San Diego, 1974

A: Sometimes people will register the disappointment that things haven't worked out. So why try something new?

K: Yes. Of course.

A: And this would be a buffer.

K: Yes. That's what I mean. Avoidance. There are so many ways to avoid - clever, cunning, superficial and very subtle. All that is involved in avoiding an issue. So what we are trying to say, sir, isn't it, the observer is the past, as we said yesterday. The observer is trying to translate and act according to the past when the crisis arises. The crisis is always new. Otherwise it's not a crisis. A challenge must be new, is new, and always new. But he translates it according to the past. Now, can he look at that challenge, that crisis, without the response of the past?

A: May I read a sentence out of your book? I think that maybe this has a very direct relationship to what we are talking about. It's a sentence that arrested me when I read it. 'Through negation that thing which alone is the positive comes into being.' May I read it again? Through negation, something is done apparently.

K: Absolutely.