Seeing God

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q: Can everybody see God?
Yes

Q: Can I see God?
Yes

Q: Who is my guide to see God? Do I not need a guide?
Who was your guide to Ramanasramam? With whose guidance do you see the world daily? God is your own Self beyond body, mind and intellect. Just as you are able to see the world yourself so also you will be able to see your Self if you earnestly strive to do so, your Self alone being your guide in that quest also.

Q: Whenever I worship God with name and form, I feel tempted to ask whether I am not wrong in doing so, as that would limiting the Limitless, giving form to the Formless. At the same time I feel I am not constant in my adherence to worship of God without form.
As long as you respond to a name what objection could there be to your worshipping a God with name or form? Worship God with or without form till you know who you are.

Renunciation Is Pertinent To Mind

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q: I have a good mind to resign from service and remain constantly with Sri Bhagavan.

M: Bhagavan is always with you, in you, and you are yourself Bhagavan. To realize this it is neither necessary to resign your job nor run away from home. Renunciation does not imply apparent divesting of costumes, family ties, home etc. but renunciation of desires, affection and attachment. There is no need to resign your job, but resign yourself to Him, the bearer of the burden of all. One who renounces desires etc. actually merges in the world and expands his love to the whole universe. Expansion of love and affection would be a far better term for a true devotee of God than renunciation, for one who renounces the immediate ties actually extends the bonds of affection and love to a wider world beyond the borders of caste, creed and race. A sannyasi, who apparently casts away his clothes and leaves his home does not do so out of aversion to his immediate relations but because of his love to others around him. When this expansion comes, one does not feel that one is running away from home, but drops from it like ripe fruit from a tree; till then it would be folly to leave one's home or his job.

Jnani's Prarabdha?

Sri Ramana Maharshi

People say that even a jnani is not free from the effects of prarabdha.

Yes; he does appear to others as if undergoing the results of his karma, eating the same as they do, sleeping and suffering from the ailments of the body. These aftereffects are just like the running of the flywheel by its momentum after the engine has stopped. But the jnani is neither affected by this nor does he think that he is experiencing the pleasures and pains thereof because he has no thought of being the doer.

Samadhi

Sri Ramana Maharshi

What is samadhi?

When the mind is in communion with the Self in darkness, it is called nidra (sleep), i.e., the involution of the mind in ignorance. Involution in a conscious or wakeful state is called samadhi. Samadhi is continuous inherence in the Self in a waking state. Nidra or sleep is also inherence in the Self but in an unconscious state. In sahaja samadhi the communion is continuous. 

What are kevala nirvikalpa samadhi and sahaja nirvikalpa samadhi?

The involution of the mind in the Self, but without its destruction, is kevala nirvikalpa samadhi. There are four obstacles in this, namely, vacillation of mind, prana (life breath), body and drishti. In kevala nirvikalpa samadhi one is not free from vasanas and does not, therefore, attain mukti. Only after the samskaras have been destroyed can one attain salvation.

When can one practise sahaja samadhi?

Even from the beginning. Even though one practises kevala nirvikalpa samadhi for years together, if one has not rooted out the vasanas, he will not attain salvation.

How Can This World Be False?

Sri Ramana Maharshi

It is stated that the existence of the world is false, an illusion, Maya, but we see the world day after day. How can it be false?

By false it is meant that the conception of the world is a superimposition on reality, as the idea of a snake is superimposed on the reality of a rope, in darkness (in ignorance). That is Maya, illusion.

What is Maya? Illusion?

Seeing ice without seeing that it is water is illusion, Maya. Therefore saying things like killing the mind or anything like that also has no meaning, for after all mind also is part and parcel of the Self. Resting in the Self or inhering in the Self is mukti, getting rid of Maya. Maya is not a separate entity. Absence of light is called darkness, so also absence of Knowledge, Illumination etc., is called ignorance, illusion or Maya.

All Differences Only In Mind

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q: Will the Master say that there is no difference between the poet, the artist, the clerk and the engineer etc.?

M: The difference is only in the mind: according to the predisposition of each, the differences exist. No two individuals are alike, due to vasanas. The ignorant mind is like the sensitive plate taking images of things as they appear, whereas the wise man's mind is like a clean mirror. 

Q: Is the Master here?

Who is the Master? You think there is the Master here. You see the body of the Master, but how does the Master conceive of himself? He is the Self or Atma. He sees everybody as himself. Only if there is a world apart from him could he see a world. If the Self is identified with the world then where would be the world? There has been no creation, no destruction, no preservation. That which is, is ever the Self, the Atma. These appear according to each one's standpoint, according to the maturity of the mind, and as you progress further and further these doubts will not arise. That which exists is consciousness. Consciousness and existence are not different. Existence is the same as Consciousness, pure Consciousness, Absolute Consciousness. You say I am conscious of the body and so on, but pure Consciousness is beyond all this. It is Absolute Consciousness. There is no question of transition from unconsciousness to supreme pure Consciousness. Giving up these two, self-consciousness and unconsciousness, you inhere in the natural consciousness, that is pure Consciousness.

No Mind, No Limitations

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q: How can one control dreams?

M: One who can control them during jagrat (waking state) can aslo control them while asleep. Dreams are only impressions which have been received in the waking state and are recalled to mind in the dream state (i.e., semi-sleeping state as distinct from deep sleep - sushupti). 

Referring to what he saw in dreams, the enquirer remarked, "I could not understand what they were. There were huge figures with monkey faces in my dream."

M: The Self is not limited; it is the mind which produces a form that is limited; that which has got dimensions is the mind and it gives rise to dimensions in others. The real limitation is in the mind. The mind is not different from the Supreme Being. A gold ornament is not gold itself, but is also not different from gold. The mind is a wonderful power, a mysterious power (shakti) of the Supreme Being. It is after the rise of the mind that God, world and jivas appear, whereas in sleep we are not aware of any of these three. That is the mysterious power of God. But although we are not aware of these in sleep, yet we know that we existed in sleep also. On the rising of the mind we awaken from sleep. Consciousness and unconsciousness are with reference to the mind only. In the wakeful state we identify ourselves with the mind. If now we find the real Self behind the mind, then we shall not have these limitations. In the deep sleep state, what limitations were there?

Q: None that I am aware of.

M: That which says I was not aware is also the mind. In deep sleep you are one with the real Self. That which appears in the interval also disappears. The Self always remains, whether in sleep, dream or waking state. It is the substratum both of the waking state and the sleep state. The different states of dream, sleep and wakefulness are only for the mind. Trance and unconsciousness also are only for the mind; they do not affect the Self.

Prabhu Teaches Brahma Vidya

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Continued from here

Gorakh could not be persuaded and would not budge an inch from his ground; he challenged Prabhu to try cutting his body, handing him a sword, long, bright and sharp. His body could not be cut, nor was Gorakh able to touch an atom of Prabhu, in spite of Gorakh having been told to call to his aid his own strength and that of his relations. Gorakh, who was surprised at this, acknowledge Prabhu's superiority and begged to be taught brahma vidya.

Prabhu then expounded to Gorakh brahma vidya as follows:

Gorakh, conceive not your body as your Self. Seek the in-dweller (the cave-dweller) and you will once for all rid yourself of the disease of birth and death. The cave is only your heart, the in-dweller thereof is called God and "I am That".

Prabhu and Gorakh

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Prabhulinga, the founder of the Lingayat sect, was touring the land for the uplift of the spiritually minded. He met the famous Yogi Gokarnath in Gokarnam. The Yogi welcomed him respectfully but was proudly conscious of his own extraordinary powers over the elements. He considered his guest more or less his equal, expressed pleasure at meeting him and on his greeting him asked him who he was.

Prabhulinga replied that he only who had destroyed his ego, root and branch, and realized "himself" could know who he was and wondered what he could say to a nonentity, a person who clung to his perishable body.

Gokarnath, who identified his body with his Self, replied, "That person alone who has gained the immortality of the body by the favor of Shiva and consumption of Gulikas will never die. Therefore, one who has not gained such immortality dies."

Prabhu observed: You speak as if existence in an imperishable body is your real existence and the death of the body your death. Evidently you appear to think that the body itself is your Self. You can only be matched by the ignorant masses. If the body be yourself, why do you say "my body"? Everyone speaks of his possessions as "my clothes, my gold etc." Tell me if anyone identifies himself with the clothes, or the gold etc. and says, "I am the clothes, I am the gold etc.

Gorakh replied: Men say 'I think, I walk' etc. Please tell me what the 'I' signifies in such instances.

Prabhu: 'I think' signifies the association with the faculty of thinking. Similarly also in other instances, association with the body, the senses and the faculties is meant. If, on the other hand, 'I' be identical with them how many I's are there? You are mistaking a superimposition for the reality.

Gorakh asked Prabhu to explain what is meant by saying 'I lose my life'. Is there one life to lose another?

Prabhu said: Life-breath is the real meaning of the word 'life' whereas the Self is also referred to as 'life' figuratively. Why do you seek your own ruin by identifying yourself with the perishable body composed of flesh, blood, bones, fat etc. notwithstanding the scriptural statement that the Self is Existence, Knowledge and Bliss? One who, disgusted with this body, the thing responsible for the interminable recurrence of births and deaths, is intent upon obtaining freedom, will look at this body with the same disgust as one who has unwittingly trodden on loathsome offal on the path. While the wise pray to Shiva to free them from taking a body anymore, just as a man would take medicine to rid himself of a malady once and for all, is it not a matter for wonder that you should seek to perpetuate the body by divine favor? Does not this correspond to a sick man taking medicine to perpetuate the malady?

Has even one such glorified body ever been born which has not met with death? There never was a case of a stone thrown up that has not come back to earth. So also anything having a beginning must also have an end, some time or other. Only if there was anything that was not born could it remain without death.

You have based the immortality of your body on the use of drugs and divine favor on on other assumption that the days you would live with this body are interminable. This assumption is untenable. Oh! You who are great in penance! Desire at least hereafter to obtain salvation.

(To be continued)

Self-Enquiry: Cure For All Diseases

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Hatha yogic practices are said to banish diseases effectively and are therefore advocated as necessary preliminaries to jnana yoga.

Let those who advocate them use them. It has not been the experience here. All diseases would be effectively annihilated by continuous Self-enquiry.

What about pranayama?

What about it? While I do not speak about it in terms of the well known phraseology of prakam, rechakam and kumbhakam and of their matras (inhalation, exhalation and retention of breath in units of time) I have said that it can be used. Mind and life-breath spring from the same source; if you stop the course of one, you have automatically stopped the course of the others. Control of mind is easier than control of breath. The latter resembles the forcible milking of a cow and the former the cajoling of the cow by a feed of grass and caressing it by gently patting its back.

God Is Within

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q: People practising meditation etc. are said to get new diseases; at any rate, I feel some pain in the back and front of the chest. This is stated to be a test by God. Will Bhagavan explain this and say if it is true?

B: There is no Bhagavan outside you and no test is therefore instituted. What you believe to be a test or a new diseases resulting from spiritual practices is really the strain that is now brought to play upon your nerves and the five senses. The mind which was hitherto operating through the nadis to sense external objects and thus maintaining a link between itself and the organs of perceptions is now required to withdraw from the link and this action of withdrawal naturally causes a strain, a sprain or a snap attendant with pain, which people term disease and perhaps tests by God. All these would go, if you would but continue your meditation bestowing your thoughts solely on understanding your Self or on Self-realization. There is no greater remedy than this continuous yoga or union with God or Atman. There cannot but be pain as a result of your discarding your long acquired vasanas.

Be Earnest

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q: Doesn't that all-loving, all-knowing, all-powerful God provide all that is needed for a man's realization? (The enquirer's inner thought was "Should we always depend upon the whims and fancies of a Guru, however great he may be? If so, where is freedom of the Self and Self-reliance?")

Quick and straight as an arrow came the answer from Him as if He understood the enquirer's inner trouble better than himself.

M: Do not think that this body is the Guru (pointing to his body).

Q: I fear that Self-realization is no easy thing to reach.

M: Why stultify yourself by anticipating failure in your course? Push on.There you are. Self-realization will come to an earnest seeker in a trice!

Why Think 'I am God'?

Sri Ramana Maharshi

How can I help others?

Who is there for you to help? Who is the "I" that is to help others? First clear up that point and then everything will settle itself.

As for Ishwara's help in my effort, isn't that to be secured by prayer, worship etc.? Won't that be helpful?

Ishwara's grace and worship for it etc. are all intermediate steps adopted and necessary to be adopted so long as the goal is not reached. When it is reached, God is the Self.

What particular steps will be helpful?

That depends on the circumstances in each case.

Which path is best suited to me? Won't all help be provided by God?

Bhakti, karma, jnana and yoga, all these paths are one. You cannot love God without knowing Him nor know Him without loving Him. Love manifests itself in everything you do and that is karma. The development of mental perception (yoga) is the necessary preliminary before you can know or love God in the proper way.

Can I go on thinking "I am God"? Is that right practice?

Why think that? In fact you are God. But who goes on thinking or saying 'I am a man', 'I am a man'? If any contrary thought, for instance, that one was a beast had to be put down, then of course the wrong notion that one is this or that, according to one's erroneous fancies, to that extent the idea that he is not these but God or Self, may be indulged in, as a matter of practice but when practice is over, the result is not any thought at all (such as 'I am God') but mere Self-realization. That is beyond conceptual thought.

Go On With Your Enquiry!

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q: Isn't the Guru's Grace necessary for one's progress in vichara (enquiry)?

Yes. But the vichara that you are making is itself the Guru's grace or God's grace.

Q: I request you to bless me with your Grace.

The Maharshi remains silent for a while, showing his very silent presence in perpetual (i.e., sahaja) samadhi, is an ever present help, which it is for the thirsty questioner to quaff and quench his spiritual thirst with. Then he said: Go on with your enquiry.

Q: How? I don't know how to proceed.

Who doesn't know? You say 'I' and yet you say you don't know 'I'. Can anyone be ignorant of himself? Isn't that ludicrously impossible? If there were something else to be attained or known, then you might feel difficulty in attaining or knowing it. But in the case of the ever present, inescapable 'I', how can you be ignorant? You have constantly to fight out and get rid of your false notion of 'I'. Do that.

Q: In doing so isn't a Guru's help necessary and useful? 

Yes, to start you on the inquiry. But you must yourself pursue your enquiry.

Q: To what extent can I rely on the Guru's Grace in this? Up to what point is the enquiry itself to be carried on?

You must carry on this demolition of wrong idea by enquiry, till your last wrong notion is demolished - till the Self is realized.

Probe Into The "I", the "I" Disappears!

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q: Can I get knowledge of the Self, i.e., can I experience direct realization of the Self?

M: Why? Who is there without a knowledge of the Self? Everyone has experience of the Self.

But I do not realize it.

The fact is that all the while you know the Self. How can the self not know the Self? Only you, the self, have got into the habit of thinking that you are this, you are that and you are the other. It is the wrong notion that produces or constitutes viparita bhavana of the Self at present, and that is why you say you do not know the Self. What is to be done is to get rid of that wrong notion of the Self. That then clears up the Self-knowledge or Self-realization.

How can I get rid of that viparita bhavana? Can ordinary man get rid of it? If so, how?

Yes. That is possible and is being done. There are many ways - bhakti, jnana, karma, yoga etc. are being adopted - all for the removal of this viparita bhavana. But the main way is simple.

But I am ignorant of the method and of the Self.

Who is ignorant of what? Ask the question and pursue the enquiry as to who is it that is said to be ignorant. Once you put the question, trying to probe into the "I", the "I" disappears. Then what survives is Self-knowledge or Self-realization.

But how to get at that? Isn't a Guru's help needed? Isn't God's help needed?

Why? In practice all this is adopted. But on ultimate enquiry, i.e., after reaching the goal, the method and means adopted are found to be themselves the goal. The Guru turns out ultimately to be God and God turns out to be your own real Self.

Point of Divergence

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Sadhakas (seekers) rarely understand the difference between this temporary stillness of the mind (manolaya) and permanent destruction of thoughts (manonasa). In manolaya there is temporary subsidence of thought waves, and, though this temporary period may even last for a thousand years, thoughts, which are thus temporarily stilled, rise up as soon as the manolaya ceases. One must, therefore, watch one's spiritual progress carefully. One must not allow oneself to be overtaken by such spells of stillness of thought: the moment one experiences this, one must revive consciousness and enquire within as to who it is who experiences this stillness. While not allowing any thoughts to intrude, he must not, at the same time, be overtaken by this deep sleep (yoga nidra) or Self-hypnotism. Though this is a sign of progress towards the goal, yet it is also the point where the divergence between the road to salvation and yoga nidra takes place. The easy way, the direct way, the shortest cut to salvation is the enquiry method. By such enquiry, you will drive the thought force deeper till it reaches the source and merges therein. It is then that you will have the response from within and find that you rest there, destroying all thoughts, once and for all.

This temporary stilling of thought comes automatically in the usual course of one's practice and it is a clear sign for the final goal of spiritual practice and being thus deceived. It is exactly here that a spiritual guide is necessary and he saves a lot of the spiritual aspirant's time and energy which would otherwise be fruitlessly wasted.

Picture Source: Crumbs From His Table

Temporary Stillness Of Mind

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Continued from here

Sri Bhagavan then told the following story:

A yogi was doing penance (tapas) for a number of years on the banks of the Ganges. When he had attained a high degree of concentration, he believed that continuance in that stage for prolonged periods constituted salvation and practised it. One day, before going into deep concentration, he felt thirsty and called to his disciple to bring a little drinking water from the Ganges; but before the disciple arrived with the water, he had gone into samadhi and remained in that state for countless years, during which time much water flowed under the bridge. When he woke up from this experience the first thing he asked for was 'water, water!' but there was neither his disciple nor the Ganges in sight.

The first thing which he asked for was water because, before going into deep concentration, the topmost layer of thought in mind was water and by concentration, however deep and prolonged it might have been, he had only been able to temporarily lull his thoughts and when, therefore, he revoked consciousness his topmost thought flew up with all the speed and force of a flood breaking through the dykes. If this is the case with regard to a thought which took shape immediately before he say for meditation, there is no doubt that thoughts which have taken deeper root earlier will still remain unannihilated; if annihilation of thoughts is salvation can he be said to have attained salvation?
..................
From "Control of Mind Vs. Destruction of Mind", Crumbs From His Table

Manolaya

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q: When I am engaged in enquiry as to the source from which the "I" springs, I arrive at a stage of stillness of mind beyond which I find myself unable to proceed farther. I have no thought of any kind and there is an emptiness, a blankness. A mild light pervades and I feel that it is myself, bodiless. I have neither cognition nor vision of body and form. The experience lasts nearly half an hour and is pleasing. Would I be correct in concluding that all that was necessary to secure eternal happiness (i.e., freedom or salvation or whatever one calls it) was to continue the practice till this experience could be maintained for hours, days and months together?

B: This does not mean salvation; such a condition is termed manolaya or temporary stillness of thought. Manolaya means concentration, temporarily arresting the movement of thoughts; as soon as this concentration ceases, thoughts, old and new, rush in as usual and even though this temporary lulling of mind should last a thousand years it will never lead to total destruction of thought, which is what is called salvation or liberation from birth and death. The practiser must therefore be ever on the alert and enquire within as to who has this experience, who realizes its pleasureness. Failing this enquiry, he will go into a long trance or deep sleep (yoga nidra). Due to the absence of a proper guide at this stage of spiritual practice many have been deluded and fallen a prey to a false sense of salvation and only a few have, either by the merit of good acts in their previous births, or by extreme grace, been enabled to reach the goal safely.
(To be continued)

........

From "Control of Mind Vs. Destruction of Mind", Crumbs From His Table

Effect Of Japa-Mantra

Sri Ramana Maharshi

D: I appear to get the same stillness of thought by tracing the root of the mantra which I repeat, as I would, if I put the "who am I?" enquiry. Is there any harm in my continuing with the mantra in this manner or is it essential I should only use "who am I?"

B: No. You can trace the root of any thought or mantra and continue to do so till you have an answer to your query.

D: What is the effect of japas and mantras?

B: Diversion; the mind is a channel, a swift current of thoughts and a mantra is a bund or dam put up in the way of this current to divert the water to where it is needed.

D: Some time, after the stillness of thought intervened, I used to hear first some sound resembling that which one would hear if he were in the midst of or near a rolling mill, and then, a little later, a sound like that of a steam engine whistle. This was only during meditation when I was at home, but here the sound is heard at all times, irrespective of whether I am before you or am walking around the ashram.

(Note: The present experience is that the sound is like that of a humming bee).

B: Ask who hears the sound. Repeat the question now and then.

.............

From "Control of Mind", Crumbs From His Table

Your Duty: Practice Self-Enquiry

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Q: When I spent an hour or two on the hill yonder, I sometimes found even better peace than here, which suggests that a solitary place is after all more conducive to mind control.

B: True, but if you had stayed there for an hour longer, you would have found that place too not giving you the calm of which you speak. Control the mind and even Hell will be Heaven to you. All other talk of solitude, living in a forest etc. is mere prattle.

Q: If solitude and abandonment of home were not required, where then was the necessity for Sri Bhagavan to come here in his seventeenth year?

B: If the same force that took this (meaning himself) here, should take you also out of your home by all means let it, but there is no use of your deserting your home by an effort of your own. Your duty lies in practice, continuous practice of Self-enquiry.

Q: Is it not necessary to seek the company of the wise (the Saints and Sages)?

B: Yes, but the best satsangam is inhering in your Self. It is also the real guhavasam (living in the cave). Dwelling in the cave is retiring into your Self. Association with the wise will certainly help a great deal.

....

From "Control of Mind", Crumbs From His Table