Face any Desire

What the Method Is

The core instruction for this meditation method is: “When some desire comes, consider it. Then, suddenly, quit it”. This sutra describes a process of deep, non-judgmental observation of a desire, followed by its instantaneous cessation, aimed at transforming energy and revealing inner awareness. It is considered a different dimension of the “Stop!” technique.

How It Is Done

To practice this method, you should:

  • Become Aware of an Arising Desire: Notice just as any desire comes into your mind. This can be any desire – for sex, love, food, or anything else.
  • “Consider It”: This means to look at the desire directly and immediately, as a pure fact, without interpretation.
    • Do not think for or against it, nor consult scriptures, past teachers, or your conditioning (upbringing, education, culture, religion). All ideas are borrowed, and thinking creates barriers.
    • Encounter the desire: Face it as if you know nothing about it.
    • When you consider a desire without interpretation, your whole being will become involved in it; it will stir your entire being, like a flame concentrating all energy. Every fiber of your body might tremble, filled with the passion.
  • “Suddenly, Quit It”: After this total consideration, drop the desire instantly.
    • Do not suppress or control it: Suppression merely postpones the energy, pushing it sideways to become perverted and cause psychological diseases later. This method is not about control, but about a sudden release.
    • Do not fight with it: Simply say, “I quit it”. It should feel as easy as dropping a piece of paper from your hand after you have completely considered it.
  • Start with Easier Desires/Impulses: For initial practice, it is advisable to begin with simpler, less complex things than strong emotions like anger or sex. Examples include:
    • Becoming aware of walking and suddenly stopping the walk.
    • Stopping in the middle of a sentence you were about to speak.
    • Breaking a mechanical habit, like nodding your head while speaking, by becoming aware and stopping the gesture.
    • Choosing not to start a conversation with a habitual sentence or responding mechanically.
    • Stopping the impulse to sneeze at its very beginning. Practice with “cold things” first to build the “feel of awareness” before moving to “hot” or complex emotions.
  • Wait and Observe: After suddenly quitting, wait and see what happens. Do not immediately try to think about inner centers or spiritual goals, as this will redirect the energy into thinking. Let the energy move by itself.
  • Authenticity is Key: The impulse or desire must be real and authentic for the technique to work effectively, as it harnesses genuine energy. Stopping a simulated desire will not yield results. If you feel uneasiness after attempting the method, it indicates that your consideration was not total or sufficiently aware.
Commentaries and Insights
  • Source and Lineage: This technique, like “Stop!”, originates from the Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, an ancient text containing 112 meditation methods considered a complete science for transforming the mind. George Gurdjieff’s well-known “stop exercises” in the West have their source in the Vigyan Bhairav Tantra, learned from Tibetan Buddhist lamas.
  • Mechanism of Transformation: The method leverages the principle that energy is neutral (neither anger, love, hate, nor sex) and only takes form when given direction by the mind. By stopping the external flow of this energy, it is redirected inward to its original source. When energy falls back to the source, you become a magnetic center, achieving mastery over your body, mind, and energy, and you no longer dissipate energy. This process is not suppression, which would lead to repressed complexes and perverted energy. Instead, it is a transformation where the energy (e.g., anger) returns to its source and becomes something else (e.g., compassion).
  • Beyond Duality and Mind: The method helps to move beyond dualities (like good/bad, pure/impure) and transcend the mind itself. The mind is often seen as the source of problems and illusions. By engaging in non-intellectual “doing” rather than analytical “thinking,” the mind is turned toward the present and can momentarily stop, leading to a state of “no-mind”. This “no-mind” is what meditation aims for.
  • Experiencing Inner Space: When you fully consider a desire without judgment and then quit it, the mind stops, creating an inner space. This experience leads to a state of thoughtless consciousness, which is a glimpse of samadhi. The inner space created allows for self-discovery and the dissolution of false identities or “faces”.
  • The Role of Awareness and Authenticity: This technique emphasizes total awareness of the factual reality of your inner life, without allowing societal ideologies, borrowed beliefs, or judgments to interfere. Authenticity in expressing feelings, including anger or hate, eventually leads to exhaustion and a desire to move beyond the pendulum-like swing of the mind. By experiencing desires in their totality and suffering the consequences of their pursuit with awareness, one realizes that “desiring is misery”. This realization, rather than effortful practice of no-desire, naturally leads to a state of “no-desire”.
  • Benefits of Practice:
    • Completeness: Allows for the completion of inner acts and desires that remain unresolved in daily life, thereby eliminating the need for dreams, as dreams are often completions of incomplete experiences.
    • Centering: Leads to the discovery of a deep inner center and a feeling of wholeness.
    • Disidentification: Helps disidentify from the body and mind, as the observer of the desire becomes separate from the desire itself. This allows one to realize that they are not the body.
    • Inner Calmness: A subtle calmness and tranquillity develop. The release of pent-up energy leads to genuine, unforced silence.
    • Alertness: It transforms non-alert states into alertness. The more alert you become, the less you drift into dreaming.
  • Challenges and Master’s Role: The mind often plays tricks, trying to rationalize against simple methods or encouraging immediate jumps to complex techniques, leading to failure and discouragement. Initial disturbance or uneasiness can arise as inner “chaos” is brought to the surface, but Osho emphasizes this is a sign the technique is working. A master can be highly beneficial, especially in group settings, by providing sudden “stop!” commands in unprepared moments, forcing authentic engagement and breaking conditioned responses. This helps to overcome fears and inner barriers.