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SA65T7 - Ending sorrow needs a very clear, simple mind
Saanen, Switzerland - 25 July 1965
Public Talk 7



0:00 This is J. Krishnamurti’s seventh public talk in Saanen, 1965.
0:10 Krishnamurti: In an extraordinary changing world, where one sees vast scientific changes taking place, and economic pressures and impending wars, it seems to me that our own lives must undergo tremendous changes; not merely outwardly – acquiring more cars, better houses, clothing and shelter – it is necessary to find out what one actually needs, apart from clothes, shelter and food; because life is becoming very, very complicated, and one must make life, our own human life, extraordinarily simple; and that simplicity demands a great deal of intelligence.
1:50 And so one has to find out for oneself, as a human being living in this changing world, where there are every kinds of pressure, anxiety, trouble, sorrow, one must find out, it seems to me, what one needs; what actually a human being, living in this world, has need.
2:37 And each person will answer what he needs according to his particular temperament, economic position, social prestige and so on, but to find out what one needs, you must have peace.
3:17 It is not that one finds out what one needs first, but rather one must have peace.
3:29 We always want peace outwardly, in all our relationships; but I think peace begins somewhere else, but not outwardly; because without peace, nothing can flourish, nothing can blossom.
3:57 And peace is not an escape from the world, from our everyday daily activity, but rather one has to find out, living in this world, what actually peace is.
4:30 How far a human being living in a confusing, contradictory, suffering world, how deeply does he demand peace?
4:50 Because the way of our life, the way of our conduct, our daily activity, will naturally bring peace if we want peace.
5:16 But I’m afraid very few of us want peace; and when we do want peace, we want security, we want comfort, a state of not being disturbed at all.
5:36 Because we can’t go on as we are, with the ways in which we think, the ways we act; we can’t possibly go on as we are going; there is either going to be a terrific crash or human beings will waken to a different form of life, different way of living.
6:09 And that’s what I would like to talk about this morning: if we can find, as human beings living in the actual world of everyday events and actualities, if we can find for ourselves as human beings, totally related to all the world, with other human beings, whether we can find a different way of living, a different way of thinking, acting.
6:53 To find that out, one must inquire, not only the actual state that we human beings are living in – the actual fact; not a theory, not a concept but actually, everyday movement; we not only have to be conscious of that, but also we have to end sorrow, because a mind in sorrow cannot think clearly, cannot see very clearly.
7:42 And the ending of sorrow is the beginning of wisdom, and it is only in wisdom that a new thing is born.
7:56 So one must inquire very deeply the ending of sorrow, because if we can end sorrow, we have solved all our problems.
8:16 Because, for most of us, that is the one central demand, if we are at all awake to anything in life: how to end sorrow, so that a new beginning can be made.
8:45 I think that is a fundamental question one has to ask oneself: whether it is possible at all for human beings to end sorrow altogether, and not escaping from the world of reality, from the world of actuality, from the world of daily activities; and not escaping from sorrow through drugs, through religions, through belief, through concepts, through some kind of mystical structure of one’s own mind that gives complete satisfaction — which, again, is an escape from actuality.
9:54 So living in this world, living our daily life of relationship, whether it is possible actually, completely to end sorrow.
10:19 Consciously, we can rationalise sorrow; we can see the causes of sorrow – sorrow being grief, uncertainty, the feeling of complete loneliness; the sorrow of death; the sorrow of not being able to fulfil; the sorrow of not being recognised; the sorrow of not being loved; or loving, not receiving.
11:03 There are innumerable ways of sorrow – and, it seems to me, that without understanding sorrow there is no end to this conflict, to the misery, to the everyday incessant travail of corruption, deterioration.
11:38 So that is one of the fundamental questions, it seems to me, to ask oneself and to find an answer.
11:52 There is the conscious sorrow and there is the unconscious, unknown sorrow, the sorrow that seems to have no cause; that appears, for most of us, as a sorrow which has no basis.
12:30 We know conscious sorrow; we know how to deal with it. Either we run away from it, we rationalise it or we take some kind of drug, intellectual drug or actual drug, drug ourselves with words, with amusements, with superficial, social, entertaining world.
13:00 We know that, and yet we can’t get away from it.
13:08 Then there is the sorrow which man has inherited through centuries; because man has always sought to overcome this extraordinary thing called sorrow, grief, misery.
13:36 You may be superficially happy, have everything you want, but deep-down in the unconscious there are the roots of sorrow.
13:53 So when we are talking about sorrow and the ending of sorrow, we mean not only the conscious but the unconscious ending of this thing called sorrow.
14:11 To end sorrow, one must have a very clear, very simple mind.
14:28 Simplicity is not mere idea. You know, to be simple demands a great deal of intelligence and sensitivity.
14:49 We think to be simple is to return to nature, or have one or two clothes and few meals and a simple shelter.
15:09 We want all the outward symptoms of simplicity. I do not know if you ever thought about this matter at all: what it is to be really, clearly simple.
15:28 Now, let us differentiate here what we mean by simplicity and what is generally understood as being simple.
15:42 Nowadays, there is more and more knowledge – of facts, information and the computer-like acquiring knowledge – and with that knowledge, we hope to arrive at greater understanding of life, greater expansion of life.
16:19 But the more knowledge one has, life becomes less simple.
16:33 Please, we are both of us, you and I are learning; to learn, one must listen.
16:49 Listening is learning; there is not listening and then learning, or listening and then act.
17:02 Listening is action.
17:09 If you and I know how to listen to the world events, to all that is taking place in the world: the philosophies, the dogmatisms, the rituals, the religions, the radio, information, the television, all the things that are taking place, if we know how to listen to all that, and that very act of listening is doing.
17:58 I think that is the art of listening. To listen to the train that went by, to listen to that rushing water, to listen to your neighbour, to yourself, to listen to the radio, to see what is going on in the world: the misery, the confusion, the extraordinary conflict between man and man — to listen to all that; not translate it; not translate what you listen... what you…
18:49 understand in terms of your own knowledge, information, your own petty, little mind, but to actually listen totally, completely, then perhaps that very learning is acting.
19:11 And that is what we need: acting. And to act you must have great simplicity; simplicity not derived from the complex knowledge but simplicity which comes with great sensitivity, which comes with the understanding of sorrow.
19:51 What is sorrow? Why do we suffer? Not only physically, organically, but inwardly, psychologically, inside the skin, why do we suffer, and what does this suffering mean?
20:11 Apparently, very few have escaped from this suffering; escaped in the sense, have brought suffering to an end – very few human beings; only probably, throughout the history, one or two have gone beyond this ache – and unless we human beings find out for ourselves how to end sorrow, all our lives will be dull, empty, confused, conflicting, everlastingly making effort to do or not to do.
21:08 So we must find out and learn what sorrow is; not interpret what we call sorrow; not search the cause of it.
21:30 We know the cause of sorrow: someone dies and you feel terribly lonely, miserable, self-pity, and that brings sorrow; or you have not been able to fulfil in this life, become known, important, famous; or you want to do things and you’re not able to do it, incapacity; or we use time as a means of ending or gaining, and in that process of using time there is sorrow.
22:43 So mere search for the cause of sorrow – which we all know – does not end sorrow.
22:58 I know why I suffer and you know why you suffer but the knowledge doesn’t end sorrow.
23:16 So what is one to do?
23:25 Either one becomes cynical, bitter, hard, or one escapes from it, or one lives with it, and therefore the mind becomes more and more dull, insensitive.
23:53 Knowing all this, what is one to do? You understand my question?
24:09 And it’s very important to answer this question, because a mind that is worn out by sorrow – conscious or unconscious – is a dull mind, is an insensitive mind, is a mind that is incapable of learning.
24:37 And life is a process of learning; not acquiring knowledge from which you act; learning is acting, or in acting you are learning.
24:55 But if you acquire knowledge or information or have a formula from which you act, then there is great conflict and that conflict also is sorrow.
25:18 So that is one of the major problems of life, and how is one to answer it intelligently, sanely, with complete fullness?
25:38 To answer that question – not verbally but actually, and therefore end sorrow – one must have great peace inwardly.
26:04 Please, just listen.
26:14 What do we mean by peace? Most of us want peace in terms of our own pleasure.
26:30 Please listen to what we are saying; listen to it, neither agreeing nor disagreeing, as you would listen to that water rushing by.
26:46 It has rained a great deal last night and that river is full, rich, full of silt, running.
27:00 You can’t alter it; it’s there, running, and you can only listen to it; and the more you listen, the more sensitive you become to all the noises, to the rumours, to the quietness, to the solitude, to the immensity of life.
27:26 So in the same way, listen to… and discover as we go along.
27:33 You know, we all want peace: peace in our relationship, in our work, in our surrounding; peace inwardly and outwardly.
27:57 But for most of us, peace means to be completely satisfied, to accept things as they are and remain; we don’t want to be disturbed.
28:16 But life is always disturbing us. There’s the war going on in Vietnam; there is war in our hearts; the armies and the generals are preparing for war in every part of the world, though they talk of peace.
28:41 The politicians talk of peace and yet they are seeking power, position, national prestige.
28:54 We want peace in terms of our own pleasure, and pleasure and peace cannot go together, because pleasure prevents the mind from seeing the actual, the factual, the what is.
29:22 And so to understand peace, one has to understand pleasure.
29:39 Because we translate what we call peace in terms of our own pleasure, and so without understanding the whole structure of pleasure, we cannot possibly have peace.
30:02 And you must have peace. That is, you must have peace, in the sense, where you have immense space without limitation; then only there is peace.
30:20 Peace means space in which there is not the centre which is creating the boundary, in which there is space.
30:39 And that’s very difficult to understand and to go into. Peace is only that: peace is a state of mind which has no boundary to space.
31:01 And to understand that peace we must understand what is pleasure, because it is the pleasure that creates the image; it’s the pleasure that creates the centre, round which that centre creates a space for itself.
31:26 And that pleasure dictates the terms and values and translates every act.
31:37 Please observe yourselves, your own conscious ways of thinking, feeling and your values.
31:47 So what is pleasure and why does the mind cling to pleasure?
31:57 Because, like the animal which avoids pain and only wants pleasure; the animal is that, and there is a great deal of the animal in us – a great deal – because, if you observe yourself, we don’t want anything but the continuous pleasure in different forms: excitement, amusement, knowledge, information, prestige, fulfilment, being known, carrying out what we think is the right, trying to control others – you know, the whole cycle, the wheel of pleasure – and that dictates our values, our standards, our activities, our relationships.
33:19 What is pleasure?
33:27 It is sensation – go slowly – that is, the sensation which is pleasurable, which is desire.
33:44 Right? And what is desire?
33:56 And what gives continuity to desire? You are…? Desire is – is it not? – the outcome of perception, seeing, contact, sensation and desire.
34:23 Please watch… this is nothing mysterious that we are talking about; it’s a very simple fact.
34:32 You see a beautiful car, there is a sensation; or a beautiful woman, a mountain, a house, a jewel, whatever it is, a man riding in a Rolls Royce, a man having great power in the world — you want that too.
34:57 So you see something ugly or so-called beautiful, then the perceiving of it, the seeing of it, then there is the sensation, and from that sensation, contact and desire.
35:20 Right? That is the cycle. And then the question is: what gives to that second, to that moment of desire a continuity?
35:40 You are following? Because if I understand what gives continuity to desire, then perhaps I will know how to deal with desire.
35:50 You are following? Not suppress it, not destroy it, not control it, but I will know how to come to grips; I will know what to do.
36:07 Right? So I know, we know… the mind knows how desire arises. That’s clear. But what gives desire a continuity? Surely it is thought. If I see that car, if there is a perception of that car, contact, sensation and desire, and if thought doesn’t give continuity to that desire, desire ends.
36:45 Right? You are following?
36:58 So my… we understand then that desire has continuity through thought.
37:09 The more I think about that car, the more the desire is strengthened, which is pleasure.
37:20 So without understanding the nature of thinking, I cannot possibly understand the nature of peace or pleasure.
37:31 Right? Therefore I must understand the machinery of thinking.
37:45 Please, we are trying to find out what is peace; we are trying to find out that without peace our life is dreadfully confused, miserable, anxious – you know, what it is – and to understand sorrow we must understand not only peace, we must understand also what is pleasure, what is desire, what is thinking.
38:36 You cannot skip one phase of it; you must understand the whole thing as one, not as fragments.
38:52 So we are inquiring now into what is thinking.
39:00 Obviously, very simply, thinking is the response of knowledge and experience as memory; that’s fairly simple.
39:17 Like the computer, the electronic brain that has been given a great deal of information on the tape, and when you ask it a question, according… you must have the right person to ask the question, then it’ll give you the right information.
39:39 With us, too, there is a great deal of inherited, acquired memory stored up in the brain and, when you ask it, it responds; responds according to its memory, according to its knowledge, according to its various activities, experiences, and then it responds.
40:11 That memory is always conditioned; whether that memory is conscious or unconscious, it’s always conditioned.
40:26 Like the computer, it is conditioned; it can’t go beyond itself, beyond the information that has been given to it.
40:39 We cannot go beyond ourselves, except in... beyond ourselves because we are so conditioned; we are so tethered to our knowledge, to our information, to our experience, to our past.
40:59 So the past responds to any question, and the response is thought.
41:11 That response may take a long or a very short time.
41:19 This is fairly simple and clear. A familiar question can be answered immediately, and a question which is not at all familiar will take a greater lag of time, greater length of time; the time will be… interval will be greater.
41:43 So thought is always conditioned; and the more I think about… the more thought thinks about that desire which is pleasure and avoids pain, the more the values, the image of pleasure is created in the mind.
42:13 Surely that again, very simple.
42:21 And it is right to respond; I see a beautiful car…
42:28 there’s a beautiful car: response – and that response must exist, otherwise you’re blind or paralysed or insensitive.
42:40 But why should one think about it? If you want it, you get the car; if you don’t want it, why should you keep on creating the image of pleasure?
42:59 So one begins to see that desire is not a thing to be abhorred, controlled, suppressed, but rather see how it comes into being and what gives continuity to it.
43:31 When we understand this whole picture, then desire has quite a different meaning; then desire then no longer tortures the mind.
43:46 Right? May we proceed further? So, if that is clear, then one sees that thought is the origin of conflict.
44:17 Because thought is the response of the past which meets the present and, therefore, the meeting of the present being inadequate, there is conflict.
44:32 So we say thought must be controlled and that very control of thought only increases greater conflict with life, which is constantly moving, like that river, like that stream.
44:58 So thought is not... thought does not bring about the understanding of life; thought does not free the mind from sorrow; thought will not bring about peace.
45:26 Because we see that thought is the response of the past and therefore thought must always be limited, conditioned.
45:48 So the mind that is translating all activity of life in terms of thought, and thought as creating action will only breed more conflict, more misery.
46:12 Right?
46:19 So then what is peace? Is peace to be sought through thought – you understand? – through organised thought or organised idea as pleasure?
46:39 Obviously not. So peace is a state of mind in which the image or the idea or the organised pleasure as idea does not come into being.
47:03 Right? Please, this is… we are asking the mind to perform most extraordinary thing which it has never done before.
47:20 All that we are used to is a series of thoughts, conclusions, formulas, and from there act.
47:33 And I say such a process will not bring about peace at all.
47:44 What brings peace is the understanding of this total machinery of thought, pleasure and the idea.
48:01 When that is completely understood, then there is a quietness; then thought does not interfere, except when thought has to act.
48:21 I wonder if I am making myself clear? No madame; please, this is one of the most difficult things; don’t say… nod your head in agreement.
48:36 We are trying to find out how to end sorrow. You’re not agreeing with me or disagreeing with my words or ideas.
48:48 We are trying to find out how a human being, who has lived in sorrow for two million years and more, how he can end sorrow; because without the ending of sorrow, there is no light, no clarity, no intelligence.
49:18 He may be very clever; he may go to the moon, photograph Mars, invent new machinery, new techniques to kill and to preserve; but as long as there is sorrow, there is no ending to conflict, to misery, to confusion.
49:43 And that’s what we are inquiring; not only inquiring but to find out actually whether one can be free from sorrow.
49:59 So we said without understanding the nature of thought, the nature of idea as organised pleasure, there is no peace.
50:18 And the next question is: we have to live in this very complex world, getting more and more complex, more and more tyrannical.
50:33 The radio, the television, the newspapers, the politicians, the priests, the organised belief as church, dogma, rituals are all conditioning, getting more and more cunning; psychologically they know all the tricks, how to control the mind of man.
51:03 So one has to be aware of all that and yet be free of all that; being aware of all these processes, of these innumerable influences that are always impinging upon us, one has to be aware and be free of it.
51:23 And that’s where simplicity begins. Because it’s only a very simple mind, not a cunning mind, not an informed mind, but a very simple mind that sees directly, without distortion; and there will be distortion as long as there is the image of pleasure.
52:01 So it’s only the very clear mind, the mind that is very simple.
52:12 We mean by simplicity an austere mind. You know what is… to be austere?
52:26 Austerity is generally understood as being harsh, disciplined, controlled, suppressed, conforming brutally, ruthlessly to a pattern.
52:44 Such a mind is not a simple mind or an austere mind; such a mind is a frightened mind.
52:54 Because it’s frightened, it conforms and that conformity is called austerity.
53:04 But we are talking of an austerity in which there is no conformity of any kind at all.
53:14 We are using the word austere in the sense: disciplined, not according to a pattern but being aware of all the implications of pleasure, thought and the image.
53:31 The very awareness of that brings about discipline.
53:41 In that sense we are talking of austerity. And you cannot be austere if you’re not passionate. You know, passion for most of us is translated into lust, or passion for work, passion to express, passion to become something.
54:25 But we are using the word passion in the sense of intensity, in the sense of accumulated energy that becomes tremendously intense; and that is passion.
54:47 Without that passion, there is no austerity and therefore there is no simplicity.
54:57 You must have tremendous passion to be simple.
55:11 And with that passion, with that intensity, then you can approach sorrow.
55:24 And you cannot resolve, end sorrow without passion, without great energy; and energy is dissipated when there is conflict, when you say, ‘I must not suffer,’ or try to find the cause of sorrow or try to escape from sorrow.
55:52 You need all your energy, all your attention to face sorrow.
56:05 Then you will see that in that state of passionate, intense attention, which is highly disciplined – not conforming and therefore extraordinarily austere and therefore very simple – then you can meet that thing which is called sorrow.
56:34 Then the mind will discover for itself the ending of sorrow; then it’ll find that sorrow has an end, and therefore despair, frustration, all those come to an end.
57:00 And it is only when there is an ending to sorrow there is freedom; and it is only the mind that is free is wise, and therefore such a free mind is an active mind.
57:54 Questioner: Can you say anything about the relation between individual suffering and the suffering of mankind?
58:04 K: The question is: is there any difference between individual suffering and the suffering of mankind.
58:24 Is the question clear? Did everyone hear this question? Yes or no? Many: Yes.
58:35 K: All right. When we talk about individual suffering, is it individual suffering or the suffering of mankind?
58:51 Is your suffering as an individual different from my suffering or the suffering of a man in Asia or in America or in Russia?
58:59 The circumstances may vary, the incidents may vary, but in essence his suffering is the same as mine and as yours, isn’t it?
59:14 Or wouldn’t you grant that? Is that so? Suffering is suffering, isn’t it, not yours or mine.
59:32 Pleasure is not your pleasure or my pleasure; it is pleasure. When you are hungry, it’s not your hunger, it’s the hunger of the whole of Asia.
59:45 When you’re ambitious, driven by ambition, ruthless, that ruthlessness is the same ruthlessness of the politician, of the man who is in power in Asia or in America or in Russia.
1:00:05 You see, that’s what we object to. We don’t see the relationship; we don’t see that we are all one human being, caught in different spheres of life, different areas.
1:00:22 When you love somebody, it’s not your love. Then if it’s your love, it becomes tyrannical, possessive, jealous, anxious, brutal.
1:00:42 So suffering is suffering; not yours and mine.
1:00:50 I am not making it impersonal; I’m not making it something abstract.
1:00:57 When you suffer, you suffer. When the man in Asia has no meal, no clothes, no shelter, he’s suffering.
1:01:15 The people that are being killed, the Vietnam and the American, they are suffering.
1:01:27 And to understand this suffering – which is not yours or not mine, which is not made impersonal, abstract, but actual suffering which we all have – that requires a great deal of understanding.
1:01:46 And the ending of that suffering will obviously, naturally bring about peace, not only within, but outside.
1:02:00 (Pause) I think we’d better stop now; it’s nearly talked over an hour.
1:02:34 But if you have listened and therefore the very act of listening is the act of doing.
1:02:52 Listening is acting. If you have listened this morning really deeply, listened with full attention, which means with clarity, then you will see that sorrow will never touch you again; which doesn’t mean that you don’t love.
1:03:27 When you end sorrow, then perhaps we shall know what love is.
1:03:36 But without ending sorrow, love becomes tyranny, love becomes pain, love becomes a thing that has no meaning at all, except as memory, as pleasure.