Just Listen

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

March 20, 1981

M: My personality, or individuality, is thrown to the winds, it is no more there. What you are visiting is only that Dukha Bhagavan, the God of Sorrow. Bhagavan is this manifestation, but sorrow only. It is not involved in thought or activities - it is just the manifestation. I am the total functioning and whatever in the functioning, at the moment, has certain significance, that I am.

It is only by taking the aid of this consciousness, which is suffering, that I am talking. This kind of experience happens only to a very rare one. Don't ask anything, just listen.

Q: Would Maharaj explain more about Dukha Bhagavan?

M: Dukha means pain, suffering, agony. Bhagavan means not only God, it is indicative of explosiveness, a flash - an explosive flash - world perception - with the appearance of I AMness.

When there is an explosion of fireworks there is a crashing sound, a flash of light, and lighting up of the surrounding area. Similarly the "I AM" explodes into being and the whole perceptible universe is conjured up, but consciousness, the I AMness, gives rise to inadequacy, imperfection, and therefore the beginning of sorrow, misery etc., and the settling into body-mind sense. From perfect to imperfect - from no-being to being. In the reverse direction - from body-mind to beingness to Absolute -  then the consciousness state is a Godly state.

Q: Why is there so much and pain and unhappiness in this world?

M: Because you are always in search of happiness. Happiness and unhappiness are interrelated. If you did not have unhappiness, how would you recognize happiness?