According to Osho, when a symbol says “a lotus has bloomed,” it doesn’t mean a real flower; it signals an inner center opening and a distinct, ineffable feeling arising. The lotus is a poetic shorthand for a qualitative shift in consciousness; its color names the mood or energy of the experience—like red for intensity, green for peace.
It means something inside you has opened and feels a special way—like being in a red or green room—not that a real flower appeared.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Blooming. Yes, blooming. Inside there is an experience: when a center blossoms completely, it feels as if there was a bud that has opened into a flower. How to express this outwardly? So outwardly they adopted the symbol of the lotus in bloom. And as if that lotus were hanging upside down—the first experience of the chakras comes just like a flower hanging upside down.
Yes, blossoming. There is an inner experience: when a center fully blossoms, it feels as if there was a bud and it has opened into a flower. Now, how to express this outwardly? Outwardly they made a symbol of it—the lotus has bloomed. And then, as if this lotus were hanging upside down, the first experience of the chakras comes just like that—as if the flower is hanging upside down.
‘Lotus’ is a beloved symbol for mystics—for many reasons. First, it is born in mud, in dirty mud. It arises from mud where no one would have suspected the possibility. Had we not known, seeing the mud no one could have imagined, dreamed, conceived that a lotus would be born from this! Mud and lotus—there seems no connection. Where the lotus, where the mud! The lotus appears so opposite to this earth—as though it has come from beyond, not of this earth. As though a stranger, descended from the sky. So untouched, so virginal, so beautiful, so delicate—how could it be born of mud! Such virginity belongs to the sky! Thus, in the lotus there is something of the sky, and something that has come from mud. Therefore it is a most significant symbol. Man too is mud—a form of clay! Yet the lotus can bloom.
Osho, that morning the Buddha bestowed the supreme treasure of silence upon Mahakashyapa by offering him the symbolic flower. A flower blooms in the morning and withers by evening. Yet the Zen tradition is alive to this day. Kindly explain the relation between the flower’s transience and the living vitality of Zen.
Seeing the meeting of these two lotuses, Mahakashyapa laughed—he blossomed. It was a unique event. Therefore the Buddha offered that lotus to Mahakashyapa and said to his monks, “What I could say in words, I have given you. What cannot be said in words and has not been said, I am giving to Mahakashyapa—wordlessly.” Thus, in the Zen tradition, from then on, one master has been giving to another in silence. One more story. In Mahakashyapa’s lineage there was Bodhidharma. Bodhidharma went to China, and from India the Zen tradition reached China. Bodhidharma was the twenty-eighth Indian patriarch. In China, Bodhidharma sat facing a wall for nine years. People came, but he would not look at them. He kept his back toward them. People asked, “We have seen many monks, many saints—but why do you keep your back to us?” Bodhidharma said, “When one worthy of falling within my eyes…
[NOTE: This is an unedited tape transcript of an unpublished darshan diary, which has been copy-typed on to the computer. It is for reference purposes only.] The lotus represents The ultimate unfolding of consciousness. The lotus is the biggest flower in the world And in the East the most respected flower For two reasons/ One: it grows in the mud, in the dirty mud. One cannot conceive that out of such dirty mud Such a beautiful flower is possible. Hence it represents something in man. Man ordinarily is nothing but dirt Just dirty mud But hidden in it is the possibility Of a lotus flower. So just don't condemn the dirt And don't condemn ordinary humanity. Secondly: the lotus grows in water. Out of dirty mud it rises and floats on the water. It has a very miraculous quality: It is so velvety that the water cannot touch it.
In that very moment one passes through a radical transformation. Then life is no more the same again. When you are with closed eyes all is dark. When you are with open eyes life is all colour, all light. God is the experience of existence with open eyes. Those who deny god are simply saying that they are blind. Not only are they blind, they are stubborn too. They are insisting that they are not blind but that there is no god. Friedrich Nietzsche says god is dead. The reality is that Nietzsche is mad, that he is blind. If one keeps one's eyes closed, the sun may be there in the sky showering light but you live in darkness. Just a small curtain over your eyes is enough to prevent you from seeing the truth. Sannyas is a deliberate effort to open your eyes.