According to Osho, self-analysis is not the first step to witnessing; it is the opposite. Analysis multiplies thoughts and entangles you, while witnessing is no-thought: just seeing without judging. There is no road from thought to no-thought—drop judging, allow thoughts to arise, and simply watch with pure, choiceless awareness.
Don’t analyze your thoughts; let them come and go while you quietly watch, like clouds passing in the sky.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, I practice self-analysis, “introspection,” to awaken the witnessing. Is this right as a first step? Kindly explain.
That is why you see: the wife is happily sitting, listening to the radio, knitting her sweater; the moment the horn honks downstairs—husband has arrived—she lies down: “I have a headache.” Don’t think she’s faking; it really happens. I’m not saying she is deceiving—this has become her habit. The husband’s horn is enough to trigger a headache. Association has formed. Don’t think I say she’s cheating. Perhaps in the beginning she faked it; now that is long past—now it’s a habit. As the husband comes, the headache rises—because only when she has a headache does the husband put his hand on her head. Otherwise, who puts his hand on his wife’s head! Someone might put a hand on another’s wife; who puts a hand on his own! Only when the wife is troubled does the husband show a little sympathy. Love is gone; now only sympathy keeps things moving. The…
Osho said that there was no need to try to still the mind, to stop the thoughts. He said that just as the traffic goes by and one remains on the sidewalk, unaffected, just a watcher, so one should simply witness the thoughts as they went by. We are not our thoughts, and recognising that we are the witness is enough. The very acceptance of the thoughts makes one more relaxed. The relaxation helps to create a distance, to separate oneself. To evaluate a thought as good or bad means that you are attached to your thoughts -- so one should not put labels on them.] ... put yourself aside, sit under a tree, and just watch the traffic. Soon, one day, the traffic disappears and the road is empty. Suddenly there is an interval and in that interval is meditation. But that interval cannot be created or cultivated.
For years I am most of the time witnessing and I feel it like a disease. So is it that there are two kinds of witnessing and mine is wrong? Tell me.
And only then can the third step be taken, which will bring you close to what Gurdjieff calls self-remembering, or Krishnamurti calls awareness, or the Upanishads call witnessing. But first the two steps have to be fulfilled; then the third comes easy. Don't start doing the third immediately. First the object, then the consciousness, then the subject. Once the object is dropped and the emphasis on the consciousness is no longer a strain, the subject is there but there is no subjectivity in it. You are there but there is no "I" in it, just being. You are, but there is no feeling that "I am." That confinement of "I" has disappeared; only amness exists. That amness is divine. Drop the "I" and just be that amness. And if you have been working too long on witnessing, then for a few months, at least for three months, drop it completely,…
Osho, it feels that to be a witness is also a kind of thought. So what is the difference between the witness and a thought of the witness?
The mystic laughed. He said, "Not underneath this tree, but within me there is a treasure and I am watching it. And the treasure is growing every day, it is becoming bigger and bigger, hence I have to be more and more alert." The mystic said to the king, "You can sleep, you have nothing to lose. I cannot, I have much to lose; and if I can remain awake I have much to gain." The king was very much impressed. He asked him to come to his palace, he invited him. The monk agreed. The king was a little puzzled: a monk agreeing so soon without even refusing once is not thought to be right. A monk should say, "No, I cannot come to the palace. I have renounced the world. It is all futile. It is all dream, illusion, maya I cannot come back to the world. I…
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…