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GSBR74DT06 - Creating an atmosphere of complete security
Brockwood Park, UK - 14 September 1974
Discussion with Teachers 06



0:01 This is J. Krishnamurti's first discussion with teachers at Brockwood Park, 1974.
0:09 Krishnamurti: I believe we are going to have four or five dialogues together during the next four or five days, isn’t it, all about education and what to do at Brockwood when the children come, and so on.
0:30 That’s right? They are starting a school in Canada, western Canada, Vancouver, and you are starting…
0:45 thinking of starting one in Austria. So, how shall we discuss this thing?
0:59 (Pause) Shall we begin as though we were just starting schools here and in Canada and in Austria, and what to do?
1:29 Is that all right?
1:36 We have a problem with the educator and what is his relationship to the student, who comes conditioned; whether, in teaching, in being in contact with the child, the student, whether the teacher and the student mutually uncondition themselves.
2:10 That’s one problem. That is, the educator in his education, teaching, being in relationship with the student, whether he can uncondition himself; at the same time uncondition the student.
2:34 That’s one problem. Then the other is: how to create an atmosphere, an ambience, where the student as well as the teacher, the educator, feels completely at home?
3:15 An atmosphere in which there is a sense of seriousness.
3:28 Not with a long face and all that, but a sense of very dedicated seriousness and…
3:38 Do you want to close it, sir?
3:44 Q: What do people want?
3:49 K: Oh, are there any more coming?
3:53 Q: I don’t know.
3:55 K: Oh. Do you want it closed?
3:58 Q: I wouldn’t mind. It’s a little draughty.
4:06 Q: Yes.
4:08 Q: Closed?
4:10 Q: Air.
4:12 K: A dedicated seriousness and a feeling of a reality… a feeling of irrevocable steadiness.
4:48 I don’t know if I am making myself… We’ll go into all this.
5:04 And a sense of security both for the educator and the educated.
5:14 Can we create this atmosphere? – the second point.
5:22 Third: whether it is at all possible to uncondition both the student and ourselves within a very short period.
5:42 Those are the three problems I think that would cover most of our problems.
5:50 That is, one: whether in the very act of teaching, being in relationship with the student, whether we can uncondition ourselves as well as the student.
6:11 Then, second point: an atmosphere where there is a dedicated seriousness – without the long face and with laughter and all the rest of it – where there is a sense of feeling that we are very serious people, that we are not… that this is our job, this is our life, this is our whole concern; and to make the student feel completely secure, which he is not secure at home or in other schools, but here to be completely secure.
7:19 Which doesn’t mean that he can do what he likes, but the feeling of security.
7:28 And third: whether this unconditioning can take place within a very, very short period.
7:46 Can we go into this? Shall we go into this?
7:59 The student comes to these schools, in Canada, Austria or here, having already been conditioned: drink, smoke, vulgarity, talk of sex, the general violence, oppression, fear, smoke, drink – you know, the whole social structure with its influence does shape the mind of a student, and the other boys, the parents with their self-concern and so on and so on - they come here.
8:48 Can we uncondition that student and ourselves in our relationship with each other, in the class, on the playing field, while we are eating, the whole… or the garden, whatever it is – the whole of it.
9:10 Can we do this? If that is the essence of education, if we all agree.
9:22 Not agree - if we see that is the truth or the reality of a right kind of education, if we all see this together then what shall we do together?
9:41 How shall we, as older people who are already conditioned, help or bring about a freeing ourselves from our own past traditions and all the rest of it, and also help the student at the same time?
10:03 Is this possible?
10:19 (Pause) You see, the student comes here probably with reluctance, pushed by the parents; and the student generally wants to lead a life like the rest of the gang, like the rest of the world; he comes here with a feeling of rebellion, or he likes the place and there is a sense of freedom, therefore he feels he can do what he likes; and a feeling of strange people living in a strange way because vegetarians, non-smoking, non-drinking, therefore there is this whole sense of antagonistic attitude when he comes.
11:51 Dorothy Simmons: Not really, Krishnaji, because we’ve already gone into it somewhat.
11:55 K: I know, but I am repeating it for the others.
11:58 DS: But I mean, they have been sifted through quite a number of times.
12:04 K: Quite a number of times. Here in Brockwood, I am talking. Brockwood is slightly different; there they are beginning. You see, as I said, we’ll begin as though we knew… for the first time together.
12:17 Right, sir? Brockwood has had the advantage of five years before you two, Austria and… Montague Simmons: (Inaudible) …a little bit exaggerating, I think, in any case, that those who come to Brockwood are not usually sort of rebellious or anything of that sort; they come with the idea that this is something that is different, so I…
12:42 DS: They’ve heard you talk, you see, many of them.
12:45 K: Yes, but we admit Brockwood is five years ahead (laughs), or Brockwood has the advantage of having a gathering here, the students and the parents have heard talks, and they have been rather cooked.
13:05 DS: Yes, but wouldn’t the others too, Krishnaji?
13:09 K: I am not sure. I am not sure. That’s why I am going a little bit into detail.
13:19 I hope you don’t mind. If you don’t want to go into detail, let’s drop it and go on.
13:25 Q: No, I think the problem exists at all; maybe Brockwood has some special… (inaudible) K: …advantages.
13:38 Q: Yes, but the problem exists… (inaudible) K: So, let’s put it this way. The student comes here conditioned, and can we uncondition him as well as ourselves?
13:55 If we agree that’s the essence of education. To give him freedom, which is intelligence.
14:07 Not freedom to do what he likes but the freedom which comes with intelligence. Now, how is this to be done?
14:24 Right? Am I, an educator at Brockwood or Austria or Canada, western Canada, am I really serious in my intention, that it is really what I want to do as an educator?
14:55 I want to do it because I see very clearly what is happening in the world. I see very clearly the whole phenomenon of existence. The whole thing, not just a fragment of it. Therefore I say, this is the most sacred job I have got to do, this sacred responsibility, because the future generation is in my hands.
15:24 There may be two but that doesn’t matter, or a hundred, but they are in my hands, I am responsible for them.
15:37 And do I feel it is my dedicated responsibility?
15:52 And if I do then how shall I, in my relationship with the small community with which I live, a residential school - my responsibility is to see that the student and myself begin to free ourselves from the corruption of society.
16:32 Put it… Now, how shall I do it?
16:42 And I am very serious – you follow? – it’s not just a plaything with me. I am dreadfully serious about it. Now, what shall I do?
17:03 If this is your problem, what will you do, sirs and ladies?
17:18 Q: Are you saying that if we are serious…
17:25 K: Ah, I take it for granted that you are.
17:29 Q: You take it for granted but if that’s not the case that’s where the problem is.
17:34 K: Let’s begin. If that is not the case then what shall we do?
17:51 Then how shall we have a nucleus – let’s put it that way – who are serious, a few who are really serious, and at the periphery, on the outside have semi-serious people?
18:09 Now, won’t the semi-serious people affect the student?
18:16 Q: Certainly.
18:17 K: So, how are you going to deal with this problem? I am semi-serious, you are serious, and there is the student in the middle (laughs).
18:28 Right? I infect him and you infect him, and he is lost.
18:38 Q: Yes, that atmosphere of security…
18:41 K: Is gone.
18:42 Q: …is gone.
18:43 K: Therefore what shall we do?
18:56 Because more and more, one observes, people are not serious. You understand, sir?
19:02 Q: Well, I mean, without a doubt I think everyone thinks they are serious.
19:06 K: I know.
19:07 Q: I mean, I think I’m serious.
19:10 K: So what shall we do with me who is semi-serious? How will you prevent my influence or my slackness, indifference, or my sentimentality, you know, all that, indoctrinating the child, the student?
19:33 This is a problem, sir.
19:48 And if you are serious, as you say you are, then your responsibility is to – you follow?
19:55 – becomes much more serious. How will you prevent my corruption, all the rest of it, influence?
20:08 How will you prevent it? And it’s your job to prevent it (laughs).
20:18 Sorry. How will you do it?
20:20 Q: Is it not that I have to see how conditioned my own mind is, who is always in this conditioned way, a relationship with other conditioned ways?
20:40 K: Yes, sir, but we’ll come to that. Let’s take this problem one by one. I am not serious, I’m not totally dedicated as you are.
20:59 I am lazy by nature, I am rather superficial, and so on.
21:08 How will you prevent my influence corrupting the student? He is already corrupt in his own way, but I add more to it. How will you prevent it? Brian Jenkins: Sir, surely there is no action of prevention, but there may be a quality of being within myself that…
21:32 K: Yes, all right. All right. Tell me what is your quality which will prevent, which will block, which will be stronger than mine – put it that way – which will have greater weight, greater beauty, greater sense of something other than mine.
21:58 How will you bring that about?
22:00 Q: If someone is doing some conditioning and I react against it, I mean, certainly I’m not…
22:18 K: Sir… yes, it’s much more subtle than that, isn’t it, really?
22:21 Q: It’s too… I mean, in a sense I don’t know where I stand. I mean, I can’t…
22:26 K: Yes, but what… Go into it, sir, it’s much more subtle. I do everything you ask me to. I go around.
22:33 Q: Everything, yes.
22:34 K: But the subtle form of influence is going on.
22:41 How will you deal with that? I mean, this is the whole problem of life.
22:52 J. Siddoo: I think we’ll have to weed them out.
23:01 I mean, as we discovered, we really don’t like what we are going into.
23:13 I think the people that are not serious will really find that…
23:22 K: They may drop out.
23:23 JS: Yes.
23:24 K: They may drop out. They generally do, but… because I’ve had quite a bit of… going into all this in India and other places, so I know a little bit about it. I don’t say I know all about it; I say a little bit about it. This is one of the… they drop out. But they like the place. I like the place. I like what you are talking about but I am not totally with you. You follow? I like the easy friendship, easy life, easy way of… you know, swim with the current and so on and so on.
23:58 And also probably I can’t get a very good job outside, therefore I am in here. So take all that in.
24:05 Q: And probably you also believe that you are really serious.
24:11 K: Yes, yes.
24:12 Q: You are not aware of it.
24:13 K: So how will you deal with me? Because your responsibility is much greater than mine.
24:23 You follow, sir? How will you then deal with me?
24:27 JS: Talk it over with you.
24:36 K: I talk it over with you. I say, ‘You’re quite right.’ (Laughs) This is happening in India. I’ve been there forty years, every year, and they are, ‘Quite right, sir,’ and they are back again the same old place when I go back the next year.
24:51 So how will you deal with this thing?
24:59 (Pause) I mean, they’ve often told me in India - in other places as well as India - ‘You come like a storm and thank God when you leave!’ (Laughs) JS: When the storm stays in one place it’s bound to have its own effect.
25:39 K: I know, therefore it’s better not stay in one place too long. (Laughs) That’s a different matter. So, that’s one point.
25:57 If we all agree that education, real education is to awaken that intelligence which brings freedom from conditioning, if we all agree then let’s move, otherwise we’re stuck.
26:24 How shall I as an educator, either in this, Brockwood, Austria or Canada – A, B, C, that’s good!
26:36 (Laughs) (Laughter) Mary Zimbalist: Don’t forget the other A and B… (inaudible) K: Yes, there’s going to be one in California too.
26:55 Two Cs!
26:56 MZ: (Inaudible) K: How shall I help to uncondition the student and myself in my relationship with him throughout the day?
27:14 Come on, sir, let’s discuss this.
27:34 Would it be beneath one’s dignity – I’m using the word dignity because one is a little older and so on – beneath one’s dignity to talk about oneself being conditioned in front of the student?
28:00 Q: No.
28:02 K: You understand what it means? I’ve got ten students under me. I’m responsible. Would I begin by talking to them what conditioning is and that my mind is conditioned, and what that conditioning does in its action in relationship to human beings?
28:39 Can I talk openly with the student?
28:42 JS: Yes, but I feel there would be, besides the talking…
28:49 K: Ah, I’m beginning. I’m beginning. Slowly. Piano, piano. I want to find out if I am open enough to talk about it to the student.
29:12 And am I open enough to discover for myself the effects of this conditioning?
29:22 Q: Isn’t this what you mean by serious?
29:27 K: Oh, yes. I’m just opening the chapters. Or am I shy, nervous, apprehensive that the student might discover something ugly in me – you follow?
29:41 – therefore I won’t talk about it? So am I willing to talk about my conditioning quite openly, so that I’m not ashamed of it and therefore afraid of it?
29:59 And the student feels I’m not ashamed or afraid of it, therefore I’m willing to open my hand to him.
30:07 Can I do this?
30:15 Whatever I’m doing, in the garden, in the kitchen, in the classroom, eating, I’m just – you follow?
30:24 – I say, ‘Look, this is what I am; and this is what you are.
30:36 So both of us are in the same relationship.
30:43 So can we both of us move from there? Not that I’m superior and you are inferior. Not that I’m instructing you how to be free from conditioning, but together let’s be open about it and move together.’ Ah, marvellous.
31:13 You follow?
31:14 Q: And not to fall in an automatic… (inaudible) K: No. That means no… I’m not an authority. You follow? Therefore it is moving together. The Sanskrit word for that is sangha, which means moving together.
31:31 Now, am I capable of this?
31:42 I am capable if I’m serious. I want to shatter this; this wall which has been built around my mind.
31:57 At any price I want to do that. Doris Pratt: Would it perhaps shatter the sense of security of a child who wants to feel that you know better than he?
32:09 K: Ah, no, I am going to help him.
32:16 I am going to help him. I’m going to point out. Security is very important for the child.
32:20 DP: That’s what I mean.
32:21 K: But does…
32:22 DP: (Inaudible) K: I’ll go into it with him. Does security lie in being conditioned?
32:27 DP: Security lies in feeling that you know better… (inaudible) K: Ah, no, no.
32:35 No, you think I know better. Probably I do. But you make me an example, you make me into an authority, you make me into an example, and so on.
32:47 Look, I discuss with him, you see? I am in relationship with him which is completely open.
33:07 I think this open feeling gives security, much more than the idea of the other.
33:17 Q: You feel you are in the same boat then.
33:22 K: Yes, we are in the same boat.
33:29 After all, you can put that openness as love, but I am hesitating to use that word because that somehow it becomes terribly sentimental and rather gooey.
33:40 Q: And at the same time, if that’s the feeling that’s prevailing, a student can come to anyone.
33:52 K: No, can you do it? Not ‘if it prevails’. The condition – that is another form of conditioning. Can I - not ‘if I can do it, that’ll be all right’, but can I do it?
34:06 MZ: Isn’t there a subtle balance in this, sir, in which… it seems to me there is a danger that the person initiating it, the teacher, will suddenly put himself on the table, as it were.
34:27 K: I am doing it now.
34:29 MZ: No, but may I finish?
34:31 K: Yes.
34:32 MZ: Which sort of puts the focus on a professional teacher, which can be alarming to student, whereas if you were discussing the quality of conditioning and the teacher is willing to lay his conditioning on the table just as much as anybody else, then it becomes a shared thing…
34:41 K: I quite agree.
34:45 MZ: …rather than saying, ‘Here’s mine,’ and the student may recoil from that.
34:54 BJ: He might even exploit it.
34:56 K: Of course, sir. But here we are grown up. We’re not students here. We’re discussing it as a problem. If I was dealing with ten students I would talk about it quite differently.
35:11 I wouldn’t talk about being open, I would begin very, very carefully.
35:20 That’s an art. Oh, I would do it in… oh, quite easy to do it.
35:31 DP: And also it implies that we are aware of our own conditioning enough to be able to… (inaudible) K: Ah, no.
35:38 I am open enough to find out in my relationship with the student. I am inviting him to tell me.
35:46 DS: That is the difference here, is that you are inviting him.
35:56 The difference is that you are inviting him and in that invitation there is an initiative.
35:59 K: Initiative, quite, quite. I will tell him, he will tell me.
36:02 Q: (Inaudible) K: I am putting it brutally. Now, please, this is… I wouldn’t ask the student to tell me. He’ll say, ‘Sir, you are a blasted idiot,’ and he wouldn’t… and that stops it.
36:19 But I would do it, if I was an educator and the student was there, I would do it quite differently.
36:26 I wouldn’t talk to him like this.
36:34 But we are talking this way because… to get… pushing, going into it quickly, otherwise we’ll just…
36:41 Q: Isn’t it sometimes students find out that you are conditioned and they cannot say it to you?
36:47 K: Of course, of course. So, no, I am leaving the student alone. Now in this, with us, I am not concerned with the student for the moment.
37:03 Am I capable of talking about my conditioning openly to the student?
37:11 Q: Or what hinders me.
37:14 K: I beg your pardon, sir?
37:18 Q: What are the hindrances?
37:20 DP: (Inaudible) K: Oh, there may be several: I am ashamed or I think I’m a very… etc., etc.
37:29 I mean, I’ve got all kinds of images and absurdities which are going to prevent me. But all those absurdities and images disappear the moment I say, ‘Look, I want to know.
37:42 I am open.’ Then, how shall I, being open and knowing the tricks the student will play upon me: exploit, cunning, use me, everything, and being aware of all that, how shall I help him to be aware of his own conditioning and the feeling that he must be free from that conditioning?
38:19 Q: It would come out of the relationship.
38:33 K: How shall… Yes, I am related to you. You are the student. Sorry, you are the student. I am open to you. I say, ‘Look, I am conditioned’ – I won’t talk like this in front of a student – ‘and you are conditioned.’ I point out what conditioning means: nationality, division of people, classes, economic influence, social… the whole religious, and so on and so on; I point it out to him, the family, the authority of the family, the authority… and so on and so on; I say, ‘All this is your conditioning and this is also my conditioning.’ Now, how shall I help you, and in that relationship help each other, to uncondition myself as well as you?
39:39 I am vain. I think I am… I want you all to do something better than… – you follow? – I am asserting myself, I am aggressive, I am this, I am that, and how shall that aggression disappear in my relationship with you as a teacher and you the student?
40:08 Q: As the aggression comes up, as one would feel it welling up in the intercourse… (inaudible) K: I don’t want to take a whole year to get rid of it, the damned stuff.
40:27 I want it to end in a week’s time because we’ve got much more to do than that.
40:36 You follow? I feel it’s urgent. And feeling urgent I say, ‘What am I to do with this group?’ Put yourself in that position.
40:56 Not if. Not, ‘If the thing…’ You are in that position as a teacher, who is dedicated, who is serious, who says, ‘This is the real education; there is no other education; given mathematics and all the rest of it, physics, but this is real education.’ And how will you deal with this situation?
41:19 And you have to alter the conditioning, a very, very short time.
41:31 And the urgency is there.
41:34 Q: You mean break the conditioning.
41:40 K: You have the urgency. You’ve got to do it quickly, because if you don’t do it quickly the thickening process goes on.
41:48 Q: The walls.
41:50 K: The wall thickens and he is… at the end of the five years he’s as dead as anybody else.
42:01 So if that is your problem, how will you deal with this?
42:12 Q: The moment I’m exploring something new together with somebody else…
42:22 K: I beg your pardon? I can’t quite…
42:26 Q: The moment I am exploring or doing a job together, in the garden or in a class or whatever, newly, with somebody else; if I am actually working with him it seems a lot is possible.
42:42 K: Yes, you’re working with me now. I am your student.
42:44 Q: Oh.
42:45 K: (Laughs) I’m sorry!
42:46 Q: (Inaudible) …conditioned.
42:47 K: I am your student. What will you do with me, how will you talk to me? What is your… how do you go together into this? Because it’s together, it’s not… you are not… we are moving together into this.
43:06 Come on, sir.
43:08 Q: Why haven’t we been able to break through this conditioning in all these years?
43:17 K: I don’t know. Forget it. Now I’m asking you now. Forget why we have not done it all these years, because I don’t know. The cause is really… there may be one cause or multiple causes, and if you look for the causes it will be endless.
43:35 The fact is we have to break it down. Can you break it down within a very short period?
43:44 Q: Well, do we want to break it down?
43:47 K: Ah, that’s what I said. If you don’t then the whole circus is over. (Laughs) DP: You see clearly what it is you have to break down; it’s not a series of aggression here and… (inaudible) K: No, the whole thing.
44:07 That’s fairly simple. We’ll discuss it.
44:10 DP: What is the conditioning?
44:11 K: If that is what you want to discuss, it’s fairly simple to talk about it.
44:15 DP: What is the total conditioning?
44:19 K: Ah. The me. Me, aggression; me wanting to possess, the me wanting to dominate; the me says, ‘This is mine; do it my way,’ the me that says, ‘I am better than you, I’m cleverer than you’ - the me, the egocentric activity that’s going on everlastingly; and I want in this education to break it down.
44:43 DP: And can you put the me on the operating table or…
44:48 K: Oh, I am doing it; we are doing it.
44:52 Q: But, Krishnaji, isn’t openness in itself not always the greatest inspiration you can give a young… another one?
45:00 K: I don’t want to inspire. You are wrong; I don’t want to use that word. I don’t want to inspire them.
45:07 Q: Well, all right, but… No, but openness opens the other one at the same time.
45:14 K: I don’t know. I am fairly open, but I’m… Don’t go into it.
45:18 Q: It seems that when I don’t know, and I’m doing a practical job with somebody else or a job in any way, we exchange...
45:33 K: That’s different, isn’t it, madame? A practical job is easy. Together we can mow the lawn, together we can dig in the garden.
45:44 But this is a different… psychological process is much more subtle, much more alive.
45:53 You need to deal with it differently.
45:55 Q: Well, you mention the total conditioning but in fact it reveals itself bit by bit, doesn’t it?
46:03 K: It doesn’t matter, sir, it will reveal. I want to find out how you would deal with this thing. You are the teachers, how will you deal with this problem? Come on, Mr Joe. Ted Cartee: When they say what… correct me what… with what seems to be…
46:25 K: Keep to the problem, sir.
46:33 TC: Yes, right. That is, I see that if you’re the student or if there is a student and there is this sharing of what he sees and what’s happening in the relationship, that at some point we will notice, even in the way we are sharing it, the way we may be putting some of the self or the me, in giving shades of meaning to trying to share the… understanding the conditioning, it would seem that we would get further into the conditioning.
47:22 K: No, Ted, listen to me. You are the student, I am the teacher. I’ve got a responsibility. My responsibility is that within a very short period I must not only uncondition myself but also you.
47:45 Because I feel that is the essence of education, because it not only brings freedom and in that freedom there is an intelligence which is really an extraordinary thing.
47:58 Not yours or my intelligence – it’s something… total intelligence. I want… I see that absolutely. Now, I want – not I want – in my responsibility to you I want – I will use want, that’s quickly – I want that intelligence to be awakened in you.
48:22 TC: Yes.
48:23 K: Not over ten years - I haven’t… time is much too short. You follow? And I say to myself, now there is Ted who is conditioned. He comes here with all his conditioning. And the various causes of that conditioning we won’t go into. Now, what am I to do in my relationship with you?
48:44 TC: Well, we’ve looked at each other sharing, communicating about the conditioning.
48:54 That was…
48:55 K: No, I talk to you. Wait a minute. I talk to you. I said, ‘Look, Ted, I am conditioned. I’m a Hindu, or I am a Christian or I am a communist. I am this and I want to express my desire much more strongly than you do, because I’m much more clever, I am… etc.
49:17 – I want to assert myself, I am dominating myself, I want to possess you, I want to tell you what to do, I am a…
49:24 You know, all that. I’m open, I talk about it.
49:33 In my talking to you about it I must be very careful that you don’t exploit me, take one of my weaknesses and kick it around - which you are willing to do because that’s your game.
49:49 So, knowing this, how shall I deal with you?
49:58 I talk to you. I say to you - not just one day, one minute; I’m at you; whether you are asleep or awake I’m on the… you know, drive… it’s like a river that is pushing you.
50:15 Pushing you in the sense, happily, easily, together we are moving.
50:22 I talk to you – how you sit at table, how you eat, the way of your conversation, the usage of words.
50:36 When you say, ‘I want to do this, sir,’ I say, ‘Wait a minute. Now, what do you mean, I?’ You follow? Keep at it, never let go (laughs). In the classroom, I would do the same. I’d say, ‘Mathematics, all right, but first before we talk mathematics, I want this clear between us, that we are here for this thing.’ I would put it gently, quietly, happily, but not drive it in.
51:16 You know, all that. And I would say, ‘Look, in the class room we’re going to study mathematics presently, but the principal thing is, in learning, to learn.’ And I would go into the whole implication of learning.
51:32 You follow? I’d keep on adding chapter after chapter, page after page, every day.
51:38 TC: Now, part of what’s going to happen in that is the response which would be, ‘Oh, but that isn’t what really happens.’ Or the student would say, ‘I don’t feel that’s the way…’ K: Therefore I would stop it.
51:51 I would say, ‘Look, why don’t feel that way?’ You follow?
51:55 TC: Right. Now, there, then another thing will happen instead, that you and the student will become much more clear in the sharing.
52:07 K: That’s right.
52:08 TC: And that’s… at those points, what happens? I mean, what… Because at that point it seems that you go beyond your regular awareness and there’s just a… (inaudible) K: No, I would leave him alone.
52:26 I would leave him alone. I say, ‘Now we’ve understood, now let two hours, three hours… play around, do what you like.’ It’s like a, you know, elastic thing: pull and let go.
52:40 If you pull it all the time it’ll break.
52:43 Q: But in this relationship, Krishnaji, there must also be the insistence that it’s a two way process.
52:54 K: Together, sir, together.
52:56 Q: Obviously. But I’m not pointing out things to him; I’m not helping him.
53:00 K: Together. But you see, you are supposed to be older and therefore more responsible, more knowledgeable, more aware than me who is a student.
53:09 Q: Certainly, I have a quite a different function and with it responsibility.
53:13 K: So as a group, whether in Austria or Canada or ABC (laughs), do we want this to happen?
53:25 Is this our real intention?
53:36 Not verbal intention but deep intention.
53:55 I think if we could attack it, it releases our own creative energy, our minds become much more alive.
54:12 We’ll come back to that.
54:24 Then, how do you help to create this environment?
54:31 I think environment is very important; not ecology, I’m not talking of only that, but the atmosphere of the place.
54:46 The pub has a particular atmosphere; the church has a particular atmosphere; every place where people gather there is a certain kind of atmosphere.
55:00 Here we want an atmosphere where… – not I want it or you – let’s find out what kind of atmosphere is necessary – a sense of complete security both for the teacher and for the student.
55:22 I mean by security, in the sense not the security of self-expression.
55:30 I don’t know if I…
55:37 Because there is a freedom I want to express myself, which turns into aggression, my domination, my sense of importance and all the rest of that nonsense.
55:50 But can we create an atmosphere where there is a sense of complete security?
55:59 That means a security that is non-physical. We’ll produce the physical security - we’ll come to that - but a security which is non-physical.
56:12 Q: Wouldn’t that security come if the participants have a certain confidence?
56:20 K: I want to find out what it means, sir. What it means to create an atmosphere where people are together – you understand? – are moving in the same direction, with the same depth, with the same energy.
56:43 I don’t know if I…
56:49 MZ: Conditioning is a form of security to the person who is conditioned.
57:04 K: Yes, of course. You see, the Catholic Church, or any of these religious… and including communism, if you are totally innate, completely involved, completely absorbed in the belief of the virgin, the saviour, completely, there is undeniable security, but it is the security of illusion.
57:37 Q: One may say to me, ‘If I fall out of this then I am in the hell.’ K: Yes, yes.
57:44 Q: ‘So I must not fall out.’ K: Of course. So I’m just saying there is that kind of security, which has been our security: the nation, the belief, the Church, and the ideal and so on.
58:02 That is not security. That is like living in a fanciful world and say that is security.
58:14 Now, the sense of security we are talking about is - at least, please, I’m talking about it; let’s discuss it, I’m not saying it is the only – the sense of security is that we are together.
58:33 Not in fancy but together in the feeling that this is the only thing that matters.
58:50 Which is not a fancy but an actuality. I don’t know if…
58:56 Q: Reality.
58:57 K: That means we are living in reality, not in fiction.
59:16 And that reality is logical, that reality is sane, that reality can be thrashed out, broken to pieces; it can stand by itself, therefore it is something that is irrevocable, immovable.
59:34 I don’t know if I… And…
59:37 Q: But in a sense, it’s not that we have anything to teach but it’s that this is a - I don’t know what word to put in – that this is the way, this is the condition to understand so that you can by yourself…
1:00:07 K: Yes, sir, I think I understand what you are saying. Yes.
1:00:10 Q: Yes, but it’s not that we are teachers, it’s that we’re inviting people to participate.
1:00:12 K: No, we are talking of creating an atmosphere.
1:00:14 Q: An atmosphere.
1:00:17 K: An atmosphere of that security which comes from something totally whole, totally logical, totally sane.
1:00:26 DS: That can meet anything.
1:00:29 K: That can meet anything. Of course, naturally.
1:00:34 Q: The security that won’t leave the student because he leaves Brockwood.
1:00:39 K: What is that?
1:00:40 Q: You see, I mean a security that is with the student even when he leaves Brockwood.
1:00:47 K: Of course, naturally.
1:00:49 DS: (Inaudible) K: That is, can we create this or bring about this sense of sane, reasonable, logical action in our life which is unmovable?
1:01:11 You follow?
1:01:14 JS: Sir, the security you are talking about has no fear in it, whereas the security in we who have been conditioning is based on fear.
1:01:28 K: Yes, yes. Now, I want to find out how to create this atmosphere. Because the student comes into the… and he must feel it.
1:01:39 And I think that matters, because that will break down, help to break down his conditioning.
1:01:46 He enters into something that is vital, that is strong, that has got…
1:01:53 You follow, sir? Come on, sir! Now, how will you go about creating this? No, you can’t go about - how will this happen?
1:02:10 TC: Well, when it is the most important thing to you and when you are told that responsibility is consumed in that, how can it but help to take place?
1:02:38 K: You see, Ted, this is really quite a difficult problem because - not problem – it is quite a difficult thing because, you know, unless one is very, very clear, non-sentimental, non-reactionary activity – you understand what I mean? – you cannot have this.
1:03:04 If I depend on my moods – you follow? – one day I am very cheerful, next day I’m depressed, third day I am romantic, fourth day I am very serious, and third day I’m illogical, fifth day I’m very logical…
1:03:24 You see, because…
1:03:28 Q: Isn’t it worth looking at – no – is it worth looking at those facts, major facts of behaviour, and the implication being the letting go or the seeing of them in us, so that our characteristic of responsibility doesn’t include…
1:03:56 K: You know, you have walked in a forest, haven’t you? The forest tells you to be quiet.
1:04:06 The forest threatens you. The forest becomes a menace. The forest tells you to walk quietly, gently, don’t assert. It is the forest is telling you. The same way, the atmosphere tells you what to do. I don’t know… Not you behave rightly and create the atmosphere, but the very atmosphere says you can’t do certain things.
1:04:40 I was once walking in a wood, in a town near Madras. There were very few people in it and it was late in the evening, the sun had just set, and I entered that wood and I felt it was really threatening.
1:04:55 It didn’t want me there.
1:04:57 Q: Is that a fact or is that your… (inaudible) K: Oh no, all the monkeys had disappeared. I saw… it was a fact. I don’t know if you have walked in the woods; you must have been…
1:05:08 Q: Many times, but I can’t honestly say that I feel that the woods always called for silence.
1:05:14 K: Ah no, wait; I am going to tell you. It was darkish; it may have been my own sense of apprehension and… because there were all kinds of things, snakes about and so on.
1:05:25 And I come back and go away. Next day I come, there is none of that. I mean, that’s irrelevant; don’t bring that as an issue. What I am trying to say is the atmosphere itself says, behave.
1:05:42 Not I behave and create the atmosphere; which is entirely different; then I am creating an atmosphere according to my conditioning; DS: It’s the I am creates the atmosphere, which is the cause of the trouble.
1:06:04 K: Yes. I know, I know. That’s what I’m saying.
1:06:07 MZ: But to the degree that this atmosphere is to exist, you are posing it as something that we have to do something about; the atmosphere just isn’t sitting there.
1:06:19 K: No, we have to do, in the sense…
1:06:20 MZ: Yes, so we don’t project it out of ourselves but we do something about it.
1:06:22 K: Yes.
1:06:23 MZ: Now, what is that?
1:06:24 K: That’s what I am getting at.
1:06:33 I think it comes, doesn’t it – I don’t want to be too assertive about it – I think it comes, doesn’t it, when a group of people are living a life which is logical, sane, whole, and not fantastic, sentimental, emotional and moody.
1:06:56 That creates something.
1:07:07 Q: Does it come when a lot of people are listening well to each other?
1:07:10 K: Of course, of course. We have created the atmosphere now because we are talking about serious things.
1:07:22 Q: Well, partly this atmosphere is created by your willingness to call a meeting and to stand in front and… (inaudible) K: It all helps – a lovely day and a lovely place and all that helps but...
1:07:42 Now, when the student comes into this thing he must feel it. You follow? That will be his first shock. Shock - you understand what I mean? He says, ‘Good Lord, what is this? This doesn’t exist anywhere else. Here are a group of people who have this thing, who have created something which I am not quite sure I understand; I might like it…’ JS: When one sits very quietly one creates… an atmosphere is there.
1:08:31 K: Yes, but you see, there is a danger in that. Then it becomes very limited. Sorry.
1:08:41 MS: Very self-conscious too.
1:08:44 K: Very self-conscious, limited and personal. But we are talking, you know…
1:08:50 DS: Also, would you say, Krishnaji, it’s willingness?
1:08:58 I think willingness is too weak a word.
1:09:01 K: Of course, of course.
1:09:02 DS: It wouldn’t be enough to be willing.
1:09:03 K: No, no – everybody is willing.
1:09:04 DS: All too!
1:09:05 K: (Laughs) You see, because…
1:09:07 Q: No, I don’t think we are willing enough, I mean…
1:09:15 But I don’t want to seize on the word willing and I don’t want to defend it either, but by willing I mean capable or even…
1:09:28 Q: Available.
1:09:29 Q: I mean, do we do it? I mean, that’s the question.
1:09:32 K: Ah, that’s a different matter. Do we do it? It’s our responsibility to do it.
1:09:37 Q: Yes, but if we don’t… I mean, we may feel the responsibility but we also may feel something holding us, some fear or…
1:09:56 K: Ah, therefore…
1:09:59 DS: That is the whole difference. That is what makes the difference. If you are willing, we are all… most of us all too willing, but he burns with it, he is it.
1:10:06 K: No, no…
1:10:07 DS: And it must have a certain quality of that, without the sort of sitting down and saying, ‘Yes, this is it.’ It won’t come about, it doesn’t happen, won’t happen.
1:10:16 Q: Well, I mean, if that’s the only thing that can be done… I mean, we have to work with us.
1:10:20 K: No, sir, look. Look at the student now. He comes into this place, Brockwood or Austria or Canada, he comes into this place.
1:10:36 He must feel the utter welcome first, otherwise he is… – you follow?
1:10:46 Completely welcome. He must feel that.
1:10:58 Can we do that? The moment he enters that gate there is this sense of, ‘By Jove, these people want me here.’ (Pause) Not novitiate, you know, eleven years waiting at the outer gate and then on the twelfth year let him come in (laughs).
1:11:35 Can we do that? No, not by cheerful words because that’s cheap, but the feeling that, you know, it’s a nice place, you are welcome; like a good hostess I say, ‘Come right in.’ I think the first few minutes matter tremendously, the impact of it.
1:12:28 BJ: But those first few minutes are created by something already there.
1:12:40 K: We are doing this.
1:12:53 That’s our job.
1:13:00 (Pause) I come as a student, a strange place, I don’t know anybody here.
1:13:12 I’ve talked to Mrs D and written letters, telephone; my father brought me here, goes away, and I’m nervous, apprehensive, shy, nostalgic, wanting to return home, and I want to cry, I want…
1:13:37 You follow? And can all that be dissipated the moment he enters? Come on, sir. Ted, how would you do this, how would you physically do it?
1:13:58 You understand what I mean?
1:14:04 TC: Well, how would I physically do it, then that’s my action in those moments.
1:14:08 K: No.
1:14:09 DP: No, waiting at the front door or something?
1:14:11 K: What will you do? Today is the 24th of September (laughs), the school opens.
1:14:24 DS: But pretty grim, too, if we’re all waiting on the door step waiting to… (inaudible) K: Ah, no, no.
1:14:37 (Laughter) Q: (Inaudible) K: I would get more frightened (laughs).
1:14:46 TC: Well, in the army they strip them naked, cut off their hair… (Laughter) You’re not suggesting that.
1:14:53 K: (Laughs) Yes, give them a cold bath!
1:14:56 Q: (Inaudible) DP: Of course, it would be very appropriate sometimes!
1:15:03 K: (Laughs) That would be a real welcome, wouldn’t it?
1:15:08 Q: That would shock them.
1:15:11 K: What would you do, Ted?
1:15:18 What would be your physical action in this sense of welcome?
1:15:26 TC: Well, I know…
1:15:29 K: You know what we are asking?
1:15:37 Unconditioning, the sense of holiness, sense of sacredness, sense of logic, sanity, all that, and this feeling of utter, open welcome.
1:15:55 You know what we are asking? Are we asking the impossible? I think we should ask the impossible, otherwise what is possible becomes very cheap. Right? Now, we are asking the impossible. How will you respond to the impossible? You understand, Ted? What is your first reaction, or how will you meet those twenty or two boys or girls?
1:16:42 How will you meet them? Apart from showing their rooms and carrying, how will you meet them?
1:16:58 (Pause) TC: Well, I see the seriousness and the joy and the fact that they are younger…
1:17:21 K: I’m not interested in your philosophy - how will you meet them? Tell me. (Laughter) DS: But Krishnaji, he does. He goes to the station, he takes the car, it’s probably five o clock in the morning and he meets them.
1:17:35 K: No, no. I understand that, the station, but here he…
1:17:38 DS: Yes, but in the course of doing that, in the action of doing that, he also talks with them.
1:17:43 K: Yes, I understand all that.
1:17:44 DS: And something comes across while he’s doing that.
1:17:47 K: They are coming there, crossing that grill (laughs), and how will you have the sense of... how will you convey it to them?
1:17:58 DS: Well, he conveys it; he doesn’t obviously say it in words.
1:18:03 K: No, tell me…
1:18:05 Q: Krishnaji, I’m looking forward to seeing them, I’m wanting to meet them, I’m pleased they’re coming, and if I really feel that then…
1:18:15 K: I understand all that, but you understand the innards of it? The innards. Joe Zorskie: Well, I see the innards of it having nothing to do with anything else. I see that there is no involvement with…
1:18:34 I see the kind of things that a person also could have going on inside them that make it incomplete, make it impure, that make…
1:18:44 And I…
1:18:45 K: I mean, you can’t meet them with your mood.
1:18:50 JZ: Yes.
1:18:51 K: With your highbrow philosophy, with your feeling angry, if you are aggressive - all that must be out of you when you welcome these people.
1:19:08 You are not converting them, you are not doing any propaganda, so you are…
1:19:18 TC: Well, would we meet them?
1:19:21 K: Then who will meet them?
1:19:22 TC: I mean, meet them in the sense that often they’ll be expecting to be met, and confronted or they’ll be wanting to test and they’ll be wanting to feel us out…
1:19:29 K: You are going to meet them. Yes, you are going to meet them, sir. I’m making… How will you, Mr Joe, how will you convey this feeling of, this is a very, very serious group, this is a group of people who are really logical, healthy, sane, and therefore holy people – holy, you understand? – and they offer you security and you must enter into that.
1:20:08 You follow?
1:20:09 Q: I follow.
1:20:10 K: How will you create this thing?
1:20:11 JZ: Well, you once said that you wouldn’t lift a finger to help them.
1:20:18 K: Ah, I am not going to. (Laughs) I am asking you how you would do this, how you will…
1:20:26 JZ: Well, I think that’s a good thing.
1:20:27 K: Yes, sir.
1:20:28 JZ: I mean, either a student is going to come in with the right attitude or he’s not.
1:20:36 K: Ah, you can’t. The poor chap, you can’t ask him right attitude right off.
1:20:39 JZ: Right. But if he doesn’t, I mean, if he doesn’t have the right… (inaudible) K: No, look, sir, he comes puzzled, he comes willing, he comes unwilling, he comes frightened, he comes nervous, unhappy or homely – you follow? – he comes with that feeling.
1:20:49 JZ: And he’s going to try to escape from that feeling somehow.
1:20:55 Q: Not escape. He’s going to just… those feelings will be replaced with a feeling of, ‘What’s going on here?’ or a feeling of…
1:21:04 K: That… You see, therefore…
1:21:06 DP: A feeling that this is the right place I’ve come to.
1:21:09 K: You have to create this instantly, not drag it out.
1:21:16 Q: Give them an atmosphere without fear?
1:21:21 K: Yes, we said that, but it is more than that.
1:21:23 Q: It isn’t…
1:21:24 Q: It seems to me one of the first things is when we meet them really take in what we see.
1:21:35 Q: Surely it’s the depth of my response in listening to that person in that second, to myself and to the person.
1:21:46 K: No, you see, the student must feel he is… you are concerned totally with him, not with your blasted moods and your sexual appetites and your…
1:21:58 Q: You have to be empty of any of that.
1:22:01 K: He is the jewel! (Laughs) Q: Of course, when he’s met at the airport… (inaudible) K: I tried this, sir, one year when I was in India with a group of students.
1:22:15 It worked really extraordinarily well. But then afterwards I had to leave and the thing went.
1:22:20 JZ: You tried what?
1:22:24 K: This kind of thing.
1:22:26 Q: You are just there for the student, that’s what’s happening. Right?
1:22:31 K: No, we will get the meaning of it presently. We’ll discuss this. We’ve got five days - good Lord.
1:22:36 DS: Because it’s a very awkward moment sometimes, Krishnaji. I can remember meeting somebody and feeling like that. I’d come to meet that person and he sat on his trunk, strumming a guitar, smoking a cigarette, turned his head and said, ‘Hiya, Dot!’ (Laughter) Q: Well, Dot it is then!
1:23:10 K: Then you want to kick him. (Laughter) Q: Did you?
1:23:13 MS: The immigration officer nearly turned him out.
1:23:14 DS: Yes, the immigration officer we had to sort of humour before we could get hold of him.
1:23:21 K: Quite, quite.
1:23:34 (Laughs) I think it matters very much the feeling that we are doing things together.
1:23:57 I think that is really one of the basic things: moving together.
1:24:10 We’d better stop now, ten to one, for lunch, and the dog is waiting.
1:24:18 (Laughs)