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Our next problem is that of knowledge. Is knowledge necessary to the understanding of truth? When I say "I know", the implication is that there is knowledge. Can such a mind be capable of investigating and searching out what is reality? And besides, what is it we know, of which we are so proud? Actually what is it we k... |
I do not know if you have ever thought of this problem of acquiring knowledge—whether knowledge does ultimately help us to love, to be free from those qualities which produce conflict in ourselves and with our neighbours ; whether knowledge ever frees the mind of ambition. Because ambition is, after all, one of the qua... |
Il is a very interesting (hing (o watch how in our lift: these two, knowledge and belief, play an extraordinarily powerful part. Look how we worship chose who have inunense knovs= ledge and erudition ! Can you understand the meaning of it ? If you would find something new, experience something which is not a projection... |
Our problem then, as I see it, is that we are bound, weighed down by belief, by knowledge; and is it possible Ibr a mind to be free {'rom yesterday and from the beliefs that have been acquired through the process of yesterday? Do you understand thc question? Is it possible {Or me as an individual and you as an individu... |
Is the mind capable of freedom from belief? You can only be free from it when you understand the inward nature of the causes that make you hold on to it, not only the conscious but the unconscious motives as well, that make you believe. After all, we are not merely a superficial entity functioning on the conscious leve... |
So our question is: ' 'Is it possible for the mind to be free from knowledge and belief?" Is not the mind made up of knowledge and belief? Is not the structure of the mind belief and knowledge? Belief and knowledge are the processes of recognition, the centre of the mind. The process is enclosing, the process is consci... |
A mind that would be in a state in which the new can take place—whether it be the truth, whether it be God, or what you will must surely cease to acquire, to gather; it must put aside all knowledge. A mind burdened with knowledgc cannot possibly understand, surely, that which is real, which is not measurable. |
EFFORT |
OR MOST OF Us, our whole life is based on effort, some kind of volition. We cannot conceive of an action without volition, without effort; our life is based on it. Our social, economic and so-called spiritual life is a series of efforts, always culminating in a certain result. And we think effort is essential, necessar... |
Why do we make effort? Is it not, put simply, in order to achieve a result, to become something, to reach a goal ? If we do not make an effort, we think we shall stagnate. We have an idea about the goal towards which we are constantly striving; and this striving has become part of our life. If we want to alter ourselve... |
Is not all such effort the activity of the self? Is not effort self-centred activity? If we make an effort from the centre of the self, it must inevitably produce more conflict, more confusion, more misery. Yet we keep on making effort after effort. Very few of us realize that the self-centred activity of effort does n... |
I think we shall Understand the significance of life, if we understand what it means to make an effort. Does happiness come through effort? Have you ever tried to be happy? It is impossible, is it not? You struggle to be happy and there is no happiness, is there? Joy does not come through suppression, through control o... |
Does not effort mean a struggle to change what is into what is not, or into what it should be or should become ? That is we are constantly struggling to avoid facing what is, or we are trying to get away from it or to transform or modify what is. A man who is truly content is the man who understands what is, gives the ... |
So we see that effort is a strife or a stiuggle to transform that which is into something which you wish it to be. I am only talking about psychological struggle, not the struggle with a physical problem, like engineering or some discovery or transformation which is purely technical. I am only talking of that struggle ... |
and battle are not understood and the psychologica, overtones and currents are not overcome, the structure of society, however marvellously built, is bound to crash, as has happened over and over again. |
Effort is a distraction from what is. The moment I accept what is there is no struggle. Any form of struggle or strife is an indication of distraction; and distraction, which is effort, must exist so long as psychologically I wish to transform what is into something it is not. |
First we must be free to see that joy and happiness do not come through effort. Is creation through effort, or is there creation only with the cessation of effort? When do you write, paint or sing? When do you create? Surely when there is no effort, when you are completely open, when on all levels you are in complete c... |
Perhaps in understanding the question of creativeness we shall be able to understand what we mean by effort. Is creativeness the outcome of effort, and are we aware in those moments when we are creative? Or is creativeness a sense of total self-forgetfulness, that sense when there is no turmoil, when one is wholly unaw... |
To understand the state of being without strife, that state of creative existence, surely one must inquire into the whole problem of effort. We mean by effort the striving to fulfil oneself, to become something, don't we? I am this, and I want to become that; I am not that, and I must become that. In becoming 'that', t... |
struggle. In this struggle we are concerned inevitably with fulfilment thfough the gaining of an end; we seek selffulfilment in an object, in a person, in an idea, and that demands constant battle, struggle, the effort to become, to fulfil. So we have taken this effort as inevitable; and I wonder if it is inevitable—th... |
Now why is there the desire to fulfil oneself? Obviously, the desire to fulfil, to become something, arises when there is awareness of being nothing. Because I am nothingj because I am insumcient, empty, inwardly poor, I struggle to become something; outwardly or inwardly I struggle to fulfil myself in a person, in a t... |
Now if one does not make an effort .to run away, what happens ? One lives with that loneliness, that emptiness; and in accepting that emptiness one will find that there comes a creative state which has nothing to do with strife, with effort. Effort exists only so long as we are trying to avoid that inward loneliness, e... |
But when there is understanding of what is, which is emptiness, inward insuffciency, when one lives with that insufficiency and understands it fully, there comes creative reality, creative intelligence, which alone brings happiness. |
Therefore action as we know it is really reaction, it is a ceaseless becoming, which is the denial, the avoidance of what is; but when there is awareness of emptiness without choice, without condemnation or justification, then in that understanding of what is there is action, and this action is creative being. You will... |
will find that strife, battle, the conflict of becoming, leads to pain, to sorrow and ignorance. It is only if you are aware of inward insumciency and live with it without escape, accepting it wholly, that you will discover an extraordinary tranquillity, a tranquillity which is not put together, made up, but a tranquil... |
WE SEE CONTRADICTION in us and about us; because we are in contradiction, there is lack of peace in us and therefore outside us. There is In us a constant state of denial and assertion—what we want to be and what we are. The state of contradiction creates conflict and this conflict does not bring about peace—which is a... |
Now what do we mean by conflict, by contradiction ? Why is there a contradiction in me?—this constant struggle to be something apart from what I am. I am this, and I want to be that. This contradiction in us is a fact, not a metaphysical dualism. Metaphysics has no significance in understanding what is. We may discuss,... |
The problem is this. Seeing that conflict is destructive, wasteful, why is it that in each of us there is contradiction ? To understand that, we must go a little further. Why is there the sense of opposing desires? I do not know if we are aware of it in ourselves—this contradiction, this sense of wanting and not wantin... |
What do we mean by contradiction ? Does it not imply an impermanent state which is being opposed by another impermanent state? I think I have a permanent desire, I posit in myself a permanent desire and another desire arises which contradicts it; this contradiction brings about conflict, which is waste. That is to say ... |
This constant becoming, arriving at one state after another, brings about contradiction, does it not? Therefore, why not look at life not as one permanent desire but as a series of fleeting desires always in opposition to each other ? Hence the mind need not be in a state of contradiction. If I regard life not as a per... |
Contradiction arises only when the mirid has a fixed point of desire; that is when the mind does not regard all desire as moving, transient, but seizes upon one desire and makes that into a permanency—only then, when other desires arise, is there contradiction. But all desires are in constant movement, there is no fixa... |
Now what brings about contradiction in each one of us ? Surely it is the desire to become something, is it not? We all want to become something: to become sucbessful in the world and, inwardly, to achieve a result. So long as we think in terms of time, in terms of achievement, in terms of position, there must be contr... |
Therefore it is essential, is it not ? , to understand the whole process of our' thinking, for it is there that we find contradiction. Thought itself has become a contradiction because we have not understood the total process of ourselves; and that understanding is possible only when we are fully aware of our thought, ... |
So long as we are trying to achieve a psychological result, so long as we want inward security, there must be a contradiction in our life. I do not think that most of us are aware of this contradiction; or, if we åre, we do not see its real significance. On the contrary, contradiction gives us an impetus to live; the v... |
To be fully aware of the present is an extraordinarily diffcult task because the mind is incapable of facing a fact directly without deception. Thought is the product of the past and therefore it can only think in terms of the past or of the future; it cannot be completely aware of a fact in the present. So long as tho... |
To be free of contradiction, one must be aware of the present without choice. How can there be choice when you are confronted with a fact? Surely the unde!standing of the fact is made impossible so long as thought is trying to operate upon the fact in terms of becoming, changing, altering. Therefore self-knowledge is t... |
Thus, so long as there is a pattern of thought, contradiction will continue; to put an end to the pattern, and so to contradiction, there must be self-knowledge, This understanding of the self is not a process reserved for the few. The self is to be understood in our everyday speech, in the way we think and feel, in th... |
WHAT IS THE SELF ? |
Do WE KNOW WHAT we mean by the self? By that, I mean the idea, the memory, the conclusion, the experience, the various forms of nameable and unnameable intentions, the conscious endeavour to be or not to be, the accumulated memory of the unconscious, the racial, the group, the individual, the clan, and the whole of i... |
It seems to me that it is important to understand how experience strengthens the self. If we are earnest, we should understand this problem of experience. Now what- do we mean by experience? We have experience all the time, impressions ; and we translate those impressions, and we react or act according to them; we are ... |
According to my memories, I react to whatever I see, to whatever I feel. In this process of reacting to what I see, what I feel, what I know, what I believe, experience is taking |
place, is it not? Reaction, response to something seen, is experience. When I see you, I react; the naming of that reaction is experience. If I do not name that reaction it is not an experience. Watch your own responses and what is taking place about you. There is no experience unless there is a naming process going on... |
Then there is the projection of various desires. I desire to be protected, to have security inwardly; or I desire to have a Master, a guru, a teacher, a God; and I experience that which I have projected; that is I have. projected a desire which has taken a form, to which I have given a name; to that I react. It is my p... |
When I desire silence of the mind, what is taking place ? What happens? I see the importance of having a silent mind, a quiet mind, for various reasons; because the Upanishads have said so, religious scriptures have said so, saints have said it, and also occasionally I myself feel how good it is to be quiet, because my... |
I want to understand what is truth; that is my desire, my longing; then there follows my projection of what I consider to be the truth, because I have read lots about it; I have heard many people talk about it; religious scriptures have described it. I want all that. What happens ? The very want, the very desire is pro... |
So experience is always strengthening the 'me'. The more you are entrenched in your experience, the more does the self get strengthefiéd. As a result of this, you have a certain strength of character, strength of knowledge, of belief, which you display to other people because you know they are not as clever as you are,... |
Is it possible for the mind, for the self, not to project, not to desire, not to experience? We see that all experiences of the self are a negation, a destruction, and yet we call them positive action, don't we? That is what we call the positive way of life. To undo this whole process is, to you, negation. Are you rig... |
All the various forms of discipline, belief and knowledge surely only strengthen the self. Can we find an element which will dissolve the self?' Or is that a wrong question? That is what we want basically. We want to find something which will dissolve the 'me', do we not? We think there are various means, namely, ident... |
Is it possible for the self to be completely absent now ? You know it is possible. What are the necessary ingredients, requirements? What is the element that brings it about? Can I find it? When I put that question "Can I find it?" surely I am convinced that it is possible; so I have already created an experience in wh... |
So how is it possible for the self not to experience ? One can see that the state of creation is not at all the experience of the self. Creation is when the selfis not there, because creation is not intellectual, is not of the mind, is not self-projected, is something beyond all experiencing. So is it possible for the ... |
Is there an entity apart from the self, which looks at the self and dissolves the self? Is there a spiritual entity which supersedes the self and destroys it, which puts it aside? We think there is, don't we? Most religious people think there is such an .element. The materialist says, "It is impossible for the self t... |
Is there such an element to dissolve the self? Please see what we are doing. We are forcing the self into a corner. If you allow yourself to be forced into the corner, you will see what will happen. We should like there to be an element which is timeless, which is not of the self, which, we hope, will come and interced... |
But when the mind seeks a timeless spiritual state which will go into action in order to destroy the self, is that not another form of experience which is strengthening the 'me' ? When you believe, is that not what is actually taking place ? When you believe that there is truth, God, the timeless state, immortality, is... |
When you see the whole process, the cunning, extraordinary inventions, the intelligence of the self, how it covers itself up through identification, through virtue, through experience, through belief, through knowledge; when you see that the mind is moving in a circle, in a cage of its own making, what happens? When yo... |
Reality, truth, is not to be recognized. For truth to come, belief, knowledge, experiencing, the pursuit of virtue—all this must go. The virtuous person who is conscious of pursuing virtue can never find reality. He may be a very decent person; but that is entirely different from being a man of truth, a man who underst... |
wHAT IS FEAR ? Fear can exist only in relation to something, not in isolatiÖn. How can I be afraid of death, how can I be afraid of something I do not know? I can be afraid only of what I know. When I say I am afraid of death, am I really afraid of the unknown, which is death, or am I afraid of losing what I have known... |
My inquiry now is how to be free from the fear of the known, which is the fear of losing my family, my reputation, my Character, my bank account, my appetites and so on. You may say that fear arises from conscience; but your conscience is formed by your conditioning, so conscience is still the result of the known. What... |
There is fear of pain. Physical pain is a nervous response, but psychological pain arises when I hold on to things that give me satisfaction, for then I am afraid of anyone or anything that may take them away from me. The psychological accumulations prevent psychological pain as long as they are undisturbed ; that is I... |
experiences, which prevent any serious form of disturbance —and I do not want to be disturbed. Therefore I am afraid of anyone who disturbs them. Thus my fear is of the known, I am afraid of the accumulations, physical or psychological, that I have gathered as a means of warding off pain or preventing sorrow. But sorro... |
Fear exists so long as there is accumulation of the known, which creates the fear of losing. Therefore fear of the unknown is feally fear of losing the accumulated known. Accumulation invariably means fear, which in turn means pain; and the moment I say "1 must not lose" there is fear. Though my intention in accumulati... |
The seed of defence brings offence. I want physical security; thus I create a sovereign government, which necessitates armed forces, which means war, which destroys security. Wherever there is a desire for self-protection, there is fear. When I see the fallacy of demanding security I do not accumulate any more. If you... |
Fear exists in the process of accumulation and belief in something is part of the accumulative process. My son dies, and I believe in reincarnation to prevent me psychologically from having more pain; but, in the very process of believing, there is doubt. Outwardly I accumulate things, and bring war; inwardly I accumul... |
Fear comes into being when I desire to be in a particular pattern. To live without fear means to live without a particular pattern. When I demand a particular way of living. that in itself is a source of fear. My diffculty is my desire to live in a certain frame. Can I not break the frame? I can do so only when I' see ... |
Fear finds various escapes. The common variety is identification, is it not ?—identification with the country, with the society, with an idea. Haven't you noticed how you respond when you see a procession, a military procession or a religious procession, or when the country is in danger of being invaded ? You then iden... |
Identification therefore is a form of escape from the self, even as virtue is a form of escape from the self. The man who pursues virtue is escaping from the self and' he has a narrow mind. That is not a virtuous mind, for virtue is something which cannot be pursued. The more you try to become virtuous, the more stren... |
Do we now know what fear is ? Is it not the non-acceptance of what is? •We must understand the word 'acceptance'. I am not using that word as meaning the effort made to accept. There is no question of accepting when I perceive what is. When I do not see clearly what is, then I ,bring in the process of acceptance. There... |
There is understanding and freedom from the self only when I can look at it completely and integrally as a whole; and I can do that only when I understand the whole process of all activity born of desire which is the very expression of thought—for thought is not different from desire—without justifying it, without cond... |
I WOULD LIKE TO discuss what is simplicity, and perhaps from that arrive at the discovery of sensitivity. We seem to think that simplicity is merely an outward expression, a withdrawal: having few possessions, wearing a loin-cloth, having no home, putting on few clothes, having a small bank account. Surely that is not ... |
Simplicity is not merely adjustment to a pattern. It requires a great deal of intelligence to be simple and not merely conform to a particular pattern, however worthy outwardly. Unfortunately most of us begin by being simple externally, in outward things. It is comparatively easy to have few things and to be satisfied ... |
which is fundamental, real, can only come into being inwardly; and from that there is an outward expression. How to be simple, then, is the problem; because that simplicity makes one more and more sensitive. A sensitive mind, a sensitive heart, is essential, for then it is capable of quick perception, quick reception. |
One can be inwardly simple, surely, only by understanding the innumerable impediments, attachments, fears, in which one is held. But most of us like to be held—by people, by possessions, by ideas. We like to be prisoners. Inwardly we are prisoners, though outwardly we seem to be very simple. Inwardly we are prisoners... |
There is an extraordinary freedom when one understands the whole process of belief, why the mind is attached to a belief. When there is freedom from beliefs, there is simplicity. But that simplicity requires intelligence, and to be intelligent one must be aware of one's own impediments. To be aware, one must be constan... |
Therefore one must begin within—not exclusively, not rejecting the outer. You come to the inner, surely, by understanding the outer, by finding out how the conflict, the struggle, the pain, exists outwardly; as one investigates it more and more, naturally one comes into the psychological states which produce the outwar... |
The outward expression is only an indication of our inward state, but to understand the inward state one must approach through the outer. Most of us do that. In understanding the inner—not exclusively, not by rejecting the outer, but by understanding the outer and so coming upon the inner —we will find that, as we pro... |
Our problems—social, environmental, political;. religious —are so complex that we can solve them only by being simple, not by becoming extraordinarily erudite and clever. A simple person sees much more directly, has a more direct experience, than the complex person. Our minds are so crowded with an infinite knowledge ... |
Without being simple, one cannot be sensitive—to the trees, to the birds, to the mountains, to the wind, to all the things which are going on about us in the world; if one is not simple one cannot be sensitive to the inward in•timation of things. Most of us live so superficially, on the upper level of our consciousness... |
Knowledge is not going to solve our problems. You may know, for example, that there is reincarnation, that there is a continuity after death. You may know, I don't say you do; or you may be convinced of it. But that does not solve the problem. Death cannot be shelved by your theory, or by information, or by conviction.... |
One must have the capacity to investigate all these things anew; because it is only through direct experience that our problems are solved, and to have direct experience there must be simplicity, which means there must be sensitivity. A mind is made dull by the weight of knowledge. A mind is made dull by the past, by t... |
Thus a religious man is not really one who puts on a robe or a loin-cloth, or lives on one meal a day, or has taken innumerable vows to be this and not to be that, but is he who is inwardly simple, who is not becoming anything. Such a mind is capable of extraordinary receptivity, because there is no barrier, there is ... |
A problem can be solved only when we approach it thus. We cannot approach it anew if we are thinking in terms of certain patterns of thought, religious, political or otherwise, So we must be free of all these things, to be simple. That is why it is so important to be aware, to have the capacity to understand the proces... |
To KNOW OURSELVES means to know our relationship with the world—not only with the world of ideas and people, but also with nature, with the things we possess. That is our life—life being relationship to the whole. Does the understanding of that relationship demand specialization? Obviously not. What it demands is aware... |
How is one to be aware? How are we aware of anything? How are you aware of your relationship with æ person ? How are you aware of the trees, the call of a bird ? How are you aware of your reactions when you read a newspaper? Are we aware of the superficial responses of the mind, as well as the inner responses? How are ... |
So through identification you have pleasure and pain. And our 'capacity' is this concern with pleasure and the avoidance of pain, is it not? If you are interested in something, if it gives you pleasure, there is 'capacity' immediately ; there is an awareness of that fact immediately; and if it is painful the 'capacity'... |
When you are aware, you see the whole process of your thinking and action; but it can happen only when there is no condemnation. When I condemn something, I do not understand it, and it is one way of avoiding any kind of understanding. I think most of us do that purposely; we condemn immediately and we think we have un... |
After all, if you want to understand something, you have to be in a passive mood, do you not? You cannot keep on thinking about it, speculating about it or questioning it. You have to be sensitive enough to receive the content of it. |
It is like being a sensitive photographic plate. If I want to understand you, I have to be passively aware; then you begin to tell me all your story. Surely that is not a question of capacity or specialization. In that process we begin to understand ourselves—not only the superficial layers of our consciousness, but th... |
Is intelligence a matter of specialization ?—intelligence being the total awareness of our process. And is that in telligence to be cultivated through any form of specialization ? Because that is what is happening, is it not ? The priest, the doctor, the engineer, the industrialist, the business man, the professor—we ... |
To realize the highest form of intelligence—which is truth, which is God, which cannot be described—to realize that, we think we have to make ourselves specialists. We study, we grope, we search out; and, with the mentality of the specialist or looking to the specialist, we study ourselves in order to develop a capac... |
Our problem is, if we are at all aware, whether the conflicts and the miseries ang the sorrows of -our daily existence can be solved by another; and if they cannot, how is it possible for us to tackle them? To understand a problem obviously requires a certain intelligence, and that intelligence cannot be derived from O... |
which is not sleep, but extreme alertness—the problem has quite a different significance; which means there is no longer identification with the problem and therefore there is no judgement and hence the problem begins to reveal its content. If you are able to do that constantly, continuously, then every problem can be ... |
What is important, surely, is to be aware without choice, because choice brings about conflict. The chooser is in confusion, therefore he chooses; if he is not in confusion, there is no choice. Only the person who is confused chooses what he shall do or shall not do. The man who is clear and simple does not choose; wha... |
The important thing, therefore, is to be aware from moment to moment without accumulating the. experience which awareness brings; because, the moment you accumulate, you are aware only according to that accumulation, according to that pattern, according to that experience. That is your awareness is conditioned by your ... |
Life is a matter of relationship; and to understand that relationship, which is not static, there must be an awareness which is pliable, an awareness which is alertly passive, not aggressively active. As I said, this passive awareness does not come through any form of discipline, through any practice. It is to be just ... |
FOR MOST OF Us, desire is quite a problem: the desire for property, for position, for power, for comfort, for immortality, for continuity, the desire to be loved, to have something permanent, satisfying, lasting, something which is beyond time. Now, what is desire ? What is this thing that is urging, compelling us? I a... |
Is it not, therefore, important to find out what is desire and whether it can be transformed? What is desire? Is it not the symbol and its sensation? Desire is sensation with the object of its attainment. Is there desire without a symbol and its sensation? Obviously not. The symbol may be a picture, a person, a word, a... |
With one form of pleasure I am fed up, tired, bored, so I seek a new sensation, a new idea, a new symbol. I reject the old sensation and take on a new one, with new words, new significances, new experiences. I resist the old and yield to the new which I consider to be higher, nobler, more satisfying. Thus in desire the... |
If I observe the whole process of desire in myself I see that there is always an object towards which my mind is directed for-further sensation, and that in this process there is involved resistance, temptation and discipline. There is perception, sensation, contact and desire, and the mind becomes the mechanical instr... |
When I am aware of this whole structure of desire, I see how my mind has become a dead centre, a mechanical process of memory. Having tired of one desire, I automatically want to fulfil myself in another. My mind is always experiencing in terms of sensation, it is the instrument of sensation. Being bored with a particu... |
If we have gone into it at all deeply we are familiar with this process; and. we seem to be incapable of going beyond. We want to go beyond, because we are tired of this endless routine, this mechanical pursuit of sensation; so the mind projects the idea of truth, of God ; it dreams of a vital change and of playing a p... |
Our problem, therefore, is to understand desire—not how far it should go or where it should come to an end, but to understand the whole process of desire, the cravings, the longings, the burning appetites. Most of us think that possessing very little indicates freedom from desire—and how we worship those who have but f... |
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