I first heard of Osho, then called Bhagwan, through my mother-in-law, a crabby English woman who followed her son to Australia, for she employed a person to work in her garden once or twice a week. One day she complained that her ‘gardening boy’ was leaving. I liked him, and that day, we chatted for a while, and he told me he was going to India to meet a man he had heard of from a friend, Indivar, who was the inspiration for many to journey to meet Osho. The ‘gardening boy’ was called Samant Bhadra.

Time passed….

My marriage disintegrated, and I left my husband – and his mother – and sometime later, I was working in Perth and sharing a house with a group of friends. One of them, a tall, lanky fellow with the unusual name of Vimal, used to regularly turn out the lights in the living room in the evening and play music and dance… wild changing music, silence at the end, my first introduction to Kundalini Meditation. I began to also dance each day, in company with him and others who joined from our group – sometimes to the meditation music, sometimes to other music – and finally I became curious enough to ask what this was all about.

Mild interest began, but although I found the meditation enjoyable, there was no real inspiration for me; I was not even really aware that I was looking for anything. What was later to become a fire inside me was still dormant. The spark remained unlit. I looked at photos of Osho, and I was interested in the way of the folks around me who were already involved – a few who had already changed their names and begun to only wear orange – but I found they didn’t talk about Him unless they were directly invited.

More time passed, and one evening I went to a farewell party. Farewell to Swami Vimukta, who was off to travel to Poona the next day. We liked each other, and as life at that time was of a free and easy nature, I stayed the night with him.

This connection became the spark that lit the flame. Partway through the night, I took a good look at a photo of Osho at the end of the bed. And suddenly, this photo that I had seen before on a number of occasions came alive! Osho was laughing at me, laughing with me… laughing – and in that second I fell in love with Him and knew that I too was going to India.

With that conviction and total knowing, I headed down south to see my sister (now Ma Prem Sahaja), who was pregnant. She was expecting me to be around for the birth, so I felt quite nervous about telling her I was leaving on an adventure, heading off to India into an unknown future. To my surprise, she completely amazed me. She grabbed me, jumped up and down, and just went into utter joy for me. I didn’t even know she had any idea who Osho was.

But she was already in love with Him too.

The rest is history… My first true meeting with Osho was through a photograph. I was more than fortunate to meet him in person many times after that, and I could easily say that the most joyful times of my life were days spent cleaning: sweeping the roof of the big house he lived in, clearing the leaves from the mosaic tiles on the open roof – feeling as if I was sweeping the leaves in heaven.

Thank you, Osho, for giving me so much joy, for opening my heart, and for your unending love given so generously to all who came.

And thank you too, my mother-in-law, for through you I met my Master.

“I was reading a story just this morning. It is one of the most beautiful stories. One young seeker, after a long and arduous journey, reached the hut of his Master, the Master of his choice. It was evening, and the Master was just sweeping fallen leaves. The seeker greeted the Master, but the Master remained silent. He asked many questions, but there were no replies. He tried in every way to get the attention of the Master, but the Master was there as if he were alone. He went on sweeping the fallen leaves. Seeing no possibility of getting the attention of the Master, the disciple decided to make a hut in the same forest and to live there. He lived there for years. After a time, the past dropped, because in order for it to continue one has to go on creating it daily. You have to create your past again and again daily in order to continue it. But in the forest everything was silent. No man was there; only the Master was there who was just like ‘no- man’. There was no communication. He would not even reply to a greeting; he would not even look at the disciple. His eyes were just vacant, an emptiness.

So after a time, the past dissolved. The disciple continued to be there. Thoughts were there; then by and by they slowed down because you have to feed them daily for them to continue. If you do not feed them, they cannot continue forever. With nothing to do, he would relax, sit silently, sweep the fallen leaves. One day, after many years, he was sweeping the fallen leaves and he became Enlightened. He stopped everything, and he ran to the Master’s hut and went in. The Master was sweeping fallen leaves. The disciple said, ‘Thank you, Sir!’

Of course, the Master never replied. But this ‘thank you’ is beautiful. He went to the Master and said, ‘Thank you, Sir.’ Only because of this Master not replying to him – not giving any intellectual answers, not even looking at him, remaining so silent – only because of this did he learn something from the Master. He learned this silence; he learned this living in the centre without being bothered by the periphery.”

Osho, The Ultimate Alchemy, Vol. 2, Ch 7

From the book, Past the Point of No Return by Ma Anand Bhagawati