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BR78DSS1.1 - Can you give equal importance to all the things in your life?
Brockwood Park, UK - 9 May 1978
Discussion with Staff and Students 1.1



0:20 Krishnamurti: What shall we talk about? Questioner: I would like to discuss something which is a bit difficult, yet I feel it is quite important.
0:35 I would like discuss relationship and sex. I think this is something a lot of students have discussed among the staff and students, and something that most of us seem to be unclear on.
0:47 K: Relationship and sex.

Q: Yes.
0:52 K: Anything else?
0:55 Q: Can we maybe bring into that the subject of guilt?
0:59 K: Death?

Q: Guilt.
1:07 K: Anything else to talk about?
1:28 All right, let's start.
1:36 You know, you are going to have examinations at the end of next month, and most of you are probably concerned about that a great deal, and so you put examinations first, before everything else.
2:05 Like those people who put career first, before everything else, sex before everything else, family before everything else.
2:20 Or their wife or their child first.
2:27 Haven't you noticed all this? So, what happens when you put one of these things first and disregard everything else, including sex, child, career, 'God' in quotes.
2:50 What happens to such people? What happens to their minds, when you put something first?
2:59 Sex, oneself, career, examination, family, and so on – what happens to their mind?
3:13 Discuss it with me. When you put anything first, disregarding or giving other things in life a secondary place, what goes on within the mind?
3:39 You have understood my question? Say, for example, when you put sex first, what takes place, and disregard relationship, work and so on.
4:02 Come on, let's talk it over.
4:09 Q: You become focused on it.
4:15 K: When you become focused on a particular thing and give your whole life to that...

Q: Then you become isolated.
4:26 K: Go into it a little more. You say isolated.
4:33 Q: One tramples on other people, in order to get what one wants.
4:38 K: When you concentrate or give your life to a career – say, this is my career and nothing else matters, what is the quality of such a mind?
4:56 Q: Ruthless. It becomes ruthless. It doesn't care for others.

K: Yes. Discuss it. Go into it a little more. Ruthless.
5:06 Q: Narrow. It is narrow. It is got that one direction, disregarding everything else.

K: So, you set a direction.
5:16 K: Are you saying that? A direction which is much stronger, more particular, direct, disregarding other things. Is that what you are saying?
5:35 Q: I think you neglect things that require attention.
5:44 K: Why do people do that? Why do people make money the most important thing in their life, or sex, or their baby, or their family, or their career, say, this is most important for me. Why do they do it?
6:12 Q: Because they have been conditioned to think that that thing is most important.
6:22 K: Is that it, they are conditioned that way? They might be interested in various other things.
6:35 In seeing countries, or various other things, but this one thing becomes prominent – why?
6:44 Go into it a little more, discuss it with me.
6:50 Q: It can be used as an escape, if you are all into one thing.
6:55 K: You are saying that is a good escape. Is that it? It is an escape from what?
7:10 Q: Our problems, our fears, unpleasantness.
7:18 K: Go on, give a little more, go into it, sir. I don't want to push you. I give my life, I give predominant importance to my career. I say that is the most important thing in my life and I will sacrifice everything else for that.
7:42 Though I have other interests, but those interests don't dominate this one particular interest, which is career.
7:54 Why do I do that?
8:03 Q: For one thing, it makes you feel secure, it gives you something that you can identify with.
8:08 K: It makes me secure. Does it?
8:14 Q: Well, it makes me feel secure.
8:17 K: Does it, actually? A man says, I am giving all my life to earning money. Nothing else matters much. Why does one do it?
8:34 Or sex – you raised the question – and that becomes almost all-important.
8:41 Why? Why does it become important? Supersedes all other interests.
8:56 Q: Because it is the most pleasurable?
9:01 K: Pleasurable. Is that the reason?
9:11 Q: It is tangible as well. It is tangible, you can recognise it, you can pursue it.
9:22 It closes you off from a great number of anxieties which you would otherwise be open to and which you would have to deal with.
9:30 K: Therefore, what am I doing? Why does one do it? Is it an escape from other problems?
9:44 Q: It is partially that.
9:46 K: I have committed to go in one direction and I close my eyes to all other directions.
9:53 Though I take interest, minor interest, but this is the predominant interest. Why?
10:01 Q: Some people who do that, the distance that they can make in that direction, if narrow themselves to specialise, they seem to out-distance other people.
10:12 If you are going to be a scientist and you do it full time, you will be better than people who only do it part time.
10:19 K: Is that the reason? That you will have more success and be beyond competition, more money?
10:28 Q: For many people it is, yes.

K: No, I am asking for us. When you make sex as all-important, or your family all-important, your child or your God, whatever it is, why does one do it?
10:46 You haven't answered my question.
10:56 Q: I think because one sees the necessity of giving it importance.
11:06 K: Do you, if I may ask, give importance solely to one thing?
11:15 Think it out, carefully. Money, sex, husband, marriage, or not married but a boy or a girl, a career – you follow?
11:31 Find out why you do it.
11:50 No answer?
11:55 Q: It seems different with...

K: Do you do it, sir? Otherwise, if we don't apply it to ourselves, it becomes theoretical, rather stupid.
12:10 To discuss vaguely about something, it means nothing. But if you say, am I committed to one direction – family, child, whatever it is, sex, money, position – are you?
12:36 Q: Yes, at certain times.
12:40 Q: I don't feel that I am committed to just one thing.
12:42 K: So, are you generally vague about everything – is that it?
12:47 Q: No, but at times one thing can become of big importance.
12:58 K: You answer her question. She says, at certain times I give importance to one particular thing above all others.
13:13 When you do that, why do you do it?
13:27 Q: In order to decide more easily.
13:33 K: Apply it to yourself, don't discuss it vaguely, then it is meaningless.
13:40 Q: It seems when I give importance to something, say like making money, during the holidays, that seems to be the most important thing to do.
13:51 K: All right. That is a different matter, isn't it? Don't reduce it to that. During the holidays you have to earn money for various reasons. You give importance to that. But when you give importance to something above all others, for the rest of your life, or give importance to a particular thing and move away from what you are doing, abandon what you are doing and say, this is what I am going to do – why?
14:39 Q: It seems we just wander if we don't have a direction.
14:41 K: So, you say, If I don't do that, I wander all over the place, I become sloppy, vague, indifferent, and so on. Is that it?
14:59 Is that why you place something above all others?
15:06 You, personally. Go into yourself and find out. Come on.
15:12 Q: I put a lot of importance in my exams, right now.
15:17 K: That is a different matter. Wait a minute, we will take that. We will go step by step. Exams next month, so you give all your time, your energy, your thought, because – why?
15:32 I won't tell you, you tell me.
15:37 Q: Well, I look at them as a necessity.
15:40 K: Explain it, go on. Don't just stop there. I want to know why all of you who are here are so anxious, frightened, nervous, apprehensive, that examination is so important – why?
16:03 Q: Perhaps, psychologically one wants some moorings. Psychologically, one wants something to hold on to. We don't want to be lonely.

K: No. Exams. Are you frightened of your exams coming next month?
16:24 Q: I am not actually frightened of exams.
16:26 K: Anxious?

Q: No.
16:30 K: Because you are not going to take exams.
16:34 Q: Even when I do have them, I mean, I just...
16:37 K: I want to know. Please go into it for yourselves. It is important. Give your thought to this a little bit. Why are you so concerned about exams? Why? You know, in Russia and Japan – I know some people in India, students, who committed suicide because they failed.
17:06 And they were very good, very clever boys, but exams made them so nervous, so frightened they couldn't think clearly.
17:18 And in Japan, all the rest of it goes on. Now, why are you so concerned?
17:25 Q: Isn't it because it determines the quality of our future?
17:29 K: Yes. You say if you don't pass exams you might not go to college.
17:38 Get a better job and a career.
17:46 So you are frightened of the future. So you say, unless I pass these exams, my future is very uncertain.
18:06 So, to make your future certain, be satisfied with the future, you must pass exams. Is that it?
18:18 To get a job. I am not saying it is right or wrong. And if you don't pass examinations, goodness, what are you going to do?
18:33 Become a labourer, or menial jobs – you have a horror of all that, so you pass the exam.
18:48 Q: And also, parents and teachers...
18:52 K: Parents pressure you, the society, the culture, everything says pass exams.
18:59 If you don't you won't be good, you won't make good.
19:19 Go on, take up something else. Money. Do you place great importance on money as the chief thing in life?
19:32 You must have money – agreed. Everybody agrees. Don't say, well, I must have money. But I am saying if you place money as the most important thing in your life, why do you do it?
19:54 Or if you place sex as the most important thing – why?
20:01 Or your wife or your husband or your child as the most important – why? Come on, sirs, join.
20:21 Q: Are you suggesting that there is a common...?
20:25 K: We are going to find out. Investigate. Go on, sir. All right. Are you escaping when you do that?
20:43 Q: There seems to be some fear behind it.
20:47 K: Yes, that means escape. Escape from having a very complex life.
21:00 You avoid all romanticism, all idealism, all fanciful imaginations, and so on, you say, this is what I want to do.
21:10 Is that why you do it?
21:19 Q: It doesn't seem to be the reason when we do it. It doesn't seem to be apparent when we are doing it.
21:26 K: Of course not. But shouldn't we be thinking about all that, now? Be aware of all the traps that one can be caught in?
21:47 All right, let me go on with it. I place my wife or my child or my career as the most important thing.
22:04 Why do I do it?
22:11 I disregard what I am doing, I am only concerned with that.
22:19 So I neglect, I push things away, I leave, I hold on – whatever I do.
22:26 So, I am concerned with that one thing – my wife or my girl or my child or my family.
22:38 What takes place? Why do I do it?
22:45 Am I doing it – please, listen. Discussion, right?
22:53 I am not saying it is so – do I do it because I am escaping from myself?
23:08 Myself being my problems, my desires, my deeper interests.
23:27 This, at least, I am committed to – my wife.
23:36 And when I am committed to my wife, my wife likes it, loves it.
23:43 She feels, at last I have got a man by the neck.
23:52 So, am I doing that? Am I escaping from myself when I am totally concerned with my wife, with my job, with sex?
24:18 You understand what I am saying? Am I? My problems, my worries, all the disturbances, anxieties.
24:31 I say, you are more important than myself. When I commit myself to my wife, the wife becomes all-important.
24:44 Or the girl – all important. What takes place when one person, or one idea, one thing becomes all important?
24:54 Q: Is that what happens? Or is it that a person thinks that their self is most important? I am saying, is that actually what happens or does a person really think that their self is more important and that they accumulate a wife or a job or sexual pleasure for themselves?
25:18 K: No, wait. That is, by committing myself to you, what happens to me?
25:30 Q: I become very important.

K: That is the whole point.
25:37 K: What happens to me when I say, you are all important'?
25:49 Q: To you, then I am important.
25:55 K: What do you mean by that? Look at it, carefully. Answer, don't guess. When you say, you are all-important, money is all important, sex, my child, my wife is all-important, what has taken place?
26:15 Q: You are saying nothing else is important.
26:18 K: Yes, nothing else is as important as that, so what has happened?
26:23 Q: Usually, I identify with that thing.
26:26 K: Which is what?
26:28 Q: Which is the same thing as saying, I am most important.
26:30 K: That is it. Only I put it on my child, wife. I wonder if you've got it.
26:44 Q: So, if something happens to your child, is it the same as it happening to you? If something should happen to your child or your money or whatever, does that also mean...?

K: All right.
26:58 If I say my wife is all-important and everything else is of minor importance then if anything happens to her I get hurt, I get jealous, I get frightened, I am anxious.
27:13 Q: Because I project me onto her.

K: Watch it, sir. Look at it.
27:19 K: Go into yourself and find out when this happens.
27:34 An ideal is all-important to me, a utopian ideal.
27:43 I have projected that ideal or society projected it, I accept it.
27:50 I am that ideal. I am worshipping myself.
27:59 I wonder if you see this. No?
28:22 When God or Christ or Krishna or somebody becomes all-important, what have I done?
28:29 I am playing a trick upon myself, I am deceiving myself.
28:43 Do you see it logically, reasonably, and see the fact of it, that when you place something above all others you are escaping from yourself, thinking that is more important, with which you have unconsciously identified, and created it.
29:18 No, you won't accept this. Not accept – do you see it? Am I wrong? Convince me. Show me where I am wrong.
29:33 Q: Where does love come into it?

K: Ah, wait, wait!
29:40 K: When I say, I love you above all others, you are my wife, I adore you, etc., etc., and I am holding you.
30:03 You are a prisoner to my commitment. No? So, I am afraid to let you go.
30:16 Nothing must happen to you.
30:22 Q: I think it is too general to say everything you place importance on, you basically do it for yourself, because then there would be no place for concern and love.
30:34 K: We are going to find out.
30:37 Q: It wasn't saying importance, but when you put something as being of the utmost importance.
30:45 K: When you give something utmost importance, it that love?
31:07 Then you become prisoner to my importance. Goodness, it is so simple.
31:26 No? You have all stopped thinking, have you?
31:40 Q: Is it like if you catch a bird, put it into a cage, you have it in your room and it is singing and you say, I love this bird?
31:55 K: Put the question differently, would you give equal importance to everything?
32:03 Money, sex, child, wife, husband, God.
32:12 Q: Isn't there some fear in giving importance to something, that if I don't give it importance I won't be able to secure what I want?
32:20 K: Partly. That is one of the things. I am asking, if you don't give importance to one thing, then will you give importance to everything else?
32:32 Everything is important.
32:41 You understand what I am saying? Go slowly into it, examine it carefully. It may be easier to give importance to one thing rather than money, sex, relationship and so on, give equal importance to all of that. Is that possible?
33:16 Or thinking that it is not possible, we say, I will give my importance to one thing.
33:23 Q: If you think about it as giving equal importance to everything...
33:29 K: Can you?

Q: No, you can't.
33:31 K: No, don't say you can't – find out.
33:34 Q: No, I haven't expressed what I meant. You see, if you put it as a concept, put importance to everything, then you find yourself doing something impossible.
33:50 So, you just think about it, you don't do it. It seems to not be very easy. You just discard many things and put your utmost importance to one thing.
34:04 K: That is, because you say, I cannot give importance to all things equally which is difficult, which is probably impossible, so you say, I will give my attention to that one thing. Is that it?
34:20 Q: Maybe we are going a little too quickly. We have to go into why should we do this? If it were possible, what is the benefit of it?
34:30 K: What is the benefit of giving importance to all things equally?
34:35 Q: Yes. It may be very difficult but it may be worth it.
34:38 K: No, is it worth giving importance to one thing?
34:44 Q: At least it gets tangible results.
34:46 K: What are the tangible results?
34:48 Q: You might become very wealthy or have a big car or a big house.
34:52 K: I understand with regard to money. I am talking about giving importance to a wife. Which is what she raised, which is relationship. If you give all-importance to your wife, to your child, to your husband, to your girlfriend, what happens?
35:14 Q: Krishnaji, is it because there is importance on the self that we tend to give importance to one thing?
35:24 That we give importance to one thing over other things, and to give equal importance...

K: Look, listen, K: can you give equal importance to everything?
35:36 Money, sex, relationship, goodness, and so on – equal importance.
35:47 Q: By equal importance, I take it you don't mean spending the same amount of time and energy on each thing.
35:57 K: That means that – energy on money, energy on sex, energy on goodness.
36:03 Q: It would seem silly to spend, say ten units of energy on each thing.
36:09 K: Find out, sir.
36:13 Q: Do you mean giving importance to each thing in your life?
36:19 K: What?
36:20 Q: Giving importance to each thing in your life and not just to one thing.
36:27 Equal sounds difficult, because you then have to compare each one to the other.
36:32 K: People give their life to earning money, and say that is the most important thing.
36:39 Or my family, my child, my wife, my husband.
36:48 And we said that may be an escape from themselves.
36:57 But it is not an escape from themselves, it is a dreadful thing because it recoils.
37:07 So, from that one says, can I give equal importance, equal energy to all the things?
37:15 Q: It seems it is important to find out what creates this importance.
37:20 K: Go on, go ahead, find out. Why does one give importance?
37:32 Why do you give importance to sex, which the world is doing? The whole world is caught in it, most important thing in life.
37:49 Money will help you to get that, and so on. Why?
38:04 Q: That very state of mind which demands to put importance in it, is the thing which wants to identify and then recoils back, and I can't face myself in that state.
38:20 So it is easier for me to create the something and identify.
38:23 K: I understand, but why do you call it important?
38:32 I understand when you are a student that you must pass examinations to get a job, career, and so on.
38:46 And you give your energy, your thought, your anxiety, everything to get that.
38:57 That becomes important. Why does money become all-important to a man, to a businessman, the whole of it – why? Go on, sirs.
39:11 Q: Krishnaji, you keep asking why, and really I don't know why. I really don't know why I put importance on all these things.
39:20 K: Find out.

Q: But I don't know why.
39:24 Q: It seems to be there and I don't quite know what to do with it.
39:34 Q: Part of it is the self-image, isn't it?
39:37 K: Is it self-image?
39:40 Q: If you have a lot of money, people treat you differently.
39:45 K: Yes, with lot of money you are free, you can do what you like, go where you like, same thing.
39:50 Q: I am thinking more of how when you let it be known that you have a lot money, their image of you changes.
40:00 And a lot of people like being treated that way.
40:05 K: And people want power, position, and they go after power.
40:13 They might get married, children, but their whole direction is to have great deal of power.
40:24 Q: To put it another way, if you don't have the money or if you don't have the power, you feel you are nothing.
40:32 K: Yes. So, is it the fear, escaping from your nothingness?
40:45 Q: I think it is avoiding things that we don't know how to deal with.
40:51 K: Would you please find out for yourself? Look at yourself, don't look somewhere else. Look at yourself and say why do I give importance to this thing?
41:07 Put that thing more forward than anything else.
41:21 Q: Out of a fear of being empty or lonely.
41:28 One wants to devote their energy and time to something so that one is not lonely.
41:34 K: So you say, I am escaping from my loneliness, from my emptiness, from my nothingness, and so that becomes all-important. Is that it?
41:51 Q: That is what I think.

K: Not think. Is that a fact to you?
41:58 Q: Yes.
42:02 K: Wait. Is that a fact to you? That you are escaping from your own nothingness – these are good words, nothingness, emptiness are marvellous words, from your own shallowness, much better – you are escaping from your own shallowness by saying that my wife is all-important, my work is all-important.
42:49 Why do you do that? Is it an escape from your shallowness, from your callousness, from your stupidity, from your indifference, from your uncertainty?
43:14 At least I have got my wife, there I am certain. I don't sit between two things. You follow? There, I am quite clear.
43:29 Q: I think I give importance to something when it benefits me.
43:34 K: Yes, I benefit from giving all-importance to my wife because then I get sex, she cooks, and all the comforts.
43:50 Also, I get the backlash, which is becoming jealous of her, then I must possess her much more. I won't let her go.
44:05 She feels imprisoned and perhaps she likes to be imprisoned.
44:13 I possess her and she feels happy being possessed by me. And she possesses me, also. Then it is a interrelationship of possession, in which there is always anxiety, fear, My God, I hope nothing will happen – a quivering relationship.
44:42 Q: But we don't generally look at all the fear, we look at the good things about it.
44:49 K: I started out escaping from my, whatever it is, shallowness, I have given my escape to my wife, to my child, to my husband, to my girl, or my boy, and in that escape, I create tremendous problems. No?
45:20 No?
45:23 Q: But I really can't see the escape that you are talking about. There doesn't seem to be any escape taking place.
45:32 K: Then why do I do this? Why do human beings do it?
45:44 Businessmen, politicians, people who are seeking power, position – why?
45:59 When you have power, like Brezhnev and prime ministers and so on, they have a lot of power. Why do you pursue that power?
46:20 Q: It seems that money has no importance of itself.
46:28 K: I never said money has no importance. I said money has importance, otherwise you and I couldn't be sitting here.
46:35 Q: So that very importance may be attracting me to put emphasis on it, and not the escape phenomenon, completely.
46:44 K: No, look at it, look into yourself, each one of us, see what is taking place.
46:54 When you give importance to sex – importance, in the sense, that is the most important thing in my life – what happens?
47:15 Q: It seems the pleasure you get from that certain thing takes you away from your problems and difficulties.
47:29 Q: Also there is a certain idea of fulfilment. If I want to go into politics, I may have ideas as to how I could do a very good job in politics, so that it may not feel like an escape but rather pursuing the idea that I am projecting into the future.
47:53 K: Look at this way, is it one is escaping from one's own ugliness, shallowness, when you say, that is most important – my wife?
48:11 And the other point is, can you give importance to all the things equally, to all the things of your life – money, sex, God, if you have a god, a rather silly word, to goodness, to everything – can you do that?
48:34 When you give importance to one thing, you become unbalanced, don't you?
48:46 Don't you?
48:47 Q: The thing is made out of place.

K: Out of place. It is out of place. It is like developing one very strong arm and the rest of the body will be very weak.
49:02 Q: Sir, it seems when you give importance to one thing, that you are able to do it only because you are setting aside a lot of other things as being unimportant, and without those other things you couldn't give importance to one thing.
49:18 So, how can you give importance to everything?
49:21 K: Find out. Is it possible? I did not say it is, or it is not.
49:32 Q: Sir, I have difficulty with this word equal, because equal implies comparison.

K: No – equal.
49:42 Money is equally important, sex is equally important, whatever – everything important.
49:54 You understand my question?
49:56 Q: Do you mean to see the proper importance?
50:02 K: If you give one thing importance, place one thing above all others you live an unharmonious life, don't you?
50:17 Contradictory, it is not harmonious. It is like having very strong legs and a very weak mind, or one very strong arm, and the rest is very weak.
50:32 It is not a total, harmonious development of the body.
50:39 Now, if you give importance to one thing – sex or child or money or wife or husband, girl or boy – it is not a harmonious living.
50:53 Would you agree to that? Would you see that? Then let's inquire, what is harmonious living?
51:13 Which is, the mind: clear, strong, not wobbling between two sides and never taking any side, but a strong mind, clear mind, unworried mind.
51:37 And a good physical body.
51:44 If you haven't got a good physical body, you become slightly psychosomatically neurotic, and all the rest of it follows.
51:52 Then also, emotionally, you must be highly sensitive.
52:00 So the three operating together create harmony. The mind, the body and the quality of deep sensitivity of affection, and so on.
52:16 The whole of that, neither one thing stronger than the other, that is living a harmonious life.
52:29 That is not possible when you give importance to one thing. Is this clear?
52:42 Q: Krishnaji, is it appropriate to ask if there are things that have absolute importance, and not relative importance?

K: We are going to find out.
52:51 K: There are.

Q: Like living a harmonious life.
52:54 K: Absolute importance. Irrevocable and total. Absolute.
53:04 We are going to find out. Now, how is this to be brought about? A total harmonious living, neither the mind, intellect, dominating everything else or the soma, which is the body, influencing everything else, the senses. You understand?
53:34 Which is what the world is doing, living on sensation, and emotionally romantic – all that stuff.
53:52 Now, how do we bring about a harmonious existence – mind, body and what shall we call the other thing?
54:07 The heart, it is generally called. But that again, is a rather silly word, but we will accept it for the moment to get on with it.
54:17 So, the body, the heart and the mind always in harmony, not one or the other dominating.
54:29 Now, can this be done?
54:42 Come on, don't go to sleep. Hey! Shankar, come on, sir. If this is important, totally and absolutely important in your life, what will you do?
55:11 To have an excellent body, which means no drink, no drugs, no alcohol, no smoking, very sensitive, highly responsive sensations, senses.
55:40 Therefore, if you have that kind of sensitivity, senses awakened, then sex becomes important – pleasure.
55:51 I wonder if you are following all this.
55:59 Are you, Shankar? Or you are going off somewhere else?
56:11 If you cultivate the intellect as the intellectuals do – and they are very strong people, the intellectual people – they write clever books, clever theories.
56:35 Marx, Karl Marx was an intellectual.
56:43 He created marvellous theories. Lenin, Mao, the popes, the priests, they are tremendously intellectual people.
56:59 Some of the saints.
57:06 And they have led the world. Freud was a tremendous intellectual and he has created havoc in the world.
57:16 Putting the father against the son and the son against – you know, all the rest of it. I won't go into all this.
57:25 So, how will you, as you are young, as you are students, all of us, how will you bring this about in your life?
57:34 Which is the most important thing. Come on. Do you agree this is important? No, the most important.
57:48 Q: I have just realised that any importance is the creation of my mind.
57:54 K: No, no, no, it is not. I see clearly, observe clearly that if I do not have good psychosomatic responses, clear responses, I become neurotic. That is a fact.
58:18 I see it very clearly. Logically, reasonably, sanely, I see, if there is not a perfect harmony – mind, heart, body – every action is neurotic.
58:37 Q: Does the word neurotic mean giving more importance to one thing than other things?
58:43 K: Don't for the moment go into the full explanation – is not correct action, let's put it that way.
58:56 Now, if you see that, not as a theory or as a goal, as a purpose, as an end, but it has to be done now, not tomorrow, you must have an excellent body now, eat the right food, no smoke, no drink, etc.
59:25 And you must have a very good mind. Not intellect, I don't mean intellect. Those who have tremendous intellects have misled the world. Sorry, I hope there is nobody here.
59:51 Like Andre Gide and so many people who said communism is the greatest gift to man.
1:00:02 And they got disillusioned and the poor followers were caught in it and remained in it. You understand what I am saying?
1:00:17 So, my question is, what will you do? If that is the highest and the greatest – not even important, not an ideal, it is the greatest way of living.
1:00:36 What will you do now?
1:00:44 Wouldn't you immediately cut off this is the most important thing in life? The particular thing, sex, money, child, husband, wife, and so on. I wonder if you see all this.
1:01:00 Q: I want to be sure that this is not another escape that I am creating.
1:01:06 K: Oh, no. No, you are not creating, it is a fact.
1:01:14 It is a fact that tree is there.
1:01:17 Q: I could make it the most important thing to not have a most important thing.
1:01:23 K: You could make it – quite right.
1:01:30 Do you see the fact of this, not the idea of it?
1:01:39 You understand? Not the idea of it but the fact that one must live that way.
1:01:57 If that is a fact and it is actual, then what takes place?
1:02:14 Then, don't you become tremendously aware, that you don't push anything in a wrong direction?
1:02:21 You understand what I am saying?
1:02:26 Q: But there seems to be a problem here because in my trying to live the harmonious life, I have to give importance to all things equally.
1:02:37 K: No, you haven't found out, you haven't listened. Sorry, I haven't explained myself, clearly. If you have not a good body, an excellent body, responding properly and sensitive, clear, strong, the body reacts on your mind, doesn't it?
1:03:03 And the mind then reacts on the body. The body being weak, unless you are extraordinarily alert to it, the mind becomes also weak.
1:03:19 And your actions then will be weak. Now, if you see that, not as an idea but as a fact, like pain in your tooth or tummy, that is a fact, then you say, there must be great care in what you eat, what you drink – you follow?
1:03:47 And also to think very clearly, not personally, not, I don't want to think about it because it is going to affect me.
1:03:59 To think clearly, objectively, non-personally, non-emotionally.
1:04:13 Will you do it? Will you begin?
1:04:20 You began by asking this morning, relationship and sex.
1:04:27 Can you have harmonious relationship with another who is not harmonious?
1:04:42 You may be harmonious, living this extraordinary life I am your wife – thank God I am not – I am your wife, then what happens?
1:04:55 I am not like you – I want money, I am attractive, I want to show my beautiful face to everybody.
1:05:04 I want to be dressed by Christian Dior, or Yves St. Laurent – and where is your relationship with me?
1:05:24 You follow the difficulty of all this, the complexity of it? If we are both in disharmony, it is much easier.
1:05:37 We can quarrel, we can say, it doesn't matter, carry on, messy life. But if you are tremendously harmonious and your partner is not, then havoc.
1:05:59 Q: But if you are that tremendously harmonious you should be able to affect the people around you.
1:06:04 K: But you might become harmonious after you have been caught in marriage or with a girl or a boy.
1:06:13 You may become harmonious and the poor girl or the boy, what are they going to do?
1:06:22 You have to be aware of all this, not come to any conclusion. You have to find out.
1:06:32 Q: And parents too, Krishnaji, this relationship.
1:06:35 K: Of course – parents, aunts, etc.
1:06:45 So, I am asking you, please, will you live that way?
1:06:52 Q: You seem to be suggesting two things, Krishnaji, one is a cultivation of the mind, the heart and the body, in order to have a certain lucidity, and the other is a harmony that comes about from lucidity.
1:07:08 From clarity, from being clear as to what harmony is.
1:07:17 K: I don't quite follow this.
1:07:18 Q: You are saying that a harmonious life consists of these factors, a clear mind, an open heart and a sound body.
1:07:28 Those are things which can to a degree be cultivated.
1:07:33 K: I am coming to that, sir. Can it be cultivated?
1:07:36 Q: Aren't you suggesting that it can?
1:07:39 K: I am putting this forward. Therefore I ask, will you do it? Then you will ask, how am I to do it? But you don't ask. Then we will go into it. I say look, can this harmony be created by thought?
1:07:59 You understand my question? Which means thought itself is harmonious. Therefore, whatever it can create is harmonious.
1:08:16 You understand? Come on, that is not difficult.
1:08:20 Q: But thought isn't harmonious.

K: No, that is why.
1:08:27 He said – I am asking you – can thought create this harmony, bring about this harmony?
1:08:36 Harmony between the mind, etc. – the three.
1:08:43 Can thought do it?
1:08:47 Q: There seems to be a contradiction in this.
1:08:50 K: No, there is no contradiction. Can thought do it? I am asking you.
1:08:53 Q: I would suggest it can't.
1:08:56 K: No, I say it is impossible, because thought itself is a fragment, is a broken piece, is limited.
1:09:10 Thought has created this disharmony in the world and thought has created this disharmony in my life.
1:09:27 So I say, no, thought cannot create it. Then what will?
1:09:37 Q: We're coming to these conclusions only through thought, aren't we?
1:09:45 K: No, there is no conclusion, only seeing fact.
1:09:54 Ah, that is the difficulty. As long as you are using thought as a means of bringing about harmony, then you have to inquire whether thought itself is harmonious.
1:10:13 If it is not it can't create it. If I am using a blunt instrument where a sharp instrument is needed, then I have to throw away the blunt instrument.
1:10:31 In the very throwing away of the blunt instrument, I create the sharp.
1:10:36 Q: If I cannot get harmony through thought, what do I do?
1:10:41 K: No. Right. Is it time to stop or can we go on? It is a quarter past one, nearly. I am not avoiding your question, by introducing lunch.
1:11:00 Do we go on? I am asking, please tell me, do I go on or do we stop?
1:11:09 Q: Can we go on for a few minutes?
1:11:13 K: Ask Mrs D. and the cook and all of us.
1:11:16 Q: Yes, let's go on.
1:11:19 Q: I think you ought to stop.

K: We ought to stop?
1:11:28 Q: I think we ought to hold that question and start off the next talk with that. Hold that question, go into it ourselves...
1:11:37 K: You see, it is so difficult to hold that question till next time.
1:11:42 Q: Well, let's go on.
1:11:44 K: No, but I want consensus.
1:11:48 Q: It has been suggested that we shouldn't be greedy about...
1:11:53 K: May I have five minutes? Is that enough? Will that be enough?
1:12:07 Do you see very clearly that thought itself, whatever it creates, whatever it does, brings disharmony?
1:12:29 Q: When you are unclear and you think, it brings disharmony, but if you are clear...

K: Do you see it?
1:12:36 K: See the fact that thought has created disharmony.
1:12:44 It has separated people into nations, it has separated people into various categories of religions, classes, it has created the architecture, but not the tree, not the nature.
1:13:08 Nature is harmonious, whether the tiger kills the goat, it is harmonious, it is this way.
1:13:16 So, do you actually see the nature of thought, that it is a broken piece, limited, therefore it cannot, whatever it does, create harmony?
1:13:31 Thought has created The League of Nations, there is no harmony.
1:13:40 On the contrary, it is preparing wars. Are you clear on this? Are you? Shankar? If you are not clear on this, we can't go further.
1:14:03 We have to say, let's go into it, why thought, whatever it does, is destructive, not harmonious.
1:14:14 Then we have to go into the whole movement of thought.
1:14:27 Q: I have a question. When I actually see this, do I see it through thought, or not?

K: No.
1:14:38 Q: Then how do you see it?

K: Wait. Make it very simple.
1:14:43 K: When you look at that tree, can you look at it without calling it green, a tree, the word?
1:14:51 Just look without the word, without saying it is green, it is this, it is that – just look.
1:14:58 Can you do it?
1:15:05 To look without the word. Because the word is not that thing. So can you look at that thing without the word?
1:15:21 Q: You saying that thought is words?

K: Do it, then you will discover.
1:15:32 I have got two minutes more.
1:15:36 Q: Are you suggesting that thought is the basis of sorrow, and each one is escaping through these various things?
1:15:42 K: What, sir?

Q: Thought is the basis of sorrow.
1:15:46 K: Absolutely, of course.
1:15:53 Q: What confuses me is talking about the harmonious life, because I am not harmonious, and when we talk about it it is a theory for me, and it is another thing that I am going to spend my time trying to be, so I will be in more conflict.
1:16:10 K: No. One discovers one lives a contradictory, disjointed, confused life.
1:16:21 Out of that confusion, we say we must live harmoniously.
1:16:28 That act of wanting to live harmoniously is part of thought, and thought has created confusion.
1:16:42 So, do you realise thought cannot create anything but confusion?
1:16:50 Not architecturally and so on, but in oneself.
1:16:57 Q: That is not very clear, because while one can see that thought has not created something that is harmonious, it is not absolutely clear that it cannot create something that is harmonious, because one hasn't examined it.
1:17:16 K: Is thought itself harmonious? To create something harmonious, the creator must be harmonious. So we say, God is harmonious, therefore we worship God, Therefore God will make me harmonious.
1:17:33 The God is created by thought.
1:17:45 Time. We will continue with this another time. May I get up?