Freedom is Pure Observation

Kinfonet Discussion
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On another thread @danmcderm drew attention to the notion of freedom being born from perception, which made me want to read the original talk from which the quote he mentioned is from. I also did a Kinfonet search on the topic of freedom and found @Rick’s thread on freedom from his core of the teachings series: The Core of the Teachings :: Freedom

What both passages seem to have in common is the relationship for K between freedom and perception, or freedom and observation. Because this is not the usual way we understand the word ‘freedom’ I thought I would share both texts and make it open for comment.

(Note: the following passages are edited extracts from the originals)

From The Core of the Teachings

Freedom is pure observation without direction, without fear of punishment and reward…

In observation one begins to discover the lack of freedom. Freedom is found in the choiceless awareness of our daily existence and activity.

From Talk 1, Bombay/Mumbai, 1959

To be free, one must understand oneself; one must be aware of the movements of thought and feeling, the ways of one’s mind…

We are concerned with understanding the mind, and in understanding, there is no condemnation or demand for a pattern of action…

What matters is to observe your mind without judgment – look at it, watch it, be conscious of the fact that your mind is a slave. That very perception releases energy, and it is this energy that is going to destroy the slavishness of the mind… We are concerned only with perceiving what is, and it is the perception of what is that releases creative fire…

To find out about oneself, what one thinks, what one is, the extraordinary depths and movements of the mind – to be aware of all that requires a certain freedom. To inquire into oneself also requires astonishing energy, because one has to travel an immeasurable distance.

To go into ourselves deeply, fully, a sense of freedom is necessary, not at the end but the very beginning. Do not ask how to arrive at that freedom. No system of meditation, no book, drug or psychological trick will give you freedom. Freedom is born of the perception that freedom is essential. The moment you perceive that freedom is essential, you are in a state of revolt, against this ugly world, against all orthodoxy, against tradition, against leadership, both political and religious. Revolt within the framework of the mind soon withers away, but there is a lasting revolt which comes into being when you perceive for yourself that freedom is essential…

Most of us are not aware of ourselves… We have never really looked at ourselves, never wandered into the depths of ourselves without calculation and premeditation, without seeking something out of those depths. We have never taken the journey into ourselves without a purpose…

This perception, this constant awareness of what is, has its own will – if I can use that word will without confusing it with the will to which you are accustomed. I am talking of a perceptive state of mind which has its own action. That is, perception itself is action…

Going to the office day after day in utter boredom, being a slave to tradition, custom, fear, to one’s wife, husband or boss – that is one’s life. See the appalling pettiness and nauseating indignity of it. So we ask how we are to be free…

If you perceive completely, absolutely, that the mind must be free, that very perception brings an action which will set the mind free…

So the problem is, surely, to free the mind totally so that it is in a state of awareness which has no border or frontier. How is the mind to discover that state? How is it to come to that freedom?

… The margin of freedom is growing narrower every day. The politicians, leaders, priests, newspapers and books you read, the knowledge you acquire and the beliefs you cling to, all this is making the margin of freedom more and more narrow. If you are aware of this process going on, if you actually perceive the narrowness of the spirit, the increasing slavery of the mind, you will find that out of perception comes energy. It is this energy, born of perception, that shatters the petty, respectable, fearful mind.

Perception is the way of truth.

To perceive something is an astonishing experience. I don’t know if you have ever really perceived anything – a flower, a face, the sky or the sea. Of course, you see these things as you pass by, but I wonder whether you have ever taken the trouble actually to look at a flower…

You perceive something only when your mind is silent, and there is no chattering of any kind. If you can look at the evening star over the sea without a movement of the mind, you really perceive the extraordinary beauty of it…

Perception takes place on the instant; it is a state of effortless attention. The mind is not making an effort, and so it does not create a border or frontier, it does not place a limitation on its own consciousness. Then life is not this terrible process of sorrow, struggle and unutterable boredom. Life is then an eternal movement, without beginning and end. But to be aware of that timeless state, to feel the tremendous depth and ecstasy of it, one must begin by understanding the slavish mind. Without understanding the one, you cannot have the other…

If you are aware that your mind is narrow, limited, slavish, petty – aware of it choicelessly – then you are in a state of perception. It is this perception that will bring the necessary energy to free the mind from its slavery…

So, what is important is to be aware of how one’s mind, in the very process of accumulation, becomes a slave. Do not ask, ‘How am I to be free from accumulation?’ – for then you are putting a wrong question. But if you really perceive for yourself that your mind is accumulating, that is enough. To perceive requires complete attention, and when you give your whole mind, your whole heart, your total being to something, there is no problem. It is partial attention, in which there is a withholding, that creates the problems and the miseries in our life.

So, freedom means observation and perception. What do people feel about this?

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“It is partial attention, in which there is a withholding, that creates the problems and the miseries in our life.”

We are slaves because we hold onto something. Since I can’t say what it is, it could be I.

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2 questions for starters :

Are you deliberately wanting to focus on perception rather than what is perceived?
Because we are neglecting the “freedom is essential” bit.
One could make the argument that “killing the evil enemy is essential” - is that why we are avoiding content?

Secondly why is perception equal to freedom?
The argument could be made that we are under the authority of what we perceive.

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But if perception is direct there is no perceiver, i.e., no authority.

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If there is no perception that “the house is burning”, there’s no need to ‘change’, no need for ‘freedom’. Plenty of ‘time’ to work things out.

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Yes - what is seen does have an effect on subsequent action.

To “perceive that freedom is essential” can mean I “feel strongly that freedom is essential” or I “see clearly/realize that freedom is essential”

But the premise of the thread is that Observation itself is freedom.

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If the ‘illusion’ returns, was there not enough energy to dissolve it?

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When I’m at a magic show or when seeing some amazing optical illusion - there can be 2 outcomes : I can be fooled (believe that what I see is as it seems) or I can be free from the illusion (realize that I am always experiencing reality as a human)

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I have reason to believe “that I’m always experiencing reality as a human”; to believe my reality is what what my conditioning dictates, but I don’t actually know this. To know it is to understand it and be free.

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My mind is in a different place from this morning when I began the thread, but I think a crucial element in both passages is the perception or observation of one’s lack of freedom.

In the first passage K says

In observation one begins to discover the lack of freedom

and in the second he talks about how

if you actually perceive the narrowness of the spirit, the increasing slavery of the mind, you will find that out of perception comes energy…

If you are aware that your mind is narrow, limited, slavish, petty – aware of it choicelessly – then you are in a state of perception. It is this perception that will bring the necessary energy to free the mind from its slavery

So - as I understand it - it is in becoming aware of how limited and bound one is in various ways, that we become aware of the importance, the essentialness of freedom.

It sounds like a paradox: to be aware of one’s limitedness is the beginning of freedom; which is the same thing as the perception that freedom is essential.

I didn’t respond to everything you wrote, but we can come back to that?

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Yes - I think this is the same point I was making to Douglas. Unless there is an awareness/perception of our lack of freedom, we will not have a perception or awareness of the absolute necessity of freedom.

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Similar to a good hologram; it looks perfectly real but once you pass your hand through it you can’t see it as real after that …even though it looks the same?

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Generally, I think it is fair to say, we operate through life from a centre that assumes for itself a large degree of objectivity and impartiality. We all believe that our own opinions are the best opinions, otherwise we wouldn’t be so attached to them. Whether it is opinions, beliefs, standards, principles, ideals - it is all part of an impulse to transcend one’s limitations by the accumulation of more refined versions of the same thing. Therefore we remain limited by the very processes we employ to ascend further along the path of life. So, actually, we are never free to move at all. Our movements through life are really nothing more than a series of reactions. There is nothing free about it, even though the centre which is experiencing these reactions holds on to a belief in its own special status as a separate entity who is able to make sense of existence. This ‘making sense’ is what we call our own thinking, the internal noises of the mind, which lead us on a limited time-based journey of self-improvement, self-knowing or self-realisation. But it is surely only a mind that is absolutely empty and still that is free to move, that is able to go in any direction at all, not dictated by any internal pressures or prejudices. Only a mind without motive can move freely.

Therefore, freedom is to be aware of every single pressure and prejudice as it arises. And if we don’t do it now, we shall never do it. So every moment of relationship is this same opportunity. The realisation that there can never be freedom while the mind is operating from a limited, idealistic centre makes for a very alert and watchful mind. All of its energy is in the watching, which is not the watching for a reward or a result. Then one’s observation of the world has a completely different meaning.

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Douglas? You’ve disappeared :slightly_smiling_face:

Perhaps I didn’t reply to the most pressing questions you had? - probably because I didn’t understand some of the concerns you raised. Perhaps you could explain it a bit more?

I didn’t understand your meaning when you wrote

Can you explain a bit what you mean here? :pray:

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This is what Krishnamurti said, so why repeat it as if it is coming from you, as if you are “empty and still”, free to move and “able to go in any direction at all, not dictated by any internal pressures or prejudices”?

Do you believe this describes you, or do you just want the reader to believe this is who you are? Are you trying to deceive the reader, or have you deceived yourself?

Why not, instead of pretending or presuming to be as enlightened as Krishnamurti seemed to be, just be honest and say you think Krishnamurti was speaking the truth when he said one has to be choicelessly empty and still and silent to be free, or something to that effect? Why not be honest, for a change?

We’re not here to emulate or imitate Krishnamurti, but to understand what he was saying, and, if possible, fathom the meaning and significance thereof. If you think you have done this, you don’t need Krishnamurti anymore, and you don’t need to be here at all.

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Sorry - I thought you’d answered quite adequately : No.
So I felt : OK

The “perception that freedom is essential” is a topic that I started a thread on - because its an essential :grin: point - without which acceptance of death is impossible.

If you like we can look at a kooky quote from that thread :

@Inquiry 's point below ties in to this a bit

I think he’s saying that if we realise that what we call reality is merely a conditioned (though hopefully practical) hallucination produced by the brain, we would be free of it.
But just knowing that, doesn’t necessarily make freedom essential.
Essential means that “it must be” - I shall not accept the authority of suffering, whatever the cost.

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This is a bit like a koan. I’m mulling it over…

Are you saying that the perception that freedom is essential is synonymous with the acceptance of death, and is also connected with the ending of suffering/being the cause of others’ suffering?

(As well as being the ending of one’s attachment to pleasure)?

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I’m not sure if you intended this comment for me as well or only for @Inquiry ?

Is this related to the issues you already raised about freedom = acceptance of death = end of suffering/being the cause of suffering = ending of attachment to pleasure ?

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Yes all related to the koan.

The question is also related to what it is that makes observation a synonym for freedom.
In us normal humans, being conscious of what we are experiencing doesn’t necessarily free us from the authority of suffering, it can often add more complexity to it.

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This is interesting. We know that consciousness of pain can often make the pain more painful, by concentrating on that pain and emphasising it. We’ve all seen children fall over and begin crying when they become conscious of their situation because of how concerned adults react.

But is this kind of self conscious or concentrated consciousness what we mean by choiceless observation?

The other point is that K says that a different quality of perception can be born from simple observation - suggesting that there are different amplitudes or intensities in observation, from the more diffuse to the more acute and energetic.

Clearly suffering is not dissipated by diffuse awareness, but a diffuse or generalised awareness may be the ground of a more intense perception that does dissipate suffering.

What do you feel?