17 Mar Joy is Always a Non-Thought Away
I often tell my clients and the participants in my workshops about Osho’s technique of envisioning ourselves as headless people. It always makes me laugh:
“Just drop it, be headless. Try it as a meditation. It is one of the most beautiful Tantra meditations. Walk, and think that the head is no longer there, just the body. Sit, and think that the head is no longer there, just the body. Continuously remember the head is not there. Visualize yourself without the head… A few days of remembrance, and you will feel such weightlessness happening to you, such tremendous silence, because it is the head that is the problem. If you can conceive of yourself as headless – and that can be conceived, there is no trouble in it – then more and more, you will be centered near the heart.” Osho, Come Follow Me, Vol. 2
I also share a cartoon I saw on Facebook – a man and his dog are walking. Above the man’s head is a bubble of his thoughts – a calendar, where every day is marked with his to-do list. Above the dog’s head also is his calendar, where every day is marked, “This is the best day of my life!” “This is the best day of my life!”
The dog is right, today is the best day of our lives, only our minds tell us it is not. When we sink down in the body, the body is like that little dog. It is pulsating with the mindless joy of being alive. We can feel it when thoughts are not there, and our attention drops down with the breath.
Personally, I spent a lot of my life depressed. I was always thinking, thinking, trying to think my way out. And then thankfully I learned that joy is in the body, not in the mind.
“Really, joy only means that your body is in a symphony, nothing else – that your body is in a musical rhythm, nothing else. Joy is not pleasure; pleasure has to be derived from something else. Joy is just to be yourself – alive, fully vibrant, vital.” Osho – The Supreme Doctrine
More and more it is like this. Joy becomes a way of life rather than a special occasion, as we remember to be people without heads.
© 2020 Catherine Auman
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