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BR79DSS1.2 - On being good
Brockwood Park, UK - 27 May 1979
Discussion with Staff and Students 1.2



0:22 Krishnamurti: I am sorry not to be sitting on the floor.
0:50 If you will allow me, let me talk first for a while and then we can have a dialogue. Shall we?
1:07 The word 'good' originally meant, I believe, to join, to put together well, well put together, to join, fit in.
1:33 And a good man or a good woman is one who is not disjointed, who is not broken up in himself, who is not contradicting his actions, his way of life and so on.
1:59 A good house is put together properly. A good meal also implies that it is nourishing, sufficient, tasteful – all that is implied in those words 'good meal'.
2:28 So bearing that in mind, what is a good man or a good woman?
2:36 And what is a good society?
2:43 It has been one of the important things in the ancient world – both in India and in Greece – they have talked about having a good society.
3:03 Not necessarily an egalitarian society, but a good society, a society in which there were no opposing forces, contradictory activities, a society that was well knit together, put together, joined together.
3:35 So if I may, I would like to talk about that.
3:43 Unless you have something else for me to talk about.
3:53 The Greeks, with Aristotle – because I heard an interview on television when I was in California, with an Aristotelian professor who was advocating idealistically, logically, verbally, I thought a little bit artificially because it was not his way of living – that there must be a good society.
4:33 So when we heard that, I thought a great deal about it. What is a good society? What is a good man or a woman? What is it to have good relationship? What is it to have good quality of mind that is not broken up, that is whole, harmonious, well put together?
5:05 Like a physical body, if it is healthy, normal, well fed, proper exercise, is an excellent body, is a good body.
5:21 And why is it so difficult that we cannot be, as human beings, good people?
5:35 Good, in the sense, well put together.
5:44 The Sanskrit word is 'ghadya' – they will tell you what it means in Sanskrit. Also the same thing.
5:58 Why hasn't it been possible throughout the ages, though men have longed for it, talked about it, written about it, why hasn't there been good human beings, a good society?
6:25 Is that possible? To live in a society that doesn't destroy human beings, that doesn't corrupt human beings, that is well put together so that they can live in peace, in harmony, in the sense of good relationship, not only with the intimate person but also with others.
6:57 Why hasn't it been possible?
7:07 I am asking you why. If that were a challenge to you – a challenge being you have to answer it, not just sit back and say, well, I don't care, but you are put in corner to answer it – why hasn't it been possible?
7:28 Is it because society, as well as human beings, has given tremendous importance to the individual, to the separate?
7:46 To the separate, the one who is not totally involved with the whole living quality of a society, who is only concerned with his own achievements, with his own ambitions, with his own problems, with his own misery, and religions have also emphasised the individual salvation, the individual achievement, all the rest of it.
8:31 Is that one of the reasons why human beings have not created a good, happy, peaceful society?
8:43 Is it also because we haven't even given great thought to it?
8:53 We have never inquired of ourselves and therefore of our society, how to live a good life.
9:06 Not a pattern, not a discipline to make one good – that is impossible – not an authoritarian state that says, you must be good or you will be punished.
9:28 Or is it because we have never inquired of ourselves how to live a life that is well knitted together, well joined together, a life that is really totally, completely harmonious without any breaks in it, without any division?
10:00 And in a school like this, isn't it important that we educate ourselves and so educate each other to have a good mind, a mind that is not put together by circumstances, by experience, by various pressures, but a mind that is whole?
10:43 A thing that is whole is not put together. I don't know if you are following all this. And so, I am asking why you, as students, cannot possibly lead a good life?
11:05 I am using the word 'good' in the right sense. Not a respectable life, not a comfortable life, not a convenient, self-satisfying life – which is generally considered a good life, having good meals, a good house, good wife, good salary, good job.
11:35 We are using the word 'good' in a totally different sense.
11:44 So can we here, in this small community, live a good life?
11:57 Because we create the society. Society doesn't come into being by itself. Human beings by their actions, by their mischief, by their dishonesty, by their greed, by their envy, by their violence – they have created this society.
12:27 And to be educated is to have a good brain, good heart, good conduct.
12:41 All that is implied in that word 'good'. Can we do it here? So that when you leave here you are a good human being, who is not in himself violent, in himself contradictory, he has innumerable problems, this and that and the other things, but from now on, to learn how to live a really good life.
13:20 Is that possible? You know, the Greeks and the ancient Hindus, and probably the ancient Egyptians too, wanted to create such a society.
13:39 But it was all idealistic, it was all conceived as a utopia, as something to be achieved, a goal to be arrived at.
14:07 But that is not, from my point, that is not living a good life.
14:14 I may have an idealistic concept of a good life – a concept, something that has been conceived by thought, and if I, or anyone adapts himself or adjusts himself, conforms to the pattern which thought has conceived as a good life, that is obviously not a good life because there is a contradiction between now and then.
14:48 Right?
14:55 So a good life is not a concept, is not an idea, is not something to come by though time, achievement, gradually.
15:14 But – and here comes our difficulty – to change the way of our life now, which is contradictory.
15:34 To change it, not take time.
15:43 If you take time, there is an interval between now and then. In that interval, a great many other incidents take place, a great many influences come into being, a great many pressures, so you really never come to the point because you are always distorted.
16:13 You are following all this? So can we – which is part of our education, part of our daily living, part of our activity – to live a good life, now, not eventually.
16:36 Because after all, the future, that is the tomorrow, depends on the younger generation.
16:49 You are that. Either you contribute to the disaster of a society, to the madness of this modern world, to the corruption of all that is going on – the violence, the destruction, the wars, the dishonesty, the deceits – or you yourself are so good – I am using the word 'good' not in the bourgeois sense of the word, in the mediocre sense of the word, but I am using the word 'good' in its original sense: a well put together human being.
17:46 A human being that has no contradiction in himself, no sense of despair, depression – all those things human beings go through.
18:09 Can we do this here? It is not merely the responsibility of the educator, but it is each one's responsibility.
18:25 Don't say, well, you tell us what to do, we will do it. Or, you don't help us to live a good life.
18:39 But the very understanding of what is a good life, not merely the intellectual understanding, which is verbal understanding, but the depth of that word, the feeling of that word, because every word has a feeling, when properly used.
19:08 So can you have that feeling of being really good?
19:16 Not occasionally – of course, then you are lost – but being good.
19:28 Which is not an achievement.
19:36 When we think of being good, we think of it in terms of achievement, as though something to be achieved.
19:47 Which admits time. Right? You are following this? As I explained, when you have an interval between now and then, all kinds of things can take place in that interval, which it generally does, so it becomes a distortion.
20:12 I want to go there, but many things are preventing me. These become important and I lose that. Or I get caught in this. So seeing all this, that the older people will not create a new society – they have contributed to all the misery of the society, they are going, you are coming.
20:54 Can you be a good human being?
21:03 Which involves responsibility, affection, love, care.
21:13 All that is implied in that word. Can Brockwood, this school, this community bring this about?
21:28 That is really a religious life, not the rotten religion, that's all stupid.
21:41 The rituals, the dogma, the worship, the prayers, that is not religion.
21:51 The religious life is a good life.
21:58 That is why it is very important while you are very young to understand this, because you are going to create a new society.
22:17 Either that, or you will join the bandwagon, or you contribute to the misery of mankind.
22:30 I don't know if you see all this.
22:48 A good life doesn't mean conforming and losing one's own capabilities, one's own understanding of the wholeness of life.
23:19 So most people are afraid when we talk about division and individuals, they say, I have nothing left if I don't pursue my own individual greeds and envies and ambitions.
23:37 But a good man or good woman includes everything because he is in himself whole, sane, healthy.
24:00 Now, can we discuss this, have a dialogue about it?
24:13 Or is it too difficult to understand the depth of that word 'good'?
24:31 As we pointed out, it originally meant well put together, joined, holding together, not breaking up.
25:00 Modern people don't think about a good society, they have given it up. They say, too hopeless, it has gone beyond redemption, and if you bring up that word good, they either become cynical, they say, oh, for God's sake, don't talk about being good because that is too old-fashioned, or they haven't thought about it, therefore it doesn't mean a thing to them.
25:35 But if you think about it, go into it, see what is involved in it, that word contains a great depth.
25:53 And most human beings are very shallow people.
26:00 They may be highly sophisticated, highly educated, technological specialists and so on, but it is all on the surface.
26:22 And goodness implies from the very depth of your being.
26:32 Can we, as a group of people, educate ourselves to this, in this, so that when you leave or while you are here, you are really a good human being.
26:48 You know, when there is goodness in you, your face changes.
27:00 I am not offering a reward. Not that you are not beautiful already, or whatever it is, but it gives you something, a quality that is extraordinary.
27:23 So having said all this, and we can add much more, shall we have a dialogue about it?
28:08 Or you don't want to talk about it. Or you have seen instantly – I mean it, seriously – instantly, the beauty of that word, the beauty of the feeling of it.
28:45 You see a tree that is really extraordinarily beautiful and the moment you see it, you capture the beauty of it instantly.
28:55 That means you are sensitive to nature, sensitive to what people say, you don't have to argue, dispute, offer one opinion against another opinion, but you capture instantly the depth and the beauty and the quality of that word.
29:23 Is that what you are doing?
29:34 Or do you treat it as rather sentimental, romantic, it has no place in modern society?
29:55 How do you regard that, not only the word but the meaning of it, the implications of it, the reasonableness, the sanity of it?
30:26 We were talking about it one day at a lunch table in California, and the person said, for goodness sake, why do you use that word?
30:36 It is so old fashioned, it is just gone, finished. It has no meaning in the modern world. We are technicians, we are functionaries, we have to live a life, job, overpopulation, shortage of petrol.
31:00 What are you taking about, a good life? It is excellent for Aristotle to talk about it, in 500 B.C. or whatever it was, but now that word is meaningless, rather ugly, a rather disreputable word.
31:24 But I still think it is a good word, in spite of what all the people have said about it.
31:33 I still think it has a meaning, it has a fullness, a great sense of beauty.
31:57 Now, will you – sorry to ask this, it sounds rather silly to ask – will you, as a human being, be good?
32:15 Whether you are grown up or young. This is a very serious thing. You understand?
32:33 A good person is the most excellent human being, excels, not in any one particular direction, technologically, or as a doctor or as a physicist or as a good husband – excels inwardly, excellent spirit, excellent quality of thinking, excellent virtue – again, that word 'virtue' is spit upon.
33:26 They say, that is all too old-fashioned.
33:37 Excellence in behaviour, care, the highest expression of affection, love – all that is in that word, for me.
33:57 Not a mediocre human being, which is what the modern world wants.
34:07 Don't excel, be like everybody else, and anybody who has a little talent becomes extraordinarily important.
34:20 Haven't you noticed? A writer, a man who can write plays, scenarios, or a specialised doctor, surgeon.
34:37 Goodness is not a factor of specialisation.
34:45 It excels them all. Are you following all this? Does it mean anything to you?
34:57 Or you get rather bored and fidgety about it? Questioner: I find your question rather puzzling because I don't know what you are talking about.
35:11 K: You don't know what I am talking about. Good. Then we can have a dialogue about it.
35:27 I explained, sir. I was looking at the word 'good' this morning in an excellent dictionary, what that word means.
35:40 It means well put together, joined together, held together, so that it won't break up.
36:01 Like a good, well-built house, it will stand through centuries, because they have used excellent materials, excellent timber, everything has been put together with great care.
36:25 That is the meaning of that word good. From that, I asked myself, why is it human beings are not good, well put together, so that there is no cleavage, breaking up?
36:53 A good house has no cracks, it will last centuries.
37:03 Why is it that human beings cannot live that way?
37:12 And therefore, as human beings have created a society which is destructive, which is not well put together, and that society is the result of human activity, so can we not be such good people?
37:36 Q: The problem is, I do have cracks. I am not well put together. So I don't know what it is to be well put together.
37:51 K: All right, let's talk about it, let's have a dialogue about it.
38:01 Q: I can try to picture it, what it could be, and I can see the analogy with the house but I can't really get the deep meaning of it.
38:20 K: What do you say? Answer him. This is not a one-sided dialogue between him and me. Answer him.
38:29 You have understood what he said? He doesn't understand what you mean by being well put together.
38:41 To be whole, all parts working together, the mind, the heart, the organism, all working harmoniously together, like a good engine.
39:09 Do you understand? Why?
39:20 Q: If you look at your body, for instance, your body is sometimes in excellent shape, it is really well put together, it is strong, it is healthy.
39:28 K: The body is well put together.
39:33 Q: But it may not be like that all the time, it may become ill.

K: We will find out. Go slowly.
39:39 K: Well put together by various genes and all that, the organism.
39:49 But we spoil it, through lack of right food, through overeating, through overindulgence, over-exercise or lack of exercise, we eat food that tastes good but may not be beneficial to the body, we smoke, we drink, we take drugs, alcohol – it goes on.
40:19 All that is destructive to the body, obviously.
40:26 This is not just what I say – doctors are saying this too. So can we physically, can we not destroy the organism by all this, wrong food, wrong taste, overeating, smoke, drink, drugs, lack of exercise and all that – can we do that?
40:56 Not only now – it is easy in a place like this to say, I won't smoke, but the moment you go out, the world demands that you smoke.
41:06 When you go to a party, everybody is smoking. If you don't smoke, you feel you are out of it. Everybody drinks, if you don't drink, you feel out of it. So can you have a good, excellent body?
41:25 Go on, discuss it. Because you must have a good body, not a sloppy body.
41:38 Right? Do you get that? Right food, proper exercise, right amount of sleep, right amount of intellectual stimulation, care – all that is implied in having a good, healthy body.
42:11 The other day I met a man, he said to me, I haven't seen you for 25 years. How in the name of heavens do you keep like this? You understand? You are getting old – how do you manage it? I said, don't bother, you will do it properly. Look about yourself, don't bother about me. I went into it. So I am asking, do you get that here? That you have excellent food, right exercise, mind carefully cultivated, not technologically, not academically, but inwardly also.
43:00 So, if you have good body, then have you a good mind?
43:08 Good means, as I explained, well put together, so that it doesn't break, go to pieces.
43:22 A good conduct, good behaviour.
43:34 Right, sir? You understand now what I am talking about?
43:38 Q: Yes, I am getting more into it, now.
43:44 Q: That is assuming that our bodies are well put together at the very beginning, which is not so, in all cases.

K: No, I know that, K: because our fathers overdrink, overindulge, oversex, diseased and all that, and they produce children – you know what is happening.
44:06 Fortunately, you are not in that position, are you?
44:08 Q: No.

K: You may have bad eyesight.
44:13 K: You can improve it without glasses, but you won't take the trouble.
44:20 Q: That is not quite so.
44:22 K: It is not quite fair – all right. Find out if you can read without glasses, find out how to improve your eyes.
44:45 Now, if our parents have misused their lives and have produced children who are deformed, lack of eyesight and this or that, then we do the best we can, but you are not in that position, fortunately.
45:14 Most of you have fairly good bodies. But will you spoil it? You can't here, because we are all vegetarians, we don't smoke, we don't drink, we don't do this, we don't do that, but the moment you go outside, you begin all that.
45:39 Q: What about if our brain is distorted?
45:47 K: If your brains are distorted – how?
45:55 By your conditioning?

Q: Yes.
46:00 K: Then, if your brains are distorted, because you have been conditioned to be a Catholic, Protestant, an Arab, a Jew, a Hindu, a Buddhist, this or that, which is a distortion, can you become aware of that distortion and finish it, not carry on?
46:35 If you live in Britain and if you are not British, with all the implications of that word, they think you are a non-entity, you are a foreigner.
46:55 If you go to the Catholic world, a country where everybody is Catholic and you don't believe in all that stuff, they think you are a strange human being.
47:06 Not so much nowadays. So are you aware that your brains are distorted? And being aware, break down that distortion, correct it, be free of it.
47:30 Don't take time over it, break it.
47:39 Q: This does sound a bit romantic to me because we are talking about physical matter.
47:45 K: The brain is physical matter.

Q: Yes.
47:48 K: But the brain has been under pressure, which is propaganda, which is tradition, your parents, your grandparents and so on, have said, you are an Arab.
48:10 So, the brain of that boy who says, I am an Arab, his brain has been narrowed down, held together, he is in a prison.
48:24 Now, can that boy become aware that he is in a prison and say, I won't be an Arab, it is too silly.
48:36 But if he says that in an Arabic country, he will have a bad time.
48:44 His parents will disown him or kick him out or shoot him. Will he have the courage to say, I don't mind, shoot me. You see what is implied?
49:07 I met a boy with his father, a Muslim, and the father asked him to recite the Quran.
49:21 You know what that is. The little boy, I should think about 4, for an hour he held forth. You understand? I said, my God, at that age, you have already so heavily conditioned him, he can never escape from it.
49:43 That is a distortion, that is a criminal thing to do.
49:54 So can you, knowing what your parents have done to your brain, brainwashed you, break – say, no more.
50:13 Not only in the religious, nationalistic sense of that word, but also one has been conditioned to be ambitious, to be greedy, to be dishonest, to be not straight.
50:32 It is part of this whole conditioning. Can you be aware of it and walk away from it?
50:40 Q: No, sir, I can't grab this. That you say, be aware of it and walk away from it.
50:50 K: All right, that is an English expression. Sorry, I won't use this. Be aware of it. Can you be aware of it? Are you aware of your conditioning? This is a very serious question, it is not easy to answer this question. One may be aware that you are conditioned as an Englishman or a Frenchman or an Arab, but you are conditioned much more deeply, more extensively, more subtly.
51:34 It is easy to say, yes, I have been conditioned, or put in a prison called the Arab.
51:43 And one can easily throw them off if you are not living in a particular country that is Arabic, etc.
51:51 You can escape from that, go away to some other country. That is fairly easy, but can all the subtleties of conditioning, the tradition, the feeling that you belong to a group of people, the feeling that you believe in something.
52:25 I don't want to go into the whole nature of this conditioning, but you can see, as you begin to look at it, as you become aware of your conditioning – not only the nationalism, the stupid religious prisons that man has invented for himself – as you begin to look at it, you find out deeper and deeper levels of conditioning.
53:00 Or with one glance see the whole thing quickly.
53:08 Q: It is very hard to know what to look for.
53:15 K: I can't hear.
53:18 Q: He says, it is hard to know what to look for.
53:21 K: I am not looking. I am just looking at myself, my conditioning, and that reveals the whole flow of conditioning.
53:32 I am not looking for one particular type of conditioning.
53:39 One's brain has been conditioned through centuries.
53:47 You are the result. Your brain is an old brain, it is not just a new brain.
53:56 Q: You are suggesting that you can get aware of the whole thing and it will drop away.
54:05 K: I am saying, first to be aware of it – right? Are you aware of it?
54:13 Q: No, I am not.
54:15 K: Why not? This is a dialogue, you understand? I am not criticising you. I am not telling you, should, should not. This is a friendly dialogue between two people who say, what do you mean by conditioning?
54:32 Why does this conditioning take place? Is it possible to be free of the conditioning. That is all we are discussing.
54:46 Q: I think I am not free of conditioning, because I am not at the point that you are suggesting you can be at if you are aware of it.
54:59 K: I said, first, am I aware of it, that I am conditioned, as an Englishman, Frenchman, German, whatever it is.
55:09 Q: Yes, that is easy. Partly.
55:12 K: Begin where it is palpable, where it is concrete, where we can observe it, and then go deeper.
55:20 First, you must look at what actually is. It may be on the surface, whether it is superficial, or deeper and deeper. So you begin with the superficial and then see. Go on, sir.
55:39 Q: I find that I am aware of my conditioning, but I don't know what to do about it.
55:49 K: Let's examine the word 'aware'. What do you mean by aware'? You used that word, I am 'aware'. Both of you. What do you mean by that word? Please, I am not trying to corner you, I am not trying to browbeat you or challenge you, but we are having a friendly conversation.
56:09 So we say, what do you mean by that word 'aware'? When you say, I am aware.
56:18 Q: It means that you sense that it is there. Being aware is to sense it.
56:26 Q: You sense it.
56:29 K: Do you sense this room? This auditorium? Are you aware of the walls, the colour of the walls, the roof, how the roof is put together, the wood that is used, the shape of it?
56:50 Are you aware of this? Or you have looked at it and said, yes, very nice, and walked out. Are you aware of this whole thing? The proportions, the height, the quality of the curtains, the shape of the windows, the slope of the roof – have you taken all that in?
57:22 Go on, I am asking.
57:26 Q: Yes.
57:28 K: That is to be aware of this, the floor, the carpet.
57:36 When you enter the room, this hall, don't you look around and see immediately the proportions, height, the windows, what is outside the windows, the clouds – you take everything in, don't you?
58:01 Or you are so occupied, talking, talking, talking, that you never look around.
58:09 Which is it? I am not criticising, I am not saying. You don't have to answer. So, superficially one can be aware of this room, of this auditorium.
58:26 In the same way, superficially, one can be aware of one's nationality, the superstitions, the religions, the dogma, all that.
58:39 Superficially, you can be aware. Are you? Awareness means, be cognisant, be watching, seeing.
58:55 When you enter the room, you look at it. You don't say, I don't like the room, I wish it were larger, I wish it were taller, I wish it were a different colour – you see actually as it is.
59:12 Now – just watch it – in the same way, can you watch your conditioning, Not try to say, I must change it, I must do something about it – just watch.
59:28 Q: To see the room you are using a tool, which is your eyes, and your nerves and whatever.
59:35 What do you use when you are watching yourself?
59:39 K: All right. Do you watch yourself in the mirror?
59:44 Q: The physical mirror?

K: Yes, the mirror is physical.
59:48 K: When you comb hair, when you shave, when you put lipstick on or whatever you do, don't you watch yourself, see what you are?
1:00:01 You might wish your nose were shorter or longer, longer eyebrows, longer hair, but this is a fact.
1:00:08 You might wish for something else, but the fact is what you see. Right? What you actually see. But you may not like what you see, or you may like what you see.
1:00:25 So the fact is you look in the mirror. There is no choice. The fact is your nose is short, or the fact is your hair is long, or short – that is a fact.
1:00:40 I am fairly light brown, that is a fact. I might wish I were lighter, because that is the fashion, or I might wish I were taller, but that is not the fact.
1:00:54 Now, in the same way, can I look at my conditioning, that I am an Arab?
1:01:04 Just Arab, the word, the implication of that word – follow it, slowly – the religion, the script, the way it is written, why I call myself an Arab – just see the fact as I see my face in the mirror.
1:01:32 Because the moment I say, I don't like this, I have distorted the fact. Right?
1:01:44 Q: But can you do this while your conditioning is in operation?
1:01:51 K: Obviously. It is only in operation that you discover your conditioning. If you lived in the Arab world, in a little village, and everybody is Arab, you don't even think about it, but the moment you go outside and they say, there is a Christian or a Muslim or a Jew or a Hindu, you begin to see the conditioning.
1:02:17 So through action, through reaction, through relationship you discover your conditioning.
1:02:24 This is what is happening now, isn't it?
1:02:34 What is happening now is we are talking about it, in the talking about it, you become conscious that you might be conditioned.
1:02:45 So you become aware of it and so on and so on.
1:02:52 Q: That is a slow process...
1:02:55 K: I said so. Either it is a slow process, bit by bit, by bit, by bit, or as you come into the room you see the whole thing, see the walls, the shape of the roof, the tree outside, the grass, the daisies – everything you see at a glance.
1:03:20 Can you do that?
1:03:24 Q: Well, not all the time.
1:03:27 K: No! Forget all the time. If you can see at one instant the whole thing, why do you need to have 'all the time'?
1:03:42 Each time, you see it.
1:03:48 Q: But the room is outside of you.
1:03:53 K: I said that. The room is outside. The face in the mirror is outside.
1:03:59 Q: Yes.
1:04:02 K: How do you look at yourself, who is not in the mirror, who is not the room, which is not the carpet?
1:04:12 How do you look at yourself?
1:04:19 Q: Always after.
1:04:22 K: Find out. How do you look at yourself? Apply your brain, your capacity, think it out, find out. How am I to look at myself which is not in the mirror – how am I to look at myself?
1:04:52 Go on, don't stop.
1:05:05 Q: One way is to look at your actions and the reactions of other people to your actions.
1:05:11 K: Yes, that is right. That is all. You discover yourself, see yourself, through your actions, through your reactions – that you are angry, that you compare yourself, that you are unhappy, that you are irritable.
1:05:35 You see all that.
1:05:37 Q: But it is always in the past.
1:05:39 K: That is good enough. Begin there. You are already ahead, without observing the facts. The fact is through reaction and action, in relationship, – obviously – I discover myself.
1:06:02 I discover I am terribly greedy, because you have got a very nice pair of trousers and I would like to have those, or whatever it is – I am greedy.
1:06:14 That is, in observing you, the reaction comes into being, and that reaction is greed.
1:06:26 So I say, by Jove, I have discovered something, which I haven't seen in the mirror, I have discovered that I am greedy.
1:06:43 Then I say, what's wrong with it, why I shouldn't I be greedy?
1:06:52 Go on, why shouldn't I be greedy? What's wrong with being greedy? So I investigate why I am greedy, why I shouldn't be greedy.
1:07:14 Right? Do you want to examine it? Go into it, for yourself. Our whole society is based on that: production, usage, wastage, deliberate wastage – produce a car that will last two years so that you will buy a new car at the end of two years.
1:07:48 So society, parents, grandparents, the people around me are encouraging me to be greedy, because our society is partly based on commercialism, production, consumerism.
1:08:10 Right? So I see that and I say, what's wrong with it? Why shouldn't I live that way? Go on, tell me, why shouldn't I live that way?
1:08:31 Q: On the other hand I think that we have also been taught not to be greedy.
1:08:36 K: Why? Why are we taught not to be greedy? Is that another superstition? Is that another conditioning?

Q: Yes.
1:08:47 K: So I am conditioned to be greedy, I am also conditioned not to be greedy. So what shall I do? I look at both.
1:09:05 K: You are getting what I am saying?

Q: Yes.
1:09:07 K: I don't say, I am not greedy, I mustn't be, I say, why am I greedy? There is pleasure in having many things, pleasure in possession, which is encouraged by commercialism, consumerism, production, and also, I have been encouraged not be greedy – conditioned.
1:09:32 Why? Go on, why am I conditioned not to be greedy?
1:09:43 Q: Isn't it because part of my conditioning also involves an ideal situation.
1:09:51 K: Why? Find out. I am encouraged to be greedy. I am also encouraged not be greedy. Not to be greedy is an ideal. Why all this? Go on, work it out, think it out.
1:10:17 When I am greedy, I am being terribly self-concerned.
1:10:27 I am concerned about myself, my greed, my possession, my coats, my trousers, my hats, and God knows what else.
1:10:38 And society also tells me, religions also tell me, don't be greedy.
1:10:45 On one side, they encourage me... See the stupidity of it! One side, the whole society says, do be greedy, the other side says to me, don't be greedy, because when you are greedy, it is terribly self-centred, and when you are very self-centred, you can't cooperate, you can't love – all that.
1:11:17 So you are caught between the two, and the struggle begins.
1:11:24 I am greedy but, my God, I mustn't be greedy. Right?
1:11:31 Q: That creates conflict and with that comes pain.
1:11:35 K: Yes, conflict, and so throughout life you live in conflict.
1:11:42 Not only with your wife or husband but also in yourself, I am greedy, I am ambitious, I am cruel, I mustn't be.
1:11:51 In this turmoil, you live. Now, are you aware of all this? Not out there, but in yourself?
1:12:07 Q: I can be aware of it after my reactions.
1:12:10 K: All right. Even after your reactions, you are aware of it. So next time, you are much more alive to see your reactions.
1:12:20 I may observe my reaction after the incident is over, but that very observation becomes acute as I begin to see.
1:12:32 Each time, I say, by Jove, look what is happening.
1:12:38 Q: That involves time.
1:12:41 K: That is all right. Begin there. Again, you have got greed coming in. Just watch it. What one is trying to point out is: the acuteness and the quickness of observation, not whether it takes time.
1:13:03 If you see your reaction when it is over, and say, I have been greedy, watch it and leave it.
1:13:14 Next time you see a shirt or whatever, in the window, then already, you are quick. You follow?
1:13:25 Q: But when we observe, it is so difficult to stop at the observing, not to condemn it.
1:13:30 K: That is just it. Reward and punishment, that is what we are trained upon. Like a monkey, like the animals, people train monkeys, tigers, all the animals with reward and then punishment.
1:13:48 If you behave properly, you are rewarded with a piece of meat or whatever they do, or you are punished, and we have been brought up on that.
1:14:03 Now, just to be aware of it. Just look at yourself in the mirror. So look at yourself in the reactions – which is yourself.
1:14:19 Now, I will come back to my original point – I must stop, it is quarter past one – can you bring about a life of goodness here?
1:14:44 So that you are marvellous human beings.
1:14:55 We better stop. We will go on next time. May we stop? It is lunchtime. Shall we stop? What do you say, shall we stop? You tell me and I will stick to it.
1:15:23 Q: Let's stop.

K: Let's stop. Right.