What happens when I bring light into the unconscious?

Beloved master, when I first sat in front of you I heard you say to me, "bring light into the unconscious." eight years have since passed and I feel more silent and loving than ever before and yet sense that there is much more. Does the light which enters the unconscious come through efforts and determination, or is it an existential gift, requiring patience, openness and receptivity? Could you speak on what it means to bring light into the unconscious?

Raymond, every step on the path reminds one of the utter poverty of language. I may have said to you, "Bring light into your unconscious," because in that moment you would not have understood what you can understand now. You can only prepare the ground. Light comes on its own accord. And that is happening in all these eight years by your becoming more silent and more loving. But you feel a lingering sense that there is something more -- there is much more. Now I can say to you: Relax in your silence so it can become deeper. And relax in your love so it is no longer a solid thing but becomes more liquid, more flowing in all directions. In short, learn the art of let-go. The light will come not according to your expectations or by any effort. Every effort will be a great hindrance and every…

Question: OSHO, HOW DOES ONE EXPLORE THE HIGHER STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS? He throws a rock into the well and runs away. Certainly, the rock falling in the well makes a big noise, and all the people who are following him stop near the well -- they think that the man has jumped into the well. So now some arrangement has to be made: more light has to be brought, somebody has to go down and find out who this man is, whether he is alive or dead. Now their whole mind is diverted. He reaches his home, really angry, almost ready to kill the father. And the father is sound asleep, covered with his blanket... it was a cold night. He pulls off his blanket, and he says, "Is this the way to teach your own son?" He said, "Are you back? That's enough; you have learned the art.

Beloved Osho, does "to become conscious" mean that something that was unconscious is raised to the level of the mind, and only when it has passed through the state of the mind can it rise to the level of superconsciousness? Does everything need to pass through the mind, or is it possible to become conscious from another place, and jump the mind stage?

Those who believe only in the mind -- for example, psychoanalysts, who are replacing the priests in the West and who are creating a substitute religion as bogus as the one they are replacing -- for them, there is nothing higher than mind. There are steps lower than mind; hence everything has to pass through your conscious mind to be released, so your unconscious becomes unburdened. But it is a very long process, because your unconscious carries the whole rubbish of this life, which is immense. Every second of your life, awake or asleep, you are collecting rubbish. The amount is so much that your remaining life will not be able to free you from it. Moreover, while you are freeing yourself from the old rubbish, every day you are collecting new rubbish. And this is not all. Deeper than this is your collective unconscious which has not even been…

Osho, how can I become a light unto myself?

Shraddho Yannis, THESE WERE THE LAST WORDS of Gautam the Buddha, his parting message to his disciples: "Be a light unto yourself." But when he says, "Be a light unto yourself," he does not mean become a light unto yourself. There is a great difference between being and becoming. Becoming is a process, being is a discovery. The seed only appears to become the tree, that is an appearance. The seed already had the tree within itself, it was its very being. The seed does not become the flowers. The flowers were there unmanifest, now they are manifest. It is not a question of becoming, otherwise a pebble could become a flower. But that doesn't happen. A rock cannot become a rose; that doesn't happen because the rock has no potential for being a rose. The seed simply discovers itself through dying into the soil: dropping its outer shell, it…

Osho, we have fled from suffering and are standing in darkness. And you are the representative of that supreme light which burns without wick or oil. Is a union between the two possible?

Union is not possible. That is the dilemma. Darkness and light never meet. They cannot, because light is, and darkness is not. So how can that which is meet that which is not? Darkness is only lack, absence, the non-presence of light. Darkness is nothing in itself. Therefore, if you want to do something directly with darkness, you will not be able to. A room is filled with darkness and you want to remove it—what will you do? Give it a push? Tie it up in bundles? Scoop it out and throw it away? What will you do? No, you can do nothing directly. If anything is to be done, you will have to light a lamp. Whatever is to be done must be done with light. With darkness you can do nothing. And if there is light and you want to bring darkness, what will you do? Can you…