We seem to think that the daily life we lead, the life of struggle, conflict, pain and sorrow, is something separate from the outer world of misery and confusion. We seem to think the individual, the you, is different from the rest of the World, with all its atrocities, wars and riots, inequality and injustice and that this is something entirely different from our particular individual life.

When you look a little more closely, not only at your own life but also at the World, you will see that what you are – your daily life, what you think, what you feel – is the external World, the World about you. You are the World, you are the Human being that has made this World of utter disorder, the World that is crying helplessly in great sorrow. It is you, the Human being that has built this World.

So that World outside you is not different from the World in which you live your private life. This division between the individual and Society does not really exist at all. When one tries to carve out a life of one’s own, the individual is not different from the community in which he lives. For the individual, the Human being, has constructed the community, Society. I think we ought to be very clear from the beginning that this division is artificial, utterly unreal.

In bringing about a radical change in the Human being, in you, you are naturally bringing about a radical change in the structure and the nature of Society. I think it must be very clearly understood, that the Human mind, with all its complexity, its intricate work, is part of this external World. The you is the World and, in bringing about a fundamental revolution – neither Communist, nor socialist, but a totally different kind of revolution, within the very structure and nature of the psyche, of yourself – you will bring about a social revolution.

It must begin, not outwardly but inwardly, because the outer is the result of our private, inner life.