Osho – what is awareness? Awareness is to be aware that you are not the body, not because the Upanishads say so or Patanjali says so — because you can cram it into your mind that you are not the body. You can go on repeating every morning and evening, ‘I am not the body’ — that will not help. It is not a question of repetition, it is a question of deep understanding. And if you understand, what is the point of repeating?
Once a sannyasin, a Jain monk stayed with me. Every morning he would sit and chant a Sanskrit mantra: I am not the body, I am not the mind; I am the purest Brahma. He chanted and chanted and chanted for one and a half hours every morning. On the third day I said to him, ‘Have you not known it? Then why do you chant? If you have known it, it is foolish. If you have not known it, it is again foolish because just by repeating how can you know?’
If a man goes on repeating, ‘I am a man of great potential, sexual potential,’ you can be certain that he is impotent. Why repeat, ‘I am a man, and very potent and powerful?’ And if a man repeats this for one and a half hours every morning, what does it mean? It shows that something that is just the opposite is in the mind; deep down he knows that he is impotent. Now he is trying to befool himself with, ‘I am a very powerful man.’ If you are, you are. There is no need to repeat it. I told the Jain monk, ‘This shows that you have not known. This is a perfect indication that you are still identified with the body. And by repeating, how can you get out of *itl Understand that repetition is not understanding.’
To understand, watch. When hunger comes, watch whether it is in the body or in you. When illness comes, watch where it is, in the body or in you. An idea comes, watch where it is, in the mind or in you. A feeling arises, watch. By being more and more watchful you will attain to awareness. By repetition nobody has ever attained.
Source: Osho Book “Yoga: The Alpha and the Omega, Vol 4”