Notes from reading: Total Freedom by J Krishnamurti

I got to know about  “J Krishnamurti” long back when my sister went to study at KFI Rajghat Besant school Banaras.

But sometime back I got to know about his writing and viewpoint about life and all things Philosophy.  I am still in process of becoming a regular reader.

Total Freedom has been one of the longest reading for me so far. It feels great that I finally finished it after 20-25 days. I am hoping to finish up reading all his writings over few years time.

Big thanks to Naval Ravikant for recommending this book in one of his podcast. I will highly recommend everyone reading this this.

These are some of my notes from the book :

1. What you are is the result of the past and what you will be tomorrow is what you are now.
2. Time and thought are the root of fear.
3. We depend on others so much to be helped, to be encouraged, to solve our problems; therefore, out of our confusion we create authority, the gurus, the priests.
4. Learning implies not only observing visually, optically, but also observing without any distortion, seeing things exactly as they are.
5. Truth is very dangerous because it brings a revolution in oneself.
6. Where there is division there must be conflict. Conflict with all its violence is a wastage of energy. The gathering of total energy is the beginning of silence.
7. If you want to see “heaven” you must be silent.
8. If we apply our mind we can solve anything.
9. Confusion arises when there is division, which is inattention.
10. Compassion is the highest form of intelligence.
11. Emptiness in yourself can never be filled by something else.
12. How can there be a relationship between two people when each one is pursuing his own desires, ambitions, greeds?
13. Man has done everything on earth possible to run away from the actuality of daily living with all its complexities.
14. What mankind has done is quite incredible and shocking, not only toward other human beings, but also in himself.
15. When there is no observer but merely observation then there is no conflict.
16. Enlightenment is where you are. And where you are, you have to understand yourself.
17. If I have cause to love you—because you give me comfort, psychologically, physically, sexually, morally—it is not love.
18. Meditation implies a quality of mind that is absolutely silent. Not made silence, not a contrived act brought about through will, but a silence that comes naturally when you have established order, relationship, and behavior.
19. We are the world. The world is you and me, the world is not separate from you and me. We have created this world—the world of violence, the world of wars, the world of religious divisions, sex, anxieties, the utter lack of communication with each other, with no sense of compassion, consideration for another.
20. All human beings, radically, basically, are afraid, anxious, in sorrow, confused, unhappy, with occasional joy; psychologically it is a constant movement, wherever human beings are it is the same stream.
21. Attachment gives a certain occupation to the mind; you constantly think about something. The brain and the mind say, “I must be occupied with something”—with my god, with my sex, with my drink; “I must be occupied”—with the kitchen, or with some social order, or commune, or whatever it is.
22. Why is one human being attached to another? Does not attachment breed fear, fear of losing what one is attached to? Being attached, you may become jealous, frightened, anxious, which are obvious phenomena. You are attached because of your own insufficiency, loneliness. And so out of your own insufficiency, loneliness, a sense of lacking, you cling to another. So is attachment love? Where there is attachment there must be exploitation. And we use that word love to cover up all this. And is love jealousy?
23. In attachment there is fear, there is anxiety, there is hate, all the conflicts in relationship; and where there is conflict can there be love? Where there is ambition, can there be love? When you strip yourself of ambition, anxiety, attachment, and understand deeply the meaning and the significance of pleasure and desire, then you perhaps come upon that strange thing called love.
24. Suppose I am attached to a person. In that attachment and in the consequences of that attachment are innumerable pains, jealousy, anxiety, dependency, the whole consequence of attachment. In that attachment to the person there is division immediately. Now is that attachment, the feeling of dependence, clinging, holding on to somebody, different from me? Or I am that? I am attachment. If one realizes that, conflict ends. It is so. Not that I must get rid of it, not that I must be independent, detached; detachment is attachment; if I try to become detached I am attached to that detachment.
25. There is only one thing. A mind that is very clear is free from all entanglements of attachment. Such a mind is a light to itself. Therefore, it does not want an experience, there is nothing to experience.
26. When there is an ending to attachment—completely, not just to persons and ideas but the whole process of attachment, with all the consequences of that—there is a totally different state of mind.
27. If you take a journey into yourself, empty all the content that you have collected and go very, very deeply, then there is that vast space, that so-called emptiness, that is full of energy. And in that state alone there is that which is most sacred, most holy.
28. If you leave all the psychological memories, hurts, pains, behind, every day, then it means dying and living are together. In that there is no fear.
29. Meditation can only be actual, truthful, honest, when there is no fear, no hurt, no anxiety, no sorrow. Meditation can only take place when there is no conscious effort made to meditate. I am afraid it goes against everything you believe.
30. If you end all conflict, the mind naturally becomes quiet. And when the mind is absolutely silent, without any movement of thought, then perhaps you will see something, perhaps there is something sacred beyond all words. And this man has sought everlastingly, something that is beyond measure, beyond thought, which is incorruptible, unnameable, eternal. That can only take place when the mind is absolutely free and completely silent.
31. If I live completely without psychological time, it is an extraordinary thing. Time means accumulation. Time means remembrance. Time means accumulating knowledge about oneself. But when there is no time at all, psychologically, there is nothing.
32. When you yourself become both the teacher and the disciple—disciple being a man who is learning, learning, learning, not accumulating knowledge—then you are an extraordinary human being.