Freedom from the Known: The Krishnamurti Perspective
This is a presentation given by Cory Fisher at the KFA Explorations Conference 2019.
This is a presentation given by Cory Fisher (Archivist and Publications Director of the Krishnamurti Foundation of America) at the Explorations Conference 2019. You can watch the full talk above. We selected some highlights:
Why Be Free from the Known?
Why do we ask this question? What kind of mind asks the question: “Why be free from the known?”
To be free from the known could mean many different things, and what it means really depends on the quality of the mind that asks the question. It seems that, ultimately, the question of freedom from the known is in a class of questions different than most questions that we ask about ourselves because it is a question that points directly to the structure of ourselves. So it is not a question of who or what we think we should be, but it is a question of the very structure of what we are and how that interacts with the world. In that sense, it is a very different question than it may appear to be initially.
Along with the scientific and philosophical components to this question, hopefully, there is another component that is more intimate to us. There is somehow something about this question—and I think that’s why we’re all here—that is important to us in our daily lives. There is a reality to this question that goes beyond philosophizing about how one should live, but on the ground, in daily life, what is the activity of our lives.
Conflict
Quote by Krishnamurti
To start, “We take conflict for granted.” Conflict is something that, in general, seems to be the basis for a lot of the activity of our lives, both internally and externally.
There is a sense somehow that knowledge fills a space between us, and though that could be an evolutionary shortcut that may help us to relate in some ways, it could be a shortcoming that may inhibit us from relating in others. That’s something that I notice is a recurring theme throughout this presentation: What may be a shortcut for the brain in some ways is a shortcoming in others. And that I think is a key component to our question: Is it possible for the brain to be free of the shortcomings of its shortcuts?
To a brain that is evolutionarily built to use these shortcuts to relate to its environment and those around it, knowledge can be very valuable. But the environment and the people in it are constantly changing. There is not anything that is static, except for our knowledge about what we are and where we live.
We know from studying the brain that it tends to see what it expects to see, and this is because the brain is uses its previous knowledge as a way to predict and interact with the world.
If the brain is conditioned to see what it expects to see, does it always see what it needs to see to have the right information to respond directly to what is going on?
You, Me, & the World
Quote by Krishnamurti
Could our personal problems and the problems of the world have a common element? At the root of these problems, there is a brain that attempts to solve them but this brain is caught in what it knows, what it is seen before. Can it actually meet a problem that it is never seen before? The problem may be personal, or may be global—but the question is how knowledge acts in the present, in the world, both personally and globally, and if there is a common element in how knowledge functions.
We’ll unpack it more when we go into knowledge more specifically, in Krishnamurti’s work, there are different classes of knowledge. Some classes of knowledge are functional and absolutely necessary. So there is never at any point a complete denial of the fact that knowledge has a very real place in the life of human beings. But, particularly in regard to how we relate to one another, knowledge seems to be problematic. Not only in terms of ‘yesterday’ knowledge—that you said something to me yesterday that hurts, and I carry that with me, and that informs our relationship—but also in terms of our evolutionary knowledge about who is a part of you and who is not a part of you, or who is allowed in your group and who is not allowed in your group.
So it is not only a personal, short-term kind of knowledge but a really long-term, relational kind of knowledge that we may not even realize is functioning because we are built to be related in this way. As social beings, we have developed to take so many cues and to relate to one another through so many different kinds of information, and that information is stored to make future predictions. Yet, in terms of our direct relationship with one another, this predictive knowledge may overstep its functional boundary and restrict our actual relationship.
Knowledge & Freedom
This slide is not really defining what Krishnamurti meant by these terms, but it is more about pointing out that, when Krishnamurti spoke about the ‘known’ and ‘freedom,’ he’s speaking about them in quite a different way than we commonly do.
We could define knowledge as the sum total of the organism’s software to function in an environment. It is the accumulation of experience. Personal and impersonal. Often in Krishnamurti’s work, the known is synonymous with the past. This suggests a component of how we interact with our world in the present is directly influenced by what we know about ourselves and about our world from the past. All of our experiences from the past are constantly informing how we interact with the present. In this way, knowledge is a physical thing that functions in the world. It lives in the brain and in the body. Therefore knowledge isn’t just a functional, dictionary-like reference; it has a feeling component. And that really comes into play when you realize how it acts in the present, and how it directly affects our relationships.
It is important to reiterate that there are aspects of knowledge that are absolutely necessary to survive. You need to know how to get home. You need to know your name. You need to know who you are related to. You need to know how to eat, what to eat. This is functional knowledge. This kind of knowledge is not called into question in terms of Krishnamurti’s work, and we’ll go into that more when we unpack what knowledge is.
Freedom, in the way that Krishnamurti speaks about it, is an ending—which is not how we commonly look at freedom. Freedom, defined this way, is the end of conflict. I think that’s one of the cruxes of why the question of freedom from the known is so important. We take conflict for granted as a force in our lives, but Krishnamurti’s proposal is the possibility of ending conflict.
Krishnamurti says freedom is denied by desire. Often, and especially in our society, freedom is seen as an ability to choose what you desire. The more choices you have to avail yourself of what you want or desire is seen as a kind of freedom. This is antithetical to what Krishnamurti is speaking about with regards to freedom, because the freedom to choose is in itself conditioned by what you’re conditioned to choose. It is a subtle but clear distinction: for Krishnamurti, your “freedom” to choose is a direct consequence of how you’re bound to your choices that you’re conditioned to make. So in Krishnamurti’s sense, this is the opposite of freedom.
Consciousness
Quote by Krishnamurti
Krishnamurti’s notion of consciousness is in many ways analogous to what he means by knowledge and the known. This is very different from our common understanding of what consciousness is, and the difference is exactly the difference to our common understanding of knowledge.
In our common definitions of consciousness and knowledge, there is always an assumed entity that consciousness or knowledge belongs to. In Krishnamurti’s work, this is not the case. This assumed entity that consciousness or knowledge would belong to is itself built out of the consciousness and knowledge that it presumes to own. There is never a distinction between the owner of the knowledge and the knowledge that it owns. That in itself is a whole, a sum total that is itself knowledge. The same with consciousness. So, consciousness itself is the sum total of the content of the movement of your mind, which includes what you think you know, but also the one that thinks it knows.
This distinction between knowledge and the one who knows is what we’ve grown up with and developed through— an entity separate from and aware of what it knows and how it feels, that can act on and deal with what it knows and how it feels. The claim here is that, that very essential distinction is the root of why knowledge can be conflictual and divisive. Krishnamurti suggests this distinction may very well be incorrect but is not seen or observed or understood in this way. So it continues to act and has power not only because of its assumed reality but because of its inability to be directly perceived.
Past & Present
Quote by Krishnamurti
What gives knowledge its power but also what gives memory its utility is the fact that it functions in the present. Knowledge is not a dead thing that lives in the past that you can recall when you desire; it is an active process so deeply ingrained into who you are and how you interact with the world. It functions and revitalizes itself actively in the present.
Again, there is no full blanket denial of the fact that knowledge is valuable. But the reason knowledge is valuable and the reason that memories are valuable is that they actually act in the present. You remember where you live right now so you can go there now—which is a very functional, real, living value to what memory is. But at the same time, this shortcut to memory is its shortcoming. So, you remember what happened yesterday between you and a friend, and that remembrance may color and affect how you relate to them today. And that may, in turn, affect how you relate to them forever. And those memories may not be the best way for us to relate to one another. So there is a value and a danger in how knowledge acts.
Security & Order
Quote by Krishnamurti
The brain constantly seeks security and order: a constant navigation of one’s experience to turn negative experiences into good ones and good experiences into ones that last. There is a constant manipulation of one’s experiences to maintain a certain order. There may be a kind of security that has nothing to do with the manipulation of one’s experience, and that seems to come out of an understanding of the limits of knowledge. To see that knowledge is the factor of your own manipulation of your experience may be a different kind of security that’s founded in something that’s beyond your own limited experience of your past.
What is Freedom?
Basically, by freedom, Krishnamurti refers to the process in which the brain’s responses to contemporaneous events are not necessarily influenced or conditioned by the known, but this is specifically in relation to what is deemed psychological knowledge—freedom from this entity that assumes it has the ability to act upon knowledge and the state of the mind.
Functional Knowledge vs Psychological Knowledge
Quote by Krishnamurti
Often, Krishnamurti talks about the right place for knowledge, which seems to be born of an understanding of the limits of functional knowledge and where knowledge and its action tends to move in the direction that becomes psychological. So memories and ideas are stored as an entity that can then work on ideas and memories and the brain. And this entity, this psychological being, is where knowledge becomes dangerous. Somehow there is a misinterpretation of what action is, especially in terms of my own ability to interfere with my experiences and my mind. And this is essentially what Krishnamurti is pointing out as psychological knowledge.
To zoom in to this entity, we could say that: what is psychological is the movement of desire and will, that there is a constant activity of the avoidance of pain and the pursuit of pleasure, and the totality of this movement of the mind is what we typically refer to as “psychological.”
So it is not to say that “psychological” is anything separate from physical, but more that there is a subset of knowledge that is rooted in an activity born of desire that is deemed psychological. It is not necessarily not physical; it has more to do with this activity of a ‘me’ that feels it is an actor in the realm of knowledge and experience.
A key component of this actor in the realm of experience and the reason that it has a tendency to create conflict is called many things—psychological time, the factor of becoming—but it is basically this: You have a certain experience, and feel that experience is unsatisfactory, so, out of that sense of ‘unsatisfactory-ness’, there is a projection of what the experience should be or would be or can be and that projection is something that this psychological being can move towards within its own bounds. This movement within the confines of my experience, between what is and what should be is Krishnamurti’s definition of psychological time.
This presumed entity within knowledge “acts” as it projects a future state that it can move towards. Here, what we assume is action is merely a kind of reaction that is born out of what we already know and understand about ourselves.
Freedom Is the End of Becoming
Quote by Krishnamurti
Krishnamurti points to freedom as being the ending of this process of moving from something that is occurring to something that should be or would be occurring. It is the ending of a movement of desiring or any sort of aversion to what is occurring.
“Freedom means the ending of the observer, because the observer is all tradition, established order, social acceptance, morality. It is the ending of the self. The images I have about myself, and then when the brain is free, only then is there supreme intelligence.”
“Freedom is the ending, completely, of becoming something.”
Freedom isn’t a state that’s achieved within which new kinds of experiences happen; it is the ending of the necessity for experiencing at all. It is the end of the necessity for certain kinds of experiences versus others. Often, when we attempt to observe or look, the observer or the looker has some quality of judgment or interpretation of the experience. So what freedom is, is when there is absolutely no critique or preconceived condition upon any kind of experience, moment to moment.
Negation
Negation is the denial of this activity of projection altogether. To see that moving towards anything requires that I know something about it from the very beginning. The truth is that in moving towards anything [psychologically], I’m only moving towards my own projection of what I assume is at the end of my goal. This process of negation is to see this whole activity and consistently deny it as it attempts to move. So negation is the denial of reaction against what is.
Choiceless Awareness
There is a possibility of the mind that sees that if it is attempting to move in any direction, it is choosing for or against certain experiences. So that choice in itself is already built into the program. Is it possible for there to be no choice at all? This absence of choice is related to this non-projective movement. There is an active quality to being aware of what is going on, and without choice, there is no movement away or against what is occurring.
Perception
This move brings us to what Krishnamurti speaks about in terms of perception, and I think this is one of the most interesting bits and something that is difficult to understand in our common terms because really what Krishnamurti means by perception is that, the act of perception is itself the value of perception. What is perceived is not important. There is something about perception itself that has value in and of itself because it is not related to or dependent on what is perceived.
Freedom and perception really are not two things; they are not one before the other but freedom and perception are themselves one action, and Krishnamurti proposes that real action itself is perception. It is not what is perceived but the very act of perception which is not based on previous knowledge, that has value, and that value itself is because it is an action of itself.
Transformation
Listen to this audio from the time already selected til the end:
Cory Fisher
Archivist and Publications Director of the Krishnamurti Foundation of America.
Dear Cory,
With the greatest of respect there are many assumptions made in this interpretation of K.
For instance: Quote CF: “What is perceived is not important. There is something about perception itself that has value in and of itself because it is not related to or dependent on what is perceived.”
Pure perception occurs when there is no perceiver, when only technical thought operates, and the senses are no longer entangled in the myth of emotions. It is also an ending of the concept of inside and outside – hence no perceiver.
Negation is the ending, the dismissal, of any thought measurements other than technical knowledge.
Quote CF: ‘This process of negation is to see this whole activity and consistently deny it as it attempts to move.’
To constantly deny is not negation, as constant denial requires a choice, and in negation there is no choice and hence no energy wasted in denial.
And also in denial there is conflict as denial implies the refusal to accept a fact, where as negation is simply not acting psychologically as only technical thought exists – that means psychological time has been negated and not denied.
And there are many more instances which are similarly misunderstandings and interpretations of from where K spoke.
Best energies. Michael Berry
i am friend of JK for 10 years . looking forward to more videos thanks
Excellent article, especially that it invites good questions. Why did the brain invent the “self” in the first place? Why is that invention so (nearly) universally created and recreated across all cultures and over eons of time? There must be a constant that the human brain has been unsuccessfully grappling with over time and across cultures that has prompted a universal and constantly unsuccessful response from the brain. It seems a true insanity in the sense of doing the same unsuccessful thing (creating a self) over and over and expecting but never finding different results. Is it possible the brain has been trying to achieve something that is impossible and the only real way to resolve the dilemma is to accept it? If that is the case, then clearly identifying the dilemma would be core to realizing the solution.
The mind is just a display or even an electromagnetic phenomenon working off the brain. The “self” represents the body in the mind and all the aspects of the self, just a word, to represent a “thing in itself” in the body-brain.
https://www.quora.com/profile/Siri-Perera
https://medium.com/me/stories/public
Every being on planet earth seems to our understanding continues to evolve, adapt, adopt solely to live, to survive like global warming, etc. Only very very few beings are aware that they are aware and try to lift others; others are not interested and run in the same maze, amaze and endlessly amuse themselves. Not able to get out. Only knowledge of the self-education primer has the potential to awaken the slumbering soul. If that path is denied, the endless rat race is all that results. What is the purpose of all these, even this self-question is disabled!
Thinking in a field of the known is not freedom from the known.
“Freedom From The Known”–For A Younger Audience (18-24 yr old females)
Considering the Audience
There could hardly be a better Krishnamurti topic to introduce to a new or burgeoning audience than “Freedom From the Known”! It was through this portal, more than 40 yrs ago, that I (in my early twenties) first entered the dynamic and radical dimension of “Self-Inquiry” inspired by K. As a therapist working with young people for decades, over the years I have constantly been on the look-out for appropriate individuals and opportunities, ways and means, (with individuals as well as in groups) to share or introduce potentially fertile facets of The Teachings. It is out of this experience, experimentation, intention and concern that I will share the following questions, queries and points. Hopefully they will spur/stir more inquiry and soul searching regarding how we might more creatively, compassionately and skillfully, endeavor to relate and communicate K’s Radical teachings such as “Freedom From the Known” and “The Immeasurable” as well as other such profound transformational and transcendent matters, to young people or other audiences.
This Freedom From the Known article is a portion of a longer talk the author gave at a conference. It also contains several K quotes and some video clips. The following offers a nut-shell glimpse of the many interconnected terms, topics, issues and concepts touched on or referred to in this article, which apparently has been endorsed, published and promoted by The Immeasurable Project:
the brain and its shortcuts; personal problems and those globally of the world; how knowledge acts and functions; different classes of knowledge; evolutionary knowledge; short term, long term and relational knowledge; predictive knowledge; the feeling component of knowledge; freedom’s “ending of conflict”; the “denial” of freedom by “desire”; your “freedom” to choose is a direct consequence of how you’re bound to your choices that you’re conditioned to make; common definitions of consciousness and knowledge; the distinction between knowledge and the one who knows; security; functional knowledge and psychological knowledge; psychological time; freedom is the ending, completely, of becoming something; the observer; negation; what is; choice-less awareness; the act and value of perception; freedom and perception are not two things; real action; transformation.
Who is this “Freedom from the Known” article aimed at? What effect is it supposed to have? If it is supposed to “inform”, then what is hoped for in the response to, or as a result of, being so “informed”?
Jaap Sluijter of the KFA recently said that the Immeasurable Project was especially aimed at cultivating young people and particularly intended to appeal to and cultivate females 18-24 yrs old. Did this article accomplish this? If so how? If not, how and why not? What needs to be further done, or at least done differently? Does the Immeasurable Project or the KFA feel and understand what 18-24 year old young women think and feel; what they fear; what they seek; what they value; what they most struggle with; what terms appeal most to them and which don’t? How do these young women express, conceive of, conceptualize and deal with their “freedom” and non-freedom in daily life? What are their strategies and how well are they working? What do they “know” and what is their relationship to this known and knowing? How do they uniquely and specifically regard and handle “knowledge” in daily life and relationships? Do knowledge and freedom have anything to do with their self-image, emotions, confidence, or mental health? Has “knowledge” or knowing ever seemed to be a problem or limitation of their freedom? If we don’t know these things, how might we proceed to find out, act and effectively relate to and/or proceed to responsibly address the needs of these young women?
Might this article about Freedom From the Known be perceived (perhaps even while consciously received favorably and impressively) as somewhat of an intimidating, pedantic or desultory tour de force–from an 18-24 yr old female’s point of view? Might it pose unnecessary or even unfair obstacles or burdens for them to meaningfully, palatably, taste, savor, swallow or digest it, even with more than one attentive reading?
Might, it be, from now on, a good idea for all potential authors (and/or their editors) serving The Immeasurable Project to inquiringly challenge themselves regarding each and every sentence they consider, construct or elucidate about K or the Teachings with empathetic questions like: “what might an 18-24 year old female think, feel, understand, say about, or do with this?” ; “am I saying or writing something that will personally and intimately, psychologically or existentially touch the intended audience, kindle interest, energy, enthusiasm, engagement, truly inspire or not”?; “Am I directing attention to K’s life, teachings, thoughts, superiority, or to their lives”?; “Am I providing “food for thought”, “trains of thought” for “future” intellectual consideration, analysis and thinking?”; “Am I inviting these 18 to 24 yr old females to follow me, the K org or The Immeasurable Project in studying, thinking about, analyzing, learning and gradually accumulating partial and fragmented/fragmenting insights regarding K and his teachings?”; “am I suggesting (subtly or indirectly, by example) that it can be legitimately stimulating, gratifying, entertaining and even attention-getting to cultivate sophistic K “insights” with which to play with?”; am I arrogating and aggregating pseudo-satisfying surrogates for authentic Transformation and Insight or…; “am I stressing and interpersonally laying bare here-and-now observation (without mediating “observers”), direct seeing, the Radical “Way” of Transformation, Intelligence and Insight, free of thought and time, which unconditionally liberates?”
Might it be prudent if not direly necessary to thoroughly and relentlessly interrogate ourselves querying, as K did of others from time to time in an almost vexed, anguished or exasperated tone–“What are we playing at sirs?”
Is it optimally effective or insightful and empathetic of us, without scruples, foresight or hindsight, to rush to feed 18-24 yr old females a diet of K, without an extensively informed heeding of their appetites and allergies? Do 18-24 yr old females need to be or are they assumed to respond optimally to being charmed, titillated, impressed, motivated or bowled over, by charismatic, erudite or entertaining presentations “about” K and his story, and “about” The Teachings, employing and emphasizing his teachings, his terms, his questions and his meanings, his “frame of reference” (cemented and with and propelled by ours)? Might it be more worthwhile, more authentically and meaningfully “charming”, to strive to find and develop more customized and laser-focused means of shifting the focus more to them, their needs, their experience, their language, their values, their world of meaning, their struggle for “freedom”, their attraction and/or repulsion for “knowledge”, their questions and inquiry, in their terms as much as possible?
If we are constantly stressing as a priority, intellectually and/or conceptually knowing “what K “said” (past tense) and what K “meant” (past tense) by this or that” (objectively not subjectively, partially not wholly), are we at the same time sending the wrong message even if we are saying the right things? Are we missing the most important focus, and point of contact, their here-now and their subjective present tense dynamic “self-inquiry” with its immediate, as a whole or totality, not piecemeal or gradual (K stresses “total insight”, “at once”, “wholly” at Brockwood 1979) potential transformation that is all-important?
Dare we allow ourselves such slack as to contribute to any degree of potentially germinating discouraging impressions, supporting, nurturing or ignoring any seed of doubt in their minds about whether or not all K material is ultimately about K’s magnificent story, his greatness, his uniqueness, his Intelligence, his wisdom, his Transformation, his Insight, his prolific legacy and his peerless achievements or…initially, rather amazingly/ironically, ridiculously/unbelievably, but nonetheless actually, in fact about none other than their own apparently (too often to their young minds) puny, unremarkable, tawdry and more or less comparatively unimportant lives, how they cope, how they understand their minds and hearts, live their lives in all their particulars and relationships, flounder about to find their own unconditional Freedom from fear, anxiety, Thought, Consciousness and its contents, how they come to inherit not K’s but “their very own “Kingdom of Happiness” (K’s 1929 talk)?
Moving forward, after bravely backwardly, fully appraising and confessing our evident shortcomings presenting K’s Teachings, seeing ( though ever so reluctantly with fear and trembling) as K might put it, “the fact” and “what is”, might it behoove us to consider, actively explore and begin now to engage, a “radical shift” of direction and consciousness in presenting such profoundly (as well as intellectually) challenging teachings as “Freedom From The Known” or “The Immeasurable”, in forms more femininely attuned, intuitive, integrative, reflective, enlightened and empowering? Might it be crucial to make concerted efforts to transcend and move beyond, rather than recapitulate or regurgitate an older-generation masculine dominated expert/expertise, linear, analytical, objective, goal oriented, “Contents-Centered”, subject/object, “thinker/thought dualistic, “tick-tock (time encompassed) pedagogy”, perspective or paradigm? Might it be incumbent on us to devote ourselves to discovering a less direct, more Holistic, gentler, intuitive, evocative, egalitarian (in terms of “power” differential) feminine-focused, existential, depth and meaning based “Client-Centered” context or paradigm?
Are we willing to assertively and cooperatively draw on the full resources of the worldwide K Community, in all its multifarious branches and forms—calling forth that spiritual remnant, that “Body”, “Flame” and “Intensity” which “really understands” (K’s 1929 talk), in order to advance and engage the project of creatively discussing, exploring, inquiring into and experimenting, so that we may by way of “True Friendship” and “Real Cooperation” (K’s 1929 stated “Purpose”) realize and manifest such possibilities?
Congratulatinos,Cory Fischer, your point of view seems to me, to be very good. The photo of a tunnel with a ligth at the end is a very good.. I think to be free of the known is a question of self knowlege and is necesssary seriouness to reach it.I hope everyone find out it. A very good article, go on
Freedom from the known means experience your self as Eternal Spirit as realized in deep meditation, you are NOT the body and brain , you are not an individual as you assume to be. Living in a state of Freedom, also called , Enlightenment , satori , Nirvana , Heaven, Samadhi, etc., etc you use the body and computer brain to serve each other with love. As Eternal Spirit you understand the nature of all things and the purpose of life ( which is a play of nature or energy also called Leela) .to RETURN to your original and inherent nature is the purpose of life, to overcome the play of tempting nature, to subdue the earth. ( realm ) then you are free from the KNOWN stored in the computer brain , i.e. you USE the COMPUTER BRAIN……the COMPUTER BRAIN and the Body machine does not control you.
Freedom From The Known and Krishnamurti’s “Quote to End All Quotes”
What does “quoting” K have to do with “Freedom from the Known”? It seems that no one has ever asked this before. The article and talk on Freedom from the Known contains multiple “quotes” from K along with various ways of prefacing them by something like “Krishnamurti says…” This likely did not strike anyone as a matter of concern or note. Why should it? The Immeasurable Project/Krishnamurti Educational Center, (and perhaps the KFA) actually requires or expects copious quoting with a policy that every article must include several regularly interspersed K quotes in order to qualify for publication on its website. The best way to talk about Freedom from the Known is to focus on K…right? Providing plentiful K quotes can only benignly inspire, instruct and help future generations…right? Quoting can only enhance and insure the depth, transcendent and transformational nature and quality of K’s Teachings and legacy…right? Those have been some of the subliminal unquestioned operating assumptions until now. Now… shall we “go into it”?
K quotes are ubiquitous and ever proliferating. It seems that most everyone who speaks, writes, teaches or talks about K, freely and often quotes K as well. Quoting is so widespread and taken for granted that it is almost a given, beyond question, and seemingly not worth drawing attention to. It is basically de rigueur and par for the course. If all our talk and study is all about K then why shouldn’t we say repeatedly that “K says this (a quote) and that (a quote), and then this about that (a quote) and so on ad infinitum? Yes, if it is “all about” K, why not? But what if the subject of “Freedom From the Known” is not really much “about K” at all, at least according to…K! What if we really, not superficially/intellectually assented to the idea of this? What if we took it to heart and deep down shifted our focus from K Teachings being all or mostly about K and his teachings to “our” travail, “our” life challenges and “our” inquiry, and accepted the fact that K’s teachings, including Freedom From the Known are primarily about “us” and “our freedom” and “our knowing/knowledge” and emphatically “Not” about: K’s Insight, Transformation, Self-Inquiry; personal spiritual journey, remarkable story or Consciousness? Would that be a difference that truly made a notable if not outstanding difference for us and for K organizations and for K’s legacy?
What if “quoting” itself was identified as an insidious agent of disorder or fragmentation, an infectious virus inimical to a healthy thriving system, disguised (with the best of intentions) as a wholehearted form of homage to K as well as packaged/presented as a wise/compassionate sterling example of skillful means for students? What if rather than being a simple and pure, wise, selfless and compassionate act, quoting actually disrupted, diverted, diluted, distracted, deterred, detoured and produced an overall weakening effect on the full Immeasurable intensity, immediacy and efficacy of “attention”? If our “attention” is to any degree sidetracked, misdirected, debilitated, skewed, or co-opted, then might the range, depth, quality and outcome of our self-inquiry for such matters as Freedom from the Known and The Immeasurable, be diminished, effected, infected or ruined? Could this, even possibly be a result of decades of quoting and the culture, attitude, or consciousness which indulges, exults in and promulgates it?
What if quoting K was shown definitively to be fundamentally counter to the expressed intentions of K and the core of his Teachings? What if quoting in some heretofore unrecognized way, has long functioned under the radar, as a hindrance to receptivity for and comprehension of “Freedom From the Known”, “The Immeasurable” and the actual Transformative thrust, radical depth and meaning, of K’s overall Teachings? K lamented in his last days, that no one really, entirely, totally or wholly understood his Teachings. If K is right about this, then could a significant reason for this perennial missing the boat on K’s teachings have something to do with the need, tendency, consciousness, psychological quirk and disposition, to never let go of our passivity, our feeble and false self-abegnation merged with and submerged in a self deluding pious, inappropriate exaltation of K? Could our subordinated, unnatural relation to K and covert hope that K would feed us as we are suckled by his wisdom through quotes, coupled with a continuous and relentless proclivity to compare ourselves with him unfavorably, thereby devaluing and deferring, prohibiting a fully independent, unconditioned and non conformist realization potentially comparable to his, be at fault for so little (if any) “Transformational” fruits from K’s lifelong labor? Could K’s future legacy be on course to be a mere vapid recapitulation of its past sterility at least somewhat because of “quoting”?
The following “Freedom From the Known” related exploration will hopefully initiate a more awakened and awakening inquiry into the widespread and widely adopted and promoted (modeled) practice of “quoting” K. It will culminate with what might be considered “the mother of all K quotes”; or “K’s quote to end all quotes”.
Freedom From the Known: Who’s it all about? K?
The first and foremost issue to begin with, for our purposes, now, is: what does or might “Freedom From the Known mean for “us”, underscoring what it means for and to “us” first and foremost, not, as is usually and too often primarily the case, what it might mean for K, or to an elite academic, intellectual set on determining the most accurate exegetical or hermeneutic or systematic assessment, analysis or interpretation of what K’s philosophy might have meant or intended (which would of necessity catapult us once again towards reliance upon the authority and preeminence of quoting!). For those who bristle at the word “authority” consider this; why “quote” anyone, unless that one being quoted is not regarded in some way as an elevated exemplar and “authority”? Is there any paradox or contradiction (duplicity?) in on one hand saying that K says and we accept, that he is “not” and never should be any sort of an “authority”, while on the other hand quoting him prolifically as if he indeed is? Has anyone ever throughout the history of the world been quoted, whose words and/or actions, and/or person were “not” regarded as at least in some sense or to some degree, either positively or negatively “authoritative”?
Can we or dare we keep the focus upon “our” quest and “our” inquiry? If we are die hard quoters or true believers in quoting, then sadly, perhaps not! Even though it is quite evident that K himself consistently preferred and urgently urged us to focus on examining and understanding ourselves far more than on understanding him– might we just not be able to “hear” this? Has this deafness been borne out over the last 90 years?
“Freedom From The Known”—Down the Rabbit Hole?; Lost in the Labyrinth?; Caught in the Web of…Quoting?
Is the mere introduction of a quote a complication or distraction from an intimate, existential, inter-subjective here-now relational communication? Is it a change of subject or a modulation into another key? Could it be that a quote shifts the focus from the terms, style, range of meanings of the participants, instead towards the one quoting and the one quoted, by means of what is quoted? Is it feasible, to some previously tragically or disastrously underestimated extent, that when a quote comes into play, the rules of the language game have changed and the one for whom the rules have been changed “for” (the listener, reader, audience) undergoes and is subjected to a dis-orientation and in the process is re-oriented (a kind of “conversion” or trance induction)? Can it be that meanwhile the one who provides the quote (usually having cooked up and prepared the quote in advance), who sides with the one quoted and the material quoted, is further elevated, enhanced confirmed and empowered in their “old” previous and preconceived (“known”) orientation and supported in the rightness of their position and view by the “proof” text provided by the quote (and of course the unassailable, untouchable, inerrant and infallible source of the quote–K)?
Could it be then that the mere introduction of a quote not only changes the topic and interpersonal power balance, but that quoting might actually alter or abruptly transpose the “key”, “tone”, “rhythm”, “beat”, “spirit”, “level of energy”, “flow”, “direction” and “dimensions” of an otherwise (if left unimpeded, freely and spontaneously to emerge out of an authentic I-Thou inter-subjectivity), more potentially creative and transformative interaction? Might quoting frustrate or foreclose here-and-now freshness, creativity and discovery? Might quoting inhibit authentically free and unencumbered (by judgmental injunctions like “shoulds”, “oughts” and “musts”) dialogue or mutual inquiry?
Might one sentence or word quoted of K, with the aim of clarifying or further elucidating a point a speaker is making or another raises, contrary to expectations, be prone to attract more attention to itself, if the one being quoted to, finds even one word or sentence unclear and needs more clarification of the clarification? Might then such a question prompted by the “quote” itself, also then call for and be met by even more quotes which may continue to perpetuate the same need for “more quotes to clarify the previous”—“a quote-loop vicious circle”, a web, a trap, a sucking black hole?
Is a “quote” at least potentially if not mostly, a limited and limiting, fragmented and fragmenting form of “content” of consciousness? Is a quote a form of “knowledge”? When K facilely, drawing on General Semantics, says “the word is not the thing”, as if everyone could easily and naturally understand and immediately adjust to such a declaration despite at least 12 years of educational and cultural brainwashing, then does that proclamation (even if fully and rightfully understood) invalidate or at least seriously constrain, delimit and disqualify or nullify what to most or all of us would be the obvious “content”, meaning, and even the apparently readily accessible “value” of all quotes from him? Why shouldn’t it? Should there be at least a yellow light if not a red light whenever quotes occur?
If the “word”, the quote, is not what it appears and what most of us with at least 12 years (in my lamentable case, about 20 years) of formal educational conditioning (brainwashing?) would immediately and fully expect it to be, then ought we be firstly, (before trying to effortlessly, immediately, expertly, translate, interpret, catch and integrate quotes on the fly), be fully apprised, disabused of the dangers and illusions of all quotes? Ought we to receive preliminary specific mind training regarding how to “encounter” a quote? Shouldn’t we be awakened to knowing full well, that despite all our learning, what we see, read and apparently understand is “not” the “thing” at all and that cameo appearances of quotes despite their poignant entries or exists, do not stand in for “the thing”?
If new students are not given this orientation to quotes and their relation to “the word is not the thing” early then is it any wonder that they develop more and more of a blindly voracious appetite or addiction for “K’s “words” in whatever form they can encounter them, be they books, talks, articles or quotes and that they are likely to proceed under their spell and induce others to the trance of “quotes”, words and confusing the “The Thing” with “the word” or words of quotes?
Does a quote involve “memory?” Does a quote involve motive and intention, purpose, agenda for choice of and positioning of that particular quote in whatever context? Are we attached at all to quotes, even or especially if it is a quote of K? Do we feel a sense of pride or elation or empowerment by virtue of our “using” a quote? Are we “using” quoting for some advantage, with some “motivation” that might be to some extent self-serving? Are we bound or enslaved, or feel any pressure to conform to any extent, with K’s quoted words? Is “quoting” an act of power, a bringing in an “authority” to make “our” point, so that the listener is disadvantaged and dispatched and or subordinated in the guise of benevolently sharing our wisdom wrapped up in K’s, with them? Is there a sort of mental elevation, a pumped or puffed up “vanity”, “power” or “glory”, a bit of self aggrandizement/congratulation and/or intellectual intoxication and/or “special” distinction/entitlement, in the act of quoting, by virtue of association (inhaling?) with K’s rarified air, his exalted, incontestably esteemed estimation in our and others’ minds? Is a quote or the act of quoting, conditioned or unconditioned, comparable or incomparable, “measurable” or “Immeasurable”? Is it absolutely freeing or relatively binding in any subtle indirect ways?
What does quoting involve or imply, particularly in terms of “Freedom From the Known”? Does quoting answer (provide a known) or to any extent foreclose the question or issue/topic at hand by prematurely, peremptorily and insensitively imposing any degree of subtle pressure towards conformity, obeisance, to K’s higher level of “Knowing”, terms and frame of reference? Does quoting involve “knowing” (a gnosis) something, something like K’s words’, esoteric meanings and perhaps also involve the implication that we “know”, are “in the know” or are intimate with the actual Transformation, realization or Insight K speaks of (“The Thing”)? Is quoting in any way or degree dishonest or disingenuous, in service of a lie, pretence, façade or persona masking who we actually are with others and so by providing a veneer of “knowing” it sustains a distance which inhibits freedom and equality in relationship? Does quoting involve any motivations such as fear, security, power, ambition, all of which is not free or freeing and is held in a false knowledge and perception? Is quoting a crutch to prop up a lame or weak consciousness that cannot think and express for itself, but needs and employs K to help fight its battles for it or shield it from its own challenges and challengers? Is quoting a denial and avoidance of our “vulnerability” by means of safe egress to safety among the “higher” atmosphere of clouds of unassailable abstraction? Is quoting an activity that is not conducive to “wholehearted”, but rather more effectively “half-heartedly” or multi-task oriented communication and relationship? Could quoting involve some degree of covert manipulation? Does quoting take unfair advantage (or a superior attitude) rhetorically, intellectually, emotionally, if not psychologically? Is quoting pedantic or bombastic, showing off or misusing spiritually vapid knowledge? Might quoting be using K as a third party, buffer or mediator between us and those to whom we ought to less abstractly and more directly, relationally, wholeheartedly (not from the head) meet as an “I-Thou” via person to person encounter? Is quoting an abandonment of the “Present Moment” in favor of the preeminence of “what K said and meant previously, at least 30 years ago” rather than keeping the focus on the inter-subjective potential of the here and now? Does quoting surreptitiously create, maintain or justify a safe or self-protective “distance”, “difference” or even “entitlement” between the one who quotes and those quoted to? Is quoting a substitute for honestly, humbly and humanly admitting that we in fact, actually don’t know what (“The Thing”) we are talking about, though we make a convincing effort to make it look like we do by resorting to a competent persona and impressively (knowingly) quoting of K?
Could our resorting to quoting make us more like fundamentalist Christians than we care to admit, who similarly rely on quoting “The Word of God”, and use the Bible/Jesus’ words as proof-texts? Are we, as we practice more and more quoting, in peril of legalistically using K’s words as lawyers use the law? When we quote to others, either in print, audio, video or in person, are we setting a bad example for others who might seriously want to approach K’s teachings such as “Freedom From the Known”, due to our influence, to be converted to taking up the habit of quoting and inspiring ever more prolific quoting in others, following our misguided and misguiding example? Is quoting a contagious virus or an epidemic of sorts which already has infected past generations of K students and threatens future generations of K students? Have we, through advocating and promoting uninspected, unrestrained quoting, unwittingly been breeding a new generation of young people to become even more hyperactive, mindless, addicted quoters? If new students come to us to learn about K, conditioned by more than a decade of education which has thoroughly inculcated in them a central dogma “knowledge is power”, then is it likely that they will apprehend, appropriate and attempt to construe K’s words and quotes as little more than a “powerful” new and better “knowledge”, and way of “knowing”, a knowing and knowledge that promises possessors even more “power” than their previous religious or spiritual thoughts systems have? Are K students and is K’s Teachings about creating a “powerful new generation” pumped up and appearing ripped with a new “power” from the “knowledge of K?
If we don’t urgently do anything now, to address the issue of the previous baggage and academic pedagogical indoctrinization that K students bring with them and are at the mercy of, which equates power with “knowledge” and vice versa; and which impels them to reflexively take K’s words and quotes, as “The Thing”; unconsciously misconstruing “The Thing” as “Knowledge” and “Knowledge” as “Power”, then…?
Is the future legacy of K and his teachings destined to be one of little more than a measurable increase in the number of young “K Quoting Consumers” being groomed to do little more than espouse an inglorious as well as vainglorious K gospel largely comprised of or buttressed by K quotes? Do we want to risk leading the young people and next generation astray and stranding them in a purgatory of intellectual access to K only via quotes, words and concepts, but denying them the real deal?
Now hopefully after starting to look at this issue for the first time, might we begin to see how quoting might significantly impinge on our “Freedom”? Might we begin to consider that quoting could very well directly involve and tie us up in further knots of thought, analysis, and “The Known”? Might we see that in quoting there is only, at best, a temporary, illusion of unconditional “Freedom From The Known” and rather a surreptitious insertion of a impostor, a cloaked form of “knowledge” camouflaged as the non-knowledge (using K’s quotes and words of course) of “freedom from knowledge”?
Imagine There’s No…Quoting!
Can we imagine for a moment what it might be like to wake up tomorrow and never again feel the need, urge or even attraction to the satisfaction of “quoting K”? Would we have “withdrawal symptoms”? Would we feel “defenseless” without K’s shielding, even though we have full access to online word searches, hundreds (and more and more in the works) of videos and audios, and dozens of books on K? Would we feel as if we lost something and need to “grieve”? Would our tongues feel tied, muted, and our minds numbed without K’s words in our mouths and heads? Would we feel naked and weakened, our confidence deflated? Would we have to face our own impotent and ignorant emptiness and lack of Insight without K’s consoling quoted words or the looming overshadowing figure of K to prop us up as a crutch and prevent us from doing the only thing we truly need to and must do: looking unflinchingly, with equanimity, directly into the self-revealing mirror?
What if the entire international K community, had the vision to “imagine” doing without quoting K–if not forever then how about a limited moratorium on quoting? If not for a limited time, then how about a trial period of sort of a “Sabbath” timeless time once a week, when quoting would be off limits? If not, for a short periodic Sabbath or for a moratorium, then how about at least endorsing and setting up some presentations or retreats to explore and experiment with interaction and dialogue without resorting to quoting K, sort of “K without K” retreats or seminars?
What impact might there be on the operation of the KFA, The Immeasurable Project, The Krishnamurti Educational Center, conferences, gatherings, study groups, retreats, online and offline talks etc. if they dared to, even for a week or a day or a session or a gathering, proceed without quoting K? Would this be too risky or severe of a “diet” to attempt? Might such a radical experiment shake things up, rattle some cages? Might it fundamentally expose a previously unknown, unobserved, treacherous fault line? Could “going quote-less” (sort of “taking the pledge”) shift, redistribute, augment, unleash or transformationally reorient the quality, energy, content, depth and intensity of many gatherings or occasions in surprisingly meaningful ways?
Going “quote-less” might likely curtail a lot of desultory, comparative, speculative, abstracting, analytical talk about K’s thinking, ideas, concepts, philosophy and how K’s concepts and ideas relates to, complements or is complemented, verified or validated by, science, physics, the brain, and a host of other no doubt fascinating and intellectually gratifying potential academic forays into erudite subjects. What good would that do? Does even a temporary suspension or and overall reduction of for instance “scientific” K oriented discourse, seem like too great a potential loss? What would be lost? What is gained? What if all of that time, energy, intellect, attention and erudite discussion of K’s ideas fueled, driven and supported of course by a fount of never-ending “quotes” were realized to be a gateway to avoidance of what really needed to be talked about and dealt with? What if the bulk of these such discussions were not much more than lurid sideshows, “off track” and “beside the point” excursions into peripheral topics—topics and discussion which can easily been observed to not inflame much passion, interest or energy for Transformation? What if these discussions on topics which are: not here-now; not based on the “Urgency of Change” not directly laser-beam focused liberationally on the immediate emergency that is most people’s lives and their desperate need of self-inquiry and Transformation–were abandoned in deference to those topics which directed and unmistakably are?
Why would such a quote-less approach to self inquiry and unconditional liberation, necessarily be too dangerous, bad or not worth at least making a noble radical effort to explore? What might be lost and what might be gained in a world that did not put quoting K front and center but rather put people, each person’s process of liberation from the world’s contents/consciousness/suffering, first and foremost?
If quoting K ever, to any degree, directly or indirectly, overtly or covertly serves to support the impression (even unconsciously) that such quotes of K should be deferred to or depended upon as the framework, the rule, canon, the doctrinal or dogmatic boundaries within which K discourse, study and practice must conform, then are we in dire danger of turning K’s teachings into a sort of nefarious crypto religious endeavor or project?
K’s “Quote to End All Quotes”
What does K say about quoting him? Should we care? If we do care, then what shall we do?
Might we stop, look and listen and then act accordingly after hearing what he has to say? Might we soberly and profoundly reflect on each and every one of his reasons and proceed to appropriately apply them to Freedom From the Known or The Immeasurable etc.? Might we happily, enthusiastically, and unreservedly, commend the meaning of his words, spoken unmistakably as clear as can be, to everyone who would talk about K, to all K organizations, and affiliates far and wide?
If we ignore, minimize or otherwise justify avoiding explicitly appending a “warning label” and an upfront admonition of “caveat emptor” (as expressed by K himself!) before we baptize students in a teeming ocean of wild and wooly K quotes—are we being unethical in not at least providing “full disclosure” of the perils of quoting, for potential students and young people? Should we not lead with what K says about the matter of “quoting”, “the word” and “the thing” and orient students by means of some preparation or inoculation for the inevitable ensuing psycho-spiritual assault and germ warfare by means of quotes that may await them?
J.Krishnamurti:
“I wish you wouldn’t quote me”. I will clarify the issue: don’t quote me, or anybody, because then it is not yours, you become second-hand human beings, which we are. So please, that is the first thing to do, because that distorts our thinking. You understand? We are the result of a million years of pressure of other people’s thinking, propaganda, all that. And if one is not free of all that you can never find out the origin of all things. You understand?”
‘But if you don’t quote, and find out for yourself – you understand, sir? – there is greater energy, more fun, more alive, you become much more alive.’
J.Krishnamurti– Ojai May 15 1980 3rd Question Q&A Meeting 4: Can We Die Psychologically to the Self? To find out is a process of Choiceless Awareness (see also Talk 4, Bombay, 05 March 1950 & Talk 4, Madras, 02 December 1959)
These are strong, emphatic, uncompromising and unequivocal words! We must “understand”! “Don’t” do it! “That is the first thing to do”! Don’t be “second hand human beings”! Quoting “distorts our thinking”. “If one is not free (recall “Freedom” from the Known), of all that (referring to quoting and being influenced by others’ thinking including his!), you can never find the origin of all things” (including finding the essence of what it is to be Free from the Known or realize and live from and within The Immeasurable!).
Do we understand? Will we understand??