Should one continue meditation practice if the body gets tired or if the hands ache?

A friend has asked: with meditation practice the body gets tired—should one continue the practice or not? Another friend has asked something similar: in meditation the hands move a lot and the hands begin to ache—should one continue the practice or not?

Many of you will also feel that some part of the body gets tired. It is natural. When any limb moves so much, when it gets so much exercise, it will get tired. But only for two, four, six days. Just as with any new exercise you feel fatigue; the same here. In two or four days it will be fine. And when it settles, for the first time you will realize that the limb which was moving during this period was ailing. But until it becomes healthy, you cannot even know it. Like a man who has had a headache since childhood, a pain twenty-four hours a day—he will think that the pain is his head. Only when the pain drops will he know that the pain was not the head. The limb that is moving more is proof that it is afflicted by some tension. It is not…

The same friend has asked: Osho, then all day there is aching in the arms and legs, sometimes there is pain in the back.

It will happen. If you get tired in two minutes, what else but pain will happen! No—don’t get tired in two minutes. Put in your total energy. The one who puts in total energy for thirty minutes will be the least tired. I say this to you from my daily hundreds of experiences. The person who gives his total energy for thirty minutes will be the least tired. And if you truly give your total energy, after thirty minutes you will suddenly feel light and fresh, not tired. We get tired because we don’t put our total energy—one. We do put energy, and all the while keep thinking inside, “I might get tired”—two. We do put energy and at the same time we hold ourselves back so that we don’t overdo it—three. That’s where the whole disturbance happens. Now, as you say there is pain in the back, or for…

Beloved Osho, the first few days of active meditation tend to tighten muscles, causing pain everywhere. Is there any way to get over that?

Look at any animal and see the grace of the body. What happens to the human body? Why is it not so graceful? Why? Every animal is so graceful: why is the human body not so graceful? What has happened to it? You have done something with it: you have crushed it and the natural spontaneity of its flow has gone. It has become stagnant. In every part of your body there is poison. In every muscle of your body there is suppressed anger, suppressed sexuality, suppressed greed -- and everything -- suppressed jealousy, hatred. Everything is suppressed there. Your body is re#ally diseased. So when you start meditating, all these poisons will be released. And wherever the body has become stagnant, it will have to melt, it will become liquid again. And this is a great effort. After forty years of living in a wrong way, then suddenly meditating,…

It is very subtle in the mind but when the vibration reaches the body it is easily detectable. If you become watchful you will see that the trembling starts in the mind, then it spreads towards the body. It spreads on the body but it doesn't come from the body. This is one of the oldest experiences in yoga. It has always been a problem and many people have tried to locate it -- as if kundalini is something in the body -- and then they move into stupid speculations. It is not in the body. Of course the spinal column is the most sensitive part of the body so there it is felt more, but it is not there... it is just because it is the most sensitive part of the body. So it catches easily and vibrates.

Osho, if this energy is abundant, one shouldn’t feel tired; one should feel fresh.

No—at the beginning you will feel tired. Gradually you will feel a great freshness, a freshness you have never known. But at first there will be fatigue. The initial fatigue is because your identity is with the senses. You take them to be “I.” So when the senses get tired, you say, “I am tired.” This is exactly where your identity needs to break, isn’t it? It’s like this: your horse gets tired while you are sitting on it—but you have always believed, “I am the horse.” Now the horse is tired and you say, “We are finished, we are exhausted.” What we call “our” tiredness simply reflects where our identity lies. If I am the horse, then I am tired. The day you know “I am not the horse,” a very different kind of freshness will begin to arise. Then you will know: the senses are tired—but where am…