|
Finding Sanctuary Viriam Kaur finds spiritual peace in the Osho Meditation Resort The Osho Meditation Resort is a sanctuary – a place where you can explore the possibilities of meditation for the first time or one that you can make your home for decades. The whole place is conducive to mediation – it has a Zen layout with waterfalls, sleek marble, Buddha statues and even peacocks roaming the grounds. Even at its busiest, around January, you can find places to be in solitude. Twenty thousand people visit the Osho Meditation Resort every year, crossing the globe from 100 countries. It is a sacred space where you respect the space, both of others, the environment and that within yourself; it is also a safe space where you can enter into meditation and the whole gamut of emotions that it can bring up. The idea of this meditation sanctuary – a hotbed for healing and personal growth – was created by the mystic Osho. For over 30 years, Osho delivered discourses to his followers around the world, but mainly centred here, at the Osho Meditation Resort in Pune, south-east of Mumbai. As well as answering their many spiritual and emotional questions, he explored spiritual texts from Jesus, Guru Nanak and Lao Tsu, opening them up so that we can get a greater understanding of them. His ultimate skill as a teacher was to make the teachings real, bringing spirituality home to you. He dubbed himself the “spiritually incorrect mystic”, controversially dropping the dogma of spirituality and making it accessible to everyone. He cut out the middle man: so many people want to put themselves between us and our experiences, between us and God. Osho aimed to destroy the “guru game”, not wanting to be seen as anything more than a teacher. “The Buddha is nobody’s monopoly, it is nobody’s copyright. It is everybody’s innermost being.You don’t have to be a Buddhist to be a Buddha.To be a Buddha transcends all concepts of religion; it is everybody’s birthright. ” All his discourses have been transcribed into books, making Osho the most published writer in the world. His words are a reminder for us to wake up. Osho left his body in 1990, but the meditation resort goes from strength to strength and is a living tribute to his dreams of community and individuality – people come and go, they do not follow one person, they create their own path – but they are in harmony with others. “The master is not a master over others, but a master of himself. Every gesture and his every word reflect his enlightened state. He has no private goals. The master welcomes the disciples not because he wants to lead them, but because he has so much to share.Together, they create an energy field that supports each individual in finding his or her own light. If you can find such a master you are blessed. If you cannot, keep on searching. Learn from the teachers and the would-be masters and move on.” Osho created dynamic meditations to jump-start the meditative process. He believes that vipassana (silent meditation) is a deeply valuable technique, but that often in our modern times we simply to do not have the time and space to sit cross-legged under a tree like the ancient mystics, nor can we always abandon home and office for a cave in the Himalayas – we have to wake up in the here and now. Osho diffused the essence of meditation into a series of hourlong techniques. The day starts at 6am with “Dynamic Meditation” which wakes up every cell of your being. Dynamic Meditation includes chaotic breathing to switch off the thinking mind, our monkey- mind which always jumps in when we try and meditate. This is followed by a cathartic process to clear out the dead wood, jumping to clear the chakras, standing in silence and a celebratory dance – it is a sweaty, invigorating way to start the day. It is really a preparation for meditation, creating a space for stillness. There are also kundalini meditations, heart meditations, silent-sitting, meditations where you lie and dissolve into the sky above you and meditations where you dance. “Laughing Drum” is an all-out dancefest where African drums give way to Punjabi Dhol drumming and then finally ebb away so we are left alone, silent except for our thumping heartbeat.The drum beats like our mother’s heartbeat when we were in the womb, and dancing to drums takes us back to our tribal roots. “The stillness of God is not apart from the dance of our everyday. It is at the heart of it. It is not by leaving the world, but by abandoning ourselves to the dance of life.” As well as a dayful of meditations, there is the multiversity where you can participate in courses which last from one day to three months. Inside the groups is where the real alchemy can happen. Joe took time out from London and spent three months at the resort. “It’s just like being at university, but it’s a university about me. I am doing a degree in Joe.” You can explore yourself in courses like “Born to be a Buddha”, untangle your relationship patterns with “Co-dependency” and “Healing the Inner Child”, and open up to Tantra. In “Finding Your Song” Joe and his 20-strong group all wrote songs for the first time, learning to come from an authentic place; and on the technical side they learnt to structure and create a piece of music with a band. I found myself doing a hip-hop class in the middle of the resort you can learn everything from archery to belly dancing and can stretch your body and soul with hatha and ashtanga yoga. Osho explored yoga and Patanjali through many of his discourses. “Patanjali’s yoga has been very much misunderstood and misinterpreted. Patanjali is not a gymnast, but yoga looks like it is a gymnastics of the body. Patanjali is not against the body. He is not a man to teach you contortions of the body. He teaches you the grace of the body, because he knows only in a graceful body a graceful mind exists; and only in a graceful mind a graceful self becomes possible; and only in a graceful self, the beyond.” While you are in the meditation resort, you wear maroon robes which contribute to the “collective meditative energy” of this oasis. Leafy-lined streets lead up to the beautiful zen spaces of the resort – you can get great organic food and even the odd cappuccino… there is a great swimming pool, bookshop and tennis courts. Everything is on hand to explore your creative side. And there are many healing hands available for ayurvedic massage, shiatsu, rebirthing – the resort is a melting-pot of healing techniques. The day culminates in the White Robe meditation – it is a time for contemplation and celebration with Osho video discourse and dance. Amoda spent a few months here several years ago, but its influence still resonates inside her. “My life and work have been deeply touched by Osho. Arriving at Pune was like coming home to me and I have been opened to love ever since. There is something both deeply timeless and yet fantastically futuristic in the whole place, a mystic vastness as well as a grounded juiciness, that has resonated deep in my cells. “The message of love and consciousness shouts loud across the rooftops and the blend of meditation and celebration is totally refreshing. It’s all about awakening life-force, opening the heart and becoming a conscious human being in every way.” After several days, I found my mind was still questioning, but it was asking more interesting questions… and with all the body work and moving meditations I found I could go inside and surrender. Finally, I stopped trying to find answers to the questions. The meditative, alchemical atmosphere of the resort can blow you wide open, make you question everything you have ever thought about yourself and the world around you, but in a protective, respectful, loving space where you feel safe to let go.There has been a subtle yet dramatic shift for me: I am open. I have found a peacefulness that lasts long after the gong sounds the end of a meditation session. “Zen says that if you drop knowledge and within knowledge everything that is included, your name, your identity, everything, because this has been given to you by others if you drop all that has been given to you by others, you will have a totally different quality of your being innocence.There will be a crucifixion of the persona, the personality, and there will be a resurrection of your innocence, you will become a child again, reborn.” The resort has also been inspired by Sufi mystic practices and I had the pleasure of experiencing one such practice. Whirling slowly, slowly I am dancing inside the meditation hall – a giant pyramid – a thousand people move, dance and swirl around me. Here dance is meditation, jumping is meditation, walking is meditation. “No Dimensions” is a Sufi-inspired meditation a slow, choreographed dance which opens your heart. Your hands move from your hara your power centre below the navel to the heart chakra and out in all directions around you, radiating heart energy out into the world. The evocative Sufi music builds up and up until the meditation culminates in whirling like a dervish creating a strong vortex of energy within you and melting the distinction between yourself and the universe. It’s both hypnotic and revitalizing. |