According to Osho, an open mind drops all directions and goals created by desire and ego. It refuses second-hand definitions and images, rests utterly in the herenow, and becomes receptive to the totality rather than chasing a part. When ambition and becoming stop, awareness is uncluttered, spacious, and nonjudging; in that directionless presence, reality—what mystics call God—reveals itself.
An open mind is like an open window: stop chasing and labeling, just be here now so life itself can come in.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, what is being open?
Devena, BEING OPEN SIMPLY MEANS being without mind. If the mind is there you are closed. Mind is a wall surrounding you. It is a transparent wall, hence you can see through it and you can go on living behind it without ever becoming aware that you are living in a prison cell. Prisons should be made of glass, then very few people will suffer so much in prisons. They will be able to see the people walking on the road, talking; they will be able to see everything, and they will believe that they are free. If they are not going out and mixing with the people, that is simply their own decision that they don't want to mix with the crowds. They are "aristocrats," they are not ordinary people, they are "special" people. And these walls which cannot be seen will not be thought of as walls, they…
Please, Osho, what is receptivity?
RECEPTIVITY is a state of no-mind. When you are utterly empty of all thought, when consciousness has no content, when the mirror reflects nothing, it is receptivity. Receptivity is the door to the divine. Drop the mind and be. In the mind, you are miles away from being. The more you think, the less you are. The less you think, the more you are. And if you don't think at all, those are the moments when being asserts itself in its totality. Receptivity simply means dropping the garbage that you go on carrying in your head. And much garbage is there, utterly useless. The mind means the past. Now the past is no more of any use; it has happened, and it is never going to happen again, because in reality nothing ever repeats. Even when you think, feel, that this is the same situation, it is never the same…
Osho: You cannot be open through effort. If you are thinking this, then you have not understood it. Thinking means non-understanding. The person who thinks is a man of non-understanding. A person who knows doesn't think. (much laughter) It is not a question of thinking. He sees, he is aware, but not in thinking. Thoughts are not opening, thoughts are closing; they close your mind. The more you are in a thinking mood, the more you are closed and isolated from the whole. If you are not thinking, if you just are, if you are in a state of being, then something comes. That is not thinking, that is the realization. That is not thinking, you have not thought it. And the more you have thought about it, the less is the possibility for its coming. The known must go for the unknown to come.
A friend has asked: Osho, if one enters oneself with preconceived notions, the revelation of the simple Self is not possible. Tell us, is a movement toward self-knowing possible without preconceptions? Is not the very root of curiosity a prior knowledge of the object’s essence?
This is precisely what is called a preconception. The question itself is full of preconception. As you say, “Entering oneself with a preconception is not possible.” That has already been assumed. Have you entered and seen? You have formed the notion, without entering, that it is not possible. Now possibility will become very difficult. This very notion will be the obstacle: “It is not possible.” Why would you even attempt what you believe to be impossible? If it is impossible, you have shut the door. Now it will be hard. To be free of notions means: keep the mind open without knowing in advance; do not bind it. Do not decide whether it is possible or impossible. Experiment—do not decide. Experience—do not decide. Let decision arise from experience; do not manufacture experience out of decision. Because if you have decided beforehand, the scientific quality of the experiment is finished. You…
When you want to make a problem out of it that means deep down you would like to show that you want to drop it and yet you are so compassionate, that's why you are not dropping it. On the surface you show you are not interested -- that too is a trick of the mind. That's also a way of being possessive. On the surface show indifference -- as if this is not your need -- you are free, you can drop it any moment. But then why don't you drop it? Who can prevent you from dropping it? At least I am not going to; prevent you. If you want to drop it, drop it. If you J want to continue, then change yourself. My suggestion is: dropping it is not going to help much.