Senility means getting old but not wise, so when your strength fades your hidden immaturity pops out as childishness—not the clear innocence that comes from real inner growth.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Is the childishness of senility anything to do with awareness? Is senility a disease of the west only? What is senility?
It has nothing to do with East or West. East and West may differ on the surface -- deep down there is no difference. Man is man... maybe a few different patterns in the East and a few different patterns in the West, but they are on the surface; they are only skin deep. Just scratch a little and East and West both disappear. Deep down is humanity, one. This question is significant. 'Is the childishness of senility anything to do with awareness?' And, 'What is senility?' Senility is becoming old without becoming mature. Senility is growing old without growing up. Then, as the end result, the senile person becomes very childish because his child has never become a grown-up; he has always been hiding the child inside him. He was occupied in a thousand and one things of the world and the child was waiting and waiting. Now he…
Osho, I have heard that a seeker has to pass through four stages of sadhana: tariqat, shari’at, marifat, and haqiqat. The last is haqiqat, where the seeker meets his beloved and comes face to face with Truth. Osho, please explain the first three states.
These words are from the Sufis—very significant, and very straightforward. The first is tariqat. Tariqat means: the way, the method, the discipline, the means, the yoga. Tariqat means: something has to be done; only then will you attain—without doing, you will not receive. One has to walk a path; find the way; make a footpath. One has to bring some discipline into life, give it an order. Tariqat means learning the way to become worthy of it. When you go to have an audience with an emperor, you learn the etiquette of his court. You don’t just walk in. If you do, you will not be accepted. You learn how to sit there, how to stand there, how to bow there. If you are going to meet an emperor, you must taste something of the flavor of the emperor’s way of life. If you are going to meet the Divine,…
Osho! Death does not frighten me as much as the thought of old age, or old age itself. Why is that?
Therefore I say to you: drop worrying about yoga. Enjoy bhoga so totally that by the very enjoyment you become free of enjoyment. And then yoga will kindle of its own accord. The lamp will light by itself. Then there is no death. Then even death brings only one message—release from the body. Then death is not an end—only the beginning of a new journey; only release from the body. And the body is narrow. The body is as if one were shut in a prison, as if a bird were trapped in a cage. Death brings the news that the cage has broken. And now the hamsa can fly. Let the hamsa go alone! Now—to Manasarovar! Now—let us go home! What message of death has arrived? By whose jewel-like voice has the music of rhythm been sung? What message of death has arrived? The body grew tired and worn;…
Osho, I am growing old, yet I still cannot gather the courage to take sannyas. What should I do now?
They say Ibrahim was struck—by the man’s voice, his power, his blow—and he said to him, “You stay; I will go. If it is an inn, then stay at your ease—but I am leaving.” Ibrahim left the palace! And whenever anyone later asked him, “What did you do?” he would say, “I understood the point. It is true. How many have halted in this palace, come and gone—it will be the same with me. If I must go, why the claim! I dropped it.” And Ibrahim said, “From the day I left that inn, I found my home. I came to know my true dwelling.” Sannyas is courage, yes—but not as difficult as you imagine. Once understood, it is very simple. I say only this to you: this world is an inn. And I do not even say you must leave it and go. Ashtavakra would not say that either.…
Osho, “na sā sabhā yatra na santi vṛddhāḥ; vṛddhāḥ na te ye na vadanti dharmam. nāso dharmo yatra na satyam asti; na tat satyaṁ yac chalelānuviddham.” “A gathering without elders is no assembly; those who do not expound dharma are not elders. That which has no truth is not dharma; that which is laced with deceit is not truth.” Osho, please say something on this subhāṣita from the Mahābhārata.
Sahajanand, growing old is very easy. Do nothing and you will grow old anyway. The irreligious grow old, the religious grow old; sinners and saints; virtuous and unvirtuous. Growing old is not an art. Animals grow old, birds grow old, trees grow old, mountains grow old. Vindhyachal is Earth’s oldest mountain—so old its back has bent. From that bent back came the story that when the sage Agastya went south, Vindhya bowed to salute him. Agastya said, “Stay bowed till I return,” and he never did. Ever since, poor Vindhyachal remains bent. The truth is: Vindhya is the oldest, and the Himalayas the youngest. Mountains grow old, trees grow old, birds and animals grow old, humans grow old. Old age in itself is not a virtue; it carries no intrinsic worth. So the aphorism says, “A gathering without elders is no assembly.” Taken at face value, it is simply wrong.…