What is it about thought that leads to suffering?
All I can see is that thought is suffering. As long as there is a thinker, experiencer of suffering, there will be suffering.
In awareness there is no experiencer but only movement in space without experiencer, so even if there is mental pain there is no entity that experiences, stores, reacts, escapes, suffers, interprets, judges.
Otherwise thinker experiences pain as suffering.
So awareness is release from mental suffering. What is awareness? It is not thought or thinker or labelling or interpreting or judging.
We don’t seem to have a very robust model of the self and suffering - whatever is the source or direction of our claims seems a little hazy - incomplete perhaps?
Or is the knowledge that this is good and that is bad all that is really necessary?
Suffering is my experience of distress and its expression (shouting, gnashing of teeth etc) in the world.
Adeen has added this identification with the experiencer, which seems significant (and so has Dan many times in the past)
My goal is to choose good over bad. I am the avatar of need. My source is desire and so all I see is problems and solutions - my suffering is essential.for success.
Knowledge is the past
Success is in the future
Suffering is the way from one to the other.
Experience is the projection of Knowledge.
Experience is the past meeting the present
The conflict that arises from that meeting
Is due to confusion
Confusing what I know for truth
And seeing no need to let go.
It may not be. The concept of ‘improvement’ mistakenly moved from the practical to the psychological e.g.,: Make the ‘chattering’ brain a ‘silent’ brain. (Good luck with that!) K put it wonderfully simple : “Change is the denial of change.”
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The self is basically unaware, so it is difficult to talk about something that is unaware.
You might have heard the story of a group of blind men touching different parts of an elephant and trying to guess what it is. They end up interpreting depending on which part they touch.
The self is like the blind men. It is unaware of unawareness. First the blind men are unaware they are blind. The self is unaware that it is unaware, it believes it is aware which is false.
So how do the blind explore unawareness? There has to be another quality of awareness which is unrelated to blindness. Thinker or self cannot explore awareness.
Can there be awareness of unawareness?
Some people propose meditation, but not as method, but perception.
If you close your eyes and look at the movement of the mind, there is awareness of unawareness in silent passive awareness which has no division.
The self operates in division and is unaware. Krishnamurti challenges can thought be aware of itself. In daily life it is difficult as thought is interacting with the world as mental action, whereas non-division or awareness is non-action. Daily action of thought is in unawareness, dreamer is unaware but perhaps in meditation there is awareness of unawareness. Discovering a silent quality that is not thinker, not thought but pure awareness.
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It seems awareness of unawarness is not possible. Awareness of unawareness is moment of unawareness.
I sit with eye closed and watch. There is moment of chattering of mind - unawarness. Then one becomes aware and chattering stops - there is silence… If during this moment of silence one recollects or aware of chattering of mind few moments back that means this moment one is not aware as one is operating in past .
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In your words, what does this paradoxical statement mean.
Its impact for me, is IN the seeming paradox.
(Btw it is from ‘The Urgency of Change’)
The conditioned brain creates its self, an imaginary being in its imaginary reality, but it has to be aware to function, so it distorts, denies, or dismisses what awareness reveals. The conditioned brain is no less aware than any brain, but it chooses what awareness reveals, chooses to alter awareness to accord with its conditioning.
Can there be awareness of unawareness?
No. Awareness is fundamental. Without it the autonomic nervous system my operate but the brain is unconscious and the body in a comatose state.
So how do the blind explore unawareness? There has to be another quality of awareness which is unrelated to blindness.
You’re equating blindness with unawareness and it’s a false equivalence. Blind people are aware…they just don’t have sight.
Can there be awareness of unawareness?
No. As I said, awareness is fundamental. Without awareness there is nothing. The brain’s conditioning alters, distorts, denies or dismisses what awareness reveals.
The self operates in division and is unaware.
The self is unaware of what it is doing when it alters awareness because it is conditioned to choose what awareness reveals instead of having no choice but to be inseparable from awareness.
Daily action of thought is in unawareness, dreamer is unaware but perhaps in meditation there is awareness of unawareness.
Instead of calling it “unawareness” why not call it “chosen awareness”, since that’s what it is?
Impact can be a blow to the head. Is the statement just a blow to the head or does it signify anything?
If I can’t explain what “Change is the denial of change” means, it’s like “a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury [impact] signifying nothing.”
No it’s hardly that…….
would it be more accurate to say :
The self has a very narrow focus, and it is difficult to transcend our own cognitive biases.
The important message is that they “end up interpreting depending on which part they touch”.
In other words they confuse their narrow conditioned perspective for the whole picture.
Sorry - my brain had to react - but now I am ready to reread what you say about the the very important subject of meditation/awareness.
Don’t be coy. Do you know what “Change is the denial of change” means?
I’m not sure I do. If you asked me to explain it I’d have to give it some thought and I might not come up with a satisfactory explanation.
The only “impact” the quote had on me was, here we go again…can I decipher this one?
It seems to be about the Karma of selfish action (in buddhist terms) - that any action by the self only confirms how real and true I am.
Because before that he says : “Any movement from what I am strengthens what I am”
That might be what, “Change is the denial of change” means.
Like Yogi said, “It ain’t over 'til it’s over”?
So this was in fact K asking a question to himself. He surely felt it was a very important one. He mentions “way”, “discipline” and “action”. I understand that what he’s implying is that a great many people who listened to the talks or read K’s books, felt that there must be some learnable practice which could get them to the place where K was - someone who was free of past conditioning, free of the ego or self.
I understand that K felt that any “way” would involve mechanical repetition, which would inevitably involve a dulling of the senses rather than an awakening of them. Is there any practice which helps open the heart and the mind? Perhaps not. One thing K often did, however, was to ask if the people who were attending his talks could put aside everything they knew about a certain subject before they embarked on a joint exploration of it with him. Maybe this putting aside of past knowledge is something which is worth being constantly aware of. I mean, if you have a coffee with a friend, is it possible to put aside the image you have of your friend and see him/her with fresh eyes? Is it possible to listen with attention to your friend and communicate freely without past knowledge interfering? How do you all see this?
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It’s a worthwhile exercise, if you haven’t tried it. Putting aside what I know means being aware of what I take for granted instead of being mindlessly content with my content.
Has a rhythm to it. 
Yes good exercise and also can there be a looking at the image that has been created of myself…see it at any moment, as if for the first time?