Osho - his life and teachings

Osho - his life and teachings

Osho is a very interesting historical figure. He had a rather turmoiled life so I will only give here a very brief overview. Wikipedia has an entire very detailed page dedicated to his life.
Osho, with the real name Bhagwan Shree Rajneesh, was an Indian mystic born in India in 1931, who died in India in 1990.
During his life, he traveled all over India, teaching his philosophical views, which were among others, criticising socialism, religion and Mahatma Ghandi.
In 1981 he moved to the US to Oregon where he started his foundation, also called Oregon community. After various troubles that the members of his community caused, among others a bioterror attack against citizens of The Dalles, he was finally deported from the US. He then returned to India, where he died in 1990.

During his lifetime he made his mark on humanity by teaching the importance of meditation in our life. He taught about awareness, happiness, love, humor and all those qualities in us that we should nourish.
He was of the notion that socialism and organized religion was trying to suppress these qualities, so he was trying to awaken them in those that he could reach through his many discourses and speeches.
Started from one Osho meditation center, these days there are several all over the world that teach his meditation and philosophies by helping people go deep wtihin themselves and experience the inner journey of just being. The main center in the US has now changed its name to Osho International Meditation Resort.
The New Age movement has drawn a lot from his spiritual teachings and they are using the Osho meditations and his tarot cards on a regular basis.

Osho on Meditation - the right way to meditate

Osho has said a lot about meditation and how to do it the right way. Osho meditation speaks about learning to understand the mind instead of actively fighting it or repressing the thoughts within it.
Our thoughts and feelings are with us all the times. We cannot fathom a time where we are not surrounded by all this chit-chatter in the mind.
What Osho meditation techniques help us achieve is experience a sense of simply being. As Osho said (paraphrasing), this is a state that we start out naturally with, one that we eventually forget when we become caught up in the daily stress and worries.
His teachings say that meditation should have as goal clearing the mind completely of thoughts, of any thoughts, regardless whether they are good or bad. In his opinion, even good thoughts are junk, and they should not be there in the first place.
The Osho meditation methods help us disconnect easier from our mind and body (thoughts and feelings) so that we simply are.

The Art of Listening

When you start to practice Osho meditation, you will learn about the art of listening. Osho says that
"If one can learn how to listen rightly, one has learned the deepest secret of meditation."(www.osho.com)
When you listen to Osho, you stop thinking, you are simply there, listening. And this is what he is trying to teach in one of his meditations. He also emphasizes that one can learn the art of listening without having to listen to his voice.
This is just a prop that can be left behind. One can just as well listen to the sound of the sea, the thunder, the falling rain, anything that allows you to put your ego by side for a few moments and just be.
The ego is born out of a sense of self-defence. We all use it to defend ourself, our goals, ideas, beliefs or anything else that matters to us. By listening to the sound of the nature around us, Osho says that we can let go of our ego for just a litle bit.
Afterall these elements of nature are not out to hurt or attack us. They just are. Just like you, listening to them. The more time you spend listening to such sounds without your ego around, the easier it will become, and the more often you will have access to these very peaceful moments.
"Soon it will become your very life." (Osho, The Invitation, Talk #14)

Osho Zen Tarot as spiritual meditation tool

I've been using the Osho Zen tarot cards from the time I bought them from Amazon a few years back. I am regularly using them in my spiritual and meditation journey. Tarot cards are most of the times not used for meditation, however non-traditional tools can be used easily as such.

What I usually do is pick every morning one card. I mix the cards and then draw one at random, face down. I turn it over and start meditating on its meaning.
The Osho Zen tarot cards come with a booklet that explains the meaning of each card. These meanings are rather different from that of the traditional tarot.
Of course, if you like divination using tarot, you can use it as such, however the fact that the images are so different from the regular ones means that the mind doens't make an automatic connection to the regular tarot meanings, so you are free to use it as a meditation tool, as a tool for spiritual growth.

Watching and listening, becoming aware. This is the road to knowing, the road to living a much more fulfilled life.
Letting go of tension is the first step in learning meditation. Osho recognized that we are all filled with daily tension that can not leave easily from our body. It is all that gathered stress that makes learning meditation difficult. Osho meditation techniques help with this.
There are several meditation techniques available to those that want to learn his way of meditating, such as the Osho Active Meditation including his Dynamic Meditation and Osho Kundalini Meditation, Nataraj, Nadabrahma, Devavani, Gourishankar, Mandala, Whirling Meditation, and his famous the Art of Listening and Gibberish and Let-Go.