Krishnamurti: We are having a dialogue, not a discussion. The difference between dialogue and a discussion is, a discussion implies trying to find truth or a conclusion between two opinions, between two arguments, dialectic, fanciful, imaginary, or romantic, even so-called historical. But a dialogue means a conversation - dialogos - that means conversation between two people. So this is a conversation between you and the speaker. A conversation implies two friends, I mean friends who like each other, who have a certain affection for each other, who are concerned about their personal problems and so they talk over things together, not try to browbeat one or the other by superior knowledge, or superior intellect, but to investigate together their own problems, their own difficulties, their own personal lives and so on. So please, if you don't mind, this morning we are going to have a dialogue, a conversation between you and the speaker. I see there are a lot of questions here, written questions. You don't write when people are walking together, two friends, you don't write questions to each other, you talk, you ask. So if you don't mind we will leave these questions aside for the moment and continue with our dialogue. So what shall we talk about this morning?

Questioner: Could we talk about pain?

K: Pain? Physical pain.

Q: No.

K: Psychological pain.

Q: Human pain in the heart.

K: Physical pain of the heart?

Q: No, psychological pain.

Q: Could we talk about impediments to passive observation.

K: Intelligence?

Q: Impediments.

K: If some one hears it very clearly, would mind passing it on to me? I am not deaf - maybe - but I like to be informed correctly.

Q: Impediments in the way of passive observation.

K: Ah, impediments in the way of passive observation. Psychological pain, impediments that might prevent clear, acute, passive awareness and observation. Anything else?

Q: Natural foods and diet, fruits and nuts will help a great deal? – for thinking clearly.

K: Qu'est-ce qu'il dit?

Q: Diet, natural food, raw eating, and fruits and nuts will help a great deal for clear thinking.

K: Oh, oh, dietary. You can have marvellous nuts, and marvellous fruit, and marvellous diet but you may be equally stupid. So any other questions, sir? Yes, lady? Wait a minute, sir.

Q: Your first question – thinking together, I got confused when you gave the example, the only example you gave was at the time of war, you sounded something like, thinking together. This could be mainly incomplete because thinking together inside prejudices will be contradictory (inaudible)

K: Why do you take only the crisis of a war when people think together, and why don't you there may be thinking together without a crisis.

Q: She says you gave only that example and not any other.

K: Oh, we want other examples of thinking together. Any other questions?

Q: Sir, when we have a national crisis as that we are having today in our country, do you want millions of people to have that passive, total observation and decide the issues, or what?

K: This country is in a crisis and we ask all the millions of people to be passively observant. I am afraid even those who are here won't even listen, let alone the millions. Any other questions sirs?

Q: Sir, the energy that is produced through the influence of a drug, and the energy you are speaking about, or rather, pointing out, which must have that insight through that, are they similar, or are they different?

K: The energy that is produced with drugs, with stimulation in various forms, is that different from the energy that you are talking about. Chemical energy, which is, drugs are chemical energy, and is that energy different from the energy that we are talking about. Right, sir?

Q: (Inaudible)

K: Just a minute, sir.

Q: What is that state when supreme intelligence dawns?

K: What is the state when that intelligence dawns. Now just a minute, sir, you have asked several questions, which of these shall we take? Physical, psychological pain, talking to the millions, what is the state of supreme intelligence, what is the mind, or the state which is passively observant. Now which of these shall we take?

Q: The last two.

K: The last two. Which is what?

Q: Let’s go into passive observation and supreme intelligence.

K: I am asking, sir, which would be the most comprehensive question, which would include all the other questions, to discuss?

Q: Facing a crisis.

K: Facing a crisis, do you want to discuss that, I mean talk, have a dialogue about - facing a crisis, or what is it to be attentively - the gentleman used, 'passively observant' - seeing. Which of these, please, it's up to you.

Q: Is there any effect of the movement of the planets on the brain cells?

K: Oh, yes sir. Is there an astrological influence on the brain cells. Right? Is that all the questions? You mean to say you have no personal questions? No personal problems?

Q: Our personal problems arise out of national problems. (Laughter)

K: Oh! Our problems arise from national problems. No, I won't go into this question because it's rather... Which would you like to talk about?

Q: How to translate your ideas into the right kind of economic, social and political structure.

K: How to translate my ideas, the speaker's ideas into social, economic and political I am afraid you can't!

Q: Would you speak of love and compassion?

K: You speak of love and compassion, would you talk about it, could we have a conversation about it.

Q: Something which is pertinent, derived, relevant for our daily life. What’s the use of talking about compassion and love, which are so abstract!

K: Love and compassion are so abstract, why talk about those abstractions when we are concerned with our daily life. You mean to say, sirs, that you exclude love and compassion from your daily life?

Q: It is so. I will have a dialogue with you, sir, if you ask me. It is so.

K: What is so?

Q: That so-called love and compassion which you refer to. I at least am not able to understand what it is, and how it can be related to daily life.

K: You have understood the question? How can love and compassion be applied to daily life?

Q: When I came here I didn’t know what you were talking about.

K: Quite right.

Q: That itself made me to concentrate on what you are going to talk about.

K: What, sir?

Q: Sir, I have not concluded what we are going to talk about this morning, and I am keenly observing what you are going to talk about and I am ready to learn. And when I am channelised to a particular point I am stopping there.

K; Yes, sir.

Q: That is, I am in the not-knowing condition.

K: Do you want to talk about compassion and love, which is an abstraction? Do you want to talk about an abstraction also called observation? An abstraction between the movements of the stars and your brain? An abstraction of pain in the heart? So which of these abstractions do you want to discuss, have a dialogue about?

Q: The relationship between desire and consciousness.

K: Desire and consciousness, what is their relationship. Sir?

Q: Love and compassion need not be an abstraction.

K: What, sir?

Q: Another most important thing is, the question arises in the mind. How does a question arise, sir?

K: What shall we do, sir?

Q: Sir, you asked that we should ask a personal question, and my personal question is about intelligence, because I see that it is lack of intelligence, or absence of it that creates all the problems. If that problem is solved probably all the others are.

K: We have spent twenty minutes talking about abstractions, not about actually what we are, what we go through in our daily life, our miseries, our confusions, our travail, our ambitions and competition, but we want to talk about something else quite apart. So please let's come down to the earth and let's talk together.

Q: In my life, and in most people’s life that I see that it is because of the pain that they will not look at it.

K: All right, sir, shall we discuss that? Shall we talk over that?

Q: Yes.

K: That most human beings, including ourselves, you and I - sorry, I won't include you - can we talk about that, why human beings accept, live with, continue with pain, sorrow, anxiety and all that. Shall we talk about that? Right, let's do it.

Q: Answer is clear. We want a solution.

K: There is a solution.

Q: Then all right.

K: Sir, before we begin to go into this, will you kindly listen? Listen. I listened to you, I listened to you for twenty minutes, so kindly also listen to each other. Right, sir? Not that we are going to find a solution immediately, or try to convince each other of anything; we are trying to find out, or learn the movement of pain, common to all human beings: the tears, the anxieties, the grief, the sorrow and all that make up our human, daily existence. Is that all right? We can talk about that?

When we say we have pain, are we aware of it, know it, observe it, as it is taking place? We are going into this step by step, if you don't mind, is that all right? Are we, each one of us, conscious of the pain, of various forms of griefs, anxieties, fears, are we aware of it as it takes place, or we are aware of it a few minutes, or a few seconds later? Let's talk about that. You understand my question? I have a toothache - one has a toothache. That's a physical fact and you know it instantly. Right? That is, immediately you know that there is a physical pain. And you act, if you can, immediately because the pain is intolerable and you act. Right? Now when we say we have pain, psychological, inward, inside the skin as it were, the pain, is that pain as acute, clear as toothache? You understand my question? Or we are aware of it after it has taken place? Would you please discuss with me? This is no good. I am not giving a talk - the day after tomorrow.

Q: Depends on our attachment to the gross, physical body.

K: Sir, I asked psychological pain, not physical pain.

Q: Only if there is psychic attachment to the body, we understand the pain. If we are not attached to the body

K: So as long as the psychological state is not acute, not aware, not sensitive, we are not aware of it. So that is what I am asking: is the psychological pain, which we say we have, are we sensitive enough to act instantly, immediately, or not being sensitive we postpone it, or look at it a few minutes later and then try to say, what am I to do about it? I wonder if I am conveying this? Come and sit there, sir, out of the sun. Or would you like to come sit on the platform - anybody is welcome to sit here, you can all come!

Is it that one is not sensitive to psychological pains, as one is very, very sensitive when one has physical, acute pain? You understand my question? Won't you have a conversation with the speaker?

Q: When the pain comes, like someone you love, suddenly it hurts you, and you say, why, and there is a pain.

K: Yes, sir.

Q: And you usually want to run away from it.

K: Yes, when you love somebody, or you think you love somebody, and when that somebody does something which is not according to your like or dislike, then you feel the pain. Right? And what shall we do about it? What do you do about it, sirs?

Q: That means to live the

K: Sir, sir, don't just throw out words; just see what is happening, sir, to each one of us: when somebody you love leaves you - at least, you think you love - leaves you, you go through great agony. I don't know if the Indians, if you do. Some people do. When somebody whom you love leaves, or you have a battle with your wife - right, sirs? - at last you are waking up! - there is pain, there is jealousy, there is anxiety, the sense of antagonism, hatred - which are all various forms of violence - what then do you do? Go on, sir, meet it, sir, have a discussion, have a dialogue with me, don't just sit there and wait for me to go on! What do we do when this happens - which is a crisis. It is not a national crisis, it is a crisis every day of our life, what do we do?

Q: I react selfishly.

K: Yes. You react selfishly. What do you mean by that word 'selfishly'?

Q: In the old way.

Q: I react with pain.

K: That's what I am saying, sir. He says, you react to that crisis through pain, jealousy - right? That's your reaction, it's not selfish, that's your reaction. So when you have that reaction what do you do?

Q: So far as I am concerned I will listen to you, I am patient with the situation and I am anxiously observing what is happening.

K: My darling sirs, you are not meeting what I am saying! This is the crisis, sir, you won't even listen to what the other fellow has to say.

Q: You try to reduce the pain.

K: You try to reduce the pain, the anxiety and so on. How do you What process do you go through to reduce it? Either run away from it, suppress it

Q: Rationalise it.

K: Yes, substitute and so on. Which is, in effect, run away from it. Right? Suppose I have pain because my husband has left me, and I shed tears. Then I am lonely, I miss him - sexually, this way and that way, and I am deeply hurt and I don't know what to do. Right? Then what happens? Not knowing what to do, I try to escape from it, I try to smother it, I try to go away to some psychologist, to some temple or something, anything away from the fact that I am in a great state of disturbance. Then how shall I deal with that disturbance if I don't escape? You understand my question? Do I know that I am escaping, first? Or is it our natural, or unnatural response, to escape? Sir, find out, sir, don't go into yourself, find out.

Q: Excuse me, sir, for my part I experience that pain, I endure it, without having an escape from it, in practical life.

K: You don't endure if you have tremendous physical pain.

Q: I have endured it.

K: My god, my god. You go to a doctor. Please kindly listen, sir. I said, endure it, suppress it, try to get out of it, escape from it. You do all kinds of things to avoid this pain.

Q: Yes.

K: Please would you mind listening before you agree? Gosh! So what shall I do? I won't escape. Do we see the futility of escape? Not mentally, as an idea, do we see the absurdity, the futility of any escape? If one sees that escape does not solve the problem, then what shall I do with the problem? Go slowly, sir. What shall I do with the problem?

Q: I try to accept.

K: I have just now said that madame, I said, escape from it - I included that word.

Q: A-C-C. Accept the problem.

K: Yes, that is endure, accept. So if I don't do any of those things what am I to do? I won't accept, why should I accept? Why should I endure this pain?

Q: In time, it will pass.

K: Yes, that is the same - escape, in time it will pass, endure it, accept it. (Laughs) But you don't accept physical pain!

Q: You must see what the problem is and deal with it at its level.

K: We are going to do it sir. First that can only happen when I don't escape. But we have cultivated such a network of escapes that we don't know even that we are escaping. So I am just asking, most respectfully, do we see the fact, the truth - the fact that the moment you escape the problem still remains? I may postpone going to the doctor because one doctor, or several doctors have told me I have cancer; I say, it doesn't matter, I will put up with it, I can escape, but eventually I have to be operated, or die. So do I, do we acutely realise the fact that any escape in any form - acceptance, running away, enduring it, time will solve it - will never resolve the problem? Right? Do we accept that? If that is so then what shall we do?

Q: Just observe the pain.

K: Do you?

Q: That’s the only thing left.

K: Yes, so you?

Q: That situation has not arisen for me. (Laughter)

K: That you don't face the problem?

Q: No, sir, that anxiety has not arisen.

Q: He said he has not had an anxiety at any time in his life.

K: Ah, sir, this is You battle it out! (Laughter) This is most extraordinary. Sir, look: I realise the futility and the stupidity of escape, I realise it, I know the problem will not be solved, then what shall I do?

Q: Understand the problem

K: God! Are you telling me, or am I telling you?

Q: Understand the problem and (inaudible)

K: How do you understand the problem?

Q: You seek for the cause of the problem.

K: Wait, sir.

Q: Observe the pain in all its aspects

K: You try to understand the problem by analysing it, trying to find out the cause of it, trying to investigate it, look at it, and all that you are saying. Now, listen carefully please, if you will. I have a problem. I analyse it, try to find the cause of it - what is that? What is that process of analysing, trying to find the cause of it, what is taking place? Just watch it, sir. Just watch - do. Kindly give me two minutes. I have a problem, my husband has run away and I realise - I have shed tears and all the rest of it - and I realise I can't escape, it is there on my front door step. It is there. Then I say to myself, I must find the cause of it. Right? The cause, analyse, all that - what does that imply? Watch it sir, in yourself, don't just throw out words. Is that not also an escape?

Q: Just that. It is an escape.

K: (Laughs) What do you say, sir, is that not an escape? Just a minute, sir, look at it, please. This is what our tradition is: I have a problem, either we escape in different forms or analyse it, go into the cause of it, there may be several causes and I have to examine each cause, there may be ten causes. So what have I done? I have moved away from the problem. Right? Do we see that, sir?

Q: If we are on the problem, how do you say that we have moved away from the problem? Are we not analysing that problem?

K: Yes, sir, that's what, I am saying exactly the same thing as you are. Which means what? Just a minute sir. Do you know what is implied in analysis?

Q: Yes.

K: What?

Q: Finding out what is the cause behind it.

K: No, what does it imply? What is implied in analysis?

Q: Analysis implies (inaudible) identity procedures, trying to find out the ingredients, the elements, the causes, the effect.

K: Right. Now who is cutting it, analyzing it?

Q: Myself.

K: Myself. That is, yourself analysing the problem of my wife escaping from me, which means what? You have spent a couple of days, or a couple of months in analysing, which means what?

Q: Which means

K: Wait, sir, you haven't answered my question. I have analysed, I have taken a couple of years, I have been to an analyst, or to a puja, or sat by myself and said, what is the cause of all that. What has happened? Have I solved the problem?

Q: It may solve the problem.

K: No, no, have I You say it may - have I?

Q: In many cases it has solved the problem.

K: I question it.

Q: I am satisfied with that.

K: Good, sir. That's all right then.

Q: That’s my daily life.

K: Yes, I am dealing with daily life.

Q: Yes, I am also talking about that.

Q: By analysing, I am not facing it.

Q: Sir, if you will just permit me for one minute. I think I have more intensive problems in my daily life than your respected self. I know how I am living with that.

K: Yes, sir. Wait, forgive me, I have no problems.

Q: I have problems.

K: I know. (Laughter)

Q: So I know how to live with it.

K: I know, sir, you have all problems. I am trying to find out sir, will you kindly listen to me? I am trying to say that when we have a problem, without escaping, we begin to analyse. Right? We say, what am I to do? So I say, what is the cause of it, what is the root of this matter? Right? Then what happens? What is actually taking place when I say I am trying to find the root of the matter?

Q: I am living in the past.

Q: I am getting more clear about it.

K: That is, sir, you are analysing, aren't you? Now just let's stop there for a moment. What are the implications of analysis? Who is it that is analysing, thinking the analyser is different from the problem? Careful, go slowly, sir. The analyser thinks he is different from the problem, and therefore he is able to say to himself, I am going to understand, investigate, analyse the cause of it. That is, the analyser is different from the thing analysed. Just a minute, sir. Do you see that?

Q: I see that, the problem is part of me and I am part of the problem. The problem and I are not different.

K: So what shall we do? If the problem is you, and the problem is interrelated, what shall we do? This is incredible. This is not a conversation between that gentleman and myself, please we are all involved in this.

Q: Step aside and watch.

K: Do you? You see you just throw out ideas.

Q: Sir, we will listen.

K: What am I to do, sir? We don't seem to think together - right? - we don't even look at the same thing at the same time together. Look sir, just listen to it for two minutes and then... I have a problem: my wife or my son or my husband has left me. It is an acute problem because I am then facing my loneliness, my lack of sexual relationship, my sense of isolation, my sense of being deserted, left. And one generally runs away from this fact. Right, sir? Runs away in different ways. Then I say, I won't run away, but then I must understand the problem. To understand the problem it is our tradition that says you must analyse. Now what does 'analyse' mean? It implies the analyser and the thing to be analysed. Following all this, sir? Please follow it! Which means I may take days, months, years. I think by doing that I am resolving the problem. But the problem is still there at the end of the analysis. But wait, sir, we'll see it in a minute. Look at it, sir, don't disagree immediately. For god's sake, give the other fellow a chance!

Q: By analysing the problem and I think I will solve the problem, but I don’t know what else to do.

K: I am pointing this out, sir. I think by analysing I will be able to solve the problem. We haven't understood the full meaning of analysis. Ah, don't smile, don't say I'll turn up Look at it, sir. You have analysed, you are all experts at analysis: introspection, conversation, discussion, but the fact remains at the end of it, have you solved the problem? That is, by analysis, perhaps a year, week - all that is time. That is, through time you think you will have solved it - not through analysis. I don't know if you understand this. Wait sir, wait sir, wait sir, don't be too quick. There is a problem, no escape and I analyse, one analyses, that involves time which means what? I hope through time to resolve the problem, which is another escape. You don't even understand what I am talking about!

Sir, you act immediately - please listen to it - you act immediately if you have a very acute pain - physical - immediate action. Right? Why don't you do the same with regard to that? Wait, sir, listen to it. I can answer all the questions you raise, sir. Why don't you act as acutely, sharply, immediately as you do with regard to physical pain, why don't you do the same with psychological pains? That is the real issue. Right? Take it, sir, listen to it. Why don't I do that? You understand, sir?

Q: May I comment, sir?

K: Comment, sir? We live on commentaries, sir. So go ahead, make a comment.

Q: If you give me that freedom I will comment, otherwise I won’t.

K: I said! You are a free place, sir.

Q: I am questioning your very analogy, sir. Even with regard to the physical thing, you can’t say that you are acting instantly to end it. Can you say that?

K: You may take, sir, a taxi to go to the hospital. I mean sir, don't let's play with words. If you have pain, it may take an hour to get to the doctor, but inwardly you have acted instantly, immediately. Now why don't you do the same? That is...

Q: Correct, correct. Correct, sir. That position is there, we go to the victim. What to do here? Clear. Sorry.

K: I am pointing out, if you will I know all this, sir, you are all I know all these questions which you raise. I have lived, sir, with these questions for the last sixty years. Everybody throws out an idea, and apparently one doesn't listen to what is being said. Just listen, sir, please! I am saying, the physical pain may be compared to the psychological pain. The physical pain, you may allow ten minutes to go to the doctor, but the inward decision is, act immediately. That action may take time, that is, ten minutes in a taxi. Is it possible, I am asking myself, to inwardly decide immediately, without analysis - wait sir, you haven't even listened, you disagree - can I decide immediately to end this problem? Not take time, not run away, not move away from that problem completely.

Q: Mind immediately abstracts it, this feeling of shock is the word.

K: You're not doing This is a question I am asking, madame, would you find out what the question is, first?

Q: Mainly it is about which you spoke the other night.

K: Yes, sir. When you act physically, pain, your intelligence is acting. Here intelligence is not acting. And I say intelligence can only operate at the moment. So just go slowly. I am asking myself, instead of going through all the process of analysis, escapes, time and all that, why can't I - the mind - say, this must be tackled instantly, immediately? Now, wait a minute, I'll show you in a minute. My wife has left me and I am terribly hurt, lonely. Right? Is it not possible to deal with that loneliness instantly? Right? Now probably you have never asked this question. Now I am pointing out how to do it, well, follow it up - will you?

I am not - my mind is not allowing time to interfere with it. Don't, sir, this is one of the most difficult things to do, don't just... Not to allow time as a means of the solution of a problem - time being analysis, escape, suppression, acceptance, all those imply time. Right? Right, sirs? No, not as an idea, see the fact that all those movements are away from the problem and involve time. And I say to myself, time will not solve it. It's obvious. Time has not solved the problem of war - for the last five thousand years historically there have been five thousand wars. So time psychologically, or outwardly, will not solve the problem. So I say now, if I will not allow time to interfere what then takes place? Answer it, sir. Now it's up to you, the ball is in your court! What do you say, sir? Will you put yourself in that position of not allowing time at all?

Q: You give it your full attention.

K: Now you see, you have said something. Which is, escape, suppression, acceptance, which are all implied in analysis, time, which is what? A wastage of energy. I don't know if you see this. That is, I have done all these things, like a silly person, because my wife has run away, I have been through all this. And I suddenly realise time will not solve it. So what has happened? I have wasted my energy through analysis, through escape, through saying I will accept it, but ache inside. All that allows time. Right? Right? And time is not going to solve it. So I must find a way of dealing with the problem immediately. Right? The immediacy implies what? Please follow this. I have wasted energy in all this. When I say the problem must be solved immediately I have brought all my energy into it, that means all my attention to it. Have you?

So that means, what is attention? This bringing together all your energy to look at the problem, and you cannot have that total energy if you are wasting it through analysis, through suppression, through finding the cause, saying yes, time will solve the problem. Right? Is this clear? Verbally at least? Now can that be brought to reality? That is, can I, having listened to you, say time will not solve it and I see time will not because I am fairly intelligent, I won't remain in my old groove, I say, yes, you are quite right. And I say, now am I in that position when I am bringing all my energy into the problem? What do you say, sirs? My wife and I quarrel, that's a problem. I say, now, I won't allow time, which is the most destructive way of thinking. So what happens? As the wife and I begin to quarrel, the good old business, then if I give full attention at that moment what happens? Come on, sir, what happens? You should know!

Q: I am living in the present.

K: No, what actually takes place? Would you please, sirs?

Q: (Inaudible)

K: (Laughs) You see, you don't unfortunately, sir, you don't seem to apply the question to yourself. That is, you and your wife quarrel, don't you?

Q: I become silent.

K: Don't say, 'I become silent', sir, you and your wife quarrel, which is the common thing in the world. As the gentleman says, a daily fact. What happens when you don't escape from that fact?

Q: There is no quarrel.

Q: I open myself totally in my mind immediately.

K: What?

Q: I open myself totally to my wife immediately.

K: No, no, no, no, don't, don't, don't, you're just being you don't open your No, I won't discuss it.

Q: Why not! It’s immediate! You know there I am burdened (inaudible)

K: Would you stop talking with your hands? (Laughter) What are you trying to say, lady?

Q: I open myself totally to my wife!

K: You open yourself totally to your wife - what does that mean?

Q: I am open and my wife is also open, there won’t be any quarrel (inaudible)

K: (Laughs) I'll wave the hands, you talk! (Laughter) This is most extraordinary - have you done this ever?

Q: Yes.

K: Then, lady, you have solved the problem. (Laughter) Have you done this ever, if you are honest? That is, I and my wife quarrel, at the moment of the quarrelling not to allow time to interfere. Which means you give all your attention at that moment to the quarrel. What happens? Oh, do it, sir, for god's sake, do it!

Q: The quarrel will aggravate. If mutually our experiences we submit and think that the other party is lying and

K: I know sir, all that, we know all that.

Q: And we cause the problem that way.

K: I know all that.

Q: One party should yield, otherwise life is a misery.

K: We know all that, sir. That's the common pattern we live by. And I am saying break the pattern and see what happens. Sir, please I am pointing out, sir. Break the pattern, that is, the pattern is escape, time, all the rest of it, break it and say, I am going to give my full attention at the moment of quarrel.

Q: Then the quarrel stops.

K: Have you done it, sirs? Now wait a minute: you and I are quarrelling now, it is a quarrel, I'll show you. Will you give your complete attention? Then what happens? If you, as the husband or the wife, give complete attention what happens to the other person? You don't even come Come on, sirs, what happens?

Q: I can say what happens to me, but what happens to the other party

K: What happens to you?

Q: There is nothing, no thinking except feeling, looking at it.

K: What are you looking at?

Q: At the fact.

K: Sir, that gentleman is speaking.

Q: Sir, I am just seeing.

K: That's all. That is, you and I are quarrelling, you are always quarrelling with me. This is an old game, not a recent game. Now I am paying full attention to what you are saying. Are you?

Q: Yes.

K: No, no, don't be so quick, sir. Are you giving complete attention when I am nagging you? Don't so easily agree, sir, wait sir. I explained what I mean by attention, don't say, yes, I understand. I am asking you: we are quarrelling, and I give my complete attention to that quarrel, and I mean by 'complete attention' I am not escaping, I am not analysing, all my energies are there, watch. So what happens here? I have stopped any sense - wait, sir - any sense of being hurt - being hurt - I am not building a wall against her, there is nothing. I am in a position of total attention. Now what's my relationship to you then? Sir, sir, this is an open if you don't talk somebody else will talk.

Q: Complete absorption.

K: No! You see you are using words, what do you mean 'absorption' - in what?

Q: I don’t think of any other thing except this.

K: Then use correct words, sir. It's not absorption.

Q: What I mean by that is

K: No, that's not the word. To be absorbed in something implies like a child being absorbed in a toy.

Q: I am one with that.

K: This is a hopeless conversation! When you are completely attentive there is neither absorption, nor one with that, you are attentive. Right? You attend. Now what happens to the person who is not attending? That's your relationship now. I am attending because I don't care whether you listen to me or don't listen to me, but you want to quarrel with me, argue, discuss, open, this, right, right. So what is your relationship to me? Attentive. I am attentive, and you are not, then what happens? What happens between two people, sir?

Q: There is a division.

K: That's all. What do you do with that division? She is attentive, I am not. She is full of that intense energy, it's only when there is inattention, when there is no attention the quarrels begin. Right? Do you understand this, sir? When there is complete attention on both sides, there is nothing, no quarrel, no division. Because we think attention means there is a centre from which I am attending. I say attention means there is no centre at all. Right? So will you please attend? Attend, which means give your total energy to listen to problems that you have - running away from your wife, from your husband, thinking you are frightfully superior than your wife and so on, so on, so on. So as long as there is a division between you and your wife, or your whatever it is, in your relationship, there must be quarrels, there must be fight. Like two nations divided - look what is happening in the world, fighting, fighting, fighting. So in the same way can you abolish this division? And that can only be wiped away when there is complete attention. Will you give that attention to your problems? You see, sir, in the business world, as I have been told, as I have watched it, the executive finally decides - right? - the top boss, but before it comes to that it goes through various stages. Right? Don't you know all this? The clerk, the minor, it's conveyed to the top, boss, and he decides. We are doing exactly the same thing. Right? We don't say, this has got to be solved immediately. Our minds don't work that way. We are so traditionally bound that we can't think anything anew. And that's why we become so very dull.

Enlightenment, sir, according to tradition, will take lives, time, struggle, sacrifice, control - you follow? Suppose I don't accept time at all, and say that's all nonsense - what happens? You do it, sir!

Any more things, sirs? It's a quarter to nine, isn't that enough? Have I answered your questions, sirs? Or you are still carrying on the battle? You can carry on the battle, sir, I won't. The ball is in your court. Yes, lady?

Q: In the case of death, in the case of national calamities, or crisis like death, don’t you think that time is of help?

K: I don't. I have explained, lady, time is one of the most destructive factors. Time is death. Yes, sir, you haven't understood when I said time is death.

Q: You have shown us that paying attention to the moment is like death.

K: Will you do it? Not, I have shown - I have shown you nothing because it is a problem for all humanity. Which says, one day I will solve it, one day I will go to the analyst, or I will take time to analyse it. All that is a wastage of energy.

Q: (Inaudible)

K: What are you pointing at, sir?

Q: You were going to explain about ‘time is death’. You said if you don’t understand, I’ll explain.

K: All right, sir. Sir, explanations are pleasant, but they don't meet the fact. I can explain to you how beautiful the mountain is. Right? How lovely the snow, the lines, the valleys, the rivers and the beauty of the sky, but unless you see it yourself it has very little meaning. Right? Now in the same way, I said, time is death. Right? What do you make of it? Don't ask me to explain, I will, but what do you make of a statement of that kind? You are allowing time, aren't you, now? All your life you have allowed time, so you are dying now. Look at you, you are dying. You think death is the final thing. Death is when your mind is gone, when you are caught in tradition - the tradition of time, the tradition of evolution, the tradition of gradualness, the tradition of analysis, all those are traditions in which you are caught. You see you won't break those and you talk about heaven. Right, sir?