Turn Your Anguish into a Witnessing Consciousness

Osho,
Why is the world so miserable today?

“The world is miserable because the world has forgotten how to be. The world is in suffering because people have listened to all kinds of superstitions, followed all kinds of wrong thoughts, and are lost in a jungle. Naturally there is great anxiety. Time is slipping out of your hands, death is coming closer every moment, and you have not even known about life. And life is fleeting by.

“As you grow older you will find yourself in more anguish, because the life that was an opportunity to find the truth, to find meaning, to find some eternal nourishment, you have wasted in collecting seashells on the beach, colored stones, and death will take everything away. Hence the tension goes on growing, and the whole world is becoming tense, particularly at these times, because the third world war is hanging just on the horizon. That is the death of all.

“For the first time humanity is feeling the fear of a universal death.

“Before, individuals have felt it, it was a small thing. Now it has become total and global. Any moment any computer in Russia or America can go wrong. It is not even in human hands, now everything is being controlled by the computers. And you know, you cannot depend on machines, you cannot depend even on men. Just a small accident and the whole world will be just going up in smoke, hence the tension is tremendous. But you can make it a great opportunity too, because death is so close and life is more unreliable than it has ever been.

“You can change your life into deep silence, into meditation; you can realize, under this pressure it is easier to realize, your innermost center, which is immortal.

“No nuclear weapons can destroy it. And once you have felt it, all tension, all misery, all anguish, will simply disappear as if it was never there before.

“This is the time for everybody to meditate. This is the time that, except for meditation, nothing can help you to get out of your misery. And meditation is a simple phenomenon. Just whenever you have time, sit silently, doing nothing.

“Relax, close your eyes, watch your thoughts as if you are watching a movie on the screen. You are just a…