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BR76DT6 - Do we see the importance of the radical transformation of the human mind?
Brockwood Park, UK - 24 September 1976
Discussion with Teachers 6



0:25 K: What shall we talk about? Stephen Smith: There’s a question I’ve been thinking about, how can one get across the essence of these teachings without a student becoming rigid, without him getting a very fixed concept of what it’s about, and seemingly acting out of that, becoming narrow?
1:01 K: How shall we do it? Would you start with learning?
1:14 Because learning is a constant process, isn’t it? So there can be no rigidity if there is really an act of listening and learning, both listening to everything that’s happening outside and inside, and learning.
1:37 Would that reduce the rigidity?
1:51 SS: Seemingly what happens often is that an idea is formed of what the teachings are about.
1:58 And this often, apparently, blocks the response to many things.
2:05 So, there is an almost instant condemnation of things because they don’t fit in with the idea of what the teachings are about.
2:16 K: We’re asking, is it possible to prevent ideation being formed?
2:28 Why do we do this? Why do we make everything into ideas, conclusions?
2:40 SS: Isn’t that a part of our conditioning itself?
2:43 K: Let’s explore it a little bit.
2:57 Is there a time interval between listening and acting, and therefore ideation being formed?
3:12 I listen to what you’re saying, verbally, and I form a conclusion from it, and act according to that conclusion.
3:34 The three steps – listening, conclusion, and then acting. So there is a time interval between listening and acting.
3:49 Why do we do this? This is our process. Montague Simmons: There’s a continuous resistance to effort, and when you’ve got an idea, that makes it all simple, you just simplify it to an idea and then you don’t have to think any more about it.
4:09 That’s one of the tendencies, why you get ideas, to save yourself effort.
4:14 K: Are we saying that where there is listening, ideation or formulation and action, there is effort involved in it?
4:25 Whereas listening, acting, not ideation, then there is no effort. You see and act.
4:39 Like seeing danger and acting. Mary Zimbalist: But the mind tends to store up in the memory a residue of that, which is that X is dangerous – whatever was perceived is a danger, therefore that is stored as a sort of stationary fact in the memory.
5:06 K: Let’s go into that, too. One sees a dangerous snake and there is instant action.
5:19 That instant action has been conditioned by centuries of being told that snakes are dangerous, and therefore it’s a conditioned action of self-preservation.
5:47 Is there a difference between that and listening and acting – seeing, observing and acting?
6:02 In the observation there is no conclusion, no preconceived ideas, you observe, see what is, and act.
6:15 MZ: Perhaps because of the previous process, which is to see that the snake is dangerous, we tend to carry that over into everything, accumulate a lot of facts about something and act out of that, rather than the new perception.
6:33 The mind seems to have conceived of learning as accumulated facts, from which one reacts, instead of something different.
6:46 K: Let’s see. The danger of a snake, a conditioned response, and observing and acting – is there a difference between these two?
7:14 The one is the response of memory, deeply conditioned and the other, there is no response of memory, only observation and action.
7:35 Can we live that way?
7:47 Philip Brew: Aren’t all conclusions arising out of the known, for which there is some feeling of security.
7:55 And observation and action is free from the known, free from the conditioning.
8:07 K: Sir, one observes in oneself, jealousy.
8:22 The conditioned response to that is, ‘I mustn’t be jealous’ or rationalise jealousy, or suppress it, or run away from it – those are all conditioned responses to jealousy.
8:43 Now, the other is, the observation of jealousy, without all the conditioned responses, just the observation of jealousy and the ending of it.
9:05 Now, jealousy is a word – we went into that – jealousy is a word, thought, image and habit. Right?
9:24 When I say I’m jealous – need I go through all that, must we? We have gone into it – need I?
9:37 SS: May I just bring this up again, the original point? Because there is jealousy and all the things that we are caught in, there is also the idea that because I have listened to
9:54 I have got the answer to all this.

K: Yes.
9:56 SS: And the others who are exhibiting these things are inferior, and they are caught in it but I’m not because I’ve listened to the speaker and I know that this is… I know about it.
10:10 So, there seems to be a double, an edifice, as it were.
10:15 K: But if one is aware of that, ‘I am not, the others are,’ what happens?
10:39 I’m aware that I am not and you are, or you are and I am in it.
10:47 What happens then, if you are aware of this feeling of superiority, this feeling that you have gone beyond that – ‘Poor chap’ – all the rest of it?
11:05 If you are aware, would you go through it? Would you have such a feeling?
11:15 Which is really another form of jealousy, isn’t it?
11:21 MZ: It is a continuation of habit.
11:23 K: Yes, habit, another form – same thing.
11:29 MZ: But the habit of this other kind of learning, of getting hold of a fact and sitting on it, is so innately ingrained in the human child from the moment it’s born, in each one of us, that is there some way that we can explain to the student and to ourselves the constant watchfulness, not to fall into that habitual way of learning something?
12:02 K: When I’m learning about myself, or the way I think, the motives – when I’m learning about myself, I don’t think it would ever arise that I’d feel superior to the other.
12:24 MZ: But the tendency to make that a fixed fact in one’s thinking, after one’s perceived it, let it fall back into the old way, is tremendously strong.
12:35 I think it’s the thing we’re talking about.
12:37 K: That’s habit again. Is it possible – again, we go back to the question – to drop a habit?
12:48 See what habit does, which is a mechanical process, which is the brain has become mechanical – see the danger of it and drop it.
13:05 Apparently, that is the most difficult thing, what we were discussing the other day, to see a habit and to drop it.
13:20 SS: It seems, in a sense, quite easy for instance with the students here, to get them into a way of life wherein they don’t smoke and drink and eat meat, for instance – that seems fairly easy.
13:36 But then it seems to be that that, in the very process of that there seems to be an ideation taking place that because I don’t smoke and drink and eat meat, etc., when I go out into the world and meet people who do these things, they are obviously..

K: Untouchables.
14:01 SS: And also, of course, with the deeper things, which is worse.
14:12 K: Is that an intelligent action?
14:19 Is that intelligence when I say, ‘I’m better than you are?’ So, how can we cultivate that intelligence – we come back to the same thing.
15:01 Well, sir, what shall we do? How shall we cultivate this intelligence? We said intelligence is – if we all agree to that, see that – intelligence is perception and action, no ideation.
15:22 That is intelligence. Now, how do we
15:29 convey this to the student, so that he becomes really intelligent?
15:42 What would I do? What would you do, sirs?
15:56 What would I do with a lot of children, students, of various conditioning, from different so-called cultures?
16:13 How shall I, if I’m a teacher here, how shall I break down all that, and in the very process of breaking down, they become intelligent?
16:31 If I was here, what would I do? Come on, sirs, what would you do?
16:52 Carol Smith: Perhaps one thing you can do is pursue a certain habit of thinking that you notice the student has, whenever it comes up, perhaps it can be gently pointed out: ‘Is this the same thing that happened yesterday?’ Of course, it could work both ways, but pursuing a habitual pattern of looking at the world, because we see the students so frequently, we very frequently notice that they have, for instance, likes and dislikes, one particular thing, always doing what you like.
17:40 I think that could, by the end of term, be trodden into ground, if it’s worked on.
17:48 K: Is that what you’re doing? Is that the way you would do it? What would you do, sir? Come on. Let’s have a dialogue about this.
17:56 MZ: From the student’s point of view, that turns into moralising, we’re underlining the party line that...
18:05 Doris Pratt: Couldn’t we first find the common factor in ourselves, to expose to the student, as it were?
18:14 To find the common factor within ourselves, first. I don’t know, I’m just thinking.
18:22 MZ: Then we’re back to that confession to the student.
18:25 DP: Not necessarily confession, but first we must be on safe ground, we must know what we’re talking about.
18:31 K: We’re going to face this the day after tomorrow, Sunday, from Monday on, or Sunday on – Dorothy Simmons: They’re here now, most of them.
18:40 K: All right, they’re all here – what shall we do?
18:43 DS: We’ve abandoned them. We’ve said, ‘Look after yourselves.’ K: I know, but what shall we do – please, apart from – what would you do, each one of us?
18:56 DS: Come and listen to you – that’s what we’re doing. Passing the buck. Leaving them to get on with it.
19:06 K: No, no. I don’t want to leave them.
19:09 DS: But we are.

K: I know, only this morning.
19:13 DS: Well, it’s a very vital time.

K: No, only this morning – you’re not going to leave them like this, every morning.
19:21 Ingrid Porter: Could we perhaps look at it this way? The way their mind works now, they think it’s quite natural, they perceive something but they don’t act, there’s that interval.

K: How will you deal with this?
19:37 IP: You have to bring that to their notice first. We’ve talked about it and we’ve understood this is what is necessary, but the students don’t know that, yet.
19:54 MZ: Would it be helpful to try to sort out from the student’s point of view the area in which the so-called ‘old way,’ a factor, drive on the left in Britain, or something like that, is applicable, useful and so forth, but that way of looking at certain other factors is very harmful...
20:16 K: I’m not interested in all this. How would you do it? You’re going to face them from tomorrow, or today – how will you tackle this problem? As teachers, as a community, together, not each one having his own idea about this – together, how shall we do this?
20:50 SS: Not create an orthodoxy to replace the one that they’ve come out of. For instance, they’ve come out of a catholic background or a protestant background, this or that background, and having discarded that, or perhaps think they have, to create a new orthodoxy based on what you are saying.
21:12 This is the question.

K: I understand that. Is that what we’re all going to do?
21:21 CS: I hope not.

SS: This is what is worrying me.
21:28 K: Instead of old orthodoxy...

SS: A new orthodoxy.
21:35 DS: If you’ve seen the truth of something, would it become an orthodoxy? You have to see the truth of what is being said and act from that, rather than say, ‘This is what is thought here.
21:51 This is what the teachings say.’ You’re putting it to the test in the daily functioning of everything, on all levels, so I don’t see how it... – there’s a danger always because we cling to something that seems familiar.
22:17 But if you’re meeting the actual moment that you’re dealing with, I don’t see how that arises.
22:30 I think it’s thinking about it brings that about.
22:34 SS: One can’t deny that it does arise.
22:36 DS: But that’s our job to deal with it, break it down, as it arises.
22:41 SS: That’s what we’re talking about, isn’t it?
22:43 DS: But that is the thing in action.
22:47 SS: Yes, I know but...
22:49 DS: So that you’re on the ball the whole time, whatever you’re doing.
22:59 SS: I don’t know, I feel one could perhaps go further into it.
23:02 K: Is that what you’re all going to do, point out each time, as the thing arises?
23:11 DS: Discuss it.
23:13 K: Is that what you’re all going to do?
23:20 At the end of a month here, they say, ‘Oh, my God!’ Wouldn’t they say that? ‘Lord, I’ve heard that before.’ Q: It wouldn’t be the same if one was also learning and reacting in the moment.
23:42 In this way, one wouldn’t establish an idea or a set procedure.
23:48 K: How would you do this? Were you going to say something? Please, please.
24:00 Q: We’ve discussed a great deal with you, both in India and here, we’ve gone into it, intellectually, we talk a great deal about it.
24:10 We also do a great deal of work, we work with the students, work with the teachers and so on.
24:18 But is it possible we have not succeeded in producing… in keeping the matrix really alive?
24:27 K: I know. I know. That’s what my point is.
24:32 Q: To put it in another way, sir, these two are easy, but the other thing seems to be inordinately difficult, to keep really awake.
24:46 K: How would you do it?

Q: Is it that one is lazy or asleep?
24:50 K: How would you deal with this problem, Shakuntala? You’ve got to. Please answer. Discuss this.
25:06 What would I do?
25:32 May I hold forth? I don’t want to. The way I would do it – I may be wrong, please correct it, don’t listen, accept it, jump on me, criticise, go into it with me.
25:58 As I feel very strongly that they should radically change, psychologically – that’s my chief concern, nothing else, except they have to study and all that, but my chief concern, my commitment, my passion is that they should, when they leave here they should be totally different human beings.
26:33 That’s my chief concern. Now, that being my concern, I want to convey this to them, so that they see the importance of it, they see the necessity of it, they see that they must be like that.
27:06 That’s the first thing I want them to understand. Which means, I want them to listen to what I’m saying. To listen.
27:22 All right, may I go on? Joe Zorskie: You’re just restating the question, though. You’re just putting the question in different words. The question that you put to us is, how do you bring that about?
27:34 K: I’m going to do it. As I am the teacher for the moment, as I’m concerned, I want them… This is my chief concern.
27:47 I would meet them, if I was here, every day, about that – set apart ten minutes or quarter of an hour every day and say, ‘Listen, we must find out together how to change ourselves, radically.’ I would say, ‘Are you interested in this?
28:22 Do you want this to happen?’ Then they would ask me, ‘What do you mean by change?’ Then I would have dialogue with them.
28:42 In that dialogue, we’ll show each other how we are conditioned, how we accept things.
28:53 I would devote my energies to this quarter of an hour, completely to make them understand this.
29:19 JZ: I don’t see how it would work with the school...
29:21 K: Because I feel passionately. I would convey my passion to them.
29:30 MZ: But if a staff of twenty odd each spend ten or fifteen minutes a day...
29:35 K: No, together. I mean together. Don’t reduce it. I told you, if I had to do it, that’s my passion.
29:47 I would convey my passion to them.
29:59 I would find ten different ways to convey it – on a walk, sitting, I would do it.
30:08 SS: The task for us seems to be to convey it non-verbally, really.
30:13 K: Non-verbally, as well as verbally. I would say, ‘Listen to me, see what’s happening in the world, you are conditioned, you are this’ – you follow? – go into it with them, completely.
30:27 I’m not frightened. I’m exposing myself to you – I don’t mind. But don’t make that into a burden. I’m not putting a burden on you. See what I’m doing.
30:42 SN: This is being done already, but obviously we are not doing it in the right way.
30:49 K: Find out. If you’re doing it, what’s wrong? Why haven’t they caught fire about this? Jim Fowler: They inevitably feel they’re being spoken down to.
31:06 SN: They feel they’re spoken down to.

K: Oh, no. I have told you, I’ve come off the pedestal, all that’s washed out, cut it out.
31:15 MS: Aren’t we assuming that they don’t catch fire? It seems to be an assumption that isn’t necessarily carried out. One can think of a certain number of students who have caught fire. They may not be burning with the great Gunpowder Plot bonfire, but the fire is there and it’s glowing.
31:33 K: I want them to catch fire and that fire burns for the rest of their life, not just a couple of days and disappear.
31:43 I want them to have it.
31:45 MS: I think there are some of them for whom it is.
31:58 K: May I put the question to you? Is this a passion to you?
32:14 Is this really our chief concern, apart from study, is this our real passionate concern, for each one of us?
32:35 Amen.
32:45 I’m going to meet them – every Tuesday, by themselves, and Thursday with all the staff and the students.
32:58 Sunday, all the staff, students and invited. Now, I’m going to meet them on Tuesday. I’m going to convey it to them. I’II find out. I’II find out how to do it. Because I know I can do it, because I’m passionate about it.
33:21 PB: Krishnaji, every time over the many times we meet, you say, ‘How will you do this?’ This is the only response, is it not?
33:30 K: I’m using ‘how’ only... P

B: No, that’s all right.
33:35 K: I won’t use ‘how’ any more – I’II cut it out.
33:38 PB: But when you keep saying, ‘What are you going to do?’ this, surely, for me is the only response, which is why mostly I think we’re silent.
33:51 I care enough, I’m passionate about this, I will do it, it will...
33:57 K: No, if you’re passionate, you must convey this passion to them.
34:04 PB: Yes.
34:07 DS: Excuse me, Krishnaji, but the horses are charging around. Is that all right, Jim?

K: What?
34:12 DS: The students are charging round with the horses outside.
34:17 JF: Had I better go and see?

DS: I think you ought to. There’s a fourth horse, and there’re two small children right in the middle of them, charging round.
34:39 K: If you and I are passionate about it, passion is common to us, not your passion is different from my passion.
34:51 Passion is passion. And our approach to the student must be the same.
35:03 PB: It must stem from the same...

K: Yes, stem from the same... So, we must be careful we don’t contradict each other to the student.
35:21 You may say one thing out of your passion, and I may say something out of my passion, which may contradict yours – but we’re both passionate.
35:32 So we must go into that, so that you and I don’t contradict each other.
35:40 PB: We do spend a lot of time amongst ourselves, the staff.
35:43 K: We’re doing it now. We must be careful not to contradict each other.
35:54 In what way then shall we convey this without each of us contradicting it, contradicting each other?
36:09 PB: I don’t see that if there is a real observation and a real awareness and a real caring amongst us, about what we’re doing here, I don’t see quite that contradiction arises – in fact, it does arise, I know – but I don’t think the question is to avoid us saying different things, I think the question is are we all one as to what we’re doing here?
36:39 DP: The students will not accept from the teacher, what they accept from Krishnaji. They won’t accept it. They’ve actually said at their meetings, the function of the teacher here is to teach. Leave the other to Krishnaji.

K: Oh, no.
36:54 DP: ‘We don’t want to hear anything of Krishnamurti’s teachings from a teacher.
36:59 K: Is that it? No, I would cut out…
37:03 DP: That’s why I’m wondering whether it’s absolutely wise for you to see the students alone.

K: No, no. I would not talk about the teachings. I am concerned, as we are concerned, about the transformation of a human being, which is absolutely necessary in this culture, or in these times.
37:29 That’s all we’re concerned with, not about Krishnamurti’s teachings. Blazes with all that stuff!
37:35 PB: It’s not your teachings.

K: No, of course not.
37:42 CS: If that’s the case, we might as well stop the whole school, because K won’t be here all the time.
37:51 We can’t have that attitude.
37:53 K: I wouldn’t enter into that at all. I’d say, ‘We are...’ ‘Are we concerned together, do we feel passionate together about this?’ It’s nothing to do with somebody’s teaching.
38:14 CS: I don’t quite follow – if you’re passionate about the same thing, the transformation of man, then how can there be contradiction?
38:24 K: Of course, there must be contradiction. You and I may feel passionate...
38:31 CS: If it’s on the same line – the changing of man – how is there contradiction?
38:40 K: You and I see the basic need of transformation of man.
38:48 You and I may feel very strongly about it, passionately about it. Would you not convey that passion in a different way from me?
39:00 Q: Yes.
39:03 K: There might be contradiction in that.
39:09 PB: Contradiction because we’ve not all handled our own conditioning...
39:13 K: That’s what I’m saying.
39:15 CS: Or there may be contradiction, in the way that the student interprets what’s being done.
39:25 K: What you say to the student, how you deal with a problem with the student.
39:32 I may deal with it one way and you in another way, therefore there might be contradiction in that.
39:39 CS: Actual contradiction?

K: Actual contradiction, of course – that’s what I’m talking about.
39:46 MZ: Everything politically, psychologically, educationally and religiously, claims to be concerned with the transformation of the human being.
39:54 There’s an infinity of approaches.
40:02 K: I’ve come off the pedestal, I really have no motive, and also you pointed out to me, as I’m a new teacher: self-interest. I see that.
40:22 And my passion is to see that they understand this basic necessity of transformation.
40:31 And I will talk to them. My talking and my acting towards them must be the same as yours, otherwise we’re all contradicting each other – that’s all – basically.
40:49 You might say, ‘It’s all right, Old Boy, go and smoke.’ And I say, ‘Don’t, please, that’s a habit, don’t be caught in a habit.’ So there’s immediately contradiction.
41:57 JZ: Are you familiar with the evangelical movement in religion?
42:04 The Evangelists.

K: I am a super-evangelist. Not the Jesus, bloody kind, but I am super- of all that.
42:16 JZ: In that movement, people utilise – I don’t know what you call it – a trick of the mind.
42:23 K: Ah, no, I don’t want tricks.
42:25 JZ: I think that none of us want tricks, here.
42:27 K: No, of course not.
42:30 JZ: But there is the obvious capability of the mind to shift its self-image from a low one – I’m nothing, I have no energy, I don’t have the passion – and then slip into it another totally different attitude...
42:49 K: That’s phony. J

Z: That’s totally phony.
42:52 K: But we’re not talking about phony.
42:53 JZ: But that’s what Steve is saying, that you can merely change your idea and transform into a new idea.
43:00 ‘I now have the passion, I’m going to speak for ten minutes a day,’ because you have the desire for that transformation.
43:13 K: Do we have to...? Shall we begin again? Don’t we all see the importance of radical transformation of a human mind?
43:32 Suppose I do and you don’t. I have to show it to you, haven’t I? How important it is. I’d say to you, ‘Will you please listen? For God’s sake, listen to what I have to say.’ Will you listen? Or will you say, ‘Yes, my dear chap, you’re too serious – forget it’? Or will you really listen to what I have to say?
44:05 So I shall proceed by asking those students, ‘Do you really want to find out what I want to say?’ CS: For some of them, you are talking about issues which they themselves have had no contact with.
44:24 They themselves have not reached a maturity or an experience with the world that they see the necessity for this.
44:32 K: They see that. C

S: No, that they don’t see it.
44:34 K: It’s my job to show it to them.
44:38 CS: If you assume they all want to...
44:39 K: No, no, it’s my... I’m going to make them want it.
44:43 CS: Good. You’ll make our job very easy!
44:50 K: It’s my responsibility, it’s my job, my bread and butter – that’s why I’m here.
44:56 JZ: When you ask a question to us, will we listen? All of us will say to you, ‘Yes, we will listen.’ K: And not translate it into ideas.
45:06 JZ: Yes, but we’ll say, ‘We will try to do that.’ K: Don’t try, don’t try – don’t do it.
45:14 JZ: But you see what I’m saying?

K: I understand very well, sir.
45:18 JZ: We realise that if we are translating then we’re not listening, and if we’re not listening, this whole thing is a farce.
45:26 K: Therefore, here it is – don’t translate or make an abstraction of the fact of the necessity of change.
45:37 Don’t make an abstraction of it.
45:41 JZ: But I may be translating, as you say that.
45:45 K: That’s just what… Please, don’t do it.
45:50 JZ: But if we are doing it.

K: I say, ‘Please be aware of it.’ Be aware of it, see that you’re doing it and stop it.
46:02 JZ: But if there is self-deception in the human mind, then the deception covers that over, we don’t see that we’re not doing that.
46:14 K: Are you doing it? Are you, Mr Joe, saying that you cannot stop making an abstraction of it?
46:25 JZ: All I can say, honestly, is I don’t see… if I am making an abstraction of it, I don’t see it.
46:33 K: So you’re not doing it. J

Z: I say I’m not doing it.
46:35 K: So, that’s good enough.
46:38 JZ: But it may not be good enough.
46:41 K: Good enough for the time being. Let’s go into it. Which means you are really not concerned with ideas but with action.
46:53 SN: But I think what he’s saying is that he could be fooling himself. I could say that I see it, but I might be fooling myself.
47:01 K: You’ll find out. Don’t say, ‘I might be fooling myself,’ and talk about it.
47:05 MZ: One might be making an abstraction out of action.
47:11 K: Find out if you’re making a fool of yourself, or caught in an illusion. Don’t say, ‘I might.’ JZ: How do you find that out, with certainty?
47:27 K: We said you make an abstraction because either you don’t want to act or you want to escape through an idea, or there is the desire to change, which is a motive.
47:46 JZ: When you say ‘abstraction’ here, do you mean an abstraction about there being a self, some abstraction related to a self-image?
47:57 K: No, just a minute, sir, let’s stick to one thing.
48:04 Do we both see the absolute necessity of radical change in the human mind?
48:11 That’s all we’re talking about. Now, when you listen to that, do you make an abstraction of that into an idea?
48:23 JZ: Well, the words ‘radical change,’ either that has some meaning to you...
48:29 K: Psychologically.
48:30 JZ:...psychologically, or it doesn’t.
48:32 K: I’ll convey it to you, what I mean.
48:34 JZ: If you don’t know what a radical change is...
48:35 K: I’ll explain to you. Don’t quarrel over words.
48:39 JZ: I’m not quarrelling.
48:40 K: I’ll explain to you what a radical change is. A radical change implies not conforming to a pattern. That’s one thing. Not conforming to any authority – authority of your own experience or the authority of another.
49:11 Are you following? J

Z: Yes, I’m following that. Because we do conform to a certain degree.
49:18 K: Of course, of course, I have to put on trousers. We’re talking psychologically, conforming to a pattern.
49:29 JZ: A pattern of thought and ideation.
49:32 K: Or ideation – it’s the same thing.
49:39 And radical change is eliminating time altogether – say, ‘I will be something,’ ‘I will change, later on.’ Right? That’s one of the basic things in transformation.
50:00 I can explain lots more, but that’s one of the basic things.
50:09 You agree… do you see that?
50:12 JZ: I think we’re all with you with that.
50:16 K: If you’re all with the person who is talking, you feel that’s important, don’t you?
50:30 JZ: Obviously.
50:33 K: Do you feel passionately enough to convey it to those students? Say, ‘Act instantly, don’t allow time to interfere’ – after explaining all the things involved in it.
50:48 JZ: We do that when we see them acting in a pattern, thinking in a pattern, conforming – we do that, as Dorothy said.
51:00 K: But apparently, they don’t do it.
51:11 SN: Not always. Sometimes they do.
51:14 K: Please. My God, you people!
51:21 I want my son to be intelligent – I want, not wishy-washy stuff – it’s my burning desire that he should be totally different from the rest of the human monsters that are growing up in the world.
51:44 SN: Yes, but you’re asking for a total intelligence.
51:47 K: I am – what’s the point, otherwise? I say, ‘Why should I waste my life on this?’ You might ask me, ‘You’ve talked for fifty years, have you done it there?
52:06 If you haven’t done it there, why the heck do you expect those children to do it?’ SN: I’m asking, have we done it here, have I done it?
52:23 K: What are you trying to say? S

N: Our task is much more difficult, because I have to convey something to them that I’m not totally free of.
52:35 K: You’re not totally free and they are not totally free, therefore we’ve been through that – talk it over with them, say, ‘Look, we are both on the same level with regard to this.
52:45 I may know more history than you, but that’s a different matter. So, as I’ve come off my pedestal, we are together in this problem.
52:59 So, let’s both of us find out.’ You see, sir, if I may put it differently, the older generation to whom I talk, they like it, they like these ideas, but they are already heavily conditioned.
53:39 They’ve got work, their marriage – tremendous problems they have. Here, with these students, they have not the tremendous problems, as the grown-up people have.
53:51 So, perhaps we can change this a little bit. Not ‘a little bit’ – I withdraw, quickly.
54:05 BJ: Krishnaji, how can we be sure we’re not involving ourselves in the blind leading the blind?
54:12 K: That’s your job to find out. If you’re blind, find out why you’re blind. We all say, ‘Yes, if I am blind, how can I change?’ You make that statement and remain there.
54:38 What do you say, sir?
55:18 JZ: It seems that to have seen through conditioning is one thing, but love, seems to be an entirely different thing.
55:29 K: Passion is love.
55:34 JZ: I generally can see when there’s a pattern of thought. I can’t be certain that I see through all the patterns of thought but sometimes I feel that there is… that love is an idea.
55:52 Do you see what I mean? For me, love is an idea – it’s more like ‘I should love.’ K: I know. So you don’t love.
56:05 JZ: In approaching a student without that love, without that compassion, in a sort of cold, analytical, intellectual way, even though you’re talking about conditioning, pointing out some habit, some lapse of his attention...
56:25 K: Are you saying, that because we have no love, everything becomes intellectual, and verbal, and therefore, it really has no deep effect?
56:41 SN: That’s what they seem to feel.
56:44 K: Wait. If that is so, what shall we do? What’s the next step? That we’re always preaching to them, always telling them what to do, they get bored with it, they get hardened.
57:01 We know all that. Then what shall we do? If they feel that there is no love, then move from there. Don’t repeat that and stay there.
57:31 JZ: I think we have an affection for the students, for each other...
57:40 K: Affection is all right, but it’s much more than that.
57:48 CS: We’re talking about love in the sense we’re using it in this room, it doesn’t exist when one is still involved in these problems of self.
58:04 And as Joe says, we have affection for the students, we have concern, we have sympathy or empathy, but if there isn’t that compassion...
58:13 K: I understand. We’ve got a little affection, but that’s not good enough, there must be love.
58:21 Then proceed. How to have this thing?
58:24 CS: You have to free yourself.
58:34 K: It may be, in India, here, Ojai, everywhere, there may be no love.
58:46 You follow, sir? No, look, I have affection but I see it isn’t good enough, the other thing is what is necessary.
59:01 Then how shall I proceed?
59:09 Keep on saying, ‘I’ve no love but I’ve got a little affection’ – and what? What is my next step?
59:25 PB: Love is not a thing one can cultivate.
59:28 K: Agreed. Cultivation means time. I can cultivate an onion, but not love.
59:38 PB: I don’t know the answer. I think that love, that if this place is founded on anything...
59:44 K: If I haven’t got it, sir, if I haven’t got that love – perhaps you may have it – what am I to do?
59:54 PB: I truly have no idea.
1:00:02 K: Why? These are all your children, your sons and daughters, and you have that love – if you have it, suppose you have it – and they haven’t got it. What will you do?
1:00:20 That’s your burning desire, passion.
1:00:23 PB: I thought we were talking about us?
1:00:28 K: All right, I’m saying to you, I haven’t got that love, you may have it – help me to have it.
1:00:37 To at least smell it, taste it.
1:00:54 BJ: I think that does happen. You can’t avoid it happening.
1:00:57 K: Why not? I know it cannot be cultivated. I know it’s not a thing, that you give to me.
1:01:06 BJ: No, but I’m saying I don’t think it can avoid but to be communicated. I think if the person has love, the speaker has love, it must be communicated, it can’t be avoided.
1:01:20 K: But you can communicate it, I can’t because I haven’t got it. Then, I’m asking you, ‘Please teach me. What am I to do?’ Is it that I’m seeking power, that I want to dominate people?
1:01:53 Is it that – you follow? – I’d give up everything to have that – not in the sense, possess it, you understand what I mean.
1:02:09 Is it power, position, myself more important? I would investigate, break everything down, to find it out.
1:02:25 Because without it – it all turns to ashes.
1:02:36 Harsh Tankha: If I say I have no love, isn’t that already a self-image that I have about myself?
1:02:43 K: We are talking about… verbally – not image. You can’t put it into words, there is the feeling of it, the extraordinary sense of – all the rest of it – you don’t...
1:02:56 But we’re talking verbally for the time being – you may all have it, and I haven’t got it.
1:03:03 It isn’t in me, and I’d like to have that flower born in me.
1:03:15 MZ: What is it you mean when you speak of love in this sense? What is it you mean, this quality of love that you’re talking about now?
1:03:24 K: What do I mean?
1:03:31 Part of my passion, part of that passion.
1:03:34 MZ: Passion. What is that passion?
1:03:46 K: Need I explain it?

MZ: I think so, Krishnaji, because I think there’s a tremendous misconception – not necessarily here, but among many people – a sentimental abstraction of love.
1:04:00 K: Oh, no.

MZ: But there is.
1:04:03 K: It has nothing to do with sentiment, emotion, romanticism.
1:04:08 MZ: What does it mean in this school, amongst these people – ourselves, the students, those who come here – what is it you’re talking about, that quality which should be here?
1:04:23 K: I don’t think it can be put into words.
1:04:31 The description is not the described, the word is not the thing. We are talking about the thing, not the word.
1:04:38 MZ: But if one says concern, affection, friendliness, compassion?
1:04:45 K: No, don’t use ‘friendliness’... Affection, friendliness, kindness, gentleness, has nothing to do with love.
1:04:56 It is a negation of all this, you have the other. Don’t…
1:05:02 MZ: You must negate friendliness, compassion, warmth and affection?
1:05:06 K: No, if you have love, all the other things come. But if you have all these things as a kind of basketful, the other thing won’t happen.
1:05:15 MZ: But love is, at least to me, something infinite, something that there is no describing.
1:05:24 K: I’ve said that – there is no description, the word is not the thing, therefore I won’t indulge in words about it.
1:05:31 MZ: Unless one is on a plane where this is a total reality all the time, what does it mean to those of us who are not, except...?
1:05:45 I feel that we’re using something sacred in a lesser way, because of not knowing that totality, therefore it’s terribly dangerous to talk easily about love.
1:06:01 I don’t mean you.
1:06:07 K: I may convey it to you if you are very quiet. Instead of all these arguments and back and forth, perhaps if you’re very quiet you may know of it, I may convey it to you.
1:06:23 Or there might be non-verbal communication.
1:06:33 Therefore, I want those students, my concern is that, nothing else.
1:06:42 JZ: It seems obvious that any self-image blocks seeing that.
1:06:51 It seems also that the usual case is that I have a self-image blocking seeing love, but I don’t see that self-image, it’s not clear to me.
1:07:02 Now, say, you see my self-image, knowing my self-image, you could hurt me, because any self-image can be hurt.
1:07:17 Now, is love always avoiding hurting me?
1:07:22 K: No. Obviously not. It’s like going to a surgeon.
1:07:32 JZ: No, I mean psychological hurt.

K: I mean that. Psychologically, if you are hurt, then you have to pick up that problem, and go into that problem, why you are hurt.
1:07:43 JZ: I might be hurt if I have this idea that I’m very humble.
1:07:50 You would see that.
1:07:53 K: You might feel very humble – I’d say, ‘Look, you’re playing a game with yourself.’ JZ: But that might hurt me.

K: Then pick it up.
1:08:00 You might be hurt, and I say, ‘Why are you hurt?’ JZ: Are you suggesting then that, sometimes, maybe all times, before that self-image can be seen and evaporated, that there has to be some hurt?
1:08:20 K: There has to be a shaking up. Of course. Inevitably, if I am a Catholic, and to me that’s an image which I have created for myself, you come along and say, ‘Don’t be silly,’ I get shocked, or I don’t listen to you at all.
1:09:36 I wish you could stick to one thing.
1:09:46 Mine, not yours – my chief concern is that radical, deep, psychological change.
1:09:57 When he leaves this place, he must be so completely changed. That’s my concern. In that concern is my love for him. I love him so I’m passionate about it.
1:10:43 We shall meet them, I will convey this, say, ‘Look, that’s my passion.
1:10:57 You see why it is – look at the world, what is happening, everything, appalling things are happening – the cheating, the lying, the whole terror.’ I’d say, ‘Therefore, you must change, you must be totally different.
1:11:14 Not as a superior entity, just be different.’ And I would go into it.
1:11:24 I’d say what is involved in this. We must have love, there must be love in you. They’ll say, ‘Yes, plenty of it, I want to sleep with that girl.’ So, I’d break it down, go into it – ‘When there is love there is no jealousy, no hate’ – and go into it, convey it with my blood.
1:12:04 HT: Krishnaji, in actual practise, we meet the student for the first time, say, in the corridor, and you look at them, you see that they’re shy and frightened, and that this is not the time to start explaining it to them...
1:12:20 K: I know, I saw some of them. H

T:...why the world is like that.
1:12:23 K: They look so nice, some of them.
1:12:27 HT: What are we to do when we perceive their self-image, we see that they have this image about themselves, making them afraid?
1:12:35 K: I’d break it down, say, ‘Don’t have an image, see what’s involved – you’ll get hurt. For God’s sake, don’t get hurt. You’ll get hurt as long as you have an image.’ HT: This is when we just meet them, we pass them in the corridor.
1:12:52 K: I know, first time, sir, they must feel that this is their home, that they’re loved here.
1:13:04 I know you can’t do it – leave it.
1:13:27 HT: So, without actually going into the details of why the transformation is necessary, how can we immediately convey this feeling of love?
1:13:43 K: I will convey it because I feel very strongly.
1:13:53 I will convey it, all right.
1:14:02 Whether they will do something about it, is a different matter.
1:14:11 They know what I’m talking about.
1:14:19 When I talk to big audiences, they know exactly what I’m talking about.
1:14:28 They may not want to do it. They may say, ‘Oh, for God’s sake, this is much too difficult. Go away, do something else, my responsibility is I have to earn money,’ but they know what I’m talking about.
1:14:45 So I want them to know what we’re talking about, all of us together.
1:14:52 If we’re not clear, they won’t be clear. What we convey, if it is not clear to ourselves, we’ll make them more confused.
1:15:05 That’s why I said, do we really want or feel the absolute necessity of this?
1:15:29 Because here, when I talk under the marquee, they listen, they know what I’m talking about and go away.
1:15:36 Here we have them for the next four, five, six months. We can cook them. Sorry!
1:15:52 I feel in those Indian schools they exist to cook these children – and they don’t.
1:16:02 Here too, I say, ‘For God’s sake, don’t let’s waste our days, lovely days and all the rest of it, if we can’t convey this to them and make them bring about a change.’ Look, sir, how they train – I was listening to something last night on the television, how a good family conveys to the children their taste, their way to behave, it’s drilled into them, day after day.
1:16:48 I’m not saying that we should do that. They have been conditioned that way. Here, if we could uncondition them that way, say, ‘Look, watch.’ BJ: Are they going to find this uncomfortable as well?
1:17:12 K: Oh, that’s understood. That’s what Mr Joe meant. They get hurt, feel uncomfortable, they are frightened. So you have to go into it, point it all out – you follow? It’s not you are making them uncomfortable, society, life is making them uncomfortable.
1:18:36 The other day, after the meetings in the marquee or tent, a young man came up to me.
1:18:44 He said, ‘I’ve understood what you’re talking about. I want to be with you so that I get more and more.’ I said, ‘That’s stimulation and you might just as well take a drug.’ He said, ‘No, I just want to spend my days talking to you, being with you.’ I said, ‘Then you depend on somebody.’ He was really so moved, he began to cry, ‘What am I to do?’ There, it’s a different matter because we’re meeting there only four times in a year, or something or other.
1:19:22 Here we have got these children for four months, day after day.
1:19:49 MS: Once we agree that we’re going to hurt the children we’re on very dangerous ground.
1:19:55 K: No, I would see not to hurt them – sir, they are children, they’re young, they’re sensitive, they are also conditioned, they are also hard, they’ve already settled in a groove.
1:20:15 You have to pull them out of it, say, that might hurt… Sir, it all depends how you deal with it.
1:20:24 MS: We’ve got to be clear on the precise area on which it’s legitimate to hurt them.
1:20:30 K: It all depends how you deal with it, sir.
1:20:40 JZ: You don’t have to have love to see someone’s conditioning, hence see their image-making process and know how to hurt them.
1:20:52 But if you go on that, and they are being hurt, and they look at you and they don’t see any love and they don’t see any compassion, then there’s real fear going on.
1:21:01 K: Therefore, I’d prevent it. J

Z: You’ve got to begin with...
1:21:08 K: I’d tell them. I’d say, ‘I may say something – don’t be hurt by it, listen to find out.’ I’d approach it ten different ways – I’d talk to them about meditation.
1:22:43 Unfortunately, it’s not my job to stay in one place and cook anybody.
1:22:55 My job, apparently, is to go around, what I’ve been doing for the last so many years.
1:23:02 So perhaps it may be your fortunate job, that you can cook them.
1:23:10 Sorry, I’m using the word ‘cook’ – not in any ugly sense.
1:23:40 After all, they go to all the various schools and colleges to be conditioned, more and more.
1:23:48 If they can condition them, I don’t see why we can’t uncondition them here – which may be much more difficult.
1:24:59 I think we’d better stop, don’t you? One o’clock.
1:25:33 Right, sir.