From the first Madras 1980 public talk. Krishnamurti distinguishes responsibility from duty, arguing that the felt weight of being the only one responsible for one's life and surroundings is the soil from which genuine care grows.
Transcript
what is our responsibility in saving this country? It is your responsibility, yours alone and nobody else's, not the government's, not the scientists', not the economists', not the environmentalists', the social workers', nobody. You are the only responsible person. Therefore it matters very much that we not only feel it, but undertake this responsibility so that, from that responsibility, one begins to have care. Responsibility is not duty, 'duty' is an ugly word. Responsibility has great significance. You are responsible for your family, for your child, for your neighbour. And when that responsibility is given over to another, to your guru, to your politician, to the specialist, then you become merely a robot. That's what we have done. We have handed ourselves over to all the authorities that exist in the world. We have become incapable of thinking for ourselves. Looking at facts as they are. The fact that you do not love, that's a fact. And to live with that fact, to realise how, without it, one becomes brutal, careless. And when you live with that fact that you do not love, realise what happens to your mind and your whole being. To realise it not as an idea but as an actual, daily fact. Then your whole approach to life is totally different. You become sensitive, you become alive, you become passionate to change that which is not true. So if you find the cause of this catastrophe in this country, finding the cause you have to act – that is, to remove the cause. And to remove the cause is to observe the cause. Not try to change the cause. If I am corrupt, I observe what that corruption is. As I pointed out, there is corruption when there is attachment. Whether it is to your family, to your belief, to your profession, to a particular dogma, inevitably corruption takes place. Haven't you noticed this? If I am attached to a belief, I am attached to it because I find satisfaction, security in that belief. That belief may be illusion, but I am attached to it. So that attachment separates me from another who believes in another... has his own particular attachment. So there is conflict between us. If you are attached to your wife or your husband, what takes place? You are anxious, you are frightened, you are jealous. And the more you are attached, the more the agony becomes. So where there is attachment there must be corruption. That is a fact, that is the truth. Now, what will you do with it? Or will you find lots of explanations, or rationalise and say, 'Yes, I accept that, but we have to live in this world'. So such a mind is a corrupt mind. So the responsibility is yours to be absolutely incorruptible. And to have such integrity that's like a rock. Have you ever watched a river flowing, in the midst of it there is a great boulder, and the great volume of water cannot push it aside. It is stable, immovable, and the water goes round it. Our minds, our lives have to be like that to bring about the salvage of this country, which means the salvage of human beings.