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BR72DSS2.3 - Communication without the blockage of images
Brockwood Park, UK - 1 October 1972
Discussion with Staff and Students 2.3



0:01 This is J. Krishnamurti’s third discussion with teachers and students at Brockwood Park, 1972.
0:10 Krishnamurti: What shall we talk about this morning?
0:18 Questioner: Sir? Could we go into language? We seem to be using it quite often and I was wondering whether or not we could go into what it involves, what is involved in language.
0:34 K: All right, sir – rather fun – let’s do it.
0:59 Shall we start off with word is not the thing?
1:09 Right? The word ‘elephant’ is not the elephant, the ‘door’ is not the actual door, it’s only a description of a door.
1:34 I say, ‘The green door,’ pointing to that, would be the door to which I’m pointing.
1:41 So the word is the description of a fact, of the thing, but the word is not the thing.
1:55 Can we start off from there?
2:03 All right, sirs? So when I describe Gregory, my description is not Gregory.
2:20 But we generally get caught in the description.
2:29 Right? When I describe a tree, the beauty of it, the curve of the branch and so on, the description is not the described.
2:50 Right, sirs? Are we moving along? The description is not the described. So the word is the description, the word is the means of communication.
3:11 I communicate to you through the use of a word, which is ‘the door’.
3:20 But you and I know actually, the word ‘door’ is not the actual fact of a door, made out of steel or out of wood.
3:32 I describe a tree and the tree isn’t – the description is not the tree.
3:39 I describe you but the description is not you. I explain something in words; the explanation is not the explained.
3:51 Right? We’ve got it? Right? Are we clear on this? But see how difficult it becomes presently. When you and I have a common reference, that is common thing which we both understand the use of a particular word, then communication is possible.
4:24 When you and I meet an elephant and we both know what we mean by that word ‘elephant’, and not a piano, then there is an understanding between us that ‘elephant’ is an animal and not a piano.
4:51 So communication means not only the usage of words, which we both understand, the common meaning of that word, and the thing to which we refer to is common to both of us.
5:18 Right? Is this getting a little… All right?
5:26 Q: Yes.
5:27 K: And up to that point it’s fairly simple.
5:38 But it gets rather complex when I use words which you are unwilling to listen… or you listen to the words – sorry – you listen to the words and are unwilling to understand or do not want to understand the significance of the word.
6:06 I say to you, in words, that tobacco is bad for you, for your health, and you smoke and you don’t want to listen.
6:22 You put up a barrier by saying, ‘What’s wrong with it, I feel very well, silly doctors say that it might affect my lung but I want to enjoy my life while I live, so I smoke.’ So you prevent actual communication taking place between you and me, when there is a resistance.
6:51 So we have to find out what we mean by that word ‘communication’.
7:02 What do you mean by that word? I want to tell you something. I know English therefore I use the English words, and you also know English and therefore understand the words.
7:21 I want to tell you something, and you must be willing to listen to what is being said, otherwise you won’t listen.
7:36 So communication means that both of us want to understand the thing of which we are talking about.
7:49 If you don’t want to understand what another is saying, though you understand the words, you turn a deaf ear.
8:09 So communication is only possible when you and I understand the meaning of words, when you and I are paying attention or listening to what is being said.
8:25 If it is a very superficial thing that is being said, you listen casually.
8:35 If something which is very serious is being said, you have to listen with attention.
8:45 And if that is something which needs attention you must not only pay attention, you must have the same quality as the speaker, who is intense, passionate, or not.
9:04 So to communicate with each other means, really deeply, that both of us understand the word, knowing the word is not the thing, the description is not the described, both of us must listen to what is being said with the same quality of attention, with the same intensity of feeling between you and I, at the same level, at the same time, otherwise there is no communication.
9:45 Right? Are you meeting all this?
9:47 Q: When you say, know the meaning of the word, do you include in that having to be aware of the possibly special meaning that it has for oneself?
10:03 You and I may use...
10:06 K: Of course.
10:07 Q: ...the same word, we know the dictionary meaning of it, but it may be a pleasant word to me and an unpleasant word to you.
10:16 K: I use a word like, say for instance, ‘attention’. You may give a different meaning and I may give a different meaning. You interpret it according to your like and dislike of that word, I may merely stick to the meaning of the dictionary.
10:38 I stick to the meaning of the dictionary and you don’t, or vice versa.
10:46 Then communication is not possible.
10:49 Q: But a word like ‘responsibility’, it might have a different quality for you than for me.
11:06 K: Yes, therefore I explain it. The word ‘responsibility’ means to respond – and the dictionary doesn’t go any further.
11:21 And I say, ‘Well, let’s understand what that word ‘response’ means.’ We talk over it.
11:29 We say respond to a challenge, respond to what you are saying, respond to some demand.
11:42 If the response is not complete, adequate, then there is conflict between you and me.
11:55 Right? So, the word is important in communication and the word is the only means of communication.
12:16 Just a minute. Is that the only means of communication? You understand? We use words, French, Latin, Greek, Russian or any other word, in order to convey a thought which is expressed in words, or a feeling.
12:47 When I say, ‘I love you,’ I have a feeling towards you, a sense of whatever it is, and I tell you that.
13:02 So the word represents my thought or feeling.
13:17 Right? And are words the only means of communication or is there other means of communication?
13:31 Q: Expressions?
13:32 K: What do you mean, expression?
13:34 Q: Well instead of words, facial expressions or physical expressions.
13:41 K: Which is what? Non-verbal. Which is, I make an angry face at you. That’s a non-verbal expression, which you and I both understand.
13:58 I salute you that way, without saying a word.
14:08 You and I understand it. Heil Hitler. May I say it? Heil Hitler, or what, some other word, some other gesture.
14:22 So there is not only a verbal expression, verbal communication, there is a communication through gesture – right? - through expression, through facial expression, through a gesture, and I’m asking: is there any other means of communication?
14:47 You understand what we’ve gone through? Look what we’ve learned this morning – it’s awfully interesting if you go into it. Right?
14:56 Q: Can you also express yourself through action?
15:02 K: Gesture is an action.
15:07 Q: In other words, not just facial expression but through your actions, what you do day in and day out, you know?
15:21 That’s how you also express yourself.
15:22 K: Yes, yes. So verbal, gesture, expression. Expression, facial expressions. Now is there any other means of communication?
15:30 Q: Visual.
15:31 K: Which is – I mean, if I’m blind I can’t see your facial expression, I can’t see your gesture – you can only communicate with me through words - unless I’m deaf, dumb, and blind, then I’m rather stuck.
15:54 You can communicate then with me through Braille, you know that, all kinds of ways.
16:02 All right. Now is there any other way? So, we’ll come back to that a little later. By Jove, I’m learning a lot, aren’t you?
16:17 I’m seeing something myself. Now, I look at that tree, visually, and describe that tree to you.
16:29 The description is the expression of my thought… of thought in looking at that tree.
16:42 Right? So the word represents the thought.
16:56 Does it?
16:57 Q: Represents the fact, as well.
17:00 K: Wait, slowly, stick to one thing at a time, you’ll see.
17:15 I say, ‘Gregory is short,’ or tall or is fat – sorry, you’re not, but I am saying.
17:23 By looking at him, visually, a thought is born and that thought has measured Gregory and says, ‘He is tall.’ Right?
17:46 So thought expresses itself through word. Go slow, go slow, look at it first, look at it.
18:06 You tell me you like me, or you don’t like me.
18:14 You have a feeling, a thought, and you express it. No? Look, don’t accept a thing that I’m saying.
18:28 You understand? Wait a minute, sir, I must make this clear.
18:36 Don’t accept a thing, but look at it, find out. Right? If you say yes, shake your head and say yes, it means you really are listening superficially to the words, you haven’t discovered it.
18:53 If you discover it, it’s yours. You understand? It’s not mine. Is that clear? Now let’s proceed. We are saying, thought must express itself either in word, in gesture or in a facial expression.
19:29 Right? I write a poem or an essay and I express my feeling, my thoughts, my reactions through words, poetic words and so on, so on, words that have rhythm and, you know, all that.
19:55 So thought expresses itself in words, in gesture, in facial expression.
20:14 And without a word is there any communication?
20:23 Your thought and my thought communicating with each other, without the word, without the gesture, without the facial expression.
20:32 Vous avez compris? You have understood? Now wait a minute, go slow, go slow, look, listen, find out, Tunki, find out.
20:51 You know what telepathy is? Reading other people’s thoughts.
20:59 Q: Yes, but it’s with thought. It is with thought. You said without thought.
21:05 K: No, no. No. No, I said to you: is there communication without the word, without the gesture, without the facial expression?
21:22 Q: Well sometimes when you’re thinking of wanting to do something with somebody, and you just think it and the other person...
21:44 K: …picks it up. Right?
21:46 Q: ...comes to you and says the same thing.
21:47 K: Yes. So what has taken place there? There is no verbal communication. Right? There is no gesture, no facial expression. You pick up my thought, or I pick up your thought. Then I express it in words. Right?
22:10 Q: Yes.
22:11 K: Now go a step further, that is – no, we are not going a step further, we’ll finish this.
22:27 I think something and you being my friend, with whom I have talked before, we have walked together, we have seen the same birds, the same sky, the same blue, and we’re sensitive to each other.
22:44 Right? And without a gesture, without an expression, facial or word, you pick up my feeling, my thought, and express it in words.
23:03 Now that is generally called telepathy. You have heard that? Reading thoughts. They have experimented with this a great deal. At Duke University in America, and also they have experimented in various parts of the world where I have seen this myself.
23:33 One is in a different country and reads the other man who is in another country, and says, ‘That man is thinking this and this.’ And writes to him at the time – you follow? – and the other fellow replies, ‘Yes, I was thinking that.’ This goes on.
23:55 Now I ask myself: is there communication which is not verbal, which is not a gesture, a facial expression, which is not the thought.
24:15 You understand? Now, which means, is there a thinking without a word?
24:30 Q: There may be, but we always translate it into words.
24:50 Q: No, no. Not necessarily we always translate into words.
25:01 Q: We don’t know, though.
25:06 Q: For example, I don’t know, sometimes when I visualise a certain action, I can visualise the movement but it doesn’t come into words.
25:19 And I was thinking of looking for the word...
25:20 K: Look, Tunki, you’re not answering my question. Are you answering my question? I may be mistaken but I don’t think you are. So I want you to tell me what I have said.
25:24 Q: You asked: is there thought without the word?
25:29 K: Yes, is there thought without a word - a word being the image - you understand?
25:39 - a symbol.
25:40 Q: No, just a moment.
25:42 K: Look, Tunki, you’re not listening, old boy. Just listen to me. I say: is there a thinking without the word, without the image, without a symbol?
26:04 You know what a symbol is?
26:08 Q: Yes.
26:09 K: So is there a thinking without that?
26:16 Q: That will be action then.
26:21 K: My darling, no, no, look, I’m asking you something, you don’t answer it, you go back to something else.
26:28 You say that’s action then. It may be, I don’t know. But I’m asking you something. Let me put it round the other way: can you think without a word, without a symbol, without a picture?
26:56 Q: No.
26:59 K: So what? Go on, sir, push, push. So if you have no word – look at it carefully - no word, no symbol, no image, no picture – right?
27:22 - what is thinking? You follow? (Laughter) You understand what I am saying? Have you got it? No, this is very interesting, go into it.
27:34 It’s good for you to exercise your brain. I want to talk about that a little later; I’m coming to it.
27:44 Q: Do you include no memory of a certain feeling?
27:47 K: I said to you, old boy. Yes, that’s right. Memory is a series of images.
27:52 Q: A feeling is not a memory K: A feeling, the same thing - feeling, images - I remember I got frightened at that particular bridge because it was so high.
28:10 I remember it. Now I say to myself, without an image of that bridge is there a thinking about that bridge?
28:22 So is there a thinking without a word? Which is, is there a thinking without knowledge? Knowledge is the word.
28:34 Q: Do you include in thinking the instantaneous reaction?
28:43 Supposing lightning struck in this room, we wouldn’t have time to think, ‘It’s lightning.’ K: I agree.
28:55 MZ: We would react.
28:57 K: We would react - which he called action. Venezuelan – no, where are you? The Venezuelan, I’ve forgotten his name, so I’ll call him his country – Venezuela said that action takes place.
29:13 There is Brazil, there.
29:16 Q: There is in the object of the words to communicate but not in myself.
29:26 You talk to me but your words create images in myself.
29:32 K: Of course. I said that. I talk, I use words. Those words create certain images in you.
29:41 Q: Yes.
29:42 K: Those words mean something to you, and the same thing to me. We said that at the beginning.
29:48 Q: Yes, but these images cut our communication.
29:51 K: No. No, sir. No. No. If I speak Spanish and you speak German, unless I understand German and you understand Spanish, there is no communication.
30:09 So the word is not the thing. The word has a meaning to you and to me when that word means the same thing to you and to me.
30:28 A microphone, we know. When I use the word ‘microphone’ you know what it means and I know what it means. So we don’t call it an elephant. If you give to that word ‘microphone’ the picture of an elephant then communication ceases between us. Move. I want to get going.
30:47 Q: Could we take an example of music? We listen to music. Are we listening with thought or are we listening with something different?
31:02 K: You listen to music. Have you listened to it? Yes? How do you listen to it? Come on, sirs.
31:18 Q: We recognise the sounds.
31:23 K: You recognise the sound.
31:27 Q: Yes.
31:28 K: You recognise, say, that’s written by Beethoven or whoever it is, Bach.
31:34 Q: Yes, something that we...
31:36 K: Wait, sir, go slowly. Prego! So you recognise it as the Ninth or the Second or Mozart, something – right? - symphonies. Then what takes place? You know that. You say, ‘Well that orchestra is playing Mozart, Bach.’ Right? Then you are listening. Right? You have recognised it and you’re listening.
32:00 Q: There is also a more subtle recognition of...
32:04 Q: Yes, the meaning is not to recognise what, the title, it’s recognise something that I have…
32:14 The sound, you know?
32:16 K: You recognise the sound.
32:17 Q: Yes.
32:18 K: You recognise the feeling.
32:19 Q: The feeling that one knows.
32:20 K: The feeling one knows.
32:22 Q: Yes, not something new, not something that...
32:23 K: Wait. When I use the word ‘recognise’, which means you recognise the composer, you recognise the music – go beyond all that.
32:46 How do you listen? Is there a listening if you have a remembrance operating?
33:02 Q: No. If you remember how you feel about that sound then obviously you’re not listening to that sound at that moment.
33:20 Q: Yes, you’re listening to what you remember.
33:24 K: Yes, and so you are saying - are you? - you are listening to what you have remembered. So you’re not actually listening to the music.
33:29 Q: Not at that moment.
33:30 K: Is that so?
33:31 Q: But you must be listening to the music to be able to recognise it.
33:36 Q: The music stimulates it, though.
33:40 K: We know all that, old boy. I’m asking beyond that.
33:43 Q: There are two kinds of listening, surely – the kind which recognises what in music is equivalent to our words, certain archetypal forms and expressions which are used, really in every kind of music almost...
34:00 K: Yes.
34:01 Q: But beyond that there is...
34:03 K: That’s what I want to find out. (Laughter) Q: I suppose it’s possible to recognise a silence, too.
34:14 K: I don’t know, we’re inquiring. I don’t know.
34:19 Q: I mean, when you listen to music you listen to the noise and silence also.
34:26 K: That is, are you listening to the silence between two notes, or are you listening to the remembrance which you have had about that particular piece of music, and the sensations, the pleasures, the delight you have had, and therefore those memories are revived when you listen, and you are listening with pleasure to the memories that you’ve had?
35:02 You understand? Or are you listening differently? Right, sir?
35:09 Q: Yes.
35:13 K: I want to find out.
35:16 Q: But we translate immediately.
35:20 K: No, I understand that – I want to find out what it means to listen without knowledge.
35:33 Knowledge being the memory – right? - knowledge being the word, the meaning of the word. Now, listen, I’m going to show you something.
35:52 I want to tell you something about love.
36:01 I think I have to tell you because I feel very much involved in it.
36:14 I want to tell you. And I use words to tell you - words, gestures, facial expressions, to tell you, verbally.
36:28 And how do you listen to it? First of all, you listen through the word – right? - and the reaction to the word, the reaction that word has evoked in you.
36:47 Right? Are you following all this? And that reaction either urges you to listen, or says, ‘No, I mustn’t’ – I put up a defence.
37:04 Right? Now if you go beyond that, beyond your reactions, which may be according to your conditioning – you understand?
37:19 - according to your pleasure, according to your experience, according to your particular knowledge, which will prevent you from listening to what I want to say.
37:33 Right? You understand what I’m saying? I want to tell you about love, because I say, ‘By Jove, I would like to communicate with you, because I feel very strongly about it.’ I tell you, I begin to tell you, by using words, gesture, facial expression.
37:54 You are going to translate it according to your memory – right? - which will awaken in you certain reactions.
38:03 Right? Are you following this? When those reactions arise, either pleasure or dislike, then you stop listening, don’t you?
38:20 Naturally. Are you following all this? Right? Now, I say put those aside and listen, because I want to tell you this, it is a burning thing, it’s a marvellous thing, I feel, I want to tell you about it.
38:41 In telling, you have all your reactions, memories, which will prevent you from listening further.
38:50 Right? Right? Venezuela, have you got it?
38:57 Q: Yes.
38:57 K: Right. Now, can you put those aside and listen?
39:09 Right? Then what is the state of your mind that is listening? You’ve understood, Gregory, or you are not paying attention, you a getting tired?
39:30 You have understood my question? What is the state of your mind that is listening when you have gone through your reactions according to your conditioning, and say, ‘Yes, I know my reactions, I’ll put them aside for the time being, and I want to listen to what he’s saying’?
39:51 Right? What is that state of your mind or the quality of mind that is listening?
39:57 Q: (Inaudible) K: Listen quietly. Find out, sir, find out.
40:10 Q: There is the state of the mind who wants to learn, and while he’s learning he puts all aside.
40:31 K: Therefore what is the state of that mind?
40:33 Q: It’s an open mind, a receptive mind.
40:36 K: No, no. You see, you are… Receptive mind - that means to receive. Right? You’re waiting to receive. Right? Are you waiting to receive? And are you then, if you say, ‘Tell me, tell me, tell me,’ receive – I can’t communicate, can you?
41:06 Q: Why not?
41:08 K: Wait. Why not? I’ll show you. Listen. Mrs Zimbalist asked: why not. What’s your answer?
41:19 Q: Because you’re expecting something, to receive.
41:28 K: You’re expecting – right? You’re expecting, waiting and anxious, wanting to find out, you’re straining.
41:39 Q: Not necessarily. You said…
41:42 K: All those are implied.
41:43 Q: Are they? I mean, it’s a matter of terminology but you said if you put aside all the self-projections and listen, you are presumably in a receptive state, there are no blockages that you have put there yourself.
41:58 K: No. All right. You are in a receptive state. What is that receptive state?
42:04 Q: Open, attentive.
42:07 K: Tell me, please, what is that receptive state?
42:15 Q: It’s just quiet.
42:16 Q: Sir, how can you say anything about that receptive state?
42:19 K: I’m going to show you something, old boy. I’ll tell you lots about it. (Laughter) What is that receptive state?
42:27 Q: Dissatisfied?
42:29 K: No, no. Dissatisfaction and satisfaction are the reactions of your conditioning. Right? So we put aside all that. And I say to myself: what is the quality of the mind that is free from the reactions of its conditioning, its images, its words, all that?
42:55 What is that quality of mind? Is it receptive? It may be, I don’t know, I’m asking.
43:04 Q: Inquiring.
43:06 Q: Why do we use a word?
43:09 K: What?
43:10 Q: In other words, we’re all using words to attempt to explain. We’re taking a word like ‘quiet’ – that is a word.
43:17 K: I’m not. No, I say, first – listen – I forget all your names, doesn’t matter - I say - please listen – first the word.
43:27 The word awakens certain reactions in you, depending on your conditioning, temperament and all the rest of it, and if you want to listen to what is being said you obviously must go beyond that.
43:47 If you’re caught up in your reactions you’re not listening.
43:56 Now, so you say, ‘Yes, I want to listen to what he’s saying, therefore for the moment I’ll put away my reactions.’ Right?
44:04 Now I say: what is the quality of that mind that has put away it’s reactions, maybe temporarily or permanently, and says, ‘Now, tell me what you want to say.’ It’s listening.
44:19 You follow? It’s listening, it is receptive – I’m using that word for the time being, though I don’t quite feel in that word.
44:30 I am open, receptive, eager. Now, go behind that – what is that quality of mind?
44:43 Can it be described in words?
44:45 Q: Is it a quality?
44:47 K: It is a quality in the sense – all right, I won’t use that word ‘quality’. What is the state – again, ‘state’ means… So, again, go beyond the word of ‘quality’, ‘state’ – can you put it into words, the mind that has put aside it’s reactions and says, ‘I’m listening to you’?
45:10 Q: How can you put it into words, because our words are part of our conditioning.
45:25 K: I know, my lady. I said just now, put aside all that, if you can, for the time being, and find out if you have put aside, what is, when you’re listening, what is happening in the mind?
45:54 And can that, whatever that mind is, can that communicate with me and say, ‘Yes, I know what it is, and I’m now listening to you’?
46:13 Now let’s begin. Leave that for the moment – put the whole thing in a different way.
46:27 There is that tree, which you all have seen, which you see every day.
46:38 When you look at it – you understand? – when you look at it how do you look at it?
46:45 Q: With the image of the tree.
46:52 K: I don’t know, you tell me. How do you look at it? There is that tree – how do you see it?
47:02 Q: I guess you see it every day.
47:10 After the first time that you’ve seen it, probably you see it through your memories of it.
47:12 K: So what do you do? So you say the first day I looked at it, I had no image when I looked at it.
47:21 Right? The next day I see it through my image. Right? The image being your knowledge of that tree.
47:31 Q: But if you saw the tree in winter...
47:35 K: …it has changed.
47:38 Q: It has changed, but all the year round you see the tree without leaves.
47:42 K: Some part of the year you see that tree without leaves and some part of the year you see it fresh, new leaves, and summer still more, and so on.
47:53 But you see it now. Now. How do you see it? Do you see it through your image of that tree?
48:02 Q: I see it as it is.
48:06 K: Without the image?
48:07 Q: Yes.
48:08 K: Be clear. You know me. You have met me last year and this year. Have you an image about me?
48:16 Q: When I don’t see you I have an image of you.
48:27 K: Now, sir, when you’re looking at me, have you an image about me?
48:44 Q: A physical image, yes.
48:47 K: Yes, he says. Why? What do you call your image?
48:54 Q: Well, the form of your body.
48:57 K: Body, face, and – go on.
49:01 Q: But psychological image of you, I can’t have it.
49:07 K: No, but you have an image of me already. You may not have, because psychologically you may not know me.
49:16 Q: That’s right.
49:18 K: So you look at me through your image, which is, through your memory.
49:29 Right? Not me, sir, take your friend. How do you know your friend? How do you know Gregory? You met him yesterday. To your brother, all right. How do you know your brother?
49:46 Q: I don’t know him, I just know certain characteristics.
49:50 K: Therefore, I’m using the word ‘know’ not the entire ‘your brother’. So I say you know your brother because you have lived with him, grown up together, seen him, so you have an image of him.
50:07 Right?
50:08 Q: I can have, yes. I do now, yes.
50:12 K: Otherwise you couldn’t recognise him.
50:15 Q: Okay.
50:17 K: So you have a remembrance which is an image, which is a memory and so on and so on, and through that you look.
50:30 Now can you look at your brother without the image, and you at your brother, without the image?
50:44 That means, can you look at the tree without the image?
50:51 Can you look at me, who insulted you yesterday, without that memory of that insult?
50:58 Q: Can we differentiate between ‘without the memory’, totally, which is hard to…
51:10 is impossible perhaps – or the action of that?
51:13 K: Yes, that’s a fraction of it.
51:14 Q: If you look at a tree you know it is a tree and not a...
51:21 K: Of course - an elephant.
51:22 MZ: ...horse or something.
51:23 K: Yes, quite. So go on. Please go on, because I want to find out what is the mind that is without the reactions of its conditioning?
51:36 Q: It’s an unseeing mind.
51:37 K: I’ll show it to you in a minute, sir.
51:48 Go on, play with it. Go on, play with it, sir. Look at it, find out.
52:04 Q: These images that I have of other people, or the other people...
52:19 K: …have about you.
52:21 Q: ...seem to be so connected with the… very much bound up with the image I have of myself, that big image I have of myself.
52:25 K: Of course, of course. So the image you have about yourself, the image you have about others...
52:31 Q: …make a whole, somehow or another.
52:32 K: Yes. And I’m asking, if these images continue or if these images interfere all the time, you’re not really communicating, we’re not really in touch with each other.
52:48 So I say: what is that relationship or that communication when there is non-verbal, non-imagery, non-reactions, which are not brought about by conditioning?
53:05 Q: It’s true communication, free communication. True communication, or clear, free communication.
53:16 K: What does that mean? You tell me. I don’t know what you’re talking about – you tell me. You may be right.
53:22 Q: Communication without the blocks of images.
53:24 K: Yes. So what does that mean? Can you communicate with me without the blocks?
53:33 Q: I don’t know if I can do it.
53:42 K: Can you describe to me what is that mind that is free of blocks?
53:47 Q: You can’t describe it if you’re not there, you know, if you don’t have the blocks.
53:55 K: We agree. Therefore – see what you’re saying – you don’t know it. Therefore you can’t describe it, therefore you can’t tell me about it.
54:05 Q: Right. Exactly. (Laughter) K: Wait. Wait, wait, wait. Wait, wait. I want to tell you about it. You can’t tell me but I want to tell you about it.
54:19 Right. Right? How do I? How can I tell you about it if you have your blocks?
54:28 Q: (Inaudible) K: Listen to what I’m saying. How can I tell you about it if you have your blocks all the time interfering?
54:41 You can’t. Therefore what will you do? I want to tell you – you follow? I will choke you, I will do everything - I want to tell you.
54:48 Q: Somehow you have to break down those blocks.
54:53 K: So break it down.
54:55 Q: Somehow you have to be…
54:57 K: Don’t take time. You see? You’re going to take time, in breaking them down. Right? But I want to tell you now; I’m not interested in tomorrow.
55:15 I feel tremendously, you must know it now. And you say, ‘No, sorry, I’ve blocks which are preventing me.’ (Laughter) And I say, all right, if you know you’ve those blocks that are preventing you, get rid of them, push them away, quickly.
55:31 Don’t take time to learn about them, and push them – do it.
55:37 Q: How can we when we’ve had them for so long? How can you just do that?
55:41 K: Now, so, find out. It’s really good exercise, this. (Laughter) Go on, sir, find out. You have had your reactions for the last fifteen, ten, five or twenty years, and here somebody comes along and says, ‘My dear friend, I want to tell you the most extraordinary thing in life.’ And I want to tell you - it isn’t just words, it isn’t just…
56:09 Because you are here I want to pour it out to you. And you say, ‘Please, I know I have blocks and I can’t listen to you.’ Right?
56:20 So I say, ‘Please get rid of them.’ Don’t take time to get rid of them, don’t say, ‘I will do it when you come back next year’ – I may be dead.
56:35 Knowing I may be dead I want to tell you now.
56:40 Q: The best way is for you to tell what...
56:49 K: Ah! (Laughter) Good old Tunki!(Laughter) Q: (Inaudible) K: (Laughs) No, it isn’t such an easy…
57:06 You are lazy and therefore you say, ‘Please tell me. It doesn’t matter whether I accept it or not, just tell me.’ (Laughter) I say: get rid of them.
57:16 Q: No, but the thing is, I don’t know whether I have blocks.
57:22 K: So, investigate.
57:23 Q: That takes time, doesn’t it?
57:25 K: Do it now. You see, when you are saying, ‘Won’t it take time?’ you are still holding on to it.
57:33 Q: How do you start now, though? Now.
57:37 K: I’m going to show it to you.
57:38 Q: Then if you get rid of all the blocks and things then you’d have nothing to tell, because you’d already know.
57:44 K: Then we’ll communicate with you. (Laughs) You see how clever your beastly little minds are!
57:55 (Laughter) I want you to leave the house to which you are accustomed, and you say, ‘No, please, I don’t know, tell me!’ First of all – it’s very interesting, isn’t it? – first of all, do you know you have blocks?
58:30 Yes? Because somebody told you you have blocks? No, no, no, go slowly, careful. Do you know them because somebody told you you have blocks? Psychologists, your father, your mother and so on, so on, so on, told you you have blocks and you say, ‘Yes, yes I have blocks,’ or without anybody telling you, you know you have blocks.
59:04 You poor darlings are caught. Come on! (Laughs) Q: When you feel you have a block. When you feel you do, you have blocks.
59:14 K: Why do you call it ‘blocks’?
59:15 Q: What is a block?
59:19 K: Why do you call it a block? She used that word ‘blocks’ – why does she call it a block?
59:29 How does she know block means something between you and me – blocks. Blocks. It’s like a wall, like you can’t look through.
59:42 So do you know them, that you have such walls?
59:54 You know when you’re hungry, don’t you? Nobody has to tell you that you are hungry. You know when you are hungry. Now, why don’t you know about your block, if I can use those words? In the same way, say, ‘Yes, I have them.’ Q: But it all means now, doesn’t it?
1:00:18 K: Sir, don’t waste time, I’ve got another half an hour.
1:00:27 (Laughs) Do you know them?
1:00:29 Q: Maybe yesterday you had blocks. Today you might not have blocks.
1:00:32 K: No, no, no, no. No, yesterday you had it… (Laughs) You know you have them, do you? Whether you had it yesterday, whether you will know those blocks exist when you don’t want… when you have reactions to what is going to be said.
1:00:53 Or reactions according to your conditioning. Right? It’s really quite simple, really. I’m going to show it to you in a minute. Go on. Look, sir, you come along and say, ‘Look, my friend, you are a beastly little Hindu.’ Your word ‘beastly’ upsets me.
1:01:28 I resist. And you also say being a Hindu blocks you from understanding the European, or the American.
1:01:43 I listen to that, and I say, ‘Yes, I intellectually accept that.’ Right?
1:01:50 Verbally I accept it, but deeply I still am a Hindu. You follow? That’s my blockage. Now – and you say to me, ‘Look, as long as that blockage remains you can never feel for a European.’ So I say, ‘Quite right, quite right, that’s perfectly true, but I still am a Hindu.’ Right?
1:02:18 So how am I to get rid of that blockage? Because I want to have the same feeling as you have when you say there is neither Hindu, European, there is only human beings.
1:02:30 You follow? I want to have that feeling. I know what that is, you have conveyed it to me and I say, ‘What a marvellous feeling that is,’ I want to capture it, hold it, delight in it.
1:02:42 You understand?
1:02:43 Q: But you’re still a Hindu.
1:02:45 K: So how am I to be free of my blockage, as a Hindu? Am I going to take time over it? You understand? Or is it possible to get rid of it now?
1:03:00 Q: Only if you see the whole. If you see the whole.
1:03:04 K: Please don’t use the word to me, ‘if’.
1:03:09 Q: Well, when you do.
1:03:11 K: I don’t – that means time.
1:03:17 Q: (Laughs) Yes.
1:03:22 Q: You are part of the whole.
1:03:23 K: I am not. That’s your idea. I’m a fragmented human being.
1:03:27 Q: Yes, well that’s the recognition.
1:03:30 K: No, no. My question is: how am I to be free of my blockage as a Hindu? Don’t say ‘if’, ‘when’, or ‘when you are total’, ‘when you see the whole’ – those are all intellectual concepts, which I say, ‘Sorry, I don’t accept intellectual concepts, because I’ve got a beastly intellectual concept about being a Hindu’ – don’t add another concept.
1:04:03 You understand? So, look, I’ve only one concept, that’s good enough (laughs) – I don’t want to have more of them.
1:04:11 So my question is: how am I to be free of this blockage as a Hindu?
1:04:19 Not tomorrow, not ten years’ time, I want to be free of it now, instantly, so that I can listen to what you’re saying, to the feeling that you express in your face when you say, ‘My friend, as long as you’re a Hindu, Catholic, Protestant, you’re a beastly little man.’ Q: Sir, how to be free from the blockage, okay?
1:04:47 Just each word – how then to be free. The ‘how’ does imply a way, a method of doing it. If I am a Hindu and I try to find out a way, and I find a way, I’m still a Hindu.
1:05:05 K: No, you’re quite right. When I put the word ‘how’ to be free, it’s a means of communicating to you that I want to be free now.
1:05:22 Q: Okay.
1:05:23 K: The ‘how’, with all the implications of the ‘how’, the method, the system, the practice – we won’t use that. I just want to tell you, ‘Look, my friend, you have told me something of freedom, in which there is neither a Hindu, Buddhist’ – you follow? – ‘and by your words, by your gesture, expression, you have awakened a sense of greatness.’ And I say, ‘I can’t understand it, live it, I can’t be with it when I have this blockage as a Hindu.’ So my question is, my feeling is this must be put aside.
1:06:15 So I say I’m not going to allow time – you follow? – so I must finish it now.
1:06:29 Right? Will the ending of it be brought about through will? You understand, will? That means, determination, through saying, ‘I must be free’?
1:06:43 Q: No.
1:06:44 K: No. Why do you say no?
1:06:48 Q: Because just the fact that you must be free – you can’t be free because you’re trying so hard to be free.
1:07:02 K: I understand, old boy. I’m not going to help you to put it into words – you must put it into words. He’ll help you to put it into words. Go on.
1:07:10 Q: Just the fact that you desire to be free from it.
1:07:13 K: Yes, so what do you mean by desire?
1:07:15 Q: Well, desire, you want it, strive.
1:07:18 K: That means what? Watch it. Now you use words: ‘want’, ‘desire’ – right? – and the want, the desire, create the will.
1:07:29 Q: Yes. And you’ll do anything…
1:07:32 K: Wait. Stop there, stop there, stop there. The want, the desire, bring this determination, the will, into operation.
1:07:47 Right? And you say that won’t work.
1:07:49 Q: No, because that will is more or less a memory, isn’t it?
1:07:52 K: That’s right, that’s right. So you say to me, ‘Will will not dissolve this blockage.’ Q: But you were talking about yesterday of seeing it.
1:08:08 K: Not yesterday.
1:08:09 Q: Okay, it’s today also, the obvious – what is a Hindu?
1:08:11 K: Yes. I don’t see it, therefore it’s a blockage. Right? And you tell me, will, determination, the ‘must’, won’t wash it away. Quite right. I say, ‘Yes, I see that too.’ So what am I to do?
1:08:24 Q: Isn’t the will and the determination making it a reality?
1:08:35 K: There is only the reality, as ‘what is’, which is my blockage.
1:08:43 Right? I know it.
1:08:45 Q: It’s the wanting to get rid of it that really makes it more, that stops you from getting rid of it.
1:08:54 K: That’s it. Therefore you’re beginning to learn, say, ‘By Jove, I must not say I must get rid of it’ – right?
1:09:05 – ‘I must be free of it.‘ So when you say, ‘I must be free of it,’ your mind has realised verbally a different state, and you say, ‘This is a blockage, I must get rid of it.’ You follow?
1:09:29 So I won’t complicate it; it’s very complex, I won’t go into it. So you say, ‘Don’t do that.’ ‘All right,’ I say, ‘I won’t do it, I won’t exercise my will and push it away.’ Then what am I do?
1:09:46 Tell me what am I to do?
1:09:55 Q: If you are aware of those blocks which prevents you from seeing, then there will be instant action, which will...
1:10:01 K: Yes, old boy, now what do you mean by aware? You used that word ‘aware’- what do you mean by that?
1:10:07 Q: Well a seeing that those blocks...
1:10:09 K: What do you mean by ‘see’? I can’t. You must be very clear when telling me.
1:10:15 Q: Well those blocks that prevent you from...
1:10:20 K: (Laughs) Go on, go on. Now you tell me. When you say, ‘see’, ‘aware’, ‘look’, what do you mean by that? This is awfully good, isn’t it, this morning? (Laughter) You like it?
1:10:36 Q: Which words am I to use then? Which other words that I can use?
1:10:41 K: Use, tell me. I’m asking you, ‘Please explain, I don’t know what you mean by that word ‘aware’ – tell me, please.’ Q: In other language?
1:10:50 K: No, same language. (Laughter) Yes, tell now me in Spanish. I know a little Spanish, so I say, ‘I’ll listen to you.’ Or if you don’t know Spanish I’ll say, ‘I’ll listen to you in French, Italian, because I happen to know a little French and a little more Italian – please tell me.’ Q: I will use the same words then, but in Spanish.
1:11:20 K: So you are translating that word ‘awareness’ into Spanish and telling me in Spanish.
1:11:27 Q: Yes, sir.
1:11:29 K: Right, tell me.
1:11:31 Q: Uno debe estar atento.
1:11:34 K: Eccolo, bene. Attento. Now what do you mean, ‘attento’? (Laughter) No, this is not just verbal cleverness.
1:11:46 What do you mean attento?
1:11:49 Q: Perceptivo.
1:11:52 K: Ecco, bene, bene – perceptivo, which means, be attentive, be perceptive, be alert.
1:12:04 Right? Now what is the quality or what is the state of the mind that is attentivo, perceptivo?
1:12:12 Q: It’s saying…
1:12:15 K: Ah, you’ve got it. You follow? Listen carefully what I’m telling you. What is the state of the mind that is attentive, perceptive?
1:12:35 Q: It’s not a reaction.
1:12:41 K: Watch your mind. First watch your mind, and then put it into words. Don’t put into words which you don’t know.
1:12:51 Q: (Inaudible) K: See your mind: what is the mind that’s attentive?
1:12:57 Q: It has no blocks.
1:13:02 K: Quite right, it has no block. Therefore you’ve got it! You understand? A mind that is attentive has no blocks.
1:13:17 Q: (Inaudible) K: Do you see this?
1:13:27 Because you are not attentive, you have blocks. Right? The moment you say, ‘By Jove, I’ve got to understand you,’ you are attentive, and you have no blocks.
1:13:43 You get it? Which means you must have the same intensity, same vitality to listen as the man who wants to tell you something.
1:14:02 So you have no blocks when you are attentive. You’ve got it? Are you, now?
1:14:14 Q: Attentive. (Laughter) K: So when you look at a tree attentively you have no blocks, you have no image, you look.
1:14:30 Go on, sir.
1:14:34 Q: Well all through this talk, you know, you’ve been in our beastly minds, more or less.
1:14:42 K: Agreed.
1:14:43 Q: You know, you take us through all these complications, you know, of something that is simple.
1:14:50 K: I agree, sir. Therefore – now this is the point I’m coming to it – therefore you must meet minds that demand something of you.
1:15:06 You understand?
1:15:07 Q: Yes.
1:15:08 K: You must, I mean… I get so… You must, while you’re in Brockwood - not Blockwood (laughter) It’s quite funny! – while you’re in Brockwood (laughs), they’re going to demand you, demand the highest of you.
1:15:44 You understand? So when there is this great demand you have to pay attention.
1:15:53 Now, so there are two ways of demanding.
1:16:02 Aren’t you getting tired?
1:16:05 Q: No.
1:16:07 K: There are two ways of demanding, aren’t there? I’m talking - you tell me. I say while you’re here, during these years, you must demand of yourself your highest capacity, and the others, the staff and the older members of the community, will also demand the highest of you.
1:16:42 Demand. You know what demand is? Ask, insist. Now, there are two ways, aren’t there? May I go into it?
1:16:59 Q: Yes.
1:17:01 K: One is with affection, with love, to demand.
1:17:12 The other, to demand because I have an idea or an intention or a purpose - by demanding the highest of you, I’m going to educate you.
1:17:24 You see the two? You see the difference? Do you?
1:17:29 Q: One is destructive and one is fair. One is very destructive.
1:17:34 K: Wait. First see – don’t discuss – first see the two facts. I demand that you will be free, that you must be free, I say you must.
1:17:50 Q: One is with effort.
1:17:52 K: Yes, sir – effort. Go on.
1:17:56 Q: And...
1:17:57 K: …one is with authority. Right?
1:18:02 Q: Yes.
1:18:04 K: In that authority there is no consideration. I have an idea that you must be free when you leave here.
1:18:11 Q: That’s what makes the block.
1:18:12 K: Listen. That meets a block in you, which I have a block in me. Q. Yes.
1:18:21 K: Right? Venezuela, are you following this? (Laughs) I have a block in me which says, ‘By Jove, they must be free when they leave here.’ And by insisting on that, you know, intellectually, verbally, ideologically, that you have a different idea of what freedom is, so we battle.
1:18:54 Right? You see the difference? Whereas I’ve great feeling, I feel responsible, I’ve great affection for you, and say, ‘Look, you must… in yourself you must ask the highest of you.’ And also I’ll ask the greatest of you - the whole of you, not just partially.
1:19:29 Then you respond to me quite differently. Right? Because I’ve no idea, I don’t want to compel you, I don’t want to force you, I show you, look at the world, what it is, how it is suffering, how brutal it is, I show you the horror of everything that’s going on – I say, ‘For the love of God, be different.’ You follow?
1:19:59 Which is, I tell this to you out of my affection for you, not out of my idealism.
1:20:06 I spit on idealism. You follow? So I say to you: there are two ways of demanding something – one is intellectual, verbal, ideological, assertive – all based on my concept or a conclusion that freedom must be.
1:20:28 Which is the same as the establishment ideas. You follow? Whereas the other is entirely different. Right? Now can you demand of yourself the highest, of your capacity, you know, everything in you?
1:20:54 If you can, I’ll help you. You see the difference? If you cannot, I’ll also try to see that you have this. Are you getting this? Gosh, I feel hot about all this.
1:21:16 So Brockwood - not Blockwood - Brockwood is to help each other to demand the highest of each.
1:21:31 Can you stand this? Otherwise you’ll be just like any other, you know, bourgeois, middleclass and lower class or aristocrat or God knows what else.
1:21:54 I must tell you a story, then we’ll stop.
1:22:03 A teacher, every morning, at a certain time, used to give a sermon to his disciples.
1:22:17 And it was a lovely morning, clear sky and soft breeze and green, everything lovely.
1:22:24 So he gets up on the platform to give his sermon, and as he begins to talk, just as he was about to talk, a bird comes and sits on the windowsill and begins to sing.
1:22:41 Because it’s spring and it’s a lovely day, the bird is singing away.
1:22:48 The teacher listens to it and the pupils also listen.
1:22:55 And the bird, after a while, as his song finishes, flies away. So the teacher says, ‘The sermon for this morning is over.’ Right?
1:23:09 Have you got it? Have you got it?
1:23:19 (Laughs)