Question – WHY ARE THE ASHRAMITE SANNYASINS NOT ALLOWED TO PARTICIPATE IN ALL THE MEDITATIONS? WHY ARE THEY TOLD TO PARTICIPATE IN ONLY ONE MEDITATION EVERY DAY?
Osho – It is because of you, ladies and gentlemen. It is because of your laziness. I go on talking about non-doing and my text becomes your pretext. Non-doing has nothing to do with laziness. In fact, a lazy person can never move into non-doing. A lazy person is almost suicidal. He is closed; his energy is not flowing. A non-doer is a flowing person: alive.
A non-doer does not mean that he does not do anything. He does many things, many more than ordinary doers, but he is still not a doer. All that he does is a happening. He is instrumental: as if the divine possesses him and functions through him. He never thinks, “I am doing it.” At the most he thinks, “I am allowing it,”
A non-doer will do many things and will not be tired because there will be no tension. A non-doer will do many things and will not accumulate any ego because he is not the doer. Things are just happening. A non-doer loves his work, and the work becomes worship.
People who are in the ashram — they are allowed to be in the ashram only for a certain work. That certain work is: they have to transform their work into worship. But they would like to be lazy. And particularly in India, sannyas is thought to be a type of laziness. People who don’t want to do anything become sannyasins.
I am not a shelter for them; I am not a shelter for escapists. I am here to teach you life and more life and still more life, because only when your energy is flowing will you be able to love; only when your energy is flowing will you be able to know; only when your energy is flowing will you someday be able to transcend death — otherwise not.
But very few in the ashram work as a worship. Many go on avoiding. Not that they want to meditate, because if they want to meditate then the thing will be totally different: they can meditate with their work. But they would like to d3 all the meditations just to avoid the work.
A few are absolutely lazy and they think that they can rationalize it. For example, let me tell you about one day in one sannyasin’s life. From six to seven in the morning he will meditate, Then comes breakfast. Then eight to nine-thirty or ten is the lecture. Then of course by ten o’clock he has already done too much: meditated, listened to such a long lecture…. So a little gossiping — it is obviously needed. Then by eleven, eleven-thirty, he is ready for lunch. By twelve, of course, he has already done too much — meditating, listening, even eating — so by twelve o’clock he goes to sleep. Up till three o’clock, rest is needed. Three to three-thirty: tea or coffee time. Three-thirty to four-thirty: Nadabrahma, an individual meditation. Four-thirty to five-thirty he goes for a walk of course. One needs a little physical exercise. Five-thirty to six-thirty: Kundalini meditation. Then dinner time. And then, of course, the girlfriend comes, so the day is complete. Still more meditations you need?
I talk every day for ninety minutes. That means, at the most, thirty pages. In the ashram we have twenty persons who are doing editing. Every day they have to edit, transcribe, proofread, thirty pages. Twenty persons — that means one and a half pages per sannyasin. Still the work goes on piling up. And they are always carrying long faces, as if they are doing too much work. It looks ridiculous: one person speaks; twenty persons edit. It simply looks ridiculous. And then, too, the work is never done. It goes on piling up.
They are told not to meditate too much because listening to me is meditation. Can you do a better meditation than listening to me? If you love the work, if you love me, that is meditation. Your whole life should be meditation. People who come for a few days from the outside have to learn meditation, but those who are living in the ashram — their whole life should be meditation. Their walking, their sitting, even their sleep; everything should become meditative. Meditation should be a climate here. Not something that you do, but something that you are.
And don’t carry faces that show you are doing very great work. Love it! Nobody is helped by carrying a long face and a burden. And nobody is deceived by you because the whole thing seems to be ridiculous. You just have the idea of feeling burdened. That burden kills you. And if you go on thinking about it, it will become a burden. It will create ulcers, it will make your body feel ill, and you will become tense and nervous. Then you will try to show even more that you are burdened very much. You are moving in a vicious circle now.
Here you are to enjoy, to be, to delight. And there is so little work that, in fact, it can be done within minutes. Just one and a half pages of editing, transcribing and proofreading — how long will it take? And this is just an example. The same is true with the other work. But there ARE people who take it as worship. They are flowing and growing and flowering. There are people who work — and work lovingly. That’s why some work is done; otherwise it would be impossible.
But these questions come from the people who are lazy. I will not give the name of the person who has asked this question because it is the same sannyasin who wants her name to be told.
Source – from Osho Book “Come follow to you, Vol2”