Even the desire to become desireless is a desire, no less, points out OSHO who says that’s why we need

to wake up from our slumber

If you are filled with desire, your sorrows swell

Like the grass after the rain. But if you subdue desire,

your sorrows fall from you Like drops of water from a lotus flower.

This is good counsel and it is for everyone: As the grass is cleared for the fresh root,

cut down desire Lest death after death crush you as a river crushes the helpless reeds.

For if the roots hold firm, a felled tree grows up again.

If desires are not uprooted, sorrows grow again in you.

— Gautama Buddha in Dhammapada Gautama Buddha’s

Gautama Buddha’s most fundamental message to humanity is that man is asleep. Man is born asleep.

He is not talking about ordinary sleep;he is talking about a metaphysical sleep, a deep unconsciousness within you.You are acting out of that unconsciousness, so whatsoever you do goes wrong. It is impossible to do right with this unconsciousness within you.This unconsciousness perverts all of yourefforts; it leads you into wrong directions. Desire cannot be dropped unless you wake up.Millions of people have tried to drop desiring without waking up.

In fact, the very idea of dropping desire was another desire and nothing else. They heard from the buddhas,from the awakened ones that there is great peace if you drop desire, there is great bliss if desires wither away;that you will attain to eternity,that you will not know any birth,any death anymore; that you will become part of the universal celebration that goes on and on — if you drop desire. Millions became greedy, thinking that by dropping desire they will attain all these joys. Now, isn’t this is a new desire taking root in you? The desire for godliness, the desire for truth, the desire for liberation, the desire for becoming desireless, each of these is still a desire.You have misunderstood the whole point again.A new greed — religious greed — has taken possession of you. It is very difficult to drop desire; unless you wake up,you cannot drop desire. Desire is a natural phenomenon when you are asleep. 

Desire is dreaming and nothing else.When you wake up dreams disappear, and when you wake up desires disappear. Hence,it has to be understood:the real point is not to fight with your desires but to fight with your sleep.That is cutting the very root; otherwise you remain the same.You will function out of your unconsciousness and you will go on doing the same;it does not matter what it is. You are living in dreams.Why do you dream? You dream because there are so many desires unfulfilled, and to live with unfulfilled desires is painful. In your dream, you try to fulfil them; you create a false feeling of fulfilment. Hence,your dreams show much about you: what your desires are, what you want to become. The man who is awake knows there is nowhere to go, nothing to become. He is already that which he ever can become.Seeing the grandeur of his being, desires wither away on their own accord.You are not even expected to drop them; they drop by themselves, like dry leaves falling from the trees. Hence, Buddha never says ‘pray’; he says, ‘meditate’.What can you pray? You will always pray for something; it will be a desire.You can go to churches and temples and listen to people’s prayers, and you will be surprised: they are always asking and asking.

Their prayers are superficial. They had not gone there to thank God;their prayers are not full of gratitude but full of complaints. The Buddha says: Don’t be bothered with prayer,because you are asleep and your prayer is bound to be nothing but a desire.Your asceticism is bound to be nothing but an expression of your desire, nothing but a deep hedonism. Hence all religions talk about the joys and pleasures of heaven and paradise.These are allurements which draw people to places of worship. Go into silence,because silence creates the right space to wake up. Silence goes to the very centre of your being like an arrow and wakes you up. And when you are awake,your whole life is a prayer! Abridged from Dhammapada, The Way of the Buddha, courtesy Osho International Foundation, www.osho.com .