Stop trying to control everything; relax and go with life, and only your stubborn ego will feel lost.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, when one tries to steer one’s life in a particular direction, the call of the other directions becomes a distraction. But is it possible to let one’s life flow in all its directions—and then, in a state free of distraction, is there not a danger that life will fall apart?
The very moment you want to concentrate, you have made a wound. You must have noticed: if there is a wound on your foot, the whole day everything bumps into it. A child climbs right onto that foot. You are amazed: all these years, all his life, he never climbed on my foot, and today he climbed! You pass through a doorway and it bumps into you. Things fall. They fell every day, and that child climbed many times—but you never noticed it, because there was no wound. Today there is a wound—so you notice. It is not that seeing your wound the whole world is falling on your foot. No one knows of your wound. When you sit to be concentrated and you make an effort—that very effort creates a wound. Now the smallest things start obstructing you. You must have noticed: the moment you sit to meditate, an…
Never hanker for the past and never ask that it should be repeated. Always remain available for the future -- fresh, hopeful, waiting, patient. One never knows how many more riches life is going to reveal to you. So never carry any negativity about anything and never take too much interest in any sort of misery, otherwise that becomes a vested interest. Then you have invested much in it. So don't cry or weep. Whatsoever has happened is good. Accept it, float with it. What can you do? The very idea to manage one's life and to control one's life is absurd. We cannot manage it, we cannot control it. We are such a small atomic part in such a vast network that the only way is to relax and go with the stream. So don't waste the days you are here. Be friendly, be loving, be together, meditate...
Beloved Osho, can one live without planning? Not counting the dreams about a hazy future, I see that a lot of my mind activity goes into planning -- for next week, for next month. And when I try to act spontaneously I look like a weather vane that does not know how the wind blows.
These are the people who have made the proverb: Man proposes and God disposes. There is no God and nobody disposes. Your very proposition is wrong. Proposing anything from your side means you are not trusting existence. Just be a weather vane which slowly moves without any reluctance, without any resistance, wherever the wind is blowing. It enjoys all directions. The whole of life has to be enjoyed; existence in all its colors has to be enjoyed. But the mind is one of the most stupid things that you are carrying within you. When it is morning it is longing for the evening, when it is evening it is longing for the morning; it is the root cause of all your misery and frustrations. What is the need? I cannot understand why the weather vane should want to know how the wind blows. Can you figure it out? Is there…
Another friend has asked: you say religion is not tradition; but isn’t tradition necessary? Has tradition only caused harm, or has there been some benefit too?
It is recorded of Albert Einstein that he went to a friend’s house. He was forgetful. They talked; dinner happened; they talked on. The friend kept looking at his watch, kept yawning. Einstein too looked at his watch, yawned—but didn’t get up. Finally the friend said, “It’s two o’clock—your wife must be waiting.” Einstein said, “What do you mean?” The friend said, “I mean your wife must be waiting. Otherwise no harm—do sit.” Einstein jumped up, shocked: “Extraordinary! I was wondering when you would leave so I could sleep. I thought I was in my own house!” Both were watching the clock and yawning. Time felt very long. When you cannot merge with an action—the same action, exactly the same... You dance—for someone else; you don’t want to dance—then time will be there. You dance for yourself, or for someone for whom you want to dance—time vanishes. Time is tension.…
Osho, to abide in oneself beyond the knower, knowledge, and the known—can one live in that state for an entire lifetime? Just as a lake is sometimes calm, sometimes playful, and sometimes stormy, does the self-realized one remain unaffected by worldly circumstances in the same way? Osho, dispel my ignorance!
Spring means harmony between season and mood. Meditation means harmony between you and the whole. You become harmonious. Whatever is, is perfectly okay—accepted. Nowhere any refusal, nowhere any opposition. Whatever is happening is auspicious. That is trust; that is meditation. Such meditation naturally takes you into an altogether new experience. Storms will rise; they will not stop because you meditate. Diseases will not stop coming to the body because you meditate. They will come. A thorn will sometimes pierce the foot. Raman had cancer; so did Ramakrishna—great storms came! Ramakrishna got cancer of the throat; he could neither eat nor drink. Vivekananda said to him, “What is not in your power! Why don’t you pray to the Lord at least to allow food and water to pass? We suffer watching you writhe.” Ramakrishna said, “Ah, it never even occurred to me to pray. How could it occur—to one whose prayer…