Osho on Satsang

IF YOU BRING FORTH THAT WITHIN YOURSELVES, THAT WHICH YOU HAVE WILL SAVE YOU. IF YOU DO NOT HAVE THAT WITHIN YOURSELVES, THAT WHICH YOU DO NOT HAVE WILL KILL YOU.

But you have not looked at all within, you have not even had a single glimpse. So whatsoever you have is going to destroy you, it cannot save you. You may have wealth, you may have power, you may have many things of this world, but nothing is going to save you. On the contrary, that weight of the world is going to drown you. You have gathered much weight, and that is what is drowning you already, your boat is half-drowned already. You cannot leave the boat either, because all your possessions are there, you have to carry them to the other shore. But the possessions belong to this shore, and they cannot go to the other shore. Nobody has ever been capable of taking anything from this world to the other.

When you die, how can you carry anything from this world to the other? When you die your body drops. All that could be carried could only be carried through the body, and all that you possessed was possessed through the body. When the body drops, the very medium, the very vehicle drops. Then you cannot carry anything from this world, it is impossible. That’s why many clever people think, “Don’t collect the commodities of the world, just collect knowledge, because knowledge can be carried.” Remember well: knowledge cannot be carried either, because when the body drops, the brain drops, and the brain is the accumulator of knowledge.

Your brain is the computer in which knowledge, information collects. It is also outside: if you take the brain of Einstein out, he will be an ordinary idiot, because with the brain knowledge disappears. But if you take the brain of Jesus out, there will be no difference, he will remain the same, because Jesus accumulates awareness, not knowledge.

So there are three types of people: the most outward-oriented — they collect things, but those things cannot be carried to the other shore. Then the second — who are not so outward-oriented, but still outward — they collect knowledge, scriptures, theories, philosophies. They are more clever but still stupid, because knowledge is accumulated in the brain and the brain is part of the body — the innermost part, but still part of the body. And when the body drops, the brain drops. Then there is the third person, who accumulates awareness, who cultivates awareness, whose whole life goal is to be more and more conscious. This consciousness is your innermost self. Only this consciousness goes to the other shore, only this consciousness belongs to the other shore.

In this body, both worlds exist: this and that, of matter and of consciousness. And between these two worlds there exists an interlink. That interlink is your knowledge. Drop things and drop knowledge. Just grow more and more in awareness, consciousness, become more and more alert. The more alert, the more you will carry from this world to the other; you will not go like a poor man, you will go rich. In this world you may look like a poor man, like a Buddha, like a beggar, a bhikkhu, but in the other world you will be like a king, because you will carry only yourself.

It happened: when Pompeii was destroyed by a volcanic eruption, the whole city was afire in the middle of the night, buildings were falling and people were escaping. Everybody was carrying something or other, because the city was very rich. And people were carrying their most valuable things: somebody was carrying his gold, somebody his diamonds, somebody his money; scholars were carrying their scriptures, books — whatsoever could be saved they were carrying. But there was one man who was not carrying anything, just his walking stick. And those who were carrying things were very disturbed, worried; their whole lives were being destroyed. Only this man was walking amidst the crowd as if he were going for his morning walk. That was his usual routine: at three o’clock in the morning he used to go for a morning walk, and this was the time.

Whosoever looked at him said, “Why? You couldn’t save anything? Everything is lost?”
The man said, “I didn’t have anything, and all that I have I am carrying.”
“Then why are you walking as if you are going for a morning walk? It is such a crisis, whole lives are destroyed, people are ruined!”
The man laughed and he said, “Because whatsoever you have accumulated is of this world — death ruins it, fire burns it. I have accumulated only awareness. It may be a crisis for you, for me it is time for my morning walk.”
This man is the mystic, this man is the yogi, this man is the one about whom Jesus is talking.

IF YOU BRING FORTH THAT WITHIN YOURSELVES, THAT WHICH YOU HAVE WILL SAVE YOU. IF YOU DO NOT HAVE THAT WITHIN YOURSELVES, THAT WHICH YOU DO NOT HAVE WILL KILL YOU.

If you are poor inside, you may be rich outside but you are going to be destroyed by your own possessions. If you are rich inside, then don’t bother. Then whether you have anything or not, death cannot snatch anything from you. Only awareness transcends death; that is the only ray of light in human life which transcends death.

Can you die fully aware? That is the only, the whole point. But if you have not lived fully aware, how can you die fully aware? Even in life you are so unaware — how can you be aware in death? Remember that whenever there is too much pain, the body has an automatic mechanism to throw you into unawareness, because otherwise it will be intolerable. Doctors have invented anesthesia very recently, but nature knows anesthesia, it has always known anesthesia. Whenever you come to a point when there is too much pain, suddenly you become unconscious, you faint, because it will be intolerable. So the body has an inner thermostat. You may be saying to people, “It is intolerable, my pain is intolerable,” but you are wrong, because if it is intolerable you will be unconscious.

There exists no pain which can be called intolerable. All pains are tolerable, all sufferings are tolerable. That’s why you remain alert, otherwise you would faint. And death is the most painful thing. When death comes, it is the greatest surgery possible, because your whole being has to be taken away, separated from the body with which you have become so much identified and one. It is not cutting a finger, it is not cutting a hand, it is not removing your appendix — it is removing your whole body from you. No doctor can do that yet. The whole body is being removed, separated. And you have lived with this body for seventy years, eighty years; not only lived with it, you have lived in identification with it: you thought you were the body. The pain is such that you will become unconscious.

The whole of life is a preparation to be aware in death. That’s what a Sannyasin should do, that’s what a seeker should do: be ready! Don’t lose a single moment, because once lost it cannot be regained. And the only richness that you can get out of it is by being more aware. Do whatsoever, but do it with alertness, awareness. Your lives may be different but your inner search cannot be different; it is the same. You may be a businessman, you may be a professor, you may be a doctor, an engineer, or a laborer, but it makes no difference. The inner search is the same, and that is how to become more and more conscious. A point comes when you are so conscious that even death cannot make you unconscious. This is what Jesus means: unfold that which is within you. If you have that you will be saved, if you don’t have that you will be drowned.

And in another saying Jesus says a very strange thing. He says, “Those who have, they should be given more. And those who don’t have, even that which they have will be taken away.” Looks absurd! Jesus says, “Those who have should be given more. And those who don’t have, even that which they have will be taken away from them.” He is talking about awareness, because awareness attracts more awareness. If you become aware, you become capable of being more aware; every step leads to a further step. If you are not aware, then every step leads you further away…If you suffer in your life, you suffer because you are losing your consciousness somewhere: you are wrong, but you think the other may be looking from the wrong window, you think you are always knocking at the right door.

You have always been knocking at the wrong door, because all the doors in this world are wrong — unless you knock at the inner door, which is not part of this world. It moves with you, but it is not part of this world. You carry something within which does not belong to this world. That is your treasure, and that is your door through which God can be approached.

Jesus says, “Grow in that which you are already carrying.” The one ray has already happened: you are not aware, or just a little bit; a cloudy awareness, a dim light, very dim — you cannot see. But it has happened, that is how you are higher than the animals, even that is not in animals.

The first ray of consciousness has penetrated you, but that ray of consciousness is just a mustard seed; you have to give it soil. What is the soil for it? Hindus have called that soil satsang. Go near to those who have grown higher than you, just be near them, in their presence, and your ray of consciousness will become higher and higher — it needs a challenge.

But the common tendency of the mind is always to move with inferiors, always to move with people who are even less alert than you. Why? — because there you feel superior, there you feel you are somebody.

Everybody seeks the inferior and through this seeking becomes inferior himself. Whenever you reach a man like Jesus you are disturbed, because you cannot assert your superiority here. You are inferior, it is not an inferiority complex. You simply are inferior before a Jesus, because your consciousness is nothing, and he is a light so tremendous that you become almost dark before him. Even the flicker, the one ray of consciousness seems to be nothing. It has to be so: you take your earthen lamp out in the day in the sun, and what will you feel? It is as if the earthen lamp, the flame has become dark beside the sun. Take your earthen lamp into a dark room and it becomes a sun itself. Hence the tendency of the mind to seek the inferior. It is just like water: as water always seeks a lower and lower level, mind always seeks the inferior…Look at your friends — why have you chosen them? Deep down you will find the cause to be this: they are inferior to you, with them you become a great light; otherwise you are an ordinary flame in an earthen lamp. The mind seeks the inferior to prove that it is superior. People even love animals; people who cannot love human beings, how can they love animals? But a dog buttresses you so beautifully, as no person can. Whether you beat him or welcome him it makes no difference, he goes on moving and waving his tail, he is always welcoming you. He always goes with you wherever you go, you cannot find a better follower than a dog. Why do people enjoy the fellowship of a dog? The inferior helps, you feel you are superior…

The mind is always seeking the inferior, and there comes a point when even a dog can sometimes be superior to you. In many ways he is! He is stronger; if he fights, you will be nowhere. People go on falling lower; then they seek things, then a car becomes their love object — do whatsoever you want to do and the car cannot do anything: then a house, then objects, possessions. With things you feel like a person, very superior.

Satsang means always choosing the company of the superior. The mind will help you to choose the company of the inferior. Be alert and avoid this, because with the inferior you will become inferior. More and more the ray of consciousness will be lost in darkness. Always choose the superior, move towards the superior. But your ego will feel hurt. The ego has to be left. Satsang means living against the ego, transcending the ego, always seeking the superior. And you want to encounter God, and you are not happy in encountering Jesus and Buddha? Then how will it be possible?… because God is the superiormost light, the climax of the whole existence, the flowering of all life.

If you always choose the inferior, how can you really desire to enter into the kingdom of God? You are following a wrong path.

Remember this, and only one point has to be continuously kept in mind, and that is: move in circles — with people, with friends, with books — always remembering that something superior is there, so that you can drop your ego; you can feel inferior and drop the ego. Always seek the superior. By and by, one step, another step… you will be able to encounter Jesus. And only if you can encounter Jesus will you be able to encounter God.

This is the meaning when Jesus says, “Except through me, you cannot reach him.” This is the meaning: if you cannot encounter me, how can you think of encountering the supreme most? If you encounter the son, then there is the possibility that you may be capable of encountering the father, because the son is just a representative.

Avatars, buddhas, tirthankaras, they are just the representatives, they are a light from the supreme. If you cannot encounter them, if you cannot live with them, if your ego cannot allow them to exist with you, then there is no possibility for the final, ultimate truth.

Source:

This is an excerpt from the transcript of a public discourse by Osho in Buddha Hall, Shree Rajneesh Ashram, Pune. 

Discourse Series: The Mustard Seed: My Most Loved Gospel on Jesus
Chapter #21
Chapter title: Become a Gardener
10 September 1974 am in Buddha Hall

References:

Osho has spoken on ‘Satsang, awareness, consciousness, transcendence’ in many of His discourses. More on the subject can be referred to in the following books/discourses:

1. Beyond Psychology
2. The First Principle
3. The Fish in the Sea is Not Thirsty
4. From the False to the Truth
5. Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega, Vol 1, 6
6. Zen: The Path of Paradox, Vol 1, 2, 3
7. Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, Vol 1, 2
8. Philosophia Perennis, Vol 1, 2
9. The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha
10. The Path of the Mystic
11. Sat Chit Anand
12. Sermons in Stones
13. That Art Thou