What does it mean if a person has an inner experience in the presence of a teacher but cannot replicate it later?

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…

Osho, you’ve said that shaktipat happens only through an egoless medium; and that whoever says, “I will bestow shaktipat upon you,” know that he cannot. But I am acquainted with many who bestow shaktipat. Through their shaktipat, people undergo kundalini processes exactly as described in the scriptures. Are they not authentic? Are they false, pseudo processes? Why, and how?

One room is always held back. It tells you whether it has happened or not. If your experience is exactly by the book, know it hasn’t happened—it’s a false coin—because in the scripture one room has always been reserved. That reservation is essential. So if everything is happening to you exactly as written, understand that the book is being projected. But the day something happens not exactly as written—here it matches, there it doesn’t—know that you are on a real track where things are becoming clear to you; where you are not simply threading scripture into imagination. When kundalini truly awakens, you will be able to see where and how the scripture used stratagems. But you cannot know this beforehand. Every scripture had necessarily to omit certain things; otherwise it would be impossible to determine what is what. I had a teacher, a university professor. Whenever I named a book,…

Beloved Osho, when I told you I saw you empty, you said, "emptiness in you is a `real' experience." you said that twice. My understanding of the proof of reality is that it -- the observed -- remains with awareness, whereas imagination dissolves. Seeing you empty did not return and as much as I try it will not return. And yet something has remained with me, something will not leave me since seeing you like that. Is that reality, Osho?

It is reality, there is just a little confusion -- which is natural. I have said that with awareness imagination disappears but the reality remains. You saw me absent or empty and I said this is real. Then you tried to see me empty again but you forgot one thing, that while you are trying you cannot be aware. So it is not that my emptiness was your imagination. Just be aware and you will see the emptiness again, but don't try -- because for the first time when it happened you were not trying, you were simply sitting silently here listening, and out of nowhere you felt the emptiness. It will come in the same way, without even knocking on your doors. With effort you cannot bring it. It is not imagination. But the other half you have forgotten. In the silence you were aware without any effort, and…

Osho, what does realization feel like? How can a seeker know that something has truly happened? How can one distinguish reality from self-created imagination? How can others recognize the attainment of one who is realized?

You ask: “How can a seeker know that something has truly happened?” When you have a headache, how do you know you have a headache? When I was in school, I had a Muslim teacher—perhaps he is still alive—Rahamuddin, a lovely man, but very strict in one thing: it was almost impossible to get leave from him. He himself never took leave and would not grant it to students. I often needed leave. I would say my stomach hurts, or my head hurts. He said, “Listen, I accept fever; I do not accept stomachache or headache. If you have fever, I can at least take your hand and feel it. But how am I to know whether you truly have a stomachache or headache?” I said, “Since you ask, let me ask you—have you ever had a headache? A stomachache?” He said, “I have.” I said, “What proof can you…

During the lectures you seem to bring us up to your level. You sit and talk, surrounded by buddhas. But as soon as you leave, our egos are back again; we're the same old schmucks we were before. Is the experience of what happens when we're with you just an illusion? Or the only reality?

SATYA, IT DEPENDS HOW YOU INTERPRET IT. The criterion is this: if it gives you great contentment, if it takes your anxieties away from you, if it helps your mind to disappear -- even for a few moments -- then it is real. You will get back into your old mind again -- because when you are with me you are not alone, you start flying with me. When you are with me you are riding on a tidal wave. When the wave is gone, of course you have only that which YOU have: the old mind starts functioning again. And naturally, one hour you are with me and twenty-three hours you are with yourself. So those twenty-three hours may look like the reality, just because they are long. And this one hour may look like illusion. It is not so. Truth does not depend on durability, truth has nothing…