Yes—natural urges still move him, but they arise in a calm, aware space without inner fights, like a grown-up guiding a playful child.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, it is commonly understood that in an enlightened person all passions are exhausted and they go beyond every kind of tendency. But in your talks yesterday and the day before you said that even after enlightenment their natural, inborn tendencies still function. They may even descend into lust, anger, and violence, although they themselves remain only as witnesses to it. Please explain this.
Therefore do not think of inactivity as real inactivity. If there is the sense of doership in it, it is just activity standing on its head—its inverted form. Someone is running with the sense of doership; someone is standing still with the sense of doership—but the sense of doership is present. Buddha has said somewhere: “I am now neither involved nor withdrawn; I am neither a householder now nor a renunciate; neither am I holding anything nor am I abandoning anything.” Take this well to heart, because in many aspects of life this very snag arises. We think: “We are doing something—let us not do it.” Our attention is on the act; our attention is not on the doer. Because in doing, I am the doer; and in not-doing, I am still the doer. All the endeavor of the seers is that the sense of doership should dissolve. Let me…
Osho, we find that our tendencies are stronger than our understanding. When watched with awareness, the waves of hatred, jealousy, anger—all these tendencies—seem to rise from the navel center. The witnessing and the rising of the wave happen together. Please tell us why these waves arise from the navel center. Is the unconscious related to the navel center? And is there a large accumulation of these tendencies in the unconscious, or are they produced moment to moment?
The stream of consciousness itself is not divided. The split into conscious and unconscious exists because of repression. First understand this well. A child is born with consciousness one and undivided. There is neither a conscious mind nor an unconscious mind—no such two parts. But soon the division starts, because we teach the child what is right and what is wrong; what is auspicious and what is inauspicious; what to do and what not to do. And all that we brand as “don’t,” “bad”—what will the child do with it? Calling something bad does not destroy it. We say anger is bad. The child hears and understands—but anger doesn’t vanish just because we label it bad, because anger is natural. The child has not learned anger; he is born with it, just as he is born with a body, with eyes and hands. And existence uses anger: anger is energy.…
Beloved Osho, our impulses seem to be stronger than our understanding. When we look with awareness at our own feelings of hatred, jealousy and anger, they seem to be arising from the navel center. The witnessing and rising up of the waves happens simultaneously. Please, tell us why these waves arise from the navel center? Is our unconscious related to the navel center and is there a great store of these impulses in our unconscious, or are they created moment-to-moment?
So in the name of spirituality there are two possibilities available: either withdraw the fuel supply so that there is no fear of the steam being created, or go on adding weights on the kettle lid so that there is no fear that it will blow off. In one case the result is a dull person who is dead before he has died, and in the other a person doomed to go mad when the explosion finally happens. Those whom we call monks follow one or the other of these two paths of sickness. But look at Buddha or Mahavira; they look neither sick nor insane. It is rare to find a body as beautiful as Mahavira's. His every cell is the incarnation of dance and bliss. Looking at an image of Mahavira it is hard to imagine that we could ever find a more beautiful body. But just look…
Verse (Sanskrit): चित्तमूलो विकल्पोऽयं चित्ताभावे न कश्चन। अतश्चित्तं समाधेहि प्रत्यग्रूपे परात्मनि।। 26।। अखंडानंदमात्मनं विज्ञाय स्वस्वरूपतः। बहिरंतः सदानंदरसास्वादनमात्मनि।। 27।। वैराग्यस्य फलं बोधो बोधस्योपरतिः फलम्। स्वानंदानुभवाच्छान्तिरेषैवोपरतेः फलम् ।। 28।। यद्युत्तरोत्तराभावे पूर्वपूर्वं तु निष्फलम्। निवृक्तिः परमा तृप्तिरानन्दोऽनुपमः स्वतः।। 29।। Transliteration: cittamūlo vikalpo'yaṃ cittābhāve na kaścana| ataścittaṃ samādhehi pratyagrūpe parātmani|| 26|| akhaṃḍānaṃdamātmanaṃ vijñāya svasvarūpataḥ| bahiraṃtaḥ sadānaṃdarasāsvādanamātmani|| 27|| vairāgyasya phalaṃ bodho bodhasyoparatiḥ phalam| svānaṃdānubhavācchāntireṣaivoparateḥ phalam || 28|| yadyuttarottarābhāve pūrvapūrvaṃ tu niṣphalam| nivṛktiḥ paramā tṛptirānando'nupamaḥ svataḥ|| 29|| Translation: All thought-constructs have the mind as root; with the mind absent, none exists. Therefore, still the mind in samadhi, in the innermost form of the Supreme Self.।। 26।। Knowing the Self—undivided Bliss—as your own true nature, within and without, forever savor the nectar of bliss in the Self.।। 27।। The fruit of dispassion is knowledge; the fruit of knowledge is stillness. From the experience of one’s own bliss comes peace; this indeed is the fruit of stillness.
Osho, can the ultimate state not be attained through continuous witnessing and without meditation? And when only witnessing remains, how does one become free of that too?
Begin with action—and go to non-action. Begin with meditation—and go to samadhi. Start in shallow waters, then slowly go deeper… then into the bottomless depths. Do not hurry. Gently, step by step… But you seem to be in a hurry. The question is quite extraordinary: “Can the ultimate state be attained through continuous witnessing and without meditation?” And then: “And when only witnessing remains, how to be free of that too?” You are in a great rush! Witnessing has not happened yet. Meditation has not happened yet. Meditation hasn’t even begun; theoretically you have adopted the notion: it would be good if witnessing were accomplished—without meditation. If it had happened, you would not be asking. It has not happened. Yet you go further: “If witnessing is accomplished—without meditation—then how to be free of that?” Not such haste. If you leap like this, you will break your hands and feet. The…