OSHO: Waking Up the World

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Excerpts from an Interview with Roberta Green,
Santa Ana Register. Orange County, CA

OSHO

OSHO International Foundation Presents

Osho: Waking Up the World

Excerpts from an interview with Roberta Green

Santa Ana Register, Orange County,CA

I never thought I'd get the chance to come here.

Takes care of my questions!

They said it was safe to tell you that I'm a little nervous!

One of the things that I've read that you've said, and I've heard you say it on videotapes,

is that

you tell a few jokes to wake the world up.

When did the world go to sleep, and is it waking up?

It has always been asleep,

only a few individuals in the whole history of man

have

been

awakened.

Their names can be counted on ten fingers,

not more than that.

And it was natural:

Man has evolved out of the animals.

Animals are in a deep sleep,

they don't know that they are.

That is the meaning of sleep –

one is,

but one is not aware that one is.

No animal is aware

of himself.

And I agree with Charles Darwin,

on different grounds....

His grounds are

ordinary,

mundane;

can be criticized,

have been criticized.

In fact he is no more

an accepted

scientist about the evolution of humanity.

The majority of scientists have deserted him.

But I am

in his support

on a totally different ground.

My ground is:

Looking at man's sleep

this is the only possibility,

that he has grown up

out of the animals –

monkeys,

chimpanzees,

whatsoever,

whosoever

was there in the beginning.

Man's sleep proves it.

And only rarely, once in a while – a Gautam Buddha,

a Bodhidharma,

a Socrates –

once in a while there has been a man who has the guts

to come out of sleep.

It needs tremendous courage to come out of sleep,

because we have so much invested in sleep.

It is just like a man, who is dreaming

that he is living in a golden palace –

with a great kingdom,

with all the luxuries –

and you try to wake him up.

He is just a beggar on the street.

Only beggars dream of being emperors.

Emperors never dream of being emperors,

that will be

simply

illogical.

The beggar has so much investment

in his sleep and dream,

that he will resist

in every possible way, not to be awakened.

He will get irritated,

he will oppose you:

"Who are you to interfere in my life?

Can't you even tolerate a man

who is having a sweet dream?"

And even if you force him to awaken

he is going to fall asleep again,

because on waking he is only a beggar,

asleep he becomes an emperor.

The investment in psychological sleep

is tremendous.

That's why all those people –

Gautam Buddha,

Bodhidharma,

Chuang Tzu,

Plotinus,

Heraclitus –

they all failed.

They did their best.

They struggled against the sleep of man,

but

still, man is asleep

and whatever he is doing proves

that he is asleep.

These two World Wars prove

that he is asleep.

The coming Third World War

can be prevented only if we can awaken enough people,

so those

people become infectious

and go on awakening other people

in a chain.

And it has to be done so fast,

because there is not much time.

Otherwise the sleepy people

are going to destroy this earth,

this life.

Politicians are asleep.

No awakened person can become a politician

for the simple reason that he cannot lie,

he cannot give you promises that he knows

can never be fulfilled.

No awakened person will be

a politician,

because he has no desire

for his ego to be fulfilled.

There is no ego anymore.

Ego exists as a substitute self in sleep.

The moment you are awakened

ego has no function,

it is useless.

You are there, now you don't need it.

And the man who knows himself

has no inferiority complex.

Unless you are suffering from some inferiority complex

you will not be involved

in any kind of leadership –

political,

religious,

social.

You don't have the base.

The inferiority complex

is the cause of everybody becoming ambitious,

because if they don't become somebody in the world,

then in their own eyes

they have failed.

They want to prove themselves,

prove that, "We are here!"

that, "We have been here!"

They want to be recorded, their names in history –

although they know

that even the greatest names in history,

by and by,

go on slipping

from prominence;

become footnotes,

move into the appendix

and out of the door.

Naturally, how many people

can we go on carrying?

But they want to make their name.

That too proves

to be something animal.

All animals in the world

have an instinct,

scientists call it

the territorial imperative.

The dog, pissing on the

tree.

is simply making his signature.

He is saying, "This tree belongs to me."

He won't allow another dog to come near.

Other dogs will smell his urine

and will know

that this tree is not free,

not available, somebody possesses it.

There are animals who will go on –

particularly the lion –

urinating on a vast territory,

just so that everybody is aware.

Man also

works in the same way.

All these nations

are nothing but

people pissing and making

a boundary:

"This is America,

this is the Soviet Union,

this is India!

You can smell

it is a different country;

don't enter without a visa,

without a passport."

Otherwise there is no need for any nations on the earth.

What is the need?

Can't we all live as one humanity?

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Source: 'The Last Testament, Volume 1 # 14' Copyright: OSHO International Foundation, Switzerland.OSHO® is a registered TM.