Meditation-1
Krishnamurti on Meditation
[Excerpts from his books and discourses]
Meditation is the emptying of consciousness of its content, the known, the "me".
The essence of meditation
Meditation is one of the most extraordinary things, and if you do not know what it is you are like the blind man in a world of bright color, shadows and moving light. It is not an intellectual affair, but when the heart enters into the mind, the mind has quite a different quality: it is really, then, limitless, not only in its capacity to think, to act efficiently, but also in its sense of living in a vast space where you are part of everything. Meditation is the movement of love. It isn't the love of the one or of the many. It is like water that anyone can drink out of any jar, whether golden or earthenware: it is inexhaustible. And a peculiar thing takes place which no drug or self-hypnosis can bring about: it is as though the mind enters into itself, beginning at the surface and penetrating ever more deeply, until depth and height have lost their meaning and every form of measurement ceases. In this state there is complete peace, not contentment which has come about through gratification but a peace that has order, beauty and intensity. It can all be destroyed, as you can destroy a flower, and yet because of its very vulnerability it is indestructible. This meditation cannot be learned from another. You must begin without knowing anything about it, and move from innocence to innocence.
Meditation itself is the movement of peace. It is not an end to be found; it is not put together by thought or word. The action of meditation is intelligence. Meditation is none of those things you have been taught or experienced. The putting away of what you have leared or experienced is meditation. The freedom from the experiencer is meditation. When there is no peace in relationship, there is no peace in meditation; it is an escape into illusion and fanciful dreams. It cannot be demonstrated or described. You are no judge of peace. You will be aware of it, if it is there, through the activities of your daily life, the order, the virtue of your life.
Any authority on Meditation is the very denial of it. All the knowledge, the concepts, the examples have no place in meditation. The complete elimination of the meditator, the experiencer, the thinker, is the very essence of meditation. This freedom is the daily act of meditation. The observer is the past, his ground is time, his thoughts, images, shadows; so time-binding. Knowledge is time, and freedom from the known is the flowering of meditation. There is no system and so there is no direction to truth, or to the beauty of meditation. To follow another, his example, his word, is to banish truth. Only in the mirror of relationship do you see the face of what is. The seer is the seen. Without the order which virtue brings, meditation and the endless assertions of others have no meaning whatsoever; they are totally irrelevant. The truth has no tradition; it cannot be handed down.
Now, before you meditate, who is the meditator? The meditator says, 'I must meditate'. Who is the meditator? It's still thought, isn't it? Thought has found, learned that it has created this confusion in the world and inwardly, and therefore thought says, 'Now, perhaps I'll be able to find peace through meditation'. So it says, 'I must control thought'. Thought is saying to itself, separating itself as the thinker and the thought and the thinker says, 'I must control thought'. So there is conflict between the thinker and the thought in controlling it, isn't there? Because thought goes off and the thinker says, 'I must hold on'. So there is conflict there, which is a wastage of energy. So the thinker is the product of thought, is he not? Don't say he is the Atman; that is again still the product of thought; so you are caught in a trap. When the thinker says, 'I must control thought' who is the thinker, how has he come into being? Is he not the product of thought? Therefore the thinker is the thought. So you say meditate. Meditation means control of thought. It's up to you. Meditation means control of thought, concentration of thought, and in all that there is conflict because thought wanders off and you try to pull it back. You keep up this game for the next twenty years, or ten days is good enough. So that's a wastage of energy. Whereas if you saw the truth that the thinker is the thought. Thinker is the thought. Without thought there is no thinker.
So when there is no division between the thinker and the thought, conflict comes to an end. Then the division between the thinker and the thought is not, therefore the thought is the thinker, the thinker is the thought. You realize what happens then? When thought is the thinker and the thinker is trying to control thought, dominate thought, twist its tail, there is a division between the two - space - but the thinker is the product of thought, without thought there is no thinker. So when the thinker is the thought and the thought is the thinker, what takes place? […] Therefore, we come to something, which is: when the observer, the thinker is the thought and the observer is the observed, there undergoes a fundamental mutation, and that mutation cannot be described, you have to live it, which is, tested in your daily life. You can't say, 'I have changed and have an ugly life'. So when there is the realization that the observer, the thinker is the thought and the observed, you are altogether functioning in a different dimension, because in that there is no contradiction and therefore no effort. And that is the basis of all free enquiry. And it's only a mind that is free can find out what truth is: free from anxiety, free from the word, free from fear, free from greed, otherwise it cannot possibly find out. You must have a very clear, sensitive mind, not a mind that is twisted, distorted.