How do I cut through the net of maya?

Osho, I want to be rich, I want a high position, and I want a beautiful woman too. What should I do?

A man once placed an advertisement—meant for people like you: “Send two rupees and learn the formula to become a millionaire overnight.” Now who wouldn’t want to become a millionaire for two rupees! Almost a hundred thousand people sent their money. A week later, everyone who had sent the two rupees received the reply: “Do exactly what I did.” He had indeed become a millionaire overnight! One lakh people sent two rupees each—two lakhs landed in his lap. This is how you’re being duped—through gambling, matka. And it’s not only people who run these scams; governments do it too. Governments that claim to be Gandhian run lotteries! A lottery is gambling—a cheat dressed up nicely. But the greedy get hooked: “Just one rupee for a chance at lakhs. If it comes once, that’s enough…!” But what will you do after getting lakhs? There’s a famous story by Tolstoy: A tailor…

That which is beginningless and yet which ends, which is neither being nor non-being and which in itself is seen as the purest of energies is called maya or the magical world. It cannot be described in any other way except this.

THIS MAYA IS IGNORANCE-LIKE, PETTY AND UNREAL, BUT IS SEEN BY THE DELUDED PERSONS AS REAL AT ALL TIMES -- PAST, PRESENT, AND FUTURE. THEREFORE TO SAY THAT IT IS SUCH CANNOT EXPLAIN ITS REAL CHARACTER. Now, the enquiry goes into MAYA. After brahman, it must be discussed. By maya is meant something which IS and yet IS NOT, which appears to be -- the appearance. Things as they appear to us are not as they are. Immanuel Kant says somewhere that we cannot know the thing in itself; a thing cannot be known in itself. Whatsoever we know about a thing is a projection; it is a contribution, we have contributed something to it. When you fall in love with someone, it is your projection. You contribute to your beloved, to your lover, something -- you give something, and then you are impressed by your own contribution. This is…

Presently you cannot remember. If you understand rightly, even now you are doing the same thing in reverse. For twenty-four hours, when you are awake, you assume that whatever you see is true. Because of this belief, when at night you see a dream, you take it to be true. Because that assumption becomes deep. What could be more false than a dream! And how many times have you not found on waking each morning that the dream was false, futile. But again you sleep and the same mistake recurs. Why does the mistake recur? There must be a very deep reason behind it. The reason is that in waking, whatever you see, you take to be true. When everything seen is taken as true, then at night when you see the dream, how will you take that as untrue? You take that too as true.

In front of a government ration shop stood a large crowd. A man holding a large bag under his arm kept trying to push through. But a crowd is a crowd—how can one pass through! Again and again they shoved him back. After three hours of this, exhausted, he addressed the crowd: “Brothers and sisters, if you do not let me go to the front, then hear me—I tell you plainly, the shop will remain closed again today. Because, after all, who will open it but me?” He was the manager; without him the shop could not open. The key of maya lies with your mind. You just set the mind aside, and then however much maya tries, the shop cannot open. The key of maya is within you—this is our good fortune! Had the key been with another, there would perhaps be no possibility of liberation in this world.

Osho, this world is maya. Here everything is false. Save me from drowning in it.

A cat was sitting on a tree branch, swaying, in a great devotional mood. A dog passing below saw the cat—his mouth watered—but she was up on the branch, beyond his reach. And she was swaying as if on a journey to heaven, eyes closed, tears of ecstasy flowing. The dog stood awhile hoping she might sway too much and fall. But she did not sway that much; she held the branch tight. Finally the dog said, “What’s the matter? What’s giving you such bliss?” The cat opened her eyes: “You spoiled it all! I was dreaming that from the sky it was raining mice—a torrential downpour! Mice upon mice were falling!” The dog said, “Fool, do you know scripture? It is clearly written that sometimes miracles happen, and when they do, bones rain from the sky, not mice. There is no mention of mice in the scriptures. Idiot! You…