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BR76CTM3 - Can I completely change at the very root?
Brockwood Park, UK - 18 May 1976
The Transformation of Man 3



0:10 K: Shall we start where we left off? We were asking, weren't we... why do human beings live this way?
0:25 S: What is the root?
0:27 K: The turmoil, the confusion... the sorrow behind it all, conflict, violence... and so many people offering different... ways of solving the problems... the Asiatic gurus... and the priests all over the world... and the new books, new… everybody offering a new solution, a new method... a new way of solving the problems. And I'm sure this has been going on for a million years. 'Do this and you will be all right. Do that you'll be all right'. But nothing seems to have succeeded... to make man live in order, happily... intelligently, without any of this... chaotic activity going on. Why can't human beings, so-called educated... knowing all the scientific knowledge... biology, sociology... everything is now open to every human being. Why do we human beings live this way, in this appalling misery? Some of them are conscious, some of them... are unconscious, some of them say... 'Well, this is all right... it's only for a few years and I will die. It's a jolly good business and it doesn't matter'. So, why? What is the… Why?
2:21 S: Well, I have often said they do it because it gives them... the very sorrow, the very turmoil... the very problems themselves is the security.
2:35 B: I wouldn't…

K: That doesn't...
2:38 B: I don't really think so, I think people just get used to it. They miss anything they are used to but… people get used to scrap fighting and they miss it... when they don't have it. But that isn't the primary reason in my view... why they got started.
2:54 S: What is the primary reason in your view?
2:56 K: That's what we are exploring.
2:58 B: I just feel that whatever happens you'll get used to it... and you come to miss it after a while... because you're used to it but that doesn't explain why it's there.
3:05 K: I was reading the other day... some writer saying, historically... 5000 years, historically... there've been 5000 wars... thousands of people killed, millions... killed, women crying - you follow? the whole… and still we are going on.
3:26 S: That's right. I had the same experience. at one time I was working and... a guy said to me that he wanted... to go to Vietnam to fight because otherwise... his life was every night at the bar.
3:42 K: I know, but that isn't the reason. Why?
3:46 S: That's not the reason but there is something they hold… we hold on to the conflict and the sorrow.
3:53 K: Is it we like it?

S: It's not that we like it; it's almost that we like not liking it. It's a kind of orientation, a kind of... 'If I know my conflict, I know where I am at'.
4:08 K: No. Have we all become neurotic?
4:11 S: Yes. The whole thing is neurotic.
4:16 K: Are you saying that?
4:20 S: Yes. The whole society is neurotic.
4:25 K: Which means that the entire humanity is neurotic?
4:30 S: I think so. This is the argument we have all the time... Is the society sick? Then if you say the society is sick... which is your judgement, what is the value... you are using for comparison?
4:42 K: Which is yourself, who is neurotic.
4:44 S: Right.
4:46 K: So, when you are faced with that... that human beings live this way... and have accepted it for millennia; there have been saviours... there've been gurus, there've been teachers, there've been... you follow? - and yet they go on this way. And you say... we are all half crazy, demented... from top to bottom, corrupt; and I come along, us come along and say, why?
5:27 S: Why do we do it?
5:29 K: Why?

B: Why are we crazy?
5:30 S: Why do we keep it up. Why are we crazy? Right. I have it with my children. I say to my children 'This is a sick society. They spend 50 hours a week in front of the television box. That's their whole life'. My children, they laugh at me... all their friends are doing it.
5:45 K: You know, and moving beyond that - why?
5:48 S: Why? Without it, what?
5:52 K: No, not without it, what. Why first.
5:54 S: That's what we run into.
5:56 B: Well, no, that's merely a secondary effect. I think we get to depend on it, as we were saying this morning... to occupy us and so on... and Vietnam might seem some release... from the boredom of the pub, or whatever... but that is secondary.
6:12 K: And also when I go to Vietnam, or fight the war... all responsibility is taken away from me. Somebody else is responsible - the general.
6:22 S: Right.
6:23 B: In the old days people used to think... that war would be a glorious thing. When the war started in England everybody was... in a state of high elation.

K: High, exactly.
6:31 B: They didn't know what was in store.
6:33 K: They are all united. Why?

S: Why?
6:47 K: Is it that we have started out on the wrong path?
6:56 S: That's only part of it.
6:58 K: The species don't kill themselves... the animal species... but we are the species that kill each other.
7:09 S: Right.
7:11 K: So looking at all this panorama of horror, and misery... I feel this very strongly because... when I travel all over the place... I see this extraordinary phenomena going on... - in India, in America, here, everywhere... and I say why do people live this way... accept these things... read history, and don't... - you follow? it's no longer concealed. They've become cynical. It's all there.
7:45 S: That's right. They have become cynical.
7:47 B: Nobody believes anything can be done about it, that's one point.
7:50 K: That's it.

S: That's it.
7:52 K: Is it that we feel that we cannot do anything about it?
7:56 S: For sure.

B: That's been an old story. People say human nature is that way.
8:00 K: Can never be altered.
8:01 B: Yes. That's not new at all.
8:03 K: It's not new.
8:05 S: That's certainly true, people feel - or we feel... let's not say 'people' - we feel... like I said this morning... this is the way it is, this is the way we live.
8:15 K: I know, but why don't you change it?
8:20 S: Why don't we change it.
8:27 K: You see your son looking at the television for 50 hours a day... you see your son going off to Vietnam... killed, maimed, blinded - for what?
8:41 S: Right.
8:43 K: Sorry! There have been pacifists, there have been war mongers.
8:54 B: Many people have said 'we don't accept that human nature... is this way, we will try to change it' and it didn't work. So many people did that, right? The communists tried it... the socialists tried it, some others tried it.
9:07 K: The utopians.
9:08 B: The utopians, and...there has been so much bad experience... it all adds up to the idea that human nature doesn't change.
9:14 K: Change.
9:16 S: You know, when Freud came along, Freud made his studies; he never said that psychoanalysis is to change people. He said, we can only study about people.
9:25 K: I'm not interested in that. I don't have to read Freud... or Jung, or you, or anybody, it's there right in front of me.
9:32 S: Right. So let's say… that's good. We know this. We know this fact about people... and we also know the fact of the matter is... they don't try to change it.

K: So what is preventing them?
9:46 S: That's the question. That's another fact.
9:49 B: People have tried to change it in many cases but...
9:51 S: OK. But now let's say that they don't try to change it.
9:54 K: They go to Ashramas, they go to… a dozen ways they have tried to change. But essentially they are the same.
10:01 B: I think people cannot find out... how to change human nature.
10:05 K: Is that it?
10:06 B: Well, whatever methods have been tried are entirely...
10:10 S: Is that it? Or is it the fact that the very nature of the way... they want to change it is part of the process itself?
10:16 K: That's what he is saying.

S: No, he's…
10:18 B: Well, no, but I'm saying both. The first point is that... whatever people have tried... has not been guided by an understanding... a correct understanding of human nature.
10:28 S: So it's guided by this very process itself. The incorrectness.
10:32 B: Yes, let's take the Marxists who say... that human nature can be improved but... only when the whole economic... and political structure has altered.
10:40 K: Altered.

B: But then...
10:42 K: They've tried to alter it, but human nature stays the same.
10:44 B: They can't alter it, because human nature is such... that they can't really alter it.
10:49 K: They've got a class society... they started off no wars, you know...
10:53 S: But they are using a mechanical way... to make a mechanical change.
10:57 K: Look at it, you, take yourself; sorry to be personal... if you don't mind; you be the victim!
11:04 S: I'll be the victim. Pig in the middle!
11:06 K: Why don't you change?
11:09 S: Well, I...

K: No! Don't give explanations.
11:15 S: Well, the feel of it is that… the immediate feel of it is that... there is still, there is that… I guess, I'd have to say there is... some sort of false security, the fragmentation... the immediate pleasures that are gotten from the fragmentation; in other words, there is still that movement of fragmentation. That's how come there is not the change. There is not seeing the whole thing.
11:54 K: When you say that, are you saying, political action... religious action, social action, all separate... all fighting each other almost; and we are that.

S: Right.
12:15 K: Is that what you are saying?

S: Yes, I'm saying that. We keep getting something back from it, we get these... immediate pleasures and failures, frustrations from these...
12:29 K: Sir, there is a much deeper issue than that.
12:32 S: There's more. My immediate response is, why don't I change? What is it that keeps me from seeing the total? I don't know. I keep coming up with a kind of feeling that... I am getting something. I keep getting something from not changing.
12:56 K: No. Is it the entity that wishes to change... sets the pattern of change... and therefore the pattern is always the same... under a different colour? I don't know if I'm making myself clear?
13:16 S: Can you say it in another way?
13:19 K: I want to change. And I plan out what to change... how to bring about this change. The planner is always the same.

S: That's right.
13:36 K: But the patterns change.
13:38 S: That's right. Yes. I have an image of what I want.
13:43 K: No - patterns change, but I, who want to change... create the patterns of change.

S: Yes, that's right.
13:52 K: Therefore I am the old and the patterns are the new... but the old is always conquering the new.
13:58 S: Right.
14:01 B: But of course when I do that I don't feel that I'm the old...
14:04 K: Of course.
14:05 B: I feel that I'm the new...
14:06 S: 'I have got a new idea'…
14:09 B: But I really don't feel that I'm involved in that old stuff... that I want to change.
14:13 K: Just now, after lunch you were saying... Kabala, that thing, there is a new system.
14:18 B: Yes.
14:19 K: Say, if you study this you will be transformed.
14:22 S: That's right.
14:23 K: This has been said a 100 million times. 'Do this and you will be transformed'. They try to do it but the centre is always the same.
14:32 B: But each person who does it... feels that it has never happened before.
14:36 K: Yes. My experience through that book is entirely different... but the experiencer is the same old self.
14:46 S: The same old thing, right.
14:50 K: I think that is one of the root causes of it.
14:53 S: Yes, yes.
14:54 B: It's a kind of sleight of hand trick whereby the thing... which is causing the trouble is sort of put into position... as if it were the thing that were trying to make the change. You see, it's a deception.
15:08 K: I'm deceiving myself all the time by saying... 'I am going to change that, become that', then if it doesn't… and so on and on. Is that it?

S: That begins to get at it…
15:24 K: No, no. Look at yourself and say 'Is that it?' You read Hindu... wait a minute - Hindu, or some book.
15:34 S: Right.
15:35 K: And say 'Yes, how true that is... I am going to live according to that'. But the 'me' that's going to live according to that... is the same old me.
15:44 S: Right. But we have… We run into this in... I think that all systems, for instance, of therapy... with patients, the patient will say... the doctor is going to be the one... who is going to help him. And then... when they see that that doctor is...
16:03 K: ...is like you.
16:05 S: ...is like you or is not going to help you, then… they are supposed to get better, they are supposed to be well... but in fact they have never touched... that central issue, which is that... 'I thought that somebody could help me'. So then they go to something else... most of them go to another theory.
16:23 K: Another guru…
16:24 S: Another guru, another type of thing... whether it's a mind guru...
16:27 K: This afternoon there was a man here... talking about a new guru... or an old guru - it's all the same old stuff.
16:39 S: You are really getting at the issue... the fact that the root is this belief... that something can help you.
16:47 K: No, no. The root remains the same, and we trim the branches.
16:55 B: I think the root is something we don't see... because we put it in the position... of the one who is supposed to be seeing.
17:01 K: Yes.
17:03 S: Say that another way.
17:05 B: It is a sort of conjuring trick. We don't see the root... because the root is put into the position of somebody... who would be looking for the root. I don't know if you see it...
17:16 K: Yes. The root says 'I'm looking for the root'.
17:20 B: It's like the man who says 'I'm looking for my glasses'... and he's got them on!

S: Or like that Sufi story... 'I am looking for the key'... the one about 'I'm looking for the key over here'... You know the story? The Sufi, the guy comes along... and the guy is crawling around under... the lightpost, and he's looking for… a guy comes along and says 'What are you doing there?'. 'I'm looking for my key'. - 'Did you lose it here?'... 'No, I lost it over there... but there is more light over here'. (Laughter)
17:48 B: We throw the light on the other part.
17:53 K: Yes, sir. So if I want to change... because I don't want to live that way... I don't want to follow anybody... because they are all like the rest of the gang. I don't accept any authority in all this.
18:12 S: Yes.
18:15 K: Authority arises only when I am confused.
18:18 K: When I am in disorder.

S: That's right.
18:21 K: So I say, can I completely change at the very root?
18:29 B: Let's look at that because you are saying 'I'... there seems to be confusion in the language... because to say 'I'...
18:36 K: Confusion of language.
18:38 B: It makes it hard because you say 'I'm going to change…' It's not clear what I mean by 'I'.

K: The 'I' is the root.
18:45 B: The 'I' is the root, so how can 'I' change?
18:47 K: That's the whole point.
18:49 B: The language is confusing because you say... 'I've got to change at the root', but I'm the root.
18:55 K: Yes.

B: So what's going to happen?
18:58 S: What's going to happen, yes.
19:00 K: No. How am I not to be I?
19:05 S: That's the question.

B: What do you mean by that?
19:11 S: How am I not to be I. But let's roll it back a minute. You state that you are not going to accept any authority.
19:22 K: Who is my authority? Who? They have all told me 'Do this, do that... do the other. Read this book and you will change. Follow this system, you will change. Identify yourself with god, you will change'. But I remain exactly as I was before... in sorrow, in misery... in confusion, looking for help... and I choose the help which suits me most.
19:53 S: Can we stop here for a minute? What would you say... I mentioned something about psychiatry... and I'd like to get something straight if we can. There is this whole theory... and gurus have it, they don't talk about it, but they have it... and there is in all psychiatry, that is the theory... that if I go along with the authority... to where I see my addiction to authority... then I'll free myself from the authority. You know that?
20:19 K: Yes. The communists say... 'Freedom comes at the end of good discipline. And discipline is what I tell you'.
20:27 B: Yes, at the end of it... there is the dictatorship of the proletariat.
20:31 S: Right. In other words... by giving myself over, I will discover my error. Now, what do you want to say about that?
20:41 B: Isn't that obvious?
20:43 S: Right. It's obvious that... I'm doing the same thing, and then I see... the failure of this authority, but there is a thesis there... that if I see the particular of my following authority... then I will see the universal in the root.
21:01 B: But why do you have to follow the authority to see authority? This is one of the questions. Do you have to deceive yourself... in order to understand self-deception? (Laughter)
21:18 K: Yes sir. Is it possible for a human being... to change at the very root of his being? They have tried different ways, - Zen - you follow? 10 different, umpteen different ways to change man... rewarding him, punishing him, promising him. Nothing has changed, or brought about this miraculous change. And it's a miraculous change.
21:57 S: It would be, yes, yes.
22:00 K: It is. Everybody promises, do this, do that, do the other.
22:05 S: Right.
22:07 K: And I, we come along and say 'Look, I don't want to... accept any authority'.

S: Right.
22:16 K: Because you have misguided everybody. All the authorities.
22:22 S: Authority...

K: ...in itself is disorder.
22:26 S: Right.
22:28 K: Authority exists because human beings are in disorder. The disorder has created them, not clarity, not compassion... not something entirely different. The disorder has created them. So why should I follow them? Though they promise, do this, discipline yourself... according to this way, ultimately you'll be free. I reject all that. Intelligently, because I see. It isn't a cantankerous rejection... it's a reasonable, sane rejection. So how do I proceed? I've got 50 years to live. I don't know about the future, may be... I'll find out, but I have got 50 years to live properly. What is the correct action?
23:36 S: What is the correct action to live properly?
23:40 K: That's all. To be sane!

S: To be sane.
23:44 K: Not to be neurotic. Who is going to tell me? The communists? Marx? Lenin? Mao? The Pope? Or the local priest? Who is going to tell me? Because they don't act rightly either.
24:12 S: We have a whole group of people... who don't say that they'll tell you... a whole group of people who say... 'See how you follow me... if you follow me, see your tendency to follow me…
24:27 K: Yes, yes.

B: I understand that.
24:29 S: The business of self-deception. To see through your own self-deception.…
24:34 B: That's really an impossible trick... because if you say 'Follow me and deceive yourself'... then you must genuinely deceive yourself, and you can't see.
24:41 S: That's right, but the thesis is that... if you deceive yourself, you will see... your own tendency to self-deception... which you don't see.
24:49 B: But that must be authority because... it doesn't make sense to say that... if I deceive myself I'm going to see through deceiving myself. The whole point of self-deception is... if I am really doing it right... I don't know what I am doing.

S: Right.
25:02 B: Therefore how do you guarantee to me that I can see... through self-deception by deceiving myself?
25:07 S: Because I am going to show you through your… I am not going to participate; I am going to be here and you are going to deceive yourself... and then you'll see this authority in action... the way you need authority.
25:18 K: You are talking about group therapy…
25:20 S: I am talking about a kind of psychotherapy, right.
25:23 B: Why do I need to go through all that to see self-deception? You see, it's not clear.
25:29 S: No, it's not clear. But that is the only way - in other words... you are so desperately in need. You need me desperately.

K: I don't need you!
25:37 S: No, but he does.
25:40 K: That is fundamentally wrong.
25:42 B: I'm accepting authority. Right?
25:45 S: Yes, you are fundamentally... That's right. He is fundamentally wrong. Here he is... he is fundamentally wrong!

K: Tell him that!
25:51 S: You are fundamentally wrong. He did not hear me.
25:54 K: No. Don't allow him to appeal to you.
26:01 S: You mean, don't play along in this absurdity.
26:05 K: I can't help you.

S: I can't help you.
26:08 K: Because I'm like you.

B: I'll take my trade elsewhere!
26:11 S: He'll go somewhere else.
26:13 K: If everybody said 'I can't help you'... you have to do it yourself, look at yourself... then the whole thing is beginning to act.
26:22 S: Right. But the whole thing doesn't work like that. There are a lot of people who will be willing... to deceive him for a few dollars.
26:29 K: We know they are all neurotic people. Here is a man who says 'I am neurotic... I won't go to any other neurotic... to become sane'. I know. So what does he do? He doesn't accept any authority... because I have created... out of my disorder, the authority.
26:59 B: Yes, that's merely the hope that somebody knows what to do.
27:02 K: Yes.
27:03 B: Because I feel this chaos is too much for me and I just assume... that somebody else can tell me what to do. But that comes out of this confusion. In other words…
27:12 S: Yes, the disorder creates the authority.
27:15 B: The authority, yes.
27:16 K: Of course. In the school I have been saying... 'if you behave properly there is no authority'. The behaviour we have all agreed to... punctuality, cleanliness, this or that. If you really see it... you have no authority.
27:37 S: Yes, I see that. That is a key point, the disorder itself creates the need for authority.
27:45 K: Look what has happened in India. Mussolini is a perfect example. Trains run properly (laughs)…
27:51 B: It doesn't actually create a need for authority. It creates among people the impression... that they need authority to correct the disorder... that would be more exact.

K: Right.
28:00 B: Because authority, they don't need it at all... because it's just destructive.
28:04 S: Right, right.
28:08 K: So let's start from there. I reject all this - being not insane. In the rejection of authority I have become very sane. I'm beginning to become sane.
28:26 K: So I say, I know I am neurotic; a human being says... I know, now what shall I do? What is the correct action in my life? Can I ever find it, being neurotic? I can't. So I won't ask what is the right action. I will say now... can I free my mind, the mind... from being neurotic, is it possible? I won't go to Jerusalem, I won't to - you follow? to Rome, I won't go to any new… Park Avenue doctor - nobody.

S: Right.
29:16 K: Because I'm very serious now. I am deadly serious because that is my life.
29:21 S: Right.
29:22 B: But then, you have to be so serious… then you said that in spite of the immense pressure to escape...
29:27 K: I won't.
29:29 B: You won't. But I am saying... one will feel at this juncture... there'll probably be an intense pressure towards escape... saying this is too much.

K: No sir. You see what happens…
29:40 S: Actually it's not what happens.

B: Why?
29:42 K: When I reject authority, I've much more energy.
29:45 S: Tremendous energy.
29:46 B: Yes, if you reject the authority.
29:48 K: Because I am now concentrated to find out.
29:51 S: That's right. That is what happens…
29:53 K: I'm not looking to anybody.
29:55 S: In other words, then I have to… I have to be rawly open to 'what is' - that's all I've got.
30:03 K: So what shall I do?
30:05 S: When I am rawly open to 'what is'?
30:07 K: Not open. Here is a human being, caught in all this... what shall he do? No authority; knows social discipline is immoral. Right?
30:29 S: Then it's the intense alertness…
30:32 K: No. Tell me. Tell me - you are a doctor... tell me what I am to do. I reject you.
30:38 S: Right.
30:40 K: Because you are not my doctor, you are not my authority.
30:43 S: Right.
30:44 K: You don't tell me what to do, because you are confused.
30:48 S: Right.
30:49 K: So you have no right to tell me what to do.
30:51 S: Right.
30:54 K: So I come to you as a friend and say... 'Let's find out. Because you are serious and I'm serious'.
31:00 S: That's right.

K: Let's see how...
31:02 S: We can work together…
31:05 K: No, no, be careful. I'm not working together.
31:09 S: You are not going to work together?
31:11 K: No. We are together investigating.
31:13 S: Together investigating. OK, we won't call it…
31:16 K: No, no. Working together means co-operation.
31:20 S: Right.
31:22 K: I'm not co-operating. I say you are like me. What am I to co-operate with?
31:29 S: You don't want to co-operatively investigate?
31:31 K: No. Because you are like me.

S: That's right.
31:36 K: Confused, miserable, unhappy, neurotic. Sorry!
31:40 S: Right, right.
31:42 K: So I say 'How can we co-operate?' We can only co-operate in neuroticism.
31:48 S: That's right. You mean we will collude essentially to… deceive ourselves. So what are we going to do?
31:56 K: So can we investigate together?
31:59 S: That's a very interesting question. Can we? How can we both investigate together if we are both neurotic?
32:05 K: No. So I say 'Look... I am going to first see in what ways I am neurotic'.
32:13 S: OK. All right. Let's look at it.
32:16 K: Yes, look at it. In what way am I neurotic? A human being... who comes from New York, or Tokyo... or Delhi, or Moscow, or wherever it is. He says 'I know I am neurotic... society is neurotic, the leaders are neurotic... and I am the world and the world is me'. So I can't look to anybody. See what that gives you, what it does?
32:49 S: It really puts you straight up there in front.
32:54 K: It gives you a tremendous sense of integrity.
32:59 S: Right. You have the ball in your hands, now run with it.
33:12 K: Now, can I - 'I' being a human being... Can I look at my neurotic things? Is it possible to see my neuroticism? What is neuroticism? What makes me neurotic? All these things that are put into me... into me in the sense of the 'me' that has... collected all this, which makes the 'me'. Can my consciousness empty all that?
33:46 S: Your consciousness is that though.
33:51 K: Of course.

B: Is it only that?
33:54 K: For the moment I am limiting it to that.
33:57 S: That is my consciousness. That very… the proliferation of my fragmentation... my thought is my neuroticism. What am I going to do with this... what am I going to do here, where am I going to get this... or what am I going to do there... or how am I going to - I mean this 'me' is... made out of the proliferation of these fragments. Right?
34:26 K: Of course. But also this means... a tremendous question, you follow? Can I, can the consciousness of man - which began 5... 10 million years ago... with all the things that have been put into it... generation after generation, generation after generation... from the beginning until now... you are asking, all that is neurotic, old boy... all that is a fragmented collection; can you take one at a time of those and look at it? Or can you take the whole of it and look?
35:16 S: Yes. Can you take the whole of it and look - that's not clear. How can you take the whole of it and look?
35:24 B: It seems a language problem there because you say... if you are that, how are you to look at it?
35:33 K: I'll show you in a minute - we'll go into it.
35:35 B: No, but I meant that it is a difficulty of stating it.
35:39 K: Stating it - I know. It is a verbal, you know... the words are wrong, you see?

B: The words are wrong.
35:45 S: Because the words are made by this very system…
35:48 B: So we shouldn't take these words too literally.
35:50 K: Too literally, of course.
35:52 B: Could we say that the words can be used flexibly?
35:54 S: Right. Now that's a good point…
35:56 K: No - the word is not the thing.
35:58 S: That's right. The word is not the thing but the word points... at something much bigger than itself.
36:03 K: No. The word is not the thing. It may be the big thing or the little thing... but the word is not that.

S: Not that.
36:10 B: No, but we are using words and the question is how are we... to understand them. You see they are in some way a clue...
36:16 K: ...an impediment and - quite.
36:18 B: ...in some way a clue to what we are talking about... It seems to me that one trouble with the words... the way we take them... we take them to mean something very fixed, like saying...
36:28 K: ...this is a chair.
36:29 B: ...this is exactly a chair. My consciousness is just so. I am the neurosis, therefore we take it very fixed.
36:38 K: It's moving, it's subtle... it's much more...
36:41 B: It's moving and changing, therefore you can't just... exactly say I am the neurosis or I'm not the neurosis.
36:46 K: It is constantly in flux.
36:48 S: But he is saying something bigger which is... the fact that the very thing that we are investigating... I mean, the way we use words as the thing... is the very movement that we are investigating. That is the consciousness.
37:06 K: That's it. Would you repeat that once more?
37:09 S: Yes. That the very act of the word being seen... as the thing by consciousness... that very movement is the thing we must investigate.
37:21 K: Of course, yes.

B: Yes.
37:23 K: Now, can you look at it without the word? Is that possible? The word is not the thing. The word is a thought. And as a human being I realise... I am neurotic, neurotic in the sense, I believe, I live in conclusions, in memories... which are all neurotic processes. In words, pictures and reality. I believe!
38:05 S: That is how you live.
38:08 K: My belief is very real, it may be illusory... - all beliefs are illusory... but because I believe so strongly they are real to me.
38:18 S: Right.They are very real to you.
38:22 K: Very. So can I look at the nature... of the belief, how it arose - look at it?
38:32 S: Look at how I am living in the world... in which I am trapped by the belief... in the word is the thing. Look at that movement.
38:41 K: Don't expand that. I understand. Just look at… You have a belief, haven't you?

S: Oh, yes.
38:46 K: Now, look at it. Can you look at it?
38:51 S: I saw, this morning we were talking about the fact... that the belief is doctor - word, thing.
38:57 K: Don't expand it. Can you look at that fact that you have a belief? Whatever it is, god... The State is the most important, or whatever it is.
39:13 S: Right.
39:14 K: Marx is newest god, or Mao and so on and so on.
39:23 S: But I believe it is true.
39:26 K: No, no. Can you look at that belief?
39:32 S: As a belief and not as a fact.
39:36 K: Ah, no. It is a reality to you when you believe in it. Go to a Catholic, a Hindu, or a Marxist...
39:44 S: Right. But how am I going to look at it if I really believe it? In other words, look. I say there is a god!
39:51 K: Right.
39:53 S: Now you are telling me to look at my belief in the god.
39:58 K: Why do you believe? Who asked you to believe? What is the necessity of god? Not that I'm an atheist - I am asking you.
40:06 S: I know it's there. God is there for me, if I believe.
40:09 K: Then there is no investigation, you have stopped. You have blocked yourself. You have shut the door.
40:14 S: That's right. So how are we going to get... you see, we have got such beliefs.
40:22 K: Ask him.

B: What?
40:23 K: You have tried 100 times to show... to somebody who has a very strong belief... he says 'What are you talking about? This is reality'.
40:32 B: Yes. That's the thing of how our word becomes reality. Can we investigate that?
40:38 S: How can we get at this? I think we have loads of these... unconscious beliefs that we don't really shake... like the belief in the 'me'.
40:48 K: He is asking some other question.
40:51 B: How thought or the word becomes the sense of reality…
40:56 K: Why words have become realities?
40:59 B: I think a deeper question is how the mind sets up... the sense of reality. If I look at things I may think... they are real, sometimes mistakenly, that's an illusion... but when it comes to… even with objects you can say a word... and it seems real when you describe it that way. And therefore in some way... the word sets up in the brain a construction of reality. Then everything is referred to that construction of reality.
41:29 S: How am I to investigate that?
41:32 K: What created that reality? Would you say everything that thought has created... is reality, except nature?
41:51 B: Thought didn't create nature.

K: Of course, not.
41:53 B: But I meant... Can't we put it that thought can describe nature.
41:57 K: Yes, thought can describe nature - poetry, all the rest of it.
42:00 B: And also measure it.
42:02 K: Imagination - all the rest of it. Can we say, thought... whatever it has put together, is reality? The chair, the table... all these electric lights; It hasn't created nature, but it can describe it.
42:24 B: And also make theories about it.
42:26 K: Make theories and all the rest of it. And also, the illusion that it has created is a reality.
42:35 S: Right.
42:37 B: But isn't it to a certain extent... this construction of reality has its place... because, if I feel that the table is real... although the brain has constructed that, it's OK. But at some stage we construct realities that are not there. We can see this sometimes in the shadows on a dark night... constructing realities that are not there.
43:00 K: Fear that there is a man there.
43:02 B: Yes. Also all sorts of tricks and illusions are possible... by conjurors and so on. But then it goes further and we say that mentally... we construct a psychological reality…
43:14 K: That's where it comes.
43:16 B: …which seems intensely real, very strong. But it seems to me the question is... what is it that thought does to give that sense... of reality, to construct reality?
43:29 K: What does thought do, bring about, to create that reality?
43:35 S: Yes. Like if you talk to someone who believes in god... they say to you that is real... that it's really there, it is not a construction. And if you talk to somebody who really believes in their self... I have talked to many people and you have been talking... to the psychotherapists, they say that the self is real... that it exists, it's a thing. You heard a man once say, a psychotherapist says... to Krishnaji, 'We know the ego exists'... 'We got a theory - it exists'.
44:08 B: Well, it is not only that, I think people have felt its reality... what happens is that the illusion builds up very fast; once you construct the reality, all sorts of events... are referred to it as if they were coming from that reality... it builds up a tremendous structure... a cloud around it of support.
44:26 S: So how am I to investigate my reality-making mechanism?
44:29 K: Wait. We have 5 minutes more. So let's come to it. What are we doing now?

S: We're moving. It's moving.
44:40 K: What are we doing? We have said... no authority, nobody can say to another... 'This is the right thing to do'. We are trying to find out... what is the correct action in life. I can only find that out... if there is no disorder in me. 'Me' is the disorder.
45:07 S: Right. That's right.
45:10 K: However real that 'me' is, that is the source of disorder.
45:14 S: Right.
45:16 K: Because that separates, that divides... - me and you and we and they... my nation, my god - me. Now, we are asking… With its consciousness... Can that consciousness be aware of itself? Aware like thought thinking.
45:50 B: Thinking about itself?
45:51 K: Thought can… Put it very simply, Can thought be aware of its own movement?
46:00 B: Yes.

S: That's the question.
46:01 B: That's the question. Could we say a self-reference... of thought… Thought understanding... its own structure and its own movement.
46:09 S: Its own movement. But is that thought that is aware of itself? Or is it something else?

K: Try it! Try it!
46:16 S: Try that.

K: Do it now, 4 minutes you have! Do it now. Whether you can be aware of your - not you... whether thought can be aware of itself. Of its movement.
47:00 S: It stops.
47:03 K: What does that mean?
47:06 S: It means what it says, it stops, that it can't be that with the observation of thought, thought stops.
47:20 K: No - don't put it that way.

S: How would you put it?
47:25 K: It is undergoing a radical change.
47:30 B: So the word thought is not a fixed thing.
47:33 K: No.

S: The word thought…
47:35 B: …does not mean a fixed thing. But it can change, right?
47:38 K: Right.

B: In perception.
47:43 K: You have told me, other scientists... have told me, in the very observation... through a microscope, the object undergoes a change.
47:51 B: In the quantum theory the object is... cannot be fixed apart from the act of observation.
47:58 S: This is true with patients in psychoanalysis. Being with the patient, they change automatically.
48:03 K: Forget the patient, you are the patient!
48:05 S: I'm the patient. It changes.
48:08 K: No, no.
48:12 S: It stops.
48:13 K: What takes place when thought is aware of itself? Sir, this is an extraordinarily important thing.
48:33 B: Yes.
48:37 K: That is, can the doer be aware of his doing? Can I move this vase from here to there... can I be aware of that - moving?
48:58 S: Yes.
48:59 K: I can physically. That's fairly simple. I stretch out the arm and so on and so on.
49:04 S: Yes.
49:05 K: But is there an awareness of thought which says... yes, thought is aware of itself... its movement, its activity, its structure... its nature, what it has created... what it has done in the world, the misery... all the rest of it?
49:27 S: Is there an awareness of the doing of the brain? Let me ask you something? Why do you think you can be aware of...
49:44 K: Time.
49:46 S: I want to save that question for tomorrow.