To bring about a good society has been the dream of ancient Hindus, the ancient Greeks and Egyptians. And a good society can only exist when mankind is good because being good he creates goodness, brings about goodness in his relationship, in his actions, in his way of life.
Good also means that which is beautiful. Good also means that which is holy; it is related to God, to the highest principles. That word good needs to be very clearly understood. When there is goodness in you, then whatever you do will be good, your relationships, your actions, your way of thinking. One may capture the whole significance of that word, the extraordinary quality of that word, instantly.
Please, let’s carefully think this over together, because if you really go into it very deeply it is going to affect your consciousness, it is going to affect your way of thinking, it is going to affect the way of your life. So please give a little attention to the understanding of that word. The word is not the thing. I may describe a mountain most beautifully, paint it, make a poem, but the word, the description, the poem, is not the actual. We are generally carried away emotionally, irrationally by the description, by the word.
Examine it, look at it. Goodness is not the pursuit of conformity. If you conform to a belief, to a concept, to an idea, to a principle, that is not good, because it creates conflict. Goodness cannot flower through another, through a religious figure, through dogma, through belief; it can only flower in the soil of total attention in which there is no authority. The essence of goodness is a mind that is not in conflict. And goodness implies great responsibility. You can’t be good and allow wars to take place. So a person who is really good is totally responsible for his whole life.
We are asking if one who has lived in a society with the pressures of institutions, of beliefs, of authoritarian religious people, can be good, because it is only if you are good, if you, as a human being, are totally and absolutely good—absolutely, not partially—that we will create a different society. Is it possible, living in this world, being married, with children, jobs, to be good? We are using the word in the sense that implies great responsibility, care, attention, diligence, love. The word good contains all that. Is that possible for you who care to listen? …
What prevents every human being from being utterly good? What is the barrier? What is the block? Why don’t human beings—you—be utterly, sanely good? One who observes realizes what the world is and that he is the world, that the world is not different from him, that he has created that world, that he has created society, that he has created the religions with their innumerable dogmas, beliefs, rituals, with their separations, with their factions. Human beings have created this. Is that what is preventing us from being good? Is it because we believe, or because we are so selfconcerned with our own problems of sex, fear, anxiety, loneliness, wanting to fulfil, wanting to identify with something or other? Is that what is preventing a human being from being good? If those things are preventing us, then they have no value. If you see that to bring about this quality of goodness any pressure from any direction— including your own belief, your own principles, your own ideals—utterly prevents that goodness from being, then you will naturally put them aside without any equivocation, any conflict, because they are stupid.
From This Light In Oneself, Chapter 3