searching and the end of searching

[skrowzdm]

I read this recently - Realization.org: My Awakening by Osho - I have found this to be a great account of what the event of "awakening" is like. As a seeker, I want to know if any of you can describe a similar experience, and what insight you can give to someone on the path that is still searching.

[Glass Joe]

Thanks for sharing this skrowzdm. It was a tad bit long (or at least it felt long because it was laid out as one continuous page), but still a great read.

I never heard of Osho until a few months ago, and I never read anything from him until that article. So, thanks!

I have no idea one way or the other about what the higher states and experiences he described in the article will be like for other people. (It would be like trying to describe the taste of an avocado to someone who has never tasted one before, from someone who also has never tasted one before but only read descriptions of it. Nearly impossible.) But I suppose I can comment on his description of the end of searching, which I really liked and thought was helpful.

The day I stopped seeking... and it is not right to say that I stopped seeking, better will be to say the day seeking stopped. Let me repeat it: the better way to say it is the day the seeking stopped. Because if I stop it then I am there again. Now stopping becomes my effort, now stopping becomes my desire, and desire goes on existing in a very subtle way.

[...]

Let me repeat. Without effort you will never reach it, with effort nobody has ever reached it. You will need great effort, and only then there comes a moment when effort becomes futile. But it becomes futile only when you have come to the very peak of it, never before it. When you have come to the very pinnacle of your effort -- all that you can do you have done -- then suddenly there is no need to do anything any more. You drop the effort.

But nobody can drop it in the middle, it can be dropped only at the extreme end. So go to the extreme end if you want to drop it. Hence I go on insisting: make as much effort as you can, put your whole energy and total heart in it, so that one day you can see -- now effort is not going to lead me anywhere. And that day it will not be you who will drop the effort, it drops on its own accord. And when it drops on its own accord, meditation happens.

Meditation is not a result of your efforts, meditation is a happening. When your efforts drop, suddenly meditation is there...

[...]

That meditation cannot be created by human effort. Human effort is too limited. That blessedness is so infinite. You cannot manipulate it. It can happen only when you are in a tremendous surrender.

[...]

Your meditation that you create by chanting a mantra or by sitting quiet and still and forcing yourself, is a very mediocre meditation. It is created by you, it cannot be bigger than you. It is homemade, and the maker is always bigger than the made. You have made it by sitting, forcing in a yoga posture, chanting 'rama, rama, rama' or anything -- 'blah, blah, blah' -- anything. You have forced the mind to become still.

[...]

You are your undoing, you are the barrier. Meditation is when the meditator is not. When the mind ceases with all its activities -- seeing that they are futile -- then the unknown penetrates you, overwhelms you.

I'd say the searching ends when you no longer feel the need to search anymore. It just stops on its own. As opposed to trying to force it to stop through sheer willpower and self-discipline. Like when you just naturally stop eating when you're full instead of forcing yourself to stop eating mid-meal. Of course, it's still possible to force yourself to stop, but the hunger will still be there and won't go away. So you'll likely start eating/searching again as soon as you let your guard down. At least that has been my experience.

It's probably also like searching all around your house for your glasses. You search and search and search, only to realize you were wearing them on your face all along but just forgot. And although something is still gained through the whole searching process, you didn't really "find" anything. You just remembered where it was all along. And knowing this, you simply don't feel the need to continue searching anymore. Searching is now seen as totally futile.

[Gary]

Your desire to search is over when you are able to fill yourself emotionally with Love and Happiness. Until then it is a challenge to face your fears and the underlying false beliefs of lies.

As you progress on the journey it is easier to spend time in love and happiness and it becomes more of your default state. You visit dreams and emotions of fear in your mind less and less.

It will take great desire to make the journey to complete awakening. Most people who start will not finish. However just to break free of a few of your fears will allow you to live happier for the rest of your life.