K: Look at the field of conflict. There is division. Where there is division there
must inevitably be conflict—my family, your family; my God, your God.
A: Does every divided fragment become aware?
K: I see the fact that where there is division there must be conflict. In this
consciousness where there are so many fragments, there must be conflict. In the
phenomenal world he is a Hindu and I am a Muslim, and that is breeding war and
hatred. This is a simple, straight phenomenon. We all talk of unity and keep on
with our divisions.
See, sir, what takes place. In this field there is conflict, contradiction,
fragmentation, division. When the conflict becomes acute, then comes the ‘me’
and the ‘you’, otherwise I leave it alone. I float along in this conflict, but the
moment conflict becomes acute there is war. In the Hindu-Muslim war, I am a
Hindu and you are a Muslim. And so identification takes place with something
which I think is greater—with God, with nations, with ideas.
So long as the conflict is mild, I leave it alone. Observe the world around.
Everybody goes along walking as if in a dream, and then Pakistan attacks; you
are identified.
My point is, as long as there is no conflict, there is no ‘I’. We are saying,
therefore, that conflict is the measure of the ‘I’. There was no conflict yesterday,
there is conflict today, and I hope there will not be conflict tomorrow. This
movement is the ‘I’. This is the essence of the ‘I’.
A: There are many other facets.
K: Is the tree different from the branches, even if it has ten hundred branches?
The structure of consciousness is based on this conflict. We are not discussing
how to end conflict.
R: The traditional view is: Division is the ‘I’, and the separation from the conflict
is also the ‘I’.
A: As long as conflict is hidden, not observed, the ‘I’ is not.
R: Does this all begin here, or does the arising of the ‘I’ go deeper?
K: Is there a self, the ‘I’, which is to be studied, or is the ‘I’ a movement?
A: You say that the ‘I’ begins as a movement in consciousness.
K: No. There is an assumption that the ‘I’ is static. Is it so? Is the ‘I’ something
to be learnt about? Or is the ‘I’ a movement? Do I learn about something or do I
learn in movement? The former is non-existent; it is fallacious; it is an invention.
So the central fact is division. It is the source of all conflict. The conflict may
take different shapes, exist at different levels, but it is the same. Conflict may be