A: Out of this has come consciousness.
K: I do not separate the two. There is no separation of the two. If there is no
content, there is no consciousness. In consciousness there are many fragments; it
is not one solid content. There are different levels, activities, attitudes,
characteristics—all that is total consciousness. One part of that total
consciousness, a fragment, assumes importance. Then it says: I am
consciousness, I am not consciousness; I am this, I am not this.
A: You have made a distinction between consciousness which has different
levels and that point at which it says: I am different. At that point it becomes
different.
R: ‘I and not-I’—the division is there.
A: Then there is a difference between the matrix and the self.
K: Look, the content of consciousness is consciousness. Without the content
there is no consciousness. The content is made up of various divisions—my
family, your family, and all that; it is made up of fragments. One of the
fragments assumes importance over all other fragments.
R: The classical way of saying this is: The reflection imagines it is the prototype.
A: The moment there is the focus, individualization starts.
K: Be careful. This is very important. The word ‘individual’ means ‘one who is
indivisible in himself; one who is not fragmented’. So one fragment assumes the
authority, the power to criticize; it becomes the censor—all within the area which
we call consciousness.
A: In the case of consciousness as the not-identified, what happens?
K: I don’t know a thing about identification.
A: The significance of identification is that I begin to identify myself with the
part. That is the point of separation.
K: Do not assert anything. The content of consciousness is consciousness; when
there is no content there is no consciousness. In that content there are tremendous
factors of conflict, of fragmentation: one fragment assumes authority; one
fragment feels insecure, it does not identify with any fragment; another does
identify itself when it says: I like this and I don’t like this. There are such vast
conflicts there.
R: What is that ‘I’?