Thought continues as thought. The different awareness, not of thought, which shows no thoughts leading up to it, is called insight. Or you could say it is the beauty of living.
Hello again Howard. When I said âno holds barredâ I wasnât suggesting for a moment that the forum guidelines, which seem very sound to me, should be ignored. I just meant to say that we can see that when questioning the nature of thought that someone may express, it often leads to a defensive response which ends communication. My suggestion was that to avoid this breakdown in communication, it might be a good idea to say in the opening post of a thread that participants should be prepared to have what they express challenged. Itâs just an idea.
That seems to make sense but perhaps we think that we are using thought to communicate observations (which we might indeed be doing). When someone challenges this and says âlook at what thought is doing hereâ, that may seem too direct/aggresive. It comes down to different interpretations of what is reasonable/fair/direct/aggressive. Itâs a pity when challenges which could lead to the dialogue going somewhere very interesting end up with conflict.
The conflict is a total condition of human life, as the lives we live. It is witnessed in a fragmented way, as arising in this and that, due to the fragmented way of thinking. Thinking it is a conflict arising in this or that, here and there, is the fragmentation.
Is this assertion an example of conditioned thought? Or is it something else?
**And of course, itâs a very reasonable idea. But, given that weâre already accepting the suggested guidelines of this forum, another way to look at your idea might be this: âPlease go easy on my ego, I get defensive if you question any of my ideas.â How many times did K talk about being serious? What do you suppose he meant by that? How often did he talk about being mediocre? This isnât a suggestion that anyone âshouldâ be other than they are. Itâs just a question about how serious we each are. Thereâs no rule that says we must be serious. Itâs just a question. To my observation, all attempts to âcontrolâ what is, interfere with the choiceless awareness. The attempt to control comes from the conditioning, even when it seems quite reasonable. Itâs also how the system of thought moves away from what is. Ex: Q: What is fear? Response: First, I need to know youâll be careful how you talk to me.
What happened to looking at fear? The response distracted the attention away from the observation. This is one of the main things we discover observing what thought is doing, the responses are constantly moving attention away from what is. Every time we respond with past experience, it moves away from observing what is. Ex: âWell, K or Bohm said this or that.â That past knowledge moves away from seeing for ourselves.
**And thatâs the analysis K rejected, psychological âevaluationsâ. Ex: "This is not âfairâ to âmeâ. Looking at what thought is doing is different that telling the person, âYouâ arenât being fair. Thatâs violence against the person, asserting they âshould be other than they are.â Itâs expecting them to conform to some fictional idea. To point out that thought is being judgmental, isnât saying, âYou should be different.â Weâre âlooking togetherâ, not telling anyone what to do or not do, right? Or do you or anyone else have a different understanding of looking together, in choiceless awareness? The point is to observe ourselves in relationship, isnât it? If weâre inquiring together, weâre listening and looking at all of the responses. I donât recall K or Bohm suggesting to judge or critisize anyone personally. The suggested to observe thought, to observe the responses, and stick with the facts. The fact is that personal judgments, in âthoughtâ, are âpsychological thoughtâ, what âIâ believe. Thatâs not a judgment of a âperson.â Thatâs describing the nature of the thought. Sure, most every conditioned being thinks this âideaâ that the thoughts belong to some thought-identity is âthe truth.â But the âfactâ is, this identity is just thought, not an actual entity. Thoughts donât belong to a conceptual identity. The identity is part of the system of thought.
I donât think being serious means speaking out regardless of how
what you say will be received. Thatâs the kind of âmachoâ philosophy that is very common in certain circles. K talked about âcommunionâ which involved passionate inquiry but also listening to each other with great attention and possibly affection. If a number of people react âbadlyâ to what I am saying, I think I have to look at that carefully and not say that others are not really serious. Talking about anything being âmediocreâ always sounds judgemental to me but I know K used the word at times.
**Who suggested any such thing? Did anyone suggest either thing? The question was, âWhat do you think K meant?â So, regarding this response, Iâll ask, "Does this response reflect âevaluation according to memoryâ, or âlookingâ at the question? What did the question have to do with âspeaking out regardless of how what you say will be received,â or a âmachoâ philosophy? Isnât this analysis according to memory?
âWhat is thought doing?â This is the question being asked now:
K: When thought meets the challenge, which is ever new, is not that response the outcome of the old, the past?
**What K seemed to be asking when he asked âAre we serious,â seemed to be, âAre we serious about inquiry, are we serious about observing what is.â If weâre more concerned with defending an image, a belief about how people should be, versus inquiry, then is that seriousness?
K: To ask a question is the easiest thing in the world, but your question has meaning only if it affects you directly so that you are very serious about it.
**You see how thought works? It brings situations out of the past, that arenât whatâs occurring now, to defend the belief, or point itâs making. Where is the number of people behaving 'badly" occurring? Is that what is occurring now?
Hereâs why I suggest K used the word mediocre, itâs actually another way to say this:
K: If you treat what we are saying at a verbal level, then go away, it is a waste of time. - Madras Feb. 1952
**Itâs a way of suggesting, itâs a waste of anyoneâs time, if theyâre not serious. The cultural conditioning is deeply engrained, and a mediocre approach will just be a waste of time.
Itâs actually an act of love to say, âLook, if this isnât something really important to you, then youâre better off not wasting your time here.â Itâs more blunt than that, but thatâs the message.
And by the way, if you openly look, I never said anyone was or wasnât serious. I asked, What do you think K meant. But do you see how thought interprets that? It makes false assiumptions about what the other person did. And then we generally donât notice that this idea we have about the other person doesnât reflect what actually occurred, unless weâre observing what thought is actually doing.
If one reacts to what I wrote, the reaction demonstrates how the authority of what-should-be (and its corollary, what-should-not-be), precludes seeing what-is.
When one reacts and doesnât examine the reaction, self-defense is a higher priority than self-knowledge
Think about it. How can this be said, without the actuality of this discovery called conditioned thought being on the mind, and why do we think it doesnât apply to oneself?
He also spoke of the âshoddy mindâ. Is that judgmental or just an accurate description?
Coming from a shoddy mind, it would be judgmental because a shoddy mind is bound and conflicted by what-should-be, rendering it incapable of seeing what-is. But coming from a mind without belief, and therefore without conflict, it is acknowledging what-is.
A free mind doesnât have to judge because it sees clearly what-is. A conflicted mind sees only judgment because it canât see what is.
In the two sentences above, there is no tone of voice available to the reader as there would be to the listener in a spoken utterance. There is also an absence of non-verbal communication such as body language. Reading those sentences, it would be easy to get the impression that you were somewhat angry when you wrote them Howard. Of course, this may not have been the case. If you had written, âI think you may have misunderstood what I was sayingâ, the reader may well respond in a different way to how she/he would respond on reading a more direct statement or question. My point is that we all need to try to communicate what we are saying in as skillful a way as possible so as to maintain communication. I donât see this as compromising âwhat isâ.
Iâm a bit lost here and I think Iâve lost the thread of what we were originally talking about. Please, feel free to challenge anything I write robustly Howard. I look forward to further inquiry with you here.
The problem isnât K using this term but others - we tend to think of our own minds as free of thought and conditioning while others have âshoddy mindsâ. Donât we all think we can see âwhat isâ? Isnât that what makes us all the same here? Itâs easy to judge others and look down on them from a superior vantage point whether it be fellow posters, the homeless or whatever. Isnât that basically what is happening all the time in the world?
That was essentially my question - does conditioned thought apply to you?
It applies to us all. This way of thinking individualistically is part of the conditioning, and shows how intellectually we miss the point.
Please donât respond, âwhat is the point?â Try to see it is not about him or her saying something for your entertainment. It is looking at the human conflict which is I, self, you and, me. See the conflict, psychologically as it were, for yourself, or not. See what happens, totally, mind, body, feelings, etc, all of that together in your own immediate existence.
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Ok, thanks for clearing that up Peter.
**Yes, this is not the case. And this appears to be an important thing to be aware of. This is why I mentioned it in my testimonial. With regard to this, Iâd like to share one of the guidelines for dialogue I was given when I was first introduced to dialogue in 1986, written by Mark Lee, the Director of the KFA at the time, that I feel is an essential part of dialogue. This one: âDialogue is letting the issue unfold in affection and mutual respect.â Mark told me he wrote the dialogue guidelines âIn the spirit of Krishnamurtiâs teachings.â Perhaps in the spirit of this sort of comment K frequently expressed at his talks:
K: We are two friends sitting in a park on a bench, talking over together our problems, friends who are concerned deeply with what is going on in the world, with the confusion, the chaos that exists throughout the world. I wonder if you have a friend with whom you talk, to whom you expose your own feelings, your concepts, your ideas, disillusionment, and so on. We are going to talk over together in that manner â exploring, enquiring, without any bias, in great friendship, which means, with great affection, respecting each other, without having some kind of hidden thought, hidden motives. - Brockwood Sept.1975
**I suspect that this tendency to âinterpretâ email messages in this manner is related to the cultural conditioning of defending âmy beliefâ against âyour belief.â Weâre conditioned to imagine relationship as âadversarialâ. Weâre told by the culture to âdefend âyourâ beliefs.â
So, thanks for keeping an open mind Sean.
**Well thanks for that. My views are also open to question. What I was referring to was the tendency for thought to respond in a manner that âmoves away from observing what isâ, or away from looking at the question that was just asked.
**The question arising out of this statement is, âWhen does the examination or inquiry begin?â The impression I get visiting various Krishnamurti sites, here, on Facebook, and other places, is that most every participant is great at quoting K, and telling each other what they havenât done, or what they should do. But âdoing the workâ together appears to be quite rare. It seems that K gave a great example to all of us when he spent over 50 years inviting humanity to inquire with him. He wasnât pushing ideas, he was saying, âLetâs look together choicelessly.â If weâre going to âlive the teaching,â is that about quoting words, or giving directions, or, meeting each other in openness? From not knowing, and observing together? If weâve read or listened to K for a fair amount of time, who hasnât already heard âwhat weâre supposed to do?â Are the teachings about the words, or about the looking, from not knowing?
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If one can look âfrom not knowingâ, one can see. Our problem is that we look from what-should-be and react to what is reflected rather than see what actually is.
If Kâs teaching can help one to realize this, his work was not in vain because someone âgot itâ. Whether that one must converse with others to get it, I donât know, because itâs a matter of seeing what is going on in oneself.
Yes, right up to the moment you realize you are reacting to what-should-be.
**Is this âproblemâ a âfactâ, or a translation based on past experience? Do we know what each person is actually going to do, before we begin the inquiry? I think weâre all aware of this possibility, and it may be a âreasonable guess.â But isnât this how thought responds to the suggestion to begin an inquiry, it âtalks about how itâs nearly impossible.â It looks like it is how thought responds, because it just happened, right? So, do we really know whatâs going to happen next?