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BR85DSG1.1 - Why don’t you listen?
Brockwood Park, UK - 14 October 1985
Discussion with Small Group 1.1



0:18 Mary Zimbalist: Sir, there’s a question which seems to come up around the world, over and over, and we’d like to ask you if you could go into it, as deeply as you’d like. The question seems to be, in the minds of people who have really studied and gone into your teachings, as deeply as they know how, and that question is that something doesn’t happen, there isn’t a sort of explosion that gets them beyond what one would consider the intellectual level. Is there some factor of change we could go into?
0:55 K: This has been a question that has been asked over and over again.
1:01 Scott Forbes: May I interrupt and ask a correlative to this question? All of the material that has come from your teachings, all of the books and the video tapes and the audio tapes, how can one approach those, or what does one do with those so that they really make a difference, it’s just not more intellectualising or gathering more knowledge? And even how does one listen to this?
1:32 K: Does K answer the first question or your question?
1:37 SF: It seemed that they might be related questions, sir.
1:41 K: I see. The first question was – and this question has been asked in different parts of the world – why isn’t there, in all of those who are concerned, serious, an explosion, something totally different taking place? I wonder if that’s the right question. Why should anything take place? This expectation that something should take place may be utterly wrong. I'm just talking it over with you. Maybe something that sounds rather trivial, though it may be put very seriously, it is not appropriate. Why should anything happen? Either as an explosion, as further clarity, or something that the brain is never occupied with, something the brain is not acquainted with, and so on. Is that the right question? I'm asking myself and you, is that the right question? Or – let me – or this expectation something should happen may be totally wrong.
3:50 MZ: Are you suggesting that the expectation may prevent it or that there shouldn’t be something?
3:57 K: Not only it prevents, but also can the brain expect something which it hasn’t cooked up?
4:13 MZ: You’ve talked a great deal about change, the necessity, the urgency of change, about mutation. This implies something very different from what we all know in varying degrees.
4:27 K: What you are trying to say, I don’t understand.
4:29 SF: You ask the question why don’t we change, and you talk about the urgency of change and the need for transforming, and yet we don’t do it.
4:38 K: May I suggest that we rather stick to that rather than ‘something doesn’t happen’.
4:46 SF: Stick to what, sir?
4:48 K: Why don’t human beings, you or I or Mrs Zimbalist, why don’t we find out why there isn't a change in us, rather than expect something to happen, to explode and bring about a change?
5:11 MZ: I think people feel that they have worked very hard at this, they have read, studied, listened.
5:16 K: That might be wrong, too.

MZ: How so?
5:21 K: You can’t try hard. If you try hard and give all your time and energy to something then it becomes like one of these monks, like the monks and the sannyasis the world over. There are tremendously making incalculable effort. They pray, get up in the morning, and go through all kinds of tortures. All that might be totally immaterial. So, I'm asking – are you asking, too? – why is it that we human beings don’t radically change? I should think that was more important than expecting something new to happen – that’s so silly!

SF: That is our question, sir. Why don’t we fundamentally change? We can’t even say why don’t the two here in front of you, radically change because it’s undoubtedly the same for anybody.
6:43 K: Why? Why don’t you or her fundamentally change? Or, change implies time – from this to that. We have said that before, too.
7:12 SF: Yes, that’s the becoming that you have talked about.
7:16 K: Would you kindly allow me to finish. Change implies time. Changing from one room to another, going to another room, changing from what I am to what I should be – all those endeavours, all those attempts imply time, either a long time or a short time. We may be approaching it wrongly, when we talk about change.
7:54 MZ: Krishnaji, could I say in defence of people who have been serious, that they're not using time as an aid.
8:05 K: No, I'm not saying as an aid. The very word 'change' implies time.
8:10 MZ: Does it?

K: Yes. Change to what?
8:15 SF: But sir, it doesn’t imply time when you have asked that question. Now, here you have someone in front of you, Krishnaji. Why does this person not change?
8:31 K: Change to what, change from what?
8:34 SF: From what that person is.
8:39 K: May I ask then, why don’t you change, Scott? I won’t even use that word, if I may. I think it’s dangerous to keep on repeating the same word. Vocabulary then becomes monotonous and meaningless. Could we change that word, I mean not use that word at all?
9:05 SF: Fine.
9:06 K: And look at it differently. Will you do that?

SF: Yes, of course.
9:14 K: That is, I am what I am. That is, I'm angry, jealous, hating and disliking, pain, pleasure, sorrow, and all that.

SF: Yes.
9:34 K: Do I realise, or you realise that I am all that? There is no other entity. There is nothing superior or inferior, higher self, lower self, who is attempting – I am that. Do you two realise that?
10:02 MZ: Krishnaji, in that very word 'realisation' there is something. Because one realises it.

K: Do you see the fact of it?
10:09 MZ: You see the fact.

K: That’s all. Stop a minute. You see the fact. It is so. Now, go very carefully into it. What do you mean seeing it? Seeing the fact. Seeing the fact there are so many books there.
10:37 MZ: Don’t you see...?

K: I want to be very clear. When you use the word 'see', do you see the idea of it or the actuality of it? Don’t answer me, yet. Do you see? There it is. Or, at the back of your brain there is the idea it shouldn’t be, or that you are not satisfied with it, or there is certain urge that it should not be. Because that’s our tradition, that’s our whole education, everything is involved in it. Could you, could we, look at it, wipe away every form of condemnation or approval?
11:49 MZ: Can I ask you if this description is looking? For me, it is to see the action happening at that moment.
12:01 K: Good enough.
12:02 MZ: The feeling, whatever it is in the mind, happening in that moment without qualifying good or bad or anything else, or changing it, just seeing it happen.
12:12 K: Therefore one has to go back and see why it happens.
12:15 MZ: Yes.
12:17 K: Why this urge to move it, change it, control it, despise it.
12:25 SF: It’s obvious when one looks at it, that these things are not right.
12:30 K: That’s what I'm objecting to.

SF: They cause chaos in one's life.
12:35 K: No, I don’t want to feel it’s chaos. It is so.
12:40 SF: It is so and it’s a mess.

K: That’s all. It is so.
12:46 SF: Yes, it is.
12:48 K: There is not the urge or the condemnatory attitude or accepting it is so.
13:02 SF: But is there, without judgment...?
13:06 K: That’s what I'm asking.

SF: Just a seeing that it’s somehow inadequate or it’s not right.
13:11 K: No, you're already taking a point of view of condemnation.
13:17 SF: Not of condemnation but of seeing the thing as it is.
13:19 K: As it is – stop there.
13:21 MZ: May I go back to your question, do you see what is behind it, why it’s so? What is that process? That can so easily become an intellectual one.
13:33 K: No, no. I won’t use any of these intellectual words.
13:41 MZ: But that’s a danger there.

K: To me, this is a fact. It is so. What is, is. And there is no other movement.
14:02 MZ: But you suggested seeing what’s causing it.
14:05 K: I am not even going into that yet. First, do we realise or see, observe, any form of acceptance or non-acceptance doesn’t exist in the brain cells themselves?
14:26 SF: I am not trying to be clever here, but part of what is, part of the condition of oneself, is this sense that things are not right.
14:43 K: That’s what I'm objecting to.
14:45 SF: But if I'm to say that it’s not right to have a sense that things aren’t right it’s actually creating it. The way one is has a sense of judgment or condemnation.
14:59 K: No, that’s all our training, our conditioning, our sense of man’s history.

SF: But that’s the way one is.
15:08 K: So I say look first that you have brought in all that. I say the fact is I am all this. That’s all. I'm insisting on that – sorry. You are bringing in another reaction of the background, that we are trained, educated to say this is right, this is wrong, this should not be, this must be, this is the ideal, this is what Lenin or somebody taught. I want to wipe out all that and start.
15:52 SF: Does that imply a change?

K: I don’t know anything about change.
15:57 SF: But to wipe out all of that, sir, is a kind of movement, isn’t it?
16:02 K: I'm objecting to saying this is right or wrong, or admitting this is correct, this is false. It is so – you have got brown shoes.
16:15 SF: But are you saying it’s incorrect to condemn or…?
16:20 K: No, do you see when you say, 'This is right, this is wrong, this should be...' – that is interference with what is? That’s all I am saying. I'm not saying anything else. You are really objecting to what is, when you bring all that in.
16:44 MZ: May one ask about the 'what is'? Let’s take the usual sort of emotions that we talk about, say anger.
16:53 K: Anger. I am angry.
16:56 MZ: Looking at that is what? It is feeling it at that moment. It’s not saying, ‘I’m angry’, and that’s just a statement of fact.
17:03 K: I have been angry – that’s a fact.
17:06 MZ: It’s feeling it at that moment and seeing that action of anger in the mind and body. Is that what you mean?

K: No. Not what I mean, it’s wrong to ask me a question like that, 'Is that what you mean?' Because what do you mean? Not what I mean, what does K mean. What do you mean to be aware at the instant of anger? That’s what’s implied. It bursts out.

MZ: Yes.
17:47 K: All right. And then, a second later, you say it shouldn’t be, or it was correct to be angry, it was reasonable to be angry, and so on. That comes later. At the moment of anger there is no 'I' involved in it, at all. There's just a reaction, all the adrenalin coming into action. All right. Later on, I begin to condemn it or rationalise it.
18:30 SF: Very quickly.

K: Very.
18:32 MZ: But before that, you recognise it, you say, 'anger'. You name it.
18:36 K: Of course. 'I have been angry.' I have also given it a name, immediately.
18:43 SF: Sir, can we come back then? Do we see what we are without condemning it or judging it?
18:52 K: Just see if you can do it. Just consider, seriously, if you can just observe it without… if there is an observation – not you observing – if there is an observation without any reaction. That is change – if you like to use the word.
19:26 MZ: May I ask, at that very moment, that observation, the anger is still flowing, it’s still happening.
19:33 K: No, no, no, it’s gone.

MZ: It’s gone?
19:36 K: Of course.

MZ: When did it go?
19:39 K: When you say it’s right or wrong.

MZ: No, no, I'm not saying that. You feel it and you say, 'anger'.

K: Yes.
19:47 MZ: Then does it go or do you let it… You feel it. You let the feeling…
19:53 K: It has gone.

MZ: You don’t abort it, as it were. The moment you say it is anger?

K: Yes.
20:00 MZ: It’s gone.

K: It’s gone, of course. You have used that word so often with regard to that particular reaction, and it comes out quickly – 'I have been angry'.
20:19 MZ: So, it’s gone at that moment.

K: Not gone. It’s not there. You are using this word 'gone'. It’s not there. I'm asking you to do something which you are not doing, if I may request. You see anger or jealousy. You observe the arising, the causation, all that, of jealousy. It’s very common. If I may suggest, don’t condemn it, don’t say, ‘It’s right, it’s wrong, I should be, I should not be’, but just see if you can remain with that feeling without any sense of judgement.
21:18 SF: Oh! Fire alarm, sir. Sir, we have the observation of the fact without any judgement, without any…

K: …reaction.
21:37 SF: Then what?
21:41 K: Is that a fact, or just, ‘then what?’
21:44 SF: Well, it seems when you ask the question, ‘If I do that…’
21:50 K: No, I don’t suggest anything. I say, do you actually observe a fact, observe the self movement, the self-conscious or unconscious state of the brain, the feeling that you are that. Do you have that actual reality, truth or fact in front of you? And you are observing it? Or, ‘Let’s get on with it’. I'm afraid you are implying, ‘Yes, I understand, let’s get on, what next?’

SF: But if you ask that question, and if the answer is no, which is what’s implied, but then there’s the next question.

K: I am not asking no or yes.
22:51 SF: No, but you are asking that question of me and if I say, 'No', my next question then is, 'Well, why?'
23:00 K: Why can’t you see the fact, the tiger, whatever it is, the tree or your own antagonism or like and dislike, and so on – why don’t you see all that, without any reaction? Don’t say, 'No' or 'Yes', 'I can, I cannot', just find out why you can’t, if you can’t.
23:34 MZ: But, sir, can I ask, that seeing, that observation tends in many people, myself included, to be intellectual, it isn’t seeing it all the way.
23:50 K: That’s another of your statements which I'm refuting. It has nothing to do with intellect.

MZ: It comes out that way so often.
23:59 K: That means you have gone away from the fact. The fact is this is a blue sweater. And then I look at it. I don’t have bring in, ‘I don’t like it, the button is wrong, it’s not from the right place...’
24:15 SF: Making it just absolutely simple, sir, this is not something that one does – one is stuck.
24:23 K: No, one is not stuck. You are making statements, using words which I… it doesn’t mean a thing to me. You are not stuck.
24:35 MZ: The blue sweater – your mind, eyes, see the wavelength of colour and your mind identifies it 'blue' and 'sweater'. So, that’s a purely intellectual response, but this inside oneself is quite different.
24:50 K: Now, move along the same wavelength or whatever word, to find out why you can’t look at yourself without reaction. Go into it. You don’t go into it.
25:09 SF: One is trying, sir.

K: No, you are not. You can’t try. You just now admitted without trying, you are all that. Right? You admitted it.

SF: Yes, sir. Absolutely.
25:24 K: Now you go back and say, ‘I’m trying to see the causation of all this.’ It’s very, very simple.

SF: I might be an absolute idiot, but for years one has been listening to you and reading the books...
25:43 K: Don’t do it. Stop doing it.
25:46 SF: But all of the things that one does, sir, because one can see the necessity of something like this, and...
25:52 K: No, don’t go off to something, Scott, if I may suggest, stick to this point, why these reactions predominate. Why can’t you look at your anger, whatever it is, without any judgment? Yes, I have been angry, it is so. I have lied, it is so. I dislike that woman or like that man or… Why do you have to bring all the other things in? K is saying this because he has actually done it. He won’t talk about it if he hasn’t done it, it would be stupid, hypocritical. So, I'm asking you both, do you see the fact without any background response, all the rest of it? And you keep on moving from that.
27:17 SF: At the risk of sounding awful, it seems that one has done that.
27:25 K: Ah, I doubt it.
27:27 SF: I agree, because nothing comes from it.
27:29 K: Question me why I doubt it.
27:31 SF: I doubt it also, sir, because nothing follows from it, and yet when one looks at the thing it seems that that is what one is doing.
27:39 K: Sir, could you actually listen without all this talk and say, ‘I'm doing, I'm not doing’? Do you actually see something in yourself without any response of the background, without any sense of previous judgment, previous appreciation or depreciation of something that you have seen in yourself? That is where we are stuck – not go on further.
28:27 SF: I agree, sir.

K: To me there is no further – no more or less or better. All that implies measurement. Measurement means time. And I say, 'Why should I have all this? It is so'. Somebody has hit me, it is so. Why should I bring in my particular reaction to it and say, ‘I dislike that man or woman who has been rude to me’? Yes, they have been rude, and pass on. I think this is really very important if you go into it, quietly, not say, 'It’s impossible, I've tried, not tried' and all that kind of stuff. If you could spend a little time and find out why this constant noise of the background. You will find something real there, which is, first of all, memory operating – you have been angry a thousand times before, or twice before, so the memory says, ‘That’s anger, cut it out, it’s bad.’ So, the memory is in question. Then recording is the question – you understand? – how the brain records the previous reactions and keeps on repeating the previous reactions. I have been angry, I know the feeling of it, I know also the adrenalin coming up to the surface, and so on – it’s obvious, but it goes on. So, I am asking you, look at it without any sense of recognition. Suppose I have been hit badly – which I have been, K has been – and next day it’s exactly as it was. You understand?

SF: It hasn’t left a mark.
31:43 K: Otherwise, I couldn’t stay. Ah, no, not otherwise – it didn’t happen. I was as friendly, as generous, as before the incident. So, why does the brain keep this thing going – memory and, ‘You hit me and therefore I must hit you'. 'I mustn’t hit you because I have certain ideas’ and so on? It’s all so complicated. Is it a matter of being very, very simple? Answer this. Being very simple. Or simplicity may be contrary, or you object to that very word, because we are so highly educated, or sophisticated, any word you like to use, and we have lost this real simplicity of things as they are.
33:11 SF: But you are also saying simplicity in the sense that it just goes on, it doesn’t carry a thing.
33:17 K: To look at things as they are, very simply. Yes, they are there. I have been angry. Yes, quite right. Finished. Why should I go into all this rigmarole about it? You tell me. Can you do it? Not try, then you are gone. I have made a habit, some habit. Can I break it given a very, very short time? Not carry on day after day, day after day, year after year. Go on, sir, that’s my problem. That’s the question you're asking, in a different way.
34:10 SF: If that simplicity is not there, if that education, that sophistication has already complicated the brain…
34:18 K: It is there. Don’t say, 'If it is not there'.
34:22 SF: That education, that sophistication.
34:24 K: It is there.
34:26 SF: So that simplicity is not there.
34:28 K: That’s all I'm saying – it’s not there.
34:32 SF: Then what does…?

K: Don’t do anything, it’s not there.
34:37 SF: I agree, it’s not there.

K: Therefore, look at it. It’s not there, and remain with it and see what happens. You don’t. You move away and say, ‘It should be, why am I not simple?’
34:54 SF: To stay with it is almost too simple, sir.
34:55 K: That’s it! Because I think if you are very simple, in the real sense, then that very simplicity has great subtlety. Not the subtlety of a highly educated brain or anything of that kind. The subtlety which lies behind great simplicity. Let’s move from this subject, sir, to something else. We were going to talk, weren’t we, without any personal probing, we were going to talk about ourselves. Right?
36:13 MZ: Yes.

K: Are you doing it?
36:20 SF: One feels yes, sir.
36:22 K: No, you see how...? Don’t say ‘one feels...’ or you would now say, ‘I want to talk about myself’.
36:32 SF: Yes, sir, I have been.

K: Now, do it.
36:38 SF: But I…

K: I’ll tell you. You’re bound to have some habits – right? – long-established, perhaps from your childhood. I may point it out to you. Will you stop it, entirely break that habit within a certain short period?
37:10 MZ: I think this is very close to the other question. Because again you say, ‘Yes, of course’.
37:18 K: You're off. You're moving away from it.
37:22 SF: Sir, if we can just stay with that question, 'Will you move away from it quickly or in a short period of time?'
37:32 SF: What would make that happen, sir?
37:34 K: Let’s be very simple about it. I may have a habit. You come as my friend and say, ‘For God’s sake, don’t have it’. Wait, you are not listening. I will say to you, ‘Show me that habit, point it out, I won’t rebel against it, get irritated, show me, and within three days, I promise you, I will break it’.
38:08 MZ: If may say, this seems to imply…
38:11 K: No, do you do it?

MZ: No.
38:14 SF: Krishnaji, can I make this a bit more real?
38:18 K: It’s very real.
38:19 SF: Instead of you having a habit and someone comes up and says... I have habits.

K: No, sir. You see how you are complicating it?
38:28 SF: I'm not, sir. I'm actually trying to make this much more real.
38:32 K: No, sir. I tell you a habit you have. Whenever you begin to speak you say, ‘Ah…’ Now, wait, wait, wait, listen to me. You have that habit.

SF: Yes.
38:48 K: I don’t know for how long you've had it, it may be nervousness, it may be that, in saying that, you are thinking out, it gives you space, time, and so on. I am just asking you, I'm not asking you, ‘Do this, don’t do that’. Will you break it completely within three days? Don’t say, 'Yes' or 'No', or, ‘I will try’. That’s all... I am saying to you – just listen – show me a habit, doesn’t matter what, my thinking or I have a habit of thinking about this and that, and begin to chatter – right? Give me three days – that’s maybe too long for me – I will completely stop. There will be an end to it.
39:45 SF: May I ask now, my beginning to speak and saying, ‘Ah…’ you've pointed that out several times, that habit has not been broken.

K: Find out why. No, you are answering. Don’t answer me. Find out why you cannot stop it.
40:07 SF: I haven’t found out, sir. That’s a fact.
40:11 K: I think it’s very simple. You are complicating it. The simple thing is you are not paying attention to it.
40:21 SF: When it happens?
40:22 K: When it happens you say, ‘Look, I’m going to watch it very carefully, watch it, that I don’t do that anymore’. I want to know why I'm doing it. I put a pin into it right away. You begin to say, ‘Yes, I know I have a habit, I will try, I will be this and that’. It’s like a balloon, you are pushing air into it, all the time. If you say, ‘Yes, that’s my habit, I recognise it. Thank you for pointing it out to me’ and three days, no more. Wait! Three days, no more than that.
41:09 SF: Sir, when you do this…

K: Not ‘when I…’
41:14 SF: No, when I do this, three days no more, is there no condemnation in this, there is no judgement, there is no wanting to end? There is no sense of time in saying three days?
41:28 K: You point out to me – right? – a habit. I don’t know, point out to me, x-habit, a certain kind of habit. At first, I rebel against it, or whatever it is, I say, ‘You are quite right. I have that habit of chattering’, let us say, and I say, 'You are quite right'. Habit implies repetition, mechanical brain, mechanical attitude – habit, repetition. All the time repeating becomes – you understand, sir? – the brain becomes weary of all this, or deadens or scatterbrained. So, I realise all that quickly. I don’t have to discuss with anybody.
42:28 SF: And that’s not a condemnation either.
42:30 K: Of course, not – it is a habit.
42:32 SF: It's a fact, not a condemnation, that it dulls the brain.
42:35 K: No, it is so.

MZ: Why doesn’t that realisation act?
42:40 K: It's not the realisation that acts.
42:44 MZ: But you said attention.
42:46 K: I realise I should get up at six o’clock in the morning, but I don't. So I say, it’s not realisation. Please just listen to what I am saying – you are not. You tell me I have a habit – right? – you have a habit, or a dozen habits. Habit is habit – repeat, repeat, because you have done it a thousand times before. You point out to me. I'm not condemning it, it is so. And I realise too, the brain realises too, repetition, mechanical, thoughtlessness, scatterbrained. So, I say, ‘Give me three days, I’ll end it’. Which means I pay tremendous attention. Attention. Don’t argue with me. I pay attention – where I put the towel, whether I'm rushing to do something else – I pay attention. And you will see a thing happens then.
44:08 SF: May I ask, this same attention that might end a simple habit like saying, ‘Ah...’

K: Oh, no, it’s not simple. Habit is habit, whether it is the habit of going to the church and worshipping some image, or sex, or whatever it is – habit.
44:31 SF: Sir, are you saying that all of the continuation of our background, the anger, all of that is habit?

K: Part of it.
44:40 MZ: But, sir, what brings about that intense attention?
44:44 K: Nothing will bring it about. You are going back again.
44:48 MZ: But something must generate that, because habits are mechanical, they are deeply engrained – something has to be alert to that.
44:58 K: No. Listen. Listen to what another person is saying. Don’t be casual. I have told you certain things, day after day – yes, it’ll pass it by. You don’t actually listen. When Scott tells me about that habit – I am resisting it, I don’t want to listen to you. What you're saying is so, but I dislike you pointing it out to me, I get irritated with you and so on. There is all this interference with my hearing what you say – it’s a habit with me. You say, ‘That’s your habit – end it’. No, you don’t even don’t say that to me. I say, ‘Yes, quite right’ and I realise all my background has been a habit, most of it, getting up, putting down, throwing this and throwing that, it has become a habit. And you tell me that. I don’t reject it, I don’t accept it. I see the fact that I am doing it. That means I have really listened to you. Right? Now, will you listen to me, now? When K says to you, with this triangular discussion, or rather, deliberation, see your anger or dislike, listen carefully, or whatever it is, and not try to change it, condemn it, justify it or anything, just watch it. You've told me I've got that habit. I don’t rebel, I watch it. I don’t say, ‘You are quite right, thank you for pointing it out’. You've told me. The very listening is attention – not how attention will come about.
47:28 MZ: You are saying the quality of the listening.
47:32 K: Yes, I've been saying this for umpteen years, listen.
47:37 MZ: Without rejecting.

K: Listen. You listened to the fire alarm just now and rushed out. In the same way, listen to... K would really listen to you if you say, 'Your habit is this'. You don’t have to tell me anymore. Right? My brain, the brain, is already in operation because I've listened to you and I see the correctness of it. And I don’t get angry or justify it – it is a habit. I see the whole nature of habit – right? – immediately.
48:40 MZ: But you see the particular.
48:43 K: Habit, I said, whether it is one habit or ten.
48:46 MZ: But there are endless habits that we need in order to exist.
48:51 K: That’s a different matter. Don’t bring that in.
48:53 MZ: So you have to see that this a particular habit is not necessary.
48:59 K: You don’t have to explain that. I am an old hand at it.
49:02 MZ: I mean we have to see.

K: I don’t want your explanations. Do it. Forgive me, I'm not being rough or impolite.
49:15 SF: Sir, part of our original question that we wanted to ask you is why don’t we do it? You say, 'Do it'.
49:29 K: It’s fairly simple why you don’t do it. May we go into it?

SF: Yes, sir.
49:38 K: Why? Is it that we are incapable, because our life is so quick, incapable, or we've reduced ourself to incapacity, not to listen? Not to listen to anybody.
50:06 MZ: Krishnaji, it’s as though…

K: You don’t listen to K.
50:11 MZ: It’s as though our brains…

K: You read his books, hear his tapes over and over and over again.
50:19 SF: But not really listen.

K: No. Therefore, scratch the books, wipe them out. Don’t ever read the books anymore, for two or three months. Work, find out, instead of just going on in the old way. I repeated this. I repeat it again. Not repeat – K says this again, that one hardly ever listens. He has talked about it endlessly, the art of listening. Nobody does.
51:09 SF: Sir, may I ask something else that you've often talked about in relationship to this art of listening, which is, holding a question.

K: Yes, sir.
51:27 SF: That seems to be fundamental.

K: Yes, sir. You don’t… Let’s begin, that's a very interesting thing. I've got a question. I always try to find an answer to it – in books, or talking to somebody, or waiting for it to be answered. That means the brain is never with the question. That’s a simple fact, because I'm looking everywhere for an answer. Talk to the great pundits or some yogi or someone, so I never remain with the question. Right?
52:29 SF: Yes, can we talk about this?

K: I'm going into it, I'm doing it. So, can the brain stop trying to find an answer? You understand? I put to you a question. Which question shall we put?

SF: Why don’t you listen?
52:56 K: That’s a question, why don’t you listen? When you ask me, K, ‘Why don’t you listen?’ my brain instantly says, ‘Quite right, I don’t listen to you’. First of all, I have never listened to anybody. I'm vague, or I've inherited this vagueness, or my mother was vague – you know all the excuses, or realities, genetic reality. And I say, ‘Yes, I recognise all those’, and I say, ‘Look, I want to listen to this man or to that woman’. I listen, not say, ‘I'm going to try, not going to try, it’s too tiring,’ etc. She wants to tell me something and I listen. No, wait, wait. I listen first. I can’t hold it before I listen to it.
54:25 SF: But then one doesn’t listen.

K: So, not how to hold the question. Why don’t I listen? What’s wrong with me? Why don’t I listen to something which you are trying to tell me? Because I want to do so many other things or I am reading a book, or, ‘Please, later’. Or she says, ‘Stop reading, I want to tell you something’. I am interested in the book, not what she is going to say. So, ‘Be quick’, I say to her, I am interested in this. ‘Be quick, tell me briefly.’ She can’t. I have already made her irritated. So I won’t say anything. I listen. Put the book down, or whatever I am doing, because I want to listen to you. That’s my feeling, the urgency of listening. Right? And I listen to you, and I see in listening there should be no reaction, because then I am not listening. Right? It’s an obvious fact. If I want to listen to you, I can’t say, ‘I have no time’, or, ‘I am bored with you, don’t repeat that’. But I want to listen to you, so I listen. My brain is quiet – that’s the point. My brain is entirely quiet in listening – not saying, ‘I should, should not', or 'It’s an old habit’, etc. I am listening. I don’t know if you have noticed, when the brain is silent, it can listen infinitely – most terribly acute, sensitive, alive. So, can I listen to you who tell me I have got a habit? Somebody told me the other day, after one of these gatherings, he said, ‘Sir, may I say something?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘You are stuck in a groove.’ I didn’t object, or feel the boy is right. I went to the room I occupy, and I said, 'Is this a fact?' Is it a fact that I am stuck in groove? Probably I am, I haven’t noticed. So, let’s examine. You follow? I went into it, not taking sides – I am right, he is wrong. Your whole sense of aliveness – if I can use that word – your whole sense of active observation. You tell me I am stuck in words or in a groove. I am listening because that’s terrible to be stuck in a groove. I am getting to be old – perhaps I am. Not getting – I'm old. I may be stuck, and you may be quite right. So, I am watching where I am stuck. I don’t deny it, I am watching. Right? Will you do it, will you watch it that way? Don’t tell me, ‘I'll try’ – then you are off. That’s just an excuse. Will you do it? Will you listen, so entirely that you see the actuality of your own idiocy? Sorry to use that word.
59:24 MZ: Sir, is there something that keeps you so watchful? Is this quality of immensely alert watchfulness something...? It’s not apart from you, it is the way you are.
59:44 K: So, if you are inalert, not alert, why?
59:48 MZ: Yes, why?
59:49 K: Not enough sleep or you are used to a kind of sluggishness, or a dozen reasons. Those reasons don’t explain this, explain that you don’t listen. And also, we are getting old. The brain for so long has carried on a particular direction or particular habit and it can’t change. They talk about change, they talk about, but they can’t.
1:00:31 MZ: I think this is not a matter of age, though it could be, because one sees it at all ages, as though the brain were in layers.

K: Don’t talk about all those things.
1:00:44 MZ: Things do not penetrate people the way they do with you.
1:00:48 K: First see how – etc.
1:00:52 SF: Sir, may one ask then…?

K: No, ask – not, 'May'.
1:00:56 SF: This listening, is this something which is available to everyone, despite the years of non-listening?

K: Why are you putting that question? If I want to listen to good music, I want to listen, there is no… It’s so simple.

SF: Sir, I ask because even though all of these things you have said, it’s still not done.

K: It’s up to you. I come along and say to you, ‘Smoking is bad for your health, it affects your heart, affects your brain – right? – affects real sensitiveness’. You say, ‘Quite right, sir’ but you go on. Which means what?
1:01:56 SF: That you haven’t seen something.
1:02:00 K: The taste has become more important than to find out. I know several people, they have told me, ‘I smoke though I know it’s very bad for me, coughing and all that. I like the taste of it’. That’s the end of it.
1:02:20 MZ: There is the element of physical addiction in something like smoking, but this superficiality of attention which is in so many people...
1:02:33 K: We're not talking about so many people, I am asking you. As you are good enough to talk to me, I am asking you to pay attention, listen. Pay attention to what you are doing. You may have to do ten things, but one thing at a time. I think all this is extraneous talking, useless talking. You tell me something and it rings true, and because I want to be truthful, I listen very carefully. I don’t want to be a hypocrite. I like you to point out to me whether I am hypocrite or not. I don’t say, ‘I am sorry’. I like to be pointed out if I am hypocrite. And you say, ‘Yes, you do this contrary to that, you say one thing and do something else’. I don’t object, on the contrary, I receive it. I basically feel that hypocrisy is terrible for me. So I say, ‘All right, I'm very glad you told me, I'm going to watch it’. I'm on the top of it already.
1:04:27 SF: Yes, sir.
1:04:37 K: It’s five minutes to one, sir. Basta?

SF: Basta.