Head-knowledge doesn’t change you; only when your whole self truly sees, change happens by itself.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, Lao Tzu says that understanding is enough; with understanding, revolution happens. It seems to us that something does seem to be fully understood, yet no revolution happens from it. What is the reason? Please explain!
Understanding means a thing reaches your innermost layer. But reason will never let it reach. And we insist on understanding through reason. Reason is the mischief-maker—the guard. It says, “Explain to me first. If you convince me, I’ll take you to the master. If you can’t convince me, how can I take you in?” And the trouble is: when it is convinced, it thinks it is the master and that it has understood. Then it finds nothing changes—because the intellect has no power to act. The force to act lies hidden behind it on another plane. Hence the obstruction. If you want to reach that plane and it doesn’t happen directly—if it does for someone, fine—then first you must find ways to break the guard of the intellect. You must do certain meditations that make you non-intellectual, irrational. For example, the meditation I use is utterly beyond the intellect. A…
Why is it that no revolution takes place even after understanding? If we practise non-action, what will happen to labour? How is perfection in emptiness attained? If the vessel is empty, it will also disintegrate? What is the way to empty the mind? Question: lao tzu says that understanding is enough and that transformation takes place together with understanding. We feel that we have understood well but feel no transformation within us. What is the reason? Kindly explain.
Bhagwan Sri: Lao Tzu says that once a matter becomes perfectly clear, there is nothing more to be done, for then the understanding leads all our actions and makes us do what is worth doing. What is not worth doing, falls of its own, just as dry leaves fall from a tree. Nothing is required to be done in order not to do what should not be done. What should be done, happens on its own, and what should not be done, stops happening also. What is this understanding? Since you say that you feel you understand and yet the transformation that Lao Tzu talks of, does not take place! This then can mean only two things: either what Lao Tzu says is wrong or what we call understanding, is not understanding. What Lao Tzu says is not wrong because not he alone but all those who have ever known…
Osho, you say the same thing in countless ways. But when I listen to you, it feels as if I am hearing it for the first time. And I feel so much joy that I don’t feel like going back home. What should I do—what can I do—so that I can just keep listening to you!
You will feel as if you have been made to rise out of season, before time—as if you were not yet to go and yet had to go. And if you go in that way, your home will become even more desolate than before. I do not want to make your home desolate; I want to make your home a temple. I want that when you go home, your home’s new form is revealed. I do not want to tear you away from home, from the world, from family life. That is the newness of my sannyas: I do not want to sever you from the world; I want to join you to the world in such a way that your connection with the world becomes a connection with the Divine. Let the world no longer be a barrier between you and the Divine; let it become a means. If…
Osho, Lao Tzu says, nothing needs to be done; understanding is enough. Explain when and how understanding becomes being?
Your inner attachments to anger are intact. You have not yet seen anger’s poison. For if poison is seen, you won’t say, “Granted, it is poison, but to reform the child a little dose may be given.” Who gives poison to reform anyone? Has anyone ever been improved by poison? Has any child ever been improved by anger? You know the truth: he can be spoiled, yes; he is never improved by anger. Has any order ever been truly established by anger? It may be disturbed—that is likely; how will it be created? And even if some order is produced by anger, it will be deception, false. If your wife becomes quiet out of fear of your anger, that quiet is not peace; inside her fire will go on burning. From such quietness no love can be born. She may become your slave, but not your beloved. And a slave…