CHOICELESS AWARENESS: To observe without evaluating is the highest form of intelligence
Krishnamurti Sonoma Center | In-person 5-day retreat
August 16-21, 2025
Learn more:
https://krishnamurticenter.org/choiceless-awareness/
Awareness is the silent and choiceless observation of what is; in this awareness the problem unrolls itself and is fully and completely understood. A problem is never solved on its own level; being complex, it must be understood in its total process.
-J. Krishnamurti
August 16 – 21, 2025, Saturday to Wednesday
J. Krishnamurti emphasized choiceless awareness as central to self-understanding and inner transformation. Unlike conventional approaches that rely on effort, analysis, or willpower to bring about change, Krishnamurti pointed to the simple yet profound act of observing without judgment, resistance, or preference—a state he called choiceless awareness.
For Krishnamurti, this meant being fully present to the movement of thought, emotion, and experience as it arises, without trying to control, interpret, or label it. Such observation is not passive; rather, it demands intense attention and sensitivity. When one watches anger, fear, or desire without naming it, condemning it, or trying to escape it, a radical clarity begins to emerge. In that clarity, one sees things as they are—not through the filters of memory, conditioning, or personal bias.
He maintained that true understanding does not come through choice—selecting what one wants to pay attention to, or clinging to what is pleasant while avoiding the unpleasant. In choosing, the mind divides experience into what it likes and dislikes, thus perpetuating conflict and fragmentation. But in choiceless awareness, the mind is silent, attentive, and undivided. It mirrors reality without distortion, like a still lake reflects the sky.
Krishnamurti believed that only in this state can there be insight—not born of thought, but arising spontaneously, without motive. Such insight brings about a transformation of consciousness that is not dependent on time or gradual progress.
Ultimately, choiceless awareness is both the means and the end. It is not a technique to be practiced but a living presence, accessible in any moment when the mind is quiet and watchful. In that stillness, according to Krishnamurti, lies the possibility of a wholly different way of being—free from fear, conflict, and illusion.
Please join us for this 5-day retreat as we immerse ourselves in exploring this topic with a small group here on the beautiful property of the Krishnamurti Center in Sonoma.
Register now:
https://krishnamurticenter.org/choiceless-awareness/
You may also like the following events from Krishnamurti Foundation of America:
- This month, 25th July, 04:00 pm, Silent Retreat: On Sorrow in Ojai
- This month, 27th July, 09:00 am, Silent Retreat: The Past, the Present, & the Future Are Now in Sebastopol
- Next month, 2nd August, 09:00 am, The Nature of the Mind 4 in Sebastopol
