According to Osho, yes—any influence borrowed from an external medium will inevitably wane once you disconnect; that is the nature of influence. Only what has awakened within you endures. A medium may trigger an inner flowering, but once it becomes your own, it remains. Your inner wealth doesn’t diminish, and evolution of consciousness cannot go backwards.
If you stop relying on something outside, its pull fades; what you truly grow inside stays and you can’t un-grow it.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, if one no longer remains connected with the medium, will its influence gradually wane and finally disappear?
It will certainly lessen. All influences are destined to wane. In fact, the very meaning of influence is that whatever has come from the outside will fade. What has arisen from within will not fade; it is your own. Influences are bound to diminish—they do diminish; but what comes from within you does not. Even when something comes in the wake of influence, once it has arisen within you, it does not lessen; it remains. Your fundamental wealth does not diminish; influence does. In the evolutionary process, going back is impossible.
Questioner: in case a contact with the medium is not maintained, does the effect of shaktipat wear off?
The effect is bound to decline. In fact, every effect wears off gradually. Effect itself means that it has been caused by an outside agency, and so it will decline. But the energy rising from within you is going to stay, because it is your own. Energy coming from without is bound to diminish and disappear. But what comes from your inside is not going to diminish; it will stay. Also that energy will stay which rises under the impact of shaktipat. Your basic capital does not wear off, but the effect does.
This question had arisen because of the fact that the effect of shaktipat wears off by and by.
Yes, it will get less and less. In fact, what is attained from another is bound to diminish. Besides it is only a glimpse and you are not to depend on it. You have to awaken it within yourself: then only will it be permanent. All influences are foreign; they belong to the outside. I pick up a stone and I throw it in the air: it will fall according to the force exerted by me. The stone has no strength of its own, but it may well think, as it flies through the air, that it has strength to cut through the air and that there is no one to stop it. But then it does not know what influence has caused this; it does not know the force of the hand behind it. It will fall -- if not after ten feet then after twenty, but it will…
In one of your talks you said that the effect of shaktipat diminishes gradually; thus the seeker must maintain a regular contact with the medium. Does this not mean dependency upon some person in the form of a guru?
All relationships are binding, whether they be of husband and wife, father and son, or guru and disciple. Where there is relationship, there is slavery. So the spiritual seeker has not to form relationships. If he keeps the relationship of husband and wife there is no harm; it is not a hindrance because this relationship is irrelevant. But the irony lies in the fact that he renounces and drops out of husband-wife, father-son relationships to form a new guru-disciple relationship. This is very dangerous. The idea of a spiritual relationship has no meaning. All relationships belong to the mundane world. Relationship as such is worldly. If we say that relationship is the world, it would not be wrong. You are alone, unassociated. This is not an egotistical statement because others too are alone and unassociated. Someone is two steps ahead of you; if you have heard the footsteps, then you…
Osho, this question arises because the effect of Shaktipat can gradually diminish, can’t it!
Yes, yes—it will indeed lessen. In fact, anything you receive from another will keep diminishing; it is only a glimpse. You are not to depend on it. One day you have to awaken it within yourself; only then will it not fade. Truly, all influences will grow faint, because influences are foreign, alien, external. I threw a stone. The stone has no power of its own. I threw it; the force was in my hand. To the extent my hand exerted force, the stone will travel and then fall. But while the stone is slicing through the air, the stone may think, “Now I’m cutting the air; nothing can bring me down.” It doesn’t know it has gone under an influence, from someone’s shove, another’s hand behind it. It will fall fifty feet away—fall it will! Any influence that comes from another will always have a limit. It will fall.…