The way I inquire into K’s teachings is direct exploration in daily life through testing. I am more interested in directly finding out. If in daily life through direct testing I find some freedom, space, clarity, I share, so it might seem unconnected to previous posts.
After having been contact with K’s teachings for 17 years almost on daily basis, may be I mistakenly feel those words are easily understandable. An exploration through words doesn’t really interest me as I know that direct exploration is not through words, so my exploration is in daily life and then I share. I think others are also testing directly in daily life. If both see the same thing directly in daily life, it means those words have validity, so I share here to test that too.
I am afraid, this is theory.
In daily life, there is awareness not through like and dislike. Thought is never aware. It only knows word.
Awareness is there when there is silence or space which is not thought. In that space or silence, if anything arises it can be seen.
That is the difference between most human beings and K.
K’s mind was silently aware, so he noticed things arising. There was no me looking, no subject, no like, no dislike, no choice.
It is crucial to understand self or thought is unaware and awareness is not this, not self, not observer, not subject. In awareness, things are seen, but there is no seer, there is object, but no subject. What is seen is temporary and leaves no mark as there is no seer which is like, dislike.
What I have noticed through years of discussion that this is never accepted that awareness is not thought. People want to continue in thought and be aware, which is not possible, which is continuity of the same
I don’t understand what part of the text you quoted you think is theory?
I wasn’t talking about an awareness “through” like and dislike, but an awareness “of” reactions of various kinds.
In my garden for instance there are different birds and animals. When I notice the wren, or the robin, I am aware of an almost instant feeling-response of friendliness and warmth. But when I see the rat slithering behind the plant pots, I am aware of a momentary reaction of disgust.
There is no judgment of the feeling of friendliness towards the robin, or of the momentary disgust towards the poor rat. It is just the fact of what takes place when I see these animals. That is what nonjudgmental awareness involves in daily life. You see someone wearing ugly clothes, and there is a reaction to that. The reaction is immediate - and yet there can be a nonjudgmental awareness of that reaction. That’s all. Is this theoretical? I don’t think so.
I don’t compare myself with K, who may have operated from a silence of non-thought in daily life. But I’m interested in his teachings, and there is nothing in his teachings that says one cannot be aware of one’s reactions and responses in daily life.
And nowhere have I said that awareness is thought (which you have repeated several times already).
It sounds to me, Adeen, as though you have arrived at some set conclusions about awareness, and about your understanding of Krishnamurti’s teachings - and this is impeding any possibility of actual dialogue.
Are you operating in thought? The answer yes or no, determines what I am trying to say.
If the answer is yes, it is not what I am saying
You want thought and awareness to exist at same moment. Practically this is not the case. If thought interferes, listening stops. Listening or awareness is from silence.
If you want thought and awareness to exist at same moment, you say there can be awareness of thought.
I say this is impossible. As long as thought operates, there is no silence, no awareness.
Thought cannot touch silence or awareness. But you want to discuss about awareness through intellect, through thought. Not possible. If at all awareness is to be discussed, it can be talked about only negatively, what it is not, which is what Krishnamurti did by talking about what awareness is not.
You might intellectually accept awareness is not thought, but you still continue with thought.
Take example of psychological pain. If thought interferes it becomes sorrow or suffering. Awareness is completely different without word.
I am not interested in words or intellectual dialogue. I am trying to directly find.
Adeen, the problem with jumping into a conversation without context is that it can generate unnecessary confusion.
I don’t know how closely you followed the conversation I had with Inquiry, but Inquiry was saying - or words to the effect - that simple ordinary everyday awareness is always conditioned by thought and so there is never (according to Inquiry) a sustained moment of simple, thought-free awareness.
So I was responding to him by saying that in ordinary everyday perception it is self-evidently possible to be aware of something - at least for a second or two - before one’s conditioning intervenes. This is so. We can discuss this if you want, but I think any reasonable person will accept this.
So that’s the context of the post to which you replied.
In that exchange I also wrote that it is possible to be aware of the secondary wave of reaction (of conditioning, thought, feeling, labelling, etc) that may intrude in when looking at an object. Again, I don’t think this is controversial. One can be aware of one’s reactions.
I am talking about ordinary awareness, not ‘total attention’ or a state of being totally free from the contents of consciousness (a state of nothingness or emptiness). I’m not claiming to be speaking from a space of absolute non-thought (though you are claiming to be?). I’ve just been exploring ordinary awareness.
I recall that recently (in a post that you subsequently deleted) you mentioned the Ashtavakra Gita - a classical Hindu text on the subject of non-duality, and I wonder if this is not creating some miscommunication between us?
In the Ashtavakra Gita it talks about awareness as something absolute, non-dual, and that nothing else exists apart from it:
“I am awareness”…
You are really unbound and actionless, self-illuminating and spotless already… what you consist of is pure awareness…
You are unconditioned and changeless, formless and immovable, unfathomable awareness, unperturbable: so hold to nothing but consciousness.
This view of awareness is obviously different from the ordinary perceptual awareness I was talking about with Inquiry. It may also be nontrivially different from the way that Krishnamurti approached the question of awareness. I will share some quotes from K to show this in a minute.
Now you say:
If one takes your statement literally then you seem to be asserting that if someone is aware then they are already unconditioned - free from all thought, feeling, reaction, from all the contents of consciousness. This is what your statement implies.
But is this the case? It certainly isn’t true in the ordinary sense of perceptual awareness that everyone has access to.
If one goes by what Krishnamurti had to say about awareness, he seems to have taught that it is possible (and indeed necessary) to be aware of one’s conditioning (which is put together by thought). He said that we can become aware of our thoughts, feelings, reactions - of the whole content of our consciousness.
To know oneself is to observe what one thinks, how one feels, not just superficially, but to be deeply aware of ‘what is’ without condemnation, judgment, evaluation or comparison (Talk 1, Ojai 1955)
If I want to understand somebody, I cannot condemn him: I must observe, study him. I must love the very thing I am studying. If you want to understand a child, you must love and not condemn him. You must play with him, watch his movements, his idiosyncrasies, his ways of behaviour; but if you merely condemn, resist or blame him, there is no comprehension of the child. Similarly, to understand what is, one must observe what one thinks, feels and does from moment to moment. That is the actual. Any other action, any ideal or ideological action, is not the actual; it is merely a wish. (1948)
Awareness begins with outward things, being aware, being in contact with objects, with nature. First, there is awareness of things about one, being sensitive to objects, to nature, then to people, which means relationship; then there is awareness of ideas. This awareness, being sensitive to things, to nature, to people, to ideas, is not made up of separate processes, but is one unitary process. It is a constant observation of everything, of every thought and feeling and action as they arise within oneself… I must be open to every thought, to every feeling, to all the moods, to all the suppressions; and as there is more and more expansive awareness, there is greater and greater freedom from all the hidden movement of thoughts, motives and pursuits. (First and Last Freedom)
Meditation is this attention in which there is an awareness, without choice, of the movement of all things, the cawing of the crows, the electric saw ripping through the wood, the trembling of leaves, the noisy stream, a boy calling, the feelings, the motives, the thoughts chasing each other and going deeper, the awareness of total consciousness. (Krishnamurti’s Notebook, 1961, August 23rd)
So you see that the rose and all the universe and the people in it, your own wife if you have one, the stars, the seas, the mountains… this room, the door, really are there. Now, the next step; what you think about these things, or what you feel about them, is your psychological response to them. And this we call thought or emotion… So there is the superficial awareness of the tree, the bird, the door, and there is the response to that, which is thought, feeling, emotion. Now when we become aware of this response, we might call it a second depth of awareness. There is the awareness of the rose, and the awareness of the response to the rose (Urgency of Change)
You see a lovely tree with its leaves sparkling after the rain; you see the sunlight shining on the water and on the gray-hued feathers of the birds; you see the villagers walking to town carrying heavy burdens, and hear their laughter; you hear the bark of a dog, or a calf calling to its mother. All this is part of awareness, the awareness of what is around you, is it not?
Coming a little closer, you notice your relationship to people, to ideas and to things; you are aware of how you regard the house, the road; you observe your reactions to what people say to you, and how your mind is always evaluating, judging, comparing, or condemning. This is all part of awareness, which begins on the surface and then goes deeper and deeper.
(Choiceless Awareness)
Just to be aware—what does it mean?
To be aware that you are sitting there and I am sitting here; that I am talking to you and you are listening to me; to be aware of this hall, its shape, its lighting, its acoustics; to observe the various colours that people wear, their attitudes, their effort to listen, their scratching, yawning, boredom… their agreement or disagreement with what is being said. All that is part of awareness—a very superficial part.
Behind that superficial observation there is the response of our conditioning: I like and I don’t like, I am British and you are not British, I am a Catholic and you are a Protestant. And our conditioning is really very deep. It requires a great deal of investigation, understanding. To be conscious of our reactions, of our hidden motives and conditioned responses, this also is part of awareness… To be aware is to be conscious of all this, choicelessly, it is to be aware totally of all your conscious and unconscious reactions. (Choiceless Awareness)
If you are aware of outward things—the curve of a road, the shape of a tree, the colour of another’s dress, the outline of the mountains against a blue sky, the delicacy of a flower, the pain on the face of a passerby, the ignorance, the envy, the jealousy of others, the beauty of the earth—then, seeing all these outward things without condemnation, without choice, you can ride on the tide of inner awareness.
Then you will become aware of your own reactions, of your own pettiness, of your own jealousies.
From the outward awareness you come to the inward… when you are aware of your thoughts, of your feelings, both secret and open, conscious and unconscious, then out of this awareness there comes a clarity that is not induced. (Choiceless Awareness)
Being aware of a thought or a feeling as it arises, without condemning it or identifying with it, you will find that it unfolds ever more widely and deeply, and thereby discover the whole content of what is. (Choiceless Awareness)
So when Krishnamurti uses the word ‘awareness’ he doesn’t seem to mean that there is the total absence of thoughts, feelings, reactions, and other conscious and unconscious contents of thought - which is what your statement claims.
So how aware are you in daily life? Are you aware post facto, after your reaction has happened or in the same moment that is arises. Everyone is aware afterwards. You are angry, say something and afterwards are aware of it. That is pointless. In the moment of anger, you might verbally abuse or even hit. Afterwards you are aware. That is pointless. Basically at the moment you verbally abuse, you are unaware. Thought is unaware. Self is unaware. Self operates in division. I feel this is not the awareness K talks about.
These politicians engaged in war, how aware are they? Very little. They operate on thought. Mass media operates on thought.
You said
in connection to my saying one can be aware of, notice, a reaction or response as it is happening.
Can one not be aware of, notice, a reaction or response as it is happening?
I think one can.
I also shared with you 9 extracts where Krishnamurti talks about the importance of doing just that, of being aware of one’s own reactions and responses.
So when you say
is this a fact?
It is true for Krishnamurti and not for others, why? Why the difference between K and others.
All the extracts and videos I shared explore that.
My understanding is that K did not operate the same way as rest of us. Why? Perhaps because we use thought and he doesn’t. His actions come from silence and not observer, self or thinker. Observer, self, thinker being thought. That is what I am exploring.
What is true for K and not for others in the 9 extracts I shared with you above?
As far as I’m aware, in all these extracts K is simply saying that it is possible to be aware of one’s reactions and responses in daily life. This is all I have been talking about. There is nothing in K’s teaching to suggest that this is not something any normal and healthy person can carry out.
K also said that when the contents of consciousness have been completely emptied (through total attention, insight) then there is a totally different kind of consciousness. But this is not what I have been talking about on this thread. I have been talking about ordinary awareness - i.e. the simple noticing of outer and inner facts of experience.
Maybe it is also worth reminding ourselves that we don’t in all honesty know how K “operated”. Are we not speculating when we say that K was living from a space of absolute “silence”?
I’m not denying that he lived and acted from a different dimension of awareness than the rest of us; I’m only saying that for us it is a speculation, not a fact. And this may cause unnecessary confusion.
May we say that the ability to be aware of your thinking processes in real time varies, depends on the person, the time, the setting, the level of awakeness, usw? It can go from a whisper/hint to deep wholistic understanding/grokking. The lag time can also vary: from instantaneous-ish to minutes, hours, days, months, even years later.
I doubt it’s a different dimension to me it’s more a level of awareness. Being a boy, I used to wonder why girls apparently became aware when they were looked at. Later after my eye surgeries, I missed several degrees of vision and defended myself with that argument when I had missed something. Until, during a retraining course, I was blindfolded in a training session, turned around and my fellow cusists had to take seats around me. I had to indicate not only how many were within a circle but also who and to my but also my fellow students and trainers I scored 80 per cent. It took away my excuse and after that I took my feelings a lot more seriously.
Not long ago, a fitting one-liner came to me: ‘Seeing with the heart goes where the eyes cannot see.’
Could K have spoken and written without using thought?
Yes, I would think so. While most people are vaguely aware of their feelings and thoughts, clearly there are only very few (relatively speaking) who are willing or able to pay close attention to their inner state (i.e. in the sense of being sensitively, choicelessly, passively, nonjudgmentally aware, in the present moment).
I just meant that there are states of attention or cosmic consciousness that K refers to - in his journals and in his discussions (for example with Bohm) - that are radically different from the kind of everyday consciousness we ordinarily experience.
What does this exploration entail? Can you describe what takes place? How you go about it?
When the attending is done with a heavy hand, it can really mess with your flow and spontaneity. I think it’s best done lightly, sensitively, though not superficially.
I’m wondering if this is not really tricky stuff, and that its not really worth trying to do some weird self checking business.
It might just be some confused tail chasing
Passively… ? (that’s why I like the term passive awareness). Wu wei.
‘Passively’ feels quite right. It’s got the right vibe. 
Though there may be times when more active attention is appropriate. Sitting meditation, for example?
When I ‘do’ mindfulness I sometimes feel like someone’s sitting on my shoulder critically observing me, like I was being evaluated at a job. I hate it! Perils of self-checking?
There’s nothing wrong with sitting down sometimes is there? But if we are sitting down in a very conscious way, wanting to get a specific result, straining to stay alert, then that’s not passivity is it?