According to Osho, the blankness on the sannyas initiation paper is the core message: your name in a tiny corner is to be forgotten, while the vast empty space points to the sky-like truth of no-identity. Sannyas means becoming a blank page—dropping all labels and boundaries. Emptiness is the mystery and pointer; the written part is only a small ripple.
It reminds you to let go of your name and stories and be open and quiet like the sky.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, at the time of our sannyas initiation, on the paper where you inscribe our new name and your signature, a large portion remains blank. What should be written on what remains blank? Osho, what is the mystery behind that blankness?
That is the very formula for your sannyas. The name I write for you in the corner—forget it today or tomorrow; erase it. Let only a blank page remain! You become blank! Let it not be known to you who you are, what you are! Let there be no identification. Let all your boundaries fall; become a blank page! That’s why, quite deliberately, I write your name in one corner—down below. Above: the empty sky! Have you ever seen the paintings made by Chinese Zen sages? Their paintings are the real paintings. In them you’ll find a large, long canvas, and in the lower corner just a tiny bit of painting. The vast, limitless sky—and in one corner a little…! They are giving a precise indication. They are saying: all that man has known is just like that—something small in a corner! All that man has made is just like…
Osho, what did you write on the blank page of my life that my life itself has changed? The love and bliss I had been seeking for lifetimes have come to me as an unasked-for gift of the Master’s grace. I was not even worthy of it. Beloved, I want to share the treasure you have given me. Kindly give your guidance and blessing.
First, I did not write anything on the blank page of your life. Your page was not blank; I made it blank. Do not nurture this illusion; otherwise, instead of knowing you will get entangled in information. I have not written anything on your life’s page; if you have written something and ascribe it to me, I bear no responsibility. All my effort is to wipe off whatever you have written on your page. I want to take away all your accumulated information. I want to leave you in utter dispassion, empty of conclusions. Dispassion is nirvana. And that is what has happened. But your old habit of seeing and thinking keeps misinterpreting. That too is what has happened. You say, “What did you write on the blank page of my life that my life itself has changed?” I have written nothing—because writing has never changed anyone’s life. Writing only…
Psychological memory has to be dropped. Factual memory is okay, it is not a problem, it does not create any dust. If one can drop the psychological memory and can be new every moment, every day, then life becomes a joy. It becomes an incredible experience. Each moment brings new surprises. Each moment flowers go on showering on you from the beyond. Sannyas is a sunrise; hence the orange colour. It is the colour of the sky in the East just before the sun rises. It is the colour of the dawn, the night is over and the new day beings. A new chapter opens. Sannyasin is not a continuity with your past, it is discontinuous. Put a full stop on your past and start from ABC, fresh. Be a child again. Unlearn all the tricks that you have learned before.
But for that moment to come, continue to be alone a little longer. And this is the criterion: if this mind of "I would like to be loved by others" continues then you still have to remain alone. One day this desire will disappear and another desire will take its place; that will be a transformation in you. From that moment onwards there is no need to be in seclusion; then start moving. You are no more dangerous; to others and to yourself you are no more dangerous. Your being alone has helped you. It has settled you -- it has made you calmer, quieter. Just a little more... a little patience. Veet means beyond, martyo means death. The really real within you is beyond death. The one that dies and is born is not your reality.
That's what sannyas is: becoming a child again again reclaiming the innocence of childhood which the society has destroyed. It will be difficult, because to live with people who live in lies, without lies living with them is difficult. People who are all pseudo and phony, to live with them as true is to invite danger -- but it is worth. This life is bound to go, so even if one has to sacrifice one's life for truth one should not be worried about it. Truth is far more valuable than life itself because life ends in death but truth never ends. Truth is eternal, timeless, deathless. Manoj Bharti. One thing to be remembered: that from this moment meditation becomes your goal; everything else is secondary. So arrange your life in such a way that everything revolves around meditation.