
Two great Chan (Zen) masters speak:
Zhaozhou: How should one approach enlightenment?
Nanquan: If you try to head for it, you immediately turn away from it.
Tom’s comments:
So, what to do?

Two great Chan (Zen) masters speak:
Zhaozhou: How should one approach enlightenment?
Nanquan: If you try to head for it, you immediately turn away from it.
Tom’s comments:
So, what to do?

It is the concept of a subject,
That gives rise to the concept of an object.
Or put another way,
The concept of ‘me’,
That gives rise to ‘not me’.
But look at your experience for yourself:
What was thought to be the subject
Is actually also an object.
The experiencing entity that we take ourselves to be,
Is actually something we are aware of,
and not the subject at all.
The person looking at and experiencing life,
Is just a part of life,
Totally inseparable from life.
The body,
thoughts,
emotions,
inner sensations,
intuitions,
visions,
dreams.
– all these are objects.
– all these are sensations.
– none of these are ‘me’.
– none of these are ‘mine’.
Sensations cannot themselves sense.
The perceived cannot perceive.
In fact, looking at our own experience,
Where is the subject at all?
Look!
-There are only sensations.
-There are only objects.
-There is only experience.
-There is never the experience of the subject.
Look!
Experience is a seamless whole,
One seamless happening,
And the so-called experiencer, the ‘me’,
Is simply part of that happening.
So what are we left with?
Just this.
Life simply happening,
All by itself.

In advaita (non-duality), we know that the God which is devote ourselves to is not separate from us.
Also see:
Does Jnana (Knowledge) lead to Bhakti (Devotion) or the other way round?
Should I bow to Sri Ramana Maharshi?
Grace alone is of prime importance
Bhakti Yoga (love and devotion) as a complete path to liberation
Ramana Maharshi on those who mock Idol-Worship
For many purists there is no place for devotion and prayer in non-duality. But devotion has always had a prominent role in spiritual traditions, and for good reason: it can be a hugely purifying and uplifting part of spiritual practice with many positive effects on the body and mind and our relationships. (click here for how devotion can be part of a wider spiritual path)

I remember:
My life being lit up,
Without the sun shining any brighter.
Things appeared clearer,
But the same spectacles perched on my nose.
My body became just a wisp,
But I weighed the same.
Wholeness was there,
But I was still just me.
This post hits the spot for me ❤ Thanks Atreya
Hi everyone,
So I’ve decided to try to embrace social media and think I’ve got this twitter thing sorted out. Well, the basics at least anyway 🙂 Are any of you out there on Twitter? Please let me know or find me @tomdas. I’m regularly tweeting for now – let’s see how long it lasts for! Do you use twitter? What’s your experience of social media been?
I’ve also used a wordpress widget to add a twitter feed to the sidebar – please let me know if there are better ways I can use social media or twitter, etc, many thanks
Love, peace and joy to you all
❤ ❤ ❤

All there is is God. It is not right to say God is in all things, for that implies a duality between things and God. It is not right to say God is in you, for that implies you are a container for God and different to God.
There are no things, only God. The idea of separate things is illusory. There is just an interconnected whole. Call this wholeness God, or Life, or The Great Spirit, or anything you like. There is no room for anything else. Only God. No ‘you’, no ‘I’, just ‘Him’.
Is there even a single particle where ‘She’ is not? (Is She not omnipresent and infinite?)
Everything moves and has its being in Him. Everything that moves and has being (exists) is also Him.
All there is is God. All is God.
This is one of a series of introductory articles – please see the homepage of tomdas.com for more introductory articles. Also see:
In Brief: how to attain Liberation
The entire path explained: the Path of Sri Ramana (Parts 1 and 2; PDF downloads)
This is one of the most important posts I have written – it condenses years of spiritual seeking which has involved exploring dozens of spiritual teachings, reading hundreds of books and texts from spiritual teachers and spiritual traditions across the world, undergoing all sorts of spiritual practices and meditations over the years, entering samadhi’s and experiencing visions of infinite oneness, and a genuine realisation of the Freedom-that-already-is.
The aim of the post is to guide you to a Freedom beyond words, but also stay concise. For all those people who have asked me: ‘That’s all very well but how do I actually become enlightened? How can we free ourselves from suffering? What do we do?’, this is for you, and others like you.

The mind cannot get this,
Cannot describe this,
Cannot come to it by logic.
It cannot be deduced,
Or inferred.
It cannot be gained,
Or lost.
The good news is that it doesn’t need to be.
It is already here.
It is just
whatever’s here.