I like reading books from Jiddu Krishnamurti. I like his work because he bridges the world’s different philosophies; at least, that is what I think of it. Yesterday, I read part of the Network of Thought; you can read in it his ideas about our thinking and how we all share that capacity.

“Thought is the common factor of all mankind. There is no Eastern thought or Western thought; there is only the common capacity to think, whether one is utterly poor or most sophisticated, living in an affluent society. Whether a surgeon, a carpenter, a laborer in the field, or a great poet, thought is a common factor of all of us. We do not seem to realize that thought is the common factor that binds us all.”

Jiddu Krishnamurti, Network of Thought

I like the idea of thinking as a function we all share like we all share the mechanism that makes our heart beat or how we digest our food. We often believe that our thoughts are coming from a special place within, but though our thoughts might be unique, they are made in the same factory, so to speak, one we all have.

I remembered today the time I worked in Cambodia. My brain back then was the same as I now have in that it has the same function: producing my thoughts. My brain created little fear in that dangerous environment because it was busy coping with the situation and the safety of the team with whom I was there. I saw some disturbing things and was sometimes in dangerous situations, but I didn’t register that at the moment. Only later, and repeatedly, have I felt the heaviness of what I experienced. I can Imagine that we all share this function of our brain, the capability of repressing thoughts of imminent danger to make room in the mind to take responsible actions.

I still see the civilian sometimes who slowly died in our car in Cambodia; he was shot by his neighbor and left for dead beside the road. It is not something I suffer under, but it is something that never goes away. I assume we all have this mechanism and are all hunted by thoughts that have a large impact. In my case, I have several hunting thoughts, I guess that’s normal.

Sometimes, I meet people from who I expect that they live in a constant and extensive hunting thought. It is as if something in their life was so traumatic over such a long time that they constantly relive that period.

Maybe we all do that without knowing?

“You must understand the whole of life, not just one little part of it. That is why you must read, that is why you must look at the skies, that is why you must sing, and dance, and write poems, and suffer, and understand, for all that is life.”
Jiddu Krishnamurti