According to Osho, you cannot verify an inner voice beforehand; discernment is born by walking your own path. Act, risk error, and learn—falling is unavoidable and instructive. Take advice from all, but take orders only from yourself. By experimenting personally, you develop balance and can recognize mind’s tricks; following others only delays learning and may keep you lost.
You find the true inner voice by trying things yourself, making mistakes, and learning—like learning to ride a bike by falling a few times.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, you said... then you will find that the devotee is God. The question arises: if one devotee prefers to be God and another wants to remain only a devotee, then which of the two is superior?
The one who wants to be God will not be able to be. And the one who wants to remain a devotee will become God. The question of superior or inferior does not arise, because only one of the two will happen. The one who does not want to be will be. The one who wants to be will be deprived. That very wanting is of the ego. But the matter is a little delicate. Sometimes humility too belongs to the ego. Beware that your humility may not be of the ego. Perhaps you are saying, “No, I don’t want to be,” because you know that those who refuse are the ones who attain. Then you are clever. Then your humility is adulterous. Your humility is not pure, not sacred, not virginal—it is like a prostitute. The one who wants to be God, whose ego says, “I must become God,”…
Beloved Osho, how far can one rely on one's 'inner voice'?
The thief said, "But one thing let me say first: don't tell me to stop stealing. Because whenever I go -- and I go to mystics and saints and I am a famous thief around here, so they all know -- they immediately say, 'First you stop stealing,' and that I cannot do. I have tried but that I cannot do, so please don't make that condition. Whatsoever else you say I will do." Nagarjuna said, "Then you could not have yet met a mystic or a saint. You must have been meeting ex-thieves; otherwise, why should one bother about your being a thief? Be a thief! -- that is your business, that is not my worry. Just one thing I would like to tell you, and that is: Go, do whatsoever you feel, but be aware, alert. Don't do anything unconsciously, mechanically, robot-like." The thief said, "This is perfectly…
I am always listening to inner voices. But one voice says one thing and another says just the opposite. What should I do?
There are many people here who go on listening to inner voices. These inner voices are just crap. These are just fragments of your mind; they have no value at all. And sometimes you may think that you are listening to some inner guide or you are listening to some master from the beyond -- Master K H, or some spirit, some Tibetan spirit -- and you can go on imagining these things. And you will be simply be fooling yourself. These are all your fragments. And if you go on following them you will go crazy -- because one part will pull you to the north, another part to the south. You will start falling apart. Remember, this is neurosis -- you have to learn to watch all these voices. Don't trust any. Only trust silence. Don't trust any voice, because all voices are from the mind. And you…
Beloved Osho, how can I find out which of the many voices inside me is the one which comes from the real self to guide me? How can I be sure it doesn't come from the unconscious?
It is very simple: none of the voices come from the inner self. All voices come from the mind. When all voices are absent, the inner self inspires you in silence towards a certain action, direction. It does not come in words -- it is just a silent indication. Otherwise it would have been absolutely impossible to find out which one is the voice of the inner self. It is easy because no voice is of the inner self. So when all voices have died down and there is utter silence, the inner self is capable of taking your hand and moving you. That is the moment to be in a let-go, and allow it to take you wherever it takes you. In language we have to use words which do not apply to the inner reality -- for example, the "inner voice." There is no voice -- it is…
If you try too hard to remember the name of the person you think you know and have forgotten, it will be impossible. The more you try, the more tense you will become. It is better to go into the garden, to start thinking of the trees and the butterflies and the flowers, or to lie down on the grass and just look at the blue sky, and suddenly it pops up. Exactly like that god happens: it pops up. And all that I teach here is how to relax, how to play, how to allow your life to be fun. When you are really in a playful mood, relaxed, it pops up. Deva means divine, sukho means joy -- divine joy. It needs nothing to be joyful -- life is enough, in fact, more than enough. If we listen, see, love, a spontaneous joy starts arising.