Questioner: Is your world full of things and people as is mine?
Nisargadatta Maharaj: No, it is full of myself.
Questioner: But do you see and hear as we do?
Nisargadatta Maharaj: How a ‘self-realised person’ sees the world
Author: Tom Das
Zen Teachings: The Four Kinds of Spiritual People
“There are four kinds of people who study.
The highest are those with practice, with understanding, and with realization.
Next are those with understanding, and with realization but without practice.
Next are those with practice and understanding but without realization.
Lowest are those with practice, but without understanding or realization.”Zen Dawn, J. C. Cleary
Practice, understanding and realisation are all important, but we can deduce from the quote above that of these realisation is the most important. Next in importance is understanding, and least important is practice.
How can this be? How can understanding be more important than practice? Isn’t it often said that an drop of practice is worth an ocean of theory?
Continue reading
Jesus and non-duality
Also see:
The Non-Dual Vision of Jesus Christ and the teachings of Sri Ramana Maharshi
The Sermon on the Mount According to Vedanta (Jesus, Christanity, Advaita and Non-Duality)
In non-dual teachings, the basic teaching is that the sense of self that we presume ourselves to be is a fiction. What remains after this is seen is a mysterious and ordinary sense of ‘divine oneness’. One ramification of this teaching is that we can learn to see that we are not the authors of our own actions even though we appear to be. This is known as non-doership. This teaching is often stated explicitly in non-dual traditions such as Advaita Vedanta, Zen, Dzogchen and Taoism.
In theistic traditions like much of Hinduism and the Abrahamic traditions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, non-duality is still expressed, but its form often differs. Continue reading
All exist in me
Confusion, anger,
love and life –
All exist in me.
How to connect with anyone
Try this powerful experiment, with a loved one, a friend, a stranger…
“Studies say that 4 minutes of uninterrupted eye contact can increase intimacy. To test this this theory out, we brought in six pairs in different stages of their relationship and had them try it.”
So, how did you get on?
No ego
If you say “spiritual enlightenment does not exist”,
You have denied yourself, and anyone who believes you, a route to end suffering:
“Suffering can end”, thus the wise ones have proclaimed.
If you say “you can be enlightened”, “your suffering can end”
Then by saying ‘you’, you are perpetuating the false concept of self.
Suffering can end, but your suffering cannot end.
Continue reading
Jnaneshvar: Is Sat-Chit-Ananda the supreme?
Jnaneshvar (1275–1296), also known as Jnanadev is widely acclaimed as a great self-realised master and teacher whose poetry and writings have influenced many generations after him. He was part of the Nath tradition, an ancient lineage of spiritual masters, which has become recently famous in the West due to Nisargadatta Maharaj (1897-1981), a more recent initiate in the Nath tradition.
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That ancient path
In seeking it, it is lost.
In loosing it, it is found.
If you never heard of it, you would never seek it;
If you never sought it, you would (probably) never find it.
Thus the importance of hearing about it.
Thus the importance of seeking it.
Thus the importance of letting it go.
Thus the importance of finding
That which was always here.
Peace and blessings
❤
Fleetwood Mac: Women, they will come and they will go
‘Women,they will come and they will go
When the rain washes you clean
you’ll know….you’ll know’
from Dreams by Fleetwood Mac
‘Women,they will come and they will go…’
Women will come and go,
Material goods will come and go,
Experiences will come and go,
Power and prestige will come and go,
Continue reading
Ramana Maharshi: Is the world an illusion?
In many spiritual traditions, such as some schools of of Buddhism, vedanta and yoga, seekers are advised to consider the world to be like a dream: ephemeral, transient and illusory. But is the world really an illusion, or is this merely a teaching method?
Many well-versed pandits and scholars have debated this very issue over the centuries, but for those that have glimpsed the reality that lies beyond mere verbal assertions, such debates are missing the essential point.
Here are two powerful quotes from Ramana Maharshi explaining how the teachings work:
Question: “Brahman (the Supreme Spirit) is real. The world is illusion” is the stock phrase of Sri Sankaracharya. Yet others say, “The world is reality.” Which is true?
Sri Ramana Maharshi: Both statements are true. They refer to different stages of development and are spoken from different points of view. The (spiritual) aspirant starts with the definition, that which is real exists always. Then he eliminates the world as unreal because it is changing.
The seeker ultimately reaches the Self and there finds unity as the prevailing note. Then, that which was originally rejected as being unreal is found to be a part of the unity. Being absorbed in the reality, the world also is real. There is only being in Self-realisation, and nothing but being.
From Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, talk no. 33
We can clearly see Ramana says the teaching that the world is an illusion is itself a ‘thorn used to remove a thorn’. The teaching is a concept, and it is used to remove another concept, before they are both thrown away.
Here is another instructive quote:
Sri Ramana Maharshi: At the level of the spiritual seeker you have got to say that the world is an illusion. There is no other way. When a man forgets that he is Brahman, who is real, permanent and omnipresent, and deludes himself into thinking that he is a body in the universe which is filled with bodies that are transitory, and labours under that delusion, you have got to remind him that the world is unreal and a delusion.
Why? Because his vision which has forgotten its own Self is dwelling in the external, material universe. It will not turn inwards into introspection unless you impress on him that all this external material universe is unreal.
When once he realises his own Self he will know that there is nothing other than his own Self and he will come to look upon the whole universe as Brahman.
There is no universe without the Self. So long as a man does not see the Self which is the origin of all, but looks only at the external world as real and permanent, you have to tell him that all this external universe is an illusion. You cannot help it.
Take a paper. We see only the script, and nobody notices the paper on which the script is written. The paper is there whether the script on it is there or not. To those who look upon the script as real, you have to say that it is unreal, an illusion, since it rests upon the paper. The wise man looks upon both the paper and script as one. So also with Brahman and the universe.
From letters from Sri Ramanasramam
Here in the next excerpt Ramana is asked directly if the world is perceived after realisation:
A visitor: Is the jagat (world) perceived even after Self-Realization?
M.: From whom is this question? Is it from a Jnani or from an ajnani?
D.: From an ajnani.
M.: Realise to whom the question arises. It can be answered if it arises after knowing the doubter. Can the jagat or the body say that it is?
Or does the seer say that the jagat or the body is? The seer must be there to see the objects. Find out the seer first. Why worry yourself now with what will be in the hereafter?
[Tom – Ramana is telling the questioner not to worry about this question and rather attend to himself ie. to do self-enquiry]
Sri Bhagavan continued: What does it matter if the jagat is perceived or not perceived? Have you lost anything by your perception of jagat now? Or do you gain anything where there is no such perception in your deep sleep? It is immaterial whether the world is perceived or not perceived.
[Tom: Now Ramana answers the question directly:]
Tom Das 