Why are you badgering him? You don’t think he was asking a fair question?
The separation between the observer and the observed is necessary; otherwise, how can I brush my teeth, or kiss my girlfriend? I don’t think it is a wrong turn but an intelligent arrangement in the order of things.
Kimo, you are again doing the same game of extrapolate a sentence from the speech to suit you and so avoiding to answer my questions which you don’t want to answer.
I didn’t ask you for a definition of choiceless awareness, instead my whole speech was:
“What is choiceless awareness for you? Just a topic of conversation, or something you want to arrive at? You must answer (not to me) to this question otherwise what I will say will have no meaning to you.”
Your answer shows that it is only a topic of discussion for you. You don’t fill your stomach with a definition of food. You must eat the real food.
Your definition of C.A. is perfect but did you try it? If you try seriously you will discover that it’s impossible not to attempt to do anything as long as we value thought with all its urges. Thought is a tyrant which always wants to choose, reject or achieve something. And thought will always win because we want it to win.
And this is why they found a comfortable escape: drugging the mind with a mantra, so that thought looses its grip.
Now let me go back to your statement that:
“It’s not a matter of devaluing thought but of realizing it’s limitations. Thought is essential - it can’t be devalued.”
Did you ever read a book of Krishnamurti? K. spent all his life explaning the necessity of devaluing thought (he didn’t use that expression though), in all his talks he stressed the deceiving nature of thought, its conditioning power, and the necessity of going beyond thought to discover truth. And you come here, in a forum focused on K. and state: “Thought is essential”?
Yes, but this is ignorance. There’s a strong identification with the “me” hence “Desire…rejection …opposing…aspiring…and the rest.”. No identification no movement of the “me”, but just “choiceless awareness”. K said (Ojai 2nd Public Talk, 3rd April 1977): “I’ve no problem because I don’t mind what happens”. That’s it!
+1
OFF TOPIC
Hi @DanMcD! @Thomas-Paine!
I just made a visit after a long, long time just to find out that ‘Quit Place’ no longer exists 
… I have searched for Clive but it seems he’s not here, any news from him? … And what about the old friends at Quiet Place, are there any of them around here (@Mina, @Wim, @Huguette, @Peter, …)?
Glad to meet you again to share some interesting dialogs and views! … fraggle (AKA Juan E.) 
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That’s not true. Thought does not stop violence, it just postpones it for a “better time.” Keeping all those things that you and I know well enough in memory/consciousness that will make it come up again in the future. So being unable to end violence once and for all, it’s not at all useful (regarding violence).
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Since you seem to be asking this seriously, I will give you some examples:
- on being hurt
- when comparing oneself with others
- in turning things over in the mind obsessively.
- in dealing violence, greed, selfishness, etc. through it
- in…
you continue filling the list.
What a nice oxymoron! 
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And fear? There will be strong identification as long as there’s fear, no? Well perhaps they’re two sides of a coin, like fear and desire/pleasure. Good to hear from you again, Juan.
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Do you really want to know how you can kiss your girlfriend without the observer?
Try to kiss her then, without thinking: “I AM kissing MY girlfriend”. If you cannot or believe that without that thought you could never kiss “your” girlfriend, let me tell you then that you are trying to tackle something that is not of thought, with thought. Then you will never see what “seeing without the observer” really means, and you will remain caught in constant conflict with “your” girlfriend (neighbor, coworker, strangers, etc).
I would say it in another way, Tom: "There will be a strong fear as long as there is an identification of the “me” with a present or future event. If for example I go to the doctor because I have severe pain, and the doctor says “well, we will check the cause” so I have to wait a few days for the results, the fear will be exponential to how much I am attached/identified to that “me” and “mine”.
At first, that fear will be imagined. And few days later when I go back to the Doctor to know the results, if the Doctor says: “Everything is fine, just take this pill or whatever for 5/8 days and the pain should go away” the fear will fade (though not the attachment or identification with the “me” and “mine”, which will continue to await the next event capable of powerfully challenging that “me” again). But if the Doctor says “I’m sorry to have to say this to you but you have cancer and it’s very widespread, so you only have a few weeks to live”, then the imagined fear suddenly becomes real (again exponential to how much I am attached to “me” and “mine”).
Now, in both cases (imagined or real fear) I have the possibility of deeply questioning the “me” that I identify with and which is the cause of “my” strong fear. In both cases too, that questioning will be easier (maybe even almost non-existent) if I have been able to deeply question that “me” when there were no real causes to be afraid. Perhaps then, one is able to face any situation with a choiceless awareness, that is: without any fear.
It’s also good to know that you and the rest are still here, Tom! But I miss Clive, do you know if he is coming back? I have seen that the changes in the forums have been very recent (in June or early July, if I remember well). Did he say goodbye to you and the rest to never come back again?
Time to go to bed, read you tomorrow 
I think it could be stated either way, fraggle. They are two sides of a coin. Well, I may be mistaken, but it’s getting late and I need to shut down soon. Will come back to this tomorrow time permitting.
K has said to “die” to yourself (me) now. That me/you will die with the body and brain. The self is responsible for the psychological suffering, misery, fear, pleasure, etc. It will die with the body. It will not ‘continue’ after death. All that is a dream of self, of thought. Being aware of the self and its workings now is what is needed, not on one’s death bed. It is too late then with the fear pain and who knows what distractions there will be. Die to it now, he says. Being “choice-lessly” aware of the self is that dying. And it has to be clear ‘why’ that dying. Why can’t I live out the days as best as possible, getting all the comfort and enjoyment I can and then sometime in the future, die? Why now? Why this minute? I would say that it isn’t for us, personally, that we do this, it isn’t for some kind of psychological reward…that would be the motive of the ‘self’, It’s what has to be done for the sake of the ‘human brain’ which is destructively, ensnared in the past. We see the mess that has been done and can imagine the future if there is no radical change.
Yes, but we don’t see how we are creating “the mess” at this moment. We’re aware of the effect of our egocentric condition, but unless we are choicelessly aware of its ongoing operation, we can do nothing about it.
I won’t label what is seen in the moment as a “mess” or anything else. There is no time for that. No time for an evaluation or time for a judgement…No judge. There is only a ‘letting go’ of what one is thinking, feeling in the moment. Gently, effortlessly. Nothing is being ‘accumulated’. It is a dying to everything that arises. The ‘dying’ is dropped and picked up again. The state of not-knowing what will come next, just a moving with ‘what is’… I don’t know if that gets across anything.
Yes, we’ve read all about it in the writings of various spiritual teachers, and we know how one can feel confident that he is doing it.
With all due respect, you should actually find out yourself if any of this is true or not. But maybe you’d rather not. I don’t know. Now K said : experiment. Do you? Are you satisfied with ‘them’ (the “spiritual leaders”) up there and you ‘down’ here. That works for you? No interest in ‘dying to yourself’? No interest in ‘looking into it’? Yet that is what K said you must do. What are you doing here? Speaking of " confidence" you seem to have quite a bit of it. You recall K saying that “a confident man is a dead human being”?
I don’t care for this kind of schoolyard dialogue and your ‘derailments’, perhaps I should just ignore you as others do, but thought I had to say at least this, to what your very rude post implied.
Again:
[quote=“DanMcD, post:116, topic:30”]
I won’t label what is seen in the moment as a “mess” or anything else. There is no ‘time’ for that. No time for an evaluation or time for a judgement…No judge. There is only a ‘letting go’ of what one is thinking, feeling in the moment. Gently, effortlessly. Nothing is being ‘accumulated’. It is a dying to everything that arises. The ‘dying’ is dropped and picked up again. The state of not-knowing what will come next, just a moving with ‘what is’.
How would you describe your relationship with Krishnamurti’s teaching? Are you not “down here” in relation to it? Can you verify that everything he said is true? If you can, you have no further use of his teaching.
When the mind doesn’t completely understand how it operates, it can believe things that are not true. How is the mind to find out what it needs to know if it gets defensive about its ignorance, confusion, incoherence? How certain can the mind be about anything?
Your statement about “dying” needs much elaboration. it isn’t clear at all what you’re saying, You assume the role of teacher in making this statement, so why not make sure your students know what you’re saying?
To me this is not difficult. I simply began listen, when I could,
throughout the day, no effort, like K suggested, while brushing my teeth etc.
It came naturally.
Welcome to this forum Godavegogogo. What kind of toothpaste do you use? 
I bought a toothbrush online because it advertised “nanotech bristles” - this may be proof that I am a fool. (Luckily I try not to judge myself too harshly)
How do you know when the toothpaste is on the toothbrush?