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Every Escape Is Bound to Fail Alexander Smit

Alexander Smit at 25.

And Interview with Alexander Smit by Belle Bruins

September 1988. Location: the kitchen of his house on the Prinsengracht in Amsterdam.

We were busy going over the translation of THE NECTAR OF THE LORDS FEET (Dutch titleSELF-REALIZATION) by his Spiritual master Nisargadatta Maharaj and he wanted to do an

interview for a change, as a sort of practice. The interview has survived a computer crash, break-inand theft, because luckily I had typed it out and printed the tape previously. I have preserved this as

a treasure for years. Until now.

Alexander met Nisargadatta in September of 1978. In the beginning of September of that yearJacques Lewenstein had been in India and come back with the book I AM THAT and tapes ofNisargadatta.

Alexander: That book came into the hands of Wolter Keers. He was very happy with it, because

after the death of Krishna Menon (Wolters spiritual master) he had not heard anything so purelyadvaita. After Wolter had read the book he decided to translate and publish it because this is so

extremely good. Wolter gave me the book immediately and I was very moved by it. Then there was

an article in Panorama or The New Revue: GOD HAS NO TEETH. A poorly written story by theyoung man who did Showroom (TV). There was a life-sized photo of Nisargadattas head in it. That

was actually my first acquaintance with Nisargadatta. By then Wolter had already told me: I cannot do anything more for you. You need someone. But I wouldnt know who. But, when he had

read I AM THAT he said: If I can give you a piece of advice, go there immediately. And that I did.

What were you seeking?

I was seeking nothing more. I knew everything. But, if you had asked me what I had learned Iwould have said; I dont actually know it. There is something essential that I dont know. There was

a sort of blind spot in me that no one knew what do with. Krishnamurti knew nothing that he could

say about it. Bhagwan was for us at that time not someone that you would go to, at least for this sortof thing. Da Free John was also not it. Those were the known people at that time. I had a blind spot.

And what typifies a blind spot is that you dont know what it is. You only knew that if you werereally honest with yourself, if you really went to the bottom of yourself, that you had not yet solved

the riddle.

For the first time in Bombay?

A little staircase going up to an attic room. First came my head, and the first thing that I saw wasMrs. Satprem and Nisargadatta. There were maybe three or four people there. Here I am, I said.
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And he said: So, finally you came. Yeah, that is what they all say, that I heard later, but for me it

was the first time that I heard it. I did have the feeling when I went in that now it was really serious.Now there is no escape possible, Here something is really going to happen. Naturally I had already

met many of these people: Krishnamurti, Jean Klein, Wolter, Swami Ranganathananda, Douglas

Harding, and also some less well known Indians. I was naturally too young for Ramana Maharshiand Krishna Menon. They died in the fifties. I was 7 or 8 years old then. That is not the age to be

busy with these sorts of things. It held also true for us at that time, wait for a living master. And Ihad a very strong feeling that this was the man that I had been looking for. He asked if I were

married, what I did, and why I had come to India.

What precisely did you want from him?

Self-realization. I wanted to know how I was put together. I said: I have heard that your are thegreatest ego killer who exists. And that is what I want. He said: I am not a killer. I am a diamond

cutter. You are also a diamond. But you are a raw diamond and you can only be cut by a purediamond. And that is very precise work, because if that is not done properly then you fall apart into

a hundred pieces, and then there is nothing left for you. Do you have any questions? I told him that

Maurice Frydman was the decisive reason for my coming. Frydman was a friend of Krishnamurti

and Frydman was planning to publish all of the earlier work of Krishnamurti at Chetana Publishersin Bombay, And that he had heard from Mr. Dikshit , the publisher, that there was someone inBombay who he had to meet. (I AM THAT was of course not yet published at that time because

Frydman had yet to meet Nisargadatta). Frydman went there with his usual skeptical ideas. He came

in there, and within two weeks things became clear to him that had never become clear withKrishnamurti. And I thought then: if it all became clear to Frydman within two weeks, how will it

go with me? I told all this to Nisargadatta and he said: That says nothing about me, but everythingabout Frydman. And he also said: People who dont understand Krishnamurti dont understand

themselves. I thought that was beautiful, because all the gurus I knew always ran everyone down. It

seemed as if he wanted to help me relax. He didnt launch any provocations. I was able to relax,because as you can understand it was of course a rather tense situation there. He said; Do you have

any questions?I said; No.

When are you going to come?

Every day if you allow me.Thats good. Come just two times every day, mornings and afternoons, for the lectures, and well

see how it goes.I said: Yes, and I am not leaving until it has become clear.

He said; Thats good.

Was that true?

Yes, without a doubt. Because what he did within two minutes he made it clear, whatever youbrought up, that the knowledge you presented was not yours. That it was from a book, or that you

had borrowed or stolen it, or that it was fantasy, but that you were actually not capable of having a

direct observation, a direct perception, seeing directly, immediately, without a mediator, without selfconsciousness. And that frightened me terribly, because everything you said was cut down in a

brutal way.

What happened with you exactly?The second day he asked if I had any questions. Then I began to ask a question about reincarnation

in a more or less romanticized way. I told that I had always had a connection with India, that when I

heard the word India for the first time it was shock for me, and that the word yoga was like beinghit by a bomb when I first heard it on TV, and that the word British India was like a dog hearing

his boss whistle. And I asked, could it mean that I had lived in India in previous lives? And then he

began to curse in Marathi, and to get unbelievably agitated, and that lasted for at least ten minutes. Ithought, my god, whats happening here? The translator was apparently used to it, because he just

sat calmly by, and when Maharaj was finished he summarized it all together; Maharaj is asking


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himself if you are really serious. Yesterday you came and you wanted self-realization, but now you

begin with questions that belong in kindergarten In this way you were forced to be unbelievablyalert. Everything counted heavily. It became clear to me within a few days that I knew absolutely

nothing, that all that I knew, all the knowledge that I had gathered was book knowledge, second

hand, learned, but that out of myself I knew nothing. I can assure you that this put what was neededinto motion. And thats how it went every day! Whatever I came up with, whether I asked an

intelligent question or a dumb question, made absolutely no difference. And one day he assertedthis, and the following day he asserted precisely the opposite and the following day he twisted it

around one more time even though that was not actually possible. And so it went, until by

observation I understood why that was, and that was a really wonderful realization. Why do I try allthe time to cram everything into concepts, to try to understand everything in terms of thinking or in

the feelings sphere? And, he gave me tips about how I could look at things in another way, thusreally looking. And then it became clear to me that it just made no sense to regard yourself

whatever you call yourself, or dont call yourself in that way. That was an absolute undermining

of the self-consciousness, like a termite eating a chair. At a certain moment it becomes sawdust. Itstill looks like a chair, but it isnt a chair anymore.

Did that lead to self realization?He kept going on like this, and then there came a moment that I just plain had enough of it. Reallyjust so much I would not say that I became angry, but a shift took place in me, a shift of the

accent on all authorities outside of myself, including Nisargadatta, to an authority inside myself. He

was talking, and at a given moment he said nobody. He said : Naturally there is nobody here whotalks. That was too much for me. And I said: If you dont talk then why dont you shut up then?

Why say anything then?And it seemed as if that is what had been waiting for. He said: Do you want that I should not talk

anymore? Thats good, then I wont talk anymore and if people want to know something then they

can just go to Alexander. From now on there are no more translations, translators dont have tocome anymore, there is no more English spoken. Only Marathi will be spoken, and if people have

any problems then they can go to Alexander because he seems to know everything. And then beganall the trouble with the others, the bootlickers and toadies who insisted that I had to offer my

apologies! Not on my life. Yeah, you cant offer excuses to a nobody, eh?!

And to me he said; And you, you cant come here anymore. And I said: What do you mean I cantcome here anymore. Try and stop me. Have you gone completely crazy? And the translators were

naturally completely upset. They said nothing like this had ever been seen before. And he wasangry! Unbelievably angry!. And he threw the presents that I had brought for him at my feet and

said: I want nothing from you, Nothing from you I want. And that was the breakthrough, because

something happened, there was no thinking because I was.. the shift in authority had happened. As Iexperienced it everything came to me from all sides: logic, understanding, on the one hand the

intellect and on the other hand at the same time the heart, feelings and all phenomena, the entire

manifest came directly to me from all sides to an absolute center where the whole thing exploded.Bang. After that everything became clear to me.

The next day I went there as usual. There was a lecture, but indeed no English was spoken. I canassure you that the tension could be cut with a knife, because I was the guilty party of course. He

wanted to push that down my throat and the translators just went along quietly. There was not evenany talking. And the next day, there was not even a lecture. He arrived in a car, and drove away

when he saw me and went to a movie Then I wrote him a letter. Twelve pages. In perfect English.

I had someone bring the letter to him. Everything was running over. I wrote everything. And hisanswer was: let him come tomorrow at 10 oclock. And he read my letter and said: You

understood. This confrontation was needed to eliminate that self-consciousness. But you understoodcompletely and I am very happy with your letter and nothing happened. Naturally , that cleared the

air. He asked if I wanted to stay longer. From this situation that took place on September 21, 1978,I want to be here in love . And he said; that is good. From that day on I attended all the talks andalso translated sometimes, for example when Spaniards, or Frenchmen or Germans came. I was a


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bit of a helper then.

So actually you apply the same method as he did: the cutting away of the self-consciousness to the

bone and letting people see their identities. Was that his method?Yes. Recognizing the false as false and thereafter letting the truth be born. But the most wonderful

thing was, MY basis dilemma, and if I say my I mean everyone in a certain sense, is that if at a

certain moment you ask yourself: what did I come here for, that seems to be something completely

different from what you thought. Everyone has ideas about this question, and I had never suspectedin the farthest reaches of my mind that the Realization of it would be something like this. That is thefirst point. The second is, it appears that a certain point you have the choice of maintaining your

self-consciousness out of pride, arrogance, intellect. And the function of the Guru, the skill with

which he can close the escapes from the real confrontation was in his case uncommonly great, atleast in my case. And for me that was the decisive factor. Because if there had been a chance to

escape, I would certainly have taken it. Like a thief who still tries to get away.

Did he ever say anything about it?

He said that unbelievable courage is needed not to flee. And that my being there had almost givenhim a heart attack, that he no longer had the strength to tackle cases like mine as he became older.

So I have the feeling that I got there at just the right moment. Later he became sick. He said: I haveno strength anymore to try to convince people. If you like it, continue to come, maybe you can get

something out of it, but I have no strength anymore to convince people like him (and then he

pointed to me). I am so grateful to him, because it only showed how great my resistance was. Therehas to be a proportional force that is just a bit stronger than your strangest and strongest resistance.

You need that. It showed how great my resistance was. And it showed how great his strength was,and his skill. For me he was the great Satguru. The fact that he was capable of defeating my most

cunning resistance and I can assure you after having gone into these things for 15 years my

resistance was extremely refined and cunning, was difficult for him even though he knew who hewas dealing with. Thats why I had to go to such a difficult person of course. It says everything

about me. Just as he said in the beginning that it said everything about Frydman. But I have never

seen the skill he had in closing the escape routes of the lies and falsehoods so immensely greatanywhere else.

Of course I have not been everywhere, but with Ramana Maharshi you just melted. That wasanother way. With Krishna Menon the intellect could just not keep it together under the gigantic

dismantling, but by Nisargadatta, every escape was doomed to failure. People who came to getsomething, or people who thought they could bring something stood naked outside the door within

five minutes. I saw a great many people there walking away in great terror. At a certain moment I

was no longer afraid, because I felt that I had nothing more to lose. So I cant really say that it wasvery courageous of me. I can only say that in a certain sense with him I went on the attack. And

what was nice about it is that he also valued that. Because, he sent many people away, and thesereally went and mostly didnt come back. The he would say: They are cowards. I didnt send them

away, I sent away the part of them that was not acceptable here. And if they then returned,

completely open, then he would say nothing about it. But during those happenings with me, peopleforgot that. There was also a doctor, a really fine man, who said; dont think that he is being brutal

with you; you dont have any idea how much love there is in him to do this with you. I said: Yeah,yeah, yeah, I know that. Because I didnt want any commentary from anyone. After all, this is what

I had come for! Only the form in which it happened was totally different from what I had expected

in my wildest dreams. But again, that says more about me than about Maharaj, and I still think that.

So, his method was thus to let you recognize the false as false, to see through the lies as lies, and tocome to truth in this way?

Yes, and that went deeper than I could have ever suspected. The thinking was absolutely helpless.

The intellect had no ghost of chance. The heart was also a trap. And that is exactly what happenedthere. That is everything. And I know that after that day, September 21, 1978, there has never been

even a grain of doubt about this question, and the authority, the command, the authenticity, has


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never left, has never again shifted. There is no authority, neither in this world or in another world,

that can thrust me out of the realization. Thats the way it is.

Did Maharaj say that you had to do something after this realization?I asked: It is all very beautiful, but what now? What do I do with my life? Then he said: You just

talk and people will take care of you. And thats the way it has gone.

Did you go visit him often?Various times. As often as I could I was there every year for two or three months. Until the lasttime. And when I knew that I would never see him again there was entirely no sadness or anything

like that. It was just the way it was. It was fine that way,

Did he do the same with others as he had with you?

Not as intensely and not so persistently.

You get what you give?Yes, that is so. In a certain sense he did that with everyone, but if someone was very sensitive he

approached it in a different way. Naturally it makes difference if an old nun is sitting in front of you,or a rebel like myself, who also looks as if he can take quite a bit. The last time he said; He will be

powerful in Europe. He has the knowledge. He will be the source of what I am teaching. And thenhe directed those headlight eyes of his towards me. That is still so wonderful It is ten years agonow, and it seems like a week. I have learned to value his words in the passage of time. The things I

questioned in the past I see becoming manifest now. At first I thought; the way he has put this intowords is typical Indian conditioning after all, but the wonder is that all the advice that he gave

taught me to hang on to them. I didnt follow them a few times and that always lead to catastrophes.

For example?

For example he said to me: Dont challenge the Great Ones. Let them enjoy. And I have to admitthat I had trouble with that. But knowing my rebellious character and naturally he saw that

immediately he still had to give me that. And every time that I see that, that aspect of my

character wants to express itself, I hear his voice: Dont challenge the Great Ones. He anticipatedthat. I know that for sure. And in that way he also said a number of things that suddenly made sense.

Then I hear him. And Wolter always said: After the realization, the only words that remain withyou are the words of your Guru. All your knowledge disappears, but the words of the Guru remain.

And I can now confirm that that is true, that it is like that.

Was Wolter also a disciple of Nisargadatta?

No, but he was there often.

I have understood that you find the Living Teaching very important. Is that especially true forAdvaita?

The objection to books about Advaita, including the translations of Nisargadattas words is that too

much knowledge is given in them. That is an objection. People can use this knowledge, andespecially the knowledge at the highest level to defend and maintain their self-consciousness. That

makes my work more difficult. Knowledge, spiritual knowledge, can, when there is no living masterbe used again to maintain the I, the self-consciousness. The mind is tricky, cunning. And I speak

out of my own experience! Because Advaita Vedanta, without a good living spiritual master, I

repeat, a good one, can become a perfect self contained defense mechanism. It can be a plastic sackthat leaks on all sides, but you cant find the leak. You know that it doesnt tally, but it looks as if it

does tally. That is the danger in Vedanta. Provided there is a good living master available, it can dono harm. But stay away from it if there is no master available! Provided it is well guided Advaita

can be brilliant.

Do you mean that people could act from their so called knowing as if they are more than the

content of their consciousness? That they therefore assume that the content is worthless?Yes. That is why up to now, I have never wanted to write a book. But, as long as I am alive there are

Living Teachings. When I die they can do whatever they want to with it, but as long as I am alive I


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am there.

To take corrective action?

Yes.

Do people have a built in defense mechanism?At the level of the psyche there is a defense mechanism that prevents you from taking in more than

you can cope with, but at a higher level sooner or later you have an irrevocable need for a spiritualmaster who can tell you certain things, who has to explain things because other wise you get stuck.Whoever doesnt want a living master gets stuck.

Books could lead to people becoming interested and going on a search.

To a good spiritual master of flesh and blood. Living!

Did Nisargadatta foresee that you would manifest as a guru?

I think guru is a rotten word, but he did say: Many people will seek your blessings.

So you couldnt do anything else. It happened by itself.He said; The seed is sown, the seasons do the rest.

Isnt that true for everyone?Yes, but some seeds fall on good soil and something grows, but other seeds dont grow. Out of

million sperms only one reaches the egg.

At Nisargadattas bhajans were also sung and certain rituals done, especially for the Indians. Didyou also participate in that?

I participated two times. The bhajans I thought, were really special

What is their goal?

Singing bhajans has a purifying effect on the body, thinking, and feeling, so that the Knowledge canbecome manifest and finds its place there. I dont have any need of it, but I see that the singing

offers social and emotional solace and thus I am not against it. In addition prasad was distributed

and arati done.What is arati?

A form of ritual in which fire is swung around and camphor is burned. Camphor is the symbol of

the ego. That burns and nothing remains of it. Just as in self-realization nothing of the self-consciousness remains. It is a beautiful ritual. It makes you attentive to all kinds of things. The fire

is swung at your eye level so what you see may be beautiful, at your ears so that what you hear maybe pure, and at your mouth so that what you eat may be pure. It is Hindu symbolism that has

become so common in India that it has mostly become flattened out and routine. It has something,

as a symbol , but Westerners shouldnt try it unless they understand the symbolism completely. Ifind the singing of OM good, that works, that is a law. It works to purify the body, thinking and

feeling, so that the Knowing that it is can be manifest and find a place in your life.

Did Nisargadatta follow a certain tradition?

But of course. The Navdath Sampradaya. The tradition of the Nine Gurus. The first was Jnaneshwar(Jnanadeva) from the 13th century, who became realized when he was twenty and also died at that

age. Nisargadatta was the ninth.

Are you the tenth?No. I always call Maharaj the last of the Mohicans.

Still you always talk about the tradition.I work following a traditional background, because there lies the experience of a thousand years of

instruction. Instruction that works! I have learned to value the Tradition. I am totally non traditional,

but in my heart I am a traditionalist. When I talk about the tradition I mean the tradition of Advaitaso as that became manifest in the Navdath Sampradaya.

What is the importance of tradition?


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The importance of a tradition is just as with violin playing, that you have had predecessors who

have done it in a certain way which you know works. But many traditions have become dead endtraditions because they dont work anymore. That is why you always see renovators like a Buddha,

a Krishna, Krishnamurti, Ramana Maharshi in a certain sense, and Bhagwan (Osho) and

Nisargadatta. The way Nisargadatta said it is after all quite different from the way his Guru said it,and the way it is here made manifest, is after all also very different then at Nisargadattas. It is about

the essence. Just as consciousness is transmitted by means of sex, enlightenment is transmitted bythe Guru.

Did Nisargadatta teach you the tradition?

You cant learn a tradition; you can only become self-realized. And that is what happened. I know

what I know. Done.

And then a tradition is born?Yes, precisely, you say it very well.

We are now busy with book Self-realization. What do you think about that book?

It is no easy book. It is no easy bedside companion.

In one way or another, translating the book has done much for me.You have been busy with these things for a long time, thus the reading of a relatively direct form ofNisargadattas words must have an effect, But even you found it to be a difficult book. The theme of

the book who were you before the conception, before body/thinking/feeling appeared and beforethe forming of words in the mind is not simple to say, but by repeated readings, and talking with

each other and all kind of other things, a few things have become clear.

It has to be digested?

Yes, especially digesting it is important. You can eat a lot, but it has to be digested.

Did you just see him sometimes in the daytime, like here in the kitchen?He lived in that house and everyone went to their hotel or family, or to friends, or had lodgings with

the translators. Someone always stayed to care for him a bit, but everyone simply went their ownway. There was nothing like an ashram in the usual sense, a care institution, a salvation army forseekers. Absolutely not.

How was he between the acts?

Changeable, from extremely friendly to grumbling.

Did you find him to be a nice man?

Never thought about it for a second.

Would you like to be his friend?

That cannot?No, Odd question.

I dont agree, you could at least say he is my Guru, but as a human, as a person if you at least

could still see him as a person.Just a whopper of a person, but yeah, there are no meaningful words that can be said about it.

I dont believe that.

Really not.

Did you ever eat with him?

Yes.

Did you ever listen to music with him?No.

Did you ever just chat with him about little things?


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Yes.

How was that?

Normal, just like with you.

Did you find that scary?No.

Never? Also not in the beginning?No.

Did he have a normal householders life?

Yes.

Was he married?

Yes, he had children.

What kind of a father was he?Strict.

What kind of husband was he?

I dont know because his wife was dead.

Did he have girl friends?

No.

Did he sometimes speak about sex?No, never.

What did he do in his spare time?

He had no spare time. All his time was spent on the talks. Or he slept or took walks, or he looked

outside, and he smoked a little beedee.

How did he experience being sick?

He didnt think about it. Its just something of the body, a little something.

What was his attitude towards women seekers?

The rule for Indian women was keep your mouth shut and listen. Ask no questions. Unless they

were very brave, then he allowed it from time to time and answered them, just as with them men.Western women he just answered, just like with the men. But with Indian women he was very

traditional: just keep quiet.

What did he think about Bhagwan (Osho)?It varied. It depended who was asking the question.

Now, Ok, you dont want anymore. I give up.

(laughs and turns of the microphone.)This interview appeared inAmigo, March, 2002 and can be found online at:http://www.ods.nl/am1gos/am1gos2/indexframe2_us.html

For more from Alexander Smit look here.

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How Am I the Witness? Atmananda

24th December 1950

Every perception, thought or feeling is known by you. You are the knower of the world through thesense organs; of the sense organs through the generic mind; and of the mind with its activity or

passivity by your self alone.

In all these different activities, you stand out as the one knower. Actions, perceptions, thoughts andfeelings all come and go. But knowingness does not part with you, even for a moment. You are

therefore always the knower. How then can you ever be the doer or the enjoyer?

After understanding the I-principle as pure Consciousness and happiness, always use the word I

or knower to denote the goal of your retreat. The I always brings subjectivity with it. It is thisultimate, subjective principle I divested of even that subjectivity that is the goal.

Consciousness and happiness may possibly have a taint of objectivity in their conception, since they

always express themselves in the realm of the mind. When one is deeply convinced that ones self is

consciousness and happiness, one finds it as the nameless. Whereupon, even this namelessness

seems a limitation. Giving up that as well, one remains as the I-principle, the Absolute.When you try to visualize the Absolute in you, nothing can possibly disturb you, because every

thought or perception points to yourself and only helps you to stand established as the Absolute.

To become a Jynyanin [Sage] means to become aware of what you are already. In this connection, it

has to be proved that knowing is not a function. In all your life, you feel you have not changed;and of all your manifold activities, from your birth onwards, the only activity that has never

changed is knowing. So both these must necessarily be one and the same; and thereforeknowingness is your real nature.

Thus, knowing is never an activity in the worldly sense, since this knowing has neither a beginning

nor an end. And because it is never separated from you, it is your svarupa (real nature) just as

shining is the svarupa of the sun and not its function. Understanding it in this way, and realizing itas ones svarupa, brings about liberation from all bondage.

When you reach consciousness or happiness, you lose all sense of objectivity or duality and stand

identified with the ultimate, subjective I-principle, or the Absolute. Then the subjectivity also

vanishes. When the word pure is added on to consciousness, happiness or I, even the least taintof relativity is removed. There, all opposites are reconciled, all paradoxes stand self-explained; and

everything, or nothing, can be said about it.

-Shri Atmananda (Krishna Menon)

FromNotes on Spiritual Discourses of Shri Atmananda, taken by Nitya Tripta

This book can be purchased from Stillness Speaks.

For more posts on Atmananda see the Atmananda Category.

To read more from Atmananda see downloadable books.

December 31, 2009

Ramana Maharshis Self-Enquiry

This was originally published as The Path of Sri Raman, Chapter 7 by Sri Sadhu Om.

Self-enquiry
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On hearing the expression Self-enquiry (atma-vichara), people generally take it to mean either

enquiring into Self or enquiring about Self. But how to do so? Who is to enquire into Self, or who isto enquire about Self? What does enquiry actually mean? Such questions naturally arise, do they

not?

As soon as we hear the terms Atma-Vichara or Brahmavichara, many of us naturally consider

that there is some sort of effulgence or a formless power within our body and that we are going to

find out what it is, where it is, and how it is. This idea is not correct. Because, Self (atman) does notexist as an object to be known by us who seek to know it! Since Self shines as the very nature ofhim who tries to know it! Self-enquiry does not mean enquiring into a second or third person object.

It is in order to make us understand this from the very beginning that Bhagavan Ramana named

Self-enquiry as Who am I ?, thus drawing our attention directly to the first person. In thisquestion, Who am I?, I am denotes Self and who stands for the enquiry.

Who is it that is to enquire into Self? For whom is this enquiry necessary? Is it for Self? No, Since

Self is the ever-attained, ever-pure, ever-free and ever-blissful Whole, It will not do any enquiry, nor

does it need to! All right, then it is only the ego that needs to do the enquiry. Can this ego knowSelf? As said in the previous chapters, this ego is a false appearance, having no existence of its own.

It is a petty infinitesimal feeling of I which subsides and loses its form in sleep. So, can Selfbecome an object that could be known by the ego? No, the ego cannot know Self! Thus, when it

turns out that Self-enquiry is unnecessary for Self and Self-knowledge is impossible for the ego,the questions arise: What then is the practical method of doing Self-enquiry? Why is this termSelf-enquiry found in the sastras? Are we not to scrutinize thus and find out? Let us do so.

There is a difference between the sense in which the term enquiry is used by Sri Bhagavan and the

way in which the sastras use it. The sastras advocate negating the five sheaths, namely the body,prana, mind, intellect and the darkness of ignorance, as not I, not I (neti, neti). But who is to

negate them, and how? If the mind (or the intellect) is to negate them, it can at best negate only the

insentient physical body and theprana, which are objects seen by it. Beyond this, how can the mind

negate itself, its own form? And when it cannot even negate itself, how can it negate the other twosheaths, the intellect (vijnana-maya kosa) and the darkness of ignorance (anandamaya kosa), whichare beyond its range of perception? During the time of enquiry, therefore, what more can the mind

do to remain as Self except to repeat mentally, I am not this body, I am not thisprana? From this,

it is clear that enquiry is not a process of one thing enquiring about another thing. That is why theenquiry Who am I? taught by Sri Bhagavan should be taken to mean Self-attention (that is,

attention merely to the first person, the feeling I).

The nature of the mind is to attend always to things other than itself, that is, to know only second

and third persons. If the mind in this way attends to a thing, it means that it is clinging (attachingitself) to that thing. Attention itself is attachment! Since the mind is to think about the body and

prana though with the intention of deciding this is not!, this is not! Such attention is only a

means of becoming attached to them and it cannot be a means of negating them! This is what isexperienced by any true aspirant in his practice. Then what is the secret hidden in this?

Since, whether we know it or not, Self, which is now wrongly considered by us to be unknown, isverily our reality, the very nature of our (the Supreme Selfs) attention itself is Grace (anugraha).This means that whatever thing we attend to, witness*, observe or look at, that thing is nourished

and will flourish, being blessed by Grace.

* The practice of witnessing thoughts and events, which is much recommended nowadays bylecturers and writers, was never even in the least recommended by Sri Bhagavan, Indeed, whenever

He was asked what should be done when thoughts rise (that is, when attention is diverted towards

second or third persons) during sadhana, He always replied in the same manner as He had done toSri Sivaprakasam Pillai in Who am I?, where He says, If other thoughts rise, one should, without

attempting to complete them, enquire To whom did they rise?. What does it matter however manythoughts rise? At the very moment that each thought rises, if one vigilantly enquires To whom did


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this rise ?, it will be known To me. If one then enquires Who am I?, the mind (our power of

attention) will turn back (from the thought) to its source (Self). Moreover, when He says later inthe same work, Not attending to what-is-other (that is, to any second or third person) is non-

attachment (vairagya) or desirelessness (nirasa), we should clearly understand that attending to

(witnessing, watching, observing or seeing) anything other than Self is itself attachment, and whenwe understand thus we will realize how meaningless and impractical are such instructions as Watch

all thoughts and events with detachment or Witness your thoughts, but be not attached to them,which are taught by the so-called gurus of the present day.

Though one now thinks that one is an individual soul, since ones power of attention is in fact

nothing but a reflection of the knowing-power (chit-sakti) of Self, that on which it falls or is fixed

is nourished by Grace and flourishes more and more! Hence, when the power of attention of themind is directed more and more towards second and third person objects, both the strength (kriya-

bala) to attend to those objects and the ignorance the five sense-knowledges in the form ofthoughts about them will grow more and more, and will never subside! Have we not already said

that all our thoughts are nothing but attention paid to second and third person objects? Accordingly,

the more we attend to the mind, the thoughts which are the forms (the second and third person

objects) of the world, the more they will multiply and be nourished. This is indeed an obstacle. Themore our attention the glance of Grace (anugraha-drishti) falls on it, the more the mindswavering nature and its ascendancy will increase. That is why it is impossible for the mind to negate

anything by thinking* I am not this, I am not this (neti, neti) On the other hand, if our (Selfs)

attention is directed only towards ourself, our knowledge of our existence alone is nourished, andsince the mind is not attended to, it is deprived of its strength, the support of our Grace. Without

use when left to stay, iron and mischief rust away in accordance with this Tamil proverb, sincethey are not attended to, all the vasana-seeds, whose nature is to rise stealthily and mischievously,

have to stay quiet, and thus they dry up like seeds deprived of water and become too

*This is why aspirants who, in order to destroy evil thoughts like lust, anger and so on, fight against

them and thereby think about them fail in their attempts, while aspirants practising Self-enquiry,

who pay their full attention to Self with an indifference towards their thoughts, bypass them easily.

weak to sprout out into thought-plants. Then, when the fire of Self-knowledge (jnana) blazes forth,

these tendencies (vasanas), like well-dried firewood, become a prey to it.

This alone is how the total destruction of all tendencies (vasanakshaya) is affected.

If we are told, Abandon the east, the practical way of doing so would be to do as if told, Go to the

west! In the same manner, when we are told, Discard the five sheaths, which are not Self, thepractical way of discarding the non-Self is to focus our attention on ourself. What is this I? or

Who am I? Thinking I am not this, not this (neti, neti) is a negative method. Knowing that this

negative method is just as impractical as saying, Drink the medicine without thinking of a

monkey* Sri Bhagavan has now shown us the practical way of drinking the medicine withoutthinking of a monkey, by giving us the clue, Drink the medicine while thinking of an elephant,that is, He has reformed the ancient negative method by giving us the positive method Who am I?,

Verily, the ego is all! Hence the enquiry What is it? (in other words, Who am I, this ego?)

is the true giving up (renunciation) of all. Thus should you know!

Ulladhu Narpadhu, verse 28

Verily, all (that is, the five sheaths and their projections -all these worlds) is the ego. So, attending

to the feeling I,

*There is a traditional story of a doctor prescribing a medicine to a patient with the condition that It

should be taken only while not thinking of a monkey; but the patient could not take the medicineunder this condition, for every time he tried to drink it, the thought of a monkey would surely jump

up.


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What is it? or Who is this I ?, alone is renouncing the five sheaths, discarding them, eliminating

them, or negating them. Thus Bhagavan Ramana has declared categorically that Self-attention aloneis the correct technique of eliminating the five sheaths !

Since this is so, with what purpose did the sastras use the term enquiry to denote the method neti,

neti? By means of neti, neti, can we not formulate intellectually (that is, throughparoksha) the

test which we have given in paragraph 4 of chapter four of this book, A thing is surely not I if it

is possible for one to experience I am even in the absence of that thing? So long as there existsthe wrong knowledge I am the body pertaining to the aforesaid five sheaths or three bodies, willnot ones paying attention towards the first person automatically be only an attention towards a

sheath or a body a second person ! But if we use this test, can we not find out that all such

attentions are not the proper first person attention? Therefore, it is necessary first of all to have anintellectual conviction that these are not I in order to practise Self-attention without losing our

bearings. It is only the discrimination* by which we acquire this conviction that has been termedenquiry by the sastras. What then is an aspirant to do after discriminating thus? How can the

attention to these five sheaths, even though with an intention to eliminate them, be an attention to

Self? Therefore, while practising Self-enquiry, instead of taking anyone of the five sheaths as the

object of our attention, we should fix our attention only on the I -consciousness, which exists andshines as oneself, as the singular, and as a witness to and aloof from these sheaths.

*The discrimination dealt with in chapter four of this book is also with the same aim in view, yet it

is not the actual process of enquiry. What is given in the last chapter of this book alone is the actualmethod of Self-enquiry.

Instead of being directed towards any second or third person, is not our power of attention, which

was hitherto called mind or intellect, thus now directed only towards the first person? Although weformally refer to it as directed, in truth it is not of the nature of a doing (kriya-rupam) in the form

of directing or being directed; it is of the nature of being or existing (sat-rupam). Because the

second and third persons (including thoughts) are alien or external to us, our attention paid to them

was of the nature of a doing (kriya). But this very attention, when fixed on the non-alien firstperson feeling, I, loses the nature of paying and remains in the form of being, and therefore it isof the nature of non-doing (akriya) or inaction (nishkriya). So long as our power of attention wasdwelling upon second and third persons, it was called the mind or the intellect, and itsattending was called a doing (kriya) or an action (karma). Only that which is done by the mindis an action. But on the other hand, as soon as the attention is fixed on the first person (or Self), itloses its mean names such as mind, intellect or ego sense. Moreover, that attention is no longer evenan action, but inaction (akarma) or the state of being still (summa iruttal). Therefore, the mindwhich attends to Self is no more the mind; it is the consciousness aspect of Self (atma-chit-rupam)! Likewise, so long as it attends to the second and third persons (the world), it is notthe consciousness aspect of Self; It is the mind, the reflected form of consciousness (chit-

abhasa-rupam)! Hence, since Self-attention is not a doing (kriya), it is not an action (karma). Thatis, Self alone realizes Self; the ego does not!

The mind which has obtained a burning desire for Self-attention, which is Self-enquiry, is said to bethe fully mature one (pakva manas). Since it is not at all now inclined to attend to any second or

third parson, it can be said that it has reached the pinnacle of desirelessness (vairagya). For, do notall sorts of desires and attachments pertain only to second and third persons? Since this mind, which

has very well understood that (as already seen in earlier chapters) the consciousness which shines as

I alone is the source of full and real happiness, now seeks Self because of its natural craving forhappiness, this intense desire to attend to Self is indeed the highest form of devotion (bhakti). It isexactly this Self-attention of the mind which is thus fully mature through such devotion and

desirelessness (bhakti-vairagya) that is to be called the enquiry Who am I ? taught byBhagavan Sri Ramana! Well, will not at least such a mature mind which has come to the path ofSri Ramana, willingly agreeing to engage in Self-attention, realize Self ? No, no, it has started forits doom ! Agreeing to commit suicide, it places its neck (through Self-attention) on the scaffold


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where it is to be sacrificed !!

How? Only so long as it was attending to second and third persons did it have the name mind, but

as soon as Self-attention is begun, its name and form (its name as mind and its form as thoughts) arelost. So we can no longer say that Self-attention or Self-enquiry is performed by the mind, Neither

is it the mind that attends to Self, nor is the natural spontaneous Self-attention of the consciousness

aspect of Self (atma-chit-rupam), which is not the mind, an activity !

A naked lie then it would be

If any man were to say that he

Realized the Self, diving within

Through proper enquiry set in,

Not for knowing but for death

The good-for-nothing egos worth!

This Arunachala alone,

The Self, by which the Self is known !

Sri Arunachala Venba verse 39

The feeling I am is the experience common to one and all. In this, am is consciousness or

knowledge. This knowledge is not of anything external; it is the knowledge of oneself, This is chit.

This consciousness is we, We are verily consciousness, says Sri Bhagavan in UpadesaUndhiyar verse 23. This is our being (that is, our true existence) or sat. This is called that whichis (ulladhu). Thus in I am, I is existence (sat) and am is consciousness (chit). When Self, ournature of existence-consciousness (satchit swarupam), instead of shining only as the pure

consciousness I am, shines mixed with an adjunct (upadhi) as I am a man, I am Rama, I am so-

and-so, I am this or that, then this mixed consciousness is the ego. This mixed consciousness can

rise only by catching hold of a name and form. When we feel I am a man, I am Rama, I am sitting,I am lying, is it not clear that we have mistaken the body for I, and that we have assumed itsname and postures as I am this and I am thus? The feeling this and thus which has now risen

mixed with the pure consciousness I am (satchit) is what is called thought, this is the firstthought.

The feeling I am a man, I am so-and-so is only a thought. But the consciousness I am is not athought; it is the very nature of our being. The mixed consciousness I am this or that is athought that rises from our being. It is only after the rising of this thought, the mixed

consciousness (the first person), that all other thoughts, which are the knowledge of second andthird persons, rise into existence.

Only if the first person exists, will the second and third persons exist..

Ulladhu Narpadhu verse 14

This mixed consciousness, the first person, is called our rising or the rising of the ego. This is the

primal mentation (adi-vritti) ! Hence:

Thinking is a mentation (vritti) ; being is not a mentation !

Atma Vichara Patikam, verse 1

The pure existence-consciousness, I am, is not a thought; this consciousness is our nature(swarupam). I am a man is not our pure consciousness; it is only our thought! To understand

thus the difference between our being and our rising (that is, between existence and thought) firstof all is essential for aspirants who take to the enquiry Who am I?

Bhagavan Sri Ramana has advised that Self-enquiry can be done either in the form Who am I? or


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in the form Whence am I? Hearing these two interrogative sentences, many aspirants have held

various opinions about them up till now and have become confused as to which of them is to bepractised and how! Even among those who consider that both are one and the same, many have only

a superficial understanding and have not scrutinized deeply how they are the same. Some who try to

follow the former one, Who am I?, simply begin either vocally or mentally the parrot-likerepetition Who am I ? Who am I? as if it were a mantra-japa. This is utterly wrong! Doingjapa of

Who am I? in this manner is just as bad as meditating upon or doingjapa of the mahavakyas suchas I am Brahman and so on, thereby spoiling the very objective for which they were revealed! Sri

Bhagavan Himself has repeatedly said, Who am I? is not meant for repetition (japa)! Some

others, thinking that they are following the second interrogative form, Whence am I? try toconcentrate on the right side of the chest (where they imagine something as a spiritual heart),

expecting a reply such as I am from here! This is in no way better than the ancient method ofmeditating upon anyone of the six yogic centres (shad-chakras) in the body!! For, is not thinking of

any place in the body only a second person attention (an objective attention)? Before we start to

explain the technique of Self-enquiry, is it not of the utmost importance that all such misconceptionsbe removed? Let us see, therefore, how they may be removed.

In Sanskrit, the terms atmanand ahamboth mean I. Hence, atma-vicharameans an attentionseeking Who is this I? It may rather be called I-attention, Self-attention or Self-abidance.The consciousness I thus pointed out here is the first person feeling. But as we have already said,

it is to be understood that the consciousness mixed with adjuncts as I am this or I am that is the

ego (ahankara) or the individual soul (jiva), whereas the unalloyed consciousness devoid ofadjuncts and shining alone as I-I (or I am that I am) is Self (atman), the Absolute (brahman) or

God (iswara). Does it not amount to saying then that the first person consciousness, I, can beeither the ego or Self? Since all people generally take the ego-feeling (I am the body) to be I, the

ego is also given the name self (atman) and is called individual self (jivatma) by some sastras

even now. It is only for this reason that even the attention to the ego, What is it? or Who is it?, isalso named by the sastras as Self-enquiry (atma-vichara). Is it not clear, however, that Self, the

existence-consciousness, neither needs to do any enquiry nor can be subjected to any enquiry? It isjust in order to rectify this defect that Bhagavan Ramana named it Who am I? rather than using the

ancient term Self-enquiry (atma-vichara)! The ego, the feeling of I, generally taken by people to

be the first person consciousness, is not the real first person consciousness; Self alone is the realfirst person consciousness. The egofeeling, which is merely a shadow of it, is a false first person

consciousness. When one enquires into this ego, what it is or who it is, it disappears because it isreally nonexistent, and the enquirer, having nothing more to do, is established in Self as Self.

Because it rises, springing up from Self, the false first person consciousness mentioned above has tohave a place and a time of rising. Therefore, the question Whence am I? means only Whence

(from where) does the ego rise ?. A place of rising can only be for the ego. But for Self, since it hasno rising or setting, there can be no particular place or time.

When scrutinized, we the ever-known existing Thing alone are; then where is time and where

is space? If we are (mistaken to be) the body, we shall be involved in time and space; but, are we

the body? Since we are the One, now, then and ever, that One in space, here there and everywhere *,we the timeless and spaceless Self alone are !


*Time and space apparently exist in us (Self), but we are neither in them nor bound by them, The

experience of the Jnani is only I am and not I am everywhere and in all times.

- thus says Sri Bhagavan. Therefore, enquiring Whence am I? is enquiring Whence is the ego?.

Only to the rising of the ego, which is conditioned by time and space, will the question Whence amI? be applicable. The meaning which Sri Bhagavan expects us to understand from the term

Whence? or From where? is From what?. When taken in this sense, instead of a place or timecoming forth as a reply, Self-existence, we, the Thing (vastu), alone is experienced as the reply. If,


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on the other hand, we anticipate a place as an answer to the question Whence?, a place,

conditioned by time and space, will be experienced within the body two digits to the right from thecentre of the chest (as said in Ulladhu NarpadhuAnubandhamverse 18). Yet this experience is

not the ultimate or absolute one (paramarthikam). For, Sri Bhagavan has positively asserted that

Heart (hridayam) is verily Self-consciousness, which is timeless, spaceless, formless and nameless.

He who thinks that Self (or Heart) is within the insentient body, while in fact the body is within

Self, is like one who thinks that the screen, which supports the cinema picture, is contained withinthe picture

Ekatma Panchakam, verse 3

Finding a place in the body as the rising-point of the ego in reply to the question Whence? isnot the objective of Sri Bhagavans teachings; nor is it the fruit to be gained by Self-enquiry.Sri Bhagavan has declared clearly the objective of His teachings and the fruit to be gained by

seeking the risingplace of the ego as follows:

When sought within What is the place from which it rises as I?, I (the ego) will die ! This isSelf-enquiry (jnana-vichara) .

Upadesa Undhiyar, verse 19

Therefore, the result which is aimed at when seeking the rising-place of the ego is the annihilationof that ego and not an experience of a place in the body. It is only in reply to the immature people

who not able to have even an intellectual understanding (paroksha jnana) about the nature of Self,which shines alone as the one, non-dual thing, unlimited by (indeed, absolutely unconnected with)

time and space, unlimited even in the form Brahman is everywhere, Brahman is at all times,

Brahman is everything (sarvatra brahma, sarvada brahma, sarvam brahma) always raise thequestion, Where is the seat for Self in the body?,that the sastras and sometimes even Sri

Bhagavan had to say: two digits to the right (from the centre of the chest) is the heart.* Hence,this heartplace (hridaya-stanam) Is not the ultimate or absolute Reality, The reader may here refer

to Maharshis, Gospel, Book II, chapter IV, The Heart is the Self (8th edition, 1969, pages 68 to72; 9th edition, 1979, pages 72 to 76).

*It is worth noting that the mention of the location of the heart two digits to the right from thecentre of the chest is not included in Ulladhu Narpadhu (the main forty verses), where the

original and direct teachings of Sri Bhagavan are given, but only in Ulladhu Narpadhu

Anubandham(the supplementary forty verses), since this is merely and of the diluted truths whichthe sastras condescendingly reply in concession to the weakness of immature aspirants. Moreover,

these two verses, 18 and 19, are not original compositions of Sri Bhagavan, but only translationsfrom a Malayalam work named Ashtanga Hridayam, which is not even a spiritual text, but only a

medical one. It should also be noted here that these two verses do not at all recommend, nor even

mention, the practice of concentrating the attention on this point in the body, two digits to the rightfrom the centre of the chest. Indeed, in no place neither in His original works, nor in His

translations of others works, nor even in any of the conversations with Him recorded by devotees has Sri Bhagavan ever recommended this practice (for meditation upon the right side of the chest or

upon any other part of the transient, insentient and alien body is nothing but an attention to a second

person, an object other than I), and when asked about it, He in fact used to condemn it (see Talkswith Sri Ramana Maharshi, number 273).

Thus, attending to oneself in the form Whence am I? is enquiring into the ego, the rising I, But,

while enquiring Who am I?, there are some aspirants who take the feeling I to be their being(existence) and not their rising ! If it is taken thus, that is attention to Self. It is just to understand

clearly the difference between these two forms of enquiry that the difference between our rising

and our being has been explained earlier in this chapter, Just as the correct meaning of the termmeditation upon Brahman (brahmadhyanam) used by the sastras up till now is explained by Sri

Bhagavan in the last two lines of the first benedictory verse of Ulladhu Narpadhu to be abiding in


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the Heart as it is (that is to say, abiding as Self is the correct way of meditating upon it), so also, the

correct meaning of the term Self-enquiry (atma-vichara) is here rightly explained to be turningSelfwards (or attending to Self).

In either of these two kinds of enquiry (Who am I? or Whence am I ?), since the attention of the

aspirant is focused only on himself, nothing other than Self (atman), which is the true import of the

word I, will be finally experienced. Therefore, the ultimate result of both the enquiries, Whence

am I ? and Who am I ?, is the same! How? He who seeks Whence am I? is following the ego,the form of which is I am so-and-so, and while doing so, the adjunct so-and-so, having no realexistence, dies on the way, and thus he remains established in Self, the surviving I am. On theother hand, he who seeks Who am I ? drowns effortlessly in his real natural being (Self), which

ever shines as I am that I am, Therefore, whether done in the form Whence am I? or Who am I?, what is absolutely essential is that Self-attention should be pursued till the very end. Moreover, it

is not necessary for sincere aspirants even to name before-hand the feeling I either as ego or asSelf, For, are there two persons in the aspirant, the ego and Self? This is said because, since

everyone of us has the experience I am one only and not two. we should not give room to an

imaginary dual feeling one I seeking for another I by differentiating ego and Self as lower

self and higher-self Are there two selves, one to be an object known by the other? For, the true experience of all is

I am one !


- asks Sri Bhagavan.

Thus it is sufficient if we cling to the feeling I uninterruptedly till the very end. Such attention to

the feeling I, the common daily experience of everyone, is what is meant by Self-attention. Forthose who accept as their basic knowledge the I am the body consciousness (jiva Bhava), being

unable to doubt its (the egos) existence, it is suitable to take to Self-attention (that is, to do Self-

enquiry) in the form Whence am I?, On the other hand, for those who instead of assuming thatthey have an individuality (jiva bhava) such as I am so-and-so or I am this, attend thus, What is

this feeling which shines as I am?, it is suitable to be fixed in Self-attention in the form Who amI ? What is important to be sure of during practice (sadhana) is that our attention is turned only

towards I, the first person singular feeling.

- Sri Sadhu Om

The Path of Sri Raman, Chapter 7

For more posts on Ramana Maharshi see: http://o-meditation.com/category/ramana-maharshi/

To read more from Ramana Maharshi see: http://o-meditation.com/jai-guru-deva/some-good-

books/downloadable-books/ramana-maharshi/

December 21, 2009

O-theism

O-theism

Religion-less Religious-ness

The no Religion of Whole religion

It is the perennial philosophy. It is the Heart of the teachings of all the Awakened Masters includingKrishna, Lao Tzu, Buddha and Christ.
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It is the religion-less of Ramana Maharshi, J. Krishnamurti and Osho. It is the religious-ness of

Advaita, the Sufis, Tantra and Zen.

Isms are always shunned but this one points to its own non-being. Words are always grasped butthis one points to its own non-limitation.

-purushottama

Prescott, Arizona

December 21, 2009

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Gurdjieff, I Am,Jean Klein,Jesus, Krishna Menon, Krishnamurti, Love,Meditation, Meher Baba,Nisargadatta Maharaj, O-theism, Osho, Ramana Maharshi, religiousness,Richard Rose,Robert

Adams, Sufi, Tantra,U. G. Krishnamurti,Vimala Thakar, ZenDecember 9, 2009

Prayer by Shankarcharya Vimala Thakar

Translation & Commentary by Vimala Thakar

Pratah smarami hridi samsphura ta twamSatchitsukham paramahansa gatim turiyam

Yat swapna jagara sushupta mavaiti nityamTad brahma nishkalamaham na cha bhuta sanghaha.

In the morning as I meet the dawn, I remember that my heart contains the God, the Beloved, who

has not yet been defined and described. I remember that it is He who vibrates within my heart,

enables me to breathe, to talk, to listen, to move. When I am thus aware, that it is He who lives andmoves within me, then the three phases of consciousness,jagrat, swapna, sushupti : wakefulness,

dreaming, and profound sleep, they are transcended into turiya, the fourth dimension, which isbehind the wakefulness, the dream-consciousness, and the sleep-consciousness.

When I thus remember, that the underlying current behind the wakefulness, the dream, and the

sleep-consciousness is He, who lives and moves within me, then that awareness gives me sat chit

sukham, the flavor of the truth, the reality, and the bliss that is the nature, the basic primary nature

of life.Sat chit sukham. When I am always thus aware of the real nature of life, then I arrive at

paramahansagatim turiyam. I arrive at a state of being that has been called by the ancient wise

Indians Paramahansa, a swan that swims through the waters of duality. That is how a sanyasi iscalled aparamahansa, one who lives in the renunciation of that austere awareness that it is not he

who lives, as separate from the universe, but that he is only an expression of the universal.

The state ofparamahansa is the state where a person is aware that he is not a conglomeration ofsense organs and only the five elements, but he is the nishkala Brahman, the supreme Brahman, the

divinity, who has taken the dense form of a mind and a physical body.

Pratara bhajami manaso vachasam agamyam

Vacho vibhanti nikhila yadanugrahenaYa neti neti vachanaih nirgama avochu

Tamdeva devam ajam achyutam ahuragryam
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But my mind, when I am awake, needs some work to do. It cannot remain without movement. So I

give it a job. Pratara bhajami manaso - by the mind vachasam agamyam by the mind Imove. On the frontiers of the mind I give the mind a job to explore that which lies beyond its own

frontiers, that which is not accessible to the word, to the speech, as well as to the mind.

My mind asks me, How shall I do it? And I ask the mind to travel back, through the word, to the

source of the word, the sound, and find out how the sound is born. I ask my mind to travel with the

breath, to go inside: with the breath to travel. That is the only way you can find out how the soundis born, because breath and sound are woven together.

All speech and all sound is a blessing of that unspoken, unstruck sound. And unless one discovers

the source from which all sound is born, one shall never set oneself free from the power of theword, that intoxicates and distorts the mind; that intoxicates the mind and sweeps it off its balance.

All the Upanishads and the Vedas have been searching for that source of sound. That source of

breath. They arrived only at two words: na iti,na iti: it is not this, it is not this. So even theVedas arrive at the point where nothing can describe and define. The source can only be

experienced, the source can only be perceived and understood, but never defined and described.

That is how the mind becomes silent. Not because I ask it, but while it is searching for the source ofits own activity it takes a dive deep into silence, where the mind becomes the no-mind, where the

knowing becomes the not-knowing.

Then I understand that silence is the only speech through which life speaks, and I feel blessed whenI am in that silence.

Pratarnamami tamasah param arkavarnamPurnam sanatana padam purushottamakhyam

Yasminnidam jagadashesham ashesamurtauRajjuam bhujangama iva pratibhatitam vai.

But then comes the body. It wants to do something. To worship, to admire, to adore. So I give it a

job. I ask my body to bow down before the light of the earth, the sun, who dispels darkness from allthe corners of the earth. And I ask my body to expose itself to that darkness dispelling sun ask it tofind out how that sun enters into the body through the doors of the eyes, and through the pores of all

the veins and nerves, every pore of my being. I want my body to find out which are the avenuesthrough which the light is received.

And when the body says, It is the eyes through which the light enters, I say, Find out how theeyes can see the light. Is the light outside the eyes, or is it inside? With the help of the mind, the

body travels inward, to find out the source of the light.

And it discovers that it is not a blind person who can receive the light from outside. He who has aneye can receive the light. So that which receives the light is greater than the light seen from outside.

So I arrive at the source of light within me. And the awareness of that light dispels the illusion the

illusion and the fear that a man experiences when he see rajo bhujangama : when he sees a rope

in the darkness and he mistakes that for a snake, a cobra. I had mistaken the rope of duality for thesnake and cobra of misery and sorrow. But the light dispels the darkness and I see that the duality is

only a rope that cannot bind me in any way unless I bind myself with it.

That light is the purushottam, that is sanatana - eternal.Purnam - that is perfect. The perfect

eternity. The God divine. That is really my nature. I had mistaken the tensions of duality to be me,but then the light dispels all the darkness, and I get rooted back into the ajam, the aychutam that

which can never be swept off its feet.Ajam that which was never born, and can never die. I amthat.

This is the prayer composed by Shankaracharya, the majestic exponent of the philosophy of non-

dualism, vedanta or advait. This was sung by Vivekananda very often, and it is really on this prayer

that Vivekanandas Song of Sanyasin is based, where he sings, in great ecstasy:


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They know not truth who dream such vacant dreams

As father, mother, children wife and friend -The sexless Self, whose father, whose mother is he?

The self is All in All,

None else exists, and thou art that,Sanyasin bold, say Om Tat Sat Om.

Where seekest thou that freedom?This world nor that can give you.Thine only is the hand,

That holds the rope that drags thee on.

Then cease lament, let go thy hold!Sanyasin bold! Say Om Tat Sat Om!

-Vimala Thakar

Hunger Mountain, MA, October, 1972

Here is a link to an audio recording of Vimalaji chanting part of the above prayer. Prayer by

Shankarcharya Vimala Thakar

For more posts on Vimala Thakar see: http://o-meditation.com/category/j-krishnamurti/vimala-thakar/

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November 28, 2009

Seeing It Simply Wei Wu Wei

It is surely axiomatic that a phenomenon (an

appearance, an object) cannot perform any action whatever on its own initiative, as an independent

entity. In China this was illustrated by Chuang Tzu in his story of the sow who died while suckling
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her piglets: the little pigs just left her because their mother was no longer there. In Europe, even at

that early date, the same understanding is expressed by the word animus which animates thephenomenal aspect of sentient beings, and this forms the basis of most religious beliefs. But

whereas in the West the animus was regarded as personal to each phenomenal object, being the

sentience of it, in the East the animus was called heart or mind or consciousness, and inBuddhism and Vedanta was regarded as impersonal and universal, Buddha-mind, Prajna,

Atman, etc.When this impersonal mind comes into manifestation by objectifying itself as subject and object,it becomes identified with each sentient object, and the concept of I thereby arises in human

beings, whereby the phenomenal world as we know it and live it, appears to be what we call real.

That, incidentally, is the only reality (thing-ness) we can ever know, and to use the term real (athing) for what is not such, for the purely subjective, is an abuse of language.

In this process of personalising mind and thinking of it as I, we thereby make it, which is

subject, into an object, whereas I in fact can never be such, for there is nothing objective in I,

which is essentially a direct expression of subjectivity. This objectivising of pure subjectivity,calling it me or calling it mind, is precisely what constitutes bondage. It is this concept, called

the I-concept or ego or self, which is the supposed bondage from which we all suffer and fromwhich we seek liberation.

It should be evident, as the Buddha and a hundred other Awakened sages have sought to enable us

to understand, that what we are is this animating mind as such, which is noumenon, and not the

phenomenal object to which it gives sentience. This does not mean, however, that the phenomenalobject has no kind of existence whatever, but that its existence is merely apparent, which is the

meaning of the term phenomenon; that is to say, that it is only an appearance in consciousness, anobjectivisation, without any nature of its own, being entirely dependent on the mind that

objectivises it, which mind is only nature, very much as is the case of any dreamed creature, as the

Buddha in the Diamond Sutra, and many others after him have so patiently explained to us.

This impersonal, universal mind or consciousness, is our true nature, our only nature, all, absolutelyall, that we are, and is completely devoid of I-ness.

This is easy enough to understand, and it would be simple indeed if it were the ultimate truth, but it

is not, for the obvious reason that no such thing as an objective mind could exist, any more than an

I or any other object, as a thing-in-itself. What it is, however, is totally devoid of any objectivequality, and so cannot be visualised, conceptualised, or in any way referred to, for any such process

would automatically render it an object of subject which by definition it can never be. This isbecause the mind in question is the unmanifested source of manifestation, the process of which is its

division into subject and object; and antecedent to such division there can be no subject to perceive

an object, and no object to be perceived by a subject. Indeed, and as revealed by such sages as

Padma Sambhava, thatwhich is seeking to conceive and to name this unmanifested source ofmanifestation is precisely this whole mind which is the animating or prajnaic functioning whichitselfis the seeking, so that the sought is the seeker thereof.

Profoundly to understand this is Awakening to what is called enlightenment.

This reasoned visualisation, therefore, like all doctrine, is merely conceptual, devoid of factuality, a

structure of theoretical imagination, a symbolic diagram devised in order to enable us to understandsomething immediate that can never become knowledge. Yet that ultimate something, which is no

thing, is nevertheless what the universe is, and is all that we are.

The psychological I-concept has no nature of its own, is no thing, and could not possibly create

genuine bondage. There cannot be any such thing as bondage at all, but only the idea of such.

There is no liberation, for there is no thing from which to be freed. If the whole conceptual structureis seen as what it is, it must necessarily collapse, and the bondage-enlightenment nonsense with it.That is called Awakening, awakening to the natural state which is that of every sentient being. Sri


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Ramana Maharshi taught just that when he said that enlightenment is only being rid of the notion

that one is not enlightened, and Maharshi might have been quoting the Tang dynasty Chinesesage Hui Hai, known as the Great Pearl, when he stated that Liberation is liberation from the notion

of liberation. He might also have been quoting Huang Po (d.850), of whom he is unlikely ever to

have heard, when they both used the same words, full of humour, to someone asking about hismind: each sage asked in reply,How many minds have you?

How many minds had they, those two young men? Why, none at all. Not only not two, but not one.Nor were they themselves a mind, for there could not be such a thing as a mind for them to be.Neither they nor mind ever had, or ever could have, any objective being whatever, for never has

any kind of objective being been, nor will such ever be. All that, and every that which ever was

thought up and that is the most purely objective of pronouns is the essence of the giganticphantasmagoria of objectivity, which we spend our lives building up, and in which we search

desperately for some truth which could not possibly be there. The whole vast construction is aphantasy, a dream, as the Buddha (or whoever wrote it in his name) told us in the Diamond Sutra,

and the truth which a dream represents, or misrepresents, of which it is a reflection or a deflection,

is the dreaming source of it which is all that it is. That source can never have a name, because a

name denotes a phenomenon and there is no phenomenal dreamer, but a functioning that is calleddreaming. Sri Bhagavan called it I-I: if it must be called anything, no nominal form could evercome nearer, or be less misleading as an indication, than his term.

All objectivisation is conceptual, all conceptuality is inference, and all inference is as empty of truthas a vacuum is empty of air. Moreover there is no truth, never has been and never could be; there is

no thusness, suchness, is-ness, nor anything positive or negative whatever. There is just absoluteabsence of the cognisable, which is absolute presence of the unthinkable and the unknowable

which neither is nor is not. Inferentially this is said to be an immense and radiant splendour

untrammelled by notions of time and space, and utterly beyond the dim, reflected sentience oftemporal and finite imagination.

- Wei Wu WeiOriginally published in The Mountain Path, July 1964.

This article was first seen on: http://www.weiwuwei.8k.com/osliii.html

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