Created by: Sudas
Being part of a community of fellow travellers is a time honoured way of spiritual navigation. It can offer a place from where to explore your own journey in surroundings which amplify and enhance your own longing in a more inner direction. This is not too often the case in normal social living.
The world, as we well know, is full of distractions, competitiveness, material byways and highways. There are generally many norms which define any world in which we find ourselves.
A Sangha, a community of meditators, is more focused on inner values. It offers a different gravitational force, pulling the seeker into a more relaxed approach to living. There, life can be lived from the centre, without necessarily losing any connection with the circumference.
My own story is of being a part of an Osho Community in Denmark for more than 30 years. At the same time I had a normal profession in society as a schoolteacher. It was an interesting combination.
The intensity of the community life of which I was an active participant could be contrasted daily with my other life in the ordinary world of a schoolroom. This gave me an ongoing reflection on who I was as a meditator and who I was as a participant in the world around me.
Seekers have sometimes chosen one over the other, becoming over identified with their spiritual seeker aspect. The success of my participation in society became in a way a proof of the value of my meditative path. They were complimentary and not in opposition to each other, a kind of dance.
The love and joy I found in my community was something I carried with me, and my classrooms were laboratories where this inner world could spread further and become an expression of all that I was becoming.
There are ups and downs in any community. The miracle for me was that I found a home, a base, which pulled me more and more into the world of Osho. Osho is a big canvas. Quite massive in fact. I already sensed that the first time I saw him in Buddha Hall way back. Nothing made sense any more, and for the first time everything made sense.
The path of meditation and the path of love are not diametrically opposites. Dealing with countless people in the daily life requires an inner navigation. I have surely felt lost on many occasions, out of sync with my surroundings, and then discovering many times the joy of coming back to myself.
A Sangha has that ability to act as a catalyst, catapulting the participants into their own karmic stuff, a melting pot. At times the temperature can get pretty high. Those closest to me in the community also understood the value of what we were doing together.
I remember once being so angry over something that happened, I refused to speak to anyone for a couple of months. Yes, I would say stuff like: “pass me the salt” or “what time is the meeting”. I went to my workplace and behaved normally, but of course I carried an underlying sadness about my own conflict with people whom I basically loved. A skilful therapist from the wider sannyas field turned up and got us all in a room for five hours until the iceberg melted.
This is just one example of community living. How richer we felt afterwards! Egos are exposed in any community. It is the nature of things.
Miten has written a beautiful song called “Shadow of Light”. I was present the first time he played the new CD in public. It was shortly after it had been recorded in a studio in Aarhus, Denmark. We listened to the music, drank champagne, and celebrated the birth of his new songs.
“See the night is falling A silent voice is calling Over the world Casting a shadow of light And in this timeless time Our golden age Over the world We are casting a shadow of light”
Miten – Shadow of Light
Osho’s light still shines for me and for countless others. He gave to me and to others the inspiration to face our own shadows, to value life as a gift. At my sannyas initiation he said the following: ”If I can give you a tongue-tip taste of Tao, my work is finished: just a little taste of Tao, and then it grows on its own.”
“The Sangha is a community of those who live with the same attitude, who live a- life in common, who commune with each other. It is a community: a community of seekers on the same path, a community of those who have been in love with the same buddha, whose love joins them together.
The community is a group. When the buddha is there, you can look at him: he can be helpful, he can guide you, he can take you out of your misery and darkness. But when he is gone, then there is only one possibility: you should join together to help each other. A few will be a little ahead, a few will not be so. A few may be lagging behind, a few may be marching forcibly, a few may just be fast asleep – but if it is a community, then those who are lagging behind can also be helped. The community can take care of them. The community can think about them, can love them, can help them, can guide them. When a buddha is alive there is no need, but when the buddha is gone, a community is the only refuge.”
Osho “Come Follow to you”, vol. 2 : Ch. #5