What happens when I allow myself to be really alive?

Beloved Osho, why such an enormous fear of allowing myself to be really alive?

The Jews have been tortured for two thousand years because they crucified Jesus, and now this is a crucifixion for all the Jews -- Israel. They have poured their money into it, they have come from faraway lands, they have been working hard, because it is a desert; and besides there is continuous harassment from the Mohammedans who are not going to accept that Israel is not theirs. On their maps they still show Palestine, not Israel. The trouble has increased more and more just now, in a way in which the Jews were not even aware would happen. There are outside enemies all around, and now there are inside enemies. Firstly, the Mohammedans who have been living for centuries in the land are still there; they function as informers to the Mohammedans, because their devotion is to Mohammedanism. And now something new, inconceivable is happening... because some Jews have…

No, they simply exaggerated. A little you have... chickenshit! (gales of laughter) [Another participant says: I felt really alive today.... I felt angry and happy, sad and crying.] When you really become alive, everything becomes alive: love, hate, anger, sadness -- everything, because they are all your facets. People have been trying to choose that only good things should be alive, and bad things -- whatsoever they call bad -- should be forced to die. In this absurd effort everything has died. People think that when all unhappiness, jealousy, possessiveness, has been dropped, you will be more happy, more loving -- but just the reverse happens. When all these things have been repressed, your love, your happiness, has also been repressed, because man is a totality, individual -- that's why we call him individual. You cannot divide him. If you try to kill one thing, the poison spreads all over.

Beloved Osho, would you talk some more on the art of how to be fully alive?

A meditator neither bothers about the past that is gone, nor bothers about the future that has not come yet. He is focused in the present, and whatever he has, he enjoys it to its full. He squeezes the juice of the present moment to its maximum. Naturally, his life is not the life of a beggar. He is never asking for more, although he is living at the maximum with totality and intensity. Otherwise, you have to be satisfied. That's what your religions teach you -- to be satisfied with little. Satisfaction and contentment have been raised to great values. They are simply opium to the people so that you can at least tolerate the suffering that surrounds you and the misery in which you are drowning continuously. A man is playing golf, and he hits his ball into the woods. He goes to retrieve it and comes upon…

When teng yin feng was about to die he said to the people around him: I have seen monks die sitting and lying, but have any died standing? 'yes, some,' they replied.

'HOW ABOUT UPSIDE-DOWN?' ASKED TENG. 'NO, NEVER SUCH A THING,' THEY SAID. SO TENG DIED STANDING ON HIS HEAD AND HIS CLOTHES ALSO ROSE UP, CLOSE TO HIS BODY. IT WAS DECIDED TO CARRY HIM TO THE BURNING GROUND, BUT HE STILL STOOD THERE WITHOUT MOVING. PEOPLE FROM FAR AND NEAR GAZED WITH ASTONISHMENT AT THE SCENE. HIS YOUNGER SISTER, A NUN, HAPPENED TO BE THERE. SHE GRUMBLED AT HIM: WHEN YOU WERE ALIVE, YOU TOOK NO NOTICE OF LAWS AND CUSTOMS; AND EVEN NOW YOU'RE DEAD, YOU'RE MAKING A NUISANCE OF YOURSELF. SHE THEN PRODDED HER BROTHER WITH HER FINGER, AND HE FELL DOWN WITH A BANG. THEN THEY WENT OFF TO THE CREMATORIUM. He was a small child in school and the question was asked: Why and how did the sea turn into red wine when Jesus reached it? The answer was fixed, ready-made; it had been taught…

The more you talk about death, the greater my desire for life. I have just realised that I have not really lived. While I can understand that life and death come together, there is a yearning inside me that cries out for life, love and passionate intensity. I have discovered I am anguished at the thought of surrendering my unfulfilled desires. Can one give up what one has never had? I feel I would only return to the body again. Illusion or not, to my great amazement I have to admit that I still desire, and I have never felt such hunger.

So let me tell you one thing. You are afraid of life because you are afraid of death. And I would like to teach you how to die so that you lose all fear of death. The moment you lose the fear of death you become capable of living. I am not talking against life. How can I talk against life? I am madly in love with life! I am so madly in love with life, that because of it I have fallen in love with death also. It is part of life. When you love life totally how can you avoid death? You have to love death also. When you love a flower deeply, you love its withering away also: When you love a woman deeply, you love her getting old also, you one day love her death also. That is part, part of the woman. The old age…