According to Osho, understanding is difficult because we try to grasp the master with a conditioned, knowledge-seeking mind instead of understanding ourselves. Words are shared but meanings differ; we hear through past patterns and types. Intellectual accumulation hinders wisdom. Real understanding arises from loving presence and self-observation; as self-understanding deepens, his words become clear, otherwise they remain distorted.
It’s hard to understand when we listen through our habits and collect ideas, instead of lovingly watching and learning about ourselves.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, why can't I understand you?
THERE is no need to understand ME at all. What is needed is to understand yourself. How is it going to help you if you understand me? And what will you understand in understanding me? You will understand what I say, you will collect it, you will become more knowledgeable, and that is not going to help. In fact it can even become a great hindrance. All knowledge becomes a hindrance to wisdom. I am here not to make you understand ME, I am here to help you to understand yourself. You have to watch your own actions, your relationships, your moods more closely: how you are when you are alone, how you are when you are with people, how you behave, how you react, whether your reactions are past-oriented, fixed patterns of thought or you are spontaneous, responsible. Watch all these things, go on watching your own mind, heart.…
Question: BELOVED MASTER, WHY DON'T I UNDERSTAND YOU? Ram Gopal, understanding is a second step. The first is hearing. You don't hear me. You miss the first step; then the second is not possible. While you are listening to me, a thousand and one thoughts are roaming in your mind. They keep you deaf. My words never reach you intact, in their purity. They are distorted, they are colored by your thoughts, by your prejudices, by your already arrived at conclusions. You listen to me through your knowledge -- that's why you really DON'T listen. And whatsoever reaches you is something totally different than what was conveyed. I'm saying one thing, you go on hearing something else; hence the misunderstanding. That's why you don't understand me; otherwise, I am using very simple words. I'm not using any intellectual jargon, I'm using the day-to-day language.
Question: BELOVED MASTER, IS IT REALLY DIFFICULT TO UNDERSTAND YOU? Dhammo, it is the same old story. It has always been difficult to understand people like me. Not that you are not intelligent enough to understand, but because you are too knowledgeable. You already think you know and that is the trouble. Come to me not knowing anything, don't come to me as Hindus, Buddhists, Christians; otherwise you will misunderstand. I am saying simple things, but if you have a preoccupied mind, you are going to miss them. "It was terrible, mother," complained the curvy teenager. "I had to change my seat four times at the movies." "Some man started bothering you?" asked her mother. "Yes," said the girl. "Finally." An American girl visiting England went to a posh party.
Osho, why don’t you speak in a language I can understand? I listen to you, I weep, but nothing makes sense to me!
Understanding and understanding—there are two kinds of understanding. One is of the intellect: of words, of thought, of logic. And one is of the heart. You feel joyous, you weep, tears of joy flow; that is the deeper understanding. What will you do with the intellect’s understanding? And you say, “Why don’t you speak in a language I can understand?” Could language be any simpler? I am speaking in everyday, colloquial speech. The difficulty is not of language. The difficulty lies in that great synthesis of mine which doesn’t fall into your grasp. The difficulty is not language. The language is perfectly plain and straightforward. What could be plainer! I don’t know Sanskrit; I don’t know Pali or Prakrit; even my Hindi is broken—just enough to get by. The difficulty isn’t language. The difficulty is with the vision of life I am offering, because you carry fixed notions. You have…
Osho, you say the same thing in countless ways. But when I listen to you, it feels as if I am hearing it for the first time. And I feel so much joy that I don’t feel like going back home. What should I do—what can I do—so that I can just keep listening to you!
You will feel as if you have been made to rise out of season, before time—as if you were not yet to go and yet had to go. And if you go in that way, your home will become even more desolate than before. I do not want to make your home desolate; I want to make your home a temple. I want that when you go home, your home’s new form is revealed. I do not want to tear you away from home, from the world, from family life. That is the newness of my sannyas: I do not want to sever you from the world; I want to join you to the world in such a way that your connection with the world becomes a connection with the Divine. Let the world no longer be a barrier between you and the Divine; let it become a means. If…