According to Osho, power and force never become one. Power radiates from within as love—healing, non-violent, dignifying, and freedom-giving. Force is external, coercive, and violent—an interference with others. We mistake them because living power can degenerate into force when love becomes law: a heart’s radiance reduced to social contracts, roles, and control. Then we keep the same words while the energy has changed.
They never join; we just confuse them when heartful love dries into control and rules, like romance turning into a contract.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Beloved master, when and how do power and force become one? Master and disciple do not come from this space at all. Please comment.
Power and force never become one. Power is something that radiates from you. The source is within. Force is violent. Force is interference, a trespass on the freedom of others. But, ordinarily, people don't make the distinction between the two words. They use them almost synonymously. Love is power, but not force. A president has force, but not power. Power never hurts anybody; it is always healing energy. It showers on you like flowers showering on you. It is a fragrance that reaches to you very silently, not even making any noise. It is for you to receive it or not to receive it. It does not force you to receive it. Power keeps your dignity intact -- in fact, it enhances it. It makes you more individual, it allows you more freedom. It makes no conditions on you. Force is totally the opposite of power. Force is violence against…
Osho, you speak of trust, love, and joy, but why don’t you explain power? These days an unbearable power is arising in me. What is it, and in this situation what stance should I take?
A friend of mine, an eminent Hindi litterateur, long-time president of the Hindi Sahitya Sammelan and the oldest member of the Indian Parliament—an MP for fifty years—was close to Jugal Kishore Birla. He was interested in my work and said, “If Birla becomes interested, great help is possible.” He arranged a meeting. Birla spoke with me, became interested, and said, “I will give you as much as you need, whenever you need it. Only one thing I must know for sure: what use will it be put to?” I said, “Then let’s end the matter here. This won’t do; such a deal is not possible. If you must ask what I will do with what you give, keep it. That isn’t giving. If you can give unconditionally so that, in front of you, I could squander it on the street and you would not be able to ask, ‘What are…
Mahavira, Buddha, and Christ laid the first foundations of the power of friendship. When they said nonviolence is power, or when Christ said love is power, or Buddha said compassion is power—we hear the words, but we do not know them. So I ask you: reflect in your own life—when do you feel powerful? When you are in enmity with someone? Or when you are serene and filled with love toward someone? You will find you feel powerful in hostility; when you are calm and non-hostile you feel weak. This means you are influenced by an impure feeling. The deeper the hold of such impurity, the less you will be able to enter within. Why can’t you go within? Understand this point well. Enmity is always outward-centered. There must be someone outside toward whom enmity is directed; without an external other, you cannot be hostile. But love is not outward-centered.
Beloved Osho, when you talked about the superman, you said that the camel has to become a lion. I feel very attracted to that lion, but I am still afraid to get in contact with it. I have the feeling the lion in me has something to do with my power. How can I use my power without losing my love? How can I use my power and still stay with an open heart? To me, love and power seem to be contradictory. Is this so? Can you say something about this, please?
"I had the strangest dream last night," a man was telling his psychiatrist. "I saw my mother, but when she turned around to look at me, I noticed she had your face. As you can imagine, I found this very disturbing; and in fact I woke up immediately and could not get back to sleep. I just lay there in bed waiting for the morning to come and then I got up, drank a coke and came right over here for my appointment. I thought you could help me explain the meaning of this strange dream." The psychiatrist was silent for a few moments before responding, "A coke? You call that breakfast?" The poor fellow has come to understand the dream, why his mother's face has turned into his psychiatrist's face; but that is not the problem to the psychiatrist. To him the problem is: "A coke? You call that…
So a very very strange phenomenon happens: the richer a man becomes, the poorer he starts feeling. In contrast to all his riches all around he starts feeling very very poor. The more powerful a man becomes, the more powerless he starts feeling within himself. Now he has the contrast: he can see how powerless he is. So all so-called superior people suffer from inferiority. Their dreams are full of inferiority, shadowed by inferiority. There is only one thing that makes a man really powerful, mm? -- that is love. And another strange thing: when love makes you powerful you become humble. A powerful man is always humble. A powerful man is naturally, inevitably unpretending; he is not presumptuous. He does not claim... he need not claim. He never tries to prove; he is so there is no point in proving.