Inspired, but not led, by the revolutionary teaching of J. Krishnamurti, this form of dialogue is open and welcoming to all those interested in learning about themselves, their ways of thinking and the impact this is having on the world in general. Lack of awareness about our fears, desires, attachments, loneliness, etc. – conscious or otherwise – is limiting our very perception and outlook on life. We will be investigating ordinary patterns of conditioned thinking – not as an intellectual activity but as an animate process affecting us directly – and seriously examining whether it is possible to actually and fundamentally change.
How are things?
Would mentioning one’s special moment as in real life be a base for attempted dialogues ?It seems to me that k was attempting to share his own life and experiments as much as it could be.
Opinion, judgement exist in the world of thought all the time, is what I see, there is a beyond that as I like many have experimented.
Then that is a start for a dialogue ,again in real life, not to forget that by being in the same room or place, if one says one’s own experiments, more than the words will be there…
And so on.
PS: are you still in the south of France as we go back there soon?
Dialog takes place between two or more friends and it is verbal as well as nonverbal.
What happens here is like writing and reading emails. It is a new phenomenon. krishnamurti was not aware of this form of communication then to give us a hint.
So we need to learn about these kind of sharing which is limited and can be misunderstood easily.
The misunderstanding is inevitable. But if I am aware of the words , the reading of the words…and the reaction to the words : like, dislike, agree, disagree etc …awareness of both of those with no judgement. Then there can be a high value in the dialogue.
Yes there are two parts in what we do in here, one is the way we read each other and the other is our personal reactions of like and dislike about what we read. Right? We need to learn about the two stages before we can have a constructive communication. Don’t you think so?
I think so. For the self, constructive means one thing and from the point of view of self knowledge, constructive is very different. There is the ordinary awareness in seeing and writing one’s thoughts, ‘trying to get one’s point across’ and the ordinary awareness of how I feel about what I’m writing, as well as the awareness of my own reactions to what another has written.
But K has introduced us to a new awareness, that he calls “attention”. This ‘attention’ is beyond the two superficial awarenesses in that it has no judgement about what is seen, it is free of judgement, it has no choice or judgement of one’s feelings, reactions, all of which are conditioned, which are the past. It is free of the known. This new awareness, ‘attention’, he calls the highest form of virtue, he calls it love.
It seems like a very good idea to be non-judgemental, but what does this look like in practice? K sometimes said to his audience, “That is a wrong question.” Isn’t that a judgement?
We have to make judgements everyday. To solve technical problems, we have to make judgments, decisions, conclusions…but does this apply to psyche? K says “psychological problems have to be dissolved immediately” otherwise ‘time’ to solve is brought in. And ‘time to become’ is a trap in the mind. The self as ‘past’ has trapped the mind. That, as I see it, is why it has been called “evil”. Not because it isn’t virtuous or it is condemnatory, etc
Those are judgements it makes of itself. It is the self / past that has to be dissolved as it arises, for the mind to be free.
That is the action of the “new” awareness: ‘attention’. As I see it.
Hi Dan. I’m not sure about the connection between dissolving psychological problems and communicating on the forum. I see these two things as separate issues. As far as I see it, when we are in dialogue here we will often be communicating our observations, and this is entirely valid. You may have observed something regarding the teachings that I have not and communicating this helps us understand more. But where is the line between a judgement and an observation? At what point in our communication does conditioning obscure understanding? I mean, we could say that everything we write here is a product of thought and therefore produced by our past knowledge and experience but that wouldn’t be helpful.
We are in a relation with our own world views - when we enter into a discussion with another, these world views are confronted - and thus the ensuing conflict.
What are you pointing at (in your comment above)? What do you mean by “each persons view is valid”? The idea that there are different “truths”? (that must be respected)
Not sure what you are talking about here Douglas. I didn’t write the ungrammatical quote that you have attributed to me.
But the question I’m asking is, what is the point of dialoguing at all if we are stuck in the trap of “everything we write is the product of our conditioning”?
Oups! To be more precise, you said that the sharing of our observations is valid - which seems legit to me. I am guilty of interpreting what you said a bit to liberally, sorry.
Since we are talking grammar, I can’t see the error in “each persons view is valid”
One point would be to see if we are capable of listening despite our conditioning. To see if we are completely stuck or if our conditioning is still plastic enough to evolve with circumstance/relationship with other than ourself.
This sounds legit to me, as you would say, but what happens when one challenges a statement? Surely a challenge, done in a sensitive way, is acceptable isn’t it?