"The very first step in understanding what this is all about is giving up the concept of an active, volitional 'I' as a separate entity and accepting the passive role of perceiving and functioning as a process." - Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

Tuesday, September 4, 2012

Jnani is like a child

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj
November 10, 1980.

Have you ever given a thought to this? At what age did you get the knowledge of your own body? Suppose you started knowing yourself at the age of four - whatever actions took place prior to the age of four happened without your knowing and there is no record in your memory of that. You have heard from others of things that happened, but you directly do not know. There is a scar and it is said that I was bitten by somebody, but there is no memory of that. So many things happened before the child knew itself. 

In the first few years the primary concept "I Am" was there, but in a dormant condition. Later on it started knowing itself. 

The jnani's state is the child state, when the child was not knowing itself. The apparatus through which that knowingness expresses itself is now quite different, but the principle is the same.

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सर्वभूताधिवासं यद्भूतेषु च वसत्यपि।
सर्वानुग्राहकत्वेन तद्स्म्यहं वासुदेवः॥

That in whom reside all beings and who resides in all beings,
who is the giver of grace to all, the Supreme Soul of the universe, the limitless being:
I AM THAT. -- Amritabindu Upanishad