Archives

The advent of the coronavirus pandemic has brought us many challenges, including a degree of physical isolation that we have never, perhaps, felt before. It has called upon us to change many of our old habits, which may be a useful exercise in some ways, including examining our relationship to Krishnamurti’s teaching and what we hope to get out of it. The Krishnamurti Educational Centre has also had to adapt to these new circumstances and 2020/2021 has seen many of our activities and weekend workshops, which were always a delightful and refreshing venue to meet new people, going online. An exciting new aspect of these online sessions is that friends from all over the world have joined in.

At the same time, we face the challenge of climate-change, which is impacting every ecosystem on the planet, and causing the propagation of bacteria, viruses, and fungi along with various destructive insect species. Scientists are predicting that we may have to change our food staples in the future from wheat to unfamiliar items like algae and maggots with changing weather conditions. We are confronted by new situations and environmental conditions, like smoke from wildfires raging all over the continent and an increasing incidence of respiratory disorders and disease. What can we do?

These words of K’s from Commentaries on Living seem particularly relevant in this current context:

“Freedom from the desire for an answer is essential to the understanding of a problem. This freedom

gives the ease of full attention… As long as there is conflict with or opposition to the problem, there can

be no understanding of it; for this conflict is a distraction. There is understanding only when there is

communion…”   Similarly, “Awareness is the silent and choiceless observation of what is;  in this

awareness the problem unrolls itself, and thus it is fully and completely understood” – J. Krishnamurti

Here were some of the programming highlights this year:

Doing Without Doing:  Krishnamurti and Transformation

An online weekend workshop with Oda Lindner

May 21-23, 2021

The workshop facilitator Oda Lindner is a yoga teacher who has been holding annual workshops hosted by KECC for many years. Attendance this time was smaller than usual, likely the result of the event coinciding with the Victoria Day long holiday weekend. Also, yoga sessions on the Centre lawn in beautiful natural surroundings may well be preferred over holding them online.

Oda was trained by the same yoga teacher as Krishnamurti, Desikachar, and has a keen interest in, and understanding of, K’s teaching. The focus of this workshop was on bringing an attitude of open listening to our ways of moving and being. This listening is in many ways a doing without doing. Is it possible to observe and sense without immediately interpreting what is felt?

Comments by the facilitator were skillfully interspersed with slow movements, Krishnamurti quotes and answers to questions from participants.

Included were:

• Body sensing
• Finding knots, habitual patterns and tensions
• Being with tightness and tension
• Guided movement sequences
• Quiet sitting: Where or what are we now?
• Breathing and sensing
• Slow movement sequences (‘bodymeditation’)

These activities, together with Oda’s gentle guidance, were designed to explore the meaning of doing without doing and its potential for transformative change, rather than trying to create change by bringing in previous experience and ingrained patterns of behavior.

Participants were already familiar with K’s teaching which led to fruitful sharing and an expressed appreciation for its experiential approach that effectively applied it to movement and increased body awareness.

RT

Becoming

Sunday, May 2, 2021

Zoom online

Sixteen of us were in attendance for this Sunday morning meeting. Participants had prepared by reading and contemplating the February 1 to 8 entries in The Book of Life: Daily Meditations with J. Krishnamurti. This section of the book was entitled “Becoming”. Amongst other aspects of self-knowledge, the selections look at the falseness of attempting to become something other than what we are (in the psychological sense) and the significance of being aware of what we actually are without moving away from it towards some ideal of behavior or identity.

The meeting began with a guided meditation experimenting with Krishnamurti’s suggestion that we look and listen to ourselves without naming or labelling our experience. This will dismantle the structures of our conditioned selves that are held in place by conceptual thinking. After the meditation participants were invited to share their experience, which opened a space of dialogue which flowed spontaneously for the two hours of the meeting, with occasional references to what had been studied in the text material.

There were occasional bottle-necks where communication was less than completely clear and frustrations arose with the difficulty in understanding what was being shared.  Nevertheless, there seemed to be a worthwhile inquiry into a number of issues, including the possibility of a deeper quality of perceiving and communicating. What does it mean to be fully attentive to the various dimensions  – “outer” and “inner” –  of what is transpiring in a dialogue? Perhaps the measure, if there is any, of such an endeavor is the very attention itself and the learning that results.

DB

Meditative Self-Inquiry: The Transformation of Consciousness

with Mukesh Gupta

May 29 – 30, 2021 (2 days)

Zoom online

This was the final session of the spring series on “meditative self-inquiry” presented by Mukesh Gupta and sponsored by the Krishnamurti Educational Centre of Canada. Eleven people (all included) were in attendance. The Saturday meeting featured a presentation by Mukesh covering quite widely the subject of the transformation of consciousness as Krishnamurti spoke of it in his teachings. Mukesh clearly stated that he was presenting his own understanding of the teachings and not claiming to be an ultimate authority on what K has said.

He soon asked the question, “What is consciousness?” According to his understanding of K, there is no consciousness as we know it without the contents, which are our experiences, thoughts, memories, knowledge, desires and fears. There may be something else when consciousness is emptied of its content, but normally we only know it through conflict between fragments, between one desire and another, between what is and what should be (the ideal). There is the conflict between “me” and my experiences, the thinker and the thought, the observer and the observed.

K asked if there is a separate “I”, or is the “I” merely a thought and therefore, in a sense, an illusion or unreal. What can be done about this sense of separation that creates all our suffering and problems psychologically speaking? Is there anything to be done other than to be completely still with it? Transformation cannot happen through effort, thought, idea, or desire. There must, rather, be a seeing of the patterns of thought and division. This seeing is the ending of conflict. The nature  of this seeing includes the facts of no observer or “past baggage”, no psychological time or effort (which is futile), and no motive. It is not part of thought and is therefore free of time and conflict. Seeing is also supreme action, negation, intelligence, love, and transformation. The false drops away when seen. Supreme discontentment is necessary in this self-inquiry process.

DB

The Art of Seeing

with Cynthia Overweg, June 25 – 27, 2021

Zoom Online

This series of three presentations by Cythia Overweg from Ojai, California, was attended by between twelve and fourteen persons in total each session. Cynthia combined talks on the teachings of J. Krishnamurti with periods of quiet meditation, breath and bodily awareness, silence, and music. She also invited questions and feedback from the attendees, to create a space of focused attention in which what K is saying may be understood through direct seeing and self-observation.

“Seeing”, she stated, is central to Krishnamurti’s teachings and warrants a deep immersion in his explanation of its nature. When true seeing takes place there is no separation between the observer and the observed. The mind is quiet and there is a transformation. According to K, “the act of seeing is the only truth; there is nothing else.” Seeing is the perennial transformation spoken of by many sages. Watching ourselves, Cynthia said, is fascinating and it opens the door to the “immeasurable”. With self-understanding comes love.

Why do we not see? K explains that our mind is not free but is occupied with self-interest. To find freedom we must learn what the mind is doing and be sensitive to all the activities of thought.

DB

Self Inquiry and Nonduality

with Hillary Rodrigues, August 27 – 29, 2021

Zoom workshop

A long-time contributor and friend of the Krishnamurti Centre, Hillary was welcomed back to present a three day online workshop exploring the teachings of J. Krishnamurti in contrast to modern and ancient nondual teachings which have been attracting a great deal of interest in recent years. Sixteen people were in attendance for the event.

Hillary began with the essential issue he wanted to consider with us: the possibility of having a transformative realization that is more real and experiential than mere knowledge, which has its own place. Over the three sessions of 1 ½ hours he went into the history of nondual teachings such as Advaita Vedanta and the Upanishads in the Hindu tradition, including the teachings of Shankara, Buddhist teachings such as Zen, and modern offshoots such as Ramana Maharshi and current teachers such as Rupert Spira and Adyashanti.

He then led an investigation of Krishnamurti’s teachings along similar lines and where there were at least apparent differences and emphases. Along the way we touched on various questions of identity, knowledge, and awareness,as well as some of the paradoxes that arise as the mind attempts to understand something which essentially cannot be grasped through thought. When asked to guess at the source of a number of quotes from different spiritual teachings it became apparent that it is in many cases difficult to distinguish between them.

When it came to looking at Krishnamurti’s expression of self-inquiry, we spent some time exploring his approach to being with pain and suffering.  K gives great emphasis on not moving away from our suffering and not creating a duality between the observer and the observed or the “me” and the “other”. It is our movement away from “what is” that is the problem in that it creates a duality which results in conflict. When we stay with “what is”, it changes. This change leaves no residue and there is a transformation.

These ideas were explored, sometimes very seriously and sometimes with a sense of humor and lightness which did not detract from the depth of the inquiry and the resulting sense of freedom and uncaused joy felt by some. Hillary’s integration of academic skillfulness and logic, along with his depth of direct realization of that which he speaks, created a space where it was possible to touch at least a somewhat different dimension of consciousness. We are grateful for his ongoing participation in the life of the Krishnamurti Educational Centre of Canada.

DB

Krishnamurti’s Notebook

with Javier Gomez Rodriguez, September 24 – 26, 2021

Zoom workshop

Javier joined us online from the Netherlands for a three-part retreat exploring J. Krishnamurti’s writings as published in the form of Krishnamurti’s Notebook. The meetings were attended by twenty-two people. Each of the three sessions was 1 ½ hours in length and consisted of a talk by Javier followed by some time for questions, comments, and inquiry.

The book reveals details of K’s experience that he didn’t often discuss in his public talks and dialogues and is thus more personal and intimate than usual. Javier began with an introduction to the work that was first published in 1976 and describes some of the painful “process” K endured for many years along with more ecstatic experiences of  ”benediction” and joy seemingly arising on a regular basis in K’s consciousness.

The issue of K’s engagement with “meditation” and the forms it took, along with some of the unusual phenomena experienced, were discussed in the context of his teachings which normally gave less detail about such matters. The question of awakening kundalini energy was touched on as an explanation of his “process” but then the focus shifted to K’s insistence that we need to face the facts of our lives, the suffering and the desires, without escaping from them. This releases a huge amount of energy which he felt was necessary in order to enter the realms of “truth” beyond the thinking mind and its projections and to contact the dimension he called “the other.” Consciousness must be emptied of its content.

We must ask ourselves if we are addressing the fact of division and conflict in our lives. According to K, his meeting the reality of “death” freed him from the reality of thought. He spoke thereafter of the flowering and dying of thought and its expressions such as fear and loneliness.

DB

The Bird in the Verandah                               IX                                             March 14, 2010

CS –      Being a romantic and a poet, I find human relationships very dissatisfying…there seems to be such a lack of love, care, sensitivity…

AA –     There has been an increase in this trend over the past century due to the mechanization of society. America is not a contemplative country; there is a lack of inwardness of lifestyle. In fact, I had quite a culture shock at the age of 14 or 15 when we emigrated from England. I was disappointed by the lack of depth in children my own age.

CS –      Yes, this is something I have always struggled with and, yet, even philosophic discussions I engaged in as a student at Brockwood often had a certain emptiness or hollowness to them because they lacked that quality of attention or listening that we seem to share…it is so nurturing.

AA –     Ah, yes, that is because people do not listen…not to themselves, not to others.

CS –      I know K. talked about aloneness as something positive and, yet, there is a certain loneliness which is the other side of the same coin; when we attend to Nature there is a very deep and rich experience of fullness and fulfillment, however, there is also a sort of loneliness in the inability to share that same quality with other human beings. For example, when one is walking alone, there may be great joy in chancing upon a tree with maraschino-pink cherry blossoms and, yet, these may be totally ignored by other human beings who are more likely to notice you than these exquisite flowers.

AA –     Yes, it is true…there are certain cultures which cultivate this sort of communion with Nature.

CS –      Yes…and we call them primitive; ironically, I had a program about hyenas hunting on for the cat the other night because I thought she might enjoy it and my mother rushed into the kitchen saying, “I cannot stand it – it is too violent!” I looked at her and said, “Yes, it is violent, but we cannot judge it, for in judging it we judge our own Creator”. She was stunned by my response and pursued the conversation no further.

AA –     I can see why she would not want to pursue it any further, as your statement was true; in fact, it is the source of our human crisis in the sense that our capacity for higher thinking has made us able to challenge the source of our very existence. This is a very fundamental difference between animals and humans – animals need to listen and commune with their surroundings in order to survive while mechanization has allowed humans to forget that aspect.

CS –      Then, it seems we may have taken “a wrong turn” as discussed by K. and Bohm and the weight of this imbalance may be against our species; if there is a fork in the road and one path leads to a dead-end while the other leads to the Garden of Eden, the majority of humans seems to be on the wrong road while just a few may be on the way to the Garden.

AA –     There is an imbalance; the weight of numbers seems to be against us.

CS –      Then we are just left with ourselves and enjoying our own company, if we cannot commune with the majority of humans who are caught up in making money or whatever they are pursuing. Even children seem to be old and wizened, these days, and seem to lack spontaneity.

AA-      In most cases, they have been robbed of their childhood and the opportunity to play.

CS –      A lack of leisure even at that tender age must affect one’s development, adversely –

then, we are still just left with ourselves…I told a friend recently that one of the greatest

lessons in life is to learn to enjoy one’s own company.

AA –     Yes, the only possibility we have as humans is self-inquiry.

[These are personal impressions of dialogues with Professor Allan W. Anderson printed with his permission given on May 23, 2010; in no way does Chanda Siddoo-Atwal (CS) purport that these are verbatim discussions, but only excerpts recalled after conversations in which she has tried to “pluck out” their essence from her notes taken during these talks. It has been serialized in its entirety as a tribute to his life and work in past issues of The Swanwick Star. This is the eighth and final serial installment from a compilation called “The Bird in the Verandah“]

Some Notes on Mind and Passive Awareness

Naftaly Ramrajkar

 “Meditation is the process of understanding oneself. Self-knowledge brings wisdom. And the mind begins to understand the whole process of itself. It becomes very quiet, completely still, without any sense of movement or demand. Then, perhaps, that which is not measurable comes into being.”

1956. Krishnamurti; Collected Works of J. Krishnamurti, Six lectures given at Hamburg, Germany, 1956.

The conscious mind is what we use in our everyday waking life and it includes perceptions, memories, concepts, imaginations, emotions and desires.

The unconscious mind was discovered very recently. The whole of unconscious is below the ‘threshold of consciousness’; we can be conscious only what is above the threshold. Like an iceberg, above the water is conscious, below the water is unconscious.

Between conscious and unconscious, just below the threshold of consciousness lies the region of subconscious, which hold all the skills and knowledge we have acquired. It is the region of our abilities and talents, not fully conscious but easily made so when required.

Between the subconscious and the unconscious there lies the main dividing line, what may be called the threshold of suppressions, which can be crossed only with the greatest difficulty and usually under abnormal conditions.

The unconscious contains not only the memories of everything that has ever happened to us but also our biological, racial, national and family heritage as well as painful experiences of the past, mostly those of early childhood.

It is the threshold of suppression that is the cause of trouble, because it keeps the vast content of the unconscious away from the conscious, though it cannot completely prevent the unconscious from affecting deeply our actions and sometimes bursting through the barrier; invading our life in various forms of insanity.

Krishnamurti stresses the importance of breaking down the barrier of repression and finding a way of bringing the unconscious in to the field of conscious.

The image that is usually chosen to describe the mind is that of an iceberg. The water line is the threshold; the tiny visible part above it is the conscious mind, whilst the huge submerged portion represents the unconscious. If we melt away the top of the iceberg, the iceberg will gradually rise up and if the process of melting is maintained, the entire iceberg will ultimately disappear and only the ocean will remain.

This process of melting the iceberg can be maintained by a piece of ice shaped like a lens to create a hot spot to melt away the ice.

This is exactly what we need to do; to create in our conscious mind a focus of intense passive awareness, of full consciousness of its content and watch the content dissolving and new content emerging to dissolve in its turn. This process will eventually break down the barrier between the conscious and the unconscious.

In fact, the conscious and unconscious together form one mind and dividing line is accidental. The opacity of the barrier makes direct awareness of the unconscious impossible, but it is possible to gradually bring the unconscious into conscious by a process of simplifying and reducing the resistance of the conscious content. This is done by fully passively aware of the whole content.

Both the subconscious and the unconscious are composed of memories, of two kinds: factual and psychological.

The former are memories of factual experiences, judgements of facts. They create no problems as they are helpful to the conscious mind, enabling it to learn by experience. Psychological memories are those of past valuation or ‘judgement of value’, each heavily charged with emotions. They do not rise to the conscious mind individually or as separate factors, but as a vague background, a coloring, a conditioning of the conscious content.

This conditioning obeys no fixed rules and follows no fixed pattern.

Conditioning of mind is divided into two classes or kinds: 1) Primary 2) Secondary

Secondary conditioning is related to the more obvious problems of life, the miseries, sorrows, conflicts, frustrations, worries and fears which are the common lot of men. There are general lines, grooves or channels along which conditioning usually flows.

Primary conditioning: Habitual conditioning which is universally present in all forms, is the presence of the ‘self’ or ‘I’. Wherever there is conditioning, there is the presence of ‘I’, and conversely, wherever ‘self-consciousness’ exist, conditioning is bound to be there.

This primary conditioning is at the root of all our problems, and arises out of this the very nature of all mental activities.

This primary conditioning takes three distinct forms:

1. Partial use of our minds
2. More emphasis is given to ‘what was’ and ‘what will be’ than to ‘what is’.
3. Mind works in dichotomy, pairs of opposites; e.g subject/object, thinker/thought, experiencer/experience.

It somehow cannot see the ‘Antiphony’ in nature but only pairs of opposites.

This thinker takes form of ‘Self’ or ‘I’, the owner of body and mind, who is continually engaged in strengthening and expanding itself.

We should live with whole of our mind (Wholistic) and not only with a small portion of it, which is least interesting. It is also already impressed with stale memories and valuation.

Actually, part of the mind dominated by self-consciousness is a wasted, crippled part almost impervious to Life, to Truth and to Joy.

Primary conditioning truncates the total mind, while secondary conditioning distorts and maims that part of the mind which we use daily and call our own.

This double conditioning deeply affects our relationship with others; the primary separates us from our fellow being whilst the secondary pits us against them.

In short, we cannot cure conditioning by more conditioning. Therefore, generally methods of meditations or intellectual discipline, austerity or physical discipline, cultivation of virtues, moral discipline, practice of prayers or religious discipline, introductions of reforms or social discipline does not help.

No amount of efforts can destroy memory. The only remedy against our conditioning is to accept the fact, to see it as conditioning, to go down to its very roots and having laid it bare, to look at it without justification, identification or condemnation, in passive and silent awareness, without calling it one’s own.

Passive awareness is effective because it destroys the ignorance of primary conditioning and the possessiveness of secondary. When we try to see that our mind is conditioned, conditioning withers away.

Passive awareness puts an end to all forms and habits of thinking to which conditioned mind has been accustomed, as well as to the emotional reactions caused by conditioning.

Passive awareness gives us insight into working of our mind.

It is important to clear the mind of problems, for a mind tortured by conflicts is useless. We need a mind that is free from all conditioning, a transformed or unconditioned mind; for only then are we able to discover truth, reality, God – whatever the name we give to the Unknown. What we discover reflects the quality of our mind. We cannot discover what is quite foreign to the mind and for the discovery of the real we need a clear, a real mind, not a mere bundle of memories and habits, problems and conflicts. To find a real mind, we must first understand the full significance of that state which is a ‘passive awareness’.

A ‘Passive Awareness’ is important because it is the only means for putting an end to wrong thinking and distorted feeling, both of which not only make us utterly unhappy as individuals, but when projected on a larger scale threatens the whole of humanity.

A mind that is conditioned and mind that is aware that it is conditioned are entirely different states. The former will get more and more entangled in the meshes of its own conditioning, because it does not know that it is conditioned, much less how it can be free of the conditioning.

A mind that is aware of its conditioning, on the other hand, is already on the way towards disentangling itself and, therefore, is proof against further conditioning. The state of ‘Passive Awareness’ is both curative and protective.

References:

1. Krishnamurti & The Texture of Reality by A.D. Dhopeshwarkar
2. Krishnamurti and The Experience of The Silent Mind by A.D. Dhopeshwarkar
3. Yoga of J. Krishnamurti: A Catechism by A.D. Dhopeshwarkar
4. J. Krishnamurti and Awareness in Action by A.D. Dhopeshwarkar
5. The Nameless Experience by Rohit Mehta
6. Philosophy of J. Krishnamurti by R.K. Shringy
7. That Pathless Land by Susunaga Weeraperuma
8. J.Krishnamurti as I Knew Him by Susunaga Weeraperuma
9. Saying of J. Krishnamurti by Susunaga Weeraperuma

Some of these books are out of print but available from the Acorn Press for regular price.

Web Site:

http://www.intuitiveapp.com/acornpress/product-category/author/a-d-dhopeshwarkar/

NR

This retreat, hosted by Mukesh Gupta in June, was an extremely inspiring one and we met for meditation every morning before starting the dialogues for the day. Sometimes there was an excerpt of haunting flute music from the Himalayas or the dulcimer tones of the santoor. The group also did a few exercises during the six-day retreat as we shared this extraordinary space and we undertook one memorable exercise in pairs. David Bruneau was my partner and each pair took a card with a theme written on it. Our card was “Cooperation”.

This was a very nice theme for both of us since we have each spent quite a bit of time during our lives living in communities with other people, and, of course, communal living is not possible without cooperation. David asked me for my observations on the subject and we discussed these together out on the lawn in front of the Mainhouse on a perfectly sunny day.

We agreed that since communal living requires cooperation, it entails a certain diminishing of the ego. There is a lessening of self-identification as one embraces a wider world view based on the experience of many people in the community rather than just being limited to one’s own isolated opinion. There is also less emphasis on personal possessions in a communal environment as one is often called upon to share things with others. Personally, this sort of living, also diminished my interest in the family unit and in engaging in possessive relationships. David also had a similar experience. Finally, we concluded that the UN could benefit from the experience of living all together on an estate and speculated that it may instill a greater spirit of cooperation among the member states. At the very least, the UN might start with a six-day retreat like this delightful one and invite Mukesh to be their facilitator!

The last evening of the retreat was a beautiful bacchanal of music, singing, and dancing in the Meditation Room where there had been arguments, tears, agreement, and hugs before the final goodbye on the next day.

CS

June Retreat with Mukesh Gupta from the KFI

This past month, a friend and I travelled to Brockwood Park for a five day intensive study/dialogue retreat on the topic:

“Death: the end of everything or the start of something new?”

As always, on this, my fourth visit, alighting at Brockwood is to breathe in deeply, the perfume, the silence, the peaceful beauty of the buildings and surrounding landscape. It is such a contrast with the hurly burly of getting there and one can always count on a warm welcome, a cup of tea and a nourishing meal, prepared largely with food from the gardens or local produce. There is, ever present, a quiet diligence of the staff and guest helpers working behind the scenes to support the visitors who are there for inquiry.

In this particular group, there were twelve of us, from divergent cultures, ages and backgrounds, which made for a rich variety of life experience. At first we knew each other not, yet by the end of the week we had become close companions. Overtly, we had our differences, but a sense of communion was developing by itself, building upon the willingness to look together at the ‘what is’ of our lives within the context of the topic. Not easy! Stephen Smith was our guide, whose competence and immersion in the teachings over very many years served us well when things started to bog down.

The days of study retreat are generously balanced at Brockwood with plenty space for personal contemplative time, or for informal dialogues.  Many participants pick up K’s lead by taking an afternoon walk in the lovely countryside.

Each day we would listen to an audio or watch a video on our topic. Some of this was unpublished material. We were able to turn our chairs towards the garden whilst listening to K speaking, which I found to be a soothing combination.

It was impossible, I observed, for most to keep listening intently for an hour or more, for the completion of each topic, for every talk includes many aspects of the teachings. What worked for me, was to watch where my interest sparked. One such example was the phrase : “Look at your problems as you would look at a flower.”

During the coffee break, I wandered into the walled garden* which, in early September, is still full of roses. This provided a perfect opportunity to test out the phrase. So, I deliberately studied a particularly beautiful rose by looking with no other agenda. Possibly ten minutes or so passed before I stirred and walked along the path ready for the next step, which was to look in the same way at a problem of this life. To my astonishment, the only problem became that there were no problems!

I searched quickly through memory banks, recalling my life back home in Canada where in each day some sort of problem arises daily. I could not recall that life. At first there was a bit of panic, as in, “this is a serious senior’s moment!” Still, nothing would come. Mind was quiet, empty. Returning to the group, which I had judged previously as ‘difficult,’ there was nothing to see but love and willingness. A deep quietness pervaded my looking and listening.  This remained through subsequent travel days back to Canada, which seemed to be filled with ease. It still remains, underneath the inevitable problems of ‘my’ constructed and conditioned daily life. The one I would call ‘mine’ because that is what I identify with.

One can see that the problem with problems is that they are self-generated, arising as they do, from the partial solution to the last problem. This can be seen to be true whether it’s a small personal difficulty like say losing keys, or on a societal scale such as pollution of our planet or political turmoil.

“You cannot solve a problem through the means by which it was created.”

Beyond our meddling and our fretting, that which transcends and encompasses the whole, remains.

As a result of a study group on death I have come away with life. K says death and life and love are all one. That was revealed to me without any effort of ‘mine.’ The only thing necessary was attention. This was easy with roses which assail all the senses so fully that they practically demand our attention.

Now, post Brockwood, I am able to wholeheartedly recommend the suggested activity. When beset by a problem, go and look at a flower, a tree, a bird, the ocean. Just look!

Look until there is no one looking.

*NB.   Walled gardens date back to medieval times. They were called “hortus conclusus.”  Entering the garden was to enter sacred space. In the centre was usually a fountain, in this particular garden, a circular pagoda. Here resided Mary of the Christian tradition, symbolizing love and compassion.  Mary was also associated with the rose. Possibly the hortus conclusus at Brockwood had its origins in the medieval period, for the land is ancient. As such it will have nurtured many inquirers and contemplatives.

LW

February Retreat with Caterina Maggi (from Italy)

CS –      Allan, I propose that there is a locus of tranquility in one’s life while the well of silence is endless and can become an addictive drug; one could easily abide in that tranquility, but just a glimmer of that locus of tranquility is enough to live intelligently. I’d call it a middle path or a happy medium.

AA-      Once a Buddhist teacher said “The Middle Way has no middle” meaning that it cannot be quantified or divided. The core of this endeavour is, of course, the display of one’s true nature, or, getting out of one’s own way so that one can see oneself clearly.

CS –      I further propose that an intelligent recognition of destructive thought patterns is the core of spirituality.

AA –     Yes.

CS –      So, we seem to share a consensus but, is that all one needs spiritually?

AA –     Yes, that, and, an unwavering resolve to abide in that locus of tranquility as a limitless proposition.

CS –      Yes, there is no limit to how aware one can be because Awareness is timeless – it is in the realm of magic and expecting the unexpected; there is an Order that is timeless. However, impatience can be caused by a desire to abide or dwell permanently within that realm or in the locus of tranquility.

AA –     St. Augustine said, “The reward of patience is patience”. Anxiety is not innately part of our natures, but tranquility is. Religion and psychoanalysis seem to be more interested in disease than in health.

CS-       Yes, it seems so. I recently started to read the Dhammapada, but found I could not finish it…

Do you believe a transformation takes place in the brain as K. talks of to allow Intelligence to function?

AA-      Yes, I believe it does.

CS –      So, something has changed chemically in the neurons to allow a new way of thinking?

AA –     Yes.

*          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *

CS –      The mysticism of Egypt has always impressed me.

AA –     The Sphinx has a lot of presence viewed from many different sides.

CS –     Apparently, it came to a Pharaoh in a dream and that’s why it was built.

AA –     Oh, really?

CS –      I saw it as a child, but I do not recall my impression vividly.

AA –     It is good to remember one’s impressions from childhood as they are often fresh.

CS –      I shall look up my notes from our trip; it is incredible how pyramids show up in South America, as well, and, this whole business of an idea occurring simultaneously around the world (or a mutation).

AA –     Yes.

CS –      K. and Bohm talked of 5 or 6 transformed individuals being able to change the world. Why not 2 or 3?

AA –     Why not?

[These are personal impressions of dialogues with Professor Allan W. Anderson printed with his permission given on May 23, 2010; in no way does Chanda Siddoo-Atwal (CS) purport that these are verbatim discussions, but only excerpts recalled after conversations in which she has tried to “pluck out” their essence from her notes taken during these talks. It shall be serialized in its entirety as a tribute to his life and work in the coming issues of The Swanwick Star. This is the sixth serial installment from a compilation called “The Bird in the Verandah”]

CS (April 11, 2009)

With Prof. P. Krishna and David Moody (May Retreat)

Reflections on the Self Dialogue Group

Meeting October 20^th, 2019

Present: 8 members: 3 apologies

There have been a number of absences throughout the summer so that some members were meeting again after 4 months, others were not present. The fluctuating nature of the group was commented on along with a question around a sense of separation and how to become reconnected?

Lynne opened the group by commenting on and reading from the first two pages of the chapter on “Freedom,” where K  declares that “Freedom does not imply choice.”Applying this to our mutual situation of voting in the federal election tomorrow it seemed pertinent to look at his statement “ You choose according to your temperament, your desire, your pleasure. You are faced with the question of whom to listen to, whom to follow.” Whom to chose indeed!

It was suggested from the outset that we cannot really dialogue about Freedom, our topic of the month and last chapter of the book, as though it were, in itself, a topic. We can only look at any situation, for example, the election, and ask if we are approaching it out of freedom, for K is clear that freedom is at the beginning.

When are we not free? This involved again going into conditioning.
Some members of the group, rather painfully and slowly, took this up as others listened. It was not clear that many had given much attention to the chapter or using it for self inquiry  as was the original intention of this group.

We returned many times to the need for paying attention in the immediacy. Are we currently in a state of separation or in a state of inclusion/communion? If not, who it not?

Is it possible to attend to all points of view, seeing that every one is only partial? What is our experience of the whole? Does action arise all by itself from that?

It was acknowledged that Freedom is synonymous with unravelling Conditioning, otherwise we assess things from our conditioned and partial standpoint, negating other views in the process and taking ‘sides.’ There were comments abut the nature of partisan political rallies.

We moved to the topic of confusion in making choices, any choices, and K’s point of view on this, ie “is it possible to be still in the midst of confusion ?”was gone into with examples.  To attend to confusion is not in itself confused.

Two other members drew our attention to sections of the chapter which were of interest and which we looked at.

As well the topic of the nature of conditioning, including biological conditioning was suggested and augmented the dialogue.

The main understanding today was that freedom could only be now, in the act of complete attention, which means communion. What is it that separates us, here and now and within society? Examples were given of faulty attempts at inclusion ie with regard to sexual fluidity, which, in the end, through multiplicity of choices ( 72 now reported on facebook!) end up creating further separation and alienation. Similarly with alternative pronouns.

Much of our looking oscillated between the world at large, ie society and our own ‘world’ including presence in the group on this Sunday afternoon. Everything which we can comment on in the world can be also seen in ourselves. There is no greater take away than this!

LW

[Photos courtesy of LT, 2019]

I loved staying at KECC, watching lots of videos, reading and taking long walks. The immensity of the sea and the soaring mountains naturally create space in the mind, silencing the chatter and leading to quiet contemplation and enquiry into the nature of human brain/human life and its function, role in the immensity of the universal or cosmic order. Clearly, the conditioned brain, to borrow K.’s terminology or the words of the Buddha, who had also pointed towards the conditioned state of human existence, clearly this brain is incapable of grasping the immensity of another state of mind or consciousness.

Both, the Buddha and Krishnamurti have unequivocally stated that there is another dimension or a state of being, or whatever words one may use, however, unfortunately, it is not in our limited, time-bound, narrow, self-centered consciousness. We don’t know what it is. And our brains, as they are now, can never grasp it unless the physical structure of the brain itself changes. Which means total insight. I don’t think that one can have partial insights into the matters of existence. One can have more clarity and rationality, but partial insights here and there into the matters of life and death, love, truth and beauty, comic order and supreme intelligence, are not possible, as far as I can see. Or they are not possible as long as time/thought, which is the make-up of the ego, are operating.

Here is a radiant statement Krishnamurti made when talking to KFI people in India:

“You always want me to come into your world and discuss your problems. But I have been saying all along to come into my world, where there are no problems. But you won’t do that.”

I wonder why we don’t do that? Are we so heavily conditioned? After all, the world is in such a crisis: a crisis beyond all crises!  The Earth may be uninhabitable in twenty, fifty years. So the only thing to do is to actually change the structure of the brain and bring about a cosmic shift or go on …!

ER (Fall 2019)

My Aunt (Dr. Jagdis Kaur Siddoo) was one of the most incredible women I have ever met and one of the great female influences of my life. She and my Mother (Dr. Sarjit Kaur Siddoo) were the first and second persons of Indo-Canadian origin to graduate from medical school in Canada, respectively (University of Toronto). In fact, it was a trend throughout her life – my Aunt was never afraid to be the first to do something. She also had a passion for philosophy and Krishnamurti as evidenced in her book “Listening is the Guru” about how the two sisters started Wolf Lake School, which I attended as a child. She enjoyed hiking and had a keen love of the outdoors that she imparted to all those around her. There is no doubt that Aunt “Jackie” was a veritable force in all our lives and really molded everything we did.

Like my Aunt, I started composing music based on birdsongs and many were the fond discussions we had about our avian friends. In fact, in the evenings near the end, I tried to amuse her by telling her a new bird story based on my encounters with birds during the day. She seemed to relish these stories whether it was about my resident woodpecker, Woodie, who would wake me up each morning by knocking on the chimney or Hummie, the hummingbird, who came every Spring looking for the red hummingbird feeder that had not been there for many years! However, I assured her that I would get a new feeder for him this year. Luckily, I was able to complete my latest opera dedicated to her in time for her birthday this year and have a classical string quartet perform it at her party.

Every new interest of hers was taken up with great energy and enthusiasm like her study of the Sanskrit language, which she mastered in her seventies, and, of course, gardening was always a favourite hobby. She excelled at everything she touched and enjoyed the detective stories which I read to her from time to time. Probably, most of all (even though she did not shy away from disciplining naughty children), she was fun, fun, fun to the end with a zest for life that I shall never forget!

CS

Before coming to this Second ‘You Are the World’ Conference at KECC, I’ve been asking myself what I have done to embody some of the things we talked about last time in my life over the past year & this is what I came up with:

*Continuing to live peacefully without confrontations

*Working at creating green spaces for wildlife & plant life

*Using less plastic & paper; using only the resources one needs; cutting back on excess in business, as well

*Promoting peaceful means of communication on social media

*Promoting a ban on nuclear & depleted uranium weapons; teaching others about their negative biological effects on social media and in co-authored books

*Advocating remediation of radioactive contamination on social media

*Respecting Nature & trying to help preserve other species (one can do this just by having a single birdfeeder in one’s garden – it’s perceived as a ‘safe space’ & it’s amazing the baby birds and squirrels I’ve found myself babysitting!)

When I asked a friend who participated in the conference last year the same question, he said:

*Living a peaceful life without conflicts

*Leading a simple life

*Not using more than he needs;

*Not having more things than he requires to exist

*Caring for others & Nature

Even before we can start talking about cooperating and begin to curb the current climate-change crisis, it is clear to me as a scientist that there are certain basic issues we must address like using war as a means of ‘trying’ to solve our problems. With the advent of biological, chemical, nuclear, thermonuclear, depleted uranium, and, possibly, meteorological weapons, war must cease altogether in order for there to be a serious dialogue, cooperation among nations, and any meaningful change in the world.

So, I’ve crafted The World Peace Treaty & would like to put it forward for everyone’s input as part of this dialogue

1. No country should invade any other & all nations should agree to peaceful coexistence
2. If one country invades another, it should be boycotted by all other nations & subjected to rigorous economic sanctions
3. One country should not be able to start a war against another, but if it does, it should be ostracized by all other nations & all diplomatic relations should be severed
4. State-sponsored acts of terrorism, sabotage, or civil war should be punished in the same way
5. No country should be able to use nuclear, thermonuclear, depleted uranium or any other type of bombs against another country, but if it does, then it should pay full reparations
6. Chemical, biological, and meteorological weapons should be illegal
7. Nuclear testing should be banned since it contributes to climate-change

*Note: As a result of the First You are the World conference in 2018, many serious environmental issues that are confronting the planet were discussed. This year, the Canadian climate-change authority, Dr. Peter Carter, was the invited speaker and he touched on various topics during the retreat. Historically, we are currently in the Sixth Mass Extinction in which many species are being wiped out and certain experts predict that humans will be extinct by the end of the century. The last Fifth Mass Extinction famously wiped out the dinosaurs. We also learned about an interesting new movement of teenage climate activists like Greta Thunberg, who are shaking up the world of complacent politicians. As a young man, Peter was involved in the nuclear disarmament movement, which is still a relevant topic, today.

CS (September 2019)    

Musical Interlude organized by Chanda (November Retreat)

When I first read a book by Krishnamurti, I had a sense that I didn’t get it, so I put the book away for a year.  When I picked it up again, the door was open.  I felt like every word I read detached congealed braincells, like peeling apart velcro, and I could see deeper.  I could now read what he was saying, and then I could see what he was saying, and then I could see.

While exploring, I’ve often had this sense of profound insight or perception, as if it’s the most immense ever, which is followed by an intimation that I’ve had that sense before, not as time, sameness or accumulation, but a vast, unknowing forgetfulness, that is eternal.  There is a newness, a freshness, as if the words have never been seen before, even if the scribbles in the margin say otherwise.

Can one see the teachings with fresh eyes each time, thus approach daily life in that way?  Since his languaging avoids abstractions and concepts, this negates the brain from extracting in order to add to one’s matrix of knowledge and associations.  Thus exploring the teachings seems to de-condition my brain.  He writes that we think together and think things through in order to find.

I visited Krishnamurti’s house in Ojai in January of 2016 and February of 2017.  This was a dream come true and the energy and beauty that Krishnamurti created there is palpable and transformative.  Krishnamurti’s teachings have impacted my brain to be deeply in touch with nature.  Looking closely and attentively at her dance of colors, the light of perception transforms into sound-like subtle whispers from Gaia herself.  She tells me something of her majestic beauty, so immense, that it doesn’t leave a trace, even if I wanted it to.

I spent an hour with the tiniest caterpillar I’d ever seen.  He was walking on my jeans, nearly camouflaged, yet perception makes life salient whenever it wiggles within the visual field of choiceness awareness.  I said aloud, “Is that a tiny caterpillar?” as if spotting him moved my vocal cords.  After the hour, I reluctantly returned the hitchhiker to the base of the Pepper Tree.

There is a sensitivity to the movement of life that grows each moment one puts one’s attention on life.  In this way, the brain cells for seeing and being with the Now grow.  It seems that reading and listening to Krishnamurti’s teachings de-conditions the brain such that perceptions is action, at the level of the brain cells.

Life meets life, and there is an explosion of energy.

I recently went to Swanwick Centre and the beauty was immersive.  It took hours before the land imbued the body with its energy to participate in moving fluidity amongst its splendors.

To me, Krishnamurtis teachings are alive and are not separate from daily life.

Anonymous

Krishnamurti Study Group
Saturday, January 21, 2017

The subject of study for this session was Q & A # 5 “On Discipline” in The First and Last Freedom by J. Krishnamurti. A questioner had asked K if self-discipline was necessary for moderating the “instincts of the brute in man” in order to realize God. K asked if these tendencies in the human being can be dealt with by suppression, sublimation, control, or by attempting to approximate one’s behavior to an ideal. Is there not a need for a more intelligent response to the issue, a creative response which does not involve the deadening of self-discipline as control.

The five participants were asked at the beginning if we could look into the question without preconceived ideas and be open to fresh and new ways of seeing. This was done very effectively and one person commented that we were in fact doing what K suggested as we inquired into the question. There was a sense of discovery and a feeling of wholeness in the group members. A very enjoyable session.

David Bruneau /Ralph Tiller

This interesting topic discussed at a Swanwick group meeting proved highly evocative for me. It triggered a stream of thoughts in the context of the violent society in which we live, today.

The brutish side of human nature is ever-present in us; our constant work is its sublimation* through Awareness.

This brute also causes madness and incoherence; this brute is the ego.

This brute is accepted by society and everyone seems to make apologies & excuses when it does terrible things.

What if this brute were totally rejected by society?

In fact, David Bohm often talked about “suspending” our opinions, judgements, reactions when interacting with others. Like K, he maintained that these mechanical exchanges are so often a result of past feelings and memories,

not a spontaneous response to the present situation. So, this seems like a very healthy exercise to undertake in these modern times when tempers flare and shootings take place within seconds and the threat of nuclear war looms.

Can we suspend our actions and reactions, momentarily, to recognize the brute within?

I dare to go even one step further and mention “the wrong turn” K and Bohm thought humanity had taken. It seems this wrong turn is inherently related to “the brute within” and, if we cannot successfully curb its destructive tendencies,

that brute will lead our species to its doom.

*even though K. did not like this word, scientifically-speaking, “sublimation” means transforming a substance from one form to another via a chemical reaction and is eminently applicable.

Chanda Siddoo-Atwal

Part IV  (August 2001)

CS –      There is an interesting passage in the “Tibetan Book of the Dead” that refers to “people who have recognized ‘the clear light’, but have not developed that recognition with practice”.
I take this to mean an intellectual recognition of something, perhaps a “state” or             “experience” outside the boundaries of thought.

AA –     What do you think “practice” means?

CS –      I do not think it means a particular daily regimen or routine.

AA –     Then, dropping dependency on the intellect.

CS –      …on the intellectual process which is necessary but not sufficient –
to “explode” the limits of thought.

AA –     “Suddenly, deluded thoughts arise!” – (Ashvaghosa, The Awakening of Faith)
Where do these come from?

CS –      I think we share a common consciousness not only with other humans, but with all living creatures. Modern physics eliminates the boundaries between EVERYTHING as do the             ancient philosophies.

I have been thinking of something very exciting –

I would like to extend your metaphor of the walk at Swanwick to the different levels of    consciousness:

*          “I” as my feelings:

“I am here now, but, my God, where will I be tomorrow?” (accompanied by a feeling of       desperation – then, one is caught in an “eddy”!)

*          The Observer as the Judge of one’s thoughts who tries to struggle out of the eddy:

“How stupid to be caught in this trap! I know better”.

*          Awareness of all these states;

each thought as it arises;

the state of no-separation.

AA –     The state of no-separation: yes,

but, inclusive of distinction.

CS –      Awareness of all these levels of consciousness, simultaneously:

there is always light at the beach, even though the woods are dark.

AA –     This point needs to be clarified – it can be a source of great confusion.

*          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *          *

CS –      I think getting caught up in the eddy and
trying to struggle out of it is what we call “time”.

In the “timeless” dimension, the eddies are still there, but somehow Awareness allows   one to “skirt around” them without falling in.

AA –     One misses them.

CS –      I know you don’t like the word “time”.

Let’s define it.

AA –     Time as “change” and “suffering”, that is to say one’s passage through the world:

coming in, reaching one’s peak, the decline, death, the movement through death –

CS –      So, Time as a linear model of existence that always includes a sense of the past or future.

AA –     Yes, it cannot account for “presence” (I do not mean Nullfication or the negation of         everything or some kind of emptiness – ideas that seem to be gaining increasing                popularity).

CS –      Those are just linear models of the present! I associate Time with a linear perception of life in which there is no “explosion”.

AA –     But Time is not that alone – don’t forget, Time as Change – that definition leaves no          room for “timeliness”.

CS –      Yes, we must avoid the “vilification” of Time.

That brings us to the problem with words –

sometimes they may cause more harm than good!

AA –     I love this quotation from Maharaj:

“Realized persons are very quiet”.

CS –      Sometimes, I think we are like two lovers that cannot be kept apart

because they want to share their reality.

AA –     The phrase “shared celebration” comes to mind.

[These are personal impressions of dialogues with Professor Allan W. Anderson printed with his permission given on May 23, 2010; in no way does CS purport that these are verbatim discussions, but only excerpts recalled after conversations in which she has tried to “pluck out” their essence from her notes taken during these talks. It shall be serialized in its entirety as a tribute to his life and work in the coming issues of The Swanwick Star. This is the fourth serial installment from a compilation called “The Bird in the Verandah”]

Questioner (asking God):       So, what about your wayward children, the humans who have gone so wrong?

God (slowly nodding sagely): Yes…it was an experiment that has not been such a great success…

Questioner:                                Then, what will you do about them?

What future lies ahead?

God:                                            Why I need not do anything! They will simply destroy themselves…

[Professor Anderson got a good chuckle out of this one page-play a few years ago when I first read it out to him. In fact, I lost or discarded it after that and had to resurrect it from memory on December 26th, 2013 as it seems so relevant in retrospect – CS]

Chanda Siddoo-Atwal

I have no name,

I am as the fresh breeze of the mountains.

I have no shelter;

I am as the wandering waters.

I have no sanctuary, like the dark gods;

Nor am I in the shadow of deep temples.

I have no sacred books;

Nor am I well-seasoned in tradition.

I am not in the incense

Mounting on the high altars,

Nor in the pomp of ceremonies.

I am neither in the graven image,

Nor in the rich chant of a melodious voice.

I am not bound by theories,

Nor corrupted by beliefs.

I am not held in the bondage of religions,

Nor in the pious agony of their priests.

I am not entrapped by philosophies,

Nor held in the power of their sects.

I am neither low nor high,

I am the worshipper and the worshipped.

I am free.

My song is the song of the river

Calling for the open seas,

Wandering, wandering,

I am Life.

I have no name,

I am as the fresh breeze of the mountains.

J. Krishnamurti (from the Song of Life)

This Canadian Krishnamurti School operated from  1976 – 1981

I was fortunate enough to spend all of September 2017 on retreat at the Krishnamurti Educational Centre of Canada. I’d found my way to the Centre in June for a few days’ retreat, and was awed by the stunning location, the charming buildings and rich libraries, and the warmth and kindness that I felt from the people who care for the place. I had been in the midst of some general life upheaval, and the timing seemed ideal; I inquired as to whether a longer retreat would be possible, and was delighted to be welcomed back for a full month.

I spent my first week at the Centre meditating, reading, exploring the grounds, and attending the reading and discussion groups on the weekend. In my second week at the Centre, Oda Lindner was giving a workshop on yoga and body-meditation. I hadn’t actually planned on taking the workshop at first, but spending some time with Oda and taking her demo class earlier in the week gave me an inkling that it might be important to incorporate some yoga and physical activity into my retreat.

I’m still extremely grateful that I took this workshop, because I almost might have missed out on a vital component of my study retreat. It’s easy for me to get stuck in my brain and ignore my physical body. Oda’s workshop offered a conscious, slow approach to staying connected with the breath and body, and helped me set the foundation for my explorations throughout the rest of my stay. Not only that, but my partner Matthew, who stayed at the KECC as well for part of the month, was inspired to offer a short, related workshop on connecting with the breath and voice in relationship with others.

Early on, Oda drew attention to the mind’s innate tendency to want to achieve some goal, and asked us to check in with ourselves as to what our motive might be from moment to moment, even in a simple moment like choosing to do a yoga asana. My favorite K quote that I discovered on my June visit is: “You can understand a problem only when you don’t condemn it, when you don’t justify it, when you are capable of looking at it silently, and that is not possible when you are seeking a result.” It’s helped me a great deal to ground myself when I consciously notice my mind wanting to spin off into problem-solving mode. But Oda’s comment about motive helped me become more aware of the subtler activity happening at the unconscious level, when I’m not fully aware that there may be something I want, but I feel an internal conflict that something isn’t “right” and “should” be changed. It’s become easier to catch my mind pushing towards a goal I didn’t know I had, and quietly let it go.

Kirsten Starcher

After coming back to Vancouver from my visit to the Krishnamurti Centre, I wondered why I waited so long.  Krishnamurti has been one of my biggest influences over the last 20 years, and I’ve hosted Krishnamurti discussion groups in Vancouver over a decade ago.  The center is a perfect place to look inward and find new ways of being.

In my study plan I wrote that I’d investigate my own inner tendencies of what Krishnamurti would call violence, e.g. trying to control oneself, conforming to an ideal, or acting out of “shoulds”.  I also wanted to investigate the feeling of “home” – often that sense is elusive to me, and he described once that he always felt at home wherever he is.  The center itself was conducive to that – a perfect mix of simple living and beauty.

My perception of beauty changed; in the city I’ve since noticed how much energy is spent trying to block perceptual inputs, such as noise pollution, social pressures, and cognitive dissonance in communication.  In the simple times at Swanwick, there wasn’t any need for that, and so there was a relaxing into more unconditioned awareness, and from that a perception of beauty grew naturally.  This beauty wasn’t of trying to get there, such as in an art gallery studying paintings in depth with focus, but naturally, from a relaxed responsiveness.  Krishnamurti connected responsiveness, a full ability to respond with one’s being, with the feeling of home, and I felt some of that.

Michael Spears

(photo courtesy of Cyril Galland)

Mon séjour au Centre Krishnamurti de Swanwick a été idéal. Une retraite de trois jours à appréhender et partager nos expériences autour de l’Intelligence, l’Amour et Soi puis trois jours en solitaire pour intégrer, et profiter pleinement du charme du site. Il est exceptionnel, sa superficie et son accès direct à l’océan, en sont pour moi les principaux atouts. Très bien équipé pour permettre d’y vivre à un rythme calme et paisible.

So grateful to those involved to preserve and offer to the public this beautiful space and programs,

Cyril Galland

(Montréal, QC)