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Chapter 3 - How Deep can One Travel? - Discussion in Bombay on 30 January 1973

Pupul Jayakar (PJ): Sir, how deep can one travel?

Krishnamurti (K): That's what we were talking about yesterday. We were saying that man has gone to the moon, which involved great training, great risk, and the immense cooperation of three hundred thousand people and so on. Man has gone outwardly, but how far can he go inwardly? That was the question you were asking.

PJ: It is very interesting: in the flight to the moon, there is a tremendous build-up of energy before the take-off. How does energy build up for the take-off here?

K: I don't know. What is energy?

Achyut Patwardhan (AP): I was thinking of energy in a slightly different way. There were motivations that led to the breakthrough in outer space where man desired to have command over his environment, but seeing how man is misusing his environment, the urgency of an inner breakthrough is infinitely greater, and that is the energy, as I can understand it. There is a feeling that there is no hope for man unless he can break out of this, because he is the environment.

PJ: Forgive me, Achyutji, that is not the reason why America has been spending millions. If it was a question of urgency that they have to conquer space, they would have continued the programme; nothing would have been too great a sacrifice. But they have stopped the programme. They have conquered the moon and stopped the programme.

AP: But I feel the other urgency cannot be stopped like this because it is the quintessence of man's travail. Unless there is a breakthrough within, there is no hope of survival.

K: That's what Pupul asked: how deeply can one go through oneself and break through? You are saying the same thing, aren't you?

AP: No. I am saying there is this energy, as far as one can see. If there is anything wrong with it, one must examine it. How does the question arise?

K: What question?

AP: Whether there is a parallel.

K: No, there is no parallel. We were talking casually about why man doesn't go very deeply instead of just chasing outward things; that's all. There was no parallelism in this at all. Can we begin by asking: What is energy, how do we have energy that isn't distracted so that as it goes along it gathers more and more and more energy, not less and less and less? Is there such energy? And without it I don't see how one can break through or go very, very profoundly. So I think we ought to ask-I am just suggesting it, I am not saying that is the line of thinking-what is the energy that is never wasted, that is constantly self-replenishing, constantly creating more energy and not less?

Maurice Frydman (MF): In physics there is a theory of possibility where energy is measured by the speed of molecules, and if we can select and separate the slow from the rapid ones, we can build up energy. So the build-up of energy in physics is a process of selectivity: select the high- energy molecules and go on collecting them, and the discrimination increases energy.

K: So what we are asking is perhaps the same thing you are stating, which is: can energy, which is being wasted, be blocked or stopped or understood, gathered and moved forward?

MF: I think you will have to tell us what it is that prevents wastage.

K: That is what we are going into: what is wastage? And is there really such a thing as wastage?

MF: Yes.

K: Wait, wait. We are just starting, we are just inquiring. We say there is a lessening of the voltage of this energy, a wastage of energy. I ask, is there a wastage of energy at all?

MF: Yes, there is entropy.

K: Yes, I have understood that. I am just questioning, I am not saying it is so. What sustains energy? Is it self- replenishing, self-perpetuating, self-propelling? How does it take place?

MF: There are two separate problems: one, the source of energy and, the other, the waste.

K: If the wastage of energy can be stopped, then it will flow.

MF: The energy will accumulate.

K: Accumulate and move, explode, do what it wants. But what is the source of energy? What is energy? That is what I began with. Is energy created through friction?

MF: Friction is a waste of energy.

K: I am asking. We know energy through friction.

Sunanda Patwardhan (SP): Is all consumption of energy a wastage?

K: I am just asking one question at a time. Say, a good writer can write only when there is tension. I have been told about this by analysts who have analysed several famous writers. When they are in a state of contradiction, tension, through drink or sex, in tension with opposing desires, violent urges, and so on, in that state they feel they are capable of writing. You can see artists taking drinks and all kinds of things in order to come to this push of energy. So there is a kind of energy in contradiction and friction, and one observes that. Now, we know that kind of energy. Is there any other kind of energy created by thought in action?

MF: Any manifestation of energy is a waste of energy.

K: I would not go to that yet. I am trying to find out what we call energy, not waste of energy. I want to build a house, so I employ an architect, a contractor. Thought is in operation, and through its desire to build a house there is energy. I like somebody and I am sexual, and there is that energy. There is the energy of thought inquiring, pushing, driving-the whole technological energy. And there is the energy of being identified with the greater, as the nation, as the State, as the family, as God; that gives you a certain energy, and with that energy you can do all kinds of mischief and all the rest of it. The energy of responsibility: I feel responsible for my family, and I work, work, work; that is also energy. So what is wastage of energy? I see how energy is engendered. And where is it wasted?

AP: Sir, will you say that the energy born of belief, of sustaining a belief, is the energy of friction?

S. Balasundaram (SB): All these are of the same class.

K: I believe in God, I believe in something, and that gives me satisfaction. Friction arises only when that satisfaction is disturbed.

AP: But the energy then does not depend upon the arising of friction. When there are one million refugees coming in and you have to house them and feed them, the energy created then is an energy based probably on a belief, but I don't see any friction in that.

K: In that there is no friction, but in carrying it out, in fighting as a member of a committee and all that, it arises.

AP: I want to understand just how this wastage takes place.

K: We are going into that. I am asking myself what is energy. I see energy as thought in action. I see energy in responsibility. I see energy engendered through identifying myself with something greater and fighting for it, killing or whatever it is. I see energy in my desire to achieve success and all the rest of it. Now, where does this wastage come in?

AP: Through belief one can recharge one's batteries-while the belief lasts.

K: Yes, sir.

AP: At the moment of belief, there is a recharging of your battery which gives you energy, but that energy does not have this self-sustaining, regenerating quality.

K: That's right.

AP: It is an exhausting energy, but there is no friction in it so long as the belief lasts.

K: We are going to find out now where friction arises. I believe, I identify myself with something; in that there is no friction. I identify myself with my God or whatever it is; in that there is no wastage. When does wastage occur in this? In the relationship of myself with a belief, where does the wastage come in?

T.K. Parchure (TKP): Identification is unreal.

K: No, it doesn't matter whether it is real or unreal; that is a fact. I identify myself with this country.

PJ: When you talk of wastage of energy, you are talking as though there is a storehouse of energy which is slowly being dissipated.

K: No, I don't. Achyutji said belief gives you a certain quality of energy.

MF: He said belief generates energy.

K: All right. Generates energy. Where does wastage come into it? He says, 'As long as I believe in something, there is no waste; on the contrary it engenders more energy.'

MF: Friction comes when belief does not generate energy.

K: Friction comes when the generating process comes to an end.

AP: I say the question of friction does not arise. I want to ask, is friction implicit in belief as it happens for people like me? My belief drops and I am depleted. So long as the belief lasts, it energizes. It is the nature of belief that since energy comes from belief, when belief goes the energy goes with it. Then I say that won't do.

K: We are asking a question which is clear and simple: is there, inherent in belief, friction?

AP: That's it.

K: Is friction inherent in belief? Yes, I think so.

PJ: I want to know whether energy comes into being by the operation of thought.

AP: It doesn't come as thought, but it comes when thought produces a belief which charges you emotionally.

PJ: That is an artificial stimulation, but how do you say energy comes into being?

K: Pupul, what are you saying? I believe in India.

PJ: So I do great deeds.

K: I do great deeds because I believe in it. I believe India is the greatest country, I must protect it spiritually, and therefore I am going to smash all other beliefs. I believe India is right, and I will fight and kill, and that gives me tremendous energy.

PJ: I start utilizing the energy.

K: No.

PJ: Why do you say it is an energy which 'comes into being'? It is an amazing thing to say energy comes into being.

K: No, it's fairly simple. I am small, living in a little village; I identify myself with the greater as India, and the idea of the greater gives me tremendous stimulation. That is part of energy.

PJ: But it is not energy.

K: It is. I am willing to kill everybody. I have got energy. Living in a village is very small, but the moment I identify myself with the greater, I have greater energy.

PJ: Is there any measurement of energy?

K: Oh yes, I can see it. I am willing to kill, I am willing to go miles and miles. What are you people talking about?

PJ: Lots of people do that, but is that an increase in the quantum of energy?

K: Of course it is, of course it is.

Radha Burnier (RB): Is there an inherent insecurity in belief which makes the friction inherent, and therefore there is depletion?

K: That's it, that's it. I have a little energy, I'm living in some potty little place; but identifying myself with the greater gives me tremendous energy.

SB: What she is trying to say is that inherent in all belief is a centre of insecurity.

K: Of course. Inherent in belief is basic friction, which is a wastage of energy.

AP: I have not yet understood this. I have a belief. That belief dashes against the environment, and then insecurity comes, and I see that when the belief goes, energy goes.

K: Yes, sir, you've said it.

AP: But I would like to understand it, if you will explain.

RB: No, it doesn't have to dash against the environment at all. The very fact that there is a belief means insecurity.

K: Of course. Inherent in belief is friction because there is a deep sense of insecurity, uncertainty. It is fairly simple. Why do we beat about the bush? So what are we discussing? We are trying to find out what is the quality of energy that is necessary to go very, very deep, which is sustaining, refreshing itself. Man has gone to the moon expending tremendous energy, great ingenuity, a great sense of cooperation, a great sense of coming together, building, training; that is tremendous energy, obviously. Now, to go inwardly, is that kind of energy necessary or a totally different kind of energy? Are there varieties of energy or only energy?

SB: On the face of it, there seems to be two kinds of energy. One is this energy of friction which we know in operation. There seems to be another kind of energy which comes with contact.

K: Contact with what?

SB: Contact with anything, contact with something seen, something heard. But that also does not seem to be self- sustaining. The two seem to be different.

K: Let's begin again. Pupul asked a question: how is it possible to go in very deeply? That is all.

PJ: There are two things. How is it possible to go as far as possible, as deeply as possible? It is no use my talking of all the energies in the world; I have to take the energy that exists. Atomic energy may be available in the next human brain, but it is not available for us. With the energy we have, how is it possible? And what is it that will give us the initial thrust?

RB: Doesn't this bring us to the same question that the energy I have is different from energy?

PJ: I question whether the two are different.

Questioner 1 (Q1): Whenever there is a thought, is there not some energy for the thought?

K: Of course. That's what we said.

Questioner 2 (Q2): How is energy created?

PJ: Is energy ever created?

K: It's always there, as she says. And it is evoked when you slap me.

PJ: Or when I chase a woman...

K: Yes, whatever it is.

PJ: Or when I have a good time, or when I know that I am young.

K: Could we put the question this way? I am putting the same thing differently. Most of our lives are very superficial, and is it possible to live at a very great depth and also function superficially? Is it possible for the mind to delve into or live at great depth? I am not sure we are all asking the same thing. We lead superficial lives, and most of us are satisfied with that.

PJ: We are not.

K: We don't know how to go deeply. So we say, 'Well, let's put up with that.' Now, how is the mind to penetrate into great depth? Are we discussing depth in terms of measurement? The word depth involves measurement. I want to be clear on that point. Superficiality also is measurement. I want to be clear that we are using the word depth not in the sense of measurement, or in the sense of time, but as something profound. These words have time significance, but we will wash away all the significance of time and measurement. The mind generally lives superficially-it may be two inches or ten inches deep-but we are talking of a penetration of the mind to great depth. Right? That's the question.

PJ: As I know no other dimension, I say penetration needs...

K: ...meditation. That's what it means.

PJ: And I say it needs a build-up of ...

K: ...energy which explodes, drives through...

PJ: And how is this energy to build up? Or is it a wrong question?

K: I won't use that word energy for the moment because we will get lost that way. I lead a very superficial life, and I see the beauty, intellectually or verbally, of a life, of a mind, that has gone into itself very, very deeply. I say to myself, 'I see the beauty of it, I see the quality of it. Now, how is this to be done?' Let's stick to that, instead of bringing in energy and all the rest of it, shall we?

PJ: How is this to be done?

K: That's what we are asking: how is this to be done? Can thought penetrate it? Can thought become profound?

MF: There must be interest, that's all.

K: Frydman, look. I say to myself I lead a superficial life, and it is not good enough, I need depth. And I see the absurdity of living such a stupid, superficial life, and the very statement says I must go deeply. Not 'There is no interest'; don't bring in interest. I am interested. I want to find out how to do it. I live a superficial life. I want to live a different kind of life, at great depth. I understand depth to mean not measurement, so many feet deep, or time to go down, but depth which, I feel, is bottomless. You can't fathom it, and I want to find it, live that way. Don't say 'interest', 'energy' and all the rest of it. Now, tell me what I am to do.

Q1: I feel thought cannot do this.

K: I don't know. I am asking, 'Can thought which is time, which is the past, penetrate into this profundity?'

MF: Where did you get this profound, bottomless depth- this concept?

K: It is not a concept. I see very clearly that any measurable depth is still within a small measurement. And I also see that if time is involved in going down, it may take years, and so I say-intellectually, reasoning it out-I see that depth means a timeless, measureless quality, without ever reaching the bottom. Infinite. It is not a concept.

MF: Whatever it is, it is a verbal definition.

K: I am putting it to you, therefore it is verbal. It is not verbal to me because I am not verbalizing, I have only verbalized it to you, therefore it becomes a concept to you.

MF: Do you put the question to me, or am I putting the question to myself?

K: I am putting the question to myself and therefore asking you to put that question to yourself.

MF: If you put the question to yourself, it is a concept.

K: No! Don't fiddle with it.

PJ: I think it is a legitimate question.

K: I'm asking that question. Tell me if it is illegitimate, and I will drop it.

PJ: I think it is a legitimate question.

K: I see my life is very superficial; that's obvious.

PJ: And I say there must be something, and I see that there are depths to myself.

K: So I ask myself, can thought penetrate this depth? And that is the only instrument I have.

Q1: In that case, would you choose not to use the instrument of thought? If I have to go to the depth, then I should realize that depth without thought.

K: That is what we are trying to find out.

Q1: And it is possible. K: I don't know what is possible.

Q1: It is possible to reach that depth without thought. Thought is not to be used.

K: How does one come upon this depth? If I am not to use thought, how does one enter into it?

Q1: I can't explain it, but it is a reality. There is that state, sometimes.

K: Ah no, no. Sir, look, I am putting this question very simply. I live a very, very superficial life, and I want to find out for myself if there is any depth which is not measurable. And I see that thought cannot reach it because thought is measure, thought is time, thought is the response of the past; therefore thought cannot possibly touch it. Then what will bring this about? If thought cannot-and that is the only instrument man has-then what is he to do? Thought, in its expression, in its movement, in its function, has created this world in which I live, which is superficial-of which I am. That is so obvious. Now, is it possible for the mind, without the usage of thought-because thought cannot do it-to touch something which is fathomless? Not some moments in my sleep or when I am walking by myself; I want to live there. My mind says this must be discovered and let the mind be of the quality of that. Right?

Questioner 3 (Q3): Excuse me, sir, how do I know, in the first place, that the life I lead is superficial?

K: Oh, my Lord!

Q3: Then I must be aware of something as deep.

K: I know, sir. I go to the club, I drink, I do business, and I go on and on. For thirty years I've done it and I say, 'My God, what a waste of life this is, and is there anything deep?' Everybody asks. And asking that, I become a sannyasi, join this group or that group, go off into some meditation; it's all the same thing. And not finding it, I go off and do some social work or become a politician or this or that. So putting all that aside, being very simple and direct, realizing that thought cannot possibly touch it, realizing also that since it does not know what depth means, and that it can only realize the superficiality and not the depth, the mind says, 'I've had enough of superficiality, now I want to see if my mind can touch that strange, fathomless depth of something which is unnamed.' That's it.

PJ: Into what does one penetrate? If there is a measuring tape, let me not use it as going downward. I'm using it in the sense of penetrating. Into what does one penetrate?

K: I wish you wouldn't use that word penetrate.

PJ: Then delve.

K: I wouldn't use those words.

PJ: No, I'm using those words. I'll tell you why I use those words. What that gentleman said is correct: thought is the instrument of measurement.

K: That's all I know.

PJ: Now, the freedom from the measurement-making machinery, which is constantly with me, in my mind, has to be delved into.

K: No, no, let's be simple about this.

PJ: Can you delve into thought?

K: Thought is superficial-we have been into that. Thought is time, thought is measure, thought is the response of memory, thought is knowledge, experience, the past, therefore time. That thought must function always superficially; that's simple.

PJ: What you said just now ends up in a big abstraction.

K: No!

PJ: It does, sir. Thought is this, thought is that.

K: No, no. It is not an abstraction; it is a reality.

PJ: How, sir?

K: What is thought?

PJ: You said thought is time.

K: Yes. That's not an abstraction.

PJ: You have extracted that out of thought. Thought in itself is a movement of abstraction.

K: No, no, please. We said thought cannot penetrate it, right? That is all, leave it like that.

PJ: So I ask: as it is the instrument that measures, can you penetrate this instrument?

K: No. I am concerned with depth, not with the machinery of measurement. The machinery of measurement is fairly obvious; I don't have to delve into that.

PJ: The machinery is measure. If you say that, then I say, 'Into what dimension does one penetrate?' If you won't have that, and that being the only instrument we know, into what dimension does one penetrate?

K: There is no question of penetration.

PJ: Then what is it?

Q1: Another pointer here is that even when we are discussing, we are still bound up with the available machinery of perception we have, and the machinery cannot reveal that fathomless state we want to live in, because the very resources of language may be thought. That instrument is too frail.

K: Agreed, sir, agreed.

Q1: That means we must have the language to deal with that dimension, the tool to communicate it.

K: Are we concerned with communication?

Q1: No. With the other.

K: Are we concerned with verbal communication or with the touching of that depth?

Q1: Of course that, because modern science cannot reach certain states.

AP: You need not communicate that state.

Q1: I know that sometimes I do touch that state.

Q3: We are not asking you about the state.

Q1: How can I tell you about that state?

RB: But Krishnaji has pointed out that it is not a question of occasionally feeling it, but of how to be in it, to live in it.

MF: As you eat...

K: As you eat, appetite comes.

MF: Energy comes with the operation of energy.

K: We are not talking of energy, Frydman.

MF: Doesn't matter. We can talk of thought or anything; it comes to the same. We are talking of one thing, but you come here representing something else, and you want us to see what you represent.

K: No, no. Look, I am an ordinary man.

MF: If you are an ordinary man, there will be no discussion. Come on, don't make us imagine.

K: No, I'm not. Leading a superficial life, as we do, as human beings do, I say to myself I would like to find the depth where there is great width and beauty, something immense-not God-and just be that. Now what am I to do? I don't exercise thought: I see the futility of it. Then what is the other operation or the other movement that must take place when thought is not functioning?

MF: This sentence cannot be formulated without you. For heaven's sake, sir, stick to facts.

K: I'm sticking to facts.

MF: But that means if you are not here sitting and talking to us, we would not formulate our problem this way.

K: How would you formulate your problem?

MF: We would go to conditioning and say what kind of conditioning we have to create in order not to have...

K: Oh no! My Lord.

PJ: You are underestimating yourself.

MF: If Krishnaji wouldn't have come with his revolutionary statements, we would be, without exception, sitting in some ashram.

K: Would I ask that question if thought wasn't in operation?

PJ: But you are asking a completely hypothetical question.

K: No, I don't feel it is hypothetical. I am asking, can the mind remain without measure? Is that hypothetical?

PJ: That state must come into being where there is no measure.

K: Yes, that is all. All my life I have known measure. Now I am asking, can the mind be without measure, comparison, time, all that?

PJ: If I were to ask you 'How?' you wouldn't say. So the only thing then left is to observe your mind in measurement.

K: All right.

PJ: Because there is no other way.

K: All right. Have you done that? Have you observed, has the mind observed its own movement in measurement?

PJ: Yes.

K: Comparing, measuring, and ending?

PJ: Yes.

K: Then what?

PJ: Then there is stillness.

K: You say the movement of measurement has come to an end.

PJ: The movement of measurement has come to an end.

K: The movement of measurement has come to an end. [Pause] Would that be right? Can you honestly, really say the movement of measurement has come to an end?

PJ: Just now it has ended.

K: Just now? Ah, that is not good enough, that is not good enough.

PJ: What is the way that is different?

K: 'Good enough' means that right through my life measurement has come to an end.

PJ: How can I know it?

K: I am going to find out. I am doing it now. I want to find out if my mind which has been conditioned in the movement of measurement-measurement equals comparison, imitation, conformity, an ideal, a resistance which safeguards it from non-measurement-if my mind can say, 'Now I have understood the whole movement of measurement, and I see where its legitimate place is and where it has no place at all.'

PJ: How is that which you said just now understood by a mind in which there is no thought?

K: It perceives.

PJ: How?

K: Wait, I will show it to you. Thought has analysed it for the moment, inquired, pushed, investigated, and it says it has seen the whole movement of measurement. The very perception of that movement is the ending of that movement-the very perception of it. That is, the seeing is the acting and the ending-seeing that this movement is time, is measure, and so on, seeing the whole map of it, the nature of it, the structure of it. That very perception acts in the manner of ending it. So the seeing is the ending. So there is no effort involved in it at all. Right. You say, 'Yes, I have seen this.' Have you?

PJ: Yes.

Q1: You see the arising of a thought, right from the bottom of memory. I am aware of thoughts only as words in the mind.

K: You see thought, observe it.

PJ: After it is over.

Q1: After thought arises I am aware of it, but I am not able to see the arising of thought.

K: You want to see the arising of thought? Would you see it if you are aware of it, if you are aware of the field in which thought may arise? You hurt me, verbally, in different ways. From that hurt every kind of movement of thought arises. I can see how thought arises from that hurt. Of course I can see it: you are not my friend, you are my enemy, and so on. You can see how thought arises when you have hurt me, or when you have pleased me; that is fairly obvious. So can the mind say, 'Yes, I have seen the whole movement of this measurement'? In my inquiry, in my attitude towards life, have I seen this movement of measurement in relationship? If I see the movement of measurement, I will never be hurt, and whatever hurts I have are finished.

MF: If I were calculative in my relationship and my calculations have gone wrong and I am hurt, and I see the entire process, does it mean that I am no longer hurt?

K: You hurt me, and I see how thought arises from that. The arising of that thought is measurement. And I have been hurt all my life. By understanding one hurt, I have wiped away all the hurts.

Q1: Hurt itself is the result of the past.

K: Of course, of course. You have hurt me, that is a fact. You call me an idiot or something, and you have hurt me. Hurt is a form of measurement. The brain has stored up hurt as memory. From that arises thought, and that thought is measure. Now, by observing that one hurt, being aware of it, being totally attentive to that hurt, from which all measurement in thought arises, the mind wipes away all the hurts. That is what I call a mind that has no longer a movement in measurement. But when you say, 'Yes, I have ended measurement', I say...

PJ: I don't say I have ended measurement. I am sorry, sir.

K: What did you say?

PJ: I said I have watched, observed this process, and there has been an ending.

K: Of what?

PJ: Of that, for the moment.

K: No. You are going back: 'for the moment'. I don't want, for the moment, to be drunk. [Laughs]

PJ: This is what is happening.

K: Then you are still in measurement.

PJ: Maybe.

SP: Without saying so, you are bringing in the factor of being free of hurt forever.

K: That is what I want to find out. You are playing with words otherwise.

SP: How does one know?

K: I will tell you.

SP: Without any self-delusion.

K: Of course, that is obvious. Without deception, without hypocrisy, without double talk. All my life I have been hurt, by the school, by parents, etc., etc. And I see thought arising from this hurt-wanting to hurt others, violence, shying away, being reserved, building a wall, all that. And I say to myself that thought is measurement. Can measurement end? Not just for an hour or two, because that has no meaning.

PJ: There is something very...

K: ...fallacious?

PJ: Fallacious.

SP: He said the whole structure of consciousness changes, and you can never go back to it again; it is implied in that.

K: You never go back to hurt. That means you have a mind that is incapable of being hurt.

SP: Can I say anything about it now unless I test it? How do I know?

K: Do you mean to say you are going to find out by testing?

SP: Sir, how can I live like that?

AP: I think there is a way out like this. We have seen that hurt arises in a moment of inattention. I have seen this. If I know I am hurt, I observe the inattention.

K: No, sir. Do you mean to say that I have been hurt for various reasons-that is irrelevant-and that I must carry it for the rest of my life?

PJ: No.

K: My life is a life now, not tomorrow or yesterday. I am living. I want to live without hurt; therefore there must be a quality of mind that is incapable of being hurt.

PJ: There is a quality of mind that is incapable of being hurt, but it is not present at the next moment of inattention.

K: I don't know anything about that. I have been hurt, by my friends, by my wife, husband, children, society, culture.

Q1: When I feel hurt, I also feel there is an inherent movement in me not to feel hurt.

K: No, that's not accurate. I am hurt, that's all I know. I don't say I mustn't be hurt.

Q1: There is a need in me because I feel hurt, I suffer. When I suffer, there is a need in me not to suffer.

K: That is a different matter. Those are all after-effects. The fact is I am hurt, whether there is the desire not to be hurt and suffer and all that.

Q1: There is an earlier need in me not to feel hurt, and it is this need which makes me feel hurt.

K: There is an earlier need in me not to get hurt, and therefore I get hurt; is that so? I am just examining. Therefore there is a state previous to being hurt which says, 'Please don't hurt me because I get pain, I suffer.' You are saying: a previous statement says don't get hurt, and therefore I get hurt. Whatever it is, I am hurt; that is a fact. Now, is there a way or can something happen so that the mind will never be hurt again? That is the question we are talking about. Somebody says, 'Look, you are hurt and observe that hurt very, very closely without the movement of measurement.' When there is such an observation, that hurt and all hurts will fade away, and the mind will never be hurt again.

PJ: All the hurts are wiped away.

K: Wiped away.

PJ: Agreed.

K: Not 'agreed'; this is not an agreement. Is this so in me?

PJ: Wait, sir, I am saying it.

K: What are you saying? That now Pupul Jayakar is not a hurt human being, and that means she will never be again hurt?

PJ: No.

K: That's what I am saying. You say no.

PJ: No. The hurt is wiped away. Full stop.

K: For the time being?

PJ: I won't use the words time being.

K: For the moment?

PJ: I don't know.

K: I am not interested in 'for the moment'.

AP: May I say that we have not discovered anything permanent?

K: This is not permanent. Don't put it into a sense of permanent time. The mind that is never hurt-unless you find that, you are going to be hurt; not today, but tomorrow, another day. You will keep on getting hurt, keep on reacting, keep on shedding tears, and all this bilge goes on.

SP: How do I know its quality?

K: I am going to tell you.

PJ: You can't tell.

K: Why not? I did not say, 'I will tell you of a state of mind'; I am not saying that. K is pointing out that when you observe one hurt without the movement of measurement, when you live with it completely, entirely, without any movement of measurement, all hurts have disappeared. You will say, 'Well it is very nice of you to talk about it, but it isn't an actuality to me.' I say then, 'You don't know, you are not observing, you are not really looking at one hurt. Bring it out, put it on the table, or in front of you, or in front of your nose, and look at it.'

PJ: I have done it.

K: You have done it?

PJ: I have done it.

K: Then you are no longer hurt, then you have wiped away all hurts?

PJ: I have wiped away all hurts.

K: What?

PJ: The remembrance of the incidents is gone.

K: No, no. I know all that remembrance is gone.

PJ: It is the pain about the incident which lingers.

K: No, sorry. We are not talking about the same thing.

PJ: We are talking of the same thing.

K: I am asking, 'Have you observed one hurt without the movement of measurement?' Don't say yes. If there is such an observation, then the whole conscious and unconscious hurts are washed away; therefore the mind is free of hurts. And freedom isn't in time.

PJ: I say yes, but you made another statement, 'You will never again be hurt.'

K: I say that. I am using that word: it is incapable of being hurt. Otherwise a few days not hurt, next day again hurt, the third day enjoy it, fourth day wash it out-what kind of a game is this?

MF: Can we take this as a blessing?

K: Can we take what as a blessing?

MF: That we shall never be hurt again? [Laughter] We can take it as a blessing that the mind will never again be hurt.

K: Throw it out.

MF: Why not? A parting gift.

K: No, sir. This is tremendously important. If there is no freedom from hurt, then you will always be hurt, you will always go through the agony of getting hurt, and all the rest of it. You must get this, otherwise what are you playing with?

AP: It means that when the mind knows what it is to be in a state where measurement is not, then that is the end of it.

K: Where measurement is not, there is no hurt.

AP: That is the state you started with.

K: Yes.