According to Osho, single-pointedness is concentration—narrowing the mind to one line, valuable for tasks like archery or science (work), but it is not meditation or worship. Being total means presence without mind—pure awareness where all dimensions are available. Spacing out is the opposite of both—being absent while acting, which is unhealthy and risky. Use focus for work; drop mind for worship.
Use a sharp focus for doing jobs, but for prayer/meditation just be fully here; don’t drift off while doing anything.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Beloved master, can you say something about single-pointedness, being total, spacing out, work, and worship?
They may be thinking that it would have been better to be in hell, because in hell there are all the colorful people: all poets, painters, singers, dancers, actors, actresses. All the colorful people, juicy people, are in hell. And people who are just dry bones are in heaven. They are not allowed to visit hell even for the long weekend. Once you enter heaven there is no exit. Other religions are in the morning -- ten minutes, twenty minutes -- chanting mantras, and thinking that this is all. I have consideredly given you red clothes, a mala with a locket of a madman, to remind you -- even in sleep -- that your whole life has to become religious; it is not a question of a few minutes, a few hours. And for me, there is no other paradise. You have to create it here and now. You have…
One winter day, a masterless samurai came to eisai's temple and made an appeal: 'I'm poor and sick,' he said, 'and my family is dying of hunger. Please help us, master.'
DEPENDENT AS HE WAS ON WIDOWS' MITES, EISAI'S LIFE WAS VERY AUSTERE, AND HE HAD NOTHING TO GIVE. HE WAS ABOUT TO SEND THE SAMURAI OFF WHEN HE REMEMBERED THE IMAGE OF YAKUSHI-BUDDHA IN THE HALL. GOING UP TO IT HE TORE OFF ITS HALO AND GAVE IT TO THE SAMURAI. 'SELL THIS,' SAID EISAI, 'IT SHOULD TIDE YOU OVER.' THE BEWILDERED BUT DESPERATE SAMURAI TOOK THE HALO AND LEFT. 'MASTER!' CRIED ONE OF EISAI'S DISCIPLES, 'THAT'S SACRILEGE! HOW COULD YOU DO SUCH A THING?' 'SACRILEGE? BAH! I HAVE MERELY PUT THE BUDDHA'S MIND, WHICH IS FULL OF LOVE AND MERCY, TO USE, SO TO SPEAK. INDEED, IF HE HIMSELF HAD HEARD THAT POOR SAMURAI HE'D HAVE CUT OFF A LIMB FOR HIM.' Even if you feel, or you think you feel, or you pretend that you feel, compassion, just go deep and analyze it and you will always find…
Question: Maneesha's question: OUR BELOVED MASTER, COULD YOU TALK ABOUT THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN A WORKAHOLIC AND SOMEONE WHO IS TOTAL IN THEIR WORK? So to be total in work is helpful in meditation. The workaholic cannot meditate, he cannot sit silently even for a few minutes. He will fidget, he will change his position, he will do something or other -- look into this pocket or that pocket, and he knows that there is nothing in those pockets. He will take out his glasses, clean them, put them away, and he knows they are clean. I have been traveling for twenty years around this country, continuously, on the train, on the plane, and I have seen people opening their suitcases, looking into them, closing the suitcase -- as if there was something to see. They are just at a loss what to do.
[NOTE: This is an unedited tape transcript of an unpublished darshan diary, which has been scanned and cleaned up. It is for reference purposes only.] [Osho spoke about the difference between meditation and concentration. In the past the two have been thought to be synonymous, and they are not.] Not only are they not synonymous, they are absolutely opposite dimensions. They never meet anywhere, they never cross each other's path -- different worlds altogether. Concentration is something within the mind and meditation is something beyond the mind. Concentration has its own utility. If you are working on a scientific project then concentration is needed; then you have to focus all your mind-energy on a single point.
Beloved Osho, how are one-pointedness, concentration and meditation related to each other?
Prem Dinesh, one-pointedness, concentration and meditation are not related to each other at all. This is one of the confusions prevalent all over the world. One-pointedness is another name for concentration, but meditation is just the opposite of concentration. But in most of the books, in most of the dictionaries, and by the so-called teachers, they are used as if they are synonymous. Concentration simply means one-pointedness. It is something of the mind. Mind can be a chaos, a crowd. Mind can be many voices, many directions. Mind can be a crossroads. Ordinarily, that's what mind is, a crowd. But if the mind is a chaos, you cannot think rationally, you cannot think scientifically. To think rationally and scientifically, you have to be concentrated on the object of your study. Whatever the object is, the one thing necessary is that you are pouring your whole mental energy onto that object.…