Wakeful State: Mind Exists

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q. There are pleasure and pain in life. Should we not remain with only pleasure?

Pleasure consists in turning and keeping the mind within; pain is sending it outward. There is only pleasure. Absence of pleasure is called pain. One's nature is pleasure - bliss (ananda).

Is it the soul?

Soul and God are only mental conceptions.

Is God only a mental conception?

Yes. Do you think of God in sleep?

But sleep is a state of dullness.

If God be real He must remain always. You remain in sleep and in wakefulness - just the same. If God be as true as your Self, God must be in sleep as well the Self. This thought of God arises only in the wakeful state. Who thinks now? 

I think.

Who is this "I"? Who says it? Is it the body?

The body speaks.

The body does not speak. If so, did it sleep in sleep? Who is this "I"?

"I" within the body.

Are you within the body or without?

I am certainly within the body.

Do you know it to be so in your sleep?

I remain in my body in sleep also.

Are you aware of being within the body in sleep?

Sleep is a state of dullness.

The fact is, you are neither within nor without. Sleep is the natural state of being.

Then sleep must be a better state than this.

There is no superior or inferior state. In sleep, in dream and in the wakeful state you are just the same. Sleep is a state of happiness; there is no misery. The sense of want, of pain etc. arises only in the wakeful state. What is the change that has taken place? You are the same in both, but there is difference in happiness. Why? Because the mind has arisen now. This mind rises after the "I" thought. The thought arises from consciousness. If one abides in it, one is always happy.