Love Your Body

Osho,
It happens often that I don’t like myself, especially my body – I feel misery in my body

“Mm mm. It is not in the body – it is just in your idea. You have a certain idea about how the body should be, and if you have some idea you will be in misery. The body is as it should be. If you have some idea you will be in misery, so drop that idea.

This is the body that you have got; this is the body that existence has given to you. Use it… enjoy it!

“If you don’t like the body, that will create the problem, mm? because then by and by you will become indifferent to the body, negligent of the body, because who cares about the enemy? You will not look at it; you will avoid it. You will stop listening to its messages, and then you will hate it more.

“And you are creating the whole problem. The body never creates any problem; it is the mind that creates problems. Now, this is an idea of the mind. No animal suffers from any idea about the body, no animal… not even the hippopotamus! Nobody suffers – they are perfectly happy because no mind is there to create an idea; otherwise the hippopotamus will think ‘Why am I like this?’”

Osho, Mind Body Balancing

Where did the idea of not liking my body come from?

“All the religions have been teaching you to fight against nature. Whatsoever is natural is condemned. The religions say that you have to manage to do something unnatural, only then can you get out of the imprisonment of biology, physiology, psychology, all the walls that surround you. But if you go on in harmony with your body, with your mind, with your heart, then the religions say you will never be able to go beyond you.

That’s where I oppose all the religions. They have put a poisonous seed in your being, so you live in the body, but you don’t love your body.

“The body serves you for seventy, eighty, ninety, even a hundred years, and there is no other mechanism that science has been able to invent which can be compared to the body. Its complexities, its miracles that it goes on doing for you… and you don’t even say thank you. You treat your body as your enemy, and your body is your friend….

“These religions go on saying to you, ‘You have to be always fighting, you have to move against the current. Don’t listen to the body – whatever it says, do just the opposite.’”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: Only Plastic Does Not Perspire

It seems that this poisonous seed has been implanted particularly in women’s minds.

“One strange thing: all the scriptures of the world say that the woman’s body is dirty, as if man’s body is made of gold – instead of bones, diamonds and emeralds; instead of blood, perhaps nectar. Nobody condemns man’s body because the scriptures were written by men. And the man’s body is also part of the woman’s body because it has come from the woman’s womb. It is the same body. But the woman’s body is dirty.

“These male chauvinist pigs have been riding on humanity’s chest for so long, you have completely forgotten that you are being used as a donkey. And they have been there so long that you think as if they are part of you. They have to be thrown, completely thrown away.

“There is nothing dirty in blood, there is nothing dirty in bones, there is nothing dirty in the body.

The body is one of the most beautiful phenomena of nature; one should be grateful to existence rather than calling it dirty. It is one of the most amazing miracles.

“For seventy to a hundred years it keeps alive, it keeps rejuvenating itself, it perpetuates itself. Its every mechanism is a miracle. People go to see the pyramids in Egypt, then Taj Mahal in India. In fact, their body contains far greater miracles than those ugly pyramids.

“You cannot even conceive how your body is working. You are not aware of it – how it transforms your bread into blood. You have heard about alchemists, that they were trying to transform baser metals into gold; your body is doing far better – it is transforming all kinds of crap that you go on throwing inside you into blood, into bone. Not only into blood and bone: it makes your brain out of that crap! Out of your ice cream, Coca-Cola, it goes on making your brain; a brain which can create a Rutherford an Albert Einstein, a Buddha, a Zarathustra, a Lao Tzu. Just see the miracle!

A brain, such a small thing, enclosed in a small skull – a single brain can contain all the libraries of the world. Its capacity is almost infinite….

“These people go on calling the body ugly, dirty. Their idea of purity has nothing to do with purity.”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: Write Your Own Scripture

Rather than appreciating this miracle, the relationship with our bodies has become a battleground!

“Do not fight with your body. It is not your foe, it is your friend. It is a gift of nature to you. It is part of nature. It is joined with nature in every possible way. You are bridged not only with breathing; you are bridged with sunrays, you are bridged with the fragrance of flowers, you are bridged with the moonlight. You are bridged from everywhere; you are not a separate island. Drop that idea. You are part of this whole continent, and yet… it has given you an individuality. This is what I call a miracle.

You are part and parcel of existence, yet you have an individuality. Existence has done a miracle, has made possible something impossible.

“So being in harmony with your body, you will be in harmony with nature, with existence. So instead of going against the current, go with the current. Be in a let-go. Allow life to happen. Don’t force anything, in any good name. For the sake of some holy book, for the sake of some holy ideal, don’t disturb your harmony.

“Nothing is more valuable than to be harmonious, in accord with the whole.”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: Only Plastic Does Not Perspire

Instead of experiencing this harmony, I only feel divisions inside me.

“Everybody is split because the exploiters, both religious and political, have depended on this strategy: divide man, don’t allow him integrity, and he will remain a slave. A house divided against itself is bound to be weak. So you have been taught to fight with the body; that is the root strategy of division, of dividing you….

“For centuries this nonsense has been taught to people. The result is that everybody is divided, everybody is against his body. If you are against your body, you are bound for trouble; you will fight with your body, and you and your body are one energy….

“You cannot defeat the body.

“I am not saying that the body cannot be won over, mind you, but you cannot defeat the body. You cannot defeat it by being inimical toward it. You can win it over by being friendly, by being loving, by being respectful, by trusting it.

That’s exactly my approach: the body is the temple, you are the deity of the temple.

“The temple protects you, shelters you against rain, against wind, against heat. It is in your service! Why should you fight? It is as stupid as the driver fighting the car. If the driver fights with his car, what is going to happen? He will destroy the car and he will destroy himself in fighting with it. The car is a beautiful vehicle, it can take you on the farthest journeys.

“The body is the most complex mechanism in existence. It is simply marvelous! – and blessed are those who marvel. Begin the feeling of wonder with your own body, because that is the closest to you. The closest nature has approached to you, the closest existence has come to you, is through the body.

In your body is the water of the oceans, in your body is the fire of the stars and the suns, in your body is the air, your body is made of earth.

“Your body represents the whole existence, all the elements. And what a transformation! What a metamorphosis! Look at the earth and then look at your body – what a transformation, and you have never marveled about it! Dust has become divine – what greater mystery is possible? What greater miracles are you waiting for? And you see the miracle happening every day. Out of the mud comes the lotus… and out of the dust has arisen our beautiful body.”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: The Wisdom of Innocence

So, your vision is to rediscover our natural harmony with the body?

“The religious person will love his body because it is the temple where existence lives.

“You and your body are not really two, but the manifestation of one.

Your soul is your invisible body, and your body is your visible soul.

“I teach this unity, and with this unity, man becomes whole. I teach you joy, not sadness. I teach you playfulness, not seriousness. I teach you love and laughter, because to me there is nothing more sacred than love and laughter, and there is nothing more prayerful than playfulness.

“I don’t teach you renunciation, as it has been taught down the ages. I teach you: Rejoice, rejoice, and rejoice again!”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: The Illogical Electron

I want you to be real, authentic human beings. Love your body, live your body to its totality. Love your instincts, your desires, and live them in their totality.

“And you will be surprised: if you love your life, life starts opening its doors to you. If you love, mysteries are revealed to you, secrets are handed over to you. If you love your body, sooner or later you will become aware of the soul that resides in it.”

To continue reading this OSHO Talk, visit: Enlightenment Is Not an Achievement

I teach you a new man, a new humanity, which will not think of the future and which will not live with ‘shoulds’ and ‘oughts,’ which will not deny any natural instinct, which will accept its body, which will accept all that is given by existence with deep gratitude.”