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Q. Speech comes under two centres, doesn't it? A. More, even. Generally it is partly instinctive, partly moving, partly intellectual, and it may be emotional, so it may include all four functions. Q. Is the intellectual part of each separate centre the better part, and the one to try and maintain, as against the emotional and mechanical parts of each centre? A. All parts are equally necessary, but each part must do its own work. Parts are not wrong in themselves, each of them has its own function, but if they replace one another, their work becomes wrong. You see, the idea that we do not use the whole of our brain but only part of it is not a new one, but psychological systems do not explain what we don't use, because parts of centres are not on the same level—they are really different machines. This system gives a real anatomy of our brain and generally of our whole mentality. So this is a very important point, and if one begins to observe oneself from the point of view of attention, one can study the different values of one's mental processes. This is the key to these machines. Q. What is the difference between the moving part of the intellectual centre and the intellectual part of the moving centre? A. They are completely different. Intellectual part of moving centre can control all our most complicated movements, when we have to invent new movements. Suppose one invents a very complicated machine, or works with a very difficult machine, or does very intricate handwork which needs constant attention and constant self-remembering even, in order not to break the whole thing; that would be the work of the intellectual part of moving centre. And the moving part of the intellectual centre is the registering or formatory apparatus—a card-index system in the brain. It is quite useful in its place, but it is used for wrong purposes. Suppose, for instance, that one throws those cards in the air and tries to make deductions from the way they come down; that would be wrong work of the formatory apparatus—and that is what we usually do. Q. When you spoke about adjusting things, did you mean trying to make centres work better? What will guide them to this better working? A. All work on yourself—self-study, self-knowledge, self-remembering. First we have to know the machine and then we have to learn to control it. We have to readjust functions so that each does its own rightful work. Most of our activity consists of one centre doing the work of another centre. Our incapacity to reach our normal level lies in our inability to make our centres work rightly. Many inexplicable things we observe are due to wrong work of centres. Q. Does wrong work of centres mean interference with one another? A. There are two forms of wrong work of centres. Either they interfere, that is, one works instead of another, or one takes energy from another.
Sometimes centres have to work for each other. If, for some reason, one centre stops working, the machine is so arranged that another centre can continue its work for a time to avoid an interruption. The original idea of such an arrangement is quite right, but in actual life it has become the cause of mental and physical disturbances, because one centre cannot work properly for another. And in the state of identification they like to do wrong work instead of their own work. It has become a kind of bad habit, and by mixing functions the centres begin to mix energies, trying to get more potent energies for which they are not adapted. Q. I find it difficult to see instances of wrong work of centres. My only observation is that I often experience a sensation of unnecessary excitement. A. You can see examples when people become unnecessarily emotional in relation to things which would be better done without any emotion. Q. How can one stop this interference? A. Our functions are at present conditioned by our state of consciousness. There is a slight variation: we can be a little more conscious than we are— a little more or much less. That affects functions, for if you are more awake functions produce better results, if you are more asleep they produce worse results. This we can observe, but as a principle you must understand that functions and states of consciousness are independent of each other and exist by themselves. The state of consciousness affects functions, and increased consciousness will create new functions. Complete, real awakening will produce new functions which we do not have now. Q. The thing to aim at is a perfect adjustment of the four centres? A. Yes, this is the starting-point. After that a man can think about creating higher states of consciousness—about being conscious of himself and then about being conscious of things outside himself. This will correspond to the working of higher centres. One centre cannot be improved by itself. All must be improved, must come to normal working. You see, the human machine is very cleverly made and everything in it can be used for the same purpose. But on the ordinary level the work of centres is not fully co-ordinated, they live too independently, and at the same time they hinder one another and use one another's energy. Every centre is adapted to work with a certain kind of energy, and it receives exactly what it needs; but all the centres steal from one another, and so a centre that needs a higher kind of energy is reduced to working with a lower kind, or a centre suited for working with a less potent energy uses a more potent, more explosive energy. This is how the machine works at present. Imagine several furnaces—one has to work on crude oil, another on wood, a third on petrol. Suppose the one designed for wood is given petrol: we can expect nothing but explosions. And then imagine
a furnace designed for petrol and you will see that it cannot work properly on wood or coal. We must distinguish four energies working through us: physical or mechanical energy—for instance, moving this table; life energy which makes the body absorb food, reconstruct tissues, and so on; psychic or mental energy, with which the centres work, and most important of all, energy of consciousness. Energy of consciousness is not recognized by psychology and by scientific schools. Consciousness is regarded as part of psychic functions. Other schools deny consciousness altogether and regard everything as mechanical. Some schools deny the existence of life energy. But life energy is different from mechanical energy, and living matter can be created only from living matter. All growth proceeds with life energy. Psychic energy is the energy with which centres work. They can work with consciousness or without consciousness, but the results are different, although not so different that the difference can be easily distinguished in others. One can know consciousness only in oneself. For every thought, feeling or action, or for being conscious, we must have corresponding energy. If we have not got it, we go down and work with lower energy—lead merely an animal or vegetable life. Then again we accumulate energy, again have thoughts, can again be conscious for a short time. Even an enormous amount of physical energy cannot produce a thought. For thought a different, a stronger solution is necessary. And consciousness requires a still quicker, more explosive energy. Q. If no amount of psychic energy can produce conscious energy, what difference does it make how much psychic energy I use? A. You want psychic energy for quite different purposes. For instance, you have to think with psychic energy. Q. I have found that trying to keep attention fixed uses a great deal of energy. Does it mean I do it in a wrong way? A. No, you have to use energy to keep attention. This is work, and work needs energy, although on the other hand it saves energy—it saves waste of energy in another direction. If you are doing things without attention, it will mean a much greater loss. Q. Why is it so difficult to control attention? A. Lack of habit. We are too accustomed to letting things happen. When we want to control attention or something else, we find it difficult, just as physical work is difficult if we are not accustomed to it. Q. Why should moments of consciousness be so rare? Is it a question of energy? A. No fuel. If you have no electricity, or if you have a pocket torch with a bad battery, you may have a flash and then nothing. Consciousness is light, light is the result of a certain energy; if there is no energy there is no light.
Q. Does the secret of all development of consciousness lie in the conservation and control of energy? A. No, not all the secret, though conservation and increase of energy is very important. But in itself it is not enough; one has to know how to control it. Energy is the mechanical side of consciousness. We cannot begin with the idea of control. In order to control one small thing we must know the whole machine. First, we have to stop waste of energy; second, collect it by self-remembering; then, adjust things. We cannot begin in any other way. Q. Can energy be stored? A. Yes, energy can be stored when you are able to store it. But at first the question is not about storing but about not wasting. We would have enough energy for everything we want to do if we did not waste it on unnecessary things. For instance, the reason why we are so formatory is that we are too dull, we do not feel enough. We think we feel, but this is an illusion. And the reason why we feel so little is because we have no energy available for the emotional centre. Leaks of energy were already spoken about, but the worst of all is expressing negative emotions. If you can stop the expression of negative emotions, you will save energy and never feel the lack of it. We can only hope to become conscious beings if we use in the right way the energy that is now used in the wrong way. The machine can produce enough energy, but you can waste it on being angry or irritated or something like that, and then very little remains. The normal organism produces quite enough energy not only for all centres but also for storing. Production is all right, but expenditure is wrong. These leaks have to be studied, because with some kinds of leaks it is not worth going on until they are stopped, for the more one accumulates energy, the more will leak out. It would be like pouring water into a sieve. Certain negative emotions produce precisely such leaks. In certain situations some people go through a whole range of negative emotions so habitual that they do not even notice them. It may occupy only five minutes or five seconds, but it may be sufficient to spend all the energy their organism produced for twenty-four hours. I want particularly to draw your attention to this idea of negative emotion and the state of negative emotion. This is really the second important point; the first referred to consciousness—that we are not conscious and that we can become conscious. It is necessary to realize that there is not a single useful negative emotion, useful in any sense. Negative emotions are all a sign of weakness. Next, we must realize that we can struggle with them; they can be conquered and destroyed, because there is no real centre for them. If they had a real centre, like instinctive emotions, there would be no chance; we would remain for ever in the power of negative emotions. So it is lucky for us that they have no real
centre; it is an artificial centre that works, and this artificial centre can be abolished. When this is done, we will feel much better for it. Even the realization that it is possible is very much, but we have many convictions, prejudices and even 'principles' about negative emotions, so it is very difficult to get rid of the idea that they are necessary. Try to think about it, and if you have any questions I will answer them. Q. You said we had no positive emotions? A. We have no positive emotions; we call positive emotion an emotion that cannot become negative, and all our emotions, even the best we can have in our present state, can become negative at any moment. Also, by their scope, our emotions are too small for positive emotions. Positive emotions include very much, whereas our emotions are very narrow. So at present we have no positive emotions, but negative emotions are there. Q. And if we become free of negative emotions? A. Then we can have positive emotions. Some negative emotions can be simply destroyed, but some others we can dispose of only by transforming them into positive. Only, that is very far from us now; we cannot do it at present; now we can only prepare the ground for that, chiefly by creating right attitudes, for mental work comes first. We create right mental attitudes by understanding that negative emotions serve no useful purpose and by realizing how much we lose by allowing ourselves the pleasure of having them. Then perhaps we will have enough energy to do something about them. Q. To do something about them is to stop them? A. We have to begin with right understanding, right attitude. As long as we think negative emotions are unavoidable, or even useful for self-expression, or something like that, we can do nothing. A certain mental struggle is necessary to realize that they have no useful function in our life and that at the same time all life is based on them. There are many strange things in us. First, there are things that could be conscious and are not; and second, we spoil our life by negative emotions for which nature has not even provided a centre, so that we must make one artificially. What is mechanical? What is not normal, what is unnatural, is most mechanical. Q. Can you always tell a negative emotion from a genuine one? A. You can tell it by identification, because two things are always present in negative emotions—identification and negative imagination. Without negative imagination and identification negative emotions cannot exist. Q. When you are in the middle of having a negative emotion such as bad temper, you cannot stop it just by thinking? A. No, but you can prepare the ground beforehand. If you can create a right attitude, then after some time it will help you to stop the negative emotion in the beginning. When you are in the middle of it you cannot
stop it; then it is too late. You must not let yourself get into a bad temper; you must not justify it. Q. From what you say it seems to me you are presupposing an 'I' higher than others who can do this? A. Not higher, but some intellectual 'I's are free from the emotional centre and can see things impartially. They can say 'I had this negative emotion all my life. Did I get a penny? No. I only paid, and paid and paid. That means it is useless.' Q. Have we emotions that are not negative? A. Certainly, but not positive. They are not negative yet, but can turn negative the next moment. Q. But it seems to me there are circumstances that simply induce one to have negative emotions! A. This is one of the worst illusions we have. We think that negative emotions are produced by circumstances, whereas all negative emotions are in us, inside us. This is a very important point. We always think our negative emotions are produced by the fault of other people or by the fault of circumstances. We always think that. Our negative emotions are in ourselves and are produced by ourselves. There is absolutely not a single unavoidable reason why somebody else's action or some circumstance should produce a negative emotion in me. It is only my weakness. No negative emotion can be produced by external causes if we do not want it. We have negative emotions because we permit them, justify them, explain them by external causes, and in this way we do not struggle with them. Q. Is there any reason why we are so anxious to keep them? A. Habit. We are too accustomed to them; and we cannot sleep without them. What would many people do without negative emotions? This habit is so strong that special work is necessary to get rid of them. But in the beginning work on negative emotions is two-fold: studying and trying not to express them. Real work on negative emotions comes later. You cannot study them if you express them. If you try to stop expressing them, then you can see and study them. Q. Is not changing one's points of view a method of struggling with them? A. Quite right, only it is not sufficient by itself. Real struggle begins with struggling with identification. If you destroy identification, negative emotions will become weaker by themselves. But of course change of points of view is also very necessary. Q. I understood you to say that struggling with negative emotions is useless, but we must study and observe them. Is this correct? A. Struggle with negative emotions needs very many efforts; the habit is too strong. At first you must simply study and attempt to struggle with the expression of negative emotions. Now, if you struggle with one
emotion you may create two instead. In time, indirectly, one can gain mastery over emotions. But the first step is study. Q. Can one have negative emotions and be in good health? A. The word 'health' must be taken in a broader sense, from the point of view of the system. We cannot take it in the ordinary sense of physical manifestations—actual absence of physical illness—because one of the first necessities of health is right work of centres. People whose centres work wrongly are not healthy. The idea of health must be enlarged, it cannot be taken narrowly. Q. About right work of centres—I do not see how you can prevent emotional centre interfering with the work you are trying to do with the intellectual. A. It interferes all the time. You can do nothing about it until you have conquered negative emotions and have learned not to identify. When you cease to identify, negative emotions cease to have power, because they work only on the basis of identification. Q. When you feel an unpleasant emotion, why is it necessary not to express it? A. It is the same as in relation to unnecessary talk. Ask yourself: is it useful, is it necessary to express them? The idea is to create resistance, otherwise we cannot observe. And this creation of resistance is the introduction to the study of emotions. We cannot see them without it. Q. Why is it that if you try to resist them it brings about a complete stop of thought? A. Lack of practice. In the beginning everything stops. Q. If you do not express unpleasant emotions, is it good bottling them up? A. Try. You must not believe anything. If you find that it is good to express them, we will argue. I will then say that you cannot control this expression and that, if you observe, you will find it better not to express them. The question is, can you refrain from expressing them? Much time and many other things besides are necessary in order really not to express unpleasant emotions. Q. Why is it that it gives a feeling of relief to express anger or irritation? A. There is a worm in you that wants to express itself. Then, when it expresses itself you feel relief, but in this way it becomes stronger and has more and more control over you. When you realize that nobody else is responsible for your irritation, little by little you will begin to feel differently. We have much more power over expression of negative emotions than we think, and we can learn not to express them. Even in ordinary life we do not always express negative emotions; in certain conditions we know that it would be dangerous. And if we can control the expression of them in certain conditions, we can control it in all conditions, if we try.
Q. May not restraint from expressing negative emotions, commonly described as 'letting off steam', have a harmful effect? A. There is no danger. We cannot produce a restraint sufficiently strong to harm ourselves. 'Letting off steam' as a relief is an illusion. It makes us lose energy. Expression of negative emotions is always mechanical, so it can never be useful. But resistance to it is conscious. Q. If we must not have negative emotions, this will abolish all emotional life! A. Quite the opposite. Now we have no emotional life, but only an imitation. The idea is to have an emotional life. Real possibilities of knowing are in the emotional centre. Q. The same amount of exhaustion is incurred by controlling as by releasing. What then can I gain by trying to control the expression of anger? A. It is quite a wrong assumption that it is the same amount of energy, because control increases energy. It may be that you have to expend a certain amount of energy to control some emotion, but next moment, since you do not spend energy on this useless emotion, control will increase your energy. This is the chemical action of control. Q. My experience is that suppressing the expression of a negative emotion makes one tired. A. You can become tired if you only suppress the expression. But I never said suppress, I said, 'Do not express, find reasons for not expressing'. Suppression can never help, because sooner or later the negative emotion will jump out. If you merely suppress, you keep the identification and only shut off the external expression. It is a question of finding reasons, of thinking rightly, because expression of negative emotion is always based on some kind of wrong thinking. Q. I should like to get more help about tackling negative emotions. A. It must be your own effort, and first of all you must study your negative emotions and classify them. You must find which negative emotions you chiefly have, why they come, what brings them, and so on. You must understand that your only control over emotions is by mind— but this is not immediate. If you think rightly for six months, then it will affect negative emotions. If you begin to think rightly to-day, it will not change your negative emotions to-morrow. Q. When I think about negative emotions, I do understand very clearly that they are in ourselves, and yet, soon after, I continue to express them. Is it simply because I am not one? A. First, because you are not one, and second, because you do not try in the right way. It is a question of long work, as I said, and this cannot be changed at once. If one has constant negative emotions, recurring negative emotions of the same kind, one always falls in at the same point. If one observed oneself better, one would know that this was coming, or
had come, and if one had thought rightly beforehand, one would have some resistance. But if one has no right attitude, if one does not think rightly, then one is helpless, and the negative emotion happens again at the same time, in the same way. This is one of the methods of controlling emotions through the intellectual centre. But attitudes must be created not at the moment of emotional explosion but long beforehand. Then, little by little, emotional explosions will come under the control of the intellect. Thoughts can be more permanent than feelings, and in that way thoughts can influence feelings. You can create permanent thoughts, permanent attitudes which will affect feelings in time. But before this can become possible a certain discipline must be introduced into our emotions, and a certain knowledge must be acquired in order to work on the emotional mind. Q. I have noticed that nearly all the time I hardly feel any emotion or have any vividness of experience. Is this sleep? A. Partly sleep, partly living in moving and instinctive centres. Then, exactly as you describe, we hardly feel any vividness of experience. Q. In some cases the negative emotion of fear seems useful, otherwise people would cross the road at any time without looking. A. You speak about instinctive fear; emotional fear is different, it is based on imagination. Q. Do negative emotions have a harmful effect on other functions? A. You must find that out for yourself. For instance, if you are agitated or irritated, or something like that, notice other things. Can you remember well? Can you think well, work well? You will see that all your faculties are diminished. This observation will by itself show you many other things to observe. Q. Why is it that negative emotion appears to affect the functioning of the instinctive centre to such a degree? A. Negative emotion affects all centres. Centres are so connected that you cannot have a strong or violent negative emotion—and with the help of identification they all become strong—without affecting all centres. You cannot have a negative emotion and at the same time do something else right or even think rightly. You eat wrongly, breathe wrongly, walk wrongly, work wrongly—everything. Q. Are negative emotions a wrong use of the instinctive centre? A. No, but all emotions have their origin in the instinctive centre. In a small child centres are not divided. Negative emotions are created from material taken from the instinctive centre. This material legitimately belongs to the instinctive centre and is wrongly borrowed from it. We are in a very strange state, because positive emotions do not belong to our ordinary emotional centre but to the higher emotional centre, and negative emotions do not belong to the ordinary emotional centre but exist in an artificial centre. The emotional centre borrows material from the instinc-
tive, and with the negative half of the instinctive centre and the help of imagination and identification, it creates negative emotions. Destroying them is a very difficult work; but you must realize that as long as negative emotions exist no development is possible, because development means development of all there is in man. Negative emotions cannot develop; it would be very disastrous if they could. So if one is trying to create consciousness, one must at the same time struggle with negative emotions, for either you keep them or you develop—you cannot have both together. Q. Would a way to controlling negative emotions be trying to understand why a thing happened, to understand cause and effect? A. It may be in some particular case, but at present there is no question of destroying or controlling, the question is of studying. The strongest method for controlling negative emotions is learning not to express them. So we must first struggle with the expression of negative emotions and, second, with such emotions as we can struggle with. When we learn not to express them, we will speak of the next step. You cannot control negative emotions as long as they have free expression. I want you to understand that stopping the expression of negative emotions and struggle with negative emotions themselves are two quite different practices. Trying to stop the expression comes first. If you express a negative emotion you are in its power, you can do nothing at that moment. When you have learnt not to express it, you can try not to identify, to create a right attitude, and to remember yourself. Q. I can sometimes manage not to express a negative emotion to begin with, but it goes on trying to come out. A. That means you only stopped the external manifestation, and you must try to stop the cause of it. I do not mean the emotion itself, but the cause of the expression. There is a difference. Emotion is one thing, expression is another. Try to find the difference. Q. Does trying to control unpleasant emotions gradually eliminate them? A. Certainly, because many of them can exist only when there is no control; the moment control begins, many of them become easy to eliminate. Q. If one's early training has been such that it is natural not to express unpleasant emotions, is it not equally mechanical? A. This is an academic question; it is necessary to verify whether you can do it in all circumstances. One may be trained not to express negative emotions in certain circumstances, but in other circumstances one will express them. Q. Is not the point not to feel unpleasant emotions? A. That comes later, it is quite a separate question. You come to that by not identifying. Q. By what means can one check where one's unpleasant emotions come
from, what causes them and how we are to get over our tendency to deceive ourselves? Is this only possible through a school? A. At present it is not important to learn where they come from, but important to stop their expression. Many things about negative emotions can be learned afterwards. As to what causes them—identification is the general cause of all negative emotions. You cannot struggle with them without help—many people tried. If you realized how small our possibility is, you would understand that one must have every possible help in order to achieve something. Q. Must negative emotions always be mechanical? A. What is opposite to mechanical? Conscious. Who will have negative emotions consciously? When one knows that one can give them up, nobody would have them. So certainly they are mechanical. Q. Could we hear more about right attitude as a weapon against negative emotions? It must mean more than just not identifying? A. Certainly, it means more; it means right thinking on a definite subject. For instance, almost all our personal negative emotions are based on accusation; somebody else is guilty. If, by persistent thinking, we realize that nobody can be guilty against us, that we are the cause of all that happens to us, that changes things, not at once certainly, because many times this realization will come too late. But after some time this right thinking, this creating of right attitude or point of view can become a permanent process; then negative emotions will only appear occasionally. Exactly by being permanent this process of right thinking has power over negative emotions—it catches them in the beginning. Q. I find that much of my time is passed in a negative state, not very definite, and I don't seem to be able to do anything about it. A. Yes, but you must have realized that it is generally connected with some kind of identification or imagination. When you find different manifestations of this negative state, you can struggle with it, because this struggle is in the mind. You can refuse some points of view and accept other points of view, and very soon you will see a difference. This is connected with a very big question, because from one point of view we are so mechanical that we can do nothing; but from another point of view there are several things which we can begin to do. We have certain possibilities in us, only we do not use them. It is true that we cannot 'do' anything in the sense that we cannot change what we, feel at any given moment, but we can make ourselves think about a subject at a given moment. This is the beginning. We must know what is possible and begin from that, because then the possibility to do something, instead of letting things happen, will gradually increase. We do not realize what enormous power lies in thinking. I do not mean that as a philosophical explanation of power. The power lies in the fact that, if we always think rightly about certain things, we can make it
permanent—it grows into a permanent attitude. You may find some inclination to wrong emotional manifestations of some kind. Just at that moment you can do nothing, you have educated in yourself the capacity for this kind of reaction by wrong thinking. But if you start from right thinking, then after some time you will educate in yourself the capacity for a different reaction. Only this method has to be understood, and this understanding must be quite deep. You can apply this method to many different things. This is really the one thing you can do. You can 'do' nothing else. There is no direct way to struggle with negative manifestations because you cannot catch them; and there is no way to prevent them except by being prepared for them beforehand. But a passing realization that they are wrong will not help; it must be very deep, otherwise you will have an equally difficult process to prepare the ground for another manifestation. You do not realize how much you lose by these spontaneous manifestations of a negative character. They make so many things impossible. Q. Even if I begin to think rightly I find imitation starts when I hear somebody grumbling, and I begin to do the same. A. The fact that you begin to think rightly will not change anything straight away. It is necessary to think rightly for a long time; then results will come—but not at once. It is a question of months or years to create right attitudes. By creating right attitudes you consolidate the fact that you have really and seriously decided not to give way to negative manifestations. We do not realize how much we lose in this way. We lose exactly what we want to get. But first of all you must stop the habit of expressing negative emotions. This is why, in the very first lectures, when you hear about self-observation, it is explained that you must learn not to express negative emotions. Everybody knows how not to show what they feel—I do not mean in exceptional cases, but in ordinary cases. All negativeness is based on identification, imagination and on one particular feature, namely, allowing oneself to express it. You always believe you cannot stop it and therefore feel it is quite right to show what you feel. So first you must get rid of this illusion. You can stop the manifestations of negative emotions. If you say 'I don't want to', I will believe you, but not if you say 'I cannot'. I have given you many suggestions about work on emotions, such as study, struggle with identification, struggle with the expression of negative emotions, right thinking about negative emotions. Four practices. If you really use all that is given, very soon you will see quite perceptible results. Real control of emotional centre needs self remembering, a new state of consciousness, so it is a long way off; now we must use auxiliary methods. The most important of them in the beginning is a right attitude.