‘Liberation doesn’t care’ for being loving, caring and nice or being good and unegotistical. It’s just its nature to be like this, loving. You could say love and affection are mere side effects!
Non-duality
REAL MEANINGS
When it is said ‘all is full’ or ‘all is whole’,
All that is really meant is nothing is required for liberation.
When it is said ‘nothing is real’,
All that is really meant is nothing is required for liberation.
When it is said ‘nothing is required for liberation’,
What is meant is that there is no separate ‘me’ that could require anything.
…JUST THIS…
Too simple for words!
Ramana Maharshi – Deep Sleep and Self-Realisation
Questioner: Miseries appear in jagrat (waking sate). Why should they appear?
Ramana Maharshi: If you see your Self they will not appear.
Q: If I turn to look who I am I do not find anything.
RM: How did you remain in your sleep? There was no ‘I-thought’ there and you were happy. Whereas there are thoughts flowering in the wake of the root-thought ‘I’ in the jagrat and these hide the inherent happiness. Get rid of these thoughts which are the obstacles to happiness. Your natural state is one of happiness as was evident in your sleep.
Q: I do not know anything of my sleep experience.
RM: But you know that it was happiness. Otherwise you would not be saying “I slept happily”. When there is no thought, no ‘I’, and nothing In fact except yourself, you are happy. That is the whole Truth. This is exactly what is conveyed by the Mahavakya- Tatvamasi (You are That). Find your Self: and then “That” is known.
Q: How is that Brahman?
RM: Why do you want to know of Brahman apart from yourself? The scripture says “You are That”. The Self is intimate to you and you cannot indeed be without the Self. Realise it. That is the Realisation of Brahman also.
Q: But I am unable to do it. I am too weak to realise my Self.
RM: In that case surrender yourself unreservedly and the Higher Power will reveal Itself.
Q: What is unconditional surrender?
RM: If one surrenders oneself there will be no one to ask questions or to be thought of. Either the thoughts are eliminated by holding on to the root-thought ‘I’ or one surrenders oneself unconditionally to the Higher Power. These are the only two ways for Realisation.
Talk 321 – Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi
‘PATH’ TO LIBERATION
The appears to be a path, a process…
A path appears to be needed…
Many teachings and practices appear to be helpful…
And yet…
Nothing is needed!
Nothing is needed!
LOVE & SURRENDER
Never underestimate the importance of surrender or letting go of the ‘me’. It is the same as meditation or being still. It is something that is the natural result of insight into non-duality/no separation and is not something you have to necessarily do, although it may start off that way. It takes us to Love, total and ordinary Love. ❤
We could say that if you are doing surrender in order to become enlightened then that is more ‘me’ or egotism. It is totally fine to do this btw. However surrender naturally results when this ‘me’ and the control me neurotically tries to exert is seen/felt/realised to be totally unnecessary and therefore the ‘me’ is non-conceptually/non-verbally realised to be a waste of energy.
Many staunch non-dualists do not advocate surrender, as who or what is there to do the surrendering? I totally agree!
And yet never underestimate the value of surrender!
😂😂
When the heart is open, even slightly, it is easy to sense those teachers whose hearts are not fully open, whose hearts remain resistant to the naturally purifying effect of love, whose minds cling on to the ‘me’, and in whom the me energy (ie. egoic vasanas) continues despite their words saying otherwise.
❤🙏❤
💥 ‘PATH’ TO ENLIGHTENMENT 💥
This is always fully known.
This is always full.
This IS always.
This IS.
THIS.
.
💥
❤
TRUTH!
None of my words are really true, and neither are any of your words either, not when it comes to ‘Non-duality’. This is not ultimately about having the right concepts or having an accurate description of the ways things ‘really’ are, thankfully.
It is much simpler than that, and from the vantage point of the dualistic mind, much more radical too.
There is just an energetic pointing to a total freedom which can never be encapsulated solely by words, but words may be used (apparently) nonetheless.
It simply is ‘what is’.
ON APPEARANCES
‘Things appear’…’This appearance’…
…Appearance is a descriptive term. This is how things appear to be. To say something ‘is’ or ‘is not’ is to stray into the domain of concepts and beliefs. No need to go there.
HOW TO MISS A GENUINELY REALISED SPIRITUAL TEACHER
What if a teacher was genuinely realised but used language in a different way to your teacher of choice? Would you pass them by?
It’s my experience that when people truly get this, they do not necessarily parrot their own teacher (although they may), but have their own unique expression of the same truth. Often this expression can be radically different, at least on the surface.
Take Nisargadatta Maharaj – he expressed his teaching in a very different way to his Guru (Siddharameshwar Maharaj) who taught in a more traditional way which emphasised progession through various specific stages and reading of traditional texts. And Siddharameshwar Maharaj taught in a different way to his guru, Bhauhaseb Maharaj (so much so that Bhauhaseb’s disciples initially rallied against Siddharameshwar) who stressed meditative practice over book reading. Similarly look at other teachers who claim the same lineage: Ranjit Maharaj, Ramakant Maharaj and even Ramesh Balsekar – all have very different expressions, using almost completely different language and methodologies.
We can see the same in the centuries gone by: when we read the various Upanishads, some appear highly dualistic, whilst others are staunchly non-dualistic, some Upanishads are heavily theistic whereas some do not refer to a deity at all.
In Chan/Zen, we can see how each of the Patriarchs, starting with Bodhidharma, expressed the inexpressible in their own inimitable style.
There are many ways to talk about this. There are many ways we can come to this. No need to judge the teachers too much.
When I was a seeker, I used to often judge various teachers, especially when they expressed things that seemed at odds with my own personal understanding. Now I can see how right many of them were (Not all though! Not all teachings are equal!)
I know it’s difficult as a seeker, I really do. Just remember to keep an open mind, watch out when you become too critical, and focus on your own path so you can ‘attain a genuine realisation for yourself’, so to speak 😊 😜
Be open to the notion that some people may be expressing the same thing you are, but just in a different way, and perhaps just in a way you don’t fully understand.
The Self is All/ Self Enquiry in daily life
Ramana Maharshi: The Self is all. Are you apart from the Self? Or can the work go on without the Self? The Self is universal: so, all actions will go on whether you strain yourself to be engaged in them or not. The work will go on of itself. Thus Krishna told Arjuna that he need not trouble to kill the Kauravas; they were already slain by God. It was not for him to resolve to work and worry himself about it, but to allow his own nature to carry out the will of the higher power.
Q: But the work may suffer if I do not attend to it.
Ramana Maharshi: Attending to the Self means attending to the work. Because you identify yourself with the body, you think that work is done by you. But the body and its activities, including that work, are not apart from the Self. What does it matter whether you attend to the work or not? Suppose you walk from one place to another: you do not attend to the steps you take. Yet you find yourself after a time at your goal. You see how the business of walking goes on without your attending to it. So also with other kinds of work.
Q: It is then like sleep-walking.
Ramana Maharshi: Like somnambulism? Quite so. When a child is fast asleep, his mother feeds him; the child eats the food just as well as when he is fully awake. But the next morning he says to the mother, “Mother, I did not take food last night”. The mother and others know that he did, but he says that he did not; he was not aware. Still the action had gone on.
A traveller in a cart has fallen asleep. The bulls move, stand still or are unyoked during the journey. He does not know these events but finds himself in a different place after he wakes up. He has been blissfully ignorant of the occurrences on the way, but the journey has been finished. Similarly with the Self of a person. The ever-wakeful Self is compared to the traveller asleep in the cart.
Tom Das 