Here Nityaprem reflects on his life as a child in Sannyas communes and his changing perspective on ‘Bhagwan’ in the light of his post-communes adult experience of making his way in the world and exploring the work of other spiritual traditions and teachers. Reaching a thoroughly positive conclusion.
Childhood is a wonderful time. You experience things so directly, you are so in touch with your emotions, everything is new…when you fall off your little tricycle and scrape your knee, you start to cry and call for your mama, who kisses it and promises to make it better. As an adult, a fall off a bicycle occasions a quick dusting off and checking to see if everything still works and you haven’t broken an arm. Certainly no crying or calling for mother.
Similarly, being a sannyasin as a child has its own unique character. You see people, other sannyasins and even Bhagwan, from that childlike perspective. On the one hand you’re in close touch with your emotions and see things with a clarity, and on the other hand you lack a grown adult’s knowledge of the world, and of yourself and your motivations.
This means that the first impressions you form are a child’s impressions. You see things like the Dynamic Meditation happening from afar, or the therapy groups, which are intended to help an adult cathart away the difficult moments of their life. You see Bhagwan give his discourses, and your approach to him is like towards a grandfatherly figure.
I remember being in the Poona One ashram in 1979, sitting in my tree not far from the gate, listening to the music of the Kundalini meditation as I read my comic books. Graceful people clad in orange and red walked on the marble path. Good times.
But all good times eventually end. Say you grow up and inevitably leave the commune after some years, make contact with the wider world and learn the ways of society. You earn your own money for a while, get in touch with “normal people”, perhaps be in a position of authority within a team working on a project. You move job a few times, and see what it is to be a cog in the machine, a machine which does not care for you in the slightest. Then something happens, perhaps an illness or a break-up, and with a shock you are reminded of the spiritual path.
So to then learn the approach to Bhagwan as if he were as the name says, “the Blessed One”, requires a few new steps of learning. It requires seeing the world through the eyes of people who have had different experiences, a different start in life. And also a different approach to spirituality, one which is more broadly based in different traditions.
A little while ago in a Dutch book by Wolter Keers called ‘Being Free’ I came across a passage about how Hindus see the world, that there are people and then there are gods, and that being a god was like a temporary job which might last a few thousand years. But the enlightened ones, they are above even the gods, because the gods are just ordinary beings who have that job. So the Hindus see Westerners, who just casually approach a guru, as rather foolhardy.
So from that perspective, to have the view of Bhagwan as being a sort of grandfather, family, is not at all close to the mark. For a sannyasin child, to have grown up in that way, it requires a significant shift in perspective to approach him as a grown-up seeker. It feels less safe, like going naked before the Master and his disciples.
In a way it is easier first to start serious seeking with other gurus, to read the memoirs of other seekers and the written words of people like Nisargadatta and Eckhart Tolle, to gain a little understanding of where the people around you came from. If you can find accounts of genuine seekers to learn from, you can count yourself lucky. Eventually you might gain a sympathy with the wide range of backgrounds that seekers come from.
And with that comes a new sensitivity to your own guru, whom you grew up with. You circle back around, and find you never really left. And then you have to cope with society’s changes over the years, you find that society has become very critical of those gurus. The whole anti-cult movement has weaponised the societal distrust of anything that smacks of a special status. It motivates people to bring out their experiences and treat them as the worst versions of what they could be, to support the anti-cult narrative.
In the end, for me it is a heart question. Is there a connection, is there love there for the guru? When all the dust settles, when the negativity, arguments, he-said-she-said has worked its way through your system, do you still feel a warmth inside for the man and for the tradition? That is ultimately your guide of whether it is spiritually beneficial to continue down this path.
Sannyas was a period of warmth, celebration, upheaval, aliveness in my early life. And I find those principles still guide my steps today, that it is a rare bright spot in a world that seems filled with more than a fair share of madness.
All the best,
Nityaprem
The article begins with the following statement, “Childhood is a wonderful time.” I can’t help but wonder what children living in Gaza right now would make of that notion, if they were to read it in twenty years time. The truth is that, if you believe such a generalism, it only means you were one of the lucky ones. I say that, taking into account that children often manage to make the best of growing up in a difficult environment, and that does not mean limiting it to war zones. I recently read a memoir about a guy who grew up in Glasgow in the fifties. I could relate to it very much as I did too. I was fortunate as I had great parents and lived in a posh part of Glasgow. He was not so fortunate. The author grew up with an extremely abusive father in impoverished circumstances. Yet his childhood on the rough streets of Glasgow was filled with adventure and fun. If nothing else, children can be very resilient in the face of adverse living conditions.
NP writes in his article, “Do you still feel a warmth inside for the man and for the tradition? That is ultimately your guide of whether it is spiritually beneficial to continue down this path.”
I find this to be a somewhat simplistic approach to have adopted. Let’s break it down.
The tradition? What tradition? Osho was not a traditionalist. He was opposed to tradition. In his words: “The whole structure of a tradition is basically political; it is there to dominate, it is there to oppress, it is there to exploit.” Yet NP takes having a warmth inside for the man and the tradition as being criteria, a standard on which a judgment or decision may be based, to be the ultimate guide on the path of spirituality.
This brings into question what exactly NP imagines the spiritual path to be. Perhaps he might be so kind as to share what he believes the spiritual path might be. After all, having warmth inside for a man might simply be a case of sentimentality, something which NP’s article is coloured by in places. And remember, Osho himself claimed that he was not a sentimentalist, although I doubt this was entirely true, because in Osho’s books about his early days, there is often a sense of sentimentality in his words.
NP states in his article, “The whole anti-cult movement has weaponised the societal distrust of anything that smacks of a special status. It motivates people to bring out their experiences and treat them as the worst versions of what they could be, to support the anti-cult narrative.”
Although not entirely clearly written, I do agree with what NP is saying. But I ask, can you blame people for adopting such an attitude? As history has shown, spiritual cults often have corrupt leaders. Some might say Osho was corrupt, as in becoming morally debased.
Being in a cult might not necessarily be a bad thing. It’s just that most cults turn out to be rotten, but not all. Even today, many sannyasins will deny that the sannyas movement was/is a cult, even though sannyas ticks most of the boxes in the ‘What constitutes a religious cult?’ questionnaire. I often joke, when people ask me, “Are you a sannyasin?”, by replying, “Yes, I was brainwashed by a religious cult. Perhaps you could help me.”
Lokesh wrote, “perhaps NP could clarify what he means by the spiritual path.”
I think I described it best under your previous article, as being a flower bud opening up into a flower. It requires the right conditions — water, good soil, the right temperature, sunlight — and then the flower will blossom.
Similarly, a human being can come to fruition, given the right conditions. One of those is the presence of a living guru. Every human being is at least somewhat unique, and they won’t all display the same talents or abilities, even in the best of circumstances.
As for Osho being morally debased, I meditated a long time over this question. In the end, I’m willing to allow him a lot of slack because of the unique historical position he occupies, and the circumstances of mind and body pertaining to his unusual state.
I just don’t think I have the basis to form a judgment of him. Initially after ‘Children of the Cult’ came out, I was hurt and angry, and eventually that left me. And I realised, he is not family, not just some guy. He declared himself “The Blessed One”, and that means a lot.
Osho always said the connection between him and a disciple was heart to heart, and I think that is still true today. That was why I said, if you still feel a warmth towards him and his sannyas, that could be your guide.
Sentimentality, hm. One needs enough emotional sensitivity to see one’s emotions. But at the same time there is also balance, equanimity. You have to have both.
Cults, well, should we care? People carry all sorts of conditioning, it’s only once you start shedding that that you notice that the dominant consumerist-capitalist paradigm is also conditioning.
NP, you write, “Osho declared himself “The Blessed One”, and that means a lot.” Okay, maybe so, it is open to interpretation what that means on many different levels, but what does it mean to you?
If it means so much, it should be easy for you to answer my question.
From an adult perspective it means to me he declared himself enlightened, and that he was going to teach. What does it mean to be enlightened? Perhaps you should look at the Hindu meaning or the Jain meaning, after all that is the culture Osho came from.
In Hindu traditions, moksha or liberation from the cycle of life and death, is the ultimate aim of life. Here is a discussion…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moksha
NP writes, “A human being can come to fruition.”
Ok. And what form do you see this fruition taking?
I think for a Westerner to become a disciple of an Indian guru means to take on board some of the Eastern thought. Enlightenment, liberation is a concept common to Hindu, Jain, Buddhist and Sikh thinking, but not European philosophy.
Osho started us off in an easy way, by giving Enlightenment Intensive groups in which people got the basics of self-enquiry. To some people he gave different advice. He also said witnessing was the master key to his sannyas.
So it wasn’t a one-size-fits-all approach, rather it was a path tailored to each seeker, leading, one presumes, to the same end.
NP is walking along the road in Holland when he runs into an old sannyasin friend he has not seen in years. The man seems confused.
“What’s up?” NP asks.
“Well,” says the guy, “I thought I was walking on a spiritual path but I’m no longer sure what that actually means.”
NP chuckles smugly and says, “The spiritual path is a flower bud opening up into a flower. It requires the right conditions — water, good soil, the right temperature, sunlight — and then the flower will blossom.”
“Godverdomme!” exclaims the man, “Are you fucking brain-damaged or something?”
You’re of course welcome to try and do better for a back-of-the-postcard definition of what the spiritual path means… it strikes me as one of those things that people just know, but it’s hard to define, like ‘truth’.
Perhaps ‘following the directions of the inner spiritual impulse’ might serve. It’s certainly better than my first attempt.
Yes, NP, I agree. Your first attempt was awful. It smacked of Osho speak, but coming from you it sounded completely corny. Nonetheless, you handled my joke well.
To complete my series of posts about Deva Ojas’s memoir, ‘Kan een gekooide vogel zingen’, I’ve um lifted a few of the photos from the pdf and will paste them up here. Ojas and I were at the same time in a few of the same places, so these brought back some memories for me.
Darshan in Poona One.
A gathering of sannyasins, Poona One
A few of the kids, I’m not in this photo, I never went to school in Poona One, we were only there for about three months.
I remember the musicians in Buddha Hall
Now we jump to the Ranch in Oregon
The Summer Festival, I remember being there
Ah we knew how to celebrate!
There were a lot of tents, I helped put some of them up.
The gacchamis, yes remember them well
Photos of the world tour are rather scarce, but I liked this
This is during Poona Two
Osho’s body being cremated
It was dark when Osho was cremated, so that photo cannot be of Osho’s cremation. I was there that night.
People were wearing white robes.
Maybe it’s a photo of another sannyasin’s cremation…it was in that place in the book but it could be just my assumption that it was Osho.
You’re absolutely right, he mentions it in the book as well, about the white robes.
Thank you for the correction!
I wasn’t there at the time of Osho’s death, but Ojas’S first-hand account was beautiful
Good, authentic article, NP.
Must be a strange thing to grow up as a Sannyas kid, seeing Bhagwan as a kind of grandfather.
No wonder that your search started later.
Thanks for the pictures from your family album.
Cool, Satchit.
Glad you got something out of it.
Osho on his purpose for his people. I felt refreshed hearing this just now…
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/UHY-qWEpzHs
You were a kid , NP, when you took sannyas. Did you ever call yourself “disciple” of the Master?
When was the time? Or maybe never?
Good question. I was never so much in the habit of calling myself this or that, I’m not sure it ever happened, to be honest.
NP meant:
“I was never so much in the habit of calling myself this or that, ”
At least you call yourself a “sannyasin”. Don’t you??
It’s funny, I just read a long question in ‘Beyond Psychology’ from someone who felt they didn’t have enough trust to be one of Osho’s sannyasins.
Osho’s answer was, just be “a sannyasin”, a seeker of truth, because that takes just a little trust.
In that sense, over the years I have become a sannyasin.
NP, what is funny about that?
It was just a bit of serendipity, that I’d read Satchit’s question about being a sannyasin at the same time that I just read Osho’s reply to someone about being ‘his’ sannyasin. It’s that familiarity of growing up with someone, that later makes you think, I know this person, is he special?
On reflecting a little on this, I was always closer to calling him a friend, when I got older, rather than me a disciple and him a Master. But there was still a love for him beneath it all, that has always returned.
Nowadays, I have let go of any tendency to judge Osho. With the grandfatherly image came a certain expectation that he would take care of you, that the commune would take care, but I think that was false.
As I said to Lokesh, currently I don’t think I have a basis of understanding by which I could judge him.
NP says, “Nowadays, I have let go of any tendency to judge Osho. With the grandfatherly image came a certain expectation that he would take care of you, that the commune would take care, but I think that was false.”
In order to think that was false, a judgment has to have been passed. This totally contradicts the idea that NP has let go of any tendency to judge Osho.
No, Lokesh, the judgment was in thinking he would take care, and I was withdrawing that. You’re always so quick to condemn.
NP, it has nothing to do with condemnation, and everything to do with contradicting yourself, which you obviously don’t care to acknowledge.
Anyway, maybe you might want to try letting go of any tendency to judge not only Osho, but others also. You know, expand your horizons a bit.
We’ve been talking on SN for quite a long time, yet you don’t seem to know me at all well? I’m not a judgmental person in the normal run of things at all.
I say, jolly good. Keep polishing that self-image of yours until it is positively shining.
Subtle, but still quick to condemn.
NP, has it ever occurred to you that you might be suffering from a persecution complex?
Honestly, it’s never occurred to me.
I see. I just asked because a persecution complex goes beyond just feeling misunderstood or criticized; it’s an intense, often irrational belief that others are actively trying to harm or sabotage you. People with this complex perceive hostility in places where it doesn’t actually exist, causing them to remain constantly on guard.
The roots of a persecution complex often connect with the psychological phenomenon known as “projection.” According to Sigmund Freud, projection involves attributing one’s own unacceptable thoughts or feelings onto someone else, which you have done a couple of times with me. In this case, a person may project their own fears of inadequacy or rejection onto others, interpreting neutral actions as targeted attacks. You know the feeling someone is ‘condemning’ you etc. This defence mechanism can protect one’s ego temporarily but, over time, it only reinforces a cycle of paranoia.
Donald Trump is a classic example of a ‘projector’. Is there a greater egotist with less self-awareness than him in public life?
I’ve not observed anything like that within myself.
I did once challenge a psychiatrist to find some mental illness which fits me, and he sent me off for three days testing at a psychological lab. The tests came back inconclusive — all of them — and he suddenly started addressing me in the formal form of Dutch, with ‘U’ for ‘you’, which you usually only do with people of superior status.
I see, superior status. I’m impressed, NP.
Did the psychiatrist run any tests on a humometer, to test the extent of your sense of humour?
I ask because in my recent posts to you I have been joking all the way. You know, about having an inferiority complex and all that nonsense.
You must excuse me because I am involved in a tedious writing project, and SN provides me with a diversion every now and zen. I certainly only wish the best for you.
Diversion is a good thing, no man should be forced to slave away at the coal face of creativity all day long.
I’ve been paging through Erich von Daniken’s classic ‘Chariots of the Gods’ when I feel like a little light relief, it gives me the odd giggle.
And if that doesn’t work I watch ‘Monty Python’ clips on YouTube…
But it’s true, I sometimes get caught taking things seriously, it’s part of the earnestness of my nature. When looking for truth in the forest canopy, I sometimes overlook the waltzing ants on the ground…
Good morning, friends.
I’m still contemplating Deva Ojas’s memoir and its strong effect on me, it really had the flavour of sannyas and Osho. The photo’s too I particularly enjoyed, it was like a time capsule which connected me back to my youth, but with the detachment of an adult viewpoint.
In a way I feel it is much healthier to be concerned with spiritual things than with say world politics, or the war in Gaza. The world keeps on turning, and human nature is not going to change on a dime. But the thing which you can affect is your mental state… so do your tasks and celebrate life…
“Witnessing is the key of my sannyas,
The master key.
I don’t give you any other discipline,
because any discipline will not help.”
( Osho, The Wild Geese and the Water, 1981 )
The temperatures here are coming down, it’s going to be a mere 26 degrees today, nice weather for a walk in the woods perhaps. However, first the vacuuming, and perhaps another cup of coffee.
“In a way, I feel it is much healthier to be concerned with spiritual things than with, say, world politics, or the war in Gaza.”
I tend to agree, NP, although it’s no use hiding one’s head in the sand and pretending we’re not in increasingly dangerous times.
This morning I’ve found it inspiring to hear the Governor of California’s ‘declaration of war’ against Trump & co’s fascism, and although it’s off-topic and not strictly within SN’s stated purpose I’m sharing it here. This man is surely a potential future president of the US (and I’ve a feeling Osho would have approved of his courage and determination to fight this evil regime):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G9uXWPMhXcM
Satyadeva said, “it’s no use pretending we are not in increasingly dangerous times”
But are we, really? Every decade seems to have its conflicts: Iraq, Afghanistan, Rwanda, the Arab Spring, Bosnia, there have been a few. Also in terms of worrisome other developments: the Y2K crisis, the 2008 crash, covid, Trump’s tariff war, AI, climate change…
It’s only the news presenters who have mastered the art of talking as if the crisis of the day is more important and significant than the crisis of yesterday. I’m no longer convinced that it is true, or relevant to the everyday man.
Ok, tell that to the Ukrainians, NP. And to the 60+% of the population of America who are against Trump (according to current opinion polls) whose country is being profoundly ruined by internal fascism. And to the people of northern Europe who feel threatened by this Russian regime’s expansionist ambitions (eg the children of one of the Nordic states, Finland, I think, are being trained in guerilla warfare to fight against a potential Russian invasion) and who can no longer count on help from the US. Two countries possessing huge military might are being controlled by two ‘madmen’.
Not forgetting the significant percentage of the world’s people who are below the poverty line or caught up in wars, civil or otherwise (there are plenty of these, not just the Gaza obscenity).
You know about all this, you’re well informed, presumably, and yes, we’re used to hearing about crises in our relatively safe, sheltered, privileged environments (thank God for our good fortune) but I suggest you’ve become rather too complacent in your perception of ‘current affairs’. Which is very easy of course, as even if we bother following ‘the News’ it can easily be interpreted as another sort of ‘entertainment’ – as long as we’re not diirectly affected.
Yes, let’s stay ‘in the moment’ as much as possible, and not become obsessed by ‘world affairs’, but why be absolute fools who think nothing out there is ever going to seriously affect us when it’s blindingly clear that the world is becoming ever more destabilised, with the likelihood, not just the possibilty, of worse to come (imho)?
Today in the news they showed something about the famine in Sudan. At the end came the account number where you can donate.
Some other ideas to change the situation?
Highly effective passionate anger with positive proposals for action from another anti-Trump campaigner at youtube, a former top man in the US Legal system. Pretty inspiring if you’re in the mood. I hope the American people responds in similar vein, ie that they “wake up!”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ld1eGU2nXyk
Well, things do affect us, but we can’t do anything about it. Case in point: there was a news item about rising coffee prices, and a few weeks later indeed my favourite Lavazza Qualita Oro went up in price to 7.50 euros per pack. But it’s the best coffee, so I still buy it.
“Trust is in the totality of the cosmos. It has nothing to do with books – holy bibles, gitas, korans – no. Then there is only one scripture which is spread all around you – in the trees, in the rivers, in the ocean, in the stars. And you don’t have to read it; you have to be just silent, and it starts showering on you all its wisdom, which is eternal.
I am against belief because I want you to come to the point of trust.”
( Osho, ‘Beyond Psychology’ )
I thought this was a beautiful passage, following several questions where Osho talks about destroying questions in such a way that disciples are left without questions.
And it is true that the timeless wisdom precedes the writing of books, the oral traditions of the world came before writing. So the art of understanding what the trees and rivers and stars are saying seems in tune with the ancient humans.
NP writes, “So the art of understanding what the trees and rivers and stars are saying seems in tune with the ancient humans.”
Modern humans have a different experience. Forests are burning. Rivers are either drying up or bursting their banks. Stars are exploding. You just have to remain silent and maybe a meteorite will hit you on the head and then you will perhaps wake up to the fact that humans are destroying their habitat at an alarming rate.
“Osho talks about destroying questions in such a way that disciples are left without questions.! And you think that is a good thing, NP? Perhaps you might want to take into consideration that disciples adopting a non-questioning attitude were partly responsible for all the shit that went on in Oregon. People who do not question authority end up as slaves.
You seem a little over-excited, Lokesh… Rajneeshpuram was not all bad, a lot of good things happened there too. Including some fine examples of humans restoring their environment and bringing life back to the ‘Big Muddy Ranch’.
NP writes, “You seem a little over-excited, Lokesh.” I can assure you that is not the case and is a projection on NP’s part.
NP goes on to say, “Rajneeshpuram was not all bad.” I never said it was, but there was definitely a lot of weird shit going on there. NP has changed his tune from being put off and disgusted by the paedophiles operating on the ranch. The pendulum swings, and now he is telling us about “Fine examples of humans restoring their environment and bringing life back to the ‘Big Muddy Ranch’.” Ding dong.
But I ask NP, where has all that restoration gone now? Ultimately, it was all for nothing, and you can interpret that any way you wish…get your projection motor runnin’, head out on highway.
To be honest, I am really not very interested in any of it. Same goes for forty-year-old photographs from Poona One.(It’s interesting to note that many of the official photographs, from Poona One at least, were mostly of the ashram photograpers’ friends and associates and Bhagwan, of course). Osho was all for living in the present, how come NP is living so much in the past…entertaining sentimental memories from decades ago and getting all fired up about nostalgic people’s memoirs describing their version of what really happened on Osho’s communes? All that sort of thing is the antithesis of what Osho wanted his people to live.
How about…”The sannyasin has to learn the knack of being here and now because nirvana is either now or never. Enlightenment happens now or never, either it happens here or nowhere else…because existence knows nothing about the past or the future. Its only way of being is the present. The present is the only time, now is the only time, and here the only space.” Amen.
The Ranch lives on, as some kind of Christian summer camp I understand. A lot of the ecology and infrastructure sannyasins built is still there.
But yes, I was upset by Sarito Carroll’s book ‘In the Shadow of Enlightenment’, and by the ‘Children of the Cult’ docu. Some of what happened to the kids on the Ranch was not ok. I’d be surprised to hear of anyone who did not feel that. It didn’t happen to me personally, but it did affect me because it happened to my community, my friends.
It’s the very nature of still having a ‘Sannyas News’ don’t you think, that part of it reaches back to those times when Osho was alive? Socrates said, “the unexamined life is not worth living”, and that is what Ojas’s memoir brings me to do, examine my life. And the roots of the present are in that distant past.
Yes, the present moment is all that there is, that is true. I don’t spend all of my day on memoirs and old photographs either. But when something like that comes along which gives you a push to look at old stuff, I accept it…floating downriver on the current…
The thing about my fellow sannyas kids is unfinished. Their experience was not my experience, but there is a sympathy there.
That’s all very well, NP. My point is that I find reading about people rewinding their dreams, even ‘spiritual’ ones, is not in the least inspiring. Sannyas News has been running for a long time and most of that kind of thing has already been covered multiple times.
What, you might well ask, would I appreciate to read about on SN? Well, for a start, I would be interested to hear about other meditators’ inner experiences. Sitting quietly doing nothing is not as simple as it sounds. A lot of surprising things arise in me when I sit doing nothing, other than being present.
Seems reasonable.
I will tell you about one long-running series of experiences I’ve had, which mostly have happened at night on waking out of sleep. This was following a period where I was interested in what happened on the boundaries of sleep, and I focussed on it for a while.
So one night I woke out of slumber and found I could talk in my mind. Then a voice replied, “you should forever stay silent.”
On subsequent nights of course I didn’t manage to follow this advice, and once I said, “I need to be empty.”
Since then on various nightly occasions I have been visited by voices which remove things from my body energy, things like supports, aides, cleaners, all kinds of things which usually just do their jobs unnoticed.
My attempts to explain have just led to fights between those who come to take and other visitors who take an interest, which the takers almost always win.
Of course, as soon as I am fully awake these things vanish. But it hasn’t been the most pleasant inward journey.
NP, that all sounds like a mind trip. The mind constantly creates all kinds of thoughts, even spiritual ones. It does this in order to create the illusion that is substantial when in reality it is not. A useful tool and a terrible master.
You write, “Then a voice replied, “you should forever stay silent.” ” We all hear voices, saying all manner of things. The idea is to ask who is hearing the voices and take it from there.
I’m not sure whether the mind is actually very active on the borders of sleep. It certainly doesn’t seem to function in the usual way, from what I’ve observed, and I have been paying attention to it for some years.
If it’s not the mind, NP, what do you think it might be? One possibility is that If you’re disturbed by the conflicting voices then you might have opened yourself to psychic ‘entities’ that are attracted to people who are vulnerable in some way.
I have considered the possibility, SD, and think it might be so. But there seems to be a range of beings there, some good-hearted, some opportunistic, and there isn’t very much I can do about it.
You could investigate ‘psychic protection’ methods, eg invoking the energy of any master you love and trust. But perhaps you don’t feel particularly threatened, these psychic entities seem pretty mild according to your descriptions.
I remembered Osho talking about this, and found this article about it. I think I’ll give this a try…
https://www.oshonews.com/2015/07/22/protective-aura-osho/
“To me, let-go means you are not fighting for anything in life, but giving everything to life to take care of. You say, “let-go seems to be natural.” It only “seems”…because your whole conditioning is against it. You have been brought up for millions of years to fight. Fighting, either you can be defeated – which will create a wound, which will create revenge – or you can be victorious; which will again create another kind of wound. That is the ego. In either case you are a loser. Defeated you lose, victorious you lose. In either case you are going further away from yourself.
Let-go has not been taught to people because it will go against the whole structure of the society – which is based on competition and fighting, where everybody is your enemy. Even your friend is your enemy, even your wife is your enemy, even your children are your enemies, because everybody is trying to snatch as much from you as possible. And the same thing you are trying to do. The world of misery is created because everybody is snatching things from everybody else. It is not a peaceful, silent, loving existence; we are still barbarous and animalistic.”
( Osho, ‘Beyond Psychology’ )
“Let-go is a deep understanding.
It is not an act that you have to do.
Every act is part of the world of fight. That which you have to do is going to be a fight.
Let-go is simply understanding.
And then a silent relaxation, flowing with the river, unconcerned where it is going, unworried that you can get lost…no anxiety, no anguish, because you are not separate from the totality, so whatever is going to happen is going to be good.
With this understanding you will find there is no mixing: understanding cannot mix with ignorance; insight into existence cannot mix with blindness; consciousness cannot mix with unconsciousness. And let-go cannot mix with different kinds of struggles – that is an impossibility.
Just let it sink within your heart, and you will find a new dimension opening up, in which each moment is a joy, in which each moment is an eternity unto itself.”
( Osho, ‘Beyond Psychology’ )
I enjoyed this piece on fighting and let-go. He is basically correct, even in our dreams these attitudes accompany us. Fighting seems to be deeply part of our experience, it only changes its form from schoolyard scraps to pub brawls.
The deep understanding of let-go is a change in one’s nature which makes it clear that fighting does not create a better reality, it only creates wounds. I find Osho’s solution a beautiful one.
I found this beautiful story in the next question, about Balmik the highwayman and murderer who was converted by Nardar into a disciple of Rama. It’s a bit too long to quote here, but it was a great illustration of violence turning into non-violence.
So let’s talk about ‘the inner experiences during meditation’.
One of my favourite meditations is shikantaza, or just sitting. I usually sit upright on my bed, eyes half closed, and let my mind go blank. Often I focus my attention on the sensation of the body sitting, and eventually a thought sneaks up on me, and after a while I find I have been thinking, and so I return my attention to the body sitting.
The kind of thoughts vary widely, but usually something superficial or something I shouldn’t forget. It’s nothing extraordinary, almost all of my unusual experiences have been on the boundaries of sleep. I only do short sessions of meditation, of up to twenty minutes or so at most.
You could say I’m a casual meditator.
A few of you may remember Andreas Vollenweider from the eighties, here’s a track he made a few years ago as a musical interlude…
https://youtu.be/y3nCkymyVHI
NP writes, “I sometimes get caught taking things seriously, it’s part of the earnestness of my nature.”
Yes, that’s a good way of putting it.
The sannyas credo of maintaining a non-serious approach has its pitfalls. For a start, one should not feel bad about being serious. Some things in life have to be taken seriously; it can’t possibly all be taken as a reason to celebrate. Such an attitude comes across as immature and childish. Kids having their legs blown off in Gaza is a deadly serious business.
Even the king of non-seriousness, Osho, became serious every once in a while. When he saw that the situation in Oregon was getting too serious, he decided to jump ship. When he was arrested, he did a good job of acting like it was all a leela when he appeared in front of the camera, but there were times when he looked decidedly unhappy, serious, utterly human.————————————————————–
And then…
Tolle, another man in prison …
https://youtu.be/c41Ua753HXo?si=qv4C8GKXir5EW-dw
Still, more often than not the reminder to be non-serious was a good one. The whole business world runs on taking things seriously, all of the news media is about taking things seriously, even many YouTube news commentators continually try to get you to take things seriously. A lot of life is a leela, and after a brief period of seriousness it is good to return to that.
The thing is, when the only time you can laugh is when watching comedy shows, that is a sad state of affairs. It means the drudgery of the everyday has become so pervasive that you don’t feel the love anymore…
https://youtu.be/WpYeekQkAdc
Terence Stamp = Swami Deva Veeten … has died – or ”left his body.”
With our backgrounds we may remember him the best in these spiritual scenes:
1. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SKJAqCnWzcw
2. https://youtu.be/uYhv0O0gUTk?si=gUmDTjR4FQ42IGj3&t=5305
Thank you for the reminder that the whole movie, ‘Meetings with Remarkable Men’ (1979), was up on YouTube and I hadn’t yet finished watching it… I had begun it some time ago but stopped about a quarter of the way through. I thoroughly enjoyed watching the rest of it.
It seems a little otherworldly these days to go and look for ancient knowledge in hidden monasteries in Afghanistan or Persia. We have gotten so used to all our questions being answered by the Internet that anything else seems absurd. Whereas in the time of Gurdjieff’s youth it was still about rare books and manuscripts…
“We have gotten so used to all our questions being answered by the Internet”
You meditate too much, NP.
This is not good for your brain!
‘Meetings with Remarkable Men’ is one of my favourite books. I’ve read it several times. I found the movie a bit dry, although I like Terence Stamp as an actor.
I remember it was a big deal when he took sannyas in Poona One. he went on to have a short-lived affair with Mukta, the gardener. Then, he was never heard of again in the sannyas scene. Probably became an unusual blip on the screen of his life.
I also felt an immediate liking for Stamp as an actor, I thought he did gravitas quite well in the ‘Meetings with Remarkable Men’ movie. On the whole I enjoyed the film, but thought it was a bit slow to get going and rather disjointed, much like the book.
On Gurdjieff I thought Ouspensky’s book ‘In Search of the Miraculous’ was more revealing, although you could say ‘Meetings’ should be read first and set the scene for Ouspensky’s volume.
Englightenment and the search for it has become such an ordinary and old-fashioned thing, it doesn’t interest young people any longer. But that occurs to be true only for those watchers who have undergone many religious trips and group-buildings in their younger days.
When Osho popped up the times were just ready to dive for deeper answers and letting go of traditional beliefs and promises.
What about the Gen Z today? Fake News, dictatorships and wars fill most unconscious spaces and there seems to be no direction to go for inner worlds and for living in harmonious resorts with friends that do want real changes. Only few individuals choose such spiritual paths at all. No need for gurus any longer…But in our old days it felt like a wave and a movement.
“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.”
(Osho, from the darshan with Terence Stamp)
The moment you start searching for things on the internet you are lost, there are a thousand and one search results which will lead you ever further down the rabbit hole, to social media and a thousand other places. In a way these things take ownership of the mind, they fill it with all kinds of rubbish.
“The basic thing to be understood is that you are not the mind – neither the bright one nor the dark one. If you get identified with the beautiful part, then it is impossible to disidentify yourself from the ugly part; they are two sides of the same coin. You can have it whole, or you can throw it away whole, but you cannot divide it.”
( Osho, ‘Beyond Psychology’ )
“Just get back a little and watch.
Create a distance between you and your mind.”
( Osho, ‘Beyond Psychology’ )
Osho in these passages talks about how man wants to identify with the beautiful, and the internet presents many beautiful thoughts to get caught in. But the beautiful parts of mind are followed by the ugly, the violent.
His prescription is to disidentify, to just stand back and let the mind be the mind, and realise that you are not it. With the mind you also distance yourself from imagination, desire and projection.
VeetTom, I thought your post was unusually insightful. A lot of spiritual thinking has to do with “unconscious spaces”, spaces in the mind left silent and fallow, and education and working with computers seems to begin earlier and earlier in life.
A childhood such as I had in the 1970s and 1980s is hard to imagine for kids born after the invention of the smartphone. And I think too a number of things have had time in the spotlight which have changed a few minds — mental health, psychedelics, childhood trauma, to name a few.
It seems to me too that the spiritual has kind of gotten crowded out of young adults mental space. These days twenty-somethings have TikTok, YouTube, Facebook, computer games, Tinder, OnlyFans, many flavours of music, films, fandom, cosplay, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Disney, Netflix, and much else all competing for their attention (and money).
A lot of that stuff just did not exist back in my youth. There was still space for reading a book like P. D. Ouspensky’s ’In Search of the Miraculous’ and getting enthusiastic about Gurdjieff dances and the ‘stop’ exercise. You could go out and explore…
I feel that with the internet there is so much knowledge that perhaps young people may feel they already know ‘all about it’, that reading a Wikipedia article may make them feel knowledgeable, which will all detract from the adventure of knowing. It’s the old Indian question of knowing about honey, or actually experiencing honey. You can read entire stacks of books but it won’t get you closer to the experience.
The same thing with shopping. A lot of effort has gone into making things easy to find, easy to order, easy to have delivered from sites like Amazon. No need to leave your comfy home or go to a shop. It all leads to a more insular way of living, away from experiencing.
Seems you worry a bit much about young people. This is a certain sign that one becomes old, lol. Oh yes, the past was much better.
Good afternoon, friends.
I hope you are enjoying Earl Grey tea and cakes, in the proper English fashion, while I take my carrot smoothie and borek pastry. It’s a lot cooler here now, 19 degrees with a little drizzle from an overcast sky.
A few days ago I was sitting in the lounge chair in our living room while my mother was listening to the two aunts who had come to visit, and I stood up to do some hostly duties. But what I hadn’t noticed was that my left foot had fallen asleep, and when I called upon it to straighten itself it did not obey…so I was left standing on one leg, lost my balance and promptly collapsed to the floor! To cries of “oh, oh, wat doe je nu?” Luckily I managed to avoid the coffee table and the rest of the furniture. So I have been nursing some bruised ligaments and a few scrapes for a few days. But I guess at age 53 these things can happen.
And I came across this…
“I cannot give you freedom, because if I give you freedom I can take it back. Freedom has to be your realisation – and that would have come through surrender, on its own. Surrender flowers into freedom, because in surrender the self is gone, and all the hell that the self creates is gone. Your whole energy is now available to blossom. I cannot give freedom to anyone.
Freedom is not a commodity that I can hand over to you; it has to happen at the innermost core of your being. Surrender only removes the hindrances. You surrender only that which is blocking the way for freedom to come to you.”
( Osho, ‘Beyond Psychology’ )
What particularly stayed with me was “and all the hell that the self creates is gone”… It strikes me that the mind, the ego, the whole complex of the self does create a kind of hell, that Osho saw correctly. That every assumption we make about the spiritual path, all we actually do, is not a correct remedy, until only let-go and watching are left.
You cannot do both at the same time.
Either watch the river or be the river as a let-go.
Freedom comes from floating with the river.
It seems to me that writing about oneself can be a good way to getting free from conditioning. By putting pen to paper you are taking a step back from yourself, from the person you thought you were. This helps you examine your own patterns of behaviour.
A friend of mine is going through a difficult period, and she is using a journaling technique to find herself again from time to time. I thought it was a good tip.
The SN book just received a 5-star review from someone calling themself ‘The Jeepster’. Thank you, Jeepster, much appreciated.
“5.0 out of 5 stars “A revealing view into the world of sannyas.”
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on 21 August 2025
Verified Purchase
“This is an exceptional achievement by Swami G, a book that should be read by every sannyasin. Most Sannyas publications are either by Osho himself, or with regard to his life, his teachings and methods. It is wonderfully refreshing to have a book about sannyasins themselves, their personal experiences and evolution. A beautiful, flowing narrative, full of amusing anecdotes and metaphysical philosophy, wide in scope, with a deep understanding of the human condition, paradoxically tragic yet full of humour. A Tour de Force.” (The Jeepster)
He doesn’t mind pouring on a few superlatives, does he? But it’s a good review, hopefully the book will go from strength to strength and sell a boatload of copies.
Well, NP, makes me wonder how realistic Osho was being when he said, “Be prepared, plan for a miracle.”
I always thought that saying by Osho was more along the lines of ‘prepare for the best that could happen as well as the worst’. Usually people plan to take care of the worst-case events, and if something better happens they take it in their stride, which means you spend a lot of time being a pessimist.
But Osho is absolutely right, we should also plan for the best that could happen, it would leave people happier and more glad to be alive…
“Be prepared, plan for a miracle” sounds like something Osho picked up somewhere from someone else, something he often did.
I think the way Osho originally used it was in relation to trusting in life more. I know what he means, but I have my doubts about trusting life totally, because life can be pretty nasty at times. Nevertheless, so far so good, and I am grateful to life.
There are some things Osho said which are comming from another level than our daily reality – and they just can’t be dealt with…just like that classical saying: “Love your enemies.”
Maybe fighting Putin’s Russia is a service of love because we take him with respect by delivering more and better weapons to Ukraine? I would agree of course, because this loving therapy is needed for fascist Russia and for us to stay democratic and free.
Quoting Osho is stupid.
Better try with your own words and stay honest.
Sorry, Jesus.
Barry Long commented on that famous invocation of Jesus, saying that you can’t effectively try to “love” your enemies, the point is to let go of them. Good advice, I’ve always thought since hearing that.
I think the right Osho quote might be something about ‘intelligence’.
“Everything that happens is good, is for the better, because existence goes on evolving. If we remember that existence is continuously in evolution, then whatever is happening…at the time it may seem disastrous, but finally you will find that it was not so; it has brought new flowers, it has created new experiences.”
( Osho, ‘Beyond Psychology’ )
Admittedly he was talking about the end of Rajneeshpuram in this lecture, and not about Gaza or Ukraine, but maybe the principle is the same.
That’s a highly contentious belief in a world where ill people have their fingers on nuclear buttons. As things become ever worse in the world let’s see how much truth this contains.
Oh, oh, it’s ‘Osho Says’ time. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ…oh sorry, I almost dozed off there.
Erm…let’s see now, Osho says, “Everything that happens is good, is for the better, because existence goes on evolving.”
There is nothing quite like a positive attitude and, ultimately, that might, of course, be in fact true in hyperspace 108, 17 trillion light years away if you travel by dragonfly.
Then again, to take such a general statement out of context and into a world full of criminally insane mad people is strictly for the super numpties who have been hit on the head by a comet that they mistakenly believed to be a space probe sent by an alien civilization in the Upper Megadon Galaxy.
Funny, Lokesh…
But what if we did have a nuclear war, and nothing bigger than a chicken survived, and the Earth took 10 Million years to recover?
After that time there’d be new life, a world free from man’s pollution, new flowers as Osho says. Seems like a fine state of affairs to me.
Well, it might sound like that to the ever-thinking mind, always looking for some consolation or way out in the face of potential threats to his/her existence. And more than likely it’s true (ET, for instance, has said as much in a recent talk).
Nevertheless, it’s easy to find that a pleasant enough prospect at a distance, shielded from major upheavals as most of us are, but when the crunch comes, perhaps the thinking mind won’t be a lot of use, numbed as it may well be, by horror at the sheer scale of disaster, destruction and loss. Will anyone be saying, “Still, never mind, it was a load of fun – at least for me – and it’ll all be fine in 10 million years…See you all then, ok?”
One thing that LSD showed me is, if you take a strong enough dose, that if an atomic bomb went off, you would not notice. That is why people used to say, “I got blasted.”
I remember an album by Material with William Burroughs saying weird things on it. He said that atomic weapons kill souls.
There is a philosophy known as “deep ecology” which I subscribe to, which is where people believe in the rights of the natural world, its animals and plants.
In essence I believe we should let half the world be just a nature reserve, drastically reducing the human population and its impact on the environment.
The human race is a dangerously insane species, which has produced a few rare flowers of consciousness along the way.
Another small GERMAN journalistic wave came in this week: At least three articles on Osho & Sannnyas (some behind bars) and an amazing, but known before, well researched video:
Eine weitere kleine journalistische Welle kam diese Woche rein: mindestens drei Artikel über OSHO & Sannnyas … und ein gutrecherchiertes, aber schon etwas älteres Video:
https://www.ardmediathek.de/video/unsere-geschichte/als-bhagwan-in-den-norden-kam/ndr/Y3JpZDovL25kci5kZS8xNDYxXzIwMjItMDUtMTEtMjEtMDA?fbclid=IwY2xjawMX-jtleHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHjoUJyZYKqJI12HT7Q4CZUPLBkJhUnV7gWVKv6Vj9VFD8vgAObd08Rwh9G00_aem_aI73rW5UIyN8yhcL7qhbNA
I watched the German documentary, it was quite good and didn’t focus overmuch on the controversies, but more on the reasons why people joined the sannyas movement. Also some rare video footage of Osho’s cremation procession… I enjoyed it, even though my German isn’t that good.
I just came to the part of ‘Beyond Psychology’ where there Osho was commenting on the therapists like Teertha and Rajen striking out on their own, and one thing Osho said was “their work destroyed them.”
It’s interesting, obviously to be a great therapist does not mean that one necessarily was close to Osho.
That’s all very well, NP, but Teertha and Rajen’s work did not destroy them. Osho got that one wrong. His crystal ball often malfunctioned.
“To be a great therapist does not mean that one necessarily was close to Osho.” Why state the obvious?
I doubt anyone gives a hoot about any of that today. NP, for someone belonging to a cult that preaches living in the present, you seem to hold a strong interest in the past. All our yesterdays ad infinitum.
It is a site called ‘sannyas news’ so a bit of reaching back to the sannyas portion is to be expected, I think. Although perhaps news brings us back to the present day.
The thing is, there just isn’t that much ‘sannyas news’ going on in the Netherlands. They are currently collecting people’s memories of the Stad Rajneesh in Heerde, where I spent some time, so I sent them a few of my anecdotes of that time (in Dutch).
Is there such a thing as an Ibiza-wide webpage for sannyasins?
NP asks, “Is there such a thing as an Ibiza-wide webpage for sannyasins?”
No, there is not. There are still plenty of sannyasins living on the island, but there are no longer get-togethers like we had in the good auld days thirty years ago.
The few sannyasins I occasionally meet rarely talk about Osho. Ibiza is a place where people enjoy the moment. Spain, in general, is a country that enjoys living today. This can pose problems, like if you urgently need a plumber and he says he will be round ‘manana’. You are lucky if he shows up after two weeks.
I sometimes talk with friends and family about Osho, but not very often. It’s history now.
NP writes, “I believe we should let half the world be just a nature reserve.”
And if it were proposed that Western Europe was to be a part of that nature reserve, and you were to be relocated to Siberia, would you still believe it was a great idea?
Yes, it’s a great idea, because only an enlightened one would go to Siberia. For Siberia choicelessness is needed.
I don’t see why not…,
Timothy Leary, whose ‘Ecstasy’ book I’m thoroughly enjoying, would probably have consulted “God” about this matter (although it took him five years of taking LSD before he was ok with saying the word “God”) as he said, “I feel very comfortable now in saying that I do talk to God and I listen to Him. He is a hipster, he is a musician, and he’s got a great beat going. You’ll never find him in an institution or in an American television stage set. He’s never legal! And he’s got a great sense of humour, too!”
I seem to recall someone that fits that description…now who on earth can it be?
That’s so cool, Satyadeva. I can totally imagine Timothy Leary saying that. After five years of mind-expanding substances, you finally lose enough of your inhibitions to say that you talk to God, wonderful!
In a way, we all talk to God, or at least those sannyasins do who’ve got ways into the feeling side of their own being.
Erm…Rab C. Nesbitt?
Pretty close, Loke, although the clothes aren’t right.
I got it. Keith Richards. After all, he was here before God.
As in…
It’s certainly an interesting contrast with the usual hats and robes….
Some Timothy Leary quotes…
“People have to go out of their minds before they can come to their senses.”
“Almost everyone today is brain-damaged by our education, which is designed to produce docile automatons.”
“TURN ON. To contact the ancient energies and wisdoms that are built into your nervous system. They provide unspeakable pleasure and revelation. TUNE IN. To harness and communicate these new perspectives in a harmonious dance with the external world. DROP OUT. Detach yourself from the tribal game. Current models of social adjustment – mechanized, computerized, socialized, intellectualized, televised, sanforized – make no sense to the new LSD generation who see clearly that American society is becoming an air-conditioned anthill.”
Okay, NP, “People have to go out of their minds before they can come to their senses.”
What exactly is your interpretation of Leary’s statement?
I think it has to do with identification with groups and people and physical things, caring for that stuff, caring for status and power and how other people perceive you. All that weighs you down, it’s stuck in your mind, hammered down by the things people tell you in your innocent childhood.
So if you go out of your mind, you lose all that for a while and you notice, “Hey, I’m ok, I didn’t need any of it.”
“Things are pretty strange in this world and people do it many ways and you are just an atom in a galaxy of possibilities and your opinions and your science and ‘What I think’ and all that, is just so much noise in a very complex and busy world. And it’s that same humbling perception that comes out of psychedelics. It just shows you, you’re very parochial.”
( Terence McKenna )
If you listen to enough of Terence McKenna you get a kind of contact high, which is quite soothing.
NP, thanks for that.
My pleasure, Lokesh. I’m glad I’ve gotten something from listening to Terence and reading Ayahuasca trip reports.
I remember some time ago you described how you like to every six months or so ‘blow out the cobwebs’ with a pinch of something psychedelic. I reckon it’s a very healthy habit.
The thing is though, the psychedelic gives you a temporary out-of-mind experience, but really you can cut many of the ties that bind you to the mind’s mechanisms by examining what this freedom is.
All you need to do is remind yourself for a while of what is unimportant, non-serious. You can come to the same place, of freedom from the mind, by examining the roots of the mind’s mechanisms. It’s a slow untangling of the reasons why the mind attaches value to concepts and things. In the end you achieve a measure of bliss, peace, freedom, love…you lose a lot of drama and the crazy reasons people have to do things.
“The distance between me and you is only a dream distance, so there is no need to feel any sadness, no need to feel that it is going to be a very arduous and long journey. It is a very simple and very natural phenomenon. If you can relax – and nothing can be easier than relaxation – things will start happening on their own.”
( Osho, ‘Beyond Psychology’ )
“Psychedelic experiences are beyond the reach of cultural manipulation, and discovering this and exploring it is somehow the frontier of maturity. Culture is a form of enforced infantilism. It’s the last nursery, and most people never leave it.”
( Terence McKenna )
It’s interesting, my journey with Osho seems to be continuing. In the time after watching ‘Children of the Cult’ and investigating the Facebook group, I experienced a strong reaction of anger, that these things could happen in our commune.
As time has passed, and it’s been nearly a year, that has faded, and what is left is a general feeling of love, and that includes a love for Osho. It creates a connection between him and me which I honour and respect.
It tells me that at the base of these things there is love, and it makes no sense to me to let mistaken identifications create anger within my heart. There are many things for which I’m grateful to my sannyas days, it’s all part of living an examined life.
C’est la vie (such is life)…
On the three P’s that Pythagoras spoke of: Purification, Preparation, Perfection.
“Then purification…In preparation you drop the conditionings which were given by the society, prejudices which were given to you or caught by you from the surroundings; it was borrowed knowledge in some way or other. You go like a child – but even the child is not pure. That is something very significant to understand, because people take it for granted that the child is pure.
He is certainly innocent, but his innocence is equivalent to ignorance, and behind his innocence are all his feelings: anger, hatred, greed, jealousy. You can see, children are very jealous. If one child has a doll, the other becomes so jealous that they will start fighting. If some child has something, then the other child also wants to have it. They are very competitive. Even in the family, children have a hierarchy, and they are constantly fighting to be higher than others. Whatever is needed to be done…if obedience makes them the most loved in the family, they will follow obedience. But they are not following obedience; they are really trying a power strategy.
So preparation simply takes away the layers that society has put on your mind. But you have brought with nature, with your birth, so many ugly instincts, that a purification is needed.”
( Osho, ‘Beyond Psychology’ )
Lokesh said, “the few sannyasins I occasionally meet rarely talk about Osho. ”
Well then, should we talk about Osho? Yesterday I came across a question in ‘Beyond Psychology’ (Discourse 31, Q2) in which Osho talked about his attempt to open his heart to us and give us a taste for the truth beyond mind, to make us into seekers of truth. He was a rare man, to kindle the spiritual search in so many.
I know there are a few questionable things you can lay at his door as well, but I feel I don’t understand his state of mind and being well enough to form any kind of judgement about him. There are many stories about the enlightened, and how in that state different human energies like sex become more intense.
For me, I grew up as a sannyasin kid, but the question of truth only arose many years later when I was 39 years old. It was only then that I experienced a first spiritual breakthrough, and spent years on the search. Returning to Osho, reading other spiritual masters, and returning again…
What does it mean “talking about Osho”?
It means talking about your experience with Osho and how your mind interprets it. So at the end, it is not about Osho, but about your mind.
My spiritual search started early.
I still remember that I did do a report about Sri Aurobindo in religious education at school.
You actually had religious education at school?! I never had such a class…I did have ‘Theory of Knowledge’ for just an hour every two weeks, which was sort of philosophy.
Yes, he was a Catholic religious teacher who was open-minded towards other directions.
NP writes, “I grew up as a sannyasin kid.”
Everyone on this blog knows that already, because you have told us dozens of times. That is called repeatedly repeating yourself.
NP, perhaps it is time to drop telling people you grew up as a sannyasin kid, because you are constantly referring to something that happened decades ago. We all grew up somewhere, but we do not need to keep telling people about it.
That’s fine too, we can talk about other things if you prefer. Let’s talk about recent history then, do you still consider yourself a seeker after truth? Besides psychedelics, do you still have a practice that you follow?
I do meditate, in short sessions of ‘just sitting’ or watching the breath, not more than 20 minutes at a time. Some days two sessions, some days none.
I got a good tip from a fellow sannyasin, which was to breathe as naturally as possible but to watch the outgoing breath and let the incoming breath just happen by itself. I had a very good session of that this morning, which left me in a beautiful space.
I find it surprising how a small tweak like that can completely change the essence of a meditation.
I think it’s not a good idea to only meditate in sessions. You have to spread it throughout the day, when it happens.
Otherwise you only create a spiritual ego.
Who has more success?
Tell us about your meditation experiences, Satchit. What kind of a practice do you follow?
I don’t do a special practice.
Sometimes I watch my breath or I watch nature, if it happens.
Practice is a doing. How can you find being by doing?
Understanding has to grow, and the rest will follow.
One of my favourite Tolle quotes…
“Someone recently showed me the annual prospectus of a large spiritual organisation. When I looked through it, I was impressed by the wide choice of interesting seminars and workshops. It reminded me of a smorgasbord, on of those Scandinavian buffets where you can take your pick from a huge variety of enticing dishes. The person asked me whether I could recommend one or two courses. “I don’t know,” I said. “They all look so interesting. But I do know this,” I added. “Be aware of your breathing as often as you are able, whenever you remember. Do that for one year, and it will be more powerfully transformative than attending all of these courses. And it’s free.”
( Eckhart Tolle, ‘A New Earth’ )
Dutch people get surprisingly enthusiastic when something is “free”, they call it ‘een koopje’, a bargain. Did you know grocery shopping in the Netherlands is about 10% more expensive because the supermarkets have to fund special ‘koopjes’ on select products, so that Dutch grocery shoppers can go bargain hunting? It’s like a national sport…
Anyway, I have decided to follow Eckhart’s advice, and am going to spend a year being aware of my breath. For ease of counting I’m going to count the year from the 1st of September. But the first day has been a great success, it’s been a great clearing out of energetic processes in my lower mental regions. It’s like I became aware of a different higher form of awareness, very light, very airy…wonderful!
Well, it is good that you follow Eckhart’s advice, because it is good advice. That said, many teachers from Patanjali to Vivekananda have been recommending being aware of one’s breath for, in some cases, over two thousand years. It is certainly a great practice that yields results, if that is the correct way of putting it.
NP concludes with, “It’s like I became aware of a different higher form of awareness.”
Okay, but what about your homework? You have read Nisadagadata; therefore, you must know that the idea is to enquire who or what it is that is aware of the higher form of awareness. That way, you take your meditation to a different level.
It might sound simple, but if you practise this, you can arrive at a place where there is only awareness with no one to witness it.
I am currently reading a book by a Zen master. It is hard going because I only understand about 3% of what the master is explaining, even though it is written in straightforward language, which leaves me feeling like a complete novice in these matters.
What book is it?
‘Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind’?
Erm…
Intriguing…is it a book by Zuangzi (Chuang Tzu)?
Chuang Tzu was a Taoist.
The book in question is…
In some places it is said that Tao is halfway to Zen….
A review on Goodreads:
“Great complement to the ‘Zen Teaching of Huang Po’ and the ‘Zen Teaching of Bodhidharma’. Enjoyed the second half more than the first half. Don’t read these if you’re brand new to Zen or Buddhism; they’ll sound like nonsense and could turn you away. But if you’ve been practising for a while, you won’t find anything better than these 3 books.”
Surely enquiring who is aware of the breath is involving the mind in the energy of breath? For me, the breath in the first instance is an experience which points to a larger scope of Being.
Nisargadatta’s enquiring leads me to the mind searching for the witness. And witnessing is a process of retreat from Being, separating ‘what is’ into observed and observer… witnessing is in essence dualistic, whereas Being is not.
Anyway, it is a good idea to do what feels right. I got a lot from my first day of being continually aware of the breath. Maybe I will eventually reach such a point of awareness where there is no observer, but I feel there is a lot of energetic confusion to be shed first…
Zen masters generally know the art of being impenetrable. Often you have to have experienced what they are talking about before they become clear.
Tolle calls “watching the breath” a portal. Reminds me of these old Stargate movies, lol.
See it whatever way you wish, NP. It is up to you.
Just happened on an Eckhart video where – if I’ve understood correctly – he states that it’s not necessary to become aware of the ‘separate’ one who is aware, it’s the awareness that is aware of itself:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qmx53mdiQ6k – See from around 12 mins.).
Good if the awareness is aware of itself, because then there is no duality.
Hey, did I upload before these four Osho-On-AI clips before?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9bUjaKQjRRE
Lipsync added to it we might see some kind of artificial lectures…
With ‘Suno’ you can quickly “create” songs – Rick Beato surprisingly inspired with this short presentation: https://www.facebook.com/reel/2842699555898926
Tried a little by myself with just two cost-free 5 and 10 sec. videos by ‘Kling’ because I just wanna try and don’t pay for more. At least I prolonged these short snippets at the beginning and the end. Original lyrics of Hermman Hesse “sung” by Suno prompting for folky J.S. Bach. I got eight songs and choose this version:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zwdjTc0bs9w
It’s very interesting, the difference between conscious breathing and merely watching the breath. When you breathe consciously, the rhythm and depth of the breath changes, becomes deeper, more forceful. Just watching the breath, on the other hand, is like sneaking up on a very subtle phenomenon.
I’ve had some beautiful moments where I have been able to watch a conscious breath descend from the throat all the way to the belly. Looking forward to seeing how it evolves.
Maybe your mind creates a difference where there is none, NP. Difference between being conscious of breathing and watching the breath? Who is watching the breath?
And maybe you’re just not observant enough to see the difference for yourself, Satchit.
There is no maybe. But certainly the ego wants discussion before giving up.
Osho called it totality, when there is no doubt.
Satchit, you always post such silly sayings, I wonder if you’re not a bot…
That’s right, NP.
I’m a bot from Sagittarius A.
Happy fool moon!
Glad to see you’rw not taking things seriously, Satchit.
Yeah, why not?
I have heard from the viewpoint of the essence, it’s all a play.
It seems to me that prayer has much to do with finding harmony in a chaotic system. You may feel chaos in the energy around you, and start with supporting the good elements, and finding actions that harmonise with that.
I came across this video of a prayer set to music this morning…
https://youtu.be/VhuW8xhcbUA
“There are three words that convey the secret of the art of living, the secret of all success and happiness: One With Life. Being one with life is being one with Now. You then realise that you don’t live your life, but life lives you. Life is the dancer, and you are the dance.”
( Eckhart Tolle, ‘A New Earth’ )
I thought this was a beautiful quote about non-resistance, surrender and going with the flow. Usually resistance leads to conflict and increased suffering, and not to peace and bliss. Truly being one with life is an art, because it is not always obvious.
I came across an interview between Waduda and Devageet on Osho News, about how Devageet came to meet Osho. I also saw that his book ‘Osho: The First Buddha in the Dental Chair’ was freely available as a pdf to download, and I’ve paged a little through it. It triggered some thoughts…
When Devageet came to Osho to talk about staying in the commune, he had a wife and children. He asked Osho whether he should try to convince her to come, and Osho said, “Just give her everything: the house, the money… that will convince her that something truly out of the ordinary has happened to you.” Powerful advice. In any case, Devageet seems to have turned out to be a real disciple.
What happened with Swami Anand Yatri was something similar, but this time without Osho’s words. He also offered his wife everything he had before leaving, including sole ownership of the house, although they had four children together.
It makes me wonder whether those sannyasins who did that, gave up a family and a house and a life together to go to India and become sannyasins, whether they felt happy about it, and what happened to the families?
Lily Dunn’s father was also one of these, and she wrote a book called ‘Sins of My Father’ about her experiences. She wasn’t happy about it and the book turned out to be largely negative about Osho’s movement.
I think it depends on oneself.
If one co-operates with the loss then the loss can become a blessing. If one does not co-operate, then the loss becomes hurtful.
I think it is interesting how few of the positive books about Osho’s movement have gotten any publicity. Books like Sam’s ‘Life of Osho’, or Ojas’s ‘Kan een gekooide vogel zingen?’, or this book by Devageet detail people’s extraordinary lives with Osho, but what gets the publicity seems to be the negative stories.
Admittedly, even books like Sarito Carroll’s ‘In the Shadow of Enlightenment’ about her sexual abuse in Rajneeshpuram sell in fairly small numbers, I heard from her, even though she was on the podcast circuit and was reviewed in The Guardian. It would be interesting to know how well Lily Dunn’s book sold.
I find it amazing that people don’t know more about Osho’s movement, because for a while it was the largest alternative spiritual movement worldwide. ‘Wild, Wild Country’ gave it a moment in the sunshine, but it never really told the whole story of Osho’s movement.
Does it mean that there are so few people outside of India on a truly spiritual path? In India and Nepal there has been some renewed interest in Osho, which I find encouraging.
I don’t know if there is room inside one head for more than one obsession, the spiritual path or modern technology. I think a lot of young Western people are making contact with technology at a tender age and are drawn in by games and social media, and then get education on top, and there is so much going on inside their heads that there is no room for anything else.
It’s like the story of the Zen Master and the cup of tea: no more will go in! In fact, modern people need to spend time emptying their minds, dropping their habits, letting things go. Then maybe they will be able to contact an authentic way of Being, a spiritual impulse for this century.
… when Nityaprem was still a baby …
I read the news today (oh boy) and was again reminded of this beauty of a song and the photos…Those Hippie trails and trips happened just a little bit before the big wave to Poona, but dope was around (not in) the ashram as well, of course not to the same amount and importance. But Danish Devam in our second last village at the riverside smoked every day with his friends and even shared acid to those still willing to experience “Instant Nirvana”.
In the early Hippie Days Osho was only known to Indians, but even later on a few moving waves from psychedelics to meditation moved all the time. Goa, for example, was a well known step backwards, if still needed to be lived…’
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puLMfz5M2bg
I enjoyed the photos in the song’s video very much, it’s not so often that you get to see sixties and seventies Kathmandu before hordes of scooters and tourists descended on it.
…when Nityaprem still was a baby…
I read the news today (oh boy) and was again reminded of this beauty of a song. I also loved to watch the photos included.
Those Hippie trails and trips happened just a little bit before the big wave to Poona, but dope was still around (not in) the ashram, of course not to the same amount or importance. But Danish Sw. Devam, in our second-last village at the riverside, smoked every day with his friends and even shared acid with those still willing to experience: “Instant Nirvana”.
In the very early Hippie-Days Osho was only known to Indians mostly, but later on some of those seekers from psychedelics to meditation again moved backwards – to Goa, for example ~ but that maybe was still needed to be lived.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=puLMfz5M2bg
Just another fragmented piece ot the puzzle for Nitya’a childhood?
https://www.oshonews.com/2025/09/11/an-unusual-school-outing/
I wasn’t there for these kinds of outings, I was only in the Poona One ashram for about three months when I was seven years old and was never part of the no-school. Mostly I climbed trees and sat on the branches with a stack of comic books.
“Without finding the centre you cannot whirl. The body goes on whirling, but the whirling has to happen on a centre; so slowly, slowly he becomes aware of the centre. After thirty-six hours of continuous whirling, Rumi became absolutely clear about his centre. That was his experience of the ultimate, the fourth. Then his whole life he was not doing anything but teaching whirling to people. It will look absurd to a Buddhist, it will look absurd to any other religion — because, what you can get out of whirling? It is a simple method, the simplest method, but it may suit you or it may not.”
( Osho, ‘Beyond Psychology’ )
I thought this was an interesting comment on methods, that they may suit you or they may not. I think it is the same with being conscious of the breath, I have found it fun to approach it with friendliness and care. I’m now two weeks into my Year of Meeting the Breath, and there have been some good moments. I’m managing to remember to become conscious of the breath at various times throughout the day.
The question is really how long to persist with a method. Osho says whirling wasn’t suitable for him because “even to sit on a swing makes him nauseous”, but he did once advise Yatri to try whirling and he enjoyed it and got quite good at it. I don’t think Yatri did it for a year, he likely stopped when it got busy in the design department.
But that is the beauty of Eckhart’s advice to become conscious of the breath, it is very accessible and easy to persist with.