According to Osho, watching itself is meditation; the object is irrelevant. You can watch trees, rivers, clouds—or children playing—and if your observation is alert, aware, and non-interfering, it is meditation. Meditation is the quality of awareness you bring to any act—walking, sitting, listening—not the act itself. Ignore the mind’s doubts; simply delight and watch with wakeful presence.
Yes—if you watch kids play with calm, awake attention, that’s meditation, because meditation is how you watch, not what you watch.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
The Search · Discourse 6
1976-03-07 · Buddha Hall · English
Beloved Osho, for me the most beautiful meditation is to sit in a corner and watch the children playing around the ashram. But I'm in trouble: is this a meditation at all?
Sometimes, for no reason at all, just swimming in the river, or running around in the hot sun, or just relaxing on the beach and listening to the wild roar of the ocean, something started happening inside you, some inner alchemical change, as if your body was creating LSD. Something inside... and you were moving in a totally unknown dimension -- as if you had wings and you could fly. You became afraid, you started clinging to the earth. It has happened many times when people come to be initiated into sannyas. Sometimes, if I see very perceptive people, very receptive, and I touch their head, immediately they become scared. Just a few days ago the daughter of Ashok Kumar, one of the very famous film actors, took sannyas. The moment I touched her head she started crying, "Stop, Osho! Stop! Stop!" And her whole body was shaking. She started…Read the full discourse →
Tao The Golden Gate Vol 1 · Discourse 6
1980-06-16 · Buddha Hall · English
Osho, please explain how I can meditate over something without using my mind.
Meditation has nothing to do with mind; meditation simply means a state of no-mind. The functioning of the mind is the only disturbance in meditation. If you are trying to achieve meditation THROUGH mind you are bound to fail, doomed to fail. You are trying to achieve the impossible. A Zen initiate was meditating for years and whenever he would come to his Master, whatsoever experience he would bring to the Master, the Master would simply reject: "It is all nonsense. You go back and meditate again." One day the Master came to the but of the disciple -- he was sitting in a Buddha posture. The Master shook him and told him, "What are you doing here? If we needed stone Buddhas we have many in the temple! Just by sitting like a stone Buddha you will not attain to meditation. Do what I have been telling you to…Read the full discourse →
Es Dhammo Sanantano · Discourse 89
1977-05-29 · Pune · Hindi · English translation
Osho, what is the first experience of samadhi like?
You will know only when it happens. It cannot be said; at most a few hints can be given. It is as if, in the dark, a lamp is suddenly lit. Or as if a dying patient, right at the edge of death, suddenly finds a medicine that works; life’s wave, life’s thrill spreads again—so it is. As if a corpse becomes alive—such is the first experience of samadhi. It is the taste of nectar. The experience of the ultimate music. But it will be only when it happens; and only then will you understand. You will not understand by my saying it. It is as with love. How can anyone explain it? To someone who has never loved, never known love, no matter how many explanations you offer—he will hear it all and still ask, “I haven’t understood; please explain a little more.” It is like explaining light to…Read the full discourse →
Sufis The People Of The Path Vol 1 · Discourse 10
1977-08-20 · Buddha Hall · English
Surely meditation is for mystics. Why do you propose it for ordinary people and their children?
First, I have never come across an ordinary person; they do not exist. They are only created by egoistic people. The egoist has to create the ordinary -- that is the only way the ego can exist, persist. Not a single human being is ordinary because each human being is so unique. Each human being is created by God -- how can he be ordinary? God never creates the ordinary. All his creation is rare. Each individual is so unique that he is never repeated. You never were before, you will never be again. You cannot find anybody who is just like you. Forget about human beings.... Not even animals, not even trees, not even pebbles on a seashore -- not even two pebbles -- are alike. Wherever you find God's signature, it is always the original, never the ordinary. God is not a manufacturer, he is a creator. He…Read the full discourse →
From Misery To Enlightenment · Discourse 2
1985-01-30 · Lao Tzu Grove · English
Osho, what is meditation?
No special posture is needed, no special time is needed. There are people who think there are special times. No, not for meditation; any time is the right time -- you just have to be relaxed and playful. And if it does not happen it does not matter; don't feel sad.... Because I am not telling you that it will happen today, or tomorrow, or within three months or six months. I am not giving you any expectation because that will become a tension in your mind. It can happen any day, it may not happen: it all depends on how playful you are. Just start playing -- in the bathtub, when you are not doing anything, why not play? Sitting under your shower, you are not doing anything; the shower is doing its work. You are simply standing there; for those few moments just be playful. Walking on the…Read the full discourse →