Transpersonal Psychology

'there is a new "fourth force" in psychology -- transpersonal psychology -- which seeks to explore the needs and aspirations that go beyond self-actualisation and humanistic psychology.' so says assagioli. Are 'transpersonal psychology' and your 'psycho-logy of the buddhas' synonymous?

Now what has Assagioli done? He has put that flower together again. That flower which had been pulled apart by Freud has been put together by Assagioli -- he calls it psycho-synthesis. But this flower is dead, it is not that unity which existed before Freud analysed it. Assagioli presupposes Freud -- without Freud there can be no Assagioli, remember this. If Freud had not existed there would have been no Assagioli. Freud does half the work and the other half is done by Assagioli. Freud dissects, Assagioli unites. But in the dissection the primal unity has disappeared. No, you can put it together but it will never be the same thing again. The flower cannot become alive again. Just by putting it together -- you can put it together very cleverly, you can glue it together with the best glue, invisible glue -- but still it will not be…

The other day you spoke about fritjof capra. Can you speak about the movement of transpersonal psychology, and in particular about the work and meditation of ken wilbur, who is said to be the founder of the spectrum psychology? Why don't such people come here? Are they imprisoned in being too established? Is your vision and its practical consequences the problem for them?

The first thing to be understood is that I am not dealing with psychology. Psychology remains attached to the mind; it is the science of the mind. And my whole work is how to take you out of the mind, so these people will take me as if I am their enemy. They are working out how the mind functions, whether it is personal or interpersonal, what are its conditionings and how those conditionings can be changed with new conditionings. Their whole work -- whether they call it interpersonal psychology or spectrum psychology -- remains confined to the mind. And my world, the world of Zen, is the world of no-mind. We simply don't want to bother about all the rubbish that mind is carrying from centuries. If you get involved in it, you can go on digging and digging, and you will find more bullshit coming out. It is…

Beloved Osho, what do you mean by "the psychology of the buddhas?" how is it different from the present psychology that prevails in the world?

It has to be understood; the people who came to Sigmund Freud, the founder of modern psychology, were all sick people -- obviously, otherwise why should they come to the psychoanalyst? They were seriously sick, their minds were falling apart. Sigmund Freud came in contact only with sick people -- that gave him the impression that man himself is sick. In a way he is logical because everybody he examined, everybody he analyzed, everybody he treated was sick. And these were high-class people, bourgeois -- professors, scientists, very rich people -- because a psychoanalyst's time is the costliest thing in the world today. All these people were basically living an insane life, but because everybody else is also living the same insane life you don't become aware of it. If Sigmund Freud denied that there is any possibility of a soul in man he cannot be blamed. He never came…

Beloved master, you speak on the psychology of the buddhas, the psychology of transcendence, as the essence of the work happening here in the buddhafield. What is the uniqueness of this third psychology? Is there a psychotherapy of transcendence?

Meditation, awareness, watchfulness, witnessing -- that is the uniqueness. No psychoanalyst is needed. You can do it on your own; in fact, you have to do it on your own. No guidelines are needed, it is such a simple process -- simple if you do it; if you don't do it, it looks very complicated. Even the word 'meditation' scares many people. They think it something very difficult, arduous. Yes, if you don't do it it is difficult and arduous. It is like swimming. It is very difficult if you don't know how to swim, but if you know, you know it is so simple a process. Nothing can be more simple than swimming. It is not an art at all; it is so spontaneous and so natural. Be more aware of your mind. And in being aware of your mind you will become aware of the fact that you…