Can someone with a legal mind become a sannyasin?

Beloved Osho,what are the qualities of a sannyasin?

In the early morning he went back, fell at Buddha's feet and said, "Sir, excuse me, forgive me. I could not sleep the whole night." And Buddha laughed, and he said, "You fool! Why? I slept perfectly well. Why should you get so disturbed about such a small thing? It has not hurt me. You see my face is as it was before. Why did you get so worried?" And the man said, "I have come to become your disciple. Initiate me. I want to be with you. I have seen something unique, superhuman. But first, forgive me." And Buddha said, "This is nonsense. How can I forgive you? -- because I have not even taken any note of it. I was not angry, so how can I forgive you?" Twenty-four hours had passed, and they were sitting on the bank of the Ganges. And Buddha said, "Look at how…

Sannyas is a quantum leap, a jump into the unknown, a great courage to become discontinuous with your own past. It is a rebirth. It is a change so great... as if the old dies, and dies utterly and totally and the new comes into being from nowhere, from nothingness, out of nothing. If the new comes from the old it remains the old. If the new is continuous with the old then it is only a modification of the old -- maybe a little bit colored and decorated and changed, with a new dress, with a new mask, but it is not a revolution, it is not a conversion. And sannyas to be true has to be a revolution so total that the old identity is simply dropped -- just as the snake slips out of the old skin and never looks back.

A friend has asked: You keep telling people again and again to take sannyas. But when the mind is not at peace, what will sannyas do?

Sannyas means only this much: that the uninterrupted stream of our life should be broken somewhere—somewhere a break, a gap, a fracture. Otherwise, out of habit, a person goes on living as he lived until yesterday. Somewhere a break is needed. Otherwise we go on bound to the old groove, and that same groove holds us until death. There is no other meaning to sannyas; psychologically it means only this: we are changing the image of the self that has existed in a person’s mind up to now. It makes a difference. Astonishingly, it makes a difference. There is a friend who took sannyas. He used to say to me, “What will changing clothes do?” I said, “Change them and see. And if it doesn’t do anything, change back.” Fifteen days later he came and said, “This is amazing! My feet stop for a moment in front of the liquor…

Osho, I would very much like to take sannyas but it will be totally ruinous for my career as orange clothes will not be accepted at my place of work. Is there any alternative to this?

Shirish Ghurye, remember only one thing: if you really want to do something, do it. If you don't want to do it, don't do it, but be clear. Don't be a hotch-potch, don't be a mess. When you really want to be a painter, become a painter then, whatsoever the risk. Yes, you will not be able to become a prime minister by becoming a painter. You will not be very respectable in the society, because your paintings are not useful to the society in any way. They are not utilitarian. And the greater they are, the less utilitarian they will be. The more original they are, the less they will be understood and sold. But if you want to be a painter, be a painter -- even if that means remaining poor, even if that means remaining starved, even if that means that you will be dying earlier. Suffer,…

Osho, sannyas was born in this land; it was granted the dignity of Gaurishankar (Everest). But today its honor has become merely superficial. Inside, the individual and society alike are afraid of it. Why have sannyas and the sannyasin lost their meaning? Please explain.

In my sannyas there is no prohibition—no “leave this, run from that.” Awakening is enough. Cowards run. Those who awaken remain where they are and are free there. My sannyas does not want to give you knowledge; it wants to give you meditation. Meditation means emptiness; it means: I do not know. Life is such an ultimate mystery that nothing definitive can be known about it. And I want to give sannyas a new posture—creativity. I will call him a sannyasin who sings a new song; who strikes a new music from the veena; who dances a new dance; who makes this world a little more beautiful, brings a little more blessedness to the earth. Then sannyas can regain its dignity. And I would have the sannyasin not imitate. Listen, understand, contemplate—but live from your own individuality. Therefore I give my sannyasins no codes of conduct—only processes to awaken the…