Don't rationalize your errors and mistakes. The mind tends to rationalize. If you commit some mistake, the mind says, "It had to be so, there were reasons for it. I am not responsible, the very situation made this happen." And the mind is very clever at rationalizing everything.

Avoid rationalizing your own errors and mistakes, because if you rationalize you protect them. Then they will be repeated. Avoid rationalizing your errors. Stop rationalization completely. Reasoning is one thing, rationalization is totally another. Reasoning can be used for some positive purposes, but rationalization can never be used for any positive purpose.

And you will be able to find when you are rationalizing, you can deceive others but you cannot deceive yourself. You know that you have fallen. Rather than wasting time in rationalizing and convincing yourself that nothing has gone wrong, put the whole energy into being aware.

-Rajneesh

If you ask the ordinary religious person he will say, "Repent -- punish yourself." But Atisha is saying: If you are attentive, that's enough. Be attentive to your inattention, be aware that you have not been aware, that's all. No repentance is needed. Don't feel guilty; it is natural, it is human. To fall many times is not something to feel guilty about. To commit errors, to go astray, is part of our human frailty and limitations. So there is no need to repent.

Repentance is ugly. It is like playing with your wound, fingering your wound. It is unnecessary, and not only unnecessary but harmful -- the wound may become septic, and fingering your wound is not going to help it heal either.

If you have fallen, just know that you have fallen, with no guilt, with no repentance.

There is no need to go anywhere to confess it, just knowing it is enough. And knowing it, you are helping your awareness to grow. Less and less will you fall, because knowing will become more and more strong in you.

-Rajneesh

Let it become one of the fundamental rules of your life. Even if you come across a negative, find something positive in it. You will always be able to find something. And the day you become skillful at finding the positive in the negative, you will dance with joy.

Try it, try the new vision of life. Think in terms of optimism, don't be a pessimist. The pessimist creates hell around himself and lives in it -- you live in the world you create.

-Rajneesh

Witness the objects of the mind. Patanjali calls it dhyana, meditation -- from the same word come zen and CH'AN.

Witness the objects, the contents, of the mind. Whatsoever passes before you, watch it, without evaluating, judging or condemning. Don't be for or against, just watch, and dhyana, meditation, is created.

And the second is, witness the witness itself -- and samadhi is created, satori is created, the ultimate ecstasy is created. The first leads to the second. Start watching your thoughts but don't stop there. When thoughts have disappeared then don't think that you have arrived. One more thing has to be done, one more step. Now watch the watcher. Now just witness the witnessing. Nothing else is left, only you are. Just suddenly become aware of awareness itself, and then dhyana is transformed into samadhi. By watching the mind, the mind disappears. By watching the witness, the witness expands and becomes universal.

The first is a negative step to get rid of the mind. The second is a positive step to get rooted in the ultimate consciousness -- call it God or nirvana or whatever you wish.

-Rajneesh

The sage is one who lives a life according to his own nature, not according to others' values. He has his own vision and the courage to live it.

The sage is rebellious. The saint is obedient, orthodox, conventional, traditional, conformist. The sage is nonconformist, nontraditional, nonconventional, rebellious.

Rebellion is the very taste of his being. He is not dependent on others. He knows what freedom is, and he knows the joys of freedom. The saint will be followed by a big crowd.

The sage will have only the chosen people who will be able to understand him.

The sage will be misunderstood by the masses, the saint will be worshipped. The sage will be condemned by the masses, maybe even murdered. Jesus is crucified and the pope is worshipped. Jesus is a sage and the pope is a saint.

-Rajneesh