If your likes keep changing, it just means you’re confused—stop, watch, and let real clarity arise.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Beloved Osho, I took sannyas from swami shivanand of rishikesh after reading his book brahmacharya and other books of his.
AFTER SOME YEARS, I WAS ATTRACTED TO SRI RAMANA MAHARSHI AND THEREAFTER TO SRI AUROBINDO DUE TO HIS INTEGRAL APPROACH TO THE DIVINE. FROM 1959 ONWARDS I WAS DOING MEDITATION ON THE LINES INDICATED BY SRI AUROBINDO AND THE MOTHER. THEREAFTER J. KRISHNAMURTI'S APPROACH ATTRACTED ME, NOW YOURS. I ENJOY AND FEEL HAPPY WHENEVER I READ SRI AUROBINDO'S WORKS, SINCE HE EMPHASIZES LIVING A FULL LIFE AND REALIZATION OF INTEGRAL DIVINE AND GIVES MUCH EMPHASIS TO PHYSICAL TRANSFORMATION. YOU ALSO EMPHASIZE NOT TO NEGATE LIFE BUT TO LIVE FULLY, AND HAVE GIVEN A NEW MEANING TO SANNYAS. HENCE I AM HERE TO EMBRACE THIS ALSO. I WONDER WHETHER I AM ON THE RIGHT PATH OR DRIFTING? WHAT IS THIS MULTIFARIOUS ATTRACTION IN ME? COULD YOU HELP ME WITH A RIGHT PATH IF I AM DRIFTING? But the questioner seems to be too much in the head: then he became interested…
Osho, another difficulty has arisen. Today there is such a gap between the private sector and the public sector that if we destroy the private sector, initiative disappears—and when initiative disappears, movement stops. In the same way, when one descends into non-attachment, or desirelessness, or karma-sannyas, it seems that initiative, zest, and drive all get converted into inactivity. That possibility seems real.
Where we claim to go against biology but still obey biology’s rule—being attracted to the opposite—everything turns dull and empty. Houses remain huts, pressed to the ground; all activity wanes; no one sings; a singing person seems criminal; bright clothes disappear; color, charm, beauty are lost; everything becomes sad, subdued, and shrunken. My own view is that both have their own laws, and a true culture stands on both. A true culture will be sex-free in the sense of being un-repressed: it will rejoice in sex, be festive in sex, and vast worldly activity will arise. And true spirituality, based on the right choice of type, will spread a web of spiritual activity. Krishna stands rightly in his own type; Buddha in his own; Mahavira in his own. Hence Krishna acts in one way, but it is not that Buddha does not act. Buddha’s life, too, is a vast web…
When you were a zen master telling us to choose our path and stick to it, I felt sure that my path was of the head, that I would never be able to surrender to anyone. Now, after one lecture on the baul mystics, I feel like a lovesick schoolgirl. How to choose a path when you have none? How to be a light unto myself when your light dazzles me every morning?
When you know all the women of your community and decide, that decision is totally different than the decision that is taken in civilized societies. You don't know other women; a better woman, a better man is always possible. Then what will you do? A more interesting personality can always be there; then there will be disruption, there will be distraction, there will be problems. These are small village communities: not many people -- two hundred, three hundred people, at the most, in one community. Every boy is allowed to know each girl. When he has known all the girls and all the girls have known all the boys, and then one girl and one boy decide to get married, before marriage happens they are given one more year to be together, to finally decide -- because to decide before knowing each other well is dangerous. The decision may be…
Osho, when one tries to steer one’s life in a particular direction, the call of the other directions becomes a distraction. But is it possible to let one’s life flow in all its directions—and then, in a state free of distraction, is there not a danger that life will fall apart?
The very moment you want to concentrate, you have made a wound. You must have noticed: if there is a wound on your foot, the whole day everything bumps into it. A child climbs right onto that foot. You are amazed: all these years, all his life, he never climbed on my foot, and today he climbed! You pass through a doorway and it bumps into you. Things fall. They fell every day, and that child climbed many times—but you never noticed it, because there was no wound. Today there is a wound—so you notice. It is not that seeing your wound the whole world is falling on your foot. No one knows of your wound. When you sit to be concentrated and you make an effort—that very effort creates a wound. Now the smallest things start obstructing you. You must have noticed: the moment you sit to meditate, an…
Osho, after listening to you I experience slackness and sadness in practical life. But when you speak on love and devotion, on joy and celebration, my mind blossoms and fills with delight. Kindly show me my path.
You see—no second Mahavira, no second Krishna, no second Rama. Once one comes, he never appears again on the stage. Remember this. You too are new. Learn from everyone; accept your own. Listen to all; let the final decision come from the heart. So if talk of renunciation brings you slackness and sadness; your heart’s flower does not open but withers; the bud does not become a flower but, on the contrary, the flower closes its petals—as many flowers do at dusk when the sun sets—then understand: this is not your sun of truth. It may be someone else’s truth, because some flowers bloom only when the sun sets—night-blooming jasmine is like that. It may be hers; it is not for you. Then your path is perfectly clear. Wherever you glimpse joy, go there with courage. I am not saying you will find joy there every time. Many times you…