Negation Options

[FishOutaWater]

I received my daily Krishnamurti quote in my email this afternoon. Today's email was entitled "The State of Negation". Is everyone familiar with that incredible, amazing song off of Four Songs - "Negation"? Pre-Mental Jewelry era, Krishnamurti philosophy-based genius! One of the best Live songs ever made!

I miss that contemplative, searching, philosophical Ed.

Here is the text of the email. Pretty interesting stuff:

"The State of Negation

Krishnamurti: Religion is not separate from life; on the contrary it is life itself. It is this division between religion and life which has bred all the misery you are talking about. So we come back to the basic question of whether it is possible in daily life to live in a state which, for the moment, let us call enlightenment? Questioner: I still don't know what you mean by enlightenment... Krishnamurti: A state of negation. Negation is the most positive action, not positive assertion. This is a very important thing to understand. Most of us so easily accept positive dogma, a positive creed, because we want to be secure, to belong, to be attached, to depend. The positive attitude divides and brings about duality. The conflict then begins between this attitude and others. But the negation of all values, of all morality, of all beliefs, having no frontiers, cannot be in opposition to anything. A positive statement in its very definition separates, and separation is resistance. To this we are accustomed, this is our conditioning. To deny all this is not immoral; on the contrary to deny all division and resistance is the highest morality. To negate everything that man has invented, to negate all his values, ethics and gods, is to be in a state of mind in which there is no duality, therefore no resistance or conflict between opposites. In this state there are no opposites, and this state is not the opposite of something else. Questioner: Then how do you know what is good and what is bad? Or is there no good and bad? What is to prevent me from crime or even murder? If I have no standards what is to prevent me from God knows what aberrations? Krishnamurti: To deny all this is to deny oneself, and oneself is the conditioned entity who continually pursues a conditioned good. To most of us negation appears as a vacuum because we know activity only in the prison of our conditioning, fear and misery. From that we look at negation and imagine it to be some terrible state of oblivion or emptiness. To the man who has negated all the assertions of society, religion, culture and morality, the man who is still in the prison of social conformity is a man of sorrow. Negation is the state of enlightenment which functions in all the activities of a man who is free of the past. It is the past, with its tradition and its authority, that has to be negated. Negation is freedom, and it is the free man who lives, loves, and knows what it means to die. - Freedom, Love and Action Eight Conversations"

Negation Lyrics:

Never used to be so tired
Never used to be so anxious
Never said "used to be" so much

If this is love then I
Have been so sorely mistaken
If this is peace then I
Have been so falsely awakened

Please don't tell me what love is
Let's look together
And find out what love is not

I've been to every book
I've been to every seer
In order to find the truth
As if it lives somewhere

I want to uproot my violence
I want to live like a saint
I want to give up everything

Just like the businessman wants to gain
Just like the businessman wants to gain

Please don't tell me what peace is
Let's look together
And find out what love is not


This post has been edited by FishOutaWater: Apr 5 2010, 2:28 pm

[Sakhmet2]

I miss that contemplative, searching, philosophical Ed.

If this is love then I
Have been so sorely mistaken
If this is peace then I
Have been so falsely awakened

Please don't tell me what love is
Let's look together
And find out what love is not

I've been to every book
I've been to every seer
In order to find the truth
As if it lives somewhere

He knew more when he was 18 than he does now.

[Wambangalang]

ahh classic krishnamurti. children should be given his books in school instead of the bible.

uh...but lets not go there.

[Pokey]

Gotigrz incoming in 5....4....3....


But really this is why I loved old Live ... so much more interesting. Sometimes songs which are specifically about a particular thing if it's interesting are good (ie TBD). But for the most part the newer songs were just "this song is about loving God", "This song is about love for a girl". Old Live like this just explored all these different avenues ... I can't really say I have many other songs by other bands in my collection where the subject of the song was something along these lines. That's what made it stand out.

[Merica]

Gotigrz incoming in 5....4....3....
But really this is why I loved old Live ... so much more interesting. Sometimes songs which are specifically about a particular thing if it's interesting are good (ie TBD). But for the most part the newer songs were just "this song is about loving God", "This song is about love for a girl". Old Live like this just explored all these different avenues ... I can't really say I have many other songs by other bands in my collection where the subject of the song was something along these lines. That's what made it stand out.

+1000.

[Sakhmet2]

Gotigrz incoming in 5....4....3....

[gotigrz]

2....... 1.......

ta da!!!!! whatever... you people love me and you KNOW it.... ha ha....

anyway, i too, like old live over new or recent live... why? because of the music... i'm not ever really attracted to music because of lyrics.... now, lyrics can turn me off, but hardly ever turn me on... LIVE's old music had an honesty and rawness and intensity that can't be produced... it has to be who you are and nothing else....and they had that, but the music post TDTH became very mainstream and generic. maybe they just ran out of ideas. either way, yes, i'm glad that ed seems to have gone away from questioning God to accepting Him.... but, i'll always love LIVE's old music over the later stuff.

honestly, i think things started going downhill when ed lost the guitar and his bro came aboard. ed, with guitar, ... ELECTRIC guitar... behind mic stand and pat and chad just playing their guitars just rocking back and forth to the music and gracey just jamming... that was the LIVE i liked. but, the band had to go and get all ROCK STAR on us, ed running all over the place, c taylor with that pretentious stomp, and even gracey's playing seemed to go downhill from his youthful days. the only one who stayed the same was dalheimer.

but, i guess it's crazy for us to think that they would always stay the same. and, it's also crazy to think that they could continue to write albums such as TC and SS for the rest of their lives... and it's also crazy to think that they could play STD or IA with the same intensity after playing those same songs for the billionth time.

This post has been edited by gotigrz: Apr 8 2010, 8:05 am

[Wambangalang]

honestly, i think things started going downhill when ed lost the guitar and his bro came aboard. ed, with guitar, ... ELECTRIC guitar... behind mic stand and pat and chad just playing their guitars just rocking back and forth to the music and gracey just jamming... that was the LIVE i liked. but, the band had to go and get all ROCK STAR on us, ed running all over the place, c taylor with that pretentious stomp, and even gracey's playing seemed to go downhill from his youthful days. the only one who stayed the same was dalheimer.

only sensible thing youve said all week

[Badman]

I forgot that we could actually see eye to eye with gotigrz on things. I approve.

[Pokey]

I thought I remember Gotigrz saying once ages ago that he gave up on Live all together and stopped listening to old live albums even until he heard word that Ed had found Jesus Christ and then he could listen to them again?

[gotigrz]

i may have said that.... but, them bottom line is, is that no song will determine what i believe. but, i will always love the music, the rawness, the passion and the intensity of LIVE's songs. the way i feel about LIVE's music today is the same as it was from day one. and, not one ounce of what i love about LIVE's music was derived from the lyrics. so, i've learned to become passive about the lyrics and just enjoy the music.