Public Talk 9, Saanen, 27 July 1967

Identifier: 27th of July, 1967, Mr J. Krishnamurti’s ninth public talk in Saanen.

Krishnamurti: I think we have sufficiently talked over together the question of fear. But, of course, one can go into greater details, exploring more minutely, but we would still be left, if we have not already understood, with the question which we began with, which was ‘fear’. And mere concern with the details of fear does not necessarily indicate, it seems to me, a serious mind. The more one is concerned with details, and however much one may be serious about those details, I think it is far more important to be serious, with the total process of not only of fear but also what lies beyond fear, whether it is at all possible for us to be completely be free, rid of fear, and if one has, what is there beyond? And that question may be rather futile because most of us still are caught in fear, and after having discussed it during the four or five meetings that we have had here, I think we should go further and not keep on at that one issue.

As we were saying, a petty little mind, a narrow, shallow mind is very concerned about details and is very serious about those details. But, when presented with greater issue, about which it has to be serious far more, then it hesitates, because it doesn’t see the full implication of what it is aware of. And I would like… we would like this morning, if we may, go into this question of what is the mind. And, in going into it, exploring it, we might perhaps come upon the beginning of all thought. And perhaps then we shall able to come upon something much deeper, which is love. And we might, if there is time and the door is open, we might then find out for ourselves what is the meditative mind.

We are asking if we could explore this question of what is the mind. The specialists, the neurologists, the various psychologists, theoreticians, religious and intellectual, have defined more or less what it is: mind that remembers has capacity to think both reasonably and unreasonably; the mind that functions not only technologically but outside, which has certain intimation, hints of otherness, something which is above and contains both the conscious as well as the unconscious; the whole storehouse of memory, which is in the brain itself, which is part of the mind; the mind cannot be separated from the body, and so on and on and on.

I think it is very important for us, for each one of us who are here, if we could for ourselves find out what one means by the mind. Not according to the specialists, however capable, or according to the theologians or to the religious people, but actually putting all that aside, if one could find out what actually for each one of us is the mind. Then, after coming upon it, we could ask further questions, which is, what is the origin of thought? Can one discover how thought begins? And that question, how thought begins, and to discover it may reveal still a further depth which we shall go into as we go along.

But first, I think, we should be able to ask ourselves and find out for ourselves what is the mind, the mind that is conscious, that thinks, that has the whole background of time, the brain that reacts according to its conditioning, the brain that is the storehouse of memory, which is part of the mind. Do we, each one of us, find it for ourselves or we have been told and find what we have been told? And I think this is important, this question, whether you find what you have been told, and therefore it is not your discovery, or you find it for yourself what it is. If you find it out for yourself what it is, from there we can proceed, but if you are merely accepting a theory, a communication about the mind, then you are dealing with second-hand things and therefore it becomes merely a theory and therefore it has no value at all. So can one find out what is the mind?

You know, to understand this question deeply, one has to be really in a state of meditation. Not the meditation according to some system, method, or the desire to achieve a certain result, which is not meditation at all, but a mind that is meditative is free to look, to observe, and therefore a mind that is extraordinary quiet. And when you observe your own mind, that is your whole consciousness, whether in that consciousness there is an observer which can examine. You are following all this?

Look, to examine that microphone, I must take it to pieces; I must see the… how it works, what is inside. So in the same way, to look at this whole field of consciousness, which is the mind, which is the brain, which are the nerves, which are the whole bundle of memories and so on and so on. To look at it, is there an entity which can examine it? You are…? Or, is the entity separate from the thing it examines? And, if it is separate, is that thing not invented by thought, which is part of the mind? I hope you are getting all this. And therefore it is not separate at all, and therefore it is not the examiner, the observer. Therefore, how is one to be… to find out what the mind is without the observer. Are you getting what I am talking about? Am I making it somewhat clear? All right.

I want to know what my mind is — the mind; the mind that feels, thinks, the brain that reacts, the thoughts that arise from the memories, the motives, the intimations, the activities, the self-centered pursuits, ideals, beliefs, dogmas, fears, which are all within the field of this consciousness, which is part of me. And I say to myself, I must look at… I must find out, I must find out what the origin of thought is, the beginning, and also I must find out what actually is consciousness. And, when I say, ‘I must find out,’ is that ‘I’ separate from the thing it is going to examine, look, observe? And therefore it is capable to looking objectively. And, if it is not, if that ‘I’ who observes this totality of consciousness which we call the mind, if that observer is not separate — please listen to this question carefully — if that observer is not separate, then how is it to find out or be aware of this total state which is called the mind? You understand what I am…? Bien?

So, I must be very clear on this point, whether there is an observer which is separate from the mind. And obviously the observer is created by thought, part of this consciousness and therefore it is not separate. Right? Don’t agree with this, please. You have to find out that it is not separate. And then, how are you going to be… how is that totality of the mind to be understood if there is not a separate entity who says, ‘I have examined and I have understood’? Right? You understand all this? You know, this demands a great deal of discipline — right? — not self-imposed discipline, controlled suppression, but the very act of looking, examining, itself brings its own discipline. I want to find out, and to find out, I am asking myself whether the observer is different from the thing that he observes. And to ask that question and to find the… whether the observer is different, demands a great deal of discipline. Not conformity, because there is no pattern here. So, I’ve… in that, in asking that very question, what is the mind, and whether there is a separate entity who observes that mind, that very question, these two very questions, in the very asking, is bringing about the discipline. Right? Because I must… the mind must be extraordinarily disciplined to find out. But this discipline is not conformity, therefore freedom. Therefore freedom brings discipline. Right? Got it? Is this fairly clear? Not clear in the sense verbally — are you doing this with me? We are going together?

One can ask these questions because you are free — you have no opinions, no conclusions, no beliefs. And in the very asking of it, there is not only austerity — you follow? — putting away everything except that one question which may open the door to enormous visions, enormous depths.

So, if the observer is part of the observed, which is the mind itself, which is consciousness itself, which has divided itself into the observer and the observed, and therefore that division is erroneous, then what is the state of… what is the state — we’ll change the words presently — which is aware of this totality which we call the mind? (Pause)

Please, if the observer is the observed — which we discussed at previous meetings; I am not going to go in details into it now because we have already done it — if the observer is the observed, that is, the whole of consciousness, which is the mind, in which is included the brain, the nerves and all that, memory, and the entity that observes all this is part of that consciousness, then when I ask myself, what is the mind, and the observer is not, then what is the state of mind that discovers this, that sees the… sees consciousness as it is with its frontiers, with its limitations and so on? Am I making myself clear? It doesn’t matter. Because you see, what we are trying to find out is, in asking that, when there is no observer, which obviously is not… who is separate, then what is it that is aware? Right? Now, let’s begin.

What is it to be aware? I am aware, sitting on this platform, of you all, of seeing different colours, the tent overhead, aware of the noise of that stream, the movement of one or two people, the silence — I am aware of this. In that awareness, is there an observer — you are following all this? — who says, ‘I am aware, separately, of that colour, that colour,’ because what we are going to examine further as we go along is: if all consciousness is limitation, and all consciousness is limitation in which there is no freedom whatsoever, then is it first of all possible to go beyond that limitation, and is it possible to experience that which is beyond the limitations of consciousness? And… (sound of train) And who is the entity that is going to experience? I don’t know if you are following all this. So I have to understand what we mean… what I mean… what we mean by awareness. To be aware. As I said, I am aware of all this. Am I aware as an observer separate from the thing observed, or am I aware without the observer?

You know what love is? Is there an observer who says, ‘I love’? And if there is that observer, is that love? And, when you say, ‘There is love,’ is there a complete absence of the observer? If there is no absence of the observer, then that love becomes hate, jealousy, pain, anxiety, guilt, you know, all the rest of it, which is not love. Then it becomes merely desire and pleasure, which again is not love — which we went into previously at previous meetings. So it is very important to find out what we mean by being aware, being attentive.

We have asked this question, what is the mind. We have asked that question because I want to find out, at least, we want to find out what is the beginning of all thought. And, in asking that question, who is the entity that’s going to find out, who is going to receive the answer? If the entity is part of that consciousness or part of that thought, then he is incapable of finding out. What can find out only is that state of awareness, is that state of awareness… in that state of awareness, is there still an entity who is aware, who says, ‘I must be aware, I must practice awareness’? You are following all this?

Look, when you look at the blue sky this morning, with those mountains and clouds, seeing the whole depth and height of those, of the sky, when you are aware of that, do you say that I am aware? Or there is only an awareness of all that without the observer. Though you see it with your eyes, with your… all the rest of it, that very seeing without creating the observer is to be totally aware. Right? (Pause; sound of aeroplane)

When one looks at that tree, are you aware of that tree without the observer? And the observer is the entity which has gathered information about that tree, and according to that information, image, symbol, he looks at that tree. And that looking with the observer is not being totally aware of the whole thing. Right? Am I…? Is this somewhat clear? That is, to bring it a little more directly: when you look at your wife or your husband are you aware of the wife or the husband through the image which you have created about the wife or the husband, or are you merely aware of actually ‘what is’, without the observer? I don’t know if you are following all this. Which is infinitely difficult thing to do — I can look at the sky, the clouds, the trees, the river and all the rest of it because that’s… it doesn’t intimately touch my feelings, my reactions. But when I have lived with somebody for a number of years, I have created an image about that person, and that person has created, built an image about me.

When we say we are aware, we generally mean the image has become aware of itself, in relation to the other image, which is part of awareness, but we have gone much further than that. And we say, is this image, the awareness of the image — sorry, I don’t mean that. When there is a centre which observes, there is a division and hence a conflict. And where there is conflict there is no awareness at all.. And to be free for… to be free from conflict, one has to become aware without conflict, without creating another centre aware of the image that I have created about myself or about another. I don’t know if you… Yeah? So, is there an awareness, without the centre, of this whole of consciousness — its boundaries, its limitation, its content; and the very contents make the boundaries. Right? Of course. The content of my consciousness, as a Hindu, educated, all that stuff, that, all that education experience is the content of this consciousness and therefore the content make the boundaries.

So I’m… we are beginning to find out that thought has its origin, it beginning, in consciousness in which there is the division between the observer and the observed. Right? Let’s put it down the other way: how will you find out for yourself how thought begins? — any thought. Have you ever asked yourself that question? Have you? If you have, how will you find out? And to find out anything, it doesn’t matter what it is, your mind must be quiet, mustn’t it. The whole of consciousness, not a part of it. Right? If I want to look at you, to see you very clearly, my mind must be very quiet, without all the prejudices, the chatters, the dialogues, the images, the pictures — all that must be put aside to look at you. And then only, because there is freedom and therefore there is quietness, it’s only in that state there can be observation. Right.

So can I — please follow my next question — can we, you and I, observe the beginning of thought? And I can only observe — please listen carefully — I can only observe the beginning of thought only in silence, not when I say… when I begin to search, ask, question, wait for a reply. I don’t know if you follow. It’s only when my mind is completely quiet after having put that question — what is the beginning thought? — when it is completely quiet right through my being, then I can begin to… out of that silence I begin to see how thought takes shape, from where it takes shape, from what material it takes shape. Right? Because it is very important, this question, because if one can be aware, if there is an awareness of the beginning of thought, then there is no need to control thought. Because, you know, we spend a great deal of time, not only in schools and colleges but as we grow older, controlling thought — right? — this is a good thought, this is a bad thought, this is a pleasant thought, I must go with it, it is an ugly thought, I must suppress it, and so on, so on — we control, suppress. And there is a battle going on all the time with various thoughts. So the mind becomes a battlefield, a field in which there is constant conflict — one thought against another thought, one desire against another desire, one pleasure dominating all other pleasures, and so on, so on. But, if one can, if there is an awareness of the beginning of thought, then there is no contradiction in thought.

Am I talking nonsense? Or is there some kind of sense in what we are talking about? I think there is a little sense in it, because, you see, a life of conflict has no meaning whatsoever; a conflict with myself or with my neighbour or with ideas. I don’t want any kind of conflict, because every conflict is attention, a distortion. And a life of conflict wears itself out very quickly. And I must find out if there is a way of living without one breath of conflict at any time in one’s life. And I can only come upon that discovery when I begin to question whether thought… what is the beginning of thought. If I can… if the mind can discover by being aware without the centre, then every thought then — please follow this — every thought then is not a distraction. Every thought then has not its opposite. Is this…? There is only thought, not the opposing thought. Therefore, it is an important question, which has… which has some sense in it and not quite nonsense. One can see that, the beginning of thought only when there is silence.

So, mind has become silent, not through discipline, not through control, not through various forms of mediations and all the rest of the ugly business, but naturally, as it is only in silence I can discover anything, the mind can find out, mind can come upon this extraordinary thing of discovering something new. It’s only out of silence. And that silence cannot possible be cultivated, it cannot be put together by thought. If it is put together by thought, it is death, it’s stagnation. When thought puts anything together, there is always conflict. And so one comes upon the discovery, because the mind is completely quiet, the beginning of thought. It doesn’t matter what thought it is — thought — and because, if there is only thought, it has no contradiction. Oh, you don’t see this. You understand? There is only desire, and contradiction arises when I… when there is a desire for that, in opposition to that. And when one begins to find out the beginning of desire, then there is no contradiction, because contradiction implies conflict, and the one who wants to live without conflict has to understand all this.

To understand all this, the mind must be silent, and this silence is meditation. A mind that is extraordinarily alive, alert. Every discovery is no longer stored up, therefore one comes upon something else, which is: is it possible for a mind to be so greatly alert, alive, a light to itself without any experience? You’re following all this? Because most of us crave for experiences — going to the moon, or seeing on the television the people who are up there, weightlessness, to experience that weightlessness of which one talks about, the astronauts. Craving for that experience. Climbing the great heights, which is a form of experience; the experience of a little mind that seeks through drugs the state of a consciousness in which there are visions, the heightened sensitivity and so on, so on. We all want experiences, don’t we? No? The mystical experience, the religious experience, the sexual experiences, the experience of having a great deal of money, power, position, domination — you know. We all crave for experiences. First, because our own life is so shallow, so empty, so insufficient, and we think that without experiences our mind becomes dull, stupid, heavy. That’s why we read book after book, we go to the museums, concerts, rituals, churches, football field — every form of experience. But we never ask what is involved in this experiencing. Is there anything new in experiencing? Do find out, please, don’t just agree or disagree — find out. Is there anything new , original in experience? Or every experience demands recognition; otherwise it is not an experience. If I don’t recognise it as an experience involving something, if I don’t recognise it, it is not an experience. Right? It’s only when I recognise it I call it an experience. No? But to recognise, I must have already known. So, through experience I can… there can be no new thing at all. Oh, come on. Right?

So one has discovered something, discovered a fundamental truth that a mind that is seeking, craving, searching for wider, deeper experience, such a mind is shallow because it lives always with its memories and therefore with its recognition, remembrances; and what is remembered is not the new. So there is no experiencing silence. And, then one asks, if the mind is really quiet, silent: is it possible to act in this world? Do you understand? Is it possible to function in this world with this enormous sense of silence? You are asking…? Go ahead. Can I go ahead? I have a certain function, I have to do certain things, as a librarian, as a cook, as a technician, sit in an office and so on, which all demand knowledge, accumulated information as knowledge, experience, and my mind which has understood and therefore lives in that state of silence, can that function in the office? I don’t know if you are following all this. When you put that question, you separate silence from the action. Right? Don’t you? And therefore it’s the wrong question. But when there is this silence, it will function in the office. You know, it’s like a drum that is highly tuned and you strike on it and it gives you the right note, but it’s always empty, silent It doesn’t say, ‘I am silent. How am I to function in the office?’ So one discovers something, which is that all consciousness, both the hidden and the obvious, the surface and the secret, is part of this process of thinking. And that thinking can only… the beginning of thought can only be… the awareness of the beginning of thought can only be aware when there is silence. So, when there is silence, there is no frontier to consciousness. I don’t know if you…

And all this demands a great deal of discipline in itself, not for something. And then, if you have gone that far, we can then ask, what is love? You understand? It is necessary. Is love within the field of consciousness, which is thought? I say, ‘I love you,’ love my country, love my god, love my books, love my position — you know, love. We use that word rather slackly or rather intensely. When you say to somebody, ‘I love you,’ what does that word mean? And the religious people throughout the world have divided it into the profane and the sacred, and so on. Is love desire? Don’t say no — for most of us it is. Desire with pleasure, the pleasure that is derived through the senses, through sexual attachment and fulfilment — my wife, my husband, the family as opposed to the other families, my family, my country, my god, my king — you know, all that stuff. And we all call that love, for which we kill others, for which… in which there is jealousy, hatred. Is all that love?

Intellectually, we say no it’s not love, obviously — too stupid to call it love. But we are caught in it. I am greedy, I want money, I want position; you deny it and I hate you. You are my enemy; I’ll talk against you. Or my wife looks at somebody else and I am in a torture; and yet I say I love her. Is all that love? In that love, there is possession, domination, dependence, seeking satisfaction, pleasure, comfort, companionship, an escape from myself. Is all that love? Or does love lie beyond this turmoil of thought? Then if you say it does, then what will happen to my wife, my children, my family? They must have security, I must have security. Right?

When you put that question, then you’re not… you have never been outside that field of consciousness. When once you have been outside that field of consciousness, you will never put that question, because then you will know what love is, in which there is no thought, no tomorrow — right? — and therefore no time. But you see, you will listen to this, pleased and probably mesmerised and enchanted, but to actually go beyond it, beyond thought, beyond time. Because time is thought, thought is sorrow, and to go beyond all that is to be aware — not, ‘I am aware’ — is to be aware that there is a different dimension called love. And from there one can act, one can be.

And from that arises another question — sorry, you don’t mind? — what is beauty? Is the beauty… is beauty in the object or in the eyes of the beholder? Or is beauty… is neither in the object nor in the beholder but in total abandonment of the observer and the observed? Which means there can be self-abandonment only when there is total austerity. Not the austerity of the priests with its harshness, with its sanctions, rules, obedience. Austerity means simplicity, not in ideas, in clothes, in behaviour or in food, but being totally simple which is complete humility. Therefore there is never a climbing, therefore there is never an achievement, therefore there is no ladder to climb, there is only the first step, and the first step is the everlasting step.

And without understanding beauty and love and what is meditation — the real thing, I mean — life as it is, lived as it is, with its sorrow, pain, conflict, has very little meaning. You may take drugs to give it meaning, you may cling to your sexual appetites to give life a meaning but any dependence on any drug or any thought or any demand of pleasure only brings about more conflict, more misery, more confusion.

Do you want to ask any questions? Yes, sir?

Questioner: I just wanted to see… You were just taking about experience. Since a few years, I have a tremendous craving to go up in a glider and I thought that would be really wonderful. Yesterday I had the chance to go up with a Swiss…

K: …pilot…

Q: …officer and glided for one hour. Most of the interesting experience to know how to do it, because when I came down, it was just as if I had had the experience before — it was not necessary to go up.

K: Ah! Look, sir, the questioner… the questioner says he went up in a glider yesterday — you have seen them up there, obviously — and he wanted to go up because he wanted to have a new experience.

Q: To do it myself.

K: To do it yourself — another form of experience. And when he came down he found it was not an experience at all. He had already had it.

Q: Exactly.

K: But is it? No, no. No, no, you are reducing it to… Look sir, why do you crave for experience? Go into yourself first — whether in a glider, sex, mountain, or taking LSD or STP and getting a psychedelic expansion through drugs, and so on — why do you crave for experience? First ask that. And if you didn’t have an experience, not one experience, what would happen to you? Is that possible? Now, we depend on experiences to keep us awake. Experience is a form of challenge — right? — and without challenges, you know what will happen to all of us — we’ll be asleep. If there is no communism, if there was no conflict within ourselves, if there was no political changes, if everything was as we want it to be, undisturbed, we’ll all be fast asleep. And challenges are necessary for most of us, different challenges, and it’s that what keeps us awake. And we depend on challenges to keep us awake, which is, on experiences, pleasant or painful, or every form of challenge and experience we want, in order to keep awake. If, or rather when one realises that this dependence on challenges, experience only makes the mind more dull, it doesn’t really keep you awake — as you have had, as we have said the other day, thousands of wars, and we haven’t learned a thing. We are willing to kill our neighbour tomorrow, on the least provocation.

So, why do we want it, and is it at all possible to keep awake without any challenge? Which is the real question — you follow? I depend on a challenge, experience, hoping it will give me more excitement, more intensity, make my mind more sharp. But it does not. So I ask myself is it possible to keep awake? Totally, not peripherally, at the few points of my being, but totality awake, without any challenge, without any experience. That means, can I be a light to myself? Not depending on any other light, which doesn’t mean I am vain, not depending on any stimulation, a light that never goes out. And to find that out, I must go deeply within myself. I must know myself totally, completely, every corner of my self; there are no secret corners, everything must be exposed. I must be aware of the total field of my own self, which is my consciousness, which is the consciousness of the individual and the society. And it is only when I go… when the mind goes beyond this individual and social consciousness then there is a possibility of being a light to oneself which never goes out.