Krishnamurti - The World Within: You Are the Story of Humanity

The World Within: You Are the Story of Humanity

Copyright 2014, Krishnamurti Foundation of America

The World Within

YOU ARE THE STORY OF HUMANITY

J. Krishnamurti

CONTENTS

FOREWORD

Truth is not something that is mysterious; truth is where you are. From there you can begin. The truth is that I am angry, I am jealous, I am aggressive, I quarrel. That is a fact. So one must begin, if one may most respectfully point out, from where one is. That is why it is important to know yourself, to have complete knowledge of yourself, not from others, not from psychologists, brain specialists and so on, but to know what you are. Because, you are the story of mankind. If you know how to read that book which is yourself, then you know all the activities and brutalities and stupidities of mankind because you are the rest of the world.

J. Krishnamurti, 1st Question and Answer Meeting at Brockwood Park 1983

Reading the teachings of J. Krishnamurti, one is immediately struck by how personal the words are to ones own thinking and what a close mirror they are of our human psychological activity. His language is not bound by time, place, or circumstance, and so readers in any era or on any continent can find themselves clearly and compassionately made plain.

Krishnamurtis heuristic approach was typical not only of his dialogues or interviews, but also of his public talks where an attendee in an audience of thousands felt in direct contact with the speaker. His language was simple, without jargon or without any assumptions about the audience by the speaker. Krishnamurti helped the interviewees, without intending to, to see for themselves the intricacies of their thinking and of their problems.

During the Second World War (1939-1945) Krishnamurti did not speak publicly in the United States, but lived quietly in Ojai, California. People sought him out and came to dialogue with him on many issues of the times or their own personal dilemmas. Their problems were universal human problems, and each made true his statement that You are the world. As Krishnamurti unwound the tight threads of their thinking and feeling, the core or source of a concern was revealed, unadorned and without blame or guilt.

After the Second World War years, there was a set of three volumes of interviews with Krishnamurti that appeared worldwide, titled Commentaries on Living. This new book, The World Within, out of the Krishnamurti Archives, is a compendium of additional perennial questions with their timeless answers. The inquiry is still fresh, after seventy years, and readers will find themselves in both the questions and the responses.

Mark Lee

Chapter 1

ANGER AND INTOLERANCE

E. came to ask how to overcome anger, as he was particularly incensed with his colleague, irritated with his ways and behaviour.

After some further talk, we pointed out that such anger arose as E. wished to make his colleague conform to a pattern of behaviour that E. had, which bred in him intolerance; and intolerance is thoughtlessness. If he left his present colleague and sought another job, the same problem would arise, for he was the problem and not his colleague. E. must understand the circumstances and not merely change them. If he depended on the environment to free him from anger, then he would be a slave to it. If he depended on the environment, then he would become thoughtless. It is like those who seek constant change in their relationshipbeing disillusioned or tired of the one or of the group, they seek friendship or love in another. Because they have not fully comprehended relationship, mere change of environment will again produce the same conflicts, disillusionment, and satiety under different forms.

So E. must become aware of his own thoughtlessness and its cause.

Chapter 2

THE VOICE OF REALITY?

S. came from a long distance to find out whether the voice which she heard was her own intuitive voice or the voice, or the thought, of tradition.

After questioning her, we found that this voice has been beneficent, leading her away from the sensate world to more and more nobility of thought and service to others. But now she was doubtful, questioning the voice, becoming anxious. The voice had asked her to obey and not question, and now it was indifferent after a number of years. What was she to do? Was the voice the voice of reality?

After talking the matter over considerably, we went into the question of desire, want: how it arisesperception, sensation, desire, identification, I want and I do not wantand expresses itself, fulfils itself through sensuousness, craving for immortality, and worldliness.

S. said she now meditated regularly, sitting on the floor.

Without understanding the course of desire, meditation will not lead to enlightenment.

She was meditating on the oneness of God and so on, as she was a student of Vedanta.

Meditation must be based on right thinking, not on mere formulations, however noble. Right thinking proceeds from the comprehension of desire as the me and the mine. This selfishness is the selfishness of everyone, whether one lives in India, China, Europe, or here. The world is the projection of oneself. To understand the problems of the world, one must first understand oneself, not in self-enclosing comprehension but through that disinterested and kindly awareness of oneself. Self-knowledge is the beginning of right thinking, which is the true beginning of meditation.

She said her problem was taking on a new meaning: how, through her own craving, she was giving a significance to the voice, which might perhaps be her own intuitive perception.

Chapter 3

THE JOYOUS AND ACHINGPROBLEM OF BIRTH AND DEATH

R. was greatly and grievously upset over the loss of her son in the war. Does he continue? Is reincarnation true?

It is difficult to consider wisely the problem of death when one is almost paralysed with sorrow. What is your chief consideration: your son or your own loss? Every person in the world is faced with this problem: the universality of birth and death, of joy and sorrow. None can escape from it; one may escape from it in fantasy, in some theory or belief, in some self-forgetfulness; but birth and death remain, a mystery to be solved not through rationalization, but through the experience of that which is eternal and which has no beginning and no ending.

Hatred of those who helped in bringing about your sons death does not create the necessary state of mind which alone can experience reality. On the contrary, hate, grief, and possessiveness prevent the comprehension and experience of timelessness. In transcending hate, resentment, and anger, there is the dawning of compassion, which will purify the tortured mind. If you are concerned about the dead, you will create more death, but if you are concerned about the living, you will know of lifes eternity.

She said she did not understand what I was talking about. Mustnt she love her son? Must she not hate those who killed him, must she forgive, must she embrace evil? Was not war necessary in purifying the world?

Evil means do not produce good ends, violent means do not result in peace. Each one of us has brought about this spectacular chaos through our daily so-called peaceful days, which are made up of envy, greed, ill will, antagonism, and suspicion. The other mother is also crying for her son, the other mother whom you hate. She is also tortured by grief. To her too there is the joyous and aching problem of birth and death. Hate does not solve this problem; hate only perpetuates the cruelty of man to man.

Gradually, I led her to her first question of continuity. She was too shaken to go into it, but came back again another day.