dd mar 11

274

3-7-46 

A visitor said: I am told that according to your school I must find out the source of my thoughts. How am I to do it?’ 

Bhagavan: I have no school; however, it is true that one should trace the source of all thoughts. 

Visitor: Suppose I have the thought ‘horse’ and try to trace its source; I find that it is due to memory and the memory in its turn is due to prior perception of the object ‘horse’, but that is all. 

Bhagavan: Who asked you to think about all that? All those are also thoughts. What good will it do you to go on thinking about memory and perception? It will be endless, like the old dispute, which came first, the tree or the seed. Ask who has this perception and memory. That ‘I’ that has the perception and memory, whence does it arise? Find out that. Because perception or memory or any other experience only comes to that ‘I’. You don’t have such experiences during sleep, and yet you say that  you existed during sleep. And you exist now too. That shows that the ‘I’ continues while other things come and go. Visitor: I am asked to find out the source of ‘I’, and in fact that is what I want to find out, but how can I? What is the source from which I came? 

Bhagavan: You came from the same source in which you were during sleep. Only during sleep you couldn’t know where you entered; that is why you must make the enquiry while waking. Some of us advised the visitor to read Who am I? and Ramana Gita and Bhagavan also told him he might do so. He did so during the day and in the evening he said to Bhagavan: 

“Those books prescribe Self-enquiry, but how is one to do it?” 

Bhagavan: That also must be described in the books. 

Visitor: Am I to concentrate on the thought ‘Who am I?’ 

Bhagavan: It means you must concentrate to see where the I-thought arises. 

Instead of looking outwards, look inwards and see where the I-thought arises. 

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: Whence comes birth? 

Bhagavan: For whom is birth? 

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 Brahman 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: What about the powers of supermen? 

Bhagavan: Whether powers are high or low, whether of the mind or super-mind, they exist only with reference to him who has the powers; find out who that is. 

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: Different teachers have set up different schools and proclaimed different truths and so confused people. Why? 

Bhagavan: They have all taught the same truth but from different standpoints. Such differences were necessary to meet the needs of different minds differently constituted, but they all reveal the same Truth. 

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.

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

“Deathlessness is our real nature, and we falsely ascribe it to the body, imagining that it will live for ever and losing sight of what is really immortal, simply because we identify ourselves with the body. 

It says in the Upanishads that the jnani looks forward eagerly to the time when he can throw off the body, just as a labourer carrying a heavy load looks forward to reaching his destination and laying it down.” 

....

A visitor asked Bhagavan what one should do for the betterment of atma. 

Bhagavan: What do you mean by atma and by betterment? 

Visitor: We don’t know all that; that is why we come here. 

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. 

Visitor: But how is one to give up this identification? Will coming here and getting our doubts removed help in the process? 

Bhagavan: Questions are always about things that you don’t know and will be endless unless you find out who the questioner is. Though the things about which the questions are asked are unknown, there can be no doubt that a questioner exists to ask the questions, and if you ask who he is, all doubts will be set at rest. 

Visitor: All that I want to know is whether sat sang is necessary and whether my coming here will help me or not. 

Bhagavan: 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.

...

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

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. 

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.

......

281

19-7-46 

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.

.....

In the afternoon the following two questions were put by Mr. Bhargava, an elderly visitor from Jhansi in U.P.:

 (1) How am I to search for the ‘I’ from start to finish? 

(2) When I meditate I reach a stage where there is a vacuum or void. How should I proceed from there? 

Bhagavan: Never mind whether there are visions or sounds or anything else or whether there is a void. Are you present  during all this or are you not? You must have been there even during the void to be able to say that you experienced a void. To be fixed in that ‘you’ is the quest for the ‘I’ from start to finish. In all books on Vedanta you will find this question of a void or of nothing being left, raised by the disciple and answered by the Guru. It is the mind that sees objects and has experiences and that finds a void when it ceases to see and experience, but that is not ‘you’. You are the constant illumination that lights up both the experiences and the void. It is like the theatre light that enables you to see the theatre, the actors and the play while the play is going on but also remains alight and enables you to say that there is no play on when it is all finished. Or there is another illustration. We see objects all around us, but in complete darkness we do not see them and we say, ‘I see nothing’; even then the eyes are there to say that they see nothing. In the same way, you are there even in the void you mention. You are the witness of the three bodies: the gross, the subtle and the causal, and of the three states: waking, dream and deep sleep, and of the three times: past, present and future, and also of this void. In the story of the tenth man, when each of the ten counted and thought there were only nine, each one forgetting to count himself, there is a stage when they think one is missing and don’t know who it is; and that corresponds to the void. We are so accustomed to the notion that all that we see around us is permanent and that we are this body, that when all this ceases to exist we imagine and fear that we also have ceased to exist. 

Bhagavan also quoted verses 212 and 213 from Vivekachudamani, in which the disciple says: 

“After I eliminate the five sheaths as not-Self, I find that nothing at all remains,” and the Guru replied that the Self or That by which all modifications (including the ego and its creatures) and their absence (that is the void) are perceived is always there. 

Then Bhagavan continued speaking on the subject and said: “The nature of the Self or ‘I’ must be illumination. You perceive all modifications and their absence. How? To say that you get the illumination from another would raise the question how he got it and there would be no end to the chain of reasoning. So you yourself are the illumination. The usual illustration of this is the following: You make all kinds of sweets of various ingredients and in various shapes and they all taste sweet because there is sugar in all of them and sweetness is the nature of sugar. And in the same way all experiences and the absence of them contain the illumination which is the nature of the Self. Without the Self they cannot be experienced, just as without sugar not one of the articles you make can taste sweet.” 

A little later Bhagavan also said: “First one sees the Self as objects, then one sees the Self as void, then one sees the Self as Self, only in this last there is no seeing because seeing is being.” 

Mr. Bhargava also said something about sleep, and this led Bhagavan to speak about sleep as follows:

 “What is required is to remain fixed in the Self always. 

The obstacles to that are distraction by the things of the world (including sense objects, desires and tendencies) on the one hand, and sleep on the other. 

Sleep is always mentioned in books as the first obstacle to samadhi and various methods are prescribed for overcoming it according to the stage of evolution of the person concerned. First, one is enjoined to give up all distraction by the world and its objects or by sleep. But then it is said, for instance in the Gita, that one need not give up sleep entirely. Too much and too little are alike undesirable. One should not sleep at all during the daytime and even during the night restrict sleep to the middle portion, from about ten to two. But another method that is prescribed is not to bother about sleep at all. When it overtakes you, you can do nothing about it, so simply remain fixed in the Self or in meditation every moment of your waking life and take up the meditation again the moment you wake, and that will be enough. Then even during sleep the same current of thought or meditation will be working. This is evident because if a man goes to sleep with any strong thought working in his mind he finds the same thought there when he wakes. It is of the man who does this with meditation that it is said that even his sleep is samadhi. A good way to reduce the amount of sleep needed is to take only sattvic food and that in moderation and to avoid work or activity of any kind.” 

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285

After a slight pause Bhagavan replied, 

“Faith is in things unknown; but the Self is self-evident. 

Even the greatest egoist cannot deny his own existence, that is to say, cannot deny the Self. 

You can call the ultimate Reality by whatever name you like and say that you have faith in it or love for it, but who is there who will not have faith in his own existence or love for himself? That is because faith and love are our real nature.”  

A little later Ramamurti asked, “That which rises as ‘I’ within us is the Self, is it not?” 

Bhagavan: No; it is the ego that rises as ‘I’. 

That from which it arises is the Self. 

.......

Ramamurti: They speak of a lower and a higher atman. 

Bhagavan: There is no such thing as lower or higher in atman. Lower and higher apply to the forms, not to the Self or atman.

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