A Story of Appreciation

This is a powerful message in our modern society. 

We seemed to have lost our bearing & our sense of direction.

**Story of Appreciation**


One young academically excellent person went to apply for a managerial position in a big company.

He passed the first interview, the director did the last interview, made the last decision.


The director discovered from the CV that the youth's academic achievements were excellent all the way, from the secondary school until the postgraduate research, never had a year when he did not score.

The director asked,

"Did you obtain any scholarships in school?"

the youth answered "none".

The director asked,

 " Was it your father who paid for your school fees?"

The youth answered,

"My father passed away, when I was one year old, it was my mother, who paid for my school fees.

The director asked,

 " Where did your mother work?"

The youth answered,

 "My mother worked as clothes cleaner.

The director requested the youth to show his hands.

The youth showed a pair of hands that were smooth and perfect.

The director asked,

 " Have you ever helped your mother wash the clothes before?"

The youth answered,

"Never, my mother always wanted me to study and read more books.

Furthermore, my mother can wash clothes faster than me.

The director said,

"I have a request. When you go back today, go and clean your mother's hands, and then see me tomorrow morning.*

The youth felt that his chance of landing the job was high. When he went back, he happily requested his mother to let him clean her hands. His mother felt strange, happy but with mixed feelings, she showed her hands to the kid.

The youth cleaned his mother's hands slowly. His tear fell as he did that. It was the first time he noticed that his mother's hands were so wrinkled, and there were so many bruises in her hands. Some bruises were so painful that his mother shivered when they were cleaned with water.

This was the first time the youth realized that it was this pair of hands that washed the clothes everyday to enable him to pay the school fee. The bruises in the mother's hands were the price that the mother had to pay for his graduation, academic excellence and his future.

After finishing the cleaning of his mother's hands, the youth quietly washed all the remaining clothes for his mother.

That night, mother and son talked for a very long time.

Next morning, the youth went to the director's office.

The Director noticed the tears in the youth's eyes, asked:

" Can you tell me what have you done and learned yesterday in your house?"

The youth answered,

 "I cleaned my mother's hand, and also finished cleaning all the remaining clothes'

The Director asked,

 " please tell me your feelings."

The youth said,

Number 1,

 I know now what appreciation means.. Without my mother, there would not the successful me today.

Number 2,

 by working together and helping my mother, only I now realize how difficult and tough it is to get something done.

Number 3,

I have come to appreciate the importance and value of family relationship.

The director said,

" This is what I am looking for to be my manager. I want to recruit a person who can appreciate the help of others, a person who knows the sufferings of others to get things done, and a person who would not put money as his only goal in life. You are hired.

Later on, this young person worked very hard, and received the respect of his subordinates. Every employee worked diligently and as a team. The company's performance improved tremendously.

A child, who has been protected and habitually given whatever he wanted, would develop"entitlement mentality" and would always put himself first. He would be ignorant of his parent's efforts.

When he starts work, he assumes that every person must listen to him, and when he becomes a manager, he would never know the sufferings of his employees and would always blame others.

For this kind of people, who may be good academically, may be successful for a while, but eventually would not feel sense of achievement.

He will grumble and be full of hatred and fight for more. If we are this kind of protective parents, are we really showing love or are we destroying the kid instead?*

You can let your kid live in a big house, give him a Driver & Car for going around, Eat a Good Meal, learn Piano, Watch a Big Screen TV. But when you are Cutting Grass, please let them experience it. After a Meal, let them Wash their Plates and Bowls together with their Brothers and Sisters. Tell them to Travel in Public Bus, It is not because you do not have Money for Car or to Hire a Maid, but it is because you want to Love them in a right way. You want them to understand, no matter how rich their parents are, one day their hair will Grow Grey, same as the Mother of that young person. The most important thing is your kid learns how to appreciate the effort and experience the difficulty and learns the ability to work with others to get things done. 

Tale 57 ~ 100 Tales For 10,000 Buddhas

As I come out of the room, I see Chaitanya Bharti standing there with his camera. I ask him if he will take a picture of me with Osho after discourse. He agrees to it. I tell him that after discourse I will go near Osho, where he should be available.

I sit down on the floor in the audience near the podium and close my eyes. I am in an “Aha” space. I have no clue of what is going on. There are about 400 to 500 people sitting in pin drop silence waiting to receive their master. In a couple of minutes I feel Osho’s presence near me and I open my eyes. He is right in front of me, standing with His folded hands, greeting His friends. I look upwards to see His face one more time to quench my unending thirst. He speaks nearly two hours, answering all kinds of questions.

After discourse, I walk towards Him and say, “Osho, I want to have a picture with you.” He immediately agrees to it and I stand next to Him on His right side, and Chaitanya Bharti clicks his camera in seconds. This picture is my real treasure. When I receive it in the mail from Delhi, I take it to show to Osho.

Osho gazes at the picture for a minute and signs it with the message; “One who lets go of everything is a real Sannyasin.”

Tale 56 ~ 100 Tales For 10,000 Buddhas

Meditation camp at Manali has started. Today, I go to see Osho in my regular clothes. He asks me, “Where is your orange dress? Why have you put it on?” I tell Him, “I will put it tomorrow.”

Next morning, I am dressed in my orange lunghi and kurta and have come to see Him before discourse with my girl friend Veena from Bombay. We both are waiting in the living room with much excitement. After a few minutes, He comes out of the bathroom. His face is very radiant with an aura of light around Him. He greets me with a big smile as I go neat Him to touch His feet. He blesses me placing His hand on my head.

As I get up, He says, “You look good in this dress. Now you are a Sannyasin. What name should be given to you?” He places a huge Mala with big beads around my neck. I am just surprised, not knowing what is going on. I take it all as a joke and simply laugh. He looks at Veena, and the name ‘Jyoti’ slips out of her mouth. Osho likes this name and says, “It is good name but not complete. ‘Dharm Jyoti’ will be the right name for you.” It all happens standing in the living room. That is how I am initiated into Sannyas. Not a big deal. I feel pulled towards Him and hug Him. He receives my hug, showering all His love on me by placing His hand on my head. I feel drowned in utter silence and joy.

Osho Stories ~ Trust

"A man just got married and was returning home with his wife. They were crossing a lake in a boat when suddenly a great storm arose. The man was a warrior, but the woman became very much afraid because it seemed almost hopeless -- THE BOAT WAS SMALL AND THE STORM WAS REALLY HUGE, AND ANY MOMENT THEY WERE GOING TO BE DROWNED. But the man sat silently, calm and quiet, as if nothing was happening.

The woman was trembling and she said, "Are you not afraid? This may be our last moment of life! IT DOESN'T SEEM THAT WE WILL BE ABLE TO REACH THE OTHER SHORE. Only some miracle can save us, otherwise death is certain. Are you not afraid? Are you mad or something? Are you a stone or something?"

THE MAN LAUGHED AND TOOK THE SWORD OUT OF ITS SHEATH. The woman was even more puzzled -- what he is doing? Then he brought the naked sword close to the woman's neck -- so close that just a small gap was there, it was almost touching her neck.

He said, "ARE YOU AFRAID?"

She started to giggle and laugh and said, "WHY SHOULD I BE AFRAID? If the sword is in your hands, why should I be afraid? I know you love me."

He put the sword back and said, "This is my answer. I know God loves me, and the sword is in His hands, and the storm is in His hands -- so WHATSOEVER IS GOING TO HAPPEN IS GOING TO BE GOOD. If we survive, good; if we don't survive, good -- because EVERYTHING IS IN HIS HANDS, AND HE CANNOT DO ANYTHING WRONG."

This is the trust one needs to imbibe. SUCH TREMENDOUS TRUST IS CAPABLE OF TRANSFORMING YOUR WHOLE LIFE! And ONLY such tremendous trust is capable of transforming your life -- less than that won't do."

~ Osho

Osho Story – You don’t know enough about yourself

Question – Beloved Osho, you said the other day that if you were a cab-driver nobody would be able to recognize you. I don’t agree. At lease I for one would recognize you.
Osho – Madam, I don’t believe you. You don’t know enough about yourself. I appreciate your love for me, but I cannot say that you would be able to recognize me.
I will tell you one real story. I used to stay with a family in a certain city in India for many years — a very rich family, millionaires. He was very respectful to me, he was a follower. When I used to go to his town he would touch my feet as many times as possible — at least four, five times every day.
Then after seven, eight years, he wanted to come to visit the place where I used to stay in Jabalpur. He came. Just to puzzle him, just to confuse him, I went to receive him at the station. That he had not expected — that I would come to receive him at the station.
He used to fall at my feet. That day he touched my feet, but halfheartedly — because a great ego arose in him: that I have come to receive him. He used to come to receive me for seven years and each year at least three or four times I used to visit his town. He had not expected this. He had expected that somebody would be there to take him to me. But that I myself would come to receive him? — that was not even in his dreams. He must have argued inside: “I am somebody, a millionaire…”
That day he bowed down, but very halfheartedly. How can you bow down to somebody who has come to receive you at the station, with great respect? We left the station, and when he saw that I was going to drive him back home, then all his
respect disappeared. Then he started talking like a friend. The millionaire became very ‘famillionaire’! And after three days, when he left — I had gone to say goodbye, to give him a send-off — he did not touch my feet.
And the family that I used to live with all knew that I was playing a joke on him, and the poor fellow had got hooked in it. They all laughed when the train left. I said “You wait. Next time, let him come — he will expect me to touch his feet. And it will be no wonder if he forces me to touch his feet.”
That’s how things go, that’s how mind functions. You recognize me, you love me, but you don’t know your own mind. And in that experiment I lost one of my millionaire followers. I have been losing many followers that way, but I go on experimenting.
Source – Osho Book “The Heart Sutra”

Osho – Truth is hidden because of our Restlessness

Osho – We attach a lot of value to ourselves; and the more value we attach to our little selves, the more restless we become; and the more we suffer and the possibility of realizing Truth gets less and less.
He who is tranquil and filled with peace, can realize Truth. The first rule for obtaining tranquillity is not to consider that life which we lead, as real. Attach no more importance to it than you would to a dream. The moment life begins to appear as a dream, the mind becomes quiet. Until then, it is impossible for we attach such importance to trivial things. We take even dreams to be real and suffer on account of them. A man sees a ghost in his dream and gets up with a fright, his chest pounding; his sleep is broken, the dream is no more, yet it has seemed so real that the heart beats faster!
We are such, we even get carried away by theatrical performances. You will see many people wiping their eyes in cinema-houses; whereas on the screen there is nothing but the p1ay of electricity. Knowing full well that it is the current of electricity forming pictures on a blank screen, we yet laugh or cry or get frightened with the different scenes! The drama becomes a reality, whereas actually, the first rule in the quest of Truth is to consider as play, what we take to be a reality in life. Then only does Truth reveal itself.
There was a great thinker in Bengal by the name of Ishwarchandra Vidyasagar. He went to see a play. In the play, the hero is after the heroine. He does everything to harass and trouble her. Then one day, in the dead of night, he jumps into her bedroom and catches hold of her.
Vidyasagar could bear it no longer. He jumped on to the stage, took out his shoe and beat up the hero – completely forgetting it was a play on the stage! Everybody was shocked but the hero took the shoe and holding it to his chest, bowed reverently to Vidyasagar. He turned to the audience and said: ”Never have I received so great an honour. That anyone should be so carried away by my acting and that too, a great thinker like Vidyasagar! It is the biggest award I have ever received. I shall always prize this shoe.”
Vidyasagar felt ashamed. He went quietly back to his seat. Later on, he told his friends that the play appeared so real that he completely forgot it was a drama!
If a play looks real, man gets disturbed but if life appears a play, man becomes tranquil. Where is the need to be agitated by a dream? Then if poverty comes, it is a dream; even riches are a dream. Then sickness and health, honour and dishonour, are all dreams. As this truth becomes clearer to us, the mind starts to get restful. Truth is hidden because of our restlessness.
Source – Osho Book “The Beginning of the Beginning”

Osho – Truth is God. There is no other God except the truth

Osho – I was in a big city. Some young men came there to meet me. They started asking: “Do you believe in God?” I said: “No. What relation is there between belief and God? I know God.”
Then I told them a story: There was a revolution in some country. The revolutionaries of that place were busy in changing everything. They were determined to destroy religion also. In the same context an old beggar was arrested and brought to the Court.
They asked that beggar: “Why do you believe in God?” That beggar said: “No gentlemen, I do not believe. But God is there. What should I do now?”
They asked: “How do you know that He exists?” That old man said: “After opening my eyes ever since I began seeing I have seen none except Him”.
That beggar’s replies served as ghee to the fire. Those revolutionaries became very angry and said: “Very soon we will kill all your monks and nuns. What then?”
That old man laughed and said: “As God may wish! ”
‘But we have decided to destroy all signs of religion. We will not leave any sign of God in the world.”
That old man said: “My son, this is a very difficult job that you have selected. But as the God may will! How will you destroy all signs? Whatever remains will announce His existence. At least you will be there, and you will announce His existence. It is impossible to eliminate God, because God is all-pervading.”
All these misunderstandings cropped up because God was compared to a man. God is not a person. He is what He is. And the thought of believing in God has also created a lot of misunderstanding.
What is the meaning of believing in light? That can be seen only when the eyes open. Belief is a supporter of ignorance and ignorance is a sin. Not the blind faith, with eyes tied under cloth, but the discrimination with eyes fully open can take a man upto the truth. Truth is God. There is no other God except the truth.
Source – Osho Book “The Earthen Lamps”