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BR78S2 - Is it possible never to be hurt?
Brockwood Park, UK - 13 September 1978
Seminar 2



0:54 K: Shall we go on to talk over together the thing that we wished to talk about this morning: relationship? The word means - please correct me - from Latin, 'to refer to', to look back. I think that most of our relationships are that. And we are going to talk over together the whole significance of relationship as it is, and in the understanding of what it is, actually, go beyond all the implications of that narrow, limited relationship into something wider and deeper. That's what we are going to talk over together.
2:11 So, what do we mean by relationship? Please, this is not a talk by me, or a solo, but please join all of us together in this because we are all involved in some kind of relationship - with a wife, a husband, with a girl, a boy, with parents, our relationship to society, to nature, to the whole world, our relationship to all the things that are happening in the world, the terrible things, the violence, and also the extraordinary technological advancements, and science, and engineering, and so on. So, not only the limited relationship between two people but also our relationship with the whole world. Have we any? So will you start it?
3:17 Q: When you said that the word, you understood it in the dictionary means 'to refer back to'.
3:25 K: Referre, from Latin, to look back to, to refer to.
3:29 Q: Are you of the opinion that people generally, this is how they relate to other people, they refer back to them? But I don't quite understand what you meant by that. I think, you said you feel people generally...
3:43 K: Let's begin, sir. Forget what I have said. What does relationship mean to you, to each one of us? I am married - suppose - I have children, what is my relationship to my wife, to my children, and what do I mean by relationship? Am I related to nature, to the ecological world? Am I related to what is happening in Nicaragua, between the Arab and the Jew, the starvation, and so on? So what is my relationship with the most intimate and the most, far, outward? We have to begin with the near, the closest, and then work forward. So if you are married, if you have got a girlfriend, or if you have no girlfriend, what actually is our relationship with another.
5:13 Q: We don't seem to have any, that's all.
5:18 K: Please, investigate it.
5:20 Q: There is always a barrier there whenever you meet anyone, or a separation between what is happening outside, or in nature, or in each one of us.
5:41 Q: I can see that with my family it is a succession of trying all the time, of shifting, and to a certain extent with nature, just around, but the farther issues, I can see that it doesn't extend to any extent, really.
6:06 K: Look, madame, relationship is one of the most important things in life. Relationship between me and another, me with many others, which creates society. And in my relationship with another there is always tension, there is always a sense of division, and therefore conflict, and a sense of guilt, a sense of possession, a sense of responsibility, a sense of protection - all that is involved in it, not only with the children but with each other. And that, apparently, from the ancient of times, it goes on that way. Constant conflict between you and me - not you and me, you know what I mean - my wife and myself, or with another. Why do we go on that way? Why do we live that way? What is right or wrong in our relationships with each other? I want to begin the closest and gradually work to the world about us, not only in England but in India, Japan, the whole world. So I must begin near to go far. I see, as it is now, without exaggeration, without giving false values, it is a constant struggle, constant pain, constant tension, a division. If we accept that as being normal then it's all right, but if one doesn't accept it as being normal, healthy, then we have to proceed to find out whether it is possible to end that kind of relationship, in which there is no shadow of conflict with each other. Is that possible? What are the implications if it is possible, and whether one can actually, in daily life, do it. That's the issue we are going to talk about this morning.
8:51 Q: I have a relationship with another in those moments when I am aware of them and aware of myself - in that moment. But as I approach it, I feel fear, and either pain or a threat.
9:13 K: That's right, sir. So all that is implied - pain, attachment, jealousy, anxiety, fear, and the great sexual pleasure - the whole of that is implied in our daily relationship. Why do we accept it? Why don't we question it? That's what we are here for.
9:39 Let me again repeat: we are here, this gathering, the group of us, are supposed to be serious people, with a serious intention to understand our problems and resolve them, not in ten years time, but here, now. Otherwise it is not worth talking about it, it becomes theoretical and nonsensical. Personally, I am not interested in that kind of stuff. If I am married, if I have a problem of that kind, I want to resolve it instantly. That may be my peculiar tendency, or my way of looking at it, I don't want to carry a problem overnight, specially a psychological problem, which is relationship with another. Either I say, that's normal, I can't help it living that way and, for the rest of my life, it is that. I may change wives, I may change husbands, but the same pattern is repeated over and over again. And as I am a serious man I want to find out if it can end, what is the manner of ending it, and a way of living in which there is no conflict at all. That's what I want to find out. At least that's what we are gathered here, to do that.
11:15 Q: We then overlook the original meaning of that word 'relationship' which means to carry back.

K: What, sir?
11:23 Q: Relationship is: something goes out from one person and something is carried back from the other.
11:30 K: Yes, yes.
11:31 Q: Without the carry back, the re-late, there won't be anything called relationship.
11:37 K: Yes.

Q: It can't be carried back. We have been talking so far as though one person were doing the relating only.
11:46 K: I think, you've heard all that so I don't have to repeat it. Please, enter into the discussion.
11:57 Q: Is it possible to look at why we do that.
12:00 K: Yes, why do we support this kind of life, why do we live this way.
12:07 Q: Then is it important why we question? It is important to know what is our motivation.
12:14 K: No, I am questioning it now. I am questioning why human beings, including us, we live that way. Is it part of our heredity, part of our tradition, part of our habit, so we have got used to it and say, yes, that's the way to live. Trees struggle, everything struggles, this is part of nature, inevitable that in our relationship there must be conflict. We can find all kinds of excuses but the fact remains which is, a relationship between two people, give and take, and looking back, and all the rest of it. We are questioning why we accept that way of life? Why we accept wars, why we accept violence, and so on.
13:24 Q: Sir, if we relate impartial, therefore our motivations are impartial.
13:52 K: So, do you say you accept it as it is?
13:56 Q: I don't know, but it seems to be the problem of not wanting to get entangled in something false, and yet not wanting to isolate oneself.
14:12 K: I don't quite follow this. The others may follow, please answer him, not me alone. I am not the oracle.
14:21 Q: You've said relationship creates conflict.
14:27 K: No, no, I didn't say that. Not 'I said', what is the fact. Fact is, in our daily relationship with each other - man, woman, and so on - there is division, there is conflict, there is struggle, and all the things involved in it, which we don't have to describe in detail because everybody knows what our relationships are.
15:02 Q: If all those things are eliminated...
15:06 K: No, not 'if'. You see, that is supposition.
15:10 Q: When all those things are gone...
15:12 K: The same thing - if, when.
15:22 Q: Isn't part of the tension in relationship because another can hurt you, and you are afraid of this.
15:33 K: First, let's see what actually is taking place and then we can move from there. If we accept that this kind of struggle in relationship is healthy, and in nature everything is struggling - a tree in a forest is struggling to have light, a tiger is chasing a deer. You follow? There, constant struggle. And we may say, to have this conflict is healthy, helps us to grow, all kinds of things, and you accept it. Right? One generally accepts it, unless the struggle becomes utterly intolerable, then there is divorce, the breaking up of the family, which affects the children, and so on. If that is a fact, and it is generally a fact, then how do we approach the fact in order to bring about a transformation in the way we are living? I can't explain. I think, it is fairly clear what we are talking about, isn't it?
17:12 Q: I feel that there is no true relationship if there is no love.
17:18 K: So, then we come to the question, what is love. We may come to that question presently, or we may begin with that, if you wish. Then we have to enquire into what we call love. Have we love for another? One may say, I love my wife, but is that love? You follow?
17:52 Q: Why is there no love in us?

K: I beg your pardon?
17:56 Q: Why is there no true relationship? I feel it is because there is no love in us, inside us.
18:09 K: Sir, I want to find out - I don't know why I am answering, please we are all supposed to take part in this discussion, every one of us, not me talk all the time and you listen. All of us are supposed to engage in conversation, when one question is put by another, to answer it as well as we can, find out how each one of us reacts to these things.
18:40 Q: Before I can come to any consideration of love I have to somehow face the fact that I am threatened by a relationship.
18:50 K: That's what I am asking. Are we clear what our actual relationships are at present, now, not in some future, if and when.
19:08 Q: We are all afraid of getting hurt.
19:12 K: So, is our relationship based on fear, getting hurt?
19:25 Q: It is unconsciously based on fear, pressure, and images.
19:38 K: Tunki, you have heard me talk about images, infinitely, for a number of years I've been talking. Are you repeating what we have said, or you have discovered that for yourself?
20:00 Q: I need somebody and then that person does something which I like and then I would have a certain image of this person - oh, this person is named such and such, and is a very kind person.
20:18 K: So, you are clear, it is your own discovery. I haven't told you that you have got an image about that person. It's your own discovery that you have an image about a person.
20:35 Q: Yes.

K: That's all. So it's yours, not mine.
20:49 Q: I think, we do have relationships with people but they are limited because we are always looking for something to share. For example, nationalism will bring a lot of people together and they will have a sort of relationship, but the moment there is nothing that interests you in a relationship, you won't care.
21:11 K: So interest brings us together because of a particular interest. Is that it?
21:21 Q: Like here we are sitting together and we have relationship because we all care about the same thing.
21:26 K: Aren't we moving away ? I am just asking.
21:31 Q: There is also another factor of relationship which he was talking about.
21:39 Q: Might it help, can we go back to the question of how is it that we can approach this, so that it will bring about a transformation in relationship?
21:47 K: And also the gentleman raised the question, we are anxious about our relationship because it is based on fear of getting hurt.
22:04 Q: I don't understand this 'getting hurt'.
22:07 K: We will go into it, sir. But first, do we realise, that, at present, as we live daily, our relationship is a peculiar affair, to put it mildly. A sense of division, 'you' and 'me'. You with your ambitions, you with your career, you with your passions, you with your ambitions, and so on, and me with my ambitions, and greed, and so on. This is our actual daily state. I have a profession, and I spend ten hours at it, earning money, I come home, and she has also gone out to earn money and comes home, and we are both tired, irritation - you know all this, why should I discuss it, I am not married, sure.
23:21 Q: And also with little children. We enter a peculiar relationship with very little children where one feels they can look through one, so there is a block in the relationship.
23:32 K: What I am asking, madame, is, do we realise actually the way our relationships are. Do I know my relationship with my wife - or girl, boy - is divisive, and because it is divisive there must be conflict? That's all. I am starting from there.
24:04 Q: I don't think we do know it - at least I don't think I know it most of the time. It's a sort of compulsive thing. And until I can allow it to be different and to be separate then I have got no choice.
24:21 K: Now how do we discuss this problem? Nobody seems to want to join except a few of us. All of us, it's all our problem. Why don't we talk about it, why don't we go into it? Are we afraid to go into it?
24:39 Q: It's a fact.

K: Are we afraid to go into the fact?
24:42 Q: I think, we are.

K: That's just it. We are afraid to go into the fact, and facing the fact, the very facing of the fact may produce certain reactions, and of those reactions we are afraid. Is that it?
25:02 Q: I nearly cry when I think about it.
25:09 K: So what shall we do? Just verbally talk about relationship? And keep our fears and let things go on as they are?
25:21 Q: That's what we generally do.

K: I know. Is that what you want?
25:25 Q: No.

K: For god's sake.
25:32 Q: How can we at every moment recognise division? It seems that we see it retrospectively, afterwards, but in the moment we have our barriers (inaudible). How can we recognise this division every second?
25:51 K: I don't have to recognise something, it is there! Why do I have to say I have to recognise that I am in conflict with my wife? It is there.
26:03 Q: I am afraid of saying so.
26:05 K: Therefore, is it a question of fear that we don't talk about our relationship?
26:10 Q: Yes, in case...

K: If it is fear, let's tackle fear! Let's go into the question of fear. But if you say, sorry, I don't want to discuss any kind of relationship with my wife, or with the world, or with anything because I am afraid if I do go into it, something may happen in our status quo, therefore let's leave that alone and let's talk about God and golf, or the beautiful days. Is that what you want? If you want to talk about God and the beautiful days, cut me out. It's very simple.
27:11 Q: Well, for me, I again come back on the level of getting hurt.
27:18 K: All right, sir. Now wait a minute. Do I really want to find a relationship with somebody in which being hurt is impossible? Is it possible never to be hurt? Even that, to discuss it.
27:42 Q: You ask is it possible, never?

K: Of course.
27:47 Q: Never to be hurt?

K: Never to be hurt.
27:49 Q: Not physically, you mean?

K: In all relationships.
27:54 Q: But sometimes I feel hurt.
28:04 K: I don't quite follow.
28:05 Q: Sometimes she feels hurt.

K: Why should I be hurt? Why should another hurt me? Why should my wife hurt me? Or my children, or my boss, or anybody, why should they hurt me? No, why? I know they do. I know we have been hurt.
28:29 Q: Because you have different feelings and different thoughts.
28:33 Q: It seems we have a self, and that self is what gets hurt, and that self is what prevents us from having any relationship.
28:43 K: Either we accept being hurt, as inevitable, or there is a way of living in relationship where there is no hurt at all.
29:01 K: Apparently you don't even find out.
29:07 Q: It's also not wanting to hurt the other person.
29:21 K: What do we do now, sir? Do you want to go into this question of being hurt?
29:25 Q: Yes.

Q: Yes.
29:27 K: Which means, a way of living with another, intimately or not intimately, in which there is no possibility at any time of being hurt. Right? Is that possible? So let's find out.

Q: No, it's not possible.
29:49 K: If you say, not possible, then it's finished.
29:52 Q: All right, it's finished.
29:54 K: If you say it is not possible you have closed the door on it.
29:59 Q: It is possible.
30:01 K: If you say... If you say it is possible you have also closed the door on it. Let's find out.
30:12 Q: Yes, let's find out.
30:17 K: Do you really want to go into this?

Q: Yes, I have never thought about it.
30:20 K: Not you and I, but all of us. Is this a problem that you want to discuss, go into and resolve it, not next year start again and say, 'I am hurt, please tell me how to get rid of it' - it becomes too silly.
30:39 Q: Probably I want to find out because I don't like being hurt.
30:43 K: If you want to go into this question of being hurt, what is hurt? When you say, I am hurt by my wife, or by somebody, what is the thing that is hurt?

Q: Some feeling in myself.
30:58 K: Examine it, don't answer me. Forgive me. Find out for yourself what is the thing that is hurt.
31:23 Q: One can see, if one looks at it, that there are areas of rigidity in oneself that are hurt.
31:37 K: Rigidity. All right. You say that. Please, all of us take part in this, for god's sake!
31:48 Q: It's the self, that's hurt.
31:52 Q: What is the self, what do you mean?
31:56 Q: It's the self images, it's what you consider to be you.
32:01 K: Look, I want to find out, I am hurt for various reasons - we can find out what has hurt me - but I want to find out what is the thing that is hurt. You understand, sir? Is it my thought, is it my body, is it my image about myself, is it a sense of wanting not to be hurt and therefore being hurt? You follow? So what is it when you say, I am hurt? Is it physical hurt, or a psychological hurt?
32:43 Q: It's a psychological hurt we are talking about. I took it that we're talking about that.
32:49 K: I am asking you, sir, please tell me, or tell each other.
32:54 Q: Let's talk about psychological hurt because physical pain I can understand, I am sure.
32:58 Q: But doesn't psychological pain give you physical pain as well?
33:04 Q: In the sense, you mean you feel tense?
33:06 K: I am married, or you call me a fool, and I am hurt. My wife says something to me and I get hurt. Right? Or you call me a perfect fool, an idiot, and I get hurt. Now I am asking you - please stick to this one point - what is the thing, when I say, 'I am hurt' - what is hurt?
33:39 Q: It seems to me that I am hurt because I have a certain idea of myself.
33:44 K: All right. Leave it there. An idea about myself. Right?
33:51 Q: An interpretation of the words.

K: Wait, keep to that one thing, don't add more to it, we will come to it. That is, I have an idea about myself. Right? I think, I am a great man, with tremendous reputation, you come along and say, you are a perfect ass, and I get hurt.
34:16 Q: That's not the primary observation. The first observation is sensations in the body, and heat...
34:23 K: Yes sir, I know. I am hurt because you called me a fool. Right? Now, what is the thing that is hurt? When I say, I am hurt, what is this 'I' that is hurt?
34:45 Q: There are certain things that compose our self. Our conditions, our ideas, everything our self is made up of, so for that matter we have certain desires, certain goals, certain ideas. If someone comes along and contradicts what I think, what I know is myself, is my knowledge, is my idea, is my condition, and breaks it at a certain limit, well, then it is for me - not for him, because he has other ideas, and other conditionings, and other things.
35:38 K: So for you - leave the other fellow alone.
35:42 Q: For me, it is not enough, the line is broken at a certain point.
35:53 K: So, you have a certain idea.

Q: I have a certain goal.
35:57 K: Certain idea - keep to that word 'idea' which that gentleman suggested. That idea is broken, is modified, or shattered. And that idea, being shattered, hurts you.
36:18 Q: Yes, of course.

K: Keep to that, don't expand.
36:22 Q: OK, yes, of course.
36:26 K: So, what is hurt is the idea about yourself. Keep to that simple thing.
36:39 Q: What is hurt, yes, it's my idea.

K: Keep to that simple thing. I have an idea about myself, or I have an ideal, or a belief, or a conclusion, and so on. You come along and break it, kill it, or chip it, break it up.

Q: Modify it.
37:04 K: Modify it. So I get hurt.

Q: Yes.
37:07 K: That's all. That's all. Keep it there. So, what happens? You come along and break my idea, or you give a shock to that idea, and I get hurt, I shrivel up. Right?
37:28 Q: Yes.

K: That's all. Right, sir?
37:32 Q: It's not just the idea that I have about myself, it's the idea I have of the other.
37:38 K: Oh no, how can I have the idea about the other?
37:41 Q: Because I have an idea... I don't get hurt if people I don't care about, or don't respect, say that I am a fool, it's only if there is someone says this if I have an idea about something that is between us, or that I respect his opinion.
38:02 K: It is still my idea.
38:06 Q: It's my idea, but not entirely only inwardly about myself, it is also...
38:12 K: It is still my idea about her.

Q: Yes, all right.
38:17 Q: Yes. If I have an idea and you come along and chip off half of it, or say, if I think I am something, and you say I am something else, I don't necessarily have to be hurt. I can say, well, he's the fool, I am not the fool. He's a fool for saying I am a fool because I am not a fool and therefore I avoid the whole issue. I am concerned with my ideas.

K: Which means I have an idea I am not a fool. I don't see why we scramble all over the place for a simple thing. I have an idea. And you come along and chip that idea, break it up and I get hurt. That idea gets hurt.
39:07 Q: But she is saying that not necessarily one will get hurt.
39:13 Q: Is that one is depending on other people to keep this image?
39:19 K: Partly, sir. I am dependent on you, or my wife, and I am afraid that dependency might break down and therefore I am frightened, and so I get more dependent on her, or on him. It is still me getting hurt. I am asking you what is the 'me' that gets hurt?
39:51 K: No, you are going off to a little more complex thing. Have you an idea about yourself which can be hurt? You have, haven't you?

Q: Yes.
40:04 K: That is, you have a picture, an idea, an image, or you have conclusions about yourself, and that image, conclusions, ideas, get hurt. Right? Then the next question is: why do you have images about yourself? Why do you have a conclusion about something or other? You don't go into all this!
40:37 Q: It is supposed to give the self a meaning.
40:42 Q: What do you give the meaning to?
40:45 K: I can't hear that, sir, what you said.
40:47 Q: Well, conclusion is the meaning.
40:52 Q: Why is one looking for meaning?
40:59 Q: It gives importance, it is still an idea that one is important.
41:11 Q: I think it is for security.
41:21 Q: Somehow there is an energy that tries to be important. There's something behind it that wants importance.
41:29 Q: But can we really try to narrow down what is this energy that seeks importance. Is that just a different word for the same thing we are trying to catch hold of? A 'me', an ego, an idea, an energy, what is that thing, or is there such a thing, why is there a moving towards, a generating factor?
41:57 Q: Isn't it thought that creates all these ideas and desires to be meaningful?
42:07 Q: So shall we try to find out what it is?
42:13 Q: I even don't know if it has got something to do with my idea when I get hurt by seeing violence.
42:20 K: You see, you are moving away from something, which is, sir, we are talking about relationship. Relationship with my wife, my girlfriend, my boy, relationship. In that relationship we get hurt. Right? Is that what you are saying? Or am I saying it and you are accepting it?
42:49 Q: No, we are saying that.

K: Right. People are frightened about this matter, you know, that's why they are all very quiet, because it may open the Pandora's door. You know that? Open the devil's inside, so he is frightened, he keeps it all very closed. So, I want to open it for myself, you don't have to listen. I've opened it for myself umpteen times.
43:16 So, I am hurt. I question. I say, why? Why am I hurt and what is hurt? As many of you have pointed out, it is my idea, my conclusion, my dependency, my sense of belief I have got, which all goes to make up a picture about myself. Right? Right? I am a - what? - a scientist, a professor, a businessman, and I have a picture of myself. And you come along and say, you are not as good as I am. I have discovered much more, or I have done this, I have done that. I get a shock. Right? So my next question is, why do I have these pictures, images, ideas, conclusions, which can be hurt? As long as I have them they are all going to be trodden on. Right? No? No?
44:37 Q: Are we asking, Krishnaji, why do we maintain the self?
44:40 K: No. My question is, Scott, - just listen - I have gotten them. Right? And I see, as long as I have them, somebody is going to tread on them. It may not be my wife, it may be some stranger or somebody whom I know, somebody is going to tread on it. Then I get hurt. So I am asking myself, why do I have these images, pictures, ideas, conclusions about anything, which can be hurt, which can be trodden on?
45:18 Q: Isn't it to build up an identity about ourselves?
45:22 K: So, I have identified myself with my belief, my picture, my image, and so on, so I am all that! Right? And when any of you tread on any of these things I am hurt. Keep it as simple, let's keep it simple first and we will make it very, very complex as we go along.
45:54 Q: Because I feel I need to know and to be sure, to be secure.
45:59 K: But it is so, isn't it. If you have no picture about yourself - I am a marvellous woman, marvellous man, I play, I am very good at this, and so on - if I have no pictures at all about myself, you can't hurt me.
46:21 Q: Then I am afraid that I might not exist
46:23 K: So, then, you say, if I don't have images, pictures, conclusions and so on, I am nobody. So fear of being nobody creates these pictures. Right? The fear of being nobody is conditioned by society, by your parents, and so on, they say you must be somebody, you must be good at mathematics, at being a professor, businessman, or a violinist, and so on, and society has imposed this through education, or you have your own capacity. And so you have a picture about yourself. You say, can I live without a picture about myself, and you say, I can't, because it is too frightening to be nothing. Wait, wait. Which means what? You actually have not given that up - the picture - but you are afraid what might be. It might be something entirely different. It's like a person who is attached to another tremendously, and won't let go because he says, if I let go what will happen. 'What will happen' is creating fear, not the letting go. But if you let go then you will find out what might happen. Right?
48:26 Q: Part of the trouble seems to be you want to know what will happen before you let go.
48:31 K: Yes, yes. Before I give up I must have some reward at the end of it. This is the good old game we've all played. So I am asking, myself and you, why am I hurt? Can I and you be free of the idea, the image, the picture? If you can't, then get hurt and accept it, and live with it, don't say, is it possible to live without being hurt. I say it is not possible if you accept that. But if you say, I know I am hurt, now I see why I am hurt, the reason, the logic, the sequence of getting hurt, now let us find out a way of not being hurt. That is, let's find a process, or something which will completely wipe away any image I have. And I don't create future images. Is that possible?
49:52 Q: Not creating the negative image, saying I am bad, I am worth nothing, therefore I won't be hurt.
50:02 K: Ah, no, again that's a game you are playing. Do you really, seriously, want to find a way of living in which you cannot possibly be hurt? Do you want to find out?
50:22 K: No, it isn't a game you are playing.
50:27 Q: But we think that these images about our self are necessary so we won't drop them.
50:34 K: Let's find out. Are they necessary? If you think they are necessary it is going to be hurt. So anything that can be hurt is not necessary. Right? Anything that can be destroyed, trampled upon, broken up is not worth keeping! You wouldn't buy a cheap dress which would last half a day. Right? You may say it is necessary to have a dress, agreed.
51:17 Q: Also along with those hurts comes pleasure.
51:20 K: I just want to keep to this one thing, that comes a little later. Now, do we want to find a way of living in which there is no possibility of being hurt?
51:38 Q: It seems that if I have an image of myself it is because I always refer to the past.
51:48 K: Yes, which is, past is your knowledge about yourself, what you have accumulated, and so on. I am asking a different question, if you don't mind. Do we want to discover for ourselves a way of living in which the picture is not?
52:17 Q: Is there a way?

K: Dead silence!
52:25 Q: Can we want to... if we are afraid of being totally alone, totally empty, can we want to find out how to?
52:39 K: Ah! that's not the point. The point is, is there a way of living not to be hurt? Not what it means to be empty, not what it means to be lonely.
52:53 Q: Not to be hurt implies to be empty, as we have talked it over, isn't it?
53:04 K: What is it, Tunki, sorry?
53:05 Q: Not to be hurt implies to be empty, as he mentioned it, as he has talked this over.
53:13 K: Look, sir, that's not the point, we are not talking about emptiness. You see, you won't face the fact! You talk about non-fact, emptiness. You don't know any thing about emptiness, why talk about it?
53:32 Q: Surely, if you don't want to be hurt, that is possibly a wrong way of putting it, that seems to have a motive.
53:39 K: I beg your pardon?
53:40 Q: You see, if you live and you are prepared to look at hurt, and you will get hurt, but then be able to look at it and say, why am I hurt, I see what I am doing, but not to avoid hurt, to live without hurt. You learn by living, and being, seeing all these things happening.
54:03 K: But it is happening every day of my life.
54:05 Q: Yes, how do you solve that?
54:10 K: Why should I look at it, I know that I am hurt.
54:15 Q: But it is not necessarily a question of hurt. It is a question, there is a problem arising, how do I solve this. How do I meet this?

K: I am showing you.
54:26 Q: But if it is recorded in the memory and it is a return always of the memory, the same hurt.
54:36 K: Mrs Simmons, I am asking you - we are asking each other - knowing that one is hurt, either...
54:49 Q: I don't think it is a question of hurt necessarily, I think, it is a question of looking at difficult facts.
54:54 K: No, no, please, lady, now you are introducing something entirely different.
55:00 Q: It is the meeting of the facts that causes the difficulties.
55:04 K: I don't know how to meet the fact.

Q: Well, I am finding out in living.
55:09 K: Which is, that is in living I have learnt the fact that I am hurt.
55:18 Q: Krishnaji...

K: Answer her.
55:21 Q: I think she is just trying to say that, if you say, how can I not be hurt, there is a danger of just avoiding being hurt, but obviously that's no solution either.
55:32 K: Oh, my lordy!
55:33 Q: Yes, it's about what we are doing right now. Are we trying to move away from hurt, trying to find a way to not be hurt? Then what is it about?
55:47 K: No, Mrs Simmons is saying something entirely different. As far as I understand, she is saying that, as I live, I begin to learn the way I am hurt, and why I am hurt, and not make a problem of it.
56:05 Q: I don't think that was what she was saying.
56:08 K: Wait, let me finish. I am trying to understand what she said. I am not hurt, but I am learning, as I live, that I am getting hurt, and as I am getting hurt, I learn about the hurt and act about it, immediately. Is that what you are saying?
56:36 Q: That is what life is about.
56:46 K: I understand. Is that it? Is life like that? You may think life should be like that, but is it like that?
57:00 Q: I find it so.

K: Actually.
57:03 Q: Actually.
57:04 K: Actually you find that, living, you are getting hurt and you are learning about that hurt, and wiping away that hurt. Is that it?
57:24 Q: Can you tackle one hurt after another?
57:27 K: Just a minute. So, you have learnt about that hurt. And next time again you learn.
57:33 Q: That seems to be just putting it off. I am trying to understand the problem as she raises it.
57:42 Q: You see that's in the course of it, but you are the common problem all the time.
57:47 K: Yes, I am the common problem, which comes to the same thing.
57:50 Q: You say, what is it about me and I have got such a fantastic ego that I refer everything back to how I feel, and so you begin to perhaps say, it doesn't rest with me, perhaps there is something else.
58:06 K: So you have learnt through a series of days, through a series of events that you get hurt, and that you have this enormous ego that is getting hurt, through a series of days, and then tackle the problem of why you have built this extraordinary importance about yourself. Is that it?
58:32 Q: Not quite.
58:33 K: I say, why do that? Why wait till the very end to discover that you've built...
58:40 Q: Of course, this is the doing of it as you live, you don't sit down like this and discuss...
58:45 K: Can one do that - that's all I'm saying. Probably, we are saying the same thing in different words. Can you, as you live daily life, observe that you are getting hurt and wipe it away instantly? Can you? Will you?
59:05 Q: I want to learn more about these hurts, the very hurt itself.
59:08 K: I tell you, it is hurt because I have got an image, a picture about myself. You come along and say, you are not as good a pianist as I am, and I get hurt, because I have got a picture that I am one of the best.
59:25 Q: But Mrs Simmons...
59:28 K: Listen to it, that gentleman hasn't understood the idea that we have got a picture about ourselves.
59:35 Q: I have understood that.
59:38 K: Then as long as you have that picture you will be hurt.
59:41 Q: Yes.
59:42 K: So, next question is, is it possible to wipe it out?
59:46 Q: The hurt you mean?

K: No, the picture.
59:49 Q: The picture.

K: Which gets hurt.
59:54 Q: If I can accept the hurt then that wipes out the picture.
1:00:01 K: No.

Q: It is no longer hurt.
1:00:04 K: Why should you accept a hurt?
1:00:08 Q: Because if I accept the hurt I am not longer hurt. It is something different if I can accept it.
1:00:17 Q: Is that so?

Q: Yes.
1:00:20 Q: Then it's destroying all our images, all our conditionings.
1:00:25 Q: You have a new image about yourself that you are able to accept hurts.
1:00:30 Q: I cannot do it.

Q: No, no. My question was, the gentleman said that if you accept it then it was no longer hurt, I just wanted to know if that is so, is that a real experience.

Q: It is for me, yes.
1:00:43 K: Why should I accept anything? Why should I accept war? Why should I accept violence? Why should I accept I am hurt and it's all right?
1:00:56 Q: But it's the truth that is hurt to me, so why should I not accept it? I am hurt by the truth.
1:01:04 K: All right. If you are hurt by the truth, and you accept that hurt, who is accepting the hurt?
1:01:22 Q: It is not the image.
1:01:25 K: No. Who is accepting the hurt? It's another image which is accepting the hurt .
1:01:35 Q: You don't accept it. We react to the hurt, we don't just let it pass by and say it was nothing, we are obsessed by it because it drives us to do things.
1:01:55 Q: Even after having discussed all this, hurt will go on tomorrow, I am sure.
1:01:59 K: What, sir?
1:02:00 Q: Even after having discussed all this today hurt will go on tomorrow, I am sure, when I read the newspaper.
1:02:06 K: Yes. So we are hurt by the world events, by violence, and we are hurt by our immediate friend. So we are saying, as long as we have an image, which you may discover at the end of ten days, learning about getting hurt, and what is getting hurt, and so on, can't you see directly now that as long as you have an image - either the accepting image or the denying image, they are still the images - as long as I have an image it'll be hurt.
1:03:01 Q: But it seems to me that if one is thinking only in terms of hurt, then one is rather trapped because one may convert, settle for the hurts one knows.
1:03:11 K: Yes, sir.

Q: That is a possibility.
1:03:17 K: We can enlarge the whole thing, not just hurt. As long as I have an image there is no possibility of love.
1:03:27 Q: The image seems to be all that there is, so what can get rid of the image? That's all the question. As long as there is the image you are going to be trodden on.
1:03:40 Q: The image is my reference.
1:03:42 Q: It seems that that's all that there is, so what can get rid of the image?
1:03:46 K: Now, what will you do?
1:03:50 Q: We said looking at the image.
1:03:51 K: No, let's forget it. Let's start it again - please help me, sir - I have got an image about myself, a marvellous image. I have talked for fifty years, and I am a great man, I am extraordinarily clever, blah, blah, blah. And you come along, tread on it. And I get hurt because I have this immense egotistic picture about myself. Right? Now please help me to be free of that picture because you have told me: as long as you have that picture somebody is going to put a pin in it. Right? Now, help me to understand the picture and wipe it away so that nobody can put a pin into me at all.
1:04:58 Q: There are so many pictures.
1:05:05 K: There is only one picture-maker, in Bond Street - sorry! There is only one picture-maker. There are not many pictures. Right? This is not clear?
1:05:26 Q: There are many pictures, but only one picture-maker.
1:05:30 K: No, only one painter painting many pictures.
1:05:34 Q: Yes.

K: That's all. Right? So who is that one painter who is painting innumerable pictures: I am a great man, I must be rich, I must have a position, I must be recognised - you follow? - I am beautiful, I am lovely, I am great. These are all pictures.
1:06:05 Q: All our judgements.
1:06:08 K: All judgements, pictures, convictions, beliefs, dogmas - the whole circus.
1:06:15 Q: That's what I think of as myself.
1:06:17 K: Which is the image-maker. Which is what? Thought.
1:06:25 Q: Yes.
1:06:27 Q: Thought in a certain direction - self-interest.
1:06:34 K: Yes, thought in one direction one day, the next day another, and so on.
1:06:38 Q: Isn't thought...

K: No, don't move. First, let me understand - you've said thought - let me understand that, don't jump to something else. Is that so? Is the central painter of innumerable pictures, who is that one painter who is doing all this? You understand my question?

Q: Yes.
1:07:08 K: Who is that one painter who is painting so many pictures according to circumstances, according to desire, and so on, so on. Who is that?
1:07:23 Q: It is a thing that I used to call the 'me', but I doubt now if it is me.
1:07:28 K: Not what 'I' call - forget what I call - what do you call? How do you look at the painter, the one painter?
1:07:40 Q: What I call 'I'?

K: Who is the one painter?
1:07:44 Q: Thought.

K: So tell them.
1:07:47 Q: Thought.
1:07:49 Q: Wouldn't you say that this painter is made up by... everything around me. Because in relationship everybody has images and it's like a whole board of pins, whereby you put one person over there, and the other there, and yourself on a certain place on the board, and it seems our relationship is...
1:08:23 K: Look, Tunki, Picasso painted a thousand pictures, let's say, different periods, different ideas, and so on. Picasso was the painter all the time. Right? Who is that Picasso?
1:08:43 Q: His talent.
1:08:47 K: What is that talent? Who is that painter? Don't reduce it to talent. Who is that painter? The talent, the greed, money, communist - the dove carrying the peace - all that is Picasso, and more, his sexual appetite, his jealousies. So there is only one painter which is me, Picasso. I am not Picasso, thank god! Now, as long as there are pictures I am painting, somebody is going to come and tear it. And that tearing I call being hurt. Right? Now, can I - what's the good of my repeating this umpteen times! I want to find out a way of living that whatever I paint can never be trodden on.
1:10:08 Q: Well, then...
1:10:09 K: Listen to my question first, don't jump.
1:10:12 Q: Yes, it's the second time it's aroused in the conversation. I see the question very clearly. For there not to be hurt, I think, it is necessary for all the paintings to be eliminated.
1:10:33 K: Which means what? That I don't paint at all.
1:10:36 Q: Right, yes.
1:10:37 K: Wait, go into it. That I don't paint at all, that I don't act, that I don't express, that I don't give way to my talent, I do absolutely nothing.
1:10:51 Q: Yes.
1:10:53 K: I can't live like that! What are you saying!
1:10:57 Q: Maybe one starts with not putting the name on the picture.
1:11:03 Q: What do you mean by picture? The picture is the images of ourselves, right? So, if you don't have those pictures...
1:11:13 Q: There is no self, no.
1:11:15 Q: Then we get the painter without paintings, that's no good.
1:11:19 Q: No, there is no painting. There is no painter, nor painting.
1:11:25 K: Look, that's just an idea, you're just enjoying this expression of ideas. But you haven't helped me. I have asked you to help me. - listen, sir - I have asked you all to help me to be free of this hurt. And I also say not only these peculiar hurts, but to be completely without fear of being hurt. Help me.
1:12:01 Q: Saying that there is no fear to be hurt means that there are images, that there are paintings.
1:12:10 K: Please help me to be free from being hurt.
1:12:18 Q: I am doing the best I can.
1:12:20 K: You are not helping, you are putting it into another set of terms. I am afraid - listen to it carefully - I am afraid. Afraid of getting hurt. Now please help me to be free of my fear of getting hurt.
1:12:40 Q: Nobody can help you.

K: Otherwise you stop discussion.
1:12:47 Q: Could we go back a little bit there is something that I don't really see well, which is, we say the painter is the 'me', and that's quite easy to say, and yet, I still don't see that entity, it's not so clear that I understand it and see it.
1:13:10 K: That's just the point. You don't see the truth, the reality of it, but you have accepted the ideas about it. Right?
1:13:22 Q: Which is like another painting.
1:13:24 K: That's what we have spent, an hour and a quarter, on ideas. We haven't faced the fact, which is my fear of getting hurt. And Mrs Simmons says, learn about it as you live. Right? Learn what fear is, go into it, daily, as it happens, and learn all about it. Right? And at the end it is finished. But I am saying quite the contrary. Forgive me. Which is, don't spend a day on it, an hour on it. Look at it, understand it immediately, and wipe it - finished. There is no choice between the two. You don't say, I like her way, or I like your way. Let's find out what the truth of the matter is.
1:14:35 Q: So is it an accumulative process where I acquire knowledge about being hurt and I slowly, tomorrow I'll find out about it.
1:14:44 K: That's right. Talk to her, not to me.
1:14:47 Q: How can I begin to look at this so that I see it much more clearly? Because so far I haven't been able to do that.
1:14:59 Q: Can we see that we accept the deception that we create something, like a toy, hold it up to the world to shoot at , that we are admitting this being hit, by creating a nucleus which is very vulnerable and then we paint it red and move it around.
1:15:23 Q: So if we actually saw it as clearly as that...
1:15:26 Q: Yes, it's 'our fault', using bad words but the hurt isn't necessarily something outside, inevitable, aimed at you, but we admit that hurt psychologically, by the formation we all have made this notion of the self, this dependence.
1:15:53 K: Is it that we are afraid to discuss this question of relationship? For you it is very easy, because you are not involved for the moment. But if you get married, have children, then it will become a problem. So for you it is no problem, so you could say, I am not afraid of it. But having married, having children - the whole business - somebody says, let's talk about relationship, I am frightened because I may discover things which may be shattering.
1:16:32 Q: Well, there's relationship without marriage.
1:16:34 K: Oh, darling, sir... Yes, I can have a relationship without getting married.
1:16:45 Q: Doesn't it actually refer to sorrow? As we live in sorrow, hurt is part of sorrow.
1:16:56 K: Yes, quite.
1:16:57 Q: And after the hurt arises the image. Or the image exists and I get hurt, not after. You see, please, I am asking you a simple question, first, if you don't mind. Is it that we are frightened to discuss relationship, in which is involved dependency, attachment, and jealousy, sexual pleasures, remembrances of all that, is it we are avoiding to look at it? That's why we are all so silent?
1:17:45 Q: Wouldn't you go a little bit deeper into the question how do we get rid of the image and the image-maker, because that's the problem to me, how to get rid of it.
1:17:57 Q: There is a difficulty here in words - how do I get rid of it, how do I wipe it away. Surely, if it is an image, I want to see that it is an image and that's...
1:18:10 K: Sir, is the image different from you? Is the picture, the image different from you? Separate.
1:18:24 Q: I don't know.
1:18:25 K: Is it? I am asking you. Or you are that picture?
1:18:46 Q: It seems that we have to preserve our image we all still have.
1:18:51 K: No, I have asked a simple question: are we frightened to discuss about our relationships?
1:18:57 Q: Yes, it would seem so because that's...
1:19:00 K: I am just asking, forgive me, for just two minutes, you can come afterwards. Are we frightened to discuss relationship, in which is involved attachment - right? - dependence, sexual pleasures, the separateness - my wife and me are two different beings, there is a division - and open up this enormous complex thing in relationship. Are we frightened to look at it?
1:19:38 Q: I don't think we are frightened, but we don't know how to tackle it.
1:19:41 K: No, I am asking, is anybody frightened about it?
1:19:45 Q: Yes.

Q: Yes, because..
1:19:49 K: Yes, one is frightened, so you are avoiding it, are you?
1:19:53 Q: Yes.
1:19:56 Q: No, it seems we'll have to start at the beginning.
1:20:01 K: Start at the beginning.

Q: Which is conflict in relationship.
1:20:05 K: Which is conflict in relationship. You are attached to me and I like it, so as long as both of us like it there is no conflict. But suppose, I begin to say, no, sorry, don't depend on me, it is rather irksome, then conflict comes in you. So again, you see... I have asked this question, please answer it, loudly or to yourself: are you frightened to discuss this whole question of relationship?
1:20:46 Q: No.
1:20:49 K: My darling, wait till you get married.
1:20:58 Q: Ah, why, I am sitting here and I want to talk about it.
1:21:00 K: Yes, I am talking. Are you frightened?
1:21:03 Q: No.

K: Why? Why aren't you frightened?
1:21:07 Q: Because I want to find out.

K: What? Verbally?
1:21:16 Q: It seems that there is necessarily a certain reluctance to look at it because it involves the self.
1:21:21 K: No, I am asking Tura whether she really wants to find out... She has no problem now. She says, I must understand this before I plunge into all that.
1:21:35 Q: Yes.
1:21:38 K: Now, can she understand it? Or must she plunge - listen carefully - or must she plunge into it and then understand it? Or can you look at the whole thing, non-verbally and see what is involved in it and begin?
1:22:01 Q: But how can we look at something not letting it...
1:22:04 K: Why not? Must I become a murderer before I find out about murder?
1:22:11 Q: No, but this was not murderer.
1:22:13 K: It is exactly the same thing.
1:22:17 Q: We are talking about marriage!
1:22:22 K: Are you saying marriage is murder? No, you asked me whether it is possible to understand something if you are not experiencing it. To that I said, to understand murder must you commit murder? Must you get drunk to understand sobriety?
1:22:52 Q: But we all have relationships whether we are married or not, or whether we have them just as friends, we all have relationships.
1:22:59 K: That's the whole point. If you acknowledge that this problem of relationship is one of the greatest importance in life, and I am not frightened to look at it, to go into it, see the whole picture of it, what is its nature, its structure, what is involved in it. And you can only do that if you are not frightened. But at the beginning if you are frightened you can't open the door.
1:23:35 Q: Not to be frightened to stand alone.
1:23:40 K: No, no. You see, you have drawn a conclusion. I said do we want to go into this question, whether we are married, not married, girlfriend, or boy, and all the rest of it, what's the meaning, and the implications, and the nature, and the whole business of relationship. And I say if you really, deeply want to go into it and understand the whole... the beauty of it, the tremendous thing involved in relationship, you must approach it without fear. But if I am already caught in it, - my wife and I - I am afraid to open it because something might happen between her and me. I would rather remain in status quo, as we are, rather than open the door. That may be the most of us.
1:24:50 Q: How can I know this room without sitting in it? From outside, you mean?
1:24:58 K: No, I am asking you in return: must I get drunk to know what it means to be drunk? Must I get drunk?
1:25:12 Q: Yes, I think so.
1:25:14 K: So why should I go through that? Why should I go through being drunk?

Q: If you want to.
1:25:21 K: I don't want to drink. It is stupid. Why should I go through that?
1:25:40 Q: I can't know you without knowing you.
1:25:43 K: You can't know me?
1:25:44 Q: Without knowing you, without seeing you.
1:25:46 K: You've met me, but you can't know me. You can know the picture of me, the reputation, or non-reputation about me, and so on. You can't actually know me because the thing is living. So a living thing can never be known, it is only a dead thing that can be known. So I can never say, 'I know my wife.'
1:26:21 Q: You can only follow it, stand by, having contact, follow life.
1:26:28 K: Can you follow the life of another? All the variations, all the subtleties, all the nuances, the movements. Sir, what are we talking about! Do we want to go into this question of relationship without fear?
1:26:54 Q: Yes.
1:26:59 K: Yes? All of us, or one or two, the rest say, hey! go piano, piano, non molto allegro. We have come together to have a serious enquiry into our relationships, our pleasures, our sorrows, into the whole problem of existence. If you are afraid at the beginning you can't go into it. If you want to discuss fear let's talk about it and wipe it away! Not say, next year I'll come back to fear.
1:27:48 Q: There seems to be one fundamental question whereby this painter is still painting this image, because the human mind wants to be liked, wants company.
1:28:10 K: Yes, I know all that, Tunki, I am asking something else. Before you put your own question, I put it first, so give me... . I asked you, do you really want to go into the question of the very complex problem of fear, without fear? Do you want to go into the question of fear and therefore enter into the whole problem of relationship? And you can only enter it if you are not afraid of it.
1:28:43 Q: Yet, I can see that I can only enter it with fear.
1:28:49 K: You can't.

Q: You can't at all?
1:28:51 K: It's like you can't climb the Everest with all your burden.
1:28:56 Q: No.
1:28:57 K: So you throw away lots of things and have a few things - metaphorically speaking, they carry a terrible lot of things. So do you want, tomorrow morning, to discuss the question of fear? What do you say, sirs, do you want to?
1:29:29 Q: Yes.
1:29:29 Q: Is it merely fear that is preventing us from continuing to discuss?
1:29:36 K: Yes, sir, may be.
1:29:40 Q: I question that, sir, because I am not so sure.
1:29:46 K: Then what is preventing us from going into it? Is it verbally that we don't understand English? Don't understand the expression of the English language, and therefore you are doubtful? So let's make very clear every word we use, so that linguistically we understand each other. We are not doing anything but just throwing words at each other.
1:30:13 Q: Sir, that is part of the problem. The problem is, here and now we don't have a problem with relationships we are only listening, we are talking. The problem is later. And now we can understand the words, that's quite easy, it is not necessarily fear of going into the problem that makes it difficult.
1:30:34 Q: That may be a part of it.
1:30:38 Q: This is no time.
1:30:47 Q: I would say that we reject, not because we don't have the problem right now but because we don't get the right question to ask.
1:30:56 K: No, Tunki, that's not it. I am frightened because I have committed myself to a woman or to a man, and I call that relationship, I am frightened to open that cupboard. There may be terrible skeletons in it. So I would rather discuss round it and go anywhere but say, I want to go into this, understand it, and go fully into it. But apparently you don't.
1:31:34 Q: Can we discuss tomorrow, to go into this without fear?
1:31:37 K: Ah! I am saying - perhaps the language difficulty is here - we are saying, you cannot understand the depth, the beauty and the whole complex question of relationship if there is any kind of fear in you, about it. That's clear. If I am afraid to understand the relationship, what is involved in it, I am afraid because god knows what is going to happen. I might leave my wife. I am not saying that - you follow? So, I say, please, let's talk about relationship.
1:32:37 So do we talk tomorrow morning about fear? What do you say, sirs? Which means do you want to be free of fear to live differently?
1:33:08 Q: There's tremendous fear of going into the question, but yes.
1:33:11 K: What?
1:33:12 Q: There's enormous fear of going into this question of what is fear.
1:33:16 K: Yes, sir. There is fear. That's what I am saying. There is fear, and how can you examine anything if there is fear. How can I understand what love is if there is fear? I can tell my wife I love her, but it means nothing, if I am afraid.
1:33:47 Q: May I ask a question?
1:33:51 K: There is no chairman here.
1:33:55 Q: I wonder if it's possible for us at all to approach things in this way. Like today we tried to talk about relationship and we find that when we are afraid we cannot discuss it. Tomorrow we will talk about fear, and something else will stop us from talking about fear, and then it goes on, and on.
1:34:16 K: That's right, sir. That's what is going to happen.
1:34:17 Q: So how are we going to approach all this?
1:34:19 K: That's what is going to happen. Therefore that means you are not serious. I want to live a life without fear! I will do anything to stop my fear - give up my property, give up my wife, give up everything because I want to live without fear. You follow? That's the only way to find out. You can't just talk about the mountain top, you have to climb it!
1:34:58 Q: As I understand that question, it's almost the same thing as saying, I want to live a life without any hurt.
1:35:04 K: That's right, same thing, sir.
1:35:06 Q: And as far as I can see, we haven't really finished with that question, we haven't discovered what it means to live a life without hurt, or how one can come to that.
1:35:16 K: Look, Scott, I want to find out why I am hurt. And I find, verbally at least, that I have got an image which is going to be hurt, and that image is me.
1:35:32 Q: Fine, but will I satisfy with just the words?
1:35:37 K: That's a rationalisation, logic, and all the rest of it, but it isn't an actuality. So how are you going to make me understand and see the actuality of it? You can't do it. You can't hit me on the head.

Q: No.
1:35:59 K: You can't bully me into it, you can't persuade me into it, you can't give me a reward to see it. You say, here it is, look at it. But if you refuse to look at it what am I to do?
1:36:10 Q: Or, if one is unable to look at it.
1:36:14 K: Why are you unable to look at it? Stop there and find out. Don't go off to something else. Why are you unable to see something dangerous?
1:36:30 Q: Because of fear.
1:36:33 K: So it may be fear - wait - it may be habit, you have never even thought about it, you are so heavily conditioned you refuse to see it?
1:36:46 Q: Or the brain just keeps on...
1:36:47 K: You brain may not be active enough to see it. So these are all the factors. So we then have to examine why your brain when faced with something very, very dangerous refuses to see it. Is it made dull by drink? By sexual overindulgence? You follow? Is it by continuous traditional acceptance of things? So the brain has become mechanical. Right? And so something new put in front of it, it says, I don't understand. Is that so? Is your brain like that? Is your brain mechanical?
1:37:46 Q: It is very mechanical. But I don't know if that's the only...
1:37:48 K: Stop there! If it is very mechanical, why? What has made it mechanical? Knowledge?
1:38:07 Q: Partly. Habit.

K: Habit.
1:38:09 Q: Partly.

K: Routine. Can the habit be broken without the man who says, 'I want to break it'? Which is mechanical. You follow? So can you do all that. Not take years, and years, and days, now, instantly, do it, completely free of habit. You can only do it when you see the fact of it, when you see the danger of a habit. Going day after day to the office, you know, habit. The mess of it all!
1:38:57 Q: But what comes first? Be free to see, or see to be free?
1:39:02 K: No, no, no. Why has the brain become so mechanical? You understand? Why? Is it we have accepted tradition, habit? Habit - living in a routine. You follow? So, if all these are the causes of a mechanistic mind then why don't you break it?
1:39:42 Q: Sir, somehow the self is involved in all this.
1:39:45 K: Yes. Don't involve it.

Q: It survives and maintains itself.
1:39:49 K: That is just an avoidance of breaking the habit 'self is involved' and so on. Here is a factual thing, that is, habit in any form becomes mechanistic. Habit implies mechanism, the very meaning is a habit. So the brain might have got into the habit of living this way, and it says, please leave me alone, I am used to this, don't break it up because I don't know what will happen. You follow?
1:40:32 Q: I feel a kind of laziness to break habits.
1:40:37 K: Yes. If it is laziness, go into it, break it, break your laziness. You see, we all talk about this!
1:40:59 Shall we talk about fear tomorrow morning? Not for the fun of it , but actually say, I am afraid, I want to be free of the damn thing! Then it is worth it, it's fun to talk about it. But if you say, I am afraid, but let's talk about the window there is no point. Right, sirs, it is time to stop.