The Great Path - Oshorajneesh.com

CHAPTER 8. THE FOURTH STATE
and time again your remembrance will slip. Give yourself a push, a jolt into wakefulness again and
again. As a person ties knots in his handkerchief to help him remember something, tie knows in
your consciousness that will remind you again and again. Whatever you are doing, whenever, shake
yourself into consciousness of the truth – that ”I am not the doer, I am only the observer.”
When this thought takes root within you, you will notice all your tensions disappearing. All tensions
belong to the doer, the ego As soon as you begin to contact the observer in you, all tensions vanish.
If this happens even for a moment you will catch a brief glimpse. The waves of the ocean will
start dancing within. Again and again you will lose it. This is only natural, for you have cultivated
unconsciousness over many births. It will take time to overcome this unconsciousness. You have
to be persistent and courageous. You have to keep on pouring the oil of the fourth state into your
wakeful state – say about twenty times during the day.
While walking along the road, stop! Become the observer: realize that it is the body walking and
you are merely an observer. While eating, stop! Become the observer. The body eats. You are
merely observing. While attending to the customers in your shop, stop! Become the observer. Do
not get so engrossed as to forget the observer. Take hold of yourself time and again. It will require a
continuous effort. You will find, by and by, that the effort becomes easier day by day; now and again
you will get flashes of turiya.
When turiya comes easily in the daytime you can gradually utilize it in your dreams. Then when you
are about to fall asleep let the last thought in your mind be: ”I am the observer”. As sleep overcomes
you let this thought reverberate in your mind: ”I am the witness, I am the witness...” And thus you
fall asleep. You will not be able to catch the moment when sleep comes and the repetition stops.
If you cultivate the feeling till you fall asleep the feeling will continue into sleep, for it is only the
body that sleeps. As you cultivate this feeling more and more, one night you will suddenly become
conscious of the observer in your sleep. And as soon as you become aware of the observer a rare
thing happens – dreams vanish. Dreams occur only because of your unconsciousness.
When this even takes place in your dreams, the third happening becomes possible. Continue the
repetition: ”I am the witness... I am the witness...”: into your sleep. The day this stream of awareness
enters your sleep the key to the supreme treasure falls into your hands. Now nothing and nobody can
make you unaware, unconscious. He who awakens even for a moment in his sleep, his unawareness
is gone forever.
The day you awaken in your sleep you become a yogi. You cannot become a yogi by performing
asanas. These are merely exercises. They are good and useful to keep the body healthy, but if you
take them to be the true yoga then you are deluded. Yoga means: the art of awakening in sleep.
Thus he who awakens is a yogi.
This sutra tells you to bring the fourth state to the first three states, and then this occurrence is bound
to take place one day. When you awaken even in sleep you will become fixed in the fourth state.
When a person is established in the fourth state he becomes like a flame that burns unflickering,
as if there is no breeze. Such will be your wisdom, such your knowledge; such will be your soul,
non-flickering, filled with light. Then everything in you will be transformed.
The first thing is: for the one who becomes awakened in his sleep, dreams end forever. He who
reaches Buddhahood never dreams. In the beginning when you awaken in your dream that dream
The Great Path 145 Osho