In preparation for a webinar I am giving on the Soul at Work* I found myself searching for books I had long put away on a high shelf, the works of Krishnamurti.
I’m not sure why he suddenly came to mind. It’s been a long February. In London the unremitting ironclad days cast their pall – I was certainly looking for glimmers of light. But two further prods, one global, one personal, have made me thirsty for spiritual nourishment – something true and solid. The dismantling of democracy in the US – a coup as commentators have named it** – and the repercussions across the globe, spiralling outwards before our helpless eyes, is shocking and scary; and in my own family sudden health challenges have thrown turbulence into our midst. So I have found myself drawn to the teacher that formed the background tapestry of my childhood. I read this:
“Meditation is not the repetition of the word, nor the experiencing of a vision, nor the cultivating of silence….The meditative mind is seeing – watching, listening, without the word, without comment, without opinion – attentive to the movement of life in all its relationships throughout the day. And at night the meditative mind has no dreams for it has been awake all day.”
(Krishnamurti, 1973, p.18)
I was completely caught off guard by the surge in heart-uplift I felt. A real shot of joy. And the effect repeats as I read a few pages daily of Krishnamurti ***. His writing is simple and sometimes stuffy with old-world form. But it is honest, and it’s unpretentious. What I call, ‘everyday spirituality’. None of the heroic or performative spirituality one sees so much of.
Krishnamurti was plucked as a child from his native India by Annie Besant to become the darling of the Theosophy movement in the early 20th century. Later he rejected it all and became a reluctant but inspiring teacher with a curious, mischievous personality, a taste for beautifully tailored suits and Agatha Christie novels, and a loving, piercing intelligence that drew the likes of David Bohm and other scientific thinkers to his circle. I went only once to the summer gatherings at his school in Petersfield and later I was lucky enough to meet him briefly.
Reading his texts today takes me back to my childhood – to the home my mother created in London after coming here as a refugee in the Second world War. Spirituality was not talked about: it was an infusion through beauty and attentiveness in our household. Not the obvious things, although we had lovely time-worn pieces of furniture picked up for very little by her in junk shops in the post-war rebuilding years. We had blankets pinned up as curtains to begin with, but there were flowers and paintings – my mother taught illustration at a London art school. Her experiences made her also profoundly political. So, more importantly, beauty was a practice, through care and attention.
She taught us to lay the table as an act of zen, to create and curate corners of found objects – something lovely, something meaningful; the garden was a place to learn precision in seeing, naming colour (cadmium red, Naples yellow, veridian) and form, and how it all comes to life only through juxtaposition. At supper, politics, local and international, rubbed shoulders with local news, with art and literature, and the small and large instances of our daily lives. Outrage and laughter. Without knowing it we learned that all is one connected flow.
Beauty was and is in the attentiveness we bring to the moments of every day. This way is meditation. And this way lies joy. I forget and re-find this every day. It is both so simple and, in our attention-high-jacking world, so hard.
Attentiveness lies at the heart of a new acronym I have been working around for some time now: CARE : for courage – to step out, stand out, and stand for better attentiveness – to see with eyes sharp as an eagle, loving as a dove; responsibility – to respond with action that is generative and thus healing; equity – to live in recognition that my wellbeing depends on yours – and on the wellbeing of the world we are part of.
Krishnamurti again:
“The hills were being carried by the clouds and the rain was polishing the rocks, big boulders that were scattered over the hills. There was a streak of black in the grey granite, and that morning this dark basalt rock was being washed by the rain and was becoming blacker…It was quite extraordinary to feel the rain on one, to get wet to the skin and to feel the earth and trees receive the rain with great delight; for it hadn’t rained for some time…”
Reading Krishanmurti reminds me that beauty, attentiveness, care are really all the same thing at heart. And we can practice this somehow, somewhere every day.
* The Soul at Work webinar is part of a series by the EcoLeadership Institute.
** It is a Coup – Carole Cadwallader, 10th February 2025.
** Krishnamurti (1970) The Second Penguin Krishnamurti Reader, edited by Mary Lutyens. Penguin.