The fundamental factor of self-deception is this constant desire to be something in this world and in the world hereafter.
Interpretation
Self-deception arises from the longing to achieve a specific identity or status in life and beyond.
This quote by Jiddu Krishnamurti highlights the deep-rooted nature of self-deception in human existence, stemming from our incessant desire to be perceived a certain way in both this life and the afterlife. It suggests that when individuals focus excessively on external validation and the quest for meaning, they may lose touch with their true selves, leading to a conflict between their genuine identity and their perceived persona.
In practice
This quote can be used in a philosophical discussion about the nature of self and identity.
The following of authority is the denial of intelligence. [It] may help us temporarily to cover up our difficulties and problems; but to avoid a problem is only to intensify it, and in the process, self-knowledge and freedom are abandoned.
In seeking comfort, we generally find a quiet corner in life where there is a minimum of conflict, and then we are afraid to step out of that seclusion.
If you listen through the screen of your desires, then you obviously listen to your own voice; you are listening to your own desires.
If you have this extraordinary thing going in your life, then it is everything; then you become the teacher, the disciple, the neighbour, the beauty of the cloud - you are all that, and that is love.
Meditation is one of the greatest arts in life - perhaps the greatest, and one cannot possibly learn it from anybody, that is the beauty of it.
All of us have been trained by education and environment to seek personal gain and security and to fight for ourselves. Though we cover it over with pleasant phrases, we have been educated for various professions within a system which is based on exploitation and acquisitive fear.
Words can make the illness a subject I can master, and not one that one simply emotes over.
Any priest or shaman must be presumed guilty until proved innocent.
People's personalities, like buildings, have various facades, some pleasant to view, some not.
My father's family was mostly obliterated in the Holocaust, and I grew up very much with the sense that the central moral and political question is how do we prevent these things from happening again.
The greatest mistake in the treatment of diseases is that there are physicians for the body and physicians for the soul, although the two cannot be separated.
I readily admit that I have such a great respect for what happens in the human soul that I would be afraid of disturbing and distorting the silent operation of nature by clumsy interference.
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