Krishnamurti & the Art of Awakening

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Krishnamurti Quote of the Day

Ojai, California | 6th Public Talk 23rd June, 1934

Question: How can one determine what shall fill the vacuum created in the process of eliminating self-consciousness?

Krishnamurti: Sir, why do you want to eliminate self-consciousness? Why do you think it is important to dissolve self-consciousness, or that "I", that egotistic limitation? Why do you think it is necessary? If you say it is necessary because you seek happiness, then that self-consciousness, that limited particularity of the ego will still continue. But if you say, "I see conflict, my mind and heart are caught up in disharmony, but I see the cause of this disharmony, which is the lack of understanding of environment which has created that self-consciousness", then there is no void to be filled. I am afraid the questioner has not understood this at all.

Please let me explain this once again. What we call self-consciousness, or that "I" consciousness, is nothing else but the result of environment; that is, when the mind and heart do not understand environment, the surroundings, the conditions in which an individual finds himself, then through the lack of that understanding, conflict is created. Mind is clouded by this conflict, and this continual conflict creates memory and becomes identified with mind and thus this idea of "I", of ego consciousness, becomes hardened. Hence further conflict, suffering and pain. But the understanding of the circumstances, the surroundings, the conditions which create this conflict does not come through substitution but through intelligence, which is mind and love; that intelligence which is ever self-creating, ever in movement. And that to me is eternity, a timeless reality. Whereas, you are seeking the perpetuation of that consciousness which is the result of environment, which you call the "I", and that "I" can disappear only when there is the understanding of environment. Intelligence then functions normally, without restraint or compulsion. Then there is not this frightful struggle, this search for beauty, search for truth, and the constant battle of possessive love, because intelligence itself is complete.

Tags: craving, understanding

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Only when mind is free from choice is there liberation.
You must realize with your heart as well as with your mind that the cause of emptiness is craving.
When there is a craving, your mind is already clouded, is already perverted, because mind identifies itself with one and rejects the other
When you are really able to think without any craving, without any desire to choose - for choice implies opposites - there is discernment.
Although you may think that you are experiencing the actual, you are really experiencing your own wishes, and these wishes become so real, so concrete, so definite, that you take them for actuality.
Discernment is that state of integrated thought-emotion in which all craving, choice has ceased; it is not a state induced through mere denial and suppression.
The desire to become, without understanding duality, is a vain struggle;
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Craving engenders fear, fear nourishes dependence, dependence on things, people or ideas.
Any becoming involves non-becoming and as long as there is becoming there must be duality with its endless conflict.
The conflict of acquisitiveness appears in knowledge, in relationship, in possessions; acquisitiveness in any form creates inequality and brutality.
The chain of sorrow is broken only when the becomer ceases to become, positively or negatively.
How is thought which has become the means of self-expansion to act without giving sustenance to the ego, the cause of conflict and sorrow?
Conflict and sorrow come to us in different ways but the cause common to us all is self-expansion.
Whether positive or negative, the activity of craving is still within the framework of the self ...
You must build around you a wall in order to gain what you want.
the explanation is never that thing which is explained, that is the word is never the thing.
We don't love children, because we have no love in our own hearts. We just breed children.
The essence of control is suppression.
A mind that is indifferent, is aware of the shoddiness of our civilization, the shoddiness of our thought, the ugly relationships;
Mere reformation of the pattern of society only alters the surface, it brings about a more respectable form of ambition.
Until I, in my relationship to you, understand myself, I am the cause of chaos, misery, destruction, fear, brutality.
Life itself has no system, for it is always in movement;
In the confusion and turmoil of life, in its continual bustle and conflict, every individual is caught.
Criticism is only of value in so far as it trains your observation so that it can eventually be turned on yourself.
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As fear cannot free itself through any means, for all its efforts spring from its own source, there must be the cessation of all intellectual safeguards.
Conflict at any level, at any depth, indicates immaturity.
There is no essential difference between the old and the young, for both are slaves to their own desires and gratifications.
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There is a vast difference, then, between the mental examination of a fact and the understanding of that fact.
We are not concerned with individual salvation or individual liberation, or whatever the individual is trying to seek but rather with the whole movement of life, the understanding of the whole current of existence;
to observe means to observe without the interference of one's background; but one is the background - you follow?-one's whole being which looks is one's background - as a Christian, as a Frenchman, or as an intellectual.
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In action born of choice there is no discernment, choice being calculation, a remembrance of incomplete action.
When you are awakened there is conflict, struggle. which you call suffering; but immediately you want to put away that struggle, that awakening;
In order to fight, you must know what you are fighting, so there must be understanding of the fundamental, not of the divisions between the false things.
Because what you can now discern as God must be limited, since your mind is circumscribed, held in bondage; therefore I will not describe that.
When you understand you don't seek to modify, to alter, to reform.
There is the reaction to environment when the mind does not understand the environment, and acts without understanding, thereby further increasing the limitation of environment
I doubt, if I may say so, that you really understand what I am saying, even intellectually;
There is either deep understanding or the creation of mere theory.
Truth, the beauty of reality, can be discerned only when the mind is fearless; not with the fearlessness of intellectuality, but of utter insecurity.
If you have beliefs, you are translating and moulding your experiences according to them, and so you are continuously forcing and limiting thought-emotion, and these limitations become the "I" process.
Both the religious and the materialistic mind are conditioned by their own prejudices which prevent the integral comprehension of truth and the communion with it.
The problem of starvation is not solved by merely discovering its causes - the bad economic system, over-production, maldistribution, and so on.
I can give you [also] a very good explanation, but we are trying to go beyond mere explanations.
I have explained what I mean by understanding. This understanding is not an intellectual, analytical process.
Understanding is not brought about through the mere exertion of a one-sided will but through that experimental approach which has that peculiar quality of wholeness.
All overcoming is a form of ignorance and violence; only understanding can free thought from bondage.
To understand the complex causes of conflict and the desire to be free from it, requires not the mere will to be free, but constant awareness in our daily life.
I am talking of understanding which transcends reason and emotion.
What is of primary importance [then] is understanding, in whose wake follows compassion.
Understanding is not a reward; in the very moment of awareness it is born.
Surely there is a difference between right thinking and right or conditioned thought.
It is natural, is it not, to be depressed at this present time when there is so much killing, confusion and sorrow?
To merely deny craving, to merely oppose its many expressions is not to transcend it but to continue in it.
Compulsion does not create understanding, whether it is from outside or from within.
To understand there must be no judgment or comparison, no acceptance or denial, for all identification prevents that passive awareness in which alone the discovery of what is true is made.
These talks will be utterly useless if you do not experience as you are listening.
Condemnation, judgment and comparison do not bring the experience of understanding; on the contrary they will stop experience
In the outer world there is no hope, no clarity, no creative and renewing understanding, there is only bloodshed and confusion and mounting disaster.
Instead of trying to control these wandering thoughts become aware of them, think-out, feel-out every thought, comprehend its significance, however pleasant or unpleasant;
Search to understand, not to know; for in understanding, the dual process of the knower and the known ceases.
Understanding comes when your whole being is deeply and silently aware.
Without understanding oneself meditation becomes a process of self-hypnosis inducing experiences according to one's conditioning, one's belief.
Effort made to be free without the liberating action of Truth is still within the enclosing walls of the self.
If you saw the truth about self-expansion problems would begin to fade away.
Our difficulty lies in that we have built around ourselves conclusions which we call understanding.
Understanding is not substitution; mere change of patterns, of conclusions, does not yield understanding.
It is truth alone that frees, not the activity of will.
As we have got a very difficult subject to deal with it requires a great deal of patience and we must not jump to conclusions.
I am not here to give you ideas but on the contrary, I am here to discuss together with you if we can, seriously and earnestly, the problem of living.
We use the present as a passage to the future.
Understanding is a total responsibility of your entire being, a perception which comes to you of the entire picture and not of a part only.
When the mind is dull, it is unwilling to look at 'what is' but wants to change itself into something else, thus bringing another element into the problem.
[Understanding] involves change of will altogether and not merely change in will.
You cannot overcome a hindrance; the hindrance has to be understood by approaching it without condemnation, without judging, without a desire to alter it.
A truth, probably heard by you, ceases to be a truth when you merely repeat it; it will be a truth to you only when you, for yourself, have discovered it to be true.
As long as the mind is moving from the known to the known, it is 'dead', and a 'dead' thing cannot understand anything.
Is understanding to come through effort, or is there a state in which effort has ceased for understanding to be?
Why do we not realise that our pursuit of drunkenness, God or an ideal is only the pursuit of our escape from facing the actual, and therefore reduces us to a state of dullness and insensitivity?
Is not knowledge different from understanding and does the mere accumulation of knowledge yield understanding?
As it is, our existence is pretty awful and merely to understand verbally what is being said and use it as a pattern to translate everyday existence will not bring about understanding.
You will have understanding only when you consider the problem, when you accept it, look at it, become aware of its significance completely, and even love it.
If I want to understand what is, I must give my whole attention, my whole being to it and not be distracted by the opposites.
There is always in the 'thinker' a sense of permanency, a sense of continuity.
Most of you agree with what we have discussed so far in regard to the falseness of the trick played by the mind on itself; yet you have not seen the real depth of this problem and, therefore, it has not brought about clarification and transformation in you.
I am going to explain presently that truth can be understood instantaneously.
Outward action, when accomplished, is over, is static; and if the relationship between individuals, which is society, is not the outcome of inward revolution, then the social structure, being static, absorbs the individual, and therefore makes him equally static, repetitive.
Question: Can we realize on the spot the truth that you are speaking of, without any previous preparation?
Surely, meditation is understanding - meditation of the heart is understanding.
Self-knowledge is the beginning of meditation - not the knowledge that you pick up from my books, from authorities, from gurus, but the knowledge that comes into being through self-inquiry, which is self-awareness.
Peace can come into being only when the confusion which we have created is completely understood, not on the verbal level, but inwardly;
I cannot understand myself if I am tethered to anything - property, idea or thing.