I am questioning the whole process of following, not the substitution of one authority for another, or of one guru for another – those are all childish activities. But if we can inquire into the question, into the problem of why we follow, then perhaps we shall understand the problem of authority. When you are asked why you follow, you do not know the reason why. The reason is fairly obvious – you follow for satisfaction, for a motive, for gain, for an end in view. But the whole instinctual response to follow somebody, to follow an ideal, to follow an experience which you had ten years ago and which you want now, and therefore follow and strive after in order to get that richness – this total process of following is the problem. The moment you follow or have a guru, you create the authority. But if there is cessation of following, there is no authority, there is no guru; then you are a light to yourself.

From Collected Works, Vol. 8

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One of the results of fear is the acceptance of authority in human affairs. Authority is created by our desire to be right, to be secure, to be comfortable, to have no conscious conflicts or disturbances, but nothing which results from fear can help us to understand our problems, even though fear may take the form of respect and submission to the so-called wise. The wise wield no authority, and those in authority are not wise. Fear, in whatever form, prevents the understanding of ourselves and of our relationship to all things. The following of authority is the denial of intelligence. To accept authority is to submit to domination, to subjugate oneself to an individual, to a group, or to an ideology, whether religious or political; and this subjugation of oneself to authority is the denial, not only of intelligence, but also of individual freedom.

From Education and the Significance of Life

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The only purpose in life is the one you create in your mind.

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The word ‘authority’ means one who originates something – as in the word ‘author’ – and people follow, making what they say into an authority. And then it is dead. This is especially true here because if you follow what I say, it is finished. You must be very careful, if you want to go into this question of meditation, to be completely, wholly, inwardly free from all authority and comparison. I don't know if you can do it. Therefore, you must be extremely aware of the importance of authority in one direction – of the doctor or scientist – and understand the total unimportance of authority inwardly, whether it is the authority of another, which is fairly easy to throw off, or the authority of your own experience, knowledge and conclusions, which becomes prejudice. You must be equally free from the authority of another and your own authority.

From What Is Meditation?

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The observer, who has come into being through various images, thinks himself permanent, and between himself and the images he has created, there is a division, a time interval. This creates conflict between himself and the images he believes are causing his troubles. Then he says, ‘I must get rid of this conflict,’ but the very desire to get rid of the conflict creates another image. Awareness of all this, which is real meditation, has revealed that there is a central image put together by all the other images, and this central image, the observer, is the censor, the experiencer, the evaluator, the judge who wants to conquer or subjugate the other images or destroy them altogether. The other images are the result of judgments, opinions and conclusions by the observer, and the observer is the result of all the other images – therefore, the observer is the observed.

From Freedom from the Known

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One must discover whether there are two separate things, two separate movements: the observer and that which is observed. Are they separate? Or is the observer the observed? It is tremendously important to find this out for oneself; if one does, then the whole way one thinks undergoes a complete change. It is a most radical discovery, the result of which means the structure of morality and the continuation of knowledge have, for oneself, quite a different meaning. Find out if you have discovered this for yourself, or whether you have accepted what you have been told as fact. Have you discovered this for yourself without any outside agency telling you it is so? If it is your discovery, it releases tremendous energy, which before had been wasted in the division between the observer and the observed.

From Beyond Violence

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Who is the observer? This is not deep philosophy, but just ordinary, daily life. Who is the observer? Who is the ‘I’ that says, ‘I look’? The ‘I’ that is looking is the accumulated experiences, condemnations, observations, knowledge and so on. It is the centre, the observer. He separates himself from the thing observed, saying, ‘I am observing my fear, my guilt, my despair.’ But the observer is the observed. If he is not, he recognises his despair. I know what despair is, what loneliness is, and that memory remains. The next time it arises, I say that I see something different from me. This division between the observer and the observed creates a conflict, and then I go off on a tangent, trying to find a way to resolve it. But the fact is that the observer is the observed. This is not an intellectual concept, but a fact.

From Collected Works, Vol. 17

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