Public Discussion 3, Bombay, 25 February 1966
Krishnamurti: What can we, this morning, talk over together that would have real significance in our lives?
Questioner: Sir, you said last… (inaudible).
K: No, just… just… We should be able to talk over together something that will actually affect our lives, our daily living, not some abstract idea, not some theory, but that will profoundly bring a significance, a meaning, vitality to our life and existence. Can we discuss seriously, talk over together, something that you feel that’s worthwhile; not what I have said or what somebody else has said but something that will have, in talking over together, a profound effect in our daily living?
Q: Sir, books have been a great factor in one’s life; you said, ‘Throw away mine too.’ Now, looking at your talk and the glamour around you, one is inclined to throw away your books too. If the books are not to be read, what are they made for and why are they… (inaudible)?
K: Oh, sir, go and think about something else. Surely, that’s not what we… does that affect your life, reading books?
Q: Surely, sir, it does.
K: Just a minute, sir, just a minute. Don’t answer me so quickly, sir. Does it really affect your life, profoundly? You have read the Gita, probably; I haven’t. Some of the Upanishads; I haven’t. You have read modern psychology, you have read various other books, has it really, profoundly changed your life? If it has not, the books aren’t worth a penny. It isn’t worth going across the road to buy a book, so mere reading has no value at all. So what does affect you, sirs?
Q: How is the contradiction pleasure?
K: I haven’t understood the question.
Q: How does contradiction cause pleasure?
K: I am sorry, I don’t know what you… Sir, put it in your particular language, somebody will translate it to me.
Q: You’ve said that pleasure is caused by contradiction… (inaudible).
Q: (Inaudible)… fear is the thing that affects each one of us… (inaudible) problem of fear.
K: You want to really discuss the question of fear as it really affects all our lives. Do we discuss that?
Q: Yes.
K: Right, sirs?
Q: (Inaudible).
Q: (Inaudible)… also suggest that we continue last time’s topic because… (inaudible).
K: Sir, please, sir, we are not discussing topics. We are discussing…
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Please, sir, we are discussing problems that affect us, not any old subject that you discuss in a college.
Q: (Inaudible)… problem and we were trying to pick up the problem on how to bring the mutation of the mind with which you ended that we have to free our minds, so if we can take that topic and continue it… (inaudible).
K: Sir, we are… if we discuss this question of fear seriously, perhaps then we will understand what mutation is implied, what freedom from fear implies. So do we discuss that? Yes sir? What? Do we discuss that?
Many: Yes.
K: Right, sir. Talk it over together. First of all, to talk things over together about this question of fear one must be quite certain, assured, that you want to be free from fear. Because one sees what fear does in life. Are you aware what it does in your life? You are afraid of something, aren’t you, sir? Afraid of your wife, your husband, your boss, afraid of death, afraid of what people might say, afraid of losing your job, afraid of ill health, afraid of pain, afraid of not being able to achieve what you want to, afraid of not being able to fulfil, afraid that you will… that you can never find — in quotes — God or some reality that will give you immense joy. So there are… one is afraid of so many things. Right, sirs? What? You know what you’re afraid of? No? Do you know what you’re afraid of, sir?
Q: I’m not afraid of anything, sir.
(Laughter)
K: The gentleman says he is not afraid of anything and you all laugh. Either it is a fact and therefore he’s a very happy man or it is not a fact and what he says has no meaning whatever. So each one of us knows in some way or other, consciously or unconsciously, of a fear in which we are held. Do you know it?
Q: Yes sir. We know it.
K: One moment you said you are not free of…
Q: I’m not but I experienced fear, sir. I’m not at this moment afraid of anything. I experience fear and doubts… (inaudible) afraid of so many things in life…
K: Just a minute, sir. The gentleman says at the present moment he is not aware of any fear. He has been through fear and is free of it and now at present today, now, in this hall he is not aware of it. That means you may be aware of a future fear. For the moment, sitting here casually, being talked at or talking to, you feel, ‘Well, I’m not afraid,’ but that’s not what we are talking, sir, is it? Sir, haven’t… don’t you know of any hidden or conscious fear?
Q: (Inaudible)… what you’re afraid of.
K: Not to type it, sir, you be aware of it.
Q: We are aware that we can be afraid.
K: Not can be.
Q: Or are or have been.
K: Ah, that’s right.
(Laughter)
Now, if you are… if one is aware of what one is afraid of then we can proceed factually — you follow, sir? — not theoretically, not in abstraction. Right, sirs? If I know what I am afraid of, of my wife or my husband, of falling ill, of losing a job, of my son not getting or daughter not getting married or failing in some exam — you know? – afraid, and there are all kinds of subtle forms of fear. Unless one takes that actually of… one is afraid of, mere abstract discussion of fear has no meaning whatsoever. So we will take one fear, whatever you like, and go through it. What fear do you want to discuss?
Q: (Inaudible).
Q: (Inaudible)… of mediocrity.
K: That’s right, sir. Wait a minute. That’s a good fear. The gentleman says he is afraid of remaining a mediocrity. You know what that word *mediocre* means? The average, the middle class, the bourgeois, the man who says, ‘My little garden, my little house, my little family, my little country; you can step on my neck, you can treat me as you like but I am very humble man, I am nobody.’ You know, that’s generally, what mediocrity means; a bourgeois; a man with a little mind, with little reactions, with few reactions and they’re all very petty, he is afraid and refuses to acknowledge he’s afraid, he thinks he knows a great deal but he’s very humble about it, pretends, poses, very petty mind, and wants to help the world and do marvellous things with his petty, little mind. And the gentleman says he’s afraid of being mediocre. You’ve understood, sir? Now, he says, ‘Let us talk it over together and see if we can’t break away, break through this mediocrity, this pettiness.’ Right, sir?
Q: Yes.
K: That’s not his problem, please bear in mind (laughs). You’re all in that position; we’re all petty minds, small, narrow, little minds. You may have read a great deal or experienced much but it’s still a small mind. So he says, ‘How am I’ – which is you, we say, you say, ‘How am I to break this petty little mind?’ Right, sir? Because I see around me petty minds: the politicians, the gurus, the businessmen, the saints, the… everything around me, every human being is a very small entity, hating, killing, being affectionate, being jealous, angry, furious, all the rest of it, and I’m afraid of being swallowed up by this mind, by the majority, and also I’m afraid my own petty little mind I don’t understand, I can’t break through. Right? That’s the problem. You understand, sir? We are all in it. Right? So I am afraid of that. I see it leads nowhere. I can practice meditation, go to the temple, belong to the communist part, social work, and belong to this group or that group, which is doing little reform for this beloved country, as it’s called, which is silly nonsense, and so on and on and on and on. So one is frightened, frightened of being such a small mind.
Now, first of all, what do we mean being frightened; frightened of what? Please go very carefully into this. Frightened of being what one is?
Q: What one may have to face.
K: Sir, please, sir, do… don’t find… please don’t answer me so quickly, sir. Examine; examine the question first before you answer it. When I say I’m frightened, frightened of what, of what I am? Frightened of my bourgeois my pettiness?
Q: Frightened of not being able to go somewhere from here.
K: Wait, wait, wait. ‘Frightened’, the gentleman says, ‘frightened of not being able to go beyond my limitations’ — right? — frightened not to break through, frightened of not having the capacity to destroy this pettiness.’ Right? So I’m frightened of what I am. Right? Go slow… Frightened of what I am. Why should I be frightened? No, don’t laugh, look at it, sir. This is very serious, sir, do go into it. Why should I be frightened of what I am?
Q: Because I know what I should be.
K: No… which… that… Now, follow this up slowly. I am frightened of what I am because I have an idea of what I should be. Sir, this is a very difficult subject. Go very slowly into it, and if you go into it as we are going to, you will see at the end of the discussion you will be out of it, if you vigorously follow this discussion right to the end. So you’re frightened of what you are because you think you should be something else or you ought to be something else.
Q: But… (inaudible) different standards.
K: Same thing, sir.
Q: Not a radical change or… (inaudible).
K: I am narrow, petty — I’ll use that word *petty* – I am petty and I have an idea that I should not be that. My standard is much higher — same thing… (inaudible) standard — and so what has happened? I am really frightened of what I am because I have an image, an idea, a concept what I should be.
Q: May I suggest…
K: Wait, sir, please. I am not being impatient but you want to throw in words before you… we haven’t even understood this fact. I am petty and I should not be petty. The ‘should not’ is an idea, is an image, is not an actuality, is not the fact, but ‘should be’ is not ever a fact. The fact is what I am.
Q: Sir, what I wish to say is… (inaudible). There’s nothing to be frightened about… (inaudible).
K: Sir, please, please, listen to what I’m saying, sir, I beg of you. Yourself, you are in that position; don’t describe it. I am saying I am mediocre, petty and I have seen people or heard people who are not petty and I say, ‘By Jove, I must be like them.’ What I should be is not what actually is. Right, sir?
Q: Right.
K: Now, let us proceed.
Q: Sir, but I understand the point, but what I feel is this dissatisfaction… (inaudible).
K: All right, sir, keep to your word, he wants that. You see, that gentleman is not following, following his pettiness and going through with it; he’s trying to say that he doesn’t mean fear but he means satisfaction. He’s still there.
Q: Sir, the pettiness is that one is afraid of what one is and what one should be, whereas the fact is that one is afraid of what one may have to face.
K: No, sir. Are you all cleverly trained lawyers?
(Laughter)
Sir, I realize by comparing myself with another who is not petty that I am petty, so I say, ‘I wish I could be like him, break through my pettiness.’ I am afraid of that, afraid remaining in my little pettiness, it doesn’t satisfy me. I have to be that, I like to be that, which means what? There are several things implied in this. Go slowly. First, I have compared myself with something else, with an idea, with a concept. I have seen an example of a human being who is not petty and I have compared myself, who am petty, with him. Right? So – follow this slowly — comparison. Right? Why do I think comparatively at all? Wait, wait, listen to the question before you answer it. Why do you compare yourself with another or with an idea, an example? Why? To better yourself? Ah? To better — wait, listen — to better yourself? The desire to better oneself is the very essence of mediocrity.
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Wait. Listen to it, sir; swallow that pill first, see what it does: whether you can live in this world without comparing at all. Wait, wait, you will come… you will see. Oh, don’t deny, sir, find out. I have compared myself with a human being or with an image which I have created, what should be the non-bourgeois and the non-petty, I’ve compared and I think by comparing I can improve myself, I can break through my pettiness. I use the comparison as a lever to force myself out of my pettiness. Wait, sir. So I say to myself, why do I compare at all? This happens in the school with the little boys. The little boy is told to compare himself with the… top of the class, so because… to force him to work more harder — right? — to study more. So what does it mean? Through comparison we hope to bring about a change, and does change come about through comparison? I can compare myself to — who? — some saint or some communist social worker, and what? I can compare myself and say, ‘I must be like him,’ and sweat for the rest of my life trying to be like him. Have I really changed? Have I changed my pettiness? All that I have done is transformed my pettiness to conform itself to the image which I have created, but it’s still petty. I don’t know if you follow this. I see you have not… have you followed this, sirs?
Q: Sir, can’t we not have ambition without comparing yourself with somebody else?
K: I am not talking about ambition; that’s, of course, implied. If I compare myself with somebody because I want to be like somebody else, I am ambitious and I’m still the same petty, little self.
Q: (Inaudible)… at the time when you are ambitious, it might be… (inaudible).
K: What, sir?
Q: Possibly, at the time when you are ambitious your qualities may be different and you might… (inaudible).
K: So, first see, sir. Do I transform, change my pettiness through comparison? I am not beautiful and you are and I compare myself with you and say, ‘I must be beautiful.’ Right? I put on… whatever I do to make myself beautiful. Am I beautiful?
Q: That’s not a man’s problem… (inaudible).
K: Ah, no, sir, don’t be silly… (inaudible) all infantile… (inaudible). Does comparison bring clarity of what you are? Obviously not. You have had dozens of examples of… I don’t know… of so-called non… human beings who are not petty, but generally they’re all petty. Now, another problem involved in it: can a petty, mind, a small mind says, ‘He is not a bourgeois, he is not petty and therefore I must be like him,’ can the petty mind judge what is freedom? It will still be petty. You understand, sir? Go slowly, sir. So one sees that through comparison, through judgement of another who is supposed to be outside the field of pettiness, when the mind is still petty it can only function in pettiness. Of course, sir.
Q: But you at least recognize greatness.
K: Wait. How can a confused mind choose a leader?
Q: I’m not choosing…
K: When you compare; comparison with another, it is a choice of a leader.
Q: I’m not comparing with any particular thing. I’m just increasing my standard.
K: Which is what? Out of your own pettiness you have created a picture of what you should be but it is the product of a petty mind.
Q: But… (inaudible).
K: But it is still the product of a petty mind.
Q: But… (inaudible) can be good… (inaudible).
K: It is still the product of a petty mind.
Q: (Inaudible).
K: That’s all. A petty mind creating something which it thinks is great is still petty because it… the root of the future is out of pettiness. Sir, this is simple. Now, so… I hope you are working too, not just listening.
Q: Suppose a great man wants to be greater than what he is.
K: ‘Suppose, the gentleman says, ‘a great man wants to be greater than what he is’ — he should go and drown himself.
(Laughter)
Q: Sir, we are not aware of our pettiness.
K: That just it, sir.
Q: (Inaudible)… pettiness, comparison, inferiority complex, ambition, all these things, do they come under category of fear?
K: But, sir, that gentleman said… What are you trying to trying to tell me, sir, at the end of it?
Q: I’m just inquiring whether all these things…
K: He says so; he wants to discuss… we have changed the word *fear*.
Q: Satisfaction.
K: You people are… Sir, don’t you know that your minds are as big as a peanut?
Q: Sir, I think words have some meaning and we should not use wrong words.
K: Oh, sir, sir, don’t tell me about usage of the words. We started out that gentleman asking what fear is? I began with saying let’s discuss fear, and he said, ‘I’m really frightened’ — please, sir, listen to what he said, ‘I’m really frightened of being like the rest of you,’ because he’s young. He says, ‘I don’t want to become like the rest of these old men who talk a great deal but have little minds.’ Right, sir? Ah, no, you won’t put it that way, I put it that way.
(Laughter)
So he says, ‘What am I to do?’ Which you are also in the same position, even that gentleman who says, ‘I am seeking satisfaction,’ or this or that, he’s still in the same position, that our minds are petty and whatever it does, whatever it creates, whether the world recognizes it as a marvellous picture, painted by a petty mind, it’s still petty. Right? Now…
Q: Sir, our mind is not petty at all moments… (inaudible).
K: Oh no. ‘Mind is not petty at all moments.’ the gentleman says. Then what’s the point of that statement? ‘Occasionally I’m happy, occasionally, I have food but all the time I am hungry.’ Are you satisfied with that? So, sir, don’t bring in extraneous subjects which have no meaning.
Q: Sir, surely there is some person in the world… (inaudible).
K: All right, sir, please, sir, you have said enough.
Q: About what?
K: About everything. Let’s discuss.
Q: I’m afraid you’re rather impatient.
K: Ah?
Q: You are rather impatient.
K: The gentleman says I’m rather impatient. I said I am not, at the beginning, but you keep on asserting something which we have already understood; you’d better go and talk to yourself, sir, I can’t go on; otherwise we’ll go back and back and back, never proceed. You see, it shows that you don’t want to go through this to the end.
Q: We want to go.
K: You go on, sir.
(Laughter)
I realize that my mind being petty, whatever the image, however great that image it creates, it is still within the field of pettiness. Right. So I say to myself I see that very clearly, I won’t compare, because it is still within the field of pettiness. I won’t imagine I must do this or that. It is still within the field of pettiness. So I say to myself, ‘By Jove, I must first face this pettiness, not try to change it.’ Right? I must know what this pettiness means. Look, sir, I have a dull mind; I may be very clever with words, sharp in my argument, quick in asserting or denying but I’m still a dull mind. I’ve learned to polish it up but inwardly is still a dull mind. How is a dull mind to become a clear mind, knowing first, that it is the dull mind, not trying to say, ‘ I’ll polish it, I will do something, I will not do something’? First I must know. In the same way, I must know what my petty mind is, which means I must come into contact with it, mustn’t I? No? Oh no, you’re all gone off, you’ve gone to sleep.
Q: Sir, I… (inaudible).
K: What, sir?
Q: When I face my dull mind, my mind, I become… (inaudible).
K: I become confused?
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Now, wait a minute. I’m going to show you – please follow this – I’m going to… we are going to talk over together and see how to look at a dull mind first. So I will not escape from the fact that my mind is petty by imagining that it should be something else. I won’t escape from the fact that I am petty. Then I can look because all my energy now, instead of being dissipated in escape, is centralized to look. Right? I am looking – now, go slowly – I am looking at my petty mind. Right? What is a petty mind? I say, ‘I’m petty.’ How do I know I am petty? Only through comparison — right? — and I have denied comparison. You follow, sir? Go into it. Right, sir.
Q: (Inaudible).
K: I show it to you just now, sir. A petty mind comparing itself with something great, the great is created by the petty mind, therefore the great, what it calls great is still petty.
Q: But it’s still greater than what I see in myself.
K: It is not. How can it be? The petty mind is a field, in that… out of that field it creates something. The thing it has created is still petty but it considers great.
Q: (Inaudible).
K: But it’s still petty, though it may consider great.
Q: (Inaudible) the whole world.
K: Ah?
Q: (Inaudible)… by whole world, perhaps.
K: I am not interested in the great world. I’m not interested in what people call saints and mahatmas and Christs and communist leaders. I’m not interested. I want… we are considering when a petty mind creates out of itself something great, the great is still petty. You won’t acknowledge that; that’s the difficulty.
Q: That means your mind and mind and my mind is one.
K: What?
(Laughter)
Q: You are also great and I’m also great.
(Laughter)
K: You know what maturity is? Not age. To be sensitive, which means intelligent to what other people are saying, thinking, feeling. So, sirs, I see very clearly a petty, confused, dull mind, whatever it may create, whatever it may project out of itself is still petty.
Q: Why not take it as it is, sir?
K: Ah?
Q: Why not to take it as it is, sir?
K: We are doing it.
Q: (Inaudible).
Q: Why analyse?
K: Why analyse?
Q: At all.
K: I am not analysing. Mind is trying to escape from the fact.
Q: Why you analyse it? Why not take it as it is?
K: The gentleman says, ‘Why analyse? Why not take it as it is.’ What is ‘as it is’?
Q: It comes to love.
K: To?
Q: It comes to love.
K: To?
Q: It will come to love.
K: Oh. The gentleman says, ‘It will come to love.’ I don’t know what that gentleman is talking about, I’m sorry. How can a petty mind come to love?
Q: It’s not… (inaudible).
K: Oh, God. Do you see, sir, the difficulty of clear thinking? This requires discipline to think clearly and discipline comes by thinking clearly, not by imposing discipline.
Q: (Inaudible)… it is only by comparison that he will call himself petty, otherwise… (inaudible).
K: Therefore… if there is no comparison what will you do? How will you know you are petty?
Q: (Inaudible)… there will be stagnation.
K: So, the gentleman says if there is no comparison, there will be stagnation. Right? Aren’t you stagnating though you have compared?
Q: No, not because of that; because we are not able to live up to that comparison.
K: That’s it. A petty mind cannot live up to its image, which it has created.
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Just follow it, sir, don’t… Good God, you people are so… (inaudible). A petty mind says, ‘I have not made enough effort to live up to that,’ and therefore it says, ‘It’s my fault, not the fault of the image.’ Right?
Q: Right.
K: Then why have the image at all?
Q: Because…
K: Wait. We’ll find the right kind of effort which we’re going to into now. Sir, look, you have compared yourself with everybody from childhood. You are conditioned that way to compare, compare, compare. The little politician compares himself with the big politician, a little yogi with a big yogi, the little guru with the big guru, the little lawyer with the judge and so on and on and on. That you are so heavily conditioned to compare and you can’t think anything except in those terms and you refuse to see a different way of looking at it; and you have compared – where are you? You have compared yourself with Shankara, with Buddha, with Christ, with all the latest saints and so on but where are you at the end of it? You are just where you are. Right?
Q: Right.
K: So begin there. Don’t compare and see if you can’t… So if you don’t compare, what happens? Then you’re faced with the fact, aren’t you? If you are faced with the fact, then you say, ‘I don’t like it,’ but that is the fact; why do you introduce like and dislike into something that is so? The like and dislike is a waste of energy therefore let’s look at the fact of pettiness — listen carefully, sir — at the fact of pettiness without like and dislike. Right?
Q: Right.
K: And how do you know you are petty if you have no comparison? Listen carefully. How do you know you’re petty?
Q: By recognizing that there is scope for improving, sir.
Q: (Inaudible).
K: The scope for improving is comparison and I refuse to compare myself with anybody.
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Please listen to that. Will you do that? Can you do it? Break through your conditioning which is so heavy that is to compare and you see the fallacy of comparison and so you say, ‘No, I will never compare.’ Then you are in a position of having energy, because you have wasted energy in comparing, you have energy to look. Right? Now, have that energy to look. What do you look at? Go slowly, sir. What do you look at?
Q: (Inaudible)… capability.
K: Look… first begin slowly, sir, slowly. What do you look at? At the word *petty*? Ah?
Q: What it implies.
K: What implies? The word implies?
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Please, sir, do listen to what he is… What the word implies?
Q: No, not the word.
K: Then?
Q: The fact.
K: Do…
Q: The condition that it puts you in.
K: Sir, sir, don’t…
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Sir, look, I don’t compare anymore with anybody but I want to change, break down this pettiness. Right? Before I break down this pettiness, how do I know I’m petty? I have only known pettiness through comparison, so I don’t compare and I’m looking and I say I’m still petty. Ah? Is the word making you petty or the fact is petty?
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Do please, sir, listen; apply your mind to find out this out.
Q: The fact is petty.
Q: It’s only the word.
Q: (Inaudible).
Q: Sir, the feeling of… (inaudible).
K: What are you looking at, at the word or the fact, knowing that the word is not the thing? Right?
Q: Right.
K: So what are you looking at?
Q: The actual pettiness.
K: Which is, how do you know it is petty when there is no word?
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Please, listen to it, sir. I’ll begin again. The word *microphone* is not the thing. The word *tree* is not the tree. Right? The name, the symbol is not the fact. So am I looking at the word or through the word to the fact or I’m only looking at the fact?
Q: (Inaudible).
K: You see the difficulty, sir? Now, we have accepted the word, the comparison and the battle through comparison as the norm of life and I reject all that silly stuff. And I say what am I looking at? Right? Am I looking at the fact though the word and therefore the word gives to the fact the meaning which the word has? Right?
Q: Right.
K: So I don’t… so if I look at the fact through the word then I’m misjudging the fact. Right?
Q: Right.
K: So I reject the word. Right?
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Not if you can. You must if you want to understand the fact.
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Ah?
Q: (Inaudible).
Q: Even if we reject, the word the feeling remains.
K: I don’t know… Please, do listen quietly. Now, sir, now what have I done? Listen carefully. I said first I am afraid of being a bourgeois, a petty mind, because I don’t want to be swallowed up by the mediocrity of mankind, so I have — follow this step — I have invented out of my pettiness an idea what I should be and hoping through that comparison I will change myself, and I see, by comparing myself, pettiness still remains. Which means what? I have now rejected comparison. The moment I do not compare, I’m out of the ordinary. Right? Do you understand, sir?
Q: (Inaudible).
K: Ah? If I don’t compare with anybody, and they… all the people around me comparing and living in that comparison with conflicts, with misery, and I… (inaudible) I am not… I don’t belong. I am out of comparison.
Q: (Inaudible)… remain petty.
K: I am going to go into that, sir, but you haven’t gone that far. You haven’t stopped comparing. So if I don’t compare, I’m out. Right?
Q: (Inaudible).
K: So then what am I to do? Am I still petty? Now, I’m going to find out — right? — not through comparison but find out if whatever I do is petty, small. Right? Now I have the energy to tackle the problem; the energy which I’ve dissipated with comparing; the energy that has gone into conflict between what is and what should be; the energy of trying to imitate, copy, suppress – I’ve pushed all that aside. Now I’ve got this tremendous energy to find out. Right?
Q: Right.
K: I’m going to find out, not what pettiness is, because that’s out, because I do not compare. You understand, sir? I don’t compare but since all human beings compare, they are petty and comparison shows to me that one of the reasons of pettiness is comparison. Now I’m going to find out. I’ve got energy, plenty of energy to find out if the mind which has been made petty by the environment, by circumstance, by all of you people, whether I can wipe it out. Right? You have understood, sir?
Q: Yes sir.
K: Now, all right. That is, I want to know how to transform the petty little thoughts, the narrow little mind… activities which the brain has accumulated through its conditioning, living among the petty people. Right? And knowing that whatever it does is still petty. Right? Now I’ve got the energy to look at the fact without any reaction. Sir, it’s only energy, tremendous energy that can be stable and I’ve got this tremendous energy to look at the fact completely without a movement. Right? What is the petty mind? How do I know it is a petty mind? I know it is still petty, not through comparison because… what it does daily, its daily thoughts, its daily stupidities, its jealousies, its vanities, which it has been conditioned by all the generations that have passed. So I have the energy to be aware of any petty thoughts and break it.
Q: But how are we going… (inaudible) without comparison?
K: All right, sir, go on asking that question to somebody else. You understand, sir? I’m now watching thought, feeling without calling it a name. You understand? I’ve got the energy to look at it because I’m not escaping anywhere through any direction, in any direction. So I look, I am observing and to observe quietly demands tremendous energy. Right? When you look at a thought, at a feeling, at an idea that arises out of a mind, a brain that has been made petty, I can look at… that can be looked at with complete energy. Right? So when you look completely at anything, what takes place?
Q: Freedom.
K: Ah… You see, you haven’t even experienced the thing, you just verbalize it. You don’t know what it means.
Q: Can I ask you the one question? (Inaudible)… with our full energy and freedom from comparison, what standards are we to use to judge ourselves?
K: What, sir?
Q: What standards… (inaudible) to use to judge ourselves, that we are going to look at ourselves.
K: Don’t… please, sir, please.
Q: (Inaudible).
K: I understand, sir, I understand. We have no standard.
Q: How are we going to look at ourselves?
K: I’m doing it. You’re not doing it.
Q: I would like to find out which part of the mind knows that the whole mind is petty.
K: The gentleman wants to know which part of the mind is looking at the whole mind. See, these people have… Sir, I have to begin in a different direction, very simply and we have… time is limited, we’ll have to stop in few minutes. These interruptions have really spoilt it; you can’t follow right though. Just a minute; just listen to it. Will you give me two minutes, sirs, and observe what is being said and examine what is being said?
To look at anything you need energy. Right? Anything, it doesn’t matter. To look at that colour I need energy but to casually pass it by is what we do. We see so many colours, so many faces, so many trees, so many dirty streets and we just pass it by, but to observe that colour needs tremendous energy, just to observe. Right? Energy is needed. Now, to look more intensely into that colour, greater energy is needed and therefore no escapes, no thought, just to observe. Then, in observing I see, I call it green. The word *green* becomes a waste of energy when I’m looking. Right? And I say, ‘I don’t like that colour’, which is a waste of energy, or ‘I like that colour.’ which is a waste of energy, so any movement of thought looking at that colour, any movement of thought is a waste of energy. And I know I can only look at it completely when there is no waste of energy. So there is no interference of thought. So I’m looking… there is a perception of that colour without any interference. What has happened? Ah, it gets too long. I won’t…
That is, who is the observer? Is there an observer? But only the observer is the fact, the green. (Inaudible). Therefore, until there is this complete attention without any movement of thought, which demands tremendous energy, there is an interval of space between the observer and the observed and hence the whole process of comparison adjustment, conflict arises.
Right, sirs.