Osho’s zing of Zen

I understand life’s contradictions, dilemmas and pulls and pressure can be given a deep burial if one follows the Zen way of life. That is what Osho says and adds that it is in your nature and it is a great experience. Well, a bit confusing. But if you ‘keep aside’ your mind for a while and try to experience your own true nature, then you are likely to get a taste of Osho understanding.

I understand life’s contradictions, dilemmas and pulls and pressure can be given a deep burial if one follows the Zen way of life. That is what Osho says and adds that it is in your nature and it is a great experience. Well, a bit confusing. But if you ‘keep aside’ your mind for a while and try to experience your own true nature, then you are likely to get a taste of Osho understanding.

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Let me put it this way: The Zen way of life, as Osho says in his ‘Walking in Zen, Sitting in Zen’ is not a philosophy. It has nothing to do with either Buddha's philosophy or Taoist philosophy; and hence Zen is neither Buddhist nor Taoist. It is the convergence of the Buddha's experience and Lao Tzu's experience.

By its very meaning and definition, meditation is mindlessness and making way for pure awareness to take over. That is the stage one gets into the realm of understanding by spiritual experience and not by any intellectual effort.

The word Zen is derived from the Pali word ‘dhyan’, pronounced ‘jhan’. It means concentration, which is the basis of meditation. Thus, Zen is a meditative system that enables one to go transcendental and see what one can’t see normally. It enables one to see and understand the reality of one’s nature, and one moves from multiple existence to the centre of One — the absolute truth.

Simply put, one does not understand Zen by philosophical efforts. But it is not that easy to ‘banish away’ one’s mind to get into deep meditation. The mind plays a devilish role in meditation; and devils, as you know, are difficult to tackle. Thus, one can say Zen and mind are each other’s deadly enemies.