QUESTION: BELOVED OSHO, SINCE YOU INITIATED ME INTO SANNYAS, I HAVE BEGUN TO FEAR YOU A LITTLE. BEFORE THAT, THIS FEAR WAS NOT THERE, ALTHOUGH I HAVE BEEN FRIGHTENED THROUGHOUT MY ENTIRE LIFE. I KNOW, TOO, THAT THE FREEDOM AND LOVE I HAVE FOUND IN BEING CLOSE TO YOU WERE NOT AVAILABLE TO ME EVEN AROUND MY PARENTS. IF IN THE SHADOW OF YOUR OVERFLOWING LOVE, I AM NOT GOING TO FIND FREEDOM FROM FEAR, THEN WHERE ELSE? HOW IS THIS FREEDOM FROM FEAR POSSIBLE?
OSHO: Many points will have to be understood. Freedom from fear has no relation whatsoever to any other person. The master cannot free the disciple from fear, because the fear is within you and the master is outside. What a master can do, at the most, is to create in you the illusion of freedom from fear â but then he is not a real master. He may give you the feeling that the fear has disappeared, but it can only be an idea, a belief.
Courage, bravery, can be created externally, but not fearlessness. Fearlessness means that there are no causes for fear within, and courage means that the causes for fear are present within, but from the outside you have made yourself strong, pulled yourself together somehow. There is not much difference between a courageous man and a coward. The coward is unable to hide his fear, while the man of courage is able to do so; this is all the difference there is between the two. The one whom we call courageous is also afraid inside, just as a coward is; and if the coward tries a few techniques he, too, can become courageous.
So, your guru may make you courageous, but fearlessness can be attained only from within. Fearlessness cannot be imposed from the outside â it is not like face paint or Brylcreem; it is not a cosmetic, it is not makeup, it is an inner experience. What I mean by inner experience is that fearlessness cannot be born in you until it is the realization of your inner being.
The man who attains courage by suppressing fear seems to have found fearlessness, but in reality such a person can never attain to fearlessness. Only he who first experiences his inner fear totally, lives it, goes through it, transcends it, can attain to fearlessness. Only then fearlessness is born. To attain fearlessness is very, very difficult, because the fear will have to be destroyed from its very roots. So remember, if your fear increases when you come to me, it is a good sign. You have come here certainly with the intention of getting rid of some fear, but I will enhance your fear because that is the only way to destroy it.
Let yourself be in fear, as deeply in fear as the leaf of a tree that trembles in a storm. Don't stop yourself, and don't fight the fear, because if you fight you will suppress it and if you suppress it, it will remain with you. Become one with the fear, understand that fear is your destiny; tremble, get frightened, don't try in the least to console yourself. Don't discipline, don't suppress, let the fear come, be overwhelmed by its onslaught â become the fear! âOsho "Nowhere To Go But In," Discourse 5 (May 29, 1974)
