Insights on 4 Inner Barriers, inspired by Osho
Osho defines intuition by contrasting it with instinct and intellect. Instinct is the bodily drive, intellect is the mental drive, and intuition, which is very subtle but powerful, is the consciousness drive.
Most importantly intuition is above intellect, when intellect fails and can’t seem to find a way, intuition can provide answers if you can access it. Many artists, and creators have come to this realisation and as Osho describes intuition transcends thought.
“You have a guide within you, but you don’t use it. And you have not used it for so long, for so many lives, that you may not even be aware that a guide exisit within you.” — OSHO
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How do you access this guide?
First, you have to know the barriers to our inner guide.
Knowledge
Knowledge makes you blunt and indifferent to the wonders of life. If you know that this flower is a rose, you can’t be mesmerised by it. But imagine a beginner’s mind, you know nothing and then you come across a rose, you will act differently, you will observe it more intensely — there is wonder, there is mystery.
“To understand this is to understand much. To understand that knowledge divides, knowledge creates distance, is to the very secret of meditation. Meditation is a state of not knowing. Meditation is pure space, undisturbed knowledge.” — OSHO
Intellect
I have been taught that I need to think to make the right decisions. Thinking is stressed in our schools and universities. However, our intellect has to have limitations. Thinking can’t be all. Our intellect has its beauty when it remains a slave to consciousness; the mind as a master of consciousness is a dangerous master.
You might think a good thinker is intelligent, NO!
Intelligence is a far bigger phenomenon. Intelligence includes intuition. So many great discoveries are based on intellect but are given their greatness by intuition.
There are far greater things where intellect is not needed at all. And where it is not needed, it goes functioning there too; that’s a problem. A meditator uses his intellect, but he uses his intuition too — he know that their function are different. He uses his head , he uses his heart too. — OSHO
Imagination
Imagination and intuition are two opposite faculties. Imagination is us creating our reality, dreaming. Intuition doesn’t create anything. It is a mirror and informs you what is there. It is crystal clear, pure and silent. So do not be misled by saints and gurus who claim to have seen and talked to God. Their god is created in their imagination.
You don’t have to create your reality, you just have to cleanse your senses to feel the reality and its psychedelic beauty, its colourfulness, its greenness, its aliveness. And inside, you have to discover the reality, not create it because anything created by you cannot be but imagination. You simply have to go in, in silence, and watch — just be alert and aware so that you can see whatever is real…you will experience tremendous silence, great joy, infinite blissfulness, immortality; but you will not see any God, and you will not see any angels. Those things have to be created to be seen. — OSHO
Politics
Politics is driven by the law of the jungle: “Might is Right”, which is quite instinctive. The world would be a better place if the opposite was supported: “Right is Might”.
Politics is a sign of will to power. Anyone trying to be superior to another- that’s politics.
Politics means an effort to prove yourself superior. But why? — because you feel, deep down, inferior. And the man of instinct is bound to feel inferior — he is inferior. It is not an “inferiority complex,” it is a fact, a reality — he is inferior. To live the life of instinct is to live at the lowest possible level of life. But might does not prove right — it is perfectly okay in the world of animals and in the world of instinct. Intelligence reverses the whole thing: “right is might” — and right has to be decided by intelligence, by logic, by reason, by argument. — OSHO
Intuitive people seek the truth and what is righteous. Truth belongs to nobody and it should win, no matter who is defeated.
In a better world the people of intuition will be the guiding lights for those who can at least understand them intellectually. And the intellectual politicians — professors of politics, the intelligentsia, theoreticians — they will be the guide for the instinctive politicians. Only this way can the world be at ease, live at ease. — OSHO
This is a fresh take on things for myself because until now knowledge and intellect have always been the focus points. In our society, it is impossible to ignore knowledge and intellect and rely on intuition. Nonetheless, Osho implies that to fully experience human intelligence, you also need to leave room for intuition.
What are your thoughts on this?