Real Attainment

Sri Ramana Maharshi

• The state of non-emergence of 'I' is the state of your being THAT. Without questing for that state of the non-emergence of 'I' and attaining it, how can one accomplish one's own extinction, where after 'I' never revives? Without that attainment how is it possible to abide in one's own state where one is That?
• Without uttering the word 'I' to quest with the mind turned inwards, as to whence the 'I' rises, is alone the enquiring leading to Self-knowledge. Other than this, can contemplation, "This I am not, That I am", be by itself the enquiry, though it may be an aid thereto?
• Questing 'who am I' within one's mind, when one reaches the Heart, the individual 'I' sinks crest-fallen, and at once Reality manifests itself spontaneously as 'I-I'. Thought it reveals itself thus, it is not the ego 'I', but the Perfect Being the Absolute Self.
• To seek and abide in the Reality that is ever attained is alone the attainment. If it is said that liberation is of three kinds, with form or without form or with and without forms, then let me tell you, the extinction of ego which asks, which form of Liberation is true is the true Liberation.

From 'Thus Spake Ramana'