Quotessence
Home / Authors / Rajneesh
Rajneesh

Rajneesh Quotes

Guru

Filter quotes by topic

AllIfsMeditationMindWholePeopleKnowsMenMomentsWorldWayMeanEgoPersonsDisappearGoes OnLifeNeedsLove IsWantGiving

Famous Rajneesh Quotes

“Meditation means a state of unconditioned mind. Meditation is the process of undoing the harm that every society goes on doing to every individual - communist or Catholic, Jaina or Jew, it does not matter. I am not talking about any particular conditioning that is wrong; I am saying conditioning AS SUCH is wrong.”

MindMeanDoeMatterStatesIndividualProcessTalkingMeditationSocietyParticularGoes OnCatholicJewHarmCommunistConditioningNot TalkingUndoing
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“I call a man a sannyasin who breaks out of these institutions and lives spontaneously. To be a sannyasin is the most courageous act possible. To be a sannyasin means to live without the mind, and the moment you live without mind you live without society. The mind has created society, and society has created the mind; they are interdependent. To be a sannyasin means to renounce all that is false but not to renounce the world, to renounce all that is unauthentic, to renounce all the answers, to be responsive, spontaneously responsive, and not to think about the reasons, but to be real.”

ThinkingMenWorldMindMeanRealReasonMomentsAnswersBreakSocietyInstitutionsCourageousBeing RealRenounceBreak Out
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“To accept yourself wherever. you are.... And don't think in terms of competition! You need not be anywhere else. Wherever you are, if you can be happy there, you have become religious, you have become spiritual. Spirituality knows no competition, spirituality knows no greed, spirituality knows no ambition - because spirituality means desirelessness.”

IfsThinkingKnowsNeedsMeanSpiritualSpiritualityTermReligiousAcceptingAmbitionCompetitionGreedAccepting YourselfWherever You Are
Book:The Discipline of Transcendence: Discourses on the Forty-two Sutras of Buddha
Create image

“The reality is just the opposite: the master does nothing. It is in your becoming a disciple that the whole mystery lies. It is in your surrender of the ego that the whole search comes to an authentic point. It is in putting your mind aside. That is what sannyas is: an authentic discipleship. It means putting your mind aside. You have lived according to your mind up to now. If that is fulfilling, then there is no need for anybody to become a sannyasin.”

IfsNeedsMindMeanDoeWholeRealityLyingMysteryMastersBecomingEgoOppositesSurrenderDiscipleFulfillingDiscipleship
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“The Christian, the Mohammedan, the Jew - their emphasis is on the second: to die as soon as possible, to surrender to God. Prayer is their way. Prayer means dying, dying and disappearing as a person, becoming part of the universal, a surrender, a trust in God. The whole emphasis is on how to surrender your ego, sacrifice your ego, at the altar of the divine.”

WayMeanPersonsWholeChristianDiesPrayerSacrificeDyingDivineBecomingEgoUniversalJewDisappearSurrenderTrust In GodEmphasisAltarsPraying To GodGod PrayerSurrender To God
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Listening is totally different from hearing. Hearing, anybody who is not deaf can do. Listening is a rare art, one of the last arts. Listening means not only hearing with the ears but hearing from the heart, in utter silence, in absolute peace, with no resistance. One has to be vulnerable to listen, and one has to be in deep love to listen. One has to be in utter surrender to listen.”

HeartMeanArtDifferentLastsCan DoSilenceListeningEarsAbsolutesHearingSurrenderResistanceVulnerableDeafDeep Love
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Meditation means you start changing your inner world. You start removing dust from the inner world, you start removing all that is unnecessary in the inner world. You remove all that clutter, all the rubbish you are full of. Meditation means emptying yourself of all that the society has put inside you so that you can have a clean, clear vision, so that you can have a mirror-like quality.”

WorldMeanQualityVisionClearMeditationMirrorsCleanDustRemoveUnnecessaryRubbishClutterInner WorldClear Vision
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Meditation simply means a discipline that makes you capable of being aloof and detached from your mind. So even if the mind is sick, your consciousness is never sick. Even if your mind is going crazy, you are just witnessing it. Mind is only a machine. You are not. Meditation is the experience: "I am not my body, not my mind - I am the witness of it all." This experience, this transcendental experience, immensely transforms the whole situation. Many things which were driving you crazy simply drop away.”

IfsMindMeanWholeBodyConsciousnessSituationMeditationCrazyDisciplineCapableMachinesSickDrivingWitnessDetachedTranscendentalAloofGoing Crazy
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Go deep into meditation. And by meditation I mean awareness, watchfulness, witnessing. It is only through meditation that the inner light begins. Otherwise man lives in darkness. Meditation enkindles something that is latent in all of us, but needs to be provoked. We are looking outwards. Our backs are at our inner source; hence it is being neglected, ignored. and to ignore one's inner being is the only ignorance. To know it is the only knowledge. All other knowledge is worthless. It may help you in the world but it can't help you in eternity.”

KnowsMenWorldNeedsMayMeanHelpingLightDarknessMeditationAwarenessIgnoranceSourceEternityIgnoredWorthlessNeglectedLatentProvokedInner LightWatchfulness
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Go deep into meditation. and be meditation I mean silence, awareness, witnessing. You can meditate any time of the day, you can meditate working, walking, doing things. Meditation is not something separate from life; it should not be separate, otherwise it remains a little artificial. Meditation should be spread all over life. You should walk in meditation, you should sit in meditation; that means silently, fully aware. Slowly slowly it becomes your very flavour, then the bridge is created.”

ShouldMeanLittlesWalksSilenceMeditationAwarenessWalkingRemainsSpreadBridgesArtificialFlavour
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Meditation means undoing what the society has done to you. It has reduced you to a machine; you have to de-automatise yourself, you have to become a man again. You have to come out of this state of unconsciousness, of mechanicalness. You have to come out of this sleep. It is possible only through meditation. There is no other way, there has never been, there will never be. The only way to reduce a man to a machine is take away his consciousness force him to function unconsciously. And just the opposite is the way of meditation: give him back his consciousness.”

MenWayGivingMeanStatesDoneForceSleepConsciousnessMeditationMachinesOppositesFunctionUnconsciousnessUndoing
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Dhyan means meditation. Meditation means awareness, watchfulness, a silent witnessing of all the processes of the mind. And the magic of watching is that as your watchfulness deepens, the mind starts evaporating. When the watchfulness is absolute mind becomes nil, a zero. And the disappearance of the mind gives you clarity, absolute clarity, transparency; you can see through and through, you become a mirror. And then life is reflected as it is - not according to any doctrine, not according to the Bible or the Koran or the Gita but as it is. And to know life as it is, is to know god.”

KnowsGivingMindMeanLife IsProcessMeditationMagicAwarenessAbsolutesMirrorsSilentDoctrineClarityZeroKnowing GodTransparencyDisappearanceGitaWatchfulness
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“It is only through meditation that purity comes. Meditation means jumping out of the mind. There is no need to purify the mind, it can be put aside. One can become disidentified with the mind. To know "I am not the mind," is real purity because then you are only consciousness, awareness, a witnessing. To live twenty-four hours a day as a witness is the way of the sannyasin.”

KnowsWayNeedsMindMeanRealHoursConsciousnessFourMeditationAwarenessTwentiesWitnessPurityJumping
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“In the beginning this is bound to happen. You have been sitting on the lid that covers your repressions, and you have been riding on that lid a long time, trying continuously to hold down everything beneath it. To become a witness means that you have finally jumped off the lid; now you will only stand aside and will not do anything. Now you will no longer repress, now you will just witness. So everything suppressed will arise, all the repressions will catch fire; you will find flames leaping where there were only ashes.”

TryingMeanLongHas BeensHappensFireMeditationLong TimeSittingBoundsAriseWitnessFlamesRidingAshesRepression
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Meditation means you don't have anything, any object to think about. You are just in a state of absolute aloneness. You don't have anything on which you can focus yourself - not a sutra, not a mantra, not any great value of life, just pure space all around you. Then you are in meditation. Meditation is never about something. Meditation is a state.”

ThinkingMeanStatesValuesSpaceFocusMeditationObjectsPureAbsolutesMantrasValue Of LifeGreat Value
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Meditation means how to be not a mind. How to be not a mind! Meditation means how to create the state of no-mindedness. It doesn't mean unconsciousness. It means conscious and still, without any disturbance in the consciousness; conscious with no ripples, with no waves, with no vibrations; conscious as a deep, calm, silent pool with no ripples on it, with no disturbances on the surface; just a calm silent pool with no breeze to disturb, just mirrorlike.”

MindMeanStillsStatesConsciousnessMeditationConsciousSilentCalmWaveSurfacePoolBreezeVibrationsRippleDisturbanceUnconsciousness
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“This is what meditation means: how to be not identified with the mind - how to create a space between yourself and your own mind. It is difficult because we never make any separation. We go on thinking in terms that the mind means me: mind and me are totally identified. If they are totally identified, then you will never be at peace; then you will never be able to enter the divine, because the divine can be entered only when the social has been left behind.”

IfsThinkingMindMeanHas BeensAbleLeftSocialDifficultTermSpaceBehindsMeditationDivineGoes OnSeparationLeft BehindSpace Between
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Meditation is totally different. When you concentrate you close your mind to everything else. Meditation means just an openness, a relaxed openness. It is not concentration. While listening to me you are listening to the birds singing in the trees too. The wind passing through the trees singing its song - you are open to it too. The aeroplane passing by, or the train - you are open to it too. This is meditation - you are simply open, available, conscious, available, all doors are open.”

MindMeanDifferentSongMeditationDoorsTreeWindListeningSingingBirdConsciousTrainAvailablePassingPassingsConcentrationOpennessRelaxedAeroplanesPassing ThroughPassing By
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“The more your meditation goes deep, the less and less you will feel the burden of the mind. The more and more meditation goes deep, the less and less you will be a mind. Thoughts will become rare, and ultimately they cease. That doesn't mean you become unthinking; it only means that your consciousness becomes clear, transparent, without thoughts moving continuously as clouds. Whenever you need to think you can think; but now thought becomes an instrument to you, not an obsession as it is presently. Thoughts are an obsession without meditation.”

ThinkingNeedsFeelsMindMeanMovingConsciousnessClearMeditationInstrumentsCloudsBurdenCeaseObsessionTransparentMind Thoughts
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Every child is born sane, and then, slowly slowly, we civilize him - we call it the process of civilization. We prepare him to become part of the great culture, the great church, the great state to which we belong. Our whole politics is stupid, and then HE becomes stupid. Our whole education is ugly. Our politics means nothing but ambition, naked ambition - ambition for power. And only the lowest kind of people become interested in power.”

PeopleKindMeanChildrenStatesWholeCultureProcessBornChurchStupidCivilizationAmbitionUglyNakedSaneLowest
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Each child is poisoned by the society through teaching him ambition. Ambition is a poison far more dangerous than any alcohol can ever be, far more dangerous than marijuana or LSD, because ambition destroys your whole life. It keeps you moving in a false direction. It keeps you imagining, desiring, dreaming, it keeps you wasting your life. Ambition means a subtle creation of the ego, and once the ego is created you are in the grip of darkness. And the whole social structure depends on ambition.”

MeanChildrenWholeDreamMovingSocialDarknessTeachingDangerousCreationDependsEgoAmbitionStructureAlcoholWhole LifePoisonSubtleMarijuanaMoving InLsdSocial StructureLife Ambition
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“All power is God`s power; we are only vehicles. He pulsates in our hearts. He breathes through us. He sings a thousand and one songs through us. Sannyas means to let this understanding become the foundation of your life: We are not, God is. Let the ego disappear, evaporate, and you will find infinite contentment. With the ego there is only misery; without the ego there is only God; and God is bliss, and God is benediction, and God is ecstasy. Die to the ego so that God can live in you.”

HeartMeanSongDiesUnderstandingThousandEgoInfiniteFoundationMiseryBreatheDisappearBlissContentmentEcstasyVehicleBenediction
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Devotion means for the total; it is never for Rama, never for Krishna. Of course, Rama and Krishna are implied in the total, but it is never for a chosen one. Love is always for the chosen one, devotion is for the whole. So you cannot be a devotee of Rama. If you are for Rama, you are only a lover; and when you are a lover, then competition is bound to be there. Then Krishna will be a competitor, and Christ will be a competitor, and the same jealousies, the same conflicts, and all the same nonsense will follow. It has followed.”

IfsMeanWholeCoursesChristLove IsLoversConflictCompetitionBoundsDevotionChosenNonsenseCompetitorsOne LoveRamaKrishnaImpliedDevoteeChosen One
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Once you are afraid of death you are bound to be afraid of life. That`s why I am talking about this Hasidic approach. The whole approach consists of methods, ways and means of how to die - the art of dying is the art of living also. Dying as an ego is being born as a non `ego; dying as a part is being born as a whole; dying as man is a basic step towards being born as a God.”

MenWayMeanArtWholeDiesBornTalkingStepsDyingEgoApproachArt IsMethodBoundsArt Of LivingAfraid Of DeathAfraid Of Life
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“The word `ecstasy` is beautiful; it simply means `standing out.` Out of what? Standing out of your ego, your personality, your mind; getting out of the whole structure in which you have lived - not only lived but with which you have become identified. Standing out of all this, just a pure witness, a watcher on the hills - and everything is left deep down in the valley.”

MindMeanWholeBeautifulLeftPersonalityPureEgoStandingStructureWitnessHillsEcstasyValleysStanding OutDeep DownWatchers
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Effortlessness means not doing anything, inactivity - AKARMA. Effort means doing much, activity - KARMA. Both have to be there. Do much, but don`t be a doer - then you achieve both. Move in the world, but don`t be a part of it. Live in the world, but don`t let the world live in you. Then the contradiction has been absorbed. Then you are not rejecting anything, not denying anything. Then the whole God has been accepted.”

WorldMeanHas BeensWholeMovingEffortAchieveActivityAcceptedKarmaContradictionDoersRejectingInactivity
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Existence cares. When I say God cares I mean that existence cares for you, it is not indifferent. Let this be the foundation of your sannyas and then the temple can be raised very easily. It is easy to raise the temple once the foundation is rightly put. This is the foundation stone: remember that existence loves you, cares about you, is concerned about you; that you are not alienated, that you are not a stranger, that you are part of this great symphony, this orchestra, this celebration that goes on and on and knows no ending.”

KnowsMeanCareRememberEasyExistenceLove YouGoes OnConcernedStonesRaisesFoundationRaisedStrangerTemplesCelebrationIndifferentOrchestraSymphonyCare For You
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Spiritual seeking means knowing this negative part: that desiring is the root cause of frustration. To desire is to create, of one`s own accord, a shell. Desiring is the world. To be worldly is to desire and to go on desiring, never becoming aware that each desire comes to nothing but frustration. Once you become aware of this, then you do not desire, or your only desire is to know what is.”

KnowsWorldMeanSpiritualDesireCausesKnowingGoes OnBecomingNegativeRootsSeekingFrustrationShellsWorldlyAccordRoot Cause
Author:Rajneesh
Create image

“Be creative in that sense and your creativity will become an offering to God. God has given you so many gifts, Garima; something HAS to be done just in deep thankfulness. But remember: with no motive, not as a means but as an end unto itself. Art for art's sake, and creation for creation's sake, and love for love's sake, and prayer for prayer's sake.”

MeanArtEndsDoneRememberGivenPrayerCreativityCreativeCreationAnd LoveSakeMotiveOfferingBe CreativeThankfulnessOffering To God
Author:Rajneesh
Create image