Known as the ―sister meditation to Dynamic, with four stages of fifteen minutes each this method is a gentle yet effective way to release all the accumulated stress of your day.

A sitting method, that is one-hour long, in which humming and hand movements create an inner balance and stillness.

A one-hour nighttime meditation, which includes a breathing technique, gazing softly at a light and gentle body movements.

The Osho audio talks are keys to understanding silence. For the first time in history, talking is used to provide an experience of listening, not to gain knowledge but to directly experience one‘s own center of stillness, silence and relaxed awareness.

Breathe chaotically through the nose, concentrating always on exhalation. The body will take care of the inhalation. The breath should move deeply into the lungs. Be as fast as you can in your breathing, making sure the breathing stays deep. Do this as fast and as hard as you possibly can – and then a little harder, until you literally become the breathing. Use your natural body movements to help you to build up your energy. Feel it building up, but don‘t let go during the first stage.

Explode! Express everything that needs to be thrown out. Go totally mad. Scream, shout, cry, jump, shake, dance, sing, laugh; throw yourself around. Hold nothing back; keep your whole body moving. A little acting often helps to get you started. Never allow your mind to interfere with what is happening. Be total, be whole hearted.

This meditation lasts for one hour and has four stages, three with music, and the last without. Kundalini acts like an energetic shower, softly shaking you free of your day and leaving you refreshed and mellow.

Be loose and let your whole body shake, feeling the energies moving up from your feet. Let go everywhere and become the shaking. Your eyes may be open or closed. ―Allow the shaking; don‘t do it. Stand silently, feel it coming and when your body starts trembling, help it but don‘t do it. Enjoy it, feel blissful about it, allow it, receive it, welcome it, but don‘t will it. ―If you force it will become an exercise, a bodily, physical exercise. Then the shaking will be there but just on the surface; it will not penetrate you. You will remain solid, stone-like, rock-like within. You will remain the manipulator, the doer, and the body will just be following. The body is not the question – you are the question. ―When I say shake, I mean your solidity, your rock-like being should shake to the very foundations so that it becomes liquid, fluid, melts, flows. And when the rock-like being becomes liquid, your body will follow. Then there is no shake, only shaking. Then nobody is doing it; it is simply happening. Then the doer is not.

Dance, any way you feel, letting the whole body move as it wishes. Again, your eyes can be open or closed.

Close your eyes and be still, sitting or standing, observing, witnessing, whatever is happening inside and out.

Keeping your eyes closed, lie down and be still.

This is a 65 minute dancing meditation in three stages, with specifically created music. Disappearing in the dance, then relaxing into silence and stillness, is the route inside for this method. ―Forget the dancer, the center of the ego; become the dance. That is the meditation. Dance so deeply that you forget completely that ‗you‘ are dancing and begin to feel that you are the dance. The division must disappear; then it becomes a meditation. If the division is there, then it is an exercise: good, healthy, but it cannot be said to be spiritual. It is just a simple dance. Dance is good in itself – as far as it goes it is good. After it, you will feel fresh, young. But it is not meditation yet. The dancer must go, until only the dance remains…. Don‘t stand aside, don‘t be an observer. Participate! And be playful. Remember the word playful always – with me it is very basic.

With eyes closed, dance as if possessed. Let your unconscious take over completely. Do not control your movements or witness what is happening. Just be totally in the dance.

Keeping your eyes closed, lie down immediately. Be silent and still.

Nadabrahma meditation lasts for one hour and has three stages. It is a sitting method, in which humming and hand movements create an inner balance, a harmony between mind and body. Suitable for any time of the day, have an empty stomach and remain inactive for at least fifteen minutes afterwards. ―So in Nadabrahma, remember this: let the body and mind be totally together, but remember that you have to become a witness. Get out of them, easily, slowly, from the back door, with no fight, with no struggle.

Sit in a relaxed position with eyes closed. With lips together, start humming, loud enough so that if you are doing it with others, you can be heard by them. This will create a vibration in your body. You can visualize a hollow tube or vessel filled only with the vibrations of the humming. A point will come when the humming continues by itself and you become the listener. There is no special breathing, and you can alter the pitch, and move your body smoothly and slowly, if you feel to.

This stage is divided into two segments, of seven and a half minutes each. For the first part, move the hands, palms upwards, in an outward, circular motion. Starting at the navel, both hands move forward and then divide to make two large circles mirroring each other left and right. The movement should be so slow that at times there will appear to be no movement at all. Feel that you are giving energy outwards to the universe. After seven and a half minutes, the music will change and you turn your hands palm downwards, and start moving them in the opposite direction. Now the hands will come together towards the navel and divide outwards towards the side of the body. Feel that you are taking energy in. As in the first stage, don‘t inhibit any soft, slow movements of the rest of your body.

Sit absolutely quiet and still.

This technique, for the nighttime, consists of four stages of fifteen minutes each. The first two stages are preparation for the spontaneous Latihan of the third stage. If the breathing is done correctly in the first stage, the carbon dioxide formed in the bloodstream will make you feel as high as Gourishankar (Mt. Everest).

Sit with closed eyes. Inhale deeply through the nose, filling the lungs. Hold the breath for as long as possible; then exhale gently through the mouth, and keep the lungs empty for as long as possible. Continue this breathing cycle throughout this stage.

Return to normal breathing and with a gentle gaze look at a candle flame or a flashing blue light. Keep your body still.

With closed eyes, stand up and let your body be loose and receptive. Allow your body to move gently in whichever way it wants. Don't do the moving, just allow it to happen gently and gracefully.

Lie down with closed eyes, silent and still.

This is another powerful technique that creates a circle of energy, resulting in a natural centering. There are four stages of 15 minutes each.

With open eyes run on the spot, starting slowly and gradually, getting faster and faster. Bring your knees up as high as possible. Breathing deeply and evenly will move the energy within. Forget the mind and forget the body. Keep going.

Sit with your eyes closed and mouth open and loose. Gently rotate your body from the belly, like a reed blowing in the wind. Feel the wind blowing you from side to side, back and forth, around and around. This will bring your awakened energies to the navel center.

Lie on your back, open your eyes and with the head still, rotate them in a clockwise direction. Sweep them fully around in the sockets as if you are following the second hand of a vast clock, but as fast as possible. It is important that the mouth remains open and the jaw relaxed, with the breath soft and even. This will bring centering energies to the third eye.

Close your eyes and be still.

"Sufi whirling is one of the most ancient techniques, one of the most forceful. It is so deep that even a single experience can make you totally different. Whirl with open eyes, just like small children go on twirling, as if your inner being has become a center and your whole body has become a wheel, moving, a potter‘s wheel, moving. You are in the center, but the whole body is moving."

Keep your eyes open and feel the center point of your body. Lift your arms to shoulder height, with the right hand palm up and the left hand low, palm down. Start turning around your own axis. Let your body be soft. Start slowly and after 15 minutes gradually go faster and faster. You become a whirlpool of energy – the periphery a storm of movement but the witness at the center silent and still.

Let your body fall to the ground when the music stops. (it may already have happened before.) Roll onto your stomach immediately so that your navel is in contact with the earth. Feel your body blending into the earth. Keep your eyes closed and remain passive and silent.

This is a powerful method for centering one's energy in the hara - the area just below the navel. It is based on a Sufi technique of movements for awareness and integration of the body. Because it is a Sufi meditation, it is free and non-serious. In fact it is so non-serious that you can even smile while you are doing it. This one-hour meditation has three stages. During the first two stages the eyes are open but not focused on anything. During the third stage the eyes are closed. The music, created especially for this meditation, begins slowly and gradually becomes faster and faster as an uplifting force.

Begin by placing the right toe over the left toe. Fold your arms across your chest and embrace yourself. Feel love for yourself. When the music starts bow down to existence for bringing you here for this meditation. When the tempo changes, begin whirling either to the left or to the right, whichever feels best for you. If you whirl to the right put the right foot and the right arm to the right and the left arm in the opposite direction. As you start to whirl you can change your hands to any position which feels good to you. If you have not whirled before then go very very slowly at first and once your mind and body get acclimated to the movements the body will naturally go faster. Do not force yourself to go too fast too soon. If you do get dizzy or it feels like it is too much for you, it is okay to stop and stand or to sit down. To end the whirling, slow down and fold the arms over the chest and heart.

The art of meditation Is the art of listening With your total being
"If one can learn how to listen rightly, one has learned the deepest secret of meditation." The essential function of the provide an easily accessible way of learning this art of listening. An opportunity to experience, "silence with no effort," the key to bringing sharpened awareness to your daily life.Whether you want to listen quietly at home, or while commuting to work, or sitting in the park, never has meditation been more simple, or more widely available to anyone anywhere. Once you have selected an Osho talk, make yourself comfortable, relax and, in your own time, allow your eyes to close.

Gibberish is to get rid of the active mind, silence to get rid of the inactive mind and let-go is to enter into the transcendental.

Whenever you are sitting and you have nothing to do, just relax your lower jaw and open the mouth just slightly. Start breathing from the mouth but not deeply. Just let the body breathe so it will be shallow and will be more and more shallow. And when you feel that the breathing has become very shallow and the mouth is open and your jaw is relaxed, your whole body will feel very relaxed. In that moment, start feeling a smile — not on the face but all over your inner being. It is not a smile that comes on the lips — it is an existential smile that spreads just inside. No need to smile with the lips on the face — but just as if you are smiling from the belly; the belly is smiling. And it is a smile, not a laughter, so it is very very soft, delicate, fragile, like a small rose flower opening in the belly and the fragrance spreading all over the body. Once you have known what this smile is you can remain happy for twenty-four hours. And whenever you feel that you are missing that happiness, just close your eyes and catch hold of that smile again and it will be there. And in the daytime as many times as you want you can catch hold of it. It is always there.

Step 1: Watch the In Breath Close your eyes and start watching your breath. First, the inhalation, from where it enters your nostrils, right down into your lungs.

Step 2: Watch the Gap That Follows At the end of the inhalation there is gap, before the exhalation starts. It is of immense value. Watch that gap.

Step 3: Watch the Out Breath Now watch the exhalation.

Step 4: Watch the Gap That Follows At the end of the exhalation there is a second gap: watch that gap. Do these four steps for two to three times – just watching the breathing cycle, not changing it in anyway, just watching the natural rhythm.

Step 5: Counting In Breaths Now start counting: Inhalation – count 1 (don‘t count the exhalation), inhalation – 2, and so on, up to 10. Then count from 10 back to 1. Sometimes you may forget to watch the breath or you may count beyond 10. Then start again, at 1.

These two things have to be remembered: watching, and particularly the gaps at the top and the bottom. The experience of that gap is you, your innermost core, your being. And second: go on counting, but not more than up to 10; and come back again to 1; and only count the inhalation. These things help awareness. You have to be aware, otherwise you will start counting the exhalation, or you will go over 10. If you enjoy this meditation, continue it. It is of immense value.

2. Four Levels of Relaxing This particular method is useful for those time when you are sick because it helps build a loving connection, to create a rapport between yourself and your bodymind. Then you can take an active part in your own healing process.

Step 1: The Body Remember as many times as possible to look into the body and see whether you are carrying some tension in the body somewhere – the neck, the head or the legs…. Relax it consciously. Just go to that part of the body, and persuade that part, say to it lovingly ‗Relax!‘ You will be surprised that if you approach any part of your body, it listens, it follows you – it is your body! With closed eyes, go inside the body from the toe to the head, searching for any place where there is a tension. And then talk to that part as you talk to a friend; let there be a dialogue between you and your body. Tell it to relax, and tell it, ‗There is nothing to fear. Don´t be afraid. I am here to take care; you can relax.‘ Slowly slowly, you will learn the knack of it. Then the body becomes relaxed.

Against the tradition you don't become free. You are still under the rule of natural instincts. You are possessed by lust, by greed, by ambitions. And you are not a master of these things You are a slave. Hence I say Freedom is only possible through awareness. Unless one transforms ones unconsciousness Into consciousness there is no freedom. And that is where only very few people Have succeeded ― a Jesus, a Lao Tzu A Zarathustra, a Buddha Just a few people Who can be counted on one's fingers. They have really lived in freedom Because they lived out of awareness. That has to be the work for every seeker: To create more and more awareness. Then freedom comes of its own accord. Freedom is the fragrance of the flower of awareness.

Will meditation help me to be happy ?

Just the misery. The only pleasure that you have is talking about it. Look at people talking about their misery: how happy they become! They pay for it: they go to psychoanalysts to talk about their misery ― they pay for it! Somebody listens attentively; they are very happy. People go on talking about their misery again and again and again. They even exaggerate, they decorate, they make it look bigger. They make it look bigger than life-size. Why? You have nothing to put at stake. But people cling to the known, to the familiar. The misery is all that they have known ― that is their life. Nothing to lose, but so afraid to lose anything. With me, happiness comes first, joy comes first. A celebrating attitude comes first. A life-affirming philosophy comes first. Enjoy! If you cannot enjoy your work, change it. Don't wait, because all the time that you are waiting you are waiting for Godot. Godot is never going to come. One simply waits ― and wastes one's life. For whom, for what are you waiting? If you see the point, that you are miserable in a certain pattern of life, then all the old traditions say: You are wrong. I would like to say: The pattern is wrong. Try to understand the difference of emphasis. You are not wrong! Just your pattern, the way you have learned to live is wrong. The motivations that you have learned and accepted as yours are not yours ― they don't fulfill your destiny. They go against your grain, they go against your element.... Remember it: nobody else can decide for you. All their commandments, all their orders, all their moralities, are just to kill you. You have to decide for yourself. You have to take your life in your own hands. Otherwise, life goes on knocking at your door and you are never there; you are always somewhere else. If you were going to be a dancer, life comes from that door because life thinks you must be a dancer by now. It knocks there but you are not there ― you are a banker. And how is life expected to know that you would become a banker? The divine comes to you the way it wanted you to be; it knows only that address – but you are never found there, you are somewhere else, hiding behind somebody else's mask, in somebody else's garb, under somebody else's name. The divine can find you only in one way, only in one way can it find you, and that is your inner flowering: as it wanted you to be. Unless you find your spontaneity, unless you find your element, you cannot be happy. And if you cannot be happy, you cannot be meditative. Why did this idea – that meditation brings happiness – arise in people's minds? In fact, wherever they found a happy person they always found a meditative mind. They become associated. Whenever they found the beautiful, meditative milieu surrounding a man, they always found he was tremendously happy ― vibrant with bliss, radiant. They became associated. They thought: Happiness comes when you are meditative. It was just the other way round: meditation comes when you are happy. But to be happy is difficult and to learn meditation is easy. To be happy means a drastic change in your way of life, an abrupt change ― because there is no time to lose. A sudden change, a sudden clash of thunder...a discontinuity. That's what I mean by sannyas: a discontinuity with the past. A sudden clash of thunder, and you die to the old and you start afresh, from ABC. You are born again. You again start your life as you would have done if there had been no enforced pattern by your parents, by your society, by the state; as you would have done, must have done, if there had been nobody to distract you. But you were distracted. You have to drop all those patterns that have been forced on you, and you have to find your own inner flame.

The outer beauty comes from a different source than the inner. The outer beauty comes from your father and mother: their bodies create your body. But the inner beauty comes from your own growth of consciousness that you are carrying from many lives. In your individuality both are joined, the physical heritage from your father and mother and the spiritual heritage of your own past lives, its consciousness, its bliss, its joy. So it is not absolutely necessary that the outer will be a reflection of the inner, nor will vice versa be true, that the inner will correspond with the outer. But sometimes it happens that your inner beauty is so much, your inner light is so much that it starts radiating from your outer body. Your outer body may not be beautiful, but the light that comes from your sources, your innermost sources of eternal life, will make even a body which is not beautiful in the ordinary sense appear beautiful, radiant. But vice versa it is never true. Your outer beauty is only skin-deep. It cannot affect your inner beauty. On the contrary the outer beauty becomes a hindrance in search of the inner: you become too identified with the outer. Who is going to look for the inner sources? Most often it happens that the people who are outwardly very beautiful, are inwardly very ugly. Their outer beauty becomes a cover-up to hide themselves behind, and it is experienced by millions of people every day. You fall in love with a woman or a man, because you can see only the outer. And just within a few days you start discovering his inner state; it doesn't correspond to his outer beauty. On the contrary it is very ugly. For example, Alexander the Great had a very beautiful body but he killed millions of people, just to fulfill his ego that he is the world conqueror. He met one man, Diogenes, when he was on his way to India, who lived naked, the only man in Greece who did, unique in a way. His beauty was tremendous, not just the outer, but the inner radiance was so much and so dazzling that even Alexander had to stop his armies when he was close by in a forest near a river. He stopped the armies and went to see Diogenes alone; alone, because he did not want anybody to know that there exists a man who is far more beautiful than Alexander himself. It was early morning and Diogenes was taking a sunbath, naked on the riverbank. Alexander could not believe that a beggar ... He had nothing, no possessions -- even Buddha used to have a begging bowl, but that too Diogenes had thrown away. He was absolutely without any possessions, exactly as he was born, naked. Alexander could not believe his eyes. He had never seen such a beautiful personality and he could see that this beauty was not just on the outer side. Something infiltrated from the inner; a subtle radiation, a subtle aura surrounded him. All around him there was a fragrance, a silence. If the inner becomes beautiful -- which is in your hands -- the outer will have to mold itself according to the inner. The outer is not essential, it will have to reflect the inner in some way. But the converse is not true at all. You can have plastic surgery, you can have a beautiful face, beautiful eyes, a beautiful nose; you can change your skin; you can change your shape. That is not going to change your being. Inside you will still remain greedy, full of lust, violence, anger, rage, jealousy, with a tremendous will to power. All these things the plastic surgeon can do nothing about. For that you will need a different kind of surgery. It is happening here: you are on the table. As you become more and more meditative, peaceful, a deep at-onement with existence happens. You fall into the rhythm of the universe. The universe also has its own heartbeat. Your heartbeat, once it starts in rhythm with the universal heartbeat, will have transformed your being from that ugly stage of animality, into authentic humanity. And even the human is not the end. You can go on searching deeper and there is a place where you transcend humanity and something of the divine enters in you. Once the divine is there, it isalmost like a light in a dark house. The windows will start showing the light; even the cracks in the wall or the roof or the doors will start showing the inner light. The inner is tremendously powerful, the outer is very weak. The inner is eternal, the outer is very temporary. How many years do you remain young? And as youth fades away you start feeling that you are becoming ugly, unless your inner being is also growing with your age. Then even in your old age you will have a beauty that the youth may feel jealous of. Remember, from the inner the change to the outer happens, but I am not making it inevitable. Most often it happens, but sometimes the outer is in such a rotten state that even the inner radiation cannot change it. There have been cases on record: one very great mystic of India -- I have spoken on him for almost half a year continuously. His name was Ashtavakra. And what he has written is tremendously important; each sentence has so many dimensions to be explored, but the man himself was in a very difficult situation. Ashtavakra -- the name was given to him, because he was almost like a camel. In eight places he was distorted in the body -- one leg was longer, one arm was shorter, his back was bent -- in eight places he was distorted. That's how he was born, with a crippled, distorted body. But even in a crippled and distorted body the soul is as beautiful as in the most beautiful body. He became enlightened, but his body was too rigid to change with his inner change. His eyes started showing something of the beauty, but the whole body was in such a mess. The story is that the emperor of India in those days was Janak and he was very much interested in philosophical discussions. Each year he used to call a big conference of all the scholars, philosophers, theologians or whoever wanted to participate. It was a championship competition. One very famous philosopher, Yagnavalkya came a little late. The conference had started and he saw standing outside one thousand beautiful cows. Their horns were covered with gold and diamonds. This was going to be the prize for the champion. It was a hot day and the cows were perspiring. He told his disciples, "You take these cows. As far as winning the competition is concerned, I am certain. Why should the cows suffer here? You take them to our place." They had their own place in the forest. Even Janak could not prevent him, because he knew that he had been the champion continuously for five years, and he would be the champion this time, because there was nobody else who could defeat him. It is not right to take the reward before you have won, but his victory was so certain to everybody that nobody objected. And his disciples took away all the cows. While Yagnavalkya was discussing, a very unknown scholar was also present in the conference. Ashtavakra was this unknown philosopher's son. His mother was waiting for her husband to come home. It was getting late and the meal was getting cold. So she sent Ashtavakra to bring his father home, because he could not win the competition. Why should he unnecessarily waste his time? He was a poor scholar and there were great scholars there. Ashtavakra went. There were at least one thousand people in the conference, the highly cultured and sophisticated scholars of the country. As Ashtavakra entered, looking at his distorted body they all started laughing. But Ashtavakra was a man of tremendous integrity. As they started laughing, he laughed even louder. Because of his loud laugh they stopped. They could not believe that he was laughing. Janak asked him, "I can understand why they are laughing -- because of your body; but I cannot understand why you are laughing. And you stopped all their laughing with your laughter." A single man stopped one thousand people's laughter. Ashtavakra said to Janak, "I thought this conference was for scholars and philosophers, but these are all shoemakers. They can understand only the skin. They cannot see the inner, they can only see the outer." There was a great silence. What he was saying had a great truth in it. Janak dissolved the conference and said, "Now I would like to inquire of Ashtavakra only. He has defeated you all just by his laughter and his statement that, `You can't see the inner, you can only see the outer; you are all shoemakers.' Shoemakers work with the skin of different animals. I dissolve the conference and, Yagnavalka, return those one thousand cows, because you also laughed. And when Ashtavakra laughed, you also stopped!" It was a very strange situation; it had never happened before. And then began the long inquiry of Janak, the emperor. He asked questions and Ashtavakra answered them. Each answer in itself carried so much meaning and significance. Because his body was in such a bad shape he could not get identified with it. Sometimes blessings come in such disguise. He could not go out, because wherever he went people would laugh, "Look at that man! Have you seen anything uglier than this?" So most of the time he was in the house, meditating, figuring out, "Who am I? Certainly I am not this body, because I can be aware of this body, I can observe this body from within. Certainly that awareness has to be different from the body." Because of his crippled body he experienced enlightenment. The only barrier is identification with the body. But he could not identify, the body was so ugly. He never looked in a mirror; it would have been such a shock. But Yagnavalkya had to return those one thousand cows to Ashtavakra's house. He was young and he defeated one thousand old philosophers in the ancient scriptures. It is one of the strangest things in this country that on every book written by any prominent mystic there have been hundreds of commentaries, but nobody has commented before me on Ashtavakra. And he must be at least five thousand years old. For five thousand years nobody has bothered to look into his statements, which are so significant. But his inner enlightenment, his inner understanding could not change his outer appearance. And yet for those who are going deeper into themselves, the outer does not matter. They would have seen even in Ashtavakra tremendous beauty, but it would not have been of the outer circumference, but of the center. Most often the inner change changes the outer, if the outer is not too rigid. But the outer never changes the inner. You need to have eyes, going deep into people's beings, which is possible only if you are going inwards yourself. The deeper you go into yourself the deeper you can look into other people's beings. And then a totally new world opens its doors. Flanagan is on his deathbed and Father Murphy has come to give him the last rites. "Open your eyes," says the priest. "We have got to save your immortal soul." Flanagan opens one eye, closes it and tries to doze off. He is having such a nice snooze. "Come on now!" says Father Murphy. "If you don't want to confess, at least answer me this: do you renounce the devil and all his works?" "Well, I don't know," says Flanagan, opening one eye again. "At a time like this it doesn't seem very smart to upset anyone." The inner comes out, you cannot hide it much. Now he is being very calculating. At the time of death, unnecessarily annoying anybody ... and who knows where you are going? It is better to keep silent. A wealthy widower and his beautiful daughter are on a sea cruise. By chance the girl falls overboard, and Rubin Fingelbaum, aged seventy, splashes in afterwards and rescues her. After the two are brought on board the ship, the widower throws his arms around Rubin. "You saved my daughter's life," he cries. "I'm a rich man -- I will give you anything! Ask for whatever you want!" "Just answer me one question," replies Rubin. "Who pushed me?" What is inside is bound to come outside. How can you hide it? An old black preacher had used the letters B.S., M.S. and Ph.D. after his name for many years without ever having had anyone from his congregation ask what they meant. Finally a nosey old woman questions him about it. "Well, sister," he answers. "You know what B.S. stands for, don't you?" "I sure do," says the lady indignantly. "Bull shit!" "Right," says the preacher. "And M.S. just means more of the same, and Ph.D. means piled high and deep." That's the inner side of most people: bull shit, B.S.; M.S., more of the same; and Ph.D., piled high and deep. No plastic surgeon can change it. But you are capable of changing it yourself. It is within your hands. Nobody can do anything about your inner being except you. You are the master of your inner world. And as the inner world becomes silent, naturally your eyes become deeper, with an oceanic depth. As your inner being becomes cloudless your face also becomes cloudless, just an open sky. As your inner being comes to discover the source of your life, the flame of your life, something of that flame starts radiating from every pore of your body. This is the rule. Ashtavakra is an exception. Exceptions don't make the rule, they only prove the rule. But it has never happened vice versa before, and I don't think it can ever happen. We are all trying to be beautiful on the outside: all kinds of make-up, all kinds of things are going on to make your outer beautiful. I Have Heard... A man was catching flies. Finally after two or three hours' effort he caught four flies. He told his wife, "I have caught four flies: two are male, two are female." The wife said, "My God, how did you figure out who is male and who is female?" He said, "Easy! Two were sitting for almost two hours on the mirror and two were for two hours reading the newspaper!" We are so much identified with the periphery of our being that we have forgotten that the periphery does not exist in itself. There must be a center inside. And the search for the center is the only religious search -- not for God, not for heaven, not for any rewards for your virtues, not to avoid hell and punishment. There is only one authentic religious search and that is to know your innermost being. It is the being of the whole universe. By entering your innermost temple you have entered the real temple. All other temples are false, man-manufactured; all other gods in those temples are false, they are man-manufactured. Only one thing is not man-manufactured and that is your innermost dignity, your innermost grace. That grace starts flooding your outer being too. And that grace transforms not only the inner, but gives a new look to your outer being: an innocence, a serenity, a depth, a peace, a love, and these are all flowers blossoming around you. Then even your periphery becomes so beautiful, so musical, such a dance of rejoicing. But you should start from the inner

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What will meditation do to solve my problems ?

How to know when to change methods ?

Is it good to start with a sitting meditation or an active meditation?

You can force anything on yourself. If you want to be angry, just breathe the rhythm that happens in anger. Actors do it, when they want to express anger they change their breathing rhythm; the breathing rhythm must become the same as when there is anger. By making the rhythm fast they begin to feel anger, the anger part of the mind comes up. So breathing rhythm can be used to suppress the mind, to suppress anything in the mind. But it is not good, it is not a flowering. The other way is better; when your mind changes and then, as a consequence, your breath changes; the change comes first from the mind. So I use breathing rhythm as a sign. A person who remains at ease with himself constantly remains in the same breathing rhythm; it never changes because of the mind. It will change because of the body ― if you are running it will change ― but it never changes because of the mind. So tantra has used many, many breathing rhythms as secret keys. They even allow sexual intercourse as a meditation, but they allow it only when your breathing rhythm remains constant in intercourse, otherwise not. If the mind is involved, then the breathing rhythm cannot remain the same, and if the breathing rhythm remains the same, the mind is not involved at all. If the mind is not involved even in such a deep biological thing as sexual intercourse, then the mind will not be involved in anything else. But you can force. You can sit and force a particular rhythm on your body, you can create a fallacious buddhalike posture, but you will just be dead. You will become dull, stupid. It has happened to so many monks, so many sadhus; they just become stupid. Their eyes have no light of intelligence; their faces are just idiotic, with no inner light, no inner flame. Because they are so afraid of any inner movement, they have suppressed everything ― including intelligence. Intelligence is a movement, one of the most subtle movements, so if all inner movement is suppressed, intelligence will be affected. Awareness is not a static thing. Awareness, too, is movement ― a dynamic flow. So if you start from the outside, if you force yourself to sit like a statue, you are killing much. First be concerned with catharsis, with cleaning out your mind, throwing everything out, so that you become empty and vacant ― just a passage for something from the beyond to enter. Then sitting becomes helpful, silence becomes helpful, but not before. To me, silence in itself is not something worthwhile. You can create a silence that is a dead silence. Silence must be alive, dynamic. If you "create" silence, you will become more stupid, more dull, more dead; but this is easier in a way, and so many people are doing it now. The whole culture is so suppressive that it is easier to suppress yourself still more. Then you do not have to take any risks, then you do not have to take a jump. People come to me and say, "Tell us a meditation technique that we can practice silently." Why this fear? Everyone has a madhouse inside and still they say, "Tell us a technique that we can do silently." With a silent technique you can only become more and more mad ― silently ― and nothing else. The doors of your madhouse must be opened! Don't be afraid of what others will say. A person who is concerned about what others think can never go inward. He will be too busy worrying about what others are saying, what they are thinking. If you just sit silently, closing your eyes, everything will be okay; your wife or your husband will say that you have become a very good person. Everyone wants you to be dead; even mothers want their children to be dead ― obedient, silent. The whole society wants you to be dead. So-called good men are really dead men. So don't be concerned with what others think, don't be concerned about the image that others may have of you. Begin with catharsis and then something good can flower within you. It will have a different quality, a different beauty, altogether different; it will be authentic. When silence comes to you, when it descends on you, it is not a false thing. You have not been cultivating it; it comes to you; it happens to you. You begin to feel it growing inside you just like a mother begins to feel a child growing. A deep silence is growing inside you; you become pregnant with it. Only then is there transformation; otherwise it is just self-deception. And one can deceive oneself for lives and lives ― the capacity to do so is infinite.

Is it good to start with a sitting meditation or an active meditation?

Is it always necessary to close my eyes while meditating?

There is no naturally given way to go inwards, but it is not needed. If enough consciousness is gathered in, it will create its own way, just as water creates its own way – no map, no guidelines, just enough quantity and the water will start flowing towards an unknown sea. It has never heard about, knows nothing about, where it is going. The same is true about consciousness. Enough consciousness gathered inside immediately makes a way upon which nobody has ever trodden, and starts moving inwards. Outward senses are closed; that‘s what I mean when I say in your meditations to close your eyes, to leave the body completely behind...because all the senses are joined to the body. Just be a watcher of the mind, so the mind cannot take your energy outside. With body and mind both closed, energy gathers upon itself spontaneously and, at a certain point, it starts moving inwards. You don‘t have to do anything except to close all the doors that lead you away from yourself. It is one of the simplest things because you don‘t have to do it. But just because of its simplicity, its obviousness, it has become difficult, the most difficult thing, because nobody can teach you; nobody can indicate to you where to move, how to move. The master can only create a situation in which the spontaneous movement of the energy will happen. That‘s what I call meditation. It is not your doing. You have to stop doing everything. It is your non-doing. The moment when you are not doing, all your energy that was involved in doing a thousand and one things is released. It gathers to a point where it starts flowing inwards, and the innermost center is not far away.

What about any aches or pains I might feel during or after meditating ?

Anything else I should know about meditating ?

Not Pushing... The old habits of the mind can make themselves felt even when you are meditating. For example, you might start competing with yourself – urging yourself to go beyond your limits, even if your body is in pain. [Of course the mind can also try and sabotage your intention to meditate by telling you that you have reached your limit before you‘ve barely begun!] …Yet Going For It If there is a key word to guarantee success in your meditative practice it‘s totality or wholeheartedness. So for example, when you are dancing in Osho Nataraj Meditation, really dance – not just going through the movements with your mind engaged in something completely different, such as what you are going to do later, or ruminating over a conversation you had yesterday. Be present, on every level of your being. Follow the instructions of the method given, but then gauge for yourself, by tuning into your body and staying in contact with yourself, how much to exert yourself. There is a fine line between totality and over-zealousness to the point of causing yourself physical harm. By and by your level of awareness and sensitivity will be heightened, and will act as reliable barometers. At the same time the habit of your interfering mind will begin to loosen its hold on you. My only work is to give you a clear-cut idea how you can become more conscious; I call it meditation – working, walking, sitting. I don‘t believe in what others call meditation, that ten or twenty minutes you do it and then just be your ordinary self for twenty-four hours and again for twenty minutes meditate. This is stupid. It is like saying to a person that every day in the morning breathe for twenty minutes and then forget all about it, because you have to do many other things. Then the next morning you can breathe twenty minutes again. To me, meditation is exactly like breathing. So whatsoever you are doing and wherever you are, do it more consciously. For example, I can raise this hand without any consciousness, just unconsciously, out of habit. But you can raise your hand with full awareness, and you can see the difference between the two. The act is the same: one is mechanical, the other is full of consciousness, and the quality is tremendously different. Try it, because it is a question of taste and experience. Walking, just try for a few minutes to walk consciously. Each step be alert, and you will be surprised that the quality of your walk is totally different; it is relaxed. There is no tension and there is a subtle joy that is arising out of your relaxed walking. The more you become aware of this joy, the more you would like to be awake. Eating, eat with awareness. People are simply throwing food into their mouths, not even chewing it, just swallowing it. People who are suffering from obesity, fatness, cannot resist eating more and more. No doctor is going to help them, unless they become aware while they are eating, if they become aware. A few things happen as a by-product of awareness. Their eating will be slowed down. They will start chewing, because unless you chew your food you are putting an unnecessary burden on your whole system. Your stomach has no teeth. One has to chew each bite exactly forty-two times; then anything that you are eating becomes liquid. A man of awareness only drinks, because before he swallows he has changed the solid food into liquid. And the strange thing is that when you chew forty-two times you enjoy the taste so much. One bite of an unconscious man gives forty-two times more taste to the conscious man. It is simple arithmetic: the unconscious man will have to eat forty-two bites just to have the same taste, and then he becomes fat and is still unsatisfied. Still he feels to eat more. The man of awareness eats only as much as his body needs. He immediately feels that now there is no need; the hunger is gone, he is content…doing anything. My meditation is a totally different kind of approach. It has to be spread all over your twenty-four hours. Even falling asleep, remain alert how sleep is descending on you, so slowly, so silently, but you can hear the steps. The darkness is growing, you are relaxing – you can feel the muscles, the body, the tense parts which are preventing sleep – and soon you will see the whole body has relaxed and sleep has come. But slowly, slowly a great revolution happens. Sleep comes to you, but something deep inside you goes on remaining awake, even in sleep. The situation is: you are asleep even when you think you are awake, and I am awake even when you think I‘m asleep. Unless a man becomes aware in his sleep he is not aware, not awake; that is the criterion. There are so many by-products that you can judge by. Dreams disappear, because dreams need you to be completely unconscious; they come from the unconscious mind. But if you are conscious they cannot come. Sigmund Freud would have been immensely enriched if he had come to a man like me who has no dreams. He would have been puzzled also and he would have had to change his whole idea of psychoanalysis. But he only came across people who were asleep. He himself was asleep – he had no idea of any spiritual awakening; otherwise he would certainly have realized that there is a space when man is conscious, just conscious, and there are no dreams at all. If dreams disappear in the night, the second thing will happen to you: thoughts will disappear in the daytime. That does not mean you will become incapable of thinking; that simply means you will not just go on thinking mechanically, unnecessarily. You will be capable of thinking if you want to think, otherwise you will be silent. And a man who can remain silent for hours is gathering energy so whenever he wants to think his thinking has some strength, some power, some tremendous energy. Ordinary people‘s thinking is just impotent, their thoughts are just vagrant…clouds floating in their mind. A man of meditation will find that dreams disappear, and then sleep is incomparable beauty. Then sleep becomes spiritual; to transform sleep into spirituality is religion. Then your whole day becomes a day of silence. You will talk but something deep down in you will remain a silent witness. So you will not say things which will unnecessarily create trouble for you and trouble for others. You will say only that which is absolutely needed. You will say only the truth; otherwise you will be capable enough to say, "I do not know." You will not believe in anything. Either you will know it or you will not know it. Belief is a deception: you don‘t know, yet you pretend as if you know. All these people in temples, in churches, in synagogues, what are they doing? To whom are they praying? They don‘t know God. Their priest does not know God. They don‘t know that any prayer has ever been heard by anybody. They don‘t know that any prayer has ever been answered by anybody. Still, they are praying to a god…. Religion is a very simple phenomenon. Theology has nothing to with religion. It makes things unnecessarily complex. Religion is a simple awareness of whatever you are doing, wherever you are. And when this awareness surrounds you always like a luminous aura, you become aware for the first time of the universe – its beauties, its music, its eternal song. And to me, that is the religious experience. In religious experience you don‘t encounter a god. There is nobody there, just this pure existence. But it is all alive – these flowers, these birds on the wing, these stars – everything is alive, but because you are asleep you cannot experience the aliveness that surrounds you. And we are not islands. No man is an island. We are part of this whole living, infinite continent. Those flowers are part of us just as we are part of them. Those faraway stars are within us as we are within the universe. That experience of unity, of at-onement, is liberation. So my teaching is very simple: meditation is the key, becoming totally aware is the result. Experiencing oneness with the whole is the reward. This is my trinity: meditation, awareness, oneness.

What is vipassana ?

Mothers who have experienced having at least two or three children, start feeling after a certain time whether they are carrying a boy or girl in their womb. The boy starts playing football; he starts kicking here and there, he starts making himself felt ― he announces that he is here. The girl remains silent and relaxed; she does not play football, she does not kick, she does not announce. She remains as quiet as possible, as relaxed as possible. So it is not a question of conditioning, because even in the womb you can see the difference between the boy and the girl. The boy is hectic; he cannot sit in one place. He is all over the place. He wants to do everything, he wants to know everything. The girl behaves in a totally different way…. The second form is breathing, becoming aware of breathing. As the breath goes in, your belly starts rising up, and as the breath goes out, your belly starts settling down again. So the second method is to be aware of the belly, its rising and falling. Just the very awareness of the belly rising and falling ... And the belly is very close to the life sources because the child is joined with the mother's life through the navel. Behind the navel is his life's source. So when the belly rises up, it is really the life energy, the spring of life that is rising up and falling down with each breath. That too is not difficult, and perhaps may be even easier, because it is a single technique. In the first, you have to be aware of the body, you have to be aware of the mind, you have to be aware of your emotions, moods. So it has three steps. The second sort has a single step: just the belly, moving up and down. And the result is the same. As you become more aware of the belly, the mind becomes silent, the heart becomes silent, the moods disappear. And the third is to be aware of the breath at the entrance, when the breath goes in through your nostrils. Feel it at that extreme ― the other polarity from the belly ― feel it from the nose. The breath going in gives a certain coolness to your nostrils. Then the breath going out ... breath going in, breath going out.... That too is possible. It is easier for men than for women. The woman is more aware of the belly. Most men don't even breathe as deep as the belly. Their chest rises up and falls down, because a wrong kind of athletics prevails over the world. Certainly it gives a more beautiful form to the body if your chest is high and your belly is almost non-existent. Man has chosen to breathe only up to the chest, so the chest becomes bigger and bigger and the belly shrinks down. That appears to him to be more athletic. Around the world, except in Japan, all athletes and teachers of athletes emphasize breathing by filling your lungs, expanding your chest, and pulling the belly in. The ideal is the lion whose chest is big and whose belly is very small. So be like a lion; that has become the rule of athletic gymnasts and the people who have been working with the body. Japan is the only exception, where they don't care that the chest should be broad and the belly should be pulled in. It needs a certain discipline to pull the belly in; it is not natural. Japan has chosen the natural way; hence you will be surprised to see a Japanese statue of Buddha. That is the way you can immediately discriminate whether the statue is Indian or Japanese. The Indian statues of Gautam Buddha have a very athletic body: the belly is very small and the chest is very broad. But the Japanese Buddha is totally different; his chest is almost silent, because he breathes from the belly, but his belly is bigger. It doesn't look very good because the idea prevalent in the world is the other way round, and it is so old. But breathing from the belly is more natural, more relaxed. In the night it happens when you sleep: you don't breathe from the chest, you breathe from the belly. That's why the night is such a relaxed experience. After your sleep, in the morning you feel so fresh, so young, because the whole night you were breathing naturally...you were in Japan! These are the two points: if you are afraid that breathing from the belly and being attentive to its rising and falling will destroy your athletic form...men may be more interested in that athletic form. Then for them it is easier to watch near the nostrils where the breath enters. Watch, and when the breath goes out, watch. These are the three forms. Any one will do. And if you want to do two forms together, you can do two forms together; then the effort will become more intense. If you want to do all three forms together, you can do all three forms together. Then the process will be quicker. But it all depends on you, whatever feels easy. Remember: easy is right. As meditation becomes settled, mind silent, the ego will disappear. You will be there, but there will be no feeling of "I." Then the doors are open. Just wait with a loving longing, with a welcome in the heart for that great moment, the greatest moment in anybody's life ― enlightenment. It comes ... it certainly comes. It has never delayed for a single moment. Once you are in the right tuning, it suddenly explodes in you, transforms you. The old man is dead and the new man has arrived. Big Chief Sitting Bull had been constipated for many moons. So he sent his favorite squaw to the medicine man for help. The medicine man gave the squaw three pills and told her to give them to the chief, and then report back to him the next morning. The next morning the squaw came back with the message, "Big chief no shit." So the medicine man told her to double the dose. The next day, she came back with the message, "Big Chief no shit." So again he told her to double the dose. Again she came back with the same message. This went on for a week, and finally the medicine man told the squaw to give Sitting Bull the whole box. The next morning, she came back with a very sad expression. "What is wrong, my child?" asked the medicine man. The little squaw looked at him with tears in her eyes and said, "Big Shit, no chief!" One day it will happen to you, and that will be a great moment. That's what I am calling the right moment.

When and how often do I need to meditate ?

Is it possible to meditate without any technique ?

Another howl rang out. "Now, now, Albert," murmured the father, "keep your temper." A young mother, passing by, remarked, "I must congratulate you. You certainly know how to speak to babies." Then, patting the baby on the head, she cooed, "What is bothering you, Albert?" "No, no," interrupted the father. "His name is Johnnie; I am Albert." He was simply trying to keep himself alert: "Albert, don't lose your temper." He does not want to forget; otherwise he would like to throw this baby into the lake! Meditation is simply awareness without any effort, an effortless alertness; it does not need any technique. But your mind is so full of thoughts, so full of dreams, so much of the past, so much of the future ― it is not here now, and awareness has to be here now. The techniques are needed to help you to cut your roots from the past, to cut your dreams from the future, and to keep you in this moment as if only this moment exists. Then there is no need of any technique. Hymie Goldberg was visiting his friend, Mr. Cohen, who was dying. "Do us a favor," said Hymie Goldberg, "when you go to heaven could you find a way of letting me know whether they play baseball up there?" Mr. Cohen said he would certainly try to contact his old friend if at all possible. Only a few days after Mr. Cohen died, Hymie Goldberg had a phone call. "Hello, Hymie," said Mr. Cohen, "it is your old friend here." "Cohen? Is it really you?" asked Hymie. "Sure," answered his friend. "I have some good news and some bad news. First, there sure is baseball in heaven. And the bad news is that you are pitching next Sunday." Life is a complicated affair. There is good news, and there is bad news. The good news is that there is no need of any technique; but the bad news is, without any technique you are not going to get it.

Meditation or therapy ― sex, love, and death ?

Buddha never needed any psychotherapy for his sannyasins; those people were innocent. But in these twenty-five centuries, people have lost their innocence, they have become too knowledgeable. People have lost their contact with existence. They have become uprooted. I am the first person who uses therapy but whose interest is not therapy but meditation...just as it was with Chuang Tzu or Gautam Buddha. They never used therapy because there was no need. People were simply ready, and you could bring the rosebushes without clearing the ground. The ground was already clear. In these twenty-five centuries man has become so burdened with rubbish, so many wild weeds have grown in his being that I am using therapy just to clean the ground, take away the wild weeds, the roots, so the difference between the ancient man and the modern man is destroyed. The modern man has to be made as innocent as the ancient man, as simple, as natural. He has lost all these great qualities. The therapist has to help him ― but his work is only a preparation. It is not the end. The end part is going to be the meditation.

Modern physics has discovered one of the greatest things ever discovered, and that is: matter is energy. That is the greatest contribution of Albert Einstein to humanity: e is equal to mc squared, matter is energy. Matter only appears; otherwise there is no such thing as matter. Nothing is solid. Even the solid rock is a pulsating energy, even the solid rock is as much energy as the roaring ocean. The waves that are arising in the solid rock cannot be seen because they are very subtle, but the rock is waving, pulsating, breathing; it is alive. Friedrich Nietzsche has declared that God is dead. God is not dead ― on the contrary, what has happened is that matter is dead. Matter has been found not to exist at all. This insight into matter brings modern physics very close to mysticism, very close. For the first time the scientist and the mystic are coming very close, almost holding hands. Eddington, one of the greatest scientists of this age, has said, "We used to think that matter is a thing; now it is no more so. Matter is more like a thought than like a thing." Existence is energy. Science has discovered that the observed is energy, the object is energy. Down through the ages, at least for five thousand years, it has been known that the other polarity ― the subject, the observer, consciousness ― is energy. Your body is energy, your mind is energy, your soul is energy. Then what is the difference between these three? The difference is only of a different rhythm, different wavelengths, that's all. The body is gross ― energy functioning in a gross way, in a visible way. Mind is a little more subtle, but still not too subtle, because you can close your eyes and you can see the thoughts moving; they can be seen. They are not as visible as your body; your body is visible to everybody else, it is publicly visible. Your thoughts are privately visible. Nobody else can see your thoughts; only you can see them ― or people who have worked very deeply into seeing thoughts. But ordinarily they are not visible to others. And the third, the ultimate layer inside you, is that of consciousness. It is not even visible to you. It cannot be reduced to an object, it remains the subject. If all these three energies function in harmony, you are healthy and whole. If these energies don't function in harmony and accord you are ill, unhealthy; you are no more whole. And to be whole is to be holy. The effort that we are making here is to help you so that your body, your mind, your consciousness, can all dance in one rhythm, in a togetherness, in a deep harmony ― not in conflict at all, but in cooperation. The moment your body, mind and consciousness function together, you have become the trinity, and in that experience is the divine. Your question is significant. You ask, "Please say something about the relationship of consciousness and energy." There is no relationship of consciousness and energy. Consciousness is energy, the purest energy. The mind is not so pure; the body is still less pure. The body is much too mixed, and the mind is also not totally pure. Consciousness is totally pure energy. But you can know this consciousness only if you make a cosmos out of the three, and not a chaos. People are living in chaos. Their bodies say one thing, their bodies want to go in one direction; their minds are completely oblivious of the body ― because for centuries you have been taught that you are not the body. For centuries you have been told that the body is your enemy, that you have to fight with it, that you have to destroy it, that the body is sin. Because of all these ideas ― silly and stupid they are, harmful and poisonous they are, but they have been taught for so long that they have become part of your collective mind, they are there ― you don't experience your body in a rhythmic dance with yourself. Hence my insistence on dancing and music, because it is only in dance that you will feel that your body, your mind and you are functioning together. And the joy is infinite when all these function together; the richness is great. Consciousness is the highest form of energy. And when all these three energies function together, the fourth arrives. The fourth is always present when these three function together. When these three function in an organic unity, the fourth is always there; the fourth is nothing but that organic unity. In the East, we have called that fourth simply the fourth ― turiya; we have not given it any name. The three have names, the fourth is nameless. To know the fourth is to know the divine. Let us say it in this way: the divine is when you are an organic orgasmic unity. The divine is not when you are a chaos, a disunity, a conflict. When you are a house divided against yourself there is no divinity. When you are tremendously happy with yourself, happy as you are, blissful as you are, grateful as you are, and all your energies are dancing together, when you are an orchestra of all your energies, the divine is. That feeling of total unity is what the divine is. The divine is not a person somewhere, The divine is the experience of the three falling in such unity that the fourth arises. And the fourth is more than the sum total of the parts. If you dissect a painting, you will find the canvas and the colors, but the painting is not simply the sum total of the canvas and the colors; it is something more. That "something more" is expressed through the painting, the color, the canvas, the artist, but that "something more" is the beauty. Dissect the rose flower, and you will find all the chemicals and things it is constituted of, but the beauty will disappear. It was not just the sum total of the parts, it was more. The whole is more than the sum total of the parts. It expresses itself through the parts but it is more. To understand that it is more is to understand the divine. The divine is that more, that plus. It is not a question of theology; it cannot be decided by logical argumentation. You have to feel beauty, you have to feel music, you have to feel dance. And ultimately you have to feel the dance in your body, mind and, soul. You have to learn how to play on these three energies so that they all become an orchestra. Then the divine is ― not that you see it; there is nothing to be seen. The divine is the ultimate seer, it is witnessing. Learn to melt your body, mind, soul. Find ways in which you can function as a unity.

A belief simply means you don't know ― still you believe. My effort here is that you never believe unless you know. When you know, there is no question of believing, you know it. I destroy all belief systems and I do not give you any substitute. Hence, it is not easy to understand me.
Beliefs are like colored glasses: they will make the whole existence of the same color as your glasses. It will not be the true color of existence; it will be imparted by your glasses. You have to put aside all your glasses. You have to contact reality directly, immediately. There should be no idea between you and existence, no a priori conclusion. A real seeker has to be in the state that Dionysus calls agnosia ― a state of- not-knowing. Socrates said at the very end of his life, "I know only one thing, that I know nothing." This is the state of a true seeker. In the East we call this state meditation: no belief, no thought, no desire, no prejudice, no conditioning ― in fact, no mind at all. A state of no-mind is meditation. When you can look without any mind interfering, distorting, interpreting, then you see the truth. The truth is already all around; just you have to put your mind aside. The seeker has to fulfill only one basic thing: he has to drop his mind. The moment the mind is dropped, a great silence arises ― because the mind carries your whole past; all the memories of the past go on hankering for your attention, they go on crowding upon you, they don't leave any space within you. And the mind also means future. Out of the past you start fantasizing about the future. It is a projection out of the past. You have lived a certain life in the past: there have been a few moments of joy and many many dark nights. You would not like to have those dark nights; you would have your future to be full of those joyous moments. So you sort out from your past: you choose few things and you project them in the future, and you choose a few other things and you try to avoid them in the future. Your future is only nothing but a refined past ― a little bit modified here and there, but it is still the past because that's all that you know. And one thing very significant to be remembered: those few moments of joy that you had in the past were basically part of those long dark nights, so if you choose those moments those dark nights will come automatically; you cannot avoid them. The silver linings in the dark clouds cannot be chosen separately from the dark clouds. In the dark night you see the sky full of stars; in the day those stars disappear. Do you think they evaporate? They are still there, but the context is missing. They need darkness; only then you can see them. In the night, you will be able to see them again. Darker the night, the more shining are the stars.

In life everything is intertwined with each other. Your pleasures are intertwined with your pains, your ecstasies mixed inevitably, inseparably with your agonies. So your whole idea of the future is sheer nonsense. You cannot manage it, nobody has ever been able to manage it, because you are trying to do something which cannot be done in the very nature of things. It will be simply a repetition of your past. Whatsoever you desire is not going to make any difference. It will be again and again a repetition of your past, the same past, maybe a little bit different, but not because of your expectations ― a little bit different because life goes on changing, people go on changing, existence goes on changing. So there will be few differences but not basic differences, only in the non-essential parts. Essentially it will be the same tragedy. Dropping the mind means dropping the past, and with it of course the future disappears. Dropping the mind means you are suddenly awakened into the present, and the present is the only reality there is. Past is non-existential, so is future. Past is no more, future is not yet, only the present is. It is always now ― only the now exists. And the meditator starts merging and melting with the now.

Is meditation anything to do with morality or sin ?

What is the wisdom of the heart ?