Authority Corrupts Both Leader and Follower

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Self-awareness is arduous, and since most of us prefer an easy, illusory way, we bring into being the authority that gives shape and pattern to our life. This authority may be the collective, the State; or it may be the personal, the Master, the savior, the guru. Authority of any kind is blinding, it breeds thoughtlessness; and as most of us find that to be thoughtful is to have pain, we give ourselves over to authority. Authority engenders power, and power always becomes centralized and therefore utterly corrupting; it corrupts not only the wielder of power, but also him who follows it. The authority of knowledge and experience is perverting, whether it be vested in the Master, his representative or the priest. It is your own life, this seemingly endless conflict, that is significant, and not the pattern or the leader. The authority of the Master and the priest takes you away from the central issue, which is the conflict within yourself.

- J. Krishnamurti, The Book of Life

Why does one create an image about oneself?

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One has an idea, a symbol of oneself, an image of oneself, what one should be, what one is, or what one should not be. Why does one create an image about oneself? Because one has never studied what one is, actually. We think we should be this or that: the ideal, the hero, the example. What awakens anger is that our ideal, the idea we have of ourselves, is attacked. And our idea about ourselves is our escape from the fact of what we are. But when you are observing the actual fact of what you are, no one can hurt you. Then, if one is a liar and is told that one is a liar, it does not mean that one is hurt: it is a fact. But when you are pretending you are not a liar and are told that you are, then you get angry, violent. So we are always living in an ideational world, a world of myth, and never in the world of actuality. To observe what is, to see it, actually be familiar with it, there must be no judgment, no evaluation, no opinion, no fear.

- J Krishnamurti: The Collected Works, Vol. XII, 246, Choiceless Awareness

There is a division between the FACT & NON-FACT.

My philosophy on life is to live by facts alone, which is truth. There is no greater good than to perceive exactly and completely what is actually taking place in ones emotions, psychologically -- just to study what one feels very deeply.

This area of life is not really understood. It is commonly presumed that identifying with some ideal, dogma or belief will shield one from harm and will elevate one to feeling superior/greater than his/her fellow man/woman. This breeds hostility and conflict. But all (psychological/spiritual/political) systems oppose the direct observation of ones erroneous presumptions/conditioned thinking.

Society is sick (at odds within itself deeply). Human consciousness on a whole is suffering from its programmed training "to egotistically become" the so-called "better" or "higher" Self, without fully understanding that the "becomer" is nothing but memory/the past experiences. So for centuries Humanity has been repeating the past and only tweaking the modifying the peripheral effects. Meanwhile the "ROOT" of conflict remains virtually ignored, on purpose. We are programmed to distract ourselves from coming into direct, holistic contact with "How our thinking creates conflict and then blames it on someone else. Ego denies what it is doing.

There is great confusion because we do not distinguish between "what is actual" (not based on anyone's personal opinion) and "what one desires reality to be" (based on emotional escapism from any disturbing thought or feeling).  Part of what it means to be intelligent is to be able to distinguish things clearly. However, where there is any emotionally-based image or ideal is imposed, then our ability to perceive things clearly is corrupted/fragmented. There is a division between the FACT & NON-FACT. NON-FACT is our ego demanding to dominate reality to our desired end in view. This is the very origin of conflict.

Conflict is the action of opposition.  We are oblivious to the fact that conflict can only produce further conflict. The concept that violence can bring about peace is an ancient deceptive error that has maintained itself through threat of death if we do not conform to building up and defending our own egos. This is the very essence of our system. It is being fueled by our consent to remain ignorant about what we are doing. We are programmed to rationalize any kind of horror by claiming it is being done for the sake of the "greater good". Goodness as a fact has nothing to do with ideals about "goodness".

Look, can you tell the difference between eating a meal, actually in the present moment and filling your stomach gradually filling full? Then, there is a TV commercial that shows you a video of a delicious-looking meal. The former is fact; the latter is fiction. Why? Because one actually supplies real energy to your body so that you can stay alive. The other is an emotional stimulation and that is all it is. We are in trouble because the human race, for the most part, has placed their highest allegiance to the image that stimulates hope. And, where there is hope it must go along with its counterpart -- "fear" underlining that ideal of "hope".

We're drown in a sea of psychological images all opposing one another, both within our consciousness and with our human encounters. We demand psychological identification with each other, not realizing that such identifications breed disaster for the physical/factual world. We are greedy, psychologically. Always demanding to be fed emotional ideal/beliefs. Yet at the same time demanding to be physically secure, as well. There is a law, not made by the mind of man, but that law is a FACT, not my opinion or belief or desire -- it is actual regardless who likes it or not. No amount of power or money can change this law. This law can be observed in your mind if you will look and it is the same law for all human beings no matter who they are.

The law is:  As long as the psyche fights against FACTS, it cannot sustain its physical well being. The requirement to serve ones ego is to sacrifice the physical. To show your devotion to an ideal or image, you must be prepared to give up your life (the reality of you, your body and all of your property) in order to prove that you have achieved an image of "superiority". Hitler is a good example, as well as Jesus. They both died for an image that they thought was good. So propaganda throughout world history has always promised an emotional ideal of bring salvation or relief of of some kind. But in the end, the promise always turned out to be unreal. Take Rev. Jim Jones. They believed and what happened to their physical security.

One might say that there are wealthy people who believe. They have physical security. Do they really? Or, do they not have to use a portion of their wealth to hide from their enemies. You see as long as you believe, you are plagued by enemies no matter how powerful position one might hold. Study the history of the monarchy families. They had private civil wars in order to gain psychological superiority. The rulers stabbed and slashed their way to power.

We human beings are still primitive on a psychological level. Technological achievements masks our psychological  natures. We assume that just because we can memorize information and can operate complicated machines, therefore, "I am civilized and intelligent". That is the basic image most people have about themselves. We also think that just because we believe in emotional words, that makes us somehow those words. But is that so? Is the word the thing?
Is the word "food" able to take away my hunger and give me energy? Can the word "love" bring about that state of being? The word is simply a description of something real. In the land of emotions, the word becomes the reality.

For example people are programmed to believe that they are part of a race. Is that race biological or is that a psychological identification? Biology is factual, not created by the mind. It is a fact that cannot be denied. On the other hand, a race is based on people agreeing to call themselves a race name and then tribalism began. Hence warring gangs began. The identification to an image begets war/violence. There is only a single human race of homo sapiens. That is our biological species which is also interconnected to the rest of the ecological environment. Our bodies are reality that is directed hardwired to this planet. The proof that this is a fact is simple. You must eat and drink water on a regular basis because we are biological beings, first and foremost.

Humanity took a wrong turn and sustained that mistake to the present day. The wrong turning was the presumption that, "As above, so as below." Psychologically the woman is considered "below". The man is considered as representing the "above".  The "below" is what the conditioned thinking mind of man considers to be inferior. The "above" is that which humanity bows down to. The material world is classified as being the "inferior/below". The ideal is what is called the "Master Image", which we are prepared to sacrifice our physical security for. Look at how people join the military to fight for an ideal, and they have to sacrifice their health and/or their lives. Their families are elevated to an emotional/psychological standard of superiority status. People have gone along with their programming, yet they cry about the side-effects of such thinking. This why I say society is ill, psychologically. We are functioning from fragmentary thinking and refuse to study it so that we can be free to live in peace and everyone can have physical security. The reason why some people are poor while others are wealthy or middle-class is because his entire system right throughout the world is based on the Human Ego, which is psychological  becoming, which is conflict, which is based on ones emotional desires. Desire is prejudice and bias. Therefore, inequality is the inevitable result. No ideal can ever bring about peace, equality and preserve our planet's ecological balance.

Our planet is under attack by the psyche of the entire Human Race. This emotional ego-based world is systematically dismantling our environment and replacing it with artificial substitutes. Since we are living off of images, which in essence is nothing but emotional memory, and memory is the storehouse of past emotional experiences. This is why history is taught in schools, in order to maintain past hatreds to fuel the past wars and continue them on and on and on. We are instructed WHAT WE SHOULD EMOTIONALLY FEEL. For instance, we "should feel identified with our so-called country". Is a country a reality or is it an image based on emotional experiences of past sacrifices to an image of belonging to a war group. It is assumed that we must have a military or violence to be safe. But it is all of these military organizations choking us to death with their technological covert weapons of mass destruction. Our air is being pumped with lethal toxin that are upsetting the natural balance of nature, which has sustained our entire species for millions of years.

Yet the human ego bites the hand that feeds its biological existence. Without biology, psychology can't exist. The ego (our emotional biased reactions, thoughts, feelings) feels that it is more important that the physical world, simply because it can use images and ideas to shape the physical world to its desires. Yet, the physical ca first. And, without the physical the ideal is gone. If there were no more human bodies, how can anyone read all of the books that thought has left behind to remember its experiences? So if we destroy our bodies, which is what is happening (by living off of artificial substances), there will eventually come a point where the ego will become so fragmented that the human body will be unable to function. The greater the ego, the more it inhibits the natural functions of biology. Now the ego is playing with DNA. Why?

Because, the ego is playing "God". It is pretending that it owns life. It does not own reality. The foundation of reality is pure energy. I am not talking about forms of energy life, water, air, nutrients. If you will explore into this you will find that the essence of life is energy which animates all life forms. Humans are a life form, and all other creatures and the universe with its elements and organisms. Now then. The point is that energy is running life, not memory. Energy runs our brains. Energy is immortal. Energy is indestructible. You can kill a creature but the energy that was inside of that creature was not touched at all. All energy returns to its source of all energy. When a battery runs out of energy, the battery is dead. But energy cannot die. Energy simply goes on creating endless life forms.

My point is that the human ego of the powerful humans think that just because they can kill many life forms or alter its DNA that it can be THE MASTER OF LIFE. How absurd. No matter how many life forms you destroy, thought/human mind can never destroy energy itself, which after all is responsible for us breathing every single day. Our bodies are merely batteries. The ghost in the shell is our image we have about our emotional selves. Until we study this ghost within this human shell, we shall sacrifice our shells to an UNREALITY that has been made important through emotional propaganda to cause fear of not conforming to that image.

Without self-understand or self-awareness, life is frightening and lonely. A free mind is one that has the freedom to face the facts about itself. Failure to face facts/reality is insanity. To be out of touch with that which is actual, is to be delusional and deadly. Ego is a 2-sided imaginary, psychological coin. It is like a Dr. Jekyll/Mr. Hyde that strongly believes that they are separate entities. That would be like, if your arms could think the right arm saying that it is not connected or associated with its left arm. It flatly denies that. Psychologically we have desires that we call "bad" THOUGHTS/FEELINGS. As long as we believe that we are different from what we think, we shall try to suppress the dark side of our psychological coin of consciousness and worship and identify with the vain or "good" thoughts/feelings we have about ourselves. That is a split in the psyche of  the Heads & Tails, with the idea/belief that Heads and Tails are 2 separate coins. But the FACT IS that ALL OF OUR THOUGHTS & FEELINGS ARE ONE COIN -- THE ME -- THE EGO.

The Ego arises whenever we use an image to oppose facts about ourselves that we wish were not so. So we identify with the opposite and call that being moral and righteous. There is nothing sacred about about memory (no matter if that memory is emotionally based). Memory is a dead thing that is measurable. Whereas the act of PERCEIVING, SEEING EXACTLY "WHAT IS TAKING PLACE IN PSYCHOLOGICAL" RESPONSES in my relationships with another, that is the mirror in which I can detect the movement of thought/ego.

When we see a problem, we are trained to take over that problem and bring about a change for  the better or to resolve that problem. But if the image is the problem, all thinking is image, well it cannot move. Thought thinks that it has all the answers to lifes problems. So it thinks that it can think its way out of psychological confusion. All thinking adds to that confusion. Ego objects to the action of watching alone. Ego contends that there must be more complicated solution to a complicated problem. That is mere am idea based on desire to be in control of all things, including itself. The fact is that the simple approach is the only answer to bring about an undisturbed mind that is clear and no longer a threat to physical security (its own body on out to others). We are addicted to conflict. We are allergic to the facts. That is why whenever someone points out the truth about the ego, it pretends not to understand. But deep down it knows that if it faces reality, its entire artificial world that is based on images that oppose reality would end. It could no longer feel superior or inferior. It would be in a state of holistic love and cosmic intelligence. Physical security would be able to balance itself again.

As long as people insist on living encased in their psychological identities, the physical world will continue to disintegrate. Disintegration begins psychologically when we oppose a thought, feeling that we dislike and try to replace it with an image that we like. The replace he real with the unreal is corrupt, violent and immoral. A foundation that is cracked (cracked by a belief/image of "what should be") -- no matter how impressive the structure you build on top of that fragmentary foundation, psychologically/emotionally, it cannot be sustained. That is why all of the great empires in the past fell. And they will continue to rise and fall, because all empires are built upon the psychological foundation of human thinking. That is why it is the most important responsibility to be aware of exactly how we create conflict with our thinking that "the better" ideal is a noble endeavor. What is noble about destroying our world? Look it up and you can do your own research and see the damage taking place in the atmosphere, the biosphere and our children are becoming brain damaged on a scale that is historically unprecedented. Why?

We think that knowledgeable people have our best interest at heart. What we fail to realize is that they are just as much a slave to their psychological images and anyone is. They will do almost anything to maintain their prestige. The ego is after the same thing and that is to continue no matter the consequences. I originally pointed out the fact that conditioned thinking is an illness. But unlike a physical ailment that can be easily remedied, the Ego is the most difficult sickness to cure because you cannot use any positive approach to cure it. Any positive approach (an approach based on an image) will only feed the sickness. It is like a computer virus that has programmed itself to feed off of opposition. If you take a positive image or a negative image to fight the ego to bring it down, it will grow stronger because it is kept going by any form of opposition.

The facts of life are not in opposition with the ego. It is the ego that is in opposition to reality. Reality is based on the Energy of Life that animates all life forms. Life forms have one common function and that is to understand its nature so that it can operate in balance and harmony.

The ego is anti-matter, literally. It is strictly an imaginary creature, like a cartoon. Sure you see pictures that stimulate emotional responses, but that is a self-centered, ego-based indulgence. The more the ego stimulates itself, the more it demands more and more stimulation. Example, a group may overthrow another group. After their victory, they crave to overthrow another group. It is like a bottomless pit of wanting more and more people to tell that group that they are superior. This is an irrational exercise because the material world must be stripped in the process of elevating the ego. Ego wishes to be rich by damaging the food chain with DNA scrambling. Who knows what the long-term effects will be caused to generations to come and to the entire food chain. The ego only cares that it has left its mark so that it sends a message that I am the ruler of this world (no matter how messed I have made it). It is all about "MY EMOTIONAL OPINION OF WHO I AM". It was A Greek philosopher who once said, "I think, therefore "I am".

Unfortunately, no one really understands the "I". After all, Ego is the result of "Self" ignorance. That means to deliberately ignore what it is ACTUALLY doing. The image tells itself that, "I am calling myself a certain race or nationality for the greater good." The "greater good" is double-talk for meaning that I am serving my own psychological interests so that "I" can stand out above the rest. That is the very nature of ego. All humans (minus those in comas and whatnot) are faced with the same challenge of their ego. Will we allow that ego to dominate our lives and those around us, or will we investigate HOW WE PRODUCE CONFLICT. One can only come upon freedom, not by dreaming up an image about freedom and destroying anyone or anything that gets in your way of achieving that psychological, but by detecting for yourself what is false. You can only arrive at the Real by first Seeing or being Aware of that which is UNreal. Whenever thought tries to directly seek the Real, it is only chasing its own tail (the image/the unreal).

You see here is how the hoax began and is being sustained to this present day. Thinking says that I have to think for physical reasons. Thinking is using images. I use images to do all physical activities. One needs to learn words and mathematics, etc. The image has its natural place. Memory is necessary in order to carry out the daily activities of taking care of our biological needs.

HERE IS WHERE THE WRONG TURN COMES IN...

Thought cunningly presumes that just because the image/memory is a necessity where material needs are concerned, it is also just and necessary for being related emotionally to one another. The moment we use images for emotional fulfillment, we are being egotistical and causing conflict between the image I have made of my myself, instead of observing ALL of my thoughts/feelings/emotions. We divide out thinking into good & bad and fight/oppose the bad thoughts with images that its opposite. Any psychological opposition creates internal conflict between "what I actually feel that is disturbing" and "what I wish to feel". Fear is born because there is always the fear that I will not be able to always fulfill my desire to be more than what I am. It is a form of psychological greed -- wanting more than the actual state of mind. Seeking the more, psychologically produces frustration and loneliness. One is isolated and encapsulated in n imaginary cocoon. But underneath the image is the Read. The ground is always there no matter how much concrete you lay over it, psychologically speaking.

The ground is the fact. At the end of the day, facts remain. That is why the ego of humanity has repeated history for eons and has failed to get satisfaction.

We Are Paid To Live And Work In Conflict

Thought has taken one problem and smashed it into trillions of pieces so that it can pretend to run around all day trying to resolve them. The ego is strictly a problem-maker. It can pretend to want to fix problems, but every solution it offers has embedded within it egotistical self-serving ulterior motives. That which serves the ego, destroys physical security. That is an absolute, irrevocable fact that anyone can verify, if one cares to. If one were to look at the problem from its “root” source rather than its superficial outward expression, it would be simple to resolve all of these problems human beings have made. All problems originate from the “will to believe” in "a future" where the mind will finally be at peace. While one is fantasizing about that non-reality, what is actually unfolding is tragic circumstances that destroy physical security.

People have been misinformed for centuries. But, it is the responsibility of every adult to understand fully their mind (by observing and learning from that observation). The observation itself purifies and clarifies the mind to be whole and not seeking an image to take refuge away from itself. The wrong information has been that we have the natural right to seek psychological security (a false sense of being superior), and we can also have physical security too. That is false. To seek egotistical fulfillment breeds enmity with your fellow man. When you say you are "better", you are in opposition, which is an act of aggression and war. When that happens physical security is damaged or destroyed. And, the only reason why "the wealthy" have both psychological and (temporary) physical security is because they have cunningly barricaded themselves behind thugs who will protect them. And, certain groups of people have their physical security sacrificed for another group of people. This is the way “believing” works. “Believing” established the fake world of hierarchic-ism. It is founded on the pretext of the “higher” & “lower” ego which came into being when the mind decided to “believe” (which became the intellectual mask of humanity). It is these masks that do battle at work and in the family home. They are false representations of that person.

The "elite class" have a "belief" that they are "better". But, we all come into the world and leave the same. But more importantly, we all fear totally being in direct contact with ALL of our feelings. 

It is “Wisdom” that sees
 that you can never win the fight against Reality/Truth. But when one embraces Reality (like or dislike is irrelevant
). So when one sees the futility and harm it is to take refuge in a “belief”, then the Truth of what one observes in ones mind sets it utterly free to perceive itself without any fear. When one is truly free, in the mind, one does NOT see any need to depend on any “belief” system. For, one clearly sees that they all are rooted in division, duality and conflict. There is no freedom in "believing". One is a slave to words. And, one is afraid to question when they truly mean. And, it is “Fear” that is driving one to lean on them.

“Belief” is the antithesis of Truth. Where one is, the other is not. That is why when you see the truth about that false endeavor, that seeing of Truth sets the mind free from its blinds about the true nature of believing. One is not free to totally observe ones state of mind so long as belief corrupts and perverts the internal observation of itself. Then, there is an “observer” & the “observed” and the “observer/believer” chooses parts of itself will likes to observe and other parts will cover up with an opposing “belief”. Also, the “observer/believer” locks away the truth and treats the “belief” as if it were the truth. The ego thinks that it can invent wherever it deems the “truth” to suit its fancy. But a fragment (which memory always will be) can never enslave or capture the whole, the Truth. A fiction can never “become” a Truth no matter how much thought wills it to be so. It can never be. “Belief”, with regard to the psyche, is what is solely responsible for what keeping most of humanity trapped in the “Psychological Dark Ages”.

Our ability to progress in the mechanical world has tricked us into “believing” that we are highly evolved beings. We are psychologically fear-driven savages with a lot of machinery at our disposal to kill each other with. That does not prove that we are civilized. We are like robots that blindly accept “beliefs”. We are collectors of emotionally-charged words. We imitate how others react to those words and then follow along without question. If you will observe the wild animals and little babies they are highly observant and watchful and they learn through their observations. After all children teach themselves how to speak by listening, then the intelligence learns to speak. “Belief” was unnecessary to learn to speak and walk and eat and sleep and to sense danger. Pure perception questions and observes what “believing” is. But, we are chastised and sometimes assaulted whenever we question why it is necessary to “believe” at all.

Most mental experts “believe” that one cannot be completely free of psychological conditioning. They say it will take time. That is “ego” talking right there. Ego is put together by psychological time. “Belief” is something that takes time to psychologically become the opposite of what one is. And, a “belief” never makes good on its promise of bringing about tranquility. It brings it about violently by either drugging or killing (and then it says at the grave site, “may he or she rest in peace”). Notice whenever politicians promise to relieve us from pain and suffering, their solution winds up being a form of genocide (either the crude version of it or the covertly cloaked version of it). When Rev. Jim Jones offered salvation if they would "blindly believe" that everything will be OK, it ended in a mass grave, did it not? That is all the ego can offer – a bloodbath. And, the survivors get to go on existing in conflict -- as well as haunted by it forever .

This is not about condemnation, criticism or fatalism. This is about being responsible for the world. All of these think-tanks “believe” they can control the mind of man. Thought cannot control itself. Only self-awareness to how we play tricks on ourselves can free the mind from its limitations/ignorance. No matter how much knowledge one may have, technologically speaking, that has absolutely no impact at all on the understanding of the mind/ego. That can only be dealt with through a negative approach. All technology is based on a positive approach of using thought to come up with a plan of action to fix a technical problem. This is the purpose of thought, and there is not anything wrong with that. If there is a dangerous animal in your path, you move away from it because your brain intelligence naturally protects itself from harm. The animal is not a part of your being, so you can move away from it.

Conversely, when you choose to alter your mind by ignoring it and focusing on an illusion that you prefer to be true, you are attempting to move away from the perception of yourself in order to protect a lie that you have made up about yourself in order to feel emotionally safe (by pretending to be in control of your mind through a chosen belief). This is the mind fighting against being aware of itself, completely. This is not intelligent to run away from yourself (psychologically), because you cannot escape from yourself. Running from Psychological Death (Holistic Observation) means that the physical must die, instead. That is why war exists – it has its roots in a belief of some kind.

When we finally awaken to the prolonged error of “believing” that will be when our species has awakened and stops choking the planet and atmosphere to death. We must wreck the physical world so long as we serve our egos (which is an entity cut off from the rest of the Universe). The Cosmos is functioning in truth. Our minds are a part of the Cosmos that is naturally capable of observing itself, completely. A partial observation is no awareness at all. You are either all the way awake or you are asleep, where the ego is concerned. You can't be kind of aware. Just like pregnancy, you either are or you are not – there is no other position. So you either see your ego which produced "belief" as it really is, or you don't. The proof of what is the case shows in your bias you have with people. If you are nice to someone because they identify with your race, religion, gang, political party, organized belief system of any kind, then you are at war and you are blind to what “belief” really is (and you're not really interested in going below the surface of "believing").

The reason why our property and bodies are under attack is because we are “believing”. It does matter if you get your belief from someone else or you customize one for yourself, they all are based on opposing seeing your total emotional mind exactly as it is. So then, it is that "holistic seeing" that is not bound by psychological time. Seeing is now, not futuristic expectations. But, thought hides from the present by remaining in a trance state of “believing”. Once you understand, fully, the entire nature of believing, one is free from fear. 

Opportunities for Self-Expansion

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Hierarchical structure offers an excellent opportunity for self-expansion. You may want brotherhood, but how can there be brotherhood if you are pursuing spiritual distinctions? You may smile at worldly titles; but when you admit the Master, the savior, the guru in the realm of the spirit, are you not carrying over the worldly attitude? Can there be hierarchical divisions or degrees in spiritual growth, in the understanding of truth, in the realization of God? Love admits no division. Either you love, or do not love; but do not make the lack of love into a long-drawn-out process whose end is love. When you know you do not love, when you are choicelessly aware of that fact, then there is a possibility of transformation; but to sedulously cultivate this distinction between the Master and the pupil, between those who have attained and those who have not, between the savior and the sinner, is to deny love. The exploiter, who is in turn exploited, finds a happy hunting-ground in this darkness and illusion. Separation between God or reality and yourself is brought about by you, by the mind that clings to the known, to certainty, to security. This separation cannot be bridged over; there is no ritual, no discipline, no sacrifice that can carry you across it; there is no savior, no Master, no guru who can lead you to the real or destroy this separation. The division is not between the real and yourself; it is in yourself. What is essential is to understand the increasing conflict of desire; and this understanding comes only through self-knowledge and constant awareness of the movements of the self.

- J. Krishnamurti, The Book of Life

When we see the fact as it is, then that very fact is the truth which resolves the problem.

Behind the screen of words

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It is important to see, is it not?, that no one can give us freedom from the conflict of relationship. We can hide behind the screen of words, or follow a teacher, or run to a church, or lose ourselves in a cinema or a book, or keep on attending talks; but it is only when the fundamental process of thinking is uncovered through awareness in relationship that it is possible to understand and be free of that friction which we instinctively seek to avoid. Most of us use relationship as a means of escape from ourselves, from our own loneliness, from our own inward uncertainty and poverty, and so we cling to the outer things of relationship, which become very important to us. But if, instead of escaping through relationship, we can look into relationship as a mirror and see very clearly, without any prejudice, exactly what is, then that very perception brings about a transformation of what is, without any effort to transform it. There is nothing to transform about a fact; it is what it is. But we approach the fact with hesitation, with fear, with a sense of prejudice, and so we are always acting upon the fact and therefore never perceiving the fact as it is. When we see the fact as it is, then that very fact is the truth which resolves the problem.

-J. Krishnamurti: The Collected Works, Vol. VI",207, Choiceless Awareness

The Root of Violence

There must be a quality of freedom from the known (the emotional or psychological past). Otherwise, the past will simply continuously repeat the tradition of believing in images (in the hope of attaining some futuristic salvation by way of an “outside” savior of sorts).

The “past” IS “The Observer/Ego”, which is the accumulation of past hurts, beginning in childhood – when his parent(s) told him or her that they were not as good as their brother or sister.

But, what exactly is an emotional pain? What is the entity that gets hurt? And, is it possible not be hurt nor to hurt another?

What is emotional pain?

Jealousy, depression, loneliness, hatred and the feeling of being weak or helpless or desperate. All of these expressions are of one essence, which is psychological fear.

When one compares oneself against another, one is creating a state of envy, which is an expression of fear/emotional distress. Someone has something or behave in a way that I wish to be like, but it is not my nature to express myself that way. So I suffer from envy. Either I will torment myself for not being liker that person that I have compared myself to, or I will rationalize tormenting the person to whom I envy. Either way, that is only furthering my misery because, either way, I am not happy with myself as I am, so I seek to escape from myself by trying to imitate someone. Then, I secretly despise them while I pretend to admire that person. Why does the ego do this?

First of all, the ego is a dualistic emotional state of mind born out of escaping from observing itself. The way it escapes is by hiding inside of a cocoon of emotionally gratifying words (a.k.a., beliefs, ideals, opinions, etc.). Ego always pretends to be the opposite of what it is through words. In other words, it lies to itself, then to the world. It believes the lie to be the truth, however. It does not want to see its mistake, so it attacks the outer world as a distraction from facing its self -deceit.

So... What, exactly, is the entity that gets psychologically hurt? What is the ego? It is your emotional responses to yourself and others. It divides itself from its responses and denies its original feelings by covering them over with the opposite veil of “nice-sounding” words. The word/the description is NOT the described/the actuality. For example, the word “food” does note fill your stomach and nourish your actual real body, does it? The word merely is a suggesting toward the action of getting something to eat. The recipe is NOT the actual meal. It was the map to prepare the meal – a tool.

Emotionally, we have been led astray and misinformed about accepting, without question, words that give us psychological identities for the purposes of inflating our egos and sense of “self-importance” and a dangerous sense of superiority. Ego had divided itself into the “high” & “low”. This gave birth to the projected image we call “God” (high) & “Satan” (low). This was pattern after our human emotions that we divide into the ones we like & dislike. This is psychological division in the very psyche and that brings forth a dualistic, contradictory state of mind which demands respect or will seek to punish.

Therefore, what the ego is, is shattered intelligence (which was whole).

Naturally, the mind was designed by mother nature to perceive its ENTIRE/WHOLE emotional responses. And, through the very HOLISTIC OBSERVATION, of every single emotional response Wisdom/Balance State of Mind/Intelligence is born. Through seeing completely the shattered mind as it is, exactly without the slightest movement to oppose what is being observed (because one can feel the Fact that “I am the past” that cannot put an end to itself). The very perception/seeing of that fact frees the mind from attempting to “improve” itself. A thing that is limited to psychologically “dividing” itself from itself (through the verbalization and the emotional identification with the “What Should Be” or “The Better/Higher”), such a state of division can only beget further division. And, the Eternal Law of Reality (outside of the realm of psychological thought) says that, “Where there is Division, there must be Conflict/Violence” – that is not a man-made law – that is The Law of Objective Facts. Just like there is the Law of Physics, there is a law that has been hidden from most of humanity. And, that law, when broken, brings about devastation to the material world (our health, finances and overall well-being) and is in a constant state of danger.

The root of the Ego is the Fear of Self Observation (without controlling what is observed). The “Observer” IS “The Observed”. The psychological disturbance, no matter what it is, is you – nonetheless. “You” cannot escape from “you”. But, for centuries we have lived through a superstitious notion that we can control ourselves through choosing to identify ourselves with an image that sounds “better that what we are”. An image is from the mind (which is emotional memory). “Love” is eternally whole, whereas thought is not eternal. Thought/ego is just memory. It remembers a certain emotion and regurgitates it and deems that to be “happiness”. That is merely pleasure – like getting high or having sex. Words cannot create a state of wholeness, such as Love or Peace or Sanity.

The root meaning of the, “sacred” or the “holy” is that which is unbroken, whole. When we detect a state of mind that we don't like, we seek to change it or run from it through self-hypnosis of repeating words that stimulate ones emotional imagination. Thought pretends to be “God” by pretending that it can escape from itself by willing oneself to “believe” that the opposite is true and to get other people to play along with the lie (and reward those who play along).

When you take a psychological state of mind that is in pain and attempt to divide that mind away from its pain, you are adding to the pain because any effort to avoid understanding ones state of mind creates even more pain and confusion. When the mind is disturbed and battling itself by opposing the state of mind it doesn't like and seeking to suppress with a blanket of words that deceive, that fragmented mind is emitting a frequency of disturbed imbalance which is also impacting the physical brain that is operating its body. Imbalance in the mind brings about a disturbance in the overall equilibrium of the entire body. A mind at war within is also at war with his or her body, as well (knowingly or not).

The old saying, “Divide and Conquer” is, in essence, the way the ego works. Once the ego gets you to believe in anything (even negative believing is still the same thing – its merely the flip side of the psychological coin). Fact is what is really happening (what one actually feels). The “Opposite Ideal” is born out of the fear of perceiving that state of mind. The mind wants a thing to be true so it tells itself that it is true. It takes many repetitions and others to help fortify the lie and then the comes a point where a person detaches from reality and accept the “Fiction” as being “Non-Fiction”. But the mind can never fabricate wholeness, when it is born out of psychological/emotional memory. All memory is limited, and is therefore not able to produce wholeness. That is why all plans to bring about peace, which is wholeness, fail. War is merely the outward expression of our psychological states of mind.

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Psychological Death is the only thing that can end war in this world and inequality. All governments are based on psychological achieving-- a false sense of being more important than another. Control is the sign of the ego. A mind that is whole does not need to control itself. Thought is limited to just wanting more and more. So the nature of thought is to go out of control seeking self-fulfillment of being better than another human being. When you study the nature of thought, you have an insight into limitations of thought and therefore a natural death takes place. Think of breathing, for example: One inhales (Life - In) then exhales (Death – Out). If you divide this and cling to breathing in and resist exhaling, you'll physically die. So the Life/Death movement of breathing is a demonstration of the wholeness of the Life-Death.

When the mind fails to die to all that is false about itself, it bring premature physical death and destruction to the world (through warfare). When the mind is whole and not at war (by imposing images/ideals over its original state of mind), then there is a death to division in the mind and True Order is established in the psyche. Then, the body can function properly and the person will have appropriate behavior. No concepts will dictate right behavior. Right behavior comes from the Pure Observation (of all of ones emotional responses) that gives birth to “Wisdom/Holistic Intelligence”. That can only happen in each present moment. Psychological Death is only in the present. You cannot gradually achieve it. It not a thing to be desired. It not for the purpose of feeling superior to another human being. It's only purpose is to restore sanity and clarity so that we can function in a manner that is safe and healthy and does not destroy our physical world.

There is ONE COMPLEX PROBLEM that is plaguing all of our lives – no matter where you live on this planet. That problem is your psyche/ego. We have been fighting over what to believe for so long, no one ever challenged the mind to find out exactly what “believing” is?

What does it mean to believe?

Does it not mean to take a thing for granted to be factual? Does it not mean that you must not examine nor question this collection of words? Does it not mean that you are psychologically in bondage to an image? When you assume something to be a fact, that is believing.

What caused belief to come into being in the first place? FEAR!

Ergo, “belief” is the child of “fear”.

What is the essence of Fear? IGNORANCE!

Look closely at the word “IGNORANCE” – the root word is : “IGNORE”

When you “ignore” your disturbed state of mind and opt to seek comfort in something that sounds good on the surface, then one is acting out of “ignore -ance”. That is how superstition was born, as well. One is avoiding being aware of that emotional pain.

There is the pain of feeling insecure, then thought comes along and offers a trick to escape from that disturbance (keeping in mind that one IS the very disturbance). You can't hide from yourself. But “believing” that you can anyway, causes a person to turn into a sort of Dr. Jekyll/Mr./Ms. Hyde contradictory state of mind. There is the disturbed original state of mind: Mr. Hyde that is later suppressed by the Dr. Jekyll (“believer” who is in denial about being associated with “Mr./Ms. Hyde). Therefore, thought “believes” in the “Me” (that was put together by desire & willpower) and the “Not Me” (which is the flaw I don't wish to see about myself). The one we favor (we externally equate to as representing the image/concept of “God”). The fact that we seek to hide from (we externally equate to as representing the image/concept of the “Devil”).

The ego seeks help in hiding from itself. So it enlists “friends” only who will tell it lies that will help the ego to hide from seeing the truth about oneself. Anyone who reveals the truth is viewed as being an “enemy”. Violence is inevitable because one justifies being cruel to anyone who would not lie to give psychological pleasure/gratification to ones ego. So a divided mind thinks that it is OK to be mean and vicious toward an “enemy” who does not make one feel superior. Then, the ego contradicts itself by turning around and superficially giving pleasurable flattery to those who stroke its ego. That is why starvation and wars has plagued humanity. The ego cannot holistically be kind to the entire world. It can only pretend to be nice only to those who will bow down its ego and helps it to escape from seeing the truth about itself. And that is considered “love”. But is “love” based on the condition of ego-stroking.

The ego is millions of years old. Our psyches contains the history of humanity. When you read that whole book at a glance, you end that history of violence. Either we are a contributor to conflict or we are not. There is no middle ground. Either you see your ego and that seeing is whole and does not interfere with its observation of itself, or desire intrudes and tries to control itself by opposing Fact with a “fiction” (conjured up from emotional-memorial background) -- and so internal war ensues.

Beliefs all profess to be seeking the light. But, the instrument of “belief” IS the “darkness” (ignorance). It obstructs one from being free to look directly at oneself, without any distortion. When you see what is responsible for “darkness/ignorance”, that seeing is The Light. No one can “see the truth” for another. I can see my mind playing tricks by watching my emotional reactions with full clarity that the “I” is the past (past emotional experiences – both pleasant and not). All reactions are from my past. But the peaceful watching of the emotional past in the present moment, ends that past totally, because there no fragmentation. There is no intrusion to fix myself. The past can never fix the past. It can only pour salt into the wound and pretend that it is not doing that.

When one accepts beliefs, one is doing great violence to oneself, which is a integral connect being to this physical world. When you violate yourself by accept a belief or an ideal to conform to, you are simultaneously related to the world in the very same manner. Politics will not save the world. It operates on the theory that outside agency will rescue us from the world we have made through our psychological ignorance. It is irresponsible to expect someone else to clean up our mess. We made the mess so its our responsibility to resolve it. It can only be resolved by learning, holistically, what is the nature of psychological seeking. When the mind seeks it can only seek the known, which is limited to dividing itself through believing, period. It is superficial to argue over “what to believe”. Poison is poison no matter the different types – result is the same, is it not?