If you are not occupied, are you nothing?

I believe this is the last talk. There will be discussions, or dialogues, or conversations - whatever you may like to call it - on Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. Then we can bombard each other with a lot of questions and try to find answers for them!

During the last six talks we have talked over together a great many things. We've talked over how we are influenced by institutions, controlled and shaped by them. We also went into the question of ideals, how they distort our lives, making us violent, ineffectual, not dealing with realities of life. And also we talked about the pressure of knowledge: knowledge, we said, is always in the past, how that knowledge controls, shapes our thinking, our action, and we are influenced by that greatly, by the past; the past being experience, accumulated as knowledge in the brain and the response of that is memory. We also talked about the pressure of ideas - ideas in our relationship with each other, what must be, what should be and so on. We also talked about the various forms of illusion in which we live. And we talked about fear, whether fear can end, completely, totally, eradicated from our very depth, so that a human being is totally free from that darkness. We also talked about the pursuit of endless pleasure, pleasure being the response of the senses as desire and the expression of that desire in the present, from the past, and to the future.

We also went into the question of whether human beings can ever end their sorrow, not only their momentary, passing grief, but also the deep sorrow of man who has faced wars, destruction, endless conflict, without any meaning to life. And we also went into the question of what is love, whether a human being can love another without all the problem that is involved in it: ambition, personal concern, jealousy, antagonism, domination, attachment and so on. We went into all that. And where these things exist, we said, there is no love. And when our action is based on merely thought, which is memory, then that action is incomplete, and being incomplete it must invariably bring about conflict. Any action that is not total, whole, holistic, complete, must breed contradiction. We went into that very carefully.

And the other day we talked about the ending of sorrow, and with that ending, compassion. And I think we ought to talk about various other things too, this morning. I hope you are all comfortable - it is pretty hot!

We ought to ask ourselves, I think, why we follow another, which apparently you are doing. Why we become disciples of somebody. If there were no disciples there would be no teachers; and because of disciples the teachers multiply; and the disciple then destroys that which he started out to look for. He wants to find out, if he is a really serious person, he wants to find out what truth is, if there is freedom, if there is a sense of timeless existence. And if you follow another, whether it be the priest, a book, a guru, an authority, then you will never, under whatever circumstances, find all that. So can one ask oneself seriously why we follow another? This is really very important because it denies freedom. And one has followed the priest in western Europe as well as in Asia for thousands and thousands of years. We are still in agony, uncertainty, miserable, unhappy, in conflict, endless travail. And it may be essentially the fault of the disciple, of the one who follows, either the book, the word, or the person. And when you follow you deny your own investigation, exploration into truth. And so, if one may suggest, don't follow anybody, including the speaker. I have made that very clear from the very beginning, that we are talking to each other, that the speaker is not here, that you are looking at yourself, and discovering all the problems, the confusion, the uncertainty, the extraordinary demand of desire and so on. You are asking these questions of yourself, therefore there is no teacher and no disciple, only learning - not learning from another, but learning about yourself, looking into yourself. You cannot possibly look into yourself objectively, without any direction and motive if you are all the time consumed with your own importance, with your own ambitions, with your own problems.

I wonder if you have ever asked yourselves why you have a problem of any kind - perhaps a mathematical problem, scientific problem, problems of knowledge, but psychologically why do you have problems? And if you have a problem, why do you not end it immediately and not carry it over and over and over again for the rest of your life? You see when a problem presents itself to you and you do not solve it instantly, and you think about the problem, worry about the problem, that deteriorates the brain cells, obviously. To solve a problem, human problem, psychological problem, the problem of relationship, it matters enormously how you approach it. Do you understand? Please, We are talking to each other. There is no guru, there is no teacher here, there is only the problem, and how you approach the problem, because in the approach to the problem may be the solution. You understand what we are saying?

Suppose I have a problem: if I approach it with a desire to end it, I'm already coming to it with a determined purpose, which may distort the problem itself. If I come to it with a motive, the motive will dictate the answer of the problem. We are following each other, I am not talking to myself, we are talking to each other. We are sharing this thing together. Or rather, you are investigating and discovering this thing for yourself, that you cannot solve a human problem if you approach it wrongly. There is a correct approach, which is: without a motive, without trying to end the problem, you then are approaching it with a conclusion, with already premeditated intention, so the problem remains. Whereas if you can free yourself from the motive, from the direction, the desire to find an answer, then you come to it freely, whatever that problem is, even if it be the most scientific, complex problem. Because the free mind doesn't create a problem, it meets a problem, then answers it, but it doesn't create a problem. But whereas we create problems, and having created it we approach it with fear, with anxiety to solve it, consult others, you know, go through all the movements of trying to solve it. Or you investigate the problem very thoroughly, observing it, let the problem tell you the whole story of itself. Then perhaps during the day you find a complete freedom from that problem.

So what we are saying is: our human minds, the brain, the mind, the thought, the emotions, the senses are millions and millions of years old. It is heavily conditioned and that is creating the problem. And as long as the brain is still thinking of ways out of it, it is still furthering the problems, enlarging the problems. I hope... Are we making this clear for ourselves?

So we are going to discuss, non-problematically - you understand, it is not a problem, nothing is a problem till you make it. We are going to investigate, not make it as something that you have to solve. And please understand this. This is very important because we are going to enquire into this whole question of what is a religious life, whether it is tenable, possible to live that religious life in this world. That is one of the problems - I won't call it a problem - that is one of the things that we are going to look into. And we are also going to enquire into the whole movement of the mind, the brain, not only during the day but when it is asleep. We are also going to enquire - and not make an issue of it - into the question of time, the question of space, distance, and the very complex problem - not problem - the very complex state of mind that is capable of real meditation.

We are going to go into all that, and as we said let us approach it without wanting to find a solution for any of that. You understand? Then it becomes fun. Then there is a certain sense of joy in enquiry.

First of all let us enquire, look, observe, what is the movement of our life when we are awake during the day, and what is that movement when we are asleep. We have divided sleeping and waking, which may be entirely wrong. One must sleep, darkness is necessary for nature, so we need to have sleep. But we have separated sleeping and waking. And we have never enquired into the state of the mind that is not sleeping, that is awake - I won't use the word 'awake', that is not sleeping, let us put it that way. And the state of the mind that is asleep during the night. Right? Because it is important to understand this because - not because, sorry - it is important to understand. (Laughs) Phew! Very hot. What is the state of the mind in which is included the senses, the desires, thought, memory, experience, knowledge and all the movement during our waking hours, what is that state of mind? - not how to get out of it, or how to resolve it, but to look at it. You understand? You look at a flower by the roadside. There, you are looking at it, seeing the beauty of it, the quiet state of its existence, the colour of it and the perfume of it. And you just look and you go by. In the same way let's look at the movement of our life during the waking hours, just like that, without wanting to resolve any of the complexities, any of the issues that are involved during our day. During our day in which there is constant relationship, whether in a factory, in the office, whether in the house, everything, it is based on relationship. And why has everything become a problem? I hope you are asking this question of yourself: why we take on certain robes, follow certain people, put on their... carry on their message or whatever they're - all that filth - I call it filth because it is not reality, it is not truth, it is just an evasion from enquiring into the enormous complexity of our existence.

And does that same movement, which is during the day, carry on when we are asleep? You understand my question? Please put this question to yourself, though I am putting it to you, you are putting it to yourself. Does the daily movement of reactions and responses, and anxious, all the things that are going on in our daily activity, both technological as well as in human relationships: the observation of the beauty of a mountain, the running waters, the still sky, and the majesty of a mountain, and the solitary tree in a vast field, all that movement, does it go on when we are asleep? How will you find out? It is important to find out. Obviously, if you have an issue, a problem, something that has not been resolved, you carry on that problem during the day to the next day, and so on. That problem goes over and over and over during the day and during the next day and so on, which means that problem is carried over during the sleep, obviously. A problem implies disorder. Right? Any problem you have, human, specially human problem, implies that there is a state of disorder in your mind, in your way of thinking, looking, and so that disorder is carried over during the sleep and continues the next day. Right? I am not stating this, you are discovering this for yourself. Bene?

Now the brain is constantly active with one, or a dozen problems, and the brain can only function clearly, efficiently, intelligently, with all its energy, when there is order. That is obvious too. When you have order in your life, or even for a day, or even for an hour, you feel full of energy. So the brain demands order. Right? But during the day we have problems, we have disorder, and the brain during the sleep has to bring about order, otherwise it can't function the next day properly. The speaker is not a brain specialist, thank god! But he has observed this phenomena in himself, watched it.

So can there be order during the day? Order being: any problem that arises, dissolved instantly. If you are jealous, solve it, get free of it immediately, as it arises. To be so totally free of it, look at it. That is, look at it not as an observer separate from the thing he has observed, as jealousy, but the observer himself is jealous otherwise he couldn't recognise it. You are following all this? I hope you are. It doesn't matter if you don't. It is your own life. If you are envious, as most people are, and in being envious there is comparison, imitation, conformity - and to end envy immediately. Which means to look at it and not run away from it, translate it, justify it. Just look at it as you would look at that wayside flower, with its colour, with its beauty, with its light, with its extraordinary strength, growing out of poor soil. In the same way, look at it. But you cannot look if you say, 'That is jealousy, that is envy' - which means you are looking at it with the word, which is a means of remembering that you have been jealous, when you have been greedy, envious. So you are looking at it with the eyes of the past. Right? You are getting all this?

So when there is complete order during the day the brain then hasn't to work, work while you are asleep to bring order. Then when there is complete order - I mean absolute order, not relative order - then the brain is renewing itself and the dreams, which for so many people become so extraordinarily important, do not take place, except very, very physical, superficial dreams. You understand all this? Unless you test this, test it, go into it, find out for yourself: if you accept this, then you become a disciple, then you become something utterly useless.

So the brain, which is very old, so heavily conditioned, in disorder. Right? Look, if you have seen those ancient pictures in the caves, or seen the pictures of them, the problem exists between good and bad, evil and right, fighting, fighting, fighting, symbolised, and so on. Man throughout the ages has lived with enormous problems, and therefore there is never a renewal of the brain. We are talking about the transformation, the mutation of the brain cells themselves, which can only happen, as we went into the other day, when there is direct perception and action; not perception, then later on action, which only creates a problem. The insight into any problem, into any issue - insight, which is not memory, which is not an intuition, which is not a something that you have stored up and act; insight is not a continuous thing. It is only from moment to moment. When it happens there is an insight into it there is action in it and - resolve.

So we are talking about the nature of our action during the day and that same action taking place during the night. When there is complete action during the day, which means no disorder, then the brain becomes, during the night, you know, it can function totally differently. We are going to go into that when we talk about meditation.

Then also we should understand the whole nature, the whole concept man has of time. There is not only the time according to the sun, but also psychologically, inwardly we have developed time. Right? 'I will do this tomorrow. I will arrive at a state of beatitude, or happiness, or enlightenment' - or whatever you like to call it - 'Give me time, give me a sense of practice, discipline and I will have it'. Time, which is to evolve. You understand? 'I am this. I will, through time, evolve'. So there is the question of evolution, which means time. Perhaps man has developed this idea of evolution from watching a little bush grow into an enormous tree, the baby into manhood, the developing of a muscle - that muscle is weak but practice, exercise and it gets strong. So this idea of evolution, growing, psychologically thought has taken it over and said, 'I need time to become something'. I don't know if you are following this. Not me, you are watching yourself. Is that a fact? We have accepted it. We live by it. We are accustomed to it. It is our habit: 'I can't do this', psychologically, 'Tomorrow I will work at it. I will try', which means you have developed a duality: 'I am this, but I will be that'. - right? 'I am angry, but I will get over it', which is, the little seed growing into an enormous tree, the baby growing to manhood, the little bird or the little animal which hasn't the strength to walk, run, will take time. So that same observation has entered into the psychological field and there we say we will evolve, we will become. Is that so? You understand? That is, there is physical time and we have cultivated the psychological time. Now why have we created psychological time? You are following all this? You know, the baby is crying in the nursery and you are half asleep and you instantly wake up and run to the baby. Right? The mothers and the fathers know about this. You might say, 'How do you know about it?' Because I have watched, I have taken care of a baby for a couple of weeks, for four or five days, I know about it. Not my baby, somebody else's baby. Probably when you are looking after a baby you do it much more attentively than the mother! So in the same intensity, with the same urgency, with the same immediate action - you don't let the baby cry, keep on, you jump out of bed and run, change its diaper (laughter) - so in the same way look at this problem, with the same urgency at this question. Which is, why has man created, cultivated this psychological time, which he calls evolution, which is, 'I will be better. I will attain' - why? And when you have that spirit everybody is willing to exploit it. Right? The gurus are excellent at this exploitation, the priests are excellent. And of course the politicians love this - why? What is the truth about it? Please listen to what I am suggesting. What is the truth about it. Is truth a matter of argument? Is truth a matter of opinion? Is truth a matter of experience, arguing, opinion, knowledge, hoping you will find truth? Will these things point out what truth is? Or is truth not related to thought, not related to memory, not related to past experiences? - and so on and so on. You understand my question? Because if truth is related to the past, it is time-binding. Right? I wonder if you understand all this. Or is truth something entirely different? And to find out the truth, whether there is psychological time at all, will you argue about it, the pros and cons, and the clever quotations, people saying, 'It is', people saying, 'It is not'. Or you want to find the truth of it, so you come to it without any prejudice - right? - without any conclusion, without being attached to this idea of evolution; which means truth can only take place when there is absolute freedom to observe. Right?

So can you so observe without your conclusions, of saying, 'Yes, it is possible', 'It is not possible', 'What nonsense you are talking about', or finding out from books, from your teachers - all that, throwing all that out, free to look. That is, to have an insight into the problem, into this issue, why man has cultivated the psychological time. When there is insight into it, the brain cells which have been conditioned by the idea of evolution, psychological evolution, the brain cells themselves undergo a change. Don't accept what we are talking about. Find out. Test it. That means you have to be free to observe, to observe without any wish, any longing, any pressure - you know to observe as you observe a lovely flower. Then you will find that time psychologically has ended. There is no becoming, or 'I am' - which is the same.

Then also we have to find out, as we said, what is space. It is important to have space. Nothing can mature, grow, alive, if you don't have a space. Physically it is becoming more and more... less and less space. We live in cities - unless you happen to live in the country and I hope you do - if you live in cities there is hardly any space physically. And perhaps out of that lack of space there is violence. That violence is increasing day by day, and perhaps, one of the reasons of this multiplication of violence is perhaps that there are no wars. You understand? If you had a war you can go and explode in violence. Now you have no war, you are crowded in cities, you live practically in a drawer - these high rise buildings - and so you have no space. And also you have no space in your mind because you are all the time occupied with something or other. Right? The wife with the cooking, with the utensils, cleaning and all that, the husband occupied with the office, with whatever he does, or he is occupied with his own ambition, with his own vanity, with his own success. And she with her own beauty, with her own enjoyments and so on and so on, with sex - occupied. Have you noticed how occupied you are? And your guru tells you, 'Be more occupied. Only not with that, with this.' And you, so gullible, say, 'All right, I will do that', which is still occupation. I am not reacting to the gurus. I was a guru myself, long ago - thank god! - and that is all too silly. You have been under the pressure of the priests for two thousand years in this country and you are bored with it and you take on the guru from the East, who is equally the same and you love that, you think you are achieving some nonsense.

So if one sees space is necessary - obviously, - what will you do? That is, space between you and another is necessary, which doesn't mean isolation from another. Space. Space implies independence. Space implies non-attachment. Space implies a consideration for each other, to allow space. And you must have space in the mind, which means, the mind never completely - never - be occupied with anything. Can you do it? Test it out. Test it. Don't accept the speaker - you are not accepting what I am saying because I am not here. And I mean it. The speaker, K. is not here. You are learning from yourself, by observing, so there is no authority.

So why is the mind occupied so endlessly? The businessman with his business, the artist with his painting, the pianist with his - you follow? And you and I, ordinary people, oh, a dozen occupations - why? Is it fear of not being occupied? If you are not occupied, what? What are you then? You follow? If you are not thinking about yourself, how you look, how you dress, how you walk, your feelings, your desires, your ambitions, your vanity, your arrogance and all the rest of it, if you are not occupied with all that, you might be occupied with the United Nations (laughs), which is the same thing. I won't go into the United Nations, it is not very pleasant. So we are occupied with something or another - sex, good or bad, and all that - why? Is it because - please, look, find out, ask, find out - is it because if you are not occupied you are absolutely nothing? And, realising I am nothing I say, 'My god, I must fill that, I am frightened.'

So can you be nothing, actually which you are? You may call yourself by a name, you have a particular face and so on, bank account, house, but strip all that, what are you? Strip your knowledge, your occupation, your endeavours, all that - those are memories, words. Remove the words, remove the memory - consciously, you know, not become insane or lose your memory, or senility, but actually when you are alive, full of energy, which is being wasted in occupation, when that is not occupied, when there is no occupation, there is tremendous energy in nothingness. Test it out. Don't accept a thing from anybody.

So we said problems, time, space. Man or woman, doesn't matter - when I say man it includes woman, so don't be... Women's Lib. - when we say man and woman, they have always sought power - power over themselves, controlling themselves, which gives a certain sense of power in oneself, if you can completely control yourself - you understand? - you feel very strong, a sense of power; or the power of a politician whom you have elected, or, like in the totalitarian states, they have assumed power. And power is one of the problems of man - you understand?

And there is the other power, which is clairvoyancy, reading thoughts, all that - so-called the occult. You understand? So there are these two types of power: physical, psychological power over another, the power that comes when there is complete, absolute control of oneself; and then there is the power, the hidden power, persuasive power, the power of propaganda, the power of authority and those who are in authority are always seeking to entrench themselves more and more in power. Right? Why does man demand power. You understand? Why? Why do you want power over another? Wife over husband, or husband over the wife, or the girl over the boy or whatever it is, why? Which is, power means arrogance, power implies vanity, 'I know, you don't know. I am the boss and you are not. I am the acknowledged guru, and you, poor chap, you are a disciple down below.' - why? Why do we accept this thing? Because that is destroying man, you follow? Because again it emphasises the 'me' - the 'me' which has identified itself with a nation, with a group, with a country and in that identification I feel very strong. You follow? All that follows. And man has never been able to solve this question of power, which means man doesn't know what it means to have humility. You understand? Because without humility you can't investigate, you can't look, without humility you can't love another, without humility there is no compassion. The man who has power tries to be compassionate, tries to love. That is obviously nonsense. Like a man who is ambitious, he cannot love.

So humility comes into being when you understand the nature of power. You can't cultivate humility. Then what you are cultivating is vanity under the cloak of humility. Right?

So. And the same thing, man now, it is one of the fashions, or a passing phase, to talk about the occult, wanting to find out. The speaker - I am sorry to bring the speaker into this - knows quite a bit about all that. They are part of the senses. If you are highly sensitive you can almost read somebody - no? Of course. If you are sensitive to your boy friend or your husband, or your wife, you know exactly, almost quickly before she tells you something, or he tells you something. And you can cultivate that - you follow? - and have that peculiar power of reading people's thought. Please, when the speaker is talking about this, he is talking of what he knows, what has happened to him, and the speaker considers all that childish, absolute childishness. You may be able to read other people's thought, you may be able to do all kinds of non... or rather extreme sensory perception. Extreme sensory perception - ESP with all the business involved in it. If you are caught in that trap, walk out of it, completely. It is the most dangerous trap, because it is only the extension of highly sensitised senses.

Then having established all this in our life - order - which means the art of learning, the art of putting everything in its right place - sex in its right place, money in its right place, everything - and you can only do that when there is freedom from thought which is always creating problems, issues, because thought is limited. So put thought in its right place. Then we can proceed - or rather from putting things in their right place we are beginning to meditate. Hai capito? Shall I go into all that? Do you want me to go into all this?

Most meditation - now first of all, that is a new word introduced into the west. Right? It has existed in India for thousands of years (sound of train) like those trains. So there are different forms of meditation: from India, the Hindu type of meditation, there is the Buddhist type of meditation, there is the Tibetan type of meditation, there is the Zen meditation, and the gurus that invent something new but along the same line. So there are different types of meditation in the world. And there is that absurd transcendental meditation with all that nonsense. So we are going to find out what is meditation. We are new - you understand? - we are new to it, we haven't been conditioned by what people have said about meditation and your practice - all that is too absurd and too childish. But we are going to find out what is meditation, what is implied in it. If you have not put everything in its right place, to find out what is meditation is impossible, because then you will get caught in some illusion. Right? That is, if the mind is not free to look into what is meditation, how can you learn about it, how can you understand it? You must come to it like a child who goes for the first time to learn how to write. He goes to it fresh, innocent, curious. But if you already say 'This is meditation, you must sit in a certain way, you must stand in a certain way, breathe in a certain way' - then the trivialities become all important.

So we are going to find out what is meditation. And why is it so important to meditate? Why has the east given such extraordinary importance to it, which is now gradually sweeping over the west? It is a very complex problem, this. All right, if you have time and the energy to listen, listen, if you don't it doesn't matter. You can observe that the Grecian revolutions... evolution, Grecian culture from Greece, ancient Greece, has swept over the west - I am not a historian but you can see it, you can observe it. To them the intellect mattered enormously: their theories, their discoveries, their arguments, their democracy. You follow? That is, thought was tremendously important for them. That is, thought being measure. Go into it. You can see it. Thought is measure. That is, measure means from here to there. Also that means comparing, measuring. So the west has cultivated enormous technology. If you had no measure there would be no technology. Right? Obviously. And the other side, the whole Asiatic - it really began in India - the Indians said, 'All measurement' - the ancient Hindus, not the modern ones, they are all as crooked as the rest of the world - including the gurus - (laughter) the ancients have said, 'Measurement is illusion' - consider it, see the reason of it. They said, 'To find the immeasurable the mind must be free of measure'. One side, measurement, the other side, non-measurement. Right? To find that which is eternal, which is timeless, which is immeasurable, which is nameless, which is Jehovah, which is God, which is Brahman, and all the rest of it, there must be no measure. That means no comparison. They don't say that, I am saying it, the speaker is saying it - no comparison.

So the west laying complete, all emphasis on thought, memory, knowledge, experience and through knowledge ascending more and more and more. And the other said, no measurement; but to find that which is immeasurable they began to think about it, they began to evolve, grow - you follow? - practise, do this, don't do that - which is all based on thought. Only, here technology, there non-technology. But technology is now conquering India too. So you have this problem. Can the mind be free of all measurement? Measurement is to think in terms of the past, or the future. The present being measured by the past, modified by that measurement and that measurement continuing into the future, which is our life. Measurement. Yesterday I was, today I may change, tomorrow it will be something different.

So the movement of meditation is, to live in daily life without measurement. Which means, without the movement of thought, which is measure. The ending of time can only come into being, which is the ending of time as thought, as movement, all that, when thought has discovered its own limitation. Right? - and puts it in its right place. Are you following all this? It has been one of our problems, of man, and woman, he has been always asking whether there is an end to time, stopping of time. Not the stopping of time in science fiction, which you can imagine and all the rest of it, but actually the ending of thought, which is the movement of measure, which is the movement of time. I don't know if it interests you - not interests, it is part of life. As we said, the art of listening, the art of seeing, the art of learning, consists in understanding the word 'art'. Art means to put everything in its right place, the actual dictionary meaning of that word. When everything has its right place, then the mind is completely at rest. Right? Because - obvious.

So from that there arises the question: what is awareness, and what is attention? Is awareness part of attention? Is awareness part of concentration? You aren't tired of all this?

Questioner: No.

Krishnamurti: All right, I don't know, you should be - doesn't matter. Or is attention nothing to do with concentration or with awareness? So we'll have to examine those three things because - not because - meditation is involved in this. Awareness is to be aware of the things around you. Right? To be aware of the mountains, the rivers, the shadows, the snow, the birds, the ravens, the people, the things they wear, all the things - so on, so on - to be aware of this tent, the shape of it. But in that awareness your prejudices enter, your opinions enter: this isn't right, should be that way, I don't like that colour but I like the other colour - you follow? You are aware but this constant choice, constant evaluation. So can you observe, can you be aware without reaction, which doesn't mean that you don't have reactions. Just to observe the mountain without any reaction, to look at it, just to look at it. The moment you bring in your prejudice, anxiety, all the rest of it, you are not aware. You are caught in your own net.

Concentration implies - I must be quick because it is five minutes past - concentration implies exclusion and giving all your energy on a particular point. Right? 'Don't look out of the window but pay attention to the book' - that is what we are told in school. But if you are the teacher and say, 'Look what you are... when you are looking out of the window, do look at it completely, don't say... don't be frightened of looking'. You understand?

So attention is freedom from every form of evaluation, measurement. Because in that there is no centre. I don't know if you have discovered it for yourself - if you attend completely to something there is no centre. There is no 'me' being attentive - that is too silly. If you see that, I mean see the fact of it, then you realise there is no practice, there is no system to be aware, to attend, to concentrate. That is all again so extraordinarily silly. The moment you see, understand this whole business of awareness, concentration and attention, then you are attentive. That attention may last two seconds or five minutes, and you may lose that attention but don't go back and say, 'I must be attentive'. You understand? Attention came because you knew what it means. You follow? There was understanding, deep understanding - not intellectual - of what attention is. It came naturally. But if you begin to say, 'I must have constant attention during the day', you are being terribly greedy and it is no longer attention. It is a desire to have something which you call attention.

So when there is such attention the mind, because there is no centre from which to attend, the mind is completely quiet. Not that you train the mind to be quiet, which all of them practise - to be quiet. Or often one has heard this phrase, 'I must have peace of mind' - they'll have a piece of mind but it is not peace. You understand? They've just a little piece of something.

So, when there is complete order in our life, which is the beginning of meditation, and one understands the nature of awareness, concentration and attention, then all effort has come to an end - all effort. When you put everything in order there is no effort. So the mind becomes extraordinarily quiet - uninvited, not cultivated, something totally new. And religion - not this nonsense that is going on around us with all their priests and ceremonies and all that circus that goes on, then religion means the ending of the self, the 'me'. It is only then that the mind can be absolutely, irrevocably quiet, and therefore silent. Which means the ending of thought as time and measure. Then if the mind has gone that far, in that silence which is vast space and energy there is totally a state which cannot be put into words. But if you put everything in order and so on, it will come to you without your invitation. You cannot invite truth. There is no path to truth. There is no intermediary or gateway or anything between you and truth. You have to come... it has... if the field is right then that thing comes to you with such glory. That is ecstasy. In that there is great sacredness. That is holy.