What is the relationship between consciousness and nirvana?

Question: Third question: Osho, Gautam Buddha does not accept a soul, but he does accept consciousness, heedfulness. And perhaps consciousness is the ultimate—or does even that have a nirvana? It will be hard to understand. Consciousness too attains nirvana. Because consciousness is needed only so long as there is unconsciousness within you. As long as there is darkness in the house, there is a need for light. And as long as there is illness within, there is a need for medicine. When the illness has gone, what will you do with the medicine? And when darkness is no more, what will you do with the light? In the morning you put out the lamp, don’t you? Once the sun has risen, what will you do with a lamp? If, after the sun has risen, you still walk around carrying a torch, people will think you are mad.

Question: Osho, before discussing the process of entering a conscious death, I would like to ask: what is the difference between stupor and awakening? What do we call the state of unconsciousness? In other words, in wakefulness and in unconsciousness, what is the state of the jivatma’s consciousness? - One is concentration. When your attention concentrates at one point, you “sleep” to all other points. If a pin pricks, as awareness converges there, the rest of the body fades out. The sick live only in the ailing organ; the rest of the body disappears. In concentration, attention densifies at one point while darkness spreads over the rest. The man whose house is on fire is awake only to the fire; to the rest of the world he is asleep. - The second is awareness without concentration—nonfocused awareness.

Question: YOU OFTEN SPEAK OF BECOMING A BUDDHA. BUT SHANKARA OFTEN SAID THAT BUDDHA ONLY BROUGHT HIS DISCIPLES TO COSMIC CONSCIOUSNESS, WHILE THERE ARE STILL HIGHER STATES OF CONSCIOUSNESS, SUCH AS UNITY CONSCIOUSNESS AND BRAHMA CONSCIOUSNESS. PLEASE WILL YOU COMMENT ON THIS AND, IF YOU KNOW, TELL US ABOUT THE PATHS WHICH LEAD TO THESE STATES. Chuang Tzu says that he dreamed in the night that he had become a butterfly, and since then he has been very confused -- confused because now in the morning, he thinks it may be just that the butterfly had fallen asleep and was dreaming that she was Chuang Tzu. Now who is right: Chuang Tzu dreaming that he has become a butterfly, or Butterfly dreaming that she has become a Chuang Tzu? Now what is true?

Question: First question: Osho, in the Chandogya Upanishad there is a sutra: na pashyato mṛtyuṁ pashyati na rogaṁ noto duḥkhatām, sarvaṁ ha paśyaḥ paśyati sarvam āpnoti sarvaśa iti. That is, the knower does not see death, nor disease, nor sorrow; he sees all as the Self and attains everything. You are a witness—does a buddha truly see even death, disease, and sorrow as the very Self? Kindly give us direction on this sutra. Sahajanand! Sambodhi means the disappearance of ego—the end of the “I,” the dissolution of asmitā. Where the “I” is not, the question of death does not arise. Only the “I” dies. It is the ego that dies, because the ego is like a house of cards—one small gust and it collapses. It is false; today or tomorrow it must fall. It is imaginary, dreamlike; it will break. How long will you stretch it?

Question: The fifth question: Osho, Buddha has said that those steadfast ones who practice meditation continuously attain the unsurpassable ease and security called nirvana. Are there kinds of nirvana? There are no kinds of nirvana. When a fruit ripens it falls in a single instant; there are no “types” of falling. But there are many steps to ripening. An unripe fruit—green—has not yet fallen; a half‑ripe fruit is closer, but still on the branch. The actual falling happens in one moment. Once it is ripe, not even a moment is needed: it simply drops. There are no steps in the dropping; but before the drop there are many steps. The green fruit is still attached to the tree, the half‑ripe fruit is also attached—if we only look at their still being on the tree, there is no difference.