is like sprouting wings and soaring in joy over the open sea. The state of witnessing is neither col...

Mind as a Master is a Disaster Question 1 Beloved Osho, When I listen to your discourses, you take me on an indescribable journey. If afterwards someone asks me about what you have said, I hardly remember. But when people ask me personal questions, answers are coming out of my mouth which a...

Question 1 Beloved Osho, What is the relationship between enlightenment and the spring of life? Is enlightenment the spring of life? One basic thing has always to be remembered: not to get involved in questions of intellect. They are pseudo questions; they don’t belong to your experience. M...

Osho on Witnessing sadness and boredom Question 2 : Beloved Osho, For me it’s either high-energy excitement where life is wonderful and a joy To be alone; or very often these days there’s a quietness that’s dull and Boring. In the one there’s juice but no awareness, and in the other there’s...

The Witness and the Illusion How may one enter into that supreme truth, how may one know that supreme mystery which is so near and yet remains unknown; which is forever with us and yet is lost? How may we reach it, how has anyone ever reached it? In these sutras is the explanation of that s...

What Is Meditation Meditation is a state of no-mind. Meditation is a state of pure consciousness with no content. Ordinarily, your consciousness is too full of rubbish, just like a mirror covered with dust. The mind is a constant traffic: thoughts are moving, desires are moving, memories ar...

I loved the introduction about the psychological universe that you gave me yesterday. And yet I would like to repeat the question. You say that you were studying us in order to find out which are the difficulties that the seeker finds on the path towards realization of the Self, towards his...

Question 3 Beloved Osho, For me the most beautiful meditation is to sit in a corner and watch the children playing around the ashram. but i'm in trouble: is this a meditation at all? Watching is meditation. What you watch is irrelevant. You can watch the trees, you can watch the river, you ...

Watching the Thinking or Thinking of Watching Question 2 Osho, Is it possible that instead of watching the thinking, I am thinking of watching? Yogananda, it is not only possible, it is absolutely certain that instead of watching the thinking you are thinking of watching. But if you have be...

A Meditator Needs No Personal Guidance Question 1: Osho, I have been your sannyasin for seven years and i am unable to express my gratitude, as it gave my life direction and joy and grace and more. Now, being here for only one week, i realize that i have always had a need for personal guida...

“Be aware of your mental processes, how your mind works. The moment you become aware of the functioning of your mind, you are not the mind. The very awareness means that you are beyond: aloof, a witness. And the more aware you become, the more you will be able to see the gaps between the ex...

There is nothing comparable to the death experience in life, except deep meditation. So those who know meditation, they know something of death—that's the only way to know before dying. If I am saying there is no more significant experience in life than death, I am saying it, not because I ...

Witnessing: The Base of All Techniques WITNESSING is the technique for centering. We discussed centering. A man can live in two ways: he can live from his periphery or he can live from his center. The periphery belongs to the ego and the center belongs to the being. If you live from the ego...

A State of Clarity, Not a State of Mind What is meditation? Is it a technique that can be practiced? Is it an effort that you have to do? Is it something which the mind can achieve? It is not. All that the mind can do, cannot be meditation — it is something beyond the mind, the mind is abso...

“You have lived in a certain way up to now – don’t you want to live in a different way? You have thought in a certain way up to now – don’t you want some new glimpses in your being? Then be alert and don’t listen to the mind. Mind is your past constantly trying to control your present and y...

"Judgment comes from the past, and witnessing is a present consciousness" Question 2 Beloved Osho, You talk so much about the Witness, But what is the Witness and What is the Judge? How can we tell which is which -- The Witness or the Judge? Deva Bhumika, it is very simple; the distinction ...

Sandhya: Twilight of Meditation When people come to me and they ask, “How to meditate?” I tell them, “There is no need to ask how to meditate, just ask how to remain unoccupied. Meditation happens spontaneously. Just ask how to remain unoccupied, that’s all. That’s the whole trick of medita...

Just one quality of the Buddha has to be remembered. He consists only of one quality, witnessing. This small word witnessing contains the whole of spirituality. Witness that you are not the body. Witness that you are not the mind. Witness that you are only a witness. As the witnessing deepe...

This Witnessing is the Buddha When there is nothing to perceive – No input from the body or the mind and so one has nothing by which to define oneself – Is what is left witnessing? There does not even seem to be a witness, but just the awareness that there is no one there. That’s exactly ri...

Start Witnessing Question 1 Our Beloved Osho, Last night I saw for the first time that the mind need not be inimical to meditation. Does what you said about the mind accepting enlightenment also apply to its acceptance before enlightenment, of, for example, witnessing? Can the mind acknowle...

Why active meditations? Modern man is a very new phenomenon. No traditional method can be used exactly as it exists because modern man never existed before. So, in a way, all traditional methods have become irrelevant. For example, the body has changed so much. It is so drugged that no trad...

“That’s why sex has got so much appeal. You become one in a moment, but in that moment you are unconscious, and you seek that unconsciousness. But the more you seek, the more conscious you become. Then sex becomes absolutely absurd. A moment will come…because if you practice this continuous...

Witnessing and the Heart Question 1 Osho, Would you please speak a little on Witnessing and The Heart. Can they be experienced simultaneously? Deva Darshan, WITNESSING AND THE HEART ARE ONE AND THE same thing. Witnessing is not of the mind; mind can never be a witness. When you start witnes...

A beautiful flower in the garden and you say, "A beautiful rose"; now you are not with this rose this moment; it is already a memory. When the flower is there and you are there, both present to each other, how can you think? What can you think? How is thinking possible? There is no space fo...

Awareness and Effort "For me, there is no earth, water, fire, air or sky. Only the one who has realized the godliness which dwells in the cave of the heart, which is formless, which is beyond the web of illusion, which is the witness to the whole and which is beyond existence and non-existe...

Witnessing is the Beginning, No-Mind is the Fulfillment Question : How does watching lead to no-mind? I am more and more able to watch my body, my thoughts and feelings and this feels beautiful. But moments of no thoughts are few and far between. When I hear you saying “Meditation is witnes...

“Meditation is a pure, scientific method. In science you call it observation, observation of the objects. When you move inwards it is the same observation just taking a one-hundred-and eighty-degree turn and looking in. “That’s what we call meditation. No god is needed, no Bible is needed. ...

The One Observer of All Today’s first sutra says: “You are the one observer of all, and in reality always free.” The individual is the observer, not the observed. There are three types of people. Those who have become objects to be seen, performers – they are in the deepest darkness…. Secon...

Osho on Confusion in Witnessing Question 2: Beloved Osho, How do I come to know when I am really witnessing my body, feelings and thoughts, or when it is only my mind pretending to be a witness? The question is only intellectual; you have not even tried to pretend. When you are witnessing a...

Witnessing is the Purest Consciousness Question 1 Osho, I have heard you say that if we lose consciousness -- through fear -- at the point of death we re-enter the circle of birth and death. Is witnessing all we can do at this crucial moment or is there any specific technique? Maneesha, the...

Question 2 Beloved Osho, When we start watching our bodies, and then our minds and emotions, there remains an element, although subtle, of concentration. Initially, for example, watching my breathing, I would watch it to the exclusion of everything else – here there was an element of focus....

Mind is Never Where You Are Says Rinzai, “When I eat, I only eat, and when I sleep, I only sleep.” Somebody said, “But nothing is special in that, everybody is doing it.” Rinzai laughed and said, “If everybody is doing it, everybody is a Buddha, everybody is enlightened then.” Eating – simp...

Enlightenment means exactly that: when meditation has become natural. You are meditative — not that you sit sometimes in meditation, not that you have a few hours of meditation every day — your whole time is meditative You move in meditation, you walk in meditation, you sit in meditation, y...

“The meditation I am talking about is not a meditation on something: rather, it is a state of meditation. So this is what I mean when I am talking to you about meditation as a state. Meditation does not mean remembering someone. Meditation means to drop everything which is in one’s memory a...

“Remember, meditation is not something that is done by the mind, it is the absence of the mind. When the mind stops meditation happens. It is not something out of the mind, it is something beyond the mind. And whenever you are alert, the mind is not. So we can conclude that your sleepiness ...

Q: What is witnessing? A: Whatever you are doing.... For example, right now you are writing. You can write in two ways. The ordinary way that you always write.... You can try another method: you can write it and you can also inside witness that you are writing it. Q: Does that mean some kin...

“There are two planes in you: the plane of the mind, and the plane of the no-mind. Or, let me say it in this way: the plane when you are on the periphery of your being and the plane when you are at the center of your being. Every circle has a center – you may know it, you may not know it. Y...

And what is meditation? It does not mean meditating upon something; the English word is misleading. In English there is no word adequate enough to translate Buddha's word samasati. It has been translated as meditation, as right mindfulness, as awareness, as consciousness, alertness, watchfu...

The Grass grows by itself Question 2 Beloved Osho, How can one get out of the trap the mind creates of never being quite blissful in the moment, and be patient, letting the grass grow by itself? I'm always wanting to move faster, to push the river, and missing the beauty of it taking me in ...

Meditation cannot be a fragmented thing, it should be a continuous effort. Every moment one has to be alert, aware and meditative. But the mind has played a trick: you meditate in the morning and then you put it aside; or you pray in the temple and then forget it. Then you come back to the ...