According to Osho, gluttony is only a symptom of inner unhappiness—don’t fight food, heal the sorrow. Repression and forced dieting backfire; go to the root with meditation. When the lamp of awareness and joy is lit within, cravings, heaviness, and other compulsions wither by themselves. Cultivate meditation daily; as bliss flowers, eating naturally finds balance without struggle or guilt.
Instead of battling your appetite, learn to sit quietly and grow happiness inside; then the urge to overeat fades on its own.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Question: Last question: Osho! I am a complete glutton. What should I do? Ganeshi Lal! No one is complete in this world—so drop that illusion. And a complete glutton is a very difficult thing, almost impossible. The Choubeys of Mathura—the temple priests there—are famous for being great gluttons. Once they had a community feast, and a crowd of boys gathered to watch. The feast was held in a walled courtyard. When it ended, one Choubey came out, stroking his protruding belly. The boys clapped and said, “Here comes the eater Choubey!” The Choubey said very softly, “You haven’t seen anything yet—the eater is coming behind.” The boys waited eagerly. Then another Choubey came out, his hands resting on the shoulders of two servants. The boys clapped, “Here comes the eater Choubey!” He said with great disdain, “The eater is coming behind.
Some Coca Cola company is interested in selling Coca Cola to you. It has nothing to do with your body; it allures you. Wherever you go, there is Coca Cola; Coca Cola seems to be one of the most universal things. Even in Soviet Russia -- nothing else american is allowed, but Coca Cola is there. From everywhere the bottle is calling you, beckoning, 'Come here.' And suddenly you start feeling thirsty. That thirst is false. I'm not saying don't drink Coca Cola -- but let it hum; make it a point. It will take a few days, even a few weeks for you to come to feel what appeals to you. Eat as much as you want of what appeals to you. Don't bother about what others say. If ice-cream appeals to you, eat ice-cream.
Beloved master, I am obsessed with food. I eat too much and have gained enormous weight. Can you help me to reduce my weight?
Sangito, you will have to learn love. There is no other way to reduce your weight. All other programs can help you a little bit, but sooner or later you will gain weight again because the basic root cause remains the same. You can diet, you can run, swim, exercise, but how long can you diet? Sooner or later you will be fed up with dieting and your mind will become more and more obsessed with eating. Now you will eat in your fantasy, in your dreams, and your mind will convince you that this is not the right way to live. You can't eat this, you can't eat that, and somehow if you ask the doctors, all the good things have to be avoided. A child was talking to his mother, "You say God is very wise. I don't believe it." The mother said, "But why don't you believe…
When there is nobody, not even a thought of anybody and you are really alone, you start sinking, you drown into yourself. Don't be afraid. In the beginning that drowning will look like death and a gloom will surround you, a sadness will surround you, because you have always known happiness with people, in relationships. Just wait a little. Let the sinking go deeper, and you will see a silence arising and a stillness which has a dance to it... an unmoving movement inside. Nothing moves, and still everything is tremendously speedy... empty, yet full. Paradoxes meet and contradictions dissolve. So for one month you delight in it, and just wait for something to happen. Sit silent, relaxed, yet tense because you are waiting, something is going to descend on you. And I am going to do something.
Osho! You say unhappy people eat more, so they become fat. Then why are the mahatmas fat?
Now here is a contradiction. The very man who cripples the woman so she must depend on him—when she does depend, he torments her. She will torment him too, because nothing else remains; whatever there is, is him. So she sits waiting, watching the door: “You are an hour late—why?” Where were you? You have no idea what that hour is. For you it’s just an hour—perhaps not even that. You were chatting with friends, playing cards. But for your wife, there is nothing else in life. You alone are her filling. If you aren’t there, she is empty. For her, an hour passes as if years have gone by. You can’t imagine her pain. So you say, “What got spoiled in an hour?” For you it’s an hour, but you don’t understand relativity. For her, it isn’t an hour. Your situations are entirely different. So then she will harass…