Clarity and Charity Go Together

Sri Nisargadatta Maharaj

Q: Is the universe a product of the senses?

M: Just as you recreate your world on waking up, so is the universe unrolled. The mind with its five organs of perception, five organs of action, and five vehicles of consciousness appears as memory, thought, reason and selfhood.

Q: The sciences have made much progress. We know the body and the mind much better than our ancestors. Your traditional way, describing and analyzing mind and matter, is no longer valid.

M: But where are your scientists with their sciences? Are they not again images in your own mind?

Q: Here lies the basic difference! To me they are not my own projections. They were before I was born and shall be there when I am dead.

M: Of course. Once you accept time and space as real, you will consider yourself minute and short-lived. But are they real? Do they depend on you, or you on them? As body, you are in space. As mind, you are in time. But are you mere body with a mind in it? Have you ever investigated?

Q: I had neither the motive nor the method.

M: I am suggesting both. But the actual work of insight and detachment (viveka-vairagya) is yours.

Q: The only motive I can perceive is my own causeless and timeless happiness. And what is the method?

M: Happiness is incidental. The true and effective motive is love. You see people suffer and you seek the best way of helping them. The answer is obvious - first put yourself beyond the need of help. Be sure of your attitude is of pure goodwill, free of expectation of any kind. Those who seek mere happiness may end up in sublime indifference, while love will never rest. As to method, there is only one - you must come to know yourself - both what you appear to be and what you are. Clarity and charity go together - each needs and strengthens the other.