Living without Conflict

Krishnamurti say ‘A religious mind is one that is without conflict’.

Conflicts arise constantly in the mind. Past hurts, unfulfilled ambitions, discordant behavior of near ones, society, politics – so many things cause conflict in us. The root of conflict is when things don’t go the way we think it should go.

But we are a race of nearly 8 billion, each with their own version of what they think is ‘the way to go’. How can we live without conflict if we constantly look outward, wanting others to change to our way of thinking? It’s never going to happen. Einstein’s theory of relativity suggests that at the same time two contrary viewpoints might BOTH be true because they are from different vantage points. What does that teach us?

We constantly evaluate and judge everyone and everything and then add value to our mental constructs. It’s like copying a beautiful landscape on paper and saying this is the actual view- whereas the view can be vastly different when someone else paints the same scene. Just as no two finger prints are alike, no two viewpoints are alike. People think differently all the time.

In such a scenario how does one live without conflict?

As stated above conflict arises when we want another to behave in a certain manner we have prescribed. Can we stop doing this? Can we stop dictating our terms on others.  The only person that we have a control over, a right over, is us.  “Be the change you want in others’ is oft quoted yet we rarely work on ourselves to bring that change. It seems to come naturally to us to change our environment- while that is ok if all we want to have a comfortable home, healthy air and diet, but it never stops there.

We constantly think our lives will be better if people around us changed. That never happens and leads us to be angry or miserable. Why do we expect so much from others?

Isn’t it simpler to give up these notions, to correct our own thoughts and actions? To change the habits of thought that cause these conflicts?

Perhaps that is our real challenge. The mind that has already formed a certain neural pathway of thinking is almost ossified.

Krishnamurti suggests awareness as a way to change one’s automatic thinking. When one tunes in and watches how an old way of thinking is being repeated inside of our heads, at least for that moment we distance ourselves from that thought and see it dispassionately. The old thought has a weak hold on us. With time, new thoughts, new ways of being start forming and we find ourselves changing. It requires an alert mind, a healthy body and an ever present aliveness to change.

Changing our way of thinking is the only way to live without conflict.