KinkOsho

Kinkazzo's Quest

2007-02-13T09:57:00.000Z

One of my most frequently used monikers is KINKAZZO, and one of my most frequent activities is searching...

What?

Ahem...

This time my search is on gurus, pseudo-gurus, anti-gurus, semi-gurus, guru-busters, gurus lookalikes, Western equivalents, mystics & allied professions. I'm also going to search for spiritual meanings, spiritual quests, spiritual paths, spiritual idiocies... And finally, I'm going to look into GOD Himself and see if anyone is there.

Now, let me start with a long-dead Indian guru, who wanted to create a spiritual bridge between East and West: "My effort is to dissolve the separation between East and West. The earth should be one, not only politically but spiritually too." His name was Acharya Rajneesh, aka Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, aka Osho.

I'm going to research him first, because I like him -- with all his failings and ultimate demise. I'll work this blog backward in time, leaving this page as my front (with updates from time to time), and posting follow-ups in reversal so that in the Previous Posts the earliest date will always be the most recent (clear as mud, eh?).

So, to start, heeeeeere is --- ta-daaaaaa ---> Osho!

OSHO
NEVER BORN
NEVER DIED
ONLY VISITED THIS PLANET EARTH BETWEEN
1931 - 1990 *

* Inscription on the plaque covering Osho's marble slab under which his ashes were placed in 1990, in Pune (India).
In 1988, Osho dropped all his names (i.e., Bhagwan, Shree Rajneesh, Zorba the Buddha, etc.) and adopted that suggested by his sannyasins: OSHO, which originates from Zen stories as a term of respect and honour, and also relates to William James' term oceanic.

Read Osho on Meditation:

“The way I talk is a little strange. No speaker in the world talks like me. Technically it is wrong; it takes almost double the time! But those speakers have a different purpose – my purpose is absolutely different from theirs. They speak because they are prepared for it; they are simply repeating something that they have rehearsed. Secondly, they are speaking to impose a certain ideology, a certain idea on you. Thirdly, to them speaking is an art; they go on refining it.
As far as I am concerned, I am not what they call a speaker or an orator. It is not an art to me or a technique; technically I go on becoming worse every day! But our purposes are totally different. I don´t want to impress you in order to manipulate you. I don´t speak for any goal to be achieved through convincing you. I don´t speak to convert you into a Christian, into a Hindu or a Mohammedan, into a theist or an atheist. These are not my concerns.
My speaking is really one of my devices for meditation. Speaking has never been used this way: I speak not to give you a message, but to stop your mind functioning.
I speak nothing prepared. I don´t know myself what is going to be the next word; hence I never make any mistake. One makes a mistake if one is prepared. I never forget anything, because one forgets if one has been remembering it. So I speak with a freedom that perhaps nobody has ever spoken with.
I am not concerned whether I am consistent, because that is not the purpose. A man who wants to convince you and manipulate you through his speaking has to be consistent, has to be logical, has to be rational, to overpower your reason. He wants to dominate through words.
My purpose is so unique: I am using words just to create silent gaps. The words are not important so I can say anything contradictory, anything absurd, anything unrelated, because my purpose is just to create gaps. The words are secondary; the silences between those words are primary. This is simply a device to give you a glimpse of meditation. And once you know that it is possible for you, you have traveled far in the direction of your own being.
Most of the people in the world don´t think that it is possible for mind to be silent. Because they don´t think it is possible, they don´t try. How to give people a taste of meditation was my basic reason to speak, so I can go on speaking eternally; it does not matter what I am saying. All that matters is that I give you a few chances to be silent, which you find difficult on your own in the beginning.
I cannot force you to be silent, but I can create a device in which spontaneously you are bound to be silent. I am speaking, and in the middle of a sentence, when you were expecting another word to follow, nothing follows but a silent gap. Your mind was looking to listen, and waiting for something to follow, and does not want to miss it – naturally it becomes silent. What can the poor mind do? If it was well known at what points I will be silent, if it was declared to you that on such and such points I will be silent, then you could manage to think; you would not be silent. Then you know: ‘This is the point where he is going to be silent; now I can have a little chit-chat with myself.’ But because it comes absolutely suddenly.... I don´t know myself why at certain points I stop.
Anything like this, in any orator in the world, will be condemned, because an orator stopping again and again means he is not well prepared, he has not done the homework. It means that his memory is not reliable, that he cannot find, sometimes, what word to use. But because it is not oratory, I am not concerned about the people who will be condemning me – I am concerned with you.
It is not only here, but far away...anywhere in the world where people will be listening to the video or to the audio, they will come to the same silence. My success is not to convince you, my success is to give you a real taste so that you can become confident that meditation is not a fiction, that the state of no-mind is not just a philosophical idea, that it is a reality; that you are capable of it, and that it does not need any special qualifications.
With me, to be silent is easier because of one other reason. I am silent; even while I am speaking I am silent. My innermost being is not involved at all. What I am saying to you is not a disturbance or a burden or a tension to me; I am as relaxed as one can be. Speaking or not speaking does not make any difference to me.
Naturally, this kind of state is infectious.
Because I cannot go on speaking the whole day to keep you in meditative moments, I want you to become responsible. Accepting that you are capable of being silent will help you when you are meditating alone. Knowing your capacity...and one comes to know one´s capacity only when one experiences it. There is no other way.
Don´t make me wholly responsible for your silence, because that will create a difficulty for you. Alone, what are you going to do? Then it becomes a kind of addiction, and I don´t want you to be addicted to me. I don´t want to be a drug to you.
I want you to be independent and confident that you can attain these precious moments on your own.
If you can attain them with me, there is no reason why you cannot attain them without me, because I am not the cause. You have to understand what is happening: listening to me, you put your mind aside.
Listening to the ocean, or listening to the thundering of the clouds, or listening to the rain falling heavily, just put your ego aside, because there is no need... The ocean is not going to attack you, the rain is not going to attack you, the trees are not going to attack you – there is no need of any defense. To be vulnerable to life as such, to existence as such, you will be getting these moments continuously. Soon it will become your very life.
Wherever you are – at home, at work, or on the way between the two – you can use the presence of any sound, any noise, as an opportunity to move inside to a space of inner silence and stillness.”

Osho: The Invitation, #14

For a good shakeup to your bigot beliefs and creationist idiocies, visit:

THE CHRISTOPHER HITCHENS WEB
(an archive with an amazing collection of video clips, sharp essays, articles, et al.)

and don't forget to browse Richard Dawinks' excellent webpages:

Who looks outside dreams … Who looks inside wakes

2007-01-14T19:53:00.000Z

ARE YOU READY FOR THE JUMP?

... MEDITATION: the only trampoline

Meditation is widely acknowledged to be the single most useful technique for combating the underlying stress and tension which is at the heart of so many illnesses. But it is so much more than that...

It allows us access to the deepest part of ourselves, enabling us to attain a state of profound inner peace, personal power and self-worth. It is the gateway to the soul.

More research has been carried out into the efficacy of meditation that any other complementary therapy, and it has consistently been found to reduce stress, improve overall levels of health and generally increase feelings of wellbeing and inner harmony. Indeed, many physicians now consider meditation to be a key element of an integrated health programme.

Through meditation:

-You develop peace of mind, self-respect and happiness
-Your mind becomes clearer and more focused
-Your memory and concentration improve
-You are able to face life's challenges with equanimity
-You can realise your potential
-You have greater control of your thoughts
-You are able to make decisions more easily
-Your quality of sleep improves

And here are some rules for...

...Being Human

1. You will receive a body. You may like it or hate it, but it will be yours for the entire period this time round.

2. You will learn lessons. You are enrolled in a full-time informal school called Life. Each day in this school you will have the opportunity to learn lessons. You may like the lessons or think them irrelevant and stupid.

3. There are no mistakes, only lessons. Growth is a process of trial and error, and experimentation. The 'failed' experiments are as much a part of the process as the experiment that ultimately 'works'.

4. A lesson is repeated until learned. A lesson will be presented to you in various forms until you have learned it. When you have learned it, you can then go on to the next lesson.

5. Learning lessons does not end. There is no part of life that does not contain its lessons. If you are alive, there are lessons to be learned.

6. There often seems better than here. When your there has become a here you will simply obtain another there that will, again, look better than here.

7. Others are merely mirrors of you. You cannot love or hate something about another person unless it reflects something you love or hate about yourself.

8. What you make of your life is up to you. You have all the tools and resources you need. What you do with them is up to you. The choice is yours.

9. Your answers lie inside you. The answers to life’s questions lie inside you. All you need to do is look, listen and trust.

10. You will forget all of this.

Or perhaps not?

Let's meditate upon No. 10...

The U.G. Intermezzo

2006-12-25T20:03:00.000Z

Here's U.G. Krishnamurti and his elusive wisdom to bring you down to earth...

I am not out to liberate anybody. You have to liberate yourself, and you are unable to do that. What I have to say will not do it. I am only interested in describing this state, in clearing away the occultation and mystification in which those people in the 'holy business' have shrouded the whole thing. Maybe I can convince you not to waste a lot of time and energy, looking for a state which does not exist except in your imagination.

Get this straight, this is your state I am describing, your natural state, not my state or the state of a God-realized man or a mutant or any such thing. This is your natural state, but what prevents what is there from expressing itself in its own way is your reaching out for something, trying to be something other than what you are.

You can never understand this; you can only experience this in terms of your past experience. This is outside the realm of experience. The natural state is acausal: it just happens. No communication is possible, and none necessary. The only thing that is real to you is the way you are functioning; it is an act of futility to relate my description to the way you are functioning. When you stop all this comparison, what is there is your natural state. Then you will not listen to anybody.

There is no teaching of mine, and never shall be one. "Teaching" is not the word for it. A teaching implies a method or a system, a technique or a new way of thinking to be applied in order to bring about a transformation in your way of life. What I am saying is outside the field of teachability; it is simply a description of the way I am functioning. It is just a description of the natural state of man -- this is the way you, stripped of the machinations of thought, are also functioning.

The natural state is not the state of a self-realized God-realized man, it is not a thing to be achieved or attained, it is not a thing to be willed into existence; it is there -- it is the living state. This state is just the functional activity of life. By 'life' I do not mean something abstract; it is the life of the senses, functioning naturally without the interference of thought. Thought is an interloper, which thrusts itself into the affairs of the senses. It has a profit motive: thought directs the activity of the senses to get something out of them, and uses them to give continuity to itself.

Your natural state has no relationship whatsoever with the religious states of bliss, beatitude and ecstasy; they lie within the field of experience. Those who have led man on his search for religiousness throughout the centuries have perhaps experienced those religious states. So can you. They are thought-induced states of being, and as they come, so do they go. Krishna Consciousness, Buddha Consciousness, Christ Consciousness, or what have you, are all trips in the wrong direction: they are all within the field of time. The timeless can never be experienced, can never be grasped, contained, much less given expression to, by any man. That beaten track will lead you nowhere. There is no oasis situated yonder; you are stuck with the mirage.

This state is a physical condition of your being. It is not some kind of psychological mutation. It is not a state of mind into which you can fall one day, and out of it the next day. You can't imagine the extent to which, as you are now, thought pervades and interferes with the functioning of every cell in your body. Coming into your natural state will blast every cell, every gland, every nerve. It is a chemical change. An alchemy of some sort takes place. But this state has nothing to do with the experiences of chemical drugs such as LSD. Those are experiences; this is not.

Does such a thing as enlightenment exist? To me what does exist is a purely physical process; there is nothing mystical or spiritual about it. If I close the eyes, some light penetrates through the eyelids. If I cover the eyelids, there is still light inside. There seems to be some kind of a hole in the forehead, which doesn't show, but through which something penetrates. In India that light is golden; in Europe it is blue. There is also some kind of light penetration through the back of the neck. It's as if there is a hole running through between those spots in front and back of the skull. There is nothing inside but this light. If you cover those points, there is complete, total darkness. This light doesn't do anything or help the body to function in any way; it's just there.

This state is a state of not knowing; you really don't know what you are looking at. I may look at the clock on the wall for half an hour -- still I do not read the time. I don't know it is a clock. All there is inside is wonderment: "What is this that I am looking at?" Not that the question actually phrases itself like that in words: the whole of my being is like a single, big question mark. It is a state of wonder, of wondering, because I just do not know what I am looking at. The knowledge about it -- all that I have learned -- is held in the background unless there is a demand. It is in the 'declutched state'. If you ask the time, I will say "It's a quarter past three" or whatever -- it comes quickly like an arrow -- then I am back in the state of not knowing, of wonder.

You can never understand the tremendous peace that is always there within you, that is your natural state. Your trying to create a peaceful state of mind is in fact creating disturbance within you. You can only talk of peace, create a state of mind and say to yourself that you are very peaceful -- but that is not peace; that is violence. So there is no use in practicing peace, there is no reason to practice silence. Real silence is explosive; it is not the dead state of mind that spiritual seekers think. "Oh, I am at peace with myself! There is silence, a tremendous silence! I experience silence!" -- that doesn't mean anything at all. This is volcanic in its nature: it's bubbling all the time -- the energy, the life -- that is its quality. You may ask how I know. I don't know. Life is aware of itself, if we can put it that way -- it is conscious of itself.

When I talk of 'feeling', I do not mean the same thing that you do. Actually, feeling is a physical response, a thud in the thymus. The thymus, one of the endocrine glands, is located under the breast bone. The doctors tell us that it is active through childhood until puberty and then becomes dormant. When you come into your natural state, this gland is re-activated. Sensations are felt there; you don't translate them as 'good' or 'bad'; they are just a thud. If there is a movement outside of you -- a clock pendulum swinging, or a bird flying across your field of vision -- that movement is also felt in the thymus. The whole of your being is that movement or vibrates with that sound; there is no separation. This does not mean that you identify yourself with that bird or whatever -- "I am that flying bird." There is no 'you' there, nor is there any object. What causes that sensation, you don't know. You do not even know that it is a sensation.

'Affection' (this is not my interpretation of the word) means that you are affected by everything, not that some emotion flows from you towards something. The natural state is a state of great sensitivity -- but this is a physical sensitivity of the senses, not some kind of emotional compassion or tenderness for others. There is compassion only in the sense that there are no 'others' for me, and so there is no separation.

Is there in you an entity which you call the 'I' or the 'mind' or the 'self'? Is there a co- ordinator who is co-ordinating what you are looking at with what you are listening to, what you are smelling with what you are tasting, and so on? Or is there anything which links together the various sensations originating from a single sense -- the flow of impulses from the eyes, for example? Actually, there is always a gap between any two sensations. The co-ordinator bridges that gap: he establishes himself as an illusion of continuity.

In the natural state there is no entity who is co-ordinating the messages from the different senses. Each sense is functioning independently in its own way. When there is a demand from outside which makes it necessary to co-ordinate one or two or all of the senses and come up with a response, still there is no co-ordinator, but there is a temporary state of co- ordination. There is no continuity; when the demand has been met, again there is only the unco-ordinated, disconnected, disjointed functioning of the senses. This is always the case. Once the continuity is blown apart -- not that it was ever there; but the illusory continuity -- it's finished once and for all.

Can this make any sense to you? It cannot. All that you know lies within the framework of your experience, which is of thought. This state is not an experience. I am only trying to give you a 'feel' of it, which is, unfortunately, misleading.

When there is no co-ordinator, there is no linking of sensations, there is no translating of sensations; they stay pure and simple sensations. I do not even know that they are sensations. I may look at you as you are talking. The eyes will focus on your mouth because that is what is moving, and the ears will receive the sound vibrations. There is nothing inside which links up the two and says that it is you talking. I may be looking at a spring bubbling out of the earth and hear the water, but there is nothing to say that the noise being heard is the sound of water, or that that sound is in any way connected with what I am seeing. I may be looking at my foot, but nothing says that this is my foot. When I am walking, I see my feet moving -- it is such a funny thing: "What is that which is moving?"

What functions is a primordial consciousness, untouched by thought.

The eyes are like a very sensitive camera. The physiologists say that light reflected off objects strikes the retina of the eye and the sensation goes through the optic nerve to the brain. The faculty of sight, of seeing, is simply a physical phenomenon. It makes no difference to the eyes whether they are focused on a snow-capped mountain or on a garbage can: they produce sensations in exactly the same way. the eyes look on everyone and everything without discrimination.

You have a feeling that there is a 'cameraman' who is directing the eyes. But left to themselves -- when there is no 'cameraman' -- the eyes do not linger, but are moving all the time. They are drawn by the things outside. Movement attracts them, or brightness or a color which stands out from whatever is around it. There is no 'I' looking; mountains, flowers, trees, cows, all look at me. The consciousness is like a mirror, reflecting whatever is there outside. The depth, the distance, the color, everything is there, but there is nobody who is translating these things. Unless there is a demand for knowledge about what I am looking at, there is no separation, no distance from what is there. It may not actually be possible to count the hairs on the head of someone sitting across the room, but there is a kind of clarity which seems as if I could.

The eyes do not blink, except when there is sudden danger -- this is something very natural because the things outside are demanding attention all the time. Then, when the eyes are tired, a built-in mechanism in the body cuts them out -- they may be open, but they are blurred. But if the eyes stay open all the time, if the reflex action of blinking is not operating, they become dry and you will go blind; so there are some glands beyond the outer corners of the eyes, which are not activated in your case, which act as a watering mechanism. Tears flow all the time from the outer corners. Ignorant people have described them as 'tears of joy' or 'tears of bliss'. There is nothing divine about them. By practicing not blinking, one will not arrive in this state; one will only strain the eyes. And there are neurotics in mental hospitals whose eyes do not blink for one reason or another -- for them it is a pathological condition. But once you are in your natural state, by some luck or some strange chance, all this happens in its own way.

Does beauty lie in the eye of the beholder? Does it lie in the object? Where does it lie? Beauty is thought-induced. I do not stop and write poems about the mountain in front of me. What happens is that I am walking and suddenly see something different because the light has changed. I have nothing to do with it. It is not that something new is seen, or that there is a total attention; there has been a sudden change in the light itself. There is no recognition of that as beauty. Clarity is there, which probably wasn't there before the light changed. Then this consciousness suddenly expands to the size of the object in front of the body, and the lungs take a deep breath. This is the pranayama (breath control); not what you are doing, sitting in a corner and inhaling through one nostril and exhaling through the other; this pranayama is going on all the time. So, there is consciousness of a sudden change in the breathing, and then it moves on to something else, the mooing of a cow or the howling of a jackal. It is always moving; it does not linger on something which thought has decided is beautiful. There is no one directing.

Do you listen to anybody? You do not; you listen only to yourself. When you leave the sense of hearing alone, all that is there is the vibration of the sound -- the words repeat themselves inside of you, as in an echo chamber. This sense is functioning in just the same way with you, except that you think the words you are hearing come from outside of you. Get this straight: You can never hear one word from anyone else, no matter how intimately you think you are in relationship with that person; you hear only your own translations, always. They are all your words you are hearing. All that the other person's words can possibly be to you is a noise, a vibration picked up by the ear-drum and transferred to the nerves which run to the brain. You are translating those vibrations all the time, trying to understand, because you want to get something out of what you are hearing. That is all right for a relationship with someone on the level of "Here is some money; give me a half kilo of carrots" -- but that is the limit of your relationship, of your communication, with anybody.

When there is no translation, all languages sound the same whether or not your particular knowledge structure 'speaks' a particular language. The only differences are in the spacing of the syllables and in the tune. Languages are melodic in different ways.

It is acquired taste that tells you that Beethoven's Ninth Symphony is more beautiful than a chorus of cats screaming; both produce equally valid sensations. Of course some sounds can be damaging to the body, and noise levels above a certain number of decibels are hard on the nervous system and can cause deafness -- that is not what I am talking about. But the appreciation of music, poetry and language is all culturally determined and is the product of thought.

Your movement of thought interferes with the process of touch, just as it does with the other senses. Anything you touch is always translated as 'hard', 'soft', 'warm', 'cold', 'wet', 'dry', and so on.

You do not realize it, but it is your thinking that creates your own body. Without this thought process there is no body consciousness -- which is to say there is no body at all. My body exists for other people; it does not exist for me; there are only isolated points of contact, impulses of touch which are not tied together by thought. So the body is not different from the objects around it; it is a set of sensations like any others. Your body does not belong to you.

Perhaps I can give you the 'feel' of this. I sleep four hours at night, no matter what time I go to bed. Then I lie in bed until morning fully awake. I don't know what is lying there in the bed; I don't know whether I'm lying on my left side or my right side -- for hours and hours I lie like this. If there is any noise outside -- a bird or something -- it just echoes in me. I listen to the "flub-dub-flub-dub" of my heart and don't know what it is. There is no body between the two sheets -- the form of the body is not there. If the question is asked, "What is in there?" there is only an awareness of the points of contact, where the body is in contact with the bed and the sheets, and where it is in contact with itself, at the crossing of the legs, for example. There are only the sensations of touch from these points of contact, and the rest of the body is not there. There is some kind of heaviness, probably the gravitational pull, something very vague. There is nothing inside which links up these things. Even if the eyes are open and looking at the whole body, there are still only the points of contact, and they have no connection with what I am looking at. If I want to try to link up these points of contact into the shape of my own body, probably I will succeed, but by the time it is completed the body is back in the same situation of different points of contact. The linkage cannot stay. It is the same sort of thing when I'm sitting or standing. There is no body.

Can you tell me how mango juice tastes? I can't. You also cannot; but you try to relive the memory of mango juice now -- you create for yourself some kind of an experience of how it tastes -- which I cannot do. I must have mango juice on my tongue -- seeing or smelling it is not enough -- in order to be able to bring that past knowledge into operation and to say "Yes, this is what mango juice tastes like." This does not mean that personal preferences and 'tastes' change. In a market my hand automatically reaches out for the same items that I have liked all my life. But because I cannot conjure up a mental experience, there can be no craving for foods which are not there.

Smell plays a greater part in your daily life than does taste. The olfactory organs are constantly open to odors. But if you do not interfere with the sense of smell, what is there is only an irritation in the nose. It makes no difference whether you are smelling cow dung or an expensive French perfume -- you rub the nose and move on.

My talking comes out in response to the questions which are asked. I cannot sit and give a talk on the natural state -- that is an artificial situation for me. There is nobody who is thinking thoughts and then coming out with answers. When you throw a ball at me, the ball bounces back, and that is what you call an 'answer'. But I don't give any answers; this state is expressing itself. I really don't know what I'm saying, and what I'm saying is of no importance. You may transcribe my own talking, but it will make no sense to me -- it is a dead thing.

What is here, this natural state, is a living thing. It cannot be captured by me, let alone by you. It's like a flower. (This simile is all I can give.) It just blooms. It's there. As long as it is there, it has a fragrance which is different and distinct from that of every other flower. You may not recognize it. You may or may not write odes or sonnets about it. A wandering cow might eat it, or it may be chopped down by a haycutter, or it fades and is finished -- that's the end of it. It's of no importance. You can't preserve its perfume; whatever you preserve of this is only a synthetic, a chemical perfume, not the living thing. Preserving the expressions, teachings or words of such a man has no meaning. This state has only contemporary value, contemporary expression.

The personality does not change when you come into this state. You are, after all, a computer machine, which reacts as it has been programmed. It is in fact your present effort to change yourself that is taking you away from yourself and keeping you from functioning in the natural way. The personality will remain the same. Don't expect such a man to become free from anger or idiosyncrasies. Don't expect some kind of spiritual humility. Such a man may be the most arrogant person you have ever met, because he is touching life at a unique place where no man has touched before.

It is for this reason that each person who comes into this state expresses it in a unique way, in terms relevant to his time. It is also for this reason that if two or more people are living in this state at the same time, they will never get together. They won't dance in the streets hand in hand: "We are all self-realized men! We belong!"

The natural needs of a human being are basic: food, clothing and shelter. You must either work for them or be given them by somebody. If these are your only needs, they are not very difficult to fulfill. To deny yourself the basic needs is not a sign of spirituality; but to require more than food, clothing and shelter is a neurotic state of mind.

Is not sex a basic human requirement? Sex is dependent upon thought; the body itself has no sex. Only the genitals and perhaps the hormone balances differ between male and female. It is thought that says "I am a man, and that is a woman, an attractive woman." It is thought that translates sex feelings in the body and says "These are sexual feelings." And it is thought that provides the build-up without which no sex is possible: "It would be more pleasurable to hold that woman's hand than just to look at her. It would be more pleasurable to kiss her than just to embrace her," and so on. In the natural state there is no build-up of thought. Without that build-up, sex is impossible. And sex is tremendously violent to the body. The body normally is a very peaceful organism, and then you subject it to this tremendous tension and release, which feels pleasurable to you. Actually it is painful to the body.

But through suppression or attempts at sublimation of sex you will never come into this state. As long as you think of God, you will have thoughts of sex. Ask any religious seeker you may know who practices celibacy, whether he doesn't dream of women at night. The peak of the sex experience is the one thing in life you have that comes close to being a first-hand experience; all of the rest of your experiences are second-hand, somebody else's. Why do you weave so many taboos and ideas around this? Why do you destroy the joy of sex? Not that I am advocating indulgence or promiscuity; but through abstinence and continence you will never achieve a thing.

There must be a living contact. If you walk out of the room, you disappear from my consciousness. Where you are, or why you are not here -- these questions do not arise. There are no images here -- there is no room for them -- the sensory apparatus is completely occupied with the things I am looking at now. There must be a living contact with those things that are in the room, not thoughts about things that are not here. And so, if you are totally 'tuned in' to the sensory activity, there in no room for fears about who will feed you tomorrow, or for speculation about God, Truth and Reality.

This is not a state of omniscience, wherein all of man's eternal questions are answered; rather it is a state in which the questioning has stopped. It has stopped because those questions have no relation to the way the organism is functioning, and the way the organism is functioning leaves no room for those questions.

The body has an extraordinary mechanism for renewing itself. This is necessary because the senses in the natural state are functioning at the peak of their sensitivity all the time. So, when the senses become tired, the body goes through death. This is real physical death, not some mental state. It can happen one or more times a day. You do not decide to go through this death; it descends upon you. It feels at first as if you have been given an anaesthetic: the senses become increasingly dull, the heartbeat slows, the feet and hands become ice cold, and the whole body becomes stiff like a corpse. Energy flows from all over the body towards some point. It happens differently every time. The whole process takes forty-eight or forty-nine minutes. During this time the stream of thoughts continues, but there is no reading of the thoughts. At the end of this period you 'conk out': the stream of thought is cut. There is no way of knowing how long that cut lasts -- it is not an experience. There is nothing you can say about that time of being 'conked out' -- that can never become part of your conscious existence or conscious thinking.

You don't know what brings you back from death. If you had any will at that moment, you could decide not to come back. When the 'conking out' is over, the stream of thought picks up exactly where it left off. Dullness is over; clarity is back. The body feels very stiff -- slowly it begins to move of its own accord, limbering itself up. The movements are more like the Chinese T'ai Chi than like Hatha Yoga. The disciples observed the things that were happening to the teachers, probably, and embodied them and taught hundreds of postures -- but they are all worthless; it is an extraordinary movement. Those who have observed my body moving say it looks like the motions of a newly born baby. This 'conking out' gives a total renewal of the senses, glands and nervous system: after it they function at the peak of their sensitivity.

You shall not taste of death, for there is no death for you: you cannot experience your own death. Are you born? Life and death cannot be separated; you have no chance whatever of knowing for yourself where one begins and the other ends. You can experience the death of another, but not your own. The only death is physical death; there is no psychological death.

Why are you so afraid of death?

Your experiencing structure cannot conceive of any event that it will not experience. It even expects to preside over its own dissolution, and so it wonders what death will feel like -- it tries to project the feeling of what it will be like not to feel. But in order to anticipate a future experience, your structure needs knowledge, a similar past experience it can call upon for reference. You cannot remember what it felt like not to exist before you were born, and you cannot remember your own birth, so you have no basis for projecting your future non- existence. As long as you have known life, you have known yourself, you have been there, so, to you, you have a feeling of eternity. To justify this feeling of eternity, your structure begins to convince itself that there will be a life after death for you -- heaven, reincarnation, transmigration of souls, or whatever. What is it that you think reincarnates? Where is that soul of yours? Can you taste it, touch it, show it to me? What is there inside of you that goes to heaven? What is there? There is nothing inside of you but fear.

Why do you dream? You have the feeling that there is somebody, a self, who is running the show of your perceptions, translating what is seen, heard and felt, directing the eyes, saying "This is beautiful; that is ugly. I will look at this; I will not look at that." You cannot control like that -- you think that you can; but the camera is taking pictures all the time, and the tape- recorder is recording all the time, whether you look at one thing for a longer time than you look at something else. Then, when the body is at rest or your thoughts are in a passive state, these things begin to come up -- one bit of this, one bit of that -- it creates some kind of a mosaic and you begin to dream. When that 'somebody' is not there, there is nothing which says "I was asleep, I was dreaming, and now I am awake."

What is morality? It is not the following of enjoined rules of conduct. It is not a question of standing above temptations, or of conquering hate, anger, greed, lust and violence. Questioning your actions before and after creates the moral problem. What is responsible for this situation is the faculty of distinguishing between right and wrong and influencing your actions accordingly.

Life is action. Unquestioned action is morality. Questioning your actions is destroying the expression of life. A person who lets life act in its own way without the protective movement of thought has no self to defend. What need will he have to lie or cheat or pretend or to commit any other act which his society considers immoral?

What is keeping you from being in your natural state? You are constantly moving away from yourself. You want to be happy, either permanently or at least for this moment. You are dissatisfied with your everyday experiences, and so you want some new ones. You want to perfect yourself, to change yourself. You are reaching out, trying to be something other than what you are. It is this that is taking you away from yourself.
Society has put before you the ideal of a 'perfect man'. No matter in which culture you were born, you have scriptural doctrines and traditions handed down to you to tell you how to behave. You are told that through due practice you can even eventually come into the state attained by the sages, saints and saviors of mankind. And so you try to control your behavior, to control your thoughts, to be something unnatural.

We are all living in a 'thought sphere'. Your thoughts are not your own; they belong to everybody. There are only thoughts, but you create a counter-thought, the thinker, with which you read every thought. Your effort to control life has created a secondary movement of thought within you, which you call the 'I'. This movement of thought within you is parallel to the movement of life, but isolated from it; it can never touch life. You are a living creature, yet you lead your entire life within the realm of this isolated, parallel movement of thought. You cut yourself off from life -- that is something very unnatural.

The natural state is not a 'thoughtless state' -- that is one of the greatest hoaxes perpetrated for thousands of years on poor, helpless Hindus. You will never be without thought until the body is a corpse, a very dead corpse. Being able to think is necessary to survive. But in this state thought stops choking you; it falls into its natural rhythm. There is no longer a 'you' who reads the thoughts and thinks that they are 'his'.

Have you ever looked at that parallel movement of thought? The books on English grammar will tell you that 'I' is a first person singular pronoun, subjective case; but that is not what you want to know. Can you look at that thing you call 'I'? It is very elusive. Look at it now, feel it, touch it, and tell me. How do you look at it? And what is the thing that is looking at what you call 'I'? This is the crux of the whole problem: the one that is looking at what you call 'I' is the 'I'. It is creating an illusory division of itself into subject and object, and through this division it is continuing. This is the divisive nature that is operating in you, in your consciousness. Continuity of its existence is all that interests it. As long as you want to understand that 'you' or to change that 'you' into something spiritual, into something holy, beautiful or marvelous, that 'you' will continue. If you do not want to do anything about it, it is not there, it's gone.

How do you understand this? I have for all practical purposes made a statement: "What you are looking at is not different from the one who is looking." What do you do with a statement like this? What instrument do you have at your disposal for understanding a meaningless, illogical, irrational statement? You begin to think. Through thinking, you cannot understand a thing. You are translating what I am saying, in terms of the knowledge you already have, just as you translate everything else, because you want to get something out of it. When you stop doing that, what is there is what I am describing. The absence of what you are doing -- trying to understand, or trying to change yourself -- is the state of being that I am describing.

Is there a beyond? Because you are not interested in the everyday things and the happenings around you, you have invented a thing called the 'beyond', or 'timelessness', or 'God', 'Truth', 'Reality', 'Brahman', 'enlightenment', or whatever, and you search for that. There may not be any beyond. You don't know a thing about that beyond; whatever you know is what you have been told, the knowledge you have about that. So you are projecting that knowledge. What you call 'beyond' is created by the knowledge you have about that beyond; and whatever knowledge you have about a beyond is exactly what you will experience. The knowledge creates the experience, and the experience then strengthens the knowledge.

What you know can never be the beyond. Whatever you experience is not the beyond. If there is any beyond, this movement of 'you' is absent. The absence of this movement probably is the beyond, but the beyond can never be experienced by you; it is when the 'you' is not there. Why are you trying to experience a thing that cannot be experienced?

You must always recognize what you are looking at, otherwise you are not there. The moment you translate, the 'you' is there. You look at something and recognize that it is a bag, a red bag. Thought interferes with the sensation by translating. Why does thought interfere? And can you do anything about it? The moment you look at a thing, what comes inside of you is the word 'bag', if not bag', then 'bench' or 'bannister', 'step', "that man sitting there, he has white hair." It goes on and on -- you are repeating to yourself all the time. If you don't do that, you are preoccupied with something else: "I'm getting late for the office." You are either thinking about something which is totally unrelated to the way the senses are functioning at this moment, or else you are looking and saying to yourself "That's a bag, that's a red bag," and so on and so on -- that is all that is there. The word 'bag' separates you from what you are looking at, thereby creating the 'you'; otherwise there is no space between the two.

Every time a thought is born, you are born. When the thought is gone, you are gone. But the 'you' does not let the thought go, and what gives continuity to this 'you' is the thinking. Actually there is no permanent entity in you, no totality of all your thoughts and experiences. You think that there is 'somebody' who is thinking your thoughts, 'somebody' who is feeling your feelings --- that's the illusion. I can say it is an illusion; but it is not an illusion to you.

Your emotions are more complex, but it is the same process. Why do you have to tell yourself that you are angry, that you are envious of someone else, or that sex is bothering you? I am not saying anything about fulfilling or not fulfilling. There is a sensation in you, and you say that you are depressed or unhappy or blissful, jealous, greedy, envious. This labelling brings into existence the one who is translating this sensation. What you call "I" is nothing but this word 'red bag', 'bench', 'steps', 'banister', 'light bulb', 'angry', 'blissful', 'jealous', or whatever. You are putting your brain cells to unnecessary activity making the memory cells operate all the time, destroying the energy that is there. This is only wearing you out.

This labelling is necessary when you must communicate with someone else or with yourself. But you communicate with yourself all the time. Why do you do this? The only difference between you and the person who talks aloud to himself is that you don't talk aloud. The moment you do begin to talk aloud, along comes the psychiatrist. That chap, of course, is doing the same thing that you are doing, communicating to himself all the time -- 'bag', 'red bag', 'obsessive', 'compulsive', 'Oedipus complex,' 'greedy', 'bench', 'banister', 'martini'. Then he says something is wrong with you and puts you on the couch and wants to change you, to help you.

Why can't you leave the sensations alone? Why do you translate? You do this because if you do not communicate to yourself, you are not there. The prospect of that is frightening to the 'you'.

Whatever you experience -- peace, bliss, silence, beatitude, ecstasy, joy, God knows what -- will be old, second-hand. You already have knowledge about all of these things. The fact that you are in a blissful state or in a state of tremendous silence means that you know about it. You must know a thing in order to experience it. That knowledge is nothing marvelous or metaphysical; 'bench', 'bag', 'red bag', is the knowledge. Knowledge is something which is put into you by somebody else, and he got that from somebody else; it is not yours.

Can you experience a simple thing like that bench that is sitting across from you? No, you only experience the knowledge you have about it. And the knowledge has come from some outside agency, always. You think the thoughts of your society, feel the feelings of your society and experience the experiences of your society; there is no new experience.

So, all that any man has ever thought or felt must go out of your system. And you are the product of all that knowledge -- that's all you are.

What is thought? You don't know a thing about it; all that you know about what you call 'thought' is what you have been told. How can you do anything with it -- mould it, control it, shape it or stop it? You are all the time trying to do something with it because somebody has told you that you must change this or replace that, hold on to the good thoughts and not the bad thoughts. Thoughts are thoughts; they are neither good nor bad. As long as you want to do something with whatever is there, you are thinking. Wanting and thinking are not two different things. Wanting to understand means there is a movement of thought. You are adding momentum to that movement, giving it continuity.

The senses function unnaturally in you because you want to use them to get something. Why should you get anything? Because you want what you call the 'you' to continue. You are protecting that continuity. Thought is a protective mechanism: it protects the 'you' at the expense of something or somebody else. Anything born out of thought is destructive: it will ultimately destroy you and your kind.

It is the repetitive mechanism of thought that is wearing you out. So, what is it that you can do about it? -- that's all that you can ask. That's the one and the only question, and any answer that I or anybody gives adds momentum to that movement of thought. What is it that you can do about it? Not one thing. It's too strong: it has the momentum of millions of years. You are totally helpless, and you cannot be conscious of that helplessness.

If you practice any system of mind control, automatically the 'you' is there, and through this it is continuing. Have you ever meditated, really seriously meditated? Or do you know anyone who has? Nobody does. If you seriously meditate, you'll wind up in the loony bin. Nor can you practice mindfulness trying to be aware every moment of your life. You cannot be aware; you and awareness cannot co-exist. If you could be in a state of awareness for one second by the clock, once in your life, the continuity would be snapped, the illusion of the experiencing structure, the 'you', would collapse, and everything would fall into the natural rhythm. In this state you do not know what you are looking at -- that is awareness. If you recognize what you are looking at, you are there, again experiencing the old, what you know.

What makes one person come into his natural state, and not another person, I don't know. Perhaps it's written in the cells. It is acausal. It is not an act of volition on your part; you can't bring it about. There is absolutely nothing you can do. You can distrust any man who tells you how he got into this state. One thing you can be sure of is that he cannot possibly know himself, and cannot possibly communicate it to you. There is a built-in triggering mechanism in the body. If the experiencing structure of thought happens to let go, the other thing will take over in its own way. The functioning of the body will be a totally different functioning, without the interference of thought except when it is necessary to communicate with somebody. To put it in the boxing-ring phrase, you have to "throw in the towel," be totally helpless. No one can help you, and you cannot help yourself.

This state is not in your interest. You are only interested in continuity. You want to continue, probably on a different level, and to function in a different dimension, but you want to continue somehow. You wouldn't touch this with a barge pole. This is going to liquidate what you call "you," all of you -- higher self, lower self, soul, Atman, conscious, subconscious -- all of that. You come to a point, and then you say "I need time." So sadhana (inquiry and religious endeavor) comes into the picture, and you say to yourself "Tomorrow I will understand." This structure is born of time and functions in time, but does not come to an end through time. If you don't understand now, you are not going to understand tomorrow. What is there to understand? Why do you want to understand what I am saying? You can't understand what I am saying. It is an exercise in futility on your part to try to relate the description of how I am functioning to the way you are functioning. This is a thing which I cannot communicate. Nor is any communication necessary. No dialogue is possible. When the 'you' is not there, when the question is not there, what is is understanding. You are finished. You'll walk out. You will never listen to anybody describing his state or ask any questions about understanding at all.

What you are looking for does not exist. You would rather tread an enchanted ground with beatific visions of a radical transformation of that non-existent self of yours into a state of being which is conjured up by some bewitching phrases. That takes you away from your natural state -- it is a movement away from yourself. To be yourself requires extraordinary intelligence. You are 'blessed' with that intelligence; nobody need give it to you, nobody can take it away from you. He who lets that express itself in its own way is a natural man.

SELECTED LINKS TO U.G. KRISHNAMURTI RELATED WEBSITES:

U G Krishnamurti ~ Resource site for this self-proclaimed anti-guru. Includes books for download (also in other languages), articles, poems, interviews and references

The Essential U G ~ Quotes and Photos of UG Krishnamurti, Webiste by Dr. Raj Mehta, philosopher, educator, spiritual teacher

Wikipedia's Krishnamurti

Spiritual Teachers' entry on U G Krishnamurti ~ Brief review of this thinker as a spiritual teacher

Realization's entry on UG

Osho on UG Krishnamurti ~ Finally, some comments by Osho on UG... Not very positive ones, since UG heavily criticised Osho (at one point UG publicly called Osho the "worlds biggest pimp" because "He made money from the boys and the girls and he kept it for himself." But in 1971 Osho had stated that U.G. Krishnamurti was "realized." After much public criticism from U.G., then Osho counterattacked by calling U.G. a "phony guru."). The battle of the gurus!

Osho's Dynamic Meditation

2006-09-22T21:43:00.000+01:00

The Dynamic Meditation:

This spectacular meditation method was Rajneesh's trademark, and it remains a tremendously effective tool for naturally expanding consciousness. Rajneesh never did the technique himself because he didn't need to. He developed the method simply by observing his disciples, who would occasionally go into spontaneous body movements during his early meditation camps. Later on, he unfortunately changed the third and fourth stages of the method into a pointless torture test. The correct and most effective version of this meditation technique has four stages, each lasting ten minutes.

Stage 1) Start by standing with your eyes closed and breathe deep and fast through your nose for ten minutes. Allow your body to move freely. Jump, sway back and forth, or use any physical motion that helps you pump more oxygen into your lungs.

Stage 2) The second ten minute stage is one of catharsis. Let go totally and be spontaneous. You may dance or roll on the ground. Screaming is allowed and encouraged. You must act out any anger you feel in a safe way, such as beating the earth with your hands. All the suppressed emotions from your subconscious mind are to be released.

Stage 3) In the third stage you jump up and down yelling Hoo! Hoo! Hoo! continuously for ten minutes. This sounds silly, but the loud vibration of your voice travels down to your centers of stored energy and pushes that energy upward. When doing this stage it is important to keep your arms loose and in a natural position. Do not hold your arms over your head as that position can be medically dangerous.

Stage 4) The fourth ten minute stage is complete relaxation and quiet. Flop down on your back, get comfortable, and just let go. Be as a dead man totally surrendered to the cosmos. Enjoy the tremendous energy you have unleashed in the first three stages and become a silent witness to the ocean as it flows into the drop. Become the ocean... Oshoooooo, yeah!!

Rajneesh unfortunately changed the third stage of the method to rigidly holding your arms over your head while shouting Hoo! Even worse, he changed the fourth stage to freezing in place like a statue with your arms still held awkwardly over your head. This method is not only uncomfortable to the point of torture, it can also be medically dangerous for those with an underlying heart condition. When you stand with arms elevated over your head, you increase your level of orthostatic stress. This means that your heart must work harder to pump blood that has traveled down to your legs back up to your heart and on up to your brain. You could easily pass out in this position, or induce a heart attack in individuals with coronary artery disease.

Freezing in place makes deep relaxation impossible as it keeps your mind's controlling functions fully operational. This holds your consciousness on the surface, defeating the purpose of the exercise. The point of the technique was to have three stages of intense action followed by a fourth stage of deep relaxation and complete let go. Rajneesh could never have practiced the freeze method himself, not even in his youth.

I think it advisable for meditating students to only use the enjoyable early version of Dynamic Meditation. This wonderful technique was intended to grow with the student and change as the student changes. After a few years of practicing the method vigorously, the first three stages of the meditation should drop away spontaneously. You then go into the meditation hall, take a few deep breaths, and immediately go deep into the ecstasy of the fourth stage. Rajneesh intended the method to be fluid, health giving, and fun.

~ See the many faces of a mesmerizing man here: Osho's Photos

One biographical view

2006-09-21T21:15:00.000+01:00

This is one appraisal of Osho's life on Earth, not a very positive one - but allows you to acquire perspective before passing judgement...

Osho, Bhagwan Rajneesh, and the Lost Truth

by Christopher Calder

Meditation must not be made into a business. ~ Acharya Rajneesh 1971

Acharya Rajneesh was 39 years old when I first met him at his Bombay apartment in December of 1970. With long beard and large dark eyes, he looked like a painting of Lao-Tse come to life. Before meeting Rajneesh, I had spent time with a number of Eastern gurus (see pictures here) without being satisfied with the quality of their teachings. I wanted an enlightened guide who could bridge the gap between East and West, and reveal the true esoteric secrets without the excess baggage of Indian, Tibetan, or Japanese culture. Rajneesh was the answer to my quest for those deeper meanings. He described for me in vivid detail everything I wanted to know about the inner worlds, and he had the power of immense being to back up his words. At 21 years old, I was naive about life and the nature of man and I assumed that everything he told me must be true.

Rajneesh spoke on a high level of intelligence, and his powerful presence emanated from his body like a soft light that healed all wounds. While sitting close during a small gathering of friends, Rajneesh took me on a rapidly vertical inner journey that almost seemed to push me out of my physical body. His vast presence lifted everyone around him higher without the slightest effort on their part. The days I spent at his Bombay apartment were like days spent in heaven. He had it all, and he was giving it away for free!

Rajneesh possessed the power of direct energy transmission, which is known in India as "shaktipat." He used this power nobly to bring comfort and inspiration to his disciples. Rajneesh claimed to have the "third eye" powers of telepathy and remote viewing as well, and for many years I believed that claim to be true. However, in the 1980s Rajneesh was unable to perceive the tragic events at his Oregon commune which occurred directly under his nose, so those claimed powers are now a question mark in my mind. Many gurus boast of having mysterious psychic abilities in order to attract new disciples and new money. Rajneesh's habit of getting his helpers to investigate visitors, so he could impress them with his knowledge of their personal lives, adds to my current skepticism about the potency and effectiveness of his "third eye." It was a definite fact, however, that those who came near him did experience his incredible cosmic presence. One or two face to face meetings with Rajneesh was all it took to turn doubting Western skepticism into awed admiration and devotion.

One year earlier I had meet another enlightened teacher known to the world as Jiddu Krishnamurti. J. Krishnamurti could barely give a coherent lecture, and he constantly scolded his audience by referring to their "shoddy little minds." I loved his frankness, and his words were true, but his subtly cantankerous nature was not very helpful in transferring his knowledge to others.

Listening to J. Krishnamurti speak was like eating a sandwich made of bread and sand. I found the best way to enjoy his talks was to completely ignore his words and quietly absorb his presence. Using that technique, I would become so expanded after a lecture that I could barely talk for hours afterwards. J. Krishnamurti, while fully enlightened and uniquely lovable, will be recorded in history as a teacher with very poor verbal communication skills. Unlike the highly eloquent Rajneesh, however, J. Krishnamurti never committed any crime, never pretended to be more than he was, and he never used other human beings selfishly.

Life is complex and multilayered, and my naive illusions about the phenomena of perfect enlightenment faded over the years. It became clear that enlightened people are as fallible as anyone. They are expanded human beings, not perfect human beings, and they live and breathe with many of the same faults and vulnerabilities we ordinary humans must endure.

Skeptics ask how I can claim that Rajneesh was enlightened, given his scandals and disastrous public image. I can only say that Rajneesh's spiritual presence was identical to that of Jiddu Krishnamurti, who was recognized as enlightened by every high Tibetan Lama and revered Hindu sage of the day. I do sympathize with the skeptics, however. If I had not known Rajneesh personally, I would never believe it myself.

Rajneesh pushed the envelope of enlightenment in both positive and negative directions. He was the best of the best and the worst of the worst. He was a great teacher in his early years, with an innovative meditation technique that worked with dramatic power called "Dynamic Meditation." Rajneesh lifted thousands of seekers to higher levels of consciousness, and he detailed Eastern religions and ancient meditation techniques with luminous clarity.

One false move. One grand error.

Acharya Rajneesh was born on December 11th, 1931, in the village of Kuchwada in central India. The term 'Acharya' means a religious teacher, and 'Rajneesh' means moon. Rajneesh's actual legal name was Chandra Mohan Jain; 'Rajneesh' being only an unofficial nickname acquired in childhood. Late one night in 1971, the man I knew as Acharya Rajneesh suddenly changed his name to "Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh." The famous enlightened sage, Ramana Maharshi, was called 'Bhagwan' by his disciples as a spontaneous term of endearment. Rajneesh simply declared to the world that everyone should start calling him Bhagwan, a title that can mean anything from 'divine one' to God. 'Shree' is an honorific term for Master, so his new name could be translated as God Master Moon. Rajneesh became irritated when I once politely corrected his mispronunciations of English words after a lecture, so I felt in no position to tell him that I thought his new title was inappropriate and dishonest. That change in name marked a turning point in Rajneesh's level of honesty and was the first of many big lies yet to come.

Rajneesh lived in an ivory tower, rarely leaving his room unless to give a lecture, his life experience cushioned by throngs of adoring devotees. His isolation became even more complete when he moved from his small Bombay apartment to a large estate in Poona, India, in 1974. As most human beings who are treated as kings, Rajneesh lost touch with the world of the common man. In his artificial and insulated existence, Rajneesh made one fundamental error in judgment which would destroy his teaching.

What you tell them is true, but what I tell them (the useful lies) is good for them. ~ Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, Poona, India, 1975

Rajneesh calculated that the majority of the earth's population was on such a low level of consciousness that they could not understand nor tolerate the real truths. He thus decided on a policy of spreading seemingly useful lies to bring inspiration to his disciples and, on occasion, to stress his students in unique situations for their own personal growth. This was his downfall and the prime reason he will be remembered by most historians as just another phony guru. Rajneesh's teachings were full of intentional lies and unintentional falsehoods, which were born out of his own ignorance, gullibility, and Indian cultural conditioning. His psychic presence, however, was 100% real and extremely powerful.

Acharya, Bhagwan Shree, Osho,...all the empowering names taken by Rajneesh could not cover up the fact that he was still a human being. He had ambitions and desires, sexual and material, just like everyone else. All enlightened humans have desires. All enlightened men have had public lives that we know about, and all have had private lives that remained secret. The vast majority of enlightened men do nothing but good for the world. Only Rajneesh, to my knowledge, became a criminal in both the legal and ethical sense of the word.

Rajneesh never lost the ultimate existential truth of being. He only lost the ordinary concept of truth that any normal adult can understand. He rationalized his constant lying as "lefthanded Tantra," but that too was dishonest. Rajneesh lied to save face, to avoid taking responsibility for his own mistakes, and to gain personal power. Those lies had nothing to do with Tantra or any selfless acts of kindness. What is real in this world is fact, and Rajneesh misrepresented fact on a daily basis. Rajneesh was no simple con man like so many others. Rajneesh knew everything that Buddha knew, and he was everything that Buddha was. It was his loss of respect for ordinary truthfulness that destroyed his teaching.

Rajneesh's health collapsed in his early thirties. Even before reaching middle age, Rajneesh suffered reoccurring bouts of weakness. During his youthful college years, when he should have been at a peak of vigor, Rajneesh often had to sleep 12 to 14 hours a day due to an unexplained illness. Rajneesh suffered from what Europeans call Myalgic Encephalomyelitis (ME), or what Americans call Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS). His classic symptoms included the obvious fatigue, strange allergies, recurrent low grade fevers, photophobia, orthostatic intolerance (the inability to stand for a normal period of time), insomnia, body pain, and extreme sensitivity to smells and chemicals, a condition doctors now refer to as "multiple chemical sensitivity."

Rajneesh's trademark chemical sensitivity was so severe that he instructed his guards to sniff people for unpleasant odors before they were allowed to visit him in his quarters. People with Gulf War Syndrome, MS, and other neurological and immune system illnesses are also often highly sensitive to chemicals and smells. Rajneesh's poor health and strange symptoms were a product of real neurological and immune system dysfunction, not some esoteric supersensitivity caused by his enlightenment. Rajneesh also had Type II diabetes, asthma, and severe back pain.

Rajneesh was constantly sick and frail from the time I first met him in 1970 until his death on January 19th, 1990. He thought he was getting a different cold or flu every week. In reality he suffered from a chronic neurological and immune system illness, Chronic Fatigue Syndrome, with flu like symptoms that can last a lifetime. Rajneesh could not stand on his feet for long periods of time without becoming lightheaded because he suffered damage to his autonomic nervous system which controls blood pressure. This neurally mediated hypotension (low blood pressure while standing) causes chronic fatigue and can lower IQ due to a lack of sufficient blood and oxygen being pumped to the brain (brain hypoxia). In the 1970s, Rajneesh often complained of becoming lightheaded immediately upon standing. During the final few months of his life in Poona, Rajneesh frequently passed out into complete unconsciousness.

Rajneesh used prescription drugs, mainly Valium (diazepam), as an analgesic for his aches and pains and to counter the symptoms of dysautonomia (dysfunction of the autonomic nervous system). He took the maximum recommended dose of 60 milligrams per day. Rajneesh also inhaled nitrous oxide (N2O) mixed with pure oxygen, which he claimed increased his creativity. The nitrous oxide probably did relieve the sensation of severe exhaustion and suffocation patients with Chronic Fatigue Syndrome often feel, but it did nothing for the quality of his judgment. Naive about the power of drugs, and overconfident of his ability to fight off their negative effects, Rajneesh succumbed to addiction.

A number of disciples have claimed that Rajneesh was so intoxicated at his Oregon ranch in the 1980s that he sometimes urinated in the halls of his own home, just as heroin addicts and common drunks often do. I believe this to be true, as the last time I saw Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh he was inebriated to the point of becoming physically ugly. He had the same washed-out look and foolish behavior I had witnessed in drug addicts while working at a methadone clinic in the United States. Rajneesh had miraculous mental power, but he was an ordinary human being physically and he could not tolerate the devastating effects of large doses of tranquilizers.

On top of Rajneesh's physical illness, his massive intake of Valium caused paranoia and greatly reduced reasoning skills. Valium addicts often think the CIA or some other unseen villains are plotting against them, so it is not surprising that he imagined that he was poisoned by the United States Government. His reasoning powers became so damaged that Rajneesh actually considered moving to Russia to combine his totalitarian form of spirituality with Russian communism, an idea no sane man could possibly entertain. Rajneesh publicly called for the assassination of Michael Gorbachev, because Gorbachev was moving Russia to Western style capitalism rather than Rajneesh's own brand of "spiritual communism." Historically, Valium has been the drug of choice for CFS sufferers as it masks the unnerving symptoms of dysautonomia and helps bring sleep. Rajneesh suffered from insomnia, another classic symptom of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome.

Rajneesh was a physically ill man who became mentally corrupt. His brief experimentation with LSD only made matters worse. Rajneesh's drug use and addiction was a problem of his own making, not a government conspiracy. Rajneesh died in 1990 with heart failure listed as the official cause of death. It is probable that the physical decline Rajneesh experienced during his incarceration in American jails was due to a combination of withdrawal symptoms from his Valium addiction and an aggravation of his Chronic Fatigue Syndrome due to stress and exposure to allergens.

After Rajneesh's humiliation and downfall in America, he declared that he was "Jesus crucified by Ronald Reagan's America." In truth, Rajneesh was a drug addicted guru who self-destructed through his own wrong actions. Comparing himself to Jesus was doubly dishonest, as he himself had no respect for Jesus. He once undiplomatically proclaimed to the American media that everything Jesus said was "just crazy."

I went through the abandoned city of Rajneeshpuram and saw things that were almost unbelievable. Ma Anand Sheela's headquarters, a group of mobile homes pieced together, was a hive of secret doors and hidden tunnels, her private room a command post with electronic listening gear tapped into every room in the development. The Bhagwan's parquet-paneled quarters had nitrogen oxide spigots by his bedside, and was surrounded by huge bathrooms with multiple showers. ~ Jim Weaver, former Oregon Congressman.

In the 1998 preface to Books I Have Loved, Rajneesh's (Osho's) personal dentist, Swami Devageet, states that Osho dictated three books under the influence of nitrous oxide. They were Books I Have Loved, Glimpses of a Golden Childhood, and Notes of a Madman. Referring to his own nitrous oxide use, Rajneesh himself stated that "Actually oxygen and nitrogen are basic elements of existence. They can be of much use, but for reasons the politicians have been against chemicals of all kinds, all drugs." Ma Anand Sheela, Rajneesh's personal secretary, publicly stated on the CBS news show 60 Minutes that Rajneesh took 60 milligrams of Valium every day. Hugh Milne, Rajneesh's head bodyguard, confirmed Rajneesh's heavy Valium use, as did Swami Devageet. The FBI knew that Rajneesh was a Valium and nitrous oxide addict from their own investigations, and that fact was published in newspapers around the USA, including articles in "THE OREGONIAN" and "THE NEW YORK TIMES." There is no doubt that Rajneesh became a drug addict except in the minds of passionate Osho followers who don't want to admit the painful truth.

Upon his sudden death in 1990, there was much media speculation that Rajneesh had committed suicide by taking an overdose of drugs. As no disciple has confessed to giving Rajneesh a lethal injection, there is no hard evidence to support the suicide theory. A compelling circumstantial case could be made for such a scenario, however, with suicide provoked by Rajneesh's constant ill health and disheartenment over the loss of Vivek, his greatest love.

Vivek had taken a fatal overdose of sleeping pills in a Bombay hotel one month before Rajneesh's passing. Pointedly, Vivek decided to kill herself immediately before Rajneesh's birthday celebration. Rajneesh had threatened suicide at the Oregon commune several times, hanging his death over the heads of his disciples as a threat unless they obeyed his orders. On his last day on earth, Rajneesh is reported to have said "Let me go. My body has become a hell for me."

The rumor that Rajneesh was poisoned with thallium by operatives of the United States Government is entirely fictional and contradicted by undeniable fact. One of the obvious symptoms of thallium poisoning is dramatic hair loss within seven days of exposure. Rajneesh died with a full beard and no exceptional baldness other than ordinary male pattern baldness at the top of his head. Radiation poisoning, another fictional cause of his illness, also causes dramatic hair loss.

The symptoms which may have led Rajneesh's doctors to suspect poisoning are common symptoms of dysautonomia caused by Chronic Fatigue Syndrome. Those symptoms can include ataxia (uncoordinated movements), numbness, standing tachycardia (rapid heart rate upon standing), paresthesia (sensations of prickling and itching), nausea, and irritable bowel syndrome, which causes one to alternate between constipation and diarrhea. All of his negative physical and mental symptoms were severely compounded by his own self-induced nitrous oxide poisoning and heavy Valium use.

The only proven cases of illegal poisoning related to Rajneesh were carried out by Rajneesh's own sannyasins. A sannyasin is an initiated disciple, one who takes sannyas. In the year 1984 there were 751 poison victims, including women and small children, at ten restaurants in the The Dalles, Oregon. Rajneesh sannyasins attempted to take over the Wasco County Commission by making so many people ill on election day that they could elect their own sannyasin candidates.

Rajneesh disciples poisoned the restaurants' customers by contaminating salad bars and coffee creamers with salmonella bacteria. Forty-five of the victims became so ill they had to be hospitalized, making the case the largest germ warfare attack in United States history. Sannyasins were later suspected of trying to kill a Wasco County executive by spiking his water with an unknown poison. A Jefferson County District Attorney, Michael Sullivan, also became ill after leaving a cup of coffee unattended as Rajneesh sannyasins filled the courthouse. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh never apologized to any of the people who were poisoned by his own trusted disciples.

Members of Rajneesh's staff were poisoned by Ma Anand Sheela, Rajneesh's personal secretary. Sheela had the habit of poisoning people who either knew too much or who had simply fallen out of her favor. Sheela spent two and a half years in a Federal medium security prison for her crimes, while Rajneesh pled guilty to immigration fraud and was given a ten year suspended sentence, fined $400,000., and deported from the United States of America. As part of his plea bargain agreement, more serious charges of racketeering were dropped.

Rajneesh felt that teaching ethics was unnecessary because meditation would automatically lead to good behavior. The actions of Rajneesh and his disciples proves that theory to be completely false. Rajneesh taught that you should do as you please because life is both a dream and a joke. This attitude led to the classically fascist belief that one can become so high and mighty that one is beyond the need for old fashioned values and ethical behavior.

Those unfamiliar with the Rajneesh story can read the book, Bhagwan: The God That Failed, published by Saint Martin's Press and written by Hugh Milne (Shivamurti), a close disciple of Rajneesh during his Poona and Oregon years. Mr. Milne's book is largely corroborated by Satya Bharti Franklin's book, Promise of Paradise: A Woman's Intimate Life With 'Bhagwan' Osho Rajneesh, published by Barrytown/Station Hill Press. Both books are out of print but secondhand copies can be obtained through Amazon.Com. There have been many other tell-all books published on the same subject matter, but I have not read them and I do not know the authors, so I do not mention them here.

Regarding Bhagwan: The God That Failed, I can verify many of the facts Mr. Milne states about the life of Rajneesh in Bombay and Poona, though I have no first hand knowledge of the tragic events at the Oregon commune. My contacts with people who were there lead me to believe that most of the facts Mr. Milne presents of the Oregon era are also highly accurate. Hugh Milne is due great credit for a well written and entertaining book, which is a sincere effort at complete honesty. On a few occasions, however, I differ from Mr. Milne's interpretations of what the facts he presents actually mean.

Rajneesh did not suffer from "hypochondria," as Mr. Milne suggested. Rajneesh had a very real neurological and immune system disease which he mistook for frequent viral infections. Rajneesh became unusually afraid of germs only due to his understandable medical ignorance. I fully agree with Mr. Milne that Rajneesh suffered from "megalomania," however, and will add that the short statured Rajneesh had a Napoleonic, obsessive-compulsive, and extravagantly narcissistic personality.

Mr. Milne suggests that Rajneesh used "hypnosis" to manipulate his disciples. Rajneesh had a melodic and naturally hypnotic voice which would be a great asset to any public speaker. In my opinion, however, Rajneesh's power came from the intense energy field of the universal cosmic consciousness which he channeled like a lens. Hindus call this universal energy phenomena the Atman. As a Westerner, I prefer more scientific terms and describe the Atman as a highly evolved manifestation of time-energy-space, the TES.

Hugh Milne's book records a day when Rajneesh admitted, while under the influence of nitrous oxide, that there is no such thing as 'enlightenment.' I cannot confirm this event through other contacts, but I assume Rajneesh was simply stating what U.G. Krishnamurti has said all along; that the storybook fiction we accept of a perfect enlightenment, full of infallible wisdom, is a big lie. A powerful and expansive state of cosmic consciousness does exist in humans who achieve it, but the way this condition is described by the religious establishment is an egocentric fiction, contrived by spiritual leaders to control the masses for their own personal gain.

Enlightenment is not something you own; it is something you channel.

Whatever term you use for the phenomena of enlightenment, it is scientifically accurate to say that no human being has any power of their own. Even the chemical energy of our metabolism is borrowed from the sun, which beams light to the earth, which is then converted by plants through photosynthesis into the food we eat. You may get your bread from the supermarket, but the caloric energy it contains originated from thermonuclear reactions deep in the center of a nearby star. Our physical bodies run on star power. Any "spiritual" energy we channel also comes from far beyond, from all sides of the universe, from the complete TES, from beyond the oceans of galaxies, and onto infinity. No human being owns the Atman, and no one can speak for the TES.

The Void has no ambition or personality whatsoever, so Rajneesh could only speak for his own animal mind. The animal mind may want its disciples to "take over the whole world," but the Void does not care because it is beyond any motivation. The phenomena we called Rajneesh, Bhagwan, and Osho, was only a temporary lens of cosmic energy, not the full cosmos itself.

Rajneesh, and the famous Greek-Armenian mystic George Gurdjieff, often used the power of the Atman for clearly personal gain. Both men used their cosmic consciousness to overwhelm and seduce women. Gurdjieff was ashamed of his behavior and vowed many times during his life to end this practice, which was a combination of ordinary male lust backed up by the potent advantage of oceanic supermental power. Rajneesh went even further and used his channeled cosmic energy to manipulate masses of people to gain a kind of quasi-political status, and to aggrandize himself far beyond what was honest or helpful to his disciples. In Oregon, Rajneesh declared to the media that "My religion is the only religion!" Diplomacy and modesty were not his strong points.

To my knowledge, George Gurdjieff never reached the extremes of self-indulgence of Rajneesh, and he even warned his disciples not to have blind faith in him. Gurdjieff wanted his students to be free and independent, with the combined abilities of clear mental reasoning and cosmic consciousness. Rajneesh, by contrast, seemed to believe that only his thoughts and ideas were of value because only he was "enlightened." This was a grand error in judgment and revealed a basic flaw in his character. Unfortunately, when Rajneesh achieved the ability to fully channel the power of the Atman, he failed to apply the needed wisdom of self-restraint. His human mind so rebelled against Asian asceticism that he failed to ensure that his borrowed power was only used for the good of others. Rajneesh was driven by strong personal ambitions, not just compassion.

Power is the ultimate aphrodisiac. ~ Henry Kissinger

Rajneesh left India in 1981, in part to escape paying a four million dollar Indian income tax bill. As he disembarked from a 747 jetliner to take his first footsteps in the USA, Rajneesh declared that "I am the Messiah America has been waiting for." - [Milne, Bhagwan: The God That Failed] After a brief stay in a newly acquired castle styled home in Montclair, New Jersey, Rajneesh bought the 64,000 acre Big Muddy cattle ranch near the small town of Antelope in eastern Oregon for six million dollars.

Rajneesh created his Oregon desert commune from his own powerful mind and named it "Rajneeshpuram." He made himself the ultimate dictator, his picture placed everywhere as in an Orwellian bad dream. J. Krishnamurti called Rajneesh a "criminal" and Rajneeshpuram "a concentration camp under the dictatorship of enlightenment." Poonjaji, Ramana Maharshi's famous student, refered to Rajneesh as "a pig" for building himself up in the eyes of his disciples to dishonest proportions. Poonjaji's position was that even the enlightened remain human beings, not saints or superheroes, and that we all share the same cosmic identity no matter what our class and social standing.

U.G. Krishnamurti, a famous maverick anti-guru, was even more critical of Rajneesh. During the mid 1970s Rajneesh deemphasized his own meditation methods and started selling Western style group therapies as a way to gain income. It was difficult to make money from authentic meditation techniques because they are all easy to learn and can be done alone, without the aid of a teacher. One of the groups Rajneesh sold to students was the "Tantra" group, which was basically just male and female disciples having sex with each other. U.G. Krishnamurti publicly called Rajneesh the "worlds biggest pimp" because "He made money from the boys and the girls and he kept it for himself." In 1971 Rajneesh told me directly in a face to face meeting that U.G. Krishnamurti was "realized." After much public criticism from U.G., Rajneesh counterattacked by calling U.G. a "phony guru."

Guru wars aside, the totalitarian atmosphere of Rajneeshpuram was the main reason I did not stay at the commune beyond two brief visits. I was interested in meditation, not in a big prison camp where human beings were treated like insects with no intelligence of their own. Rajneesh put such a high emphasis on his disciples following orders without question that they did just that when Ma Anand Sheela, Rajneesh's personal secretary, gave absurd orders to commit crimes which Rajneesh himself (hopefully) would never have approved of.

When you decapitate the intelligence of human beings you create a situation that is highly dangerous and destructive to the human spirit. You cannot save people from their egos by demanding "total surrender." The antidemocratic technique of forcing blind obedience did not work well for Hitler, Stalin, or for Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. Germany, Russia, and the Rajneesh Oregon commune were all destroyed by authoritarian imperial rule. A diversity of opinion is always healthy because it acts as an effective counterbalance to the myopic arrogance of those who would be king. Rajneesh never understood this truth of history and referred to democracy scornfully as "mobocracy." Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh was an imperial aristocrat, never a generous and open minded democrat, and he put his contempt for the democratic process into highly visible action in Oregon.

In an attempt to subvert a local Wasco County election, Rajneesh had his sannyasins bus in almost 2,000 homeless people from major American cities in an effort to unfairly rig the voting process in his favor. Some of the new voters were mentally ill and were given beer laced with drugs to keep them manageable. Credible allegations have been made that one or more of the imported street people died due to overdosing on the beer and drug mixture, their bodies buried in the desert. To my knowledge that charge has not been conclusively proven. Rajneesh's voting fraud scheme failed, and the derelicts and mental patients were returned to the streets after the election was over, used and then abandoned.

Rajneesh used people, spoke out of both sides of his mouth, and betrayed the trust of his own disciples. This betrayal caused Vivek, his longtime girlfriend and companion, to commit suicide by taking an overdose of sleeping pills. Rajneesh even lied about her death, slandering his greatest love in her grave by falsely claiming that she was chronically depressed due to some intrinsic emotional instability. Vivek was never depressed during the years I knew her, and she was the most radiant women I have ever known.

Vivek was a glowing student of meditation, but her only meditation method was being with Rajneesh and absorbing his tremendous energy. When her one true love collapsed into insanity, she took her own life out of overwhelming grief. Rajneesh drove her to suicide because she could not understand nor tolerate his mental decline and collapse. Rajneesh lied about her death to avoid taking responsibility for his own bizarre behavior, which was the underlying cause of Vivek's despair.

The young Acharya Rajneesh started his life as a teacher who condemned false gurus, and he ended his life as one of the most deceitful gurus the world has ever known. The difficult fact to comprehend is that he was enlightened when he was an anti-guru puritan, and he was still enlightened when he was the ultimate corrupt, self-indulgent guru himself. Rajneesh destroyed his own teaching because he discarded truthfulness in favor of what he thought were useful lies. Once you make that wrong turn, away from ordinary straightforward truth, you have lost your way. No human being can disregard fact on a regular basis without finding himself in a sea of turmoil, because by discarding fact you discard the ground beneath your feet. Little lies grow into big lies, and the now hidden truth becomes your enemy, not your friend and ally.

Rajneesh overestimated himself and underestimated his own disciples. The real seekers around him could have easily handled the truth and were already motivated without the need for propaganda. Rajneesh had been a famous guru for such a long time that he came to see himself in grandiose terms. He was indeed an historic figure, but he was not the perfect superhuman he pretended to be. No one is! His disciples deserved honesty, but he fed them fairytales "to give them faith."

Jiddu Krishnamurti had been more honest than Rajneesh in repeating relentlessly that "there is no authority" due to the intrinsic nature of the universe. Ardent Rajneesh disciples didn't heed J. Krishnamurti's warnings and put blind faith in a man who claimed to be all-seeing, to have all the answers, and who once in 1975 brashly stated that he had never made a single mistake in his entire life. Clearly, Rajneesh made as many mistakes as any human being. Just as obviously, his basic existential enlightenment was no guarantee of functional pragmatic wisdom.

Rajneesh was a brilliant philosopher, but he was a lost babe in the woods when it came to the world of science. Worried about worldwide overpopulation, Rajneesh pressured his disciples to undergo sexual reproduction sterilization procedures. Unfortunately, he did not consider the demographics of population growth. The current population expansion is largely a phenomena of poor Third World nations, not a problem originating in the USA, Canada, and Europe, where birth rates are actually declining. North America and Europe are only experiencing population increases due to legal and illegal immigration from Third World nations. Having his Western disciples medically sever their reproductive capabilities only added to this imbalance, and many former disciples now regret they complied without question to his thoughtless edicts.

Discouraging followers from having families is a common device of gurus to keep disciples from spending money on children rather than handing their cash over to the guru himself. Childless disciples make better workers and are usually more subservient. Thus, sexual sterilization fit into Rajneesh's business plan and his desire to create an army of followers who felt that "only the relationship to guru is important." Rajneesh was the son of an ambitious Jain businessman, and he was more like his father than he ever realized. Rajneesh's enlightenment was overlaid on top of a mind attuned to business and making money.

In the 1980s, Rajneesh declared that the AIDS epidemic would soon kill three quarters of the world's population and that a major nuclear war was just around the corner. He thought he could escape nuclear holocaust by building underground shelters and slow the spread of AIDS by having his disciples wash their hands with alcohol before eating meals. His more reasoned admonition was for his followers to always use condoms. To enforce his sexual rules, which also involved elaborate instructions on the use of rubber gloves during sexual encounters, Rajneesh encouraged his sannyasins to spy on each other, reporting the names of those who failed to conform to his orders.

The disaster of Rajneesh appointing himself the singular great brain of the universe was compounded by his lack of real world reasoning skills, and this was apparent even before he started taking large amounts of Valium and inhaling nitrous oxide. Rajneesh had no understanding of the scientific method. If he thought something was true, in his own mind, that made it true. Rajneesh could weave magnificent philosophical dreams and addict his disciples to imagined worlds of spiritual adventure, but those dreams did not have to stand any empirical test of truth. In the world of science, you have to prove what you say is true through testing. In the world of philosophy and religion, you can say anything you desire and throw caution to the wind. If your words sound good to the masses, they will sell whether they are fact or fiction.

Rajneesh ruled his desert empire as a warlord with his own private army and puppet government. His visions and ideas, faulty or not, were taken without question as the word of God. His disciples were judged by their ability to surrender to his will, and any opposing views were branded as an unspiritual lack of faith. As conditions at the ranch became progressively more unpleasant, a number of sannyasins escaped by hiding in the back of outgoing trucks. Their quest for freedom upset Rajneesh, who demanded that the disillusioned must now ask his permission to leave. Rajneesh then dramatically threatened suicide if others escaped by stealthful means.

Rajneesh's poor reasoning became even more apparent during and after the Oregon commune scandal. After being jailed and then deported from the USA, Rajneesh angrily declared America "a wretched country" and branded Americans as "subhuman," ignoring the fact that it was he, an Indian, who pled guilty to felony immigration fraud, and that it was Sheela, an Indian, who ordered the most serious crimes which brought his empire to ruin. Even in his fifties, Rajneesh was still lying to get his own way and still demanding to be the center of attention. In 1988, suffering from drug and illness induced dementia, Rajneesh publicly pouted that his box of toys, his expensive car collection and jewel encrusted watches, had been taken away.

Rajneesh's disciples thought they were following an authoritative "enlightened Master." In reality they had been mislead by a highly fallible human animal who was still a little boy at heart. Rajneesh had not only misrepresented himself personally, but he misrepresented the phenomena of enlightenment itself. The idealized fantasy of perfect enlightenment does not exist anywhere in the real world, and it has never existed. The universe is far too big and complex for anyone to be its "Master." We are all subjects, not Masters, and those who pretend to be infallible and all-knowing end up looking even more the fool as history inevitably proves them wrong.

Nature does not use anything as a model. It is only interested in perfecting the species. It is trying to create perfect species and not perfect beings. - U.G. Krishnamurti

The famous sages of old seem perfect to us now because they have become larger than life myths. The long passage of time has allowed their followers to cover up their guru's flaws, just as Rajneesh disciples are currently censoring history to cover up Rajneesh's great failings. Rajneesh was never more infallible than any other human being. Unfortunately, cosmic consciousness does not automatically render greater intelligence, wisdom, and honesty.

Rajneesh died addicted to Valium, and he experienced all of the negative symptoms of drug addiction, which included slurred speech, paranoia, poor judgment, and dramatically lowered intelligence. At one point his paranoia and confusion were so great that he thought a group of German cultists had cast an evil spell on him. His physical disabilities and drug abuse were simply more than his mortal brain could take. His biggest flaw, his disregard for the ordinary concept of truth, was his ultimate downfall and for that crime he must be held fully responsible.

Never give a sucker an even break. ~ W.C. Fields

Rajneesh lied when he said he had enlightened disciples. He lied when he said he never made a mistake. Near the end of his life he was forced to admit that he was fallible, as his list of bungles had grown to monstrous proportions. He lied by pretending that his therapy groups were not mainly just a money making device. Rajneesh lied about breaking United States immigration laws, and he only admitted the truth after he was presented with overwhelming evidence against him. He lied by saying that he was adopted in a phony scheme to get permanent residence status. Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh was no bank robber, but he was quite literally a pathological liar. The ridiculous thing is that all of his lies were totally unnecessary and counterproductive. As conventional and square as it may sound, honesty really is the best policy!

Rajneesh lied when he claimed that he was not responsible for the horrors of the Oregon commune. Rajneesh was responsible because he hand picked Ma Anand Sheela and the people who committed the major crimes of conspiracy to commit murder, poisoning, first-degree assault, burglary, arson, and wiretapping. Rajneesh himself gave direct verbal approval for Sheela's illegal bugging and wiretapping of his own disciples. The fact that Rajneesh did not order or have preknowledge (hopefully) of the most serious violent crimes does not mean that he was not ethically responsible for them. Rajneesh never turned against Ma Anand Sheela until he started to suspect that Sheela was stealing money from him.

Just one month before Sheela fled the commune, Rajneesh spoke of her publicly, stating that "I have been preparing her like a sword. I told her to go out and cut as many heads as possible." Later, Rajneesh feigned innocence and claimed that Sheela was controlling him in spite of the obvious fact that Rajneesh was the singular reason the commune existed. Rajneesh was surrounded by thousands of adoring disciples who would have gladly expelled or even jailed Sheela any time he gave the order.

Sheela did Rajneesh's dirty work, and the fact that she went farther in her crimes than Rajneesh had planned does not exonerate him of all guilt. Upon leaving the commune, Sheela stated that she was tired of "being his slave for 16, 17 or 20 hours a day," and tired of "taking food out of the mouths of people to buy him watches and Rolls Royces." Rajneesh then publicly claimed that Sheela had extorted millions of dollars from the commune. Sheela's response to his charge was that Rajneesh had spent all of the money himself on his own expensive toys, and that Rajneesh was bad at mathematics and "can't count." Clearly, Rajneesh's insane purchases of dozens of bejeweled ladies' watches and over 90 Rolls-Royce automobiles cost the commune many millions of dollars. After her release from prison, Ma Anand Sheela continued to work for a living, without obvious signs of enormous wealth. Sheela committed many crimes, but Rajneesh himself was never "innocent."

If a teacher puts a drunken sailor in charge of driving a school bus, and the children end up dead, then the teacher is responsible for their deaths. Rajneesh knew what kind of a person Sheela was, and he chose her because of her corruption and arrogance, not in spite of it. Rajneesh personally tutored Sheela in how to control and manipulate his own disciples, and it was Rajneesh himself who encouraged Sheela's infamous outbursts on the ABC television show, Nightline. In a cowardly attempt to evade his own failings, Rajneesh changed his name to Osho, as if a change in name could wash away his sins.

There is no publicly released evidence to suggest that Rajneesh ordered the germ warfare attack on the ten Oregon restaurants. There is also no publicly released evidence that implicates Rajneesh in the plot to have a sannyasin pilot fly an airplane full of explosives into an Oregon courthouse in order to intimidate the political opposition. Luckily, the sannyasin pilot who was asked to perform that insane task was not as dumb as the plotters, and he fled the commune without committing any crime.

Rajneesh was directly responsible for the twisted mix of totalitarian slavery and libertine indulgence that the commune represented. According to highly credible published reports, Rajneesh allowed middle aged men to have sexual intercourse with prepubescent girls at the commune in the name of sexual freedom, yet his disciples were not allowed to have a mind of their own and had to totally surrender to the great Bhagwan's will. Disciples were often forced to work 12 hours a day in cold and difficult conditions, while Rajneesh himself experienced "groovy spaces" in his private heated indoor pool and watched countless movies on his big screen projection television, all the while enjoying his daily supply of drugs. Rajneesh showed his divine love for his disciples by squandering millions in hard earned commune assets on his car collection and expensive jewelry, and all in the name of egolessness and spiritual surrender.

Why did Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh own over 90 Rolls-Royces? Why did Saddam Hussein own dozens of luxurious palaces? Those desires were products of the base animal mind of two men who grew up surrounded by poverty. Enlightenment does not care about symbols of power and potency. Looking for hidden esoteric explanations for obsessive behavior is pointless. Is there an occult reason that Elton John spends over $400,000. per month on flowers? Is there a secret spiritual reason that Rajneesh had a collection of dozens of expensive ladies' watches? The universal cosmic consciousness is completely neutral and without any need to possess, impress, or dominate. It also cannot drive or tell time.

One of Rajneesh's most blatant lies was that "the enlightened one gains nothing from his disciples." Rajneesh wanted people to believe that everything he did was a free gift born of pure compassion, and that he gained nothing personally from the guru-disciple relationship. In obvious provable fact, Rajneesh gained much from his disciples: money, power, sex, and the titillation of constant adoration. Just as rock stars become energized by screaming fans at concerts, Rajneesh gained emotional energy and support from his army of sannyasins. The energy transfer was a two-way street, not a totally free one-way gift. Being a guru was his business, his only business. Without that income, at least on the material level, he was just a short, balding, physically disabled Indian man who could not hold a job. Rajneesh's very real enlightenment would not pay his bills or give him the material luxuries he craved.

Consciousness needs entertainment to survive, and Rajneesh used his disciples as playthings for his own amusement. Rajneesh had no bankable power of his own, so he could only gain material power by manipulating others to do his will. The equation was simple. The more disciples he attracted, the more power and wealth he obtained.

During Rajneesh's incarceration in America, a television network broadcast a video of Rajneesh caught off-guard by a security camera while he was being held in a waiting room. Rajneesh looked bored and disgusted, just as any ordinary man might be. He didn't look blissful or enlightened at all. In my own opinion that video clip revealed the stark truth about the phenomena we call 'enlightenment.' The realization of the Void is not enough for anyone. All human animals, enlightened or not, need social interaction and the comforts of the material world to be content.

Rajneesh, on so many levels, was just an ordinary man. Sexually he was even less than ordinary. Pretending to be a great Tantric in his early years, Rajneesh handed out ridiculously bad sexual advice at a time when he had very little first hand experience with sex himself. During his Bombay years, Rajneesh often grabbed the breasts of young female disciples. On at least one occasion, he asked a couple to have sex in front of him so that he could watch. The couple wisely rejected his request.

Rajneesh often asked women half his age to strip in front of him so that he could "feel their chakras." To facilitate this practice, he installed an electric lock on his bedroom door that could be activated from a button on his desk. Rajneesh groped the breasts of two of my women friends and "felt the chakras" of a third. I soon began to realize that like so many other girl grabbing Indian gurus who had made the headlines, Rajneesh on the human level was just an ordinary sexually immature Indian male. My lady friend who suffered the chakra feeling incident was so put off that she never came back to see him again. He had told her "Don't worry. You are mine now." That grasping statement had chilled her as much as the sexual advance. The young woman was a student of Indian music and had previously been sexually exploited by a famous Indian musician. She knew first hand what many Indian men were like. Rajneesh proved himself to be predictably and disappointingly the same.

After Rajneesh started having sexual intercourse on a regular basis, the spiritual need for him to "feel the chakras" of his female disciples mysteriously vanished. Rajneesh rationalized having sex with his female disciples by claiming that the act would bless them so much that they would become enlightened in some future lifetime. His admission years later that there is no such thing as reincarnation made his sexual rationalizations appear even more ridiculous and self-serving.

Rajneesh had much inside him that I wanted: light, energy, and a vastly expanded state of being. Regrettably, he also had much inside him that I did not want or respect. I do not find fault with Rajneesh for having the same sexual desires that all men have. I did find fault when he was dishonest and cruel for purely selfish reasons.

While living in Bombay, Rajneesh made one young woman pregnant through an aggressive and unasked for seduction. The woman was highly upset and forced by circumstance to have an abortion. In order to protect his image as a great guru, Rajneesh lied about his involvement and claimed that the girl had imagined the whole affair. The young woman told the American Embassy her story, and that incident marked the beginning of Rajneesh's troubles with the United States Government.

Nature has provided human animals with a strong, virtually unstoppable sex drive to ensure reproduction of the species. Because of the overwhelming importance and power of sex, most gurus, enlightened or not, have maintained active sex lives which are often kept secret for purely political reasons. In his early years, Rajneesh lied about his strong sexuality by claiming to be celibate. To be fair, this has to be understood in the context of a rigidly antisexual and highly hypocritical Indian social structure. Later on, after his position as a guru had become secure, Rajneesh publicly bragged to the American media that he had sex "with hundreds of women." All of Rajneesh's sex partners were his own female meditation students who were used as his personal harem.

All human beings are animals, specifically mammals. Scientists now understand that human DNA is approximately 96% the same as chimpanzee DNA. World history, Asian mythology, politics, and the behavior of alpha male gurus makes allot more sense if you keep that unavoidable fact in mind. Our most primal subconscious motivating forces come from the animal world, which we are still a part of.

The last time I visited the Rajneesh ashram in Poona, India, was in 1988. The ashram was literally like a loud convention of German Brownshirts (storm troopers) by that point. Rajneesh, alias "Osho," was still very popular in Germany, due in part to his comments in the German magazine Stern which were widely interpreted as being pro-Hitler. Many young Germans who were looking for a strong and charismatic leader were thrilled by his words. Those who lost loved ones during World War II were justifiably shocked.

Even in the early 1970s in Bombay, Rajneesh made careless statements which could easily be interpreted as being pro-Hitler and pro-fascist. In one lecture on "esoteric groups" he claimed that Adolf Hitler had been telepathically propped up by an occult Buddhist group that Rajneesh himself was in contact with. During World War II it is well known that a number of Brahmin Indian yogis and Japanese "Zen masters" had supported the Axis cause and the extermination of the "inferior races," so Rajneesh's claim was not entirely surprising, if not totally believable.

In Poona, Rajneesh gave an infamous lecture in which he stated that Jews had given Hitler "no choice" but to exterminate them. In his last years Rajneesh declared that "I have fallen in love with this man (Adolf Hitler). He was crazy, but I am crazier still." Rajneesh said that he wanted his sannyasins "to take over the world" and that he had studied Hitler to gain insight into how to accomplish the task. For a man who portrayed himself as the world's smartest, highest, and greatest soul, such remarks were proof to me that his drug use had destroyed the quality of his mind.

Rajneesh's comments about Hitler could be discounted as obnoxious but largely harmless hot air if it were not for the fact that he put many of Hitler's techniques into practice. Rajneesh used Hitler's "big lie" method of mind control very effectively, and he demanded total surrender from his troops (disciples). Rajneesh condoned illegal spying on his own followers and used informants to weed out the disloyal. Ma Anand Sheela, his personal secretary, turned the tables on Rajneesh by bugging Rajneesh's trademark high-backed chair, a betrayal his "third eye" never detected. The Oregon police later found Rajneesh's illegally taped conversations, but due to rules of evidence they could not be used against him in a court of law. The tapes were reported to be highly damning as to Rajneesh's culpability in much of the commune's day to day illegal activities.

Rajneesh turned many of his disciples into the equivalent of armed Brownshirts. I have received letters from several of Rajneesh's former security guards who admitted they had fallen under the spell of fascism and now regretted their behavior and attitudes. One wrote that he did not even know how to meditate, and that the thrill of power was what kept him loyal to his great leader. In Poona, Rajneesh guards beat up an annoying local resident, his hands held behind his back as the guards pummeled him. In Oregon, Rajneesh guards were armed to the teeth with handguns and military style semiautomatic assault rifles. Rajneesh was never an admirer of Mahatma Gandhi, the great Indian pacifist, but he did have a unhealthy fascination with Adolf Hitler, as well as the United States Army General, George Patton. According to Hugh Milne (Shivamurti), Rajneesh watched the movie Patton over and over again on his big screen projection television at his ranch house in Oregon.

Perhaps Rajneesh's worst personal trait was that he could dish it out but he could not take it. He constantly put his disciples through great physical hardships, which resulted in serious illness and even death for some, yet he himself lived in luxury and could not endure physical discomfort without complaining loudly like a baby. After his arrest on October 28th, 1985, at the Charlotte/Douglas International Airport in North Carolina, Rajneesh was interviewed by ABC television news. He began his jailhouse interview by crying in a shrill voice about his less than royal accommodations in the slammer. His high pitched whining was so weird and annoying that Saturday Night Live, NBC's late night comedy television show, used the footage sarcastically as a joke about "God" complaining.

During Rajneesh's jailhouse appearance on the ABC television show Nightline, Rajneesh gave evasive and dishonest answers to all of Ted Koppel's questions, and he behaved as an unusually pompous and inept politician caught red handed at illegal activity. Rajneesh claimed that he was not responsible for any of the crimes committed at the commune because he was "in silence." In proven fact, although Rajneesh had stopped giving public lectures for a time, he had never stopped talking to Ma Anand Sheela and other close disciples. Rajneesh was always the ultimate authority at the commune, even though Sheela committed some of the most serious crimes behind his back.

Rajneesh's favorite Rolls-Royce dealer stated that "the Bhagwan" had spent hours on the telephone talking to him about his often weekly purchases of new automobiles. All of his over 90 Rolls-Royces were paid for from general commune funds on his direct orders, not "gifts" from outsiders as he would later try to claim. Rajneesh was the only person who wanted the cars and he was the only person allowed to drive them. After bankrupting the commune, he claimed that the automobiles were owned by the commune, not by him.

In his Nightline interview, Rajneesh pretended not to know that he was leaving the United States during his attempt to escape an impending Federal arrest warrant on racketeering and immigration charges. Rajneesh's defense was that he was innocently sleeping when police boarded the private jet he had hired to fly to Bermuda. Rajneesh said that he thought Bermuda was just another American state, and that he was going on vacation to rest and to escape "death threats." The authorities later learned that a Rajneesh disciple with ties to the United States Justice Department had tipped off Rajneesh about his impending arrest. His own sannyasins had not even known that he had left the commune until they learned from the media of the arrest of Rajneesh and several followers at the North Carolina airport. The sad fact was their great "enlightened" guru had secretly abandoned his own disciples, leaving them to face the music all on their own. The luggage of Rajneesh and his companions was searched and found to contain a bag of cash, a box of expensive jewel encrusted watches, and a handgun.

The Rajneesh cult had little luck winning over American television viewers. Ma Anand Sheela disgraced herself on Nightline weeks earlier by bursting into loud obscenities, forcing Ted Koppel to take her off the air. Saturday Night Live later broadcast a skit about an auction with actor Randy Quaid selling off "the Bhagwan's" over 90 Rolls-Royce automobiles. Years later, the The Simpsons, the FOX television network's wildly popular cartoon show, produced a spoof of Rajneesh that depicted a white gloved guru driving his Rolls-Royce down a muddy commune road as his disciples felt joy at eating his road dirt. In the cartoon, the great guru tried to escape the commune with bags of cash in a homemade peddle driven flying machine.

When it comes to gurus, take the best and leave the rest. ~ Ramamurti Mishra

During my last visit to the Poona ashram in 1988, Rajneesh was in silence because he was angry at his own disciples. He wanted his sannyasins to demonstrate in the streets against some Indian officials who had spoken out against him. Wisely, no one was interested in creating a new confrontation. This spell of sanity among the flock irritated Rajneesh, who canceled public talks as punishment. I was thus only able to see him on video tape.

On the taped lecture, Rajneesh was ranting emotionally, and factually incorrectly, about how the police in the United States had stolen his collection of jewel encrusted ladies' watches. He said they would never be able to wear them in public because his sannyasins would see the watches on their wrists at airports, train stations, etcetera, and start screaming out loudly that "you stole Bhagwan's watch!" His words and manner were so childishly irrational that he reminded me of the suicidal cult leader, Jim Jones. This crazy old man, now called "Osho," was a far cry from the serene, dignified, and highly eloquent Acharya Rajneesh I had met years earlier.

Obviously, Rajneesh was not "egoless" as he had often claimed. The human brain is a biologically created thinking machine that has evolved for both personal self-preservation and survival of the species. The ego, which is a selfish motivating force, is needed to protect our colony of living cells (the physical body) from danger and to keep our cells replenished with food and water. If you did not have an ego, you would not be able to think, speak, or find food, shelter, and clothing.

Functional magnetic resonance imaging scans (fMRI scans) of Tibetan monks and Hindu yogis have shown that during deep meditation the parts of the brain that gives us a sense of location in time and space are less active. If you slow down the thought process, and at the same time reduce the brain's sense of location, consciousness loses both its content and its boundaries. You feel infinite, timeless, and empty. This feeling of an infinite Void gives the false impression that ego no longer exists. Egolessness is an illusion because the ego function is a fundamental part of the basic physical structure of the brain itself. Ego cannot be lost unless your brain dies, which will cause your entire body to die.

Many enlightened humans have become fooled by the reduction of the space localization function of the brain and believed they no longer had personal selfishness that could cause trouble. Meher Baba spent much of his life bragging about how great he was, yet in his boundaryless consciousness he felt no personal ego. Meher Baba even proclaimed to the world that "No one loves me as much as I deserve to be loved." In truth, Meher Baba was very egocentric and he should have realized that even the brain phenomena we call "enlightenment" is no excuse for bragging. The same fundamental misjudgment plagued Rajneesh. He became fooled into thinking that he was above arrogance and greed, but that was simply not the case. The ego is hard wired into our neural pathways and cannot be destroyed unless the physical body dies.

Even enlightened humans have to mind their manners and realize that the Atman is the wondrous phenomena they should promote, not their own temporary personalities. Ramana Maharshi had the right approach in this regard, and that is one reason he is still beloved by all. Ramana Maharshi promoted the Atman, the universal cosmic consciousness, but never his own mortal body and mind.

Rajneesh's spectacular energy was proof that he was enlightened in the Eastern, esoteric sense of the word. The Eastern, esoteric definition of 'enlightenment' is an energy phenomena, gained only by those who are totally open to the infinite power of the universe. The Western definition is simply to be a very wise man, which Rajneesh, in my opinion, was not.

Even after returning to Poona, Rajneesh continued his Valium and nitrous oxide use and seemed unable to learn from his own mistakes. Rajneesh had often branded his critics as "idiots," yet in his final years Rajneesh had no sane voice inside himself to say No! Enough is enough! Like a deranged alcoholic, Rajneesh could not stop his own self-destructive behavior, and the quality of his judgment dropped to below that of even the most ordinary unenlightened human being. Rajneesh had used the myth of Tantra to rationalize his dishonesty and selfishness, and now he could not stop. Earlier in life, Rajneesh had skipped out of paying a hotel bill, cheated a real estate agent out of a commission, and obtained millions of dollars from his own disciples through lies and fraud. In the end, Rajneesh had become a hopeless drug addict as well, and no amount of spiritual rationalizations could alter that fact.

Rajneesh's lifelong teaching had been that enlightenment is a state of perfect egolessness which brought about wisdom, compassion, and in his unique case, total infallibility. In the last months of his life, Rajneesh, now renamed "Osho," finally admitted that the ego could not be destroyed, only "observed." The very basis of his demand for total surrender of his disciples was that the ego contaminated followers had to submit their will to the perfect Master, because only the perfect Master had no ego and thus could do no wrong. If this were not true then why should anyone surrender to another fallible and corruptible human ego?

Rajneesh even finally admitted that there is no reincarnation, and that the very concept of reincarnation was just a "misinterpretation" of other phenomena. This shocking admission meant that his previous frequent claims of being a famous guru in past lives were pure fiction, designed to impress, manipulate, and control his disciples. Rajneesh's main teaching was based on souls, reincarnation, and achieving freedom from rebirth (moksha) through spiritual practice. His massive drug intake seemed to act as a truth serum at times, allowing admissions of truths that he had previously kept secret in order to remain in control of his cult empire. The course of Rajneesh's life and his drug induced admissions proved to me that his most basic teachings were wrong and a lie.

In his last days, Osho argued with his doctors to ignore their medical ethics and give him even more nitrous oxide. Osho rationalized his drug addiction just as a teenage boy might if caught smoking marijuana by his mother. The God "Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh" had fallen down to the stumble-drunk Osho, and a substantial number of his disciples were so addicted to his artfully seductive words and false image that they could not see what was happening right in front of their own eyes. In late 1989, in a final bizarre act, Osho ordered his dentists to remove most of his teeth for no legitimate medical reason. If Osho had suspected that the mercury fillings in his teeth were causing him health problems, he could have easily had the old fillings replaced with modern white plastic dental fillings. Why Osho wanted to have so many teeth removed is a mystery to this day. Needless to say, their removal did nothing to improve his health.

In the years after Osho's death (see Osho's death celebrations here), the Poona ashram has been turned into a "cashram" and is run for profit. Color Puncture, Tantric Tarot, encounter groups, and every crackpot scam in the book is being peddled by Osho disciples for large sums of money. I think back to the day when the just turned 40 year old Acharya Rajneesh instructed a Japanese woman that "Meditation must not be made into a business." The corrupt means have gotten so far out of hand that the original intent of the ends has long been forgotten. It would be wonderful to believe that enlightened men were perfect in every way. That would make life simpler and sweeter, but it would be fiction, not fact.

© 1998 Christopher Calder

~Italian version/versione italiana here/qui, translated/tradotta by/da Alessia Guidi.

Other biographical perspectives (with images):

About Osho (from Osho.com)

Osho's Life - An Anthology (from Oshoworld.com)

Religious Movements: Osho (or Rajneeshism)

The Rise & Fall of Rajneeshpuram

The Story of Osho - Master, Mystic, Madman

Wikipedia's Osho (s.v., Rajneesh)
Sam's Life of Osho ~ A not-so-official biography [a book in pdf format: you can download it free, or read online - just click the link and wait for it to load]
Osho, Formerly Known As Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh

Chi è Osho [in Italian], from the trilingual (Italian/English/Japanese) website Conscious Living

Some interesting links:

The Saffron Swami, by Rachel Graham

Osho Rebellious Spirit - All Colors Of Osho Sannyas

Vacationing With Friends - 'Countries in which you can look out for a home away from home' (Osho points around the World)

New Enlightened World - Meditate & Celebrate (Osho Vision: A Lifestyle Of Meditation & Celebration)

Friends of Osho ("Sannyas World")
...

An Italian reaction to Calder's piece

2006-09-21T16:18:00.000+01:00

This is an exchange of correspondence between two Italian sannyasins, debating (in Italian, naturally) Christopher Calder's article Osho, Bhagwan Rajneesh and the Lost Truth. The first one is directly addressed to Calder himself, as an open letter addressing the latter's criticism of Osho's behaviour/teaching and supplying different explanations. Here it is:

Lettera aperta in risposta a "Osho, Bhagwan Rajneesh e la Verità Perduta" [Open letter in response to "Osho...etc"]
di Marco Galzenati

C'è una preoccupazione e un accanimento del tutto particolari nella maniera in cui lei sig. Christopher Calder si preoccupa di difendere valori quali verità e democrazia, e credenze quali reincarnazione e illuminazione, la cosa più umoristica è che ciò viene di fatto da un "discepolo diretto di Osho" che sembra continuamente mancare i punti essenziali, nella foga di screditare non tanto l'insegnamento Oshiano quanto la figura dell'uomo.

Parlare di contraddizione tra illuminazione e corruzione in relazione ad Osho significa supportare sottilmente, le peggiori tendenze instupidificatrici che agiscono nel contesto della discussione sulla realtà dell'illuminazione.

Vediamo "brevemente" perché:

Iniziamo dalla verità, la verità non esiste come concetto o esperienza esprimibile attraverso le parole, il linguaggio.

La verità nell'accezione iniziatica è uno stato esperienziale dell'essere, una particolare postura dello stato percettivo, una tavola d'acqua non increspata… cosa intende dunque sig. Calder quando dice: «Rajneesh non ha mai perso la verità esistenziale definitiva dell'essere. Ha solo perso il concetto comune della verità che ogni adulto normale può facilmente comprendere.»

Mi sfugge il significato di comune verità, sta forse parlando della verità socialmente accettata e condivisa da quelle che lei definisce menti non illuminate? e se sta parlando di questa verità come bisogna intendere il suo adulto normale, una persona benpensante, che si muova nei limiti del comune buonsenso?

Qui non si tratta di "razionalizzare il continuo mentire come un tantra mancino", bensì di usare le parole come un gioco che porti il nostro interlocutore a riscoprire uno stato interiore di consapevolezza, sicuramente al di là del suo senso di comune verità sig. Calder, una verità che se lei è così preoccupato di difendere non le darà mai nessun accesso a se stessa, la verità come la chiama lei non ha mai amato i propri difensori.

Lei continua poi:
"Decise consapevolmente di abbandonare la verità a favore di ciò che considerava utili menzogne. Rajneesh calcolò che la maggioranza delle persone sulla terra si trovava ad un tale infimo livello di consapevolezza che non poteva capire, né tollerare, le reali verità."

Qui lei continua a focalizzare l'attenzione sul contenuto della parole di Osho le utili menzogne come se le parole avessero a che fare con la verità, lei continua sorprendentemente dopo anni di meditazione a confondere il dito che indica la luna con la luna. Di quali reali verità lei parla?

Mi perdoni se la correggo, non si tratta di verità si tratta dell'intrinseca impossibilità di indicare una meta, usando le stesse parole, a persone che si trovano in posizioni geografiche diverse. Si tratta della necessità di comunicare a tutti, e non solo ai discepoli più vecchi e motivati, cose che se a quel punto non avevano ancora capito non avrebbero probabilmente capito, come dice lei in maniera diabolicamente seria, in questa vita.
"Il disprezzo per il comune concetto di verità, fu la sua definitiva rovina e per quel crimine deve essere ritenuto completamente responsabile, senza scusanti."

Riecco che la ritrovo aggrappato al comune concetto di verità, la cosa è assolutamente esilarante. Osho passa la vita nel tentativo di abbattere il comune senso della verità, e lei suo seguace lo condanna per il suo terribile crimine "il disprezzo per il comune concetto di verità". Lei è assolutamente geniale in questa profonda sottile e originale forma di non comprensione, ci vuole un talento tutto particolare. Capisco un po' di più tutte le riserve che il compianto Osho aveva in relazione ai seguaci.

Passiamo al secondo suo grande mito, la democrazia, si badi bene non solo quella politica, ma ad un concetto di democrazia che lei estende alla vita di relazione tra gli individui al di là del contesto politico, e senza considerare minimamente come la coscienza degli individui sia sottilmente manipolata attraverso l'illusione di scelta che le moderne democrazie offrono attraverso i media ecc…

Lei dice:
"Faceva sprezzante riferimento alla democrazia come ad una "plebaglia - crazia". Rajneesh era un aristocratico imperiale, e non è mai stato un democratico generoso e di larghe vedute."

Su questo sono d'accordo con lei, Osho era sicuramente un aristocratico, appartenente a quel particolare lignaggio spirituale, le cui strade sono da sempre a tutti accessibili, ma che solo pochi esseri umani sporadicamente percorrono; in quanto ai democratici generosi e di larghe vedute, credo che l'umanità ne abbia già un numero sufficiente, per continuare indisturbata nel proprio percorso verso il più stupido autolesionismo senza scomodare il povero Osho.

Forse un po' semplicisticamente, preferirei sempre la guida di un sovrano illuminato ad una banda di politici inconsapevoli e spesso in malafede, che decide "democraticamente" il da farsi. Lei pare dimenticare un punto essenziale della storia umana, non sono tanto i sistemi che fanno la differenza, ma gli individui che li gestiscono, in quanto un sistema ingiusto gestito da uomini saggi può trasformarsi in un sistema giusto, mentre un sistema giusto gestito da uomini inconsapevoli può solo trasformarsi in un sistema ingiusto.

Passiamo alla sua idea di "illuminazione":
"Ramana Maharshi, uno degli uomini più illuminati del XX° secolo, aveva l'approccio giusto a questo riguardo, ed è il motivo per cui è ancora tanto amato da tutti".

Qui Le sfugge un punto centrale, Ramana Maharshi ha semplicemente testimoniato lo stato di illuminazione, ma non si è certo esposto "così poco saggiamente" come Osho nell'attacco e nella distruzione delle fondamenta del potere politico e religioso del sistema di controllo mondiale delle coscienze. Forse per questo Osho è ancora tanto amato da tutti quelli che hanno coscienza della programmazione all'infelicità di cui l'umanità è vittima. Osho oltre ad essere un grande maestro, è stato anche un personaggio di primissimo piano dell'area della cultura antagonista checché se ne dica.
"Bhagwan mentiva quando diceva che aveva discepoli illuminati."

Certo bisognerebbe definire un po' meglio cosa si intende per "illuminati":

Quante ore al giorno l'ego è collocato alla periferia dell'essere e quante al centro?

Oppure quanto è spostato in periferia in relazione al cento dell'essere?

Dato che pare impossibile accopparlo, questo ego (come dice lei), si dovrebbe trovare un punto, una manifestazione dalla quale dire: si è questo il punto! Qui sei illuminato!?

O più semplicemente dichiarare di esserlo quando è necessario soddisfare lo spasmodico bisogno di una fonte autorevole, di una autorità incontestabile, delle persone che ci circondano? Non so ma questo poi sarebbe mentire, se a farlo non fosse un maestro?

Oops, mi pare essere inciampato in un buffissimo paradosso.

Oppure come diceva Giuda a Cristo nel noto film Jesus Christ Superstar: "Veramente stai iniziando a credere le cose che dicono di te? Veramente stai iniziando a credere che questo parlare di dio sia vero?" Domande senza risposta assoluta mi pare di capire...
"Qualcuno può inorridire davanti al fatto che un'anima illuminata possa essere condannata per reati penali."

Infatti quando Gesù è stato condannato e messo sulla croce "per quelli che oggi sarebbero molto probabilmente reati penali" gli individui benpensanti dell'epoca inorridivano proprio come oggi mi pare lei sia vicino a fare.

Poi continua con pettegolezzi del tipo: "Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh usava le persone, parlava alle spalle ecc...", che non riesco a capire che nesso abbiano con l'insegnamento.
"Ed è anche un promemoria sul non prendere troppo seriamente ciò che la gente dice, è molto meglio osservare come essa vive, e togliere enfasi da ciò di cui parla. Le chiacchiere valgono poco. Le azioni sono più ricche e rivelatrici."

Sicuramente l'avere coscienza delle debolezze umane di una persona non lede in alcun modo ciò che è il suo apporto allo sviluppo della consapevolezza del pianeta (a meno che non si creda che lo stato di illuminazione comporti il dover di mantenere una particolare condotta etica, una buona reputazione, la rispettabilità insomma).

Per dirla in altro modo parafrasando una frase celebre, in pieno spirito imperiale-aristocratico: "Ciò che fa la differenza tra me e i miei servi è che loro parlano delle persone, io parlo dei concetti e delle idee," ma mi rendo conto che in un mondo in cui le telenovela riscontrano tanto successo questo possa passare in secondo piano.
"Rajneesh sopravvalutava se stesso e sottovalutava i suoi discepoli. Chi intorno a lui era realmente in cerca della conoscenza avrebbe facilmente fronteggiato la verità, ed era già sufficientemente motivato senza bisogno di propaganda. Ma Rajneesh era stato un grande guru per così lungo tempo, non solo in questa vita ma anche nelle precedenti, che era arrivato a vedere se stesso in termini grandiosi. Era davvero una figura storica, ma non era il perfetto superuomo che fingeva di essere. Nessuno lo è! I suoi discepoli meritavano onestà, ma lui li nutriva con favole per dare loro fede".

Credo infatti che le persone che erano realmente in cerca della conoscenza abbiano facilmente fronteggiato ciò che lei si ostina a definire verità, anche se lei dal tono del suo articolo mi pare non essersene accorto.

E poi sulla reincarnazione e il credere in genere:
"Se ci rendiamo conto che l'illuminazione è semplicemente una progressione graduale dell'espansione della consapevolezza, allora quell'obiettivo sarà raggiungibile da tutti noi, con il tempo necessario. Se lavoriamo per centinaia di anni, attraverso molte nascite e molte morti, con il semplice obiettivo di andare un po' più in profondità giorno dopo giorno, allora credo, con prevedibilità scientifica, che chi cerca di raggiungere l'illuminazione col tempo ce la farà."

Qui c'è un punto cruciale che pare sempre sfuggire a tutti, cose come illuminazione, vite passate, reincarnazione ecc… per chi non ne ha esperienza diretta restano atti di fede, dei credi alla moda ai quali aggrapparsi... Questa volta una nuova ragione legittima il nostro credere, se ne parla Osho sarà vero... "L'onestà è la vera strada da seguire".

No non è così semplice, un Maestro spesso non è onesto per calcolo, per non lasciare nulla a cui aggrapparsi, credere ad un maestro è inutile, non ci porterà dove vorremmo essere, capire la natura del suo gioco questo può esserci utile, per poi abbandonare anche quel gioco, per poi ritrovarci al centro esatto della danza dell'esistenza dopo aver avuto l'intuizione che ci consentirà di giocare tutti i giochi abbandonando la presa...

Lei dice molti avrebbero capito, sinceramente non mi pare, la gente ha bisogno, per ascoltare, che si parli il suo linguaggio… non sempre soddisfare aspettative significa essere disonesti... Soddisfare aspettative a volte serve ad aspettare che gli individui siano pronti a gettare le proprie stampelle, e a far sì che non impazziscano nell'egoica illusione di non averne...

Cordiali saluti,
Marco Galzenati

P.S. se qualche anima misericordiosa trova Mr Calder, traduce la lettera e riesce a recapitarla, le sarò immensamente grato in tutte le mie vite future, ed anche in questa, và. Crepi l'avarizia. (il mio inglese non mi consente di farlo e non ho l'indirizzo).

Rendo omaggio ai Maestri!

Roberto replica a Marco [Roberto replies to Marco]

Ciao Marco, ho letto la tua risposta a Christopher Calder.

A me sembra che Christopher volesse soprattutto porre l'accento sul fatto che anche un uomo che ha vissuto e controlla totalmente l'esperienza dell'illuminazione può, a volte, parlare o agire esclusivamente per evitare frustrazioni al proprio ego.

Causa precarie condizioni di salute e introduzione di sostanze nocive nell'organismo, trovo plausibile che anche la mente di un illuminato, dovendo anch'essa sottostare (quando non è in samadhi) a leggi stabilite da "qualcosa" di superiore, possa accusare dei cedimenti e compiere a volte azioni al solo scopo di evitare dispiaceri psico-fisici, spinta da vecchie abitudini che non sempre riesce a controllare perfettamente.

Del resto a pié di pagina, Christopher riconosce tranquillamente la fallibilità del suo giudizio.

Io, che ho imparato e continuo ad imparare dalle parole di Osho più che da chiunque altro, sento le considerazioni di Christopher molto utili alla mia crescita interiore e mi consentono di sistemare qualche altro tassello al proprio posto. Come puoi essere tanto certo che Osho non abbia mai mentito soltanto per difendere propri interessi egoici? Il tuo giudizio è infallibile? Siamo tutti d'accordo (anche Christopher) che Osho ha dato e darà un apporto meraviglioso per l'evoluzione dell'umanità, ma le osservazioni di C. sono importanti per far sorgere dubbi e raggiungere un quadro ancora più completo della Verità, che sicuramente si trova su un piano più elevato rispetto a qualsiasi Maestro (nel momento in cui, agendo nel mondo, non è disciolto in Essa).

Anche un Maestro che non sia in samadhi può cadere vittima, complici malanni fisici, del proprio ego, e i limiti di questa caduta non puoi stabilirli tu... E' evidente che l'argomento di cui stiamo trattando sia un dettaglio trascurabile di fronte all'immensità del pensiero e del contributo di Osho, ma è proprio lavorando sui dettagli che si progredisce sul sentiero della Conoscenza...

In bocca al lupo per tutto!

Roberto

~ from Alessia Home Page, an Italian site dedicated to human rights & cults (seems to have stopped publishing in 2003 -- but still quite useful for snippets of interesting news).

Other Italian reflections [in italiano]:

Movimenti e Danze Sacre: Riflessioni su Osho

Rajneeshpuram, Utopia e incubo orwelliano [Rajneeshpuram, Utopia and Orwellian Nightmare] - un minestrone di informazioni commentate

Osho Amici.it, Meditazione Online e altro...

Meditazione Aum

The 'Official' bio

2006-09-20T17:15:00.000+01:00

1931 - 1953 Early Years

December 11,1931: Osho is born in Kuchwada, a small village in the state of Madhya Pradesh, central India.

He is the eldest of eleven children of a Jaina cloth merchant. Stories of His early years describe Him as independent and rebellious as a child, questioning all social, religious and philosophical beliefs. As a youth He experiments with meditation techniques.

March 21, 1953: Osho becomes enlightened at the age of twenty-one, while majoring in philosophy at D.N. Jain college in Jabalpur.

1953 - 1956 Education

1956: Osho receives His M.A. from the University of Sagar with First Class Honors in Philosophy.

He is the All-India Debating Champion and Gold Medal winner in His graduating class.

1957-1966 University Professor and Public Speaker

1957: Osho is appointed as a professor at the Sanskrit College in Raipur.

1958: He is appointed Professor of Philosophy at the University of Jabalpur, where He taught until 1966.

A powerful and passionate debater, He also travels widely in India, speaking to large audiences and challenging orthodox religious leaders in public debates.

1966: After nine years of teaching, He leaves the university to devote Himself entirely to the raising of human consciousness. On a regular basis, He begins to address gatherings 20,000 to 50,000 in the open-air maidans of India’s major cities. Four times a year He conducts intense ten-day meditation camps.

In 1970, the 14th of April, He introduces His revolutionary meditation technique, dynamic Meditation, which begins with a period of uninhibited movement and catharsis, followed by a period of silence and stillness. Since then this meditation technique has been used by psychotherapists, medical doctors, teachers and other professionals around the world .

1969 - 1974 Mumbai Years

Late 1960’s: His Hindi talks become available in English translations.

1970: In July, 1970, He moves to Mumbai, where He lives until 1974.

1970: Osho - at this time called Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh - begins to initiate seekers into Neo-Sannyas or discipleship, a path of commitment to self-exploration and meditation which does not involve renouncing the world or anything else. Osho’s understanding of ‘Sannyas’ is a radical departure from the traditional Eastern viewpoint. For Him it is not the material world that needs to be renounced but our past and the conditionings and belief systems that each generation imposes on the next. He continues to conduct meditation camps at Mount Abu in Rajasthan but stops accepting invitations to speak throughout the country. He devotes his energies entirely to the rapidly expanding group of sannyasins around Him.

At this time, the first Westerners begin to arrive and to be initiated into Neo-Sannyas. Among them are leading psychotherapists from the human potential movement in Europe and America, seeking the next step in their own inner growth. With Osho they experience new, original meditation techniques for contemporary man, synthesizing the wisdom of the East with the science of the West.

1974 - 1981 Poona Ashram

During these seven years He gives a 90 minutes discourse nearly every morning, alternating every month between Hindi and English. His discourses offer insights into all the major spiritual paths, including Yoga, Zen, Taoism, Tantra and Sufism. He also speaks on Gautam Buddha, Jesus, Lao Tzu, and other mystics. These discourses have been collected into over 600 volumes and translated into 50 languages.

In the evenings, during these years, He answers questions on personal matters such as love, jealousy, meditation. These ‘darshans’ are compiled in 64 darshan diaries of which 40 are published.

The commune that arose around Osho at this time offers a wide variety of therapy groups which combine Eastern meditation techniques with Western psychotherapy. Therapists from all over the world are attracted and by 1980 the international community gained a reputation as ‘ the world’s finest growth and therapy center.’ One hundred thousand people pass through its gates each year.

1981: He develops a degenerative back condition. In March 1981, after giving daily discourses for nearly 15 years, Osho begins a three-year period of self-imposed public silence. In view of the possible need for emergency surgery, and on the recommendation of His personal doctors, He travels to the U.S. This same year, His American disciples purchase a 64,000-acre ranch in Oregon and invite Him to visit. He eventually agrees to stay in the U.S. and allows an application for permanent residence to be filed on His behalf.

1981 - 1985 Rajneeshpuram

A model agricultural commune rises from the ruins of the central Oregonian high desert. Thousands of overgrazed and economically unviable acres are reclaimed. The city of Rajneeshpuram is incorporated and eventually provides services to 5,000 residents. Annual summer festivals are held which draw 15,000 visitors from all over the world. Very quickly, Rajneeshpuram becomes the largest spiritual community ever pioneered in America.

Opposition to the commune and new city keeps pace with its success. Responding to the anti-cult fervor which pervades all levels of American society during the Reagan years, local, state and federal politicians make inflammatory speeches against the Rajneeshees. The Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS), the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI), the Treasury Department, and the Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms Agency (ATF) are only a few of the agencies spending millions of dollars in taxpayers’ money while harassing the commune with unwarranted and fruitless investigations. Similar costly campaigns are conducted in Oregon.

October 1984: Osho ends three and one half years of self-imposed silence.

July 1985: He resumes His public discourses each morning to thousands of seekers gathered in a two-acre meditation hall.

Sept. - Oct. 1985: The Oregon Commune is Destroyed

September 14: Osho’s personal secretary Ma Anand Sheela and several members of the commune’s management suddenly leave, and a whole pattern of illegal acts they have committed - including poisoning, arson, wiretapping, and attempted murder - are exposed. Osho invites law enforcement officials to investigate Sheela’s crimes. The authorities, however, see the investigation as a golden opportunity to destroy the commune entirely.

October 23: A U.S. federal grand jury in Portland secretly indicts Osho and 7 others on relatively minor charges of immigration fraud.

October 28: Without warrants, federal and local officials arrest at gun point Osho and others in Charlotte, North Carolina. While the others are released, He is held without bail for twelve days. A five-hour return plane trip to Oregon takes four days. En route, Osho is held incommunicado and forced to register under the pseudonym, David Washington, in the Oklahoma County jail. Subsequent events indicate that it is probable that He was poisoned with the heavy metal thallium while in that jail and the El Reno Federal Penitentiary.

November: Emotions and publicity swell around Osho’s immigration case. Fearing for His life and the well-being of sannyasins in volatile Oregon, attorneys agree to an Alford Plea on two out of 35 of the original charges against Him. According to the rules of the plea, the defendant maintains innocence while saying that the prosecution could have convicted him. Osho and His attorneys maintain His innocence in the court. He is fined $400,000 and is deported from America.

Among others, U.S. Attorney in Portland, Charles Turner, publicly concedes that the government was intent on destroying Rajneeshpuram.

1985 - 1986 World Tour

January-February: He travels to Kathmandu, Nepal and speaks twice daily for the next two months. In February, the Nepalese government refuses visas for His visitors and closest attendants. He leaves Nepal and embarks on a world tour.

February-March: At His first stop, Greece, he is granted a 30-day tourist visa. But after only 18 days, on March 5, Greek police forcibly break into the house where He is staying, arrest Him at gun point, and deport him. Greek media reports indicate government and church pressure provoked the police intervention.

During the following two weeks He visits or asks permission to visit 17 countries in Europe and the Americas. All of these countries either refuse to grant Him a visitor’s visa or revoke His visa upon His arrival, and force Him to leave. Some refuse even landing permission for His plane.

March-June: On March 19 He travels to Uruguay. On May 14th the government has scheduled a press conference to announce that He will be granted permanent residence in Uruguay. Uruguay’s President Sanguinetti later admits that he received a telephone call from Washington, D.C. the night before the press conference. He is told that if Osho is allowed to stay in Uruguay, the six billion dollar debt Uruguay owes to the U.S. will be due immediately and no further loans will be granted. Osho is ordered to leave Uruguay on June 18th.

June-July: During the next month He is deported from both Jamaica and Portugal. In all, 21 countries had denied Him entry or deported Him after arrival. On July 29,1986, He returns to Mumbai, India.

1987 - 1989 Osho Commune International

January 1987: He returns to the ashram in Pune, India, which is renamed Rajneeshdham.

July 1988: Osho begins, for the first time in 14 years, to personally lead the meditation at the end of each evening’s discourse. He also introduces a revolutionary new meditation technique called The Mystic Rose.

January-February 1989: He stops using the name "Bhagwan," retaining only the name Rajneesh. However, His disciples ask to call Him ‘Osho’ and He accepts this form of address. Osho explains that His name is derived from William James’ word ‘oceanic’ which means dissolving into the ocean. Oceanic describes the experience, He says, but what about the experiencer? For that we use the word ‘Osho.’ At the same time, He came to find out that ‘Osho’ has also been used historically in the Far East, meaning "The Blessed One, on Whom the Sky Showers Flowers."

March-June 1989: Osho is resting to recover from the effects of the poisoning, which by now are strongly influencing His health.

July 1989: His health is getting better and He makes two appearances for silent darshans during the Festival, now renamed Osho Full Moon Celebration.

August 1989: Osho begins to make daily appearances in Gautama the Buddha Auditorium for evening darshan. He inaugurates a special group of white-robed sannyasins called the "Osho White Robe Brotherhood." All sannyasins and non-sannyasins attending the evening darshans are asked to wear white robes.

September 1989: Osho drops the name "Rajneesh," signifying His complete discontinuity from the past. He is known simply as "Osho," and the ashram is renamed "Osho Commune International."

1990 Osho leaves His body

January 1990: During the second week in January, Osho’s body becomes noticeably weaker. On January 18, He is so physically weak that He is unable to come to Gautama the Buddha Auditorium. On January 19, His pulse becomes irregular. When His doctor inquires whether they should prepare for cardiac resuscitation, Osho says, "No, just let me go. Existence decides its timing." He leaves His body at 5 p.m. At 7 p.m. His body is brought to Gautama the Buddha Auditorium for a celebration, and is then carried to the burning ghats for cremation. Two days later, His ashes are brought to Osho Commune International and placed in His samadhi in Chuang Tzu Auditorium with the inscription:

OSHO

Never Born
Never Died
Only Visited This Planet Earth Between
11 December 1931 - 19 January 1990

from Oshoworld.com, A Short Biography - see also biographical extracts from Osho's anthology of discourses here

Oshean appraisals

2006-09-20T16:46:00.000+01:00

1.
The Via Positiva and The Unfortunate Instincts

Life

Osho was born in 1931 to a Jain family as Rajneesh Chandra Mohan in Kuchwara, a town in central India. He claims to have waited 800 years to find parents of sufficient purity for him to take human birth, having already sought enlightenment at the feet of many great Masters in previous lives. (Whatever the merits of this claim it is of interest to see that the parents of great Masters may be significant, for example both parents of Ramakrishna had a presentiment of his spiritual greatness, as did the mother of Krishnamurti, to say nothing of Mary mother of Jesus). As a child Osho was unruly and adventurous. His main early influence was his beloved grandfather, whose death was a terrible blow to the young child. Characteristic of the young Osho's temperament was his leadership of a gang of boys, inspiring them with daredevil acts such as diving from great heights into rivers and whirlpools, or from a bridge guarded by a policeman to prevent suicides. Osho was self-confident and sometimes aggressive, particularly if he thought that his rights had been ignored.

Despite a rather basic early schooling Osho studied philosophy at Jabalpur University, where he received his BA degree in 1955, and where he later taught. He also attended the University of Saugar and obtained an MA in 1957. He taught until the force of his spiritual illuminations led him to the life of spiritual Master. Osho claims that every seven years he went through a spiritual crisis, the first being on the loss of his grandfather, and the second at the age of fourteen when he felt, somewhat like Ramana, that he was going to die. Taking leave from school for a few days he found an almost deserted temple in the mountains and laid down, as if to die, or to be reborn in some as yet unknown way. Eventually a snake made its way over his body, and Osho thought that this would be the turning point : life or death. The snake passed on its way and the youth felt that a new life had been given him. His interest in all things spiritual continued and in 1953 at the age of twenty-one after seven days of intensive spiritual search he was enlightened under a tree in a local park.

Osho began an intensive teaching itinerary, commenting once that he had been his own 'John the Baptist' to prepare India for his later teachings. This period of exhausting travel ended when he settled firstly in Bombay and then in Koragaon Park in Pune (Poona), where an ashram was founded around him, and he acquired the honorifics 'Bhagwan' and 'Shree'. As Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh he taught to ever-increasing crowds of followers, initiating those who chose it into 'neo-sannyas', which involved the wearing of orange robes and a 'mala' or necklace bearing his picture, and the taking of an Indian name. Despite his provocative teachings he had a significant number of Indian followers, but the bulk of his disciples were Westerners.

Before long he had an international following with 'Rajneesh Centres' in many major cities around the world, where books and tapes were sold and visitors could participate in a number of the meditations he had devised, many of which included dancing or chaotic movement and breathing. Osho had little interest or patience in convention and was under pressure from the Indian government for tax irregularities. In 1981 he moved his commune to a large ranch bought for the ashram in Oregon USA, and proceeded to create an alternative society partially based on the Israeli kibbutz system. They turned the unproductive ranch into fertile farmland, combining an intense spiritual practice with long hours of manual labour. As the project grew the community wanted to incorporate their settlement as a city, a move that alarmed local residents, and hostilities grew between the two communities. The ashram leader, a woman called Ma Anand Sheela, was eventually accused of plotting to poison local residents, interfering with the democratic process and even of plotting to kill the district attorney. Osho (as he had become known in this period) had spent some years in silence, so it is debatable as to his role in the events that led to the collapse of the commune, but he was arrested and charged with falsely arranging marriages. While in prison Osho claims that he was poisoned by the authorities with thallium, and on his eventual deportation and return to India his health deteriorated. He died in 1990, at the age of 59, and in intense pain. The ashram claim that his early death was due to thallium poisoning, citing similarities with the mysterious death of a anti-nuclear civil rights campaigner who had been imprisoned in the same jail in the US as Osho.

Teachings

Osho's teachings centred on awareness and a love of life. For many years he spoke for one and a half hours a day, and while he was in India he alternated on a monthly basis between the English and Hindi languages. The transcripts of his talks appear in almost five hundred volumes, which include book series on the great spiritual teachers of the world. His ten-volume translation and commentary on the Yoga Sutras of Patanjali are typical of his early discourses, combining his own translation from the Sanskrit original with lengthy commentary, interspersed with jokes. The breadth of his reading was remarkable, perhaps only approached by Douglas Harding amongst the Masters presented here (as we saw Krishnamurti took no interest at all in the teachings of others, and is reputed to have read mainly detective novels). Osho's eclecticism gave him a universality of mind, but makes it hard to pin down his own teachings.

Awareness is a common theme however, in particular the 'double-edged arrow of awareness' that G.I.Gurdjieff taught (or 'double-barbed' as Douglas Harding called it, quite independently). Osho was greatly influenced by Gurdjieff in his approach to teaching, believing that the mind-feeling-body continuum benefited from 'shocks' that helped stimulate awareness and wake up the dormant spiritual side. These ideas were put into practice in a series of meditations that Osho devised, and in workshops or 'groups' that became the mainstay of practice for visitors to the ashram and centres round the world. Osho adopted many psychotherapeutic techniques that were in vogue in the seventies, and, in keeping with the doctrines of sexual liberation of that time, encouraged sexual experimentation as part of spiritual practice. He drew heavily on Hindu and Buddhist Tantric sources for guidance on the use of sex in the pursuit of transcendence, and it is for this that he is mainly infamous now. Few seemed to have noticed how often he spoke of transcending sex, implicit for example in the title one of his early books From Sex to Superconsciousness. His approach was to go through sex rather than suppress it, but his goal was nevertheless its transcendence.

Osho also emphasised the master/disciple relationship, which he saw as a kind of love affair. He thought it unlikely that an aspirant could gain enlightenment from his discourses in printed form (however insightful they may have been), often stressing that it was his presence, or the 'silence between the words' where the real work took place. This was a quite traditional view of the role of guru, in the East at least, but for many of his Western followers it may have been their first exposure to the idea.

His embrace of the breadth of life, in opposition to traditional views of renunciation, found a simple formula in his three 'M's --- Music, Mathematics, and Meditation, standing respectively for the arts, science/technology, and the spiritual. He felt that to neglect any one of these three areas was to become narrow or even one-dimensional, and in the modern era it was absurd to turn one's back on the delight and creativity of the arts, or the knowledge and living standards that science and technology could bring. Accordingly, life in the ashram involved the arts, the creation of beautiful buildings and gardens, and the use of modern technology where appropriate. For Osho, transcendence meant to embrace everything that life had to offer, rather than to shut down the senses and dull the mind.

Commentary

Osho was an iconoclast. While Krishnamurti ignored Indian spiritual traditions (and all other spiritual traditions for that matter), and spoke out against the guru principle, he did not otherwise set out to destroy tradition. In contrast Osho was convinced that the ancient spiritual traditions of India (in particular) were in themselves an obstacle to spiritual progress. His main target was the concept of renunciation, which he saw as responsible not only for the material poverty of India, but for the serious, if not rather grim, face of religion. His vision of the spiritual life was that it should be light, joyous and full of humour, rather than serious, sorrowful and moralising. Although he had immense respect for Ramana Maharshi and Sri Ramakrishna, he saw their renunciative stance as part of a past that should be overthrown, and his chosen method was to take the ancient symbol of renunciation, the ochre robe, and turn it into a symbol of the 'new man'. His followers, called 'neo-sannyasins', were to retain the inner spiritual life of the renunciate, but embrace and celebrate every aspect of the physical life, including sex. His target was conventional Hindu society, and the orange-robed Westerners flaunting their sexual and material wealth achieved his purpose of shocking conservative Hindus. His own symbolic revolt against renunciation included the wearing of expensive clothes and watches, and the gradual accumulation of 92 Rolls-Royces.

The events in Oregon leading to the expulsion of the movement and Osho's death are considered by many to undermine or negate anything of value in Osho's teachings. A neutral and critical appraisal of Osho's legacy is long overdue, as most commentators seem to have drawn on a single book for negative material, The God Who Failed, by Hugh Milne. Such an appraisal will have to wait, but what is of importance here is the implication of Osho's experiment for via positiva.

Osho attempted a revolution in spiritual thinking, to integrate the spirituality of a Ramana or Ramakrishna, with a love of life. He called his ideal composite 'Zorba the Buddha' after a novel about a Greek man with an exuberant lifestyle. As such it is worthy of consideration, all the more because Osho also recognised the importance of the jnani / bhakti distinction. While Whitman is the great guru of via positiva, he has been largely ignored, and even Osho was not aware of his significance. Harding's via positiva is neutral about the world, which is there mainly to demonstrate our 'original face' or true nature. Krishnamurti saw the beauty of the natural world, perhaps mainly in an aesthetic sense, but Osho went much further in advocating a love of life in all its ramifications. The fact that his experiment 'failed' in the eyes of most commentators has left the world community of spiritual seekers wary of such an approach and more likely to succumb again to scepticism about life itself. This can be seen in the teachings of Andrew Cohen for example, whose emphasis on purity and moral values is a reaction to many of the teachers of the 1970s, who, like Osho, were experimenting with sexual openness and counter-culture ideas.

'Given that many of Osho's followers seemed to have learned from him only the least attractive of his qualities, noticeably a contempt for tradition and the democratic process, the disaster in Oregon was inevitable. The real loss is the devaluing of his teachings, which, as found in his books, audio tapes, or videos, are a treasure-trove of spiritual insight.'

Osho's via positiva is contradictory or paradoxical however. In Oregon he spent several years in complete silence, one of the marks of the renunciative life he so criticised. He also lived a very simple life, in a small room, ate a vegetarian diet, and had no legal title to any ashram property or possessions. Paradox was part of his teachings, and he did not encourage attempts to distil his often contradictory remarks spread over some 500 volumes into a coherent and concise system of thought. He liked to enter deeply into the teachings of whoever his discourses focused on, and said that his ability to become a conduit for their teachings inevitably meant that there would be contradictions. There were common themes however, one being that the inner transformation of the individual from a divided and fearful personality into an enlightened being grounded in awareness could be described as the transition from an experience of the world as a chaos to the vision of it as a cosmos. This is a valuable clue to the via positiva, that its hallmark is a perception of the manifest world as profoundly and beautifully ordered. In contrast most beginners on the spiritual path are drawn to explore religious teachings because they feel that life is a chaos.

There is no doubt however that Osho left chaos behind him. He was influenced by G.I.Gurdjieff in his teaching methods, which included techniques for deliberately creating confusion in the disciple's life and mind in order to allow a new and more spontaneous order to arise. What he failed to take from Gurdjieff however was an extreme selectivity of pupil, allowing instead individuals with a range of vulnerabilities and personal problems to be exposed to his methods, often through senior ashram members, who were not necessarily gifted teachers. The desire to reach a large number of people also permitted power-hungry individuals to take control of the community. Given that many of his followers only seemed to have learned from him the least attractive of his qualities, noticeably a contempt for tradition and the democratic process, the disaster in Oregon was inevitable. The real loss is the devaluing of his teachings, which, as found in his books, audio tapes, or videos, are a treasure-trove of spiritual insight.

Osho does not deserve to be dismissed. His discourses are instructive in the positive sense as his mistakes are in the negative sense. Any new spiritual community is capable of the errors of Oregon. This is closely related to the unfortunate instinct of seekers to latch onto the apocalyptic and paranoid components of a teaching, even when these comprise a very small part, as in Osho's case.

2.
Osho? Oh No!
The Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh's international popularity has soared since his death 10 years ago. But in Portland--a mecca for alternative spirituality--his memory still carries a lot of unwanted baggage.

by Rachel Graham (originally published February 2, 2000)

Common Ground's meeting room is filling up, and Viram is letting it all hang out. His mala, usually hidden beneath designer-label shirts, is out in the open. Tall, broad-shouldered, with short salt-and-pepper hair and a goatee, Viram has been a follower of the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh since the mid-'80s. Tonight, he's the unofficial greeter at an event commemorating the 10th anniversary of the Bhagwan's death.

He hugs a couple of old friends, shakes hands with some new ones, and reminds stragglers to leave their shoes under the bench in the hall. Like most people here, Viram is cautious about sharing his sannyasin identity with outsiders. If his professional peers ever discovered he was a Bhagwan follower, Viram says, they'd have him "drawn and quartered." Gesturing to the string of polished wooden beads with a pendant of the Bhagwan around his neck and the growing crowd of people, he adds, "So, I keep it all sub rosa."

A glance at the bulletin board in any local coffee shop reveals a thriving market in Portland for tarot card readings, goddess workshops and shamanic counseling. Portlanders don't have a problem with alternative spirituality, they have a problem with the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh. The Indian guru renamed himself Osho in 1989, but the new moniker didn't erase his old public image. Too many Oregonians remember the Rajneeshee excesses of the 1980s--the Bhagwan's collection of Rolls-Royces and expensive jewelry, his red-robed disciples' poisoning 750 residents of The Dalles with salmonella, and his venomous secretary Ma Anand Sheela's references to ranchers' kids as "retards."

So, while local interest in alternative spirituality and national interest in the Bhagwan have both increased over the past decade, the two trends have not overlapped. At ground zero of his American experiment, the Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh remains persona non grata, says Ma Chit Tantra, director of the Portland Osho Information Center. "Around here, being a sannyasin is worse than being gay."

Hard numbers are difficult to come by in a community that insists it isn't one. Tantra says Portland has fewer sannyasins than Mill Valley, Calif., or Sedona, Ariz., but more than anywhere east of Denver. She estimates there are about 150 sannyasins statewide, split evenly between pre- and post-ranch recruits. Many have nothing to do with her center or other sannyasins. "I get e-mails all the time from people who say they love Osho, but they don't come to meditation," she says. "They're fine where they are."

Without a living leader to rally around and with Osho's books and tapes a mouse-click away, many followers meditate in the privacy of their living rooms and forgo the stigma of associating with other sannyasins. In Oregon, the Rajneesh movement has morphed from the notorious '80s commune with its strict dress code into a loose affiliation of individuals whose only identifying feature is their devotion to Osho and his teachings--a blend of Eastern mysticism, Western pop psychology and simple meditation techniques.

The failure of their Oregon experiment in communal living, says Sarito Carol Neiman, editorial director of Osho International, taught sannyasins "that as long as people look outside themselves for a savior they are going to miss the point." After the Antelope ranch debacle, personal responsibility became sannyasins' unofficial mantra and meditation their only daily requirement. Of the 30 people at the Common Ground meditation-celebration Viram recognized only a handful. "It's all about the meditations," he says. "The rest is just politics."

Judged by appearances, the Common Ground gathering could have been the audience for a Tracy Chapman concert at the Schnitz: overwhelmingly white and clad in jeans and sweaters, some trying to be hip, some trying to be liberal, and some digging the mellow music with a message. There were college students, businesswomen and retired men with pot bellies in patterned golf shirts. Viram's was the only mala in evidence, and only Ma Anand Arupo, who led the meditation, wore all red. Between the meditation, the sitar playing, and the Osho funeral video, attendees chatted about First Thursday and Portland's crappy weather.

The meditation itself consisted of 40 minutes of dancing, 20 minutes of lying down and another five minutes of dancing. It was like playtime for grown-ups, right down to the reminder to use the potty five minutes before the meditation started. At the end, as the music wound down, the dancers broke into broad grins and a few of them raised their arms in the air, palms up--as evangelical Christians often do in joyous praise.

Viram says that, as a Presbyterian deacon and Sunday school teacher in Salem, he used to beg Jesus for "joy, joy, joy." But neither Christian prayer nor transcendental meditation helped him cope with the stresses of life. "Who wants to come home after a stressful workday and deal with a mantra? Blah, blah, blah," he mimics with a pained look on his face. "It never got my mind off my business. But this is cathartic. It's helped me through some really difficult times."

Viram isn't alone in seeking something or someone to help him experience joy through life's rough patches. American gurus of general spirituality Deepak Chopra and Marianne Williamson praise Osho's meditation techniques. Osho's Web site, available in seven languages with three more forthcoming, receives 5,000 hits a day. St. Martin's Press has reissued Osho's all-time bestseller, From Sex to Superconsciousness ("Some people," Tantra pointed out, "are still out there looking for the perfect orgasm") and has started publishing a new Osho series, Insights for a New Way of Living.

Osho's general appeal, sannyasins say, is his ability to translate ancient religious traditions into contemporary, ecumenical and autonomous terms. "It's about individual spirituality," Sarito emphasizes, "not an organization, group, set of beliefs, or practices to learn." Whether or not they become sannyasins, people come to Osho, Tantra says, who are "into holistic movements, becoming vegetarian, and more into Eastern thought. They like that he doesn't come from Christianity but he's not quite Buddhist, which can seem a little rigid. It's for people who don't want to be conspicuous."

Oregon sannyasins, however, feel they have no choice in the matter. Along with Osho's transcendent wisdom, sannyasins were also left with the guru's bitter Oregon legacy. Voluble as Viram is, he would not give WW his real name nor was he willing to be photographed. Tantra, too, uses her legal name only in her professional life. "I would never tell people at work that I'm a Rajneeshee," she says. "I would never put up with that kind of discrimination."

Viram, who continues his meditations by himself in his living room, concedes that solo seeking can get lonely sometimes. He wishes for more "structure"and is thinking about renting the Odd Fellows Building on Sunday mornings so sannyasins can get together for regular weekly meditations. Something, he says, a little more like church.

NOTES:
~ Ma Anand Sheela now owns and runs two upscale nursing homes in Switzerland.
~ At the Osho Meditation Resort & Spa in Pune, India, some 200,000 visitors a year take classes in everything from primal deconditioning to "zennis" (tennis in which winning isn't the goal).
~ Osho never actually "wrote" a word. His books are transcribed from nearly 5,000 hours of his taped talks in English.

3.
I Was Burned
Article by Miten, on being a Sannyas musician.
Published in the Viha Connection, Sept./Oct. 2001

By the time I came to Osho, playing music, for me, had become associated with pain, frustration, ambition, helplessness. I was damaged by my years in the music business. Record executives, publishers, managers and agents... everybody pushing and hustling. It’s a desperate business. All for money.

When I look back, I see a young man tired of playing a game he was never about to win....and ready for embrace a new set values. When I took sannyas, the first thing I did was to sell every guitar I owned. That was a great move! I moved into the Commune (Medina), and began my new life. I worked in the cleaning temple and later in the kitchen. I loved the simplicity. And most of all, I loved the Music Groups and Sannyas Celebrations on Saturday nights. These were magic times. I felt my love returning... my love for life, and my love for music. The joyous singing turned me on most.

I'd never experienced anything so powerful or as uplifting. I became hooked on Sufi Dance! I’m still grateful to Aneeta and Anubhava for introducing this meditation to us. It was a revelation to me, to look into the eyes of a stranger and sing the name of God, and have it simultaneously sung back to me. This was simple, honest, real...and ecstatic music!

And as the healing continued, I would pick up a guitar every now and then, strum a few chords and sing whatever came through.

One of the first songs that came through was Like Falling Leaves... another was Enough for Me...another was a joyful rocker called Love is the Fire...they were simple songs, innocent, and very direct. And because of their simplicity... and because they were borne out of the moment, (as opposed to ‘working on a song’ which is what I’d done in the past), they had a different quality. Innocence was intrinsic in the song, so they had the potential to transport the singer straight into the moment, whenever they were sung. They still do. It’s the gift returning to the giver.

One Saturday morning in Medina, Deva Peter (now Ashik) who led the Music Groups back then, came to me and said that he had to go to London that day and if he wasn't back in time, that I should take care of the Music Group that evening. I took a deep breath! I was scared, and excited. Somehow, I knew that he wasn’t coming back. And this was my initiation into playing music for Osho... an honour I cherish to this day.

I was given the opportunity to express the love and gratitude I felt, simply by doing what I loved best: to play music. That night, the band was hot, the chemistry between the musicians was sychronised, and we just sang and danced and danced and sang until we dropped! The whole commune was alive with joy and celebration. It was a magic night that is with me still.

From then on, I was ready to embrace music again. Well, the truth is, music embraced me - thanks to Osho's love and compassion. After this, the songs started to pour out.

Here is the root of my gratitude to Osho, that he had a vision... and most of all, the courage, to create a Buddhafield. A playground in which thousands could move, make mistakes, and learn... and move on... Where every ‘hit’ and every disappointment becomes an opportunity to learn... and all in an atmosphere of love.

All for love. This is a miracle to me. I need a community for transformation. I'll never forget the first time I played for him. It was in Chuang Tzu. The musicians were up front in those days, pretty close. He zapped me that day. I still don't know if it was my imagination... or whether he really did look into my eyes. I remember I was doing fine until he came out and started dancing. As he moved closer and closer towards the musicians, my heart started to burst open and I’m laughing and crying and trying to sing and play the guitar all at the same time.

When he looked into me, I just exploded. My left hand froze tight on the strings of my guitar... it just ceased to funtion, and my right hand was thrashing at my guitar at 100mph! I was aware of the music, I was aware of everyone going crazy all around me... but essentially, all I knew were his eyes and the roaring silence. When I came back, the music had stopped and Osho was already speaking! Fortunately my right hand must've stopped at the same time as the music, because I wasn't fired from playing! After that Darshan, I knew the healing was complete.

Playing for Osho when he was in his body is very different to playing for him now. I felt like a child back then... I was learning so much. It was my apprenticeship. Not only through the groups I was doing and the people I was meeting, but also, through the music I was playing:

I was learning to trust myself...and pradoxically.
I was also learning to surrender to the Divine.
I was learning not to judge myself and my creativity.
I was learning how to lead a band without feeling like a 'leader'.
I was learning how to breathe and play music (and make love!) at the same time!
I was learning about sensitivity.

I guess these are gifts bestowed on each of us by the Master... singing in gratitude is no different to cooking in gratitude, or re-balancing in gratitude. The gratitude has to express itself. "We all have our ways to kneel and kiss the ground", as Rumi says. These days, playing music for Osho, I feel like a warrior. A love warrior maybe, but a warrior all the same!

I feel strong. I have the tools and I have the experience. And I can share Osho without effort. I’ve learnt to relax.... Thanks to all those nights in Buddha Hall, and all those Music Groups and Sannyas Celebrations, singing our hearts out.

Deva and I, we just sing it! When Osho says he has dissolved into his people, this is what I see. That whenever, and whatever we share through our creativity, there he is. It’s Osho coming through. I’ve often heard him say that the chair is empty.... And it seems to me, that what was coming through him, is the same divinity that expresses itself now, through our love and creativity. It’s the same force. And my responsibility is to share it through music. When I look around, it seems to me that the world is finally catching up with Osho.

His name is not so present as it once was, but his influence is everywhere. From raves to the satsang givers, from corporate business men learning how to hug... to all the New Age therapy. You can trace it all back to Osho’s vision. Many people who come to our concerts, are unaware that Deva and I are sannyasins. Many don't even know Osho. But once they fall into our space (which happens as soon as Premal sings!), they become very touched and over-flowing in gratitude. They call it Love, we call it ‘Osho’. It feels like many are thirsty now, to integrate joy, celebration, and meditation, into their lives... and well, this to me is perfect. Because a crowd of people singing together as one, is a crowd of people breathing together as one... and when that happens, synchronicity happens. And when a room full of people are in synchronicity, Osho happens!

For me, Love is just another name for Osho. Who he was as a person, and who he is as a spiritual entity, constantly ever-present, ever true, in our lives. When we look, he’s there!

A song just came to me as I write this, I never sang it so much, but, it seems appropriate to share it here.

Sing a joyful song,
Sing it out loud,
Let your heart be free,
Free as this passing cloud.
Sing your heart song,
Let your voice fill the air,
In the Here and Now,
We will find him there
He is here!
In the shadows of our lives,
He is here!
In the space between the lines,
He is here.
As we open up our eyes,
He is here.

With love,
Miten

Other references:

Pulse: Osho Biography

Osho, The Mystic Of Laughter, from a Dutch Mystical Site.

What Is An Osho? by Prem Amrito, MD (© Osho International Foundation 1998)

Realization's Osho

Some Remarks About Effort, by Osho

Prem Joshua, a multi-instrumentalist and composer, awakened by Osho & the inner music

Osho Happenings, events past and present

Osho's Awakening

2006-09-19T21:31:00.000+01:00

This has been described as the most vivid description ever written of what it feels like to become enlightened.

MY AWAKENING

by OSHO

I AM REMINDED of the fateful day of twenty-first March, 1953. For many lives I had been working -- working upon myself, struggling, doing whatsoever can be done -- and nothing was happening.
Now I understand why nothing was happening. The very effort was the barrier, the very ladder was preventing, the very urge to seek was the obstacle. Not that one can reach without seeking. Seeking is needed, but then comes a point when seeking has to be dropped. The boat is needed to cross the river but then comes a moment when you have to get out of the boat and forget all about it and leave it behind. Effort is needed, without effort nothing is possible. And also only with effort, nothing is possible.

Just before twenty-first March, 1953, seven days before, I stopped working on myself. A moment comes when you see the whole futility of effort. You have done all that you can do and nothing is happening. You have done all that is humanly possible. Then what else can you do? In sheer helplessness one drops all search.

And the day the search stopped, the day I was not seeking for something, the day I was not expecting something to happen, it started happening. A new energy arose -- out of nowhere. It was not coming from any source. It was coming from nowhere and everywhere. It was in the trees and in the rocks and the sky and the sun and the air -- it was everywhere. And I was seeking so hard, and I was thinking it is very far away. And it was so near and so close.

Just because I was seeking I had become incapable of seeing the near. Seeking is always for the far, seeking is always for the distant -- and it was not distant. I had become far-sighted, I had lost the near-sightedness. The eyes had become focussed on the far away, the horizon, and they had lost the quality to see that which is just close, surrounding you.

The day effort ceased, I also ceased. Because you cannot exist without effort, and you cannot exist without desire, and you cannot exist without striving.

The phenomenon of the ego, of the self, is not a thing, it is a process. It is not a substance sitting there inside you; you have to create it each moment. It is like pedalling bicycle. If you pedal it goes on and on, if you don't pedal it stops. It may go a little because of the past momentum, but the moment you stop pedalling, in fact the bicycle starts stopping. It has no more energy, no more power to go anywhere. It is going to fall and collapse.

The ego exists because we go on pedalling desire, because we go on striving to get something, because we go on jumping ahead of ourselves. That is the very phenomenon of the ego -- the jump ahead of yourself, the jump in the future, the jump in the tomorrow. The jump in the non-existential creates the ego. Because it comes out of the non-existential it is like a mirage. It consists only of desire and nothing else. It consists only of thirst and nothing else.

The ego is not in the present, it is in the future. If you are in the future, then ego seems to be very substantial. If you are in the present the ego is a mirage, it starts disappearing.

The day I stopped seeking... and it is not right to say that I stopped seeking, better will be to say the day seeking stopped. Let me repeat it: the better way to say it is the day the seeking stopped. Because if I stop it then I am there again. Now stopping becomes my effort, now stopping becomes my desire, and desire goes on existing in a very subtle way.

You cannot stop desire; you can only understand it. In the very understanding is the stopping of it. Remember, nobody can stop desiring, and the reality happens only when desire stops.

So this is the dilemma. What to do? Desire is there and Buddhas go on saying desire has to be stopped, and they go on saying in the next breath that you cannot stop desire. So what to do? You put people in a dilemma. They are in desire, certainly. You say it has to be stopped -- okay. And then you say it cannot be stopped. Then what is to be done?

The desire has to be understood. You can understand it, you can just see the futility of it. A direct perception is needed, an immediate penetration is needed. Look into desire, just see what it is, and you will see the falsity of it, and you will see it is non-existential. And desire drops and something drops simultaneously within you.

Desire and the ego exist in cooperation, they coordinate. The ego cannot exist without desire, the desire cannot exist without the ego. Desire is projected ego, ego is introjected desire. They are together, two aspects of one phenomenon.

The day desiring stopped, I felt very hopeless and helpless. No hope because no future. Nothing to hope because all hoping has proved futile, it leads nowhere. You go in rounds. It goes on dangling in front of you, it goes on creating new mirages, it goes on calling you, 'Come on, run fast, you will reach.' But howsoever fast you run you never reach.

That's why Buddha calls it a mirage. It is like the horizon that you see around the earth. It appears but it is not there. If you go it goes on running from you. The faster you run, the faster it moves away. The slower you go, the slower it moves away. But one thing is certain -- the distance between you and the horizon remains absolutely the same. Not even a single inch can you reduce the distance between you and the horizon.

You cannot reduce the distance between you and your hope. Hope is horizon. You try to bridge yourself with the horizon, with the hope, with a projected desire. The desire is a bridge, a dream bridge -- because the horizon exists not, so you cannot make a bridge towards it, you can only dream about the bridge. You cannot be joined with the non-existential.

The day the desire stopped, the day I looked and realized into it, it simply was futile. I was helpless and hopeless. But that very moment something started happening. The same started happening for which for many lives I was working and it was not happening.

In your hopelessness is the only hope, and in your desirelessness is your only fulfillment, and in your tremendous helplessness suddenly the whole existence starts helping you.

It is waiting. When it sees that you are working on your own, it does not interfere. It waits. It can wait infinitely because there is no hurry for it. It is eternity. The moment you are not on your own, the moment you drop, the moment you disappear, the whole existence rushes towards you, enters you. And for the first time things start happening.

Seven days I lived in a very hopeless and helpless state, but at the same time something was arising. When I say hopeless I don't mean what you mean by the word hopeless. I simply mean there was no hope in me. Hope was absent. I am not saying that I was hopeless and sad. I was happy in fact, I was very tranquil, calm and collected and centered. Hopeless, but in a totally new meaning. There was no hope, so how could there be hopelessness. Both had disappeared.

The hopelessness was absolute and total. Hope had disappeared and with it its counterpart, hopelessness, had also disappeared. It was a totally new experience -- of being without hope. It was not a negative state. I have to use words -- but it was not a negative state. It was absolutely positive. It was not just absence, a presence was felt. Something was overflowing in me, overflooding me.

And when I say I was helpless, I don't mean the word in the dictionary-sense. I simply say I was selfless. That's what I mean when I say helpless. I have recognized the fact that I am not, so I cannot depend on myself, so I cannot stand on my own ground -- there was no ground underneath. I was in an abyss... bottomless abyss. But there was no fear because there was nothing to protect. There was no fear because there was nobody to be afraid.

Those seven days were of tremendous transformation, total transformation. And the last day the presence of a totally new energy, a new light and new delight, became so intense that it was almost unbearable -- as if I was exploding, as if I was going mad with blissfulness. The new generation in the West has the right word for it -- I was blissed out, stoned.

It was impossible to make any sense out of it, what was happening. It was a very non-sense world -- difficult to figure it out, difficult to manage in categories, difficult to use words, languages, explanations. All scriptures appeared dead and all the words that have been used for this experience looked very pale, anaemic. This was so alive. It was like a tidal wave of bliss.

The whole day was strange, stunning, and it was a shattering experience. The past was disappearing, as if it had never belonged to me, as if I had read about it somewhere, as if I had dreamed about it, as if it was somebody else's story I have heard and somebody told it to me. I was becoming loose from my past, I was being uprooted from my history, I was losing my autobiography. I was becoming a non-being, what Buddha calls anatta. Boundaries were disappearing, distinctions were disappearing.

Mind was disappearing; it was millions of miles away. It was difficult to catch hold of it, it was rushing farther and farther away, and there was no urge to keep it close. I was simply indifferent about it all. It was okay. There was no urge to remain continuous with the past.

By the evening it became so difficult to bear it -- it was hurting, it was painful. It was like when a woman goes into labour when a child is to be born, and the woman suffers tremendous pain -- the birth pangs.

I used to go to sleep in those days near about twelve or one in the night, but that day it was impossible to remain awake. My eyes were closing, it was difficult to keep them open. Something was very imminent, something was going to happen. It was difficult to say what it was -- maybe it is going to be my death -- but there was no fear. I was ready for it. Those seven days had been so beautiful that I was ready to die, nothing more was needed. They had been so tremendously blissful, I was so contented, that if death was coming, it was welcome.

But something was going to happen -- something like death, something very drastic, something which will be either a death or a new birth, a crucifixion or a resurrection -- but something of tremendous import was around just by the corner. And it was impossible to keep my eyes open. I was drugged.

I went to sleep near about eight. It was not like sleep. Now I can understand what Patanjali means when he says that sleep and samadhi are similar. Only with one difference -- that in samadhi you are fully awake and asleep also. Asleep and awake together, the whole body relaxed, every cell of the body totally relaxed, all functioning relaxed, and yet a light of awareness burns within you... clear, smokeless. You remain alert and yet relaxed, loose but fully awake. The body is in the deepest sleep possible and your consciousness is at its peak. The peak of consciousness and the valley of the body meet.

I went to sleep. It was a very strange sleep. The body was asleep, I was awake. It was so strange -- as if one was torn apart into two directions, two dimensions; as if the polarity has become completely focused, as if I was both the polarities together... the positive and negative were meeting, sleep and awareness were meeting, death and life were meeting. That is the moment when you can say 'the creator and the creation meet.'

It was weird. For the first time it shocks you to the very roots, it shakes your foundations. You can never be the same after that experience; it brings a new vision to your life, a new quality.

Near about twelve my eyes suddenly opened -- I had not opened them. The sleep was broken by something else. I felt a great presence around me in the room. It was a very small room. I felt a throbbing life all around me, a great vibration -- almost like a hurricane, a great storm of light, joy, ecstasy. I was drowning in it.

It was so tremendously real that everything became unreal. The walls of the room became unreal, the house became unreal, my own body became unreal. Everything was unreal because now there was for the first time reality.

That's why when Buddha and Shankara say the world is maya, a mirage, it is difficult for us to understand. Because we know only this world, we don't have any comparison. This is the only reality we know. What are these people talking about -- this is maya, illusion? This is the only reality. Unless you come to know the really real, their words cannot be understood, their words remain theoretical. They look like hypotheses. Maybe this man is propounding a philosophy -- 'The world is unreal'.

When Berkley in the West said that the world is unreal, he was walking with one of his friends, a very logical man; the friend was almost a skeptic. He took a stone from the road and hit Berkley's feet hard. Berkley screamed, blood rushed out, and the skeptic said, 'Now, the world is unreal? You say the world is unreal? -- then why did you scream? This stone is unreal? -- then why did you scream? Then why are you holding your leg and why are you showing so much pain and anguish on your face. Stop this? It is all unreal.

Now this type of man cannot understand what Buddha means when he says the world is a mirage. He does not mean that you can pass through the wall. He is not saying this -- that you can eat stones and it will make no difference whether you eat bread or stones. He is not saying that.

He is saying that there is a reality. Once you come to know it, this so-called reality simply pales out, simply becomes unreal. With a higher reality in vision the comparison arises, not otherwise.

In the dream; the dream is real. You dream every night. Dream is one of the greatest activities that you go on doing. If you live sixty years, twenty years you will sleep and almost ten years you will dream. Ten years in a life -- nothing else do you do so much. Ten years of continuous dreaming -- just think about it. And every night.... And every morning you say it was unreal, and again in the night when you dream, dream becomes real.

In a dream it is so difficult to remember that this is a dream. But in the morning it is so easy. What happens? You are the same person. In the dream there is only one reality. How to compare? How to say it is unreal? Compared to what? It is the only reality. Everything is as unreal as everything else so there is no comparison. In the morning when you open your eyes another reality is there. Now you can say it was all unreal. Compared to this reality, dream becomes unreal.

There is an awakening -- compared to THAT reality of THAT awakening, this whole reality becomes unreal.

That night for the first time I understood the meaning of the word maya. Not that I had not known the word before, not that I was not aware of the meaning of the word. As you are aware, I was also aware of the meaning -- but I had never understood it before. How can you understand without experience?

That night another reality opened its door, another dimension became available. Suddenly it was there, the other reality, the separate reality, the really real, or whatsoever you want to call it -- call it god, call it truth, call it dhamma, call it tao, or whatsoever you will. It was nameless. But it was there -- so opaque, so transparent, and yet so solid one could have touched it. It was almost suffocating me in that room. It was too much and I was not yet capable of absorbing it.

A deep urge arose in me to rush out of the room, to go under the sky -- it was suffocating me. It was too much! It will kill me! If I had remained a few moments more, it would have suffocated me -- it looked like that.

I rushed out of the room, came out in the street. A great urge was there just to be under the sky with the stars, with the trees, with the earth... to be with nature. And immediately as I came out, the feeling of being suffocated disappeared. It was too small a place for such a big phenomenon. Even the sky is a small place for that big phenomenon. It is bigger than the sky. Even the sky is not the limit for it. But then I felt more at ease.

I walked towards the nearest garden. It was a totally new walk, as if gravitation had disappeared. I was walking, or I was running, or I was simply flying; it was difficult to decide. There was no gravitation, I was feeling weightless -- as if some energy was taking me. I was in the hands of some other energy.

For the first time I was not alone, for the first time I was no more an individual, for the first time the drop has come and fallen into the ocean. Now the whole ocean was mine, I was the ocean. There was no limitation. A tremendous power arose as if I could do anything whatsoever. I was not there, only the power was there.

I reached to the garden where I used to go every day. The garden was closed, closed for the night. It was too late, it was almost one o'clock in the night. The gardeners were fast asleep. I had to enter the garden like a thief, I had to climb the gate. But something was pulling me towards the garden. It was not within my capacity to prevent myself. I was just floating.

That's what I mean when I say again and again 'float with the river, don't push the river'. I was relaxed, I was in a let-go. I was not there. IT was there, call it god -- god was there.

I would like to call it IT, because god is too human a word, and has become too dirty by too much use, has become too polluted by so many people. Christians, Hindus, Mohammedans, priests and politicians -- they all have corrupted the beauty of the word. So let me call it IT. IT was there and I was just carried away... carried by a tidal wave.

The moment I entered the garden everything became luminous, it was all over the place -- the benediction, the blessedness. I could see the trees for the first time -- their green, their life, their very sap running. The whole garden was asleep, the trees were asleep. But I could see the whole garden alive, even the small grass leaves were so beautiful.

I looked around. One tree was tremendously luminous -- the maulshree tree. It attracted me, it pulled me towards itself. I had not chosen it, god himself has chosen it. I went to the tree, I sat under the tree. As I sat there things started settling. The whole universe became a benediction.

It is difficult to say how long I was in that state. When I went back home it was four o'clock in the morning, so I must have been there by clock time at least three hours -- but it was infinity. It had nothing to do with clock time. It was timeless.

Those three hours became the whole eternity, endless eternity. There was no time, there was no passage of time; it was the virgin reality -- uncorrupted, untouchable, unmeasurable.

And that day something happened that has continued -- not as a continuity -- but it has still continued as an undercurrent. Not as a permanency -- each moment it has been happening again and again. It has been a miracle each moment.

That night... and since that night I have never been in the body. I am hovering around it. I became tremendously powerful and at the same time very fragile. I became very strong, but that strength is not the strength of a Mohammed Ali. That strength is not the strength of a rock, that strength is the strength of a rose flower -- so fragile in his strength... so fragile, so sensitive, so delicate.

The rock will be there, the flower can go any moment, but still the flower is stronger than the rock because it is more alive. Or, the strength of a dewdrop on a leaf of grass just shining; in the morning sun -- so beautiful, so precious, and yet can slip any moment. So incomparable in its grace, but a small breeze can come and the dewdrop can slip and be lost forever.

Buddhas have a strength which is not of this world. Their strength is totally of love... Like a rose flower or a dewdrop. Their strength is very fragile, vulnerable. Their strength is the strength of life not of death. Their power is not of that which kills; their power is of that which creates. Their power is not of violence, aggression; their power is that of compassion.

But I have never been in the body again, I am just hovering around the body. And that's why I say it has been a tremendous miracle. Each moment I am surprised I am still here, I should not be. I should have left any moment, still I am here. Every morning I open my eyes and I say, 'So, again I am still here?' Because it seems almost impossible. The miracle has been a continuity.

Just the other day somebody asked a question -- 'Osho, you are getting so fragile and delicate and so sensitive to the smells of hair oils and shampoos that it seems we will not be able to see you unless we all go bald.' By the way, nothing is wrong with being bald -- bald is beautiful. Just as 'black is beautiful', so 'bald is beautiful'. But that is true and you have to be careful about it.

I am fragile, delicate and sensitive. That is my strength. If you throw a rock at a flower nothing will happen to the rock, the flower will be gone. But still you cannot say that the rock is more powerful than the flower. The flower will be gone because the flower was alive. And the rock -- nothing will happen to it because it is dead. The flower will be gone because the flower has no strength to destroy. The flower will simply disappear and give way to the rock. The rock has a power to destroy because the rock is dead.

Remember, since that day I have never been in the body really; just a delicate thread joins me with the body. And I am continuously surprised that somehow the whole must be willing me to be here, because I am no more here with my own strength, I am no more here on my own. It must be the will of the whole to keep me here, to allow me to linger a little more on this shore. Maybe the whole wants to share something with you through me.

Since that day the world is unreal. Another world has been revealed. When I say the world is unreal I don't mean that these trees are unreal. These trees are absolutely real -- but the way you see these trees is unreal. These trees are not unreal in themselves -- they exist in god, they exist in absolute reality -- but the way you see them you never see them; you are seeing something else, a mirage.

You create your own dream around you and unless you become awake you will continue to dream. The world is unreal because the world that you know is the world of your dreams. When dreams drop and you simply encounter the world that is there, then the real world.

There are not two things, god and the world. God is the world if you have eyes, clear eyes, without any dreams, without any dust of the dreams, without any haze of sleep; if you have clear eyes, clarity, perceptiveness, there is only god.

Then somewhere god is a green tree, and somewhere else god is a shining star, and somewhere else god is a cuckoo, and somewhere else god is a flower, and somewhere else a child and somewhere else a river -- then only god is. The moment you start seeing, only god is.

But right now whatsoever you see is not the truth, it is a projected lie. That is the meaning of a mirage. And once you see, even for a single split moment, if you can see, if you can allow yourself to see, you will find immense benediction present all over, everywhere -- in the clouds, in the sun, on the earth.

This is a beautiful world. But I am not talking about your world, I am talking about my world. Your world is very ugly, your world is your world created by a self, your world is a projected world. You are using the real world as a screen and projecting your own ideas on it.

When I say the world is real, the world is tremendously beautiful, the world is luminous with infinity, the world is light and delight, it is a celebration, I mean my world -- or your world if you drop your dreams.

When you drop your dreams you see the same world as any Buddha has ever seen. When you dream you dream privately. Have you watched it? -- that dreams are private. You cannot share them even with your beloved. You cannot invite your wife to your dream -- or your husband, or your friend. You cannot say, 'Now, please come tonight in my dream. I would like to see the dream together.' It is not possible. Dream is a private thing, hence it is illusory, it has no objective reality.

God is a universal thing. Once you come out of your private dreams, it is there. It has been always there. Once your eyes are clear, a sudden illumination -- suddenly you are overflooded with beauty, grandeur and grace. That is the goal, that is the destiny.

Let me repeat. Without effort you will never reach it, with effort nobody has ever reached it. You will need great effort, and only then there comes a moment.when effort becomes futile. But it becomes futile only when you have come to the very peak of it, never before it. When you have come to the very pinnacle of your effort -- all that you can do you have done -- then suddenly there is no need to do anything any more. You drop the effort.

But nobody can drop it in the middle, it can be dropped only at the extreme end. So go to the extreme end if you want to drop it. Hence I go on insisting: make as much effort as you can, put your whole energy and total heart in it, so that one day you can see -- now effort is not going to lead me anywhere. And that day it will not be you who will drop the effort, it drops on its own accord. And when it drops on its own accord, meditation happens.

Meditation is not a result of your efforts, meditation is a happening. When your efforts drop, suddenly meditation is there... the benediction of it, the blessedness of it, the glory of it. It is there like a presence... luminous, surrounding you and surrounding everything. It fills the whole earth and the whole sky.

That meditation cannot be created by human effort. Human effort is too limited. That blessedness is so infinite. You cannot manipulate it. It can happen only when you are in a tremendous surrender. When you are not there only then it can happen. When you are a no-self -- no desire, not going anywhere -- when you are just herenow, not doing anything in particular, just being, it happens. And it comes in waves and the waves become tidal. It comes like a storm, and takes you away into a totally new reality.

But first you have to do all that you can do, and then you have to learn non-doing. The doing of the non-doing is the greatest doing, and the effort of effortlessness is the greatest effort.

Your meditation that you create by chanting a mantra or by sitting quiet and still and forcing yourself, is a very mediocre meditation. It is created by you, it cannot be bigger than you. It is homemade, and the maker is always bigger than the made. You have made it by sitting, forcing in a yoga posture, chanting 'rama, rama, rama' or anything -- 'blah, blah, blah' -- anything. You have forced the mind to become still.

It is a forced stillness. It is not that quiet that comes when you are not there. It is not that silence which comes when you are almost non-existential. It is not that beautitude which descends on you like a dove.

It is said when Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist in the Jordan River, god descended in him, or the holy ghost descended in him like a dove. Yes, that is exactly so. When you are not there peace descends in you... fluttering like a dove... reaches in your heart and abides there and abides there forever.

You are your undoing, you are the barrier. Meditation is when the meditator is not. When the mind ceases with all its activities -- seeing that they are futile -- then the unknown penetrates you, overwhelms you.

The mind must cease for god to be. Knowledge must cease for knowing to be. You must disappear, you must give way. You must become empty, then only you can be full.

That night I became empty and became full. I became non-existential and became existence. That night I died and was reborn. But the one that was reborn has nothing to do with that which died, it is a discontinuous thing. On the surface it looks continuous but it is discontinuous. The one who died, died totally; nothing of him has remained.

Believe me, nothing of him has remained, not even a shadow. It died totally, utterly. It is not that I am just a modified RUP, transformed, modified form, transformed form of the old. No, there has been no continuity. That day of March twenty-first, the person who had lived for many many lives, for millennia, simply died. Another being, absolutely new, not connected at all with the old, started to exist.

Religion just gives you a total death. Maybe that's why the whole day previous to that happening I was feeling some urgency like death, as if I am going to die -- and I really died. I have known many other deaths but they were nothing compared to it, they were partial deaths.

Sometimes the body died, sometimes a part of the mind died, sometimes a part of the ego died, but as far as the person was concerned, it remained. Renovated many times, decorated many times, changed a little bit here and there, but it remained, the continuity remained.

That night the death was total. It was a date with death and god simultaneously.

Excerpted from The Discipline of Transcendence, Volume 2, Chapter 11.
© Osho International Foundation.

Osho on Ecstasy & Revolution

2006-09-18T18:16:00.000+01:00

THE REBEL

by OSHO

ECSTASY IS A LANGUAGE that man has completely forgotten. He has been forced to forget it; he has been compelled to forget it. The society is against it, the civilization is against it. The society has a tremendous investment in misery. It depends on misery, it feeds on misery, it survives on misery. The society is not for human beings. The society is using human beings as a means for itself. The society has become more important than humanity. The culture, the civilization, the church, they all have become more important. They were meant to be for man, but now they are not for man. They have almost reversed the whole process; now man exists for them.

Every child is born ecstatic. Ecstasy is natural. It is not something that happens only to great sages. It is something that everybody brings with him into the world; everybody comes with it. It is life's innermost core. It is part of being alive. Life is ecstasy. Every child brings it into the world, but then the society jumps on the child, starts destroying the possibility of ecstasy, starts making the child miserable, starts conditioning the child.

The society is neurotic, and it cannot allow ecstatic people to be here. They are dangerous for it. Try to understand the mechanism; then things will be easier.

You cannot control an ecstatic man; it is impossible. You can only control a miserable man. An ecstatic man is bound to be free. Ecstasy is freedom. He cannot be reduced to being a slave. You cannot destroy him so easily; you cannot persuade him to live in a prison. He would like to dance under the stars and he would like to walk with the wind and he would like to talk with the sun and the moon. He will need the vast, the infinite, the huge, the enormous. He cannot be seduced into living in a dark cell. You cannot make a slave out of him. He will live his own life and he will do his thing. This is very difficult for the society. If there are many ecstatic people, the society will feel it is falling apart, its structure will not hold anymore.

Those ecstatic people will be the rebels. Remember, I don't call an ecstatic person "revolutionary"; I call him a "rebel." A revolutionary is one who wants to change the society, but he wants to replace it with another society. A rebel is one who wants to live as an individual and would like there to exist no rigid social structure in the world. A rebel is one who does not want to replace this society with another society -- because all the societies have proved the same The capitalist and the communist and the fascist and the socialist, they are all cousin-brothers; it doesn't make much difference. The society is society. All the churches have proved the same -- the Hindu, the Christian, the Mohammedan.

Once a structure becomes powerful, it does not want anybody to be ecstatic, because ecstasy is against structure. Listen to it and meditate over it: ecstasy is against structure Ecstasy is rebellious. It is not revolutionary.

A revolutionary is a political man; a rebel is a religious man. A revolutionary wants another structure, of his own desire, of his own utopia, but a structure all the same. He wants to be in power. He wants to be the oppressor and not the oppressed; he wants to be the exploiter and not the exploited,he wants to rule and not be ruled. A rebel is one who neither wants to be ruled nor wants to rule. A rebel is one who wants no rule in the world. A rebel is anarchic. A rebel is one who trusts nature, not man-made structures, who trusts that if nature is left alone, everything will be beautiful. It is!

from Ecstasy: The Forgotten Language

INNER REVOLUTION

by OSHO

Revolution is possible only in the individual soul. The social revolution is a pseudo phenomenon, because the society has no soul of its own. Revolution is a spiritual phenomenon. There can be no political revolution, no social revolution, no economic revolution.

The only revolution is that of the spirit; it is individual. And if millions of individuals change, then the society will change as a consequence, not vice versa. You cannot change the society first and hope that individuals will change later on.

That's why revolutions have been failing: because we have taken revolution from a very wrong direction. We have thought that if you change the society, change the structure, economic or political, then one day the individuals, the constituent elements of the society, will change. This is stupid. Who is going to do this revolution?

Revolutions fail. The first reason is because we try from the wrong end.

Secondly, once a revolution has succeeded we have to destroy the revolutionaries, because the revolutionaries are dangerous people. They have destroyed the first society, they will destroy the second, because they are addicted to revolution. They know only one thing, they are experts only in one thing: in throwing governments -- they don't care what government. Their whole expertise and their whole power is in throwing governments. Once a revolution succeeds the first work of the people who come in power is to destroy all the remaining revolutionaries -- and they had succeeded because of them! So each revolution turns to counter-revolution because the people who had brought them into power are more dangerous people.

Try to understand. The mind of a revolutionary is a destructive mind: he knows how to destroy, he does not know how to create. He is very capable of provoking people into violence, but he is absolutely incapable of helping people to become calm and quiet and go to work and create. He does not know that language. For his whole life he has been a revolutionary. His whole work, his whole expertise, is to provoke people to destroy; he knows only that language. And you cannot hope to change his whole life pattern at the end of his life.

So those who are in power have to destroy all the remaining revolutionaries. Each revolution kills its own fathers -- it has to be done -- and once those fathers are killed, the revolution has turned into a counter-revolution. It is no more revolutionary, it is anti-revolutionary.

Revolution cannot be imposed from above. Who will impose it? The people who impose it will be part of the past; they will continue the past. Tell the people that there is no future for political revolutions. Only one kind of revolution is possible, and that is spiritual revolution. Each individual has to change in his being, and if we can change millions of people then the society will change. There is no other way, there is no shortcut.

And this too has to be understood: It is an inherent characteristic of any developing system that heroes emerge and are heroes only in the context which stimulated their creation. As these heroes overcome and change such contexts, the heroes themselves become the context to be changed.

It is an inherent characteristic of any developing system that heroes emerge and are heroes only in the context which stimulated their creation.

Political leaders are temporary leaders. They exist in a certain context; when the context is gone they are gone.

That is where Buddhas are different: their context is eternity. Their context is not a part of time. This is where Jesus, Zarathustra, Lao Tzu, remain eternally meaningful: because they are not part of time their message is eternal. Their message exists in the context of human misery, human ignorance. Unless the whole existence becomes enlightened, Buddha will not become irrelevant.

That's why I say political leaders come and go, they are on the stage just for a few moments. Only spiritual beings remain, abide.

Buddha is still meaningful and will remain meaningful, forever and forever, because enlightenment will always be a need. Politicians don't make the real history of humanity; they only create noise. The real history is something else that runs like an undercurrent. The real history has not yet been written, because we become too engrossed in the temporal things. We become too obsessed with the newspaper which is only relevant today and tomorrow will be meaningless.

If you have eyes to see, see the point: become interested in the eternal.

Old, ancient societies were not interested in the day-to-day too much. Their interest was deeper. They were not brought up on the newspaper, radio and television. They recited the Koran, they meditated on the Gita, they chanted the Vedas, they contemplated the statues of Buddha and Mahavir. These are eternal phenomena.

That's why I say the events that happen every day are almost meaningless, because the moment they happen, immediately they disappear because their context changes. Political revolutions have been happening and disappearing; they are bubbles, soap bubbles. Maybe for a moment they look very beautiful, but they are not eternal diamonds.

The eternal diamond is the inner revolution. But the inner revolution is difficult because the inner revolution needs creativity and the outer revolution needs destructiveness. Hate is easy, love is difficult. To destroy is easy. To create a Taj Mahal takes years -- it took forty years and fifty thousand persons working every day -- but how many days will you take to destroy it? Just take a bulldozer and within a day the land will be flat.

To destroy is very easy, so people become very interested in destruction; they think this is a shortcut. To create is very difficult.

And again I will remind you: because all political revolutions are destructive -- they are capable in destroying -- they can provoke people into destruction. It is very easy to provoke people into destruction because people are frustrated, people are in misery; you can provoke them into any revolt. But the moment they have destroyed, the problem arises: "Now what to do?" They don't know how to create, and your so-called revolutionaries don't know what to do now. Then everybody is at a loss. The misery continues, sometimes even becomes deeper, uglier. After a few years, again people forget and again they start thinking in terms of revolution -- and the political leader is always there to lead you into destruction.

My work here is of creativity. I am not provoking you into any destruction, I am not telling you to blame others for your misery. I am telling you you are responsible, so only those who have the guts to take this responsibility can be with me. But this is a real revolution. If you take the responsibility for your life you can start changing it. Slow will be the change, only in the course of time will you start moving into the world of light and crystallization, but once you are crystallized you will know what real revolution is. Then share your revolution with others; it has to go that way, from heart to heart.

Governments, social structures, have been changed many times, but nothing really changes. Again the same thing is repeated.

That's why I don't call my sannyasins revolutionary but rebellious -- just to make the differentiation. Revolution has become too contaminated with the social idea. Rebellion is individual.

Rebel! Take responsibility for your life. Drop all that nonsense which has been put inside you. Drop all that you have been taught and start learning again from ABC. It is a hard, arduous journey.

And remember one thing more:... thus both coping systems and governments begin as useful and gradually become counter-productive. This is the nature of the evolutionary process itself.

Whatsoever happens on the outside may look in the beginning as if it is very productive; soon it becomes counter-productive -- because life goes on changing. Life goes on taking jumps into the unknown and your structures always lag behind. And each structure in its own turn becomes a grave; it has to be broken again.

But I am showing you a way where there is no need for any structure inside. Consciousness can remain unstructured. That is the meaning of the word 'freedom'. Consciousness need not have any structure, any character. Consciousness can live moment-to-moment without any structure, without any morality, without any character, because consciousness is ENOUGH. You can respond, and your response will be good and virtuous because you responded consciously. Live consciously, without any structure, so you will never be caught in a counter-productive system. Otherwise that too happens: you learn one thing; it is beautiful, but only for a few days will it remain beautiful. Soon it will become a habit and again you will find yourself surrounded by a habit, encaged.

Real life has to be lived without habits. You have heard, again and again you have been told, "Drop bad habits." I tell you: Drop habit as such! There are not good and bad habits: all habits are bad. Remain without habits, live without habits; then you live moment-to-moment out of freedom -- and this is the life of a revolutionary.

from The Secret of Secrets

Some considerations of mine...

2006-09-17T10:26:00.000+01:00

So what are my first considerations on all this Osho rigmarole?

I seem to find similarities with:

Jesus: Jesus & Osho were equally mistreated, imprisoned, misunderstood, spoke in parables/dicta, got upset and violent with hypocrites and tax collectors (in the Temples!), never wrote anything but only spoke via their discourses, wanted to create a new world/existential vision... Had some not-quite-fully understood friendships with Mary of Magdla, young John "the Evangelist", Judas (a male version of Ma Sheela, eh?) Vivek, Neelam, etc. Jesus ended up on a cross, Osho was cremated on a wooden ghat.
Can you find more parallels? Need help.
I can only draw conclusions and comments from my Westernised culture and historical background -- I won't even mention any Eastern connections, as I'm not suitably equipped to ponder on matters outside my current knowledge...
Well, Osho had deep radiant eyes and a big smile... Useful tools.
Every now and then he said essential wisdom... But then, it's easy if you got the cultural depth. And he did, he did - believe you me.
Had sharp sense of humour (I don't think JC had much of it, did he? Not recorded anyway), and liked dancing... he also liked...er...money, yep, money alright - and sex. Not so JC.
Now, whether Osho used money as a vehicle/tool to trascendence, well, that's another story - and a difficult one at that. Same with sex. He was indeed called the "guru of the rich" and the "sex guru" - and he did say that money & sex are good for the spirit, make you more secure and ready to go onto better things. Whereas the poor has other worries to think about (like eating, for instance), and would not concentrate properly in relaxing meditation. Hmmm, seems a bit egotistical and discriminatory to say the least, but... money does give security, right? And sex is self-fulfilling.
His life, from the late 70s on was a real mess -- I think he must've lost control of what was happening around him and because of him. Later he was completely submerged by his immediate collaborators, almost dominated by them... He took refuge in silence, for a while. But was he really so dominated? Subsequently distancing himself from those who fell, he demonstrated prior knowledge and consent, perhaps even a major leading role.
The his mind went bonkers.
JC didn't age well either.
Funny (if not tragic) was his so-called "World Tour": he was seeking a sort of asylum after deportation from the U.S., a resting place (R & R), and no country would have him. So, back to the origins: India and Pune. Still, I believe he had to settle a cumbersome tax bill...

....
....uhmmm, go and figure it out.... can't think straight...
...fuck
.....so much controversy, crap, brainwashing, promiscuity, chaos...
hard to find the pearl in the pigstay --- Osho had a pearl somewhere, a shiny one at that... but got lost in the mindfucking orgy...
hey, just a minute, let me paste here Osho's wisdom on FUCK (it'll help me think)....::::

~ Question: BELOVED MASTER, I FEEL SHOCKED WHEN YOU USE THE WORD 'FUCK'. WHAT TO DO?

~ Osho: Sargamo, it is one of the most beautiful words.
The English language should be proud of it.
I don't think any other language has such a beautiful word.
One Tom from California has done some great research on it.
I think he must be the famous Tom of Tom, Dick and Harry fame.
He says: One of the most interesting words in the English language today is the word 'fuck'.
It is one magical word: just by its sound it can describe pain, pleasure, hate and love.
In language it falls into many grammatical categories.
It can be used as a verb, both transitive (John fucked Mary) and intransitive (Mary was fucked by John), and as a noun (Mary is a fine fuck).
It can be used as an adjective (Mary is fucking beautiful).
As you can see there are not many words with the versatility of 'fuck'.
Besides the sexual meaning, there are also the following uses:

Fraud: I got fucked at the used car lot.
Ignorance: Fucked if I know.
Trouble: I guess I am fucked now!
Aggression: Fuck you!
Displeasure: What the fuck is going on here?
Difficulty: I can't understand this fucking job.
Incompetence: He is a fuck-off.
Suspicion: What the fuck are you doing?
Enjoyment: I had a fucking good time.
Request: Get the fuck out of here!
Hostility: I am going to knock your fucking head off!
Greeting: How the fuck are you?
Apathy: Who gives a fuck?
Innovation: Get a bigger fucking hammer.
Surprise: Fuck! You scared the shit out of me!
Anxiety: Today is really fucked.

And it is very healthy too.

If every morning you do it as a Transcendental Meditation -- just when you get up, the first thing, repeat the mantra "Fuck you!" five times -- it clears the throat.
That's how I keep my throat clear!
Enough for today.

[under construction - needs further input & contributions]

~ On navigating the 'Net to search for relevant material on gurus and fancy religious quests, I found this very interesting book:

The author, Geoffrey D. Falk, seems to be out to unmask frauds and maniacs in the guru zone, but doesn't leave out some sharp comments on the Catholic Church et al.

I think he did an extremely good job, although no specific attention is given to the deeper religious backgrounds. Not the aim of the book anyway. Falk isn't out to do exegesis, but to investigate the human miseries of those involved (and many the miseries are, unfortunately -- mainly befalling followers a.k.a. victims. I would've liked him to have given us a definition of "gullible" when applied to conversion and proselytes. At what point does reason become obnubilated in the follower's mind?).

Below are some extra comments -- appended to the book itself, which you can download free (how good of him: thanks!)

Armed with wit, insight, and truly astonishing research, Geoffrey Falk utterly demolishes the notion of the enlightened guru who can lead devotees to nirvana. This entertaining and yet deadly serious book should be read by everyone pursuing or thinking of pursuing the path of guru devotion.
—John Horgan, author of Rational Mysticism

Stripping the Gurus is superb—one of the best books of its kind I have ever read. The research is meticulous, the writing engaging, and the overall thesis: devastatingly true. A stellar book.
—Dr. David C. Lane, California State University

This gripping and disturbing book should be read by anyone who finds themself revering a spiritual teacher.
—Susan Blackmore, author of The Meme Machine

Geoffrey Falk's delightful but disturbing unmasking of religious prophets and preachers who command a vast following is a welcome contribution to the literature on the gurus and god-men of all religions.
—Dr. Narasingha P. Sil, Western Oregon University

No one involved in contemporary spirituality can afford to ignore this book. It exposes the darker side of modern spiritual movements, those embarrassing—sometime vicious or criminal—reports which the leaders of these movements prefer to hide. With wit and humility, and without abandoning the verities of religion, Falk has provided a corrective critique of groups that peddle enlightenment and transcendence. A must!
—Len Oakes, author of Prophetic Charisma

....
....

A Path

2006-09-16T16:09:00.000+01:00

YOUR CREATIVE ECSTASY

Thus Radhakrishnan:

A lightning flash, a sudden flame of incandescence, throws a momentary but eternal gleam on life in time. A strange quietness enters the soul; a great peace invades its being. The vision, the spark, the supreme moment of unification of conscious realization, sets the whole being ablaze with perfect purpose. The supreme awareness, the intimately felt presence, brings with it a rapture beyond joy, a knowledge beyond reason, a sensation more intense than life itself, infinite in peace and harmony.

...I experienced a shattering thunderbolt of ecstasy and my body dissolved into the flow of matter or energy of which the universe is made. I was swept into the core of existence from which all things arise and into which all things converge. Here there is no distinction between subject and object, space and time, or anything else. Here everything simply ***is*** and there is no beginning and no ending -- only becoming.

The aspect of this place is quite simple, although I cannot recall details too well. There is a flow into the centre and a flow out from the centre, but no form. The colour is neutral, both warm and cool, and there is a soft light emanating from underneath, giving off faint glow. I do not remember if there was any sound, but there was total integration so there would be no distinction between sound and no sound. All one is aware of is pure ecstasy and love.

There was no dominant element or directing force. Everything flowed from itself by its own energy. If there is any god or creative power, it exists only as a man-made concept.

In form, the ultimate reality seemed at times to have six corners, but this may have been a transitional stage of vision prior to reaching the centre. I recall describing the core as a Star composed of an infinite number of shiny starlets revolving in a spiral toward a centre which itself is infinite, and that each of the starlets is composed of still smaller stars also revolving toward an infinite centre and so on. It may be that at the ultimate point one is within the core and stored images acquire an independent entropy.

There is no sensation as such at the core -- only a state of utter, ineffable bliss. Here, as in my earlier phases of super-consciousness, one is aware of a tremendous surge of compassion and a powerful desire to share one's rapture with others. As the self dissolves, the other becomes one with all else and so there is no selfishness. Nor is there any element of conflict -- because all are one.

I am aware of having made a loud exclamation at the moment of revelation and having spoken at some times during my deepest experience, but I do not remember any words except that at the end I said, "tutto è veramente uno" (all is indeed one), as I discovered this truth. I have no idea whether I was seconds or hours in this state.

As I felt myself reappearing from the profound rapture of the core, I questioned, momentarily, the value of returning. For an instant I was tempted to remain in the place of infinite beauty, but I began to think of the interest that life in the world holds---music, books, art, people---a different kind of pleasure than the other, and I let myself rise to the surface of consciousness. What would have happened if my joy in the world were not quite so strong and I had yielded to that temptation?

What an effort to describe an essentially ineffable experience!

Now our turn...

EXERCISE:

1. To begin the self treatment choose a quiet, semidarkened room and close the windows partially. Let in a little air but try to keep most of the noise outside. Pick a time of the day or night when you are reasonably sure to be undisturbed by either visits or telephone. A good time to start is when one is physically tired -- at the end of the day, just before retiring, or immediately upon awakening before full consciousness has returned to the mind. But any other time is suitable as well, provided there is truly no interruption or distraction. Lie down on a couch or bed with your head slightly elevated and wear as little clothing as you can. The room should be neither too cold nor too warm, and it is always good to have a warm, relaxing bath prior to beginning the technique.

2. Speak in a slow, quiet voice the following phrase: "I, _______________ (insert your name), am myself and fully part of the godhead and part of the universe. I am with God and God is with me. Psychic force within me, arise!" Close your eyes now and visualize an energy flow within yourself originating from the solar plexus or stomach area and rising up towards the top of your head. Visualize it and feel it as a gentle stream of energy particles somewhat like a waterfall except that it goes in the opposite direction. Hold the thought of this phenomenon for a little while, increasing its strength gradually until it reaches the proportions of a powerful stream.

3. It is important to have a clean and clear mind free from all thoughts whether logical or emotional. If you have difficulties of cleansing your mind, visualize one mandala emblem again and again (pick one from somewhere: there are plenty on the 'Net). This will empty your mind of all extraneous thoughts. You cannot have any form of emotional turmoil within you if you want this experiment to succeed. It is therefore important that, prior to beginning, you have already cleansed yourself of these interfering thought patterns. If you have difficulties in arousing this "stream of psychic power" within yourself, go back to the beginning. Get up from the couch. Go through the entire ritual of preparing the room. If necessary, take a second warm bath and cleanse your mind again of all interfering thoughts. Then, start all over again. Eventually you will succeed in raising this power reservoir within you.

4. As you hold the visualization and thought of the psychic power within you as a stream, you order it to accomplish certain tasks upon which you have meditated beforehand. You then verbalize the command as follows: "Psychic energy within me, you are all-powerful. I direct you to make_____ do _____ (here the desired action is spelled out). You repeat this twice more in a slow, low, measured tone of voice.

5. After a minute or two of total rest in which you must be careful to avoid any extraneous thoughts whatsoever, you visualize the accomplished action as something that has already taken place. You see yourself with eyes closed having just done what you have already ordered your psychic force within to accomplish. You hold the idea and the picture of that accomplishment for as long as you can, then you speak again in the same tone of voice as you did before: "I _________ have done _________. My psychic power is omnipotent and omniscient. I am ecstatic. The power is mine. I am the power, so mote it be." This is followed by a few minutes of rest and some deep, measured breathing and then the exercise period is over.

So, here you should reach ecstasy.
Well, have you?

The above just to help you get "out of yourself" into the higher realms of consciousness and derive all the benefits found therein.

I am really quite interested in MIND COMMUNION, you know. The crossing of minds, and the crossing means Mind-communion, and Mind-communion...

...is an experience in which the human being (microcosm) intuits and perceives their participation in an "everything" and feels pervaded by the nature of this great organic unity (macrocosm), energized by the force of sharing with the Other. It means stimulating the mind in a tremendous yearning for the infinite, for fluidity, for joy, for peace, for play, for harmony, for the sense of beauty, of magic, of marvel, of tenderness, of transcendental warmth, of poetry, of fullness, of trust, of loyalty and of the devastating intuition of the mystery of eternal love and creative ecstasy.

Philosophy is born of wonder, which is then the motor of its proceeding.
Art produces wonder, which is then its instrumental capacity of knowledge.
Wonder is being in the face of being.
The harmony of the world is the substance of man and all the cosmos.
All things are born of harmony (which gushes from chaos), constitute harmony and continually fight to reconquer it and broaden it.
Poetry guides the course of the stars and guides thus the life of all things. Through poetry and art you discover beauty. But you need to want beauty in order to see it, to bring it into the world.

Perhaps this is the new value to be pursued.

In any case, in beauty there's a tension beyond communion: the tension to be a new man, that new man who is in us must come about in order to be our salvation.
This tension makes me see things differently, to conceive with other modality and perspectives until it leads me to certain elementary discoveries, to certain evidence that fills me with wonder.

Perhaps this is a new moral instance, also, which urges me to seek the path towards a new harmony in the world of the nature of human relationships.

I, you, the Other, everyone then... A Communion that becomes a cosmos where the created is intertwined with all its living points, a cross-roads of all that exists.

Life is a proceeding towards ever greater clarity and knowledge, something much more intense than any intellectuality, and it is a proceeding towards "individuation", because being different does not mean being individual.

Experience always brings knowledge with it, where intellectuality is only a shadow and outline, and provides contrasts, not individuations.

Individuation is a high step that has to be climbed.

The Mind sense is a sense of continuous integration with the world, it is total adherence. It implies development, capacity to pass fear and regard the different, the world, with an open mind.

The impulse to perceive and to think in "Mind Symbiosis" now appears propitious, indicating a path to follow. It is vision and starting point capable of permeating with self the sense of space, of specific creation, of individual "product". It reshuffles the cards of communication.

If life is yearning, a passionate journey which amplifies the consciousness, it is a moral commitment, without the acrid sense often attributed to the term.

It is joy of moral commitment.

It is joy because it promotes love and life, because it guards the shattering impulse of love.

All this before any possible design that becomes objectivity of vision and verification.

This gives rise to an ideal impulse, a need t project the image beyond the hedge of contingencies. And the design in itself has value.

The permeating and communicative force of the ideal image is put to the test of a real image, which becomes relation, commitment, goal. It walks in the depths: "communication occurs only from depth to depth". In all this, I proceed towards individuation, that is, towards being always more myself. But I still do not know what this is, it is a glimmer that my being pursues, the way I perceive and the light is within me. I know that I do not know, but a recondite part of me does know.

I feel with my whole being that it is so.

The very moment that you do too, that's communion! Communion via individuation:

WOW, great!

And there you have it.

Let's prepare

2006-09-15T16:20:00.000+01:00

Western man, in his ambition to fly out of his body, has identified with the head or, at lowest, with the heart. Orientals, with no less spiritual ambition, have stressed the importance of attaining rootedness in the body first and have cultivated the feeling of the centre of gravity in the belly. This experience, which might appear to be a matter of trivial psychological gymnastics, has proved to be an exercise of far-reaching consequences. The pursuit of centredness on the abdominal region is the dominant element in the method of eastern meditation, and I have found great benefit in it for reaching out.

The preparation is common to most meditation practices:

1. Choose a quiet room, neither dark nor bright. In a bright room one is disturbed by outward images, in a dark room, by inner images.

2. Choose a comfortable position, which the body will not be compelled to change soon, a sitting position. Crossing of the legs in the traditional lotus posture is quite unnecessary for anyone not accustomed to it. On the contrary, it is a good idea to set the feet firmly on the ground.

3. Hold the back straight (supported by a back rest if desired) and the head high but bent backward a little, so that the tip of the nose is vertically over the navel and the "light of the eyes" can easily be directed toward the body's centre (solar plexus), that is, so that consciousness can easily be directed toward the unconscious.

4. Keep the eyes half closed. The same would be true of entirely open or entirely closed eyes as of bright or dark rooms. The eyes -- their gaze converging over the tip of the nose -- are directed toward the solar plexus.

5. Hold the hands together, as in the Chinese greeting -- the right hand forms a fist which is held clasped by the left. This represents a communio naturarum of the yin and yang, if you wish to really know.

6. Before beginning to meditate, breathe from three to five times, deeply, slowly and evenly, so that the "sea of breath" is stimulated in the abdomen. In this way you will avoid being disturbed in the course of meditation by the need to take a deep breath. During meditation, pay no attention to breathing. The mouth must be closed, you must breathe entirely through your nose.

7. Look profoundly inward, at the mental image of a mandala (or another image of your pleasure - you form the image: it must be YOUR creation, from your brain energy). You must picture the interconnection uniting all of us into you. Thus you will be in our presence as it were, and will keep yourself open to meditation with confidence.

8. Banish all thought. A total emptiness of mind is created. Meditation consists in "letting go". It is not the surface consciousness but the creative genius of the deep psyche that should speak to us.

9. This emptiness of thought is facilitated by its positive counterpart, which consists in directing consciousness toward the body's centre, that is, the unconscious.

10. You now enter upon the first of the three preparatory stages of meditation. All thoughts are bound fast in imagination to the body's centre (eros!) like monkeys at the foot of a tree. The bond between logos and eros paralyzes the "monkey" thoughts. Consciousness by an act of the imagination is shifted to the solar plexus, that is, the unconscious.

11. This produces a certain degree of relaxation, though there is still a faint striving to hold fast.

12. One now attains the third stage, in which there is no further effort or tension, a state of peaceful beatitude.

Now at last the stage has been reached in which something can "happen" to you. What you now experience is the content of your meditation -- but images and ideas must be expelled at once! It is impossible to guess beforehand what this content will be. Certain temporary disturbances of the meditation will occur, but these are actually an indication that you have meditated correctly.

At point No. 7 you may use soothing music to prepare for the oncoming three stages. Relaxing ambience would assist in achieving a release of tension.

Now something WILL happen to you, and you MUST record it.

The inner journey to creativeness has started with ecstasy.

Write your experience to me, if you please. Email it to me or post a comment. I'd be delighted.

You may find it difficult to write on your "revelation". But you MUST.

Because of its openness to the promptings from your deeper nature, and its attunement to your inner creative voices, the way may be expected to be a highly individual one.

Indeed, if we seek analogies for this experience, the closest might be found in the life of some artists, whose endeavour has been to follow their "calling" or vocation. Their attunement to themselves cannot in general be divorced from their process of expression, so that their art is at the same time a result and a discipline.

When the Greeks spoke of the poet as one possessed by the Muses, they were not merely indulging in a metaphor. For many, the visionary or clairaudient experience was as true as that which Socrates reported in speaking of his daimon, and this has continued to be true among a number of artists in our own tradition.

Dante writes:
I am one who when Love inspires me, takes note; and I go on setting it forth after the fashion which Love dictates within me.

In Whitman we read:
Oh, I am sure they come from Thee, the urge, the order, the unconquerable will, the potent, felt, interior command, stronger than words. A message from the heavens, whispering to me ever in my sleep.

They are both speaking of the true experience of inspiration, which most people today have come to regard as little more than a figure of speech. Such experiences do not differ in essence from that which Alfred De Musset describes in the following terms: "...it is not work. It is merely listening. It is as if some unknown person were speaking in your ear."

The direct transmission of spiritual energy, or the possibility for a superconsciously inspired individual to bring another into contact with his/her own superconscious source of inspiration, is well recognized in the different mystical traditions both as verbal and non-verbal processes.

So, meditate.

The river flows, the watcher sits by its bank. Swallows cross the sky, the sky remains.

Make your meditating exercise one of action-in-inaction: watch your stream of consciousness without interfering with its course. Swallows cross the sky, the sky remains. "The mind is like a mirror -- it projects nothing, it clings to nothing."

Mind is like space...

Our must be an exercise in spontaneity and freedom. The river must flow on its own. You accept its course. You follow the calling. Precisely because, like space, you are like nothing, you may be filled by everything. You can let everything be and reach your creative ecstasy.

Follow the calling.

Achieve meaning.

Manifest with your mind the true dimensions of the self-spirit.

Osho's Other Meditations - 1

2006-09-14T21:09:00.000+01:00

ABOUT MEDITATION by OSHO --- [follow the links below]

What is meditation?
Meditation is not concentration.
Choosing a meditation.
Creating a space for meditation.

Be loose and natural

1. What is meditation?

"Meditation is a single lesson of awareness, of no-thought, of spontaneity, of being total in your action, alert, aware. It is not a technique, it is a knack. Either you get it or you don't." - Osho

Osho has spoken volumes on the subject of meditation. Virtually all his talks include the importance of meditation in everyday life. And despite the fact that he says meditation is not a technique, he has invented dozens of them, and spoken on dozens more from other traditions.

Ultimately, meditation is an experience which is not easily described, like the taste of cheese or falling in love -- you have to try it to find out. But for sure anyone interested in meditation will find something in what Osho has to say about this topic that "clicks" for them, just like a "knack" -- including his insistence that he can be helpful to you, but ultimately each individual has to create his path by walking it.

2. Meditation is not concentration

MEDITATION is not concentration. In concentration there is a self concentrating and there is an object being concentrated upon. There is duality. In meditation there is nobody inside and nothing outside. It is not concentration . There is no division between the in and the out. The in goes on flowing into the out, the out goes on flowing into the in. The demarcation, the boundary, the border, no longer exists. The in is out, the out is in; it is a no-dual consciousness.

Concentration is a dual consciousness; that's why concentration creates tiredness; that's why when you concentrate you feel exhausted. And you cannot concentrate for twenty-four hours, you will have to take holidays to rest. Concentration can never become your nature. Meditation does not tire, meditation does not exahaust you. Meditation can become a twenty-four hour thing - day in, day out, year in, year out. It can become eternity. It is relaxation itself.

Concentration is an act, a willed act. Meditation is a state of no will, a state of inaction. It is relaxation. One has simply dropped into one's own being, and that being is the same as the being of All. In Concentration the mind functions out of a conclusion: you are doing something. Concentration comes out of the past. In meditation there is no conclusion behind it. You are not doing anything in particular, you are simply being. It has no past to it, it is pure of all future, It what Lao Tzu has called wei-wu-wei, action through inaction. It is what Zen masters have been saying: Sitting silently doing nothing, the spring comes and the grass grows by itself. Remember, 'by itself - nothing is being done. You are not pulling the grass upwards; the spring comes and the grass grows by itself. That state - when you allow life to go on its own way. When you don't want to give any control to it, when you are not manipulating, when you are not enforcing any discipline on it - that state of pure undisciplined spontaneity, is what meditation is.

Meditation is in the present, pure present. Meditation is immediacy. You cannot meditate, you can be in meditation. You cannot be in concentration, but you can concentrate. Concentration is human, meditation is divine.

3. Choosing a meditation

FROM the very beginning find something which appeals to you.

Meditation should not be a forced effort. If it is forced, it is doomed from the very beginning. A forced thing will never make you natural. There is no need to create unnecessary conflict. This is to be understood because mind has natural capacity to meditate if you give it objects which are appealing to it.

If you are body oriented, there are ways you can reach towards God through the body because the body also belongs to God. If you feel you are heart oriented, then prayer, If you feel you are intellect oriented, then meditation .

But my meditations are different in a way. I have tried to devise methods which can be used by all three types. Much of the body is used in the, much of the heart and much of the intelligence. All the three are joined together and they work on different people in a different way.

Body heart mind - all my meditations move in the same way. They start from the body, they move through the heart, they reach to the mind and then they go beyond.

Always remember, whatsoever you enjoy can go deep in you; only that can go deep in you. Enjoying it simply means it fits with you. The rhythm of it falls in tune with you: there is a subtle harmony between you and the method . Once you enjoy a method then don't become greedy; go into that method as much as you can. You can do it once or, if possible, twice a day. The more you do it, the more you will enjoy it. Only drop a method when the joy has disappeared; then its work is finished. Search for another method. No method can lead you to the very end. On the journey you will have to change trans many times. A certain method takes you to a certain state. Beyond that it is of no more use, it is spent.

So two things have to be remembered: when you are enjoying a method go into it as deeply as possible, but never become addicted to it because one day you will have to drop it too. If you become too much addicted to it then it is like a drug; you cannot leave it. You no more enjoy it - it is giving you anything - but it has become a habit. Then one can continue it, but one is moving in circles; it cannot lead beyond that.

So let joy be the criterion. If joy is there continue, to the last bit of joy go on. It has to be squeezed totally. No juice should be left behind….not even a single drop. And then be capable of dropping it. Choose some other method that again brings the joy. Many times a person has to change. It various with different people but it is very rare that one method will do the whole journey.

There is no need to do many meditations because you can do confusing things, contradictory things, and the pain will arise.

Choose two meditations and stick to them. In fact I would like you to choose one; that would be the best. It is better to repeat one that suits you, many times. Then it will go deeper and deeper. You try many things - one day one things, another day another things. And you invent your own, so you can create many confusions. In the book of Tantra there are one hundred and twelve meditations, You can go crazy. You are already crazy!

Meditations are not fun. They can sometimes be dangerous. You are playing with a subtle, a very subtle mechanism of the mind. Something a small thing that you were not aware you were doing can become dangerous. So never try to invent, and don't make your own hotch-potch meditation. Choose two and just try them for a few weeks.

4. Creating a space for meditation

If you can create a special place - a small temple or a corner in the home where you can meditate every day - then don't use that corner for any other purpose, because every purpose has its own vibration. Use that corner only for meditation and nothing else. Then the corner will become charged and it will wait for you every day. The corner will be helpful to you, the milieu will create a particular vibration, a particular atmosphere in which you can go deeper and deeper more easily. That's the reason why temples, churches and mosques were created - just to have a place that existed only for prayer and meditation.

If you can choose a regular hour to meditate, that's also very helpful because your body, you mind, is a mechanism. If you take lunch at a particular hour

When I say meditate, I know that through meditation nobody reaches; but through meditation you reach to the point where no meditation becomes possible.

Every day, you body starts crying for food at that time. Sometimes you can even play tricks on it. If you take your lunch at one o'clock and the clock says that it is now one o'clock, you will be hungry - even if the clock is not right and it is only eleven or twelve. You look at the clock, it says one o'clock, and suddenly you feel hunger within. Your body is a mechanism.

Your mind is also a mechanism. Meditate every day in the same place, at the same time, and you will create a hunger for meditation within your body and mind. Every day at that particular time your body and mind will ask you to go into meditation. It will be helpful. A space is created in you which will become a hunger, a thirst.

In the beginning it is very good. Unless you come to the point where meditation has become natural and you can meditate anywhere, in any place, at any time - up to that moment, use these mechanical resources of the body and the mind as a help.

It gives you a climate: you put off the light, you have a certain incense burning in the room, you have certain incense burning in the room, you have certain clothes a certain height, a certain softness, you have a certain posture. This all helps but this does not cause it. If somebody else follows it, this may become a hindrance. One has to find one's own ritual. A ritual is simply to help you to be at ease and wait. And when you are at ease and waiting the thing happens; just like sleep, God comes to you. Just like love, God comes to you. You cannot will it, you cannot force it.

5. Be loose and natural

ONE can be obsessed with meditation. And obsession is the problem: you were obsessed with money and now you are obsessed with meditation. Money is not the problem, obsession is the problem, You were obsessed with the market, now you are obsessed with God. The market is not the problem but obsession. One should be loose and natural an not obsessed with anything, neither mind nor meditation. Only then, unoccupied, unobsessed, when you are simply flowing, the ultimate happens to you.

~ from OshoWorld.com

Osho's Other Meditations - 2

2006-09-13T21:15:00.000+01:00

ACTIVE MEDITATION

"In Buddha's time, dynamic methods of meditation were not needed. People were more simple, more authentic. They lived a more real life. Now, people are living a very repressed life, a very unreal life. When they don't want to smile, they smile. When they want to be angry, they show compassion. People are false, the whole life pattern is false. People are just acting, not living. Many incomplete experiences go on being collected, piled up inside their minds.

"Just sitting directly in silence won't help. The moment you will sit silently, you will see all sorts of things moving inside you; you will feel it almost impossible to be silent. First throw those things out so you come to a natural state of rest. Real meditation starts only when you are at rest."
~ OSHO
The Discipline of Transcendence, Vol. 2, Discourse 5

All of Osho's active meditations involve a beginning stage of activity -- sometimes intense and physical -- followed by a period of silence. All are accompanied by music that has been specially composed to guide the meditator through the different stages. Osho has also recommended different meditations for different times of the day. Follow the links below for details.

DYNAMIC MEDITATION [see also my other post here]
KUNDALINI MEDITATION
NATARAJ MEDITATION
NADABRAHMA MEDITATION
NO DIMENSIONS MEDITATION
GOURISHANKAR MEDITATION
MANDALA MEDITATION

WHIRLING MEDITATION

1. DYNAMIC MEDITATION

"This is a meditation in which you have to be continuously alert, conscious, aware. Whatsoever you do, remain a witness."
~ The daily morning meditation at the ashram

WHEN the sleep is broken, the whole nature becomes alive; the night has gone, the darkness is no more, the sun is coming up, and everything becomes conscious and alert. This is a meditation in which you have to be continuously alert, conscious, aware, whatsoever you do. Remain a witness. Don't get lost.

It is easy to get lost. While you are breathing you can forget. You can become one with the breathing so much that you can forget the witness. But then you miss the point. Breathe as fast, as deep as possible, bring your total energy to it, but still remain a witness. Observe what is happening, as if you are just a spectator, as if the whole thing is happening to somebody else, as if the whole thing is happening in the body and the consciousness is just centered and looking. This A woodcutter, a stone-breaker need not do cathartic meditation - the whole day they are doing it. But for the modern man things have changed.

Witnessing has to be carried in all the three steps. And when everything stops, and in the fourth step you have become completely inactive, frozen, then this alterness will come to its peak.

The dynamic Meditation lasts one hour and is in five stages. It can be done alone, but the energy will be more powerful if it is done in a group. It is an individual experience so you should remain oblivious of others around you and keep your eyes closed throughout, preferably using a blindfold. It is best to have an empty stomach and wear loose, comfortable clothing.

First Stage: 10 minutes.

Breathe chaotically through the nose, concentrating always on the exhalation. The body will take care of the inhalation. Do this as fast and as hard as you possibly can - and then a little harder, until you literally become the breathing. Use your natural body movements to help you to build up your energy. Feel it building up, but don't let go during the first stage.

Second Stage: 10 minutes.

Explode! Let go of everything that needs to be thrown out. Go totally mad, scream, shout, cry, jump, shake, dance, sing, laugh, throw yourself around. Hold nothing back, keep your whole body moving. A little acting often helps to get you started. Never allow your mind to interfere with what is happening. Be total.

Third Stage: 10 minutes.

With raised arms, jump up and down shouting the mantra 'HOO! HOO! HOO!' as deeply as possible. Each time you land, on the flats of your feet, let the sound hammer deep into the sex centre. Give all you have, exhaust yourself totally.

Fourth Stage: 15 minutes.

Stop! Freeze where you are in whatever position you find yourself. Don't arrange the body in any way. A Cough, a movement, anything will dissipate the energy flow and the effort will be lost. Be a witness to everything that is happening to you.

Fifth Stage: 15 minutes.

Celebrate and rejoice with music and dance, expressing your gratitude towards the whole. Carry your happiness with you throughout the day.

If your meditation space prevents you from making a noise, you can do this silent alternative: Rather than throwing out the sound, let the catharsis in the second stage take place entirely through bodily movements. In the third stage the sound 'HOO' can be hammered silently inside and the fifth stage can become an expressive dance.

Someone has said that the meditation we are doing here seems to be sheer madness. It is. And it is that way for a purpose. It is madness with a method; it is consciously chosen.

Remember, you cannot go mad voluntarily. Madness takes possession of you. Only then can you go mad. If you go mad voluntarily, that's a totally different thing. You are basically in control, and one who can control even his madness will never go mad.

Osho talks about some of the reactions that can happen in the body as a result of the deep catharsis of the Dynamic Meditation.

If you feel pain, be attentive to it, don't do anything. Attention is the great sword - it cuts everything. You simply pay attention to the pain.

For example, you are sitting silently in the last part of the meditation, unmoving, and you feel many problems in the body. You feel that the leg is going dead, there is some itching in the hand, you feel that ants are creeping on the body. Many times you have looked and there are no ants. The creeping is inside, not outside. What should you do? You feel the leg is going dead? - be watchful, just give your total attention to it. You feel itching? - don't scratch. That will not help You just give your attention. Don't even open your eyes Just give your attention inwardly, and just wait and watch. Within second, the itching will have disappeared. Whatsoever happens - even if you feel pain, severe pain in the stomach or in the head. It happens because in meditation the whole body changes. It changes it chemistry. New things start happening and the body in a chaos. Sometimes the stomach will be affected, because in the stomach you have suppressed many emotions, and they are all stirred. Some times you feel like vomiting, nauseous. Sometimes you will feel a severe pain in the head because the meditation is changing the inner structure of your brain. Passing through meditation, you are really in a chaos. Soon, things will settle. But for the time being, everything will be unsettled.

So what are you to do? You simply see the pain in the head, watch it. You be a watcher. You just forget that you are a doer, and by and by, everything will subside, and will subside so beautifully and so gracefully that you cannot believe unless you know it. Not only does the pain disappear from the head - because the energy which was creating pain, if watched disappears - the same energy becomes pleasure. The energy is the same.

Pain or pleasure are two dimensions of the same energy. If you can remain silently sitting and paying attention to distractions, all distractions is appear. And when all distractions disappear, you will suddenly become aware that the whole body has disappeared.

Osho has warned against turning this witnessing approach to pain into another fanaticism. If unpleasant physical symptoms - aches and pains or nausea - persist beyond three or four days of daily meditation, there is no need to be a masochist - seek medical advice. This applies to all Osho's meditation techniques.
Read More...

2. KUNDALINI MEDITATION

"...Allow the shaking, don’t do it. Stand silently, feel it coming, and when your body starts a little trembling help it - but don’t do it. Enjoy it, feel blissful about it, allow it, receive it, welcome it - but don’t will it. If you force it, it will become an exercise, a bodily physical exercise. Then the shaking will be there but just on the surface, it will not penetrate you. You will remain solid, stone like, rock like within; you will remain a manipulator, the doer, and the body will just be following. The body is not the question - you are the question." - Osho

Osho Kundalini Meditation lasts for one hour and has four stages, three with music, and the last without. The music has been composed under Osho's direct guidance specially for this particular meditation. If you would like to try, it is described below -- with short samples of the music from each stage. At the bottom of the page you can access the complete sound track. Remember that the last stage is in silence! ... and a gong will signal the end of the silent period -- promise!

First stage: 15 minutes.

Be loose and let your whole body shake, feeling energies moving up from your feet.
Let go everywhere and become the shaking.
Your eyes may be open or closed.

Second stage: 15 minutes.

Dance . . . any way you feel,
and let the whole body move as it wishes.

Third stage: 15 minutes.

Close your eyes and be still, sitting or
standing . . . witnessing whatever is happening inside and out.

Fourth stage: 15 minutes.

Keep your eyes closed, lie down and be still.

Complete Kundalini Meditation
Begin with shaking, then dancing, and end with stillness and silence, first standing or sitting, then lying. This meditation is usually done in the afternoon to let go of the accumulated stress of the day.

3. NATARAJ MEDITATION

"Let the dance flow in its own way; don't force it. Rather, follow it; allow it to happen. It is not a doing but a happening. Remain in the mood of festivity. You are not doing something very serious; you are just playing, playing with your life energy, playing with your bio-energy, allowing it to move in its own way. Just like the wind blows and the river flows, you are flowing and blowing. Feel it.
And be playful. Remember that word "playful" always with me, it is very basic. In India, we call creation God's Leela God's play. God has not created the world; it is his play."

Natraj is dance as a total meditation. There are three stages, lasting a total of 65 minutes.

First Stage: 40 minutes

With eyes closed dance as if possessed. Let your unconscious take over completely. Do not control your movements or be a witness to what is happening. Just be totally in the dance.

Meditation is needed only because you have not chosen to be happy. If you have chosen to be happy there is no need for any meditation. Meditation is medicinal. If you are ill, then the medicine is needed. Buddhas don't need meditation. Once you have started choosing happiness, once you have

Second Stage: 20 minutes

Keeping your eyes closed, lie down immediately. Be silent and still.

Third Stage: 5 minutes

Dance in celebration and enjoy.

Forget the dancer, the center of the ego. Become the dance. That is the meditation Dance so deeply that you forget completely that 'you' are dancing and begin to feel that you are the dance. The division must disappear. Then it becomes a meditation. If the division is there, then it is an exercise: good, healthy, but it cannot be said to be spiritual. It is just a simple dance. Dance is good in itself. As far as it goes, it is good. After it, you will feel fresh, young. But it is not meditation yet. The dancer must go, until only the dance remains.

So what to do? Be totally in the dance, because division can exist only if you are not total in it. If you are standing aside and looking at your own dance, the division will remain you are the dancer and you are dancing. Then dancing is just an act, something you are doing. It is not your being. So get involved totally; be merged in it Don't stand aside, don't be an observer, Participate!

Let the dance flow in its own way. Don't force it. Rather, follow it: allow it to happen. It is not a doing but a happening. Remain in the mood of festivity. You are not doing something very serious. You're just playing, playing with your life energy, playing with your bioenergy, allowing it to move in its own way. Just like the wind blows and the river flows you are flowing and flowing. Feel it.

And be playful. Remember this word 'playful' always. With me, it is very basic. In this country we call creation God's leela, God's play. God has not created the world. It is his play.

4. NADABRAHMA MEDITATION

This is an old Tibetan technique of humming, which creates a healing vibration throughout the body, and a hand movement which centers the energy at the navel.
Nadabrahma meditation lasts for one hour and has three stages. It can be done at any time of day, alone or with others, but have an empty stomach and remain inactive for at least 15 minutes afterwards.

First stage: 30 minutes

Sit in a relaxed position with eyes closed and lips together humming loudly enough to be heard by others and create a vibration throughout your body. You can visualize a hollow tube or an empty vessel, filled only with the vibrations of the humming. A point will come when the humming continues by itself and you become the listener. There is no special breathing and you can alter the pitch or move your body smoothly and slowly if you feel like it.

Second stage: 15 minutes

The second stage is divided into two 7 1/2 minute sections. For the first half, move the hands, palms up, in an outward circular motion. Starting at the navel, both hands move forwards and then divide to make two large circles mirroring each other left and right. The movements should be so slow that at times there will appear to be no movement at all. Feel that you are giving energy outwards to the universe.

After 71/2 minutes turn the hands, palms down, and start moving them in the opposite direction. Now the hands will come together towards the navel and divide outwards to the sides of the body. Feel that you are taking energy in. As in the first stage, don't inhibit any soft, slow movements of the rest of your body.

Third stage: 15 minutes

Sit or lie absolutely quiet and still.

5. NO DIMENSIONS MEDITATION

This is a powerful method for centering one's energy in the hara - the area just below the navel. It is based on a Sufi technique of movements for awareness and integration of the body. It is to be done empty stomach and preferably done around mid day. This one-hour meditation has three stages. During the first two stages the eyes are open but not focused on anything. During the third stage the eyes are closed. The music, created especially for this meditation, begins slowly and gradually becomes faster and faster as an uplifting force.

First stage: 30 minutes music.

A continuous dance in a set of six movements. With your eyes open, begin by standing in one place and placing the left hand on the heart and the right hand on the hara. Stand still for a few moments just listening to the music to get centered. When the bell rings, start the sequence as described below. The movements always come from the center, or hara, using the music to keep the correct rhythm. The hips and eyes face the direction of the hand movement. Use graceful movements in a continuous flow. Loud "Shoo" sounds are made from the throat in synchronicity with the sounds from the recording. Repeat this six-movement sequence continuously for 30 minutes.

1) Touch the backs of the hands together pointing downward on the hara. Breathing in through the nose, bring the hands up to the heart and fill them with love. Breathing out make the sound "Shoo" from the throat and send love out to the world. At the same time move the right arm (with fingers extended, palm downward) and right foot straight forward, and move the left hand back down to the hara. Return to the original position with both hands on the hara.

2) Repeat this movement with the left arm and foot. Return to the original position with both hands on the hara.

3) Repeat this movement with the right arm and foot, turning sideways to the right. Return to the original position with both hands on the hara.

4) Repeat this movement with the left arm and foot, turning sideways to the left. Return to the original position with both hands on the hara.

5) Repeat this movement with the right arm and foot, turning directly behind from the right side. Return to the original position with both hands on the hara.

6) Repeat this movement with the left arm and foot, turning directly behind from the left side. Return to the original position with both hands on the hara.

Second stage: 15 minutes music.

Begin by placing the right toe over the left toe. Fold your arms across your chest and embrace yourself. Feel love for yourself. When the music starts bow down to existence for bringing you here for this meditation. When the tempo changes, begin whirling. Turn anticlockwise keeping the eyes open a little, arms stretched out with the right palm turned upward and the left palm facing the ground. Breathe normally and let the whirling take you over. If you feel discomfort from whirling anticlockwise, you can change to clockwise and reverse position of the hands. If a sensation of nausea arises, focusing the eyes on the right hand can be helpful. To end the whirling, slow down and fold the arms over the chest and heart.

Third stage: Silence, 15 minutes.

Lie down on the belly with your eyes closed. Leave your legs open and not crossed to allow all the energy you have gathered to flow through you. Just go inside and allow witnessing to happen.

6. GOURISHANKAR MEDITATION

Osho has said that if breathing is done correctly in the first stage, the carbon dioxide formed in the bloodstream will make the meditator as high as if on Gourisahnkar (Mt. Everest).

First stage: 15 minutes music. Sit with eyes closed. Inhale deeply through the nose, filling the lungs. Hold the breath for as long as possible then exhale gently through the mouth, keeping the lungs empty for as long as possible. Repeat this cycle.

Second stage: 15 minutes music. Return to normal breathing and, allowing the gaze to be soft and gentle, look at a candle flame or flashing light. * Keep the body still.

Third stage: 15 minutes music. With closed eyes, stand up and left the body be loose and receptive. The subtle energies within will be felt to move the body outside your normal control. Allow this (Latihan) to happen. Don't you do the moving. Let the moving happen.

Fourth stage: 15 minutes silence. Lie down, silent and still.
*The rhythmic beat of the music in the second stage is seven times the normal hearbeat. If possible, the flashing light should be a synchronized strobe.

7. MANDALA MEDITATION

This powerful, cathartic technique creates a circle of energy that results in a natural centering.

First stage: 15 minutes music. With open eyes run on the spot, starting slowly and gradually, getting faster and faster. Bring your knees up as high as possible. Breathe deeply and evenly. Forget the mind and forget the body. Keep going.

Second stage: 15 minutes music. Sit with eyes closed and mouth open and close. Gently rotate your body from the waist, like a reed blowing in the wind. Feel the wind blowing you from your side to side, back and forth, around and around. This will bring your awakened energies to the navel center.

Third stage: 15 minutes music. Lie on your back, open your eyes and, with the head still, rotate them in a clockwise direction. Sweep them fully around in the sockets as if you are following the second hand of a vast clock, but as fast as possible. It is important that the mouth remains open and the jaw relaxed, with the breath soft and even. This will bring your centered energies to the third eye.

Fourth stage: 15 minutes silence. Close your eyes and be still.

8. WHIRLING MEDITATION

Sufi whirling is one of the most ancient techniques. It is good not to eat or drink for a few hours before whirling. It is best to have bare feet and loose clothing.

First stage: 45 minutes

music. Keep your eyes open and feel the center point of your body. Lift your arms to shoulder height, with the right hand palm up and the left hand low, palm down. Start turning around your own axis, anticlockwise. Let your body be soft. Start slowly and after 15 minutes gradually go faster and faster. You become a whirlpool of energy - the periphery a storm of movement but the witness at the center silent and still.

Second stage: 15 minutes

Silence. Let your body fall to the ground when the music stops. (It may already have happened before) Roll onto your stomach immediately so that your navel is in contact with the earth. Feel your body blending into the earth. Keep your eyes closed and remain passive and silent.

~ from OshoWorld.com

Electrocuting the Monk: Thomas Merton

2006-08-29T21:47:00.000+01:00

~ A Man of Alternate Currents...

Few but the cognoscenti may have heard of Thomas Merton: the "All-American Monk" – a man of paradox: the silent monk who addressed the world in over 60 books and articles on topics as diverse as medieval mysticism to the war in Vietnam and nuclear disarmament. The reclusive hermit with many friends. Initially rejecting the world with fanatical fervour, he came to embrace the world with a deep compassion.

The outline of his life can be simply told. He was born in 1915 in France to an American mother and a New Zealand father who was an artist. His mother died when he was six. He was educated in France and England, including a year at Cambridge when he inadvertently fathered a child. And so he came to America in the early 1930s, where he threw himself into the production of the student journal at Columbia University, going to movies and hanging out in the jazz bars of Harlem and 52nd Street.

Whilst working on a post-graduate thesis on William Blake, Merton felt drawn to Christianity and, in particular, Catholicism. He was baptised in 1938. Three years later, after a spell teaching English at a Catholic college in upstate New York, and an abortive attempt at joining the Franciscans, he entered Gethsemani Trappist monastery in Kentucky – a radical, silent order of monks.

The struggle to find himself had only just begun – epitomised in the silent, anonymous monk being directed to write his autobiography. Published as The Seven Storey Mountain, this immediately hit the best-seller list and established Merton as a writer. A prolific writer, especially of letters and journals, and it is these personal writings which have spoken most powerfully – revealing the human spirit beneath the words, a human spirit with whom many are able to identify and find a reflection of themselves.

Through his writings, we are able to follow his life-journey – the evolution of his soul. He wrote on many topics: initially matters of spirituality. But through this Merton came to understand the fundamental unity of all humanity: we are one in the "ground of our being". And so, with the growing nuclear crisis in the early 1960s and later with issues of civil rights at home and the Vietnam war abroad, he was unable to keep silent and, amidst much controversy, entered the fray – without stepping outside the monastery walls.

Eventually, he did leave: in 1968 he was allowed to journey to the Far East to meet Buddhists and others with whom he had a growing interest and affinity. On this trip, like so many icons of the twentieth century, he met his early death: electrocuted by faulty wiring after stepping out of the shower in a Bangkok hotel room. His last recorded words, given at the end of a conference address that morning, were strangely prophetic and typically full of irony:

"So I will disappear from view and we can all have a coke or something. "

It is a timeworn literary conceit, but some writers seem to be several people. There always exists some disparity, of course, between writers and their work. Yet a kind of multiple personality disorder keeps turning up in writers-and writers with a religious bent seem particularly susceptible, as they keep in play not only complex human realities but divine realities as well. Dostoyevsky, Graham Greene, Walker Percy, and many other distinguished names attest to how common a phenomenon this is. But of all the great modern religious writers, no one harbored within himself a larger cast of dramatis personae than Thomas Merton.

First, there is Merton the Contemplative, who emerges in the 1948 autobiographical account of his conversion to Catholicism and entrance into a Trappist monastery, The Seven Storey Mountain. Merton had a true contemplative vocation, though he agonized about its authenticity at several points. The contemplative life formed the deepest (though not always the dominant) part of his personality. Merton came to contemplation partly because of a pure attraction to wordless union with the absolute, partly because of an intense desire to flee a sinful self and world. In most contemplatives, these two motives gradually coalesce. But in Merton they remained in stark and painful contrast.

It did not help that Merton the Contemplative confronted Merton the Writer. Even for a man not vowed to silence, Merton's several dozen books would have been an extraordinary output. But adding the journals - four volumes have now appeared and the whole will run to seven volumes totaling about 3,500 large pages - we begin to glimpse a serious conflict. Can a man committed to the wordless apophatic way and a forgetting of self be preoccupied with recording - and publishing - every thought and act? Gregory Zilboorg, a convert himself and a skilled psychoanalyst, warned Merton in the 1950s that his desire to leave the Trappist communal silence for the even more withdrawn life of a hermit was schizophrenic: "You want a hermitage in Times Square with a large sign over it saying Hermit."

Though not entirely fair to Merton, Zilboorg had a point. Toward the end of The Seven Storey Mountain, Merton had already recognized that:

There was this shadow, this double, this writer, who had followed me into the cloister. . . . He rides my shoulders, sometimes, like the old man of the sea. I cannot lose him. He still wears the name of Thomas Merton. Is it the name of an enemy? . . . Maybe in the end he will kill me, he will drink my blood. Nobody seems to understand that one of us has got to die.

Later, Merton would accept writing as a parallel vocation. But in his frequent references to the soul's "hidden wholeness," his own experience of a war-to-the-death within gives the phrase special poignancy.

There were also other Mertons, among the more troublesome: the Bohemian. This Merton felt a constant need to be an outsider. When Merton lived in the world, it took the usual forms. He had aspirations to being an experimental writer and poet (his Collected Poems, which show real innovation but great unevenness, run to almost 1,000 pages). He listened to jazz, dabbled in leftist politics, hit the bottle pretty hard, smoked heavily, had his share of girlfriends, and did a bit of drawing. All relatively harmless, but some incongruous holdover bedeviled Merton the monk.

Should a Trappist be interested in Henry Miller? Or follow Joan Baez? Or Bob Dylan? As late as 1959 (after eighteen years in the abbey), Merton was reading books like James Thurber's The Years with Ross, an account of life under Harold Ross, editor of the New Yorker. The New Yorker of the fifties was more staid than its current incarnation, and Merton often claimed the chic ads reminded him of everything in the world he had fled. But there was something odd in a monk even being interested in a magazine like the New Yorker. Merton sometimes took pride in what he regarded as the fact that poets and monks are marginal people. The Trappist life occasionally seemed good to him because it represented the greatest nonconformity in the world.

A Fourth Merton, one still well known, is the Social Activist. The fifties and early sixties provided him with a series of social questions to ponder: the Cold War, nuclear arms, the peace movement, the civil rights movement, third-worldism, and the materialism of both America and Russia. A cloistered monk is not in the best position to be well- informed about the outside world. But Merton's sheer skill as a writer coupled with the deep monastic perspective made him a powerful voice in social causes.

Intimately interwoven with these four Mertons is someone we are forced to call Merton the Man. This Fifth Business never entirely settled down. The Contemplative, as may be seen in painful detail in the journals, is constantly vacillating, though in his public work Merton displays spiritual mastery. The Writer is gifted, but so much so that he has a tendency toward glibness. The Bohemian Merton got the others into any number of scrapes, and the Activist Merton often got carried away by currents in the sixties that - in retrospect - were not entirely fair to American society. Yet when all is said and done, Merton remains one of the great contemplative spirits of the century.

Merton's early life is well known from The Seven Storey Mountain. He was born in 1915 in the French village of Prades. His father, Owen Merton, was a painter and-when financial need demanded-a part-time musician who had left his native New Zealand seeking a wider world. His mother, Ruth, was an American of Quaker background with artistic ambitions. They met in Paris as art students and were working in the south of France when Thomas was born.

Artistic parents are usually both a blessing and a curse, and the Mertons were no exception. Thomas inherited gifts of insight that frequently outran even his considerable talents as a writer. His conversion would owe much to aesthetic intuitions. Yet in his mature years he believed that some cold ambition in his mother had early made him feel unworthy and led to a distance from women. Ruth died when Merton was only six, but his descriptions of her are not nostalgic. On the contrary, he notes the narrowness and provincialism on that side of the family, both socially and religiously.

Merton's father became even more restless after Ruth's death. He took Thomas with him to Cape Cod, Bermuda, New York, England, and, eventually, back to France. Thomas spent three years in a dismal lycee in the south of France, but he also absorbed there something of the medieval Catholicism of the region, which would play a large role in his future. Though he developed a facility for foreign languages, it was a relief when his father told him one day to pack up for a move to England.

As it turned out, Merton did not like England much better than France. His schools were more congenial and he became popular and wrote a great deal. But the smug wealth of 1920s Britain repelled him. He also felt that the Church of England had become a religion of social manners. Within a few years his father developed brain cancer and suffered a long, painful death. Sometime before he fell ill, Owen Merton had had a religious conversion, and Thomas was later to speculate about what purpose that suffering may have served in his father's spiritual development. But by fifteen, Merton had lost both parents.

He won a modest scholarship to Cambridge, but the posh Cambridge of the thirties proved a bad environment. If Merton was no worse than many other undergraduates, he was no better either. Besides drinking heavily, neglecting his studies, and engaging in the usual undergraduate pranks, he also fathered a child with a "lower class" girl (this episode, duly recorded by Merton, was excised by the Trappist censors from The Seven Storey Mountain). Legal niceties were tidied up by Tom Bennett, his guardian. But Bennett wrote to Merton on Long Island during the summer holiday advising him that his grades were not good enough to make a return to England worthwhile.

Merton settled down for a while with his brother and American grandparents on Long Island and started attending Columbia in 1935. He liked the American plainness of Columbia, but caroused a great deal there too. He was fortunate in soon discovering Mark Van Doren as a teacher and making such lifelong friends as the poet Robert Lax, the publisher James Laughlin, and Robert Giroux. Always energetic, he played sports and wrote for undergraduate publications. Given the chaotic habits of his early years, it was not a bad life.

But this rough equilibrium was upset when both grandparents died within a short time of one another. The sudden aloneness precipitated Merton into a kind of crisis that recurred several times later. He began having nervous attacks on the Long Island Railroad and in Manhattan. Doctors could do very little to help him. His friend Robert Lax was going through something similar, and they shared a sense of the "abyss that walked around in front of our feet . . . and kept making us dizzy and afraid of trains and high places." In Merton's case, it is not difficult to see this as a psychosomatic symptom of his second orphanhood.

For some reason, Merton's literary and philosophical reading turned toward Catholicism. He wrote a senior thesis on William Blake as seen through Jacques Maritain's interpretation of Thomistic aesthetics. He planned a doctoral dissertation on Gerard Manley Hopkins. Memories of France began to take hold of his imagination. Catholic thought appealed to him in the books he read and the people he came to know (particularly a part-time lecturer in medieval philosophy at Columbia, Dan Walsh). But there was no little aesthetic element in Merton's religious evolution, and the spiritual and sensual beauties of Catholic life animate The Seven Storey Mountain.

Merton took instruction and was baptized at Corpus Christi Church near Columbia. Almost immediately, perhaps even before the baptism, he began thinking he had a vocation. He applied to the Franciscans and was accepted. But when he revealed his illegitimate child, they found it an impediment. He turned briefly to working with the Baroness Catherine De Hueck at Friendship House in Harlem and might have become a religious social worker had he not made a retreat at the Trappist Abbey of Gethsemani in rural Kentucky. Someone warned him as he was leaving: "Don't let them change you." He responded, "It would be a good thing if they changed me." In 1941, a few days after the bombing of Pearl Harbor, age twenty-six, Thomas Merton entered Gethsemani as a postulant.

When Merton told this tale in The Seven Storey Mountain, he became an instant sensation. Clare Booth Luce, Evelyn Waugh, and other distinguished Catholics praised him. The first hardcover edition sold 600,000 copies; at one point, an unprecedented 10,000 orders were coming in a day. It was 1948, and Merton had touched a nerve, not only in America but all over the world. The spiritual exhaustion after the Second World War stimulated interest in inspirational religious stories. Novices began flooding into Gethsemani. Within a decade, a monastery built to house 70 monks had attracted 270. New foundations were begun in America and abroad. Paradoxically, the sheer numbers became a serious factor in Merton's dislike of communal life in the 1950s. He thought of becoming a Carthusian, or of going to Latin America, and let everyone know of his discontent.

But there were other reasons for his restlessness. The Seven Storey Mountain had given people an impression of Merton as a traditional Catholic writer. But the other Mertons were lurking in the background, and sometimes in the foreground. He had written a book with the charms and enthusiasms of youth; it would be unrepresentative of his more mature thought. Later, he protested that he had a right not to be turned into a myth for children at American parochial schools. And in fact he soon found himself in conflict with the Cistercian life as then lived and with American society in the 1950s.

Merton entered another crisis. Writer's block struck in the mid-1950s, though books continued to appear. Nervous attacks recurred. The reasons for this turmoil are complicated, but the upshot was that Merton began to ask whether he had made the right choice in becoming a Trappist. He had particular troubles with communal living, censorship, meaningless disciplines, and, above all, the authority of the abbot, Dom James Fox.

Dom James could be a firm man, but he was quite intelligent, and other monks attest to his kindness and understanding. The abbot probably sensed that relaxing disciplines over Merton the Bohemian and the Writer could lead to disaster - and perhaps Merton the Contemplative did as well. For a decade, they locked horns and the right was not always on Merton's side. It is hard to sympathize with the restive Mertons against the Contemplative Merton who joined the Trappists fully knowing and desiring a life of restrictions on correspondence, visitors, and involvement with the outside world.

In the 1960s that world came to the fore in his work. The Contemplative who fled the world, however, was not always a good advisor for the Activist. The Contemplative had not fared well in European or American society, and had taken this as proof that those societies were not doing well either. This led him to a number of mistaken or exaggerated judgments. During the fifties he accepted a theory of the moral equivalence of the United States and the Soviet Union. The Vietnam War abroad and the civil rights struggle at home, he came to believe, revealed a totalitarian impulse in America and he wrote of the possible emergence of a Nazi-like racial regime in the United States.

Merton was tempted-primarily because of his friendship at Gethsemani with the poet and monk Ernesto Cardenal, who would later serve in the Sandinista government in Nicargaua-to seek reassignment to Latin America. He had enjoyed a pre-Castro visit to Cuba before he became a monk, and he admired and translated several Latin American poets. Like many activists, he regarded the Latin problem as a U.S. creation, and he wondered in his journals whether he would not be ashamed of being North American if he went south. In his essay "A Letter to Pablo Antonio Cuadra Concerning Giants," he almost seems to think a nuclear exchange that would destroy the United States and Europe would be a fitting recompense for the European conquest.

Merton wrote forcefully against nuclear deterrence. A collection of his social writing from the 1960s, Seeds of Destruction, contains some of Merton's most penetrating analyses of modern just-war issues. Merton objected to Augustine's notion of right intention - which Merton thought could be easily rationalized - and to his pessimism. He suggested that Christians get rid of "Augustinian assumptions and take a new view of man, of society, and of war itself." Always sophisticated and eloquent in this pursuit, Merton tried to make clear that this was not soft-headed pacifism or optimism, but the core teaching of Pacem in Terris.

However, Merton also saw serious contradictions within the "peace" movement. He rebuked those who claimed to be pacifist yet advocated armed revolution in the Third World. In 1965, as the anti-Vietnam War demonstrations were beginning to peak, a young member of the Catholic Peace Fellowship burned himself alive, causing Merton to observe that both the country and the peace movement had an air of absurdity and frenzy. But at times he contributed to the frenzy. When, for instance, his friends Daniel and Philip Berrigan were convicted, he exploded, "This is a totalitarian society in which freedom is pure illusion."

The frequent tendency of Merton the Activist to overstatement is telling. Merton was by background mostly a European. And lacking any experience of the moral realism and decency of most Americans, he tended to judge all of American society through the lens of heated political controversies and the usual intellectual complaints about the bourgeoisie. His essays on civil rights, for example, are heartfelt and penetrating, but are not even a very good description of the predicament of the American liberal. The kind of moderation Merton showed in spiritual and moral questions rarely appears in his social commentary. He was angry about political issues in the early 1960s.

He displayed similar reactions toward the reform movement in the church. Merton made a gradual turn from a convert's effusive gratitude to the type of critical stance usually associated with cradle Catholics. Partly this was a reaction to monastic restrictions and a widening and deepening of his knowledge of human nature. But there was a more rebellious element in him as well. He admired the early Hans Kung and engaged in a heated correspondence with Rosemary Ruether, defending himself from her criticism of the unnatural monastic life with the surprising claim that he was for all intents and purposes laicized in his separate hermitage. And yet, although he welcomed reform in the monastery and in the liturgy, when they actually came he thought both had been superficial and ill-advised. He warned that much of what was going on was being distorted by self-justifying activism.

The mid-1960s brought him to the brink of disaster. Merton had a back problem requiring an operation at a Catholic hospital in Louisville. When he recovered from the anesthesia, he was anxious that he had missed daily communion. He began making notes on Meister Eckhart. His long- desired hermitage awaited him back at Gethsemani. To the eye, it was business as usual.

But a pretty young student nurse came in. A Catholic, she knew of Merton from a book her father had given her. Something erupted between them - even though she had a fiance in Chicago. On leaving the hospital, he wrote her about needing friendship. She wrote back, instructed by him to mark the envelope "conscience matter" (lest the superiors read the correspondence). Under "conscience matter," Merton sent a declaration of love. Thus began a series of deceptions, and Merton only narrowly avoided the shipwreck of his monastic vows because of the impossibility of the whole situation.

Until the later volumes of his journals appear, we will not have Merton's complete account of the episode. But we know that during the storm, Merton used friends to carry messages and provide meeting places. He ignored warnings and even thought of a chaste marriage (though chastity was not particularly high in his thought at that point). They met for dinner and drinks, wine and picnics, listened to music together. Merton wondered how he could live without her.

Dom James found out about the relationship (another monk overheard a telephone conversation), and ordered Merton not to contact the young woman again, but surreptitious contacts went on for some months. Biographers such as Michael Mott agree that the incident reflects several unresolved conflicts in Merton. To his credit, Merton wanted it eventually to be known for what it said about his neediness and incompleteness. Some of the available notes are striking: "Passing near the hospital, I thought I was slowly being torn in half. Then several times while I was reciting the office, felt silent cries come slowly tearing and rending their way up out of the very ground of my being." Though he was wrong, it is hard to wholly condemn him. The atmosphere of the 1960s drove other people into much worse, and in the end he did the right thing.

Or seemed to. All his life in the monastery, Merton had been dogged by stories that he had abandoned his vocation or run off with some woman. When he was allowed to go to Asia for a conference in 1968, he had to leave discreetly so as not to stir up rumors. But the Asia trip raises questions all the same. Merton gives several indications in his posthumous Asian Journal that he intended to return to Gethsemani - eventually. In the meantime, he began planning trips to Mount Athos, Europe, and other places. In the event, Merton was accidentally electrocuted by a fan in Bangkok.

The Merton of the late books - several solid reflections on Zen Buddhism and Eastern thought - is a cheerful man (a characteristic many people who knew him personally have emphasized). For some time he had been wondering about the distinctiveness of the monastic life. The deflation of all pretense in Zen especially attracted him for its sanity, wisdom, and good humor. Merton had gone to Asia in search of something and had apparently found it in various holy places and meetings with Asian monastic figures. He was clearly trying to redefine what being a monk entailed.

Unfortunately, his last lecture (delivered just hours before he died) invoked now dated figures like Herbert Marcuse and praised as "true monks" some young European and American activists he had met on the way to Asia. This account bears all the marks of the self-righteousness and confusion of roles that the Vietnam War and Cold War induced in many circles. Merton deserved better at the end.

Merton's true greatness lies in having engaged in person the whole range of challenges and trials of life in the late twentieth century and yet remaining essentially faithful to his Catholic inspiration. Many of those issues we still confront: poverty and war, the relationship of Eastern and Western thought, and especially how a deep religious life may be lived in contemporary conditions. As we near the end of the century, religion-even contemplative practices-have had a tremendous resurgence. Many of the paths religious people took during the 1960s are coming more and more to look like a dead end. But the attempt to bring a deeper spirituality to the public realm-to say nothing of recovering authentic spirituality-remains a burning necessity.

Merton is surely one of the great spiritual masters of our century. His personal turmoil and the misjudgments in his social thought notwithstanding, he is a forceful reminder that what may appear the most rarefied of contemplative speculations have powerful and concrete implications for the world. God dealt Thomas Merton a difficult hand. His greatness as a man lies not only in that he was able, more or less, to keep several different persons together in difficult times under the banner of "Thomas Merton," but that he provides an enduring witness to all of us much less gifted seekers who have to shore up our own fragmentary lives in quest for the "hidden wholeness."

Requiescat in pace.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Link to some poems by Thomas Merton

LIVING BEAUTY

2006-08-28T21:49:00.000+01:00

Engaged in thinking, feeling, and doing, we find values that guide us in each area. If truth is the headmaster in the school of thinking, and goodness governs the school of doing, then beauty conducts the school of feeling.

Basing a life on a balanced plane of scientific, philosophic, and spiritual truth opens a new sensitivity to beauty. The first reason for this result is that truth, fully realized, is beautiful. At its height, truth is the realization of loving relations in the universal family. Those who emphasize the biological and social-psychological dimensions of aesthetic experience may agree that the widest possible realization of truth opens up the widest possible appreciation of beauty.

There is another reason why an integrated realization of truth opens the heart to beauty especially well:

SIMPLICITY! The simple realization of BEAUTY.

Such realization gives peace with reality on all levels. Reasonable thoroughness in scientific and philosophic responsibility and spiritual receptivity leads to a new quality of simplicity. Scientific, philosophic, or inner identity-search issues do not agitate most people's daily life. Most people's daily activities operate with truth issues in the background. When that background has a luminous simplicity, a warmth derived from integration, we have the relaxation that enables us to enjoy beauty around us and to express beauty through our own lives.

On the path from truth to goodness, it has been easy to skip beauty. Understanding a situation prepares a person to act. Why should a philosophy of living not then proceed directly to reflections on morality and ethics? Beauty seems unnecessary until we reflect. The very perception of facts begins with the organism's response to beauty, since it is the attractiveness of things against a comparatively neutral background that draws attention to them at all, to a brightly colored bird on a branch or an animal moving across a field. When divine values manifest in consciousness, they are felt as lures (to use a psycho-philosophical term). If we act on the basis of a grasp of truth without beauty, we can hardly express love. By contrast, once we experience beauty in truth, beauty in goodness, or beauty in nature or the arts, it becomes unthinkable that living could be full without beauty. There are countless testimonies to the benefits to health, sanity, and happiness from taking time to enjoy beauty. Thus a philosophy of living cannot afford to skip beauty.

The more we know beauty, the more we realize beauty's role in everything we do. Even though beauty, too, usually rests in the background of most people's daily tasks, it is there, not lost, not out of the field of awareness, and there is a gentle transition as we turn to focus on it directly. Beauty has been the most thoughtlessly pursued of values and the most neglected by thinkers, but it is beginning to see a renaissance of genuine recognition. The voices of Amerindian traditions speaking about "walking in beauty" are getting a wider hearing today. Environmentalists are rediscovering the joy of natural living. Cities are discovering the blessings of giving over walls in public spaces to mural paintings done by gifted and trained artists after community discussion of what they want to represent.

The Beauties of Nature

Sometimes a spurt of personal growth has to wait until the person turns to a neglected activity. Once the missing piece of the puzzle is supplied, a leap of integration occurs. The missing piece can come from anywhere on the diagram of levels of value. I have seen many spurts of growth occur when people took a vacation or in some way relaxed the pace after a season of intense striving. The enjoyment of natural beauty is often the missing piece of the puzzle--or makes room for the missing piece of the puzzle to appear.

What is it about natural beauty that touches us so deeply? How can we expand our appreciation? If a child's delight in natural beauty is the beginning of this trail of appreciation, where does the trail end? Should it not be possible to combine the experiences of a naturalist, philosopher, mystic, artist, and ecological activist?

Imagine a film in which the camera first slowly takes in a beautiful scene, picking up the sounds of wind and water and insects and birds. Footage may be taken at dawn, morning, midday, afternoon, sunset, evening, night; in spring, summer, autumn, winter; in fair weather and in storms. After several minutes in the simplicity of this opening evocation, attention turns to geologic features, to meteorology, to the details of a particular shrub or tree, a bird's nest, an insect colony, some animal behavior, to rouse our recollection of the complexity that awaits us beyond the surface of what we notice first. Commentary adds scientific description. Then the camera goes back to the initial level of focus, completing the first of several cycles in the film. Returning to the first scene, simple enjoyment harvests something of the previous foray into science.

In another cycle, one sees artists' renditions of the scene or something like it; in another, words of poetry depict the scene. A historical tableau could be constructed, recalling dramas of historic and prehistoric peoples. What conflicts have transpired? What exploitation, protection, and restoration of the land? What sports and games have flourished there? What have past peoples appreciated about this area? What are the possibilities for the area in the future?

After cycles featuring various aspects that add meaning to the scene, the film ends with the initial setting. The realization dawns that the beauty of this scene tacitly reflects all these dimensions. Perceptual enjoyment is more than the organism's physical response, since it now engages the entire self. A film or a book or a flight of imagination can all bring home the idea that an interdisciplinary approach enhances the appreciation of natural beauty.

Initial experiences

Think of walking among fragrant blossoms in spring, smelling the sweet, heavy air of a summer field after rain, seeing the brilliant reds and yellows of autumn leaves against the dark green of conifers, walking over newly fallen snow as bright sunlight illumines thinly iced tree branches, lying on sand dunes watching waves approach the shore, discovering an isolated cove where the beach is white and the water turquoise, riding horseback in the mountains, wading in a clear mountain stream, swimming in a river, coming across deer and staying with them in stillness for a long time, watching fog cascade over hills, gazing up the length of a giant Sequoia tree in a redwood forest, dozing on a thick bed of pine needles on the sunlit floor of a forest, striding through fields sprinkled with wildflowers, walking into the caress of a gentle breeze or the bracing tonic of a cool wind, running up hills and finding lakes.

Experiences of natural beauty could be variously classified. In some experiences a single sense is predominant, while other are more multidimensional. Some find beauty on the micro level, some on the ordinary level, some on the macro level. Some turn to the heavens, some to the earth. Some experiences are more receptive, others more active. The level of contrast between the focus and the background may be high or low. Some experiences are particularly linked to natural cycles such as seasons of the year or times of the day. Some are saturated with a sense of higher meaning and value, while others are more matter of fact. Most are centered outside the self, but some are enjoyments of the self or of the self in relation to another.

Places of natural beauty stand out against a background of commonplace landscape. The Scottish Highlands with their lochs, waterfalls, heather valleys, rivers, and sparse forests enchant the eye. The value of the spectacular spots doesn't of course justify neglecting the aesthetic values of the surrounding territory, but a beautiful phenomenon--like anything we notice--inevitably has the structure of a figure-against-a-background.

An unappealing scene has beauties that disclose themselves on a different scale. Shifting to a microscopic level, one finds wonders of biology and physics. Shifting to the macroscopic scale, one finds wonders of the planet and the solar system. The point of shifting scale is not to deny ugliness but to illustrate the freedom of a seeker after beauty and to suggest that, in well-chosen perspective, beauty is the last word.

Spending time outdoors enhances positive personal qualities. Backpackers tend to have a more simple and natural way of expressing themselves and doing things, a more natural attitude about the body and physical pleasure. A layer of social artificiality is gone. Physical effort disciplined by nature's rhythms keeps the mind from racing. The greatest lives show a joy in natural living and an appreciation for the beauties of nature. Their trust in nature and affirmation of the process of life combine with their commitment to improve existence on our polluted and disease-stricken planet on which hundreds of species become extinct every year. Persons are greater than problems, and in spite of everything these people go on noticing, enjoying, and enhancing the beauty around them. Beauty nourishes them for whatever tasks are theirs.

One reason we enjoy natural beauty is that experiencing it promotes health. Health of course is partly a gift of heredity and partly a matter of enjoying proper nutrition, rest, and exercise in a relatively unpolluted environment. But health is to an unsuspected degree a consequence of a living in a way that integrates truth, beauty, and goodness. Receptivity to natural beauty is not wholly passive, not just looking at photographs of picturesque sites. While there is a contemplative side to enjoying beauty, there is also an active side. The very effort to get to the vista is an essential phase of the temporal background of the experience. The quickening of the pulse, the exertion of muscles, the filling of the lungs--these are all part of the total experience.

Cultivating appreciation: Taking time

The first lesson in learning to appreciate some particularly beautiful natural scene is to take time to experience the scene and its qualities. The hasty "experience" of the tourist does not suffice. The vista sampled, the snapshot taken, the postcard purchased--none of these accomplishes the mission. Time is required for the experience to sink in, to make a lasting impression, adding to your gallery of memories, as you gather treasures to recall in time of need.

It takes time to feel rhythms. There is a rhythm in any phenomenon, in the course of a day or the seasons of the year. A sunset comes to a peak of radiance and then it begins to fade. Some rhythms pertain to the experiencer. Each experience has its gradual or sudden onset, its culmination, and its phase of decline. In addition, the appreciative mind cannot respond fully for long. After a while, fatigue sets in, and the art of experiencing does not strain to sustain the experience unnaturally. Comprehending beauty involves recognizing something akin to melody insofar the movement of experience follows some primary focus of attention. There is melody in the flight of a bird as well as in the song of the bird. And comprehending beauty involves being able to grasp harmonies in complex appearances.

Taking time for natural beauty makes a difference in your perceptions at other times. You may start noticing more what is going on in the sky and how the seasons are changing. You may begin to wake up, not merely with the sense of awaking in this room or in this house, but on this continental landmass, for example. You may start observing the moods of nature more and their influence on people. You may notice how normal living is pervaded by other background pleasures that go unnoticed, including breathing fresh air and our ability to move as we desire and the mind's resting in the comfort provided by the supporting brain when the posture is erect.

Natural sciences and aesthetic appreciation

Experience of nature begins in perception of what is there and what is happening. In perception, lures to scientific and aesthetic exploration commingle. There is always more to experience than our senses can take in at any given moment. The very delight in phenomena attracts scientific inquiry, and each success of scientific understanding enables the growth of appreciation.

Of course, scientific and aesthetic attitudes toward a landscape are different. Science narrates the invisible structure of the trees and the geologic history of the hills, counts the populations of species, measures annual rainfall, and explores relationships within ecosystems. Aesthetic appreciation follows the visible structure of a landscape, its present look and feel, the balance of horizontal and vertical vectors and curves, and the sights and sounds and smells as they are felt by the experiencer.

Sometimes the scientific and aesthetic attitudes seem antagonistic; an aesthetic response does not suffice when science is required, nor can science satisfy the soul when it craves the beauty of nature. Too high a proportion of science crowds out aesthetic enjoyment. Science makes possible reductionistic analyses of the aesthetic response. It has been argued that the response of awe to the starry sky is basically due to the way the receptive eye is gently and approximately equally stimulated over the entire retina. This stimulation results in a sublime sense of space, an experience that underlies and gives emotional power to the idea of infinity. It has been argued that the pleasure we take in the prospect afforded by a high promontory is rooted in the organism's evolutionary biologic interest in overlooks from which an animal can watch for prey and observe its enemies. Every such observation tells part of the story, but not necessarily the heart of the story of our experience of the beauties of nature.

Nevertheless, with the qualifications just noted, the landscape is the locus of aesthetic enjoyment and a better understanding of the landscape makes for a better aesthetic experience. Background scientific knowledge enhances aesthetic perception in various ways. The first way is simply to draw careful attention to what would otherwise be missed. For example, learning about insects that one initially finds repulsive make it possible to prize them aesthetically by drawing observation to the more microscopic level where the details of the tiny creatures can be seen.

Figuring out how an island formed in a river just downstream from a dry creek bed through which water and silt once poured into the river gives a context for savoring the island as a phenomenon. One feels pleasure in having understood a moment of cosmic process; and there is something attractive in the very laws of gravity and inertia. These intellectual pleasures add to the delight in perceivable beauty.

Even modest information about the geologic history of an area can add a remarkable dimension to one's present experience. Usually a landscape seems static, except for such transient events as the blowing of grasses. Usually when we say "now" we refer to a narrow stretch of time. But a sense of process over long periods of time--when the region was, say, under water or when the glaciers of the ice age retreated leaving boulders in newly carved valleys--imparts a dynamic sense to the landscape and vastly expands the dimensions of our sense of the present.

Watch a sunset sometime keeping in mind that it is the earth's rotation that is responsible for the phenomenon. One can in fact experience a sunset as a consequence of the earth's turning, and this yields an uncanny sense of one's own motion as the earth turns silently with absolutely no felt trace of bumpiness or acceleration or pressure. The earth, along with its stability as a foundation we take for granted, involves us in a gentle dynamism of irresistible motion.

Scientific information can alter the perception of beauty. A scene with small patches of woods separated by cultivated fields and small villages might have seemed fully delightful until you learn about the need of some species for connected patches of forest, so that a habitat large enough for the species remains available. In the light of that, one may well find more beauty in a scene where wooded corridors connect larger forested areas. Visual appeal is linked to other kinds of appeal.

Science discloses pattern in nature. The organism's perceptual response is so attracted to pattern that it cannot sustain attention and awareness when confronted with something that it can only perceive as sheer consistency of texture or an uncoordinated jumble of data. Something must emerge into prominence for perception to occur. This is a pervasive trait that attunes an infant to the human face, especially the face of the mother. Perception is in the business of adequately rendering relevant features of the environment. It attunes a predator to its prey, an animal to its mate. The environment is not an incoherent mass of equi-significant detail, but an arena with at least biological significance to each type of creature. Some figure must detach itself as of greater moment than what thus becomes its background. What broader significance might there be to our orientation to pattern? And how far can mathematics and physics go in giving an account of pattern in nature?

How much unsuspected pattern pervades the world around us? A magnificent oak tree viewed from a distance approximates the shape of a parabola. As incalculable as the shapes of waves may be, they give the impression of an implicit mathematics and physics. Seashells and sunflower heads manifest a curve that can be generated from the Fibonacci series of numbers--1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 13, and so on, in which the next member of the series is the sum of the previous two. The mathematics of fractals, where large-scale patterns are repeated on smaller scales, have drawn attention to the pattern in the seemingly random shape of a coastline.

Science gives mathematical accounts of patterns, but nature is always more complex than the mathematical description. The attractiveness of the thin sliver of moon depends on the spherical appearance of the moon and the shadow cast by the earth, though neither body is a perfect sphere. Nature shows a combination of regularity and irregularity, and the combination is essential to natural beauty.

Interpretation and nature

Nature stimulates the quest for meaning and creative design without ever satisfying it in an intellectually definitive way. Experience is suggestive. Watch the sun come up behind a range of mountains. Before the sun itself is visible, the gradual process looks like the unfolding of a slow-motion explosion. In the sudden moment of discontinuity you see a light shape whiter and brighter than yellow, which quickly rises to spill its basket of golden dust into the waking valley. The sense of something akin to generosity in the sun's pouring forth is spontaneous. Can this sense be explained in terms of the biologic needs of the creature for light and warmth? How much is the feeling dependent on the comfort of being safe from the harshness of the sun? What role do the cultural connotations of gold and white play in the experience? In the experience of beauty these questions are neither posed nor answered, but wonder stirs the soul root of such questioning. Comprehending natural beauty involves sensitivity to the way a scene almost speaks.

Given a human craving to find natural reflections of spiritual principles, what shall we make of the ideas that arise in a contemplative moment in nature? It is all too easy to read lessons into landscape and to see allegories in the seasons. Suppose you are wandering in the woods, wrestling with a problem, and you come across a quiet stream. As you watch the water in openness, its gradual, winding flow comes to symbolize the patience you need at this time in your life, and you quietly rejoice that nature has conveyed this insight. Caution counsels that realizations like this, however relevant they may be to the individual's need of the moment, and however charmingly they may be symbolized in the natural setting, may be more safely interpreted as the mind's harvest not only from nature but also from the confluence of subconscious and superconscious sources. When storm clouds darken the water and sunlight enters the scene most directly only through a small hole in the upper layer of clouds, reflected from there to the upper surface of a lower layer of broken clouds, only to bounce back up to the undersurface of the higher layer, and thence to reflect a pillar of light straight down onto the waves--the observer can be in awe without translating the scene into religious allegory.

The very interpretation of nature as a self-contained, autonomous realm independent of mind and spirit arose when early modern science separated itself from some of the religious and philosophic ideas associated with older science. The modern scientific concept of nature as devoid of purpose encouraged the study of nature's mechanisms. However, once the mechanistic thinking of the European "Enlightenment" had claimed the whole of nature for itself, Romantic aesthetic sensibility reopened the question of nature's relation to mind and spirit. Nature became a symbol of untold depth, where conscious, subconscious, and superconscious converge.

For many of us, then, experiences of nature have profound religious overtones. The experience of beauty nevertheless offers a much-needed vacation from religious thinking, and philosophy and theology should not over-interpret. On the broad spectrum of responses to natural beauty, it is wise to avoid the extreme of indifference and the extreme of nature worship.

There is a temptation to impose our interpretations on nature as though they were insights. The variety of human experiences and interpretations of nature suggests that nature is comparatively passive to interpretation and that interpretation is influenced by convictions taken from other parts of one's philosophy or religion. The truth of these interpretations depends more on the truth of the associated philosophy or religion than on a simple ability to discern meaning in nature. Nature, then, is neither a meaningless chaos nor a text to be read. Nature's meaningfulness is its mysterious stimulus to interpretation.

The happy situation is that the experience of beauty is not primarily a discourse. Even the most active and thorough aesthetic exploration of a scene serves mainly to deepen the quiet of beholding. Even the remarks between friends taking a walk to enjoy nature, as one mentions something noteworthy to the other, occur in a cycles in which noticing precedes and culminates each remark. Enjoying the beauties of nature is a vacation from science, philosophy, theology, and ethics, and to shift into such topics abandons aesthetic experience. It is in quiet receptivity that other areas of activity tacitly convey their contributions to the experience.

From an interdisciplinary perspective, comprehension of beauty thus involves description of what is perceived, acknowledgement of the influences of areas of concern (science, religion, etc.) that are distinct but indirectly relevant, and confession of the incompleteness of one's grasp.

Our favorite places

What are the characteristics of people's favorite places in nature as they report them? The testimonies I have heard and read converge on a number of themes. The appeal to the senses is only part of the story. Often such a place is a protected location or refuge, somehow sheltered. Where one feels secure, a wide-open space will serve as well, a beach, a mountain summit. Adventuresome types prefer open seas, the face of a cliff, or wilderness areas shared with other predators.

The very expression "a place in nature" implies separation from ordinary society, relative solitude. People's favorite places offer a vacation from the daily pressure of other people's expectations, from social emotions, from the stress of refereeing the contest between egoistic and altruistic impulses--in short, from other human beings. Sometimes favored spots are places to go with a friend or with family. At the limit, for people among a crowd of strangers watching a sunset, the viewers have an unhindered view of the sunset.

To be sure, solitude is partial, even when we are all by ourselves. The place of relative solitude is such precisely in relation to the society from which we have temporarily removed ourselves and to which we will return. Moreover, in solitude we continue to be social beings, and our reflections go on in the language of our culture.

Many people seek solitude in nature in order to commune. A favorite place in nature is a place to get more deeply in touch with what is truest in oneself. It is a place for spiritual communion. The ambiguity of the word "commune" mirrors fittingly the indefinite and vague experience, so little verbal, so little busy with thoughts, so open to inspiration without any straining or striving, without any clear sense of the source from which inspiration is sought. It is a place to put things in perspective. The perplexing problems of the passing hour recede in their urgency. One recovers a sense that one is not, after all, the center of the universe; and, remarkably, this recovery of perspective does not normally bring a feeling that one's own life is negligible, meaningless, superfluous, or useless. Indeed, one often returns from a time of communing in nature with a refreshed sense of purpose. It is a prescription for groups suffering from tension to go for a vacation in nature, putting aside all conversation about troubling issues.

To be sure, nature functions in many ways other than through its beauty, and favorite places in nature need not be particularly beautiful.

Nevertheless, the beauty of a scene is a value that is distinguishable from other dimensions associated with the experience. The engine of the mind is not turned off, but neither is it engaged with the gears of the scientific, philosophic, and religious intellect. Practical goals are laid down for a while, as the harmony of physical contrasts absorbs attention.

Enjoying the beauties of nature in relative solitude has such satisfying appeal that people commonly experience the universe there as a friendly place. There is a sense of being embraced in something wonderful beyond measure, being part of something grand, a sense of invitation and welcome. The commingling of affirmation arising within oneself and the joy in what we perceive seem in such moments to disclose a deeper truth and goodness than we usually notice. Enjoyment gives way to rejoicing.

Myth No. 1: Beauty is merely subjective

To appreciate the significance of beauty, it helps to be free of two widespread myths about values. The first is that beauty is merely subjective.

The experience of natural beauty suggests important lessons about value that need clarifying today. One commonly hears, "Beauty is in the eye of the beholder." On the one hand, the statement is obvious. On the other hand, it is used to state something that is less obvious. People disagree about values, about beauty. Moreover the phrase about the eye of the beholder is designed to assert that value is subjective--relative to the individual or group doing the evaluating. A deeper look indicates that natural beauty illustrates the truth that value is real.

There is a universal pull in the experience of beauty. In an age where community differences are exalted in opposition to the ideal of universal humanity, the cross-cultural kinship of appreciative minds enjoying the beauties of nature provides access to common ground. In the presence of beauty we feel that we are not merely responding to something that happens to satisfy our personal preferences, but we want to share our discovery, and we feel that we are enjoying something that should appeal to everyone (or everyone with a comparable preparation for the experience). Though some prefer the mountains to the seashore, the beauties of each kind of place are widely recognized. The sublimity of the night sky has evoked awe and reverence in countless souls. How can a person not feel the pull of the ineffable in the sky?

Of course, in support of the thesis that beauty is real it is not enough to point out that there are places of beauty such as the Grand Canyon and Niagara Falls that are sought out by travelers from all over the world. There are personal and cultural differences, and they are not to be minimized. Culture affects the extent to which nature is regarded as the home of ancestral spirits, the Creator's handiwork, a realm for mystical and allegorical interpretation, a stock of raw materials for human exploitation, a place for recreation and character building, or a precious support system for endangered life-forms. Nevertheless, when the stories of difference are told in sufficient fullness, difference does not seem like an ultimate, raw datum, merely a matter of subjective preferences. Rather, differences are intelligible as responses to the complexity of the landscape of values. For example, tourists flock to the beaches of Bali, somewhat to the surprise of the Balinese themselves, who traditionally regard the mountain at the center of their island as the dwelling place of the gods. There is a logic to the Balinese preference. From the mountain comes the pure water of the rivers that become more dirty downstream as they are used by more people as the rivers flow finally into the sea.

Another example of the logic of cultural difference in aesthetic perception is that Europeans did not appreciate the beauty of mountains and forests during the centuries when these were fearsome places. Factors of geography and climate put travelers at risk, and thieves would lie in wait. As Christianity demoted nature spirits to demons, the woods became more frightful. However, as poets, philosophers, and painters joined in conversation about the sublime and the beautiful and the picturesque, and when the lake country in England was celebrated in verse, aesthetic appreciation of nature flourished. This story illustrates the long cultural evolution required for values to be appreciated.

Our talk of the development of European sensitivity to the beauties of nature is consistent with the following thesis. People's aesthetic evaluations will converge so that, at the culmination of human evolution, everyone will agree. The convergence thesis, however, despite its merits, overlooks the fact that there are different personality types. The ministry of beauty in the personality is fulfilled by different experiences for different persons. One function of beauty, for example, is to facilitate relaxation and enjoyment; but some people need more complex or subtle stimuli than others to satisfy this need. Another function of beauty is to symbolize qualities of sublime living: one person gains this value by beholding a mountain, another by climbing it.

Myth No. 2: Beauty is incomprehensible

How far can we understand beauty? If natural science supplies the paradigm of comprehension, then we cannot comprehend beauty. In determining that an animal is a rabbit, a biologist applies an idea to an example; precision and certainty are normal. In telling whether something is beautiful, however, a person needs a sense of judgment that does not proceed in the same way.

To comprehend beauty does not require a complete, systematic, and authoritative exposition of beauty. It does not mean that words can substitute for experience. It does not mean that humans can construct an equally beautiful replica on the basis of our knowledge of the laws of the phenomenon. It does not require an exhaustive inventory of the subconscious and superconscious moments of our experience.

To affirm that we can comprehend beauty means that we can recognize and express the features of a beautiful phenomenon, its tensions and unity. In nature, that which is beautiful appeals to us by contrast with what is less beautiful. After miles and miles of highway through endlessly flat, treeless, dusty plains, the look of forested foothills and flowing water comes as a relief. After a long hike in the shadows of a forest path, emerging into a sunny clearing brings a lift. Without the contrasting background, neither the forest nor the clearing would be so attractive. Fashion design relies on contrast with previous styles. There is, nevertheless, a harmony of contrasts intrinsic to the scene that occasions the recognition of beauty.

After emphasizing the fact that the appreciation of beauty goes beyond discourse, it is time to balance that thought with the recognition that language does bring beauty to light. Just perusing the letters of Vincent Van Gogh, for example, heightens the reader's sense of natural beauty. Art history teaches a discipline of describing that conducts careful noticing, for example, of contrasts and their unification, of line and curve, of light and shadow, of horizontal and vertical, of color and tone and mood. Great appreciation goes hand in hand with the capacity to convey the realization of value to others, intelligibly. Thus we move back and forth between the simplicity of wonder to an articulate expression of thorough appreciation.

The arts and natural beauty

Some connoisseurs of the beauties of nature testify that the contemplative appreciation of the beauty of landscape is enhanced, above all, by geological and biological knowledge and by a knowledge of the history of painting. Artists devote extraordinary gifts to observing, feeling, and expressing natural beauty, and the non-specialist should expect to have something to learn from them. Painters' interpretations expand our aesthetic vocabulary as observers. Moreover, there are landscapes that invite comparison with particular styles of painting. To convey a mystic luminosity in landscape, some painters laid a white glaze underneath their forest greens, earthen browns, and atmospheric rosy pinks. The brightness of the glaze, rarely if ever directly visible, suggested the limited sense in which the divine is present in nature.

Artists lead people beyond the tendency to crystallize emotions. It is so easy to imagine standard types of situation calling for standard emotional responses. One strives to rejoice, for example, when it would be far more honest and effective to start with a very different feeling and move toward a different shade of culmination in the experience. Artists challenge stereotyped, conventional responses, lead us to open ourselves, for example, to the freshness of life in a desert. Years ago, walking with my wife in the hills of Umbria, having anticipated that nature would smile upon our excursion and show off its familiar attractions, I expressed frustration over the cloudy day and cold wind and lack of sunshine. My wife responded that Japanese people learn to appreciate all the aspects of nature. Indeed, painters have taught humanity to appreciate qualities of fog and smoke and wilderness, have noticed the green in the human face, the ways in which the two eyes differ, the link between the earth we tread and the personal history implicit in a pair of shoes.

Asian painters have often depicted mountains at whose base we begin with familiar human habitations from which a narrow, winding path leads higher and higher into a peak obscured by mist. In the form of a scroll, the painting provides an occasion for friends to recount stories over the course of an evening. Such art, as a background for natural experience, reminds us of our sociality as we venture into nature, of our increasing solitude as we continue our journey, of our humility before a vast universe, and of the limitations of our knowledge: the summit can only be inferred from below.

The gifts of poets are hardly less than those of painters in expanding our sense of the import of natural beauty. Musicians attune to nature. Perfumes and gourmet delicacies also present natural beauty. Massage brings pleasure, even to those who accept self-gratification only in connection with therapy.

Conclusion

Again and again we return with profit to the simplest lessons for beginners, for those lessons contain the seeds to be unfolded at each step along our forward path. The very openness for recreation, the very relaxation that permits us to seek anew a deepened acquaintance with experience capacity, the delight in simplicity.

To deepen your initial experience with the beauties of nature, notice the variety of the beauties of nature; and take time to appreciate natural beauty, letting the beauty sink into your soul, so you can recall the lovely scene when you need an uplift. To expand the comprehensiveness of your awareness of natural beauty, contemplate the mute near-significance to you of your favorite places in nature. Bring in your understandings of science, philosophy, religion, and the arts. Do not neglect the higher beauty of the gestalt in which the beautiful is nested in a contrasting environment of the plain.

Inputs from every section of the matrix of truth, beauty, and goodness expand our awareness of the beauties of nature. Conversely, appreciating natural beauty enhances the rest of our life. If we look up, the daylight beauties of local soil and blood and native language yield to the starlight beauty of being one family, the Human Family.

Now go and read some poetry here and there...

Hard Times for Rationality!

2006-08-27T20:34:00.000+01:00

The good life is one inspired by love and guided by knowledge. ~Bertrand Russell

We live in a period of rapid technological and social change unparalleled in the history of the world. A significant number of trends, developments, and scientific discoveries have converged to create a situation today that many find confusing, others find threatening, and some even find thrilling.

Whether we're talking about global satellite/network communication, space travel, the information revolution, genetic engineering, new birth technologies, or exciting fossil discoveries -- science and technology are transforming the world's values more dramatically and more completely than organized religion has ever been capable of.

Let me explain:

In the early 1960s, the birth control pill became widely available. This brought increased attention and acceptance to contraception and family planning. It also reduced the pregnancy risk for those wishing to enjoy sex outside marriage and allowed women more control over their own bodies. In short order we saw family size in the developed nations shrink, sexual freedom expand, and the women's rights movement rise to social prominence. Today, majority values about sex outside marriage, age, family size, population control, and the place of women in society are very different from what they were prior to the sixties.

But the revolution isn't over. Today we have the new birth technologies: in vitro fertilization, sperm and egg banks, the ill-fated surrogate parenting, uterus leasing and soon, advance selection of the gender of one's offspring. Such developments force a whole host of new moral and legal dilemmas upon us -- requiring, once again, the development of a changed set of ethical standards. We will think differently tomorrow because of the technologies we assimilate into our culture today.

Biotechnology is another developing area. This includes genetic engineering, patenting of new life forms, cloning, and possibly trans-species hybrids (UK scientists have already asked the Government’s permission to go ahead with practical experiments in this field). With these developments, the features of each life form will become capable of modification. One benefit will be that genetic diseases, normally treated again and again in each generation of an afflicted family, will now be wiped out of the line altogether. Like some communicable diseases, some genetic diseases will be brought to extinction. With nearly the same license that we have manipulated machines in the past, we will soon begin to manipulate organisms. There can be no question that this will have an incalculable impact on our values about life and about the quality of life.

Recent developments in medical technology have already forced a plethora of new ethical issues upon us. In fact, we have come so far that professionals now disagree on when a person comes into existence and when a person actually dies.

How about that, eh?

Does human life begin at conception, at the appearance of brain waves, at birth, or some time after? What we decide affects our views concerning the freezing of embryos, the rights of such embryos, foetal adoption, a mother's prenatal care obligation, the atmosphere in the birthing room, and selective nontreatment of defective newborns.

Does human life end with the death of the heart, the death of the brain, or the loss of "significant life?" What we decide affects our views on hospice, living wills, and euthanasia. It also forces us to decide in the future if it is OK to use comatose individuals as "living" organ banks or, as some scientists advocate, harvest death-row inmates for their body parts. Medical technology is daily changing our values concerning human life.

Global satellite communication has made the world smaller and has increased public interest and involvement in international politics. We can now watch a war, or a democratic revolution, as it happens, and from both sides. And we can see how actions taken in one place affect the environment in some other. The slogan, "Think globally, organize locally" sums up much of the resulting politics. And through video/DVD recording and cable TV, individual choice in information gathering has been enhanced. No longer do people need to get their ethics, their aesthetics, or their politics from a common source. The existence of alternatives and options in almost everything has the potential to limit the influence of mass propaganda and bolster minority movements.

Then there are computers. Through desktop publishing (and blogging!), any computer owner can become a publisher. Home computer modems make possible individual information-gathering on a global scale. In short, private and individual choice is also enhanced through the computer, as much as is the power of individuals to be intrusive, invade the privacy of others, spread software viruses, phishing and so forth.

Space travel can change our goals. We may, in time, no longer be limited to this globe for our pursuits and interests. Colonies in space will, as have all colonies in human history, bring into existence alternative societies and novel ideas. Different visions of life's purpose will emerge.

Meanwhile, startling fossil discoveries of our evolutionary ancestors are giving us an increasingly clearer view of who we are and what we are about. The irony is that these discoveries are coming at a time when we are developing the capability, through genetic research, to change the very natures we are just coming to understand...

The conclusion from all this is clear. Technology changes society and changes values. We find ourselves today in the midst of an incredible transformation -- one that is wrecking havoc on our entire culture.

Because so many people cannot deal comfortably with the moral dilemmas raised by the new technologies, one reaction has been a backlash. This backlash is a repeat performance of past reactions to change. In every age where the old ways were uprooted by new technologies, there were those prophets of conservatism who sought to put the genie back into the bottle. During the industrial revolution, for example, orthodox preachers fumed from the pulpit against the new machines.

Congregations were told that God never intended his children to travel as fast as a steam locomotive could take them, and that people were in danger of losing their souls if they sneezed while aboard such a swiftly moving conveyance.

Today, not wishing to echo the cries of the Luddites, modern fundamentalist preachers utilize the new technologies to more effectively cry out against the changes in moral values that these same technologies bring. Few things are more ironic than listening to a preacher, broadcasting over satellite, condemning the rise of globalism -- or pontificating on cable TV or the Internet, as he complains about people making too many individualistic choices and "doing their own thing."
And these profound Bible bashers have given the new values a name. They call them Secular Humanist Values and they blame them on the atheists or the secular sector of humanity...

In the rush of history, if the past is any indication, these reactionaries will fail. The world will change, and they will either change with it (proclaiming that these changes had been advocated by them all along), or they will resist the changes and become entrenched in their own ways, living in their own communities, much like the American Amish do today.

And given that these changes have been proclaimed by them to be Humanism, Humanism will triumph. In fact this new century should really be the humanistic century. Certainly some of the values that naturally derive from certain new technologies are humanistic. Among those that I have mentioned or hinted at are: free inquiry, free choice among alternatives, individual liberties, increased opportunities for self-realization, a breaking down of mass propaganda and dogma, laws and ethics that take into consideration situations and circumstances, open-minded attitudes on human sexuality, global thinking, participatory democracy, and a greater appreciation for the power of the scientific method.

For these reasons, one should maitain an optimistic view of technology, as with using technology wisely, we can control our environment, conquer poverty, markedly reduce disease, extend our life- span, significantly modify our behaviour, alter the course of human evolution and cultural development, unlock vast new powers, and provide humankind with unparalleled opportunity for achieving an abundant and meaningful life.

The future is, however, filled with dangers. In learning to apply the scientific method to nature and human life, we have opened the door to ecological damage, overpopulation, dehumanizing institutions, totalitarian repression, and nuclear and biochemical disaster.

In short, there is no guarantee that a humanistic USE of these new technologies will prevail. That's up to us, and we have a tremendous job ahead. We have no time to wonder if Humanism and free thought will survive. It is our job to make sure that they survive, lest there be no future at all.

And that brings me to the specific challenges us free thinkers face right now, in the 21st century. With the end of the Cold War, as democratic change swept the globe, the ironic effect so far has been an incredible growth in religiosity, fanatism and irrationality. Let me share with you a few examples.

Christianity Today magazine has dubbed the former Soviet Union "the most open mission field in the world," as evangelists and missionaries descend from the West to hold mass rallies and distribute staggering numbers of bibles and tracts. In this light, it's no surprise that the first ministry legally registered in Russia since the fall of Communism was Campus Crusade for Christ.

But evangelicals aren't the only ones grabbing a market share of the old "Evil Empire." Mormon missionaries are at work there. The Unification Church of Sun Myung Moon offered to fund a bolstering of the economy in return for special privileges. Full colour Hari Krishna posters now appear in Moscow's subways while devotees distribute "blessed" food. And Moscow has become home to five national UFO study groups, four astrology organizations, and the Russian Theosophical society.

Jehovah's Witnesses reported 18,293 converts in Eastern Europe in a single year. Over 12,000 Armenians have been trained in Transcendental Meditation. Zen Buddhism, Hinduism, Theosophy, Hawaiian Huna magic, Sikhism, Baha'i Faith, and Rastafarianism are growing in Poland. The Children of God have set up shop in Bulgaria, and Zoroastrianism is growing in Hungary.

Despite the fact that most Czechs do not want their rejection of Communist tyranny to become an open door to religious dogma, all 2.3 million school-age children in former Czechoslovakia got The Book of Life, a retelling of the story of Jesus ending with a call to faith. This government-approved public school distribution was a project of the Assemblies of God, the denomination that brought America preachers such as Jim Bakker and Jimmy Swaggart (I bet you getting real worried now!).

Also with the Assemblies of God was Frederick Chiluba, the former Zambian president, who declared his country a "Christian nation," much to the chagrin of Muslims and civil libertarians there. The current Zambian president’s wife was a baptized member of the Jehovah's Witnesses, recently disfellowshiped (I wonder what happened there? Too strict?)

The effects of this activity are shown in the Scripture Language Report of the United Bible Societies, which claims that more than 80% of the world's people have access to at least a part of the Bible. You think this is good? No way: this has created the inevitable conflict.

While Jews for Jesus has been busy converting large numbers of Ukrainian Jews to Christianity, the New York-based Jews for Judaism has been at work for the last few years to "expose and unmask the missionaries," and to train Ukrainian Jewish community leaders in counter evangelism. Clashes between representatives of both groups have taken place.

Not to be outdone, now-deceased King Fahd of Saudi Arabia took the lead in funding the worldwide promotion of Islam. He ordered 6.2 million copies of the Koran to be printed and distributed in the United States, Europe, China, and elsewhere. Joining him were wealthy Muslims who wanted to help build more mosques and Islamic centres everywhere. Some disastrous consequences were evident in various countries, where fanatism caused dramatic incidents (to call 9/11 dramatic is to understate it).

Even international events have become a target, with extensive distributions of conservative Christian literature by tireless evangelical students, open-air church services by all and sundry, and performed gospel drama and dance in the streets.

Whoa!

And fundamentalist religious promotion continues unabated everywhere.

Have a quick look at America --- Recent surveys in the United States (still the most technologically advanced nation in the world) indicate that American students continue to score near the bottom of the heap in science, and that 47% of Americans in general reject evolution and believe in creationism! Canyabelievethat?

According to Emerging Trends, 95% of American teenagers believe in a god or universal spirit. Of those 16 and older, 32% say they have experienced God's presence. Teenagers who pray when they are by themselves number 75%; who read the Bible when they are by themselves, 44%.

Yet, contrary to religious expectations, the mental, physical, and emotional well-being of the young is at its lowest ebb in 30 years. Science magazine recently noted a "fall in test scores, the doubling of teenage suicide and homicide rates, and the doubling of births to unwed mothers."

There’s gotta be a rational alternative. We must provide one!

And it's not just traditional religious fundamentalism that deserves our attention. This new century won't be rendered a humanistic century merely because it isn't a fundamentalist century. Humanism is not the name for what you get when you don't have a dominant fundamentalism. There are many things that are neither fundamentalism nor humanism, such as mysticism and the New Age movement. With the assimilation of the new technologies, it could be these ideas that dominate instead of more rational ones. The Age of Reason, for instance?

Fashionable religions and therapies, in one way or another, play on the excitement of changing times to offer ever more outlandish concepts. Whether we're dealing with the pseudo-technologies of pyramid power, psychic surgery, or channelling; or the self-help strategies of meditation, aural reading, or Scientology processing, phenomena generically labelled "New Age" have affected the thinking of millions.

Again, this is nothing new. During the period of major transformation at the dawn of the Middle Ages, a mass of new religions sprung up to capture the public imagination. The same thing happened again during the early part of the Industrial Revolution. Exciting times bring exciting ideas -- and anxiety. And fast on the heels of anxiety are new therapies promising a cure. That's why we have a New Age movement in today's "age of anxiety."

But it isn't enough just to know this. It isn't enough to merely understand why such things happen, to say to yourself: "Holy mackeroly, that's too bad, I guess people really go nuts during changing times. It's a good thing I still have my wits about ME!"

What is needed is action. Humanism and rationality should thrive during changing times. The humanist alternative to traditional belief should be vigorously promoted in a way that answers the nagging questions in the minds of the people.
Consider the rapid and surprising growth of the New Age in the 90s. Contrary to the way many humanists think, the New Age is not merely some new superstition to replace the old. Though it certainly has its share of nonsense and foolishness, it also has some important parallels with Humanism and free thought. Let me list a few ideas that are commonly shared:

[e.g., check the OSHO sections on this blog]

I could add more, but this will provide an adequate sampling to demonstrate that a significant percentage of “Westerners” is ripe for a number of the ideas humanists have been advancing for years. Many followers of the New Age turn to it not because they are inclined toward superstition, but because the New Age is the only show in town.

This, then points up the problem: the reason why most of those initially attracted to the New Age haven't found a better home in Humanism or free, rational thought.

In part, it's the absence of an effective publicity campaign by “Humanists” and free thinkers. But those who somehow do manage to stumble upon a Humanist, Freethought, or Atheist organization, often find themselves either in a den of anti-religious nay-sayers, or in a loosely organized and ill-defined political caucus. There is rarely much offered for the serious seeker of happiness and the good life.

As a result, the word "Humanism" more often conjures up in the public mind images of windy Manifestos, Bible bashing, and intellectuals lecturing endlessly about reason, science, and civil liberties. While Humanism indeed involves all of these things, it's also a philosophy of joy, personal fulfilment, and emotional liberation. It's a philosophy that can bring peace of mind and self-mastery.

But heaven forbid that we should ever tell anybody!

Is it our classified secret? Do we prefer to engage in purely intellectual discussion, to prove, for the umpteenth time, that mind-body dualism is a myth? [check the KINKAZZO BURNING blog on this, especially Do You MIND?" and Hey, Death Is Not The End!]

Yet, after we've proved it, do we do much with the information? Do we now more fully enjoy and celebrate our bodies? Our feelings? Our senses? Do we live our values like the New Agers do?

The reason the New Age promoters, the growing Yuppie mega-churches, and even the evangelicals have been able to benefit from changing times while we haven't is because we have too often looked down upon efforts to make our philosophy personally relevant and emotionally satisfying.

I think the time has come to get serious about applying Humanism and free thought to the basic needs of people: to healing the hurts, sharing the joys, and expanding the horizons.

This new century will be the humanistic century only if we change our ways, open up, and reach out to others. And our outreach must appeal to them not only intellectually, but also emotionally, aesthetically, sentimentally, and even physically.

It is entirely consistent with modern Rationalism to teach the good life as envisioned by Bertrand Russell, a life motivated by love and guided by knowledge, a life of reason and compassion.

As a starting point let us take the idea that this life should be experienced deeply, lived fully, with sensitive awareness and appreciation of that which is around us.

A zest for living, following the lead of Bertrand Russell who, in his book The Conquest of Happiness, referred to "zest" as "the most universal and distinctive mark" of the happy individual. People with this quality, Russell argued, are those who come at life with a sound appetite, are glad to have what is before them, partake of things until they have enough, and know when to stop.

Let’s promote this sort of joyful living! C’mon, get your finger out!!

There are so many areas of life where an applied Humanism could make a real difference. And in doing so, it could begin to supplant the powerful influence of the New Age or any similar movement. It could begin to do for people what the New Age only promised to do.

Our guilt cultures and shame cultures must end.

We need a philosophy of liberation that can act as a counter to such Western tendencies. We need to find inner freedom.

You see, we needn't define our philosophy exclusively in abstract and intellectual terms. It can be an emotional thing as well. And, what's more, one shouldn't have to be an intellectual to be one of us, humanists.

Let me repeat that: One shouldn't have to be an intellectual to be one of us.
It is perfectly legitimate for humanists and free thinkers to promote a programme that would appeal to people of fewer intellectual interests. What would be wrong with a more emotional Humanism?

There are millions of people who are Atheists and Agnostics but who aren't intellectuals -- people who have liberal attitudes, but want some excitement, some emotion, some (dare I say it?) religious adventure.

And that's what the New Age offers, even now, in the 21st century -- religious adventure for people of tolerance.

Just think of the fun and exciting things New Agers get to do...

First, they get to go on a great journey of self-exploration.
Second, they get to make thrilling discoveries that can increase their happiness -- sort of like going on a treasure hunt through inner space.
Third, they get to participate in invigorating ceremonies and unifying rituals.
In short, for the New Ager, philosophy is fun!

Well, I think Humanism and free, rational thought can be fun, too. I think there are humanistic voyages of self-discovery. And I think there can be non-ritualistic ceremonies that express our ideals and principles.

I'm not saying this particular approach is for everyone -- anymore than a purely intellectual philosophy is for everyone. All I'm saying is that the humanistic movement can become broader without abandoning its principles. It can appeal to the non-intellectual or non-political individual without sacrificing any of its intellectually-discovered conclusions, or giving up its present intellectual activities.

So I say, yes, there can be a popular Humanism; a Humanism that reaches out to people where they are; a self-help Humanism; a Humanism that is fun, is exciting, is full of adventure and self-discovery -- and which doesn't require a Ph.D. or membership in Mensa.

If you think such an approach will get nowhere, consider this thought:

What if Christianity had only appealed to intellectuals? Would it be the world's most popular religion today? Or would it survive only in learned enclaves, easily overpowered by the far more popular forces worshipping the one and only crucified saviour, the dead and risen Adonis.

The Roman Catholic Church appealed to both intellectuals and more ordinary people. That is part of the secret of its success. The New Age is increasingly attempting the same. Our world view rests on firmer ground than either. All it lacks is popular support. But that popular support is there for the asking. All we need to do is apply our philosophy to the meeting of ordinary human needs. All we need to do is speak in ordinary language with an affirmative Rationalism.

And then we need to promote ourselves like crazy. Yes, promote ourselves! This is something else we don't like to talk about, yet it is vital if Humanism and Free Thought are to grow. I'm referring to marketing, something that is often viewed as a dirty word in humanist circles.

You see, to many of us, Humanism isn't supposed to prosper -- lest it cease to be truly Humanism. This is the failure mentality, the death-wish brought on by an unrealistic level of idealism that equates popularity with impurity. Fundamentalists don't suffer from this particular delusion. They market their religion like profit organizations market consumer products. This accounts for their incredible success all over the world, and all out of proportion to the truth value of their claims.
If Humanism and Free Thought are to have a place in the future, they will have to shed their fear of marketing and begin to directly and forthrightly advance their ideas in the world.

It's time to spread the "good news" about our way of life.

The changing world of modern technology is creating ethical issues that are breaking down the old consensus on values. A void has been created. This is our opening. This is our opportunity. The trends are in our favour if we will but seize the moment, ride the wave, and deliberately propel ourselves and our ideas into the future.

So, let's begin to think of the 21st century as our century, and the century of our children and grandchildren. Let's let humanistic values be our legacy to the future. Let's make them relevant to the daily lives of people. Let's make them fun. And let's promote them with all the vigour of our conviction.

We have nothing to lose but our minority status.

Be rational. Be human!

Consider Anxiety... [basic advice for a basic understanding]

2006-08-25T18:09:00.000+01:00

ANXIETY DISORDERS AND HOW TO IDENTIFY THEM

Everybody knows what it's like to feel anxious--the butterflies in your stomach before a first date, the tension you feel when your boss is angry, the way your heart pounds if you're in danger. Anxiety rouses you to action. It gears you up to face a threatening situation. It makes you study harder for that exam, and keeps you on your toes when you're making a speech. In general, it helps you cope.

But if you have an anxiety disorder, this normally helpful emotion can do just the opposite--it can keep you from coping and can disrupt your daily life. Anxiety disorders aren't just a case of "nerves." They are illnesses, often related to the biological makeup and life experiences of the individual, and they frequently run in families. There are several types of anxiety disorders, each with its own distinct features.

An anxiety disorder may make you feel anxious most of the time, without any apparent reason. Or the anxious feelings may be so uncomfortable that to avoid them you may stop some everyday activities. Or you may have occasional bouts of anxiety so intense they terrify and immobilize you.

Anxiety disorders are the most common of all the mental disorders. Scientists are learning more and more about the nature of anxiety disorders, their causes, and how to alleviate them. Some Mental Health institutions also conduct educational outreach activities about anxiety disorders and other mental illnesses.

Many people misunderstand these disorders and think individuals should be able to overcome the symptoms by sheer willpower. Wishing the symptoms away does not work -- but there are treatments that can help. That's why I am posting here this information -- to help understanding these conditions, describe their treatments, and explain the role of research in conquering anxiety and other mental disorders.
Here you’ll find brief explanations of generalized anxiety disorder, panic disorder (which is sometimes accompanied by agoraphobia), specific phobias, social phobias, obsessive-compulsive disorder, and post-traumatic stress disorder. For more detailed information on some of these anxiety disorders, you should refer to specialised organisation and psychotherapists/doctors.

Generalized Anxiety Disorder

Panic Disorder

Phobias

Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

How to Get Help for Anxiety Disorder

1. Generalized Anxiety Disorder

-- "I always thought I was just a worrier. I'd feel keyed up and unable to relax. At times it would come and go, and at times it would be constant. It could go on for days. I'd worry about what I was going to fix for a dinner party, or what would be a great present for somebody. I just couldn't let something go."

-- "I'd have terrible sleeping problems. There were times I'd wake up wired in the morning or in the middle of the night. I had trouble concentrating, even reading the newspaper or a novel. Sometimes I'd feel a little lightheaded. My heart would race or pound. And that would make me worry more."

Generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) is much more than the normal anxiety people experience day to day. It's chronic and exaggerated worry and tension, even though nothing seems to provoke it. Having this disorder means always anticipating disaster, often worrying excessively about health, money, family, or work. Sometimes, though, the source of the worry is hard to pinpoint. Simply the thought of getting through the day provokes anxiety.

People with GAD can't seem to shake their concerns, even though they usually realize that their anxiety is more intense than the situation warrants. People with GAD also seem unable to relax. They often have trouble falling or staying asleep. Their worries are accompanied by physical symptoms, especially trembling, twitching, muscle tension, headaches, irritability, sweating, or hot flashes. They may feel lightheaded or out of breath. They may feel nauseated or have to go to the bathroom frequently. Or they might feel as though they have a lump in the throat.

Many individuals with GAD startle more easily than other people. They tend to feel tired, have trouble concentrating, and sometimes suffer depression, too.

Usually the impairment associated with GAD is mild and people with the disorder don't feel too restricted in social settings or on the job. Unlike many other anxiety disorders, people with GAD don't characteristically avoid certain situations as a result of their disorder. However, if severe, GAD can be very debilitating, making it difficult to carry out even the most ordinary daily activities.
GAD comes on gradually and most often hits people in childhood or adolescence, but can begin in adulthood, too. It's more common in women than in men and often occurs in relatives of affected persons. It's diagnosed when someone spends at least 6 months worried excessively about a number of everyday problems.

________________________________________

Having GAD means always
anticipating disaster, often worrying
excessively about health, money,
family, or work. Worries are often
accompanied by physical symptoms
like trembling, muscle tension,
and nausea.
________________________________________

In general, the symptoms of GAD seem to diminish with age. Successful treatment may include a medication called buspirone. Research into the effectiveness of other medications, such as benzodiazepines and antidepressants, is ongoing. Also useful are cognitive-behavioural therapy, relaxation techniques, and biofeedback to control muscle tension.

2. Panic Disorder

-- "It started 10 years ago. I was sitting in a seminar in a hotel and this thing came out of the clear blue. I felt like I was dying."

-- "For me, a panic attack is almost a violent experience. I feel like I'm going insane. It makes me feel like I'm losing control in a very extreme way. My heart pounds really hard, things seem unreal, and there's this very strong feeling of impending doom."

-- "In between attacks there is this dread and anxiety that it's going to happen again. It can be very debilitating, trying to escape those feelings of panic."

People with panic disorder have feelings of terror that strike suddenly and repeatedly with no warning. They can't predict when an attack will occur, and many develop intense anxiety between episodes, worrying when and where the next one will strike. In between times there is a persistent, lingering worry that another attack could come any minute.

When a panic attack strikes, most likely your heart pounds and you may feel sweaty, weak, faint, or dizzy. Your hands may tingle or feel numb, and you might feel flushed or chilled. You may have chest pain or smothering sensations, a sense of unreality, or fear of impending doom or loss of control. You may genuinely believe you're having a heart attack or stroke, losing your mind, or on the verge of death. Attacks can occur any time, even during nondream sleep. While most attacks average a couple of minutes, occasionally they can go on for up to 10 minutes. In rare cases, they may last an hour or more.

________________________________________

You may genuinely believe you're
having a heart attack, losing your
mind, or on the verge of death.
Attacks can occur any time, even
during nondream sleep.
________________________________________

Panic disorder strikes between 10 and 25 million people in the 8 most developed countries (a conservative estimate), and is twice as common in women as in men. It can appear at any age -- in children or in the elderly -- but most often it begins in young adults. Not everyone who experiences panic attacks will develop panic disorder -- for example, many people have one attack but never have another. For those who do have panic disorder, though, it's important to seek treatment. Untreated, the disorder can become very disabling.

Panic disorder is often accompanied by other conditions such as depression or alcoholism, and may spawn phobias, which can develop in places or situations where panic attacks have occurred. For example, if a panic attack strikes while you're riding an elevator, you may develop a fear of elevators and perhaps start avoiding them.

Some people's lives become greatly restricted -- they avoid normal, everyday activities such as grocery shopping, driving, or in some cases even leaving the house. Or, they may be able to confront a feared situation only if accompanied by a spouse or other trusted person. Basically, they avoid any situation they fear would make them feel helpless if a panic attack occurs. When people's lives become so restricted by the disorder, as happens in about one-third of all people with panic disorder, the condition is called agoraphobia. A tendency toward panic disorder and agoraphobia runs in families. Nevertheless, early treatment of panic disorder can often stop the progression to agoraphobia.

Studies have shown that proper treatment -- a type of psychotherapy called cognitive-behavioural therapy, medications, or possibly a combination of the two --helps 70 to 90 percent of people with panic disorder. Significant improvement is usually seen within 6 to 8 weeks.

Cognitive-behavioural approaches teach patients how to view the panic situations differently and demonstrate ways to reduce anxiety, using breathing exercises or techniques to refocus attention, for example. Another technique used in cognitive-behavioural therapy, called exposure therapy, can often help alleviate the phobias that may result from panic disorder. In exposure therapy, people are very slowly exposed to the fearful situation until they become desensitized to it.

Some people find the greatest relief from panic disorder symptoms when they take certain prescription medications. Such medications, like cognitive-behavioural therapy, can help to prevent panic attacks or reduce their frequency and severity. Two types of medications that have been shown to be safe and effective in the treatment of panic disorder are antidepressants and benzodiazepines.

3. Phobias

Phobias occur in several forms. A specific phobia is a fear of a particular object or situation. Social phobia is a fear of being painfully embarrassed in a social setting. And agoraphobia, which often accompanies panic disorder, is a fear of being in any situation that might provoke a panic attack, or from which escape might be difficult if one occurred.

~ Specific Phobias

-- "I'm scared to death of flying, and I never do it anymore. It's an awful feeling when that airplane door closes and I feel trapped. My heart pounds and I sweat bullets. If somebody starts talking to me, I get very stiff and preoccupied. When the airplane starts to ascend, it just reinforces that feeling that I can't get out. I picture myself losing control, freaking out, climbing the walls, but of course I never do. I'm not afraid of crashing or hitting turbulence. It's just that feeling of being trapped. Whenever I've thought about changing jobs, I've had to think, Would I be under pressure to fly? These days I only go places where I can drive or take a train. My friends always point out that I couldn't get off a train traveling at high speeds either, so why don't trains bother me? I just tell them it isn't a rational fear."

Many people experience specific phobias, intense, irrational fears of certain things or situations--dogs, closed-in places, heights, escalators, tunnels, highway driving, water, flying, and injuries involving blood are a few of the more common ones. Phobias aren't just extreme fear; they are irrational fear. You may be able to ski the world's tallest mountains with ease but panic going above the 10th floor of an office building. Adults with phobias realize their fears are irrational, but often facing, or even thinking about facing, the feared object or situation brings on a panic attack or severe anxiety.

Specific phobias strike more than 1 in 10 people. No one knows just what causes them, though they seem to run in families and are a little more prevalent in women. Phobias usually first appear in adolescence or adulthood. They start suddenly and tend to be more persistent than childhood phobias; only about 20 percent of adult phobias vanish on their own. When children have specific phobias -- for example, a fear of animals -- those fears usually disappear over time, though they may continue into adulthood. No one knows why they hang on in some people and disappear in others.

If the object of the fear is easy to avoid, people with phobias may not feel the need to seek treatment. Sometimes, though, they may make important career or personal decisions to avoid a phobic situation.

________________________________________

Phobias aren't just extreme fear;
they are irrational fear. You may be
able to ski the world's tallest
mountains with ease but feel panic
going above the 10th floor of an
office building.
________________________________________

When phobias interfere with a person's life, treatment can help. Successful treatment usually involves a kind of cognitive-behavioral therapy called desensitization or exposure therapy, in which patients are gradually exposed to what frightens them until the fear begins to fade. Three-fourths of patients benefit significantly from this type of treatment. Relaxation and breathing exercises also help reduce anxiety symptoms.

There is currently no proven drug treatment for specific phobias, but sometimes certain medications may be prescribed to help reduce anxiety symptoms before someone faces a phobic situation.

~ Social Phobia

-- "I couldn't go on dates or to parties. For a while, I couldn't even go to class. My sophomore year of college I had to come home for a semester."

-- "My fear would happen in any social situation. I would be anxious before I even left the house, and it would escalate as I got closer to class, a party, or whatever. I would feel sick to my stomach--it almost felt like I had the flu. My heart would pound, my palms would get sweaty, and I would get this feeling of being removed from myself and from everybody else."

-- "When I would walk into a room full of people, I'd turn red and it would feel like everybody's eyes were on me. I was too embarrassed to stand off in a corner by myself, but I couldn't think of anything to say to anybody. I felt so clumsy, I couldn't wait to get out."

Social phobia is an intense fear of becoming humiliated in social situations, specifically of embarrassing yourself in front of other people. It often runs in families and may be accompanied by depression or alcoholism. Social phobia often begins around early adolescence or even younger.

If you suffer from social phobia, you tend to think that other people are very competent in public and that you are not. Small mistakes you make may seem to you much more exaggerated than they really are. Blushing itself may seem painfully embarrassing, and you feel as though all eyes are focused on you. You may be afraid of being with people other than those closest to you. Or your fear may be more specific, such as feeling anxious about giving a speech, talking to a boss or other authority figure, or dating. The most common social phobia is a fear of public speaking. Sometimes social phobia involves a general fear of social situations such as parties. More rarely it may involve a fear of using a public restroom, eating out, talking on the phone, or writing in the presence of other people, such as when signing a check.

Although this disorder is often thought of as shyness, the two are not the same. Shy people can be very uneasy around others, but they don't experience the extreme anxiety in anticipating a social situation, and they don't necessarily avoid circumstances that make them feel self-conscious. In contrast, people with social phobia aren't necessarily shy at all. They can be completely at ease with people most of the time, but particular situations, such as walking down an aisle in public or making a speech, can give them intense anxiety. Social phobia disrupts normal life, interfering with career or social relationships. For example, a worker can turn down a job promotion because he can't give public presentations. The dread of a social event can begin weeks in advance, and symptoms can be quite debilitating.

________________________________________

People with social phobia aren't
necessarily shy at all. They can be
completely at ease with people most
of the time, but in particular
situations, they feel intense anxiety.
________________________________________

People with social phobia are aware that their feelings are irrational. Still, they experience a great deal of dread before facing the feared situation, and they may go out of their way to avoid it. Even if they manage to confront what they fear, they usually feel very anxious beforehand and are intensely uncomfortable throughout. Afterwards, the unpleasant feelings may linger, as they worry about how they may have been judged or what others may have thought or observed about them.

About 80 percent of people who suffer from social phobia find relief from their symptoms when treated with cognitive-behavioral therapy or medications or a combination of the two. Therapy may involve learning to view social events differently; being exposed to a seemingly threatening social situation in such a way that it becomes easier to face; and learning anxiety-reducing techniques, social skills, and relaxation techniques.

The medications that have proven effective include antidepressants called MAO inhibitors. People with a specific form of social phobia called performance phobia have been helped by drugs called beta-blockers. For example, musicians or others with this anxiety may be prescribed a beta-blocker for use on the day of a performance.

4. Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder

-- "I couldn't do anything without rituals. They transcended every aspect of my life. Counting was big for me. When I set my alarm at night, I had to set it to a number that wouldn't add up to a "bad" number. If my sister was 33 and I was 24, I couldn't leave the TV on Channel 33 or 24. I would wash my hair three times as opposed to once because three was a good luck number and one wasn't. It took me longer to read because I'd count the lines in a paragraph. If I was writing a term paper, I couldn't have a certain number of words on a line if it added up to a bad number. I was always worried that if I didn't do something, my parents were going to die. Or I would worry about harming my parents, which was completely irrational. I couldn't wear anything that said New York City because my parents were from NYC. I couldn't write the word "death" because I was worried that something bad would happen."

-- "Getting dressed in the morning was tough because I had a routine, and if I deviated from that routine, I'd have to get dressed again. I knew the rituals didn't make sense, but I couldn't seem to overcome them until I had therapy."

Obsessive-compulsive disorder is characterized by anxious thoughts or rituals you feel you can't control. If you have OCD, as it's called, you may be plagued by persistent, unwelcome thoughts or images, or by the urgent need to engage in certain rituals.

You may be obsessed with germs or dirt, so you wash your hands over and over. You may be filled with doubt and feel the need to check things repeatedly. You might be preoccupied by thoughts of violence and fear that you will harm people close to you. You may spend long periods of time touching things or counting; you may be preoccupied by order or symmetry; you may have persistent thoughts of performing sexual acts that are repugnant to you; or you may be troubled by thoughts that are against your religious beliefs.

The disturbing thoughts or images are called obsessions, and the rituals that are performed to try to prevent or dispel them are called compulsions. There is no pleasure in carrying out the rituals you are drawn to, only temporary relief from the discomfort caused by the obsession.

A lot of healthy people can identify with having some of the symptoms of OCD, such as checking the stove several times before leaving the house. But the disorder is diagnosed only when such activities consume at least an hour a day, are very distressing, and interfere with daily life.

Most adults with this condition recognize that what they're doing is senseless, but they can't stop it. Some people, though, particularly children with OCD, may not realize that their behaviour is out of the ordinary.

________________________________________

The disturbing thoughts or images
are called obsessions, and the rituals
performed to try to prevent or
dispel them are called compulsions.
There is no pleasure in carrying out
the rituals you are drawn to, only
temporary relief from the
discomfort caused by the obsession.
________________________________________

OCD strikes men and women in approximately equal numbers and afflicts roughly 1 in 50 people. It can appear in childhood, adolescence, or adulthood, but on the average it first shows up in the teens or early adulthood. A third of adults with OCD experienced their first symptoms as children. The course of the disease is variable -- symptoms may come and go, they may ease over time, or they can grow progressively worse. Evidence suggests that OCD might run in families.

Depression or other anxiety disorders may accompany OCD. And some people with OCD have eating disorders. In addition, they may avoid situations in which they might have to confront their obsessions. Or they may try unsuccessfully to use alcohol or drugs to calm themselves. If OCD grows severe enough, it can keep someone from holding down a job or from carrying out normal responsibilities at home, but more often it doesn't develop to those extremes.

Research by scientists has led to the development of medications and behavioural treatments that can benefit people with OCD. A combination of the two treatments is often helpful for most patients. Some individuals respond best to one therapy, some to another. Two medications that have been found effective in treating OCD are clomipramine and fluoxetine. A number of others are showing promise, however, and may soon be available.

Behavioural therapy, specifically a type called exposure and response prevention, has also proven useful for treating OCD. It involves exposing the person to whatever triggers the problem and then helping him or her forego the usual ritual -- for instance, having the patient touch something dirty and then not wash his hands. This therapy is often successful in patients who complete a behavioural therapy program, though results have been less favorable in some people who have both OCD and depression.

5. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder

-- "I was raped when I was 25 years old. For a long time, I spoke about the rape on an intellectual level, as though it was something that happened to someone else. I was very aware that it had happened to me, but there just was no feeling. I kind of skidded along for a while."

-- "I started having flashbacks. They kind of came over me like a splash of water. I would be terrified. Suddenly I was reliving the rape. Every instant was startling. I felt like my entire head was moving a bit, shaking, but that wasn't so at all. I would get very flushed or a very dry mouth and my breathing changed. I was held in suspension. I wasn't aware of the cushion on the chair that I was sitting in or that my arm was touching a piece of furniture. I was in a bubble, just kind of floating. And it was scary. Having a flashback can wring you out. You're really shaken."

-- "The rape happened the week before Christmas, and I feel like a werewolf around the anniversary date. I can't believe the transformation into anxiety and fear."

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a debilitating condition that follows a terrifying event. Often, people with PTSD have persistent frightening thoughts and memories of their ordeal and feel emotionally numb, especially with people they were once close to. PTSD, once referred to as shell shock or battle fatigue, was first brought to public attention by war veterans, but it can result from any number of traumatic incidents. These include kidnapping, serious accidents such as car or train wrecks, natural disasters such as floods or earthquakes, violent attacks such as a mugging, rape, or torture, or being held captive. The event that triggers it may be something that threatened the person's life or the life of someone close to him or her. Or it could be something witnessed, such as mass destruction after a plane crash.

Whatever the source of the problem, some people with PTSD repeatedly relive the trauma in the form of nightmares and disturbing recollections during the day. They may also experience sleep problems, depression, feeling detached or numb, or being easily startled. They may lose interest in things they used to enjoy and have trouble feeling affectionate. They may feel irritable, more aggressive than before, or even violent. Seeing things that remind them of the incident may be very distressing, which could lead them to avoid certain places or situations that bring back those memories. Anniversaries of the event are often very difficult.

________________________________________

Ordinary events can serve as
reminders of the trauma and trigger
flashbacks or intrusive images.
Anniversaries of the event are often
very difficult.
________________________________________

PTSD can occur at any age, including childhood. The disorder can be accompanied by depression, substance abuse, or anxiety. Symptoms may be mild or severe -- people may become easily irritated or have violent outbursts. In severe cases they may have trouble working or socializing. In general, the symptoms seem to be worse if the event that triggered them was initiated by a person -- such as a rape, as opposed to a flood.

Ordinary events can serve as reminders of the trauma and trigger flashbacks or intrusive images. A flashback may make the person lose touch with reality and reenact the event for a period of seconds or hours or, very rarely, days. A person having a flashback, which can come in the form of images, sounds, smells, or feelings, usually believes that the traumatic event is happening all over again.

Not every traumatized person gets full-blown PTSD, or experiences PTSD at all. PTSD is diagnosed only if the symptoms last more than a month. In those who do have PTSD, symptoms usually begin within 3 months of the trauma, and the course of the illness varies. Some people recover within 6 months, others have symptoms that last much longer. In some cases, the condition may be chronic. Occasionally, the illness doesn't show up until years after the traumatic event.

Antidepressants and anxiety-reducing medications can ease the symptoms of depression and sleep problems, and psychotherapy, including cognitive-behavioral therapy, is an integral part of treatment. Being exposed to a reminder of the trauma as part of therapy -- such as returning to the scene of a rape -- sometimes helps. And, support from family and friends can help speed recovery.

6. How To Get Help For Anxiety Disorders

If you, or someone you know, has symptoms of anxiety, a visit to the family physician is usually the best place to start. A physician can help you determine if the symptoms are due to an anxiety disorder, some other medical condition, or both. Most often, the next step to getting treatment for an anxiety disorder is referral to a mental health professional.

Among the professionals who can help are psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers, and counselors. However, it's best to look for a professional who has specialized training in cognitive-behavioural or behavioural therapy and who is open to the use of medications, should they be needed (see further Notes below).

Psychologists, social workers, and counselors sometimes work closely with a psychiatrist or other physician, who will prescribe medications when they are required. For some people, group therapy or self-help groups are a helpful part of treatment. Many people do best with a combination of these therapies.

When you're looking for a health care professional, it's important to inquire about what kinds of therapy he or she generally uses or whether medications are available. It's important that you feel comfortable with the therapy. If this is not the case, seek help elsewhere. However, if you've been taking medication, it's important not to quit certain drugs abruptly, but to taper them off under the supervision of your physician. Be sure to ask your physician about how to stop a medication.

Remember, though, that when you find a health care professional you're satisfied with, the two of you are working as a team. Together you will be able to develop a plan to treat your anxiety disorder that may involve medications, behavioural therapy, or cognitive-behavioral therapy, as appropriate. Treatments for anxiety disorders, however, may not start working instantly. Your doctor or therapist may ask you to follow a specific treatment plan for several weeks to determine whether it's working.

Scientific institutes continue their search for new and better treatments for people with anxiety disorders. These organisations support sizeable and multifaceted research program on anxiety disorders -- their causes, diagnosis, treatment, and prevention. This research involves studies of anxiety disorders in human subjects and investigations of the biological basis for anxiety and related phenomena in animals. It is part of a massive effort to overcome the major mental disorders, which seem to afflict ever larger numbers of people.

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FURTHER NOTES

Treatment for Anxiety Disorders

Many people with anxiety disorders can be helped with treatment. Therapy for anxiety disorders often involves medication or specific forms of psychotherapy.

Medications, although not cures, can be very effective at relieving anxiety symptoms. Today, thanks to research by scientists in the U.S and U.K., there are more medications available than ever before to treat anxiety disorders. So if one drug is not successful, there are usually others to try. In addition, new medications to treat anxiety symptoms are under development.

For most of the medications that are prescribed to treat anxiety disorders, the doctor usually starts the patient on a low dose and gradually increases it to the full dose. Every medication has side effects, but they usually become tolerated or diminish with time. If side effects become a problem, the doctor may advise the patient to stop taking the medication and to wait a week--or longer for certain drugs--before trying another one. When treatment is near an end, the doctor will taper the dosage gradually.

Research has also shown that behavioural therapy and cognitive-behavioural therapy can be effective for treating several of the anxiety disorders.

Behavioural therapy focuses on changing specific actions and uses several techniques to decreases or stop unwanted behaviour. For example, one technique trains patients in diaphragmatic breathing, a special breathing exercise involving slow, deep breaths to reduce anxiety. This is necessary because people who are anxious often hyperventilate, taking rapid shallow breaths that can trigger rapid heartbeat, lightheadedness, and other symptoms. Another technique --exposure therapy-- gradually exposes patients to what frightens them and helps them cope with their fears.

Like behavioural therapy, cognitive-behavioural therapy teaches patients to react differently to the situations and bodily sensations that trigger panic attacks and other anxiety symptoms. However, patients also learn to understand how their thinking patterns contribute to their symptoms and how to change their thoughts so that symptoms are less likely to occur. This awareness of thinking patterns is combined with exposure and other behavioural techniques to help people confront their feared situations. For example, someone who becomes lightheaded during a panic attack and fears he is going to die can be helped with the following approach used in cognitive-behavioural therapy. The therapist asks him to spin in a circle until he becomes dizzy. When he becomes alarmed and starts thinking, "I'm going to die," he learns to replace that thought with a more appropriate one, such as "It's just a little dizziness--I can handle it."