According to Osho, spontaneity cannot be cultivated; it appears when we stop adding and start removing. Work on yourself negatively: practice NETI NETI - dropping thoughts, memories, desires and roles - until the mind's barriers are empty. Like digging a well, clearing the rocks lets the inner water flow. When nothing blocks your self-nature, spontaneity bursts forth naturally, deep and authentic, not an acted mask.
Stop trying to act natural; gently clear away busy thoughts and labels, and your true self will move on its own.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho: would you please say something about the relationship between spontaneity and working on oneself? Shouldn't we be loving as much as we can? If there are certain things to do or ways to be to increase our capacity for joy, shouldn't we do them? Shouldn't we let our egos drop? Many good men have written that love can begin as an impulse of the will, and trying to be spontaneous seems to be a contradiction. Would you comment on this?
You have forgotten what real love is. You fall in love with the color of the hair -- now, what has that to do with love? After two days you will not look at the color of the hair at all. Or you fall in love with a certain shape of nose or a certain kind of eyes, but after the honeymoon these things are just boring! And then you have to go on managing somehow, pretending, cheating. Your spontaneity has been corrupted and poisoned, otherwise you would not fall in love with parts. But you only fall in love with parts. If somebody asks you, 'Why do you love this woman or this man?" your answer will be, "Because she looks so beautiful," or, "Because of her nose, eyes, proportion of the body, this and that" -- and all this is nonsense! Then this love cannot be very deep…
Sekkyo said to one of his monks: can you get hold of emptiness?
I'LL TRY, SAID THE MONK, AND HE CUPPED HIS HANDS IN THE AIR. THAT'S NOT VERY GOOD, SAID SEKKYO, YOU HAVEN'T GOT ANYTHING THERE. WELL, MASTER, SAID THE MONK, PLEASE SHOW ME A BETTER WAY. THERE UPON, SEKKYO SEIZED THE MONK'S NOSE AND GAVE IT A GREAT YANK. OUCH! YELLED THE MONK. YOU HURT ME! THAT'S THE WAY TO GET HOLD OF EMPTINESS, SAID SEKKYO. Man is too full of himself and that is his undoing. He has revealed it. He has not explained, he has already given it. He has not only indicated, he has created a situation in which it happened. That's what master is for: to create a situation in which things happen to you, to create a situation in which you can become aware of the mechanicalness of the mind, and of the spontaneousness of your inner no-self. And then you can move, by and by,…
Question: THEREFORE, O SARIPUTRA, IN EMPTINESS THERE IS NO FORM, NOR FEELING, NOR PERCEPTION, NOR IMPULSE, NOR CONSCIOUSNESS; NO EYE, EAR, NOSE, TONGUE, BODY, MIND; NO FORMS, SOUNDS, SMELLS, TASTES, TOUCHABLES OR OBJECTS OF MIND; NO SIGHT-ORGAN ELEMENT, AND SO FORTH, UNTIL WE COME TO: NO MIND-CONSCIOUSNESS ELEMENT; THERE IS NO IGNORANCE, NO EXTINCTION OF IGNORANCE, AND SO FORTH, UNTIL WE COME TO: THERE IS NO DECAY AND DEATH, NO EXTINCTION OF DECAY AND DEATH. THERE IS NO SUFFERING, NO ORIGINATION, NO STOPPING, NO PATH. THERE IS NO COGNITION, NO ATTAINMENT But there are other people... by and by the phoniness disappears and sannyasins become more and more true, authentic. Then somebody simply sits there and laughs. That's what is coming in that moment. He does not feel embarrassed, he does not feel that it is out of place. It is not. The prepared script is out of place.
Hyakujo called his monks together as he wished to send one of them to open a new monastery. Placing a filled water jar on the ground, he said, "who can say what this is without using its name?"
THE CHIEF MONK, WHO EXPECTED TO GET THE POSITION, SAID, "NO ONE CAN CALL IT A WOODEN SHOE." ANOTHER MONK SAID, "IT'S NOT A POND BECAUSE IT CAN BE CARRIED." THE COOKING MONK, WHO WAS STANDING NEARBY, WALKED OUT, KICKED THE JAR OVER, AND THEN WALKED AWAY. HYAKUJO SMILED AND SAID, "THE COOKING MONK BECOMES THE MASTER OF THE NEW MONASTERY." These monasteries were antagonistic towards each other, but boys will be boys. They would forget the doctrines and meet on the way and talk, enjoy. It was really prohibited to talk -- the other monastery was the enemy. One day, the boy from the first monastery came and said, "I am puzzled. As I was going to the market, I saw the boy from the other monastery and asked him, `Where are you going?' He replied, `Wherever the wind blows.' I was at a loss as to what to…
As a cloud that rises from the sea absorbing rain, the earth embraces,
SO, LIKE THE SKY, THE SEA REMAINS WITHOUT INCREASING OR DECREASING. SO FROM SPONTANEITY THAT'S UNIQUE, REPLETE WITH THE BUDDHA'S PERFECTIONS, ARE ALL SENTIENT BEINGS BORN, AND IN IT COME TO REST. BUT IT IS NEITHER CONCRETE NOR ABSTRACT. THEY WALK OTHER PATHS AND SO FORSAKE TRUE BLISS, SEEKING THE DELIGHTS THAT STIMULANTS PRODUCE. THE HONEY IN THEIR MOUTHS, AND TO THEM SO NEAR, WILL VANISH IF AT ONCE THEY DO NOT DRINK IT. BEASTS DO NOT UNDERSTAND THE WORLD TO BE A SORRY PLACE. NOT SO THE WISE WHO THE HEAVENLY NECTAR DRINK WHILE BEASTS HUNGER FOR THE SENSUAL. EVERYTHING CHANGES... and Heraclitus is right: you cannot step in the same river twice. The river is changing, so are you changing too. It is all movement. It is all flux. Everything is impermanent, momentary. Only for a moment it is there, and then gone... and you will never find…