K: There is past action, present action and future action. Cause is never a static
thing. The effect becomes the cause. So there is a constant movement undergoing
change all the time.
P: Karma in itself has validity.
K: I plant the seed, it will grow. I plant the seed in the woman, and the child
grows.
P: So psychological time has existed as karma; it has reality.
K: No. Is it the real? When you look, it ceases. Let us look at this question of
cause and effect. I plant a seed in the earth, and it grows. If I plant an acorn, it
cannot grow to be anything but an oak. What the seed is, the bush will be, or the
tree will be. I cannot change that.
S: Can the effect be changed in psychological action?
K: Yes, of course it can be changed. You have, for whatever reason, hit me
physically or with words. Now what is my response to that? If I hit you back, the
movement continues. But what happens if I do not react when you hit me?
Because there is observing, watching, I am out of that situation.
P: I understand at that level. I set a process in motion. I observe. The process has
ended. That act affects another. It is going to affect others.
K: It will affect others—your family, and the world around you.
P: The reactions arising out of my action are, in a sense, independent of my
action.
K: The wave goes on.
P: The wave is karma: a certain energy is released which will work its
consequences out unless it meets other minds which quench it.
K: The wave can only end when both of us see it at the same level, at the same
time, with the same intensity. This means love. Otherwise you cannot end it.
New Delhi
27 December, 1970