Is meditation a method?

In 1969 followers of the Maharishi Mahesh Yogi invited Osho to talk to them. This was the first occasion on which Osho addressed a western audience, and the first time he talked publicly at length in English. The discourse has been published in OTI January 1 & 16, 1991; and February 1, 1991. Osho: Really, there can be no method as far as meditation is concerned. Meditation is not a method. Through technique, through method, you cannot go beyond mind. When you leave all methods, all techniques, you transcend mind. So meditation itself is not a method. Truth cannot be achieved through method. Method is our own invention. We, who are ignorant, have achieved knowledge through methods constructed, created, projected, in our ignorance. Through method you can achieve a sort of self-hypnosis, a sort of auto-hypnosis. Any method, whatsoever it's name, can only give you an illusory kind of peace.

A friend has asked: Is meditation a method? Any method?

This needs a little understanding. Meditation is not a method. The trouble is largely with our language. The language we have developed is for utilitarian matters; it is not made for things like meditation. So it appears as if meditation too were a method. Meditation is not a method. A method is always for action. If there is something to do, there is a method for it. But how can there be a method for non-action? Letting go of all methods—non-action cannot have a method. Actions can have methods—do this, do that, do this. But where the point is not-doing, how can there be a method? Therefore, meditation is not a method. And so do not ask how many methods of meditation there are. Do not ask how many types of meditation there are. Do not ask that one guru teaches one kind of method and another guru teaches another…

What is meditation?

Meditation is not an Indian method; it is not simply a technique. You cannot learn it. It is a growth: a growth of your total living, out of your total living. Meditation is not something that can be added to you as you are. It can come to you only through a basic transformation, a mutation. It is a flowering, a growth. Growth is always out of the total; it is not an addition. You must grow toward meditation. This total flowering of the personality must be understood correctly. Otherwise one can play games with oneself, one can occupy oneself with mental tricks. And there are so many tricks! Not only can you be fooled by them, not only will you not gain anything, but in a real sense you will be harmed. The very attitude that there is some trick to meditation -- to conceive of meditation in terms…

Osho, what is meditation?

The monk said, "You are even more stupid than the first man. My cow? A Buddhist monk possesses nothing. And why should I look for somebody else's cow? I don't possess any cow." The man looked really embarrassed, what to do? The third man thought, "Now, the only possibility is what I have said." He said, "I can see that you are meditating." The monk said, "Nonsense! Meditation is not some activity. One does not meditate, one is meditation. To tell you the truth so that all you fellows don't get confused, I am simply doing nothing. Standing here, doing nothing -- is it objectionable?" They said, "No, it is not objectionable, it just does not make sense to us -- standing here, doing nothing." "But," he said, "this is what meditation is: Sitting and doing nothing -- not with your body, not with your mind. Once you start doing…

Meditation is always passive; the very essence of it is passive. It cannot be active because the very nature of it is non-doing. If you are doing something, your very doing disturbs the whole thing; your very doing, your very "activeness," creates the disturbance. Non-doing is meditation, but when I say non-doing is meditation I do not mean that you need not do anything. Even to achieve this non-doing, one has to do much. But this doing is not meditation. It is only a stepping stone, only a jumping board. All "doing" is just a jumping board, not meditation. You are just on the door, on the steps.... The door is non-doing, but to reach the non-doing state of mind one has to do much. But one should not confuse this doing with meditation. Life energy works in contradictions. Life exists as a dialectic: it is not a simple movement.