dd mar 9

221

A visitor asked, “I have been visiting various shrines in a pilgrimage, and worshipping various images. What exactly is God’s true form?”  

Bhagavan: The only thing to know is that there is an entity who is in all these forms, but who is not these forms. 

We see the One in the many. We see the One as many, the Formless in the forms.

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226

Bhagavan has said the same on previous occasions also. He continued to speak about mukti and said, 

“Mukti is not anything to be attained. It is our real nature. We are always That. 

It is only so long as one feels that he is in bondage that he has to try to get released from bondage. 

When a man feels that he is in bondage he tries to find out for whom is the bondage and by that enquiry discovers that there is no bondage for him but only for the mind, and that the mind itself disappears or proves non-existent when turned inwards instead of outwards towards sense-objects; it merges into its source, the Self, and ceases to exist as a separate entity. 

In that state there is no feeling either of bondage or liberation. So long as one speaks of mukti he is not free from the sense of bondage.” 

The visitor who had asked about yoga in the morning now pursued his questions further. 

Visitor: I did not quite grasp all that Bhagavan said this morning. What am I to do when the mind strays in various directions during dhyana? 

Bhagavan: Simply draw the mind back each time it strays and fix it in dhyana. There is no other way. (Bhagavan also quoted Chapter VI, Verse 26 from the Bhagavad Gita which says the same thing). 

Visitor: Then is there no use in pranayama (breath control)? Should I not practise it? 

Bhagavan: Pranayama is also a help. It is one of the various methods that are intended to help us attain ekagratha or one-pointedness of mind. Pranayama can also help to control the wandering mind and attain this one-pointedness and therefore it can be used. But one should not stop there.  After obtaining control of the mind through pranayama one should not rest content with any experiences which may accrue therefrom but should harness the controlled mind to the question ‘Who am I?’ till the mind merges in the Self.

.....

Sadhu: I don’t know what all these terms mean. 

Bhagavan: Then never mind what the Arya Samajists tell you. You don’t know about God and other things, 

but you do know that you exist. You can have no doubt about that. So find out who you are. 

Sadhu: That is what I want to know. How can I find out? 

Bhagavan: Keep all other thoughts away and try to find out in what place in your body the ‘I’ arises. 

Sadhu: But I am unable to think about this. 

Bhagavan: Why? If you can think about other things you can think about ‘I’ and where in your body it arises. 

If you mean that other thoughts distract you, the only way is to draw your mind back each time it strays and fix it on the ‘I’. 

As each thought arises, ask yourself: “To whom is this thought?” The answer will be, “to me”.

Then hold on to that “me”. 

Sadhu: Am I to keep on repeating “Who am I?” so as to make a mantra of it? 

 Bhagavan: No. ‘Who am I?’ is not a mantra. It means that you must find out where in you arises the I-thought which is the source of all other thoughts. 

But if you find this vichara marga too hard for you, you can go on repeating “I, I” and that will lead you to the same goal. 

There is no harm in using ‘I’ as a mantra. It is the first name of God.

God is everywhere, but it is difficult to conceive Him in that aspect, so the books have said, “God is everywhere. He is also within you. You are Brahman.” So remind yourself: “I am Brahman”. 

The repetition of ‘I’ will eventually lead you to realise “I am Brahman”.

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232

Jivrajani: Bhagavan has said that when the ego is submerged or killed something else arises within us as ‘I-I’. Will Bhagavan please tell me more about that? 

Bhagavan: Everyone has to find that out by his own experience. It cannot be described. In the same way, you say, “something goes up”; can you describe that?

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Jivrajani: It is only by developing the intellect that intuition can be attained; in fact perfection of intellect is intuition, is that not so? 

Bhagavan: How can that be? The merging of the intellect in the source from which it arose gives birth to intuition, as you call it. The intellect is of use only to see outside things, the outside world. Perfection of the intellect would lead only to seeing the outside world well. But the intellect is of no use at all for seeing within, for turning inwards towards the Self. For that, it has to be killed or extinguished, or in other words it has to merge in the source from which it sprang.

....

Jivrajani: Has closing the eyes during meditation any efficacy? 

Bhagavan: The eyes can be closed or open as one finds convenient. It is not the eyes that see. There is one who sees through the eyes. If he is turned inwards and is not looking through the eyes they can be open and yet nothing will be seen. If we keep our eyes closed it is the same to us whether the windows of this room are open or shut.

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233

Jivrajani: Suppose there is some disturbance during meditation, such as mosquito bites, should one persist in meditation and try to bear the bites and ignore the interruption or drive the mosquitoes away and then continue the meditation? 

Bhagavan: You must do as you find most convenient. You will not attain mukti simply because you refrain from driving away the mosquitoes, nor be denied mukti simply because you drive them away. The thing is to attain one-pointedness and then to attain mano-nasa. Whether you do this by putting up with the mosquito bites or driving the mosquitoes away is left to you. If you are completely absorbed in your meditation you will not know that the mosquitoes are biting you. Till you attain that stage why should you not drive them away?

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243

Bose: When the Upanishads say that all is Brahman, how can we say, like Shankara, that this world is mithya or illusory? 

Bhagavan: Shankara also said that this world is Brahman or the Self. What he objected to is one’s imagining that the Self is limited by the names and forms that constitute the world. He only said that the world does not exist apart from Brahman. Brahman or the Self is like the screen and the world is like the pictures on it. You can see the picture only so long as there is a screen. But when the seer himself becomes the screen only the Self remains. 

Kaivalya Navaneeta has asked and answered six questions about maya. They are instructive. 

The first question is: What is maya? And the answer is: It is anirvachaniya or indescribable. 

The second question is: To whom does it come? And the answer is: To the mind or ego who feels that he is a separate entity, who thinks: ‘I do this’ or ‘this is mine’.  

The third question is: Where does it come from and how did it originate? And the answer is: Nobody can say. 

The fourth question is: How did it arise? And the answer is: Through non-vichara, through failure to ask: who am I? 

The fifth question is: If the Self and maya both exist does not this invalidate the theory of Advaita? The answer is: It need not, since maya is dependent on the Self as the picture is on the screen. The picture is not real in the sense that the screen is real. 

The sixth question is: If the Self and maya are one, could it not be argued that the Self is of the nature of maya, that is illusory? 

And the answer is: No; the Self can be capable of producing illusion without being illusory. A conjuror may create for our entertainment the illusion of people, animals and things, and we see all of them as clearly as we see him; but after the performance he alone remains and all the visions he had created have disappeared. He is not a part of the illusion but is real and solid.

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