Is there a way of living completely free from pressure?
Public Talk 1
When there is no pressure there is freedom
Public Talk 1 Ojai, California
April 01, 1978
Language acts as a great pressure and distorts communication and clarity of thinking. Any pressure, whether economic, social, moral, idealistic, or of authority, is a distorting factor. Our moral, ethical, religious, political and economic structure is based on the principle of pressure. We are living either in past yesterdays or in future yesterdays. The future is yesterday passing through the present, modified and going on; it is still yesterday. Can you be free of ideals and the pressure of conflict that comes about between ‘what is’ and ‘what should be’? Any form of institution is a distorting factor in life. When the brain has accepted the institution as a means of safety, security, status, a position, then it functions mechanically. To look at ‘what is’ without any distortion means without any pressure. Then you begin to have an insight into something which is not the action of remembrance, but an insight which is totally divorced from thought, from memory, from experience.
Public Talk 2
Is it possible to bring about order without the operation of thought?
Public Talk 2 Ojai, California
April 02, 1978
What is the actual fact of learning? What is the relationship between thought and knowledge? Any movement from here to there, physically as well as psychologically, implies time and movement. Thought is a movement, part of time, limited, incomplete. The perception that thought is creating disorder is insight, which is intelligence. That insight brings order. What is the relationship between knowledge and order, or is there no relationship at all? Complete order inwardly, therefore outwardly, is possible only when thought has realised its limitation, accepts that limitation and has its proper place. To listen implies that your mind is not occupied with your own thoughts, prejudices and conclusions. The very act of listening to the fact that thought cannot bring about order is an insight into the fact.
Public Discussion 1
Can the observer come to an end so that there is clarity of perception?
Public Discussion 1 Ojai, California
April 04, 1978
Is there a way of observing without the interference of words? Why does the brain create images? Can you observe without the past, without remembrance interfering with observation? Can the observer come to an end so that there is clarity of perception? How do you approach a question or a statement that you have not heard before? There is only thinking, not a thinker. The experiencer is the experience. There is a fundamental change radically and at great depth when the observer is the observed and there is only pure observation. In pure observation, that which is being observed undergoes a radical change. I am greed. Then what am I examining and who is it that is examining?
Public Discussion 2
Why do we live under pressure?
Public Discussion 2 Ojai, California
April 06, 1978
What do we mean by the word ‘pressure’? Does society act as a pressure? Is society different from you? Are you aware of the pressure of the past and of tradition? Is the nature of pressure essentially the nature of desire? A person who is living under pressure of any kind is not free. Is there a way of living completely free from every form of pressure? When there is separation between the observer and the observed, there is conflict. Does one see the danger of pressure? At the moment of anger are you different from anger? When I say, ‘I have been jealous,’ and try to do something about it, that is a pressure. Facts have no pressure.
Public Talk 3
Why does the mechanism of image-making come into being?
Public Talk 3 Ojai, California
April 08, 1978
The arts of listening, seeing and learning. If we do not put everything in its right place, there is confusion which acts as a great pressure on our life. Is the thinker different from thought, or is the thinker the thought? Is it possible not to observe through images? When there is no image there is actual relationship, which may be called love. Love has no pressure. Your fear is not your own, it is the fear of mankind. Thought, which is the outcome of the past, engenders fear. When fear arises from the past, can you observe it without any reaction? How do you examine or explore the hidden parts of the brain where fear may exist? Can consciousness watch itself in action, in movement?
Public Talk 4
What is the relationship of thought to desire?
Public Talk 4 Ojai, California
April 09, 1978
The very process of understanding the whole movement of thought might bring about a different quality of brain and mind. Are desire and thought one movement, or is desire something separate from thought? How does conflict arise in the movement of desire? When thought interferes with sensation, desire begins, and so the demand of desire to achieve, to fulfil. If you see this very clearly, there is no suppression of desire. Why does mankind everlastingly pursue pleasure? Joy happens by itself if you are quiet, not concerned with your little self everlastingly. The registration and remembrance of joy, and the pursuit of that joy, becomes merely pleasure. Joy is not pleasure. In total observation with all your senses, there is no registration. What is the relationship, if any, between pleasure, desire and love? Why has man made love so pleasurable?
Public Discussion 3
What will make you see the danger of conditioning?
Public Discussion 3 Ojai, California
April 11, 1978
Is it possible to live a life without choice, without conflict, without division? Is one aware of the danger of disorder? Can you give up something, a physiological or psychological habit, custom, routine, without the slightest effort? What makes one question the danger of conditioning? What will make man transform himself? You see the danger of conditioning if you are sensitive psychologically. What will make you sensitive? Thought has projected an idea of danger, and you are afraid of that idea, but you don’t see the danger of conditioning. See what happens when you are not comparing. You have thrown off an enormous burden that is making you dull, heavy.
Public Discussion 4
What is correct action?
Public Discussion 4 Ojai, California
April 13, 1978
Living in modern society, what is correct action? There is no correct action under pressure. How do you approach such an enormous, complex question of what is correct action? The word ‘action’ means doing, acting in the present, not in the future. Our action is according to a principle, to an ideal, or to some standardised memory. If action is not true, correct, accurate, there is unhappiness, regret, a constant battle going on. Can action born of thought ever be correct? Is it possible to be free of the past, and act? Is it possible to perceive action as a whole? Is there such action which is never contradictory, that is complete all the time?
Public Talk 5
Is it possible to live, act, without a centre?
Public Talk 5 Ojai, California
April 15, 1978
What is the wholeness of life? Right action is when neither the future nor the past interferes with the present. That is, when time comes to an end, which is now. Thought as time created the centre and from that centre we act. Therefore action is illogical, not accurate. Learning the art of observing without pressure. Is it possible to have no centre at all? What is action without a centre and what is life without a centre? The centre is the essence of sorrow. You can learn only when you have leisure, not when your mind is fully occupied, cluttered, full. Is it possible to end the movement of chattering? Why is one so occupied with and frightened about death? Why is there fear of ending anything? When there is a total ending, there is a beginning.
Public Talk 6
In meditation there is no observer or the observed
Public Talk 6 Ojai, California
April 16, 1978
What is it to know oneself entirely? The art of listening to what the self is saying. Freedom implies freedom from authority, from pressure, from your own demands, urges, wants, so that you are able to look very clearly at what is going on within yourself. The art of seeing and the art of learning. If you observe according to somebody, you are not observing. What takes place in meditation when there is total absence of conflict between the observer and the observed, and both cease to be? Love is not the product of thought; love is the movement of compassion. How do you look into something of which you know absolutely nothing? This is meditation. What is the quality of the mind that says, ‘I must find out what truth is’? Truth is indescribable. That thing which is the most sacred can only be when the mind is absolutely quiet.