Osho on Depression

Try to become aware when you are suffering

Osho,
More and more I see how my energy is either going very high or very low, how
sometimes I get very excited, come down again and then feel embarrassed about
what happened during this state of excitement.
Do you have a knack to give me for how to watch when the excitement comes, not
to get carried away and not to get identified with depression, and how to find my
grounding and balance?

“Mind is almost like the ocean, waves upon waves. Some waves are higher, and
between two waves there is a depression. There are two ways to get out of
this continuous up and down process.

“The easiest is that when you are ecstatic that is the moment to be aware. In
depression, in agony, awareness becomes more difficult. When you are flowing
with joy, blissfulness, that is the moment to be aware, but people do exactly
the opposite. When they are happy who cares about awareness? And when
they are in anguish, then certainly they start thinking it is time to be aware and
get out of anguish. But nobody has ever been able to get out from anguish
directly.

“First, one has to get out from ecstasy. If you can be aware of your joyful
moments in the first place, the depression, the downs will not come. The door
to get out is from ecstasy. So this is the simplest way:

“Be happy and be aware.

“Rejoice and be aware.

“Love and be aware.

“Don’t put awareness aside saying, ‘This is a kind of disturbance; I am in such a

great ecstasy.’ Awareness becomes like a disturbance; it is not. It may appear
like this in the beginning, but soon you will see it will take your ecstasy to
higher peaks. Ultimately awareness and ecstasy become one. Then those
downs, depressive moments, agonies disappear.

“The second way which is unnecessarily followed by a few people is difficult,

but your being German, perhaps the second may be right for you. Try to
become aware when you are suffering – and it is not only you, many people
around the world throughout history have tried that. If there was no suffering,
they created suffering just to be aware of it. They would fast, and that created
a suffering; they would live naked in the cold winters without clothes, and that
created suffering. Man is very inventive – he will torture himself in many
ways…

“In your agony you are alone; far away is the heart of the universe. Your agony
has created the distance. So when you are in agony – it is human and once in a
while it happens – remain alert. And if you have been able to remain alert
when the dance was descending on you and flowers were showering on you, it
won’t be difficult at all to be aware when something has gone wrong. You can
be a watcher – standing aside, unidentified.”

Osho, Om Shantih Shantih Shantih: The Soundless Sound, Peace Peace Peace,  Talk
#10
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Depression is a contemporary phenomenon

Osho,
In the olden days it was called melancholia; today it is called depression, and it
counts as one of the major psychological problems of developed countries. It is
described as a sense of despair or hopelessness, a lack of self-esteem with no
enthusiasm or interest in the surroundings. In addition, there are physical
symptoms of poor appetite, sleeplessness and a loss of sexual energy. Electroshock
treatment has largely been abandoned today, and drugs or talk therapy seem
equally effective – or ineffective. Explanations for depression have varied from the
chemical to the psychological.
Osho, what is this depression? Is it a reaction to a depressing world, a kind of
hibernation during “the winter of our discontent”? Is depression just a reaction to
repression – or oppression – or is it just a form of self-repression?

“Man has always lived with hope, a future, a paradise somewhere far away. He
has never lived in the present. his golden age is still to come. It kept him
enthusiastic because greater things were going to happen; all his longings were
going to be fulfilled. There was great joy in anticipation.

“He suffered in the present; he was miserable in the present. But all that was
completely forgotten in the dreams that were going to be fulfilled tomorrow.
Tomorrow has always been life-giving.

“But the situation has changed. The old situation was not good because the
tomorrow – the fulfillment of his dreams – never became true. He died hoping.
Even in his death he was hoping for a future life – but he never actually
experienced any rejoicing, any meaning. But it was tolerable. It was only a
question of today: it will pass, and tomorrow is bound to come.

“The religious prophets, messiahs, saviors were promising him all pleasures –
which are condemned here – in paradise. The political leaders, the social
ideologists, the utopians were promising him the same thing – not in paradise
but here on earth, somewhere far away in the future when the society goes
through a total revolution and there is no poverty, no classes, no government
and man is absolutely free and has everything that he needs.

“Both are basically fulfilling the same psychological need. To those who were
materialistic, the ideological, political, sociological utopians were appealing; to
those who were not so materialistic, the religious leaders appealed. But the
object of appeal was exactly the same: all that you can imagine, can dream of,
can long for, will be absolutely fulfilled. With those dreams, the present
miseries seemed to be very small.

“There was enthusiasm in the world; people were not depressed. Depression is
a contemporary phenomenon and it has come into being because now there is
no tomorrow.

“All political ideologies have failed. There is no possibility that man will ever be
equal, no possibility that there will be a time when there will be no
government, no possibility that all your dreams will be fulfilled…

“In the developed countries... and remember, the problem of depression is not
in undeveloped countries -- in the poor countries, people are still hopeful – it is
only in the developed countries, where they have everything that they had
always longed for. Now paradise will not do anymore; nor can a classless
society help anymore. No utopia is going to be better. They have achieved the
goal – and this achievement of the goal is the cause of depression. Now there
is no hope: tomorrow is dark, and the day after tomorrow will be even darker.”

Osho,  The Transmission of the Lamp, Talk #2

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You need a new direction

“The first thing in life is to find meaning in the present moment.

“The basic flavor of your being should be of love, of rejoicing, of celebration.
Then you can do anything; dollars will not destroy it. But you put everything
aside and simply run after dollars thinking that dollars can purchase everything.
And then one day you find they cannot purchase anything - and you have
devoted your whole life to dollars.

“This is the cause of depression.

“And particularly in the West, the depression is going to be very deep. In the
East, there have been rich people, but there was a certain dimension available.
When the road to richness came to an end, they did not remain stuck there;
they moved into a new direction. That new direction was in the air, available
for centuries.

“In the East the poor have been in a very good condition, and the rich have
been in a tremendously good condition. The poor have learned contentment
so they do not bother about running after ambition. And the rich have
understood that one day you have to renounce it all and go in search of truth,
in search of meaning.

“In the West, at the end, the road simply ends. You can go back, but going back
will not help your depression. You need a new direction.”

Osho, The Transmission of the Lamp, Talk #2

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Depression is nothing but repression

“You ask me... He is a surgeon, a doctor; naturally this question has arisen in
his mind. You ask me, ‘Is it justified and ethical for patients of depression to be
given Dynamic Meditation?’
“What else can be more justified and more ethical – because to be a sufferer of
depression simply means he has repressed too much. Depression is nothing
but repression. He is depressed so much because he has not been allowed to
express himself. Dynamic Meditation is expression. In expressing himself, in
catharting all that has been repressed in his unconscious, he will be
unburdened, he will become saner, healthier.

“Two robbers broke into a bank in a small town. ‘Alright,’ said the bigger man.
‘Line up! We are gonna rob all the men and rape all the women!’ ‘Wait a
second!’ snapped his partner. ‘Let us just grab the dough and beat it!’ ‘Shut up
and mind your own business,’ said the spinster from behind the counter. ‘The
big fella knows what he is doing!’

“We have made everybody repressed, pushing down all kinds of things. They
are boiling within.

“Before she left a friend’s house Aunt Emma was warned that a sex maniac
was loose in the neighborhood. That evening when she returned to her
apartment, she cautiously looked under her bed, in her closet and behind the
draperies. Then Emma switched on the light. ‘Well, he is not here!’ she sighed.
‘Damn it!’

“Everybody who has been brought up in our societies needs some methods to
vomit anger, sex, greed, jealousies, envies. You are sitting on a volcano. and the
volcano can erupt at any moment! If catharsis is allowed – and that’s what
Dynamic Meditation is all about – the volcano will disappear. You will become
saner.”

Osho, The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol. 7, Talk #4

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Whatsoever you are will knock at your door

“Negative emptiness is useless. It is simply the absence of something. Positive
emptiness is presence of something, not absence; that’s why positive
emptiness becomes a power. Negative emptiness becomes a sad, depressed
state of mind – you simply cave yourself inwards, that’s all. Feeling a failure,
feeling dejected, feeling everywhere the wall that you cannot cross, feeling
impotent, you denounce, you condemn.

“But this is not a growth, this is a regression. And deep inside you cannot
flower, because only understanding flowers, never depression, and if you
cannot flower, existence is not going to shower flowers on you. Existence
simply responds to you: whatsoever you are, existence gives you more of that.
If you have many flowers within your being flowering, a million times more
flowers will shower on you. If you have a deep depression, the existence helps
that too – a million times more depression will come to you. Whatsoever you
are will knock at your door. Whatsoever you are will be given to you more and
more.”

Osho, And the Flowers Showered, Talk #1

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When depressed, be depressed

“Remember this: whenever you are depressed, wait for the moment that the
depression goes. Nothing lasts forever: the depression will go. When the
depression leaves you, wait – be aware and alert – because after the
depression, after this night, there will be a dawn, the sun will rise. If you can be
alert in that moment, you will be happy that you were depressed. You will be
grateful that you were depressed because only through that depression, this
possibility; only through that depression, this moment of happiness.

“But what do we do? – we move in an infinite regression. We get depressed,

and then we get depressed because of the depression: a second depression
follows. If you are depressed, that’s okay, nothing is wrong in it. It is beautiful
because through it you will learn and mature. But then you feel badly: ‘Why do
I get depressed? I should not get depressed.’ Then you start fighting with the
depression. The real depression is good, but the second depression is unreal -
and this unreal depression will cloud your mind. You will miss the moment that
would have followed the real depression.

“When depressed, be depressed. Simply be depressed. Don’t get depressed

about your depression. When depressed, simply be depressed. Don’t fight it,
don’t create any diversion; don’t force it to go. Just allow it to happen, it will go
by itself. Life is a flux, nothing remains. You are not needed: the river moves by
itself, you are not to push it. If you are trying to push it, you are simply foolish.
The river flows by itself – allow it to flow.”

Osho,  The New Alchemy: To Turn You On, Talk #8

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If you get depressed, be happy that you are depressed

“When there is depression, allow it to be. Don’t get depressed about it. If you
want to remove it sooner, you will get depressed. If you fight it, you will create
a secondary depression, which is dangerous. The first depression is beautiful,
God-given. The second depression is your own. It is not God-given, it is
mental. Then you will move in mental grooves - they are infinite.

“If you get depressed, be happy that you are depressed and allow the
depression to be. Then, suddenly the depression will disappear and there will
be a breakthrough. There will be no clouds and the sky will be clear. For a
single moment, heaven opens for you. If you are not depressed about your
depression you can contact, you can commune, you can enter this heavenly
gate. And once you know it, you have learned one of the ultimate laws of life:
life uses the opposite as a teacher, as a background.”
 Osho, The New Alchemy: To Turn You On, Talk #8
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Whatsoever you do the depression will follow

“If you are depressed, so be depressed; don’t do anything. And what can you
do? Whatsoever you do will be done out of depression, so it will create more
confusion. You can pray to God, but you will pray so depressingly that you will
even make God depressed through your prayers. Don’t do that violence. Your
prayer is going to be a depressed prayer.

“You can meditate, but what will you do? The depression will be there.
Because you are depressed, whatsoever you do the depression will follow.
More confusion will be created, more frustration, because you cannot succeed.
And when you cannot succeed you will feel more depressed, and this can go
on ad infinitum. It is better to remain with the first depression than to create a
second circle and then a third circle. Remain with the first; the original is
beautiful. The second will be false, and the third will be a far-off echo. Don’t
create these. The first is beautiful. You are depressed, so this is how existence
is happening to you at this moment.”

Osho, The Book of Secrets, Talk #38

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Acceptance is transcendence

“A non-accepting mind will ‘non-accept’ anything, but if you can accept your
loneliness, your depression, your sadness, you are transcending already.
Acceptance is transcendence. You have taken the very ground away, and then
the depression cannot stand there.
“Try this: Whatsoever your state of mind, accept it and wait for when the state
changes itself. You are not changing it; you can feel the beauty that comes
when states change by themselves. You can know that it is just like the sun
rising in the morning and then setting in the evening. Then again it will rise and
again it will set, and it will go on. You need not do anything about it. If you can
feel your states of mind changing by themselves, you can remain indifferent,
you can remain away, miles away, as if the mind is going somewhere else. The
sun is rising, setting; the depression is coming, the happiness is coming, going:
but you are not in it. It goes and comes by itself; the states come and move.”

Osho, The Book of Secrets, Talk #38

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I never suggest anything that can create frustration, depression, sadness

Osho,
Dynamic Meditation is very active, very strenuous. Can one not go into meditation
just by sitting silently?

“If you begin with sitting, you will feel much disturbance inside. The more you
try to just sit, the more disturbance will be felt; you will become aware only of
your insane mind and nothing else. It will create depression, you will feel
frustrated. You will not feel blissful; rather, you will begin to feel that you are
insane. And sometimes you may really go insane.

“If you make a sincere effort to ‘just sit,’ you may really go insane. Only
because people do not really try sincerely does insanity not happen more
often. With a sitting posture you begin to know so much madness inside you
that if you are sincere and continue it, you may really go insane. It has
happened before, so many times; so I never suggest anything that can create
frustration, depression, sadness – anything that will allow you to be too aware
of your insanity. You may not be ready to be aware of all the insanity that is
inside you; you must be allowed to get to know certain things gradually.
Knowledge is not always good; it must unfold itself slowly as your capacity to
absorb it grows.”

Osho, Meditation: The Art of Ecstasy, Talk #5

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 Osho on Relaxation

Osho on Relaxation

Relaxation Is Just Being Natural

Osho,

Will you say something more about relaxation? I am aware of a tension deep at the
core of me and suspect that I have probably never been totally relaxed. When you
said the other day that to relax is one of the most complex phenomena possible, I
glimpsed a rich tapestry in which the threads of relaxation and let-go were deeply
interwoven with trust, and then love came into it, and acceptance, going with the
flow, union and ecstasy....

"Total relaxation is the ultimate. That's the moment when one becomes a
buddha. That is the moment of realization, enlightenment, christ-
consciousness. You cannot be totally relaxed right now. At the innermost core
a tension will persist.

"But start relaxing. Start from the circumference – that's where we are, and we
can start only from where we are. Relax the circumference of your being –
relax your body, relax your behavior, relax your acts. Walk in a relaxed way, eat
in a relaxed way, talk, listen in a relaxed way. Slow down every process. Don't
be in a hurry and don't be in haste. Move as if all eternity is available to you –
in fact, it is available to you. We are here from the beginning and we are going
to be here to the very end, if there is a beginning and there is an end. In fact,
there is no beginning and no end. We have always been here and we will be
here always. Forms go on changing, but not the substance; garments go on
changing, but not the soul.

"Tension means hurry, fear, doubt. Tension means a constant effort to protect,
to be secure, to be safe. Tension means preparing for the tomorrow now, or
for the afterlife – afraid tomorrow you will not be able to face the reality, so be
prepared. Tension means the past that you have not lived really but only
somehow bypassed; it hangs, it is a hangover, it surrounds you.

"Remember one very fundamental thing about life: Any experience that has
not been lived will hang around you, will persist: "Finish me! Live me! Complete
me!" There is an intrinsic quality in every experience that it tends and wants to
be finished, completed. Once completed, it evaporates; incomplete, it persists,
it tortures you, it haunts you, it attracts your attention. It says, "What are you
going to do about me? I am still incomplete – fulfill me!"

"Your whole past hangs around you with nothing completed – because nothing
has been lived really, everything somehow bypassed, partially lived, only so-so,
in a lukewarm way. There has been no intensity, no passion. You have been
moving like a somnambulist, a sleepwalker. So that past hangs, and the future
creates fear. And between the past and the future is crushed your present, the
only reality.

"You will have to relax from the circumference. The first step in relaxing is the
body. Remember as many times as possible to look in the body, whether you
are carrying some tension in the body somewhere – at the neck, in the head, in
the legs. Relax it consciously. Just go to that part of the body, and persuade
that part, say to it lovingly "Relax!"

"And 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.

"Then take another step, a little deeper; tell the mind to relax. And if the body
listens, mind also listens, but you cannot start with the mind – you have to
start from the beginning. You cannot start from the middle. Many people start
with the mind and they fail; they fail because they start from a wrong place.
Everything should be done in the right order.

"If you become capable of relaxing the body voluntarily, then you will be able
to help your mind relax voluntarily. Mind is a more complex phenomenon.
Once you have become confident that the body listens to you, you will have a
new trust in yourself. Now even the mind can listen to you. It will take a little
longer with the mind, but it happens.

 
"When the mind is relaxed, then start relaxing your heart, the world of your
feelings, emotions – which is even more complex, more subtle. But now you
will be moving with trust, with great trust in yourself. Now you will know it is
possible. If it is possible with the body and possible with the mind, it is possible
with the heart too. And then only, when you have gone through these three
steps, can you take the fourth. Now you can go to the innermost core of your
being, which is beyond body, mind, heart: the very center of your existence.
And you will be able to relax it too.

"And that relaxation certainly brings the greatest joy possible, the ultimate in
ecstasy, acceptance. You will be full of bliss and rejoicing. Your life will have
the quality of dance to it.

"The whole of existence is dancing, except man. The whole of existence is in a

very relaxed movement; movement there is, certainly, but it is utterly relaxed.
Trees are growing and birds are chirping and rivers are flowing, stars are
moving: everything is going in a very relaxed way. No hurry, no haste, no
worry, and no waste. Except man. Man has fallen a victim of his mind.

"Man can rise above gods and fall below animals. Man has a great spectrum.
From the lowest to the highest, man is a ladder.

"Start from the body, and then go, slowly slowly, deeper. And don't start with
anything else unless you have first solved the primary. If your body is tense,
don't start with the mind. Wait. Work on the body. And just small things are of
immense help.

"You walk at a certain pace; that has become habitual, automatic. Now try to
walk slowly. Buddha used to say to his disciples, "Walk very slowly, and take
each step very consciously." If you take each step very consciously, you are
bound to walk slowly. If you are running, hurrying, you will forget to
remember. Hence Buddha walks very slowly.

 
"Just try walking very slowly, and you will be surprised – a new quality of
awareness starts happening in the body. Eat slowly, and you will be surprised –
there is great relaxation. Do everything slowly... just to change the old pattern,
just to come out of old habits.

"First the body has to become utterly relaxed, like a small child, then only start
with the mind. Move scientifically: first the simplest, then the complex, then
the more complex. And then only can you relax at the ultimate core.

"You ask me, "Will you say something more about relaxation? I am aware of a
tension deep in the core of me and suspect that I have probably never been
totally relaxed."

"That is the situation of every human being. It is good that you are aware –
millions are unaware of it. You are blessed that you are aware, because if you
are aware then something can be done. If you are not aware, then nothing is
possible. Awareness is the beginning of transformation.

"And you say, "When you said the other day that to relax is one of the most
complex phenomena possible, I glimpsed a rich tapestry in which the threads
of relaxation and let-go were deeply interwoven with trust, and then love
came into it, and acceptance, going with the flow, union and ecstasy...."

"Yes, relaxation is one of the most complex phenomena – very rich,

multidimensional. All these things are part of it: let-go, trust, surrender, love,
acceptance, going with the flow, union with existence, egolessness, ecstasy. All
these are part of it, and all these start happening if you learn the ways of
relaxation. 

 
"Your so-called religions have made you very tense. Because they have created
guilt in you. My effort here is to help you get rid of all guilt and all fear. I would
like to tell you: there is no hell and no heaven. So don't be afraid of hell and
don't be greedy for heaven. All that exists is this moment. You can make this
moment a hell or a heaven – that certainly is possible – but there is no heaven
or hell somewhere else. Hell is when you are all tense, and heaven is when you
are all relaxed. Total relaxation is paradise."

Osho, The Dhammapada: The Way of the Buddha, Vol. 1, Talk #8

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Religious Leaders

Neither the religious leader nor the politician is interested in the people whom
they pretend to lead. They are interested in being leaders – and of course the
leader cannot be without the led, so it is a necessity to go on promising the
people things. Politicians promise them things of this world; religious leaders
promise them things of the other world. But do you see any difference in what
they are doing? Both are promising so that you go on following them, afraid to
get lost somewhere else, because if you lose the path then you will miss the
promise.

The promise keeps you with the crowd – and promises don´t cost anything.
You can promise anything. Promises are always for tomorrow, and tomorrow
never comes.