To be sensitive in my sense is to be sensitive in the Krishnamurti sense. This has no significance to me in my conversation with you. What is of interest to me is whether or not your sensitivity to the suffering of mankind is like mine.
This is an important point, PeterâŚto see it all as conditioningâŚall my thoughts and reactionsâŚthe âmeâ and mineâŚmy thoughts and feelings and ideas/opinions/conclusions. Itâs based upon the past/memory and the movement of life is not.
Very interesting indeed! Thank you!
Dear WSB, you are writing about something you are at a distance from. It is something you heard about and it began long ago. Perhaps even the geography places you distant from the object of your concern. That is something to note. We see injustice around the world and it should disturb us, but let us take something very direct and immediate and start from there to discuss this, not something far distant.
So, I will ask a question: If you were to see someone being beaten before your eyes, would you not be disturbed? If it were so direct and so immediate and so close, would you not feel the urgency to intervene in some way? And is Sree correct to state that K said, âInaction is real actionâ in respect of something such as this?
I donât think K would have said any such thing in such a context. Faced with such a challenge one cannot walk by on the other side. It does not mean one would be violent, though one may be. Action can take many forms. But âinaction?â Really?
And so to the son of your friend. If it concerns you, if it troubles you, by all means do something about it in the same way you would if it was in front of your eyes. Go to the end of it.
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I could not find the post where Sree said that. However that statement of K. was not meant for external action but rather about how to deal with oneâs own impulses or disturbances, like fear or violence in us. Surely not about how to tackle a violence we see from others. Very often K.was asked: âwhat would you do if your sister was attacked in front of you?â His answer was " One cannot say it in advance, there is no general rule. Only intelligence will decide according to the circustances. First elimitate violence in you and then youâll know what to do."
WSBâs post raised two questions mainly: 1) What am I to do in relationship to this particular injustice. 2) How to deal inwardly with the general problem of injustice.
Nobody can help her/him with the first question, her/his intelligence only can decide. But she/he wonders why that bothers her/him and feels that may be wrong. In this case K. teaching, I think, could help.
Yes Voyager, my thoughts concur with yours here.
A general point that may bear on the second question is this: When you leave a business unfinished it tends to nag at you. The function of internal disturbance seems to be pretty much the same as disturbance which has an external cause, to draw your attention to a challenge that you are actually facing. I am not referring to neurotic disturbance, which is less direct.
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Do you have a citation for that Voyager? I think that just to place it in a comment with no context leaves it very open to misinterpretation.
It is in his first contribution to this thread, the fifth comment down from the top I think.
âAs Krishnamurti had said, we need to hold still and watch our impulses and refrain from contributing to the disorder. Inaction is real action, he said.â
OK, thank you. I had missed it.
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If I find it, Iâll post it. Now I canât, so you have to trust my memory, understanding and⌠honesty (
OK, I got it. You find it here:
I remembered it from being present in Saanen then, but now Iâm going to listen to it again and see if my memory was right⌠(
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Ah! Yes, thatâs a good way to put it. K. used to say that a problem must be tackled (if not solved) immediatly otherwise it will take roots in our minds. Again you must trust my memory (
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Allow me to clarify. In respect to being disturbed by something such as someone being beaten before your eyes, respond according to your instinct which is not driven by thought. But be careful; more often than not, our impulse to react are conditioned by our sense of morality which is informed by thought and not by intelligence. In that case, you will add to the mess.
âInaction is real actionâ, Krishnamurti said. I did put that to the test one time. While walking to a store, I came across an old man (Tamil) sitting on the ground by the side of the road. He looked up at me and extended his hand begging for a handout. My impulse was to give him some change and be on my way. I changed my mind and resisted that urge. The old guy looked puzzled wondering why I stopped and piled on the imploring. I was torn between my conscience (telling me to do the decent thing) and the Krishnamurti teaching (that instructed me not to act and watch my mind like a beautiful flower which kept telling me not to be such a prick and just give the beggar the money). This went on for several interminable agonizing minutes as the weird interaction escalated with intensity brought on by the insistent begging. I refused to budge and the stubborn begging finally stopped. The old guy got up and ambled away leaving me cursing myself silently for being deliberately cruel. Just then, I spotted something on the ground where the old man sat. It was an empty bottle of cheap toddy (alcohol). If I had given in, that wino would have used my money to buy another drink. Howâs that for insight into the Krishnamurti teaching?
Please let me have your comment.
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Ah, you justified your inaction Sree. hahaha. Sometimes it is better to go with the heart and not worry so much the consequences. The old Tamil may have needed his alcohol more than you needed those coins. You could have chosen to watch your mind after you had given. Then you would have satisfied your your dual-tormentors, conscience and teaching.
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I found this video today about the same topic (more or less) we are discussing here. K. talks about several aspects connected with justice, and some may seem irrilevant for the questions raised by WSB, however I think itâs worth listening.
Two statements struck me:
âShould we not talk of justice but of compassionâ
"A human being who has not love or compassion is worse than an animal. "
The second is quite hardâŚ
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A selfless mind can be sensitive to the suffering of others (because the selfless mind canât take it personally), but the mind that identifies with and image or idea of itself cannot be sensitive to the suffering of others without being adversely affected. In medical school, students develop what is called âempathy fatigue:â, and by the time they are doctors, theyâve learned how to be more practical than empathetic.
If I had done what you said here, I wouldnât have gotten the insight into and broke free from my conditioning: giving to the poor. The beggar and the benefactor, the disciple and the guru, this eternal karmic dance in which the self is caught. I am unconditionally free now: no more inner-conflict in any relationship in my life. You are correct. Mind-watching (teaching) and conditioning (conscience) are the dual tormentors of the Krishnamurti reader in turmoil.
Isnât this an oxymoron? It equates with a mindless self. Words have meanings just as actions have consequences. Poetic license does not grant freedom from facts of a matter if conversation is to have material value.
It equates with a mindless self.
Iâm not equating mind with self. Self is the mindâs creation of an identity.
The mind is the mechanism of cognition. It can refer to itself as âIâ and âmeâ and act as a person, a character, for the sake of sociability and communication. But if it has no illusions about itself, so it is free of psychological thought.
This Krishnamurti quote is characteristically snappy and paradoxical, but puzzling out of context. Had he said, ârestraint is actionâ, one wouldnât have to search for what he meant by, âinaction is real actionâ.
âInactionâ can mean sloth or apathy.
Sometimes language fails meaning. It is an uneasy relationship.
Often K pointed out that when action is sparked from emotion it is not in fact action but reaction.
Maybe what K was trying to convey (in the quote) was not âinactionâ but ânon-reaction.â 
Non-reaction is also action.
Again, the implication is that while we often âreactâ from emotion, true understanding is a deeper source from which to act. Emotions tend to be programmed. They seem to be shortcuts to be triggered by patterns we have learned. But when emoting begins it is very difficult to step back. So, emoting is both a learned behavior and also something ingrained in the instincts. The mutation K speaks of has to involve the ridding of the mind of this reactive complex. It is not a question of resisting the emotions, which is a practice of some religions. Suppressing the emotive response is another form of conflict.
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