before we do. But the question is more complex: how to think, what to think, why to think, what is “to think”? No one can stop or control your thought process or your thinking. You can think anything you want. But that doesn’t seem to be the point. The thinking process has to be directed into a certain approach. That does not mean that your thinking process should be in accord with certain dogma, philosophy, or concepts. Instead, one has to know the thinker itself. So we are back to square one, the thinker itself: who or what thinks and what is the thought process?…

At this point the only genuine ground we have is back to square one. If you cut all kinds of roots and fascinations, all kinds of entertainment, regarding it as a very subtle form of conmanship, what do you have? You might say nothing. But it’s not quite nothing–it’s back to square one. The point is that your genuine existence and expressions should not be colored by any form of artificiality. However subtle, however magnificent, however beautiful or holy it may be, it still discolors your existence. So if you have a sense of ultimate cynicism, you are back to square one. If you see through any trips that are laid on you, or anyone trying to influence you, if you see through how you yourself are influencing somebody else’s ideas or borrowing ideas and concepts from somebody else–then you are back to square one.