Facing a World in Crisis. Part 2

~Jiddu Krishnamurti

So there is this question: What is one to do, how is one to act? By a collective response, or by a response that comes from the freedom of a human being, and then in that freedom to act collectively? We must act collectively because great changes are demanded, but it is deep psychological revolution that is necessary, not mere physical revolution, not throwing bombs and killing thousands of people in the name of order, of a new society, in the name of peace. That there must be such a deep psychological revolution is not a dogmatic statement on the speaker’s part; it is what is demanded, it is what one observes to be necessary. Is that revolution to be brought about by collective action? That is, through different types of education, forcing the individual, the human being, through conditioning to behave properly? This is what is being done, and therefore denying total freedom to the human being, though it may bring about a collective action. Or is the revolution to free the mind from conditioning, and in that freedom to bring about a cooperative action? Am I making myself clear?

So we are not emphasizing the individual or the collective, because the world is divided in that way; neither are we emphasizing the freedom of the individual, and therefore allowing him to do what he likes, nor emphasizing collective action that will drown the individual. We are talking about something entirely different, neither this nor that.

You see, human beings are so disorderly, so self-concerned, so utterly selfish that religions throughout the world with their beliefs, dogmas, rituals, saviors, and all the rest of that circus have tried to condition them to behave through fear. You can see it in Christianity, in Buddhism, in every kind of organized religion—condition human minds through fear. And modern psychologists, from what they have told me, are trying to condition the human being not through punishment but through reward. It is the same thing, two sides of the same coin. Because the human being must behave, become sane, orderly, have right relationship with others, whether black, brown, colored, or whatever it is. And as human beings apparently cannot behave, therefore they impose authority, conditioning through fear and reward, or offering physical or psychological security. Are you following all this?
May I go on? I’ll go on anyhow because it interests me tremendously, because we must create a different kind of people, a different kind of human mind, which doesn’t belong to the past, which is neither of the left nor right, which is entirely different.

So seeing all this, there must be a collective action in which the human being is totally free, and the question is whether that freedom can bring about harmony in relationship and therefore in behavior. So that is our problem: how a human mind, your mind, which has been so conditioned by the past, through the present to the future, how can such a mind be changed radically? Then the question is whether it will take time, time being gradual, taking several years, or as the Asiatics say, several lives, which is the same thing. Or is it to be brought about by instant perception? That is, suppose my mind is conditioned as a Catholic, Buddhist, Communist, whatever it is. I realize that it is conditioned, not as an idea or as a speculative formula, but I realize that it actually is conditioned. Now, will it change through analysis, analytical processes, or through pressure, which is reward and punishment, or is there a totally different approach to this problem?

Please, you are sharing this; you are not just listening to me. If you just listen to it casually, accepting certain words and denying others, or agreeing or disagreeing, it will be of little significance. Whereas if you share in this, so we actually communicate with each other, then you will have to find out for yourself whether time is involved in this problem—time being a long period that you have to go through analytically, either by yourself or through another, or you are compelled by circumstances and environment to bring about change, all of which implies time. Or, as I have said, is there a totally different approach to this question?

Now, what do you think? How do you look at this problem? Because we are sharing, exploring this together. The speaker is not an authority, not your beastly guru, nor are you his followers. We are human beings trying to resolve this immense problem of existence. So if you are serious, we have to share this thing together. Therefore you have to listen, not only to what is said but also to your own reactions, your own thoughts and feelings. You have this problem before you: It has been said that you cannot possibly change the human mind instantly, that time is needed to gradually bring about this radical, psychological revolution. That has been said in the past and in the present. This has been the philosophy, the attitude, the assertion: You cannot change the human mind—which has been so conditioned—instantly.

Let us look at this idea. It really is an idea, you follow, a formula that the human mind cannot be instantly and radically changed psychologically, and that it must have time. That is a concept, a supposition, a theory. Now, the root meaning of that word theory is to behold, to have an insight. Now, follow that. You have an insight into something, then from that insight you formulate an idea, a concept, and act according to that concept.
So how is a mind like ours that is so heavily conditioned, whether we acknowledge this or not, both consciously and deeply—the conditioning being the past, whether that is yesterday or a thousand yesterdays—how is that mind to free itself from its conditioning so that it is free to behave properly, to establish true relationship with another in which there is love and not division? You have understood the problem, I hope, so how do you set about it? What is the truth of this? Not according to any psychologist, whether ancient or modern, not according to any religious teacher—wipe all that away, if you can, and look at it. Can you wipe out your associations with any group, with any particular system, with any particular ideology? Perhaps you can’t. To wipe out means to stand completely alone. Then you can face the problem. Are you doing this?

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