Talks in Madras - 2nd Public Talk - 26th December, 1982 - ‘Life is a Movement in Relationship’

We are together having a conversation. We are walking down a lane, wooded, with plenty of shadows and birds singing; we are sitting down together and talking about the whole problem of existence which is very complex. We are not convincing each other about any subject, we are not trying to persuade each other, we are not trying to overcome the other through arguments or sticking dogmatically to one’s own opinions, prejudices, but rather, together we are going to look at the world as it is and the world that is within us.

Many volumes have been written about the world outside of us – the environment, the society, politics, economics, and so on, but very few have gone to the very length of discovering what we actually are. Why human beings are behaving as they are doing – killing each other, constantly in trouble, following some authority or the other, some book, some person, some ideal, and having no right relationship with their friends, with their wives, with their husbands and with their children; why human beings have become, after so many millennia, so vulgar, so brutal, so utterly lacking in care, consideration, attention to others, and denying the whole process of what is considered love. Outwardly, man has lived with wars for thousands and thousands of years. We are now trying to stop nuclear war but we will never stop wars. There has been no demonstration throughout the world to stop wars, but there are demonstrations against particular wars, and these wars have been going on – people being exploited, oppressed and the oppressor becoming the oppressed. This is the cycle of human existence with sorrow, loneliness, a great sense of depression, the mounting anxiety, the utter lack of security. There is no relationship with society or with one’s own intimate persons, a relationship in which there is no row, no conflict, quarrels, oppression, and so on. This is the world we live in, which I am sure you all know.

As we said yesterday, look at the activities of thought, because, we live by thought. All our actions are based on thought, all our contemplated efforts are based on thought – our meditations, our 76 worships, our prayer. Thought has brought about the division of nationalities which create wars, the division in religions as the Jew, as the Arab, the Muslim, the Christian, Hindu, Buddhist, and so on. Thought has divided the world not only geographically but also psychologically, inwardly. Man is fragmented, broken up not only at the psychological, mechanical, level of his existence but also in his occupation. If you are a professor, you have your own small circle and live in that. If you are a businessman, you are in money making, or if you are a politician, you live within that area. And if you are a religious person, in the accepted sense of the word – doing various forms of puja, rituals, meditations, worshipping some idol, and so on – then also you live a fragmented life. Each fragment has its own energy, has its own capacity, has its own discipline, and each path plays an extraordinary role in contradicting the other path. You must know all this. This division – both outwardly, geographically, religiously, nationally, and the division that is between yourself and another, is such a waste of energy. It is a conflict: wasting our energy, quarrelling, dividing, each one pursuing his own thing, each one aspiring, demanding his own personal security, and so on. All action takes energy, all thinking takes energy. This energy which is so constantly being broken up is a wastage of energy. When one energy contradicts another, one action contradicts another action – saying one thing and doing another, which is obviously a hypocritical acceptance of life – there is wastage of energy. All such activities must invariably condition the mind, the brain. We are conditioned as a Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, Christian, with all the superstitions, beliefs. We are conditioned, and there is no question about it. There is no argument that we are not conditioned; we are, religiously, politically, geographically.

Until there is freedom from conditioning, freedom from the activities of thought which is creating great problems, those problems cannot possibly be solved. A new instrument is necessary to solve our human problems, and we are going to talk as we go along about it, but it is not for the speaker to tell you what the new quality of that instrument is; each one has to find for himself. That is why both of us must think together, if we can. That demands that both of us feel, enquire, search out, question, doubt, all these things that man has put together, all the things that we have created as barriers between each other. We as human beings living on this beautiful earth which is slowly being destroyed, living on this earth which is our earth – not the Indian earth or the British earth or the American earth – have to live intelligently, happily; but apparently, that is not possible because we are conditioned. This conditioning is like a computer: we are programmed. We are programmed to be Hindus, to be Muslims, to be Christians, Catholics, Protestants. For 2000 years the Christian world has been programmed and the brain has been conditioned through that programme, like the computer. So our brains are deeply conditioned and we are asking if it is at all possible to be free of that conditioning. Unless we are totally, completely, free of that limitation, mere enquiry or asking what is the new instrument which is not thought, has no meaning. 5 First, one must begin very near to go very far. We want to go so far without taking the first step, and perhaps the first step may be that last step. Are we understanding each other, are we communicating with each other, or am I talking to myself? If I am talking to myself, I can do this in my own room. But if we are talking, having a conversation together, that conversation has significance when both of us meet at the same level, with the same intensity, at the same time. That is love. That is the real, deep friendship. To me this is not a lecture in the ordinary sense of the word. We are together trying to enquire and resolve human problems. That requires a great deal of enquiry because human problems are very, very complex. One must have the quality of patience, which is not of time. We are all impatient to get on – ‘tell me quickly something or other’ – but if you have patience, that is, if you are not trying to achieve something, to arrive at some end, some goal, then enquire step by step into it.

As we said, we are programmed. Our human brain is a mechanical process. Our thought is a materialistic process, and that thought has been conditioned to think as a Buddhist, as a Hindu, as a Christian, and so on. So our brain is conditioned. Is it possible to be free from that conditioning? There are those who say it is not possible, because they ask, how can a brain which has been conditioned for so many centuries upon centuries, how can that conditioning be wiped away completely so that the human brain is extraordinarily pristine, original, capable of infinite capacity? Many people assert this, and are merely satisfied in modifying the conditioning. But we are saying that this conditioning can be examined, can be observed, and there can be total freedom from that conditioning. To discover for ourselves whether it is possible or not, we have to enquire into our relationship.

Relationship is the mirror in which we see ourselves as we are. All life is a movement in relationship. There is no living thing on earth which is not related to something or other. Even the hermit, a man who goes off to a lonely spot, is related to the past, is related to those who are around him. There is no escape from relationship. In that relationship which is the mirror in which we can see ourselves, we can discover what we are, our reactions, our prejudices, our fears, depression, anxieties, loneliness, sorrow, pain, grief. We can also discover whether we love or there is no such thing as love. So, we will examine this question of relationship because that is the basis of love. That is the only thing we have now with each other. If you cannot find the right relationship, if you live your own particular narrow life apart from wife, husband, and so on, that isolated existence brings about its own destruction.

Relationship is the most extraordinarily important thing in life, If we don’t understand that relationship, we cannot possibly create a new society. We are going to enquire very closely into what is relationship – why human beings throughout their long existence of life have never had a relationship in which there is neither oppression, possessiveness, attachment, contradiction, and so on. Why is there always this division – man, woman, we and they? We are going to examine together. This examination can be intellectual or merely verbal, but such intellectual comprehension has no value at all. It is just an idea, it is just a concept, but if you can look at your relationship as a whole, then perhaps you can see the depth and the beauty and the quality of relationship. Right, sir? Can we go on? We are asking, what actually is the present relationship with each other, not theoretically, not romantically, not idealistically, which are all unreal, but the actual, daily relationship of man, woman, with each other? Are we related at all? There is the biological relationship; our relationship is sexual, pleasurable. Our relationship is possessiveness, attachment, various forms of intrusion upon each other.

What is attachment? Why do we have such tremendous need for attachment? What are the implications of attachment? Why is one attached? When you are attached to anything, there is always fear in it, fear of losing it. There is always a sense of insecurity. Please observe it for yourself. There is always a sense of separation. I am attached to my wife. I am attached to her because she gives me pleasure sexually, gives me pleasure as a companion; you know all this, without my telling you. So, I am attached to her, which means I am jealous, frightened. Where there is jealousy, there is hatred. And is attachment love? That is one point to note in our relationship.

Then, in our relationship each one has, through the years, put together an image about the other. Those images she and he have created about each other is the actual relationship. They may sleep together, but the fact is that he and she have an image about each other, and in that relationship of images, how can there be any actual, factual, relationship with another? All of us from childhood have built images about ourselves and about others. We are asking a very, very serious question – can one live without a single image in our relationship? Surely, you all have an image about the speaker, haven’t you? Obviously you have. Why? You don’t know the speaker, actually you don’t know. He sits on a platform, talks, but you have no relationship with him because you have an image about him. You have created an image about him, and you have your own personal images about yourself. You have got so many images about politicians, about businessmen, about the guru, about this and that. Can one live profoundly without a single image? Image may be conclusion about one’s wife, image may be a picture, sexual picture, image may be some form of better relationship, and so on. Why do human beings have images at all? Please ask this question of yourself. When you have an image about another, that image gives you a sense of security.

Love is not thought. Love is not desire, love is not pleasure, love is not the movement of images, and as long as you have images about another, there is no love. And we ask, is it possible to live a life without a single image? Then you have a relationship with each other. As it is, it is like two parallel lines never meeting, except sexually. A man goes off to the office, ambitious, greedy, envious, trying to achieve a position in the business world, in the religious world, in the professional world, and the modern lady also goes off to the office, and they meet in their house to breed children. And then the whole problem of responsibility, problem of education, of total indifference, comes. It does not matter then what your children are, what happens to them. You want them to be like you – safely married, with a house, a job, etc. Right? This is our life, daily life, and it is really a sorrowful life. So, if one asks why human beings live by images – all your gods are images, the Christian god, the Muslim god and your god – you will see that they are created by thought, and thought is uncertain, fearful. There is no security in the things that thought has put together. Is it possible then to be free from our conditioning in our relationship? That is, to observe in the mirror of relationship attentively, closely, persistently, what our reactions are, whether they are mechanical, habitual, traditional. In that mirror you discover actually what you are. So, relationship is extraordinarily important.

We have to enquire into what it is to observe. How do you observe yourself what you are, in the mirror of relationship? What does it mean to observe? This is really another important thing one has to find out. What does it mean to look? When you look at a tree, which is the most beautiful thing on the earth, one of the most lovely things on the earth, how do you look at it? Do you ever look at it, do you ever look at the new moon – the shape of the new moon, so delicate, so fresh, so young; have you ever looked at it? Can you look at it without using the word ‘moon’? Are you really interested in all this? I will go on like a river that goes on. You are sitting on the banks of the river looking at the river, but you don’t become the river ever because you never take part of the river, you never join the beauty of the movement that has no beginning and no end. So please consider what it is to observe. When you observe a tree, or a moon, something outside you, you always use the word – the tree, the moon; can you look at that moon, the tree, without naming it, without using the word to identify? Can you look without the word, without the content of the word, without identifying the word with the tree or the thing? Now, can you look at your wife, at your husband, at your children, without the word ‘my wife’, without an image? Have you ever tried it? When you observe without a word, without a name, without the form you have created about her or him, in that observation there is no centre from which you observe. Then find out what happens. The word is thought. Thought is born out of memory. So you have the memory, the word, the thought, the image interfering between you and the other. Right? But here is no thought, thought in the sense, the word, the content of the word, the significance of the word to look, to observe. Then, in that observation, there is no centre as ‘me’ looking at ‘you’. Then only there is a right relationship with another. In that, there is a quality of learning, a quality of certain beauty, certain sensitivity.

May we go on? Why do human beings throughout the world live in perpetual conflict? Please ask that question of yourself. You are in conflict. Your meditation is conflict, your worship is conflict. You have got various gods who are in conflict with each other and with you. Why do human beings throughout the world live in constant struggle, pain, conflict? What is conflict? What is the cause of conflict? Where there is a cause, that cause has an end. If I have a cause of pain, the doctor examines the cause and the symptom which is the pain. Then the cause may be removed. So where there is a cause or a causation, there must be an ending of that causation. So find out for yourself what is the cause of conflict by which man has lived from time immemorial. Don’t wait for the speaker to tell you. Go into yourself as we are doing now. Find out what is the cause of this conflict, outside and inside. Is there one cause or many causes? If there are many causes, we can examine the many and slowly resolve each cause. One of the causes may be the constant attempt to become something – the becoming – I am this, I must be that; I am greedy and I hope I will not be greedy. That is to become something different from what I am: I am not beautiful but I will become beautiful; I am violent but I will become non-violent. So the becoming is a process of evolution. All becoming – whether the clerk becoming the manager, or the manager becoming the chairman – is a process of time which is evolution, from the low to the high. You plant a sapling which becomes a great tree, which is the evolution of the plant, of that tree. Is evolution one of the causes of conflict? That is, I am violent. All human beings apparently, most unfortunately, are violent. I am violent and I will become non-violent. The becoming from ‘what is’ is a process of evolution which requires time, space. And we are asking, is evolution, this movement from ‘what is’ to ‘what should be’, which is the movement of evolution, one of the causes of conflict? Is time one of the causes of conflict, that is, duality – light and dark, man, woman, physical world? There is duality between good cloth and bad cloth, between nice dress which is tasteful, good material and bad material, between a good car and a bad car. Obviously, physically there is a difference; there is duality. And we are asking, inwardly, psychologically, is there a duality at all?

We are asking, does conflict exist as long as there is duality? Why have we psychologically, inwardly, duality? I am violent and I have thought I must not be violent, and so I invent an idea called non-violence which, in this country, is fashionable. And this fashion of non-violence is spreading all over the world, which has no meaning. Because violence is the fact, is real, non-violence is fiction. So there is only ‘what is’, not ‘what should be’, so that if one realizes that ‘what is’ is a reality and not ‘what should be’, then you can dispense with ‘what should be’. Then there is no duality. Do you understand this?

The moment there is the idea ‘I must not’ or ‘I should, or, I will, away from ‘what is’, then there must be conflict. Does one perceive this intellectually or actually – that there is no opposite psychologically, inwardly, but only ‘what is’? You deal with ‘what is’, not ‘what should be’. I am violent, and this idea of non-violence is fictitious, is hypocritical. It has no value because, in becoming non-violent, I am sowing the seeds of violence all the time. So there is only violence. What is the nature and the structure of violence, not only to get angry, to hit somebody, to kill somebody, not only the killing of human beings but killing animals, killing nature? Violence is also imitation, conformity, trying to be something which you are not. Can one look at that violence with all the content of that word, not just physical anger or physical expression of that anger but to look at the whole content of that word and hold it, look at it, and not move away from it, neither suppress it nor escape from it nor transcend it but just look at it as you would look at a precious jewel? When you so look at it, are you looking at it as something separate from you or what you observe is what you are? This is important to understand. We are violent. That violence, we have said, is different from ‘me’. Therefore, I try to change it to become something else. That violence is me. I am not different from violence, greed or hate or jealousy. Suffering is me, but we have separated anger, jealousy, loneliness, sorrow, as something separate from me so that I can control it, shape it, run away from it; but if that is me, I can do nothing about it but just observe it. So the observer is the observed, the thinker is the thought, the experiencer is the experienced. The two are not separate.

So where there is division, there must be conflict. If I am separate psychologically from my wife, there is bound to be conflict. So time, evolution, the sense of the opposite, are the factors of violence. These are the other factors. All these factors are ‘me’. And ‘me’ in essence is the cause of conflict. If I ask how am I to be free of ‘me’, it is a wrong question, but observe the whole movement of conflict, not try to understand, but just observe, like you observe the marvellous movement of the skies, the ocean. Then it tells you all its content without your analysing. So a brain that is in conflict mechanically, psychologically, must inevitably bring about disorder in itself and so outwardly. Is it possible for human beings to be totally, completely, free of it? When there is that freedom, there is order, there is love, compassion, and that compassion is intelligence.