According to Osho, we repress ourselves not out of choice but survival-learning from childhood. Helpless children are conditioned by reward and punishment; approval brings love and food, disapproval brings pain and withdrawal. This Skinnerian training imprints a 'conscience' that polices us from within, turning external control into internalized guilt and defenses, so we voluntarily continue self-repression long after danger is gone.
As kids we obey to get love and avoid hurt, and that training sticks, so we keep shutting ourselves down even when we’re grown.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Why do we voluntarily repress ourselves and adopt crippling defense mechanisms?
Yes, it is simply survival, the need to survive. The child wants to live, that's why. He starts compromising. He bargains. Anybody will bargain when there is a question of life and death. If you are dying in a desert and somebody has water and you are thirsty and you are dying, he can ask any price. He can say 'Crawl and kiss my feet' and you will crawl and kiss his feet. He can manage anything, he can force anything upon you. That's what we have done up to now with children. I'm not saying that you should go and kill your father and mother. They were victims just as you are victims. They were victims of their society, of their parents. And those parents were again victims in their own turn -- it is a long, vicious chain. So I am not saying make your parents feel guilty.…
What is repression?
But repression makes you false. It is not by repression that anger, sex, greed are destroyed, no. They are there -- just the labels are changed. They go into the unconscious, they start working from there: they go underground. And, of course, when they are underground, they are more powerful. The whole psychoanalytic movement tries to bring what is underground to the surface. Once is becomes conscious, you can be freed of it. A Frenchman was staying in England, and a friend asked him how he was getting on. He said he was doing very well, except for one thing. 'When I go to a party, the hostess, she does not tell me where is the 'pissoir"...' 'Ah, Georges, you mean she does not tell you where the toilet is? That's just our English prudery. Actually, she will say "Do you want to wash your hands?" and that means the…
Question: OSHO, WHY HAVE ALL THE RELIGIONS USED REPRESSION AS A BASIC STRATEGY? The mind says the woman is beautiful -- and if you feel a desire for beauty I don't see that there is anything wrong in it. If you feel a desire for ugliness, then something is wrong, then you are sick. Beauty has to be appreciated. When you see a beautiful painting, you would like to possess it. When you see anything beautiful, just by the side of it the idea comes as a shadow, "If this beautiful thing could be mine...." Now, these are all natural thoughts. But the priest will say, "The rains have not come because of your impure thoughts" -- and you are absolutely indefensible. You know it, you are ashamed of yourself. God is always right.
Osho, why is it that only humans repress, manipulate, kill, try to conquer the natural flow in nature, the tao? Why are we so stupid?
Hindus and Mohammedans, whenever they are in a murderous mood, become united amongst themselves; otherwise they go dull, dead -- they start vegetating again. It is very strange. Why people are so much interested in destruction? If you are going on the street and you see two people fighting -- you may be going for a very urgent work -- you will forget all about the urgent work; you will stop there. First you will see the fight; you cannot leave that place. The urgent work can wait; in fact there is no more any urgency than to watch the fight. Why? Why a crowd gathers when two persons are fighting? You become identified with the fight. And this happens in many ways. Just a football match or a hockey match and you see thousands of people shouting, going almost mad, jumping, ready to kill each other. Why so much…
Osho, could you say something about what is going on in Delhi?
I’ll tell a little story. When Lanka’s former ruler Ravana was on his deathbed, Rama sent Lakshman to learn statecraft from him—saying, “Son, we may have won, but we have no experience of running the administration here; go and ask him how to run things.” Lakshman went there and said to Ravana, “You are dying now—tell us how to govern here.” Ravana said, “Half the politics I handled, half Kumbhakarna did. Had you gotten in touch with Kumbhakarna as well?” Lakshman said, “Yes—he said: eat to your heart’s content and then sprawl on the sofa with your eyes closed. This is the best method.” “Tell me,” Ravana asked, “are you going to unleash dictatorship, or will you run things by democracy? Which method will be suitable?” “What will go down well with the people?” “Nothing,” said Ravana. “When you impose dictatorship, the people will yearn for democracy; and when you…