On Right Livelihood

So, the mind is the product of time, and time exists when love is denied; therefore, love is not of time. love is not a coin to be distributed. Giving you something, giving you satisfaction, giving you courage to fight with - all these belong to the field of time, which is of the mind. Therefore, mind destroys love. It is because we as so-called civilized people are cultivating the mind, the intellect, the verbal expression, the technique, that there is no love; and that is why there is this confusion, why our troubles, our miseries multiply. It is because we are seeking an answer through the mind that there is no answer to any of our problems, that wars succeed wars, disasters follow disasters. The mind has created these problems, and we are trying to solve them on their own level, which is that of the mind. So, it is only when the mind ceases that there is love, and it is only love that will solve all our problems, like sunshine and darkness. There is no relationship between the mind and love. Mind is of time, love is not of time. You can think about a person whom you love, but you cannot think about love. love cannot be thought about; though you may identify yourself with a person, a country, a church, the moment you think about love, it is not love - it is merely mentation. What is thought about is not love, and there is emptiness in the heart only when the mind is supremely active. Because the mind is active, it fills the empty heart with the things of the mind; and with these things of the mind we play, we create problems. The playing with problems is what we call activity, and our solution of the problems is still of the mind. Do what you will, build churches, invent new parties, follow new leaders, adopt political slogans, they will never solve our problems. The problems are the product of the mind, and for the mind to solve its own problem it has to stop, for only when the mind stops is there love. love cannot be thought about, love cannot be cultivated, love cannot be practiced. The practice of love, the practice of brotherhood, is still within the field of the mind; therefore, it is not love. When all this has stopped, then love comes into being, then you will know what it is to love. Then love is not quantitative, but qualitative. You do not say, ''I love the whole world,'' but when you know how to love one, you know how to love the whole. Because we do not know how to love one, our love of humanity is fictitious. When you love, there is neither one nor many - there is only love. It is only when there is love that all our problems can be solved, and then we shall known its bliss and its happiness.

So, your sympathy is not love. Is forgiveness love? Let us go into it and you will see. I hope you are experiencing as I am talking, not merely listening to words. Is forgiveness love? What is implied in forgiveness? You insult me and I resent it, remember it; and then, either through compulsion or through repentance, I say, ''I forgive you.'' First I retain, and then I reject. Which means what? I am still the central figure. I am still important; it is I who am forgiving somebody. Surely, as long as there is the attitude of forgiving, it is I who am important, not the man who is supposed to have insulted me. So, when I accumulate resentment and then deny that resentment, which you call forgiveness, it is not love. A man who loves obviously has no enmity, and to all these things he is indifferent. So, sympathy, forgiveness, the relationship of possessiveness, jealousy, and fear - all these things are not love. They are all of the mind, are they not? As long as the mind is the arbiter, there is no love, for the mind arbitrates only through possessiveness, and its arbitration is merely possessiveness in different forms. The mind can only corrupt love, it cannot give birth to love, it cannot give beauty. You can write a poem about love, but that is not love.

Now, do you call it love when in your relationship with your wife there is possessiveness, jealousy, fear, constant nagging, dominating, and asserting? Can that be called love? When you possess a person and thereby create a society which helps you to possess the person, do you call that love? When you use somebody for your sexual convenience or in any other way, do you call that love? Obviously it is not. That is, where there is jealousy, where there is fear, where there is possessiveness, there is no love. You may call it love, but it is not love. Surely, love does not admit of contention, of jealousy. When you possess, there is fear and though you may call it love, it is far from love. Experience it, sirs and ladies, as we go along. You are married and have children; you have wives or husbands whom you possess, whom you use, of whom you are afraid or jealous. Be aware of that and see if it is love. You may see a beggar in the street; you give him a coin and express a word of sympathy. Is that love? Is sympathy love? What does that mean? By giving a coin to the beggar, sympathizing with his state, have you solved the problem? I am not saying that you should not be sympathetic - we are inquiring into the question of love. Is it love when you give a coin to the beggar? You have something to give, and when you give it, is that love? That is, when you are conscious of giving, is that love? Obviously, when you give consciously, it is you who are important, not the beggar. So, when you give and you express sympathy, you are important, are you not? Why should you have something to give? You give a coin to the beggar; the multimillionaire also gives and is always sympathetic to poor humanity. What is the difference between you and him? You have ten coins, and you give one; he has umpteen coins, and he gives a few more. He has got that money through acquiring, multiplying, revolutionizing, exploiting. When he gives, you call it charity, philanthropy; you say, ''How noble.'' Is that noble? (Laughter) Do not laugh, sirs, you also want to do the same thing. When you have and you give something, is that love? Why is it that you have and others have not? You say it is the fault of society. Who has created society? You and I. Therefore, to attack society, we have to begin with ourselves.

Questioner: You are telling us every day that the root cause of our trouble and ugliness in life is the absence of love. How is one to find the pearl of real love?

Krishnamurti: To answer this question fully, one must think negatively because negative thinking is the highest form of thinking. Mere positive thinking is conformity to a pattern; therefore, it is not thinking at all - it is adjustment to an idea, and an idea is merely the product of the mind, therefore unreal. So, to think this problem through completely, fully, we must approach it negatively - which does not mean denial of life. Do not jump to conclusions but follow step by step, if you kindly will. If you will follow this experience deeply and not merely verbally, then as we proceed you will find out what love is. We are going to inquire into love. Mere conclusions are not love; the word love is not love. Let us begin very near in order to go very far.

Krishnamurti: You cannot reconcile creativeness with technical achievement. You may be perfect in playing the piano and not be creative; you may play the piano most brilliantly and not be a musician. You may be able to handle color, to put paint on canvas most cleverly, and not be a creative painter. You may create a face, an image out of a stone because you have learned the technique, and not be a master creator. Creation comes first, not technique, and that is why we are miserable all our lives. We have technique - how to put up a house, how to build a bridge, how to assemble a motor, how to educate our children through a system - we have learned all these techniques, but our hearts and minds are empty. We are first-class machines; we know how to operate most beautifully, but we do not love a living thing. You may be a good engineer, you may be a pianist, you may write in a good style in English or Marathi or whatever your language is, but creativeness is not found through technique. If you have something to say, you create your own style; but when you have nothing to say, even if you have a beautiful style, what you write is only the traditional routine, a repetition in new words of the same old thing. So, if you watch yourself very critically, you will see that technique does not lead to creativeness, but when you have creativeness, you can have technique within a week. To express something there must be something to express; you must have a song in your heart to sing. You must have sensitivity to receive in order to express, and the expression is of very little importance. The expression is important only when you want to convey it to another, but it has very little importance when you write for your own amusement.

Krishnamurti: Sir, I do not know if you have discovered your relationship with nature. There is no ''right'' relationship, there is only the understanding of relationship. Right relationship implies the mere acceptance of a formula, as does right thought. Right thought and right thinking are two different things. Right thought is merely conforming to what is right, what is respectable, whereas right thinking is movement, it is the product of understanding, and understanding is constantly undergoing modification, change. Similarly, there is a difference between right relationship and understanding our relationship with nature. What is your relationship with nature? - nature being the rivers, the trees, the swift-flying birds, the fish in the water, the minerals under the earth, the waterfalls and shallow pools. What is your relationship to them? Most of us are not aware of that relationship. We never look at a tree, or if we do, it is with a view of using that tree either to sit in its shade or to cut it down for lumber. In other words, we look at trees with a utilitarian purpose; we never look at a tree without projecting ourselves and utilizing it for our own convenience. We treat the earth and its products in the same way. There is no love of earth, there is only usage of earth. If one really loved the earth, there would be frugality in using the things of the earth. That is, sir, if we were to understand our relationship with the earth, we should be very careful in the use we made of the things of the earth. The understanding of one's relationship with nature is as difficult as understanding one's relationship with one's neighbor, wife, and children. But we have not given a thought to it, we have never sat down to look at the stars, the moon, or the trees. We are too busy with social or political activities. Obviously, these activities are escapes from ourselves, and to worship nature is also an escape from ourselves. We are always using nature, either as an escape or for utilitarian ends - we never actually stop and love the earth or the things of the earth. We never enjoy the rich fields, though we utilize them to feed and clothe ourselves. We never like to till the earth with our hands - we are ashamed to work with our hands. There is an extraordinary thing that takes place when you work the earth with your hands. But this work is done only by the lower castes; we upper classes arc much too important apparently to use our own hands! So, we have lost our relationship with nature. If once we understood that relationship, its real significance, then we would not divide property into yours and mine; though one might own a piece of land and build a house on it, it would cease to be ''mine'' or ''yours'' in the exclusive sense - it would be more a means of taking shelter. Because we do not love the earth and the things of the earth but merely utilize them, we are insensitive to the beauty of a waterfall, we have lost the touch of life, we have never sat with our backs against the trunk of a tree; and since we do not love nature, we do not know how to love human beings and animals. Go down the street and watch how the bullocks are treated, their tails all out of shape. You shake your head and say, ''Very sad.'' But we have lost the sense of tenderness, that sensitivity, that response to things of beauty; and it is only in the renewal of that sensitivity that we can have understanding of what is true relationship. That sensitivity does not come in the mere hanging of a few pictures, or in painting a tree, or putting a few flowers in your hair; sensitivity comes only when this utilitarian outlook is put aside. It does not mean that you cannot use the earth, but you must use the earth as it is to be used. Earth is there to be loved, to be cared for, not to be divided as ''yours'' and ''mine.'' It is foolish to plant a tree in a compound and call it ''mine.'' It is only when one is free of exclusiveness that there is a possibility of having sensitivity, not only to nature, but to human beings and to the ceaseless challenges of life.

We have touched upon many things during the course of these Sunday talks, but it seems to me that one of the most important questions to discuss and find out the significance of is that of time. The lives of most of us are rather sluggish - like still waters, they are dull, dreary, ugly, and insipid - and some of us, realizing this, bury ourselves in political, social, or religious activities, and thereby we think we can enrich our lives. But surely, such action is not enrichment because our lives are still empty; though we may talk about political reform, yet our minds and hearts continue to be dull. We may be very active socially or may dedicate our lives to religion, yet the meaning of virtue is still a matter of ideas, of mere ideation. So, do what we may, we find our lives to be dull; they are without much significance, for mere action without understanding does not bring about enrichment or freedom. So, if I may, I would like to talk a little about what is time because I think the enrichment, the beauty and significance of that which is timeless, of that which is true, can be experienced only when we understand the whole process of time. After all, we are seeking, each in his own way, a sense of happiness, of enrichment. Surely, a life that has significance, the riches of true happiness, is not of time. Like love, such a life is timeless; and to understand that which is timeless, we must not approach it through time but rather understand time. We must not utilize time as a means of attaining, realizing, apprehending the timeless. But that is what we are doing most of our lives - spending time in trying to grasp that which is timeless. So, it is important to understand what we mean by time because I think it is possible to be free of time. It is very important to understand time as a whole, and not partially; but I will have to deal with it as rapidly and as briefly as possible because I have many questions to answer and this is the last evening of these talks. So, I hope you will not mind if I am very brief and to the point.