Be Your Self!

Sri Ramana Maharshi

D.: When we attempt to cease from activity the very attempt is action. So activity seems to be inevitable.

M.: True. Thayumanavar has also alluded to it. A doctor advises a patient to take the prescribed medicine with only one condition. That condition is not to think of a monkey when he takes the medicine. Can the patient ever take the medicine? Will he not think of the monkey whenever he tries not to do so? So also, when people try to give up thoughts their object is frustrated by their very attempt.

D.: How then is the state to be attained?

M.: What is there to attain? A thing remains to be attained if it is not already attained. But here one’s very being is That. 

Someone: Why do we not then know it?

Annamalaiswami: I should always try to think I am That.

M.: Why should one think “I am That”? He is That only. Does a man go on thinking that he is a man?

Mr. Anantachari: The belief ‘I am a man’ is so deep that we cannot help thinking so.

M.: Why should you think “I am a man”? If you are challenged you may say ‘I am a man’. Therefore the thought - ‘I am a man’ - is called up when another thought, say ‘I am an animal’, protrudes itself. Similarly, the thought I am That is necessary only so long as the other thought I am a man persists.

D.: The thought ‘I am a man’ is so firm that it cannot he got rid of.

M.: Be your true Self. Why should you think ‘I am a man’?

D.: The thought ‘I am a man’ is so natural.

M.: Not so. On the other hand ‘I am’ is natural. Why do you qualify it with ‘a man’?

D.: ‘I am a man’ is so obvious whereas ‘I am That’ is not understood by us.

M.: You are neither That nor This. The truth is ‘I am’. “I AM that I AM” according to the Bible also. Mere Being is alone natural. To limit it to ‘being a man’ is uncalled for.

D.: (Humorously) If votes be taken the majority will be on my side.

(Laughter)

M.: I cast my vote also on your side (Laughter). I say also ‘I am a man’: but I am not limited to the body. It is IN ME. That is the difference.

Someone: The limitation (upadhi) of being a man cannot be got rid of.

M.: How were you in deep sleep? There was no thought of being a man.

Another: So, the state of sleep must be brought about even when one is awake.

M.: Yes. It is jagrat-sushupti.

Sri Bhagavan continued: Some people even say that while they sleep they are enclosed somewhere in the body. They forget that such an idea did not persist in sleep but rises up only on waking. They bring their waking-state to bear upon their sleep.

The lights went down and all retired.