Archive for category: Event Summaries

Exploring Awareness
July 7, 2019
At KECC

This Sunday afternoon session is presented as an opportunity to experience what J. Krishnamurti and other teachers are pointing to in a manner that can be quite deeply experiential – perhaps in a different way than is enabled by discussion. The opportunity was only taken by three participants, but they all reported finding it of value. David guided the small group in a meditation exploring the sense of “Being”, or the “inner body”, as Eckhart Tolle calls it. The inner body was accessed by bringing attention to the sense of aliveness in the body and enhancing that sense with the breathing. Then there was an exploration of the awareness that was knowing the inner body experience, an entry into the effortless attention that Krishnamurti so often points to. In the meditation the thoughts can become very quiet and one can notice a wholeness that is our natural state. The active mind settles and awareness is no longer being dominated by the busyness of compulsive thinking.
The guided meditation was followed by a short reading from John Wheeler on the topic of seeing the root of our suffering

Are You Aware?

 

In this video Rupert notes that spiritual awakening is not an extraordinary experience nor an exotic practice. Every single human being on the planet lives in awareness every day. Discovering this does not require extensive meditational practices or devotions. If you ask any person on earth the simple question—‘Are you aware?’, they will say “yes” because they experience being aware. To answer this question a responder has to go to the actual experience of awareness to get the answer. This experience is the portal to spiritual awakening which we all have access to. The secret is to abide in awareness knowingly. Krishnamurti implied the same idea when he coined the phrase, the observer is the observed.

 

 

Is There a Wholly Different Way of Living?
Talk and Dialogue with Mukesh Gupta
June 30, 2019, at KECC

This Sunday afternoon talk and dialogue was offered by Mukesh Gupta as an addition to the six-day retreat just completed on June 27. Twenty people in total were in attendance in the main house at the Krishnamurti Centre in Metchosin. Mukesh began with some slides illustrating the evolution of the cosmos, our galaxy, and homo sapiens, concluding with a look at the present state of the world and the obvious need for a change in human behaviour. He then related this need to the teachings of J. Krishnamurti and the importance of self-knowledge and self-inquiry. Can thought solve our problems, or is there another tool needed to meet the challenges, many of which are actually created by thought? Mukesh explored the nature of human fear and the resulting conflict and suffering, suggesting that “awareness” is what is necessary. The intelligence awakened by sustained self-observation can put everything in our lives in its proper place and create spontaneous order. After some forty minutes of clearly presenting our situation, he then opened the floor to group dialogue or inquiry. Some of those present clearly found the talk and discussion very interesting and relevant and gave their own input to the circle.
After two hours of engaged exploration, the session was brought to a close and it was announced that Mukesh would be returning next year at the same time to offer another retreat along similar lines to this year’s. We very much look forward to his return.

Krishnamurti Study Session
June 16, 2019
At KECC

This Sunday morning meeting was attended by three of the more regular participants. The intention was to start with a selection from The Book of Life by J. Krishnamurti, the January 19 entry, and to see how we moved forward from there. As sometimes happens, a conversation indirectly related to the text material began spontaneously and unfolded in its own way to become very interesting. In looking at the nature of the self and the process of self-discovery, with reference to what Krishnamurti says about it, we seemed to go into a shared state that was beyond duality and division. In positive terms there was a sense of unity and clarity of perception which was acknowledged by each of us. It seems that as we continue to explore ourselves such states of consciousness become more readily available and significant, along with a palpable sense of freedom and wholeness.

Krishnamurti Study Session
Sunday, June 2, 2019
At KECC

Ten participants gathered for this Sunday morning exploration of the J. Krishnamurti text The Book of Life. Our first reading was the January 16 meditation entitled “Virtue Has No Authority”, which was discussed in some depth. We questioned what K means by “virtue”, “order”, and “psychological authority”, amongst other terms, and what he is pointing to when he says humility, love, and virtue cannot be cultivated. The necessity to observe ourselves in a non-judgemental way, with “tenderness” and care, was emphasized in the dialogue and we went into some detail about the observation without an observer.
There was time to move on to the January 17 and 18 entries: “The Old Mind in Bound by Authority” and “Free at the Beginning”, which also provided fertile ground for inquiry. There is a freedom at the very beginning when we enter the learning mind which looks and listens to all that arises in consciousness and is open to receiving insight. It was a lively and creative investigation of some core issues in Krishnamurti’s teachings.