Focus on Fire

What the Method Is
How It Is Done

While the specific practical steps for “Focus on fire” are not explicitly detailed in the provided sources beyond the two-word instruction, Osho offers general guidance for approaching all the techniques in The Book of Secrets. These principles suggest the method involves:

  • Non-intellectual engagement: The techniques are non-intellectual, meaning they are to be done rather than merely understood conceptually. The moment one engages in the technique, the mind naturally turns to the present, leading to a state of ‘no-mind’.
  • Experimentation and Playfulness: The reader is encouraged to “just play with it for three days” and to approach it not with seriousness or strenuous effort, but with a sense of “play”. This open and playful attitude helps to keep the mind more receptive.
  • Finding the right “click”: If a technique “clicks” and brings a feeling of affinity, well-being, or freshness, then it should be explored more deeply. This initial “click” indicates the method is suitable for the individual.
  • Sustained Practice: If the technique resonates, one should stick to it consistently, ideally for at least three months. This sustained effort allows for deeper penetration and miraculous possibilities. However, if the method is truly right, even “three minutes are enough” for a glimpse.
  • Resisting mere imagination: It’s important to “not imagine; resist imagination” but rather to “wait” and “feel” what genuinely arises during the practice, cooperating with it without jumping ahead. Otherwise, it might just become a “beautiful, spiritual dream” rather than an authentic experience.
  • Trusting one’s inner harmony (Sahaj Yoga): If a technique feels “spontaneously coming” and brings a sense of harmony, health, aliveness, and being “at home”, it is likely the right method for the individual. One should trust this inner resonance and avoid methods that create unnecessary inner disturbance.
Commentaries and Insights
  • Purpose of the Method – From Death to Deathlessness: As the technique is presented in the chapter “From Death to Deathlessness,” it implies its profound aim: to help the practitioner transcend the fear and experience of death, moving towards a realization of timeless being.
  • Fire as Awareness: In Tantra, “fire” is often a metaphor for intense awareness or inner energy. The act of focusing on fire is thus an exercise in concentrating consciousness, aiming to dissolve the ego and merge with the cosmic. The chapter “The Fire of Awareness” further supports this interpretation.
  • Beyond Duality and Boundaries: The overall aim of Tantric techniques, including this one, is to dissolve the boundaries created by the mind and move into an undifferentiated realm where there is no definition or limit. This fosters a sense of unity with existence.
  • Death as Sleep: Tantra suggests that death is akin to a “long sleep”. By engaging with techniques that bring one closer to a “death-like” state with awareness, the individual can transcend the fear of actual death. When breath is fully exhaled and one is “emptied of life,” a point of silence is touched, akin to death, where all problems and anxieties disappear.
  • Dissolving the “Wave” into the “Ocean”: This meditation may relate to the Tantric concept of realizing that the individual self (the “wave”) is not separate from the universal existence (the “ocean”). The fear of death arises when the “wave” perceives itself as separate. However, if the “wave” understands its true nature as the “ocean”, there is no fear of death, as only the wave form perishes, not the underlying existence.
  • Mind as the Door: Osho suggests that the ordinary mind, with its wandering thoughts and desires, can actually serve as the “door” to deeper reality. The key is to shift focus from the content of the mind (the “cloud”) to the underlying consciousness (the “sky”).
  • Tantra’s Life-Affirmative Approach: Unlike some ascetic traditions, Tantra is fundamentally life-affirmative. It encourages full acceptance of all energies and experiences, including seemingly negative ones like anger or sexual passion, using them as pathways to deeper awareness rather than suppressing them. By fully entering an experience “with awareness,” transformation occurs. For Tantra, “sleep is impure, alertness is pure, and all else is just meaningless”.
  • Simplicity and Ego: These simple techniques often lack appeal to the ego because the ego seeks difficult challenges to validate itself. However, Osho states that spiritual explosion is not a causal phenomenon requiring a lengthy process, but rather a “remembering” of an already present state.
  • Physiological and Psychological Connection: Tantra emphasizes the body as the starting point for spiritual transformation, understanding the deep connection between physiological and psychological processes. By working with the body (e.g., through breath, or intense focus on sensation), one can influence the mind and move beyond it.