12. The Source of Happiness

The second part of the Commentaries on Living series was published in the spring of 1959.

In the first chapter, K asks whether creative happiness can be experienced. Can the mind keep in touch with the source of happiness? In order to acquire skills and earn a living, we need to fill our minds with factual knowledge, which is not necessarily a bad thing.

K argues that creative happiness is not a gift reserved for the few, but for everyone. We all have an innate ability to be happy and creative, and to connect with that which the grasp of time cannot touch. We just have to be "open to the source of all happiness".

However, when the mind takes control and the self assumes dominance, the light of reality with its bliss are destroyed. Some people know how to keep their minds open, while others allow special skills and the quest for prestige to destroy their minds.

Many children are in touch with the unknown before they are contaminated by education. They lose the light and beauty that cannot be found in any book or at school.

It is not that life is too much for them or because of their karma. Openness can be sustained despite knowledge and technique. To K, it is nonsense to teach children that they must suffer because of their karma or their fathers' sins.

Escaping Keeps Fear Alive

In the third chapter, K is visited by a psychologist to discuss her fear of inner solitude. She had studied psychology under one of the most famous psychologists, and was involved in some kind of welfare work. She sought refuge in various things: social prestige, work and money. She moved from one activity to another, from one misfortune to another, always being driven and always pursuing something.

She now believed that her fear of inner solitude was the root of all her actions.

K said that fear is always of something. One cannot be afraid of inner solitude, because one has never faced it.

"Your fear is really not of the inner solitude, but the past is afraid of something it does not know, has not experienced. The past wants to absorb the new, make of it an experience."

There is something behind fear that needs to be understood. It cannot be avoided; it must be faced. Running away only keeps fear alive. You only become creative when you stop trying to understand the unknown.

Getting Rid of Hate

The former teacher came to talk about the hate that she had suddenly discovered within herself.

K said that it is difficult to look at one's own hate without condemning it. Hate cannot be eliminated without first understanding it. It often stems from disappointment.

K asked the woman what she was deeply interested in.

She said that she had always wanted to paint, but her father didn't think that it would be a viable way to earn a living. After painting for a while, she gave up her hobby, yet it burned within her and bred antagonism.

She had fallen in love with a married man and was jealous of his wife.

"Jealousy is hate, is it not?" K pointed out. "If one loves, there is no room for anything else."

She found herself in a suppressed battle in most of her relationships. She began to see that all her feelings had one thing in common: it all came down to the word 'hate'.

K warned her that naming something meant thinking about it rather than looking at the facts. Trying to get free from an emotion can easily lead to setting a new goal or ideal towards which one wants to move.

"When you are hoping for something positively or negatively, you are projecting your own desire; you will succeed in your desire, but that is only another substitution, and so the battle is on again. Just be passively aware of this total thought process, and also of the desire to be free of it. See the false as the false, then the truth is. You don't have to look for it."

The Lost Vitality

A school principal had lost the spring of life. There was no longer any zest in what he did. The drive he once felt had completely disappeared.

Why? K asked. Had he lost it in the over-expenditure of limited energy, had he exhausted himself by doing things he didn't like, or had he lost sight of what he was really interested in?

He said that he had once been ambitious at his work and had chosen a career in education because he believed that it was a field in which he could do meaningful work. However, he was disappointed to find jealousy and personal ambition among his colleagues.

K asked what had happened to his urge, his flame? What was he actually interested in? If he really wants to find it out, he must be alert and watchful during his waking hours, picking up every intimation of latent interest. In a passively watchful state of alertness, his real interests will be revealed.

Love Is the Answer

A nice-looking couple came to talk about their decision not to have children. They had been married a few years and, before getting married, they had decided that it would be a sort of crime to bring children into the frightful mess the world is in. Being religiously inclined, they had vowed never to have a sexual relationship with each other. The husband had been a monk for a year, and the wife's grandfather had once been a sannyasi.

These decisions were not easy for them to live with, and after a year of marriage, they could no longer bear it. The husband became moody and irritable, while the wife became hysterical and would weep at the slightest thing.

K asked them why they had got married in the first place, and why they thought that torturing their bodies and minds was part of a religious life. Suppressing or sublimating passion is cruelty to oneself and has nothing to do with love.

The young couple had their own pattern of action and it will destroy them. This formula must be understood, as it denies them happiness. By taking vows and practising self-discipline, they only prolong their own suffering.

They also asked K about having a child.

K replied that searching for an answer through the mind leads nowhere. We use children as pawns in the game of our conceit, and pile up misery. If there is love, they will find the true answer.

Wasted Years?

A sannyasi said that he had spent years searching for the truth, visiting several teachers along the way. Through self-discipline, he had learned to focus and overcome his desires. However, he said that his mind was "sharp, but not pliable or free".

A disciplined, suppressed mind lives within its own patterns, but this is not freedom; it is conformity to what is known. The means produce the end: imitation produces only a copy.

K's words shocked him deeply, and he asked if he had wasted all those years. K replied that it was still possible to be free. A searching mind can be understood. The self is an illusory entity created by thought. Without thought, it does not exist. The controller is the controlled, merely playing its deceptive game with itself. Until the false is seen as the false, truth cannot be.

Truth is not something to be remembered, stored up, recorded, and then brought out again. Accumulated knowledge is not truth. As long as there is an actor, there is division. Fusion takes place only when the mind is utterly still without trying to be still.

Problems are solved only when thoughts no longer cloud our vision. Truth emerges in unexpected moments. We must not build an impregnable wall of thought. The bliss of truth comes when the mind is not occupied with its own activities and struggles.

Craving for Power Is Violence

The member of the government was shyly aware of his importance. He spoke about his responsibility to his people, explaining how his party was superior and would achieve more than the opposition.

Why this urge for power? Every individual and group is after it, K began. It brings a kind of gratification that is not too transient. The ease of achieving some form of satisfaction blinds us.

The search for power is driven by a psychological need, and using others lead to violence and misery.

The visitor thought this was inevitable. K asked whether human cruelty was inevitable. The power of ideas and the power of the sword lead to the same thing: destruction, they set man against man.

The pursuit of power is one way of escaping our inner poverty, loneliness, and isolation. When we are not satisfied with what we have, we seek a position where we can forget our emptiness. However, outward show does not remove our inner insufficiency; it merely covers it up.

When we stop being ambitious, we are what we are: simple and a nobody. We stop trying to become something and want power.

More isthe mantra of greedy people. If you want to be happy, you have to let ambition go. Only happy people can create a society free from the lust for power.

A Living Dead

The young woman's husband had recently died in an accident. They had been happily married and had never spent a day apart. She lost all hope and even contemplated committing suicide.

"My life is a living death. I do not want anyone's sympathy, love, or pity. I want to remain in my darkness, without feeling, without remembering," she said.

K wanted to know why she had come to see him and what she wanted: comfort, a vow of hope. Such things are not needed when you are happy, as she had been before her husband died.

There are two kinds of hope. One kind is a request for something pleasant to continue. The other kind of hope arises when you reach for something missing in your life.

We say we live in hope, but is living in the past or the future really living? Happiness is always in the now. It is only the unhappy who fill their lives with concern for tomorrow. When we are happy, we don't need hope.

Giving up hope does not mean being hopeless. It is a blissful state. It is the illusion of hope that keeps us in its grip, because we are unhappy.

Hope is fundamentally about the fear of living. Without hope, the prospect of tomorrow frightens us because it feels like a continuation of our current darkness.

Fear cannot be overcome by avoiding it. It leaves when we confront it without fighting it. Then, hope is not necessary. As we move in time, our mind develops both hope and despair. In the present moment, neither is needed.

No Worries about Tomorrow

He described himself as a revolutionary: a man who wanted to destroy all the structures of society. He wanted to help the poor to rise up, in the hope that lessons had been learned from the failures of previous revolutions. All that is needed is a clear plan that can be carried out either bloodily or bloodlessly.

K replied that revolutions based on ideas create unresolvable conflicts. Those in power try to suppress dissent, which is a form of violence, too. Real revolution requires breaking away from this old pattern and from all ideologies.

Ideologies are projections of the mind, based on knowledge and conditioning. Only when this is understood can there be a fundamental transformation of humanity. A mind trapped by a pattern cannot achieve this. It is always creating a new formula to replace the old one.

Is it possible to live without patterns and not worry about tomorrow?

Life has no pattern; death does. A mind living in the past cannot even imagine what life would be like without patterns.

The revolutionary man said he felt utterly empty, almost naked, but there was a lightness of heart and mind. However, he thought that patterns would be useful for collective revolutionary action.

Conformity Causes Dullness

A well-known writer had moved to India and lived in a guru's ashram for a few months, but could not find peace of mind. She then went to another guru. There, she realised that the living were the dead. The disciples were worshipping their dead knowledge, dead tradition and a dead teacher. She realised that she was being trapped and destroyed.

While conformity can be gratifying, it also leads to dullness, which is often mistakenly perceived as peace. The teacher exploits the disciple, and vice versa. We don't go to an ashram to be free.

Hope is not freedom; it is the denial of life. We'll do almost anything for a reward. Empty promises fill our mind for a while, but are soon revealed to be empty. Then, we either develop a new dream or we realise how the mind works. It is truth that sets us free, not the desire to be free.

Understanding the mind is the beginning of freedom. It is the first step. When the mind acts, it reveals itself. When we react to stimuli, either an old mind or a mind that has never put anything together is at work.

Every Moment Is New

A well-read, capable and direct woman wanted to talk about time and timelessness, and the source of all things. K asked her if it is possible to be aware of the timeless, and if so, why. Talking about it takes time, so it is both impossible and futile.

We perceive time as growth and becoming something. Chronological time certainly exists, but psychological time is a product of thought. The mind creates that kind of time.

Our mind lives in the images and imaginings created by our thoughts. When we think about a person, we see the image we have formed of them, rather than seeing them as they really are. This image is not the whole truth, except to ourselves. We merely imagine that we see them correctly.

We may say that we are one with everything, but these are just words without meaning. It is the image that separates us from others. When we say we love someone, we love the image we have created of them.

Every moment is new, yet it is absorbed into the old. This creates a chain of continuity in which nothing is ever truly new. The limitless is neither within memory nor measurable by it.

Truth frees the mind from its own bondage.

Family First or Worst?

A young woman had taken her master's degree in science with honours, but then wanted to marry and start a family with the man her parents had chosen for her.

K wondered why she wanted to throw away her education and end up in the kitchen. Did she not want to teach?

She replied that a teacher's salary would not be enough to hire a servant, and she asked why K was against marriage.

K replied that he had nothing against having a family, but that it could easily become a self-enclosing activity that brings about division and separation, a system resisting the whole, with each family opposing other families. An exclusive family spirit breeds every kind of antisocial behaviour. Exclusion leads to disintegration, nationalism, class antagonism and war.

She asked what an alternative way of life would be like.

K replied that, once she understood what the pursuit of inward security led to, she would abandon the idea without needing an alternative. Once she realises that there is no such thing as inward security, she will stop looking for it.

The woman said that she understood this intellectually, but is it possible to live without this desire for inward security?

Love is never security. It does not involve making any kind of request. If forming a family is a way of seeking security, then this desire originates in the mind.

Love cannot be brought about through force or compulsion. Any form of compulsion is the very denial of love.

In the Jungle of Beliefs

A young man had travelled from the other side of the country. The journey had been tiresome. He told he had taken a vow not to marry until he had found the meaning and purpose of life.

He was determined and aggressive, and his mind was so full of his own ideas, as well as those of others, that he could hardly listen. The flow of words was fast and he quoted endlessly what philosophers and teachers had said about the purpose of life. He was now eager to hear K's view.

"Are you asking in order to compare what is said here with what has been said elsewhere? Do you think that through choice you discover what is true? Do you think what is true is a matter of personal opinion and dependent on choice?"

Humility must be the starting point of all searches. We cannot be humble when we have an ideal or a fixed idea of how things are.

To perceive clearly, we must be free from desire. If we don't see what is true, we get lost in a jungle of ideas, opinions, and beliefs.

"Sir, you must begin very near to go far. You want the immense without seeing what is close. You want to know the significance of life. Life has no beginning and no end; it is both death and life; it is the green leaf, and the withered leaf that is driven by the wind; it is love and immeasurable beauty, the sorrow of solitude and the bliss of aloneness. It can't be measured, nor can the mind discover it."

Used to Being Wrong

A diplomat, a professor had travelled extensively. Although he was familiar with Western music, he preferred the music of his own country. He had studied the different religions and was particularly impressed with Buddhism.

He had experimented with thought transference and hypnosis, and was familiar with clairvoyance, but he had never pursued them as ends in themselves.

He had also taken certain drugs, including the very latest, which had given him an intensity of perception and experience beyond the superficial. He withdrew from all activity for a whole year to spend it meditating.

One evening, while chatting rather heatedly with friends, he saw a figure wearing a yellow robe and with a shaved head seated in the room. No one else saw it. The figure walked with him home and appeared to him often. It also appeared when he closed his eyes.

K asked the man how he felt about the figure, and whether it was important to him.

He replied that it had given him a creative inspiration, but did not a deep sense of freedom and peace. Nevertheless, it had become important to him, and he did not want to lose it.

"It's easy to create an illusion and live in it. The what is is ever new, and the mind finds it extremely arduous and difficult not to live in the thousand yesterdays. Because you are clinging to that memory the living experience is denied. The past has an ending, and the living is the eternal. The memory of that figure enchants and inspires you, gives you a sense of release. It is the dead that gives life to the living. Most of us never know what it is to live because we are living with the dead."

It is difficult to differentiate between experiencing and memory. When something is experienced, there is neither time nor experiencer. After a while, the lived becomes a memory.

But is it possible that this does not happen?

This question cannot be answered. What can be said with certainty is that the recognition of experience is based on memory. For example, the viewer creates an image of the figure in the yellow robe. He becomes a prisoner to that experience. Without self-knowledge, experience is a burden that leads to all kinds of illusions.

Indirect Self-pity

She was the wife of a well-known, successful man, high up in the government. She had that peculiar atmosphere of power and wealth. She was accustomed to being obeyed and getting things done.

However, her husband fell fatally ill, with little chance of recovery. She was terrified and her confidence plummeted as she told K about the turn her life had taken.

K asked her whether she had loved her husband or the things that had come through him. In order to understand what love is, she needed to find the right answer.

She replied that she didn't know the answer and hadn't had time to think about it. She said that she was so confused that her brain was not working and she suggested to come back later.

Several months later, the woman returned. Her husband had died in the meantime. She had retreated to the countryside to mourn her loss and reflect on her life. She still couldn't answer the question of whether she had loved her husband or the things she had gained from his position.

K commented that true love cannot include suffering, implicit self-pity or self-indulgence. These make us live in a world of illusions.

She said that the loss of her husband had brought her real sadness. Although she had been disappointed many times in her life, the finality of death had forced her to face facts and accept what K was saying.

In the past, she would have dismissed such blunt thoughts as rude. But now she asked for permission to come and talk to K again.

The story does not say whether she came back.

The Mystery Is Not to Be Sought

The mother of two gifted children said that she was a seeker. She had been a Catholic, but left that church to join another, and then left that too to join a religious society.

She had been psychoanalysed and wanted to travel to India to find a guru. Puzzled by what she had heard K say about meditation, she wanted to discover the truth about the mystery of life.

K replied that, since the truth cannot be known, seeking it is pointless. We can collect money or paintings, but not the truth about reality because it is alive and ever-changing.

People look for something satisfying when and because they are discontented with their lives. Happy people don't look for it because happiness is enough for them. When seeking gratification, a person
is escaping the pain they are experiencing. If life seems shallow, one may seek depth, but in vain. Depth cannot fit into a small mind.

However: "There is a mystery that is beyond the capacities and powers of the mind. You cannot seek it out or invite it; it must come without your asking, and with it comes a benediction for man."

In a State of Bliss

A young businessman had experienced something remarkable. He said that one morning, while the city was still asleep, he woke up early and went to a park a few miles away.

As he stepped outside, he had a strange feeling of lightness, as though he were walking on air. Even the building opposite – a drab block of flats – looked beautiful, and the very bricks seemed to come alive. To him, they were alive.

He sat down on a park bench and tears of joy rolled down his cheeks. He had never felt anything like it before, and this feeling lasted a couple of days. He asked K to help him experience that bliss again, or to remain in that state of bliss forever.

"It came to you uninvited. You never sought it. As long as you are seeking it, you will never have it. The very desire to live in that ecstatic state is preventing the new, the fresh experience of bliss."

The man asked where that experience had come from. K advised him to give up his desire to know, because any answer would just be a pale shadow of what it once was.

"Reality has no continuity. It is from moment to moment, timeless and measureless."

Perhaps Love

The psychoanalyst had cured many people with his methods and had become wealthy by treating the rich. He said that under hypnosis, people readily discuss their compulsions and can recover quickly.

One of his patients was persuaded by a friend to listen to K, and although she was initially bewildered after the first talk, she listened to the whole series and felt relieved afterwards. Her depression had disappeared without her doing anything about it.

Having witnessed the effect of the talks on his patient, the psychoanalyst went to listen to K himself, and now wanted to ask K what had caused the woman to change.

K replied that no method can change a person. People in the West and the East alike struggle with the same questions and find different answers, but none of them free us from deep fears and sorrow.

K then asked what is he himself was trying to do with his patients. He replied: "Stated simply, without psychoanalytical jargon, we try to help patients to overcome their difficulties, depressions and so on, so that they may fit into society."

"Do you think it is very important to help people to fit into this corrupt society?", K asked.

He replied that society may be corrupt, but reforming it was not his responsibility. His job was to help patients adjust to their surroundings and become happier citizens. He and his colleagues deal with abnormal cases; their function is not to create supernormal people.

K responded: "Do you think you can separate yourself from your function? If I may ask, is it not also your function to bring about a totally new order, a world in which there will be no wars, no antagonism, no urge to compete?"

What then, the psychoanalyst asked, is the factor that would really help mankind.

"Perhaps it is love", K replied.

What's Wrong with the Masters?

The woman explained that she used to work as a secretary, but she had given up her job because she wanted to help the world. She was educated in a convent, but she found it limited, dogmatic and authoritarian. She eventually ended up working in a religious institution as a manager.

Having heard K speak, she was disturbed by his attitude towards the Masters. What could be wrong with following and being obedient to someone who knows and can guide others?

"Following another does not bring about clarity and happiness", K began. The leader is as confused as the follower. There is no such thing as enlightened following; all following is evil. Authority corrupts the mind's ability to understand.

The woman insisted that, in order to co-operate within a group, people need to have some form of authority.

"Is it co-operation when there is compelling influence of authority," asked K.

"Co-operation comes into being only when there is the love of the thing for itself without the fear of punishment or failure. Co-operation is possible only when there is freedom from envy, acquisitiveness, and from personal or collective dominance, power."

The woman was now even more confused and took a time-out. A few days later, she returned and said that she had carefully considered the matter. Having read Krishnamurti's texts with a new brain, she decided to resign from the organisation, despite the opposition from her friends.

Why Won't Instructions Help?

He was a teacher who had read Krishnamurti's texts and listened to his talks. To him, they seemed very negative offering no direction or positive way of life. He considered K's oriental outlook to be highly destructive, and thought that his assertion that freedom from all thought was necessary was very misleading.

K considered the division of people as of the West and of the East to be arbitrary. Regardless of our skin colour, we are all human beings who suffer, hope, mourn, believe and fear. Love is not geographical. Despite our external differences, we are all the same.

The man acknowledged this, but reiterated his view that the teachings were negative.

K replied that, although giving and following instructions is seen as positive and may seem to be constructive, following anybody is most damaging. The truth is neither positive nor negative. It is the opposite of false.

The urge to be guided stems from the desire to be secure and protected. We seek certainty in our beliefs from priests and politicians. We want to be told how to think.

The man said he was beginning to understand. K pointed out that merely agreeing with the speaker is not enough; you have to see it for yourself. Seeing the truth does not involve speculation.
It is not a theory that needs to be accepted or proven correct.

The difference between thinking and seeing is significant. The truth is not revealed by thinking about it or by words alone. You have to look beyond them. There is an area that is not the result of the known. Thought must cease for reality to be.

Up in the Air

K is on a crowded plane over the Atlantic, watching the world go by. The man in the seat in front is telling another man about his business, while the woman in the seat behind is calculating the amount of duty she will have to pay on her purchases. Across the narrow aisle, two men are chatting rather loudly. K can't help overhearing them discussing the business of killing whales. They talked about the risks involved, the potential profits and how rough the sea could be.

"Human beings like to kill, whether it be each other, or a harmless, bright-eyed deer in the deep forest, or a tiger that has preyed upon cattle. A snake is deliberately run over on the road; a trap is set and
a wolf or a coyote is caught. Well-dressed, laughing people go out with their precious guns and kill birds that were lately calling to each other," K writes and continuing:

"In the West, we think that animals exist for the sake of our stomachs, or for the pleasure of killing, or for their fur. In the East, it has been taught for centuries and repeated by every parent: do not kill, be pitiful, be compassionate. Here animals have no souls, so they can be killed with impunity; there animals have souls, so consider and let your heart know love."

The Curse of Talent

An actor of some repute came to talk about the importance of acting.

Is acting merely a way to earn a living, or is it an expression of one's own vanity? It provides stimulation and escapism for people. He said that he rebels against the absurd superficiality of theatre, yet he is greatly attracted to it. He wanted to know if becoming an actor was made a good choice for him.

K said that no one can choose a career for another person, but self-promotion is always destructive and leads to sorrow.

The actor suggests that all action is based on the survival of the self, but K doubts this. What others say or how they perceive an action is not important, but one must not deceive oneself by imagining something that does not exist.

It is pointless to imagine what life without a self would be like. This prevents us from understanding a life in which there is no self. You have to be choicelessly aware of the obvious and the subtle activities of the self.

The actor said that he realised that he had certain talents that he could develop to become a good actor and create something positive in the world through his work.

However, talent can become a curse if it leads to glorification of the self and to vanity. K concludes that it is essential to be aware of the obvious and subtle activities of the self.

The Mystery of Mysteries

A wealthy socialite was on the hunt for spirituality. She had sought out Catholic masters, Hindu teachers, and Sufis, but was still searching when she came to visit K.

K asked her what exactly she was seeking. She said that she believed that one would vegetate if one did not constantly learn, and that life would have no meaning without searching.

Did she think that she would learn about people by studying various sciences and schools of philosophy, and by accumulating facts and information? Would she be set free from all bondages?

While knowledge stimulates and encourages people, is there any need for it in anything other than technical matters?

She believes that knowledge will dissipate hatred and prevent the complete destruction of the world ­– at least, that is the opinion of most serious educators.

According to K, however, this has not happened. On the contrary, knowledge is blinding us to a factor that could solve all chaos and misery.

She asks K what this factor is, but he refuses to describe it. One must figure it out for oneself, without searching for it or following instructions from others. The mind must be free of knowledge – and of the self.

Space without Words

The final chapter deals with immensity, which is not born of the mind. K asks whether our mind is aware of it, or if immensity is aware of itself. When the mind is not functioning yet passively alert, there is no movement, no observer and no words.

"There was no experiencer when this happened coming down the mountain, and yet the awareness of the mind was wholly different, in kind as well as in degree, from that which is not measurable. There was no movement of any kind within itself. There was no observer who measured the observed. There was only that, and that was aware of itself without measure. It had no beginning and no word."

Knowledge Clouds Clarity

After returning to Europe from India, K went to the Bircher-Benner Clinic in Zurich in April 1960 for an examination. There, he was put on a strict diet.

In early May, he flew from Switzerland to Ojai, where he was only able to deliver only four talks instead of eight. Mary Zimbalist, who would become his main supporter and his closest person, was also present.

Mrs Zimbalist had recently been widowed. Her husband, film director Sam Zimbalist, had died of a heart attack while completing the Oscar-winning film Ben-Hur.

In his first talk, K said that it is easier to understand external things than internal ones. When studying thought and mind, we tend to trust what others say. Our minds are shaped by their knowledge.

We too easily accept what others say without thinking it through. We fail to see and go beyond the limitations of our consciousness.

The more we experience, the duller our mind becomes. Knowledge darkens the mind and experience burdens it.

Bigger than Myself

In the third talk, K asked how the mind could be free from the contamination of consciousness. We are always looking for something bigger than ourselves to identify with and we fall in love with it: be it a leader, a religion or an idea. When life becomes a dull routine, we try to fill it with purpose, hope, and ideals.

When studying human beings, theologians, philosophers and psychologists start with a conclusion and build a speculative theory of life and death around it. When we repeat a belief, it begins to feel real. When we adopt a belief, we say goodbye to facts and self-awareness.

Knowing yourself requires you to learn about yourself from moment to moment, rather than collecting information or being persuaded. The self opens the door to human history because our consciousness is part of the collective consciousness of humanity.

Although our living conditions and the content of our consciousness differ, our inner psychological structure remains exactly the same, regardless of where we were born and raised. This becomes apparent when one is able to observe the movements of the mind without motive, without the self.

No matter how skilful a person may be, without a deep sense of self, his life will be shallow, and such a mind will never break the cycle of boredom.

K was in Ojai all autumn, not even answering letters or giving interviews. In November, he flew to India, but did not want to give any talks. However, he did talk to groups of his friends in New Delhi in December and in Bombay in February.