You laugh instead of cry because that’s how your feelings flow; let it be, and if you go fully into real laughter, tears may come by themselves.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
I am enjoying the play very much these days. A very masterful performance this morning. Every morning I wait eagerly wondering what the curtain's rise will bring. I overflow with you but it brings laughter, not tears. Where are the tears?
Sucheta, they are in your laughter. Laughter and tears are not different. There are two types of people, the tear people and the laughter people. There are always two kinds everywhere, the whole existence is divided into duality -- man and woman, yin and yang, positive/negative, day/night, life/death. So there is this division, the laughter people and the tear people. The tear people are introverts, they are easily ingoing. And when you go in, the deeper you go in the more and more your eyes will be filled with tears. Sucheta is an extrovert, she is a laughing Buddha. Geet Govind is a tearful Buddha. She is an extrovert, outgoing, a real American. So when something overwhelms her she will laugh. And remember always, never imitate anybody. If Geet Govind tries to imitate Sucheta he will be in difficulty. His laughter will be very poor and it will look phony.…
Beloved Osho, why do I always weep when I can't laugh? Isn't weeping opposed to dancing, singing and celebrating?
The phenomenon of weeping is mysterious. It does not mean that you are sad, not necessarily. It is not necessarily against celebrating, against cheerfulness, against laughing; no. The tears have a very strange function: whenever something in your heart is so much that it cannot be expressed by normal means, tears are an emergency method. So they may mean anything. You may be very happy, so happy that laughing will look stupid but tears will look perfectly right. Your tears will show that your happiness is not an ordinary happiness -- it is so deep that only tears can express it; it is so extraordinarily deep that an emergency method is used. Two friends meeting after many days, many years, may not feel like talking; talking may look too profane. They may like just to hug each other and weep on each other's shoulders. They are saying many many things...…
Beloved Osho, as an enlightened being you are able to witness every emotion. Yet to the eye of the observer you appear to be more total when you laugh than we ever are. You are seemingly so overtaken by laughter that your words are literally swamped by it. Is it that you are simply the ultimate actor?
It is not a question of being the ultimate actor; I am always total in everything. Whatever I am doing is total, but for you many things may not seem to be total because you don't have any experience of them. But laughter is in some way unique; when you laugh, you are also total in it. A laughter which is not total will be phony, a pretension, just a performance. So when you laugh, you also laugh totally. That is the only act you do totally -- so you know that laughter is total. If you see me laughing, it is a natural conclusion that it is a total act, because it corresponds with your experience. You cannot laugh partially. Try, and you will fail. You can laugh only totally. That is a unique quality about laughter. That's why I had made a meditation of it -- because of…
Osho! While listening to you I start to weep. Now, even in the celebration of active meditation, tears burst forth. What is this? In the midst of meditation a feeling arises that this body is a hindrance now; how can it be shed—the feeling keeps growing more intense. Why? Please explain out of compassion.
Akshay Vivek! Human beings have been given such wrong conditioning that they have neither ever cried to their heart’s content nor laughed to their heart’s content. They have never really lived to their heart’s content. In no aspect, in no dimension, have they ever done anything totally; everything remains half-done! So many things hang inside, suspended like Trishanku. I say meditation is a celebration, but what is happening to you happens to others as well. While celebrating, suddenly tears arise from some unknown corner! They must have been suppressed somewhere—perhaps for lifetimes. Especially in men. Because from childhood we tell boys: Don’t cry! Girls cry. You are a man; crying is not for you. This is false. It is utterly false. Nature has made the tear glands in the eyes of men and women just the same. Men’s tear glands are not smaller than women’s. So one thing is certain—nature…
Beloved Osho, somehow I can't believe my laughter, if it's true, but I always believe in my tears. Please comment.
And do you know why women close their eyes when you make love? -- just to avoid seeing you. You are doing such a nasty thing to them, they don't want to see; they don't want the light on. The man is finished within seconds, because only he is making movements. Neither the man attains orgasm nor the woman attains orgasm. Orgasm needs a little more articulateness, a little more skill. Orgasm needs first a long foreplay -- unless sex is accepted as natural, it is not possible -- a foreplay with incense burning, a music record going on, Irene Pappas singing! And before you start making love -- love should not be an immediate thing -- you should dance, you should sing, you should prepare your bodies to rejoice, you should prepare your bodies for the thrill. And waiting is a thrill. You should make love only when it…