What is the difference between sudden realization of Buddhahood and the gradual process of becoming more contented?

Whenever you talk about realizing one's buddhahood, you say it is sudden, like lightning, not a process, but what I can see happening in me is a very slow process of becoming more contented, less in the grip of the ego. Can you clarify the difference between that process and the 'sudden flash' that happened to you? Is there any danger in becoming too contented with the slow process?

No, Deepta, there is no danger. The enlightenment is always like lightning. It is in a flash, it is a sudden explosion. It cannot come gradually because it cannot be divided; you cannot have it in bits. Then what is happening to Deepta? She feels she is becoming slowly contented. This is not enlightenment, this is the ground in which enlightenment happens. The ground can be prepared gradually, in fact has to be prepared gradually. You cannot prepare the ground like lightning, in a flash. Sometimes it takes lives to prepare the ground. The preparation for buddhahood is gradual, but the actual happening of buddhahood is a sudden explosion in you. So don't be afraid, this is good. You are moving on the right track. Become more and more contented. The day you are utterly contented, the flash. Enough for today.

Beloved master, you say that enlightenment can happen any moment. To me it feels like a very slow process of learning and becoming aware of the unconscious parts of my being. Do you have something to say about this?

Enlightenment is not something like an achievement; one cannot achieve it. One has to disappear for it to happen. It is a happening and it happens only in the absence of the ego. And whenever you are doing something the ego becomes more and more strengthened. The ego is a doer, and enlightenment happens in a state of nondoing. It is simply the realization of who you are; it is not a question of achievement. You are already it! Just an awakening, just a turning in! Seeing the point, Buddha relaxed; he dropped all his methods. That is the only use of methods: you get tired of them, you feel utterly bored with them. One day out of sheer boredom you drop all the methods. That evening he dropped his whole spiritual search. He had dropped all worldly search six years before, but it is the same search whether you…

"you said that either one sees the world or the brahman and that no gradually increasing perception of the brahman is possible. But in experience we feel that as we become aware and more silent and still, the feeling of the divine presence becomes gradually clearer and clearer. What is this gradual growth and clarity if the authentic experience is never gradual, but sudden?"

The second thing to remember: even hot water is still water. So even if you become more clear in your mind, more pure in your perceptions, more moral, more centered, you are still man, not a buddha, not enlightened. You become more silent, more still, calmer. You feel a deep bliss, but still you are a man, and your feelings are really negative, not positive. You feel calm because you are now less tense. You feel blissful because now you are clinging less to your miseries; you are not creating them. You feel collected. It is not that you have come to realize the one, but only because now you are less divided. Remember this: your growth is negative. You are just hot water. The possibility is there that at any moment you will come to the point where evaporation happens. When it happens, you will not feel calmness, you…

Osho, what is the relationship between meditation and patience?

If you sit to meditate to remove mental restlessness, you will keep looking back again and again: “Has it gone yet?” And the irony is that when you begin to meditate, restlessness will increase. Because what has been repressed will start surfacing; catharsis will begin. The rubbish you have kept hidden within and never allowed to express—meditation will break open those doors too. It will clean the house. Dust piled up for years, for births, will rise again; there will be gusts and storms. For a while even the little peace you had will be lost. Then you will panic: “I came for peace, and even what I had is gone.” Without patience, you could even become unhinged, because meditation brings such a great storm. The disease is not from a day or two; it’s from lifetimes. Meditation will break through all the layers to reach your innermost core. In…

Do wisdom and understanding increase gradually or do they come as explosions?

UNDERSTANDING NEVER COMES, neither as a sudden phenomenon nor as a gradual one, because it is always there. You have it right now. It is not going to happen somewhere in the future. You are carrying it within you, just as a seed carries the tree, a woman carries a child. You are carrying it right now. Now it depends on you: if your intensity is total you will achieve it suddenly, if your intensity is not total you will achieve it by and by, in steps. But understanding never comes to you -- you are understanding. Enlightenment is not something that happens to you -- you are enlightenment. Remember this; then it is a choice, your choice. If you desire it totally, in that fire of total desire all that covers that understanding burns; suddenly the light is there. But it is up to you. It is not part…