Krishnamurti - When the illusion of individuality ends

Krishnamurti Subtitles

BR79S4 - When the illusion of individuality ends
Brockwood Park, UK - 16 September 1979
Seminar 4

1:26	Krishnamurti: I wonder where we are. We have had three talks. We are still concerned, aren’t we, with what is one to do in a world that has become so appallingly disorderly, violent and so on. What is one to do? That is the central issue. So we are not just indulging in a lot of words or theories or holding on to one’s own experiences and points of view, but for those of us who are here – and I hope we are serious and not playing around with all this – our principle question is, what is one to do? And I think we ought to consider also what is the individual action which we think is separate from the integral part of the whole. Have I made my question clear? We may think we are separate individuals and act from that self-centred intention, or from that self-centred movement, because we think we are individuals. And I wonder if we are individuals, though we have accepted that for millennia, that we are a separate individual, with its own consciousness, with its own sorrow, different from all humanity. And we have found for ourselves through all these talks that we are the whole, we are part of the world. And our actions are like the rest of the world. Right? What we do, the world is doing. So psychologically as well as in action, we are the rest of the world – we are the world. And when we have reached that point, is there any individuality at all? You understand my question? We have accepted that we are individuals, separate, something unique which, in its whole life, has to fulfil in various forms. And when we discover the truth that we are integral part of this enormous humanity, what place has any individual, individuality? Or there is no individuality at all. It’s up to you to discuss.
5:53	Questioner: The world is us and we are the world. That is no longer an idea, it is a fact. The world being us and the world is us, the action from seeing that, the full realisation of that as a fact, is a different action. Now I don’t know what that action is. But it means no further contributing to the disorder and the violence that is going on in society. Now whether the individual comes in there or not, I don’t know.
6:32	K: That is why I want to go into the question of individuality, if there is such thing at all. I know it is rather... maybe you may not like to go into the question because you may think individuality is very important, or one who is bound to that tradition, and so it is very difficult to break through that wall of individuality. But we are questioning whether the individual exists at all. If and when we see the truth or the fact that we are the whole of humanity – go into it, sirs – when we see the fact that I am part of the world, I am the rest of mankind, what is the quality of my mind that has seen this fact? Seen in the sense, be absolutely in contact with it, realise wholly, realise completely that is integral part of that vast mankind. What happens to the mind? Could we discuss this? Or it is too...
8:40	Q: The family is one, there is love. It is your family.
8:44	K: No. What is the quality of your mind, sir – before we say it is the family or it is this – what has taken place in your mind, mind in the sense your emotions, your sensitivity, the quality of your senses, feelings, affection, the capacity to think clearly – all that. What has happened in that? You understand my question? What has taken place in the mind that has seen that it is part of the whole, it is not separate.
9:31	Q: It is becoming very quiet then, sir.
9:34	K: What, sir?
9:35	Q: It is becoming very quiet.
9:37	K: No. Find out, let’s talk about it a little bit.
9:46	Q: Sir, if the mind realises that it is part of the whole of humanity, that it is humanity, human beings...
9:57	K: Does the mind realise it, or does thought realise it? You understand?
10:07	Q: If it is watching...
10:09	K: You understand my question? Is it thought that realises I am the whole – part of the whole – or the whole consciousness, which is the mind, the whole of your consciousness realises, sees, in contact, it completely comes to the truth that it is the rest of the world? I am asking, what is the quality of the mind?
10:47	Q: What was outside before has now become intimate. One feels things from the inside, rather than just as an objective series of events one has some sort of loose connection with.
11:02	K: Are you answering my question, sir? What is the quality of your mind, your consciousness, when you realise, or when there is the realisation that you are part, integral part of the whole, whole of humanity? What has taken place when there is perception of that?
11:31	Scott Forbes: Sir, we might not be able to answer that question, because that action, that perception is something that is unfamiliar to us.
11:41	K: That means we have to go back and go over all the...
11:46	SF: Well, not necessarily go over all of it, but that last activity – because we seem to be able to go most of the way, but that last action or that last activity that sees everything, that sees the whole, is something that is new to us, is something that is foreign to us.
12:08	K: No, I am not saying that sees the whole. That has realised that it is not separate from the rest of mankind.
12:19	Q: Could I ask a question? Because I feel there is a difference between someone who has never actually been through that and say someone who has listened to what you have said, and who has already had an experience of that, of being not separate from the world and therefore has found himself in a situation...
12:38	K: Sir, may I add a word there, the word ‘experience’ is rather difficult.
12:43	Q: I don’t want to get into a semantic thing, I have to use language, language is limited.
12:48	K: Yes, so, what is the question, sir?
12:50	Q: What I am interested in is – you were mentioning about toothache – I have a problem here. We never seem to be able to get to it, no one will get beyond the idea... You are saying what is it like... to be the world.
13:16	K: No, sir.
13:18	Q: Or you are the world, or you are not separate from it or something of the sort.
13:22	K: Not something – we have made it all very clear up to now.
13:27	Q: But it is not clear, that is the problem.
13:33	Q: Sir, yesterday we were talking about how just before one could see the root of the separateness or the problem, that there had to be a sort of subsiding of the problem or the bundle.
13:50	K: Sir, he is asking a question, that gentleman. He says, what you have been saying is not clear to me. So we have to clear it up with him. Right? What is not clear, sir?
14:12	Q: You seem to be asking what am I doing at this moment, what is my response at this moment, and yet I feel as though, if you have toothache – if I may use that metaphor – if you had toothache yesterday and you haven’t been to the dentist, you have still got a toothache today. And I feel as though I have got toothache, if you like, and you are asking me what I am doing about it now. And I am saying that I can’t discuss that because you are talking about the first principles.
14:53	K: No, sir – look, what we have said so far is fairly simple and clear. We think we are separate.
15:03	Q: But I don’t. For me there are problems of privacy, what happens if you are conditioned into having a private space, say mentally, how is one not to respond neurotically? Implicit in what you are saying, if one is not an individual, is that one has no privacy, for example.
15:27	K: I don’t catch your meaning, sorry.
15:32	Stephen Smith: He is saying, I think, that there is a physical correspondence to seeing that your consciousness is the same as the consciousness of mankind, that somehow has a physical correspondence in that you don’t have a private space, or you don’t have a private life. He seems to have made a logical jump there.
15:53	K: Is that it?
15:55	Q: Well, that is not only it, I think that the number of people who have actually done what you are saying is very few.
16:08	K: Don’t bother about the few or the many, but what is the quality of your mind – your mind – after examining all this? That is, psychologically we are the rest of mankind. Right? That’s obvious, isn’t it? What you suffer, people suffer similarly in India, in America, in Russia. What you go through – your sorrows, your pleasures, your anxieties – the rest of the world goes through that. You may be physically different, you may be taller, whiter, blacker, purple, what am I? – brown, and so that is superficial. Basically, psychologically, we are the rest of mankind. Would you, have you accepted that?
17:10	Q: Well, yes, I accept that.
17:11	K: No – wait. Now, is that an idea or an actual living fact? Stick to that one thing, sir. Is it an actual living fact or just a concept which you have gathered from the rest of us?
17:37	Q: How is one to tell the difference?
17:41	K: Oh yes, that is fairly simple. Either it is an idea which you have accepted, or it is a living thing! Like breathing, your whole being sees it is so.
18:01	Q: But I don’t know if the state I am in is a living thing or not. I don’t know the relationship between what is in the mind.
18:09	K: I explained – all right, if I don’t use ‘the mind’, is there seeing that fact with all your being?
18:25	Q: But I can be consecrated to the thing and it can still be in my mind, that's what I am saying.
18:29	K: What, sir?
18:31	Q: I can be consecrated to the idea, also the fact, my action can be an act of consecration, a passion, if you like.
18:39	K: I don’t quite follow.
18:40	SS: Someone can be devoted – say the Nazis, or some of them were devoted to Nazism.
18:47	K: No – you are still devoted 'to' something.
18:52	SS: Quite, that is what he is saying, and it has an immense effect on one’s life but it is still an illusion, but that illusion is also a reality.
19:02	K: The illusion is also a reality. Oh yes, we have been through that. I can accept an illusion and think that it is a reality.
19:19	Q: He doesn’t know how to tell the difference between the two.
19:23	K: Between what? The illusion and a fact? Is that it, sir?
19:30	Q: Yes.
19:31	K: Between illusion and fact. All right. Help me out, please – it isn’t a battle between him and me.
19:46	Q: It’s not like that for me. I say, the realisation of the world is me and I am the world, to me it was an idea, it’s a fact, and I know that there will be a different action – what that action will be I don’t know.
20:02	K: Just a minute, sir. He says, how do you distinguish, how do you know what is an illusion and what is a fact?
20:12	Q: I’ll tell you. K: Tell him, sir. Q: Yes, I’ll tell him. Things are not going to be the same again. My own urgency about my self-centred activity, about my business, and all the personal problems have fallen away, because the world is one and I am the world. There is a different approach.
20:33	Q: Yes, but how do you know that the different approach is the right approach, or a correct one, or an intelligent one, or a sensible one, or one that is not violent, one that doesn’t further violence or lead to more violence?
20:44	Q: Because I am no longer going to contribute to those problems, the violence of the world.
20:49	Q: But you are those problems.
20:51	Q: Exactly, I see that I am that. And it was an idea that the world is me and I am the world. It is no longer an idea. And if it is no longer an idea with me, then I will not be acting from what I was acting from, which was self-centred activity. Now there’ll be an action from something else.
21:13	K: He is asking, if I understand him, how do you separate illusion and fact.
21:22	SF: Sir, could we talk about the nature of that total perception that we talked about...
21:29	K: No, we haven’t answered that question.
21:31	SF: But that would answer it because if we saw the nature of that and we saw the nature of illusion we would see the difference.
21:44	Q: Sir, there is difference between feeling and being...
21:49	K: Then feeling and being both may be illusion. How do you separate the two?
22:02	Prof. Wilkins: Well, is illusion created by thought only?
22:06	K: Yes. Illusion is created by thought, by desire and so on.
22:17	Q: If there were somehow a way to test it out, then you could tell, because a fact – if that microphone is actually there I can touch it, but if it’s only a…
22:27	K: …an idea, you can’t touch it. Q: Right.
22:30	K: But can you touch, as you can touch the microphone, the fact? That’s what he wants to know, as far as I understood.
22:45	Q: But you could test it. If one thought one saw that one was the world...
22:50	K: No, forget the world... He is asking a question: how do you distinguish, discriminate or find out which is illusion and which is a fact? Fact is something that is actually happening. Right, sir? Yes? You are doubtful about it. And illusion: what I conceive or have an opinion of what is happening. I am suffering. That is a fact. And being a Christian I say, Jesus is the embodiment of suffering, I will leave it to Him, he will save me. That is an illusion – the actual fact is I am suffering. Right? So we don’t have to go back to that. We can distinguish, separate the two, what is actually doing, happening. I am unhappy, I am greedy, I am anxious, I am frightened – that is the actual fact. Right? And I can say that 'somebody will save me from this' is an illusion. Right? Wait – just let’s get this clear. Is this clear, sir? Q: Clear.
24:45	K: Now from there we move. Which is, the world outside is put together by me, by my parents, by generations past. Right? That is a fact.
25:14	Q: It is easy to see that one has suffering and pain, greed and things oneself. It is not so easy...
25:22	K: That your neighbour is not suffering? That your wife doesn’t go through hell?
25:28	Q: I don’t know, I haven’t got a wife...
25:31	K: Ah, no, sir, I have no wife but I can see. For God’s sake!
25:36	Q: But it does look to me as though some people are happy, no?
25:43	Q: Is it a question of degree, is part of our difficulty the fact that some of us feel as though we have lost some of our relations, that we might have seen through religious dogma, we might have seen that physical violence is rather useless, not a good way of going about it. Do we feel it is a question of degree? And that the illusion is that possibly we might have lost something that they have still got.
26:11	K: To a Catholic who believes very strongly in all that business, to him it is a fact. But when you examine it closely it is illusion. So is this clear, sir? Now wait a minute. The world, which is violent, which is all that, I am also like that. Right? So I am the world, that is a fact.
26:45	Q: No, it’s not. You have jumped.
26:47	K: No – all right – wait.
26:51	Q: There is disorder outside, there is disorder inside, but it doesn’t mean that the disorder inside is anything to do with the disorder outside.
26:59	K: Sir, your neighbour is like you – psychologically. He may have a different business, different job, he may be a carpenter, he may be a professor, he may be a doctor. But psychologically, inwardly, he is like you. He suffers, you suffer. He is anxious, you are also. We have been through all this. So you are your neighbour!
27:30	Mary Zimbalist: Sir, it is one thing to say that you are like your neighbour because he suffers and you suffer, but isn’t the difficulty that you were saying, you are your neighbour, because obviously in one's perception one is not someone else. We share certain things, one head and two arms and so forth, and we share things psychologically, but to say that you 'are' that I think maybe that...
27:58	K: Psychologically I am my neighbour.
28:03	MZ: I am like my neighbour, I share all kinds of things with my neighbour.
28:07	K: All right, I share, I share the same thing. You see, I use different words but the fact is that.
28:15	David Bohm: One may feel that it is true I share some things with my neighbour, but there may be some other things I don’t share that may seem more important. If one believes in individuality one will feel, it is true, I suffer, but my individuality is more important, and is not shared with my neighbour.
28:35	K: Of course, that is just it.
28:41	Q: Sir, have you an objective in being here this morning?
28:49	Q: Have you an objective in being here this morning?
29:08	K: A motive?
29:10	Q: Yes.
29:12	K: Have you a motive in being here?
29:15	Q: I think so, yes.
29:18	K: Then why do you ask me ?
29:20	Q: Because you are not...
29:21	K: I don’t know, how do you know ?
29:23	Q: It seems to me from your reactions that...
29:26	K: Sir, why do you bring that up, when that poor gentleman says I don’t know what you are talking about.
29:31	Q: Because the turmoil in this room is affecting me, and I think to some extent you are perpetrating it.
29:37	K: What ?
29:38	Q: He said, the turmoil in this room is affecting him and you are in some way perpetuating that turmoil.
29:47	K: I am answering his question, I am not perpetuating the turmoil.
29:51	Q: If you are not, sir, how can you ask a question ?
29:54	K: What ? He asked a question, sir. What are you all talking about ?
30:09	PW: But you are stirring a turmoil because you are trying to bring to our attention the nature of the turmoil. It seems to me a perfectly legitimate and desirable thing to do.
30:25	K: Yes, sir. That doesn’t mean I am in turmoil.
30:30	Q: This is perhaps that we are not really giving our full attention that we cannot observe.
30:37	Q: In order to see a fact I have to examine it carefully, isn’t that the difficulty, to accept something is one thing, that microphone is a microphone but it might be made out of chocolate. In order to examine it carefully I have to see that that microphone couldn’t possibly be made out of chocolate. We are very serious here.
30:55	K: Sir, would you kindly explain to that gentleman the fact and illusion, if you have understood it. And the world is me and I am the world, that is a simple fact.
31:07	Q: But in order to see it as a fact...
31:09	K: Explain to him, not to me.
31:12	Q: But in order to see it as a fact I have to go into it very carefully.
31:16	K: Three mornings we have been into it, very, very carefully.
31:21	Q: Yes, but each individual has to go into it very carefully.
31:25	K: I thought we were doing it, each one of us, as we went along, step by step.
31:33	Q: But it seems that isn’t the case.
31:36	K: Then what am I to do? Go all over again? I don’t mind. Is that what is, sir?
31:45	Q: Couldn’t one use some analogy? If one is sitting and looking at a movie, a film, he will have the idea, the illusion that you are seeing, for instance, a stream, water flowing, and you really think this is water flowing and you can’t tell if this is water or is it not. But if you go out and put your fingers down into the stream you will know this is water. Then you can tell the difference, but not while you are sitting there.
32:19	Q: So it is only a fact if you test it in your life.
32:23	Q: (inaudible) some doubt, because, as I feel it, the mind may hold onto an illusion despite facts which show it to be nothing factual, to be something simply of the mind. So an illusion can always be challenged by facts, but a fact can never be challenged by an illusion and be seen to be anything but of the mind. The fact exists, the illusions are something which the mind grasps, holds onto, in many cases as a denial of the facts, as a retreat from facts. This is how it is for me. I don’t know if this helps the discussion.
33:26	PW: Returning to his point about distinguishing between an illusion and a fact, all illusion is created by thought, then it is clear that the only way to distinguish between illusion and fact is to go beyond thought to some other form of apprehension which does not involve thought.
33:56	K: Is that clear, sir? Is that clear, so far? Sir, he is saying – Professor Wilkins is saying – that any form, any movement of thought, anything that thought has created as an idea, as a concept, a conclusion, must be illusion. Only that which is happening without the interference of thought and the observation of it, is fact.
34:46	PW: You don’t mean that thought always creates illusion, but all illusion is created by thought.
34:54	K: I took an example, that I suffer as a Christian and as a great believer always accept Jesus or Christ as the Saviour, I leave all my suffering to Him. Somehow He will help me, save me from suffering. That is an illusion, the fact is I am suffering. That is all I am saying. Now have we come to the point that we have found an answer to what is one to do in a world that is insane. Have we found the answer, what is one to do? This is the fourth morning. We have two more mornings, and I am asking myself if we have understood the question, we have investigated the whole three mornings and this is the fourth morning, and we are asking, have we found an answer to the question what am I to do, what is the right action in this world? What am I to do? To find an answer to that, is individual action right action? Right, sir? Just a minute, I want to explore that. We have so far acted as individuals, and whatever we do or modify, somehow we say that is right action – not all the things we do – but we are trying to find out what is right action as an individual. And the speaker says you can never do that, because the individual is a fragment of the whole. And when a fragment acts independently, whatever his actions be, they will be fragmented, incomplete. That is all we have said.
37:33	Q: Man cannot do it, we see that.
37:34	K: Wait – as an individual, whatever action I do must be either destructive, pleasurable, violent and so on. It is a fragment that is acting. And therefore it must create division, conflict and so on. So I say to myself, that is not right action, as a self-centred human being, that is not right action. Therefore I say to myself, what is right action? Let me follow this, sir, a little bit. What is right action? I don’t know. But I know this is wrong – 'wrong', 'right', please understand quickly. So I say, am I different from the rest of the world? Psychologically, not peripheral differences, not colour differences, but basically, at the root, am I different from the rest of mankind? I find I am not, psychologically. So, then what place has individuality? You follow? If I have discarded individuality as not capable of bringing about right action, when I realise that psychologically I am the rest of mankind, then my individuality has disappeared! That is what I want to find out.
39:14	Q: Sir, isn’t it the illusion? K: Wait, sir...
39:18	Q: Isn’t it the illusion of individuality?
39:20	K: Yes sir, we have said that, it’s gone. Is that so with you? Or am I just talking to myself?
39:31	Q: That is so.
39:33	Q: I think you are talking to yourself.
39:35	Q: Speak for yourself, please.
39:38	K: Am I talking to myself? – he says I am. Sir, the individual action which the world is doing, acting, each one acting for himself – his own security, his own pleasure, pursuing his own experiences, his own little family, all that, every human being is doing that. That is a fact. And that has produced chaos in the world.
40:23	Q: Exactly.
40:26	K: Right? Division. And where there is division there must be conflict. Right?
40:37	Q: Yes, the logic is inescapable.
40:39	K: Follow it, sir. So any action as an individual I do is not productive, is not productive of peace, of real security for mankind. Right? So I discard, not as an idea but as a fact, I am not an individual.
41:13	DB: The difficulty is that it doesn’t follow logically: from the fact that working as an individual has destructive results, does'nt follow that I have the power to discard my individuality. This is where the question is.
41:28	K: I have not the power of discarding…
41:31	DB: ...individuality – as if I believe I am one.
41:34	K: No, because I perceive the truth that I am part of the whole, integral part of the whole, I see that as a fact, not as an idea.
41:46	DB: That is the step, to see it as a fact that I am really not an individual.
41:54	Q: I can see how you can identify but I can’t see how you can see it as a fact.
41:59	Q: It is an illusion to see that you are an individual, that is what you are saying. And if you see that illusion, that is a fact.
42:07	Q: I am saying it is an illusion to identify with my mind, that I am the world, because that leads to all sorts of tortuous things, even stay in mental hospital as a result of making a mistake. The thing is, I don’t want to make a mistake.
42:22	K: Sir, you are an individual, aren’t you, you think you are an individual and you are acting as an individual. Each human being is acting separately.
42:36	Q: My personal situation is I find I can’t act as an individual because there is so much violence in the world, it is hardly possible to function, nowadays.
42:43	K: But the world, you are doing it, sir.
42:48	Q: Well, not effectively.
42:50	Q: None of us are, that is the problem.
42:54	Q: But you have the sense of your own individuality.
42:58	Q: Well, sometimes, yes.
43:01	Q: Sir, isn’t there some confusion which maybe we could sort out? I think we can all see what you are talking of the illusion of being an individual. I think we have followed that.
43:15	K: The word ‘individual’ means indivisible, obviously. But we are divided, we are broken up, we are contradictory, in ourselves. We are not individuals in the ordinary dictionary meaning. We think we are individuals. And I am saying that the very thinking that you are individual, acting separately, etc., is an illusion.
43:46	Q: Exactly.
43:48	K: I know this is very difficult to realise, because we are so stuck in this individuality.
43:58	Q: Isn’t one of the blocks the everyday common sense that... the feeling that we have separate bodies. What you are saying is, surely you are not saying that if this illusion goes, and we no longer...
44:12	K: I don’t. That is an illusion, therefore it has no reality, so I discard it – personally, I say, 'Nonsense'.
44:22	Q: But there is still a response of one human being...
44:24	K: Wait, sir. You want to step far ahead. First – sorry.
44:36	Q: The other day Professor Wilkins said that we don’t want to disappear.
44:41	K: That’s right.
44:42	Q: I think that is the point.
44:44	K: We like the idea of individuality, which is an illusion, but I will hold on to it. It is part of my blood, I have accepted it for generations, the world around me says, you are an individual, you must be ambitious, you must fulfil, you are separate.
45:07	Alain Maroger: Because it is like dying to something so important.
45:10	K: Yes sir, I am saying that. It has become part of our whole structure of thinking, part of our nature to say, ‘I am an individual.’ And somebody comes along and says, ‘Look, you are in an illusion.’ I say, ‘Nonsense!’ So he says, ‘Before you call it nonsense, examine it, look at it.’ But I am unwilling to look, therefore there is no communication.
45:52	AM: I am trying to look.
45:53	K: Wait, therefore you are willing, you as another person, are willing to listen. You are willing to listen. Therefore we are beginning to establish a communication between you and me – the speaker. I say to you, since individual action throughout the world has produced such chaos in the world – right? That's obvious– is there an action which is not individualistic? That's all.
46:42	Q: Sorry, which is not individually what?
46:44	Q: Individualistic.
46:47	K: Is there an action which is not born out of the idea of an individual?
46:57	Q: Obviously there is.
47:00	K: Obviously no?
47:02	Q: There are questions implicit in that. Are you suggesting that there is some kind of intelligence which means that one is in touch with, is receptive with other people and therefore not selfish, or self-centred.
47:18	K: I can only find out if I am not living in illusions. If I am living in an illusion, any amount of your telling me there is something greater or wider, I reject, because my illusion is stronger than the fact. So have you gone into this sufficiently and say, ‘Yes, I see for myself very clearly that the individual is an illusion.’ My God! To accept that, sir! When all the world round you is saying you are an individual, that means you are going against the current of the world, and nobody wants to listen, stand against the current. Right? So if you want to find out what is right action, I say the individual illusion must come to an end. That’s the first thing, because you are the world.
48:35	DB: It is not merely the pressure of outside circumstances but also there seems to be the direct feeling of the reality that you are an individual. It seems that you 'experience' this individuality. It’s not really that other people tell you about it. Therefore how will you see that this experience is an illusion?
49:03	K: How do you convince me, or show me, that I am not an individual? How will you show me, how will you help me, when all my education, all my conditioning is: I am an individual. And I won’t let that go!
49:25	DB: I can see that this feeling of being an individual is coming from a thought. Then it will begin to loosen. But if I don’t see it coming from a thought, I don’t know.
49:36	K: I agree logically to everything that you are saying. But inwardly this thing is so strong that I won’t let go.
49:49	DB: But I am also convinced that it is real, that is one reason that I don’t want to let go.
49:57	K: The majority of people here, that is our position. I have lived 40, 50, 80 or 20 years, individual – my pleasure, my fears, my possession, my etc., is so embedded in me that I refuse to listen to you. Or I listen to you and say, ‘Please, I don’t understand what you are talking about.’
50:24	PW: I suppose one might say that something which is real is essentially non-contradictory and makes sense. If one can draw people’s attention to the fact that regarding oneself as an individual is filled with contradictions.
50:45	K: Yes sir, we have said that. Umpteen times. But nobody wants to listen to it, because the individual is so tremendously important. You see the painters – Picasso is an individual, etc. You know. So my question then is, if one has gone so far, say, ‘What am I to do?’ Is there an action which is not born out of the idea or the illusion that I am an individual? That is really the question – if we want to face it.
51:36	PW: What you have said about people in this room working together and turning these questions over, of communal enquiry, then presumably this is not, or goes beyond the action of the individual.
51:54	K: Yes, sir. You see, we are not all together in this, are we? We are not thinking together about this, are we?
52:14	Q: As you have pointed out, no action, real action that will operate directly is possible while we retain the sense of separateness. It is self-defeating in this way. So there is a question implicit in this, is there an action that can take place, is there the possibility of an action that can take place, when a sense of separateness is not operating, here? Now, this process of enquiry has been into the nature of what we regard as separateness.
52:53	K: Sir, we have come to the crossroad. Either you accept individuality and go on, or you say, let us look in another direction. And to look in another direction you must kind of put that aside for the time being.
53:14	Q: I see that, yes.
53:15	K: All right. Are we at that point, together? Together – I may be and you may be... but together are we at that point?
53:30	Q: Sir, can I ask, is there any factuality at all to individual differences – obviously there are different bodies and so on. There might be some confusion there about those obvious differences.
53:43	K: Sir, you go back to something, forgive me. I said we have come to a crossroad, either you see that individuality brings about conflict, all that, and therefore you say, ‘I turn my back on it, let’s look in another direction.’ That is all I am asking. Are we looking in another direction? If we are, then I am saying we have to go into the whole question of our consciousness, our mind, which is, the world is me and all that. So, has my consciousness lost its sense of separateness? Because separateness brings conflict, inevitably – Britain, France, Germany, you follow, the Arab, the Jew and all that, the Hindus – is invariably bringing conflict.
54:54	Q: Every peace conference is separate – my country against your country, but they will not look in another direction.
55:03	K: The politicians won’t, general public won’t, but we are here to find out if we can look in another direction. So, when we look in another direction it means have I really realised that I am the world? That comes to the point. Have I really… am I really in contact with that absolute fact? If I am, then what is the quality of my mind, from which action invariably comes? If there is not clarity in my mind, all my action will be unclear. So, I am asking myself and therefore asking you, if I may, what is the quality of your mind when you see that individuality brings conflict, all that? Therefore it is no longer holding on to that. And realises it is a part, or an integral part of the whole of mankind. So from that realisation of that fact, what is taking place in the mind? That is my question.
56:41	Q: Krishnaji, the question is, what happens when I am really in contact with the fact that I am the world and the world is I. And your question is what happens when it is a fact, and if it is a fact, surely something will happen that is also...
57:02	K: We are going to find out, sir. You see, you are all so quick in this. We want to find out what happens and that is why I am asking after talking for four days, what has happened to your mind?
57:20	Q: It seems that fear seems to dissolve instantly at those moments.
57:26	K: If there is no fear then what is the nature of your mind?
57:32	Q: It is much more peaceful and confident.
57:34	K: Go into it a little more slowly, Madame.
57:42	Q: Less problems, certainly, because no separation.
57:45	K: Surely there is something else going on. Examine it a little more closely. That is, individuality has lost its meaning to me, personally. And I realise that I am part of this whole of mankind – I realise it, it means something tremendous, not just words! Something enormous has taken place. And have I lost the memory – please listen to it – the memory of individuality? I don’t know if... Q: Yes.
58:39	K: No, please sir, this is very serious, don’t let’s play around with this. Have I lost the memory of my individuality with its experiences, with its sorrows, with etc.?
58:56	MZ: What do you mean by losing the memory of it?
59:01	Q: The past has gone.
59:03	K: Memory, remembrance of my sorrow.
59:08	MZ: You mean that it is no longer an active something?
59:13	K: No remembrance.
59:15	Q: Finished.
59:17	MZ: How can you have no remembrance?
59:18	K: I am going to show you. Go slowly, Maria. First find out what I am saying. That is, I have collected during my 84 years of life, as an individual, lots of memories, lots of experiences. The memory of sorrow, the memory of happiness, the memory – as an individual. It is there, in my consciousness. Now, when there is the realisation of the truth – I am using the word ‘truth’ in its right sense, absolute truth – that individuality is an illusion, with that realisation, is there a loss of all the memories which I have collected during the 80 years?
1:00:31	SF: Sir is...
1:00:32	K: Just go slowly, sir. I may be crazy in saying this.
1:00:36	SF: Is it that there is a new mind that does not have that memory?
1:00:43	K: Scott, have you listened to what I have said?
1:00:45	SF: Yes, sir.
1:00:49	K: Which is, have you, who have understood or seen the truth that you are an individual and therefore are no longer – are you still carrying the memories, the structure, the nature of your remembrance, your past, all that, in your mind? Yes sir, this is a real question.
1:01:19	Q: Absolutely.
1:01:21	JM Maroger: I may be but it doesn’t touch me any more.
1:01:24	K: Ah, no. That is again... 'Maybe it doesn’t touch me', what do you mean 'it doesn’t touch me'? Me is part of that!
1:01:34	JMM: The memory may be there, you can’t lose all your memory, but it doesn’t affect me.
1:01:40	K: No, sir.
1:01:42	Q: It is wiped out.
1:01:44	K: You see how we are translating it immediately? That is, I have memories of my sorrow, but it no longer interferes with my action. Is that so?
1:02:02	JMM: That is how I see it. I may be wrong.
1:02:04	K: I have memory of being hurt – as an individual...
1:02:09	JMM: There is no more me.
1:02:10	K: Wait, listen sir – memory of it, remembrance of it, it is in my brain, in the cells. And when I say ‘Individuality is nonsense’, have I lost the memory of the hurt?
1:02:30	MZ: How can you lose the memory if it is in the brain cells, it may not be operating... is it wiped out like amnesia?
1:02:41	DB: You see, if what you remember is an illusion, when the illusion is dispelled, the memory must go. We can’t remember an illusion when you see it because it is nothing.
1:02:55	MZ: Something is in the brain cell, is that an illusion or an actual medical fact?
1:02:59	DB: Illusion in the brain cell has been changed to non-illusion, the brain cell itself must have changed, like waking up from a dream, the thing is dispelled.
1:03:11	MZ: But you may remember the dream.
1:03:12	DB: If you do, then you are not free of your dream, if you remember the experiencing, the experience of pain in the illusion, then it is still the illusion.
1:03:24	Q: It is of the past, not the present. The present has nothing to do with memory, remembering.
1:03:32	MZ: The imprint on the brain cells of certain experiences, are they no longer...
1:03:38	DB: What was imprinted was an illusion and when the illusion is dispelled, the imprint must go.
1:03:43	MZ: Why?
1:03:44	DB: Otherwise you still have the illusion.
1:03:46	K: Maria, may I say something? Have you heard my question?
1:03:52	MZ: Yes, sir.
1:03:56	K: Have you investigated the question? Or are you reacting to the question? Wait, slowly, go slow. Have you investigated the question which I have put, or are you reacting to the question and asking out of that reaction? Go slowly, Maria, find out first. Piano, piano. I'll put the question to myself, perhaps you will see it. As an individual, which is an illusion – for the moment – as an individual, I remember certain incidents which have caused pain. The remembrance of it, the memory of it, the room in which the thing happened which gave pain. And all the circumstances involved in that incident. And as an individual, it is there, circulating. Have you followed it up to now?
1:05:20	Q: Yes.
1:05:22	K: And if I drop my individuality as an illusion, will the memory still remain? I am asking a question.
1:05:31	MZ: You used the word ‘circulate’. There are the memories that are factually in the brain.
1:05:41	K: I am going to find out, Maria, you are all too quick in your answers. I remember where it happened, the house, I can go back to the house and see it happened there. I lived in Ojai, for ten years or whatever time, I can see the whole thing, but the memory of pain, that is what I am talking about – I won’t listen, I won’t answer you – the memory of the pain has gone. Have you listened to what I have said?
1:06:25	MZ: Yes, carefully, sir. May I ask a question? The memory of the pain, you say, is gone, but you have just referred to the fact that there was pain at a certain point...
1:06:38	K: That’s only a description – please, Maria, careful...
1:06:41	MZ: ...there is some record in the brain.
1:06:44	K: You see what it is...
1:06:46	MZ: But Krishnaji, I think some of us are trying to see – one is to relive the pain: the pain is active, the pain is a motive, the pain has a certain action. The other is a simple factual memory that there was once a pain, it isn’t doing anything or affecting one today.
1:07:05	Q: The hurt has gone.
1:07:07	K: No sir, be careful, this is very serious...
1:07:11	Q: Krishnaji, is the pain different from the memory?
1:07:15	K: Oh, lordy...
1:07:18	SS: Sir, could you use the word 'imprint' when talking about pain?
1:07:25	K: What?
1:07:26	SS: Could one use the word 'imprint'?
1:07:28	K: Imprint. Answer Mrs. Zimbalist, sir.
1:07:37	SS: If this is so, then one would remember the circumstances and perhaps remember the figures, in a sense perhaps as if they were in a play, but there would be no imprint inside.
1:07:53	MZ: At least to me there is a distinction between an active memory of one that is affecting my reactions, my life, my – whatever I am. The other is just something that happened that has no meaning for me anymore but I can remember it as a fact. Now, I am trying to find out, when you say, be without memory...
1:08:16	K: Now wait a minute, could you put it this way – you are attached to somebody.
1:08:23	MZ: Yes.
1:08:25	K: I am not asking, saying this personally. You are attached to somebody. And you see the whole business of attachment, what is involved, the whole structure, the nature of it, the consequences of it, and you end it. Right?
1:08:44	MZ: Yes.
1:08:47	K: Then what happens? Wait – go slowly! What happens? The person is there, the furniture is there or whatever you are attached to. What has happened?
1:09:09	MZ: There is no longer any attachment.
1:09:11	K: That’s all. What has taken place in the mind which is no longer attached to?
1:09:22	MZ: I don’t understand.
1:09:26	SF: Sir, are you saying that there is a new mind which is different than forgetting.
1:09:33	K: No, I don’t want to suggest a new mind. I just want to see, if you have been attached to something, to a belief, to a person, to a piece of furniture, and you are no longer attached, completely! What has happened?
1:09:54	Q: A sense of falling away.
1:09:56	K: She began. What has happened?
1:10:02	MZ: In the instance that you have raised, the attachment is no longer there...
1:10:07	K: So what has happened – you are not answering.
1:10:10	MZ: There has been a change...
1:10:12	K: Which means what? Have you lost the memory – quiet, please listen! – have you lost the memory of having been attached? Please, I am going to prevent you from answering. Have you lost the memory, all the consequences, when you drop completely attachment? Go ahead.
1:10:46	MZ: I think this use of the word ‘memory’ is where...
1:10:50	K: Use some other word. Contact.
1:10:53	Q: Could you say it is like a wound healing without a scar?
1:10:57	K: I am using the word 'memory' purposely because that is what is keeping me attached!
1:11:08	Q: But if it is wiped out that is the finish!
1:11:12	K: This is important because if one has done this, what takes place? That's all I am asking you.
1:11:24	Q: Can you go back a couple of steps about the individuality and just recap what you were saying because I have lost the thread of the argument.
1:11:35	K: Oh my lordy.
1:11:37	Q: Sir, aren’t you saying that if there is an actual recording of an event you remember it, you have a picture of the event.
1:11:44	K: No sir, I am asking something else. I have recorded when I am attached. Just follow it sir, please, two minutes – forgive me, I am not suppressing anybody from asking questions. When I was attached, the whole mechanism, the mechanics of registration were taking place, right? Now, when I am not attached, absolutely, the mechanism of registration has stopped. If it has not, attachment is still going on, in a different form.
1:12:36	Q: Can I make something clear? We are talking about emotion, emotional registration, we are not talking about recording in the same way that a camera records.
1:12:45	K: No sir. Memory – all the recording is memory.
1:12:48	Q: Yes, we are talking about emotional…
1:12:50	K: No, not only. Recording – I record. You have said something and my mind records.
1:12:56	Q: But I remember the fact that the person was standing there.
1:13:00	K: Yes sir. When the mind is free from that attachment, has the recording been wiped out? That is my point.
1:13:20	MZ: The recording of what? Of what – what recording?
1:13:24	K: All the memories. All the incidents.
1:13:28	MZ: Well, as this gentleman just said, you remember, say it’s a person, you remember the place, the person, the circumstances, but you are no longer in that, none of that is operating in you.
1:13:42	K: But... I am not attached to you. Just a minute – I am being personal, I am sorry. I am not attached to anybody – forgive me.
1:13:52	Q: It’s all right, I understand.
1:13:55	K: I am not attached to you. I know you, you are there, you do all kinds of things. The mechanism of the whole process of attachment has completely come to an end. But you are there.
1:14:14	MZ: That’s right. Well, then I think probably that I do understand. Attachment is not going on, but if you say, is the memory of the attachment in the past, it’s not going on, it’s not active, it’s not in one or in me.
1:14:32	K: It is not there.
1:14:33	MZ: But once it was and I remember the fact that once, it was there. That's all.
1:14:38	K: For God’s sake...
1:14:40	Q: It seems as if a kind of burden...
1:14:43	MZ: It’s gone, there’s no burden, there’s no attachment, there’s none of that.
1:14:47	K: There is no memory, I am telling you.
1:14:51	MZ: But it’s still active.
1:14:54	K: There is no memory.
1:14:56	SF: Is it the same thing as forgetting, that having no memory?
1:14:59	K: No.
1:15:00	Q: No, not at all.
1:15:06	Q: Why is it so difficult to understand that?
1:15:09	K: No sir, don’t say this – this is one of the most difficult – if you say 'what is the difficulty, it is so simple' – it is not.
1:15:17	MZ: ...in this case, at least it is with me. You say the memory is different from forgetting.
1:15:24	K: What?
1:15:26	MZ: Is it different from forgetting, Scott asked.
1:15:28	K: What?
1:15:29	MZ: Having no memory, is that different from forgetting?
1:15:33	K: No.
1:15:34	MZ: It’s not?
1:15:36	K: Forgetting is something else and having no memory is something else.
1:15:45	Q: Isn’t Mrs Zimbalist rather saying, my son dies, I wipe it all out, I don’t even remember that there was a son, which is sheer nonsense.
1:15:53	K: No sir, it is not like that.
1:15:58	Peter: Isn’t it like – I remember yesterday you called me stupid but I don’t remember the hurt.
1:16:04	K: I didn’t call you stupid.
1:16:06	P: No, somebody did. Somebody called me stupid yesterday but I don’t remember the feeling of hurt anymore, it’s gone. That’s what you are saying?
1:16:16	K: Something like that.
1:16:21	PW: He remembers that he was hurt but he can’t remember the hurt itself.
1:16:27	P: I remember being called, the words, the person said these words: ‘You are stupid.’ But the feeling that arose is gone, cannot be recalled.
1:16:36	PW: So there is no real memory of the feeling you had.
1:16:40	Q: So the emotional contents are gone.
1:16:41	K: That’s right, sir. Sir, could we take another example. Suppose I have been hurt. The memory of that hurt, the feeling of that hurt is there. Now, if I wipe out that hurt completely, therefore in that wiping away, cleansing, there is no feeling of ever being hurt. I know this is difficult for people. There is no feeling, ever, of being hurt.
1:17:27	PW: I think the difficulty is that people are so used to remembering factual things, that the idea that you cannot recollect the actual hurting, the nature of the hurt – I think is very difficult.
1:17:43	K: You cannot recollect, if you want to put it. You cannot remember, recollect what was the state of the mind or feeling when it was hurt. Is that explained somewhat? Now, come back. As an individual I remember certain incidents which have caused pain or pleasure. And with the cessation of the individual as an illusion, absolutely, then what is the quality of the mind which has remembered, recollected? I say it has gone. That’s all. Now, what is my action, what am I to do in this world? I have lost my individuality – I mean it, I am talking about myself – I have lost my individuality, I am no longer separate, fighting for myself, struggling, conflict and all that. Then what is the nature of my mind which sees that I am part of the whole? The realisation that I am the entire mankind.
1:19:32	Q: One feels a total responsibility.
1:19:38	K: Responsibility. Madame, do you feel that, or is it just a lot of words?
1:19:47	Q: No, I feel that.
1:19:49	K: How do you act from that responsibility?
1:19:51	Q: I don’t know.
1:19:53	K: So I am asking what is action?
1:20:01	Q: An action of great care, great attention.
1:20:08	Q: Sir, I think that any attempt to answer that question is rather speculative on our part.
1:20:23	K: Yes. So what will you do, how will you meet this question, how will you meet this challenge? The challenge is: what are you to do in this world, if you put away your ugly little individuality which means nothing.
1:20:46	Q: At this moment we have no basis from which to act that is of the same order, from which we have acted in the past.
1:20:56	K: Sir, you can only answer my question – have you really put aside your individuality? Or do you just say, ‘Yes, it's convenient today in this meeting but the rest of the time I’ll carry on.’
1:21:15	AM: There you are stopping us from answering, because how can I say I am sure that I really have put aside my individuality.
1:21:27	K: I am just asking. I am not asking you to be sure.
1:21:32	Q: I think that the only thing that can be after your question is silence.
1:21:40	K: No, sir.
1:21:44	Q: What I mean by silence is not answering.
1:21:47	K: After four days, you are just silent at the end of it?
1:21:53	Q: Exactly, I am, completely.
1:21:56	Q: I am not, because if we are silent nothing will change the world, and we can sit here and go out and nothing has changed. But I feel, if I may, is that if you have that big feeling in yourself that you are not separate from all people, that you really want to share with other people, really want to listen to other people...
1:22:20	K: No, no sharing – you see, you have gone off to living with other people, sharing.
1:22:27	Q: Well, maybe that’s the wrong word.
1:22:30	AM: Could one say that before I was acting for my individuality, then after this change occurs, my individual being the whole, I act for the whole.
1:22:45	K: What is the action that is born out of that?
1:22:49	AM: Love? K : Ttt...
1:22:53	Q: Or is it perhaps the realisation that we actually cannot do anything ourselves, from a me.
1:23:01	Q: How can we say any of this? How can we say that it hasn’t happened? We can’t say anything. I mean this affectionately but I don’t think we can say anything.
1:23:13	Q: This is happening because the moment is the happening, and each moment new, free from the past, because there is no illusion of memory, there are no more illusions, there is only the reality of the moment, and that is the responsive action, the thing from which you cannot divorce yourself. So there has to be some response. It is the moment, and each moment, that is the moment. At least this is how I feel now.
1:23:50	Q: It is all so new that I feel so hesitant in making any statement at all.
1:23:54	K: Could I put the question differently.
1:23:58	Q: I am plaintively looking to see is this true or not.
1:24:03	K: Is my individuality dead? It cannot be resurrected, it cannot be called back – it is dead! Then what is my action? The mind is not recollecting, remembering the individual, feeling separate. Therefore what is its action when it is dead to separateness?
1:24:50	PW: Somebody said ‘love’ and you said 'no', and I don’t understand because surely it is an act of love.
1:24:55	K: I said no because love is one of the easiest words that we all use.
1:25:00	Q: All right, but he’s right.
1:25:02	K: He’s perfectly right, but I just wondered if it is a reality or just a word.
1:25:15	Q: If one has lost one’s individuality, sense of separateness, one is a whole being. But am I whole when I say this?
1:25:23	K: You understand, sir, if you feel that you are the rest of mankind – you understand that? It's a tremendous realisation.
1:25:37	Q: Participation.
1:25:44	Q: There is a tremendous different feeling.
1:25:47	K: From that there is action. Perhaps we’ll go into it tomorrow, from that point, if we may. It’s now one o’clock – sorry. SUBTITLE TEXT COPYRIGHT 1979 KRISHNAMURTI FOUNDATION TRUST LTD