sadhana
Very Important Foundational Practices
Why is spiritual practice required? (The lion that thought it was a sheep)
Nonduality: why is spiritual practice required? (The lion that thought it was a sheep)
How long did it take for Sri Ramana Maharshi to realise the Self?
Also see: Was Ramana Maharshi’s self-realisation final and complete when he was a teenager?
Tom: as usual my explanatory comments are inserted in italiscised red
Questioner: How long did it take Maharshi to realise the Self?
Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi: This question is asked because the name and form are perceived. These are the perceptions consequent on the identification of the ego with the gross body.
Tom’s comments: Bhagavan Sri Ramana is stating that perception of name and form only occur after ignorance, ignorance being the notion that I am the body (or body-mind). This is consistent with his writing in ‘Who Am I?‘:
When the mind comes out (rises) from Self, the world appears. Therefore, when the world appears, Self will not appear; and when Self appears (shines), the world will not appear
Therefore, Sri Ramana is stating this question only is asked due to ignorance of taking Sri Ramana to be a person (ie. a body-mind entity) who at one time attained realisation, when in fact Sri Ramana is just the ever-realised Self, which is the only existent reality. That said, the fact that Sri Ramana gave out this teaching to this devotee in itself meant that the devotee was spiritually developed enough to receive this higher teaching.
If the ego identifies itself with the subtle mind, as in dream, the perceptions are subtle also. But in sleep there are no perceptions. Was there not the ego still? Unless it was, there cannot be the memory of having slept. Who was it that slept? You did not say in your sleep that you slept. You say it now in your wakeful state. The ego therefore is the same in wakefulness, dream and sleep.
Tom’s comments: Sri Ramana is stating that objects are seen in dream but not seen in deep sleep. In this instance he states that the ego is present in all 3 states of waking/dream/deep sleep and next he will say we are to find the reality that underlies these 3 states. When that is found, the 3 states are no longer present, he will say:
Find out the underlying Reality behind these states. That is the Reality underlying these.
In that state there is Being alone.
There is no you, nor I, nor he; no present, nor past, nor future. It is beyond time and space, beyond expression.
It is ever there.
Just as a plantain tree produces shoots at its roots, before yielding fruits and perishing, and these shoots, being transplanted, do the same again, so also the original primeval Master of antiquity (Dakshinamurti), who cleared the doubts of his rishi disciples in silence, has left shoots which are ever multiplying. The Guru is a shoot of that Dakshinamurti.
The question does not arise when the Self is realised.
~ Talks with Sri Ramana Maharshi, Talk no. 17
Why is spiritual practice required? (The lion that thought it was a sheep)
Should I devote ALL my time to spiritual practice? | Daily life and Self-Enquiry | How much time should I dedicate to self-enquiry?
Work, daily life and self-enquiry – an exploration | Ramana Maharshi | The path of Sri Ramana | Sri Sadhu Om
Exposing a false belief & the importance of Self-Enquiry | Sri Ramana Maharshi | Ending the ego
Some say that everything the ‘ego-me’ does simply perpetuates the ego-me, and thus the sense of separation and suffering that comes with the ego-me continues. If this is true, then there is nothing you can do to for ‘liberation to occur’ and for suffering to end. Note that this is a belief. Note that this is a conceptual view. Ask yourself: how do you even know this is true?
In order to know this is true, one would have to try every single practice in the world. It is a bit like saying no action can ever take you to the moon, as no action I’ve done so far has ever taken me to the moon. But it is possible to go to the moon!
Saying everything the ego does simply perpetuates the ego, is a bit like saying everything the body does simply perpetuates the body.
Just as there is a certain action the body can do that ends the body (ie. suicide), there is a certain effort of the ego-me that ends the ego-me (ie. self-enquiry).
Self-enquiry is ego suicide!
This is why Bhagavan Sri Ramana emphasised the need for practice and self-enquiry; see these teachings from Sri Ramana taken from Guru Vachaka Kovai (the second verse quoted summarises my points above, namely that there is a practise the ego can undertake that ends the ego):
385 When with the keen, unceasing quest
Of “Who am I?” one penetrates
The centre of oneself, the body-bound
Ego fades away, true Being
Rises clear as I, as I,
And puts an end to all diversity,
Illusive as the blueness of the sky.
388 The jiva searching “Who in truth am I?”
Subsides as the true Self without an ‘I’.
[Tom: jiva means the (conceiving of oneself as a) separate body-mind entity. Jiva essentially refers to the ego ie. the false sense of being a body-mind entity]
391 Those who do not dive into the Heart
And there confront the Self in the five sheaths hid
Are only students answering out of books
Clever questions raised by books,
And not true seekers of the Self.
402 Delusive thought now like a cloud
Conceals the boundless bright awareness
Of the Self. Enquiring “Who am I?”
Dispels the darkness and the splendour
Of the sky of Self shines clear.
403 As a ball of iron heated in the fire
Glows like a ball of fire, the jiva
Once impure is now ennobled
By self-enquiry and acquires
The very nature of the Self.
404 When the suffering fool turns inward,
Enquiring “Who am I?” the radiant
Truth is seen, confusion cleared,
And silence wells up as the bliss of peace.
405 The jiva’s terrible suffering is
The turbid folly of the mind
Unschooled and ignorant of the Self.
Practise unceasingly within the wise
Enquiry, “Whose is this dire suffering?
Who am I?”
406 By the transmuting touch of daily,
Methodical, untiring self-enquiry,
The base metal jiva shines forth clear
As Siva, freed from the mental rust,
The demon ego.
407 The jiva, son of God, forgetting
His real Being, cries “Alas” in anguish.
Then when he searches yearning inwards
He by experience knows the glory
Of oneness with the Self, his Father.
Please read the above verses carefully and slowly in order to fully gain their benefit.
Let us therefore first understand the proper technique of self-enquiry, and then let us be inspired and devoted to its practice.
Om Namo Bhagavate Sri Ramanaya Om
🙏🙏🙏
Ending Suffering & What should be emphasised in the teaching
If place A is ego, duality and suffering, and place B is liberation and the end of suffering, then Self-enquiry is the vehicle that takes you from A to B.
While many teachers and teachings spend much time describing Place A and Place B, ie. Discussing the body, the mind, and the world, the nature of ego, ignorance, and the various mechanisms that create duality and suffering, and also discussing the nature of liberation or self-realization and what happens in liberation, etc, etc…
…we see that Bhagavan Sri Ramana emphasises actually getting onto the vehicle that takes us from one (apparent) shore to the other, namely self-enquiry:
393 One who has wisely chosen the straight path
Of self-enquiry can never go astray;
For like the bright, clear Sun, the Self
Reveals itself direct to whoso
Turns towards it
~ Sri Ramana Maharshi, Guru Vachaka Kovai
Let us therefore understand the practise of self-enquiry and let us be blessed with the motivation to undertake it! Know that there is a ‘discipline that leads to permanent freedom’!:
71 How piteous is the spectacle
Of people wandering in the world’s ways
Aimless, frisky like a goat’s beard
And chafing at the discipline
That leads to permanent freedom.
~ Sri Ramana Maharshi, Guru Vachaka Kovai
Tom Das 