Awakening of Intelligence (J. Krishnamurti Book 1)

by J. Krishnamurti

Now, first of all there is no method. Because any method, system, repetition or habit, is essentially part of the corner of that field. (Are we travelling together, taking a journey together, or are you falling behind?) The first thing is to see the actual fact of the little corner and what its demands are. Then we can put the question, “How can we make the whole field completely sensitive?”, because in that lies the only true revolution. When there is total sensitivity of the whole of the mind, then we will act differently; our thinking, feeling, will be wholly of a different dimension. But there is no method. Don’t say, “How am I to arrive, achieve, become sensitive?”—you can’t go to college to become sensitive, you can’t read books or be told what to do to become sensitive. This is what you have been doing within that corner of the field, and it has made you more and more insensitive, which can be seen in your daily life, with its callousness, brutality, and violence. (I do not know if you have seen the pictures in magazines of the American and Vietnamese soldiers being wounded. You may see it and say, “I am so sorry”, but it has not happened to you, not to your family, not to your son.) So we become callous because we are functioning, living, acting, within the small petty little corner of a distorted field.

There is no method. Please do realise this, because when you realise it, you are free of the enormous weight of all authority, and so free of the past. I don’t know if you see this. The past is implicit in our culture, which we think is so wonderful (the tradition, the beliefs, the memories, the obedience to it), and all that is put aside completely, forever, when you realise there is no method of any kind to bring freedom from the “little corner”. But you have to learn all about the little corner. Then you are free of the burden which makes you insensitive. Soldiers are trained to kill, practise day after day, day after day, ruthlessly, so that they have no human feeling left at all. And that is the type of thing which is being done to each one of us every day, all the time, by newspapers, by political leaders, by the gurus, by the Pope, by the bishops, everywhere, all over the world. Now, as there is no method, what is one to do? Method implies practice, dependence, your method, my method, his path and another’s path, my guru who knows a little better, this guru who is phoney, that guru who is not (but all gurus are phoney, you can take that for granted right from the beginnin...

When you and I see that it is the moon, then there is no disagreement, it is the moon. But if you think it is something, and I think it is something else, then there must be division and hence conflict. So in seeing a tree, when you actually see it, there is no division between you and the tree,

We were talking one day to a very learned doctor, who had taken a drug called L.S.D., a minute dosage, and there were two doctors beside him with a tape recorder registering what he was saying. After a few seconds he saw the flowers on the table in front of him, and between those flowers and himself there was no space. It doesn’t mean he identified himself with those flowers, but there was no space, which means that there was no observer. We are not advocating that you should take L.S.D., because it has its own deleterious effects; and also when you take such things you become a slave to them. But there is a much simpler, more direct, more natural way, which is to observe for yourself a tree, a flower, the face of a person; to look at any one of them, and so look that the space between you and them is non-existent. And you can only look that way when there is love—that word which has been so misused.

So what is important is not to learn but to see and to listen. Listen to the birds, listen to your wife’s voice, however irritating, beautiful or ugly, listen to it and listen to your own voice however beautiful, ugly, or impatient it may be. Then out of this listening you will find that all separation between the observer and the observed comes to an end. Therefore no conflict exists and you observe so carefully that the very observation is discipline; you don’t have to impose discipline. And that is the beauty, Sirs (if you only realise it), that is the beauty of seeing. If you can see, you have nothing else to do, because in that seeing there is all discipline, all virtue, which is attention. And in that seeing there is all beauty, and with beauty there is love. Then when there is love you have nothing more to do. Then where you are, you have heaven; then all seeking comes to an end.

To find out what living is, we must not only have energy but also the quality of passion that is sustained, and intellect cannot possibly sustain passion.

Thought, which has divided this, divided the living from the dying, thought keeps it apart.

You really don’t believe in karma although you talk a great deal about it. If you really, actually, vitally, believed in it, as you believe in earning money, in sexual experience, then every word, every gesture, every movement of your being would matter, because you are going to pay for it in the next life. So that belief would bring tremendous discipline—but you don’t believe, it is an escape, you are frightened because you don’t want to let go.

And what are you letting go? Look at it. When you say, “I am afraid to let go”—what are you afraid of? Letting go what? Do look at it very closely. Your family, your mother, your wife, your child? Were you ever in relation with them? Or were you related to an idea, to an image? And when you say, “I am afraid to let go, to be detached”—what are you thinking of being detached from? Memories? Surely memories, memories of sexual pleasure, memories of your becoming a big man, or a little man climbing up the ladder, memories of your character, memories of your friendship—just memories. And you are afraid to let those memories go. However pleasant or unpleasant they may be, what are memories? They have no substance whatsoever. So you are frightened of letting go something which has no value at all, memory being that which has continuity, the bundle of memories, a unit, a centre.

So when one understands living, that is, when one understands jealousy, anxiety, guilt and despair and when one is beyond and above them, then life and death are very close together. Then living is dying. You know if you live according to memories, traditions, and what you “should be”, you are not living. But if you put away all that, which mean...

ONE CAN GO on endlessly reading, discussing, piling up words upon words, without ever doing anything about it. It is like a man that is always ploughing, never sowing, and therefore never reaping. Most of us are in that position. And words, ideas, theories, have become much more important than actual living, which is acting, doing.

Then, how is one to be attentive? Please follow this. Knowing one is not attentive (knowing one has a certain amount of concentration, which is an exercise of will which excludes and resists, knowing that any form of effort, which again is will, is not attention), how is one to attend? Because if you can give total attention to everything that you do (and you therefore do very little), what you do, you do completely with your heart, with your mind, with your nerves, with everything you have. And how is this attention to come about, naturally, without any effort, with no exercise of the will, without using attention as a means to something else?

This attention then comes about naturally, easily, when you know you are inattentive—right? When you are aware that you are inattentive, not giving attention, being aware of that fact is being attentive, and you have nothing else to do. Do you understand? Through negation you come to the positive, but not through the pursuit of the positive. When you do things without this action you do things in a state of inattention, and to be aware of action in a state of inattention, is attention. This makes the mind very subtle, makes the mind tremendously alert, because then there is no wastage of energy. Whereas the exercise of will is wastage of energy, just as concentration is.

the act of seeing is the act of love? The act of seeing is action.

When you give your attention completely, that is, with your mind, with your eyes, with your heart, with your nerves—when you give complete attention, you will find there is no centre at all, there is no observer and therefore there is no division between the observed and the observer, and you eradicate conflict totally, this conflict brought about by separation, by division. It only seems difficult because you are not used to this way of looking at life. It is really quite simple. It is really very simple if you know how to look at a tree, if you know how to see anew the tree, your wife, your husband, your neighbour, if you look anew at the sky with its stars, with its silent depth—look, see and listen, then you have solved the whole problem of understanding, because then there is no “understanding” at all, then there is only a state of mind that has no division, and therefore no conflict.

To come upon this naturally, easily, fully, there must be attention. This attention can only come about easily when you know how to look, how to listen—how to look at a tree, or your wife, or your neighbour, or at the stars, or even at your boss, without any image. The image is, after all, the past—the past, which has been accumulated through experience, pleasant or unpleasant; and with that image you look at your wife, your children, your neighbour, the world; you look with that image at nature. So what is in contact is your memory, the image which has been put together by memory. And that image looks and therefore there is no direct contact. You know when you have pain there is no image, there is only pain, and therefore there is immediate action. You may postpone going to the doctor, but action is involved. In the same way when you look and listen, you know the beauty of immediate action in which there is no conflict whatsoever. That is why it is important to know the art of looking, which is very simple—to look with complete attention, with your heart and with your mind. And attention means love, because you cannot look at that sky and be extraordinarily sensitive if there is a division between yourself and the beauty of that sunset.

This order can only come about when we see, that is actually come into contact with disorder, which is in ourselves, which is us. We are not in disorder—“we” is a state of disorder. Now when you look at yourself without any image about yourself, actually at what you are (not what Shankara, Buddha, Freud, Jung, or X Y Z says, because then you are looking at yourself according to their image), you look at the disorder in yourself, the anger, the brutality, the violence, the stupidity, the indifference, the callousness, the constant drive of ambition with its peculiar cruelty—if you can be aware of that without any image, without any word, and look at it, then you are directly in contact with it. And when there is direct contact there is immediate action. There is immediate action when you have intense pain, and when there is great danger there is instant action. And this instant action is life, not the thing that we have hitherto called life, which is a battlefield, an agony in that battlefield, despair, hidden wants and so on; that is what we have called life. Please do observe this in yourself. Use the...

I do not know if you have experimented with yourself. Take a piece of stick, put it on the mantelpiece and every day put a flower in front of it—give it a flower—put in front of it a flower and repeat some words—“Coca-cola”, “Amen”, “Om”, it doesn’t matter what word—any word you like—listen, don’t laugh it off—do it and you will find out. If you do it, after a month you will see how holy it has become. You have identified yourself with that stick, with that piece of stone or with that piece of idea and you have made it into something sacred, holy. But it is not. You have given it a sense of holiness out of your fear, out of the constant habit of this tradition, giving yourself over, surrendering yourself to something, which you consider holy. The image in the temple is no more holy than a piece of rock by the roadside. So it is very important to find out what is really sacred, what is really holy, if there is such a thing at all.

That’s it. My concept is different from the actuality that is taking place now. Right? So there is an interval, a gap between what is, and what should be, or the concept. I am still sticking to the word “concept”.

The sexual urge may or may not be there, but it is stimulated into being by the image which is fictional, not actual. So I am asking why do we have the conceptual at all?

KRISHNAMURTI: Listen to what the first gentleman says. He says that by having a concept I reform myself. Everybody thinks that, not only you. By having an ideal, a goal, a principle, a hero, and so on, you think you will be helped to improve yourself. Now, what does this do actually, does it improve you or does it create conflict, conflict between what is and what should be?

Why do you want to escape from what is? You would not want to escape from what is if it were pleasurable. You only want to escape from what is when it is painful.

KRISHNAMURTI: That’s it, Sir! That’s just it! Can I meet him without the concept next time? He might have changed, but if I meet him with my concept, that he has trodden on my toe, I have no relationship with him. Therefore, is it possible, though you have had some sort of experience, is it possible to be without the concept? So we must come back to the question—“Is it possible to live in this world without any concept?”

KRISHNAMURTI: Do not let us say it is possible or it is not possible. Let us find out. You have separated yourselves from others, Sirs, as Hindus. This is a concept. (Yes, you are! My God, you are.) Would you marry your daughter to a Muslim? Let us be clear. I am taking an instance, Sir. You hurt me, and that hurt remains in my memory. I try to avoid you if I can. But unfortunately as you live in the same house or the same street I have to meet you every day. And I have an image, the crystallised image, thickened memory, which is meeting you every day. Hence there is a battle going on between us two. And so I say to myself, is it possible to live without that image, so that I really meet you? You might have changed or you might not have changed, but I will not have the image. Can I not find out how to live without the image, so that my mind is not cluttered up with images? Do you follow, Sirs. So that my mind is free, free to look, to enjoy, to live.

KRISHNAMURTI: A bad impression or a good impression is still an impression. There is no “good image” and “bad image”. (Inaudible remark) (For bad eyesight you must go to a better occulist.) This division between the conceptual and the actual breeds conflict. And a man who wants to investigate and go beyond the actual must have all his energy. That energy cannot be wasted through conflict. So I say to myself—and I am not telling you what to do—I say to myself, “It is absurd to live with concepts at all.” I will deal with facts, with what is, all the time, and will never be immersed in the concept. So then I am faced with the question, “How do I look at the fact, at what is?” I am not concerned with the conceptual at all. I am only concerned in the observation of actually what is. Right?

KRISHNAMURTI: (Yes, but you take things as they come with a series of habits. Habits of which you may be conscious or unconscious . . . Sirs, we keep going away from the main issue.) So the question is, “Can I live with what is, without creating conflict?” Do you follow? I am angry. That is a fact. I am jealous. I like and dislike. That is a fact. Can I live with that, with what is, without making a problem, a conflict out of it?

KRISHNAMURTI: What is the difference? You want satisfaction—which is self-concern. Follow this out, Sir, for yourself. If you are seeking satisfaction in helping others and therefore that gives greater satisfaction, you are still concerned about yourself, about what will give you greater satisfaction. Why bring any ideological concept into it? One wants freedom because it is much more satisfying and to live a petty little life is not so satisfactory. So why have this double thinking? Why say one is satisfactory and the other is not. You understand, Sir? Why not say—I really want satisfaction, whether it is in sex, in freedom, or helping others, in becoming a great saint, or politician, or engineer, or lawyer. It is all the same process, is it not? Satisfaction in many ways, both subtle and obvious, that is what we want. Right? When we say we want freedom we want it because we think perhaps it may be terribly satisfying; and the ultimate satisfaction, of course, is this peculiar idea of self-realisation.

KRISHNAMURTI: That is one of the reasons, Sir. But, let us look at this, Sir. There is aggression. Right? When I want a position in society, which is recognised by society, it is a form of aggression. Now, why am I aggressive?

You get used to the squalor of the next village as you pass it every day. The little boys and the little girls making messes on the road—the dirt, the squalor, the filth. You get used to it, and then you have got used to it. In the same way you have got used to the beauty of a tree, you simply do not see it any more. So, I have discovered that where I pursue pleasure there must be, deeply in it, the root of indifference. Oh! do please see this! There are no roots of heaven in pleasure, there are only roots of indifference and pain.

So what shall I do if I see that very clearly? Pleasure is such an enticing thing! You understand? I look at the tree: it is a great delight. To see a dark cloud full of rain and a rainbow, and this seems a tremendous thing. That is a pleasure, that is a delight, that is a tremendous enjoyment. Why can’t I leave it there. You understand? Why do I have to say, “I must store it up”? (I don’t know if you are following all this.) Then when I see the next day the dark cloud, full of rain, and the leaves dancing in the wind, the memory of yesterday spoils the sight of it. I have become dull. So what shall I do? I cannot deny pleasure, but this does not mean I indulge in pleasure. So I understand now that pleasure inevitably breeds indifference. I see it. I see it as a fact as I see the microphone—not as an idea, not as a theory, not as a concept, but as an actual fact. Right? So now I am watching the operation of pleasure. You follow? The process of pleasure is what I am watching. As, “I like you” and “I do not like someone else”, which is again in the same pattern. All my judgments are based on likes and dislikes. I like you because you are respectable. I do not like you because you are not respectable. You are a Muslim, or a Hindu, or you have sexual perversions and I prefer the other perversions—and so on. You follow? Like and dislike. So I watch it. And like and dislike is again a habit, which I have cultivated through pleasure. The mind now is watching the whole movement of...

KRISHNAMURTI: Ask yourself the question, Sir, and don’t just say “Memory comes as a barrier”. You have just heard somebody else say that. You heard me say that a dozen times, and you repeat and throw back those words at me. They have no meaning to me any more. I am asking quite a different question. I am asking why thought comes into it at all. (Suggestion from audience.) Ask’yourself, Sir, and find out the answer. Why this constant interference of thought? You understand Sir? It is very interesting if you go into it for yourself. At present you cannot look at anything without thought, without an image, without a symbol. Why? (Long pause) Do you want me to answer it? The gentleman sits very comfortably and says “Yes”. “Please answer it, will you?” And it’s not going to make a pennyworth of difference to him. (That’s right, and it has become a habit. For the last fifty years, doing whatever you have done.) If it is a habit, then what shall I do? Do I see the habit as an idea or actually as habit—Do you see the difference? If you do then you must find out.

There is fear. You are afraid of your wife; you are afraid of death, afraid you might lose your job. Will any theory, concept, help you to get rid of those fears? You can escape from them. If you are afraid of death you can escape from that fear by believing in reincarnation, but fear is still there. You don’t want to die, though you may believe in all kinds of stuff, the fact is that fear is still there. Concepts do not help to get rid of fear.

KRISHNAMURTI: No Sir, please Sir, don’t bring in other things. This is very complex Sir. If you go slowly into it, you will understand it. The centre, being the prisoner of its own limitation, wants expansion. It seeks expansion through identification—with God, with an idea, with an ideal, with a formula, with a concept. Please follow this, Sir! And it thinks it can live differently, at a different level, though it is living in a miserable prison. So concepts become extraordinarily important to a prisoner, because he knows he cannot escape. And the centre being thought—we examined that—then thought tries to expand by identification with something—with the nation, with the family, with the group, with culture—you know, expand, expand. But it is still living in prison! As long as there is a centre there is no freedom: right? (Don’t agree Sir. For you all it is just a theory, and one theory is as good as another.) So, see what it does! It invents time as a means of escape. I will gradually escape from this prison. Right? I will practise, I will meditate, I will do this and won’t do that. Gradually, tomorrow, tomorrow, next life, the future. It has not only created space which is limited, but also it has created time! And it has become a slave to a space and a time of its own. Ah! Do you see this, Sirs?

But if you really saw the tree, without space and time, and therefore without the centre, then, when there is no centre and you look at the tree, there is vast space, immeasurable space. But first, one must learn, or watch, or hear how to look. But you won’t do it. You won’t begin the very complex thing called life, very simply. Your simplicity is to put on a loin cloth and travel third class and do so-called meditation, or whatever you do. But that is not simplicity. Simplicity is to look at things as they are—to look. To look at the tree, without the centre.

The past may help in the field of technology, but it does not help in the field of life.

KRISHNAMURTI: Oh, Sir. When I say “I don’t know”, I really don’t know. But am I waiting to find out, or waiting for somebody to tell me—right? I am waiting. Therefore when I say “I don’t know”, it isn’t an actual fact that I don’t know, because I hope that somebody is going to tell me, or that I’ll find out. Do you follow this? Right. Then you are waiting, aren’t you? Why are you waiting? Who is going to tell you? Your memory? If your memory is going to tell you, you are back again in the same old rut. So what are you waiting for? So you say “I won’t wait”—you follow, Sir?—there is no waiting. There is no “in the meantime”—you follow this? I wonder if you do. So when you say “I don’t know”, it means nobody knows—right? Because if anybody tells me, he will tell me out of fragmentation—no? So I don’t know, therefore there is no waiting, there is no answer—right? So I don’t know. Then I find out what is the state of the mind that says “I don’t know”—are you following it? It is not waiting, not expecting an answer, not looking to some memory, authority, it ceases—all that has stopped. Right? So the mind—follow it step by step—so the mind is silent in the face of a new challenge. It is silent because it can’t answer the new challenge. I don’t know if you are meeting this; right, Sirs? (No. No. You don’t understand?) You know when you see a marvellous mountain, the beauty, the height of it, the dignity, the purity of it, it forces you to be silent, doesn’t it?—this may last a se...

Can you demonstrate to end all wars or can you only demonstrate to end a particular war? Do think about this, give your heart to it. I can demonstrate against a particular war, but when I am concerned with the ending of all wars, not only outwardly but in myself, how can I demonstrate with a group of people? Do you also want to end all wars as I do? Do you understand? It means no nationality, no frontiers, no linguistic differences, no religious divisions—all that. No, Sir, you can’t demonstrate, you have to live it. And when you live it, that in itself is a demonstration.

The very perception of seeing what is false is the truth.

My mind knows what disorder is, how it has come into being, through the culture and the conditioning of that culture and of the human beings; I am aware of all that which is total disorder. Now, I really don’t know what order is, so what is the state of the mind that says I don’t know? What is the state of your own mind that says, “I really don’t know?” Is that state of mind waiting for an answer, waiting to be told, expecting to find order? If it is waiting, expecting to be told, then it is not the state which we are talking about, the state of not knowing. The state of “not knowing” is not waiting to be told, it is not expecting an answer; it is terribly alive, active, but it does not know; it knows what is disorder and therefore rejects it completely. When such a mind says, “I do not know”, then it is totally free. It has denied the disorder and because it is free, it has found order. Do you understand this? It is really marvellous if you go into it for yourself.

I don’t know what order is and I am not waiting for anybody to tell me. And because my mind has denied everything that is disorder, totally, without holding back a thing, has emptied the cupboard completely, it is free; so it is capable of learning. And when the mind is totally free, which means non-fragmented, then it is in a state of order. Have you understood this?

As long as there is disorder in your daily life, the brain must establish order otherwise it cannot function healthily, normally and efficiently. And when there is disorder, dreams are necessary to bring about order either deep down or at a superficial level.

Examining all this one asks is it necessary to dream at all because it is very important not to dream; it is very important to have a mind that is completely quiet when you are asleep, then the whole mind, the whole brain, the whole body can rejuvenate itself. But if the brain goes on working, working while you are asleep, then it becomes exhausted, therefore neurotic, overstrained and all the rest of it. So is it possible not to dream at all?

Now, can I look at myself with eyes that have never been touched by time? Time involves analysis, time involves holding on to the past, time involves this whole process of dreaming, recollecting, gathering the past and holding it, all that. Can I look at myself without the eyes of time? Put that question to yourself. Don’t say you can or cannot. You don’t know. And when you look at yourself without the eyes of time, what or who is there to look? Don’t answer me, please. Do you understand my question? I have looked at myself with the quality, the nature and the structure of time, the past. I have looked at myself through the eyes of the past; I have no other eyes to look. I have looked at myself as a Catholic, or something else, which is the past, so my eyes are incapable of looking at “what is” without time, which is the past. Now I am asking a question, which is: can the eyes observe without the past?

It is the image that brings conflict in relationship. I cannot get on with my wife because she has bullied me; that image has been built up, day after day, and it prevents any kind of relationship; we may sleep together but that is irrelevant; so there is conflict. Can the mind look, observe without any image what has been put together by time? That means, can the mind observe without any image? Can it observe without the observer, which is the past, which is the “me”? Can I look at you without the interference of the conditioned entity, which is the “me”?

First of all, why do you choose at all? Listen to my question, please. Why do we choose? What is the structure, the nature of choice? I only choose, don’t I, when I am uncertain. When there is uncertainty, when there is confusion. If there is no clarity then I choose, I say that I don’t know what to do, perhaps I will do this or that. When you see something very clearly, is there any need to choose? Surely, it is only the confused mind that chooses. And we have made choice one of the most important things in life. We talk about freedom to choose, to choose this or that, to choose our political party, our politicians. So I ask myself, why do I choose at all? I choose between two coloured materials, but that is not what we are talking about. We are talking about choice which is the outcome of uncertainty, of confusion, where there is no clarity; then I have to choose, but a mind that is very clear has no choice. Now, is your mind confused? (I am coming to the question, Sir.) Obviously your mind is confused, otherwise you wouldn’t all be sitting here. And out of that confusion you choose and increase the confusion.

What then is relationship? It seems to me that it is one of the most important things in life, because living is relationship. If there is no relationship, there is no living at all; then life merely becomes a series of conflicts, ending in separation or in divorce, in loneliness, with all the fears, anxieties, problems of attachment, and all the things that are involved in this sense of being completely isolated. I am sure you know all this. One observes how extraordinarily vital relationship is in life, and how very few human beings have broken down the barrier that exists between themselves and another. To break down this barrier with all its implications—not just the physical barrier—one has to go deeply into this question of action.

That is, when the mind is not completely attentive at the moment of action, then the mechanism of building images is set in motion. When you say something to me which I do not like—or which I like—if at that moment I am not completely attentive, then the mechanism starts. If I am attentive, aware, then there is no building of images. When the mind is fully awake at that actual moment, not distracted, not frightened, not rejecting what is being said, then there is no possibility of building an image. Try this—do it during the day.

Measurement, with its space, which is the very nature of thinking, is obviously limited, because thought is conditioned.

Now the mind wants to find out whether it is possible to go beyond time. Can it enter into the immeasurable—which has its own space—and live in that world, free of time and yet function with time, with knowledge and all the technological achievements which thought has brought about? This is a very important question.

” When you have pain, can you live with it without self-pity and not complain? You do whatever is necessary to end the pain—but when it has gone it is finished. You do not carry it over as memory. It is thought that carries it over; the pain has gone, but thought—which is the response of memory—has established that memory and says “you must not have that pain again”. So when you have pain, is it possible not to build a memory of it? Do you know what this means? It means to be completely aware when you have pain, to be completely attentive, so that the pain is not carried over as memory. Do it, if you are interested in it.