According to Osho, being open means being without mind: the mind is a transparent glass wall that imprisons through labels, beliefs, and prior conclusions. Openness arises by dropping mind through meditation and sannyas, living from not-knowing, innocence, and direct perception. This is the truly scientific, religious attitude: meeting facts and life without prejudice so truth can reveal itself.
Being open is like taking off invisible glasses of opinions so you can look at life fresh, without labels.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, what is being open?
Devena, BEING OPEN SIMPLY MEANS being without mind. If the mind is there you are closed. Mind is a wall surrounding you. It is a transparent wall, hence you can see through it and you can go on living behind it without ever becoming aware that you are living in a prison cell. Prisons should be made of glass, then very few people will suffer so much in prisons. They will be able to see the people walking on the road, talking; they will be able to see everything, and they will believe that they are free. If they are not going out and mixing with the people, that is simply their own decision that they don't want to mix with the crowds. They are "aristocrats," they are not ordinary people, they are "special" people. And these walls which cannot be seen will not be thought of as walls, they…
Please, Osho, what is receptivity?
RECEPTIVITY is a state of no-mind. When you are utterly empty of all thought, when consciousness has no content, when the mirror reflects nothing, it is receptivity. Receptivity is the door to the divine. Drop the mind and be. In the mind, you are miles away from being. The more you think, the less you are. The less you think, the more you are. And if you don't think at all, those are the moments when being asserts itself in its totality. Receptivity simply means dropping the garbage that you go on carrying in your head. And much garbage is there, utterly useless. The mind means the past. Now the past is no more of any use; it has happened, and it is never going to happen again, because in reality nothing ever repeats. Even when you think, feel, that this is the same situation, it is never the same…
[And to remind the next sannyasin of that promise Osho gave him the name Akash -- sky!] Mind is a very small thing, it is like a prison cell. And everybody is imprisoned in his own mind: in his prejudices, creeds, dogmas, religions, philosophies -- political and spiritual. Everybody is living in a very small dark cell. The cell is made of conditionings. Meditation means unconditioning the mind and never allowing it to be reconditioned. Otherwise it is very easy to move from one dark cell to another dark cell. A Hindu can become a Christian; that is very easy, there is no conversion. Instead of worshipping Krishna he starts worshipping Christ. In fact linguists say that the word 'Christ' comes from the word 'Krishna'; they are not different words, their root is the same. So you have changed from one cell to another. A Christian can become a Hindu.
Osho: You cannot be open through effort. If you are thinking this, then you have not understood it. Thinking means non-understanding. The person who thinks is a man of non-understanding. A person who knows doesn't think. (much laughter) It is not a question of thinking. He sees, he is aware, but not in thinking. Thoughts are not opening, thoughts are closing; they close your mind. The more you are in a thinking mood, the more you are closed and isolated from the whole. If you are not thinking, if you just are, if you are in a state of being, then something comes. That is not thinking, that is the realization. That is not thinking, you have not thought it. And the more you have thought about it, the less is the possibility for its coming. The known must go for the unknown to come.
Tokusan was studying zen under ryutan. One night tokusan came to ryutan and asked many questions. The teacher said, "the night is getting old -- why don't you retire?" so tokusan bowed, and as he opened the screen to go out he observed, "it is very dark outside." ryutan offered tokusan a lighted candle to find his way, but just as tokusan received it, ryutan blew it out. At that moment the mind of tokusan was opened. Tokusan was studying zen under ryutan. One night tokusan came to ryutan and asked many questions.
But when you leave the contradictions out, you have left Buddha himself out -- because he was in his contradictions. He was in the gaps. He was giving shocks to your mind. This is a shock: Tokusan, at that moment, suddenly became alert. He could not have predicted it. If the mind can predict anything, there is no shock. If I repeat this story with you... if I give you a candle this night, you know the story well, and then I blow it out -- nothing will happen, because you expect it. So a device cannot be used again; it is impossible to use it again. That's why new buddhas are always needed, because old buddhas ... your mind has absorbed them, it knows very well. So a new buddha may do exactly the opposite. He may give you the candle and will not blow it out, and you…