The Urgency of Change Dialogue Group Meeting, August 15, 2021
The Urgency of Change Dialogue Group
Sunday, August 15, 2021
Zoom Online
Nine participants attended this month’s gathering, with a few alerting us they would be involved with necessary activities and unable to be present. The meeting began with a guided meditation exploring the quality of attention to the “outer” and the “inner” suggested by Krishnamurti in his talks and writings. We then focused on the chosen readings for the month, beginning with the chapter entitled “Dependence” near the end of the Krishnamurti book The Urgency of Change. K enters into a discussion of the topic with a “questioner” and brings up the issue of attachment and resistance. We alternatively read passages from the text and then explored the questions, observations, and experiences that group members were moved to share related to their own study of the chapter. A dialogue took place that was quite alive and seemingly not without some conflict, which was absorbed into the movement of the inquiry. We looked at the issue of attachment to objects, to ideas and concepts, as well as to people and relationships. This involves possessiveness in different forms.
Krishnamurti points out in the chapter that, although attachment gives rise to various problems and to pain, the solution is not to become detached. Neither attachment or detachment brings the freedom that we feel is necessary for living without division and the conflict of opposites. Both are forms of resistance. What is necessary is a flow of life like a river without any boulders. It was suggested that each of us must do the inquiry into our true nature that dissolves the barriers to the natural “flow” and awakens a life of harmony. These truths were explored and expanded in a number of ways by the participants, sometimes with a sense of resonance and sometimes less so. It was suggested that we can be in a continuous process of looking, listening, and learning about ourselves, and that our interactions can be fuel for the seeing and insight that is the essence of that process. It was asked if we can be both individuals and, at the same time, a “part” of an undivided reality. Although the ideas may have been expressed in slightly different words, these were some of the issues we investigated and which seemed to be valuable to explore. It is not easy to describe precisely all the elements of such a meeting that is alive and spontaneous.
We had planned to look into the chapter headed “Fear” because of its close links with the “Dependence” chapter, but there was not enough time to do so. It would probably be appropriate to tackle the “Fear” chapter at our next meeting in September.
