Whack and Wham

Osho has slammed us with mind-blowing concepts that shock us into disbelief. Here are the best.

From Sex to Superconsciousness

Osho’s first bestselling book had this title. How audacious! Back in 1969, when this book was released in conservative India, it caused a tsunami. Use sex to get enlightened? Really! Yes, the most powerful energy, sex, should not be used only to reproduce but to helps us become enlightened. Forty five years after this book first hit the bookshops, it is still a bestseller – thanks to its title. Most people who have not read the book think it is a treatise on sex but nothing could be further from the truth. Those who start reading the book in the hope that it is another Kamasutra and expecting some salacious text will be acquainted, unexpectedly and maybe for the first time, with meditation!

Love is Mutual Exploitation

How can Osho say this? Love is the most beautiful and fulfilling emotion. Love means just giving not exploiting. But think again. You will find that most love relationships are nothing but exploitation. Husband and wife, children and parents and also friends ‘love’ each other because they are both benefitting! Now if that’s not exploitation, what is?

Be Realistic, Plan for a Miracle

If you are realistic, you cannot plan for a miracle. All the planning exercises for home budget, company expansion, and country projections are based on realistic forecasts. Nobody is expecting a miracle to achieve these targets. Yet Osho says keep the unexpected, the miraculous factor in mind at all times. Yes, you never plan for earthquakes, floods or fires that throw all plans out of the window. Also you never expect the unknown windfalls that fast forward your plans either…

Meditate in the Marketplace

No one can possibly meditate in the marketplace! The place for silent meditation is far away in the mountains or in a monastery. How can you meditate in the crowded, noisy and chaotic market? Osho says that the market is the right place to test our meditation, to see if we can keep our direct link with ourselves strong and alive. To go beyond the attractions and temptations of the marketplace is the real test of our meditation.

Nothing Fails Like Success

This is totally the opposite of what we believe in. Nothing succeeds like success. One success leads to another and we keep on climbing and progressing. Is it not so? No, once we reach the top we discover it is a lonely place up there, filled with plenty of people who are working non-stop to pull us back down. A man who is successful in the world feels the pain of being a failure as nobody else can feel it. But we cannot know this unless we have succeeded.

An Empty Mind is God’s Temple

We have always been told to keep ourselves busy, because ‘an empty mind is the devil’s workshop’. Wicked and immoral plans are hatched there! But Osho says that when we meditate and go beyond all our thoughts – good and bad – we become empty and God can move into this emptiness. Usually we get restless when we sit idle and we start thinking and planning ‘evil’ schemes. But without thoughts, in meditation, we can experience peace and stillness and thus – the devil has no room in it!

Fly Without Wings

That’s against all the rules of aviation! No one can fly without wings. But this is what Osho is saying. Life is so mysterious that we cannot reduce it to exact formulas. That is not possible. That will be unjust and unfair to life. A mystery has to remain a mystery. The full quote is: Fly without wings. Walk without feet. Think without mind. Ah! Now it makes more sense! This is the experience of meditation that takes us beyond physical limitations.

What is Needed is Happening

How can Osho say this and get away with it? Look at all the misery, the natural disasters, the wars, the injustice and the inequality in the world today; is all this really needed? How can all this be justified? But it is happening because it is the law of the nature. Both the forces of good and the bad have to be equally balanced in existence. It is difficult to understand at first but when it sinks in, it makes sense. Yes, we need good and bad, day and night, earth and sky.

Only Losers can Win this Game

Now what is this game? This is the Master and Disciple Game that has a beginning but no end. And the more you play, the more difficult it gets. This is because the master keeps on testing the disciple with tougher and tougher tasks. The disciple sometimes gives up and runs away because he cannot take it any longer. But those who realise that they are playing this game and lose before the master, actually win the game.

Zorba the Buddha

Zorba, the hard drinking, fun loving, singing and dancing hero of the famous novel Zorba the Greek by Kazantzakis – and the Buddha, the silent, enlightened, peaceful one; how can these two be combined? Osho says that this is exactly what is needed today. Zorba is the hedonistic person who celebrates life and Buddha the meditative spiritual part in us that brings peace and silence. It is the combination of science and spirituality, the inner and the outer, east and west.

Today, on his 80th Birthday, Osho is smiling that his outrageous statements have been dusted to wake us up!

By Kul Bhushan – first published in Osho World