dd5 - Self is always realised. Who is to realise what and how?

 https://selfdefinition.org/ramana/Ramana-Maharshi-Day-by-Day-with-Bhagavan.pdf

272

Visitor: And Bhagavan says that if I see that, I shall realise the Self? 

Bhagavan: There is no such thing as realising the Self. 

How is one to realise or make real what is real? 

People all realise, or regard as real, what is unreal, and all they have to do is to give that up. 

When you do that you will remain as you always are and the Real will be Real. 

It is only to help people give up regarding the unreal as real that all the religions and the practices taught by them have come into being.

Visitor: The Upanishads say “He who knows Brahman becomes Brahman.”

Bhagavan: It is not a matter of becoming but being.

Visitor: Are the siddhis mentioned in Patanjali’s sutras true or only his dream? 

Bhagavan: He who is Brahma or the Self will not value those siddhis. 

Patanjali himself says that they are all exercised with the mind and that they impede Self-realisation.

Visitor: When one attains Self-realisation, what is the guarantee that one has really attained it and is not under an illusion like the lunatic who thinks he is Napoleon or some such thing? 

Bhagavan: In a sense, speaking of Self-realisation is a delusion. 

It is only because people have been under the delusion that the non-Self is the Self and the unreal the Real that they have to be weaned out of it by the other delusion called Self-realisation; because actually the Self always is the Self and there is no such thing as realising it. 

Who is to realise what, and how, when all that exists is the Self and nothing but the Self?

Visitor: Sri Aurobindo says the world is real and you and the Vedantins say it is unreal. How can the world be unreal? 

Bhagavan: The Vedantins do not say the world is unreal. That is a misunderstanding. If they did, what would be the meaning of the Vedantic text: “All this is Brahman”? 

They only mean that the world is unreal as world, but it is real as Self.

 If you regard the world as not-Self it is not real. Everything, whether you call it world or maya or lila or sakti, must be within the Self and not apart from it. There can be no sakti apart from the sakta.

....

Visitor: Since they have recommended different paths which is one to follow? 

Bhagavan: You speak of paths as if you were somewhere and the Self somewhere else and you had to go and reach it. But in fact the Self is here and now and you are that always. It is like you being here and asking people the way to Ramanasramam and complaining that each one shows a different path and asking which to follow.

.......

Bhagavan: 

The Self or atma is always as it is. 

There is no such thing as attaining it. 

All that is necessary is to give up regarding the not-Self as Self and the unreal as Real. 

When we give up identifying ourselves with the body the Self alone remains.

.........

First you must decide what is sat sang. It means association with sat or Reality. 

One who knows or has realized sat is also regarded as sat. Such association with sat or with one who knows sat is absolutely necessary for all. 

Sankara has said (Bhagavan here quoted the Sanskrit verse) that in all the three worlds there is no boat like sat sang to carry one safely across the ocean of births and deaths.

.............278

S.P. Tayal: From about 5 o’clock every morning I concentrate on the thought that the Self alone is real and all else unreal. Although I have been doing this for about 20 years I cannot concentrate for more than two or three minutes without my thoughts wandering.

 Bhagavan: 

There is no other way to succeed than to draw the mind back every time it turns outwards and fix it in the Self. 

There is no need for meditation or mantra or japa or dhyana or anything of the sort, because these are our real nature. 

All that is needed is to give up thinking of objects other than the Self. 

Meditation is not so much thinking of the Self as giving up thinking of the not-Self. 

When you give up thinking of outward objects and prevent your mind from going outwards and turn it inward and fix it in the Self, the Self alone will remain.

...............

S.P. Tayal: What should I do to overcome the pull of these thoughts and desires? How should I regulate my life so as to attain control over my thoughts? 

Bhagavan: 

The more you get fixed in the Self, the more other thoughts will drop off by themselves.

 The mind is nothing but a bundle of thoughts, and the I-thought is the root of all of them. When you see who this ‘I’ is and whence it proceeds all thoughts get merged in the Self. 

Regulation of life, such as getting up at a fixed hour, bathing, doing mantra, japa, etc., observing ritual, all this is for people who do not feel drawn to Self-enquiry or are not capable of it.

 But for those who can practise this method all rules and discipline are unnecessary.

.................279........

At this point K.M. Jivrajani interposed, “Has one necessarily to pass through the stage of seeing occult visions before attaining Self-realization?” 

Bhagavan: Why do you bother about visions and whether they come or not? 

K.M. Jivrajani: I don’t. I only want to know so that I shan’t be disappointed if I don’t have them. 

Bhagavan: Visions are not a necessary stage. To some they come and to others they don’t, but whether they come or not you always exist and you must stick to that.

K.M. Jivrajani: I sometimes concentrate on the brain centre and sometimes on the heart — not always on the same centre. Is that wrong?

Bhagavan: Wherever you concentrate and on whatever centre there must be a you to concentrate, and that is what you must concentrate on. Different people concentrate on different centres, not only the brain and the heart but also the space between the eyebrows, the tip of the nose, the tip of the tongue, the lowermost chakra and even external objects. Such concentration may lead to a sort of laya in which you will feel a certain bliss, but care must be taken not to lose the thought ‘I Am’ in all this. You never cease to exist in all these experiences.

.........

K.M. Jivrajani: That is to say that I must be a witness? 

Bhagavan: Talking of the ‘witness’ should not lead to the idea that there is a witness and something else apart from him that he is witnessing. 

The ‘witness’ really means the light that illumines the seer, the seen and the process of seeing. Before, during and after the triads of seer, seen and seeing, the illumination exists. It alone exists always.

.........

280

K.M. Jivrajani: It is said in books that one should cultivate all the good or daivic qualities in order to prepare oneself for Self-realisation. 

Bhagavan: All good or daivic qualities are included in jnana and all bad asuric qualities are included in ajnana. When jnana comes all ajnana goes and all daivic qualities come automatically. If a man is a jnani he cannot utter a lie or do anything wrong. It is, no doubt, said in some books that one should cultivate one quality after another and thus prepare for ultimate moksha, but for those who follow the jnana or vichara marga their sadhana is itself quite enough for acquiring all daivic qualities; they need not do anything else.

..........................280

Again today a visitor put questions: I do not understand how to make the enquiry ‘Who am I?’

Bhagavan: Find out whence the ‘I’ arises. Self-enquiry does not mean argument or reasoning such as goes on when you say, “I am not this body, I am not the senses,” etc.: all that may also help but it is not the enquiry. 

Watch and find out where in the body the ‘I’ arises and fix your mind on that.

........

Visitor: Will gayatri help? 

Bhagavan: What is gayatri? It really means: “Let me concentrate on that which illumines all.”

 Dhyana really means only concentrating or fixing the mind on the object of dhyana. 

But meditation is our real nature. 

If we give up other thoughts what remains is ‘I’ and its nature is dhyana or meditation or jnana, whichever we choose to call it. 

What is at one time the means later becomes the end. 

Unless meditation or dhyana were the nature of the Self it could not take you to the Self. 

If the means were not of the nature of the goal, it could not bring you to the goal.

........................281 .........end.............................