From Ignorance to Innocence - Osho - Oshorajneesh.com

CHAPTER 15. THEY SAY BELIEVE; I SAY EXPLORE
people who discover their being have – they have it. Others are simply living in the illusion, because
scriptures say, and all the religions preach, that you are born with a soul.”
Gurdjieff was very drastic. He said, ”It is all nonsense. You are not born with a soul. You have to
earn it, you have to deserve it. And I can understand what he means, although I will not say that you
are not born with a soul.
You are born with a soul but that soul is only a potential, and whatsoever Gurdjieff is saying is exactly
the same.
You have to bring that potential to actuality. You have to earn it. You have to deserve it.
The politician recognizes it when his whole life has gone down the drain. Now, either he has to
confess... which seems very stupid because he is confessing that his whole life has been the life of
an idiot.
Wounds are not healed by covering.
Religion is a cure.
The word meditation and the word medicine come from the same root. Medicine is for the body;
what medicine is for the body, meditation is for the soul. It is medicinal, it is a cure.
You ask me, can the politician be religious?
Remaining a politician, it is impossible. Yes, if he drops politics, then he is no more a politician – he
can become a religious man. So I am not dividing... I am not preventing the politician from becoming
religious. What I am saying is: as a politician he cannot be religious because those are two different
dimensions.
Either you cover your wound or you cure it. You can’t do both together. And to cure it you have to
uncover it – not cover it. Uncover it, know it, go deep into it, suffer it.
To me that is the meaning of austerity, not standing in the sun – that is an idiotic act. And particularly
in Oregon you should not do that. Stand in the sun, the Oregonian sun and the Oregonian
atmosphere, and you will become immediately the Idiot General of Oregon. Avoid it! Or starving
yourself or standing in the cold, in the river, for days together; this is not the way to cure yourself You
are just being befooled. Anybody who knows nothing is going to give you advice: ”Do this and you
will be cured,” but it is not a question of doing something for the cure.
What is needed is an exploration of your whole being – unprejudiced, without condemnation,
because you will find many things which you have been told are bad, evil. So don’t shrink back,
let them be. You simply need not condemn them.
You have started on an exploration. Just note that something is there, note it and go on. Don’t
condemn it, don’t name it. Don’t bring any prejudice against or for, because that’s what prevents you
from exploring. Your inner world closes immediately, you become tense: something evil? – you go
From Ignorance to Innocence 206 Osho