Why is the world the way it is? Why the suffering??

It is like this… if you are born healthy and have never been ill, you will never be aware of your health. You cannot be, because awareness of health needs a background of disease and illness. You will have to fall ill to know that you were healthy or what health is. The other pole will be needed. Eastern esoteric science says this is why the world is, so that you can experience that you are divine.

The world gives a contrast.

Go into a school, and you will see that the teacher is writing on a blackboard with white chalk. He can write on a white board too, but then it will be meaningless because it will be invisible, it won’t be seen. Only on a blackboard can one write with white chalk so that it is seen. The blackboard is a necessity for the white writing to become visible. The world is just a blackboard, and you become visible because of it.

This is an inherent polarity, and it is good.

That is why in the East we have never said that the world is bad; we take it just as a school, a training. It is good because only in contrast will you be able to know your purity. When you come into the world you become identified. With identification you enter; the world starts. So you will have to fall ill to know your inner health.

This has been a basic question all over the world: Why is this world there? Why is it at all? Many answers have been given, but those answers are just superfluous. Only this attitude seems to be very deep and meaningful – that the world is just a background; without it you cannot become aware of your inner consciousness.

To have a peak, a valley is needed.

– Excerpts from “The Book of Secrets” by OSHO.