KFA - Krishnamurti Foundation of America

Tom wrote:

Chances are you will do nothing. But the whole answer is to do nothing, actually to do nothing at all. It's your fear and yours alone; it's the product of a million and one reactions. So to do nothing whatsoever about it is the only possible action. I don't mean to ignore it, to hide away from it; that's still a reaction. I mean to face it and yet to do nothing.

When you say, 'it's your fear and yours alone', that seems to contradict our general assumption that our conditioning is very much a shared feature, shared by all of us.  And isn't my fear part of my conditioning?  Can it be shared  and yet be 'mine alone'?

Of course as my consciousness emerges, or rumbles around, it is still particular and individual.  And if I'm to observe it, it would make sense to observe it in the here and now.  And such observation would have to be the death of me.  That death ... well what?

Tom wrote:

hermann wrote:

When you say, 'it's your fear and yours alone', that seems to contradict our general assumption that our conditioning is very much a shared feature, shared by all of us.  And isn't my fear part of my conditioning?  Can it be shared  and yet be 'mine alone'?

Of course as my consciousness emerges, or rumbles around, it is still particular and individual.  And if I'm to observe it, it would make sense to observe it in the here and now.  And such observation would have to be the death of me.  That death ... well what?

That death is the death of memory. So can you face fear without the memory of fear?

'Face fear without the memory of fear'?  Is that possible?  I have named a certain quality as fear.  Can I un-name it after that?  Doesn't sound too complicated.  But it does seem to require the death of the self.  Is that something I can manage?  No I?  Can I undo memory - psychological memory?  If there is pure attentiveness?  Can I have pure attentiveness?  The self is a foxy item.

just eat your soup

hermann wrote:

If one is to face fear at all, one must remove any memory of it.  And if one had put aside any such memory, how would one then explore fear?  Are there manifestations of the state of fear that one can explore?

There are many manifestations of fear, but you can only explore them through memory. And why do they manifest themselves? Isn't it also memory at work?

Look, we have surely come to this point where we have now chased around every corner of the subject.  We have looked at it all from every possible angle.  And yet, after all of this effort and investigation, we still don't have a definitive answer, an answer that is irrevocable, an answer that cannot be disputed, argued against, fought against, denied, nor just casually accepted and then played around with some more.  We have still not reached a point where it is here - the solid fact of it is there - and so the whole game is up. 

That's death too when the game is up.  After seventy, eighty, ninety years, the game is up for the body and so the mind gets dragged along with that too.  The mind then has no choice in the matter.  But before the point at which the body gives up, the mind has a choice.  And I think that's what we are always resisting: the game being up or the game being over. 

Now what is this game?  Isn't it the game of being somebody?  As long as I am somebody in your eyes or in my own eyes, that's enough for me.  Right?  That's fair enough to say this.  It should not be too shocking or too controversial.  As long as I can maintain an image of myself then I'm happy to continue at the game.  And when I talk of changing myself, what really do I mean?  Isn't it just the image I wish to alter?  It's either your image of me or it's my own self-image I want to change.  Which is no change at all because there is still an image in place.  It may be a different image, more highly polished, more refined, more subtle, less brutal and so on, but it's still very much an image. 

It's like a man who wants to be seen to be a good man, who wants to be thought of as a good person.  He's not interested in being good; he's concerned only with the image of being good.  So he rejects goodness, at the same time chasing its image.  And death itself may be the origin of goodness because there are no more images at play.  That's why we're afraid of death because we can't then create any more images about life; we are faced with the actuality of something and there is nothing we can do.

Above, you posted this:

Tom wrote:

That death is the death of memory. So can you face fear without the memory of fear?

I'm not quite clear whether fear exists without memory.  Danger, yes, danger clearly does exist without memory, but fear?

hermann wrote:

I'm not quite clear whether fear exists without memory. Danger, yes, danger clearly does exist without memory, but fear?

What is fear if not memory? Either you're afraid of what has happened in the past, which is a memory, or you're afraid of what might happen in the future, which again is dependent upon memory. Right now fear is absent. But if we say, 'Well, I may be afraid tomorrow,' does that tomorrow ever come? Isn't tomorrow as much a memory as yesterday?

night wrote:

You cannot determine what my state is and any answer I give about it cannot satisfy that so that is irrelevant: ask relevant questions that you can test. Being nobody is a baby step. Now you are still going to die. If you can't find death in you at this very moment, the part of you that is death already, then you will be afraid of it so long you are not in touch with it.

Being nobody is a baby step; all right. Then why do you even mention it or raise it for scrutiny? I haven't said a word about being nobody. It's purely your own invention this idea of being nobody; it's your own image which you have apparently placed upon some words that I wrote earlier. And why are you so eager to translate what I am saying? Why are you so eager to push my words aside and establish your own version of the truth as 'find death in you'? Are you not merely pushing one image aside and replacing it with another image?   

I was talking about the game of being somebody. To just replace that game with a game of being nobody has no meaning; it is still very much a game.

Last edited by Tom (2012-04-24 14:51:26)

Tom wrote:

I was talking about the game of being somebody. To just replace that game with a game of being nobody has no meaning; it is still very much a game.

Then you should be happy to know that I am everybody. Perhaps that is the reason I am not afraid of death.  There is an endless supply of me.

night wrote:

Just trying to give you a hand, Tom. Now if you are going to call me idiot for it (in short), that's your call. I can't do much more from there...

Why not? Can't we clear it up and then move on? Can't we clear it up together and find out what is preventing us from both seeing the same thing and seeing it so that there is no trace of misunderstanding between us? That would be a marvellous thing if we could do it.

Last edited by Tom (2012-04-25 13:12:37)

Eden wrote:

Tom wrote:

I was talking about the game of being somebody. To just replace that game with a game of being nobody has no meaning; it is still very much a game.

Then you should be happy to know that I am everybody. Perhaps that is the reason I am not afraid of death.  There is an endless supply of me.

I am sure pearl will be happy to hear there is such an infinite supply of you ;-)

night wrote:

Eden wrote:

Tom wrote:

I was talking about the game of being somebody. To just replace that game with a game of being nobody has no meaning; it is still very much a game.

Then you should be happy to know that I am everybody. Perhaps that is the reason I am not afraid of death.  There is an endless supply of me.

I am sure pearl will be happy to hear there is such an infinite supply of you ;-)

Infinite supply needed only where there is infinite demand, I mean in the techonological, economic world, but psychologically there is no demand, and so no supply either.