Equanimity

[Magnus_Anderson]

Osho was a Buddhist and he was far from an Apollonian. Everything points to the fact that he was a notorious Dionysian, very absorbed in the sensual.

Consider Chapter No. 5 in his book “From Sex to Superconsciousness”:
balbro.com/s2s/s2s2.htm

The chapter is titled “From repression to emancipation”.

Here’s an excerpt:

First of all, we have to recognize sex and understand it; we have to comprehend this elemental urge. Only then can we strive to transcend it, to sublimate it, so we can reach the stage of celibacy. Without understanding this basic life-force in all its forms and facets, all man’s efforts to restrain and suppress it will only help him degenerate into a sick and incoherent lunatic. But we do not concentrate on the basic illness, we spout the high ideal of celibacy. Man has never been so sick, so neurotic, so wretched or so unhappy. Man is completely perverted. He is poisoned at the root.

[…]

If we are observant, we will see that a lot of poison has accumulated in man. Perhaps it is because of his quack doctors, but the foremost reason is his refusal to accept what is natural in him, his refusal to accept his fundamental being. We have tried to curb and annihilate our inborn urges in vain; no attempts are made to transform them, to elevate them. We have forced ourselves to control that energy in a wrong way. That energy is bubbling in us like molten lava; it is always pushing from inside: if we are not careful, it may topple us at any moment. And do you know what happens when it gets the slightest opening?

[…]

People were shocked when I spoke about sex at the first meeting last month, in Bombay. I received many angry letters asking me not to talk in this fashion, letters saying I should not speak on this subject at all. I wonder why one should not discuss this subject? When this urge is already inherent in us, why should we not talk about it? Unless we can understand its behavior, can analyze it, how can we hope to raise it to a higher plane? By understanding it we can transform it, we can conquer it, we can sublimate it. Unless that happens, we will die and still we will be unable to free ourselves from the grip of sex.

[Pandora]

Another guru. Osho said pretty things but engaged in destructive behavior. He:

1. Used drugs (Valium and nitrous oxide)
2. Committed suicide
3. Drove his last girlfriend to suicide
4. Insisted on abortion of his pregnant girlfriends

He also exhibited self-aggrandizing paranoic ideas (the government was out to get him because of his ‘transformational’ and ‘liberating’ ideas). If life is so wonderful, as he claimed, why be so destructive yourself? If he’s sensual, it’s also a destructive and selfish type of sensuality. This is also why you can’t trust drug users, no matter how enlightened or insightful they are. Their words and actions often don’t match. If the view eventually leads to self destruction (and likely originates from it), whether physical or psychological, how is it a superior view, if only for a high that it gives, which would make it akin to any feel-good drug? And originally driven by what? Overwhelming joy and happiness? I think not. Through words, he gave people what they wanted, on a shiny platter, but he couldn’t hide his own true nature which betrayed his facade. Anyway, this is my take on him, and this is also why I’m wary of Nietzche as well.

[Magnus_Anderson]

How is that relevant?

[Pandora]

You brought up another cult leader in this thread. Why?
Why do such shady characters keep showing up in this thread?

Buddhism, and its idea of equanimity is used today as a weapon of compassion baiting, or using compassion as a form of passive aggression, and you have to be wary of that. It’s not innocent.
It’s now used to pursue rainbow agenda and normalize victimhood and passivity, all of which are portrayed as positive aspects of Buddhism. Sensitivity, tolerance, forgiveness, generosity, selflessness, understanding, equanimity, blah, blah, all seeen in Buddhism as values to live by. If you go that way, I will assume you have already sought your own end.