Birthdays

Osho, I was born on february 29th, hence my birthday comes only once in four years. Is there some significance in it?

Gandharva, JANUARY OR FEBRUARY OR MARCH February 28th or 29th - these are all arbitrary. These are our imposed ideas. Existence knows nothing of February, March. Even if you were born on April 1st there is no significance in it! You will not be a bigger fool than you are, you will be the same. What significance can February 29th have? But people want some significance. I have heard about only one accident that has happened on February 29th: that is the birth of Morarji Desai. Zoo keeper to tourists: "In this cage we see the leopard. This animal has one black spot for every day of the year." Old lady: "What about a leap year?" Zoo keeper, thinking fast: "Ah yes - behold, madam, I lift his tail thus - behold the 29th of February!" And the last question

Beloved Osho, as far as you are concerned, is your birthday just like any other day in the year? Or is it in some way special for you?

Time exists no more for me. That's why I have to go on looking at my watch, because I don't have any sense of time. If I don't look at my watch, I may speak for the whole night! To me, every day is the same, every moment is the same. But when I say every moment is the same, it means it has the same blissfulness, the same ecstasy, the same joy, the same silence, the same peace that passeth understanding. I don't see any difference between two points, between two days. As far as I am concerned, all differences have disappeared. I live in absolute silence. Even while I am speaking to you, believe it or not, I am silent. Only the mechanism of the mind is being used, but my consciousness is centered in absolute beauty and silence.

I met a man ten years ago in japan on a train. Then I met the same man in afghanistan on a bus. And two days ago I met the same man again on a plane coming to poona. Is it just coincidence, or is there some hidden significance in it?

Because our life is so meaningless, we go on finding any excuse for any kind of significance. Our life has no significance, so we go on hoping in anything that there must be some significance in it. Man cannot live without significance. Significance is inner nourishment. And because we don't create any significance in our life -- because we are not creative -- we don't create God in our being, we remain empty. And to be empty hurts -- hurts like hell. Then one goes to the astrologer or goes to the palmist; one shows the hand, maybe there is some significance in the stars, or in the lines of the hand or in the birth chart. And one starts seeking and searching everywhere -- desperately. Anything that can give you a feeling that yes, you are significant, that something special is happening to you, you pounce upon. That's why…

Osho, you have titled this series of talks “Sahaj Yoga.” Do “sahaj” and “yoga” not seem mutually opposed?

Anand Maitreya! They don’t just seem opposed, they are opposed. But no ultimate truth of life can manifest without contradiction. Life is made of opposites—darkness and light, day and night, woman and man, negative electricity and positive electricity, birth and death. The very structure of life is woven of opposites. Hence the opposites are not only opposed; they are complementary to each other. If you have labored hard all day, you will be able to sleep deeply. Labor and rest are opposites, yet only the one who has worked can rest deeply—and the one who has not worked cannot. So the opposites are not only opposed, they complete each other. And only the one who has rested deeply at night can rise in the morning and engage in work again. One who has not rested through the night will not be able to work in the morning. Look closely at…