A Vision of Death by J. Krishnamurti That Can Transform Your Whole Life

Death is the only ending we know

J.k is the only true iconoclast I know of. He was discovered at the age of 10 by the Theosophical Society on the banks of the Adyar river in Madras. He was protected and groomed to become “the world teacher”. In 1929 he disbanded the Order of the Star, an organization that was established to prepare the world for the arrival of a messiah.

He rejected the messianic role and repudiated the Order’s mission. He called truth “the pathless land” where no order, teacher, organized religion or rulebook can take. He travelled as an independent speaker for six decades. My words are the mirror for you to look within, he would say often.

His talks take us on a deep, intricate journey into ourselves — helping us relate one aspect of life with another. In the process, he creates a window for us to understand reality by dropping all the fiction which we have either collected or is imposed upon us.

We trawl through and through for tips to improve our life. Over the last many decade's human condition is getting better at the material level thus freeing the mind for higher pursuits. Sadly, our progress is not turning out this way. We have rather created a self-help industry and we want somebody to tell us how to get better; how to be happy!

A mind that is seeking anything from outside — a formula, a mantra or a method — is a crippled mind. A mind which is asking ‘how’ is running in the opposite direction. “How” is our grand escape from seeing reality.

In his entire life, he never prescribed any method. Because there isn’t any.

His commentary on death is a flash of lightning.

The Conundrum of continuity

A typical human life goes on for 70–80 years. The whole of that life one clings to the known and avoids the unknown — the known suffering, the known pain, the known pleasure, the known fears — one clings to all that which we call ‘living’. And we are frightened to let go of all that when death comes. So there’s the interval between the living and the dying, the process of time.

The death that we know of is the death of the organ. But we say there is something which is me which must continue. After all, we’ve collected so much experience and desires— I want to finish that home or that book before I die.

So what is it that is ‘me’ — that says, I don’t want to die, I must have some kind of continuity?

Travelling is my passion. Every time I go to some exotic destination, I leave with a sense of unfulfillment. Part of me wants to stay back to explore more, gather more, and soak in the feel of the place. I leave because I’ve got a schedule to keep. I make a promise to myself that I’ll come back — the longing for an unfinished agenda prods out the promise.

The craving for continuity is hardwired in our being. Right from the ancient Egyptians to modern rulers, the craving for continuity in the afterlife has engendered pyramids and palatial tombstones. The immense drive to continue with our pleasures and also with our pains — in anticipation of pleasure, is a problem right throughout our whole life.

My pleasure, I want it fulfilled tomorrow. When we are told ‘there is no tomorrow’ it becomes a moment of tremendous despair.

Ignoramus

The next question is: What is it that is ‘me’ and how does it come into being? Why it has taken such tremendous importance in our lives, and why is it that it’s so frightened of death?

The ‘me’ has come through words, through experience, through knowledge — the ‘me’, which is the form, the name, all the bundle of memories, knowledge, experience, the past pleasures, pain — all that consciousness with its content is ‘me’. Please see it for yourself.

Then we say that part of ‘me’ which is memory is not the whole of ‘me’. There is a ‘me’ which is spiritual.

‘Me’ is the essence of that spirit. When you say the ‘me’ is the essence of that spirit, covered over by all kinds of darkness, like an onion with many, many layers, that essence of the highest is ‘me’ — that is still part of thinking. Right? When you feel that the essence is ‘me’ that’s part of your process of thought. Somebody has put it into your mind or you have invented it yourself?

Thought is a material process. It is knowledge, and experience stored up as memory in the brain and the response to that memory is called thinking. Though thought can say, “There is a spirit in ‘me’”, it remains a material process. When we say, ‘I have faith in god’, it is a material process. God is our projection of what we think is the most beautiful, omnipotent creator of the world.

Sublime maybe, but it is still a process of thought. We don’t know any original answer.

The movement of thought has created the ‘me’, or the essence of the spirit. It is still in the domain of thought, so it is still a material process. So, one clings to the known and one is frightened of the unknown, which is death.

Death is the ending of the known.

The relation between time and death

The measurement is time — so many years of life, so many lifetimes, afterlives — this is nothing but a measurement. Can this time stop?

This implies the living and the dying are close together. Death means the ending of that which has continued. And whatever continues becomes mechanical; therefore there is nothing new.

Death means the ending of a continuity. That which continues means time — tradition, in our faith, in our beliefs, in our gods, is the movement of time.

To die to your attachments, now, which is going to take place when you die. Ah, this is really very serious, because when we die, what takes place? The organism with its brain dies.

There is an ending to memory with the death of the brain. That is a decisive ending of thought by compulsion.

K asks the question — can there be an ending of thought while living? Not fifty years later when the brain decays. The instant death to all the attachments and fear. When there is such death there is then non-continuity which means the ending of time, therefore a totally different dimension of consciousness.

The ‘me’ is emptying all the time. There is no gathering taking place. This can get confusing if you don’t understand the difference between psychological gathering and learning. We need learning and memory for successful living — that’s separate — it’s not a gathering.

But to claim it as my knowledge, my money, my success and the accompanying feelings of ego, attachments and worries— is part of gathering which makes ‘me’.

A new life

There are two types of beings in the world; the one who dies to everything known. The known is the structure of thought put together as the ‘me’ — the attachments, fears, loneliness, despair and the result of despair — hope. He dies to all that, ending instantly. He isn’t gathering anything, psychologically.

Now, what happens to the man who doesn’t do all this, who is lazy, indifferent, and becomes serious about something trivial. He thinks it is very important to seek external help — be a guru or a book or a method. We are that man.

The other man is a human being like every other human being in the world. He has lived in sorrow, despair, agony, in tears, like the rest of the human beings.

So there is this stream of sorrow, the stream, the river of agony, the river of pleasure, the river of violence, all that, he is in that stream, he has always been in that stream. Right? It’s only the man who steps out of the stream who is different; otherwise he is like the rest.

Immortality is not ‘me’ surviving eternally — until the Angel Gabriel blows the horn — but there is immortality that is beyond death when time has come to an end.

A man who lives a life full of accumulations is always afraid of death. He wants continuity. A man who goes about his daily life with vigour and who is not seeking continuity of action in the form of an outcome is ending the factor of time in his life.

That’s going beyond time. Immortality.