What is the difference between awareness and witnessing?

Question: what is the difference between awareness and witnessing?

Witnessing comes as a consequence of consciousness. You cannot practice witnessing; you can only practice consciousness. Witnessing comes as a consequence, as a shadow, as a result, as a byproduct. The more you become conscious, the more you go into witnessing, the more you come to be a witness. So consciousness is a method to achieve witnessing. And the second step is that witnessing will become a method to achieve awareness. So these are the three steps: consciousness, witnessing, awareness. But where we exist is the lowest rank: that is, in unconscious activity. Unconscious activity is the state of our minds. Through consciousness you can achieve witnessing, and through witnessing you can achieve awareness, and through awareness you can achieve "no achievement." Through awareness you can achieve all that is already achieved. After awareness there is nothing; awareness is the end. Awareness is the end of spiritual progress; unawareness is…

[NOTE: This is a partly edited tape transcript of an unpublished early dialogue. It is for reference purposes only.](Starts with Osho laughing) LADAK(?) WOMAN: MY QUESTION IS IN THREE STAGES: WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN TO WITNESS AND TO BE AWARE? AND WHAT IS THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN AWARENESS AND CONSCIOUSNESS? AND THE SECOND QUESTION IS ABOUT THIS MEDITATION TECHNIQUE. IS THE FOURTH STAGE OF YOUR MEDITATION METHOD THE STATE OF AKARMA, THAT IS DUAL AWARENESS? AND THE THIRD ONE IS VERY PRIVATE; ABOUT MY SADHANA. IN MY MEDITATION KUNDALINI IS RISING WITH SHOOTS OF FIRE AND LIGHT. IF I FEEL THIS MOVEMENT HOW CAN I STILL BE IN AKARMA? I NEED YOUR BLESSING! A: There is much difference between awareness and witnessing. Witnessing is still an act, you are doing it, the ego is there. So the phenomenon of witnessing is divided between this subject and the object.

Osho, in the context of the practice of heedfulness (apramad), please explain the similarities and differences among the practices of witnessing, awareness, and tathata.

One more thought on tathata. A Zen fakir wrote a small song: “The geese fly across the sky. They have no desire that their reflections be formed in the still lake below. Yet the reflections form. The blue lake has no desire to catch the reflections of the geese. Yet the reflections are caught. Then the geese fly on and the reflections also fly away. The geese do not know they were caught in the lake; the lake does not know that the reflections aroused any curiosity, any stir, any disturbance in its bosom.” Tathata means such a being. Things happen. He is ready for all—wants to do nothing and has no complaint. That is why one of Buddha’s names is Tathagata. He loved that name. Even speaking of himself he would say, “The Tathagata passed through a certain village.” Tathagata means one who has attained tathata—thus come, thus gone.…

For years I am most of the time witnessing and I feel it like a disease. So is it that there are two kinds of witnessing and mine is wrong? Tell me.

And only then can the third step be taken, which will bring you close to what Gurdjieff calls self-remembering, or Krishnamurti calls awareness, or the Upanishads call witnessing. But first the two steps have to be fulfilled; then the third comes easy. Don't start doing the third immediately. First the object, then the consciousness, then the subject. Once the object is dropped and the emphasis on the consciousness is no longer a strain, the subject is there but there is no subjectivity in it. You are there but there is no "I" in it, just being. You are, but there is no feeling that "I am." That confinement of "I" has disappeared; only amness exists. That amness is divine. Drop the "I" and just be that amness. And if you have been working too long on witnessing, then for a few months, at least for three months, drop it completely,…

Question: BELOVED MASTER, IS THERE A DIFFERENCE BETWEEN WATCHING AND WITNESSING? There is a difference. You watch television, you don't witness it. But, while watching television, if you start witnessing yourself watching television, then there are two processes going on: you are watching television, and something within you is witnessing the process of watching television. Witnessing is deeper, far deeper. It is not equivalent to watching. Watching is superficial. So remember that meditation is witnessing. Otherwise, there are the "One Thousand Friends of Oregon," who call themselves "watchdogs" -- they will all become enlightened! And I don't think you have heard the word "witnessdogs." Nothing like that exists. Watchdogs are possible, watching can be done even by dogs. Witnessing is a very deep and higher quality only man is capable of.