”Discover Your Sleep”
We have not even noticed that the cause behind all the illnesses, all the disorders that have entered man’s life is lack of sleep.
The thing which has been harmed the most in the development of human civilization is sleep.
From the day man discovered artificial light, his sleep has become very troubled. And as more and more gadgets started falling into man’s hands, he started feeling that sleep is an unnecessary thing, too much time is wasted in it.
The time when we are asleep is a complete waste. So the less sleep we can do with the better. It does not occur to people that sleep has any kind of contribution to the deeper processes of life.
They think that the time spent sleeping is time gone to waste, so the less they sleep the better; the more quickly they reduce the amount of sleep, the better.
We have not even noticed that the cause behind all the illnesses, all the disorders that have entered man’s life is lack of sleep. The person who cannot sleep rightly cannot live rightly. Sleep is not a waste of time. The eight hours of sleep are not being wasted; rather, because of those eight hours, you are able to stay awake for sixteen hours.Otherwise you would not be able to stay awake all that time.
Sleep needs to come back into man’s life. Really, there is no alternative, no other step, for the psychological health of humanity than that sleep should be made compulsory by law for the next one or two hundred years.
It is very important for a meditator to see to it that he sleeps properly and enough.
And one more thing needs to be understood — right sleep will be different for everybody. It will not be equal because the body has needs which are different for everyone…according to age and to many other elements.
Perhaps you may not be aware that the latest research says that there cannot be one fixed time for everyone to wake up.
It is always said that to wake up at five o’clock in the morning is good for everyone. This is absolutely wrong and unscientific. It is not good for everyone; it may be good for some people but it may be harmful for other people.
Normally it is alright for everybody to wake up with the rising sun, because as the sun rises everyone’s temperature starts rising.
But this is not a rule, there are some exceptions. For some people it may be necessary to sleep a little later than sunrise, because each individual’s body temperature rises at a different time, at a different pace.
Whatever the gurus may say. There is no need to listen to them at all.
Many people who get up early in the morning go to hell and many people who get up late are living in heaven. None of this has any relation whatsoever to being spiritual or unspiritual. But right sleep certainly does have a relationship with it.
And everyone should make his own rules. No two persons are alike, so no common rule is ever applicable to anybody. Whenever someone tries to apply a common rule, it has a bad effect.
Each person is an individual. Each person is unique and incomparable.
~ Osho
The Inner Journey, Talk #3