УДК 159.9
ББК 86.39
О96
Перевод с английского Swami Atmo Ravi
Дизайн обложки Е. А. Орловской
Послания любви. 365 писем ОШО
Ошо
Послания любви. 365 писем Ошо. — СПб.: ИГ «Весь», 2012. — 416 с. — (Путь мистика).
ISBN 978-5-9573-2446-1
Перед вами книга, состоящая из оригинальных писем Ошо, написанных им в 1960-х годах и адресованных друзьям и ученикам. В то время Ошо только начинал свои исследования, посвященные медитации, и эти письма будут, несомненно, полезны всем искателям, которые столкнулись с трудностями первого медитативного опыта, внутренней трансформации и начальных методов достижения просветления.
Речь Ошо необыкновенно поэтична. Чтобы читатель прочувствовал ритм и неповторимый стиль великого мастера, в книге, помимо перевода, приведен оригинальный английский текст. Исполненные тепла и любви, где каждая фраза наполнена глубоким смыслом, эти письма будут вашим другом и помощником в познании себя.
«Суть не в том, что вы слушаете, но как вы слушаете — потому что послание повсюду, повсюду, повсюду» (ОШО).
Тематика: Эзотерика / Эзотерические учения
Ранее книга выходила под названием «Чашка чая. 365 писем Ошо».
является зарегистрированной торговой маркой и используется с разрешения Osho International Foundation.
Все права защищены.
Публикуется на основе Соглашения с Osho International Foundation, Banhofstr/52, 8001 Zurich, Switzerland, www.osho.com
Слова, идущие из глубины и полноты сердца, —
отзвуки бесконечного,
как маленький цветок, выражающий бесконечную красоту.
Когда любовь вдыхает в слова жизнь,
находит выражение не то,
что сказано, а то, что хочет быть сказано.
В каждом из нас есть поэт, есть поэзия,
но оттого что мы живем на поверхности,
они никогда не рождаются.
1962
1. Love.
I received your letter.
How lovingly you insist on my writing something,
and here am I, drowned in a deep silence!
I speak, I work,
but I am steeped in emptiness within.
There, there is no movement.
Thus I seem to be living two lives at one time.
What a drama!
But perhaps all of life is a drama
and becoming aware of this opens the door
to a unique freedom.
That which is
inaction in action
stillness in motion
eternity in change
– that is truth
and that is existence.
Real life lies in this eternity –
everything else is just the stream of dreams.
In truth the world is just a dream
and the question is not whether to leave these dreams or not,
one just has to be aware of them.
With this awareness, everything changes.
The center moves.
A shift takes place from body to soul.
And what is there.
It cannot be told.
It has never been told
and it never will be.
There is no other way but to know it for oneself.
Death is known only through dying
and truth is known only through diving deep within oneself.
May God drown you in this truth!
2. Love.
I am in bliss.
I have been meaning to write for a long time
but many engagements prevented me.
My blessings, however, I send every day.
Life is a sadhana;
the more you involve yourself in it
the more divine it becomes.
The light is hidden in the darkness,
truth is hidden,
and from this comes the joy of searching.
I remember the words of a rishi:
Truth is hidden under a golden lid.
The golden lid that hides truth is nothing but our mind.
The mind has smothered us;
we are in it,
we identify with it,
therefore the suffering comes,
the bondage and the chain of rebirths.
Rise above it,
become aware that you are distinct from it –
that alone brings bliss,
that alone is freedom
and the end of birth and death.
We have to be what we truly are:
this is the only sadhana.
It is the frustration of living through desires
that brings this sadhana.
Become alert about desire
and non-attachment begins to appear.
This is not to be made to happen,
it follows naturally from awareness of attachment.
Each one of us has to become aware of his attachments,
and keep being so!
Nothing should be done unconsciously.
If this is remembered
one day a totally new kind of revolution takes place
in our consciousness.
God is leading you towards this revolution –
this I know.
3. My respects to you.
I was extremely pleased to get your letter.
So far I have not written anything
but a meditation center has started here
where some friends are experimenting.
When I have some definite results
there is every possibility of my writing something.
About my experiments on myself, I am sure and certain,
but I want to test their usefulness to others.
I do not want to write anything
in the manner of philosophy,
my outlook is scientific.
I want to say something about yoga
based on certain psychological
and parapsychological experiments.
There are many illusory notions held about it
and these have to be refuted.
Therefore I am experimenting here also.
It is clear to me
that this work is not for promoting any group or cause.
If you ever come here we can talk more about all this.
4. My respects to you.
I am grateful for your affectionate letter.
You are meditating – that is a matter for joy.
Drop all ideas of achieving in meditation,
just do it naturally;
what happens, happens on its own.
One day, effortlessly,
everything starts happening by itself.
Effort does not lead to meditation,
in fact it is a hindrance.
In effort, practice, study,
there is tension.
Any expectation,
even the expectation of peace,
brings restlessness.
The tension has to go.
As soon as this happens
a divine peace sets in.
Stop feeling: I am doing it;
realize instead: I leave myself in the hands of that-which-is.
Surrender,
surrender yourself completely;
as soon as you do this, emptiness comes.
Breathing and the body are becoming relaxed, you say.
This will happen with the mind too.
When the mind goes
what takes place is indescribable.
I know that this is going to happen to you both.
Just go on naturally and without purpose.
Soon I shall be there,
until then, go on quietly with what I have told you to do.
My respects to all.
Write whenever you feel like it.
I am in complete bliss.
5. Love.
It is through God’s grace
that you are working towards the discovery
of the inner light.
That light is definitely there
and once it is met all darkness in life disappears.
Each step taken within
peels away the darkness layer by layer
unfolding a world of light in which everything is new.
This experience cuts away all bondage –
and then comes the realization that it was never there!
Liberation happens to that which is eternally free!
I am pleased with your progress.
Your letter was received long back
but as I was busy there was delay in replying,
but my memory of you is always there,
along with all those eager for the light.
My good wishes flow for ever towards them.
We have to keep going.
Many times one becomes disheartened on the path
but ultimately the thirsty pilgrim reaches the spring.
In fact the water is there before the thirst.
My kind regards to all.
6. My respects to you.
I was away, but your letter followed me here.
I am pleased to have it.
I see life as full of bliss.
Ordinarily, we do not have the eyes to see this
and so are deprived of it,
but this seeing can be created.
Perhaps it is not correct to say it can be created;
it is already there,
it is only a matter of opening the eyes,
and then – everything changes.
Meditation achieves this.
Meditation means: peace; emptiness.
This emptiness is there
but is concealed by the flow of thoughts.
As thoughts cease it comes into view.
It seems difficult to become free of thoughts
but it is very simple.
The mind seems very restless
but it can easily settle.
The key to this transcendence is witnessing.
One has to be a witness,
an observer of the mind.
One has to watch it,
just watch it.
The moment the witness state dawns,
that very moment one becomes free of thoughts.
This in turn opens the door to bliss
and then this very world changes
into a new world altogether.
Keep meditating.
Results will come slowly.
You are not to worry about that,
their coming is certain.
My kind regards to all.
7. Love.
It is a long time since I received your letter.
I am happy that you long for peace –
but drop this idea that you are way behind.
Nobody is lagging behind.
It is just a matter of turning in –
and the drop becomes the ocean.
Actually the drop is the ocean
but it does not know it –
that is the only separation.
In the emptiness of meditation even this separation goes.
Meditation is the center of life’s sadhana.
The thought process will slow down
and in its place will come peace and emptiness.
When thoughts vanish
the seer, the witness, becomes visible
and the complex of the unconscious disappears.
This complex is the cause of bondage.
In the beginning it appears as hard as stone
but the seeker who practices patiently
finds one day that it was just a dream,
a puff of air.
May the seed of your meditation
blossom into the flower of samadhi!
My kind regards to all.
The rest when we meet.
1963
8. My respects to you.
Moving around for the whole of May affected my health so all
programs for June – Bombay, Calcutta, Jaipur – were canceled.
I am glad to hear you are experimenting with
samadhi yoga.
Don’t worry about results,
just be with the experimenting.
The return is bound to come one day – not gradually
but all of a sudden, effortlessly,
without one’s knowing, it happens.
Within a moment life becomes wonderfully different!
I am not writing anything on
Bhagwan Mahavir at the moment.
There is no urge whatsoever in me to write.
But if you persuade me it is a different thing!
Everything else is fine.
9. Love.
I read your letter on the way here.
It has touched my heart.
If your desire to know life’s truth becomes strong
then what is longing today
becomes one day the attainment.
Burning desire is all that is needed
and nothing else.
As rivers seek out the ocean
so man if he wants to can find the truth.
No peak, no mountain can stop him,
in fact their challenge awakens his sense of adventure.
Truth is within everyone.
Rivers have to find the ocean
but our ocean is inside us –
it is a wonder that so many remain thirsty still without it.
Actually they cannot really want it.
There is a saying of Christ’s: Ask and ye shall receive.
But if you don’t ask, whose fault is it?
There is no better bargain than the attainment of God.
We have only to ask, nothing more.
As the asking grows stronger and stronger
so he who asks starts vanishing.
A limit is reached,
a point of evaporation is reached,
where the seeker utterly disappears
and only the asking remains.
This is the very moment of attainment.
Truth is where the I is not –
this experience alone is the divine experience.
Absence of ego is presence of God.
My regards to all there.
10. My respects to you.
I was waiting for your letter when it came.
I really want your life to be filled with light,
for you to surrender yourself to God.
God and light are always close by.
It is only a matter of opening one’s eyes
and then what is ours becomes ours.
The distance is just that of
between the eyelash and the eye –
and perhaps not even that much;
the eyes are always open, only we don’t know it.
There is an old story:
A fish had long heard stories about the ocean.
She began to fret about it
so one day she asked the Queen of Fishes:
What is this ocean and where is it?
The Queen was surprised. She said:
The ocean? Why, you are in the ocean itself!
Your very existence, your very life, is in the ocean.
It is within you.
The ocean is your everything,
but for the ocean, you are nothing.
For this very reason
the fish couldn’t see the ocean!
And for this very reason
we are unable to find God.
But he can be found –
by being empty.
In the state of emptiness we meet him
for God is emptiness.
I am in bliss,
or shall I say –
Bliss alone is and I am not!
11. My respects to you.
I received your letter, I was waiting for it.
The trip to Rajnagar was blissful.
Religion robbed of the spirit of yoga has become a matter
of morality only, thereby losing its soul.
Morality is negative.
Life cannot be based on negation,
negation cannot nourish life.
The emphasis has to be on attainment
not on renunciation.
It is not a question of renouncing ignorance
but of attaining understanding,
it is this that has to be central.
Practice has to be positive
and this sadhana can happen through yoga.
In my talks with Acharya Tulsi,
Muni Shri Nathamaljee and others
I have stressed this point.
Many letters have come from Rajnagar and Rajasthan
in this connection; as you have said
it seems some fruitful work has been accomplished
by going there.
One thing is very clear:
people are eager for a spiritual life
and current forms of religion do not satisfy them.
If however the right religion is given to them
it can revolutionize human consciousness.
I think of you.
May God grant you peace.
My love and regards to all.
12. My respects to you.
All your letters arrived in good time
but as I have been busy I could not reply sooner.
I have been out most of the time
and I have just returned after speaking in Jaipur, Burhanpur,
Hoshangabad, Chanda and other places.
How thirsty people are for spiritual life!
Seeing this
I am surprised that some people say
man has lost all interest in religion.
This can never be.
No interest in religion means no interest in life,
bliss, the ultimate.
Consciousness is by nature God-oriented
and it can only be satisfied by attaining God –
the state of satchitananda,
the truth-awareness-bliss state of being.
Hidden within one in the form of a seed
is the very source of religious birth,
therefore whilst religions may come and go
religion can never die.
I am glad to know that you feel patient
about your progress towards the light.
Patience is the most important thing of all
in spiritual life.
How long one must wait after sowing the seed!
At first all the effort seems wasted,
nothing seems to happen, and then one day
the waiting ends and there is actuality –
the seed breaks, pushes through the earth, into a plant!
But remember that even when nothing seemed to be happening
the seed was working away under the soil.
It is the same with the seeker for truth –
when nothing appears to be happening
much is happening.
The fact is that all growth of life-energy
is unseen and unknown.
Only the results can be observed not the progress.
I am in bliss.
I want you to come closer to God.
Forget about results, just keep going on your path;
let the fruits come by themselves.
One day one wonders: What has happened!
What was I!
What have I become!
Compared to the results all the effort seems negligible.
My love to all.
13. My respects to you.
I have just returned from Rajnagar in Rajasthan.
I was invited to a religious function there
organized by Acharya Shree Tulsi.
I put four hundred monks and nuns
through an experiment in meditation.
The results were extraordinary.
In my view, meditation is the essence
of all religious practice.
All the rest –
such as non-violence,
renunciation of wealth, celibacy etc. –
are just its consequences.
With the attainment of samadhi,
the culmination of meditation,
all these things come by themselves,
they just happen naturally.
Since we forgot this central sadhana
all our efforts have been external and superficial.
True sadhana is not just ethical,
it is basically yoga practice.
Ethics alone are negative
and nothing enduring can be constructed on negation.
Yoga is positive and can therefore form a base.
I want to convey this positive basis to all.
1964
14. Love.
I have received your very affectionate letter.
You write that my words ring in your ears;
what I want is for their echo to carry you
into that space where everything is silent, empty.
This is the way from words to emptiness.
There one meets oneself.
I am in bliss.
Take my love.
I have nothing else to offer, it is my only wealth.
The marvel of it is that the more of it you give
the more it becomes.
Real wealth is like that –
it grows as you give it away;
and if it diminishes – it is not wealth at all.
Write again,
for not only do you wait for my letters,
I too wait for yours.
15. Love.
On returning from the meditation camp
I had to leave town again.
I returned only last night but I thought of you all the time.
I cannot forget the thirst for God I saw in your eyes
and the striving for truth in your heart.
This is a blessing because no one can attain
without passing through this anguish.
Remember, thirst is a prerequisite
for the birth of light and love.
Together, light and love are God.
When love has no limits
its flame becomes smokeless and so divine.
I have seen the seeds of this growth within you
and it fills my soul with great joy.
The seed is there, now it has to become a tree.
It could be that the time is at hand.
God-realization cannot happen without meditation
so you must turn towards this now
with courage and perseverance.
I have great hopes – will you fulfill them?
My regards to other friends there.
I wait for your letter.
Remember what I said about the blank paper?
Everything else is fine.
I am in bliss.
16. Love.
I received your letter.
What you say has made me very happy.
Words that come out of the depth and fullness of heart
echo the infinite
just as a tiny flower expresses infinite beauty.
When love breathes life into words
what is expressed is
not what is said
but what wants to be said.
Inside each of us there is a poet,
there is poetry,
but because we live on the surface
these are never born.
Those who go deep
awaken divine love
and this love fills their lives
with music, beauty, peace and poetry –
their very lives become music
and on to this stage truth descends.
Truth will descend where there is music
so life must be turned into a melody.
Only through music can one reach the truth.
You too have to become music,
the entire life, every little act,
has to be turned into music:
this happens through love.
Whatever is – love it.
Feel love for the whole world.
Feeling love for all with every breath
brings the inner music.
Have you ever seen this happen?
See this,
fill yourself with love and see.
Whatever breaks up the inner music –
that alone is irreligious, that alone is sin.
And whatever fills us with music –
that is religion, that alone is religion.
Love is religion
because love is beauty,
love is music.
Love is God
because it is all that is needed to attain him.
Give my love to everybody there
and feel the light of my love beside you.
17. Love.
I have received your letter.
You long for the peace I have within me.
It is yours any time.
It is the deepest possibility in everyone,
it only has to be uncovered.
As springs of water lie hidden under layers of earth
so does bliss lie hidden within us.
The possibility is there for everyone
but only those who dig for it can redeem it.
The excavation of these hidden treasures
lies through religion.
Digging with it one reaches the well of light within.
I have shown you how to dig and what with,
but the digging has to be done by you.
I know your soil is absolutely ready,
with very little effort the infinite streams can be reached.
This state of mind is attained
with the greatest good fortune
so don’t waste it or miss this opportunity.
Fill yourself with determination
and leave the rest to God.
Truth runs alongside will.
Don’t hesitate to write, I have lots of time for you.
I am for those who need me –
nothing in my life is for myself.
18. Love,
so much love.
I received your letter when I got back.
I could feel the ardor of your heart through your words.
I well know the fervor that stirs your soul
and the thirst that turns into tears within you.
I was once there too, I too have suffered it.
I can well understand your heart because I have traveled
those same paths you now have to take in the quest for God.
I too have experienced the longing
that one day turns into a raging fire
in which one has to consume oneself.
But this burning brings the birth of a new life.
The drop can only become the ocean
when it ceases to exist.
Continue your efforts in meditation;
you have to go deeper and deeper into it –
it is the only way.
Through it and it alone can one reach life’s truth.
Remember:
If you become absorbed in sadhana,
fully committed and surrendered,
you are bound to reach the truth.
This is an eternal law.
No step taken towards God is ever wasted.
My regards to all.
19. My respects to you.
Your letters were received.
I have just got back from a camp at Ranakpur.
It was just for friends from Rajasthan,
that’s why you weren’t informed.
It lasted five days and about sixty people participated.
It was a wonderful success
and it was obvious that much happened.
Encouraged by the results
the organizers are planning a camp on an all-India basis.
You must come to that.
I am glad to hear your meditation is progressing.
You have only to be silent.
To be silent is everything.
Silence does not mean absence of speech,
it means absence of thoughts.
When the mind quietens down
it becomes linked to the infinite.
Don’t do anything,
just sit and watch the flow of thoughts, just watch.
This just watching dissolves thought by itself.
The awakening of witnessing
brings freedom from the modifications of the mind.
With thoughts finished, consciousness is.
This is samadhi.
Love to all friends.
1965
20. Love.
Last night when lamps and lamps
were lit up all over town
I thought: My Sohan, too, must have lit lamps
and a few among them must surely be for me!
And then I began to see the lamps you had lit,
and also those your love has kept lit always.
I shall stay here another day.
I have talked of you to everybody
and they are eager to meet you.
21. Beloved!
Your letter came, and your photo too.
You look really simple and innocent in it!
Such love and devotion!
The heart when purified by love turns into a temple
and I can see this clearly in your photo.
May God help this simple innocence grow!
Two thousand years ago someone asked Christ:
Who can enter the kingdom of heaven?
Jesus pointed to a little child and said:
Those whose hearts are as innocent as a child’s.
Looking at your picture today, I remembered this story.
22. Love.
I have only just arrived here, the train was five hours late.
You wanted me to write as soon as I got here
so I am doing so.
Throughout the journey I thought of you
and of the tears falling from your eyes.
Nothing in the world is more sacred
than tears of love and joy.
Such tears, so pure, are not of this world.
Though part of the body,
they express something which is not.
Whatever can I give you in return?
23. Love.
I looked for your letter as soon as I got here yesterday.
Though it was Sunday, I kept waiting for it.
It came this evening –
how much you write in so few words!
When the heart is full it pours into the words
and so few are needed.
An ocean of love can be contained in just a jug!
As for scriptures on love –
it is enough to know the four letters of the word!
Do you know how many times I read
through your letters?
24. Love.
Your letter arrived this morning.
The garland you have weaved
from flowers of love
has a fragrance that I can catch!
And the love-vine you have sown
spreads through my heart!
The tears of your love and joy
bring light and strength to my eyes!
How blissful it all is!
25. Love.
I am in bliss.
It was good that you met me in Bombay,
my heart was overjoyed to see what is happening in you.
This is how a person prepares
and moves along the stairway towards truth.
Life is a dual journey:
one journey is in time and space
the other is within oneself and truth.
The first ends in death
the second in deathlessness.
The second is the real journey
because it takes you somewhere.
Those who take the first journey as it, waste their lives.
The real life begins the day you start
the other journey.
A really good beginning
has taken place in your consciousness
and I am filled with bliss to feel this.
26. Love.
On my return home from the tour
I looked for your letter.
It came together with the grapes
so the letter, already sweet, became still sweeter.
I am in bliss.
Your love enhances it yet more
and the love of all makes it infinite.
One body – so much bliss!
What else can others do but envy he
who feels all bodies to be his!
May God make you envious of me,
may everybody envy me,
this is my prayer.
27. Love.
Your letter reached me
as I was sitting on that very same spot on the grass!
What I was thinking then
I shall tell you only when we meet.
What a fragrance memories leave behind!
When life is filled with love
it is so blissful.
Life’s only paupers are those
without love in their hearts,
and how to describe the good fortune
of those whose hearts hold nothing but love!
In moments of such abundance
one encounters God.
Only love alone have I known as God.
28. Love.
I received your letter.
I am blissful to learn of your bliss.
This for me is bliss.
With every breath
I pray for all to be filled with bliss.
This is my understanding of religion.
The religion that ends in temples, mosques, churches,
is a dead religion.
A religion that fails to go beyond dead words and doctrines
has no significance.
An authentic and living religion
unites one with the whole
and leads one to the whole.
Religion is whatever unites you with the cosmos.
Whatever feelings lead you towards
this marvelous meeting and merging
are prayers, and all those prayers
can be expressed in a single word;
that word is love.
What does love want?
Love wants to share with all
the bliss it has.
Love wants to share itself with everyone!
To give of oneself unconditionally – that is love.
To love is to dedicate
one’s being to the whole
as the drop surrenders to the sea.
I pulsate with such love.
It has filled my life with nectar and light.
Now I have only one wish:
that what has happened to me should happen to all!
Give my love to everyone there.
29. Love.
I received your letter.
How did you hurt your finger?
It sounds as if you are not taking care of your body.
And why the restless mind?
In this dreamlike world
there is nothing worth making the mind restless for.
Peace is the greatest bliss
and there is nothing worth losing it for.
Meditate on it.
Just being aware of the truth brings about inner change.
I think you won’t be coming to Udaipur to assist me
and that’s on your mind.
Come if you can,
if you can’t – never mind,
you are helping me all the time.
Isn’t one’s love help enough?
If you don’t come I will miss you
because the camp at Udaipur
is linked for me with being with you,
so I am hoping you can come.
Regards to all.
30. Love,
and lots of it.
I looked at once for your letter
amongst the pile waiting for me on my return.
I can’t tell you how glad I was to get it –
written by hand, too.
You write: Now your presence is felt in your absence.
Love really is presence.
Where there is love
space and time vanish,
and where there is no love
even what is near in space and time
keeps immeasurably apart.
Only lovelessness separates
and love is the only nearness.
Those who find total love
discover everything within themselves.
The whole world then is inside, not outside
and the moon and stars lie in the inner sky.
In this fullness of love, ego vanishes.
I want God to lead you to this fullness.
31. Love.
I arrived here yesterday
and have been thinking of writing ever…