Krishnamurti Subtitles home


AM71T1 - Change without analysis
Amsterdam - 22 May 1971
Public Talk 1



0:00 This is J. Krishnamurti’s first public talk in Amsterdam, 1971.
0:08 Krishnamurti: What shall we talk about?
0:15 Because there are so many problems.
0:24 Human beings right round the world seem to have insoluble problems, crisises, and a great deal of suffering, and not only a battle within themselves but also outwardly.
0:55 We are confused human beings. We don’t know to whom to turn to.
1:08 The churches, the organised religions, with their beliefs and dogmas and rituals, have completely failed.
1:24 Social structure with its morality, which is utterly immoral, has lost its significance.
1:44 Education has made us more mechanical, perhaps able to earn money, hold on to a job.
2:07 And politically we are divided, nation against nation, people against people.
2:22 And everywhere, not only in this country, in America, in India, in the rest of the world, we are lost, confused, uncertain.
2:46 And we wait for somebody else to do all our thinking, to find a way out of our present and consistent chaos and mess.
3:09 I think this is a fact, not a theory, not a speculative assertion, but an actual state the world is in, not only outwardly but also inwardly, both psychologically and environmentally.
3:46 Observing all this, what is going on within ourselves and what is going on around us – the pollution, the hatred, the violence, the brutality of our relationship with each other – when one observes all this, not intellectually or emotionally but actually see clearly what’s going on, what is a human being to do?
4:55 What is one to do, you and I?
5:03 And unable to solve this complex problem of existence we turn to some theory, philosophy – which means really, the love of truth not speculative inventions of beliefs and ideas and hypothesis, but to search out, to enquire deeply into what is truth in all this awful mess and confusion.
5:56 Not to be caught in any belief, not to be caught in any theory, in some assertive dogmatism, but to enquire, to find out whether man, you, can ever be free totally from all this misery, confusion, conflict and sorrow.
6:46 And to enquire sanely, rationally – not neurotically, not from any fixed point of view, not with any conclusion previously determined, but to look into all this demands a free mind.
7:30 I think that is the first thing to understand, at least if you are listening to the speaker, that there must be freedom to inquire.
7:53 And you cannot possibly be free if you’re prejudiced, if you have a conclusion, if you think along a particular pattern of thought.
8:13 You’re not free to look if you are committed to a particular social activity, a particular form of utopia or a particular conclusion, religious or otherwise.
8:48 And so as most of us are conditioned by the culture in which we live, that culture which we have created, put together, whether you are a Dutchman, a Catholic, a Protestant or a Hindu or a Muslim or what you will, communist, Mao, you know, all the rest of it – if you are conditioned, as we are heavily, not only by the culture in which we live but also by our own peculiar tendencies, by our own particular experiences, desires, by our own corruptions.
9:59 If we are to examine all this chaotic mess and contradiction our minds must be totally free, otherwise you cannot possibly understand or act comprehensively, harmoniously.
10:27 I think that is a fairly obvious fact – not a theory, not something brought over from the Orient, a romantic speculative assertion, but a reality that… if you would examine the whole problem of existence, the mind, in which is included the brain, the heart and the whole organism, must be free and totally harmonious, otherwise it cannot possibly see very clearly.
11:30 That’s clear, isn’t it? That if we are to enquire and find a way out of this mess in which we are… have the capacity to observe actually what is going on without any distortion.
11:59 And that is our problem. And I think that’s the only problem, because if you are able to look clearly, without any distortion, without any particular commitment, but be committed totally to the whole problem of existence, then perhaps we shall be able to resolve not only outwardly but inwardly, not only at the conscious level but at the deeper, hidden levels of our being.
13:03 Because we are going to share together this investigation.
13:22 We are going to partake together this whole question of investigation and finding out the right answer to our present and consistent, continuous chaos and misery and sorrow.
13:55 So, we must establish between you and the speaker a communication, not only verbally but non-verbally.
14:21 That is, we must not only understand the meaning of the words which we are using but also have a non-verbal attention so that we can share together, commune together, understand together – otherwise it’ll be utterly useless, won’t it?
15:04 You’ll hear a series of talks, if you’re interested, agree or disagree according to your own particular fancy, prejudice, inclination, and nothing will be understood.
15:35 Whereas if we could this morning together – and that’s the whole issue, together – share together – therefore it’s as much your responsibility as that of the speaker, much more yours to see that we actually together investigate, understand, act.
16:21 We cannot act together, and a co-operative action is essential because the world as it is has to be totally changed.
16:44 There must be a revolution. You know, that word ‘revolution’ has been so misused.
17:01 We think a revolution is a matter of physical revolution, throwing bombs, upsetting the present state of affairs, the establishment, the present culture.
17:19 We always think that by changing the environment, by some miraculous means everything will be all right.
17:36 But unfortunately that doesn’t happen. You may be able to change a particular structure by violent means but after changing it you are still what you are – corrupt, unhappy, conflict, frustrated, seeking your own personal security and using the system, however marvellous that system be, to conform to your particular desires and ambitions and envies.
18:25 And again that’s fairly clear, an obvious fact.
18:33 And, as we said, the present structure of morality is totally immoral.
18:48 The social morality or the religious morality is not moral at all.
19:05 And observing all this, that you are the world and the world is you – you have created this culture, the structure, the environment in which one lives – and to change that environment, and it needs to be changed, you have to change yourself radically.
19:48 A psychological revolution is far greater that the physical revolution.
20:02 To change the ways of our thinking, the patterns of belief, conduct, the way we live – self-centred, limited, narrow, petty, full of anxiety, of fear – and as long as that exists we will create a world, that is the world around us, which will conform to our particular pattern of living.
20:45 So if one realises, not intellectually, not verbally, but actually feel it with all your being, intensely, passionately, that you are the world and the world is you, and to change the environment you must change yourself completely.
21:22 Now here comes the problem: how to change.
21:33 Are we communicating with each other? Yes? We are sharing, we are journeying together? Not only verbally but non-verbally. Because words are not the thing – that which is described is not... the description is not the described.
22:07 So, our question is then, how is a human mind which has been so heavily conditioned – as Catholic, Protestant, Hindu, communist, you know, heavily conditioned – how is that mind which has been shaped by time – is it possible for that mind to change at all?
23:01 If it is not possible then we live in a prison of confusion.
23:11 However much you may decorate that prison it is still a prison.
23:20 And if you cannot be free from the psychological mess one is in then you must invent an agency outside you – a political agency, law, or so-called spiritual agency, God, if you must have that word – who will help you to change.
24:03 I hope we are following each other.
24:14 If you as a mortal, caught in the trap of this existence, with its violence, with its chicanery, with its brutality, wars, struggle, envy, anxiety, fear, if that cannot be totally changed then you must have or depend on something outside of you.
24:52 Man has tried this – he says: I can’t change.
24:59 I do my best. I’m weak. I have not the vitality, the energy, the capacity or the passion, the intensity.
25:17 And some guru, some teacher, some saviour, some outside agency, political or otherwise, will help me, will help the human mind to bring about the radical revolution.
25:45 So when you depend on an outside agency then you are still in conflict because you are conforming to the authority established by the outside agency.
26:02 Right? Are we going together? And if you deny total authority, as most people are inclined – perhaps not expressing it openly, but as the present generation, the younger generation doesn’t want any... have any authority – they want to do what they like – and to do what one likes without any authority leads to greater confusion if you don’t understand authority.
27:13 So we have to understand together this problem of authority.
27:27 That’s one of our major problems in life.
27:34 The authority of the policeman, the authority of law, the authority of a community, the authority of the Church, the religion, the authority, if you brush all that aside, the authority that one establishes for oneself – I will and I will not.
28:18 So one has to comprehend together, because life exists only in relationship, otherwise there is no life at all.
28:41 And to understand this question of authority is one of the most difficult things, because we want somebody to tell us what to do – the guru, the teacher, whether that teacher is in this country or in romantic India, or still more romantic farther East, we want somebody to guide us because we say we are not capable of looking clearly, we cannot understand ourselves.
29:46 And thus you begin to create the authority. When you say, ‘I cannot understand myself, I cannot resolve my problems,’ then you are bound to create an external authority.
30:09 And then you’ve become imitative, conforming, contradictory, between ‘what is’ and ‘what should be’ – the ‘should be’, the ideal, the conclusion, the predetermined utopia in heaven or on earth becomes the authority.
30:42 And when you have established that authority then you will find that you live in contradiction between what you are and what the authority asserts.
30:56 And so with that there is constant conflict. So we come to a point, which is, can a human being live without any kind of authority and not become chaotic, confused?
31:19 Right? Are you following all this?
31:28 As we said, when one drives in this country you must keep to the right – that is the authority.
31:41 When you drive in England you must keep to the left – that’s authority.
31:51 So you have to follow the authority at a certain level, and – tax and so on, so on – and can the mind be free totally of all authority, which is not the authority of the law?
32:24 Are we together? Because this is really quite a difficult issue to go into with such a large audience, because each one has a different idea of what authority is – the specialist, the doctor, the scientist, the engineer, the professor, the man who has great deal of data and information, he has certain authority.
33:09 And he must have certain authority, but we are not referring to that kind of authority, we are talking about authority of a mind that’s confused, a mind in sorrow, a mind that is uncertain, despair, anxiety.
33:40 And such a mind is always seeking and projecting, creating authority – the religious or secular or personal authority.
34:00 Now, can the mind be free of authority to examine itself?
34:16 Can you, if you are serious and if you are paying attention to what is being said, if you care to, and if you are actually listening – that is, listening, not interpreting, not comparing, comparing with what you already know or with what you’ve already heard or read, but actually listen.
34:57 Then you want to find out, don’t you, whether the mind, which is the result of time, which is so heavily conditioned, whether that mind can possibly change without any compulsion, without any environmental influence, without the social edicts and religious sanctions – you understand the problem? – that is, psychologically, can there be a revolution, a total mutation of the mind so that we live at a different dimension altogether?
36:12 Now we’re going into that.
36:19 That is, the necessity of total change – not according to any particular plan because the moment you’ve a plan, to achieve that plan you must have a system, systems imply mechanical adjustment, therefore you are not free but merely imitating the particular system that somebody has told you or given to you or which you have invented for yourself – if you practise that system you’re not free.
37:09 And then no system can possibly bring about a psychological revolution.
37:20 Now, stating that clearly, how is a human mind with its conditioning to bring about this revolution in itself?
37:35 You’ve understood my question? Yes? Can I go on?
37:50 I can go on, the speaker can go on, but you have to share with what he is saying, otherwise we can’t travel together.
38:05 So, one realises deeply, if you are serious at all, that there must be change, deep, inward change.
38:26 Will it come about through analysis, analysing?
38:45 Now what is implied in analysis? Please, you must really go together in this otherwise we won’t share.
39:01 We are used to analysis.
39:11 Now what does analysis imply?
39:18 In that there is the analyser and the thing to be analysed.
39:27 Right? The analyser imagines he’s separate from the thing he’s analysing.
39:41 Isn’t that so?
39:50 And is the analysed different from the analyser?
39:57 You are following all this? I’m going to go into… we’re going to go into it step by step. I’m confused, and I want to analyse my confusion, why I’m confused, why I’m in sorrow, why I’m in conflict.
40:23 And in analysis is implied the analyser and the thing to be analysed.
40:32 In that very statement there is a duality. And is the analyser different from that which he wants to analyse?
40:47 Or the analysed is the analyser.
40:57 That is, the analyser, the observer, is the observed.
41:04 Right? Not the analyser different from the thing in which... which he is going to analyse – both are the same.
41:17 The analyser and the analysis are exactly the same.
41:25 Right? Are we following each other? That’s a fact, isn’t it? That is, I’m envious.
41:43 Is my envy different from myself?
41:51 Or the envy is me, not something different or apart from me.
41:59 Please, this is really important to understand because we are going to go into something which perhaps you have not thought about, which may give some clarity.
42:20 When one observes this whole process of analysis one is aware that there is this division between the analyser and the analysed, and hence there is conflict between the analyser and the analysed.
42:45 And conflict is a distortion. And when you observe more closely you will find the analyser is the analysed. That’s one point. In analysis is implied time. You take time, maybe a whole year or the rest of your life.
43:17 And if you are dedicated, as most people are to analysis, you’re still analysing when you are dying.
43:31 And in analysis is implied not only the observer and the observed, the analyser and the analysed, but time.
43:43 And in analysis is implied conflict.
43:53 And in analysis there is never complete action, there’s only partial action.
44:07 And the partial or fragmentary action creates this total confusion.
44:16 It’s only when the mind is capable of acting totally, completely, because it sees the whole process of analysis, then it has altogether a different action.
44:37 Right? That is, one must act – life is action.
44:49 Whatever you do is action. And as most of us in ourselves are fragmented, broken up, divided, contradictory, all our action is also fragmentary.
45:12 And we try to bring about a synthesis or integration in action through analysis.
45:25 And analysis is the denial of complete action.
45:38 Are we following this? Have I gone away somewhere – you’re still here?
45:50 So what we are concerned with is action.
45:59 Is there a total action which will not bring about contradiction, conflict?
46:08 And there can be total action only when I see, when the mind sees the whole picture, not a fragment, not a fragment of existence.
46:24 That is, the whole picture of existence is the understanding of religion, what true religion is, the understanding of relationship, the understanding of a life in which there is no conflict.
46:54 Because all our life is conflict – from the moment we are born till we die, it’s a battle.
47:05 The political action, the religious action, the action of relationship in which there is sorrow, grief, anxiety, the life of pleasure, fear, and the inevitable thing called death – that’s the whole of existence.
47:47 And one must understand it totally, not just take, ‘I am interested in death, I am dedicated to find out the truth of death,’ or I am dedicated or committed to a particular action.
48:03 One must be committed to the whole existence of life. That is, to the whole complex life and not to a particular fragment.
48:18 And analysis is a particular fragment, not the total view of life.
48:32 So then what is the mind to do – please follow this little bit – what is a mind to do if it is not to analyse?
48:46 Because we are used to analysis, introspective examination, finding the cause, getting rid of the cause, and that, you know, cycle we go through.
49:05 And we never see that the cause becomes the effect and the effect becomes the cause to next effect.
49:17 There is no effect as effect as cause – it’s a constant movement of cause-effect.
49:28 So what is a mind to do if it is not to analyse?
49:43 But you must first see the truth that analysis is not the way out, because in that there is inaction, postponement, an endless process of time.
50:06 And each analysis must be perfect, complete, for the next analysis, if not, you carry over what you have analysed with the memory which distorts the future examination.
50:18 It doesn’t matter – you follow all this. Then what is the mind to do? I do not know if you have ever put this question to yourself: how is it possible to change without analysis, knowing all the implication of analysis, not only the analysis that takes place when you’re asleep as dreams – which perhaps we’ll go into another time – but also to reveal all the content of the hidden consciousness – how is all that to be changed without analysis, without time?
51:32 You understand my question? You know, when you see something very dangerous, like a snake or a tiger, you act instantly, don’t you?
51:57 Now if you saw the danger of nationalism, because nationalism separates human beings both economically and in relationship with each other – you are a Hindu and I am a Muslim, or a Catholic or a Protestant, a communist or Mao, or whatever it is – and there is religious division.
52:31 So wherever there is division there must be conflict – between you and reality, between you and God, between you and the community, between you and what you should be – which you want to achieve through analysis.
52:59 So wherever there is division there must be conflict. A division between... in relationship between man and woman there must be conflict.
53:16 And we hope to get rid of this conflict through analysis, or escape from this conflict through some mysterious invention of some deity or whatever you will.
53:37 Not that there is not a mystery, not that there is not something which time has not touched at all – which we will go into later.
53:55 So, how is the mind to change itself, its conditioning, without analysis?
54:10 You know, I’m going to describe it, but the description is not the described.
54:26 Right? The description of the tree is not the tree. The word is not the thing. So we must be very clear that the description, the word, is not the thing.
54:50 The word ‘door’ is not the door. So we are asking, can the mind change without all this turmoil of will, without all this contradiction of the observer and the observed?
55:24 That is, can the mind observe itself without bringing in the duality as the observer and the observed?
55:46 You are following this? Look, when you observe a tree, what takes place?
56:02 Do please play with this a little while, share it. What takes place when you observe a tree? You look at it and you say, ‘That’s an oak tree,’ don’t you?
56:22 You observe it through the botanical knowledge, knowledge which you have acquired about that tree, the name and so on.
56:35 You have created an image about that tree, and through that image you look at the tree.
56:44 Don’t you? The flower, the rose, you name it and you, through the name, you look.
56:54 You don’t look without the word. Do you ever do that? Perhaps you may be able to do that with regard to the tree because it doesn’t affect you, but to look at your wife or your husband or your friend and so on without the image.
57:26 Because the image which you have about another, or the image which... and the image which you have about yourself, this image prevents total perception.
57:51 Right? If I have a wife or a girlfriend or if I am homosexual, I have an image, don’t I, about my wife or a girl.
58:17 I have built that image through many days, through many years, or through a couple of weeks.
58:28 What takes place in that relationship builds that image. Don’t you know this? Don’t you? You look all so astonished. [Laughter] Don’t you have images about somebody – the politician, the priest, the wife, the husband, the boy, the girl?
58:58 And through that image you look at each other.
59:09 Right? And so what takes place? The image is the past, the image that has been put together by thought through pleasure, pain, insult, flattery, you know, all that goes on in relationship.
59:39 And so observation takes place through an image.
59:47 The observer is the image.
59:55 Right? Now when you look at a tree, you’re looking at that tree through the image which you have about the tree.
1:00:09 Now what takes place? There is the image, there is the fact, there is the distance between you and the tree.
1:00:19 The distance is time. So all that is involved in observing a tree.
1:00:32 Similarly you have an image about your friend or your wife – you have an image – and she has.
1:00:41 You have not only image about her or him but also you have an image about yourself.
1:00:50 So through all these images you look at each other, and therefore there is space, time, and therefore there is no relationship at all.
1:01:11 You may sleep together in bed but you have your own images about yourself, your problems, your ambitions, your greed, and she has hers.
1:01:26 So there is no relationship at all except through image.
1:01:39 And so can you observe without the image? The image being the past. So can you observe yourself, your conditioning, without the image about that conditioning?
1:02:01 – that it must be got rid of, that you must conquer it, that you must put aside, that you must suppress it. You are following all this? So can you look at your conditioning without time as the past?
1:02:23 The time being the word, the justification, the condemnation, and so on – can you observe without any of that?
1:02:34 Don’t say no, because you have never tried it.
1:02:45 If you say no, you are finished, you have blocked yourself.
1:02:53 You make it impossible to yourself when you say, ‘I can’t do it.’ If you cannot do it then you have no love at all.
1:03:11 Because it is that quality of love in which time is not.
1:03:27 Love is timeless. Love is not the past. So when you say, ‘It’s not possible, I can’t do, I can’t observe life without the image or images,’ then next time, don’t say, ‘I love you.’ Don’t tell somebody, ‘I love you’ – it doesn’t mean a thing.
1:04:00 So it is possible and absolutely necessary to observe without the image or images.
1:04:20 Then you will see that your conditioning altogether disappears, because it is the observer who is conditioned, not the observed.
1:04:39 Right? So you approach your problems, whatever they be with a conclusion, with a formula, with previous knowledge, and therefore you divide yourself as the examiner, the analyser, the observer and the thing observed, analysed.
1:05:19 Whereas if you can observe without the past, then you will see there is no conditioning at all – you are free to observe.
1:05:39 And so it is possible to change radically without analysis.
1:05:49 Though the speaker has analysed the whole thing, allowing for time, without going too much into detail, one can see that there must be change radically and it is possible, totally possible, to change without a breath of analysis.
1:06:25 Then there is also the question, not only at the conscious level but the deep layers of our consciousness: how is all that to be exposed, changed?
1:06:48 You understand? You’re not only living on the surface but you’re living deep down also, aren’t you?
1:06:59 Our consciousness is broken up into the unconscious and the conscious.
1:07:09 One can fairly easily understand consciousness, the outer surface, but to examine, to observe the unconscious, the deep layers, the secret recesses of one’s mind, how is that to be done?
1:07:32 That is, to analyse all the content, is that possible?
1:07:46 Is it possible to analyse the content through dreams?
1:07:53 You are following all this? And it interests you all this or not? Yes? I hope so but it doesn’t matter – because it’s your life, it’s your misery, your anxiety, your dreadful sorrows.
1:08:21 Because you have all those, you create a monstrous world around you, politically, in every way.
1:08:34 So if you don’t change and you only want pollution on the outside to cease, it will not, because corruption is there at the centre and that must be changed.
1:08:56 And to change you need passion, you need energy. And we’re asking now – I don’t know what time is – we are asking now, is it possible to open up all the content that’s hidden down below in the cave, in the roots, in the recesses of one’s own dark mind?
1:09:47 Or must it be analysed bit by bit – and it will take years and years and by then you’ll be dead – or is it to be understood through dreams, or is there a way totally different, which is neither analysis nor dreams nor a slow process of peeling off layer after layer?
1:10:34 Dreams are merely a continuation of our daily existence in symbolic form, aren’t they?
1:10:46 You are following this? You dream and the dream is a continuation of your daily, confused, contradictory, shoddy little life – whether you are a great politician or a great something or other.
1:11:16 And the professionals say you must dream otherwise you’ll go mad.
1:11:24 Obviously you’ll go mad because if you don’t dream, if you don’t keep up the movement of the daily life even though you are asleep, something breaks.
1:11:39 So one asks, why should one dream at all?
1:11:50 Dreams being not only the continuation of our daily waking consciousness of life and activity but also dreams are the intimation and the hints of the unconscious, the hidden parts.
1:12:12 So can there... is there need to be any dreams at all? Can all the content of the unconscious be open when you’re awake?
1:12:24 You’re following this question? I’ll go on even if you don’t follow it. I’m sorry, I’ll go on. We are asking whether it is possible not to dream at all.
1:12:45 Because a mind that is really quiet, absolutely without any movement, regenerates itself.
1:13:00 A mind that is totally free of any friction becomes young, fresh, alive, active, not mechanical.
1:13:22 So one has to find out whether it is possible during the daytime when you are awake, if you are awake, to have all the intimation, all the hints of the layers and also to see during the day that you are so aware that your dreams are not necessary at all.
1:14:07 That is, during the day to be aware of your thoughts, of your motives, of your demands, of your urges and compulsions, appetites, to be just aware without condemning or justifying.
1:14:26 The moment you condemn, justify or rationalise then you’re being aware in terms of the past and therefore you’re not aware.
1:14:37 Just to be aware of what you are doing – your facial movements, your gestures, your words, you know, play with it, to be aware.
1:14:53 Then if you are so aware during the day then you will see that when you go to sleep your mind is extraordinarily quiet.
1:15:08 Because mind demands order – brain can only function when there’s perfect order with great efficiency.
1:15:23 And you bring order during the day by being aware.
1:15:30 You are following all this? I mustn’t ask – doesn’t matter. You bring order during the day. You bring order by being aware of the disorder.
1:15:52 The disorder is your life. By becoming aware of it in the waking moments of your life during the day, then as you sleep, or just before you sleep, you will find the mind, the brain, is demanding order and has established order, not confused, and therefore the brain, the mind, becomes extraordinarily sensitive, alive and rested.
1:16:21 Then you will find, if you have gone deeply into this question, that relationship is the most important thing – relationship, between two human beings.
1:16:52 It is this relationship that creates society. If I have one relationship that is perfect, complete, then I have relationship with everybody.
1:17:12 If I have no relationship with another, complete, total, harmonious, then I have no relationship with anybody else.
1:17:23 And because I have no relationship with one, I have no relationship with others, therefore society is completely in conflict and messy.
1:17:37 So how is it possible to establish with one a harmonious, total and complete relationship?
1:17:57 I’m afraid one has not time to go into this now. Perhaps we’ll do it tomorrow morning. So I’d better stop now and, if you are interested, would you care to ask questions?
1:18:14 [Pause] You know what it is to ask a question?
1:18:27 One can ask, and one must ask, questions of everybody and of yourself too.
1:18:42 But also you have to find out why you are asking the question. You also have to find out if you are expecting an answer for that question from somebody.
1:19:00 And if you’re asking, are you asking for an answer? Or you are asking in order to investigate together. You follow? I must stop there. Together, to investigate, that’s why you ask.
1:19:23 Then when you ask with the intention of enquiry, you brush aside altogether all authority, including that of the speaker.
1:19:39 So if you can ask, and ask with the complete intention to understand, examine, investigate, then your question has tremendous meaning, however absurd the question be.
1:20:08 Questioner: I think I understand what you mean.
1:20:36 You mean the emphasis of love.
1:20:44 But is it possible for all people to be always so creative that you can relax theories and images in your relationships?
1:20:46 K: Can everybody, the questioner asks, be so creative, so alert, so aware, so totally concerned with the whole of mankind, which means relationship – isn’t that the question, sir?
1:21:13 Is that a valid question?
1:21:29 Q: Is it possible to live then without theories and without images?
1:21:40 K: Is it possible to live without images clearly. Is it possible to live without theory and without image.
1:21:55 You know how images are formed? You insult me or you flatter me. When you insult me I have formed an image. When you flatter me I have also formed an image. Right? I have formed images all the time. Now, the machinery of image making takes place when there is no attention.
1:22:34 When you insult me and I don’t pay attention to what you are saying at that moment – attention being to listen completely, to give my heart and my mind completely to what you are saying – if there is not that complete attention then image is formed.
1:23:04 Now, the next question is: but I cannot maintain that attention all the time, I slip back into inattention in which there is no attention.
1:23:29 But be aware that you are inattentive, you’re not attentive. Be aware of that. Don’t try to become attentive all the time.
1:23:45 Be attentive. It doesn’t matter, two seconds, when somebody’s insulting you or flattering you, completely attentive.
1:23:58 Then there is no mark as an image.
1:24:05 And as that is difficult to do all the time, be aware that you are not being completely attentive.
1:24:15 Don’t try to force inattention to attention.
1:24:22 Don’t try to be all the time attentive.
1:24:29 But you will see if you do that, you will find out if you do attend completely, and also be aware when you are not totally attentive, you will find there comes a quality of attention that is all the time moving, living.
1:24:56 Then can the mind live without formulas, without concepts, without theories, without belief?
1:25:17 Why do we have to have concepts, formulas – why? Go on, sirs.
1:25:24 Q: Because we want to change the world.
1:25:33 K: Because we want to change the world, therefore we must have a formula to change.
1:25:42 Did you hear what the speaker said? If you change according to a formula there’s no change at all. I’m asking, the speaker is asking, why do you have a formula?
1:26:00 Look, what is the process of a formula? Thought either likes or dislikes the present, and it creates a formula how it should be in the future.
1:26:27 The formulas are always in the future, based upon the formulas of the past, modified – the past formula modified through the present becomes the future formula.
1:26:51 But the future is still the past. So you’re living in the past with a formula, and you go through life changing that past formula to a future formula, modified, slightly altered, but still the past moving through the present to the future.
1:27:18 So your life, when you have a formula, is in the past, and therefore you have contradiction, therefore you have conflict.
1:27:33 But can you live without a formula? That means – you know what that means? Having a tremendously sensitive mind, a mind that’s clear, not burdened with formulas of the past – sensitivity.
1:28:02 And to be completely sensitive is the highest form of intelligence.
1:28:12 And as that is... we think that’s very difficult therefore we invent formulas.
1:28:19 Aren’t you tired at the end of an hour and a half?
1:28:27 Q: No.
1:28:28 K: Yes, sir?
1:28:29 Q: I didn’t say false but I didn’t follow you completely when you said that the analyser is the analysed.
1:28:36 K: All right, sir.
1:28:46 Oh, la, la!
1:28:53 [Laughter] I’ll make it as simple and as direct as possible.
1:29:02 Which is: when I’m angry, is my anger different from me?
1:29:10 I am asking. I am angry – is my anger different from me who feels that he is angry?
1:29:23 I am anger, am I not?
1:29:30 Not: I am different from my anger.
1:29:38 When I am different from my anger then conflict takes place between me and anger.
1:29:47 Then I have to do something about anger. Then I want to suppress it, change it, modify it or rationalise it or justify it.
1:29:57 But when I am anger – anger is me – then what takes place?
1:30:07 Before, I have divided anger separate from me, something apart from me.
1:30:17 There, I could do something. I said, ‘I will suppress it, I’ll justify it.’ So there is a battle between anger and myself, conflict.
1:30:30 Whereas when I see anger is myself then what takes place?
1:30:40 When there is no observer then what takes place?
1:30:53 When I have that feeling why do I name it as anger?
1:31:04 I name it because I have experienced it before.
1:31:12 Therefore I recognise the new feeling in terms of the old.
1:31:21 Therefore I condemn it. Whereas if I am anger, I don’t name it. I watch it. There is an observation without the observer.
1:31:39 The observer is the whole... is the past with the naming, condemning, justifying and all the rest of it.
1:31:48 But when you watch, when you are anger, you just watch. There is a watching, there is an awareness. And you will see when there is no naming, no condemning, no justifying, there is a totally different movement taking place.
1:32:08 Q: [Inaudible] K: One moment.
1:32:19 Just a minute, sir.
1:32:28 Q: What do you mean by sensation, feeling?
1:32:47 K: What do I mean by sensation, feeling.
1:32:59 Isn’t it much more important to find out what you mean by sensation, feeling, than what I mean by sensation?
1:33:08 [Laughter] What is feeling?
1:33:16 You feel angry, anxiety, inferior or superior, or you feel this or that, a dozen things – what do you mean by that feeling?
1:33:27 Q: It’s so painful.
1:33:30 K: Oh, it’s so painful. Why do you call it painful?
1:33:40 But you don’t call it painful when you have pleasant feelings, do you?
1:33:47 All that you mean is you don’t like unpleasant feelings and you want to keep pleasant feelings.
1:33:58 So you have divided life – just watch yourself, please – divided life into pleasant feelings and unpleasant feelings.
1:34:09 And you want to keep the pleasant and put away the unpleasant. Can you do that? So you have to go into a tremendous problem, which is pleasure and fear.
1:34:26 Right? You have to understand this, which is, fear and pleasure.
1:34:36 Perhaps we can go into it tomorrow because that involves a great deal of enquiry.
1:34:43 So when we say, ‘I have a feeling, feeling of anxiety,’ – say that, anxious, what takes place there?
1:35:02 Thought recognises that feeling as anxiety, doesn’t it?
1:35:13 No? So thought names that feeling. If thought doesn’t interfere or name, what do you call that feeling?
1:35:29 So you have to understand the whole machinery of thinking. Sorry to make everything so complicated, but life is complicated.
1:35:40 Q: I didn’t say it before but I didn’t follow you completely when you said the analyser is the analysed.
1:35:53 K: All this morning you have analysed – the questioner says you have analysed all this morning.
1:36:02 You have come through analysis to a certain conclusion.
1:36:09 And these conclusions become the authority. What have you done? You’ve removed one series of authorities, and through analysis you have come to a conclusion, and established a new authority.
1:36:29 Right, sir? That is, remove the old authority and place new authority. I’m sorry, we’re not doing that at all.
1:36:49 We pointed out, the speaker pointed out, the whole structure of analysis, what is implied in it.
1:37:02 And not coming to any conclusion, because truth is not conclusion, truth is not an opinion.
1:37:12 You see for yourself clearly that analysis is not the way out.
1:37:22 That’s not a conclusion, you see it as a fact.
1:37:30 And you cannot make that into authority.
1:37:38 You cannot make what you see as truth into an authority for another.
1:37:46 Or what you see, is it the truth?
1:37:54 So one has to be... to see clearly, one has to, as we said, one must be free from prejudice, from the desire to form a conclusion, from the desire to be secure in a conclusion, and so on.
1:38:09 There must be freedom to examine. And when there is authority of any kind – any kind, including that of the speaker – especially of the speaker because you are very easily influenceable – when there is no authority then you can observe.
1:38:29 And what you observe doesn’t become authority. What you observe becomes... is a living thing. We’d better stop.
1:38:36 Q: May I ask you the way to be free of this?
1:38:53 The things you use therefore so as the people use drugs, music, [inaudible] something overt.
1:39:06 The people who use drugs… [inaudible] K: No, sir. The gentleman asks: by taking drugs can one be creative.
1:39:17 Are you interested in this question?
1:39:20 Q: I don’t ask it for myself.
1:39:22 K: No, no, I understand, sir. You don’t take it perhaps.
1:39:25 Q: Other people do.
1:39:26 K: Other people who take it. [Laughter] Q: [Inaudible] K: I understand, sir.
1:39:34 I understand the question.
1:39:36 Q: I think you are the authority.
1:39:43 K: No, I’m not your authority, under any circumstances. I’m not your guru nor your teacher.
1:39:49 Q: [Inaudible] K: Wait, sir, let’s go into this. Again this... First of all, why do you take drugs?
1:40:04 Because all the people around you are taking drugs? Why do you smoke? Because all the people around you smoke? Or drink or eat meat because others are doing it? Because if you didn’t smoke, if you didn’t drink, if you didn’t eat meat, if you didn’t take drugs, you’ll be out of it, you won’t belong to the circle.
1:40:31 You’ll be square or round or whatever it is. [Laughter] Therefore you take drugs because you want to conform to the pattern set by the young, or the old.
1:40:49 That’s one point. Second, you hope by taking drugs, LSD, smoking marijuana, and all the rest of it, by bringing about a chemical change in your system you will have greater experiences, you will see things more clearly, see not only the colours of a sunset more beautifully, more ecstatically, but also see yourself more clearly.
1:41:35 And you take drugs also because you want to have wider, deeper, more extensive experiences.
1:41:46 So these are the reasons, and more, that one takes drugs.
1:41:55 And you take drugs because you want to conform to the patterns set by, you know, group.
1:42:07 You take drugs in order to have wider and deeper experiences. Is that so? Or by taking drugs you expand your own consciousness with its limitations, with its conformities, with its conditioning.
1:42:30 You see more, if you are conditioned as a Catholic, by taking a drug, you’ll see some fantastic visions of angels and all the rest of it.
1:42:43 [Laughter] Or if you are inclined to be an artist, you see colours much more vividly, and so on.
1:42:56 But what do all these drugs, chemicals, marijuana and so on, do to the brain cells themselves, to the brain?
1:43:09 Doctors, professionals, independent researchers are finding out it affects the brain cells more and more.
1:43:21 Those who take it become, as one has observed, become irresponsible, cannot talk consecutively, rationally.
1:43:34 Their brains deteriorate. And as they bear children, the children are affected by it.
1:43:47 And if you like all that kind of stuff, go on with it. I’m not giving you permission to go on with it. And one asks, wider experience and all the rest of it, why do you want experiences at all.
1:44:06 wider or...? Because you are bored with the experience that you have daily, isn’t it?
1:44:15 You’re bored and you hope you’ll be entertained by these drugs more, by going to football – you know, you see it on the television or on the field and that entertains you for an hour.
1:44:36 So in the same way, when life becomes an intolerable bore, as for most of us it is a meaningless bore, then you take everything that comes around, including the drugs.
1:44:54 But drugs don’t alter your boredom, a drug doesn’t end your sorrow.
1:45:06 You may escape for the time being by making the brain dull, stupid, deteriorate, but there is sorrow.
1:45:17 There is the whole question of relationship, existence, and which cannot possibly solve by escape through drugs.