According to Osho, the initial courage to be with a living master dissolves mind-made fears and births a new courage and sincerity; the master becomes your world. True courage then is to continue moving from darkness to light, and from light to more light, aligning courage with intelligence. Turning away is merely a brave stupidity, a regression into darkness. Existence itself urges forward, toward clarity, love, richness, and godliness.
Be brave to stay with the teacher who helps you grow—your fears fade, real courage arises, and you keep moving into more light instead of foolishly going back into darkness.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Beloved Osho, once you said that we have shown courage in being with you -- but it doesn't feel like that to me. To me it feels like the easiest and the only thing to do. It rather frightens me to think of living in this world away from you. It feels like walking out of life into death. Can you please explain this for me?
First, it certainly needs courage to be with me. But once you are with me, all the fears created by the mind start disappearing and a new courage, a new sincerity, takes their place. Slowly, slowly I become your world. Then to leave me needs immense courage. The first courage was from darkness towards light; the second courage is from light to darkness. The first courage was the courage to love, to live, to be. The second courage is to commit suicide; the second is certainly more difficult and more idiotic. Just by being courageous one does not become intelligent. Idiots are very courageous in many situations: where an intelligent man will stop, they will go on ahead. To see the danger needs intelligence. You are now in that situation. You have completely forgotten the first courage. And it is natural, because when you come from darkness to light who…
Osho, what is courage?
If soldiers are allowed to be intelligent, wars will disappear from the earth. Wars can exist only if soldiers are made in such a way, conditioned in such a way that they lose all intelligence. That's why unintelligent training has to be forced on them for years. Now the soldier goes on doing things which make no sense for years. Early in the morning he gets up, he has to line up and the parade begins. And "left turn," and "right turn," and "about turn," and "go forward," and "go backward." For what? And for hours together. In the Second World War a philosopher was recruited. When the commanding officer said, "Right turn!" everybody turned right except the philosopher. The commanding officer asked, "Why? Why are you not turning right?" He said, "Why should I turn? I have no business there; I don't see the need. And I think all…
So only those who are courageous enough can know life. Others only vegetate, they don't live. Courage can be of two types. The first type is the most prevalent one. The first type is cultivated. You repress your fear and you go on repressing your fear, so much so that it disappears from your consciousness and becomes part of your unconscious. You are no more aware of it and you start thinking that there is no fear in you. In ordinary situations it will work, but in any extraordinary situation in which real courage is needed you will have a breakdown. The fear will surface again. It was only on the surface that you were courageous. It had not become your soul. The second type, the second category of courage is spontaneous, natural, uncultivated. It does not come by repressing fear.
Osho, you were more awake as an infant than I am now. How did this courage and awareness happen?
In India, in Punjab, if you are traveling in Punjab -- you can ask Neelam -- never ask anybody, "What is the time?" because if it happens to be twelve you will be beaten. And if you can escape alive it will be just a miracle. It is just for a very philosophical reason -- but when philosophy comes into the hands of fools, this is what happens. Nanak, the founder of Sikhism, has said that the moment of samadhi is just like two hands of the clock meeting on twelve, where they are no longer two. He was just taking an example -- that in the moment of samadhi the two-ness of your being dissolves and you arrive at oneness. The same happens in death too. He explained later on that the same happens in death. Again the two hands which have been separately moving come together and stop,…
Your flower has blossomed, mm? -- there is going to be fragrance. And whosoever is capable, sensitive enough, will be benefited. Mind is incapable of knowing the truth. It can gather all kinds of information about truth, but to know about truth is not to know truth. To know about love is not to know love. To know love one needs to be a lover. No information can be of any help; one has to go into the experience itself. And the same is true about truth. You can know all the great philosophers of the world, you can accumulate great words, theories, hypotheses and you can come to certain arbitrary conclusions of your own. But remember, they are arbitrary because they are not rooted in your experience. So whatsoever you know will really hinder your search.