Ah, This ! - Talks on Zen Stories

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Do you feel that there is something more to life, that you are living superficially? Are you seeking something? Osho describes Zen as a way of transforming the mundane and providing meaning. It is not a question of looking for outside guidance, of finding knowledge and answers, but of realizing your authentic self, a deep blossoming — a state of innocence.

Here and now, the ordinary can become extraordinary, and the tremendous, absurd beauty of existence can be rediscovered In these talks, Osho shows how his working methods, like those of the Zen masters before him, are designed to illuminate by creating contexts and situations where individual awakening becomes possible. His contemporary meditations are essential to modern life and the future of humanity.

Osho's unique contribution to the understanding of who we are defies categorization. Mystic and scientist, a rebel¬lious spirit whose sole interest is to alert humanity to the urgent need to discover a new way of living. To continue as before is to invite threats to our very survival on this unique and beautiful planet.

His essential point is that only by changing ourselves, one individual at a time, can the outcome of all our "selves" — our societies, our cultures, our beliefs, our world — also change. The doorway to that change is meditation. Osho the scientist has experimented and scrutinized all the approaches of the past and examined their effects on the modern human being and responded to their shortcomings by creating a new starting point for the hyperactive 21st Century mind: OSHO Active Meditations.

Once the agitation of a modern lifetime has started to settle, "activity" can melt into "passivity," a key starting point of real meditation. To support this next step, Osho has transformed the ancient "art of listening" into a subtle contemporary methodology: the OSHO Talks. Here words become music, the listener discovers who is listening, and the awareness moves from what is being heard to the indi-vidual doing the listening. Magically, as silence arises, what needs to be heard is understood directly, free from the dis¬traction of a mind that can only interrupt and interfere with this delicate process.

Man since Jesus Christ." Sunday Mid-Day (India) has selected Osho as one of ten people — along with Gandhi, Nehru and Buddha — who have changed the des¬tiny of India.

These thousands of talks cover everything from the indi¬vidual quest for meaning to the most urgent social and political issues facing society today. Osho's books are not written but are transcribed from audio and video recordings of these extemporaneous talks to international audiences. As he puts it, "So remember: whatever I am saying is not just for you...I am talking also for the future generations."

Osho has been described by The Sunday Times in London as one of the "1000 Makers of the 20th Century" and by American author Tom Robbins as "the most dan¬gerous

About his own work Osho has said that he is helping to create the conditions for the birth of a new kind of human being. He often characterizes this new human being as "Zorba the Buddha" — capable both of enjoying the earthy pleasures of a Zorba the Greek and the silent serenity of a Gautama the Buddha.

Running like a thread through all aspects of Osho's talks and meditations is a vision that encompasses both the timeless wisdom of all ages past and the highest potential of today’s (and tomorrow's) science and technology. Osho is known for his revolutionary contribution to the science of inner transformation, with an approach to meditation that acknowledges the accelerated pace of con¬temporary life. His unique OSHO Active Meditations'" are designed to first release the accumulated stresses of body and mind, so that it is then easier to take an experi¬ence of stillness and thought-free relaxation into daily life.

Zen is not a philosophical approach toward life. It is an existen¬tial approach, and it has helped tremendously; it has brought-many people to awakening. Zen does not believe in analyzing a problem because it does not believe that any problem can be solved at its own level. No problem can be solved unless your consciousness is raised a little higher than the problem. This has to be understood; this is something very fundamental.

You ask me a question. I can answer it, but you remain on the same level of consciousness. My answer cannot raise your consciousness. You ask, "Does God exist?" I can say yes or no —but you remain the same! Whether I say yes or no, it will not help you in any way to become more conscious. It will not give you more being; it will only give you more knowledge this way or that.

If you are an atheist and you ask, "Is there a God?" and I say no, you will feel very happy. You will say, "So I was right." Or if I say yes, you will say, "This man is wrong. He does not know anything. He is just a blind person. I have argued, I have looked into the matter deeply, and I can't find any proof for God."

Whether I say yes or no, whether you are a theist or an atheist, either you will accumulate the knowledge, receive it if it fits with you, or if it doesn't fit with you, you will reject it. That's what you are doing continuously in your mind. But your con¬sciousness is not raised, and unless your consciousness is raised, no problem can be solved. In the first place the problem is cre¬ated because of your consciousness, and it cannot be solved by any answer; it can only be solved by helping your consciousness to rise a little higher.

That's the work of Zen. It is not a transfer of knowledge; it is a transfer of consciousness, being.