An OSHO meditation from the series 'Meditations for Busy People' ​

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When you make decisions based on your own inclinations, based on your own intuition ... in children the inner voice is very strong, but slowly, slowly it becomes weaker. The voices of parents and teachers, society and priests are getting louder and louder. If you want to find out what your voice is, you have to go through a lot of noise.

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Observe within yourself: what voice is this? Sometimes it's your father, sometimes it's your mother, sometimes it's your grandfather, sometimes it's your teacher ... these voices are all different. There is only one thing you will not be able to find easily - your own voice. It has always been suppressed. You have been taught to listen to the elderly, to listen to the priest, to listen to the teachers. You have never been told to listen to your own heart.

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You carry a quiet, little voice of your own, unheard, and in the many voices that have been forced upon you, it is almost impossible to find it. First you need to get rid of all the noisy voices and achieve a certain quality of stillness, peace and serenity. Only then will it happen, as a surprise for you, the realization that you also have your own voice. It was always there - like a subterranean current.

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If you haven't found your natural inclination, your life will be a long, long tragedy, from cradle to grave. The only people who have been blissful in the world are the people who have lived according to their own intuition and who have rebelled against every effort by others to impose their ideas on them. However valuable these ideas are, they are useless because they are not your ideas. The only meaningful idea is that which arises in you, grows in you, blossoms in you.

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Step 1: Who am I talking to, please?

Whatever you do, think, decide, ask yourself: Is that coming from me or is someone else speaking?

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You will be surprised when you find the real voice. Maybe it belongs to your mother; you will hear her speak again. Maybe you will find your father; it's not difficult to find out. Everything remains in you, recorded, exactly as it was given to you the first time - the advice, the order, the discipline or the regulation. You will likely find many people: the priests, the teachers, the friends, the neighbors and the relatives.

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You don't have to fight them. Just realize that it's not your own voice, but someone else's - whoever that someone is - you know you won't follow it. Whatever the consequences of that - good or bad - now you choose to be self-employed, you choose to be mature. You remained a child long enough. You've been addicted long enough. You listened to all of these voices and followed them long enough. And where did they take you? Into a mess.

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Step 2: thank you and goodbye!

Once you've identified whose voice you're watching, thank the person, ask them to be left alone and say goodbye to them.

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The person who gave you that voice wasn't your enemy. Your intention wasn't bad, but it doesn't matter what your intention was. She has burdened you with something that does not come from your inner source; and everything that comes from outside makes you a psychological slave.

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Once you have clearly said to a voice 'leave me alone', your connection with it, your identity with it, is broken. She was able to control you because you thought she was your own voice. The whole strategy determines the identity. Now you know what you are observing, is not your thoughts, is not your voice, this is something that is alien to your nature. Realizing that is enough. Get rid of the voices that are within you and soon you will be surprised to hear a quiet little voice that you have never heard before ... and then the sudden recognition of your own voice.

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It's always been there, but it's a very quiet little voice because it was suppressed when you were a very small child; the voice was very weak, just a seedling, and it was covered in all sorts of rubbish. And now you keep carrying this trash and you've forgotten the plant that is your life, that is still alive, that is waiting for you to discover it. Discover your voice and then follow it without fear.

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Wherever it takes you, there is the goal in your life, there is your destiny. Only there will you find fulfillment, satisfaction. Only there will you bloom - and in this blooming recognition takes place.

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Osho,  From Ignorance to Innocence, Talk # 13

Source: https://www.osho.com/de/meditation/meditation-for-busy-people/finding-your-own-voice

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