Osho – If you want to be changed you will seek a master, not a psychotherapist

Question – Beloved Master, The west is overpopulated with psychotherapists and their patients, but why does no one seem to be helped?

Osho – Patrick, the help is possible only through a buddha. The help is possible only through the awakened one.

The psychotherapists are as asleep as you are; they are in the same boat. There is no qualitative difference between you and them — in fact they may be crazier than you are. They may be more in a mess than you are because they constantly deal with mad people; day in, day out, they are surrounded by mad people. Rather than helping the mad people to become sane, just the opposite happens: being constantly in contact with mad people, slowly slowly they become mad themselves.

This is natural. They don’t have yet that awareness which can remain aloof, unaffected. They don’t have that distance, that coolness, that detachment. They are not living on sunlit peaks; they are groping in the same dark valley where you are groping. They are as blind as you are, but they have to pretend that they are not blind — and that is more dangerous.

If a person is blind and knows that he is blind and never pretends otherwise, there is every possibility he will walk more cautiously. If he pretends that he is not blind, if he projects that he is not blind, if he convinces others that he is not blind, slowly slowly he will be hypnotized by his own sayings, auto-hypnotized. He will start believing that he is not blind and he will start walking less cautiously. And that is more dangerous.

I have heard:
Once a blind man came to visit a Zen master. When he was leaving — it was night, a dark night, no moon, and so many clouds — the master said to the blind man, “Please take this lamp with you.”
The blind man laughed loudly. He said, “Are you joking? What can a lamp do for me? I cannot see! It is all the same to me whether I have a lamp or not.”

But the master said, “That I know, that you cannot see, but at least others will be able to see in the darkness that you are coming so they will not stumble into you.”
The argument appeared right. The blind man took the lamp, went away. He had just walked only a hundred yards and a man just walked into him. He said, “What is the matter? Are you too blind? Can’t you see this lamp?”

And the man said, “I am not blind. Excuse me, but your lamp is no longer lit; its flame has gone out.”
The blind man went back to the Zen master and said, “Look, never give a lamp to another blind man again. If there was no lamp I would have walked more cautiously. I always walk cautiously. Because of the lamp I walked as if I were no longer blind — and the lamp went out. But how was I to know that the lamp went out? Because of this lamp, for the first time I have been hurt by a man. Otherwise, I have walked my whole life in every possible situation, but because I was so cautious, always making noise with my stick on the road so people can feel that some blind man is there, always groping with my stick in the darkness so I know where I am, whether I am facing a wall or a door…. It was the first time that I walked without any fear.”

And that’s what is happening to your psychotherapists, Patrick. They think they know — they know nothing. They are more informed, but information is not knowing. They are well educated, but they have not a higher being than you. And help is possible only when somebody higher than you gives you a hand.

More psychotherapists go mad than any other profession and more psychotherapists commit suicide than any other profession. And it is natural. Living with mad people, one can understand — they become affected.

A few scenes will be helpful to you….
The first scene:
A man walks into a psychiatrist’s office.
“You must help me!” he exclaims.
“What do you do for a living?” asks the shrink.
“I am an automobile mechanic.”
“Get under the couch!”

The second scene:
First psychiatrist: “Hello!”
Second psychiatrist: “I wonder what you mean by that?”

The third scene:
The patient: “Of course I am upset, doctor. I have eleven children and I find out my husband does not love me.”
The doctor: “You are very lucky. Imagine if he did!”

The fourth scene:
“Doctor, my wife accuses me of being a compulsive card-player.”
“That’s ridiculous. Now shut up and deal!”

And the fifth scene:
“Doctor, now that you have cured me of my homosexual tendencies and since this is our last session, may I kiss you goodbye?”
“Don’t be ridiculous — men don’t kiss. I shouldn’t even be lying on the couch with you!”

You ask me, Patrick, “The West is overpopulated with psychotherapists and their patients, but why does no one seem to be helped?”

Help is possible only from higher sources. A person who is on the same ground as you cannot be of any help to you. Help is possible only when a fully conscious man tries to help the unconscious. It is as if you are asleep; do you think somebody else asleep can help you in any way? Only somebody who is awake can wake you. If you want to be awakened at a particular hour, you don’t say to somebody else who is asleep, “Please wake me up at five o’clock in the morning. I have to go for that goddamned Dynamic Meditation!” You have to ask somebody who is awake. Only somebody awake can wake you up. In fact, the person who is asleep may help you to fall into a deeper sleep.

You may have watched it happen. If a few people are sitting just by your side yawning, you start feeling sleepy. They create a certain vibe; they create a certain atmosphere in which anybody vulnerable will start feeling it is better to go to sleep. The same happens with awakened people: a buddha creates a totally different vibe. He shakes you up, he wakes you up. He goes on shocking you in many ways; he finds devices to shock you.

Kavita has asked, “Beloved Master, sometimes you use such words that I feel shocked — and I used to think that no word can ever shock me. Don’t you have any couth?”

Kavita, I will go on using these words unless you wake up. You would like to listen to lullabies — but lullabies are not going to help. What appeals to you, what you like is not going to help. Something that shocks you…. I am going to use rough words till you stop yawning.

Whenever I see somebody yawning somewhere, immediately I have to say something which shocks you — and I can see his yawning disappears. The moment I say “bullshit” — immediately I say it he stops yawning! His spine is erect, his kundalini is rising upwards! Unless you all become awakened I am not going to leave you at ease; I will go on hitting you in every possible way.

Help is possible, Patrick, only from the awakened ones. You don’t need psychotherapists, you need buddhas. Secondly: you go to the psychotherapist, but you don’t really want to be helped. You have great investment in your pathology.

A few scenes again.

First:
“Doctor, my wife thinks she is a refrigerator.”
“Why don’t you divorce her?”
“I would but I need the ice.”

Second scene:
“Doctor, my girlfriend thinks she is a rabbit.”
“Bring her in. I will see what can I do.”
“Okay, but whatever happens, I hope you don’t cure her.”

Nobody wants really to be helped. People are only playing games. They go to the psychiatrist in the hope that he can’t do anything, that he is not going really to change them. Nobody wants to be changed; everybody wants to remain the same as he is. You have become so accustomed to your misery, to your pathology… it is your life, it is your way of life. If you want to be changed you will seek a master, not a psychotherapist.

Source – Osho Book “The Dhammapada, Vol 10”