... arises because your mind says, "Unless God is proved there is no need to waste time for God or in meditation or in prayer." It is mind's strategy to keep you away from meditation, from prayer. There is no need for God! If you want to meditate you can meditate without God. Buddha meditated without God; he had no belief in God. Mahavira meditated and became enlightened without any idea of God...

.... God is not a necessity, God can be disposed of! But when Buddha attained to meditation he became a god. Mahavira became a god himself. That's how it happens: you meditate and YOU will become a god, you will discover godliness in your own being. And that is the beginning of discovery. Then you start discovering it in others. Then slowly slowly, the whole existence is full of God, overflooded with God...

.... But ask for the proof first and you will miss the whole journey. Then the mind says, "First prove, then meditate." The mind has played a trick on you, the mind has befooled you. And it looks logical: before you start any inquiry, let it be proved. If God is, then meditation is significant; otherwise why are you meditating? If God is, then prayer is significant; if there is no God, then...

... thing: that obsessions differ from society to society, from country to country, from religion to religion. What is really obsession? Anything that becomes a dominating force upon you, that dominates you, that becomes master of your being. Anything that reduces you into a slave, that's my definition of an obsession. Watch it, meditate. Be silently with it, because that is how you will become master...

... enemy who always disturbs you; whenever you meditate it starts barking. Must be an agent of the Devil! Or the child starts crying or the wife starts shouting at the kids, or something or other... and thousands of things are going on all around. You cannot stop the whole world because you are doing a foolish repetition: "Rama, Rama, Rama." You cannot stop the whole world for this. The world...

... has nothing to do with meditation. Fasting will only make you obsessed with food. And there are people who think celibacy will help them into meditation. Meditation brings a kind of celibacy, but not vice versa. A celibacy without meditation is nothing but sexual repression. And your mind will become more and more sexual, so whenever you sit to meditate your mind will become full of fantasies...

..., if we start calling him Joshua the Buddha - because they are all buddhas, they are all awakened people. They live through inner light. You only grope in inner darkness. Anand Buddha, I have given you the name Buddha. If you feel you are living in choiceless unawareness, make it a point to be aware of it. A thief asked a great Buddhist mystic, Nagarjuna, "Can I meditate and still remain a thief...

... have written a book entitled SPIRITUAL SAYINGS but not Kahlil Gibran. Kahlil Gibran should meditate. It is time for him to meditate, as it is time for me to stop speaking... but I cannot for the simple reason that I have to complete the number fifty. Tenth... am I right, Devageet? "Actually we've done fifty. That was number ten, Osho." Then I will do fifty-one, because I cannot leave this...

... studying with his master, he and a colleague were both walking in the garden of the master. They were smoking and they felt guilty. The friend said, 'It would be good if we asked the master.' These few hours were given to them for a walking meditation; they had to walk in the garden and meditate as in vipassana. So they said, 'Yes, it is better to ask rather than feeling guilty.' So one went to the...

... it that he allowed you?' The second said, 'I think we must have asked differently. I asked him "Can I meditate while smoking?" He said, "Certainly, of course!"' It is the same thing. Life brings the same thing to everybody, but if you have a wrong attitude, a negative attitude, or are asking a wrong question or knocking at the wrong spot, you go on missing. So as I see it, it is...

... condemned, I will be criticized. Every religion, every tradition, every morality, every ethical code is going to condemn me. That does not surprise me! I expect it, because what I am saying and doing is changing the very course of human consciousness. I don't think that by torturing yourself you can meditate more easily; on the contrary, if your body is pleasantly at ease you can meditate more easily. I...

... don't think that when you are fasting you can meditate. You can only think of food and nothing else; you will dream of food and nothing else. But if you are well fed, well nourished, you don't think of food -- there is no need. The body is completely satisfied, it does not create any disturbance. To live pleasurably, to live joyously is not against meditation. It is really the basic need of meditation...

.... They were made to meditate on man and woman making love. And the stones have come alive. The people who have made them must have been the greatest artists the world has known. They were made to meditate upon, they were objects for meditation. It is a temple, and meditators were sitting around just looking at the sculptures, and watching within themselves whether there was any sexual desire arising...

.... This was the criterion: when they found there was no sexual desire arising, it was a certificate for them to enter the temples. All these sculptures are outside the temple, on the walls outside; inside there are no nudist statues. But this was necessary for people to meditate, and then they were clear that there was no desire; on the contrary those statues had made their ordinary desire for sex...

... directly, many things in you which need to be changed will change. More clarity will arise. And helping people to meditate, helping people to understand, helping people to become more vulnerable and open, will help you to become more vulnerable and open. It is a fundamental law of life: whatsoever we do to people returns to us one thousandfold. Buddha is reported to have said, "If you really want to...

... meditate help people to meditate, and you will find your meditation becoming deeper, easier, more spontaneous." And the best way of learning is always to teach. So you have to become a teacher on my behalf and let me function through you. And more and more will be reaching to you.... [The partner of the above sannyasin says she wants to be with him more, and he wants more space.] It has to be...

... right now - when you are so excited and high, with a bouncing heart - if you try to meditate, you are just trying something which is against your nature at this moment. Forget meditation for the moment. Meditation will come; first get tired. When you are calm, you will see that meditation is happening. The heart is bouncing no more; you are not flying high; you are no longer excited; flat on the earth...

...." You are new here. Just it will take a little time.... but soon you will find that every day meditation becomes easier and easier. The energy just has to be exhausted. With so much energy, trying to meditate is just doing something which is impossible. So the clue is simple: allow this energy to have its dance - because when it is gone, then you will ask me, "Now, how to dance, how to sing...

... singing on your own. Nobody is going to think that you are crazy - just a beginner - in the kindergarten. Exhaust this energy; and then you will not ask how to meditate: you will find yourself flat on the ground and you will find meditation is happening. Sometimes it has happened that people have thought that perhaps their hearts have stopped, or their breathing has stopped: the energy has been so...

... mostly you will enjoy yourself. I am reminded of one of Walt Whitman's most beautiful songs: "I celebrate myself." You should look into that song and meditate upon it. Unless the moment comes when you start celebrating yourself for no reason at all, you have not known what religiousness is, you have not known for what this whole existence exists, you have not known anything of beauty, of...

... mania -- tan mania! There is nowhere to go. Just meditate silently here and avoid these kinds of madnesses. They go on spreading like wildfire, and just because others are doing it you get caught into it. Just meditation is enough for you. Go in, and you will find all the answers for all your questions, and more. Question 3: BELOVED OSHO, WHEN I FIRST CAME TO YOU, YOU TOLD ME TO MAKE WORK MY...

... situation; you are in a wrong crowd. But don't look around at anybody; just concentrate, contemplate, meditate on your work. Everything has to be poured into work. Yes, be a workaholic. Be utterly drunk with the joy of creativity. I have not said it in vain, that work is your meditation. Apparently I am bone lazy, but just apparently; otherwise, who is harassing you all, day in, day out? By the time...

... enlightenment, by the side of the tree where he used to sit and meditate. That was his routine: for one hour he would sit under the tree and meditate, then for one hour he would walk by the side of the tree. Even the places where he moved are marked by stones to show you, a small path. One hour he would walk and meditate, showing perfectly that life, if it is unmoving, is dead. And life - if it has no rest...