Innocent laughter

So if you know life, you know that life is not serious at all. Religious people have made it serious because they are anti-life. But to me, that is not religion at all. That is just a metaphysics for suicide. To me, religion means a very non-serious attitude: very childlike, very innocent…

If I tell a joke, I create tension in you, expectation. curiosity. What is going to happen? How will it turn out? You become tense with expectation. You become serious, your mind begins to work. How is the joke going to end? if it ends just as you expected it to, you will not laugh because then there is no release. But if the end turns out to be completely unimagined, if it is a complete turnabout; if you never expected that this could be the end, then the tension that has been brought to a climax is released. You laugh. But the laughter is not innocent because it is just a release of tension. Every joke has to create a tension in you. Then, when you laugh, you feel released.

Innocent laughter is something very different. It is not a release mechanism, it is a way of living.

It is just a way of living! Take laughing as a way of living. Exist as laughter, you will be absolutely nonserious. It may be that you will not be able to achieve anything, but what is the meaning of achievement? Even one who achieves—what does he achieve? Even when achieving, nothing is achieved… This I call a religious mind: nonserious, playful, innocent—without any struggle.

- Osho, Credit


Be as intelligent as serpent, but be as innocent as dove. - Jesus Christ, Secret Gospel