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BR78D1 - Are you aware of the structure of yourself?
Brockwood Park, UK - 29 August 1978
Public Discussion 1



0:38 K: This is supposed to be a discussion or a dialogue a dialogue being a conversation between two people. And as that is impossible to have a conversation with two people including so many perhaps we could take a problem which may affect all of us and discuss it as though it were between two people. Or we could turn this into a question and answer meeting. So which would you like? Discussion generally ends up in an argument which would be rather futile offering one opinion against another one judgement against another and so on. But whereas a dialogue a conversation between two people who are friends who are concerned about a problem which is mutual and perhaps they can talk over their problems deeply quietly, seriously and with a sense of humour. Or we could turn this into a question and answer meeting. There too, again, what kind of question one asks who is asking, what is the purpose of asking and who is going to answer the question and so on - all that is involved in all this. So which would you like, or think it proper to either question, dialogue or discussion?
3:04 Q: Dialogue.
3:09 K: If it is to be a dialogue what shall we talk about remembering a dialogue is between two people a conversation amicable, easy, quiet and penetrating? So what shall we talk over together?
3:43 Q: Sir, I would like to ask a question, not necessarily a dialogue. You were saying yesterday that the chaos and the violence in the world is a result of our everyday lives. But I don't think it is easy as all that. If you take the spectrum, at one end of the spectrum you put Hitler and at the other end of the spectrum you put a person like Schweitzer then you have two people who are doing something quite different: one person is trying to help humanity and the other person is trying to destroy humanity. Now if you leave that aside for a moment: take any one person in this tent give them the right environment, the right job they are free of conflict, they are not hooked on religion or dope and they get cancer. Now the conventional religious view would say that it is an act of god, which is obviously crackers. But you could say this person has a disposition towards a disease. Now it does appear to me that in the world today there are people who are definitely for the forces of good and those for the forces of destruction.
4:54 K: The gentleman asks why do you say the world is in chaos because we are in chaos, each one of us: uncertain, argumentative, greedy, selfish, violent which perhaps may project in the world bearing in mind that we are the world we are not different from the world. And there are good people, the questioner says and there are some bad people, bad guys and good guys and would it be erroneous on your part to say that because we live in our own particular individual lives rather violent, ugly and so on, that maybe quite inaccurate. That's right, sir?
6:06 What other questions would you like to discuss, talk over?
6:10 Q: I would like to ask a question, if I may. I was churning over in my mind what you said yesterday about registering memories. And what concerned me was if you were to ask me a question if I was to totally experience what you were saying to me that at the end of the question if I had totally experienced it that I wouldn't know that you had asked me a question in order to be able to answer it. And what I would like to ask you is: is it possible that we have two parts to our communication which are the two hemispheres of the brain one which only receives and which totally registers all the time and the other part which transmits which in fact we need not register because if we experience that we need not register it. Is it possible that - my mind has gone a blank now, sorry. (Laughter) When we receive we are not able to blot out that memory that it is there totally and that in fact it is our choice whether we use one side of the brain or the other and to what extent we use each side of the brain.
7:36 K: The questioner says there are two spheres in our brain one that is receiving, registering, memorising and the other part, perhaps the other part which is more free, which is not conditioned and therefore there is this duality going on in us. And memory, remembrance of a particular of this sphere is necessary. That is his question.
8:20 Any other question?
8:22 Q: Yes, would you please talk about the problem that arises when the intensity of one's feelings and emotions block one's awareness of thought.
8:37 K: When one's emotions and sentiments and reactions which are intense and strong, block a perception, what is one to do?
8:57 Q: I understood that meditation is a way of life all day so you think there is no need to sit down in lotus position at certain times. That is one thing. And the other thing is when we return from here and we are all alone in a crowd where do we find the strength to keep on? I feel lost.

K: Yes. Is it necessary to sit in a certain posture lotus posture introduced from India and the East is it necessary to sit that way to meditate? And is it necessary to set aside a certain part of the day to have - daydreams! (Laughter)
9:48 Q: No, to breathing.
9:51 K: I understand (laughs), I was only joking. And how is one to have, when one leaves here to have the strength to face all one's solitude loneliness, all the travail of life. That is the question.

Q: To keep on this way of life.
10:21 K: Yes.
10:25 Q: Do you see any relation between the awareness and trust, faith?
10:35 K: Faith? Oh, do you see any difference between otherness and faith. I don't know what it is about - doesn't matter.
10:44 Q: Awareness.
10:56 Q: Relationship between faith and awareness.
11:02 K: That's the correct - sir, sorry. What is the relationship between awareness and faith. Yes sir?
11:15 Q: I would very much like to ask a question connected with the first question. This is that one can see fairly clearly that one's own psychological pain the pain in the world as a whole is caused by us, a projection. But it seems that there is pain in the universe as a whole not caused by human beings. The sort of thing I refer to is the the genetic imperfection perhaps with children being born with frightful diseases which one cannot put to human beings. In other words a slightly imperfect universe which causes pain. This is quite a problem when we think about it.
12:02 K: If I understood the question rightly may I put it in my own words, sir to see that we understand each other? That there is not only individual suffering each person suffers in different ways but also there seems to be a universal suffering a global suffering - children are born deformed mentally retarded and so on, so on.
12:35 Now just a minute please - which of these questions do you want to discuss? Which is, first, the question that gentleman asked: you may be in error when you say that because we live in chaos and uncertainty and violence and so we create a world that is chaotic violent and so on, that may be a wrong question. Are you exact in saying that? I have reduced it to a small thing, sir. And the other question is: do we have to sit in meditation in a particular posture lotus as it is called in India and it is brought over into this country. And the other is, your question emotions and sentiments which are intense come in the way of observation, clarity and awareness. And the other question is: what is the relationship between awareness and faith? And that question that gentleman put, which is: there is not only human, particular human suffering but there is global, universal suffering. Now which of these questions?
14:25 Q: What about loneliness?
14:28 K: Nobody asked about loneliness, I introduced it.
14:34 Q: The question about registration, the two sides of the brain.
14:39 K: Oh, yes, I beg your pardon - quite right.
14:43 Q: Sir, one more question.

K: Wait a minute sir. Let me That gentleman asked that perhaps two spheres in the brain one that registers, remembers, accumulates knowledge experience, cultivates memory and so on the other part may be unconditioned. What is the relationship between the two? That is right sir? Now no more questions.
15:20 Q: One more question. What is the source of urgency, energy to go into all these questions?
15:31 K: What is the source, the drive, the push, the pressure why should one be interested in all these things?
15:46 Q: And sir, what is the beginning of memory and is there a point in time when the mind sees the age of a problem?
15:55 K: What is the beginning of memory and what is
15:58 Q: Is there a point in time when the mind sees the age of a problem, like fear being older than jealousy?
16:08 K: I don't quite understand.
16:10 Q: I can see fear is older than jealousy. There are times when I can see the age of a problem. It is a rather serious question about reincarnation.
16:24 K: Ah, you want to discuss reincarnation. Now which of these questions would you like to talk over together?
16:33 Q: Global suffering.

Q: Emotions.
16:37 K: You decide. (Laughter)
16:42 Q: Emotions.
16:44 Q: The use of energy.

Q: Reincarnation.
16:48 Q: Krishnaji, could you deal with them all in some way by answering one question? (Laughter)
16:59 K: The questioner asks: could you include all these questions in one question, in one statement? Perhaps we could, and that
17:18 Q: You said that you should forget the past and
17:23 K: I never said we could forget the past sir.
17:25 Q: You should forget the past, you said it the day before yesterday.
17:28 K: No, I did not.
17:29 Q: When you have got suffering you have got injured finger or that comes in your memory it's memorising and the past is difficult to forget, you see. I want to know how we can forget the past.
17:46 K: I did not forgive me for contradicting you sir but I did not say forget the past. You can't forget the past. We will go into all this by taking one question which perhaps will include all others. Shall we take? Now which shall it be? Just think it out sir. Look we have had several problems put to us and the gentleman suggests that we should perhaps by investigating one question one statement, we could perhaps include all the others. I think that it could be done. But which shall we take which will include all the others?
18:33 Q: Emotions.
18:34 K: Just take a second sir. Take just a second. Let's find out. Which question would include all the others?
18:44 Q: Where do all these questions come from?
18:47 Q: We ask where is the thrust of all these questions.
18:51 K: What is the source of all these questions.
18:54 Q: The source of this is the energy which asks the questions.
18:59 K: Is that what you are asking, interested in the source of the energy that asks all these questions?
19:07 Q: No.
19:08 Q: Could you answer the question: what is insight and by what process does it come about?
19:14 K: Sir, look there are so many.
19:19 Q: The registration in the mind.
19:23 Q: You decide, or we are never going to start. (Laughter)
19:30 K: You are quite right. (Laughter) Could we take up the relationship between awareness faith and emotions, meditation and what is the need of a brain that it should register at all not the two, but the necessity of registering at all. Could we, by taking one question, would that I think we could do it I suggest this, I am not saying it must be that way I suggest that we discuss what is relationship which would include all these. What is the relationship between awareness, faith, meditation the registration, the global suffering of man in which is included the suffering of each one of us. Right?
20:52 Q: And the registration.

K: And registration - I said that.
20:59 Now, shall we begin by talking about registration and relate that to awareness and to the intensity of our emotions and so on? Right? So we will begin, if we may, if please correct me, I am not the Delphic Oracle if you think we should discuss something else we are willing but let us begin by asking: what is the need of a human mind, brain to register anything at all? First of all, are we aware, know, cognisant of this registering process going on? You understand? I am just beginning with that. Do you, as a human being know, or aware that you are registering? You understand my question? Or you have accepted the statement and then you proceed to question the statement? Are you aware that you register certain things? An unhappy incident of yesterday is registered. Are you aware of this registering process going on? Or you are merely accepting a statement by somebody else? You see the difference? If I accept a statement that you have made and question about that statement, which is one thing whereas if I am aware that I am registering then my question has a different quality to it. Right? So which is it we are doing now? Are we aware that we are registering? Are you aware now, sitting there that you are registering what is being said which means that you are actually listening to what is being said. Right? Are you? Or are you still concerned about why the need for registration? You see the difference?
24:03 Can we proceed this way, slowly?
24:15 Q: Sir, one is aware that one holds on to what is being said.
24:18 K: Yes, that is it. One is aware that one holds to what is being said. Now why does one hold on to what is being said? When the speaker says there is no speaker you are listening to yourself you are investigating yourself why do you hold on to a statement made by this person? which means you are not actually listening to yourself.
24:58 Q: Sir, you want to act on it.
25:01 K: No, no, which means You see the difference sir? If you are told you are hungry, that is one thing but if you are really hungry that is another. Obviously, right? So which is it? Are you really hungry or you are told you are hungry? Which means, are you aware that you are registering holding on to a statement to a phrase, to some conclusion, to an idea and so on which is registration going on? Right sir? Now why do you want to register what is being said? Because the speaker must have either a reputation or you think he knows something more than you do or you are expecting him to solve your problems so you are depending on another. The other says 'Please, don't depend on anybody, including the speaker' You follow?
26:28 So, let us be clear in this matter. Are you aware of the whole momentum, the movement of registration? I mean, you can see a tape recorder registering. Right? Are you similarly aware that you are recording? Or you have been told that you are recording. See the difference? If you are told that you are recording that is one thing it has no value, it is just like a tape you can wipe it out and a new tape can be put in whereas if you discover for yourself that you are registering and ask the question: 'Why am I registering what is the necessity of any kind of registration?' Then we can proceed then we can communicate with each other. But if you are saying, well you said that yesterday about registration I am awfully interested in this idea, let's talk about it. Then it remains merely at the verbal level, it has no meaning. At least for me, it has no meaning whatsoever. Whereas if you say 'I want to find this out, why I register' can we go along that way?

Q: Yes.
28:03 K: Why do you register, if you are aware of it? Obviously you register when something is dangerous. Right? A precipice, a snake, a dangerous animal, or a dangerous man or a motor coming hurtling towards you, it is danger. You immediately register it, in order to protect. And also you register when there is pleasure. So this process is going on all the time. The registration of everything that is dangerous. Right? And everything that gives one a great pleasure. One can say the registration began with the first man the cave man, however they lived. You can see there they had to register danger otherwise they would be destroyed. So let's find out what is dangerous for us to register and then we can go on to the other. What are the most dangerous things in life that should be registered? Not depending on individual opinions. I wonder if I am making myself clear.
29:49 Q: Yes. Yes.
29:51 K: Because to me one thing may be most dangerous and to you, you say that is too silly. So it must be a common factor for a human being whose necessity is to register danger and therefore avoid. Right? Danger means avoiding, not going near it not touching it, not be involved in it. Right sir? So what is most dangerous for you, us human beings?
30:35 Q: What disturbs the mind.
30:37 K: No, no. Physically. What is most dangerous? Not what disturbs your mind. You are going off into some - please begin at the lowest level.
30:47 Q: That is what disturbs me, that is most dangerous for me.
30:50 K: You see that's what I was trying to avoid. What is most dangerous for me I said may be not so dangerous for another. So don't look, if I may suggest don't take yourself and say this is my particular danger. See the danger of what is dangerous for man.
31:13 Q: Physical threat.
31:14 Q: Threat to survival.
31:18 K: Yes, which is, non-survival. Not to survive. That means Sorry, I am putting it wrongly. The demand is to survive. Anything that destroys that survival is dangerous. Right? For all human beings, not for me or for you, for all of us.
31:47 Q: Why?
31:50 K: Why? Why should we survive.
31:56 Q: May I restate the question? What is more important than survival?
32:01 K: Wait sir, we will come to that slowly.
32:03 Q: Sorry.

K: Come to it, sir. Survival, and the lady says why should we survive. No, it is a serious question. Why should we survive? What is the need for survival and this urgency the demand to exist, to survive, to live? Go on sirs, answer it.
32:36 Q: Instinct.
32:40 K: Instinct. That is not it. The birds have the instinct to survive, the animals the reptiles, the most elemental you know everything demands survival.
32:57 Q: Pleasure in life.
33:01 Q: Fear of death.
33:05 K: Fear.
33:07 Q: Because we think it is important to survive.
33:11 K: I don't see why you even ask that question: what is the necessity of survival. Here you are! If you hadn't demanded to survive you wouldn't be here and I wouldn't be here, none of us would be here not the parents would produce us, they wouldn't exist either. So the world wouldn't exist. So anything that is dangerous to survival we must register. Right? Physically a car coming towards us we jump out of the way. Right? So there must be some kind of registration to protect the organism. Right? To have a roof, to have clothes, to have food that's apparently natural in every living thing. And so we avoid anything that is dangerous. Right?
34:29 Let's go into it a little more. Is belief dangerous for physical survival?
34:41 Q: Yes.
34:44 K: So you have no belief.
34:47 Q: I've a particular belief a conditioned belief which does not
34:52 K: I understand sir, I understand. I believe in something or in some idea, in some goal, and so on - a belief so I am asking each one of us, I am asking: is belief a danger to physical survival?
35:12 Q: No.

Q: It may be.
35:14 Q: In Northern Ireland.
35:20 K: In Northern Ireland.
35:25 Q: Let's not get into politics right now please.
35:31 K: I know, that
35:34 Q: A misguided conscience can be
35:39 K: No, no, no, please. I am taking belief, don't begin too many things at once. Take one factor, go after it step by step into it. Is belief a danger to survival? I believe in Catholicism and you are a Protestant I am a Catholic, we believe in different things. Look what is happening in Northern Ireland what is happening in the Middle East and so on and so on. For physical survival, apparently belief is a most dangerous thing.
36:19 Q: Sir, could I ask: do we not need belief in technical matters?
36:25 K: In technical matters, why do you even there have belief? You work, and you learn and you go on. No, just please, go into it for yourself don't question me, I can but find out if you have belief, any form of belief and doesn't that belief divide people? Belief can be a conclusion, a concept an opinion, strongly-held opinion.
37:03 Q: Prejudice.
37:06 K: All that, included. We can put a lot of these words together but let's find out if each one of us has a certain belief: that I am a Christian, that I am an Englishmen a Frenchman, or - you know, all the rest of it. Isn't that a tremendous danger for physical survival.
37:32 Q: Yes, sir.
37:34 K: You say yes, sir, but are you free of it?
37:37 Q: No sir. (Laughter)

K: Ah, then
37:51 Q: Belief in the good in every one of these beliefs.
37:55 K: So, I know. We teach in the school every one of these things. So history may be rewritten differently.
38:06 Q: Surely belief is a good thing.
38:08 K: You are not really interested to find out for yourself. For god's sake, do listen!
38:15 Are you really serious to find out the necessity of registration and the inadequacy psychologically of any form of registration? We are discussing that. If you say belief is a danger then why do you hold on to it saying I am a Hindu, you are a Muslim or you are a Jew or you are a Communist - why do you hold on to these words?
38:51 Q: Because perhaps one doesn't see it completely.
38:56 K: So, the gentleman suggests you don't see this completely. The danger, you don't see completely the danger of any form of belief which is obviously non-fact. Why do you hold on to that?
39:16 Q: All belief is a support structure.
39:23 K: Yes, belief is a support. If it is a dangerous support why don't you drop it?
39:32 Q: I have dropped some, but I haven't seen
39:35 K: Ah! (Laughs)
39:36 Q: But not all of them probably when I see all of them only then will I drop them.
39:42 K: It is like all of us sir we want to keep some which are pleasurable, which are pleasant which are comfortable and the others we discard.
39:53 Q: I suggest, if I may, that it is not the sensations the physical sensations of a dangerous experience that we register but that it is the reasoning that we attribute to it at the time we register in our minds.
40:06 K: That is right sir. Let's go step by step into it sir.
40:13 We have talked about physical survival and anything that is dangerous to that must be totally avoided if you want to survive. And belief, any division between people is most destructive. Right? If you are a Christian, I am a Buddhist and I fight for my Buddhism and you fight for something else there is no physical security. Every war has shown this. Right? Every war is the result of our particular conditioning of our particular beliefs, etc. etc. So will you drop all those beliefs because that is the most dangerous thing for survival?
41:17 Q: Are you saying that anybody who believes in anything from the people you mentioned yesterday, the politicians priests, gurus, is not being honest with themselves and that only Krishnamurti can put forth the truth? (Laughter) That only the truth is available from you and we must not believe anything from any other person.
41:50 K: I couldn't hear the whole of it sir somebody who has understood it please repeat it.
41:54 Q: It is not the belief that is the threat to survival it is the belief in the belief that is the threat to survival it is an attitude of mind the feeling that the belief is something true for all time.
42:15 K: Sir, drugs are dangerous for survival drink is dangerous, smoking and all that business do we drop all those things because they are dangerous?
42:29 Q: When we see a cigarette

K: Sir, that is just it. So really we are discussing intellectually verbally this idea of survival. We really don't care if we survive or not. We just exist. So let's proceed from there. Psychologically why do you register?
43:00 Q: Fear.
43:02 K: No, just look sir. Look into yourself. I can answer these questions very quickly, but do please enquire. It is a conversation between us two us two is all of us, you and I, a conversation in which we are saying: why do I, or you register psychologically anything?
43:28 Q: Because we can't help it. It just happens.
43:34 K: It may be our conditioning. It may be our education. It may be our social condition and economic and so on and so on. So we are conditioned to accept this psychological registration. Now we are saying, all right, that is a fact. Now why?
43:59 Q: Does one actually register in fact?
44:09 K: Yes, one actually registers, that is the fact. But I am asking why? Do find out. Ask yourself sir, not me ask you, ask yourself: I register my hurts, my pleasures, what you said to me what you didn't do, your nagging, this, that, 10 different things. Why do I register psychologically?
44:37 Q: Biological registration to protect the organism is transformed to psychological level.
44:50 K: There is biological registration which we said is necessary and psychological registration. We said why do we register psychologically at all?
45:03 Q: For security. To feel secure.
45:08 K: Is that so? Or you are isolating yourself which gives you the illusion that you are secure. You don't even
45:26 Q: Because we have no choice.
45:28 Q: Because we think we can solve things by thought.
45:31 K: You say we have no choice - why?
45:40 Q: It's human nature.
45:42 K: No, just The gentleman said we have no choice. What do you mean by the word 'choice'? Is danger a choice? And why do you choose?

Q: Conditioning.
46:08 K: No, no, don't throw out
46:16 Q: Can we say biologically, let's say I like smoking or whatever. Right? This is dangerous but it is pleasurable so thought has a choice.
46:32 K: Yes. Sir we are trying to find out the meaning of that word 'choice' the depth of that word. I choose between two pieces of material for trousers or a coat.
46:48 Q: Does it exist?

K: Wait, wait. Choose. And I choose to go to that place and not to that place. I choose this guru and not that guru. I choose to believe in this and not in that. I am questioning, asking you, if you will kindly listen to find out why do you choose, what is the source of your choice?
47:16 Q: Inattention.
47:20 Q: Protection and pleasure again. Protection and pleasure.
47:24 K: No, no. When do you choose? Don't you choose when you are uncertain?
47:33 Q: When in conflict.
47:35 K: A man who is very clear - clear - there is no choice. It is so.
47:42 Q: When you don't know.
47:45 K: Ah, sir, that means what? That is right, when you don't know. Do you think you will find
47:57 Q: One thing you choose on a certainty, and the other on a non-certainty.
48:02 K: Yes, that is the same thing. When one is very clear you don't choose when you know exactly what road to take to a certain place there is no choice. It is only when you are uncertain you begin to choose or ask, question, find out. So I am asking, psychologically choice exists only when you are confused, uncertain - no? When you are very clear there is no need for choice. So a mind that is confused chooses. You are all silent at that statement.
48:54 Q: Could we talk about why the mind is confused?
48:57 K: Wait sir. I want to see - please, look at it sir. We are discussing, trying to talk over together why the brain registers. The brain biologically, we said organically, must register. Psychologically, inside, we are asking, why do we register at all? Somebody said because we have no choice in the matter. And the word 'choice' implies choosing between this and that. Now when you see danger you don't choose (laughs) - right? You see danger and move. You don't say 'Well, shall I go to the right or to the left is it right, is it wrong' - (Laughter)
49:57 So similarly I am asking: psychologically what is the need for registration? Does it help us to protect ourselves?
50:15 Q: Yes. When we set out in life we are concerned with the survival of the body but soon the mind takes over survival of the mind.
50:24 K: That is what we are saying. Physical survival has slipped into psychological survival. Right?

Q: Yes.
50:34 K: Now I say, why?
50:37 Q: It exercises a sense of identity.
50:40 K: Identity with whom?
50:43 Q: Because we don't really know what is right. Not so sure.
50:52 K: So you want to find out what is right.
50:55 Q: It's choice.
50:56 K: How do you find out what is right when your mind is (laughs) a bit uncertain, and confused? No, you are going off, you don't stick to one thing at a time. Please forgive me. Psychologically why do I register?
51:17 Q: Because we want to register.

Q: Because I am not whole?
51:21 K: No, sir. Look into yourself, you will find out.
51:28 Q: In order to build up experience.
51:31 K: In order to build up experience which is knowledge, which then becomes memory. And without memory, without knowledge you are nobody. So we say 'By Jove, I must have some knowledge about..' - right? - otherwise I am nobody. Is that what you are saying? You are not thinking about all this.
52:04 Q: One wants to protect oneself
52:06 K: One wants to protect oneself. Biologically, organically, you have. We have learnt how to do that very well. In spite of wars, in spite of terrorists, except the victims. Now we are saying psychologically do you protect yourself? What is it you are protecting?
52:30 Q: I think it is

K: Do please answer me. What is it you are protecting?
52:36 Q: All this memory.
52:39 Q: Your idea of yourself.
52:43 Q: Our minds become so cluttered up with what is in our minds that it becomes greater than our experience of our bodies. So our minds become up there and that's why we are more aware of our minds than our bodies. And we think that it is our minds that we should protect.
52:58 K: So you give more attention to your body and less attention to the brain.
53:06 Q: No, the other way round.
53:09 K: Yes, get more and more muddled.
53:11 Q: Yes. (Laughter)
53:15 K: You see sir, we psychologically register in order to be something. Right? Psychologically. Right? I register where I was born, that is simple. The brain registers because it has been trained to accept certain strata of society and that gives the person psychologically a position a sense of power, a sense of superiority. So this registration psychologically gradually builds up the ego, the 'me' - right? Isn't that so? Don't accept what I am saying, please look at yourself. If you didn't register psychologically would you have an ego?
54:26 Q: No.

K: Obviously not. Psychologically you are aggressive, abrasive, violent it gives you a certain sense of - you know, authority a certain sense of assurance. So this gradual process of registration psychologically builds the sense of the 'me'. That is a fact, no? Me, my opinion, my judgements, my wife, my husband my girl, your girl, boy, my house, my quality my experience, my hurts, my fears, my I am all that, psychologically. Right? It is a fact. You don't have to agree with the speaker, it is so. Then I say to myself, why do I build this ego why is there this constant building of the me?
55:46 Q: To protect it.
55:47 K: What are you protecting?
55:50 Q: I am just trying to hold on to it, more and more.
55:52 K: Yes, sir. After building it up you hold on to it you cling to it, you say, 'I daren't break it down'
56:00 Q: It is like a sand castle.

K: Yes, sand Don't go off into similes. Stick to one thing. So I say, what is the need for it because that brings enormous trouble, enormous pain? I am hurt, I am frightened, I am anxious, I am jealous I am greedy, I must not, I must be - you follow? this battle is going on constantly emotionally getting stronger and stronger, more intense. And what am I building? What is the reality of this structure? You understand? The reality, in the sense this is real the microphone in front of me is real. Actually I can touch it. Can I touch the psychological structure of the 'me'? I can't. So it is merely a building up of words. This is rather difficult to accept. One builds in relationship the hurts, the flattery the comfort and so gradually out of that I depend on you. And you hurt me by doing something so I cling to you not to be hurt. And so on and on and on and on. Now, why do we do this?
57:45 Q: We are protecting the part of us that does not know.
57:48 K: Ah, no. We don't know what will happen if there is no building up the 'me'. Right? I will find out. I will find out if I say 'All right, I will find out there must be a process where the building up is not'. Right? Then I will find out what happens. But to speculate what might happen before this is such a waste of time and energy.
58:32 Q: That's what makes the fear to do it.
58:36 K: So: first you build it up society helps, religions help everything helps to sustain the structure and then you are afraid to lose it. Right? And then you proceed to meditate how to get rid of this self - no? So before we say how to get rid of the self let us find out why you build it.
59:18 Q: The need for power.
59:21 K: Yes, all right, it leads to power, put it any way you like. But the fact is this constant assertion this constant building up of the 'me', psychologically is it not a great danger? A great danger in your relationship with your wife with your girl, with society, with anything. Is it not a great danger because the danger is that you are in constant struggle, constant battle.
1:00:02 Q: It makes it difficult for you to adapt.
1:00:05 K: No sir, find out why you are are you aware that you are building the 'me' up? And from that structure you have strong emotions you want to express, you want to assert.
1:00:33 Q: Is it the need for pleasure?
1:00:36 K: Yes, all right, it is pleasure and also it's fear and also it is greed and also it is constantly in pain, being hurt - you know. So don't take one thing and say it is that, it is the whole thing.
1:00:56 Q: Do we not believe in a myth is there not a myth that we believe in that if we don't survive psychologically we shan't survive.
1:01:04 K: It may be a myth sir, but can't you throw away that myth?
1:01:10 Q: Have we been conditioned to this myth?
1:01:12 K: Yes, if you are conditioned to this myth can't you uncondition yourself can't the mind say, 'It is nonsense'? See we don't want to do that and we talk round it all the time. If I am aggressive it gives me pleasure it gives the structure of aggressiveness makes me violent, rude, vulgar and I like it. All right, keep it! Don't talk about meditation, etc., etc., etc. If that is a fact find out why you register these things why you hold on, and whether it cannot be totally dissipated. If you say it cannot, that is the end of it. All right, it cannot. If somebody says, 'Find out if it can or not' 'Oh,' then you say, 'you are in an illusion you are an ass, you don't know anything about it'
1:02:26 So whereas I am suggesting psychologically there is no need for registration if you see the danger, real danger as you see a precipice, real danger of this psychological build up of the 'me' then you find out how to be free of it. Not you, you are part of that. There will be no toleration of the 'me' with all the opinions, judgements, evaluations aggressiveness, fear, pleasure, you know, the whole bundle of it.
1:03:15 Q: What about the registrations that have already taken place from childhood before you are able to reason in this way?
1:03:31 K: What about the registration that has taken place from childhood. If you see registration is a danger then the childhood registration till now disappears.
1:03:51 Q: We don't see it though, we don't want to.
1:03:53 K: That is all I am saying sir. We won't see the danger of it, we like it. We like our fear, we like our - we accept it aggressiveness, we like to live in constant battle with ourselves that gives us a sense of well-being, that at least you are alive. And so on and on and on.
1:04:14 Q: Sir, because it is comfortable.
1:04:17 K: All right, sir, it is comfortable.
1:04:19 Q: What can we do with the vacuum that is left?
1:04:22 K: You see - what will you do if you are in a vacuum. That is, you don't know what will take place if there is no registration. Find out. Not say you will live in a vacuum. I say to you you won't. What is the matter? On the contrary, a man who is in constant battle is not living.
1:04:47 Q: How do we find out?
1:04:50 K: How do I find out what?
1:04:54 Q: How can we find out what else there is? What is the alternative to having this big ego thing. How can we find out what the alternative is? How do we go about it?

K: I don't understand.
1:05:08 Q: You have a bait. (Laughs)
1:05:11 Q: No, he doesn't understand the first question.
1:05:15 Q: How did you do it? How did you get rid of your ego?
1:05:20 K: How do you know I have got rid of it? (Laughter) (Applause)
1:05:28 No sir, no, don't bother about me. (Laughter) I have been a long time at it, from the age of fifteen. For me, when I was born, probably it was not there. But that is totally utterly irrelevant to you. What is relevant is you, why you hold on to this thing this miserable unfortunate suffering 'me'. And to escape from that you go off to India put on robes and put on beads - you know. (Laughter) All that nonsense goes on.
1:06:18 Q: Because we live in the past or the future, not in the present.
1:06:22 K: Please don't bother about me. Just find out why you build see the consequences of building this structure the consequences of this structure and if you like it, if it pleases you if it gives you comfort, know in that comfort there is tremendous danger that you suffer, that you go through all kinds of neuroticisms you know what is happening. If you say that gives me comfort, stay with it.
1:07:02 Q: In other words we are too lazy to change.
1:07:06 K: Yes. Now how is that? I perceive, or I am aware that I am building this structure thought is building this structure all the time sleeping, waking, dreaming, daydreaming, walking all the time, concerned about itself. Now what is the way, what is the process to end this thing - you don't ask that.
1:07:49 Q: If I may - if I ask myself why I collect these identifying things about me who do I ask in order to get past the me?
1:08:09 K: No, I am asking you.
1:08:11 Q: I understand. I don't mean ask a person. I say how does an I do this?
1:08:19 K: I'll show you sir in a minute, look.
1:08:21 Q: Okay.
1:08:22 K: Is it a fact to you that you are building psychologically this illusory structure which has become such an extraordinary reality to one? Are you aware of the structure first?
1:08:43 Q: I think so, yes.
1:08:47 K: If one is aware of it, what do you mean by being aware of it? We have come back to the original question: what is the relationship between awareness and faith? There is no relationship whatsoever between awareness and faith. Faith is not a fact. It is a belief.
1:09:19 Q: Define faith. What does faith mean to you?

K: Nothing. Please don't bother about so are you aware of the structure? Please, let's be for 5 minutes serious. Are you aware of the structure in yourself? If you are, what do you mean by being aware? In that awareness is there a duality, that is I am aware of that? You understand my question sir?

Q: Yes.
1:10:06 K: I am aware of that light, that light is different from me. Now am I in that same position when I say I am aware of the structure the structure being different from me? Or the structure is me?
1:10:33 Q: It is a very uncomfortable feeling to be.
1:10:35 K: No, no. It is not a question of comfort or discomfort. Please move away from those things forgive me, you are just going back to something. Which is, am I aware as though the structure were something separate from me away over there, or near, and I who am aware is different from that? Or I am that? You understand?
1:11:12 Q: Yes.

K: Obviously. Right? I am that. That is, the observer is the observed. Right?
1:11:23 Q: It's a question if that is true or not.
1:11:26 K: No, no. Question it sir, don't hesitate, see, it is so simple. I have built up this structure, the structure has been built. And part of the structure is, I am different from the structure. I am the soul, I am the great man, I am the, etc. etc. Or I am full of knowledge and the structure is not knowledge. You follow? So I am asking: do you see the structure as something separate from yourself?
1:12:10 Q: No.
1:12:12 K: If you really say no, that means - what does it mean?
1:12:20 Q: (Inaudible)

K: No, just sir. This is really for half an hour do please put your minds to this, I beg of you. Are you different from your aggression? Obviously you are not. You are aggression, it is part of you.
1:12:45 Q: But we alone can change it.
1:12:49 K: No. Who is we?

Q: I mean we ourselves. We can change.
1:12:58 Q: If I was just my aggression I wouldn't know about my aggression.
1:13:04 K: Oh yes, you would.

Q: How?
1:13:06 K: Your friends would tell you, 'Don't be so aggressive' (Laughter) if he is a friend. (Laughter)
1:13:22 Q: You ask us to look into ourselves, that surely implies
1:13:25 K: No, madam, I am asking this please listen to it quietly, if I may suggest. I am asking you how do you observe this structure? You can observe the building, see it away from you. But this structure you can't separate it say 'That is not me', it is you. Your fears, your quarrels, your ambitions, your aggressiveness your anxieties, all that structure is you. There is no argument about it.
1:14:04 Q: But you are not a united thing. You are all sorts of things and they are all in conflict with each other.
1:14:10 K: That is what I am saying.
1:14:11 Q: I can take the side of one part of you you can observe the other part.

K: No. The observer is part of the observed.
1:14:19 Q: Yes, but you couldn't observe yourself in totality if you were
1:14:23 K: Oh, yes. I can observe, I can say I am fear. The next day I say I am pleasure. The third day I say oh, I am so jealous. But is part of the whole thing. Now that is what I am saying. Please if I may suggest, please give your attention to this, which is: as long as the 'me' separates himself from the structure the 'me' that separates itself from the structure as long as there is this division there will be conflict there will be fight, there will be nagging there will be anxiety, all the rest of it. But the fact is: the structure is you.
1:15:20 Q: Sir, the conflict seems to be inward, in the individual and it somehow seems to be a conflict between what you were talking about the senses not being fully alert, and also the mind the intellectual mind wanting to take individual problems and fears or tendencies.
1:15:42 K: No sir, all that is included in that. Your individual tendencies, idiosyncrasies your particular talent, or lack of talent your capacity - include everything that thought has put together as me. That is the structure thought has created. Then thought says, 'I am different from the structure'
1:16:13 Q: I don't think everybody thinks that they are different from the structure.
1:16:18 K: I don't know.
1:16:20 Q: Well, I don't.

K: Do you? I am not talking to you personally madam but I am just asking: does each one of us realise that we are the structure and structure is not separate from us? If you realise that, if that is an actual fact then a totally different action takes place.
1:16:50 Q: Are you saying that the part of us that is made up of our belief is our outer shell and that in order to grow and evolve we have to break through something
1:17:04 K: No, no, no. I am not saying anything of that kind. I am just saying sir don't translate what I am saying into your own you know when I speak in India, which I do unfortunately, or fortunately they translate what I say into their own particular language and most of the languages in India are derived from Sanskrit and the words they use are loaded with tradition all kinds of meanings. I say, please don't translate what I am saying just listen to what I am saying which is very difficult because they immediately translate it. They think by translating they have understood. They have understood the traditional meaning say for instance of awareness. They have got a special Sanskrit word for it in that word there is all kinds of connotations in that word. So please, I am just saying as long as there is a difference between the structure and the observer there must be suppression, there must be conflict there must be escape, there must be going off to India to find how to do this and how to do that, meditate surely, not cooking, and so on and so on and so on. Whereas when there is the actual truth the fact that the observer is the observed the structure is me, me is not different from the structure then there is a totally different action. That is what I want to get at.
1:18:55 Q: Sir, if you realise that and there is a sort of silence how do we keep that and not go back?
1:19:04 K: When you see a danger of a precipice, or a dangerous animal you don't go back to it, it is finished.
1:19:18 Q: It seems to me that this process of separation is a fundamental process of all the conditioning that goes on, and everything that I seem to do to try and go against this conditioning always seems to be just another part of this conditioning.
1:19:33 K: Yes sir.
1:19:34 Q: How on earth do I get around that?
1:19:36 K: I am showing to you something, you don't listen. Not that you must listen sir, but I am pointing out something. When you say 'I am that conditioning conditioning is not different from me' when that becomes an absolute, irrevocable truth, a fact then there is totally different action out of that fact.
1:20:09 Q: Then what happens?

K: Ah! Then what happens - that is exactly what it is. First you don't come to it but you say then tell me what happens. (Laughter) You don't want to climb the mountain, which is arduous which demands that you carry little, dangerous, be roped we have played with all this, I have done this, some part of it. It is dangerous to climb mountains. So you go lightly - right? not with heavy rucksack and all the rest of it.
1:20:49 So this demands that you work, that you look. But unfortunately all kinds of interruptions take place. Some of you this morning I saw doing exercises good or bad, that is up to you but here you don't even give ten minutes to find out. Find out what actually takes place when the observer of the structure is the observer himself - the structure is the observer. Then you will find there is no conflict at all. Right? When you are that what can you do? You follow sir? So there is no conflict and therefore there is energy. I won't go more into it because that is too where there is energy, complete energy there is emptiness.
1:22:19 That is enough for today, isn't it? Perhaps we can continue with this on Thursday. Would you agree to that please?
1:22:35 Q: Yes.

K: Bene.