Table of Content

Part 1 ......................................................................................................................3

Part 2 ......................................................................................................................3

Part 3 ......................................................................................................................4

Part 4 ......................................................................................................................4

Part 5 ......................................................................................................................5

Part 6 ......................................................................................................................6

Part 7 ......................................................................................................................7

Part 8 ......................................................................................................................7

Part 9 ......................................................................................................................9

Part 10 ..................................................................................................................10

Part 11 ..................................................................................................................11

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Part 1

In the space which thought creates around itself there is no love. This space

divides man from man, and in it is all the becoming, the battle of life, the agony

and fear. Meditation is the ending of this space, the ending of the me. Then

relationship has quite a different meaning, for in that space which is not made by

thought, the other does not exist, for you do not exist. Meditation then is not the

pursuit of some vision, however sanctified by tradition. Rather it is the endless

space where thought cannot enter. To us, the little space made by thought

around itself, which is the me,is extremely important, for this is all the mind

knows, identifying itself with everything that is in that space. And the fear of not

being is born in that space. But in meditation, when this is understood, the mind

can enter into a dimension of space where action is inaction. We do not know

what love is, for in the space made by thought around itself as the me, love is the

conflict of the me and the not-me. This conflict, this torture, is not love. Thought is the very denial of love, and it cannot enter into that space where the me is not. In

that space is the benediction which man seeks and cannot find. He seeks it within

the frontiers of thought, and thought destroys the ecstasy of this benediction.

Part 2

Perception without the word, which is without thought, is one of the strangest

phenomena. Then the perception is much more acute, not only with the brain, but

also with all the senses. Such perception is not the fragmentary perception of the

intellect nor the affair of the emotions. It can be called a total perception, and it is part of meditation. Perception without the perceiver in meditation is to commune

with the height and depth of the immense. This perception is entirely different

from seeing an object without an observer, because in the perception of

meditation there is no object and therefore no experience. Meditation can,

however, take place when the eyes are open and one is surrounded by objects of

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every kind. But then these objects have no importance at all. One sees them but there is no process of recognition, which means there is no experiencing.

What meaning has such meditation? There is no meaning; there is no utility.

But in that meditation there is a movement of great ecstasy which is not to be

confounded with pleasure. It is this ecstasy which gives to the eye, to the brain

and to the heart, the quality of innocency. Without seeing life as something totally

new, it is a routine, a boredom, a meaningless affair. So meditation is of the

greatest importance. It opens the door to the incalculable, to the measureless.

Part 3

When you turn your head from horizon to horizon your eyes see a vast space

in which all the things of the earth and of the sky appear. But this space is always

limited where the earth meets the sky. The space in the mind is so small. In this

little space all our activities seem to take place: the daily living and the hidden

struggles with contradictory desires and motives. In this little space the mind

seeks freedom, and so it is always a prisoner of itself. Meditation is the ending of

this little space. To us, action is bringing about order in this little space of the

mind. But there is another action which is not putting order in this little space.

Meditation is action which comes when the mind has lost its little space. This vast

space which the mind, the I, cannot reach, is silence. The mind can never be

silent within itself; it is silent only within the vast space which thought cannot

touch. Out of this silence there is action which is not of thought. Meditation is this silence.

Part 4

Meditation is one of the most extraordinary things, and if you do not know what

it is you are like the blind man in a world of bright colour, shadows and moving

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light. It is not an intellectual affair, but when the heart enters into the mind, the mind has quite a different quality: it is really, then, limitless, not only in its capacity to think, to act efficiently, but also in its sense of living in a vast space where you are part of everything. Meditation is the movement of love. It isn't the love of the

one or of the many. It is like water that anyone can drink out of any jar, whether

golden or earthenware: it is inexhaustible. And a peculiar thing takes place which

no drug or self-hypnosis can bring about: it is as though the mind enters into

itself, beginning at the surface and penetrating ever more deeply, until depth and

height have lost their meaning and every form of measurement ceases. In this

state there is complete peace not contentment which has come about through

gratification but a peace that has order, beauty and intensity. It can all be

destroyed, as you can destroy a flower, and yet because of its very vulnerability it

is indestructible. This meditation cannot be learned from another. You must begin

without knowing anything about it, and move from innocence to innocence.

The soil in which the meditative mind can begin is the soil of everyday life, the

strife, the pain, and the fleeting joy. It must begin there, and bring order, and from there move endlessly. But if you are concerned only with making order, then that

very order will bring about its own limitation, and the mind will be its prisoner. In all this movement you must somehow begin from the other end, from the other

shore, and not always be concerned with this shore or how to cross the river. You

must take a plunge into the water, not knowing how to swim. And the beauty of

meditation is that you never know where you are, where you are going, what the

end is.

Part 5

Is there a new experience in meditation? The desire for experience, the higher

experience which is beyond and above the daily or the commonplace, is what

keeps the well-spring empty. The craving for more experience, for visions, for

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higher perception, for some realization or other, makes the mind look outward, which is no different from its dependence on environment and people. The

curious part of meditation is that an event is not made into an experience. It is

there, like a new star in the heavens, without memory taking it over and holding it,

without the habitual process of recognition and response in terms of like and

dislike. Our search is always outgoing; the mind seeking any experience is

outgoing. Inward-going is not a search at all; it is perceiving. Response is always

repetitive, for it comes always from the same bank of memory.

Part 6

After the rains the hills were splendid. They were still brown from the summer

sun, and now all the green things would come out. It had rained quite heavily, and

the beauty of those hills was indescribable. The sky was still clouded and in the

air there was the smell of sumac, sage and eucalyptus. It was splendid to be

among them, and a strange stillness possessed you. Unlike the sea which lay far

down below you, those hills were completely still. As you watched and looked

about you, you had left everything down below in that little house your clothes,

your thoughts and the odd ways of life. Here you were travelling very lightly,

without any thoughts, without any burden, and with a feeling of complete

emptiness and beauty. The little green bushes would soon be still greener, and in

a few weeks' time they would have a stronger smell. The quails were calling and

a few of them flew over. Without knowing it, the mind was in a state of meditation

in which love was flowering. After all, only in the soil of meditation can this flower bloom. It was really quite marvellous, and strangely, all through the night it

pursued you, and when you woke, long before the sun was up, it was still there in

your heart with its incredible joy, for no reason whatsoever. It was there,

causeless, and was quite intoxicating. It would be there all through the day

without your ever asking or inviting it to stay with you.

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Part 7

It had rained heavily during the night and the day, and down the gullies the

muddy stream poured into the sea, making it chocolate-brown. As you walked on

the beach the waves were enormous and they were breaking with magnificent

curve and force. You walked against the wind, and suddenly you felt there was

nothing between you and the sky, and this openness was heaven. To be so

completely open, vulnerable to the hills, to the sea and to man is the very

essence of meditation. To have no resistance, to have no barriers inwardly

towards anything, to be really free, completely, from all the minor urges,

compulsions and demands, with all their little conflicts and hypocrisies, is to walk

in life with open arms. And that evening, walking there on that wet sand, with the

seagulls around you, you felt the extraordinary sense of open freedom and the

great beauty of love which was not in you or outside you but everywhere. We

don't realize how important it is to be free of the nagging pleasures and their

pains, so that the mind remains alone. It is only the mind that is wholly alone that

is open. You felt all this suddenly, like a great wind that swept over the land and

through you. There you were denuded of everything, empty and therefore utterly

open. The beauty of it was not in the word or in the feeling, but seemed to be

everywhere about you, inside you, over the waters and in the hills. Meditation is

this.

Part 8

It was one of those lovely mornings that have never been before. The sun was

just coming up and you saw it between the eucalyptus and the pine. It was over

the waters, golden, burnished such light that exists only between the mountains

and the sea. It was such a clear morning, breathless, full of that strange light that one sees not only with one's eyes but with one's heart. And when you see it the

heavens are very close to earth, and you are lost in the beauty. You know, you

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should never meditate in public, or with another, or in a group: you should meditate only in solitude, in the quiet of the night or in the still, early morning.

When you meditate in solitude, it must be solitude. You must be completely

alone, not following a system, a method, repeating words, or pursuing a thought,

or shaping a thought according to your desire. This solitude comes when the

mind is freed from thought. When there are influences of desire or of the things

that the mind is pursuing, either in the future or in the past, there is no solitude.

Only in the immensity of the present this aloneness comes. And then, in quiet

secrecy in which all communication has come to an end, in which there is no

observer with his anxieties, with his stupid appetites and problems only then, in

that quiet aloneness, meditation becomes something that cannot be put into

words. Then meditation is an eternal movement. I don't know if you have ever

meditated, if you have ever been alone, by yourself, far away from everything,

from every person, from every thought and pursuit, if you have ever been

completely alone, not isolated, not withdrawn into some fanciful dream or vision,

but far away, so that in yourself there is nothing recognizable, nothing that you

touch by thought or feeling, so far away that in this full solitude the very silence

becomes the only flower, the only light, and the timeless quality that is not

measurable by thought. Only in such meditation love has its being. Don't bother

to express it: it will express itself. Don't use it. Don't try to put it into action: it will act, and when it acts, in that action there is no regret, no contradiction, none of

the misery and travail of man.

So meditate alone. Get lost. And don't try to remember where you have been.

If you try to remember it then it will be something that is dead. And if you hold on

to the memory of it then you will never be alone again. So meditate in that

endless solitude, in the beauty of that love, in that innocency, in the new then

there is the bliss that is imperishable.

The sky is very blue, the blue that comes after the rain, and these rains have

come after many months of drought. After the rain the skies are washed clean

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and the hills are rejoicing, and the earth is still. And every leaf has the light of the sun on it, and the feeling of the earth is very close to you. So meditate in the very secret recesses of your heart and mind, where you have never been before.

Part 9

That morning the sea was like a lake or an enormous river without a ripple,

and so calm that you could see the reflections of the stars so early in the

morning. The dawn had not yet come, and so the stars, and the reflection of the

cliff, and the distant lights of the town, were there on the water. And as the sun

came up over the horizon in a cloudless sky it made a golden path, and it was

extraordinary to see that light of California filling the earth and every leaf and

blade of grass. As you watched, a great stillness came into you. The brain itself

became very quiet, without any reaction, without a movement, and it was strange

to feel this immense stillness. "Feel" isn't the word. The quality of that silence, that stillness, is not felt by the brain; it is beyond the brain. The brain can

conceive, formulate or make a design for the future, but this stillness is beyond its range, beyond all imagination, beyond all desire. You are so still that your body

becomes completely part of the earth, part of everything that is still.

And as the slight breeze came from the hills, stirring the leaves, this stillness,

this extraordinary quality of silence, was not disturbed. The house was between

the hills and the sea, over- looking the sea. And as you watched the sea, so very

still you really became part of everything. You were everything. You were the

light, and the beauty of love. Again, to say "you were a part of everything" is also wrong: the word "you" is not adequate because you really weren't there. You didn't exist. There was only that stillness, the beauty, the extraordinary sense of

love. The words you and I separate things. This division in this strange silence

and stillness doesn't exist. And as you watched out of the window, space and

time seemed to have come to an end, and the space that divides had no reality.

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That leaf and that eucalyptus and the blue shining water were not different from you.

Meditation is really very simple. We complicate it. We weave a web of ideas

round it what it is and what it is not. But it is none of these things. Because it is so very simple it escapes us, because our minds are so complicated, so time-worn

and time-based. And this mind dictates the activity of the heart, and then the

trouble begins. But meditation comes naturally, with extraordinary ease, when

you walk on the sand or look out of your window or see those marvellous hills

burnt by last summer's sun. Why are we such tortured human beings, with tears

in our eyes and false laughter on our lips? If you could walk alone among those

hills or in the woods or along the long, white, bleached sands, in that solitude you

would know what meditation is. The ecstasy of solitude comes when you are not

frightened to be alone no longer belonging to the world or attached to anything.

Then, like that dawn that came up this morning, it comes silently, and makes a

golden path in the very stillness, which was at the beginning, which is now, and

which will be always there.

Part 10

Happiness and pleasure you can buy in any market at a price. But bliss you

cannot buy for yourself or for another. Happiness and pleasure are time-binding.

Only in total freedom does bliss exist. Pleasure, like happiness, you can seek,

and find, in many ways. But they come, and go. Bliss that strange sense of joy

has no motive. You cannot possibly seek it. Once it is there, depending on the

quality of your mind, it remains timeless, causeless, and a thing that is not

measurable by time. Meditation is not the pursuit of pleasure and the search for

happiness. Meditation, on the contrary, is a state of mind in which there is no

concept or formula, and therefore total freedom. It is only to such a mind that this

bliss comes unsought and uninvited. Once it is there, though you may live in the

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world with all its noise, pleasure and brutality, they will not touch that mind. Once it is there, conflict has ceased. But the ending of conflict is not necessarily the

total freedom. Meditation is a movement of the mind in this freedom. In this

explosion of bliss the eyes are made innocent, and love is then benediction.

Part 11

Meditation is not the mere control of body and thought, nor is it a system of

breathing-in and breathing-out. The body must be still, healthy and without strain;

sensitivity of feeling must be sharpened and sustained; and the mind with all its

chattering, disturbances and gropings must come to an end. it is not the organism

that one must begin with, but rather it is the mind with its opinions, prejudices and self-interest that must be seen to. When the mind is healthy, vital and vigorous,

then feeling will be heightened and will be extremely sensitive. Then the body,

with its own natural intelligence which hasn't been spoiled by habit and taste, will

function as it should.

So one must begin with the mind and not with the body, the mind being

thought and the varieties of expressions of thought. Mere concentration makes

thought narrow, limited and brittle, but concentration comes as a natural thing

when there is an awareness of the ways of thought. This awareness does not

come from the thinker who chooses and discards, who holds on to and rejects.

This awareness is without choice and is both the outer and the inner; it is an

interflow between the two, so the division between the outer and the inner comes

to an end. Thought destroys feeling, feeling being love. Thought can offer only

pleasure, and in the pursuit of pleasure love is pushed aside. The pleasure of

eating, of drinking, has its continuity in thought, and merely to control or suppress this pleasure which thought has brought about has no meaning; it creates only

various forms of conflict and compulsion.

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Thought, which is matter, cannot seek that which is beyond time, for thought is memory, and the experience in that memory is as dead as the leaf of last autumn.

In awareness of all this comes attention, which is not the product of

inattention. It is inattention which has dictated the pleasureable habits of the body and diluted the intensity of feeling. Inattention cannot be made into attention. The

awareness of inattention is attention.

The seeing of this whole complex process is meditation from which alone

comes order in this confusion. This order is as absolute as is the order in

mathematics, and from this there is action the immediate doing. Order is not

arrangement, design and proportion; these come much later. Order comes out of

a mind that is not cluttered up by the things of thought. When thought is silent

there is emptiness, which is order.

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Document Outline

- Content

- Part 1

- Part 2

- Part 3

- Part 4

- Part 5

- Part 6

- Part 7

- Part 8

- Part 9

- Part 10

- Part 11

Table of Contents

Content

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9

Part 10

Part 11