Was Osho Wrong About Drugs?

Gangaji, a new contributor to Sannyas News,  discusses whether Osho was “naive” about drugs, contrasting his attitude with that of Sadhguru.

Question: WAS OSHO WRONG ABOUT DRUGS?

He seemed to think scientists could create drugs without the negative side-effects.
A bit naive. And then he never discussed whether people would repeatedly abuse those ‘side-effect-free’ drugs.

Osho complained that he had to stop touching people’s third eyes – because people would not meditate anymore, and just wait for Osho to touch their third eye.

Would people do the same with ‘side-effect-free’ drugs: stop meditating and just take the drugs?

And how would they create drugs without negative side-effects? The pharmaceutical companies research for decades and they cannot create the simplest medicines without negative side-effects. Even aspirin is dangerous. Anything chemical will destroy your body.

Here is the Osho quote: http://oshosearch.net/Convert/Articles_Osho/The_Last_Testament_Volume_2/Osho-The-Last-Testament-Volume-2-00000002.html

Q:
WHAT ARE YOUR THOUGHTS ON THE DRUG PROBLEM IN THE NORTH AMERICAN SOCIETY – COCAINE USAGE, MARIJUANA?

OSHO:
In fact, all the governments should help the scientists to find better drugs with lesser side-effects, rather than repressing drugs. It is stupid. Whenever you start stopping something you give great importance to it, and particularly to the youth. It becomes a provocation. The government is responsible for all young people who are being destroyed by drugs. There is no need.

All these governments should make an effort that better drugs are available, which give you more euphoria, more joy, and no side effects. Now science is capable of doing it.”

Nope, science is not capable of creating paracetamol that does not destroy your body.

I’ve also been reading Sadhguru’s view on drugs. In my opinion, Sadhguru’s energy is nowhere near what Osho’s energy is. But he is a wise man with profound insights. Some say he is stealing Osho’s ideas. I see him as continuing Osho’s work. He is influencing a lot of people.

Here is Sadhguru’s view on drugs, which is more profound than what Osho said:
https://isha.sadhguru.org/global/en/wisdom/article/getting-high-spiritual-process

Is Getting High a Spiritual Process?

Q:
CAN TAKING DRUGS BECOME AN AID TO THE SPIRITUAL PATH?
WHAT ABOUT PLANT-BASED SUBSTANCES LIKE AYAHUASCA AND MARIJUANA? ARE THEY FAIR GAME FOR THE SPIRITUAL SEEKER?

SADHGURU:
In New York City, they say that 70 per cent of the population drinks regularly, and another 20 per cent binge drink. Though this is the state of the people who live in New York everybody wants to go there.

Why an individual, or a society, or a nation seeks affluence is because, at the first stage, it means a choice of nourishment. At the second stage, affluence means a choice of lifestyle. In an affluent nation like the US, which has achieved an enormous choice of nourishment and lifestyle, seventy percent of the population is on prescription medication. Another thirty percent buys it off the backstreets, of course. America has a healthcare bill of over three trillion dollars for three hundred million people.

When there is such a choice of nourishment and lifestyle, health should be a natural outcome. If it is not happening that way, we need to look at this. Because this is not just about America; everybody will get there. America has become the aspiration, so everybody is rapidly working to get to that place and get sick!

For example, in India, 40 to 50 years ago, when people were looking to get their daughters married, they would say, “Oh, in that house they drink alcohol. We will not marry our girls into that family.” But today, if you do not serve drinks, nobody will come for your wedding! This is the change that has happened in fifty years all across the world.

A False Sense of Expansion
Essentially, we are reaching a place where to be healthful we need chemicals, to be peaceful we need chemicals, to be joyful we need chemicals, and to be ecstatic they have “Ecstasy!”

Why are people going towards using some kind of chemical to create an inner experience?Whether it is marijuana, ayahuasca, wine, whiskey, cocaine, LSD or whatever, it breaks down resistance and makes you feel free for some time. Let us say somebody is doing meth; he is having such fantastic experiences that he cannot leave it. Because people are so constipated in their heads, it takes a chemical to loosen them up a little bit. What you need to understand is, it is coming at the cost of lowering your faculties. Do you believe you can heighten your life by lowering your faculties?

The chemical may give you a sense of expansion within yourself, but it is a false sense of expansion. If you are thinking in terms of, “Well, it gave me a possibility that I saw I can expand,” it may serve that purpose. But once you start doing it, you start lowering your faculties over a period of time. After some time only the drug will be left.

If something works, it should work every day. Do ayahuasca every day and see what happens. At that moment it might have broken down your limitations and your resistance, and you might have felt something, you may have accessed something. But will that make it happen for you all the time? No. Only if you pop a pill you feel like this, once it is not there, nothing. You will become a one-trick pony.

The problem is not just that a chemical damages the body and may kill you; the real problem is that it gives you a false sense of freedom – all it is giving you is compulsiveness, addiction.

If you just climbed a mountain peak and stood there, for one moment suddenly something fantastic may happen, but it will not last. Whether it is a mountain or medicine, it will not last. The question is not about how big your experience is; the question is the transformation it leaves. Please observe the people who have gone through such chemical use – are they really transformed? Does it enhance perception in such a way that you have access to all aspects of life? No. Generally, they only have a big experience to go on bragging about to everybody.

A Different Kind of Pleasantness
If there was no pleasantness in drugs or drink, people would not have gone that way. But the pleasantness attached to it is such that in spite of the warning on the wrapper that “Cigarette smoking is injurious to health”,still people are smoking, whatever the consequences may be.

This body is the most sophisticated and complex chemical factory on the planet. When somebody gives you such a complex machinery, would you not manufacture what you want? Right now you are busy manufacturing unpleasantness because you do not know how to manage this human system. If you manage this well, you will produce that kind of pleasantness within you that you would not want to touch anything else. Because just being alive is such a fantastic thing. Unfortunately, we did not teach people any other way to know pleasantness, so they are taking to chemicals.

Forcefully trying to get people out of that pleasantness has not worked. You must offer them a pleasantness which is beyond that. Human consciousness is beyond all these things. The most empowered thing in the universe is consciousness. You are trying to believe that a leaf, a fruit, a chemical, or a drink could be better than that. If you could simply sit here and be absolutely blissed out, you would not smoke, drink or pop anything, because there is more chemistry within the system than you can get from any of these.

If you become conscious of how the human system functions, naturally you will create the highest level of pleasantness for yourself. The question is only: have you explored this possibility?

Saving the Future Generations
With this movement of trying to create an inner experience with external help – I think if we don’t do anything significant in the next 15 to 30 years, 90 per cent of people will be on chemicals. If all of us go on chemicals to create experiences for ourselves, then the next generation that we produce will be less than us. This is a crime against humanity. The next generation should always be one step ahead of us.

Also, looking at the way the human mind is, if this chemical usage goes out of control, you should not be surprised at all if in another 60 to 75 years’ time, a huge percentage of the population starts committing suicide. Because a human being doesn’t need just pleasure; he needs a purpose. One thing that happens to you with chemical usage is you have pleasure, but you lose a sense of purpose. When this happens, you will see the suicide rate in the world will increase enormously.

We should not let that happen. For this, the only solution is that we create a conscious human being. Raising human consciousness is most important.”
Osho has a powerful energy, but was naive about many things. Sadhguru does not have such powerful energy, but he has wisdom and humbleness. Even though he is an Indian with a white beard like Osho, and some of his talking points resemble Osho’s – if you actually read what he says, he speaks with spontaneity and does not actually imitate Osho.

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136 Responses to Was Osho Wrong About Drugs?

  1. frank says:

    Gangaji, I don`t really see why you assume that “Indian men with white beards” will know more about drugs than the next guy!

    Best to talk to people who have experimented with these things rather than take it on from someone on the basis of ethnicity, facial hair and some kind of assumed rank.

    SD wrote here a while back that Sadhguru once attended a football match at the Arsenal. Does his facial hair status mean that you would ask him whether it would be better to play five at the back and a lone striker or crowd the midfield?

    No, you`d ask a footballer!

  2. swami anand anubodh says:

    QUESTION:

    Master Anubodh, will drugs help my spritual progress?

    ANSWER:

    I don’t know, I have never taken drugs.

    Why don’t you go away and take some, then come back and tell me if they do.

  3. Kavita says:

    Gangaji, you could have researched on Osho’s take on the same question too. Anyway, welcome to Sannyasnews.

  4. Levina says:

    He is right about going after pleasant experiences, with drugs or without. Who wants pain or discomfort? I don’t; and with me, many people, I guess. So after the pleasant feeling has worn off, back in the discomfort again, with the desire to get rid of that.

    I think, for myself and others, that it is a good teacher and it’s so obvious now worldwide, the pleasantness and horror are seen in all its variations. As for myself, I’m quite weary of the whole thing, but also the dawning that the one who I think I am has little or no control over that.

    • satyadeva says:

      Wealth, fame and talent doesn’t equate to a problem-free life (as if we didn’t already know, but maybe worth reiterating). And some drugs can help.

      From today’s online ‘Guardian’: (UK newspaper) article on Carly Simon (American singer, now 74):

      “Simon would call (Jackie) Kennedy regularly from rehab while dealing with anxiety and depression, which have haunted her as long as she can remember. She starting taking Prozac in 1989 to help her deal with a fear of flying and nerves when she was up for an award at the Oscars; fortunately, her category was up first, and she won, for the ‘Working Girl’ theme song ‘Let the River Run’ (she also sang ‘Nobody Does It Better’ for the 1977 James Bond film ‘The Spy Who Loved Me’).

      But Simon continued taking medication, including those not necessarily prescribed for depression, but which “changed my consciousness”. She admits now: “I have a special interest in pills. They have a certain effect on me in the same way that little candies would. If I want to change my consciousness, especially if I have a terrible headache, there’s something very promising about taking a pill. I developed a relationship with them as if there was something more secretive about it than there really is. Now I take pills in front of people or not in front of people.”

      When recovering from breast cancer, she took the opioid OxyContin for about two years but, unlike millions of Americans, did not become addicted. There have been other drugs. “Is cocaine readily being done still, I wonder? I’ve done it four times, on my gums, and I loved it. I thought I was so wonderful. It made me feel confident. It made me lose all of my self-consciousness. I just thought: ‘My God, I’m not worried about how I’m coming across.’ I was actually recording, but it wasn’t on stage.”

      Simon has seen a radical shift in attitudes towards drugs during her lifetime. She is adamant: “They should all be legalised. It makes it much more attractive to the wrong people if it’s not legal. It makes the price soar. If prohibition hadn’t happened, it wouldn’t have created some of the alcoholics.”

      Alcoholism played a part in the breakdown in 1983 of her decade-long marriage to Taylor, she says. “I was too young. I think we were both too young to understand what the disease of alcoholism was like. He was blinded by the force of the alcohol and the other drugs he was high on.

      “I didn’t know how to deal with it. If I had been stronger, I would have done. I tried so many different things and I was wrong about at least half of them. I was wrong about saying you can never do that again or it doesn’t matter, I’ll do it with you. Every turn I took seemed to be the wrong turn, but I tried really hard and so did he. He really tried hard.” ”

      Extract from https://www.theguardian.com/music/2019/oct/31/carly-simon-on-turning-down-donald-trump-i-thought-he-was-kind-of-repulsive

  5. satchit says:

    Hello Gangaji,
    Btw, are you this Gangaji? https://gangaji.org/

    There is a difference between Osho and Sadhguru:
    Osho is a Master and Sadhguru is a teacher.

    A Master cannot have an attitude, because he is not against anything. Maybe you think you can find an attitude in his words, but it is just your mind that creates an attitude because it picks something out of his words.

    • shantam prem says:

      “Osho is a Master and Sadhguru is a teacher.”
      Best available drug is blind following.
      Boys compare the size, I assume girls too, and followers for sur: who is master, who is teacher.

      Satchit, your master is no more. Their teacher is here and now.

      • frank says:

        I feel we should all calm down and say a new age prayer together.
        The congregation shall kneel and say after me:

        There are myriad paths that lead up the mountain
        Yet, I am more humble than you
        I have dismantled more of my ego than you
        I am more aware than you
        I have surrendered more than you
        I have less ego than you
        My guru is better than your guru
        My guru is a master, yours is a teacher
        My guru is an orchestra
        Yours is a penny-whistle guy
        My yoga is more powerful than yours
        My spiritual practice works better than yours
        My consciousness is bigger than your consciousness,
        My no-mind is bigger than your mind.

        Amen. Hari Om. Shalom. Alleluia. Swaha. Yahoo!

      • satchit says:

        And what, Shantam? There are still many who fall in love with him after his leaving the body.

        Why? Because a Master is a Master is a Master.
        A teacher is basically a moralist.

  6. swami anand anubodh says:

    QUESTION:
    Beloved Master Anubodh,
    Osho says: Paracetamol can destroy the body – is that true?

    ANSWER:
    I don’t know, hold on…let me read the instructions on the packet…it says…”Do not exceed recommended daily dosage”. Yeah, presumably it can. Best use nitrous oxide instead then.

  7. Lokesh says:

    First conversation I ever had with Osho was about LSD. He concluded by giving me a piece of advice, which I followed. It was just what I needed to hear and it got me where I needed to go. I did not always follow the advice Osho gave me. To keep things in perspective, I might add that in one particular instance, when I actually asked for advice, I ended up doing quite the opposite of what Osho suggested and in retrospect I did the right thing.

    Osho had little or no experience with mind-altering drugs at the time. Perhaps this is part of the reason he later got into nitrous oxide and valium. Inexperience.

    As for Sadhguru, well, he certainly comes across like a nice guy who studied Osho vids to pick up performance tips. As for his take on drugs, I did not bother to read it because I am sure I have heard it all several times before.

    If you are in the spiritual peddling business, drugs are bad news as far as career gurus are concerned. With the dawn of some of the new psychoactive plant compounds that are floating about in hyper-space, gurus are right to be worried, because these substances pose serious competition to their age-old business interests. Even more so because most gurus, like Osho, have little or no actual experience in the use of psychedelics and therefore do not actually know what they are talking about. More than anything else, what gurus have to say about drug use is based in common sense, a commodity that is becoming increasingly rare in our mixed-up world.

    Until quite recently, psychoactive substances were relegated to the same place as gurus in my life, namely the distant past. I just was not interested in altered states, or satsangs for that matter. A been there, done that to the max, kind of attitude. And then, two years ago, everything changed.

    The change began when a wandering shaman contacted me through Facebook, of all places. Weeks passed and the South American shaman visited Ibiza. We hooked up in a local cafe and sat chatting and drinking coffee all afternoon. Towards the end of our conversations the shaman suggested we meet up the following day so that we could share a psychoactive plant compound experience together. By this time I had grown to like the man, a world traveller who wanders the road less travelled, very quirky sense of humour etc., but above all I felt a definite soul brother connection.

    20 hours later we are seated together by a crackling campfire in a remote section of forest. I asked what the drill was and followed the shaman’s instruction. Boy oh boy, was I in for a surprise. I trusted the shaman, and the shaman trusted that I would be able to handle a heroic dose of Garaguru.

    The plant compound had originated in the Amazon basin and had been created by a bio-chemical wizard. It hit me almost instantly. The campfire threw up some sparks and the crackling sound brought me into a ancient space where time no longer existed. I was a caveman at the dawn of human existence and I hoped to fuck there weren’t any sabre-toothed tigers around. The rocks circling the fire looked like a tribe of toads with big, black, shiny eyes…focused on me. “Wow!” I exclaimed. Everywhere I looked there were geometric designs formed by triangles with little black dots at their centres, I was coming up on the nose cone of a Garaguru interdimensional rocket.

    A group of four pine trees leaned towards me and began singing to me. I am not a tree hugger, but in that moment I thought hugging a tree would be a brilliant thing to do, but I could not move from the spot. Garaguru had nailed me to the forest floor. My ego and mind just disappeared and for several minutes, that seemed like an eternity, it was a simple case of consciousness inhabiting a body, earth suit, in order to experience the wonder of its creation. Tears streamed from my eyes. It was so beautiful it was overpowering.

    Garguru has a feminine nature that is benign in the extreme. She will teach you what you need to learn and all you have to do is respect her spirit. I closed my eyes and witnessed fantastic visuals in colours and complexity that were beyond anything in my experience. I opened my eyes and looked over to the shaman. He nodded and smiled. He had also taken the garaguru. I felt that I had known him for a thousand lifetimes and I knew that he felt the same way. “Man”, I gasped, “it’s so good to see you again.” He chuckled and said, “Likewise.” We burst out laughing. It was a beautiful moment that I treasure.

    Now then, with such amazing things being made available to us, who needs an Indian guru to tell us what’s up. In my opinion, the whole mystic Hindu trip is up the Ganges without a paddle. It is over. For me, at least. You do not need to go to an ashram in filthy India to find something higher in your life. You can find that in your back garden, if you have the courage to take the jump into dimensions beyond the known.

    I listen to people talking about their connection to Osho and think, “It is all in your mind, man.” Many of these people have no idea that there are fascinating plant compounds around that will give you a hell or a heaven alot more powerful spiritual experience than some supposed connection with a dead guru. That is a fantasy. I would say that even when a guru is alive a lot of what is experienced by disciples is fuelled by fantasy. I am basing that on personal experience. Gurus are the perfect screens for projection. Not good, not bad, just the way it is.

    Why are these substances surfacing at this particular juncture in time? I reckon that the planet is a highly intelligent…ehm…planet. We are an invasive, intelligent and extremely dangerous species. We are completely fucking up the environment that we need to exist. How stupid can an intelligent species get? In a last effort the planet is making available substances which, when ingested, bring a revelation as to the nature of the absolute interconnectedness of biological life on this planet. This is no pie in the spiritual bullshit. These substances produce a powerful emotional impact that bring with it the awareness that we are the caretakers of Earth who have fallen asleep on the job. It is wakey, wakey time. The hour is getting late.

    Listening to Sadhguru and Osho is all very well, but it is not going to bring about the radical shift in consciousness that is needed to save our environment going down the fucking tubes. We need to get active before we become radioactive. We need something stronger and what I suggest is that the new teacher plant compounds might well be a part of it. So as to what Osho and Sadhguru have to say about drugs is of no interest to me because existentially they do not have a clue what they are talking about.

    • satyadeva says:

      GANGAJI wrote a series of posts on this general topic. Here’s another (originally two separate posts):

      There was a story on sannyasnews, written by Ma Yogini. She met Osho in early days in Bombay, but she left him in order to live in the Amazon and do ahyuasca.

      This is the article:
      http://sannyasnews.org/now/archives/8251

      Instead of staying with Osho, she went to the Amazon, and did ayahuasca for years. She can rationalize it any way she wants, but from her story it is obvious that the danger of wanting to repeat a spiritual experience by abusing drugs is real.

      In the article, Ma Yogini also describes taking LSD many times:

      “I returned to Goa and, after a beautiful LSD trip, which I had by then tried several times, I decided to go and see Bhagwan, having by that time decided he was my master.”

      “I met up with friends and we travelled by road to Iquitos in Peru. It was there that I tried 5-MeO-DMT for the first time. It made my LSD trips seem like weak tea. Somebody present told me that I screamed non-stop for five minutes. I do not recall that. But I do recall understanding that I was a part of everything that exists. I understood for the first time what enlightenment is.”

      By taking some drugs, she understood what enlightenment is.
      Right….

      I saw a documentary about Amazonian tribes.

      When boys turn 14, they are given a consciousness enhancing drug. When they realize they are consciousness, and they experience expanded consciousness, they don’t view life the same way.

      They cannot just live for food and sex. They realize there is much more than the material world.

      The problem with these mushrooms – if every 14 year old takes this drug — they will want to repeat the experience – and there is a risk that a lot of members of the tribe become drug addicts.

      The shamans solved this problem by mixing this drug with some plants that make you puke and feel nauseous. This way, the boys don’t want to repeat the experience.

      They’ve had a glimpse into expanded consciousness, but the side-effects were so bad – they won’t want to take drugs again.

      They can now do sweat lodge, or vision quest, or trance dance – if they want to repeat the experience.

      These shamans avoid the problem of addiction by creating more bad side-effects (rather than less side-effects, as Osho suggests). The concoction is mixed by the shamans, so only they know the secret.

      • frank says:

        Ode to the best hit

        You might wait for the next joint to get lit,
        or sink another glass of gin and it.
        You might take a trip on that magic swirling ship
        or go to the doc to get a new scrip.
        Yes, you can take happy pills if you want to stay legit,
        But when you get hip to the ultimate trip
        Take a shot of sobriety, cos it`s the best hit.

        Speed keeps you up all through the night.
        Acid makes those colours a lot more bright.
        A bottle of booze blows the blues out of sight
        Take a shot of DMT and you`ve seen the light.
        But when you begin to wobble and start feeling shit
        it`s time to take a tip from a boring old git:
        and take a shot of sobriety, cos it`s the best hit.
        Yeah, before you snuff it and end up in an obit,
        and your cardiac monitor takes its final dip,
        Take a shot of sobriety, cos it`s the best hit!

      • swamishanti says:

        Earth plants such as psilocybin mushrooms, as well as other psychedelics, hold tremendous potential for experimentation.

        Actually, my own personal opinion is that people who dislike the idea of enlightened gurus experimenting with drugs are a bit like boring Beatles fans who prefer the Beatles’ earlier records to their later, deeper, more mature music which started to change and evolve thanks to lots of experimentation with lsd and other drugs.

        Psychedelics hold tremendous potential for enlightened ones, because an enlightened one has fully transcended their fear. That means no bad trips.

        I haven’t taken lsd since summer 1995, and gave up smoking ganja not much later than that.

        Gangaji has seen a documentary about tribal people but I have also seen a documentary about an Amazonian tribe who all got mashed every month on a particular day. It was an important part of their calendar.

        Osho spoke about governments creating and testing psychedelics. Well, nowadays, by the way, you can actually get paid to take a small amount of lsd and spend a week being a human guinea pig in a trial in London, if you’re in good health. So do consider becoming an in-patient if you fancy earning an easy couple of thousand quid.

        The immaturity of the U.S government and some of its citizens which greeted psychedelic drugs with fear and misunderstanding in the same way that Osho and his commune was feared, banning these things and jailing people for experimentation, is very different from the respect that these substances have in tribal cultures and older cultures such as the Indian subcontinent, where the use of these kind of things is respected and really no big deal.

        In its innocence the U.S. waged a propaganda war in an effort to scare its citizens against marijuana use, warning its youth of wild parties and debauchery, yet now it has formally recognised its health benefits and legalised it in several states.

        • satyadeva says:

          I notice I tend to feel a bit uncomfortable when I hear someone extolling the virtues of various substances because they’re used by tribal peoples. As if we westerners, living a life so far removed from the forests etc. we might as well be another species, can simply smoke a bit of dope or pop a drug into our system and ‘get back to where we once belonged’.

          Seems naive to me, even a little schizoid. But then my personal experience of drugs is limited to a couple of very mild lsd sessions, a mescaline trip and 6 weeks of almost nightly ‘grass’ after driving through Chicago & suburbs selling ice cream (all in summer ’68. Ah, those were the days, my friend! Except that all that severely undermined the TM sessions I was doing at the time, clearly demonstrating that it tended to screw up the nervous system. For this and other reasons I never took any more).

          GANJAJI has supplied this take on marijuana from Sadhguru:

          Sadhguru is even vehemently against marijuana.

          Marijuana is just a plant, not a chemical drug.
          I know people who smoke it a lot, and it makes them dull and ungrounded.

          Video
          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ULjABOwN0QQ

          Article
          https://isha.sadhguru.org/in/en/wisdom/article/shiva-weed-marijuana-enlightenment

          If you simply observe those who generally smoke, when you see them stoned they look peaceful. But if you do not give them their substance for two days, you will see how cranky they can become. You can be peaceful when you are hazy, but that peace is of no value. If you use any kind of external substance, something about you will shrink. But if you get intoxicated from within, something about you will enhance itself. That’s the big difference.

          Today, marijuana has become legal in many states in America with many big corporations bringing a variety of marijuana products to the market. Marijuana was a $10.4 billion industry in the US in 2018.

          Millions of years of evolution have brought the human being to this current level of cerebral functioning. But you do not know how to handle this capability and want to smoke yourself hazy. It is a backward step for sure. There is nothing spiritual about it.

          Another drug that used to be touted as spiritual is ayahuasca from South America. What happens is, you take it and puke out everything! If you think this is spiritual – all the best! When we were growing up, there was a brand of laxative, a loose motion oil called Kunti Kumari Bedhi Ennai. This is castor oil mixed with what is called as japalam. If someone was acting funny and freaking all the time, they would say, “You must give him Kunti Kumari Bedhi Ennai” because shit has gotten into his head. It needs to be purged through and through, which is really the fact of the matter. Some nonsense has gotten into your head, you are trying to smoke it down – no, you need Kunti Kumari Bedhi Ennai!

          https://isha.sadhguru.org/us/en/wisdom/sadhguru-spot/getting-high

          Eckhart Tolle has a similar negative view on marijuana

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c6IIAXjp5wE

          • swamishanti says:

            Personally, I think that marijuana can be helpfull spiritually for some people, others are better off without.

            It all depends on the individual of course.
            Indian spirituality has an ancient history of marijuana use.

            But it is also nice to be in a basically drug-free environment such as Osho’s ashram was.

            I used to smoke a lot at one stage but this ended pretty much entirely when I started experimenting with meditation.

            Now I haven’t had a smoke for many years.

            But no doubt these what I would call spiritual plants do hold potential. There’s an old tantric text somewhere where Shiva is talking to Parvati and recommends the use of marijuana for meditation but warns against opiates.

            I remember a documentary on an Amazon tribe where the shaman and most of the tribe would take a particular substance together, which seemed to activate certain parts of the brain. They were able to look back at certain events in their lives with heightened empathy. They believe that this particular plant takes one into an after-death space, where one’s deeds during earth life are looked at.

            • swamishanti says:

              I remember seeing that particular quote of Shiva in quite a brilliant book one of my girlfriends had about sex: lots of Indian and Taoist tantra positions, plus some interesting M + F + F combination positions.

              • satyadeva says:

                No F + M + M then? Wonder what the women thought about that!

                • swamishanti says:

                  No, not in that book.

                  It was Chinese Taoist illustrations, actually

                  I guess the author wasn’!t into F+M+M

                  Actually its not for me either. But I know some women (and men) like the idea.

                • frank says:

                  SD,
                  Women+thinking?
                  Don`t think I follow your drift there, bro.

                  Btw, I heard that those Daoist masters are so well…er…endowed that those oriental chick-disciples are just gagging for a threesome and a good bit of shangqing!!

                • Lokesh says:

                  I have visited equatorial rain forests and I must say that it is a pretty alien environment upon first entering it. Not romantic at all.

                  I find SD’s take on Amazonian tribal life is steeped in misconceptions.
                  An old friend of mine, who is a very wealthy woman, is currently living with an Amazonian tribe and it takes takes three days by boat up a small river to reach their village. Knowing her she will be absolutely loving it. I do not think she gives a shit about material comforts or being unable to use her mobile phone, and I can assure you she has the latest iphone. Something which I do not care about either. I don’t even have a mobile phone.

                  There is a good series out just now called ‘Frontera Verde’. There is one scene when a couple of Amazonian tribals sit under a a massive tree in the jungle and drink a potent brew. The scene captures the essence of what that must be like.

                  My lifestyle is a lot more tame, but does include a lot of contact with nature. Spent yesterday afternoon in a forest clearing sitting by a fire, one of my favourite activities.

                • satyadeva says:

                  Ok, Lokesh, but your friend would, I think, be the exception rather than the rule, surely?

                  Many, perhaps most people, including me, have enjoyed being out in the wilds, occasionally or for some, more often, hiking and camping, for instance, being extremely popular hobbies. A few have experienced longer periods away from (so-called) civilisation and its mod-cons and multiple distractions. But the point I’m making is that however much we love the natural world and envy ‘primitive’ peoples’ lives, for us, nurtured so very differently from the year dot, actually living as they do, full-time out there, is another matter entirely, isn’t it?

                  It’s all very well declaring how fulfilling it must be for the tribals (and how could anyone disagree with that?) who, of course, have known no other way of life, but if it’s so great, so superior to the western way, why haven’t you and Shanti, for example, already moved out to that sort of environment to live there permanently?

                  Perhaps because you know that ultimately it wouldn’t suit you, it’s too radically different, environmentally and psychically; you’d miss ‘home comforts’ etc., realising that (for the vast majority) being a respectful ‘tourist’, ie essentially still an ‘outsider’, even for a longer term, is probably the best we can realistically aim for.

                • Lokesh says:

                  I think one of the biggest tragedies in the life of modern man is the loss of contact with nature.

                • satyadeva says:

                  Completely agree – but you can keep equatorial forests, I had some experience of that environment during three years in north Borneo, in the early 2000s, and found it most uncomfortable, ie too hot, too humid, too many insects and, while ‘holidaying’ in a remote wooden hut near a river and next to a pool that was home to at least one crocodile, too muddy (the hut’s floor and ceiling had been badly damaged by recent rain).

                  In fact, my feeling over those years was that pale-skinned Europeans simply didn’t fit in that part of the world, no matter how exotic the surroundings. Just looking at them they seemed like fish out of water, ie exactly how I tended to feel, although there was some respite at night. Driving along the roads over there I was hugely thankful for the air-con.

                • frank says:

                  A lot of the ‘wise old shamans on jungle juice’ stuff seems to smack of the old ‘noble savage’ trope.

                  I have good reason to suspect that ultimately, the noble savage, like the true guru, is to be found…
                  within.

                • Kavita says:

                  After I was done with Osho commune in 2000, I existentially inherited some money during that time, I decided I just wanted to live in the nature, grow my own veggies and live a simple- comfortable life, enjoying sunrise & sunsets…

                  Lived there for seven years, living without neighbours and no one to disturb, then came a big fish who bought all the surrounding area & started to construct & bring the city life to this quaint village.

                  I somehow thought & felt this was my share of peace, which I enjoyed in totality & had to move on. So returned to our residence in Poona.

                  Did experiment living & travelling in a mountain city for three months but returned to Poona few months back. Since twelve years I have been thinking if something clicks, would take a jump!

                • satchit says:

                  “modern man has lost contact with nature”

                  Why? Nature is survival of the fittest.

                  No?

                • frank says:

                  Satchit.
                  Yes. If we survive, that is.
                  Doesn`t seem like a foregone conclusion to me.

                • satchit says:

                  Frank,
                  Mankind is as much part of Nature as the Empire of the cockroaches.

                  So Nature will survive anyway.

                • frank says:

                  That`s a relief.
                  I don`t think I`ll bother to put my recycling out this week, then.

            • satyadeva says:

              Re the Amazon tribe process (last parag.above), Shanti, no doubt that works for them. But, as I said previously, we and they are almost like two different species, their conditioning, environment, collective circumstances are entirely alien to us, and vice versa. Which includes, of course, the natural substances that grow in their area, perfectly suited, no doubt, to these people, as an integral part of their community and cultural set-up, but, I suspect, not so much to us.

              From our, shall we say, ‘over-civilised’ perspective, it can be tempting to envy, romanticise, perhaps even idealise such primitive tribes, wishing and yearning we could live as simply, or at least find some temporary relief from the wholly unnatural stress and strain of the ‘western way’ which, as we all know only too well, has caused so much damage, within and without.

              My personal choice is meditation, no drugs, but there again, I’ve got ‘Virgo Rising’! However, I’m not at all sure I’ve made much, if any, inner progress for years, other than that provided by the usual processes of ageing, so if I think one or two of the ‘new’ plant-based substances could provide a breakthrough then I might well be open to it/them, despite my reservations.

              • satchit says:

                Maybe you should stop thinking about ‘inner progress’ and ‘breakthroughs’, SD.

                Enjoy the moment!

              • swamishanti says:

                Yeah, I have no doubt that the life spending lots of time outdoors and living in harmony with nature is more healthy in many ways than the modern lifestyle and will help to avoid things such as depression.

                But some of those Amazonians will eat anything that moves, including maggots and rats, and that wouldn’t be for me. I think I would prefer the life of the North American Indians, if I had to choose. But I’m fortunate enough to live close to nature so I can enjoy that.

                Ive got Leo rising, by the way.

                • satyadeva says:

                  I’m not at all sure that any of us would like to switch for long to that sort of tribal lifestyle, whether Amazonian or North American Indian, Shanti. Just think what we’d have to give up, the multiple things and experiences we consume and that occupy our minds, eg (in no particular order of pain-through-attachment/dependency):
                  tv, internet, radio, jet travel/tourism, running water, flushing toilets and a proper sewage system, fridges, western medicine, eastern medicine (eg acupuncture), mobile phones, cd players, newspapers, cars, cafes, coffee, motor-bikes, central heating, walks in the park (!), having a nice flat/house, dating sites (!), art galleries, libraries, the lottery, sofas, spectator sports, gambling, films, comedians, singers, mattresses, musicians, western-style politics, nurturing opinions about what’s good and bad in the world, agreeing and disagreeing, speculating on the future, making financial plans, taking courses in further/continuing education, satsangs with the latest gurus/teachers – such a list could go on and on…

                  It’s no use dreaming, fooling ourselves, we’re deep in the intellectual materialist western mire, up to our necks and beyond in it. We’d surely be like fish out of water in what would amount to a ‘Stone Age’ culture, wouldn’t we?

                  .

                • frank says:

                  SD, agreed.

                  No point in becoming a plastic shaman (expression worth a google).

                  To avoid that kind of psychic colonialism (where self-styled Indians turn out to be cowboys!) we need to find our own `dreaming`, which broadly speaking is to reconnect to the right-brain world that all these old guys are obviously more in contact with it, but we have to do it in a way that acknowledges where we have got with the other part of the brain, as you point out. I think that psychedelic drugs can be a help in this process, but it’s a business fraught with traps, pitfalls and delusions, and for me the old Alan Watts dictum nails it:
                  “When you`ve got the message, hang up the phone.”

                • swamishanti says:

                  Many of the things on your list, although pretty much ‘essential’ to our 21st century lives, are actually what I call for ‘entertainment’ value.

                  They fill a hole.

                  Living close (in, right inside) nature, as the tribals do, especially very close to trees, must be deeply fulfilling.

                  I’ve some periods living outdoors, with like-minded people, and found in very healthy.

                  Just sitting around fires, talking and sometimes making music. And a good view of the stars. There was no tv (most of the time), no internet.

                  We used earth -privy or ‘shit-pits’ for toilets which are adequate, and I have also been in environments where we did have a hot shower facility in a trailer which was powered by fire in a trailer. Quite a luxury. And although I learnt during those times how to make fires easily and cook food over the fire, and also create amenities such as an ‘earth fridge’ – just a hole dug in the ground with a bin liner full of water – being below the earth keeps anything cool for a while – we did have, in some of those sites, also, some cafes which also had a stove to cook with and fridge.

                  That kind of environment can be fulfilling. When you come back into a house after living in the open in a field , it really feels like living in a box.

                  Even during periods of my life when I worked on farms to make some cash to go travelling, living in a field with a bunch of travellers who do seasonal work, a lot of those people stink but they do have that radiance which only comes from living outdoors.

                  In my case I did not want to live permanently on the road or in a field or on a mountain, cos I got into international travel too much. Airplanes are very usefull when you want to go to further shores, and work becomes necessary to afford it. Creature comforts soon become addictive, especially when you are interacting more with the regular society in a full-time job such as sales.

                  When I venture into the woods and the forest it feels nourishing , I think that our bodies feel natural at home close to trees and jungle habitats, after thousands of years of living in those environments. As humans, we are deeply connected to the earth in that way.

                  We find our connection when in those environments.

                  I think that those tribal people are nourished by their jungle environments, and their communal lifestyle , which involves lots of jungle drums, dancing , and a peak of physical fitness. They don’t need internet or tv, or any of the modern comforts that modern humans are addicted to.

                  I have heard that a lot of those people felt hopeless and lost when they tried to adapt and integrate into more modern environments.

                • swami anand anubodh says:

                  SD,
                  Maybe, there’s a native tribe out there, where members are forever extolling how much more they were “closer to nature” before this ‘fire’ thingy and that awful bow and arrow contraption came along.

                • satyadeva says:

                  Maybe so, Anubodh…

                  Sentimentalising a lost “Golden Age” either individual or collective, seems a pretty common human characteristic. As is, I suppose, more or less hopeless attempts to recreate it (including via one’s imagination).

                  But perhaps spending time by the sea or other watery spaces might help…(and not a drug in sight)…
                  https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2019/nov/03/blue-space-living-near-water-good-secret-of-happiness

                • frank says:

                  AB, I don`t know if anthropologists have ever come across that one.
                  Mind you, they have produced mixed results over the years.
                  I guess you have heard that anthropologists found tribes who apparently revealed to them that they (the tribals) had not made the link between having sex and the creation of babies.

                  That proved one thing, at least, that one characteristic has always been part of the human race from the beginning: taking the mickey!

      • Kavita says:

        I don’t remember if I have shared this on SN before; anyway, if I have, this is a fresh share! One summer afternoon of 1993, I had this urge to experience bhaang/marijuana, my boyfriend asked a friend to get some, this friend got raw laddoos/balls of this green herb from the local market.

        None of us knew how to make this, we had heard that it’s made with milk, sugar & ice, so we made the concoction. It tasted good, but we experienced extreme dryness in the food pipe after consumption. We were in a very giggly mood & every perception was very magnified!

        Later that night, my boyfriend (S) & me were sleepless, early morning we heard a cuckoo singing, I felt that it was a death song and so I told S that we held each others hands and see our self dying, but alas! We woke up after a good sleep!

        That dryness didn’t go for days, we were told by bhaang expert sannyasin couple friends that I should have added ground dry nuts in the concoction. Anyway, I decided that I would never try this again. S & I did try one more time with this couple at their place, this was a naan khatai/cookie from Kanpur, a refined form. This time there were less magnified perceptions! Anyway, I decided to never say never!

        I don’t have an urge to have any other natural/chemical drug after that! Now my only drug, if any, is having different cuisines!

        • frank says:

          Do they still sell bhang kulfi from those bicycles with ice-boxes in the street? It used to make me chuckle to see the tourist/pilgrims in Pushkar out with their families sucking on those. It seemed to make them chuckle too.

          Sadhguru mentions how normal it is to see people in India boozing at weddings and parties and so on these days.

          There was a time when booze was neither so popular or wanted. In those days the govt. bhang and ganja shops still existed.

          I was in Varanasi on Holi festival in the 70s and ventured out into the street. Pretty much everyone (men only) was stoned out of their heads on bhang, chillums going round, everyone shouting and acting out and throwing paint at each other. Like a kind of good-natured football riot. Completely bonkers. I expect that these days the cheap rum etc. has made the vibe a bit heavier. It`s sad. Poor Indian people drinking spirits is like giving them heroin.

          I bought quite a bit of tribal art when I have been to India more recently (this century). Nearly always we dealt with the women who are invariably battling the wildfire of alcohol abuse decimating their menfolk, and like the aboriginies in Australia, their art is a way of trying to reclaim their souls decimated by modernity which invariably arrives with a wave of alcohol.

          Drugs and their dealers from county lines up to big pharma are helping ruin life on this planet. You don`t need a guru to spot that.

          I used to be able to tell what people were on. Now there`s so much stuff about – legal highs/illegal highs/pharmaceuticals, I can`t keep up.

          I am seriously thinking of printing out copies of this form to give to anyone I meet in everyday life:

          Hello.
          Before we embark on a conversation or interaction of any sort whatsoever, would you please be so kind as to fill in this form, stating clearly what chemicals, drugs, legal or illegal, herbs, supplements, pharmaceutical prescription, on or off licence, entheogenic, recreational or spiritual, you are presently taking or have taken recently which may be affecting your brain function so that I can know how seriously (or not) to take anything you say.

          Thank you.

          • Kavita says:

            In KP there is a dairy which serves bhaang lassi only on Shivrtri & Holi. I have heard there are regular bhaang shops in some old local paan (betel leaf) shops.

            Actually this bhaang/chillum culture is predominantely Norh Indian (Uttar Pradesh).

            I think men are prone more to drug abuse due to all the societal pressures down the ages, just like Osho who is liberating women to a great extent, maybe there is a need for a female master to liberate men!

          • Lokesh says:

            I have always viewed tobacco and alcohol as the preferred drugs of the bourgeoisie. Both highly addictive and bad for health, and yet other more benign and life-enchancing substances are made illegal. Recently watched ‘Reefer Madness’, which is actually a pretty boring film but it does show the mindset of the thirties, and in a way, things have changed but not that much.

            I used to love smoking dope but I haven’t smoked a joint in years, because it makes me feel dopey.

            • frank says:

              I have always viewed tobacco and alcohol as the preferred drugs of the bourgeoisie.

              The bourgeoisie are now doing coke and have a pocket full of prrescriptions from the doc.
              Cabinet members, lawyers, traders, you name it…

              Both the bourgeoisie and the everyday people continue to be propped up by booze, it`s true, but becoming much more significant is the pharma stuff.

              All this stuff is foisted on the masses with characteristic ultra-capitalist hard sell/marketing.

              “I’m staying clean” is fast becoming a radical psycho-political position as well as a health issue.

              • Lokesh says:

                Yeah, I hear what you are saying, Frank. A sannyasin neighbour had major spinal problems, which led to depression. He was prescribed anti-depressants and they did the trick. He then realized that a large percentage of the population are running on pep pills. I suppose they must be. I do not really know much about these things.

            • swamishanti says:

              Yeah, that U.S. anti-marijuana propaganda campaign didn’t stop after the release of ‘reefer madness’ in the ‘30s.

              Nixon’s “war on drugs” also focused his efforts on marijauna, to which he gave priority over all the other drugs; all the protesters against the Vietnam war seemed to choose marijauna as their drug of choice.

              When Reagan came in, his wife Nancy Reagan started the “just say no to drugs” campaign.

              Reagan once declared to the nation that he believed that marijuana was probably more dangerous out of all he other drugs. Which was absolute rubbish of course.

              At the same time as trying to find ways to boot Osho out of the country and declaring his tougher stance on the evil pot-smokers, Reagan had endorsed the CIA to sell weapons to the Nicaraguan contras and supported and armed Saddam Hussein. CIA files proved that America also helped Saddam launch chemical nerve gas attacks against Iran in 1988.

              • frank says:

                Much as I agree with all you say here, Shanti, and much as my historic sympathies are in the pothead camp, full of amusing (probably selective) memories and stories of being off my bonce on cannabis in all sorts of places and spaces, fact is, I stopped taking it way back in the last century for the simple reason, eventually it was simply fucking my brain.

                Push comes to shove, all repetition of drug-taking kept me (and probably everyone) stuck where I was at best, at worst backsliding badly, emotionally, mentally and spiritually. That`s my view now. (Yes, you can be stuck without drugs too, but that`s another story).

                I don`t neccesarily find it any easier these days to hang out/hold a conversation with potheads than pissheads. They tend to be both predictable and dulled out in different ways.

                • satyadeva says:

                  SWAMISHANTI says:
                  2 November, 2019 at 7:46 pm

                  Yeah, although I was actually more into drinking than smoking spliffs in later life, I went through a period of smoking as much as I could, did it totally, enjoyed it, then grew tired of it and dropped it. I find that works well for me, doing something totally until I’ve had enough and no urge to continue.

                  I did the same thing with smoking tobacco, which I enjoyed with a passion for many years, often relishing each smoke, never concerned about health issues.

                  Then one day I just decided to quit. Which was probably inspired by my girlfriend who had managed to quit before me. I do occasionally smoke tobacco when I drink alchohol, that is the only time I really get the urge. But I am able to leave it again after that

                  But now I come to think about it, it was probably Osho’s wisdom of doing something with totality until you are ready to quit that trained me.

                • madhu dagmar frantzen says:

                  You said today, Frank: “I don´t neccesarily find it easier these days to hang out/ hold conversation with potheads than pissheads. They tend to be both predictable and dulled out in different ways.”

                  Before that, you already excluded the “bourgeoisie” and ´their habits´ of smoking tobacco, alcohol and whatnot of pharmaceutical stuff whatsoever.

                  Wondering, as watching this thread passing by, who´s left to be honoured as your communication partner?
                  And how you see yourself in that game of rating? Or others here?

                  Btw, would like that you elaborate a bit further, what is the characteristic of a “pisshead” in all that context showing up here?

                  “Goodness gracious me!” you then exclaimed (at 6:19 pm) when the idea of “goodness” was brought in as an evolutionary (inbuilt) nourishment, then and there following Lokesh with his sarcastic stance about it.

                  Topic title is ‘Was Osho wrong about drugs?’. And not the first time reading arrogant and ignorant stances of self-appointed drug-experts showing up, claiming to know it all.

                  Has almost nothing to do with the realities of the variety of a sangha around this Master and also nothing to do with the decades-long, ever-changing appearances and living of the numerous fellow-travellers that that took and is taking. Ever- changing.

                  The scene amongst those who were and are into drugs of whatsoever kind just a minor minoity in my experience over the decades.

                  Too bad!

                  Madhu

                • Lokesh says:

                  Oh oh, Nurse Madhu Ratched raising a flag on the moral high ground. Run, lads!

                  https://youtu.be/AIjSvu2GJxo

                • madhu dagmar frantzen says:

                  No, Lokesh, I´m not raising a flag here.
                  Just asking you to come to your senses!

                  Madhu

                • Lokesh says:

                  Madhu says she is requesting that I come to my senses, which normally means to begin to think in a sensible or correct way after being foolish or wrong. What a fuddy-duddy like Madhu judges to be a sensible and correct way of thinking is anyone’s guess.

                  As for being foolish or wrong, the same could apply. In a world where millions of American people believe that a man like Donald Trump is a great president and the ‘right’ man for the job it is anyone’s guess what constitutes right and wrong in Madhu’s sensible and correct mind.

                  On reading her comment I just thought, the poor old girl better keep taking her meds until she returns to her senses.

                • frank says:

                  Madhu,

                  “Pisshead” is, in colloquial English, someone who is pissed a lot. Maybe even all the time, ie a drunkard or alcoholic.

                  I notice that a small detail such as not understanding the words being used and what is being said does not stop you from taking offence!
                  Good for you!
                  That`s what makes you the Madhu we know and love!

                • Lokesh says:

                  Yes, Frank, I suppose I love Madhu because she is a truly enlightened spiritual disciple of Her Holiness Nurse Ratchet, the thirteenth incarnation of Sri Sri Fuddy-Duddy. All you need is love….

                • Levina says:

                  Frank, although it wasn’t meant for me, I feel touched by your last sentence for Madhu; what a difference it makes!

                • shantam prem says:

                  Was Osho wrong about drugs?
                  This question should be put forward to the personal physician of Osho.
                  It is the supply which changed the course of Osho´s life and his doldrum work.

                  MOD:
                  Shantam, what does “his doldrum work” mean?

                • shantam prem says:

                  Neo Sannyas as it started and where it reached is nothing more than big talk ponzi scheme. This is “doldrum”.

                  If Osho is somewhere, he would be embarrassed to leave behind one more exploitation machinery controlled by vicious, malicious office-bearers.

                • Lokesh says:

                  I reckon Shantam means that due to his indulgence in nitrous and valium Osho went downhill for a while.

                • shantam prem says:

                  Due to the too much trust over the personal physician, Osho simply lost control over His work and over His own self.

                  In the end, Osho lost his life and the physician is still living in Pune 28 years after his master patient’s demise and enjoying super luxurious surroundings with the financier-in-chief.

                  When we project spiritual master almost like a Gadot Avatara, I don´t think Cosmos rejoices. Human is the continuous creation of refinement, there is no last stop. Mostly masters forget to be human under the influence of indulgence.

                  MOD:
                  “Gadot Avatara” – please clarify, Shantam.

                • Lokesh says:

                  I think Shantam means Godot, in that he does not show up.

                • shantam prem says:

                  Yes, Godot.

                  And Godot Avatara is some person with some light, much narcissism; I mean any Indian guru of our time, including mine and yours and theirs!

                • anand yogi says:

                  Perfectly correct, Shantambhai!

                  On glorious day that Ayodhya is finally returned to rightful owners, surely now is the time to ethically cleanse white-skin alcoholic narcissistic drug-dealers enjoying super luxurious surroundings with the financier-in-chief and losing control over own self, and return glorious Pune samadhi to rightful inhabitants who hail from the hallowed and browned bowels of mighty Bhorat!

                  Certainly, Avatard Godot Chuddies O`Palak in league with Sheela Mitty is dream team to lead us to the light of Osho`s vision!

                  Yahoo!
                  Hari Om!

                • Lokesh says:

                  Yogi, the voice of sanity on SN.

                • swamishanti says:

                  “In the end, Osho lost his life…”

                  Which life are you talking about, Shantam? Surely you have heard your master tell you that enlightenment means being beyond life and death itself?

                  Plus: How is Dr Amrito possibly to blame for Osho’s ‘death’ ie ‘leaving the body’?

    • swami anand anubodh says:

      Lokesh,

      Is there any reason why Swami Anand Google has never heard of ‘Garaguru’?

  8. satchit says:

    Give me a dream!

    I dreamt I was an eagle flying.
    I dreamt I was a baby crying.

    I dreamt I was back in time.
    I dreamt this body was not mine.

    I dreamt my dream did come true.
    The cow in the garden said moo.

  9. Lokesh says:

    I think it was that gay Victorian poet who said that sobriety is the greatest intoxicant. Yes, it is up to the point that you find something greater.

    Gangaji says, “She can rationalize it any way she wants, but from her story it is obvious that the danger of wanting to repeat a spiritual experience by abusing drugs is real.”

    I do not think that many of the people who take ayahuasca are in any way abusing drugs, By its very nature it is difficult to abuse ayahuasca.

    5-MeO-DMT is the most powerful psychedelic on earth. Talked to a man down on the beach the other day. He’d taken 5-MeO-DMT three times in his life and loved it. He is a successful, well balanced, humorous and intelligent individual who does not normally take drugs or drink alcohol. To describe someone like that as a drug abuser sounds like something out of Nancy Fartpants’s useful sayings in the ‘Just Say No’ handbook. In other words, nonsense.

    I find that people I know that have tried 5-MeO-DMT are pretty courageous. If you want to research, just paste 5-MeO-DMT into the you tube search and you will find plenty of vids of people wishing to share their experiences. Randomly, I watched this one. Sweet.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1MbKh6VH8k0

    I have not tried 5-MeO-DMT and to be honest, I doubt I ever will. So, I suppose you could say I know where my limits are.

    • Levina says:

      I’ve watched Patricio Dominguez youtube videos on his experience with D.M.T, especially the one called ’1000 Years In 15 minutes’ – very interesting and clear, sober really. There are also vids where he talks about different mind-altering drugs, such as ayahuasca.

  10. shantam prem says:

    Maybe this piece fits with the contents of the string.

    One of India’s well known feminist journalists, Barkha Dutt, interviewing Sheela, one of the disciples groomed by Osho to be guiltless in every situation. She is blunt to say about prescription drugs misuse by her boss, her lover, her master.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_CSRWsiNyM&t=224s

    • Lokesh says:

      Shantam, I think you are a bit obsessed with Sheela. Really, when you watch this vid she comes across as an old lady revelling in a role that ended a long time ago. Yes, she can shed light on what was going on behind the scenes on the Ranch, but really, man, it’s history. Flogging a dead guru.

      • shantam prem says:

        Lokesh, I flog the corrupt & debauched people who surrounded Osho.

        In spite of all the philosophical and spiritual wisdom; Osho was at heart a middle-class man from small town India.

        To see the children of those who enslaved India sitting at His feet, master got too much cuddling chemicals. That ‘feel good’ drowned His Noah´s Ark.

        • Lokesh says:

          Shantam, if Osho was enlightened the fact that he came from a middle-class background is meaningless. Enlightened people still have personalities, otherwise they would be unable to function in society.

          • shantam prem says:

            No background is meaningless because they chalk out our values.

            I wonder what kind of notion or myths you have about enlightenment? Using present tense for the departed enlightened beings is one such myth. This I know you are not in agreement with.

            • Lokesh says:

              Shantam, the only thing I know about enlightenment on a personal level is that it does not interest me. I just read one of UG Krishnamurti’s books. Had not read him in decades. You got to hand it to the man, he was authentic. He also says that there is nothing you can do to become enlightened, it just happens to one in a billion. I do not think I am the one.

              Besides, the whole enlightenment number is past its sell-by date. More interesting paths to wander.

              • Shantam prem says:

                One in billion is like someone bragging about his 18cms. Third leg.
                It is freak of nature.

                In my understanding, Goodness is more evolutionary.

                • Lokesh says:

                  Goodness is more evolutionary? Ah yes…goodness me. The great goodness nourishing evolution.

                  Devageet explains:
                  The human body is an ark, a Noah’s Ark, a survival vehicle for goodness consciousness to extend, and occasionally transcend, its biological limits, moving into pure goodness. Each body’s energy is balanced by its dual polarities, negative and positive, electrically speaking, male and female in terms of gender. Each body also contains archived goodness information — coded in our cellular DNA and RNA — from the whole journey of its goodness evolution.

                • frank says:

                  Goodness gracious me!

                • frank says:

                  Don`t forget that the temporal differential we call wakefulness is the cosmic interaction of subatomic particles operating in the quantum field, the (quantum) leap represents a fundamental universal constant that we can only speculate upon in the macro scale of wave form frequencies.

  11. Kavita says:

    “Even more so because most gurus, like Osho, have little or no actual experience in the use of psychedelics and therefore do not actually know what they are talking about. More than anything else, what gurus have to say about drug use is based in common sense, a commodity that is becoming increasingly rare in our mixed-up world.”

    So this definitly means ‘to each her/his own’!

  12. shantam prem says:

    Someone has a myth, one in billion become enlightened.

    Not bad, it means somehow eight, nine enlightened people are still alive, bottle-fed by the followers.

    Most probably, seven out of these eight or nine are from the school of late Shri Osho Jain!

  13. samarpan says:

    How many maintain their levels of creativity and awareness during drug trips? Osho sat in a dental chair and enjoyed laughing gas while continuing his previous level of creativity. He provided critical commentary on 176 of his favourite books and actually created three new books while in the dental chair.

    I have spoken with people who have had over 100 sessions of “plant medicine” i.e. ayahuasca and puking. The only thing they have created is a psychological addiction to want more ayahuasca and puking.

    “With me everything is a little strange. From the dental chair, I have created three books!…What is there to fear? Chemistry is there, the body is there; I can talk — what does it matter if I am not in the body? One man is not important…but what I am saying matters. What I am saying will remain, it will stay; it is of the essence. I don’t matter. What matters is what I am saying.”

    Osho, ‘Notes of a Madman’ (series 1)

    • Lokesh says:

      Sam says, “I have spoken with people who have had over 100 sessions of “plant medicine” i.e. ayahuasca and puking. The only thing they have created is a psychological addiction to want more ayahuasca and puking.”

      Perhaps that is a simple case of speaking to certain types of ayahuasca users. I have spoken with people who have had over 100 sessions of “plant medicine” and they are highly successful and creative people.

      Personally, I do not take ayahuasca, but I keep an open mind about it. One could draw a comparison with people who spent a long time around Osho, some of them are fantastic people, some remained the same stupid people they have always been.

  14. Klaus says:

    https://dict.leo.org/englisch-deutsch/Klugschei%C3%9Fer

    Substantive

    wisenheimer auch: weisenheimer [ugs.]
    der Klugscheißer | die Klugscheißerin Pl.: die Klugscheißer [ugs.]

    smart ass auch: smart-ass, smartass (Amer.) [sl.]
    der Klugscheißer | die Klugscheißerin Pl.: die Klugscheißer

    smart-arse (Brit.) [sl.]
    der Klugscheißer | die Klugscheißerin Pl.: die Klugscheißer

    smart alec auch: smart aleck [ugs.]
    der Klugscheißer | die Klugscheißerin Pl.: die Klugscheißer [ugs.] [pej.]

    clever Dick hauptsächlich (Brit.) [ugs.]
    der Klugscheißer | die Klugscheißerin Pl.: die Klugscheißer [sl.]

    know-it-all
    der Klugscheißer | die Klugscheißerin Pl.: die Klugscheißer [vulg.]

    Well, then.

  15. shantam prem says:

    Was Osho Wrong About Drugs?
    What is the conclusion of esteemed scholars of sannyasnews and the stage-named Gangaji?!*

    * Gangaji is not a sannyas name, but a stage name of some faceless man or woman.

    MOD:
    What about your conclusion, Shantam?

    • Lokesh says:

      My conclusion is that Gangaji does not know what he is talking about. Osho was not speaking from experience when talking about drugs. But he gave good advice based on common sense, advice then he would have done well to heed in his own life, but ignored.

      All this talk about false samadhi went out the window with orange robes and malas. Psychedelics present a much greater perspective than some old Hindu mumbo jumbo. Most people have never experienced a false samadhi, let alone a real one, so what difference does it make?

      • frank says:

        To those who might be interested:
        Here is the only transcript of the Veeresh – Osho interview on the Ranch, circa ’85, about drugs that I could find online.
        This is Veeresh asking about how to get people off drugs and the use of meditation for that, and Osho`s reply.

        To get rid of the Dutch language bit, try pressing the translation option.

        https://vrienden-van-osho.nl/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/Osho-Veeresh-interview-deel-2.pdf

        Or google: osho veeresh interview drugs, deel 2

        • Lokesh says:

          Thanks for posting this link, Frank. I find it most inspirational, although for sure not in the way the interview was intended to inspire. I think if people go for all that is being said in this article they must have been living in a cellar for 35 years.

          When I feel so inclined and find the time I will write an article based on this link, which might require two parts to cover it in full.

        • satchit says:

          Basically it is the old story:

          He means one shall not suppress the desire for drugs, but one shall become more meditative and centered. Then the desire for drugs will disappear by itself.

          Anyway, there are still crazy people who enjoy their imagination and want to listen to singing trees.

          • frank says:

            Hi Lokesh,

            I look forward to your article. It`s a big subject but I will just write briefly now.

            At the time of the interview, Veeresh was in charge of a drug rehab facility that was recognised by the Dutch govt. for the treatment of heroin addicts etc. Osho was the master of masters whose every word was a message from deep truth to disciples.

            The idea that addicts can start to meditate while still addicted, then the drugs will simply drop is just plain ridiculous. That anyone in any position of authority or with any intelligence or knowledge about such matters would subscribe to this view is baffling.

            However, it does provide an answer to the question, “Was Osho wrong about drugs?”
            In this instance: Yes,completely off the wall.

            • Lokesh says:

              Frank says, ‘The idea that addicts can start to meditate while still addicted, then the drugs will simply drop is just plain ridiculous.’

              Of course it is. I liked Veeresh. I always wondered about the special treatment Osho gave him, because he was not a very meditative man. I think Veeresh fitted into Osho’s plans for spreading his credo. Veeresh helped a lot of people. Osho even more, which still does not mean Osho understood much about heroin addiction.

              Currently watching an excellant TV series, ‘Godfather of Harlem’. Really captures the horror of inner city smack addiction. Makes me think of something Keith Richards said about cold turkey being not as bad as it’s cut out to be once you have been through it several times. He really is a tough nut.

              • frank says:

                I first came across junkies en masse on the scene in Pahar Ganj back in the day.
                I remember one guy who was wandering around with maggots living in what was left of his head.

                You don`t forget things like that.
                Poor guy, couldn`t afford the rates of Keef`s medical team!

                Veeresh did well to survive his early life and flourish, but some of the stuff that passed for therapy in the self-styled spiritual gangster cult HQ, Humaniversity…..

                Oops…I just remembered my vow of Omerta.

          • Lokesh says:

            Sure, Satchit, just stick to your dumbed down beer dimension. No imagination needed there. Nice and safe in your beer bubble, telling porky pies about meeting Osho.

    • shantam prem says:

      I agree with Lokesh’s post. Most of the things Osho has spoken on the basis of common sense, though with much compassion.

  16. shantam prem says:

    One of my dear friend has used a certain proportion of Cannabis joint, Osho discourses and meditation techniques with his five six closed friends for years.
    Few died untimely, few got far out experiences of beyond mind.

    I think above said combination can create best sprinters in the long distance races as well as custom made assembly lined future mini gurus.

    More than Mini Guru is one who cultivate his wisdom the way poor farmer prepare his crops.

    • satyadeva says:

      “One of my dear friends has used a certain proportion of cannabis joint, Osho discourses and meditation techniques with his five, six close friends for years. Few died untimely, few got far-out experiences of beyond mind.

      I think above said combination can create best sprinters in the long distance races as well as custom-made, assembly-lined future mini-gurus.”

      I’m deeply sceptical about such claims, Shantam.

      As I’ve mentioned before at this thread, my personal experience, six weeks of having many a good laugh via good quality marijuana (Chicago ’68 vintage) after a day’s work driving around selling ‘Good Humor’ (yes indeed!) ice cream, while most enjoyable in itself (and also due to good company) was that the side-effects were a desensitising, a distinct dulling of my nervous system so that my twice-daily practice of Maharishi’s TM at that time was severely impaired, providing few, if any, delightful feelings and no ‘transcendence’ of thought (ie the mantra).

      That was enough for me to distrust any so-called link between dope and meditation (or meditation-like practices), at least in my own case.

      So I tend to think that the sort of things your friend reports (in your first paragraph) might well be based on a level of drug-induced delusion rather than being ‘the real spiritual deal’ (as it were). (And the “untimely” deaths you mention do nothing to deter me from that conclusion).

      • frank says:

        “I think above said combination can create best sprinters in the long distance races as well as custom-made, assembly-lined future mini-gurus.”

        What on earth does that even mean?
        Sounds like medication time again.
        Nurse!
        Up the dose of Delusiopram and the Lostheplotamine!

        • frank says:

          SD,
          Drugs are a lot about intent.
          Alcohol is much maligned in mind-expanding circles these days but back in the halcyon days of ancient Greek theatre, the audiences for the great Dionysian events and plays which led to the original “catharses” were lubricated with wine in a controlled way (not a piss-up) that was part of the ritual.

          Consider, too, the San Francisco Renaissance of the 50s with the Beats etc. which was fuelled by amphetamines, exactly the same stuff that a decade earlier had fuelled the German invasion of France, the blitzkrieg and the bombing of Dresden and the D-Day landings.

          The hashishin assassins of the 11th to 13th century used hashish as a facilitator to murder and assassination, whereas people of my generation tended to mostly laugh, listen to good music, have sex and get the munchies!

          • satyadeva says:

            Interesting, Frank, most of that I didn’t know.

          • Lokesh says:

            Yes, intent is a very important aspect of altered states sessions.

            I do, once in a while, lead a psychedelic session and one of the things I say to participants is that they should focus on their intent. As in, why are you doing this? What do you wish to get out of this? etc. I also say that your intent can be to simply embrace whatever happens, whatever life brings to look at.

            Few months back I did a session with a global ayahuasca facilitator and got so busy explaining intent that I forgot to focus on my own intent. I ended up pouring myself a cup of tea from a thermos and missed the cup by about 6 inches. Lesson learned.

            With all this talk about ‘drugs’ I think it important to note that many of the teacher plant compounds showing up on the underground scene are not really drugs as such. I used to take people saying such things with a pinch of salt, but have since learned that there is a lot of truth in the fact that these substances are gifts, amazing life appreciation boosters, a way to find out who and what you are etc., but not really drugs.

            When I hear all this mumbo-jumbo about Osho working on people decades after he died I think that they do not know about the direct contact with source that teacher plants can deliver. Of course, they are not for everyone, especially not those who really are not ready for an inner quantam leap.

            • Arpana says:

              Lokesh spewed up:

              ”When I hear all this mumbo-jumbo about Osho working on people decades after he died”

              The above remark is crap.

              If you meditate and engage with Osho’s discourses, his transcribed spoken word discourses, he’s as available to you as he was to anyone when he was alive.

              If you don’t meditate, forget it.

              • Lokesh says:

                Arpana, if Osho is working on you he should get the sack, because he is doing a terrible job.

                • Lokesh says:

                  Arpana says, “If you meditate and engage with Osho’s discourses, his transcribed spoken word discourses, he’s as available to you as he was to anyone when he was alive.”

                  Looking at this photograph I find that hard to believe.

                • satyadeva says:

                  This seems a tricky matter. Where, for those ‘left behind’ (as it were) does anyone, master or whoever, go when they leave the scene of the living? The most convincing answer I’ve heard to this is that they go where there’s love, ie inside the person/people that truly love them. It seems right, just, true, doesn’t it? Also extremely simple.

                  But who can really know whether another person loves someone, or how deeply, or how much this professed “love” is entwined with, and perhaps ‘corrupted’ by need, by personal immaturity, giving rise to self-delusion? Surely only the individual person him/herself? So we’re back to the basic spiritual reality again: “the flight of the alone to the alone”…

                  I tend to go along with Arpana on this, that self-knowledge, awareness through meditation (and/or a sincere, meditative approach to oneself) is the key here, and that, given this approach and these qualities, it’s entirely possible to approach the master within, even after he’s disappeared from the outside realm.

                  So in that sense the master may be said to still be ‘working’ on his people after his death, although not actively, purely as a presence, to the degree determined by the degree of clarity and love within the person concerned.

                • frank says:

                  Using the words `plant medicine`/”teacher plant` for `drug` reminds me a little of using `worship` for `work`.
                  At best, it`s about positioning intelligent intent and direction on the activity.
                  At worst, it`s a kind of psychedelic orwellianism.

                  Luckily, it doesn`t have much to do with me as I survived one `psychedelic revival` in the late 80s and I`m pretty sure my poor old bonce* couldn`t take another one!

                  *bonce – slang for ‘head’!

                • Lokesh says:

                  Yes, Frank, I understand completely where you are coming from, and that was my viewpoint for many years. Then something happened and I began to see things differently.

                  I can see as I age that I get fixed in my ways, lazy even. Once in a while I find it helpful to open the door and let the breeze blow away the cobwebs. One should never underestimate the resilience of the bonce.

                • frank says:

                  I`ve worked hard to get my bonce back to factory settings in the last few decades. A cup of coffee in the morning is as psychoactive as it’s got for over 20 years now.

                  Don`t particularly relish the idea of getting a huge psychedelic jungle custard pie in my original face at this stage of the game!

                • Lokesh says:

                  Yes, SD, I understand what you are saying.

                  The thing is, even while still alive, Osho’s disciples were a very mixed bag and even those who were close to him, as in on a personal level, were affected in many different ways; many left, disillusioned in Rajneeshpuram.

                  Then there is imagination. The ways of the mind are as infinite as grains of sand on a beach. We can imagine anything, including being worked on by a dead guru.

                  Ultimately, one has to ask one’s self to what end is this work being done on you by a master aiming towards? It is by now established that no guru can actually give you enlightenment. So if that is your goal, forget it. If your contact with a guru, alive or dead, helps you become a more sensitive, humane, loving, meditative, compassionate, creative human being, then I would say continue on the path you are treading.

                  I personally do not feel the need for a guru in my life anymore. Gurus are a mixed bag at best and when it comes to the best, that is what you take from a guru and forget the rest…and there is nearly always a “rest”.

                  I find good friends work much in the way that a guru does, in that they supply a needed reflection, perhaps not as clear as someone like Osho, but if you have a few good friends around then they can add up to more than the sum of their parts on that level.

                  Gurus can also be seen as a crutch. Once you have learned to stand on your own two feet it is stupid to hang on to a crutch, especially when the guru has been the one who helped get you on your feet. Gratitude is due there, not endless devotion.

                  My generation helped bring eastern ideas into the West. It has been a mixed blessing. People get into Hinduism, gurus etc., with little cultural understanding on the long term. They become eastern Catholics, self-righteous that their god is the real god etc., without any real core experience to back it up.

                  It is, I see as I write, a highly complex subject, a Pandora’s box. So, I leave it at that. I have nothing to prove. When the shoe fits, put it on and enjoy your walk. The way someone else is walking is none of your business, as long as they are not interfering with you.

                • satyadeva says:

                  “Then there is imagination. The ways of the mind are as infinite as grains of sand on a beach. We can imagine anything, including being worked on by a dead guru.”

                  Totally agree, Lokesh. That’s what I meant by “self-delusion”, the perilous effect of imagination, driven by emotional factors. (“But who can really know whether another person loves someone, or how deeply, or how much this professed “love” is entwined with, and perhaps ‘corrupted’ by need, by personal immaturity, giving rise to self-delusion?”).

                  As I also said, it’s not that the dead guru is actively “working”, the ‘bridge’ is the love (and trust) of the alive person inspired to live the guru’s teachings (according to his/her needs, or “lights”, as the saying goes). Although, of course, to the person it may well feel as if the guru is working on him/her – and he/she might want that to be true.

                  Beliefs (and their causes) are such powerful factors, but perhaps at one level it doesn’t matter exactly what one believes as long as the results are positive. I’m reminded of an old friend of mine who suffered a ‘nervous breakdown’ at 15 (he was simply terrified of life, largely due to his disturbed mother’s influence) and had to leave school, but who was transformed (and remains so, in ‘normal’ terms) by ‘getting religion’ (X-tianity) a few years later. He was desperate for help – and it arrived.

                • frank says:

                  Maybe it`s best not to take being `guided by a dead guru` too literally. This is about metaphorical and imaginative sense, surely?

                  If you are a musician, songwriter, painter or poet, for example (or maybe even any `role-model` in any field) you will inevitably be moved by the spirit of the works of these people who, most usually, you have never actually met.

                  This is being `guided by their spirit`, and in art it is visible, as slavish copying at one end of the spectrum to inspired moving-forward at the other end.

                  I can perfectly believe that this happens in the spiritual/moral/personal sense with spiritual figures and philosophers. For me, the insistence on the literality of such phenomena is more the problem.

                  The presence of the living master can be cited as putting a stop to these `imaginative projections` and crunching people into the true reality beyond imaginative delusions etc. If that had really been the case, we would probably have had precious little to talk about on here in the last years!

                • swamishanti says:

                  It’s true, SD (12.06pm).
                  Mind can imagine anything. However, in this case I think it’s more of a case of those who don’t have any such experience of Osho post-body, projecting, as it were, that those who talk of such things must be in some type of imaginative state. Because they can only imagine such things as connecting to Osho’s presence.

                  In your post of 10.20am today, you speculate that “The most convincing answer I’ve heard to this is that they go where there’s love, ie inside the person/people that truly love them. It seems right, just, true, doesn’t it? Also extremely simple.”

                  Osho said that when he left his body he would “dissolve into his people.”

                  However, I guess that actually he knew that he wouldn’t have to do any such thing, as he was already in the hearts of his people. At least in potential.

                  All perceived distances must surely be only of the mind in the case of an genuine enlightened master.

                  Whether a ‘disciple’ makes a connection with his presence before he left his body, or after, probably depends on a number of factors, including the particular ‘type’ of that person, and quite possibly a good deal of predetermination.

                • Lokesh says:

                  Yes, SD, I agree for the most part.

                  Just having a break from feeding a garden fire. I suppose life is my guru if I do my arithmetic, for she has taught me the most. Also important to remember that a great master is not the one who gathers the most disciples, but rather the one who creates the most masters in their own right.

            • madhu dagmar frantzen says:

              Hi Lokesh,

              You shouldn´t “lead” altered state sessions, “psychodelic” sessions as you name it; neither for other individuals nor for groups, I´d presume, and I know what I am talking about here!

              When Osho talked about “First,Healer, heal yourself!” He meant it.

              And some of those many who came to see the Master from some healing professiondid hear that from their heart, quite some also did not, as I came to know.

              And when Osho spoke about priests and politicians (in abundance) and so much harm often coming from that side, He spoke about you, me, everybody IN the commune to meditate about it.

              These first years when He was still able to speak to group leaders and participants during Darshan have been very precious, still of value.

              And His visions of living together were of value too. And what didn´t become prey for some obviously inevitable deterioration processes will survive that and inspire some of those coming in our wake (Deterioration happening by egotistical approaches re dealing with healing and consciousness issues of others, your fellow beings).

              By reading your latest stances in this caravanserai (and getting responses from your side) I wouldn´t recommend anybody to book a session or a group with you (besides your swimming in the ocean!).

              I´m reminded also about that by what Isaac Shapiro once told us about Papaji, when He came to know what people coming to Him had afterwards been doing as self-appointed Teachers in their gatherings: misuse of power…quite often!

              However, “Shaman” became a well paid ´profession´ these last decades. That´s not at all what it is when you ´re going deep in the history of that. Just another spllnter of precarious times amidst turbulent changes. And people and collectives bound in trauma issues so often.

              If you, Lokesh, reading that, feel again to spend one of your hits targeted in my direction, it would be nice if you this time choose a work out in the sporting area at your place.

              Madhu

              P.S:
              Btw, I second Arpana´s yesterday response to you at 1:54 pm.

              • Lokesh says:

                Madhu, from ‘Osho says’ to ‘Isaac says’. I do not really care. I met Isaac, nice Jewish guy doing exactly what his guru told him not to: become a self-appointed teacher, and he was not very good at it.

                I also think you have not a clue what you are talking about on an existential level. Book sessions with me? You are dreaming, Madhu. Stick to talking about what you actually know about rather than what you presume. Really, man, you come across like a dottley old busybody.

                Well, at least you agree with Arpana. Misery loves company. Poor man only comes out of the box when he is on the attack. It is said that attack is the best form of defence and therefore I can only conclude that his Osho crutch is feeling a bit wobbly.
                PS When was the last time anyone came to you for a recommendation about anything? 1972?

          • satchit says:

            The intent is already the outcome.

            If you intend to have a spiritual experience, then your mind will create a spiritual experience.

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