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184

Swami said, “I think our Bhagavan has attained Self realisation. Such beings are walking Upanishads. So I want to hear, from his own lips, his experience of Self-realisation. Why are you all butting in and distracting us from the point and purpose of my question?” 

After all this, Bhagavan said, “You say you think I have attained Self-realisation. I must know what you mean by Self realisation. What idea do you have in your mind about it?”

 The Swami was not pleased with this counter-question, but added, after some time, “I mean the atman merging in the paramatman.” 

Bhagavan then said, “We do not know about the paramatman or the Universal Soul, etc. We know we exist. Nobody doubts he exists, though he may doubt the existence of God. So, if one finds out about the truth or source of oneself, that is all that is required.” 

The Swami thereupon said, “Bhagavan therefore says ‘Know Thyself’.” 

Bhagavan said. “Even that is not correct. For, if we talk of knowing the Self, there must be two Selves, one a knowing Self, another the Self which is known, and the process of knowing. 

The state we call realisation is simply being oneself, not knowing anything or becoming anything. 

If one has realised, he is that which alone is and which alone has always been. He cannot describe that state. He can only be that. Of course, we loosely talk of Self realisation, for want of a better term. 

How to ‘real-ise’ or make real that which alone is real? 

What we are all doing is, we ‘realised’ or regard as real that which is unreal. This habit of ours has to be given up. All sadhana under all systems of thought is meant only for this end. When we give up regarding the unreal as real, then the reality alone will remain and we will be that.” 

The Swami replied, “This exposition is all right with reference to Advaita. But there are other schools which do not insist on the disappearance of triputi (the three factors of knowledge) as the condition for Self-realisation. There are schools which believe in the existence of two and even three eternal entities. There is the bhakta, for instance. That he may do bhakti, there must be a God.” 

Bhagavan replied, “Whoever objects to one having a God to worship, so long as he requires such a separate God? Through bhakti he develops himself, and comes to feel that God alone exists and that he, the bhakta, does not count. He comes to a stage when he says, 

‘Not I, but Thou’; ‘Not my will, but Thy will.’ When that stage is reached, which is called complete surrender in the bhakti marga, one finds effacement of ego is attainment of Self. 

We need not quarrel whether there are two entities, or more, or only one. 

Even according to Dvaitis and according to the bhakti marga, complete surrender is prescribed. Do that first, and then see for yourself whether the one Self alone exists, or whether there are two or more entities.”  Bhagavan further added, “Whatever may be said to suit the different capacities of different men, the truth is, the state of Self-realisation must be beyond triputis. The Self is not something of which jnana or ajnana can be predicated. It is beyond ajnana and jnana. The Self is the Self; that is all that can be said of it.” 

The Swami then asked whether a jnani could remain with his body after attaining Self-realisation. He said, “It is said that the impact of Self-realisation is so forceful that the weak physical body cannot bear it for more than twenty-one days at the longest.” 

Bhagavan said, “What is your idea of a jnani? Is he the body or something different?

 If he is something apart from the body, how could he be affected by the body? 

The books talk of different kinds of mukti, videha mukti (without body), and jivan mukti (with body). There may be different stages in the sadhana. But in realisation there are no degrees.” 

The Swami then asked, “What is the best means for Self realisation?” 

Bhagavan: 

‘I exist’ is the only permanent, self-evident experience of everyone. 

Nothing else is so self-evident (pratyaksha) as ‘I am’. 

What people call ‘self-evident’ viz. the experience they get through the senses, is far from self evident. 

The Self alone is that. Pratyaksha is another name for the Self. 

So, to do Self-analysis and be ‘I am’ is the only thing to do. 

‘I am’ is reality. I am this or that is unreal. ‘I am’ is truth, another name for Self. 

‘I am God’ is not true. 

The Swami thereupon said, “The Upanishads themselves have said ‘I am Brahman’.” 

Bhagavan replied, “That is not how the text is to be understood. It simply means, “Brahman exists as ‘I’ and not ‘I am Brahman’. 

It is not to be supposed that a man is advised to contemplate ‘I am Brahman’, ‘I am Brahman’. 

Does a man keep on thinking ‘I am a man’ ‘I am a man’? He is that, and except when a doubt arises as to whether he is an  animal or a tree, there is no need for him to assert, ‘I am a man.’ Similarly the Self is Self, Brahman exists as ‘I am’, in every thing and every being.” 

The Swami remarked, “The bhakta requires a God to whom he can do bhakti. Is he to be taught that there is only the Self, not a worshipper and the worshipped?” 

Bhagavan: Of course, God is required for sadhana. But the end of the sadhana, even in bhakti marga, is attained only after complete surrender. 

What does it mean, except that effacement of ego results in Self remaining as it always has been? 

Whatever path one may choose, the ‘I’ is inescapable, 

the ‘I’ that does the nishkama karma, the 

‘I’ that pines for joining the Lord from whom it feels it has been separated, 

the ‘I’ that feels it has slipped from its real nature, and so on. 

The source of this ‘I’ must be found out. 

Then all questions will be solved. 

Whereas all paths are approved in the Bhagavad Gita, it says that the jnani is the best karma yogi, the best devotee or bhakta, the highest yogi and so on.”

 The Swami still persisted, “It is all right to say Self analysis is the best thing to do. But in practice, we find a God is necessary for most people.” 

Bhagavan: God is of course necessary, for most people. They can go on with one, till they find out that they and God are not different. 

The Swami continued, “In actual practice, sadhakas, even sincere ones, sometimes become dejected and lose faith in God. How to restore their faith? What should we do for them?” 

Bhagavan: If one cannot believe in God, it does not matter. I suppose he believes in himself, in his own existence. Let him find out the source from which he came. 

Swami: Such a man will only say the source from which he comes are his parents. 

 Bhagavan: He cannot be such an ignoramus, as you started by saying he was a sadhaka in this line already. 

...

Bhagavan said, “He wants to know how to turn the mind from sense enjoyments and realise that bliss which is said to be so much above sense-enjoyments. 

There is only one way, making the mind merge in That which is not sense enjoyment. 

As you concentrate on That, the sense attractions will fall of their own accord. 

Again, he asks, ‘When can I attain that bliss?’ He is daily enjoying that bliss in sleep. There, no sense object is present, and he still enjoys great bliss. 

We don't have to attain bliss. We are bliss. 

Bliss is another name for us. It is our nature. 

All that we have to do is to turn the mind, draw it from the sense objects every time it goes towards them, and fix it in the Self.

 He asks whether he will attain bliss after death. There is no need to die to attain bliss. 

Merging of the mind alone is necessary. 

Death is also another name for us. For what is death but giving up the body? 

Our real nature is to be without the body.”

.....

194

..................Whether, when you transcend these three kinds and cease to be the ordinary purusha, there is any vritti still left is a matter with which you need not concern yourself now. Attain that state and see for yourself what that state is and whether there is any vritti in it. 

To speak even of brahmakara vritti, as we sometimes do, is not accurate. 

If we can talk of the river that has merged in the ocean as still a river and call it samudrakara river, we can talk of the final stage in spiritual growth as having Brahmakara vritti. 

When people from Sri Aurobindo’s Ashram come here and ask about the differences between our school and theirs, I always tell them, 

‘There, complete surrender is advised and insisted upon before anything further could be hoped for or attained. So, do it first. I also advise it. After making such surrender, i.e., complete surrender and not any partial or conditional surrender, you will be able to see for yourself whether there are two purushas, whether power comes from anywhere and gets into anywhere, etc.’ For we know nothing about God or any source from which power comes and gets into us. All that is not known. 

But ‘I exist’ is known beyond all dispute by all men. So let us know who that ‘I’ is. 

If, after knowing it, there still remain any doubts such as are now raised, it will be time enough then to try and clear such doubts.”

......

Mr. Nanavati of Bombay asked Bhagavan, “In the fifth stanza of Arunachala Pancharatna reference is made to seeing ‘Your form in everything’. What is the form referred to?” 

Bhagavan said, 

“The stanza says that one should completely surrender one’s mind, 

turn it inwards 

and see ‘you’ the Self within 

and then see the Self in ‘you’ in everything.

 It is only after seeing the Self within .......that one will be able to see the Self in everything. 

One must first realise there is nothing but the Self .....and that he is that Self, 

And then only ....he can see everything as the form of the Self. 

That is the meaning of saying, ‘See the Self in everything and everything in the Self’, as is stated in the Gita and other books. 

It is the same truth that is taught in stanza 4 of Ulladu Narpadu:

If you have the idea that you are something with form, that you are limited by this body, and that being within this body you have to see through these eyes, then God and the world also will appear to you as form. 

If you realise you are without form, that you are unlimited, that you alone exist, that you are the eye, the infinite eye, then what is there to be seen apart from the infinite eye? 

Apart from the eye, there is nothing to be seen. 

There must be a seer for an object to be seen, and there must be space, time, etc. 

But if the Self alone exists, it is both seer and seen, and above seeing or being seen.”

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

220

 29-4-46 Afternoon 

Mr Nanavati asked Bhagavan, “What is the heart referred to in the verse in Upadesa Saram where it is said ‘Abiding in the heart is the best karma, yoga, bhakti and jnana’?” 

Bhagavan: That which is the source of all, that in which all live, and that into which all finally merge, is the heart referred to. 

Sam; what is heart?

A:  That which is the source of all.

Nanavati: How can we conceive of such a heart? 

Bhagavan: Why should you conceive of anything? You have only to see wherefrom the ‘I’ springs. 

Nanavati: I suppose mere mauna in speech is no good; but we must have mauna of the mind. 

Bhagavan: Of course. 

If we have real mauna, that state in which the mind is merged into its source and has no more separate existence, 

then all other kinds of mauna will come of their own accord, 

i.e. the mauna of words, of action and of the mind or chitta. Bhagavan also quoted in this connection, the following from Thayumanavar. 

 If I get pure mauna,  then I shall have mauna of chitta, mind, word and deed. 

Bhagavan added, “Such mauna is not inertness but great activity. It is the most powerful speech.”

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