Osho,
What does it mean to say yes?

“Yes is dropping of the ego. Yes is coming out of the mind. Yes is trust… Yes means trust, and trust is the beginning of meditation. Meditation means relaxing with existence. Unless you trust, unless you can say yes to existence, how can you relax? People cannot relax because they are afraid. People cannot relax because they fear that if they relax, they may be cheated.

The moment you can say yes and you can relax, meditation becomes natural.

“Without any effort, without any strain, without any tension, you start falling into spaces called meditation.”

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And what does it mean to say no?

“Saying no is resistance, saying no is conflict, saying no is egoistic. Saying no is keeping your separation, keeping yourself aloof. Saying yes is merging, melting into the whole. Saying yes is opening up, just like a bud opens and becomes a flower. The no is a closed state of mind; yes is an open flower.

“The difference between no and yes is the difference between a dead and an alive person. The person who lives in the no remains encapsulated, remains in a windowless world where the sun and the rain and the wind cannot reach; where godliness can go on knocking but even the sound of the knock will not reach; where love cannot reach.”

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Where do these nos come from?

“Down the ages, religions have been teaching people life-negation, life-condemnation. Down the ages, religions have been telling you that you are sinners, that your bodies are the houses of sin, that you have to destroy your life in order to praise the Lord, that you have to renounce the world to be able to be accepted by the Lord. This is all holy cow dung, utter nonsense.”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: Learning the Knack

What is the impact of these life negative attitudes?

“The more negative a life is, although outwardly it will seem more intelligent, inwardly it will be more stupid. The more negative a life is, the less it will be possible for truth, bliss, and beauty to penetrate it because all elevating experiences happen only to a positive mind.

All experiences of value happen only to a positive mind.

“Whenever someone says no, something within his mind closes. Have you ever thought about the effect of words? If you close yourself in your room and loudly say no, you will find that your whole heart contracts and becomes closed.”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: The Transformative Power of Ideals

I find my first reaction is to say no. Is it possible to change this habit?

“This is so with everybody: the first thing that comes to your tongue is no. It comes so immediately that there has not been time enough to ponder over it. Yes you say only when you are forced to say it. It comes very hard, it is so difficult – as if something is being snatched from you. In a natural state, things will be just the opposite: yes will come easy and no will be difficult.

“A man who goes deep in meditation will find the change happening: yes will become easier and easier and easier, and one day yes will be a simple response, spontaneous. And no will become more and more difficult, harder to say, and even if one has to say no, he will say it in such a way that it sounds like yes. He will formulate it in such a way that it doesn’t hurt the other’s ego – because it is by hurting the other’s ego that your ego feels good.”

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What is the source of our attraction to the no?

“Mind is never interested in saying yes to anything. Mind is basically atheistic. It enjoys saying no; no is its power. Negativity is its food; it eats negativity. Positivity is its death.

“Try to say no and you start feeling powerful. Whenever you say no, whenever you can manage to say no, you feel powerful. Whenever you have to say yes you feel humiliated, as if something has been done against yourself.

To say a total yes is to destroy the mind totally, and to remain in a total no is to remain in the mind, in the ego.

“The ego is another name of the mind. The ego is the center of the mind; non-ego is the center of your being. At the very core of being, there is no idea of ‘I’; but in the center of the mind, I, I, I…. The only noise that goes on is that of the ego. The more you say no, the more you can feel your ego. ‘No’ defines your ego.”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: There Is No Hell

I have heard you talking about children asserting their egos and rebelling against their parents, of being able to say no….

“The ego is like a ladder: you have to use it but you cannot build your house on it. Or, the ego is like a boat: you can use it to go to the other shore but then you need not carry it on your head for your whole life. It has something essential to do, but it should not become a burden forever; when its purpose is fulfilled it has to be dropped.

Just as a child needs to say no, the mature person one day needs to say yes.

“If the child cannot say no to the parents, to the authorities, to the teachers, if the child is unable to disobey, he will not attain to any individuality; he will not have any form, shape. He will be just part of the mob mind, the crowd.

“He will be impotent, he will not be able to stand on his own. He will not have any self-respect. He will remain hotchpotch, an ugly mess. He will not really be born; he will remain in a psychological womb his whole life, ungrown up. He has to learn how to disobey.

“And the wise parents will help him to disobey in such a way that disobeying does not distort him. They will give him opportunities to disobey, they will give him opportunities to say no.”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: Watch This! Stranger than Fiction

Yes is significant only when you have become able to say no.

“If you say yes from the very beginning, your yes carries no meaning at all; it is meaningless. If you are capable of saying no, then your yes has meaning, as much meaning as your no has strength….

“No is good, but nobody can live in the no. Nobody can make a home out of the no. No is suicidal – use it, but go beyond it. Be alert and conscious that you don’t become encaged in the no-saying. Attain to yes; use no as a stepping-stone.”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: Watch This! Stranger than Fiction

Is it possible to change from this mechanical no to a conscious yes?

“Start saying yes for no reason at all, just as you have been saying no up to now for no reason at all. It can be one of the most beautiful chantings, far better than repeating ‘Rama, Rama, Krishna, Krishna, Jesus, Jesus.’ Far more beautiful and far more significant, far more meaningful, will be to sit silently and repeat meaningfully, consciously, ‘Yes, yes, yes.’ It can be a far deeper-going mantra than any other can ever be, because Rama and Krishna and Jesus are so far away, they are just stories; you can’t really relate with them….

“Bowing down to the earth and saying yes…. Lying on the earth naked and saying yes to the earth as if the earth is your mother, which it is…. Swimming in the lake and saying yes to the water, not only saying it, but feeling it all over, each fiber of your being, each cell of your being pulsating with yes…. Taking a sunbath and saying yes, not verbally, I mean, but existentially, being in the mood of yes, receiving the sun, welcoming the sun and the sand and the texture of the sand, and the coolness of the wind…. Welcoming all these gifts of existence that go on showering on you.”

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If I start bringing this mood of yes into my daily life, will that still be mechanical rather than spontaneous?

“In the beginning it is bound to be so. You have become so habituated to saying no that your first yes will be instead of no. But that is not the real yes yet, it is only a substitute; it will have something of the no in it, some dirtiness of the no will still cling to this yes. It is as if your cup is dirty and you pour tea into it and your tea also becomes dirty. If your yes is only a substitute for no, if it is instead of no, then it will have some qualities of no still clinging to it. But in the beginning it is bound to be so, so don’t be worried about it. Clean your cup a little more….

“Yes is gratitude. No is ugly, ungratefulness. But in the beginning, it is going to be so: your yes will be only instead of no. But it is a good beginning. Slowly, slowly you will come to a yes which is not instead of no but has its own rights, has its own roots in your being. When that yes has happened to you, which has no reference to no – not that it is not only instead of no but it has no reference to no, it is not the opposite of no, it has no resounding of no at all; you have forgotten the no, only yes exists, as if there is no opposite word to it – that is the ultimate peak of yes.

“In that moment yes becomes prayerfulness, in that moment yes becomes a bridge. The ego disappears, the separation is gone. One feels one with the whole.”

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So, learning the art of saying yes is key part of our transformation?

The ultimate growth is to say yes with such joy as a child says no.

“That is a second childhood. And the man who can say yes with tremendous freedom and joy, with no hesitation, with no strings attached, with no conditions – a pure and simple joy, a pure and simple yes – that man has become a sage.

“That man lives in harmony again. And his harmony is of a totally different dimension than the harmony of trees, animals and birds. They live in harmony because they cannot say no…. Between the two, the birds and the buddhas, are all human beings – un-grown-up, immature, childish, stuck somewhere, still trying to say no, to have some feeling of freedom.

“I am not saying don’t learn to say no. I am saying learn to say no when it is time to say no, but don’t get stuck with it. Slowly slowly, see that there is a higher freedom that comes with yes, and a greater harmony. A peace that passeth understanding.”

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“If you can say yes with totality, with no strings attached to it, with no conditions, with no desire for any reward, if you can simply enjoy saying yes, if it is your dance, your song, then it is prayer.

“But I would like to tell you that your yes should not only be a prayer. It should become your very lifestyle, it should become your flavor, your fragrance….

“I teach you a tremendous total yes to life.

I teach you not renunciation but rejoicing. Rejoice! Rejoice! Again and again, I say rejoice! – because in your rejoicing you will come closest to godliness.

“Rejoice so deeply, so totally, that you disappear in your rejoicing: there is rejoicing, but there is nobody who is rejoicing. When it comes to such an optimum, there is a transformation, a revolution. You are no more the old dark ugly self. You are showered with blessings. For the first time you come to know your grandeur, the splendor of your being. Say yes to life, say a total yes to life.“

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: Learning the Knack

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