Osho #30: Emptiness

On first thought, emptiness conjures thoughts of being without. My cup runneth over can't really happen if your cup is empty. The gas tank is empty, fill it. The bank account approaches zero, next paycheck replenishes it. "I'm feeling empty inside" isn't typically stated as a positive way to feel. Ahhh, but why not?

I challenge that emptiness is to be sought, valued, and guarded. An empty room may seem stark and cold to some, but isn't it really anything you want it to be? It's open for you to create. It doesn't have to be filled with furniture to be useful. An empty room offers space, possibility, openess. Maybe it's left exactly as is... it's a place to walk into and feel completely uninhibited, most decidedly NOT surrounded by all the crap that typically would fill it. Maybe it's a yoga studio. Maybe it's where cartwheels are perfected. Maybe it's a spot for a trampoline. Or, maybe it does become a more *normal* room. Regardless, emptiness opens the doors to all sorts of possibilities. YOU decide what goes in there.

Why can't a full life mean a life with a lot of emptiness? A life with a lot of freedom, filled with things that touch us & have meaning vs. *things* that simply fill a space. Think about music. Music doesn't pick up its bags and move on in, filling up emptiness; rather it flows into & through us as waves and sure as hell makes itself known. It can enter as sound and simply stay in the ear to be heard if we offer no open paths, bouncing back from whence it came. But if we allow some emptiness, it will find these open pathways and be heard, yes, but also felt, resonating into our awareness. Sometimes it scrapes the walls & causes pain, tears, anger. Other times it glides gently through offering love, joy, contentment. Either way, it leaves our open paths intact, whispering an entry into our memory, then leaving us with the most intoxicating emptiness to be explored over and over and over again.