The Future of Humanity - Jiddu Krishnamurti dialogue with David Bohm (Session 2 of 2)
Sunday, 16 March 2008
Page 7 of 7
Session 2: Part 7 of 7
Transcript of the Talk
David Bohm: Yes. But really the question is, we have to come directly in contact with this to make it real, Right?
J. Krishnamurti: That's it. We can only come into contact with it when the self is not. To put it very simply, when the self is not, there is beauty, silence, space; then that intelligence, which is born of compassion, operates through the brain. It is very simple.
DB: Yes. Would it be worth discussing the self, since the self is widely active?
JK: I know. That is our long tradition of many, many centuries.
DB: Is there some aspect of meditation which can be helpful here when the self is acting? You see, suppose a person says, 'all right, I am caught in the self, but I want to get out. But I want to know what I shall do?'
JK: No.
DB: I won't use the words 'what shall I do?' But what do you say?
JK: That is very simple. Is the observer different from the observed?
DB: Well, suppose we say, 'Yes, it appears to be different; then what?
JK: Is that an idea or an actuality?
DB: What do you mean?
JK: Actuality is when there is no division between the thinker and the thought.
DB: But suppose I say, ordinarily one feels that the observer is different from the observed. We begin there.
JK: We begin there. I'll show you. Look at it. Are you different from your anger, from your envy, from your suffering? You are not.
DB: At first sight it appears that I am, that I might try to control it.
JK: You are that.
DB: Yes, but how will I see that I am that?
JK: You are your name. You are your form, your body. You are the reactions and actions. You are the belief, the fear, the suffering and pleasure. You are all that.
DB: But the first experience is that I am here first, and that those are properties of me; they are my qualities which I can either have or not have. I might be angry, or not angry, I might have this belief, or that belief.
JK: Contradictory. You are all that.
DB: But you see, it is not obvious. When you say I am that, do you mean that I am that, and cannot be otherwise?
JK: No. At present you are that. It can be totally otherwise.
DB: All right. So I am all that. You are telling me that this unbiased observer is the same as the anger he is looking at?
JK: Of course. Just as I analyze myself, and the analyzer is the analyzed.
DB: Yes. He is biased by what he analyzes.
JK: Yes.
DB: So, if I watch anger for a while, I can see that I am very biased by the anger, so at some stage I say that I am one with that anger?
JK: No, not 'I am one with it; I am it.
DB: That anger and I are the same?
JK: Yes. The observer is the observed. And when that actuality exists you have really eliminated altogether conflict. Conflict exists when I am separate from my quality.
DB: Yes, that is because if I believe myself to be separate, then I can try to change it, but since I am that, it is trying to change itself and remain itself at the same time.
JK: Yes, that's right. But when the quality is me, the division has ended. Right?
DB: When I see that the quality is me, then there is no point in trying to change.
JK: No. When there is division and the quality is not me, in that there is conflict, either suppression or escape, and so on, which is a wastage of energy. When that quality is me, all that energy which has been wasted is there to look, to observe.
DB: But why does it make such a difference to have that quality being me?
JK: It makes a difference when there is no division between the quality and me.
DB: Well then there is no perception of a difference....
JK: That's right. Put it round differently.
DB: ...the mind does not try to fight itself.
JK: Yes, yes. It is so.
DB: If there is an illusion of a difference, the mind must be compelled to fight against itself.
JK: The brain.
DB: The brain fights against itself.
JK: That's right.
DB: On the other hand, when there is no illusion of a difference, the brain just stops fighting.
JK: And therefore you have tremendous energy.
DB: The brain's natural energy is released?
JK: Yes. And energy means attention.
DB: The energy of the brain allows for attention....
JK: For that thing to dissolve.
DB: Yes, but wait a minute. We said before that attention was a contact of the mind and the brain. JK: Yes.
DB: The brain must be in a state of high energy to allow that contact.
JK: That's right.
DB: I mean, a brain which is low energy cannot allow that contact.
JK: Of course not. But most of us are low energy because we are so conditioned.
DB: Well essentially you are saying that this is the way to start.
JK: Yes, start simply. Start with 'what is,' what I am. Self-knowledge is so important. It is not an accumulated process of knowledge, which one then looks at; it is a constant learning about oneself.
DB: If you call it self-knowledge, then it is not knowledge of the kind we talked about before, which is conditioning.
JK: That's right. Knowledge conditions.
DB: But you are saying that self-knowledge of this kind is not conditioning. But why do you call it knowledge? Is it a different kind of knowledge?
JK: Yes. Knowledge conditions.
DB: Yes, but now you have this self-knowledge.
JK: Which is to know and to comprehend oneself. To understand oneself is such a subtle, complex thing. It is living.
DB: Essentially knowing yourself in the very moment in which things are happening.
JK: Yes, to know what is happening.
DB: Rather than store it up in memory.
JK: Of course. Through reactions, I begin to discover what I am.
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