Osho News Online Magazine

The Vatican and Osho: A Study in Hypocrisy

Bhagawati — Wed, 22 May 2013 16:23:49 +0000

Osho apparently thought that John Paul II had met with Reagan in 1985, shortly before Osho was arrested, but this was an error. According to online records Reagan met with John Paul II in 1982 and 1987.

Reagan, a fundamentalist Christian, would ordinarily have been the natural enemy of the pope in the politics of American Christianity, but the two men shared a common passion: a hatred of communism. Carl Bernstein reported in the June 24, 2001 issue of Time that the two men met for 50 minutes in 1982, supposedly to discuss Israel’s invasion of Lebanon. In fact, they spent most of their time talking about two other topics dear to their hearts. The first was the recent suppression of the Solidarity labor movement in Poland, and the second was the assassination attempts they had both experienced in 1981. They agreed they had both been divinely spared for missions from God.

The Reagan administration believed Poland was key to the downfall of the Soviet Union and that John Paul II, as a highly influential Pole, could be tremendously useful. Bernstein revealed that the US provided clandestine aid to Solidarity, supplied the pope with top-secret information on a regular basis, and William Casey, head of the CIA and a conservative Catholic, made regular secret visits to the Vatican. The Nation reported on April 17, 1989 that in his turn John Paul II ordered all priests to resign posts in the Sandinista government in Nicaragua, which the Regan administration opposed.

This was definitely a “you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours” relationship. They were willing to do each other favors to get to their shared goal. John Paul II seems to have been obsessed with the idea of freeing Poland from communism and is reported to have talked of little else with US officials, even when they had a different purpose, like discussing disarmament. He had appointed someone else to deal with “religious threats,” while he focused on the political. His “enforcer of the faith” was German Joseph Ratzinger, who later became Pope Benedict XVI.

Joseph Ratzinger was the Archbishop of Munich and Freiling from 1977 to 1982, during a time when Stern and Der Spiegel were publishing articles with lots of pictures of naked people in groups in Pune and when centers in Munich, Cologne, and other areas of Germany were booming. Ratzinger was apparently worried that the appeal of Eastern mysticism would lure people away from the Church.

Ratzinger was appointed head of the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, the Catholic Church’s modern version of the Inquisition, in 1981. He soon became the second most powerful man in the Vatican and was elevated to cardinal in 1993. In Rome he focused much of his efforts on stopping what he called pluralism, or the seeking of truth and grace in religions other than Christianity. He claimed pluralism or “relativism” was a threat to true faith from the Third World. In a 1997 interview published in the March 21 issue of the French L’Express, Ratzinger called Buddhism an “auto-erotic spirituality” and said: “In the 1950s someone said that the undoing of the Catholic Church in the twentieth century wouldn’t come from Marxism, but from Buddhism. They were right.” Ratzinger spoke of the ”seductions” of Buddhism and other Eastern traditions. According to John L. Allen, Jr., author of Cardinal Ratzinger: The Vatican’s Enforcer of the Faith, [1] Ratzinger’s statements were so offensive that a group of American priests issued an apology to Buddhists.

Ratzinger used his inquisition to censure Catholics who supported pluralism; Allen reports that Ratzinger went so far as to excommunicate a priest in Sri Lanka. In 2000 Ratzinger’s office created a statement of doctrine later signed by John Paul II called Dominus Iesus [2]. It held that non-Catholic Christian traditions were “defective,” but non-Christian were “gravely deficient” in terms of salvation.

So, what was Ratzinger’s relationship with Osho and sannyasins? Though he was often suspected of working behind the scenes in things like German legal disputes and Italian visa applications, nothing could be proved. The October 11, 1985 National Catholic Reporter stated: “The cardinal, who ‘daily receives top secret information from every continent,’ does his best to take daily top-secret action on the basis of this information.”

The only assertion of a direct connection came from Ashok Row Kavi, former columnist for the Bombay Sunday Mail. On December 24, 1989 he reported that someone “very close” to Ratzinger had revealed that Ratzinger “is known to have operated behind the scenes in the expulsion of Rajneesh from America.” In early February 1990, Kavi reported in a column that Ratzinger had said in 1981: “All sorts of Satanic cults by oriental godmen are out to seduce the faithful away from Christ.” Kavi claimed that Osho was the “object of these controversial statements.”

Considering the quid-pro-quo relationship between the Reagan administration and the Vatican, the belief that Ratzinger was instrumental in having Osho thrown out of the US is plausible, but given the Reagan administration’s longstanding opposition to Osho, it’s unclear if they needed any encouragement. At the very least, there is evidence that Ratzinger felt justified in lobbying to have Osho removed from the US.

After becoming Benedict XVI in 2005, Ratzinger soon met with enormous scandal. Ongoing investigations of sexual abuse of children revealed Church cover-ups that led to Ratzinger’s door in the Vatican. As head of the Congregation he was directly responsible for investigating such misbehavior, and in 2000 he had ordered his office to take oversight control of all investigations. Yet virtually nothing was done to stop the abuse. Several Catholic dioceses, including the one in Portland, Oregon, have had to file bankruptcy to avoid millions of dollars of damages for abuse and cover-up. Ratzinger’s supporters have claimed that this inaction was the fault of John Paul II, but in the eight years of Ratzinger’s tenure as pope, he apologized profusely for the child abuse, while doing little to stop it. Two cardinals from the US and Ireland have been implicated in widespread abuse cover-ups, but the cardinals are still in office and joined the conclave to vote for Benedict’s successor.

Meanwhile, back in Rome, Benedict’s butler was among Vatican watchers who were appalled by the allegations of misbehavior against Benedict’s own second in command, Cardinal Tarcisio Bertone. The butler stole stacks of correspondence documenting sexual misbehavior and financial corruption in the Vatican and blew the whistle, allowing much of the correspondence to be published. Benedict had no choice but to order an investigation. The report of the investigation came in less than two months before Benedict announced his resignation.

The Italian press published information about the report, with screaming headlines about gay factions in the Vatican, which is hardly groundbreaking news, and downplayed the other issue mentioned: misuse of funds and a financial scandal that may involve the Vatican Bank. This brings to mind the story of John Paul I, who died suddenly after 33 days in office, when he, among other things, indicated a willingness to allow an investigation of a Vatican Bank scandal. Since Vatican protocol does not allow autopsies of popes, the dispute over the cause of his death continues. The case was written up in the book In God’s Name, which Osho spoke about (One Seed Makes the Whole Earth Green, Ch 3; The Rebel, Ch 13) [see related articles below].

Benedict and/or his conservative supporters recognized that he lacked the courage, vitality, and credibility to deal with the latest Vatican corruption scandal, so he’s off to a quiet retirement, while the attempt to save face and save the necks of many influential people in Europe falls on his successor, Pope Francis. Francis, another conservative, was reportedly the second runner up in the last conclave. He was elected in a conclave where well over half of the members had been selected by Benedict.

The irony of Benedict’s belief that the very flawed institution of the Catholic Church (child abuse, sexual perversion, blackmail, theft, and possibly murder) is the only agency of God on Earth and that Benedict has been justified in his self-righteous attacks on “deficient” non-Christian traditions that threaten its supremacy – like Osho, Buddhism, Hinduism – is hard to miss. But Joseph Ratzinger has apparently missed it completely. The insight and integrity of Pope Francis remain to be seen.

Footnote [1] This and some other references are quoted in the new, revised version of Max Brecher’s A Passage to America, available as an ebook on his website, www.maxbrechersbookstobuy.com
Footnote [2] www.vatican.va

Related discourse excerpts:
Osho about In God’s Name
Sannyas a Training for Rebellion

This article was first published in the May/June 2013 issue of Viha Connection – reproduced with permission

Ma Prem Sangeet (Sangeet Duchane) was trained as an attorney and was the city attorney for Rajneeshpuram and Antelope during the Ranch days, and Osho’s legal representative and researcher in Pune Two. She was also a writer and editor for the Rajneesh/Osho times. She became involved in the case challenging Osho trademarks in the US in 2000 and worked on the case until it was resolved in 2009. She now lives in northern California, where she works as a writer and editor. sangeetduchane2 (at) aol.com – replace (at) with @

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Altamira: Mystery of Art and Colours

Bhagawati — Wed, 22 May 2013 16:21:44 +0000

It is famous for its magnificent prehistoric paintings and engravings, drawings and polychrome rock paintings of wild mammals and human hands. The cave was discovered by a hunter in 1868 and only much later visited by Don Marcelino, a local nobleman and amateur archaeologist. When he excavated the floor of the cave’s entrance chamber, he unearthed animal bones and stone tools. On another visit, his eight-year-old daughter, Maria, who accompanied him, was the first to notice the paintings of bison on the ceiling of a side chamber.

After further excavations, Marcelino and archaeologist Juan Vilanova Piera from the University of Madrid stated in a much acclaimed publication in 1880 the paintings as being Paleolithic (Old Stone Age) in origin. Naturally, as is usually the case, their findings were widely ridiculed at the 1880 Pre-historical Congress in Lisbon. Finally, in 1902, the authenticity of the paintings was acknowledged and this changed forever the perception of prehistoric human beings.

The cave is approximately 300 meters long and consists of a series of twisting passages and chambers. Human occupation was limited to the cave mouth, although paintings were created throughout the length of the cave. The unknown people used charcoal, ochre and haematite for the images, and also exploited the natural contours in the cave walls to give their subjects a three-dimensional effect. The Polychrome Ceiling is the most impressive feature of the cave, depicting a herd of extinct steppe bison, two horses, a large doe and what appears to be a wild boar.

The walls and ceilings of the Altamira caves lack the soot deposits which have been found in other similar caves. This is suggestive of the fact that the people at Altamira had more advanced lighting technology which gave off less smoke and soot than the torches and fat lamps which Paleolithic people are credited with.

The Palaeolithic people decorated their cave walls either by carving or engraving them with sharp stones, or by painting them with pigment made from minerals. Red (rust) colors were obtained from iron oxide; black came either from charcoal or manganese dioxide; and white, which was rarely used, came from kaolin or kaolinite. These minerals were ground up on pestles and mortars, and combined to produce a variety of colors. They were then mixed with water to make paint.

Archaeologists used to think that the pigments were mixed with oils or fats, but experiments have shown that this does not work. The paints were applied to the walls either with fingers, fur, or brushes made from twigs. It may be that the artists also used blues and greens obtained from plants such as woad, but these colors have faded from the walls, and so we cannot be certain of this.

Scientists continue to evaluate the age of the cave art at Altamira. In 2008, researchers using uranium-thorium dating found that the paintings were completed over a period of up to 20,000 years rather than during a comparatively brief period. In 2012, further uranium-thorium dating research was published supporting an older age for portions of the art, including one claviform image at 35,600 years old. We don’t know who these people were.

Paleolithic societies survived up to our days in some places in Africa (Bushmen and pygmies), Australia (Aborigines), South America (like in Tierra del Fuego and other places).

Speaking about Altamira and the technical advancement of that age, Osho says,

In Europe in 1880 the caves of Altamira were discovered. In those caves there are coloured pictures said to have been drawn twenty thousand years ago. But the colours of the pictures look as fresh as if they were painted yesterday. Because of this, Don Marcelino, who discovered these caves, was criticized all over Europe. Everyone thought that he had touched up the pictures. All the artists who saw the pictures said Marcelino was trying to fool the public, that such fresh colours could not be ancient.

What they were saying was right, in a way, because the paintings of Van Gogh, which are not even one hundred years old, are already fading; the pictures Picasso painted in his youth have become as old as he himself. The colours used these days by artists throughout the world don’t last more than a hundred years; they are bound to fade within a century.

But when the investigation of the caves Marcelino found was completed, it was proved beyond doubt that the caves were more than twenty thousand years old. This is a great mystery, because those who painted those colours seem to have known much more about colours than we know at present. We may have been able to reach the moon, but we have not been able to make colours that can remain fresh and last longer than a hundred years. Those who made these colours twenty thousand years ago knew much more about the science of colour than we do.

Osho, The Hidden Mysteries, Ch 4 (Translated from Hindi)

Text by Naina

Tanjooberrymutts

Bhagawati — Wed, 22 May 2013 09:57:55 +0000

The following is a telephone exchange in a China hotel between a hotel guest and room-service…

Room Service: “Morrin. Roon sirbees.”

Guest: “Sorry, I thought I dialled room-service.”

Room Service: ” Rye, Roon sirbees…morrin! Joowish to oddor sunteen?”

Guest: “Uh… Yes, I’d like to order bacon & eggs.”

Room Service: “Ow ulai den?”

Guest: ” …….What?”

Room Service: “Ow ulai den?… Pryed, boyud, pochd?”

Guest: “Oh, the eggs! How do I like them? Sorry… scrambled, please.”

Room Service: “Ow ulai dee bayken? Creepse?”

Guest: “Crisp will be fine.”

Room Service: “Hokay. An sahn toes?”

Guest: “What?”

Room Service: “An toes. Ulai sahn toes?”

Guest: “I…. Don’t think so…”

Room Service: “No? Udo wan sahn toes?”

Guest: “I feel really bad about this, but I don’t know what ‘udo wan sahn toes’ means.”

Room Service: “Toes! Toes!… Why uoo don wan toes?… Ow bow anglish moppin we botter?”

Guest: “Oh, English muffin! I’ve got it! You were saying ‘toast’… Fine…Yes, an English muffin will be fine.”

Room Service: “We botter?”

Guest: “No, just put the botter on the side.”

Room Service: “Wad?”

Guest: “I mean butter… Just put the butter on the side.”

Room Service: “Copy?”

Guest: “Excuse me?”

Room Service: “Copy… tea… meel?”

Guest: “Yes. Coffee, please… And that’s everything.”

Room Service: “One Minnie. Scramah egg, creepse bayken, Anglish moppin, we botter on sigh an copy… Rye?”

Guest: “Whatever you say.”

Room Service: “Tanjooberrymutts.”

Guest: “You’re welcome.”

Credit to Naina

Osho about ‘In God’s Name’

Bhagawati — Wed, 22 May 2013 09:26:06 +0000

[...] In his book, In God’s Name, David Yallop exposes the corruption of the Vatican. He tells how Pope John Paul – the pope before this Polack pope – had ordered an investigation of the Vatican Bank after reports that it was involved in money laundering.

The pope had also made it clear that under his direction the church would approve of birth control.

Suddenly, after these two radical moves, thirty-three days after being made pope, this healthy man died of a heart attack. His personal notes, will, and medicine bottles mysteriously disappeared. Before the cause of death could be confirmed, his body was embalmed, a process which makes it impossible to detect the presence of poison. Many people feel he was murdered.

The new pope, a Polack, promoted the head of the same bank to archbishop. For this man who had been the head of the bank, the government of Italy has issued an arrest warrant – but they cannot enter the Vatican. The Vatican is a country of eight square miles just in the middle of Rome, the capital of Italy. The sovereign head of the religion and the country is the pope. Of course, nobody can enter there to arrest him. And they know perfectly well that he has to be arrested by the Italian government if he goes out of the Vatican, because of what they have been doing through the bank…

It is the greatest mafia. All the heroin money – not a small account, six hundred million dollars per year! – they are turning into white money. This is the whole function of the Vatican Bank. John Paul was a man of great intelligence. He wanted to find out the facts about the bank, because it is committing the greatest crime, for which millions of young people are suffering in jails.

After only thirty-three days… This is the least time any pope has been a pope. He was perfectly healthy; he had no record of any heart diseases, and he was found sitting in his bed, dead, clutching a paper in his hand, in which he had written his will and made two points clear: that the bank should be completely investigated, and if there is any crime being committed, the persons should be punished. And second, the situation has changed completely since the days of Genesis. Birth control should be allowed, and all kinds of birth control methods, pills, should be allowed to humanity – particularly to Catholics. It is not the time to multiply.

This paper that he was clutching in his hand – and he was dead – this paper also disappeared. And they did not get a certificate from a medical expert that he had died naturally; they immediately embalmed the body without telling anyone. After embalming the body there is no way to find whether the person has been poisoned or not.

As far as I can see, he was certainly murdered because he was going against the criminal bank, and against the criminal attitude of the Christians – they go on being against abortion, against birth control pills, against any kind of method that can prevent the population explosion.

This is not a unique case.

Osho, One Seed Makes the Whole Earth Green, Ch 3 (Excerpt)

Sannyas a Training for Rebellion

Bhagawati — Wed, 22 May 2013 09:21:07 +0000

Are you preparing us to be warriors, fighting for the right to be individuals in a society which labels truth as lies, and calls lies the truth?

I have just read David Yallop’s book, ‘In God’s Name’ , in which he clearly lays out the role of the Roman Catholic church in murder, terrorism, embezzlement, drug running, and major and continuing swindling of incredible sums of money; manipulation of politics in America, Italy, South America, Poland… The list is as impressive as it is far from the message of the carpenter from Nazareth. Will you please comment?

Devageet, David Yallop’s book is a tremendous contribution towards understanding the murderous instinct of the Catholic church. The same is needed to be done about every religion – because they all are doing the same thing, more or less. Perhaps the Catholic church is the best example because it is the most organized religion in the world, and the greatest in numbers – seven hundred million people are Catholics.

And that religion has committed every crime that you can imagine. It has burned thousands of women alive, by fictitiously labelling them as witches. There is no devil anywhere, and there are no witches anywhere. But these women were chosen to be destroyed because they were competitors to the Catholic religion. They were carrying the older and more ancient tradition of the days when the world was pagan. They were nature worshippers.

And for Catholicism that is the worst crime – because that means there is no need of a God, nature is enough. There is no need of a Jesus Christ as a saviour, because nobody is drowning. And there is no need for the Catholic priests and their confessionals, because nature knows nothing as sin.

These women were burned alive because they were pagans. But just to burn them because they were pagans was not enough of an excuse. They had to be condemned in such a way that their being burned alive could be supported rationally. First, they were tortured for days together: special mechanisms were invented to torture them.

When, six years ago, I had a bad back and I was in tremendous pain, the doctors brought a small mechanism; they call it traction. It pulls you – your legs in one direction, your hands in another direction – to fix your backbone. I asked the doctors, “Do you know who has invented this machine?” They were not aware.

It was invented by the Catholic church to torture the so-called witches. Sometimes their legs would come off the body; sometimes their hands would come off the body. It was just a coincidence that one woman who was suffering from a bad back for years, and nothing had been of any help… when she was tortured on this mechanism, she was amazed – her back pain disappeared. So the traction machine is a contribution of the Catholic church, and later on it moved to the hospitals.

And after a week or two weeks of continuous torture – no food, beating, not allowing them to sleep – the women, in a kind of helplessness, finally confessed. Because unless they would confess, the torture would continue. So what was the point? You could not escape.

The church was very powerful; it was not only the religion, it was also the government. It had all the powers of religion and all the powers of the government, of the state; so whatever they asked, the women confessed. The priests dictated the confession. They told them that they had to confess that they were having a sexual relationship with the devil – with full details.

And they had to confess it in the court. The full details were given to them – that the devil has a forked penis, not an ordinary penis. Forked, so that he could enter the woman from both her entries simultaneously. And those poor women had to confess in the court, and then the court ordered them to be burned alive because they had committed the gravest sin.

The church’s power has remained, although its state power has shrunk to eight square miles in the Vatican. But it is still a kingdom – an independent nation. And the pope is also the head of a state. Right now the manager of the Vatican’s bank is in hiding, because the Italian government has an arrest warrant against him. But they cannot enter the Vatican, it is an independent country – and his crimes have been found to be great.

The pope runs perhaps the greatest mafia in the world. And the pope’s bank in the Vatican turns all the income from drugs into legitimate money – the black money into white, millions of dollars per week. And the head of the bank is now being sought by the Italian government. There is an unbailable arrest warrant, and the police are waiting around the Vatican for him. But the pope has rewarded him, he has been made a cardinal; he was only a bishop.

The pope has been spending money on his world tours as no other pope has ever done before. Just a few months ago, in Australia, he spent more on his tour than the queen of England did when she went there. Almost every year he has been spending millions of dollars for his worldwide tours. And all this money comes from heroin and other drugs.

It is strange how blind humanity is. And these people go on speaking beautiful words; they preach against drugs, yet their whole empire depends on drugs! They condemn everything which they themselves practice. They condemn homosexuality, and almost fifty percent of Catholic priests are homosexuals. This is a very conservative estimate; the percentage is probably more than that. What to say about the monks in the monasteries?

One of the predecessors of this Polack pope was himself a homosexual. Before becoming a pope he was a cardinal in Milan. He had a boyfriend, and it was the talk of the town. Then he became the pope, and the first thing he did was to appoint his boyfriend as “secretary to the pope.” The whole world knew that he was a homosexual. The Catholic church is against homosexuality, and the head of the church is a practitioner of homosexuality! – absolute dishonesty, insincerity.

Millions of people have been killed in the name of religion and God in the crusades, jihads and other religious wars. David Yallop’s book, In God’s Name, is a great contribution, “in which he clearly lays out the role of the Roman Catholic church in murder, terrorism, embezzlement, drug-running, major and continual swindling of incredible sums of money; manipulation of politics in America, Italy, South America, Poland….”

Recently the pope declared that the church should not take part in any kind of politics; that Christian priests, monks, bishops, and cardinals should remain beyond politics. And while he was saying all this, he was sending millions of dollars to a political party in Poland to fight against communism.

These people have so many faces! If you are not to take part in politics, then why should you be interested in the communist party not remaining in power in Poland? And where did you get millions of dollars to support the opposition?… from drugs.

But this is not new. This has been going on since the crucifixion of Jesus. If that poor carpenter’s son had known that this is what was going to be the ultimate result of his teachings, Jews would not have been needed to crucify him; he would have committed suicide himself!

What David Yallop has done for the Catholic church should be done for all religions: a deep research into their workings. And you will not find them less criminal than the Catholics.

Look at what happened to Buddhists. Gautam Buddha was born in India; his impact was so tremendous that almost the whole country was under his influence and millions of people became Buddhists. But once he was dead, what happened to those millions of Buddhists? They were murdered, they were burned alive, they were driven out of the country. The whole of Asia is now Buddhist, because those people who escaped India just to save their lives reached China, Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, Burma, Japan, Sri Lanka – they moved all over the Far East. So the whole Far East is Buddhist – but not India.

And in India there has not been a single Buddhist for twenty-five centuries. They could not simply evaporate – such a tremendous movement. But because it was against Brahminism, against Hinduism, Hindus could not tolerate it, Brahmins could not tolerate it. It was destroying their whole profession, because Brahmins have lived like parasites on people – they don’t do anything except religious rituals. And Buddha was against all religious rituals; he was against the Vedas, which are full of nonsense.

While he was alive, the Hindus remained silent, because there was no argument to defeat him; what he was saying was so clear, so right and so timely, that it was impossible to have any confrontation. But once he was dead, there began a tremendous butchery against the Buddhists.

The same has happened against the Jainas. But nobody can say anything against these killings because the government immediately interferes – under the pretext of “not hurting anybody’s religious feelings.” This is strange. People are murdered, and you should not say anything about it. Hence, there is not a single book in India comparable to David Yallop’s book, because the government has to look to the voters, and the Hindus constitute the majority of voters.

Nobody has written a history of what Mohammedans have done to Hindus or Jainas while they were ruling India; how many beautiful temples they destroyed, how many millions of art pieces which represented centuries of work. They have destroyed the statues, the temples. Nobody knows how many women they have raped, how many men they have forced to either be Mohammedans or to die. Because not all Mohammedans that are in India have come from Arabia – many are converted people. And they were converted on the point of the sword, not by any intellectual conviction, not by proving that Mohammedanism is better than their religion. Mohammedans have used the sword as their only argument.

But not a single book exists to tell the story of continuous murder and rape for almost fifteen centuries; because Mohammedans are the second majority – again the government is interested in their votes. You will be surprised to know that although Mohammedans have taken Pakistan, dividing India into two parts, still the number of Mohammedans in India is greater than in any other Mohammedan country in the world.

What happened in the partition when India and Pakistan were divided? So many people were burned, whole trains were burned. Trains were coming from Pakistan burning, bringing burned corpses into India. Pakistan has erased Hindus completely, but nobody can say anything. If you say anything you immediately lose your right to freedom of speech, because you are hurting somebody’s religious feelings. It is a strange phenomenon.

And rape has been one of the basic strategies of Mohammedans, because once a Hindu woman is raped by a Mohammedan, or even kept in his house for the whole night without any rape, the Hindu cannot accept the woman again. That is their tradition and their orthodox mind. She has become untouchable; she has to go back.

And how many Jews have been killed by Christians? And what a great conspiracy by America and England in creating Israel amongst an ocean of Mohammedans! Israel had not been in existence for centuries – Mohammedans have been there; its name was Palestine. But this was a strategy, and such a subtle conspiracy, that even Jews could not suspect – in fact, they asked for it. They wanted their own land.

After the second world war it was easier, because Palestine was under American and British troops. So they forced the Jews on the Mohammedans and created a new nation. But the nation is so small, and surrounded on all sides by Mohammedan countries. Since Israel has been created, they have been in continuous trouble. And Mohammedans will never leave them in peace, because it is their country, which has been forcibly taken from them.

It is a subtle strategy to keep the Jews in continuous trouble; they have suffered for almost their whole history of four thousand years. The greatest calamity was Adolf Hitler – he killed six million Jews. And now the second conspiracy of Christian nations is the creation of Israel. This is to keep the Jews always, forever in trouble.

Every religion should be looked into, researched, and the public should be made fully aware of what these people have done to humanity. And all this nonsense that their religious feelings might be hurt should not be paid any attention to. You go on committing crimes against man and, when something is said about it, your “religious feelings” are hurt.

One of the Mohammedan caliphs, Omar, destroyed the greatest library in the world, the library in Alexandria. It contained the ancientmost scriptures from Atlantis, a continent which had sunk into the ocean, and from Lemuria, another small continent that had also gone under water. These were natural calamities – or perhaps man-made, there is no way to find out – but the library contained all their history, all their religions, all their art.

Omar went with his armies to Alexandria, it was the greatest seat of learning in those days. In one of his hands he had the Holy Koran, in the other hand he had a burning torch. He asked the chief librarian, a great scholar, “You have to answer two questions: First, is there some literature in the library which goes against the Holy Koran? If your answer is yes, I am going to burn it. If your answer is no, then too, I am going to burn it. Because if everything in this library is consistent with the Holy Koran, then the Holy Koran is enough. What is the need of having such a big library?”

He did not allow the chief librarian to answer; he answered himself. There was no alternative, either yes or no – in each case he was going to burn the library. And he set the library on fire. The library was so big that it took six months to put the fire out. But he destroyed a great treasure which cannot be recovered in any way.

Devageet, the religions have done immense, incalculable harm to all human values, to human life, to human understanding, to human evolution. And it is time that they should all be mercilessly exposed because that will prepare the ground for the birth of my rebel, for the birth of a great rebellion against these ugly institutions. It will bring the whole of humanity into a loving relationship, without nations, without religions; but with a deep religiousness, with a great respect for life, and great gratitude for existence.

All that is needed is a widespread rebelliousness, particularly in the younger generation, because they are going to live in the future. The past should not be repeated.
You are asking, “Is sannyas a training for rebellion?” Yes, Devageet.

“Are you preparing us to be warriors, fighting for the right to be individuals in a society which labels truth as lies, and calls lies the truth?”

Yes, Devageet.

Osho, The Rebel Ch 13, Q 3

3dd6

Zorba the Buddha United

Punya — Tue, 21 May 2013 10:58:22 +0000

On the photo the two teams just after the match. Standing from left to right: Chidvilas, Anubuddha, Neeresh, Neerava, Prasadam, Nirdosh, Marc, Saguna, Didi, Anugito, Wendelin, Amito, Geetee. Sitting: Prasado, Madhur, Paro, Avinash, Sarjan, Atmomani, Raiyaj. Photo by Nirdosh, thanks to Wendelin and all!

It was the match between FC Zorba and Buddha Boys; two famous different teams with very different trainers. The team of FC Zorba had a strong tradition in Southern Europe. The Buddha Boys were winners in South East Asia for a long time.

FC Zorba was down to earth, creative and sometimes rough. Wild gestures, much fuss.

Many yellow and red cards had given but the results showed the truth: they won almost all. After each match won, there was always a party with spirits. If they lost there were spirits too, but not a party.

Buddha Boys were more controlled, more sophisticated, a bit boring to look at but effective. When they won you had to check the score board for you could not even see it on their faces! Their training was intense, the discipline high.

The match was in Park Rehbergen, West Berlin because East Berlin didn’t give permission to referee Osho who had his home base in America during those years. In the end Osho was also not permitted/granted entry into West Berlin so the players agreed to wear a mala with the picture of Osho, as a reminder.

Both sponsors and supporters of Buddha Boys and FC Zorba arranged the “Battle of Giants” providing drinks, food and football garb. FC Zorba had applied for alcohol during break, but the EUFA rules were clear; it was called Tea-Time and it was to be tea-time. (1-0 for BB)

Originally the Buddha Boys were expected to play in their regular outfit; white shirt, red trousers. FC Zorba used to wear red shirt, white trousers. Because of the possible hustle and misunderstandings white was chosen only for Buddha Boys and red only for FC Zorba.

However, arriving at Park Rehbergen in two buses there was confusion. In the dressing rooms each player found his outfit to be in 30 shades of red, for the cleaning department had washed all the clothes together! Big fuss, but both teams knew what was at stake.

The first half FC Zorba was on top. The opponents were still humming and chanting while Chidvilas (FCZ) scored 1-0 in the first minutes of the match. The game was hard but fair thanks to the referee who did not have to whistle but had his eyes on the game all the time.

After tea-break Buddha Boys came back with an enlightened pass from the back (Raiyaj) 1-1. Then, as a tactical move, both teams dropped their goals. Free floating and shooting enticed the audience – birds of different feathers – whistle in excitement. Who would win?

Going with the flow, the teams of FC Zorba and the Buddha Boys got together. There was no more I, no We, no They and in the end there were only winners; Zorba the Buddha United!

Text by Marc

War and Poverty

Bhagawati — Tue, 21 May 2013 09:57:27 +0000

Credit to Santosh

Father Guido Sarducci

Punya — Mon, 20 May 2013 16:59:00 +0000

Credit Aradhana

Hoku Donovan-Smith

Punya — Sun, 19 May 2013 07:54:35 +0000

Hoku came to Pune 2 with his parents Sadhanali (aka Premrito) and Sudi (aka Sudiro), with whom he kept a deep and close friendship. He lived many years in Santa Fe and frequently visited India. As a street artist he also performed with his long-time partner, singer Granna Griffith and with Winter Riddle. He was fond of nature (his mother is a gardener); he loved to climb trees, cars and roofs; write poetry, paint his face, dress up and make faces (on the photo in the slideshow with the kids on the byke, Hoku is the one in the sidecar – making faces).

On Friday 17th he was remembered in a gathering in Santa Fe. Cremation at 2pm Monday, 25 May in Chicago.

See Hoku’s rap video on Osho News: livinitanlovinit
Hoku Donovan-Smith Memorial Fund

The Santa Fe Reporter writes on Saturday, May 18, 2013: Tuesday, at about 4:30 am CST, Santa Fe local Erin ‘Hoku’ Donovan-Smith fell to his death from the 16th story of a Chicago building. An autopsy concluded the 25-year-old’s death was an accident. [...] Donovan-Smith was, according to [his friend] McDonough, “an amazing film-maker and a really good rapper. He made a lot of music and poetry” and “inspired the shit out of everyone.”

Shana Hack, owner of Moon Rabbit Toys and Donovan-Smith’s former employer, says, “He was one of the best people I ever knew; he was a complete goofball and I loved him—he made everyone happy. [...] He made those around him feel good about themselves, which is a rare quality in people.” More…

Article on DNAinfo Chicago: Family of Street Performer Who Fell From High-Rise ‘in Shock’

Hoku on YouTube

Tributes

You can leave a message / tribute / anecdote to be published on Osho News using our contact form (pls add ‘Hoku’ in the subject field)…

Much love. Miss you Hoku, you crazy fool.
Grannia Devlyn Griffith

25a6

livinitanlovinit

Punya — Sun, 19 May 2013 07:29:33 +0000

I got no wishes, my magic lamp’s empty
nothing I want can fuckin tempt me
I’ll set fire to your desires, if you’ll just let me
don’t get upset – I’ll do it gently
doesn’t seem anyone knows better from worse
grasping at straws til they leave in a hearse
looking for salvation in money or a church
but there’s never gonna be an end to the search
everybody’s first to claim the highest perch
but if the foundation’s cursed, you’re in a lurch
gotta disperse this urge to have it perfect
by nurturing the knowledge
that everything is worth it
All of it – up, down, side-to-side
gotta admit this is a crazy ass ride
thoughts, emotions, senses and persona
all on loan, remember – you ain’t the owner

Hook
La di da da da da da da da
La di da da da da
livinitanlovinit

Suddenly you gotta surrender to the covenant
haven’t you ever wondered where’s the sovereign
and see the nothing in all that you’re discovering
I think I’m hearing the call of the conundrum it’s
La da da da da da livinitanlovinit
Gotta feel that existence is mothering
giving us this existence that’s above and in
if you grok this feeling here brother than go
La da da da livinitanlovinit

Hook

Got another conundrum here I’m wondering
why would anybody think life’s a blunder when
if you look around, you can see it’s all loving
and go La da da da livinitanlovinit
Yes it sucks living under a government
or making bucks as another indulgent
subservient to utter unintelligence
But at the end of the day what to do but go
La da da da da livinitanlovinit?

Hoku left his body on 14th May 2013. More on his tribute page…

2nd May Newsletter

Osho News — Sat, 18 May 2013 11:13:02 +0000

We appreciate the input from our many contributors that make Osho News a kaleidoscope of what our caravanserai represents.

Remembering in the Here&Now
Bhagawati reflects on enlightenment and remembers a particular discourse: Goose, What Goose?
Marc remembers living and working in Osho’s commune, Vihan: Berlin by Night
Final chapters of Bodhena’s ‘Samsara’… It Ain’t Over til the Fat Lady Sings!

Media Watch
Much talked about in the news and a BFI (British Film Industry) retrospective – Terence Stamp Today
The Daily Bhaskar, India, publishes Revealed! Osho’s Controversial Views on Women
In ‘The Speaking Tree’, India, Pratiksha writes about perfection being a myth, while Totality is the Key
Satya Puja at the Cosmic Cine Festival 2013 – ‘Slow Sex’ DVD Wins Award

Osho
16 November 1976: Osho Initiates Terence Stamp into Sannyas
Enlightenment is A Natural Happening
Osho and the Dog
A Cup of Tea (43)
A Cup of Tea (44)

People
Shazar makes a difference: Traveling to the Place of the Heart

Insights
Ganga shares her insight about The Outer Solution Is a Reflection of the Inner Solution
Kaiyum ponders Can you Afford the Luxury of a Negative Thought?

Healing and Meditation
Marc suggests get the stress out of shopping – Shopping Meditation
Sarita presents the differences between the sexes: Woman and Man’s Sexual Fulfilment

Poetry
Rashid: When I Say You’re Beautiful
A poem by Madhuri – Weight Loss Guaranteed

Events
An opportunity for friends living in Berlin: Participants for Meditation Research Required
Events in Europe
Events in North America
Events at Oshodham, India

Global Awareness
Short timelaps video shows new NASA images of a Powerful Solar Eruption

Gems
Dalai Lama Delivers Humorous Speech
Lao Tzu on Past, Future, Present
Niels Bohr

Letters
Discrepancies between Osho’s audio discourses and the written form: Respect Osho’s Words

News Articles
Opera links Wagner’s dying days in Venice with his interest in Buddhism – Wagner meets Buddha
Our plastic garbage means a cruel death for the albatrosses in the North Pacific – Midway Island

Humour

Photo in header by Veena – 3books.co.uk

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Weight Loss Guaranteed

Punya — Fri, 17 May 2013 10:54:48 +0000

Oh poor huge fat western human
Great folds overworking your jeans
Sweatshirt stretched for heavyweight unbudging stuff bulging

Hark! Here’s what you can do:
Sell a piled hill of toys and cash in the trundle-wagon
Which carries all your bewildered tonnage moiling.
Buy a ticket! Get out in New Delhi with one bag
And be completely freaked out while you navigate beggars
And shoving porters and touts, and stand firm within yourself
Till you get to your hotel. The AC will rattle like Iowa thunder!
Sleep if you can. Next day throw away your phone
And half your jars of pills. Drink water out of plastic bottles
One by one. Let somebody charge too much to book for you
A train ticket to Shimla. (Manali or Dharmsala work fine too.)

Stay six months please. Walk slowly at first – you’ll get a parasite
Right away, and there’ll be a week in bed, the medicine
Will feel like yellow death, you’ll live, you’ll lighten, you’ll walk,
Crowds and crowds of brown pipecleaners will mill and stare, mill and stare
At five fellows stuffed into one. But you’ll shrink – and shrink some more –
Keep walking – there are wildflowers, and ponies, and rocky streams,
And mountains stretched out like silk scarves pointy glowing
Around the whole entire rim of the world -
And one day while you’re hiking in your new loose cotton pants
You’ll meet a Swedish woman who will invite you to Uppsala –
Go.

Poem by Madhuri, Hebden Bridge, 2013
Illustration also by Madhuri

Mexican Jews

Bhagawati — Fri, 17 May 2013 09:27:47 +0000

Sid asked Max, “Are there any Jews in Mexico”?

I don’t know,” Sid replied. “Why don’t we ask the waiter?”

When the waiter came by, Max asked him, “Are there any Mexican Jews?”

“I don’t know Señor, let me ask,” the waiter replied, and he went into the kitchen.

He returned in a few minutes and said, “No, Señor. No Mexican Jews.”

“Are you sure?” Max asked.

“I will check again, Señor,” the waiter replied and went back to the kitchen.

While he was still gone, Sid said, “I cannot believe there are no Jews in Mexico. Our people are scattered everywhere.”

When the waiter returned he said, “Señor, no Mexican Jews.”

Are you really sure?” Max asked again. “I cannot believe there are no Mexican Jews.”

“Señor, I asked everyone,” the waiter replied exasperated. “We have Orange Jews, Prune Jews, Tomato Jews and Grape Jews, but no one ever heard of Mexican Jews!”

Midway Island

Bhagawati — Fri, 17 May 2013 09:26:31 +0000

If you are reading this on a small screen, view on YouTube

Credit to Sanmati

Woman and Man’s Sexual Fulfilment

Punya — Fri, 17 May 2013 09:10:53 +0000

Woman’s sexual fulfilment

Even though it appears that adults are knowledgeable about sex, sexual anatomy and sexual functioning. In my experience of having worked with thousands of people, the important subject of sexual relations remains under an obscure cloud of confusion in the minds of many.

Too often, a woman tries to force her sexual response to become like a man. This happens because both men and women are unaware of their opposite and yet complementary natures in regards to sex.

The woman has three areas in her genital region, which are important for sexual orgasm to take place, the clitoris (and clitoral network inside her body), a nerve in the sacrum (which is the trigger for orgasm), and the vagina (where contractions of orgasm take place).

Generally, a woman will become aroused firstly through touching, caressing, kissing or holding her entire body in deep loving embrace. She needs to experience a quality heart connection before opening up sexually. This slow buildup of arousal may take approximately 20 minutes. The woman has 3-5 thousand nerve endings in her clitoris all devoted to pleasure. These nerves come from erogenous zones all over her body. When she is touched and embraced, these nerves all over the body are activated, and her clitoris simultaneously ‘wakes up’.

It is best not to go directly to the clitoris as a way of stimulating a woman. A more teasing approach works much better. Nipples have nerves linked directly to the clitoris, so touching and massaging her breasts is of great importance.

If a lover holds the lower belly of his beloved, and simply remains present with her, within a few minutes, she will begin either laughing or crying. This is a signal that her second chakra is open. The second chakra of the woman is of tremendous importance for her to open up sexually, as it is from her lower belly that she will be able to discover the phenomenon of multiple orgasm. Emotional fluidity helps a woman to know all the joys of her sexual response, and a man needs to discover how to be comfortable just holding space while the woman moves into emotive waves.

Stroking the outer lips of her Yoni, her inner thighs, slowly and teasingly working your way to her inner lips, and finally encircling her clitoris with wet fingers or tongue, will drive her wild.

When her yoni is copiously wet, and her outer lips, inner lips and clitoris are in erection, then it is time to move into penetrative sexual union. A woman is changeable according to where she is in her monthly cycle, so the approach to her sacred portal may be different each time.

After having one orgasm, a woman’s body remains on an orgasmic plateau for at least 20 minutes, ready for more orgasms. If a man has his orgasm before she has enjoyed more orgasms, she may be very frustrated with the sex act. The game ended just as she was getting started!

In ancient Taoist Tantric texts, it is stated that a skilled lover will stimulate the woman at precise points and in particular ways, all over her body as part of the build up for sexual union. He is advised not to move into penetration unless she begs him to, with tears in her eyes, because she is so aroused that she cannot wait anymore!

In our culture, of instant coffee and instant everything, we have forgotten the joys of slow food and slow sex. A woman has been designed by existence to savor timeless, intimate and loving sexual union. For women’s sexual fulfillment, the art of Tantra is not a luxury. It is a necessity.

Man’s sexual fulfillment

The charisma and potency of a man resides in his sex center. He will be most attractive to women, and most fulfilled in himself, if he is able to celebrate his genitals and his sexual energy. The first chakra is a positive pole in the male body, which means his consciousness will revolve around first chakra issues. These are: sexual arousal, instinct for procreation, security, possessiveness, goal orientedness, competition. The more civilised a man is in his conditioning, the further away he may be from his basic instinctual nature. When he is dissociated from his genitals, a whole plethora of anxieties will haunt his being.

When moving into sexual union with a man, it is wise to deeply honour him in his sex center. If a woman lovingly holds his Lingam, his testicles, and massages the whole genital area, with deep reverence, he will begin coming in contact with his deeper nature, his Godliness. Each man has the potential to be a God. The definition of a God is: he who moves into sexual union in full consciousness.

With one ejaculation, a man releases enough sperm to populate half the planet. Nature has invested a tremendous amount of energy in each man, making him a co-creator with existence itself. This tremendous power needs to be recognized by both man and woman, and treated with reverence.

When a man ejaculates each time he has sex, he will gradually diminish his pleasure and power. It is wise for a man to learn how to move into the sexual act with no goal, discovering ways to ride the waves of pleasure for hours on end. His body has it’s own timing when ejaculation will be needed, and this is according to his age and health. A younger man needs ejaculation more often, while an older man needs genital release less. A man can attain phenomenal ecstasy states when he makes love often and ejaculates only sometimes. He will eventually be able to experience full body orgasm without ejaculation.

A man can further develop his capacity for deepest fulfillment, when he learns to become the meaning of the word Lingam, Pillar of Light. This quality of being arises when he is centered enough to contain contradictory elements within himself. When he can be both powerful and vulnerable in one and the same moment, he will be able to truly be with a woman.

A woman is made of contradictions, she is Shakti, and behaves in much the same way as the weather, i.e. unpredictably. When a man discovers his essence as Shiva, a Pillar of Light and consciousness, he will then be able to hold and be with Shakti in equanimity and inner mastery.

Meditation combined with a sense of humor will help him discover this state of being.

A beautiful poem from a Tantra Scripture says:

Behold the Shiva Lingam
Beautiful as molten gold
Firm as the Himalayan Mountain
Tender as a folded leaf
Life giving like the solar orb
Behold the splendor of his sparkling jewels!

First published in Vivid Life Radio
Illustration by Shivananda (www.shivananda.ch)

Further articles by Sarita:
Women’s Sexual Fulfilment
Money and the Flow of Abundance
Positive Addiction
Optimum Health
Beauty and Longevity
Interview: In Search of the Essence of Life

Sarita met Osho in Mumbai in 1973 and shortly afterwards received sannyas. She spent the next 26 years in his communes where she worked cleaning Osho’s house, as a medium in energy darshan, in the PR department and as a holistic healer. Osho gave her the title ‘Mahasatvaa’ meaning ‘keeper of esoteric wisdom’. Since 1997 she has been teaching Tantra, holistic healing and meditation across the world. She lives in England and France. www.tantra-essence.com

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It Ain’t Over til the Fat Lady Sings!

Punya — Fri, 17 May 2013 09:05:31 +0000

Even an incomplete tale like this should not be complete without somewhat of an account of where I’m at on my path. Yes, Osho’s still The Man, and there is nothing much I can do about that, that is just the case. Still, it has felt fine to spend some time with a few other enlightened ones over the years, when they happened along. Sort of like in that old Stephen Stills song, “If you can’t be with the one you love, love the one you’re with.”

When I returned to live in Germany in September 1999, I was totally out of touch with what was happening there New Age-wise. After all, I had been gone for 22 years, except for a few relatively brief visits. Somehow, I did not feel to continue on my path more or less on my own as I had in recent years. Following the message, “Find an awakened friend to sit with” that had gotten to me mysteriously, I started to look around. I was quite amazed to find that, besides all kinds of other things reminiscent of the scene in California, there were literally dozens of awakened people around that were doing their thing. Most of them were giving satsangs, some were more stationary, others were moving around quite a bit. Some of them were offering retreats, in Germany as well as abroad. To me, this was clearly the hottest thing going on the scene, for those that were ready for it.

It wasn’t much of a problem to obtain information about those “satsang teachers”, as they were called. From what I read in New Age magazines in the form of CVs, interviews with them or articles by them, and from what I saw in their eyes in the photographs of them, some of them definitely seemed to be genuine, seemed to “have it”, while others didn’t attract me very much, to say the least. Unfortunately, there was not much happening in my vicinity. Most of them were based in big cities like Berlin or Hamburg, and particularly southern Germany seemed to be crawling with them. Bavaria, of all places, appeared to have become the German equivalent of California (while politically, it still is very much like Texas).

There was one of them that I liked especially, a guy named Samarpan. He was a sannyasin (we might even have run into each other on the Ranch since we had been there at the same time, but I didn’t remember him from there) and had been awakened in a satsang with Gangaji. What he wrote in a magazine article about Osho rang so true and moved me so much, that I decided to give it a shot and sign up for one of the retreats he was offering. Sometime in the spring of 2000, I left a message on the answering machine of the people that were organizing the retreat, also sannyasins as I could tell by their names, and waited, and waited, and nothing happened. Eventually I called that number again and learned from a recorded message that the retreat was booked up. Well, sad as I was, I had to concede that that one hadn’t been for me.

A bit earlier that year, I had come across a brief magazine article about another satsang teacher named Pyar (“Introducing: Pyar”). Also a sannyasin, she was based in Munich and had worked with Samarpan before and during her awakening. When I saw the picture of her that came with the article, there was something in me that commented faintly, but discernibly, “Oh, her “, although I could not remember ever having seen her before, and in my mind’s eye I could see her as a wise woman, walking through the woods and collecting herbs. I was totally surprised when later that spring I received a flyer from her in the mail which informed me about two retreats she was giving, in June and in September of that year. I was very much at a loss as to how I’d gotten onto that mailing list, but there was an immediate “yes” in me, and I went ahead and booked the first of the two retreats.

I arrived a bit early at the retreat, which was taking place in the small town of Gmund at the Tegernsee, a beautiful lake right at the northern edge of the Bavarian Alps. Pyar and her staff were still getting the place ready, and they asked me to just hang out a bit outside on the patio. I went outside, sat down, took a couple of deep breaths, and, hey, there it was again, that so familiar energy, which was the reason for which I’d really come. So right there and then, even before the first satsang, I decided that I’d be attending the retreat in September as well, and then some more.

After a while Pyar came out to say hello, and she was somewhat curious as to how I’d gotten there, because she had never seen me in any of her satsangs. It took us a bit of figuring until we were able to put two and two together – what had happened was that the people I had called regarding the Samarpan retreat were also working with Pyar at times, and they had passed my address on to her staff. Another mystery unveiled!

Now, in the late summer of oh-two and with my seventh retreat coming up, all I can really say is that I feel very much at home with her and with the sangha that is starting to crystallize around her. The retreats are all “silent retreats”, except during the satsangs, when we have the opportunity to ask questions. I’d say that about a third of the participants are sannyasins. There are quite a few people that I’ve met on three or four different retreats, and I’ve made some very good friends. Sure, there is a bit of chit-chat going on, even on a silent retreat, but it is becoming apparent to me that being together in silence can be much more of a factor in getting closer to each other than a lot of talking, you connect somewhere deeper than just on the mind level.

But the main reason I’ve kept coming is that I feel that Pyar is creating the perfect space for me to work on myself, or however you want to call it. It’s not that I have very many questions on a verbal level. Actually, I wouldn’t mind if there was more time to just sit in silence during the satsangs, but not that that matters very much. The way I see it, the real work is happening on a subtle energy level. Generally, I do feel totally accepted there for what I am and where I’m at and what I need to do, and that nothing is being imposed upon me. And, which is important for me, Osho is very much present there.

In my everyday life out in the world, I have been more and more focusing on just meeting each moment as it comes, and on allowing what wants to happen anyway. There is nowhere to go and nothing to achieve – the path itself is the goal. Sometimes an input is needed from me, but that comes more out of the situation as it evolves. And the more I approach life like that, without the usual expectations, fears and other hang-ups, the more I’ve been getting into a harmonious flow, the more I’ve been flowing with the whole scene, and everything works out just fine. This same attitude I’ve tried to bring into the retreats. On a conscious level, I don’t really know what’s going on, and I don’t care, either, as long as it feels right – and that it does.

The only relevant question in life is, “Who am I?”, and the only thing I can ultimately do to find out about that is to let go, or rather, to allow a let-go to happen, and then I’ll just see whatever is the case. As simple as that may sound, it is one extremely subtle business, so until then, I just sit patiently on my small meditation bench and try to be as alert as possible, sometimes focused more outward, sometimes more inward. But at the latest when I come out of a retreat and I’m having fun with just about anything that I do, and when I notice that my meditations are noticably increasing in depth, and that this doesn’t fade out after a few days but is getting better and better over time, then I know that I must be on the right track.

As a person, Pyar never ceases to amaze me. One of her most striking qualities are her utter simplicity and unpretentiousness. After the satsangs, she hangs out with everybody else outside to have a smoke (Bavarian as she may be, she smokes “American Spirits” – this baby’s come a long way!), and she is always open if somebody wants to talk to her about something, outside of the satsangs. During the meals, you might find yourself sitting at the same table with her, and, as a special treat, you might end up just looking into her eyes for a bit. (That one always really gets to me!)

Apart from that, she is exceptionally bright. In her “other” life, she is an MD, specialized in homeopathy and acupuncture, and she is still practising, full time. According to her autobiography “Reise ins Nichts” (“Journey into Nothingness”, which has been a pretty hot item on the New Age scene in Germany), she had been one of those students who’d been getting mainly straight “A”s, without ever having to do a lot of homework for it. For many years, she has been married to Nirdoshi, her high school sweetheart, a beautiful big bear of a guy, very much in contrast to her own rather slender self. He does her PR, plays Bhajans together with a group of musicians before and after satsang, and gives great bear hugs. Also, there is nothing that she loves more than a juicy joke and a good glass of wine. If you haven’t done so yet, check her out at www.pyar.de!

Spiritually, her strongest influences are Osho and Tibetan Buddhism, but she is just as much at home on other paths, such as Zen or Sufism. Yet, I don’t see her as being confined by anything. She has her own very particular way of doing what she is doing, and that with a lot of wit and clarity and love. In satsang, I have seen her dealing with somebody’s drama with the same ease as she showed when there was a seeker who was going through some extremely deep inner spaces and needed (and got) some expert guidance. On another occasion, there was someone who was obviously suffering from the “Advaita disease” and who tried to drag her into a discussion in an attempt to prove some rather stupid point, while getting rather aggressive at the same time. Pyar did not waver even a fraction of an inch.

In personal encounters with her, like during short chats after satsang outside on the “Bankerl” (for the uninitiated – that’s what they call a bench in Bavaria), most of the time I get a quite direct experience of where I’m really at, how much I’m still rooted in my mind, how fast my mind clicks in, when it actually doesn’t need to. I don’t know if I’ve ever really met her, if I am capable to be with her on her terms, in silence. She is just too direct, too much just there, for me to be able to grasp it the way I function, to be able to truly respond to her. Usually, I have the feeling of lagging a step or two behind, and before I realize it, it’s too late. Still, what comes across from her is nothing but understanding and love and forgiveness, so that at least I don’t feel like a complete, muddleheaded fool. Every time it is a beautiful, small lesson, and I wonder how many more I still need to eventually “get it”. And fuck knows what that may turn out to be.

And so I’ve been sitting here in this one-horse town, spinning this yarn – actually, most of it is quite true, to my best recollection. But however much I’ve been trying to focus on the moment, I have to admit that there are times when I wonder a bit about where I’m heading. Not that I’m fed up here or that I’ve got the highway blues or anything like that, I’m just a little curious.

Looking at my past, I’ve become somewhat careful with making any predictions, and there’s really no way of telling what’s around the corner, in those waning days of the Kali Yuga. As my journey on the pathless path continues, I can’t help noticing that I am being coached, guided along by something that is much, much bigger than my small self, and my experience and insights are of an immense help to be able to cope with whatever situation comes along. That allows me to relax, with anything that might happen. As the saying goes and as we all know, “It ain’t over til the Fat Lady sings!” If worse comes to worst, if all else fails, I can still go and sit under a pine tree and meditate and have a good time … while freezing my ass off in the cold of the Harz Mountains winter. Unless … maybe I’ll end up underneath a palm tree – now, wouldn’t that be something! Let’s wait and see!

From Bodhena’s Adventures in Samsara (soon to be published in book form) – read all excerpts…

Bodhena took sannyas in the late seventies in Pune where he worked first as a handyman for the group department, then as a Krishna Guard. After living in Geetam for a few months, he was invited to the Ranch where he worked in construction, security, Magdalena Cafeteria, Chaitanya (accounts) and as a paralegal at Rajneesh Legal Services. In early Pune II he worked for the Rajneesh Times, and then again as a guard at Lao Tzu House. In recent years, he has been living in Clausthal, Germany, practising nowhere to go and nothing to do. bodhena (at) hotmail (dot) com

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A Cup of Tea (44)

Bhagawati — Fri, 17 May 2013 08:28:29 +0000

What gift is greater than love?
And still you ask – What have I given?
Oh, mad one!
When love is given
there is nothing left to give,
not even the giver,
for to give love is to give oneself.

You have given yourself,
now where are you?
Having lost yourself,
now you are bound to find the one
you have been longing to meet.
Now she has been born,
and I am a witness to it,
I have watched it happen.
I can hear the music that you are going to be.
The other day, when your heart was close to me.
I heard it.
Intellect knows of the present
but for the heart the future is also the present.

Dalai Lama Delivers Humorous Speech

Bhagawati — Fri, 17 May 2013 08:23:42 +0000

If you are reading on a small screen watch video on YouTube

Credit to Sugit

Shopping Meditation

Bhagawati — Thu, 16 May 2013 20:37:05 +0000

Shopping can be fun yet tiring.

Walking in shopping malls, shopping streets and supermarkets, watching all the people and products, has a great impact on us. We can lose ourselves in the external world.

As an Art student (more than 35 years ago), I walked my way from home to the Art-Academy and back through the shopping streets of Arnhem in Holland.

Tired after a day’s work, the impressions of all these visual stimuli on my way were sometimes too much. I lost myself, my centre, by watching the world of advertisements, shopping windows, people and products.

There was always a lot of outgoing energy till I found a trick:

While walking in these surroundings of overloaded visual stimuli, I started watching my breath and body too. I could still observe the outer world, and by observing my inner world at the same time didn’t get jolted out of my centre or scattered. Somehow it worked after a while! Not only that, I started to enjoy shopping more because it became an opportunity to grow.

So, when you like to shop, or have to shop, watch your breath while shopping. You might forget or lose the awareness for a while – don’t worry, it will come back.

Each time you start feeling weird while shopping it can be an opportunity to remember your breath. Breathing in…, breathing out, breathing… breathing out, preferably breathing through the nose, but the main focus is on the rhythm of the breath. Just being aware of the breath going through your nose to your lungs, and back, and at the same time walking, watching the inner and outer world.

Of course after one hour it is good to stop, sit down, have a drink, relax. It is easier to start this shopping meditation when you are alone. Talking with friends while shopping and watching the breath at the same time is mostly for advanced practitioners…..

And watching your mobile phone at the same time is not recommended!

This shopping meditation is suitable for both, men and women….

Have fun!

Marc, Osho News

Can you Afford the Luxury of a Negative Thought?

Punya — Thu, 16 May 2013 20:04:41 +0000

Maybe this will set you thinking. But then, to what extent do you truly have control over all those thoughts welling up out of the great nothingness?

Aldous Huxley once said:

Life is not what happens to you, but what you do with what happens.”

He implies the genuine choice we have, bluntly stated as: thinking positively or negatively.

Meditation teaches us that we can never stop the Mind from chattering. We can just take distance from it. We can choose to listen or to ignore, and to make space for the gifts that arrive in the heart.

From another perspective, you probably recognise the situation that the mail arrives and you know there’s a letter from a certain friend; the phone rings, and you know who it is; you’re out somewhere and know that someone is watching you (you turn around and meet the eyes … the beginning of a new romance? Or a spy thriller?).

In the Kabbalah (just as Sufism is the mystic side of Islam, so, too, does Judaism have its esoteric studies) there’s a specific prohibition on ‘bad mouthing’ – which includes even the non-spoken negative thinking about others. Take this concept to another extreme: Voodoo is fabled for its black magic, the combination of the power of negative thinking and the belief in that (destructive) power.

In 1924 Henry Ford said:

If you think you can, or think you can’t, you’ll always be right.”

This creative power of thought – for good or evil – is the basis of all self-help programmes. Simple kinesiology testing provides indisputable proof of how negatives reduce your physical energy, whether they are thoughts, words spoken aloud, or even a disapproving glance from another.

You may correctly conclude that you have choice in how you express yourself, in how you look at events and people in your life, and thereby give yourself an energy boost that costs nothing and is a lot healthier than a strong shot of caffeine!

Kaiyum, Osho News

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The Outer Solution Is a Reflection of the Inner Solution

Punya — Thu, 16 May 2013 19:13:40 +0000

When I was asked [by Viha Connection] for an article on outer conflict, not inner conflict, I looked at what the difference was for me. This is what I came up with: The main ingredient of any conflict (outer or inner) seems to be that there are one or many ways, options, wants, desires, ideas, beliefs – you name it – presented by two or more parties (inner or outer) that don’t go together. One is pulling to the North, the other to the South, each with its specific implications and possibilities: cold here, warm there. This is an uncomfortable situation, and with it comes the impulse: “Let’s get out of here fast!’”

Usually there seems to be a kind of obvious solution, an agreement about what one does in a situation like that, what is the right and lawful thing to do, what one is entitled to. Often one party either yields to the other or insists on his or her own point of view.

Sometimes this works, but most of the time the one yielding bears a grudge for having given in, which in the long run shows that the conflict has not been resolved. It has continued smoldering underground until one day out of proportion: “Boom!” the attack, the revenge.

These strategies usually leave one party more of a loser and the other more of a winner.

The trick for me lately has been not to look for a fast solution, but to do just the opposite: to hang in there and not hurry to be off the hook and comfortable again. If I really want to resolve something, I have to give myself the space to get to know what is involved. I have to find out where I and the other are coming from, what my and their intentions are.

Basically this lays the foundation for a win-win situation. Soon it becomes obvious that there are not only issues and objects involved but the subjects as well: the people who have these issues. And every single one of these people is a Buddha. (True, some feel like asshole Buddhas and some like angel Buddhas, and some are awakened Buddhas; but all are Buddhas just the same.) Feeling and remembering this creates a basis for us to look for a more creative solution together. The common jungle-war-survival attitude, where one tries to out-do the other and win over the other, feels poor in comparison.

Not long ago I was in Asia and in a situation where not only three people with their personalities (divided into two factions) but also two cultures clashed. All parties acted out of their best intentions and consideration for others, and yet all felt offended, disrespected, even betrayed by the other side. After several intense meetings in which we tried to sort things out and there was no glimmer of a resolution on the horizon, some “blip blip” flashed inside, alerting me: “Wait a minute! What is all the fuss? Something feels totally out of proportion. Up to now we loved each other and enjoyed the work, and now all is jeopardized. Heavy fears (nobody will ever come to groups organized by us again) and wild accusations (you are destroying my business, you are on a power trip) are flying through the air. What happened to love?” The crucial question came up: “What is more important to me: to be right and sacrifice love or find a way back to being together?”

The focus shifted from zoom to wide angle, from surface to depth. Being human beings came to the foreground, and the issue in question receded into the background, which, by the way, looked utterly petty from this perspective. Oh, yes, I almost forgot: The whole schlimazel was triggered by a single picture taken in a group room. Feeling the fear, close to terror, of the other melted my stand about not having done anything wrong. With the shift in perspective, almost instantly a much more true and appropriate solution was right there in front of my eyes, very simple and obvious: delete the picture.

And with that an opening to a deeper understanding arose. The growing separation melted in an embrace. Though it looked as if I had given in by offering to delete the picture, I didn’t feel a loser because I didn’t lose a friend, and the situation helped all of us to remember the essential and act accordingly. The others did not lose either; they kept their face.

Understanding myself and others more profoundly is much more valuable to me than being right or winning and a much better preparation for further conflicts; and they for sure will come.

Coming back to the question of the difference between inner and outer conflict, my conclusion is that the resolution of the inner conflict needs to happen before the outer conflict can be solved. In fact, the outer solution is a reflection of the inner solution.

Looking for a metaphor I am reminded of a story [told by Osho]:

It is reported in the life of a great Sufi mystic, Farid, that a king came to see him. He had brought a present for him: a beautiful pair of scissors, golden, studded with diamonds – very valuable, very rare, something unique. He brought those scissors to present to Farid. He touched Farid’s feet and gave him the scissors.

Farid took them, looked at them, gave them back to the king, and said, “Sir, many, many thanks for the present that you have brought. It is a beautiful thing, but utterly useless for me. It will be better if you can give me a needle. Scissors I don’t need; a needle will do.

The king said, “I don’t understand. If you need a needle, you will need scissors too.”

Farid said, “I am talking in metaphors. Scissors I don’t need because scissors cut things apart. A needle I need because a needle puts things together. I teach love. My whole teaching is based on love – putting things together, teaching people communion. I need a needle so that I can put people together. The scissors are useless; they cut, they disconnect. Next time when you come, just an ordinary needle will be enough.”

Osho, Unio Mystica, Vol 2, Ch 7

Article first published in Viha Connection

Ganga Cording took sannyas in 1975 and spent many years in Osho’s communes. She has been running the Satori (Enlightenment Intensive) process since 1976 and travels the world with her workshops. www.awareness-academy.com

Revealed! Osho’s Controversial Views on Women

Bhagawati — Thu, 16 May 2013 18:06:57 +0000

daily.bhaskar.com

Terence Stamp Today

Bhagawati — Wed, 15 May 2013 13:38:26 +0000

Terence Stamp was born in 1938 in Mile End, East London. As a young actor, after his screen debut in Peter Ustinov’s film Billy Budd in the sixties, he was nominated for an Oscar. Another well-known movie he starred in at the time was John Schlesinger’s Far from the Madding Crowd; soon he was a movie icon and was seen around with many beautiful women, including July Christie and Jean Shrimpton. He was even contacted by producer Harry Salzman in 1967 to take over the role of James Bond after Sean Connery stepped out. Terence Stamp remembers with humor, “Like most English actors, I’d have loved to be 007 because I really know how to wear a suit… But I think my ideas about it put the frighteners on Harry. I didn’t get a second call from him.”

He lived in Italy for several years and in 1967/68 worked with Federico Fellini on his ‘Toby Dammit’ section of the Edgar Allan Poe portmanteau film Histoires extraordinaires/Spirits of the Dead and with Pier Paolo Pasolini on Theorem (keystone of the BFI retrospective). It was Fellini who introduced Terence Stamp to J. Krishnamurti in 1968, which sparked his interest in spirituality.

After filming The Mind of Mr. Soames in 1970, movie offers began to cease. In 1975 he filmed Hu-Man which for him “was the only serious film I did [during those years], and that was really independent. We’d get some money, shoot for a few days, use the money, ‘See you a few months later!’ – it was that kind of thing. So I travelled. I thought I’m not going to stay around here facing this day-in-day-out rejection and the phone not ringing… I went from being a lead actor to nothing. I was devastated. My agent told me people were now looking for a young Terence Stamp.”

He went to Egypt and then “wound up in India and that opened a whole new world to me – that was an amazing thing to happen to a young performer. It’s quite widespread now, but to go there as a very young man and to meet great thinkers and great sages and to learn about breathing and movement and the whole canvas of mysticism…”

And then there is a gap – the time he spent at Shree Rajneesh Ashram in Poona where he became Swami Deva Veeten in 1976. It is interesting to note that none of the newspapers mentioned that.

Returning to his acting career in 1978, he played the Kryptonian super villain General Zod in Superman. Nick Curtis, in the London Evening Standard writes, “The ashram filled the gap when work dried up for him in the 1970s, and he was changed after his return. The BFI season feels like a vindication of his decision not to do ‘crap’ films for money, he says. He is philosophical about not having children, and about being single after his six-year marriage to Elizabeth O’Rourke, a Singaporean-Australian pharmacist 35 years his junior, ended in 2008. ‘I was married and I can’t call that a mistake,’ he says. ‘But I am set in my ways. I have never been in a relationship where the silence was mutual. And being lonely for me isn’t the same as other people understand it.’”

In 1979, Peter Brook directed the movie Meetings with Remarkable Men that many of our readers are familiar with. Brook tells the story of Asian mystic G. I. Gurdjieff, with Terence Stamp playing Prince Lubovedsky. Film critic Hal Erickson states that Terence Stamp “briefly retreated from his career after this picture, in favour of Eastern meditation.”

Among his later key movies are The Adventures of Priscilla, Queen of the Desert, The Limey, and Bowfinger. His most recent film, Song for Marion, is a touching story about ways of letting go – of life, of self-consciousness, of inhibition, a comedy-drama about death, loss and choral singing. It was nominated for three awards at the 2012 British Independent Film Awards: for Best Actor, Best Screenplay, and Best Supporting Actress. At the 2013 Beijing International Film Festival Song for Marion was awarded with Best Actor for Terence Stamp.

Terence Stamp answers questions at the British Film Awards for 2012

Nick Curtis concludes in his article, “The greatest example of how Stamp differs from your average film star is that he is technically homeless. In America, he stays in a friend’s guest house in Ojai, California, or in the New York flat and Hamptons house owned by his brother Chris, who used to manage The Who and Jimi Hendrix, and who died last November. Stamp also has the use of properties in Geneva and Gstaad owned by Chris’ Swiss widow. In London he stays with two friends, in Notting Hill and Knightsbridge, or in hotels: ‘My favourite is the Savoy, but I often can’t afford it,’ he says. ‘The absolute, honest truth is I would love to come back to England, but my taste has exceeded my earning capacity by so much that whenever I see something I like, I am millions short. And I can’t really go back to Plaistow [where he lived as a child], you know.’

“That said, whenever he’s in London, he goes back to what used to be ‘the old Green Street Market’ on Barking Road, which is now ‘Little Bombay’, and the only place he can find a particular mango he got addicted to in India. Last time he visited, a porter greeted him with: ‘Allo Terry, what the f*** are you doin’ here?’ He always walks or takes the bus, and laments the passing of the Routemaster, and the fact that the No 15 doesn’t go as far as it used to.

“‘I feel I’m kind of an urban icon,’ Stamp says, ‘that I’ve earned my place, because, you know, what the English love best is longevity. I will be 75 this July. I am five years away from being 80. That’s ridiculous. But it’s all still working, so I’m delighted.’ He puts on his hat and walks into the Waterloo sunset.”

Way to go, Terence!

Bhagawati, Osho News

Related article Osho Initiates Terence Stamp into Sannyas

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Osho Initiates Terence Stamp into Sannyas

Bhagawati — Wed, 15 May 2013 13:36:07 +0000

Osho: Mm, what about you? Is there something you would like to say to me?

Terence Stamp [a film star from England]: If you can help me in any way…

O: In every way!

T [thinking he had been misheard]: Any way.

O: In every way I am going to help, mm? The first thing first: become a sannyasin [Terence nods slowly]. That connects you with me – and before the work can start a deep connection is needed, a deep involvement with me is needed because the help is not going to be an outer help. I need a passage into the heart. And by becoming a sannyasin you become available, you become vulnerable. Then it becomes very easy, you don’t create obstacles. Otherwise ordinarily the human mind goes on creating obstacles in a thousand and one ways… unconsciously of course.

A man is his own undoing. So if you really want help, the first need is to get involved with my family – immediately many things start happening. The first thing – you become relaxed with me. Otherwise whenever a new person comes here, he’s afraid of sannyas – desirous and afraid too. There is a part which wants to move into this new space that I am making available here, and there is a part, naturally from the past, which is suspicious of everything – everything new at least; that part holds back.

So if you are here and not a sannyasin, to become a sannyasin or not to become a sannyasin remains a constant worry on the head – a very subtle tension. Once you have become a sannyasin that tension is gone. You can relax, and only when you are in a relaxed state can I penetrate you. By becoming relaxed you become feminine; then penetration is possible. By surrendering you are no more a male energy that’s why surrender is so difficult. The male energy is aggressive… it wants to conquer. Hence the West has given birth to science – science is an aggressive attack, almost a rape on truth.

In the East we have never thought in terms of conquering, we have thought in terms of surrendering. We surrender to nature, to God, or whatsoever one calls it, and then nature starts revealing its mystery.

So this sannyas is nothing but a first step towards the ultimate surrender which will be coming by and by. I am just a door. By surrendering to me you enter into the temple.

And I can help in every way, but I can help only if you allow me to help.

There is a very famous story about a Sufi mystic, Bayazid… When he went to his master he was a young man, desirous of knowing. He went to his master and he asked the master, ‘Would you teach me, sir?’

The master looked at him and said, ‘Would you allow me to teach you?’

And that very saying became a transformation.

I am ready to help but will you allow me to help you?… because nothing can be done without your cooperation. I never interfere in anybody’s life unless the life has become part of my life – that’s what the meaning of sannyas is. Then you are no more Terence: you don’t belong to your past – you belong to me. You can simply come out of your past as a snake comes out of the old skin – and it is tremendously beautiful to come out of the past. For a man like you who has lived a public life, who has become famous in a way, who is well-known, it is a must to get out of it.

This is one of the greatest human dilemmas – that when a person is not known, not famous, he hankers to become famous because walking on the road as a nonentity hurts. Nobody looks at you, nobody even says ‘hello’, nobody pays any attention. Whether you exist or not does not matter. If you die, there will not even be a ripple, you will simply disappear as if you had never existed – it hurts. One starts in every way to make one’s mark, to leave one’s signature, so that even when death comes one can live in people’s memories. And one wants that people should pay attention… people should know who you are! So there is a great urge to become famous. Somebody becomes a politician, somebody becomes an actor, somebody becomes an author, a painter, a poet… somebody becomes a saint.

The day you are famous – and it takes long effort; tired, exhausted you arrive, you become famous – suddenly you recognise that now it is almost impossible to walk on the road, to be, because no privacy is available. Wherever you go people know who you are. Everybody is staring at you. One becomes a public show. So when one becomes famous, one finds that one has lost one’s privacy, one’s own space. Then one wants to be anonymous, you want to go somewhere where nobody knows you. So first we create fame, when it is there… and by the time it is there much has been lost, much energy has been wasted, one has suffered much: many headaches and many ulcers, and everything has happened. And then by the time one becomes famous, it is futile. First one hankers for riches – when they are there, one simply sees the futility of it all.

T [quietly]: It’s true.

O: Sannyas is just a leap of understanding, that now fame does not mean anything, richness does not mean anything; that you would like to live a natural, simple spontaneous life. I am not saying to escape from the world, I’m not saying drop out of your work, but once this ambition disappears, you can remain in whatsoever you are doing, but the quality will change.

T: Yes.

O: And that’s what I can see – you need a space to be alone, you need a space, a private space, a private sky where you are left alone and you can be silently growing, doing something or not doing something, just enjoying being. You are tired of doing. Sannyas will be a great help: it will make a discontinuity.

On the surface it is very difficult to say what sannyas is. It is an experience And there are two ways to become a sannyasin: one is you think about it, you decide about it. The other and the better is that you simply go into it in deep trust without thinking about it, without making a decision about it. When you make a decision, sannyas is not so valuable because it is the past making decision. Then the break is not so abrupt. Mm? you will think – who is this thinking? Your past will think and calculate and watch and talk to people and meet people and see whether something happens or not. This whole thing will go on and then there is a conclusion, a decision you take or you don’t take. But this decision comes out of the past, and the past remains continuous; then the quantum leap is missed.

If you simply take a jump, not knowing where you are going, not making any effort to know where you are going – if you simply go into this darkness, into this vast darkness of existence, without any map, without any plan then it has a tremendous beauty. You will have a thrill, an adventure.

So it is for you to decide! Would you like to decide or would you simply like to go into it?

[Terence gazes at Osho for a moment, then wordlessly lowers his head and moves closer to Osho’s chair.]

O: Close your eyes and feel me surrounding you from everywhere as if you are just in my womb, relaxed, contented and whatsoever form your body starts taking, let it take.

[Terence sits quite still while Osho writes his sannyas name and then places the mala over his head. Osho places his thumb on Terence’s forehead, on his third eye, while his right hand holds the locket of the mala. After a moment or two Osho allows the locket to fall and places his hand on Terence’s head, gazing at him and then closing his eyes, for several minutes...]

O: This will be your name… so consciously, deliberately make a break with the old name. For your business purposes you can continue the old, but as far as you are concerned the old name becomes fictitious, the old name becomes pseudo, and this new name becomes your reality – Swami Deva Veeten.

“Deva” means “divine” – the word comes from the same root as divine. Divine comes from a sanskrit root, deva – they both mean light. From dev comes day and divine both – it means light. And “Veeten” means “beyond”: “the light beyond” or “the God beyond”. And the reality is beyond you. The reality is beyond the body, beyond the mind. That’s what one is ordinarily identified with – either the body or the mind – but reality is beyond both. Reality is in the witnessing of both.

If you can observe the body, you are more real than you are when you are in the body. If you are eating, you are not as real as if you are watching yourself eating. When you are thinking, you are not so real; but if you can watch the thoughts passing by you become more real.

Reality happens to you only when you are not identified with the body and mind. So Veeten means trying to be beyond, trying to be constantly beyond any identity that can confine you. That’s what Gurdjieff calls ‘self-remembering’, but self-remembering is not such a good word because the self in fact does not exist when there is remembering. So the word is not a very fortunate choice; self-remembering somehow makes it a self-centred thing. There is every possibility… and I have come across many Gurdjieff people who have mistaken self-remembering for self-consciousness.

They become more self-conscious – that creates more tension. Self-remembering has nothing to do with self-consciousness because it has nothing to do with self, it is simple remembering. Remembering is also not a very good choice of words, mm? Because it means that you are remembering something from the past. It has nothing to do with the past either. You have never known it. It is going to be for the first time. It is not a rediscovery it is a discovery! So it is a witnessing, it is pure consciousness, it is just seeing things as they are.

So these are the three layers upon one’s being. One is the world outside, the outermost layer: the sun, the trees, the people, the society. It is very easy to get out of it, because there is a gap between you and it; it is not very difficult. And there is no need to escape to the Himalayas or to a cave, because wherever you go the world is there – the outer world is there. It is very simple, because the distance is vast so one is never identified with the outer world. There are a few people very neurotic, who have become identified. Somebody is so much identified with his car that if a car is dented, he is dented. Or with the house – if the house is gone, he may start thinking of committing suicide. Or there are people who are very much identified with money, wife, children, but ordinarily that is not such a big problem, because you know that you are separate.

The problem starts with the body; the body is very close. The outer world is like a dream – you can drop it and you can become naked. The body is like skin it is not so easy to peel it away, but it is not impossible. So just watching helps. You are walking on the road – just become the witness, see the body walking.

And don’t make it a tense thing: strain is not needed. If it becomes strenuous, you miss the point. So be perfectly at ease and relaxed. It is fun – it is not a serious thing. That is one of the other problems which Gurdjieff people have imbibed – they become very serious, and they don’t take it as fun. That creates anxiety.

Even when Gurdjieff was there many people became ill, many people died, many people went mad, and the reason was that it was thought to be such a great work! The very word ‘work’ makes it very serious. What I am doing here is play – it is not work. When I am gone, my work is to be known as play, never as work. So take it non-seriously. Seriousness is a disease and through seriousness no one has ever gone beyond. Seriousness is so heavy that it makes you rooted in the gravitation. One needs to be very playful, then one can go beyond gravitation – one can fly!

A great unburdening is needed, so just be playful about it. When I say, ‘when walking, watch,’ I mean be playful. If sometimes you forget, nothing is wrong in it. Watch that too – you have forgotten, good! Then again you remember, good! Both are good. In fact there is a rhythm. You cannot constantly watch; it is just like breathing in, breathing out.

Veeten [suddenly animated as if something has clicked inside]: Aahh!

O: And that has been one of the missing points in Gurdjieff’ system.

V: Yes! Yes!

O: People are trying to be continuously watching. It is foolish!

V [thoughtfully, one hand under his chin, the other across his waist]: Right… right!

O: When you breathe out the air goes out, when you breathe in the air goes in, and there is a rhythm. The eyes go on blinking; there is a rhythm. And everything is a rhythm: the day and night, the summer-winter, the whole of life is rhythmic. So watchfulness cannot be a continuity. One should not strive for it. It is foolish, and it can create a neurosis! It can create cancer, tuberculosis, and it can create many things, because you strain too much.

So just let it be a natural rhythm. Sometimes you forget; that means it is exhalation. When you remember it is inhalation. And then it becomes very simple… very simple, child-like. And when you start enjoying it, forgetfulness, remembering, forgetfulness, remembering… And both are good. because the forgetfulness gives you respite and rest that is needed, it prepares you again to remember.

So walking, eating, sitting, just be watchful, but in a playful mood, with the body. And the same has to be done with the mind. Sometimes sitting silently, just watch. And that watching has not to be with a staring inside – with very relaxed eyes. One is simply sitting, a thought passes by – one looks at it.

V: Yes, because when I look at it, it stops.

O: No, you must be straining. If you strain, then it stops. Let it float, it has its own right to be. Let it float just as clouds float in the sky. Just watch. So, watchfulness without any tension in it. That’s why I am not using the word attention, because it has tension in it.

V: Yes… yes!

O: Just an unfocused watchfulness. So whatsoever it is, one is looking at it. There is no desire to stop, because if you are desiring to stop it you cannot watch it. The very desire becomes again a subtle identification – you are afraid of the thought. There is no need to be afraid. The thought is the thought, you are you. The thought is not hindering you. The clouds are moving in the sky. The thoughts are moving in the mind. The thoughts are as far away from you as clouds, and they have nothing to do with you. In fact they are not even yours – they are just passing. That’s why one thought comes, another comes, and sometimes you will become aware that if you are with a certain person a certain type of thought enters in you, mm? Because that person is constantly broadcasting. So they are not exactly yours; thoughts are collective.

The society exists in an atmosphere of thoughts just as air is social. Mm? I breathe out, you breathe in. You breathe out, I breathe in. One thought passes my head, it enters in your head, it passes into somebody else’s head and it goes on.

So nothing to be worried about. You are not to stop it. Simply watch, and in a very relaxed, calm, quiet mood. And learn to sit silently. Whenever you can find time, just relax in the chair – no need for any posture. The only thing to be remembered is that you are at ease. Any posture that makes you at ease, at home, is good. So just relax, just close your eyes, and just be.
By and by you will see you are neither the society, nor the body, nor the mind. And then a new sensation… a new feeling of being arises, and you know you are this. Not that you make that type of statement inside – no. It simply arises existentially: ‘Now this is me.’

This witnessing, this consciousness, is our innermost core. And all the religions have been working to achieve this state. Many people try but miss, because they try too hard. That is the problem with Krishnamurti – trying too hard… making it such a problem. People are already burdened with problems, and you bring another problem, and an almost impossible problem too. And Krishnamurti goes on hammering on their heads, and becomes angry too… rages!

V: Yes – he’s very austere.

O: But that is not going to help anybody. Life is playful… God is playful. And one comes closer to God as one becomes more playful.

So mix with people here, change to orange, forget your past for the days you are here. Dance, meditate – but everything has to be done absolutely non-seriously. Sincerely, yes! – but seriously, no.

V: I understand.

O: And enjoyment, delight, has to be imbibed. Laughter has to be learned and enjoyment in small things: drinking a cup of tea, talking to a friend, holding hands with a stranger or just sitting looking at the sky. Life is marvellous! And if we miss, only we are responsible – nobody else.

And all that man needs to be happy is available. All that man needs to be happy is always available. You just have to relax and enjoy it and participate in it. So let celebration be the only rule!

And I would like you to do a few groups here. A few groups will be very helpful.

V: Okay. Whatever you say.

O: And have you done any groups?

V: No. I put my name down for Rolfing.

O: Rolfing is good, mm? Do that, and book for Encounter 4th to 10th. Your dates are not yet certain, when you will be leaving?

V: No. Maybe 5th, but I’m trying to stay for the eleventh [Osho’s birthday].

O: Be here! Eleventh is not to be missed [laughter].

V: Okay!

O: And now I can order you – you are my sannyasin! [laughter] Mm?

V [grinning cheerfully]: Okay!

O: So book for Encounter, 4th to 10th, and these days you are here just mix with people and dance and enjoy… And forget everything.

Osho, The Shadow of the Whip, Ch 8

22c3

How Twins Are Made

Bhagawati — Wed, 15 May 2013 08:37:53 +0000

Credit to Fatima

Dancing with my Baby-Me!

Bhagawati — Wed, 15 May 2013 07:38:19 +0000

Jewish Date

Bhagawati — Mon, 13 May 2013 20:19:15 +0000

Sadie: “That nice Morris Finkleman asked me out for a date. I know you went out with him last week, and I wanted to talk with you about him before I give him my answer.”

Yetta: “Vell… I’ll tell you. He shows up at my apartment punctual like a clock. And like such a mensch he is dressed. Fine suit, wonderful lining. And he brings me such beautiful flowers you could die for. Then he takes me downstairs, and what’s there, but such a beautiful car… a limousine even, uniformed chauffeur and all. Then he takes me out for a dinner…. Marvellous dinner. Steak even. Den vee go see a show… let me tell you Sadie, I enjoyed it so much I could just die from pleasure!

So, then we are coming back to my apartment and into an ANIMAL he turns! Completely crazy, he tears off my expensive new dress and has his way with me two times!”

Sadie: “Oy! Vey… so you are telling me I shouldn’t go out with him?”

Yetta: “No… I’m just saying… wear an old dress!”

Niels Bohr

Bhagawati — Mon, 13 May 2013 20:10:41 +0000

Credit to Baul

Wagner meets Buddha

Bhagawati — Sun, 12 May 2013 06:16:22 +0000

The opera, written by composer Jonathan Harvey about Richard Wagner is to be partly performed in Pali, the 2,000-year-old language spoken by Buddha. In the production, a dying Wagner reflects on his own unfinished Buddhist opera.

According to author Urs App (Richard Wagner and Buddhism), it is little known that Richard Wagner was among the very first Westerners to appreciate Buddhism and that he was the first major European artist to be inspired by this religion. In 1856, in the prime of his creativity, the 33-year-old artist read his first book about Buddhism. Madly in love with Mathilde Wesendonck, a beautiful but happily married woman, he conceived two deeply connected opera projects: Tristan und Isolde which he went on to compose and stage, and Die Sieger (The Victors), an opera scenario based on an Indian Buddha legend translated from Sanskrit. These two projects mirrored Wagner’s burning desire for the consummation of his love and the necessity of renunciation.

This Buddhist opera project occupied Wagner’s mind for decades until his death in 1883. Indeed, the composer’s last words were about the Buddha figure of his scenario and his relationship with women.

Welsh National Opera (WNO) director David Pountney said the ancient Asian language was the most appropriate for the production. The original English text for the Buddhist characters has been translated by academics into Pali, while Wagner’s part is sung in German.

The British composer, who died in 2012, was keen for this to happen to “enhance and clarify the cultural dialogue” of the opera… and “brings together a giant of the Western musical tradition, Richard Wagner, with ideas and narrative elements from the Buddhist tradition,” Pountney said.

“We felt that the impact of this cultural dialogue would be enhanced by letting each of these two worlds speak in its own language rather than being confused by both being rendered in a third language, English.”

The Pali parts were translated by Professor Richard Gombrich, president of the Oxford Centre for Buddhist Studies, who said the task “brought some amusing challenges… in some places we had to split the musical notes in order for them to fit.“

Changes were also made to reflect the fact that pubs and tea – referenced in the English text – did not exist in ancient India. “I also felt obliged to insert, very briefly, some real Buddhist doctrine when the Buddha himself is speaking,” he added.

Wagner Dream will be staged at Wales Millennium Centre, Cardiff, on 6-7 June, with a performance in Birmingham on 12 June.

1f97

WHO?

Bhagawati — Sat, 11 May 2013 05:38:44 +0000

“Hey man! You too?”

“Woa! Swamiji.”

They hug for a long long time.

“I thought you were in Bali.”

”Hawaii.”

“I’m sure this girl said Bali.”

“Who?”

“I bumped into her in Amsterdam.”

“Not what’s-her–name?”

“Yeah. What’s her name? . . . She was hanging out with someone who’s ex-girlfriend was with the guy who runs a clothes business out of there.”

“Who?”

“Oh you know him. He was with the girl who got together with that drummer guy in Poona One.”

“Who’s got a commune in Brazil?”

“No. The one who sometimes played in Sufi Dance. Drove Back-hoes on the Ranch.”

“Was he the guy who twice dug up the power supply cable? And lived.”

“And fell off a town house roof!”

“No that was the Italian guy. This guy was a tarot reader in the Mystery School.”

“And wasn’t he with that girl from Munich who was in Publications.”

“Right. And she got together with old . . . um . . . the guy who set up as a builder.”

“Yes. Lived out by the river.”

“The River House? “

“That big block of flats.”

“Behind . . . what’s its name?

“Prems?”

“No! Go out of the ashram, turn right and then down that little road where the guy had the bike rental business. What was his name? My god, who does not exist, are we getting old or what?”

“Did you hear he got arrested?”

“What for?”

“Who knows? The usual I expect.”

“The Ghats! Near the burning Ghats.”

“Oh, Popular Heights.”

“Popular Heights! Of course!”

“What?”

“That’s where the builder guy lived. The one who got together with what’s her name?”

“It’s getting serious man. Too much sitting round watching the grass grow by itself.”

“You’d know him if you saw him.”

“Who?”

“The guy who set up as a builder in Poona 2 and lived at Popular Heights”

“What about him?”

“Wasn’t he the guy who got together with . . . Oh no we’ve done that. Where was I?”

“A girl in Amsterdam.”

“She’s giving Satsangs now.”

“You bumped into her in the street?”

“Not literally. He always said they’d be springing up like mushrooms when he left the body.”

“What was her name?”

“Oh man! S. Her name begins with an S.”

“Was she in Poona One?

“Okay. You remember the tall Krishna Guard who went to Japan to teach English? Well his first girlfriend, who he came to Poona with, set up a cleaning business in Alaska after the Ranch. She made a small fortune . . .”

“Hey! Do you remember that one? How does a sannyasin get a small fortune? Eh? Start off with a big one!”

“Yeah. Reminds me. On the Ranch. In the Trailer Homes. How does a Swami know when his girlfriend is coming?”

”I don’t remember that. How does a Swami know when his girlfriend is coming?”

“He hears her cries through the partition wall.”

“We were all too exhausted for that sort of thing.”

“Or we were suffering from a bad back.”

“He always said it would be hard.”

“She was a gardener in Poona two.”

”Who?”

“The one you were asking about. The one whose boyfriend’s ex is hanging out with the guy in Bali who does clothing.”

“I’ve never been to Bali.”

“Mary! That was it! Prem Mary! Wasn’t that her name before she went and changed it . . .?”

The other Swami is a blur of limbs amongst the dancers.

“Who was he. . . ?”

Rashid, Osho News

‘Slow Sex’ DVD Wins Award

Bhagawati — Sat, 11 May 2013 05:32:48 +0000

The ceremony took place before a packed house at the Mathäser Filmpalast in Munich, on April 26, 2013. The producer, Pavrati (Ela Buchwald), and Puja accepted the award.

Every year in spring, the Cosmic Cine Film Festival shows the Best Open Mind Movies that reflect the current zeitgeist with their meaning and significance, and inspire to make life one’s own responsibility. All nominated films form an overall symphony matching the theme of this year, “A World Full of Possibilities” and set creative impulses, show new understandings and ideas beyond borders.

Last year, widely-read German woman’s magazine Brigitte Woman published a 5-page interview with Puja as the cover story for their 10/12 issue, all about having more time for love, having slow sex, and how sex is so much more enjoyable when the partners are relaxed.

Satya Puja is the author of several books on Tantra, including Tantric Orgasm for Women and Tantric Love Letters, and is the co-author of Tantric Sex for Men. Together with her partner, Michael (aka Swami Raja), she has been teaching week-long “Making Love” retreats for couples since 1993. She lives in Switzerland.

DVD Slow Sex is available at innenwelt-verlag.de - amazon.de

Credit to Jivana

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Osho and the Dog

Bhagawati — Fri, 10 May 2013 09:25:08 +0000

Another time, Osho in Uruguay with another dog

There are animals who are crying out to be freed from their forms.

It happened at a camp in Matheran. I was staying very far away from the campus ground. The first evening, when I was going to my bungalow, a dog followed – really a rare dog. Then the dog remained continuously. Three times I would go to conduct the camp, and three times I would return. It was half an hour’s journey. Three times I was asleep, and he would sit just on the veranda. Even when he went to eat something, he never left me. For the whole camp this was his routine. He would follow me to the camp, and when others were meditating he would sit more silently, more deeply, than those who were attending the camp. And then he would go back with me.

The last day, when I left Matheran by train, he followed the train. He was running by the side of the train, and the guard took compassion on him and he took him in. Up to Neral he came. This train was a slow train, a toy train, coming from Matheran to Neral, traveling just seven miles in two hours, and the dog could follow. But from Neral it is a fast train; when I took the train from Neral to Bombay others were standing there on the platform weeping and crying, and the dog was also standing there in tears.

Osho, A Bird on a Wing, Ch 9

Berlin by Night

Punya — Fri, 10 May 2013 09:11:31 +0000

The night train stopped suddenly. I woke up in a strange mood.
Outside, dimmed light showed a dilapidated station sign: Helmstedt.
Border town of the German Democratic Republic (GDR).

It was December 1983 and I was in the train from Amsterdam to West Berlin. It was dark, cold, and the border between West- and East Germany was severely guarded. Only members of the ‘Volkspolizei’ (VOPO) – equipped with guns and German shepherd dogs – stood on the deserted platform. There were no passengers waiting, for nobody was allowed to leave the GDR, and not even to stand on that platform.

Since April that year I was Osho’s sannyasin and lived in the commune of Amsterdam, Holland. In the Rajneesh Times, a monthly magazine, I had read an article about the opening of the ‘Far Out’ disco on the famous Kurfürstendamm (aka Ku’damm) in Berlin.

For a long time it had been a dream: living together with friends in awareness, having fun and running a business. Life as a piece of Art, and this was now happening on the largest and most exclusive shopping street of West Berlin, a divided city, severely damaged at the end of World War II.

In the morning I arrived at Vihan, the Osho Meditation Center and spoke with Sneha, one of the two young female staff members of the commune. She was loving and open. I hadn’t phoned from Holland to announce my arrival (international phone calls were expensive and anyhow….), but after I told my story I was allowed to stay in the commune for a trial period of 14 days.

The ‘Far Out’ disco was a huge success right from the beginning and additional workers were needed. For weeks I was polishing the white marble floor with a rotating floor polishing machine until everything was clean and glossy. My mind was also often rotating – “Hey Dutchie, what are you doing, cleaning disco floors and toilets in Berlin, is that what you were born and educated for?” I was cleaning the floor and at the same time cleaning my rotating mind.

Later I worked at the bar. During the night the disco was packed with people who shouted their orders for drinks right through the noisy beats of the music: 3 beers, 2 white wine! – holding first three fingers and then two fingers up in the air. I got the idea and filled the beer and wine into glasses, at the same time aware of my breathing. Breathe in… breathe out….

My work had become my meditation.

At first I lived in the ‘Brabu’ (Brandenburgische Strasse) together with approximately 20 sannyasins. More commune members lived in several other flats in Berlin until we all moved to Dahlmannstrasse No. 9, a huge 5-storey house located close to the disco, with a basement for laundry and provisions, a ground floor with space for the commune kitchen, a restaurant, a shop, an office and a meditation room. Above that, were 8 luxurious apartments with huge rooms and high ceilings. There was enough room for a sannyasin dentist’s practice as well.

Before the disco shift started at 7pm, we all gathered on the freshly polished floor. It was then that the jobs for the night were given out, news was shared and we did the Gachchhami’s kneeling down, slowly chanting together: Buddham sharanam gachchhami, sangham sharanam gachchhami, dhammam sharanam gachchhami (I go to the feet of the Buddha, I go to the feet of the Buddha’s commune, I go to the feet of the Dhamma, the ultimate law). When everything was ready we opened at 9pm and the guests who had already been lining up outside, flooded in. The lights changed into ‘disco’ mode and the music started slowly building up. About half an hour later the disco crew came to the dance floor to greet all guests, slowly turning around, hands folded in a Namaste gesture. When we left the shiny floor, the Far Out disco truly took off!

A broad musical repertoire of those days was played sometimes loud, sometimes soft, but always with heart, thanks to our DJ’s, and the dancers on the dance floor could be hardly seen because of the crowd gathering around the bar. Behind the bar we were also dancing and it was an art of awareness to work together in this chaos of heat, loud music and ecstatic young people.

At the same time some fellow commune members from different departments who had been working during the day came in: Construction, Cleaning, Kitchen, Office, Staff and Transport staff. All enjoyed a chat, a dance, a drink (we had free vouchers), a cigarette. Smokers were given one package of cigarettes a day for free. Those were the days when smoking was still worldwide promoted, not prohibited, and Osho had taught me: Whatever you do, just be aware in the here and now, all the time.

During the night we left this pressure cooker to have a late dinner break down in the (relatively silent) basement with a nice variety of vegetarian food.

Time for a break. Breathe in… breathe out….

We learned the ‘Art of Meditation in the Marketplace’. Thanks to Osho, it was a spiritual miracle: dancing through the night, having fun, being aware, working (worshipping) with friends in our own successful ‘Far Out’ disco on the Ku’damm in a dark city behind the ‘Iron Curtain’.

When we went home after cleaning and the Gachchhamis, walking along the silent Ku’damm early in the morning at 5am or 7am, depending on the weekdays, every time there were already friends making breakfast or having breakfast. The commune was a 24 hour business.

I also worked in the commune’s kitchen. The ‘Mamas’ in charge organised the kitchen and gave us a certain job, such as cutting, cooking, washing dishes for breakfast, lunch, late/dinner or take away. Usually relaxing Osho music was played, but the work could be hectic too. We were more than 100 commune members now, living and working together.

Sannyas friends from outside the commune came and joined us because there was so much to do. They got a special ‘guest bead’ in their mala, for the commune grew so fast that we didn’t know who was actually living in! Anyway, now there were many Buddha bellies to be fed.

There were new people, job changes and surprises every day, and I loved it. The ones in charge (who also changed often) organised the businesses, the commune and the job changes. You had to leave your ego behind when one day you were being in charge and the next day following orders of the same guy! This was a hierarchy without bosses, this was ambition without ego. For me this was the future in the here and now!

A job change mostly meant a day/night shift change and a wake up call: Get out of your comfort zone! Your mattress and few belongings (what do you really need?) were moved by friends from Housekeeping during the day, no wonder you sometimes landed in another bed.

Seldom did I receive mail, but one day I got a letter from the Dutch Defence Ministry. Urgent!

I was ordered to appear in Venlo in Holland for military service; because of my studies at the Art Academy in Arnhem I had been suspended for service until one year after graduation. I knew this could happen, hoping it wouldn’t, but now was the time…. What to do? Not showing up would be treated the same like desertion and could be sentenced with two years in prison! Changing a good situation for a bad one? I wrote a letter to the Dutch Department of Defence to be exempted from service on religious grounds because monks didn’t serve either. I wrote a letter to Queen Beatrix, also signed by Sneha (as a mother superior of a monastery), but in the end there I was on the night train again, through the GDR, to the hierarchical discipline of the Dutch Army, ready for the cold war with communism.

For two weeks I served in the Dutch army, in red clothes, with the mala. I applied for red army clothing and vegetarian food but neither was available. Being the oldest in my room I had to stand in position in my red ‘corporate identity clothing’ each morning and salute with my right arm to the commander in chief at the door of the dormitory, with my left arm straight down my leg. After 14 days they sent me to see the army vicar.

My father was a clergyman himself, so I knew his cadre de référence and told him my story. Soon the vicar and I were on good speaking terms and in a letter he advised the commander in chief to suspend me from service until a definite judgement was made. Not waiting for the final judgment day, I left the barracks immediately and took the night train back to Berlin. Now I really was a deserter from the Dutch Army and could not come back to Holland, risking 2 years of army prison until I was 35 years old; more than 5 years to go.

I did not even want to go back!

Happy to be again in the Berlin commune, there were old and new friends and the river of sannyas life went on. The Building department of the commune had become specialised in attic renovations and there was a lot of work to do. It was the time when people in Berlin had become wealthier and wanted bigger and better houses. Because of the limited space on this ‘island of capitalism’ buildings could only be built higher up, so why not change attics into lofts. We had the expertise and labour force to realise those dreams. When our Building department needed workers to carry sheetrock or plasterboard up the stairs to the roofs of these Berlin houses, there were always people like me available to help out.

Then we started ‘Zorba the Buddha’, a vegetarian speciality restaurant at the Ku’damm.

I did a waiter training as part of the first restaurant crew. Efficiency, postures, opening bottles, and customer service. There was also training in creating the menus, dishes, the setting of the plates and cutlery. When all the permits were in and the Graphics Department had printed the menu cards, we opened with a grand party. As a crew with awareness we quickly got used to our new roles. Up and down I walked on request for sugar, a new spoon, and feed-back for the kitchen, the voice of Grace Jones in the background. Everything was changing moment to moment and it was fun.

The management changed too. Sheela had become general manager of all the communes in the world while Osho was in silence in Rajneeshpuram. In came new rules and new mamas. One day at breakfast all the toasters had disappeared. We learned that Sheela wanted all the communes to feel closer to Rajneeshpuram and as there were no toasters there either, so…. The worship hours were extended and the one day off we had was cancelled. More restrictions followed and at the same time AIDS precautions put us in plastic: it was itchy.

Commune members from Brazil, Denmark, England, Holland and Italy came for exchange to live in the Dahlmannstrasse. Our large building became packed with people in red who needed a job and a bed. Most of them worked in Cleaning or Construction for you had to speak German to work behind the bar or in the restaurant. I was lucky, being multi-lingual.
Now we were more than 200 Commune members in Berlin and that required further organisation. I called it Here-Now Management because many decisions were made on the spot and had to be cancelled the next day for Ma X was just going to America and Swami Y was really needed somewhere else.

What seemed to be my fortune became my misfortune. Members who could speak German had to find a job outside the commune because now we were too many! I found a job in a Bistro on the Ku’damm, close to the centre. They were asking for a larder cook during the day. I came in, said I was the new cook and could start right away. It was a very small kitchen without windows, with a Chef who showed me the menu, the kitchen, and then left.
It was not easy. The order came in via a service hatch; 1 Toast Hawaii! I had no idea what that meant and asked the waiter how to make a Toast Hawaii: White bread, a slice of pineapple, cheese on top, and then 5 minutes under the grill. It took me a while to get everything together. However, after 10 minutes it was ready and could be served. “Where is the red cherry!?” the Chef yelled from the other side of the hatch. I wasn’t to come back the next day and that was my fortune. They needed me in the commune anyway.

The new Meditation Centre was opening. We had rented a former car showroom, again on the Ku’damm, and rebuild it in the bright and timeless way all projects were done. There, meditations and groups took place and in the evening we watched Osho’s discourses.
Mostly I was sitting or lying down in the back and let the words and silences of Osho come in. Working day in day out, we were physically tired but the energy of Osho and the commune made us fly. I was living with friends and I was happy.

And then I was transferred to the disco night shift again; a new swami from Holland was in charge. There were new rules and regulations, such as having to sell drinks to patrons more actively. I thought, “Hey Dutchie, you come and tell me what I have to do here?” What I had to say took only one cigarette and a drink; It was time for me to go!

The next day I got on the night train again, heading south to the commune in Munich.

Antar Marc, Osho News

2baf

Events in North America

Bhagawati — Fri, 10 May 2013 07:07:47 +0000

May 17-19
Osho Meditation Weekend Retreat in Ithaca
Details: oshonewyork.com

June 21-23
Spring/Summer Osho Meditation Weekend event
The Inn at the Shaker Mill Farm, Canaan, New York
Organised by Osho Padma Meditation Center, New York
Contact Satya Priya, oshopriya@earthlink.net – 212 675 6529 – www.oshopadmameditation.us

July 19-21
Osho Meditation Retreat
with Arun
Stony Point Centre, New York
No prior meditation experience is needed to attend this retreat.
Organised by Osho Sadhana Meditation Centre
Details: oshonewyork.com

July 26-28
Osho Meditation Retreat
with Arun
Lake Lewisville, The Colony, Texas
There will be an opportunity to take Sannyas for those who wish.
Details: zorbastudios.com

Osho Meditation in Dallas, TX
Osho Meditation in Atlanta, GA
Osho Meditation in New York, NY
Osho Meditation in New York, NY
Osho Meditation in Chicago, IL
Osho Meditation in San Diego, CA
Osho Meditation in Austin, TX

The Octopus

Bhagawati — Thu, 09 May 2013 19:47:36 +0000

He sits the octopus down on a stool and tells everyone in the bar that this is a very talented octopus. He can play any musical instrument in the world.

Everyone in the bar laughs at the man, calling him an idiot. So he says that he will wager $50 to anyone who has an instrument that the octopus can’t play.

A guy walks up with a guitar and sets it beside the octopus. Immediately the octopus picks up the guitar and starts playing better than Jimi Hendrix. The guitar man pays up his $50.

Another guy walks up with a trumpet. This time the octopus plays the trumpet better than Miles Davis and this guy pays up his $50.

Then a Scotsman walks up with some bagpipes. He sits them down and the octopus fumbles with it for a minute and then sits down with a confused look. “Ha!” the Scot exclaims, “Can ye nae plae it?”

The octopus looks up at him and says, “Play it? As soon as I figure out how to get its pajamas off, I’m going to fuck it!”

Pet Names

Bhagawati — Thu, 09 May 2013 19:05:53 +0000

He was impressed by the way his buddy preceded every request to his wife with endearing terms – Honey, My Love, Darling, Sweetheart, Pumpkin, etc.

The couple had been married almost 50 years and, clearly, they were still very much in love.

While the wife was in the kitchen, the man leaned over and said to his host, “I think it’s wonderful that, after all these years, you still call your wife those loving pet names.”

The old man grinned. “I have to tell you the truth,” he said, “I forgot her name about 10 years ago.”

Respect Osho’s Words

Bhagawati — Wed, 08 May 2013 09:39:40 +0000

Maybe I feel super sensitive to such editing caprices as since Pune 1 days when I worked in the press office, it had been made abundantly clear that we were not to change anything Osho said, and I remember the book editors were also advised to just use punctuation; and if there was something they felt strongly about it, they could ask Osho for advice and in some rare cases Osho accepted a change.

This morning (May 6, 2013), while as usual listening to the ‘Osho No-Thought for the Day’ as the beginning for my morning meditation, I realised that the audio was different to the words on the screen:

Osho however, is saying,

And everybody is coming out with a mask which is smiling,
happy looking, so everybody is deceiving everybody else.

Why would anybody want to change Osho’s words and thus also change (even subtly) what Osho said intentionally? I am reminded of Osho speaking about Sarjano’s attempts to change Osho’s words while translating into Italian. He sent a message to Sarjano that he has to do it exactly as it is:

Don’t try to improve upon it. Leave it as it is. Raw, wild, illogical, paradoxical, contradictory, repetitive, whatsoever it is, leave it as it is!”

Tao: The Golden Gate, Vol. 2, Ch 4, Q 1

He also says,

I say a word; I mean one thing. But if ten thousand people are listening there will be ten thousand meanings, because each will listen from HIS mind, from HIS prejudice, from HIS concept and philosophy and religion. He will listen from HIS conditioning and his conditioning will supply the meaning.”

And the Flowers Showered, Ch 9

Osho entrusted his words to his editors. If any editor changes a word on a whim, this means to me breaking that trust. The mind comes in and offers a different word, which always will have a slightly different meaning.

The pundits who came after the great masters have done editing jobs during millennia. In those days there was first only the oral recital from memory, later came the manuscripts. The message of the sages was watered down and adapted to the scholar’s ideas and nobody could prove otherwise. As for those sannyasins that are editing and able to listen to the original audio recordings of Osho there is no excuse.

[…] once a master dies people start editing his words according to their own idea of what he should have said. The day Buddha died, just the next day, there were thirty-two schools immediately, thirty-two sects differing about what Buddha had said.”

The Razor’s Edge, Ch 15, Q 1

I call upon all those who work with Osho’s discourses and books to respect and take the responsibility to remain true to his words. We don’t want to go down the same slippery slope the old pundits did, do we?

Bhagawati, Osho News

29d1

Lao Tzu On Past, Future, Present

Bhagawati — Tue, 07 May 2013 19:37:56 +0000

Goose, What Goose?

Bhagawati — Tue, 07 May 2013 19:10:09 +0000

Osho has spoken about enlightenment thousands of times. We have listened to him but can it be understood? How can we talk about something that we have no direct personal experience of? Or better, something that we already are (as Osho says), but have lost the key for, have forgotten? At best I can talk about all the things we do to avoid becoming enlightened!

The very phenomenon of the flowering of consciousness cannot be explained but may be sensed by losing oneself in the depth of the Master’s eyes, by sitting silently at his feet, experiencing the delicate vibrations of his being. It can be experienced in momentary glimpses, during a Samadhi, moments of utter bliss, and then the veil that seemingly had disappeared nimbly adjusts itself again between the two worlds until a next precious moment or the final blast happens!

The word enlightenment was the carrot that hung right before our eyes, which made us forsake home and family to satisfy this incredible longing the very mention of the word brought up. Yes, we were all bent to become enlightened in this life and did we ever stop in this dream to consider what exactly happens when one enlightens? What then?

A disciple asked Osho, “What is enlightenment? Please explain.”

“I will not, because I cannot. And I cannot because nobody can. You have come a little late. Had you asked me the same question before I became enlightened, I had many answers. Now I have none. Now I am absolutely dumb about it.

I can show you the path, how to become enlightened, but I cannot say what it is. I can hold your hand to the very door and push you in, but I don’t know what is in.

If you are courageous, come, follow me. If you are not courageous, escape as soon as possible, because if you hang around a little longer, it is dangerous. And I am telling you beforehand, so you can never make me responsible for it. Either escape as fast as possible and as far away as possible – to be here is dangerous – or take courage and hold my hand: I can take you in that state of enlightenment.

But nothing can be said about it. It is indefinable, it is ineffable. It IS – in fact only it is, nothing else exists – but it is so vast, it cannot be confined to any explanation.”

Osho, Ecstasy: The Forgotten Language, Ch 4, Q 7

I remember how after listening for the first time to the Zen koan in the discourse series, ‘The Goose is Out’, my mind freaked out. My brain felt on fire. I just couldn’t ‘get it’. Actually, it was rather my mind that could not ‘get it’ and went into a feeding frenzy along the known and stored experiences and tried to figure it out. Circuits blew. I couldn’t breathe, anxiety overcame me that for sure I wouldn’t ‘get it’ because time was running out. Time! The only way to ease this turmoil was to write a question to Osho and hope for an answer, otherwise I would surely go around the bend and find myself marooned in an asylum.

The question: “Osho, I feel that we need to hurry, that there is not much time left. The cocoon of slumber I am existing in seems to suffocate me, and I am afraid I will never make it. You say the goose is out already, why does it feel so impossible to grasp?”

I spent the remainder of that day in a rather wretched state, watching time pass feverishly.

The next day, in Buddha Hall, in his inexhaustible infinite compassion and patience Osho answered my question for a long time, swinging from Master Nansen to Joseph Grimaldi and Adolph Hitler and on to Lao Tzu, gently pointing out how irrelevant time is and all that goose parable was about, was to relax:

“What is the hurry? The whole of eternity is yours! You have always been here, you are here, you will always be here. Nothing is ever lost. Now it is a confirmed scientific truth that nothing is ever destroyed. If matter is not destroyed, why should consciousness be destroyed? Matter belongs to a very gross plane of existence. If the gross is so valued by existence, do you think the higher manifestation is not valued by existence? The higher is more valued! If matter persists and is impossible to destroy, consciousness cannot be destroyed either. It is the highest expression of life; there is nothing higher than it. It is the very Everest of life, the peak beyond which there is nothing. The whole of existence is moving towards that peak. There is no hurry.

The whole idea of hurry is a creation of the mind. Let me say it in this way: mind and time are synonymous; the moment your mind stops, time also stops. The more you are in your mind the more you are in time; the less you are in your mind the more you are out of time.”

Osho, The Goose Is Out, Ch 2, Q 1

Over the years I have listened to or read this discourse again and again and entered deeper and deeper into Osho’s answer. This helped tremendously with the imaginary concept of time; an inner slowing down happened, the ‘urge’ ‘to get it’ became a mere occasional hiccup.

The amusing part about that particular morning is that I was on guard duty in the back of Buddha Hall and had to keep an eye on people coughing or doing anything untoward during discourse. So a few minutes after Osho had read my question and started talking, one visitor started to cough. I crawled over, tapped him on the shoulder and nudged him to get up and out. He didn’t want to leave! Between trying to hear what Osho had to say to me and getting this visitor out, I got myself into a quite stressful situation. Finally after almost hefting the man over my shoulders he left with me and as soon as I handed him to a guard outside I leaped back inside to my spot in the rear. I had just calmed down again when after about ten minutes I heard a cough to my left. I glared at this visitor and willed him to stop coughing. He didn’t. He got into a coughing fit and I did what was needed, left Buddha Hall with him, came back again. I just gave up and surrendered to the task I had been given and suddenly understanding the absurdity of the situation made me giggle.

Years later I heard Osho say,

“Don’t take things seriously; life is so hilarious. There is no urgency to be enlightened. It is unfortunate that I became enlightened too early! But now nothing can be done about it – once enlightened, enlightened forever…

I know the trouble of being enlightened. That’s why I make you alert. Don’t be in a hurry; otherwise you will blame me. I don’t want to take the blame. Nobody can say to me, ‘I am grateful to you that you helped me to become enlightened.’ I help you to learn and love and live as totally as possible. Out of this, enlightenment is bound to happen some day – but there is no hurry for it. It is your birthright, so you cannot avoid it long enough. Sooner or later – and most probably sooner than later – it is going to happen.

But I am telling you, I don’t want to take any credit for it because then you will see that this whole life is utterly futile, meaningless, no action is of any worth – and then you will search.

That’s why I keep myself locked in my room. I don’t want people rushing to me saying, ‘Now it is your fault. You talked about enlightenment and I have become enlightened. Now what do you suppose I should do?’

There is nothing to be done, you have become enlightened, close the door and lock yourself inside! Or if you are really angry, try to make others enlightened: Look what life has done to you…. Do it to others!”

Osho, Om Shantih Shantih Shantih, Ch 4, Q 3

Sound advice. So when enlightenment happens to me in this or any other life, I shall just shut up and enjoy the ride!

Bhagawati, Osho News

Related discourse excerpt A Natural Happening

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A Natural Happening

Bhagawati — Tue, 07 May 2013 17:04:17 +0000

If we don’t hinder it, it is bound to happen. It is not that you have to achieve it; all that you have to do is not to hinder it. You hinder it in a thousand and one ways. You don’t allow it to happen. When it starts to happen you become frightened. When it takes possession of you, you cannot give that much possession – you shrink back, you withdraw. You come back in your tiny cell of the ego. There you feel protected, defended, secure.

Enlightenment is the open sky of insecurity. It is vastness, it is uncharted ocean. The journey is from one unknown to another unknown. There is nothing that can be known. Knowledge, the very idea of knowledge, is part of human stupidity. Life is such a mystery it cannot be known. And if it cannot be known how can it be taught? And if it cannot be taught, what is the point of being a master and a disciple?

Just a few days ago there was a question: ‘Why have you declared yourself to be the Blessed One?’ It is a drama. I have decided to play the part of the Blessed One and you have decided to play the part of disciples – but it is a drama. The day you will become aware you will know there is no master and no disciple. The day you will understand, you will know that it was a dream – but a dream which can help you to come out of all your other dreams, a thorn which can help to pull out your thorns from your flesh, it can be instrumental – but a thorn all the same. A poison which can help you to drop your other poisons – but a poison all the same. Use it as a raft. That’s why I say it is a drama.

Your being a disciple and my being a master is a drama. Play it as beautifully as possible. To you it is a reality, I know. To me it is a drama. From your side it is a great reality, from my side it is a game. One day you will also understand that it is a game. That day will be the day of your enlightenment.

Osho, The Diamond Sutra, Ch 9 (Excerpt)

A Fairy Tale For The Assertive Woman

Bhagawati — Tue, 07 May 2013 16:59:38 +0000

…in a land far away, a beautiful, independent, self-assured princess happened upon a frog as she sat contemplating ecological issues on the shores of an unpolluted pond in a verdant meadow near her castle.

The frog hopped onto the lap of the princess and said, “Elegant Lady, I was once a handsome prince, until an evil witch cast a spell upon me. One kiss from you, however, and I will turn back into the dapper, young prince that I am and then, my sweet, we can marry and set-up housekeeping in yon castle with my mother, where you can prepare my meals, clean my clothes, bear my children, and forever feel grateful and happy doing so.”

That night, on a repast of lightly sautéed frog legs seasoned in a white wine and onion cream sauce, she chuckled to herself and thought, “I don’t fucking think so.”

When I Say You’re Beautiful

Bhagawati — Tue, 07 May 2013 16:34:48 +0000

When I say you’re Beautiful
I’m not just speaking in the idiom of mirrors
I’m speaking of your unseen precious core
shaped by fire and ice and centuries of mountain streams

I’m speaking of the ever-present seasons of your being
the scented buds of spring that draw the bees
the petals that shower radiance your fruitfulness
your graceful yield to winter silence

The beauty that I greet in you is like a candle flame
in currents of dim air or like a falcon rising on a thermal
or it is the steadfastness of dawn
rising to delight our sleeping world

I’m speaking of what’s seen with inner eyes
of what will slip the handcuffs of our best poetic words
I’m speaking both the language of the mirrors
and the language of the heart to say You are a Beauty.

Poem by Rashid

Illustration: painting by Rashid from the series ‘Beyond the Veil of Appearances’

A Cup of Tea (43)

Bhagawati — Tue, 07 May 2013 16:29:03 +0000

Love.
You have asked me about the sense of humour.
We can talk about it in detail when we meet but first of all:
the sense of humour should be directed towards oneself –
it is a very great thing to laugh at oneself
and he who can laugh at himself
gradually becomes full of concern and
compassion for others.
In the entire world no event, no subject,
invites laughter like oneself.

About the truth of dreams as well
we shall have to talk in detail.
Some dreams are definitely true.
As the mind quietens down
glimpses of truth begin to appear in dreams.

Dreams are of four kinds
– those concerned with past lives,
– those concerned with the future,
– those concerned with the present,
– and those concerned with repressed desires.
Contemporary psychology knows something about the
fourth type only.

I am glad to know that your mind moves towards being at peace.
Mind is what we want it to be,
peace and restlessness are both our own creations.
Man binds himself with his own chains
and so he is always at liberty to become free of the mind.

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Closed Casket

Bhagawati — Fri, 03 May 2013 19:50:09 +0000

Whenever there was a confrontation, yelling could be heard deep into the night.

The old man would shout, “When I die, I will dig my way up and out of the grave and come back and haunt you for the rest of your life!”

Neighbors feared him. The old man liked the fact that he was feared. To everyone’s relief, he died of a heart attack when he was 98.

His wife had a closed casket at the funeral.

After the burial, her neighbours, concerned for her safety, asked, “Aren’t you afraid that he may indeed be able to dig his way out of the grave and haunt you for the rest of your life?”

The wife said, “Let him dig. I had him buried upside down, and I know he won’t ask for directions.”

Credit to Sugit

Powerful Solar Eruption

Bhagawati — Fri, 03 May 2013 19:49:32 +0000

Courtesy NASA/Solar Dynamics Observatory

Totality is the Key

Bhagawati — Fri, 03 May 2013 19:46:22 +0000

There is an intricate relationship between an act and the end result. We always want to have a perfect result for whatever we do, without losing ourselves in the act. Is such an act possible? To understand the fine difference, it is important to examine ‘perfection’ and ‘totality’. Although for many people, perfection is the ultimate goal, it is nothing less than illusion or myth; something which is nonexistent. We are attracted by the very idea of perfection, not realising that it is like a disease which is dangerous and destructive. If not for our obsession with perfection, our action could open the door to a beautiful spiritual journey.

Whatever you do, just pour your heart in it, do it with totality. The Bhagawad Gita says that karma is enjoyable if the heart is involved in it. Then there is no karma and kerta; both melt and become one. That is totality. Perfection is myth, while totality is reality.

Perfection is a goal somewhere in the future while totality is an experience this very moment, in which your act is transformed into meditation and a beautiful prayer descends in your heart. In fact, there is not future reference or goal for totality; only a routine life style albeit soaked in spiritual fragrance.

If you do any work or any act with your whole heart, then you are total, then you are walking on the same path which Kabir and Ravidas chose.

The whole idea is to ‘be total’ in everything that you are doing. It doesn’t matter what you do, whether you are making clothes like Kabir or shoes like Ravidas, or cooking food or working on a new design for most advanced spacecraft, or cleaning the floor. The job is immaterial. The focus is that doing is with totality, which is the only way to transform the act into meditation and to transform the doing into a beautiful prayer.

The founder of Tantra vision, Saraha, born two centuries after Gautama Buddha in Vidarbha didstrict, Maharashtra, later became a disciple of Skri Kirti, a Buddhist saint and disciple of Buddha’s son Rahul Bhadra. Saraha, along with his father and four brothers, spent some time in the court of King Mahapala and he was particularly popular among his brothers for his knowledge of the Vedas.

After some time, the Brahmin Saraha became a sanyasin and chose Sri Kirti as his master. Immediately after his initiation, the first thing Sri Kirti asked Saraha was to drop all the Vedas, and all the learnings. After many years, Saraha became a great meditator. One day, while in meditation, Saraha had a vision that there was a woman in the market place who would become his real teacher. Saraha told his guru about the vision and with his blessings, left to seek the truth about his visions.

Sarah found the woman he saw in his vision in the marketplace. She was a young woman of a lower-caste arrowsmith family. She was making an arrow. For Saraha, this was a major shift – a learned Brahmin saint seeking out an arrowsmith woman as guru.

Saraha watched her carefully. The young woman was lively and luminous with life, cutting an arrow shaft, deeply absorbed in the process. Saraha immediately felt something extraordinary, something he had never heard or learnt in the scriptures or from any guru. Her very action of making the arrow illuminated the heart of Saraha.

He continued watching her working on the arrow. She, on the other hand, was working intensely without realising his presence or getting perturbed by his stare. For her, no one existed at that moment. After the arrow was ready, she closed one eye and opened the other as if pointing towards a target to check the fineness of the arrow. And that very moment something happened. Saraha understood the real meaning which he couldn’t discover in life despite reciting from various books. She was much absorbed in the act; there was no duality. She was one with her work. She gave Saraha the real message of Buddha – to be total in the action is to be free of action. Be total and you will be free. For the first time, he understood what meditation is.

The ordinary arrowsmith woman became the real teacher of a Brahmin guru without saying a word or mantra correcting scripture. Saraha got enlightened with just her presence involving routine work of making an arrow, albeit completely absorbed and melted with the act in the process.

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Traveling to the Place of the Heart

Bhagawati — Fri, 03 May 2013 19:44:00 +0000

Leaving Pune, and the Ashram in Koregaon Park in 1980, I had no thought in my mind that 33 years later I would be living just down the road on the edge of a little village near Lonavala in Maharashtra.

I have followed my heart almost in a full circle, but these days my early morning meditation is done with a group of young men – Shaolin Kung Fu Trainees, with a focus on the Buddha – on the top of a partially completed building that houses 67 small boys, the Shikshangram Shelter for Homeless Children.

smile

friends

Schweta

another smile

waiting for the school bus

going to school

learning

helpful sister

making cards

writing

learning together

shoes and chappals in order

bathing

Yogita and Satish

Satish Moon

Shazar

Yogita Moon

building the girls home

building

group photo

sunset

Osho visits me often as I ‘let go to let God’ in my life in these days. The strongest message I receive from all the beings who surround me – who sometimes are quite a crowd – is simply to allow and to invite the support that is there for me.

I am now 65 years old and my sister Sahaja reminded me that I once said when I am ready I will go back to India and live in a place where I can give back – perhaps grow a garden and spend some time looking inside. And here I am… growing a garden of children – helping out in whatever way I can with this amazing and inspirational vision of a young man called Satish Moon and his wife Yogita.

I am a volunteer – and this is my story…
About three years ago, I was searching for something ‘else’ to get involved in and I ‘happened’ to meet two Indian ladies; one of whom showed me a few photos of a project she is involved in; photos of children and their home – and a realisation hit me… I had been waiting to be asked to help out… waiting for an invitation, but it was up to me, up to my initiative to invite myself where I wanted to go. So in that moment, I stepped up and told my new friends I intended to come and visit them and see what I could do to contribute.

A month later I began the journey back to India, and took myself right out of my ‘comfort zone’. I felt somewhat like Alice, falling down the rabbit hole! But no, I didn’t shrink, I expanded. And my whole world changed.

As my new life took hold, the principles of trust that I have lived by for many years became the pillars that stand beside me to guide my way. I returned to my practice of daily meditation. I rediscovered the immense support and the magic of synchronicity in my life.

Although it was obvious that anything I could do to help was worthwhile here, I wanted to contribute in the fullest possible way. So I asked myself: “What is my role in this world? How can I shine a light on the incredible work being done here? How can I share this on a much bigger scale? And most important how to let go and allow what I am to do flow through me with joy and grace?”

Many of you as Osho News readers have lived and worked in India, but I found my experience of being in the Ashram or the Resort is a far cry to life in the village. I discovered my ideas and way of doing things to be often vastly different to those of the people around me… it became clear that it was fine to offer my opinion or thoughts but then I had to step back and practice the art of detachment from all expectation of outcome. To take any other position just leads to frustration and difficulty and who am I to say my way is better than another? Everything took time. Now almost three years later I am seeing the effect of my work, finding the way in to connect with the local people – discovering through the synchronicity that things happen often in very surprising ways – letting go and letting God is a daily practice. And of course there are constant challenges thoroughly mixed in with the joy. Sometimes my drama queen self finds the triggers to flip out in an extravagant display of emotion that is totally alien to my Indian family.

But fortunately they are very forgiving of my strange Western ways and I know that despite my differences and my difficulties particularly with communication, my contribution is valued and of value.

The children here have reached deeply into my heart and become family. I always thought I was a generous person until I met these kids. They have taught me so much about sharing. They have names, faces and wonderful smiles. I have begun to know their stories and their potential as human beings and their intense need for love and care just like the child who lives next door to you and me.

The consequence of this project can build future leaders – and is bringing joy into the hurt eyes of these children who were in their past, simply thrown on the scrap heap of their lives. Satish has a huge vision reaching far beyond these 107 children he is caring for now – he is seeking to change the face of education in India and to empower the rural villagers so that the huge deluge of people migrating to the cities can slow to a trickle and their children have safety and quality of life in their family homes.

Big visions need good teams.

Maybe you might like to join us?
If you have been attracted by this story we invite you to come by for a week, or a month or a year and spend some time with us.
We know the experience will exceed your imagination.

To find out more about volunteering with us you can visit our website shikshangram.com

You could join one of our voluntourism journeys – for those of you who would like to combine some tourism with giving back, or you can simply come and visit.

Shazar (aka Anand Sattha) was born in Perth, Australia and took sannyas in 1978. She worked as an alternative health practitioner in Australia for many years together with her sister, Prem Sahaja at the Best Health Centre. A few years ago she returned to India to live and work at a Shelter for Homeless Children on the edge of a village near Lonavala. Here amongst many other roles, she facilitates volunteer journeys to India.
Contact Shazar on info at shikshangram.com and check out their Facebook page – Connect with Shazar on Skype: shazarr

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The Funeral

Bhagawati — Thu, 02 May 2013 11:19:19 +0000

She noticed a most unusual funeral procession approaching the nearby cemetery. A long black hearse was followed by a second long black hearse about 50 feet behind.

Behind the second hearse was a solitary woman walking a pit bull dog on a leash. Behind her were 200 women walking single file.

The woman was bursting with curiosity. She respectfully approached the woman walking the dog and said, “I am so sorry for your loss, and I know now is a bad time to disturb you, but I’ve never seen a funeral like this. Whose funeral is it?”

The woman replied, “Well that first hearse is for my husband.”

“What happened to him?”

The woman replied, “My dog attacked and killed him.”

She inquired further, “Well, who is in the second hearse?”

The woman answered, “My mother-in-law. She was trying to help my husband when the dog turned on her.”

A poignant and thoughtful moment of silence passes between the two women. “Can I borrow the dog?”

“Get in line.”

Participants for Meditation Research Required

Bhagawati — Thu, 02 May 2013 10:47:25 +0000

A comparative study designed to compare the effects of Psycho-Educational Videos and Osho Dynamic Meditation on personal and occupational well-being is being conducted in Berlin, in collaboration with researchers from the United States.

Venue is the Osho Meditation Studio (oshomeditationstudio.com) at Schlesische Strasse 38, 2. Hof, 1. OG, 10997 Berlin.

The organizers are looking for participants in this study; a modest financial compensation is being offered.

The screening for those who would like to participate is on Sunday, May 19, 2013.

The daily meditation will be held from Tuesday, May 21 to Monday, May 27, 2013, with a follow-up on Sunday, June 2, 2013.

Space is limited – please see for more details, timing and requirements: oshomeditationstudio.com

The Phone Bill

Bhagawati — Wed, 01 May 2013 18:21:40 +0000

Mr Katzenbaum slits open the envelope and stares in shock at the exceptionally high amount he has been charged with. He immediately calls a family meeting to discuss the issue and shouts, “This is unacceptable. I don’t use our home phone, I only use my work phone!”

Mrs Katzenbaum retorts, “Me too. I hardly use our home phone. I use my company’s phone!”

Their son quips, “I use my office mobile, I never, ever use the home phone.”

In a state of shock they all look at the maid who’s patiently listening to them. She says, “What? So we all use our work phones. What’s the big deal?”