Why should one meditate?

What is meditation? Why should one meditate? To find that out, stop meditating. To find out what is real meditation, not yours or mine, your type and my type, or X's type, but what is meditation, to find out you can't hold on to some kind of meditation that you have and then enquire. That is like a donkey tied to a post. So you have to be free to enquire. First one can see very clearly that it is only a very, very quiet mind that can observe accurately. A quiet mind can observe accurately only, not a disturbed mind. So a quiet mind is absolutely necessary just to observe. But if you say, `Ah, how am I to have such a quiet mind?' Then you are asking for a system, for a method, you are going to somebody whom you think has a quiet mind, and then asking him, `Please tell me what to do.' And then you are caught in that trap because he will tell you and you will practise - if you are silly enough. But you see the importance of having an absolutely quiet mind. A mind that has no problem.

 

J. Krishnamurti Bombay 4th Public Talk 31st January 1979