Passages from The Mystique of Enlightenment

The Mystique of Enlightenment - U.G. Krishnamurti

'Outside' and 'inside' are created by thought. When there is no movement of thought, you don't know whether it is inside or outside. This is just like a mirror. This is a live mirror reflecting things exactly as they are. There is nobody here: I don't see anything; the whole of my body is reflecting things exactly the way they are out there.

The Mystique of Enlightenment - U.G. Krishnamurti

 

The recognizing and naming mechanism is in the background except when there is a need for it. This absence of the movement of thought which recognizes and names things is the state of samadhi, sahaja (natural) samadhi. You imagine that samadhi is something he goes into and comes out of. Not at all; he's always there. Whether the eyes of such a man are open or closed, he does not know what he is looking at. A person who has come into such a state of samadhi is like a madman and a child rolled into one.

The Mystique of Enlightenment - U.G. Krishnamurti

 

Madcaps function in exactly the same way -- the thoughts are disconnected, disjointed things, and so the actions are also disconnected, the feelings are also disconnected. But their thoughts are accompanied by hallucinations, mental images, seeing something that isn't there -- that's the only difference. This state is always a state of wonder; he doesn't know what he is looking at, he doesn't know what he is smelling, and yet his senses are working at their peak capacities, extraordinarily sensitive, taking in everything.

The Mystique of Enlightenment - U.G. Krishnamurti

 

Q: Why am I not in the state you are describing?

UG: Because there is a constant demand on your part to experience everything that you look at, everything that you are feeling inside. Constantly, because if you don't do that, you are coming to an end -- 'you' as you know yourself, 'you' as you experience yourself, are coming to an end -- and you do not want that to come to an end; you want the continuity. So all spiritual pursuits are in the direction of strengthening that continuity. It's a self-centered activity. Through self-centered activity, how can you be free from the activities of the self? (I use the word 'self' in quotation marks.) So all your experiences, all your meditations, all your sadhana, all that you do is a selfcentered activity -- it is strengthening the self, it is adding momentum, gathering momentum, so it is taking you in the opposite direction. Whatever you do to be free from the self also is a self-centered activity.