Vinstant

Not the way of right meditation

And this constant striving to become virtuous, to acquire virtue through discipline, through careful examination of oneself, and so on, is obviously not meditation either. Most of us are caught in these processes, and since they do not give understanding of ourselves, they are not the way of right meditation. After all, without understanding yourself, what basis have you for right thinking? All that you will do without understanding of yourself is to conform to the background, to the response of your conditioning. And such response to the conditioning is not meditation. But to be aware of those responses, that is, to be aware of the movements of thought and feeling without any sense of condemnation so that the movements of the self, the ways of the self, are understood—that way is the way of right meditation. 

J. Krishnamurti/The Collected Works vol V, p 361

Not prayer, not devotion

Prayer obviously produces results; otherwise millions wouldn’t pray. And in praying, obviously the mind is made quiet; by constant repetition of certain phrases, the mind does become quiet. And in that quietness there is a certain intimation, certain perceptions, certain responses. But that is still a part of the trick of the mind because, after all, through a form of mesmerism you can make the mind very quiet. And in that quietness there are certain hidden responses arising from the unconscious and from outside the consciousness. But it is still a state in which there is no understanding.

    And meditation is not devotion—devotion to an idea, to a picture, to a principle—because the things of the mind are still idolatrous. One may not worship a statue, considering it idolatrous and silly, superstitious; but one does worship, as most people do, the things in the mind—and that is also idolatrous. And to be devoted to a picture or an idea, to a Master, is not meditation. Obviously, it’s a form of escape from oneself. It’s a very comforting escape, but it’s still an escape. 

J. Krishnamurti/The Collected Works vol V, p 361

Not a repetition of words

Meditation is the way of live, it is not an escape from life. Obviously meditation is not the experiencing of visions or having strange mystical experiences; as you know, you can take a drug that will expand your mind, it will produce certain reactions chemically, which will  make the mind highly sensitive and in that sensitive state you may see things heightened, yet according to your conditioning. And meditation is not a repetition of words. You know, there has been the fashion lately of someone giving you a word, a Sanskrit word, you keep on repeating it and thereby hope to achieve some extraordinary experience—which is all utter nonsense. Of course, if you keep on repeating a lot of words your mind is made dull and thereby quiet; but that is not meditation at all. 

J. Krishnamurti/Talks & Dialogues Saanen 1968, p 94

The foundation of a righteous life

Meditation is hard work. It demands the highest form of discipline—not conformity, not imitation, not obedience—but a discipline which comes through constant awareness, not only of things about you outwardly, but also inwardly. So meditation is not an activity of isolation but is action in everyday life which demands co-operation, sensitivity and intelligence. Without laying the foundation of a righteous life, meditation becomes an escape and therefore has no value whatsoever. A righteous life is not the following of social morality, but the freedom from envy, greed and the search for power—which all breed enmity. The freedom from these does not come through the activity of will but by being aware of them through self-knowing. Without knowing the activities of self, meditation becomes sensuous excitement and therefore of very little significance.

J. Krishnamurti/Meditations, p 6

The explosion of meditation

Thought shattering itself against its own nothingness is the explosion of meditation.

J. Krishnamurti/Krishnamurti’s Notebook, p 166

Meditation…is the very inquiry into what is meditation

Meditation is not a process of learning how to meditate; it is the very inquiry into what is meditation. To inquire into what is meditation, the mind must free itself from what it has learnt about meditation, and the freeing of the mind from what it has learnt is the beginning of meditation. 

J. Krishnamurti/The Collected Works vol IX, p 192

Putting your house in order

The understanding of relationship, fear, pleasure and sorrow is to bring order in our house. Without order you cannot possibly meditate. Now the speaker puts meditation at the end of the talks because there is no possibility of right meditation if you have not put your house, your psychological house, in order. If the psychological house is in disorder, if what you are is in disorder, what is the point of meditating? It is just an escape. It leads to all kinds of illusions. 

J. Krishnamurti/The Network of Thought, p 96

What prevents insight

It is astonishingly beautiful and interesting, how thought is absent when you have an insight. Thought cannot have an insight. It is only when the mind is not operating mechanically in the structure of thought that you have an insight. Having had an insight, thought draws a conclusion from that insight. And then thought acts and thought is mechanical. So I have to find out whether having an insight into myself, which means into the world, and not drawing a conclusion from it is possible. If I draw a conclusion, I act on an idea, on an image, on a symbol, which is the structure of thought, and so I am constantly preventing myself from having insight, from understanding things as they are.

J. Krishnamurti/On Mind and Thought, p 34

Insight that brings about a mutation in the brain cells

Insight is not a matter of memory, of knowledge and time, which are all thought. So I would say insight is the total absence of the whole movement of thought as time and remembrance. So there is direct perception. It is as though I have been going North for the last ten thousand years, and my brain is accustomed to going North, and somebody comes along and says, that will lead you nowhere, go East. When I turn round and go East the brain cells have changed. Because I have an insight that the North leads nowhere.

      I will put it differently. The whole movement of thought, which is limited, is acting throughout the world now. It is the most important action, we are driven by thought. But thought will not solve any of our problems, except the technological ones. If I see that, I have stopped going North. I think that with the ending of a certain direction, the ending of a movement that has been going on for thousands of years, there is at that moment an insight that brings about a change, a mutation, in the brain cell.

J. Krishnamurti/Questioning Krishnamurti, p 165

The first step is the last step

... The first step is the last step. The first step is to perceive, perceive what you are thinking, perceive your ambition, perceive your anxiety, your loneliness, your despair, this extraordinary sense of sorrow, perceive it, without any condemnation, justification, without wishing it to be different. Just to perceive it, as it is. When you perceive it as it is, then there is a totally different kind of action taking place, and that action is the final action. Right? That is, when you perceive something as being false or as being true, that perception is the final action, which is the final step. Now listen to it. I perceive the falseness of following somebody else, somebody else’s instruction—Krishna, Buddha, Christ, it does not matter who it is. I see, there is the perception of the truth that following somebody is utterly false. Because your reason, your logic and everything points out how absurd it is to follow somebody. Now that perception is the final step, and when you have perceived, you leave it, forget it, because the next minute you have to perceive anew, which is again the final step.

J.Krishnamurti/Krishnamurti in India 1970-71, p 50