You Are Beauty / Krishnamurti - Applied in Daily Life

In the summer of 1997 and once again in autumn that same year I had a chance to recuperate in the wonderful stillness of nature – partly on my own, partly with friends and with my family and finally surprised as well, by an unexpected gift – a special love story – in a little house which is really more a hut, the sort used by mountain farmers in the valleys of the Bernese Oberland.

Krishnamurti had often wandered through this valley during the time he had lived in Tannegg Chalet in Gstaad, when he gave his talks every summer in Saanen. Nothing, therefore, was more natural for me than to involve myself once again with Krishnamurti and his teaching in these surroundings, and inspired by it, to even take on the task of writing a little book myself. Overcome as I was by the energy of this teaching and this personality, both of which had had me under their spell for twenty years or more, it seemed also quite obvious that I should follow Nalini’s call, that of an Indian woman, a doctor, whom I had met in the Krishnamurti school in Rishi Valley a few years earlier – to peep into the annual gathering in remembrance of Krishnamurti, held now as before every summer in Saanen. This brought me into contact with Friedrich Grohe and other people closely associated with Krishnamurti. Out of this contact came the request from Friedrich Grohe that I, as a psychotherapist, could sum up the influence of Krishnamurti’s teaching on psychotherapy – which in turn led to the following article which became already some­thing like a foreword to the book on hand. I shall therefore put it at the head of this small poetic work in a slightly extended form.

As the text which follows will reveal more precisely, this little book is above all meant to recapture what I have personally understood in my exploration of Krishnamurti and the teaching which he offered.

But besides that, it is also meant to be an actual report showing how this teaching may be applied. The teaching is of no use if it is not lived in our daily lives. So every now and then this actuality will pop up between the lines. When accomplished, the teaching has to be a love story in daily life, otherwise there remains something which is not fully understood. It must be a love story with the master, a love story with the teaching, a love story with the source from which it comes, a love story with life, with the scen­ery of these wonderful valleys which surround us here, and quite concretely, also a love story between human beings.

A special kind of interweaving of love stories took place that summer, love stories old and new, in this charming valley, as this book came into being.

In the true community each one is the great love for each of the others. One great love does not exclude other great love stories, on the contrary, it only helps to make them possible. When there is true love, each and every one is the first one for you. When relationships cease to be ruled by thoughts of possession, a sort of rivalry will be possible in love, which has nothing to do with competition, opposition, comparing, or wanting to be better, but rather, to practise along with the others the art of spoiling each other, to heap joy upon joy, to increase happiness, so that everyone can feel sheltered, nourished, well looked after and happy. True love promotes the love stories of others. It does not feel excluded because it includes itself and does not know any frontiers. The story of true love, of true community has yet to be written. Till now it has never really been lived on this earth on a large scale. To integrate the teaching of Krishnamurti in daily life would bring about a new story, in a way that has not yet been thought about. This book aims at stimulating and helping you towards this goal.

However, as soon as any thought of possession gets the upper hand within us, we want to restrict the love of others so as to prevent our own lack of love, our insufficiency in love and want of it from becoming visible. When love is there each one is eager to help it augment, to make the love of the other increase. Then one enjoys love, wherever it just happens to grow. Everybody competes with each other to be the first in loving, and so through loving everyone is first.

This booklet wants to sing about the intertwining of love stories, very concretely between human beings, to tell you a story, a completely new story about the joint journey into the unknown, which will emerge more from between the lines rather than from what you read in them.

Dear reader, in wanting to delve at once into the spiritual atmo­sphere of the master, you might wish to skip the following article which forms the main part of the foreword and embark straight away on the seven times seven meditations which succeed the foreword and try to grasp the special fragrance of the teaching of Krishnamurti. In that case you may equally well place the introduction at the end of your reflections as a summary or leave it out completely. But then the love story which has already been woven into the fore­word would possibly lose a little of its colour and meaning .

This little book has been thought of, rather, as an incentive to meditate, not to be read through at one sitting. I suggest that each day you choose at the most one of the seven times seven texts, that you carry them around with you, that you chew them thoroughly, digest and enjoy them. The same principle can of course be applied to the many questions which always accompany the text. Each of them is meant to provoke a minor earthquake in your mind. If it doesn’t, it means you have not really allowed yourself to be moved by it. A quick and purely intellectual understanding makes little sense. As for me, the original statements of Krishnamurti from which these texts have arisen worked inside me for many, many years before it was possible for me to develop a comprehensive view of them. And this process will probably never come to an end completely.

What is truth?

What is reality?

Truth is a pathless land. What is real cannot be understood through a concept, nor be grasped within the framework of a pattern. At any given point we can only turn towards truth, naked, empty-handed, without any preconceived opinion, as a “nobody”. We discover it from moment to moment. It manifests itself to us through immediate seeing, direct hearing. There are no experts responsible for the truth, no authority, no leader who can lead us into what is true.

No authority! There is no teacher and no taught.

That is already the summary of the entire teaching in a single sentence:

Truth is a pathless land. A fact. Evidence which anyone can directly see. The first truth.

The teaching is concerned with facts, with what is.

Or take this other statement which Krishnamurti himself had used to sum up his teaching: There is no teacher and no taught.

With this, the teaching already questions everything that human beings have achieved since thousands of years in terms of systems, methods and belief constructions, which are supposed to guarantee security and to banish fear. With just one first little glimpse into the truth of what is real all this is swept away, everything that has made up human consciousness for centuries and centuries, all condition­ing of the human spirit in relation to religion is wiped out, making way for freedom and emptiness, the prerequisites for an authentic exploration of truth and actuality.

What we call reality is that which human thought has created in order to escape from its sense of being lost, all the constructions it has put up in order to avoid the feeling of emptiness. The first step into truth is its recognition, the observation of what is. What is false is erased in this choiceless observation, it disappears, and the hidden truth behind it begins to show again.

The energy of reality is not the same as the energy of truth. The energy of truth has no centre. Therefore it is centred. The energy of reality is a dissipating as well as a dissipated, fragmented energy. Because of this it needs a centre, to hold its ground outside of truth, from which it shuts itself out. Whatever stands in the centre needs no centre.

To recognize the truth from moment to moment, to be eternally learn­ing, means to gain insight into the energy of things and of events. Energy teaches us directly. It tells you what is authentic and what is reality, an illusion, created by thought and covering the real. Truth unfolds itself from moment to moment; to live with it is an eternal becoming, an eternal process of growing ever deeper into it, which has nothing in common with the process of becoming, born out of the searching of thought.

To listen and to look are the only instruments we have, the only paths in the pathless land.

Perception is the way of truth; and truth is a state of being.

Freedom must stand at the beginning not at the end.

Transformation does not need time. The first step is the only step. To penetrate into the depths of understanding is one step, one decision, and then again and again, there is this one, this first step. Transformation, therefore, does not need time. For this reason, there is no psychological development. There is only radical change, immediate transformation, a sudden mutation.

Transformation does not need time. That which needs time lies in the field of becoming, in the field of thought, in the field of the fragmented energy of reality. Truth lies outside of time.

The first step consists in seeing what is. That is the only revolution. Real transformation is not a movement away from what is, towards something that should be. This is the way of thought, the false path on which mankind has wandered for many thousands of years. It is the path of authority, the path of searching and addiction, the path of security, the path of all established religions and belief systems. The first step, the only step is to confront what is true, to see what is true. It is to reach the truth of the moment. Each and every one of us can do it. You don’t need any training to do it. You don’t have to fulfil any conditions. Truth is directly accessible to us. Each one recog­nizes it; and nobody can explain why he recognizes it. It is so.

The ticking of the clock in the parlour fills the entire room; it expands into eternity. Sometimes one needs to be alone, to retreat. In the movement of liveliness one receives this from time to time as a gift, quite simply, quite naturally. At the moment it is good to be alone. And it is a joy, it is not loneliness. Because love unites us. You will soon be coming, great new love, and you too, great old love.

Mutation is a standing still, not a stepping in. Out of this comes transformation. What is really seen from the field of reality, what really lies suspended in the eye of the observer from this domain, begins to dissolve. That is the alchemical law of transformation: who­ever confronts reality, falls right through it and experiences truth.

To see what is, is the only revolution.

To acknowledge what is; to see what is. Be a light to yourself! This is the step which leads to enlightenment. One doesn’t need any instructions in this direction, one doesn’t need any methods nor any help. Each and every one of us can do it. The question is whether you want it. Therefore the first step is also a decision. We recognize immediately; we are not denied insight into truth. In the space of the moment, in the present, we have direct access to the richness of truth and intelligence. There are no obstacles. Whoever wants to see, can see. To see that I do not want to see, that I want to extricate myself from what is, is the beginning of seeing.

To stroll through the woods is ecstasy, the ecstasy of solitude. Nothing bothers this still observation. The eye and the ear receive everything directly: the colours, the fragrances, the light, the dancing shadows. Since there are no barriers to limit perception, seeing is beauty, listening is beau­ty, smelling is beauty. The musty odour of the forest ground mingles with the trembling light of the sun glittering through the trees, and the pearly sound of the nearby mountain stream cannot be separated from the mood one feels, brought about by the dewy, fresh morning: everything is oneness in aloneness, just one happy swirl of sensuous impressions, an undivided energy; beauty.

The journey into the depths of truth has no end. Truth is unfathomable, a space without borders. To step into it does not require time, each one can take it immediately, at any point. But there is no beginning and no end to its unfolding.

What do I not want to see?

What, very concretely, now, is my step into truth, into what is au­­th­en­tic?

What part of my truth do I not want to acknowledge, which then holds me down tight endlessly, in the network of thought, in the energy of reality?

Which falsehoods in my life do I not want to reveal to myself?

How to listen?

Listening. The art of pure listening, of pure seeing, of learning. Listen­ing is the pathless path, the path in the pathless land. To be aware: Be awake! To be passively aware.

Listen with your heart! It is through being immediately aware that the door to another dimension opens. Listening is the liberating
factor.

The well babbles and a cricket chirps endlessly. Although you are busy in the house at the moment, I still sense your being close. It is good to have you here.

To listen, without thoughts pushing their way through, to hear directly without a centre. To listen into the heart of things. To listen without any reaction from the past, without our opinions, without prejudice, without conclusions, without judgement. To listen without approving, without rejecting. Simply listening. Listening to every­thing, without a choice. To be able to listen; to be able to listen to some­body else. To be attentive to everything choicelessly. To listen to the energy of what is spoken. To recognize immediately whether it contains the centred energy of truth or the dissipative energy of reality. To recognize what is true and what is false directly; it needs no explanation, no discussion. Truth knows no contradiction.

The child is crying at the moment and you, his mother, rattle the dishes in the house. Your still presence around me while I work feels good. The love between us, will it be a tender blossom or will it give rise to a ripe fruit ? Will it soon fade or will it be constant?

Listen with all your senses, an extended listening which envelops the whole of being. Perceive, observe, without there being anybody who observes. To be observation, to be pure, empty perception. In unbiased listening there is no distance, and still it is precisely through this that the room opens up. Perception expands; it obtains wings. Through the wall of our thoughts, our memories, our prejudices, what is heard seems far away; and it is precisely because of this that the expanse is curtailed into a small, narrow space. Listening, real listening, brings with it an expansion, expansion without end into the infinite space of realness, the space that is completely familiar, the space that is common to us all, the space of the cosmos.

The boom of the airplane bores right through the expanse of space and through the energy of the soul. It vibrates in all senses. Far off, a bird twitters. You move gracefully. When I see you my heart jumps, and each touch with you frees a sobbing in my stomach.

To listen is to take part. To listen is to love. As long as we are search­ing, we are not filled with love; if it is there, what would there be left to search for?

Why are there no listeners in the world?

Why are there no lovers in the world?

Can you be free to look?

How do I look at anger, at sorrow, etc.?

How can one see totally?

When we say we see a tree or a flower or a person, do we actually see them?

The act of seeing is the only truth.

Observing, listening, looking, learning: one process! Watching, observing without an inner reaction from the past.

To look with eyes that are not conditioned; to look without the eyes of the past.

Don’t look from the past; look at things directly! Observe without a choice! Observing without inner reaction from the past. Observing, listening, looking, learning. Looking without a centre.

Goodness flowers in choiceless observation.

Looking without an inner censor. Looking without naming things. Looking out of compassion, from the heart of hearts, from the essence. Watching from the source of all things. Looking without separation. To look, to look attentively creates space, space with­in the spirit. And within this space there is stillness.

The pine trees are forever still and upright. Over the meadows and at their feet lies a soft mist. You lie before me on the grass and my heart flows over to you, embracing you completely with my ardour.

Real looking does not exclude anything. When you really look and listen there is no resistance to any part. To really look is to look without thought. Choiceless awareness has no motive and no influence. Listening and watching are the beginning of meditation.

When attention is complete there is no effort, no concentration, no conflict, no problem. Watching is the liberating factor. Looking frees the spirit from all conditioning, from all captivity in systems and concepts. To look in this way is the beginning of a life without a single problem. Watching is quite simple. Listening is quite simple. Everyone can do it, immediately. That is why we find it difficult. We don’t do it.

What is attention?

Immediate seeing ends all sorrow, all fear. Seeing makes the spirit innocent, empties it of all experience, frees it of the past.

The bees hum busily from flower to flower. These are still covered with morning dew. Silently you sit near me; I sense your warmth. A new bud begins to unfold. And in the distance the hills dissolve into a lovely blue.

To see beauty; to see the beauty of seeing.

When is learning possible?

Can we understand ourselves?

How is one to know oneself?

Can I rely on my experience?

In examining the depths of Being, the first step is to listen and to look, to observe what is, to watch in stillness. Out of this comes attention, which does not shut out anything, which is whole and without a centre. Self-knowledge is listening and looking inwards; to re­cog­nize the truth of what is with the same intensity, the same readiness. Self-knowledge, that is the next step on our journey into the unknown.

To look outside at things, at nature and at people without judgement and opinion is difficult enough. To look inside in the same way, without reaction from memory, from the treasure-house of the past, is still more difficult. To see oneself as one actually is, is a great art. This seeing frees our energy again, energy which was trapped in illusions and untruths through conditioning, in images which hold together our world, the way we want to see it.

Here, we use the word reality, to indicate what human thought lays on truth. Sometimes we will also refer to it as actuality or illusion. The word truth, then, signifies the immediate quality of the original, of what lies underneath. For this we shall also use the terms real­ness, what is real, what is true or what is actual.

To hold up reality fabricated from thought requires much energy. It uses up all our energy so that there is none left to see what is­ actually real behind it. This energy is set free when we learn to see ourselves the way we really are. It is this energy which has to be released, freely- flowing energy, which we need in order to really explore the innermost depths of Being so as to break through the armour of reality, the protective shield with which the images of reality obstruct what is authentic. To see things the way they are is not easy. As long as thought is not silenced, we cannot really see. And yet this process is effortless.

We can call this process of examining the truth and of what is real meditation. The main step along the way is self-knowledge. Self-knowledge, which also encompasses the field of psychotherapy, lays the foundation for what is actually meditation, the diving into the stillness and emptiness of truth. Self-knowledge is a movement from one moment to the next, a constant learning about oneself. To understand oneself implies to follow every feeling and every thought without interruption, as it arises, blossoms and fades. The self is a pro­cess that is constantly changing. It requires great ease and a readi­ness for truth to be able to pursue it with attention. Judgement and palliation have no place in it. It needs a sober looking into, it needs honesty and observation out of stillness and empti­ness, without any preconceived opinion. If there is a tendency in us to want to see ourselves in a particular way, to want to maintain a certain notion about­ ourselves, we will get entangled endlessly in illusions. Truth is something utterly alive. It is something absolute and yet unique at every moment.

Self-knowledge is a most scientific process. The fact must be observed the way it is. The fact itself is the teacher. When we observe it, it teaches us quite of its own accord and shows us everything that is worth knowing. To approach a fact with preconceived notions is not an intelligent thing to do. That is also why self-knowledge has nothing to do with accumulating knowledge about oneself. You can safely keep forgetting again everything you see. If what you have seen is essential, it will be there when you need it.

To understand truth in general and here especially the reality of the movement of the self, is always now, always new, always totally actual. The self belongs to the movement of reality, to that which we have grafted upon truth with our thoughts. Reality has no connection with truth; truth, however, which embraces everything, includes also reality. The self is a movement in thought and memory, a movement out of the past. It belongs to the fragmented energy of real­­ity, not to the centred energy of truth. Therefore it dissolves in true observation. It is subject to this alchemical transformation which is initiated through total attention: all that is not authentic disappears in the light of attention, until truth unfolds itself. What is real behind it, is not the higher self or some such concept produc­ed by thought. All that belongs to the unreal. Truth consists in the dissolv­ing of all this fragmented and fragmenting energy of thought, in the restoration of a centred energy, a still flame which forever burns all that is untrue. This still flame is pure attention, an empty perception, a state without borders and without a centre.

Can I know myself?

Do I want to know myself?

Am I ready to confront the shallowness and emptiness, the triteness and superficiality of the self and in observing it, free myself from it?

Can I be so completely attentive that the I disappears in this aware­ness?

The first step is the last step and at every crossroads a new decision is needed again to take this step which remains ever the same.

Be a light to yourself!

Can one be free of fear?

Can one be free of suffering?

Can one be free of conflict?

Does desire create fear?

Is life a process of infinite conflict?

Does pleasure bring happiness?

What in me gets hurt?

Can there be a balanced mind?

Self-knowledge is the observation of the I in action, which means in the mirror of relationship. Observation, self-knowledge must begin in relationship. It is only in this mirror relating to human beings, to things, to ideas that the self, the ego with its reactions out of the trea­s­ure-house of experience, becomes visible. Self-knowledge encompasses the entire field of psychotherapy: to grasp, to uncover, to understand the inner states of feelings, and in observing them, to be­come free from them. There has to be a fire of discontent in you in order to break through the mediocrity of the self, a discontent with the state of suffering and fear, of confusion, which constitutes the self. The movement of the self is a waste of energy, a constant going away from that which really is, and therefore a fragmentation of energy.

Keep discontent alive!

Self-knowledge is a re-gathering of this energy, the setting up of a new centering which is without a centre. That is one of the para­dox­es of truth: what does not have a centre is centred but that which has a centre disintegrates. Self-knowledge means to understand the whole human problem within oneself, to see that a prob­lem arises only when we do not observe the facts of life integrally, when we observe life not as a whole but as a fragmented process. To really understand and to see the problem of life, the problem of human be­ings, is to be free of it, to discover the state in which not a single conflict exists, not a single problem, to discover relationship which is without any conflict.

All said and done, the construction of the self is relatively simple, even though its appearance seems at first highly complex in the mirror of relationship.

Let us begin with what is innermost, loneliness. Right inside we always find loneliness, the inner void from which we want to escape. We do not want to be nothing, we want to be something, some­body, which is why we try to escape from this fact of loneliness. On our flight from it we construct the falsehood of the I, out of which arises our entire reality with its relationship structures and institutions moulded by thought, which make up the world of human beings.

When we avoid a fact based on feelings, fear arises in us in its place. Fear is non-acceptance of what is. Fear always points to the absence, to the suppression or splitting off of something, of feelings which would actually be in us if we allowed them to be. It needs a being face-to-face with the fact. By avoiding the fact and producing fear we have brought about an additional problem. Loneliness is still very close to the truth. It therefore stands at the entrance as we return to truth. With the emergence of fear we have already distanced ourselves quite a bit from this entrance. Fear is also unpleasant. One of the main difficulties which we need to recognize and overcome is the tendency to always want to avoid what is unpleasant and to persist with what is pleasant. That is why we look for opportunities to get away from this fear, too. In doing this we produce aggression, violence, opposition and struggle against what is real.

Aggression, violence has many faces but in essence it is always reduced to a struggle against recognizing what is. We want things to be different from what they are, the way we imagine they should be. Aggression reveals itself in the pursuit of pleasure and in the desire for security. It is hidden in dependence and in bonds to others. It mani­fests itself in the greed for possession which has brought about all the destructive relationship and family structures. It is obviously to be found in violence, in hatred, in envy, in jealousy. The envious person constantly compares the unhappiness which he wants to be rid of with the imagined happiness of others and thus creates – like all kinds of escape from that which is real – constant strife and sorrow. The mature mind does not compare. It does not measure itself against others. It experiences the evocation of psychological thoughts and feelings, the creation of a psyche, as a pure waste of energy. Running away from what is, is essentially a search for pleasure which is supposed to alleviate loneliness. This flight from what is creates fear. This whole movement of wanting to escape from oneself, together with the emergence of fear and aggression, finally ends up produc­ing a totally confused mind and with it, the mediocrity and dullness in which human beings normally live. As a result, the entire clarity which looking and listening bring with them is totally lost.

The way back to truth, the path of self-knowledge, uncovers all of this again, reveals simplicity in what is complicated. As soon as we are ready to look at it, the whole structure of the self which is trapped within this dull energy of illusion dissolves. We recognize the violence, the aggression contained in the attempt to distance ourselves from the real, and in this act it disappears. Behind it fear can be seen, fear which is left over when we have distanced ourselves from an emotional fact. In observing it, fear too disappears and also what it had hidden: pain, sadness, loneliness, can be seen again. The inseparable connection between fear and the search for pleasure becomes visible.

Loneliness too has many faces: being rejected, being excluded, being lost. The mind which cannot be hurt is rediscovered when lone­­­liness melts away through being observed. If I do not want acute hurt, if I withdraw from it through repression or splitting off, there arises in me an image of myself which does not correspond to what is true. I maintain this image for myself. I do not see myself the way I really am, but only my conception of myself. Each time it is called into question, I am threatened anew with hurt. In order to protect myself, escape is needed time and again, fresh reinforcement of the images, new armour, away from what really is, in a centre which be­comes more and more hardened. When I find my way back to the truth of my being, which is first of all loneliness and pain in the innermost, then precisely this pain, this sadness become the transform­­ing factor. Pain changes into an entrance, into a gate to another dimension. To stand still with what is always turns that which is – pain for example – into a striking force. It strikes out through all that is untrue. An innocent mind which knows love and compassion can be found, a mind which can therefore never again be hurt.

A problem only arises when it is seen fragmentarily.

This dissolution of the self, of this very personal centre, of the very personal part of reality, of suffering in the world, is the first transformation which we can experience during this process on our journey into the truth. It leads to the insight that you are the world, that your inner process is no different from the inner process of humankind in general.

You are the world. To recognize this is compassion.

There is a force within us. Often we call it the will. But our desires, our wishes, our thoughts do not really govern this force. The force is the life force within us which wants to manifest itself immediately and directly. It wants in us, that is the real order. I want – that is dis­order, resistance to life, which is always unavoidable, and which finally does not tolerate contradictions.

When there is total attentiveness there is no choice. That which is, is always given, and the natural unfolding of what is, in which good­ness can flower, is always obvious. The idea that freedom is the freedom of free choice is therefore a wrong idea. We do of course have a free choice, we can oppose the flow of life, we can follow the “I want” but it always brings disorder and suffering in its wake.

It takes great sensibility, sensitivity and flexibility to be able to follow nimbly the laws of life’s river which manifests itself in us as a force. It takes much vigilance, watchfulness and attentiveness. It requires a readiness for “Thy will be done”, a readiness to perpetually allow life to overwhelm you, a readiness to surrender back into the whole the centre of the I, which we keep wanting to build up ever again from experience, memories and desires. It also requires a sense of responsibility, a view of the whole, out of which arises a completely natural sense of responsibility for this whole.

You came and shared my solitude for a while. And now you are gone again. A temporary parting. Every now and then, love needs farewells, separation, a minor death; thus it keeps renewing itself. Love knows no continuity. Each of its encounters is the first encounter, each of its partings is forever. And yet a love relationship is not bogged down by superficialities, it does not lose itself in the turmoil of daily life. Its continuity does not depend on the movement of thought, of memory. It lives from with­in a much deeper source: from itself. For this reason love does not need our control. On the contrary, it retreats when we try to possess it. It satisfies itself, lives from within itself, takes only from itself. In the state of love we are totally sheltered, even though totally out of control.

You have gone away, for the time being for ever. And yet you are here. You fill me; your energy fills the house. I sense you in the glow of noon and in the devotion of evening, I sense you in the peal of the cow-bells and in the wind which rustles through the leaves of the sycamore tree.

As it knows no separation, the energy of love does not need the continuity of time.

A light-coloured bird perches gently on the branch which sways silently with its weight.

Discipline imposed by the will is disorder; it strikes straight lines into the wide field of wholeness, forcefully brings order into a part of it based on its own mental image and takes it to be order. Attentive­ness has its own discipline. The order which it creates comes from understanding the nature of disorder. Attentiveness leads to a life without effort, without an impulse of will in the sense of egoistic, self-centred striving. We then feel only the life force in us which is joyfully, freely and effortlessly at the service of the whole.

The life force which flows right through us expresses itself in different ways at different levels. Or to put it another way: we have different means to love.

We have just looked at the energy of the will which is at the service of the whole. The energy of sexuality which expresses itself as tenderness and sensuality is closely intertwined with it and follows similar laws.

The energy has to be free in us; not free to follow what “I” will, but free to move naturally, unhindered by taboos, pressures, mental images and conditioning. Whoever denies this freedom, who­ever wants to capture these energies within rigid patterns and structures which are finally meant to serve only his security or possessiveness in relationships, destroys all beauty. He destroys what is beautiful, destroys love, all relationship, what is authentic, and in its place generates fear and loneliness which are followed, as a result, by greed, stinginess and violence. All religions have done that, all cultures have attempted it, all societies try to exercise power, in that they want to subjugate these energies to thought and mental images.