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SA61T4 - There is no learning, there is only seeing
Saanen, Switzerland - 1 August 1961
Public Talk 4



0:00 This is J. Krishnamurti's fourth public talk in Saanen, 1961.
0:07 We were saying, last time we met, that seriousness is that urge, the intention to go to the very end of things, to discover the essence; and that if there is not that urge, that compulsive energy that drives one to discover what is true, I’m afraid these discussions, these talks here will have very little significance.
1:17 And I would like this morning—and it is a pity to talk on a lovely morning like this—to go into the question of humility and learning.
1:42 Of course, humility is not that pretentious vanity—vanity which cloaks under the name of humility—being vain, one pretends to be humble.
2:01 Humility is not virtue, because anything that is cultivated, dragged out, disciplined, controlled, does not bring about humility.
2:18 It is not a thing to be sown and reaped, it must come into being.
2:29 And, humility is not the subjugation of desire—desire which seeks fulfilment in success.
2:51 It is something entirely different. And I feel that without humility one can’t go very fear.
3:03 I do not mean religious humility, the humility of the monks, the saints, and the priests, the humility which cultivated austerity brings into being.
3:35 It is something entirely different. And to go to the very end of it, and to actually experience it, to live with it, so that every corner of one’s mind, all the dark, secret, hidden places of one’s own heart and mind, are exposed to this humility so that one is soaked in it.
4:25 And if we can go to the very end, which is the essence of humility, I think we have to consider what is learning.
4:39 Do we ever learn? And is all learning not mechanical?
4:59 The additive process which forms a centre, and that centre experiences; and the experience becomes memory, the experience is memory, which colours all further experiences, further information, further intimations and hints.
5:51 Is learning further accumulation, as knowledge?
6:03 And, if there is the accumulative process as experience, as knowledge, as a being and becoming, is there then humility?
6:33 Because if the mind is crammed full, filled with knowledge, with experience, with memory, it cannot possibly receive the new.
6:57 And, is not the total emptying of the mind necessary for that which is timeless to come into being?
7:21 And does that not mean total, complete sense of a mind that has humility, that is not becoming, that does not accumulate, that is no longer seeking or learning?
7:51 I wonder if one has learnt anything?
7:59 One has gathered; one has had many, many experiences, incidents, which have left their marks, which one has stored up as remembrances.
8:16 Those are all mechanical processes. I learn a language, a new way of exploring the heavens, and so on: those are all accumulative, mechanical processes, which we call learning.
8:48 And this mechanical process of learning leaves a centre—the centre which accumulates as knowledge, which resists, which experiences, which desires to be free, which asserts, which denies, which accepts, discards, which is always in battle, in conflict.
9:29 It is this centre that is accumulating and emptying itself: the positive movement of acquiring and the negative movement of denying.
9:50 This process is what we call learning.
9:57 I’m sure some of you, if you will excuse my saying so, are trying to learn something from the speaker, but you are not going to learn anything from me because you can only learn something which is mechanical.
10:25 We are not dealing with ideas; we are not dealing with descriptions of something else—we are concerned with the fact, with what is.
10:50 And to understand what is is not a process, a mechanical process, a process which by looking you gather, you add to yourself either to diminish the centre or to enlarge the centre.
11:20 And this centre, accumulated through centuries, conditioned by society, by religions, by experiences, by education, from this centre we always try to change—change our qualities, our way of thinking, implant a new set of ideas, discarding the old.
11:56 So, this centre is always trying to reform itself, to destroy itself in order to get more; and that’s what we are doing all the time: from the centre we try to change.
12:33 Please, do listen to what the speaker is talking about.
12:47 This centre is what we call the ego, the self, or whatever name you like to give to it. The name is irrelevant, but the fact is, the what is, is important.
12:59 And, in this process of change, there is violence.
13:08 All change implies violence, and through violence there is nothing new.
13:23 When one says, “I must control myself, subjugate myself, conform myself to a pattern,” all that implies violence.
13:37 The saints, the leaders, the teachers, the prophets—they all talk about changing, controlling, implying violence.
13:52 Obviously, to conform means violence.
13:59 To discipline oneself, the centre disciplining itself to a pattern, implies violence.
14:06 And then we talk about the ideal of non violence.
14:13 So, change implies, does it not, a violence within the field of time.
14:36 I am this and I am going to be that; I am going to force myself to be that. That is in the distance: the ideal, the example, the norm.
14:54 And in this process— this process is violence—and in this process there is peace and violence, the opposites and the conflict of the opposites.
15:23 And, we say, “I must learn all about myself, all about this thing.” And for us learning is accumulative, which only strengthens the centre.
15:57 So, if one sees that, if one realizes that, experiences that, not merely verbally, intellectually, but actually experiences this fact that where there is the centre which demands change, and realizes in that change there is violence, there can never be peace.
16:27 So, for me, there is no learning, there is only seeing.
16:46 Seeing is not accumulative; seeing a fact is not... there is no process of gathering in or denying. Seeing what is; and seeing what is is destructive.
17:10 And in destruction there is peace, not violence.
17:22 Violence, revolution, change, exists in the process of accumulation which the centre is always trying to gather.
17:45 But when one sees that totally, completely, with one’s whole being, then the fact, the thing that is, what is, is completely destructive; and what is destruction is creation.
18:32 So, humility is that state of mind which has discarded completely all the accumulative processes and its opposites, and is, from moment to moment, aware of what is.
19:12 Therefore it has no opinion, no judgment.
19:30 Therefore, such a mind knows what is freedom.
19:44 A mind in violence has no freedom; a mind that is seeking freedom can never be free because to it freedom is further accumulation.
20:06 And to arrive at that freedom implies more violence, or forcing the mind to be quiet, to deny, to control itself, to twist all the desires in order to be free.
20:37 Humility implies total destruction—not of outward, social things, but complete destruction of the centre, of oneself, of one’s own traditions, ideas, experiences, knowledge, completely emptying the mind of everything that it has known.
21:12 Therefore, such a mind is no longer thinking in terms of change.
21:24 It is really a marvellous thing if one can feel that.
21:32 You see, that’s part of meditation.
21:49 That’s not what we want to discuss this morning. We’ll do it another time: “What is meditation?” But without understanding what is change... because that’s what we want, most of us—to change.
22:25 And the world is changing very rapidly, changing in outward things: going to the moon, rockets and all that; changing of values; Coca Cola is spreading throughout the world; radios; the ancient civilizations are toppling over—and that’s what we call change.
23:05 The rapidity of change is greater than the fact of change.
23:20 All the ancient gods, all the traditions, the saviours, the Masters—they’re all going, gone.
23:39 And a few people hold on to them, building a defence round themselves.
23:52 And so the mind that is defending itself, the mind that is changing, is always seeking further shelter, further refuge.
24:03 It’s not concerned with destruction, it’s not concerned with creation.
24:12 So, if you go very deeply and seriously into the question of humility, you’re bound to question this whole problem of learning: the learning of words which prevents the seeing of things as they are.
24:58 And so a mind that is no longer concerned with change has no fear; and a mind that has no fear is free.
25:41 And it seems to me, such a mind is absolutely essential—not the intellectual mind, that has its own place; not the argumentative, clever, cunning mind, but a mind that has understood the thing that we are talking about.
26:18 Such a mind—not seeking, not trying to change itself into another state or into another pattern, no longer exposing itself to further experiences, and demanding, asking—such a mind is free.
26:46 And it is only such a mind that can be quiet, still; and perhaps then that which is nameless can come into being.
27:10 But humility is essential—not the cultivated kind, which is artificial; not vanity posing as humility; not the mind that is crippled with infinite knowledge and experiences, seeking humility.
27:42 You know, one must be without capacity, without gift, be as nothing inwardly.
28:21 And I think if one sees this—not learns about how to be nothing, which is too stupid and silly—when one actually sees this: and the seeing is the experiencing of it.
29:03 And then, perchance, the other thing can carne into being.
29:36 Can we further talk about this—this thing only, not how we are going to change the world, or what Khrushchev is going to do, and all the rest of it, but about this?
30:02 Questioner: (inaudible) KRISHNAMURT

I: The gentlemen asks, Is understanding a capacity?
30:49 Is it a capacity to be cultivated, to be slowly nurtured?
31:09 Capacity implies a gradual process in time.
31:21 Do I understand something through time, through many days, or do I see something immediately?
31:31 Do I understand something immediately? And what do we mean by understanding and seeing?
31:44 Now, do I understand and see that being a nationalist, identifying oneself with a particular group, sect, with a particular belief, do I see and understand that it is very destructive—not in this word I’ve used previously—that it is stupid—better than the word destructive.
32:33 Do I really understand it? And do I see completely, totally the whole significance of belonging, committing oneself to something?
32:55 Do I see it?
33:02 You know, we all want to belong to something, belong to a particular group, belong to a society, to a race, to a name.
33:35 We want to commit ourselves to a particular action: communist, socialist, or what you like, or a religious action, a moral action.
33:50 Why? There are several things involved in it, aren’t there, to do, to act co operatively, together.
34:05 And also I commit myself to a particular party because that gives me strength to do, to be.
34:18 That’s all right at a certain level, but to be committed to something surely prevents one from understanding and pursuing enlightenment.
34:58 Now, if I understand this whole process, if I see that—the seeing, the understanding of this whole thing, does it take time?
35:18 It takes time because I’m lazy; I’ve committed myself, and I’m afraid if I un-commit myself I’ll create more trouble.
35:33 So I say, “Well, I’ll postpone it, I’ll think about it tomorrow.” Surely, it’s a lazy mind that prevents itself from seeing directly something actual and, surely, that does not demand time.
35:59 I mean, to see, to see oneself being stupid, surely, it does not require time.
36:15 I see myself stupid, nobody has to tell me. But I want to do something about it, I want to change it, I want to become clever, I want to be more this and less that.
36:31 All that implies time and, therefore, violence. But to see that I am stupid, to see it, to be completely in it, not only demands understanding, but the seeing itself destroys everything that I have built in myself and around myself—that is what I’m afraid of.
37:15 But to see that I am stupid, narrow, petty minded, bourgeois, mediocre, and to live with that, not try to change it, not try to polish it and give it a new name, new title, and all the rest of the nonsense, but to live with it and watch all its movements, its pettiness, its pretences, to know all the cunning ways of stupidity trying to become very clever—that doesn’t require time, that doesn’t require capacity—it requires that seriousness which will go through to the very end of it.
38:20 Good Lord, sirs, we do, we do act immediately, feel immediately, see things immediately when there is danger.
38:41 All our instincts, our senses are fully awake when there is danger. You don’t talk about time, you don’t say it is a thing to be gathered slowly, and all the rest of it, which a lazy mind invents.
39:01 Questioner: You said about desire... (inaudible) KRISHNAMURT

I: Madam, just, not too long a question, please.
39:27 It is very difficult if you... Yes, please, a short question, because I have to repeat it. Others can’t hear it. Questioner: The stupid-ness of desire, and the freedom, and afterwards it came in again. KRISHNAMURT

I: Now, just a minute, please. The lady says, I have said, that a free mind has no desire.
39:51 I have never said that.
40:00 What’s wrong with desire?
40:10 The wrongness comes in when it creates conflict, when I want that car which I can’t have.
40:20 But to look at it, to see the beauty of the lines, the colour, the speed—what’s wrong with it?
40:31 Is that desire to look? But desire becomes important, urgent and compulsive when I want to possess that thing.
40:50 After all, to be a slave to anything—slave to tobacco, to drink, to a particular way of thinking, and the urge to break away from that pattern—all that implies desire.
41:33 And so we say we must come to a state when there is no desire.
41:40 You see, that’s why we shape life by our pettiness, by our desires, by our longings, by our fears.
42:01 And so our life becomes mediocre, empty, such a stupid affair, full of unknown fears, dark corners.
42:22 But if one understands all this, as we have been talking about, seeing it, actually seeing it, then I think desire has quite a different meaning, then it is not important at all.
42:47 Questioner: (inaudible) KRISHNAMURT

I: The lady asks, To see what is, it only applies for oneself, or the total content of what is?
43:14 Is that the question?
43:22 Can you divide seeing into what is applicable to oneself?
43:30 Seeing is this total thing, isn’t it, not partial.
43:40 There is no seeing if it is partial. You know... I don’t know...
43:51 When you see this marvellous thing on a lovely day like this, do you see the totality of the whole thing?
44:09 Or, are you caught by the word, the mountain, the hill, the pine tree, and the river, and therefore limit your seeing?
44:20 Am I...? Questioner: Is it possible to distinguish between being identified with what we see and, on the other hand, to live in what we see?
44:44 KRISHNAMURT

I: Sir, why do we want to be identified with anything?
44:51 Questioner: In order to become bigger.
44:58 KRISHNAMURT

I: You see? In order to become something bigger, something nobler, more worthwhile—that means giving significance to life.
45:09 And we give significance to life because life has no significance to us, so we give, attribute significance to it.
45:20 So, why should one identify with the family, with the friend, with an idea, with a country?
45:31 Why? Why not brush all identification away and live with the thing what is all the time, which is always changing, which is never still?
45:50 Questioner: Well, I meant that when not identified with things...
45:57 (inaudible)... so you live out there. KRISHNAMURT

I: Sir, we must be a little careful here not to get excited over ideas, symbols.
46:17 We don’t live out there; the fact is we live here in our narrow circle, with our petty jealousies, vanities, stupidities—that’s our life.
46:35 We have to face that and not identify with the gods, with the mountains, you know, all that stuff.
46:47 It is much more arduous, it demands greater intensity to live with the thing what is without trying to shatter it, trying to change it, than to live with Jesus.
47:10 That’s an escape; and a mind that escapes obviously has no significance at all.
47:22 It has significance in the thing to which it escapes.
47:29 Questioner: Don’t you think in discovering there is joy and pleasure, and is not discovering learning?
47:50 KRISHNAMURT

I: I wonder what we mean by discovering? Questioner: We have to look at our awareness here in God and everything.
48:06 KRISHNAMURT

I: Yes, sir. Do we discover our sorrow and live with it [like] joy and delight?
48:17 Questioner: Of course not. KRISHNAMURT

I: That’s just it. I can live, discover the beauties of the earth, and discover the stupidities of the politicians, either revel in it or spit at it; but to discover the whole significance of sorrow is quite a different thing, isn’t it, which means, I have to discover the sorrow of myself and the sorrow of the world.
48:59 And do we discover, do we find anything new in sorrow by living with it?
49:16 Which means, you are learning, aren’t you, you are learning, studying the book of sorrow, which means, you will learn what to do and what not to do.
49:32 You will learn to safeguard, to protect, or resist.
49:42 I wonder if you learn about sorrow? Do please, let’s talk about it. I’m not—please—I’m not an authority.
50:00 I don’t think you can learn. You can learn, which will become mechanical. But a mind that sees the danger of mechanical gathering ceases to learn, and then it observes, it sees, it perceives—which is entirely different from learning.
50:34 To know, to see, what is sorrow, just to see it, to live with it, not to accept it, not to justify it, not to find a substitute for it, but to live with it, to go into it, let it... it’s a movement, it’s a living thing, and to live with it—as I was saying—that requires, as with joy and sorrow, it requires a great deal of energy, a great deal of insight to go to the very end of sorrow or of joy.
51:53 Questioner: (inaudible) KRISHNAMURT

I: The question is, You must know the materials of which the mind is made.
52:13 No? You must know what the mind is made of.
52:25 What is the mind made up of? The brain, the responses, the senses, the mind which divides, which holds, which denies, the thing that suffers, the thing that longs, the thing that aspires, jealousy, envy, cleverness, knowledge, fear, the total thing which we call consciousness—all that is the mind.
53:10 We mustn’t go, for the moment, [into] whether the brain is the mind.
53:19 We’ll leave that for the moment. When we talk about the mind, surely, we mean all that: the capacity, judgment, evaluation, doubt, superstition, fears, safeguards, the search for security, the seeking for permanency, the dos and don’ts—this whole thing, this consciousness, which is both the inherited racial, upon which is implanted the present, the education, the experiences—surely, all that is the mind, the centre that is seeing, evolving, changing, struggling, suffering.
54:28 Surely, all that’s the mind.
54:39 We know what the substance of the mind is: the thinker and the thought, the thinker always trying to control thought, change thought, follow.
54:58 And, is it possible for the mind to empty itself of all this?
55:08 You can’t say yes or no: it would be stupid on our part to say, “Yes, it is possible,” or say, “No, it is not possible.” All that one can do is to find out whether it is possible or not to see the frontiers of consciousness and their limitations, and where it is necessary to have a frontier, and whether it is possible to go beyond all that.
55:51 And, as I was saying, that is a serious mind that knows its own limitations, that is aware of its own mediocrity, stupidity, angers, jealousies, ambitions.
56:23 And having understood them, is it possible for it to go beyond? Or, having understood them, to remain quiet, not seeking, not wanting, not groping after?
56:42 Then it’s only such a mind that has brought about order within itself and is quiet; it’s only such a mind that can perhaps receive something which is not made up of the mind itself.
57:12 Questioner: (inaudible) KRISHNAMURT

I: Ah, no.
57:30 The lady asks, Do we create eternal values? Can the mind, which is the result of time, of many days, centuries, many experiences within the field of time and space, can it create eternal values?
57:50 Or, it can cease to be that which it is and, perhaps, something else can come. You see, we are always wanting eternal values when I don’t even understand the values which I have imposed upon myself, which society has imposed upon myself.
58:15 You know, thought is of time, and thought creates values.
58:35 Thought is seeking something which is not of time. Obviously, it can’t do it.
58:51 Questioner: (inaudible).
58:58 KRISHNAMURT

I: Quite right, sir.
59:11 You’ve answered your own question, sir.
59:32 Questioner: (in French) KRISHNAMURT

I: The lady says, To know oneself requires a certain effort.
1:00:02 I wonder. God, sirs, we all make such effort to do, to be, to acquire, don’t we?
1:00:13 We’re always making effort.
1:00:20 Does seeing require effort? I’m interested in looking at that mountain, the green slope, to look at it, just to look at it.
1:00:36 Does that require effort? It requires effort when I’m not interested, and when I’m told I must look. But by looking at it I will arrive at the eternal values, then I force myself to look at it—which is all so silly.
1:00:55 If I’m not interested in looking, why bother about it? Questioner: You said yourself that the total destruction of our whole I demands a huge energy, therefore, take it.
1:01:26 KRISHNAMURT

I: I said to live with what is requires energy.
1:01:37 How do you get that energy? That’s the question: how do you get it? How do you get it?
1:01:56 Wait—un moment. Please do inquire into it: how do you get energy? You know, you get energy when you have no conflict, when there is no contradiction in your mind, in your consciousness, no contradiction, no struggle, no violence, when you’re not being torn by innumerable desires in opposite directions.
1:02:35 You dissipate that energy by worshipping success, by wanting to be something, famous, wanting to fulfil, you know, the innumerable things we do which are in a state of contradiction, which produce contradiction.
1:02:54 We dissipate our energy in that: going to the psychiatrist, going to churches, going to... innumerable things that we do—escaping.
1:03:15 And if there is no contradiction, if there is no urge to fulfil, when there is no fear of the gods, of the ultimate, eternal values, or of your neighbour, or of what another says, then you have energy, not in meagre quantity but abundantly.
1:03:56 And you must have that energy, that passion, to pursue to the very end every thought, every feeling, every intimation.
1:04:11 I’m afraid it’s twelve o’clock.