Quotessence
Home / Authors / Osho

Osho Quotes

Author

Filter quotes by topic

AllLoveBlissEnlightenmentMeditationDivorceZenLifeGodBreakupBuddha

Famous Osho Quotes

“If you want enlightenment to happen ever, you have to be ready to wait for it. Even if it comes in eternity you are ready to accept it, you are not in a hurry. Then it can come instantly too. A man who is ready to wait forever is very relaxed, knows no tension, no anxiety, no anguish. In that relaxed moment, satori, samadhi, enlightenment is possible. You attain to enlightenment only when there is no ego to demand - there is no demand, there is no demander. Time creates the ego. The ego does not exist in animals because they are not conscious of time. The ego does not exist in children because they are also not conscious of time. When you become conscious of time you become conscious of many things. First, the consciousness of time creates the fear of death. You immediately become conscious of death. Time and death, they are not separate at all. The moment you become alert about time you become alert about death because time is running out fast, death is coming, death is there and you have to do something before death grabs you. Then fear, anxiety.... In that fear and anxiety, in that impatience, you can go on searching but you will not find. It is not that you have to find God, it is that you have to allow him to find you. So you have to be in a receptive mood, in a non-desiring, non-demanding mood, utterly at ease, as if it has already happened. There is no need for it to happen, it is as if it has already happened. With this silence, this peace, with this non-tense state, it happens.”

GodTimeEgoPatienceRelax
Author:Osho
Create image

“God is not a goal, nirvana is not a goal, enlightenment is not a goal, it is not an achievement -- just the contrary. When you have forgotten ALL goals, when you have dropped the whole achieving mind, enlightenment is -- enlightenment is a state of no-mind. And enlightenment is nothing special. It is the most ordinary, natural phenomenon. It looks special because you make a goal out of it. You will have to learn ways of relaxing in the present. Enlightenment is not an effort to achieve something. It is a state of effortlessness. It is a state of no-action. It is a state of tremendous passivity, receptivity. and you are suddenly at home. Nothing is being missed. You are part, an organic part of this tremendous, beautiful whole. You are relaxed in it, surrendered in it. You don't exist separately -- all separation has disappeared. A great rejoicing happens, because with the ego disappearing there is no worry left, with the ego disappearing there is no anguish left, with the ego disappearing there is no possibility of death any more. This is what enlightenment is. It is the understanding that all is good, that all is beautiful -- and t is beautiful as it is. Everything is in tremendous harmony, in accord. The stars are in accord with the grass leaves, the earth is in accord with the sky, the rivers are in accord with the mountains. Everything is in such accord that existence is an orchestra. Everything is rhythmic, in tune. Existence is music. That experience is enlightenment. And you are not separate from it like an observer, like a spectator. The observer and the observed are one, the seer and the seen are one -- you are it! It is a great participation. You have fallen into she whole and the whole has fallen into you. The drop has dropped into the ocean and the ocean has dropped into the drop. It is impossible to say anything more about it. It is impossible to say, in fact, anything about it. It can only be experienced.”

HarmonyOnenessRelaxNirvanaReceptivityHarmony Between Mind And BodyHarmony With NatureHarmony Of LifeHarmony With Life
Book:The Fish in the Sea is Not Thirsty
Create image

“In the East we have been practicing that for millennia. Not only that, in countries like Tibet particular techniques were evolved to help a man to die. They called it BARDO TODO. When a person was dying, friends, relatives and acquaintances would gather together around him to give him the absolute certainty that he was going to die, and to help him to relax. Because if you can die in total relaxation, the quality of death changes and your new birth somewhere will be of a higher quality. The quality of birth is decided by death. And then, in turn, the quality of birth will decide the quality of another death. That's how one goes higher and higher, that's how one evolves. And whenever a person becomes absolutely certain about death a flame arises on his face -- you can see it. In fact, a miracle happens: he becomes alive as he has never been before.”

ReincarnationRebirthRebornBardo
Author:Osho
Create image

“God is herenow, always herenow. God is THIS very condition. He is THIS very condition! THIS MOMENT, within and without, God is. And God is not something sacred, holy, far away again in heaven. God is all the conditions - and when I say all, I mean all: the sacred/the profane, the body/the soul, matter/consciousness. The lowest of the low is God. and the holiest of the holy is God, and there is not any difference between the two. To understand it is to relax. Then there is nowhere to go, then there is nothing to do. Then what is left is celebration, then what is left is to live joyously. Rejoice moment-to-moment, and don't divide things. Drinking tea is as sacred as doing yoga. Sleeping silently, relaxed, is as sacred as prayer. Looking at a tree, talking to a friend, walking early in the morning, working in the factory or in the office, is as holy as anything else. This is the understanding that is needed for Tao to happen. Tao is already happening; just your misunderstanding... Tao is already showering - in the sunrays, on the green trees. But you just think, "This is just the sun and they are just the trees - where is God? These are just people - where is God?" You want God to be something specific, and that's why you miss... God is not something special, not something specific. God is all these conditions, God is this totality. This moment - my talking to you, your listening to me, this communion, this silence, this bridging - yes, this is God, this is Tao. So forget all about achieving. Don't become an achiever. My sannyasins have to drop all kinds of ambitions - material. worldly and spiritual - all. My teaching to you is: live herenow! Drop ALL kinds of ambitions. This is sannyas: drop ALL kinds of ambitions, and see the miracle happening. Once you drop all ambitions you will have so much energy left that there will be no way other than to celebrate. You will have so much energy in you - all the energy that is involved in ambitions is released because ambitions have been dropped - and that energy becomes an oceanic experience within your soul. That is paradise, that is God. God is not a goal, but an experience of a non-ambitious mind. Tao has not to be achieved! The achievers go on missing it. The non-achievers suddenly realize that they have always lived in paradise, but because of their ambitions they were not able to see it. ..just try to understand what I am sharing with you. I am sharing with you this moment, this space. I am not giving you any goals. I am not driving you crazy for some achievement in the future. I am not inspiring you to run and chase some shadows. I am simply imparting to you what has happened to me. I want it to be shared with you. Dropping all ambition, I have arrived. Drop all ambitions and just be, and see the beauty and the benediction of existence. It is incredible, it is simply far-out! You have never dreamt about it, how beautiful it is. You could not have dreamt about it, it surpasses all your imaginations and fantasies. Its beauty is unbelievable, and the grace that is showering on you is just showering for no reason at all. It is very unreasonable! God does not give you because you are worthy. God gives you because He has so much, He cannot contain it!”

GodTaoHere And Now Quotes
Author:Osho
Create image

“Sanatan means eternal, timeless, deathless. These are our real qualities. We are never born and we never die. The body is only a shelter, we are not it. It is only like a garment which one has to change when it is too old. And we have changed the garment so many times. We differ from other people only if the form and the shape and the color and the size of the garment. The innermost reality is the same. To find it, to find that which is never born and never dies, is the real goal of all religious enquiry. One can call it god, liberation, nirvana, enlightenment. They are different names for the same phenomenon. And it is not to be searched for somewhere else, it is within you. It is you, so you have to dive deep into your own nature. Sannyas is a pilgrimage from the periphery to the center, from your own surface to your depth.”

EternalEnlightenmentLiberationReincarnationTimelessNirvanaDeathlessSannyas
Author:Osho
Create image

“In fact as I see it, no lover has ever betrayed anybody. It is only ignorance that kills love – nobody betrays it. Both wanted to be together, but somehow both were ignorant. Their ignorance played tricks upon them and became multiplied. By and by they drifted. Then they think that love is dangerous. Love is not dangerous. Only unawareness is dangerous.”

LoveDivorceBreakupHappy RelationshipFailed MarriageFragile Love
Book:Beloved of my heart: A Darshan diary
Create image

“When you are sad, celebrate, and you are giving a new composition to sadness. You are bringing something to sadness which will transform it. You are bringing celebration to it. Angry? -- have a beautiful dance. In the beginning it will be angry. You will start dancing and the dance will be angry, aggressive, violent. By and by, it will become softer and softer and softer, when suddenly, you will have forgotten anger. The energy has changed into dancing. But when you are angry, you can't think of dancing. When you are sad, you can't think of singing. Why not make your sadness a song? Sing, play on your flute. In the beginning the notes will be sad, but nothing is wrong with a sad note. Have you heard, in the afternoon sometimes, when everything is hot, burning hot, fire all around, and suddenly from a mango grove you can hear a cuckoo start singing? In the beginning, the note is sad. She is calling her lover, her beloved, on a hot afternoon. Everything is fiery all around, and she is hankering for love. A very sad note, but beautiful. By and by, the sad note changes into a happy note. The lover starts responding from another grove. Now it is no more a hot afternoon; everything is cooling down in the heart. Now the note is different. When the lover responds, everything has changed. It is an alchemical change. You are sad? -- start singing, praying, dancing. Whatsoever you can do, do, and by and by, the baser metal is changed into a higher metal -- gold. Once you know the key, your life will never be the same again. You can unlock any door. And this is the master key: to celebrate everything. If you are sad, then I say celebrate, dance, sing. What are you to lose? At the most, sadness will be lost, nothing else. But you think it is impossible. And the very idea that it is impossible will not allow you to give it a try. And I say it is one of the most easy things in the world, because energy is neutral. The same energy becomes sadness; the same energy becomes anger; the same energy becomes sexuality; the same energy becomes com passion; the same energy becomes meditation. Energy is one. You don't have many types of energies. You don't have many separate pockets of energy where this energy is labelled 'sadness' and this energy is labelled 'happiness'. Energies are not pigeon-holed, they are not separated. There exists no watertight compartment in you. You are simply one. This one energy becomes sadness, this one energy becomes anger. It is up to you. One has to learn the secret, the art of how to transform energies. You simply give a direction and the same energy starts moving. And when there is a possibility of transforming anger into bliss, greed into compassion, jealousy into love... you don't know what you are losing. You don't know what you are missing. You are missing the whole point of being here in this universe. Give it a try.”

CompassionPrayingSingingAngerDanceGreedBlissCelebrationTransformEnergies
Book:Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega Volume 4
Create image

“The earth is beautiful. If you start living its beauty, enjoying its joys with no guilt in your heart, you are in paradise. If you condemn everything, every small joy, if you become a condemner, a poisoner, then the same earth turns into a hell -- but only for you. It depends on you where you live, it is a question of your own inner transformation. It is not a change of place, it is a change of inner space. Live joyously, guiltlessly, live totally, live intensely. And then heaven is no more a metaphysical concept, it is your own experience.”

JoyHeavenGuiltParadise
Book:The Book of Wisdom
Create image

“When I say the world is unreal I don't mean that these trees are unreal. These trees are absolutely real - but the way you see these trees is unreal. These trees are not unreal in themselves - they exist in god, they exist in absolute reality - but the way you see them you never see them; you are seeing something else, a mirage. You create your own dream around you and unless you become awake you will continue to dream. The world is unreal because the world that you know is the world of your dreams. When dreams drop and you simply encounter the world that is there, then the real world. There are not two things, god and the world. God is the world if you have eyes, clear eyes, without any dreams, without any dust of the dreams, without any haze of sleep; if you have clear eyes, clarity, perceptiveness, there is only god. Then somewhere god is a green tree, and somewhere else god is a shining star, and somewhere else god is a cuckoo, and somewhere else god is a flower, and somewhere else a child and somewhere else a river - then only god is. The moment you start seeing, only god is. But right now whatsoever you see is not the truth, it is a projected lie. That is the meaning of a mirage. And once you see, even for a single split moment, if you can see, if you can allow yourself to see, you will find immense benediction present all over, everywhere - in the clouds, in the sun, on the earth. This is a beautiful world. But I am not talking about your world, I am talking about my world. Your world is very ugly, your world is your world created by a self, your world is a projected world. You are using the real world as a screen and projecting your own ideas on it. When I say the world is real, the world is tremendously beautiful, the world is luminous with infinity, the world is light and delight, it is a celebration, I mean my world - or your world if you drop your dreams. When you drop your dreams you see the same world as any Buddha has ever seen. When you dream you dream privately. Have you watched it? - that dreams are private. You cannot share them even with your beloved. You cannot invite your wife to your dream - or your husband, or your friend. You cannot say, 'Now, please come tonight in my dream. I would like to see the dream together.' It is not possible. Dream is a private thing, hence it is illusory, it has no objective reality. God is a universal thing. Once you come out of your private dreams, it is there. It has been always there. Once your eyes are clear, a sudden illumination - suddenly you are overflooded with beauty, grandeur and grace. That is the goal, that is the destiny.”

GodRealityDreamsIlluminationBuddhaIllusory
Author:Osho
Create image

“God is indefinable, so no word is really adequate enough to describe him, but we have to use words. This is one of the most beautiful words which comes very close in describing god. God is as infinite as the sky, as unbounded as the whole universe. No boundaries, no limits – and that’s your nature too: god is your nature. God is not something outside, not something that belongs to the existence. It is the center of all, it is as much yours as it is anybody else’s. We are different on the circumference but we are one at the center. No difference at all at the center. The farther we go from the center we start becoming different; we start becoming persons, we start gathering personality, we start becoming faces, masks. The closer we come to the center the masks start disappearing, the personality starts evaporating, we start becoming one. That’s what I mean when I say: No man is an island. We are part of a vast continent, of an infinity, of an eternity, beginningless, endless. To know it brings great rejoicing, obviously, because to know it means there is no death, to know it means you have been here forever and you will be here forever. To know it means your inner purity is absolutely virgin, it has not been polluted. Thousands of lives have happened but it has not polluted you. Those lives have been just dreams. You have dreamed many dreams in the night but in the morning you are not polluted by your dreams. You may have been a murderer in the dream or you may have been a mahatma in the dream – it doesn’t matter. Whether you were a mahatma or a murderer, in the morning you find both were dreams, both were false and your reality has remained unaffected. Many stories we have lived, many dramas we have played. Many roles we have passed through, but this is the miracle that we are absolutely unaffected, we are virgin. Our inner purity is incorruptible. Meditation will give you a taste of that incorruptible purity, of that incorruptible innocence and from there, one can jump into the ultimate, into the infinite.”

MeditationDreamsEndlessDrama Of LifeGod Is InfiniteLeelaInner Purity
Author:Osho
Create image

“Society is not outside of you, it is something within you. And unless the root causes within you disappear, wherever you go the society will come into existence again and again and again. Even if you go to a hippie community, the society will come in; it will become a social force. If you go to an ashram, society will come in. It is not the society that follows you, it is you. You always create your society around you—you are a creator. Something in you exists as a seed, which creates the society. This shows really that unless you are transformed completely you can never go beyond society, you will always create your own society. And all societies are the same; the forms may differ, but the basic pattern is the same.”

SelfReality
Book:Love, Freedom, Aloneness: The Koan of Relationships
Create image

“Question : HOW TO SACRIFICE THE EGO? Osho : IT IS IMPOSSIBLE. THE EGO CANNOT BE SACRIFICED because the ego exists not. The ego is just all idea: it has no substance in it. The ego is a kind of absence. Because you don't know yourself, hence the ego.The ego is like darkness; darkness has no positive existence of its own; it is simply the absence of light. You cannot fight with darkness, or can you? You cannot throw darkness out of the room; you cannot take it out, you cannot take it in. If you put the light on, there is no darkness; if you put the light off, there is darkness. Darkness is only the absence of light -- so is ego: absence of self-knowledge. You cannot sacrifice it. It has been told to you again and again: "Sacrifice your ego" -- and the statement is patently absurd, because something that does not exist cannot be sacrificed. And if you try to sacrifice it, something which is not there in the first place at all, you will be creating a new ego -- the ego of the humble, the ego of the egoless, the ego of the person who thinks he has sacrificed his ego. It will be a new kind of darkness again. No, I don't say to you: Sacrifice the ego. On the contrary, I say: Try to see where the ego is. Look DEEP into it; try to locate it, where it exists, whether it exists at all or not. Before one can sacrifice anything one must be certain about its existence. But don't be against it from the very beginning. If you are against it, you cannot look deep into it. There is no need to be against anything. The ego is your experience -- maybe it is just apparent, but it is still your experience. Your whole life moves around the phenomenon of the ego. It may be a dream. But to you it is so true. There is no need to be against it. Dive deep into it, go into it. Going into it means bringing awareness into your house, bringing light into darkness. Be alert, watchful. Watch the ways of the ego, how it functions, how it manages at all. And you will be surprised: the deeper you go into it, the less it is found. And when you have penetrated to the very core of your being, you will find something totally different which is not ego, which is egolessness. It is self, supreme self -- it is God. You have disappeared as a separate entity; you are no more an island, now you are part of the whole. In that experience of being one with the whole, the ego is sacrificed, but that is only a way of speaking, a metaphor. Don't take it literally. Try to understand the ego. Analyse it, dissect it, watch it, observe it, from as many angles as possible. And don't be in a hurry to sacrifice it, otherwise the greatest egoist is born: the person who thinks he is humble, the person who thinks that he has no ego. Rather, follow a totally different path: meditate on the phenomenon of ego, enquire what it is. And as the enquiry deepens, the ego disappears. Enquiring into the ego you will come to the self. And remember: the self has nothing to do with the ego, because the self has nothing to do with you at all. The self is always the supreme self: AHAM BRAHMASMI! At that point, you (the ego) are not, only God is: Tat-tvam-asi -- thou art that. At that point, there is no distinction between thou and that. The dewdrop has disappeared into the ocean and has become the ocean itself. But no sacrifice -- the non-substantial cannot be sacrificed, it can only be understood. And in the very understanding is the disappearing. And this disappearance is beautiful, because it does not leave any traces behind, no scars, no wounds.”

DarknessEgoAham BrahmasmiTat Tvam Asi
Author:Osho
Create image

“Question : OSHO, WHY IS IT SO DIFFICULT TO FORGIVE, TO STOP CLINGING TO HURTS LONG SINCE PAST? Osho : The ego exists on misery - the more misery the more nourishment for it. In blissful moments the ego totally disappears, and vice versa: if the ego disappears, bliss starts showering on you. Joy is like poison to the ego, and misery is like vitamins. You will have to understand the whole mechanism of the ego. If you try to forgive, that is not real forgiveness. With effort, you will only repress. You can forgive only when you understand the stupidity of the whole game that goes on within your mind. You will repress in one form; it will assert in another form - sometimes so subtle that it is almost impossible to recognize it, that it is the same old structure, so renovated, refurnished, redecorated, that it looks almost new. The ego lives on the negative, because the ego is basically a negative phenomenon; it exists on saying no. No is the soul of the ego. And how can you say no to bliss? You can say no to misery, you can say no to the agony of life. How can you say no to the flowers and the stars and the sunsets and all that is beautiful, divine? And the whole existence is full of it - it is full of roses - but you go on picking the thorns; you have a great investment in those thorns. The first thing to remember is: ego is the most negative phenomenon in existence. It is like darkness. Darkness has no positive existence; it is simply absence of light...that's why you cannot do anything directly with darkness. If you try to fight with it, you will be defeated. Darkness cannot be defeated by fighting. It is impossible, for the simple reason that darkness does not exist. If you want to do anything with darkness you will have to go via light. If you don't want darkness, bring light in. If you want darkness, then put the light off. But do something with light; nothing can be done with darkness directly. I don't say to you: Don't hate; love. I don't say to you that drop all your sins and become virtuous. I say: Bring light into your being. Don't be bothered by all these fragments of darkness. And at the very center of darkness is ego. Ego is the center of darkness. You bring light - the method is meditation - you become more aware, you become more alert. Otherwise you will go on repressing, and whatsoever is repressed has to be repressed again and again and again. That I have to do; that's the function of the Master, to destroy your ego. And you can become very revengeful, and you can carry deep wounds through it. People go on carrying things that they hate. They live in their hatred. They go on fingering their wounds so they don't heal; they don't ALLOW them to heal - their whole life depends on their past. Unless you start living in the present, you will not be able to forget and forgive the past. I don't say to you: Forget and forgive all that has happened in the past; that is not my approach. I say: Live in the present that is the positive way to approach existence. Live in the present. That is another way of saying: Be more meditative, more aware, more alert, because when you are alert, aware, you are in the present. Awareness cannot be in the past and cannot be in the future. Awareness knows only the present. Awareness knows no past, no future; it has only one tense, the present. Be aware, and as you will start enjoying the present more and more, as you will feel the bliss of being in the present..You will stop going into the past. You will not have to forget and forgive, it will simply disappear on its own accord. You will be surprised - where it has gone? To be free from past and future is to taste freedom for the first time, is to taste God. And in that experience one becomes whole, healthy; all wounds are healed. Suddenly there are no more any wounds; you start feeling a deep well-being arising in you. That well-being is the beginning of transformation.”

GodLightPastDarknessMeditationEgoMisery
Author:Osho
Create image

“Breathing in, let golden light come into you through your head, because it is there that the Golden Flower is waiting. That golden light will help. It will cleanse your whole body and will make it absolutely full of creativity. This is male energy. Then when you exhale, let darkness, the darkest you can conceive, like a dark night, river-like, come from your toes upwards—this is feminine energy: it will soothe you, it will make you receptive, it will calm you, it will give you rest—and let it go out of the head. Then inhale again, and golden light enters in.”

DarknessMeditationBreathingGolden Light
Book:The Secret of Secrets
Create image

“Your marriage is a subtle politics of domination. Your fatherhood, motherhood, is a subtle politics. Look at mothers, just simply watch! -- and you will feel they are trying to dominate their small children. Their aggression, their anger, is thrown on them -- they have become objects of catharsis, and by this they are already burdened. They will move in life carrying mountains from the very beginning, and they will never know that life is possible without carrying such loaded heads; and they will never know the freedom that comes with an unloaded being. They will never know that when you are not loaded you have wings and you can fly into the sky and into the unknown. And God is available only when you are unburdened. But they will never know. They will knock at the doors of temples but they will never know where the real temple exists. The real temple is freedom: dying moment to moment to the past and living the present. And freedom to move, to move into the dark, into the unknown -- that is the door to the divine!”

GodMarriageMindfulness
Book:And The Flowers Showered Discourses On Zen
Create image