Is this experience of being hit on the head during Zazen a form of magical experience?

Yesterday while sitting in zazen I felt myself get hit with a stick on my head. But pradeepa that time had not hit me. Also today during the lecture I got hit twice on the head but no stick-hitter was around. Is this magicless magic?

There are stories of Hindu seers that when they reach to the final step of their meditation they are distracted by Indra. He sends beautiful maidens, APSARAS, to distract them. But why should anybody distract these poor saints? Why? They are not doing anybody any harm. They have left the world, they are sitting under their trees or in their caves in the Himalayas, why send beautiful maidens to them? Nobody is sending anybody. There is no agency like that. Imagination is playing the last tricks, and when your meditation goes deep, deeper layers of imagination are provoked. Ordinarily, when meditation is not there, you live on the surface of the mind. Of course, your imagination is also superficial then. The deeper you move in meditation, the more the deeper layers of imagination will be revealed to you, they will be more real. They will be so real that you…

Osho today in the samadhi tank I could have sworn I felt your presence for a few moments. I became quite frightened. Other people have spoken of feeling your presence even as far away as england. What is this? Is it imagination? Or projection? Or something else?

For example, one day in the night you are suddenly awake, alone in your room, all is silent and dark. And you become aware of a certain presence... maybe a dead friend, maybe one of your ancestors, maybe your dead mother. But you become so frightened -- in that fear you lose that perceptivity, that perception. The presence remains there, but you are dis-connected. You put the light on, you become occupied in doing something, you start reading a book, or you turn the radio on,Just to disconnect yourself from the strange experience that was happening. Don't be afraid! This existence is yours. This existence is very friendly and there are immense mysteries waiting for you -- to be known, to be experienced. This was a beautiful moment for you. Now that it has happened, you can make it happen again and again -- and there is no necessity to…

Osho, if in your presence a person has an inner experience but later cannot, what is that? Would you call it a direction toward liberation or dependence?

There can be two kinds of reasons. In fact there can be many, but broadly two will do. - One: he may only be imagining, not actually experiencing. Even for imagination my presence gives support. Alone, even imagining becomes difficult. Imagination too asks for props. So in my presence he will be able to imagine more easily, and it will be easier to mistake imagination for experience. At home, if the same kind of thing happened, he might suspect it is only imagination. - The other, less frequent, possibility: you did not imagine; you actually took a leap. For a moment you jumped two feet off the ground; you lifted your head and saw a little higher. Then you fell back to the ground. That is possible too. Both can be useful. Even imagination is an indicator that you want to imagine—really, that you want to experience; that is why…

Beloved Osho, from early childhood until my first few years as a sannyasin, an experience of expansion would happen: my head would fill the whole room, and later on it would fill the house and then move outside the house and surround it. This has not happened for a few years, and although it does not feel like a loss, I wonder why it stopped and what it was.

In isolation hallucination is easy. Go to a mountain cave at night, alone, with all the wild animals. Fear, death, darkness, all force you; your mind is compelled. Whatever you want... if you want to hallucinate that Krishna is with you or Christ is with you, it will be easier than in your own house where your wife is, your children are, the neighbors are. These people -- Krishna and Christ and Rama and Zarathustra -- are very much afraid of coming; they always come when you are alone and in a faraway place. It created in all the religions the idea of renouncing the world, because when you renounce the world and go to the mountains, the realization of God is very easy. On the mountain, Sinai, Moses encounters God. Why could he not encounter God with all his fellow Jews? What was the need that he should go…

Beloved Osho, my imagination is very strong. Sometimes when I close my eyes, I see myself sitting with you and there are no more questions. Then I feel loved and accepted. Whenever I experience this, I feel so joyful. Is this real, or just a mind-game to keep me away from reality?

If you can manage it exactly the same, again and again, then it is not imagination. Then it is not the stuff dreams are made of, because you cannot repeat a dream. But if you can imagine such a thing only once, and you cannot manage to experience it exactly the same again and again, then it is a dream; then it is a mind game. Don't waste time on it. This is the distinction between dream and reality: reality is that which remains as it is. Dream is something that happens once and is gone. And it is not in your hands to bring it back, you cannot manage to dream it. Every morning you will open your eyes -- your room will be the same. Every night you will close your eyes -- your dreams will be different. That which remains the same is the real, and that…