Self-inquiry with Ralph Tiller and David Bruneau, November 17, 2024
Self-inquiry
With Ralph Tiller and David Bruneau
Sunday, November 17, 2024
At Metchosin location
Eight people were present for this Sunday afternoon meeting at the Swanwick Road location in Metchosin, BC. We sat in a circle while David guided the group in a meditation focusing on awareness of thoughts and feelings or bodily sensations which could reveal aspects of one’s nature or conditioned “self” as we explored the make-up of our psychological structures by noticing what was arising in the space of our awareness.
After the short silence David asked if participants had any issues they would like to explore within the context of the group. One person said that she was experiencing anxiety about sitting in a group of individuals feeling that her awareness was revealing a sense of social anxiety in her body but that only the sensations above her body were the ones that mattered.
Other group members shared their habitual sense of social anxiety and, further, the presence of what Krishnamurti called fear in his talks and dialogues. David related that he’d been reading a K book called Krishnamurti for Beginners but had found it far more challenging to understand than a book for beginners. In fact, the book had brought up difficulties in understanding what K was communicating.
Ralph and David spoke of K’s “teachings” regarding the process of freeing oneself of fear and the necessity for “insight” when seeking self-knowledge or self-awareness. After we discussed the need for “interest” in learning about oneself, some group members confided that they were feeling very interested in the possibilities of self-observation and self-discovery. Later in the day, David found that many quotes later in the Krishnamurti book were from a selection of K books that would be well worth exploring in the participants’ own time:
The Collected Works of J. Krishnamurti
Commentaries on Living
The Only Revolution
Krishnamurti to Himself
Krishnamurti’s Notebook
The Urgency of Change
Two quotes of Krishnamurti that struck David were the following:
“God is when you are not. When you are, it is not. When you are not, love is. When you are, love is not.”
“The understanding of yourself is the ending of sorrow”
The meeting was a quiet and gentle sharing of mutual support and learning.
DB
