The Teachings of Bhagavan Sri Ramana Maharshi in His Own Words -5

The Teachings of Bhagavan

Sri Ramana Maharshi

in His Own Words

Edited by:

ARTHUR OSBORNE

B.: I do not say that you must keep on rejecting thoughts.

If you cling to yourself, to the ‘I’ thought, and your interest

keeps you to that single thought, other thoughts will get rejected

and will automatically vanish.1

Just as Self-enquiry is not introspection as understood by the

psychologists, so also it is not argument or speculation as

understood by the philosophers.

D.: When I think, ‘Who am I?’, the answer comes: I am

not this mortal body but am Consciousness or the Self. And

then another thought suddenly arises. Why has the Self become

manifest? In other words; ‘Why has God created the world?’

B.: The enquiry: ‘Who am I?’ really means trying to find

the source of the ego or of the ‘I’-thought. You are not to occupy

the mind with other thoughts, such as ‘I am not the body’.

Seeking the source of the ‘I’ serves as a means of getting rid of

all other thoughts. You should not allow any scope for other

thoughts such as you mention, but should keep the attention

fixed on finding the source of the ‘I’- thought by asking, when

any other thought arises, to whom it occurs; and if the answer is

‘to me’, you then resume the thought: ‘What is this ‘I’ and what

is its source?’2

Bhagavan did sometimes allow or even use mental argument

but that was to convince the beginner of the unreality of the

individual self or ego and thus induce him to take up Selfenquiry.

The argument itself was not Self-enquiry.

D.: Who am I? How is the answer to be found?

B.: Ask yourself the question. The body (annamayakosa)

and its functions are not ‘I’. Going deeper, the mind

1 S. D. B., iv.

2 D. D., p. 80.

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(manomayakosa) and its functions are not ‘I’. The next step takes

one to the question: Wherefrom do these thoughts arise? The

thoughts may be spontaneous, superficial, or analytical. They

operate in the mind. Then who is aware of them? The existence

of thoughts, their clear conception and operation, become evident

to the individual. This analysis leads to the conclusion that the

individuality is operative as the cogniser of the existence of

thoughts and their sequence. This individuality is the ego, or, as

people say, ‘I’. Vijnanamayakosa (intellect) is only the sheath of

the ‘I’ and not the ‘I’ itself. Enquiring further, the questions arise:

What is this ‘I’? Wherefrom does it come? ‘I’ was not aware in

sleep. Simultaneously with its rise, sleep changes to dream and

wakefulness. But I am not concerned with the dream state just

now. Who am I now, in the wakeful state? If I originated on

waking from sleep, then the ‘I’ was covered up with ignorance.

Such an ignorant ‘I’ cannot be what the scriptures refer to or the

wise affirm. ‘I’ am beyond even sleep; ‘I’ must be here and now,

and must be what I was all along in sleep and dream also,

unaffected by the qualities of these states. ‘I’ must therefore be

the unqualified substratum underlying these three states (after

anandamayakosa is transcended).1

Two Parsi ladies arrived from Ahmedabad and spoke with

Bhagavan.

L.: Bhagavan, we have been spiritually inclined from

childhood. We have read several books on philosophy and are

attracted by Vedanta. So we read the Upanishads, Yoga Vasishta,

Bhagavad Gita, etc. We try to meditate, but there is no progress

in our meditation. We do not understand how to realise. Can

you kindly help us towards realisation?

1 T., 25.

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B.: How do you meditate?

L.: I begin by asking myself ‘Who am I?’ and eliminate

the body as not ‘I’, the breath as not ‘I’, the mind as not ‘I’, but

then I am unable to proceed further.

B.: Well, that is all right so far as the mind goes. Your

process is only mental. Actually all the scriptures mention this

process only in order to guide the seeker to the Truth. The

Truth cannot be directly indicated; that is why this mental

process is used. You see, he who eliminates all the ‘not-I’ cannot

eliminate the ‘I’. In order to be able to say ‘I am not this’ or ‘I

am That’, there must be the ‘I’ to say it. This ‘I’ is only the ego,

or the ‘I’-thought. After the rising up of this ‘I’-thought, all

other thoughts arise. The ‘I’-thought is therefore the root

thought. If the root is pulled out, all the rest is uprooted at the

same time. Therefore seek the root ‘I’; question yourself: ‘Who

am I?’; find out the source of the ‘I’. Then all these problems

will vanish and the pure Self alone will remain.

L.: But how am I to do it?

B.: The ‘I’ is always there, whether in deep sleep, in dream

or in the waking state. The one who sleeps is the same as the

one who is now speaking. There is always the feeling of ‘I’. If it

were not so you would have to deny your existence. But you do

not. You say: ‘I am’. Find out who is.

L.: I still do not understand. You say the ‘I’ is now the false

‘I’. How am I to eliminate this wrong ‘I’?

B.: You need not eliminate any false ‘I’. How can ‘I’

eliminate itself? All that you need do is to find out its origin

and stay there. Your effort can extend only so far. Then the

Beyond will take care of itself. You are helpless there. No effort

can reach It.

L.: If ‘I’ am always – here and now – why do I not feel so?

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B.: Who says that you do not? Does the real ‘I’ or the false

‘I’? Ask yourself and you will find that it is the false ‘I’. The false

‘I’ is the obstruction which has to be removed in order that the

true ‘I’ may cease to be hidden. The feeling ‘I have nor realised’

is the obstruction to realisation. In fact, it is already realised.

There is nothing more to be realised. If there were, realisation

would be something new which did not yet exist, but was to

come about in the future; but whatever is born will also die. If

realisation is not eternal, it is not worth having. Therefore, what

we seek is not something that must begin to exist but only that

which is eternal but is veiled from us by obstructions. All that

we need do is to remove the obstruction. What is eternal is not

recognised as such, owing to ignorance. Ignorance is the

obstruction. Get rid of it and all will be well. This ignorance is

identical with the ‘I’-thought. Find its source and it will vanish.

The ‘I’-thought is like a spirit which, although not palpable,

rises up simultaneously with the body, flourishes with it and

disappears with it. The body-consciousness is the wrong ‘I’. Give

it up. You can do so by seeking the source of ‘I’. The body does

not say: ‘I am’. It is you who say ‘I am the body.’ Find out who

this ‘I’ is. Seek its source and it will vanish.

L.: Then, will there be bliss?

B.: Bliss is co-eval with Being-Consciousness. All the

arguments relating to the eternal Being apply to eternal Bliss

also. Your nature is Bliss. Ignorance is now hiding the Bliss, but

you have only to remove the ignorance for the Bliss to be freed.

L.: Should we not find out the ultimate reality of the world

as individual and God?

B.: These are conceptions of the ‘I’. They arise only after

the advent of the ‘I’-thought. Did you think of them in deep

sleep? Yet you existed in sleep, and the same ‘you’ is speaking

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now. If they were real, would they not exist in your sleep also?

They are dependent on the ‘I’-thought. Again, does the world

tell you: ‘I am the world’? Does the body say: ‘I am the body’?

You say: ‘This is the world’ ‘this is the body’, and so on. So these

are only your conceptions. Find out who you are, and that will

be the end of all doubts.

L.: What becomes of the body after realisation? Does it

continue to exist or not? We see realised people performing

actions like other people.

B.: This question need not worry you now. You can ask it

after realisation if you feel like it. As for realised beings, let

them take care of themselves. Why do you worry about them?

In fact, after realisation, neither the body nor anything else will

appear different from the Self.

L.: If we are always Being-Consciousness-Bliss, why does

God place us in difficulties? Why did He create us?

B.: Does God come and tell you that He placed you in

difficulties? It is you who say so. It is the false ‘I’ again. If that

disappears, there will be no one to say that God created this or

that. That which is does not even say ‘I am’. For does any doubt

arise that ‘I am not?’ Only if a doubt arose whether one was a

cow or a buffalo would one have to remind oneself that one is

not an animal but a man; but this never happens. It is the same

with one’s own existence and realisation.1

This last quotation brings us back from what Self-enquiry is

not, to what it is.

When the mind unceasingly investigates its own nature it

transpires that there is no such thing as the mind. This is the

direct path for all.

1 T., 197.

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The mind is merely thoughts. Of all thoughts the thought

‘I’ is the root. Therefore, the mind is only the thought ‘I’.

Whence does this thought ‘I’ arise? Seek for it within; it then

vanishes. This is the pursuit of Wisdom. Where the ‘I’ vanishes,

there appears an ‘I-I’ by itself. This is the Infinite (Purnam).1

If the ego is, everything else is also. If the ego is not, nothing

else is. Indeed the ego is all. Therefore the enquiry as to what

this ego is, is the only way of giving up everything.

The state of non-emergence of ‘I’ is the state of being

THAT. Without questing for that state of non-emergence of ‘I’

and attaining It, how can one accomplish one’s own extinction,

from which the ‘I’ does not revive? Without that attainment,

how is it possible to abide in one’s true state, where one is THAT?

Just as a man would dive in order to get something that

had fallen into the water, so one should dive into oneself with a

keen, one-pointed mind, controlling speech and breath, and

find the place whence the ‘I’ originates. The only enquiry leading

to Self-realisation is seeking the source of the word ‘I’. Meditation

on ‘I am not this; I am that’ may be an aid to enquiry but it

cannot be the enquiry. If one enquires ‘Who am I?’ within the

mind, the individual ‘I’ falls down abashed as soon as one reaches

the Heart and immediately Reality manifests itself spontaneously

as ‘I-I’. Although it reveals itself as ‘I’, it is not the ego but the

perfect Being, the Absolute Self.2

B.: The notions of bondage and liberation are merely

modifications of the mind. They have no reality of their own,

and therefore cannot function of their own accord. Since they

are modifications of something else, there must be an entity

(independent of them) as their common source and support. If,

1 E. I., vv. 17-20.

2 F. V., 26-30.

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therefore, one investigates into that source in order to know of

whom the bondage or liberation is predicated, one will find that

they are predicated of ‘me’, that is, oneself. If one then earnestly

enquires ‘Who am I?’ one will see that there is no such thing as ‘I’

or ‘me’. That which remains on seeing that the ‘I’ does not exist,

is realised vividly and unmistakably as self-luminous and subsisting

merely as Itself. This vivid Realisation, as a direct and immediate

experience of the supreme Truth, comes quite naturally, with

nothing uncommon about it, to everyone who, remaining just

as he is, enquires introspectively without allowing the mind to

become externalised even for a moment or wasting time in mere

talk. There is, therefore, not the least doubt regarding the wellestablished

conclusion that to those who have attained this

Realisation and thus abide absolutely identical with the Self, there

is neither bondage nor liberation.1

B.: The Self is Pure Consciousness. Yet a man identifies

himself with the body which is insentient and does not itself

say: ‘I am the body’. Someone else says so. The unlimited Self

does not. Who does? A spurious ‘I’ arises between Pure

Consciousness and the insentient body and imagines itself to

be limited to the body. Seek this and it will vanish like a

phantom. The phantom is the ego or mind or individuality. All

the scriptures are based on the rise of this phantom, whose

elimination is their purpose. The present state is mere illusion.

Its dissolution is the goal and nothing else.2

Bhagavan here refers to the ego as the ‘phantom’ or a ‘spurious

I’. In the explanation to the two Parsi ladies quoted earlier, he

spoke of a ‘false I’ and a ‘true I’. For practical purposes, he did

sometimes speak of giving up the false ‘I’ in quest of the true,

1 S. I., Chap. IV, § 15.

2 T., 427.

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but that should not be taken as implying that there are two

selves in a man. What he really meant was simply giving up the

false identification of the ‘I’ as an individual being in order to

realise one’s true identity as the universal Self. He frequently

insisted that there are not two ‘I’s of which one can seek and

know the other. According to the truth of non-duality, to see

the Self is to be the Self; otherwise, there would be the duality

of a subject and object and the trinity of seer, sight and seen.

D.: How is one to realise the Self?

B.: Whose Self? Find out.

D.: Mine; but, who am I?

B.: It is you who must find out.

D.: I don’t know.

B.: Just think over the question. Who is it that says: ‘I don’t

know’? Who is the ‘I’ in your statement? What is not known?

D.: Somebody or something in me.

B.: Who is that somebody? In whom?

D.: Perhaps some power.

B.: Find out.

D.: Why was I born?

B.: Who has born? The answer is the same to all your

questions.

D.: Who am I, then?

B.: (Smiling) Have you come to examine me? You must

say who you are.

D.: However much I may try, I do not seem to catch the

‘I’. It is not even clearly discernible.

B.: Who is it that says that the ‘I’ is not discernible? Are

there two ‘I’s in you, that one is not discernible to the other?

D.: Instead of enquiring: ‘Who am I?’ can I put the

question to myself: ‘Who are you?’ so that my mind may be

fixed on you whom I consider to be God in the form of the

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Guru? Perhaps I would come nearer to the goal of my quest by

that enquiry than by asking myself: ‘Who am I?’

B.: Whatever form your enquiry may take, you must finally

come to the one ‘I’, the Self. All these distinctions made between

‘I’ and ‘you’, master and disciple, are merely a sign of ignorance.

The supreme ‘I’ alone is. To think otherwise is to delude oneself.

Therefore, since your aim is to transcend here and now

these superficialities of physical existence through self-enquiry,

where is the scope for making the distinctions of ‘you’ and ‘I’

which pertain only to the body? When you turn the mind

inwards, seeking the source of thought, where is the ‘you’ and

where the ‘I’? You should seek and be the Self that includes all.

D.: But, isn’t it funny that the ‘I’ should be searching for

the ‘I’? Doesn’t the enquiry, ‘Who am I?’ turn out in the end to

be an empty formula? Or am I to put the question to myself

endlessly, repeating it like some mantra?

B.: Self-enquiry is certainly not an empty formula; it is

more than the repetition of any mantra. If the enquiry: ‘Who

am I?’ were mere mental questioning, it would not be of much

value. The very purpose of Self-enquiry is to focus the entire

mind at its source. It is not, therefore, a case of one ‘I’ searching

for another ‘I’. Much less is Self-enquiry an empty formula, for

it involves an intense activity of the entire mind to keep it

steadily poised in pure Self-awareness. Self-enquiry is the one

infallible means, the only direct one, to realise the

unconditioned, absolute Being that you really are.1

The following passages show still more clearly that it is a

question of tracing the ‘I’ thought back to its source, not of

one ‘I’ discovering another.

1 M. G., pp. 35-8.

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V.: I am told that according to your school I must find out

the source of my thought. How am I to do it?

B.: I have no school; however, it is true that one should

trace the source of all thoughts.

V.: Suppose I have the thought ‘horse’, and try to trace its

source. I find that it is due to memory and the memory in its

turn is due to prior perception of the object ‘horse’, but that is all.

B.: Who asked you to think about all that? All those are

also thoughts. What good will it do you to go on thinking

about memory and perception? It will be endless, like the old

dispute, which came first, the tree or the seed. Ask who has this

perception and memory. That ‘I’ that has the perception and

memory, whence does it arise? Find this out. Because perception

or memory or any other experience only comes to that ‘I’. You

do not have such experiences during sleep and yet you say that

you existed during sleep. And you exist now too. That shows

that the ‘I’ continues while other things come and go.

V.: I am asked to find out the source of ‘I’ and in fact that

is what I want to find out, but how can I? What is the source

from which I came?

B.: You came from the same source in which you were

during sleep. Only during sleep you could not know where

you entered. That is why you must make the enquiry while

awake.

Some of us advised the visitor to read Who am I? and

Ramana Gita and Bhagavan also told him he might do so.

He did so during the day and in the evening he said to

Bhagavan: ‘Those books prescribe Self-enquiry, but how is one

to do it?’

B.: That must also be prescribed in the books.

V.: Am I to concentrate on the thought: ‘Who am I?’

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B.: It means that you must concentrate to see where the

‘I’-thought arises. Instead of looking outwards, look inwards

and see where the ‘I’-thought arises.

V.: And Bhagavan says that if I see that, I shall realise the

Self?

B.: There is no such thing as realising the Self. How is one

to realise or make real what is real? People all ‘realise’ or regard

as real what is unreal, and all they have to do is to give up doing

so. When you do that, you will remain as you always are and

the Real will be Real. It is only to help people give up regarding

the unreal as real that all the religions and practices taught by

them have come into being.

V.: Whence comes birth?

B.: Whose birth?

V.: The Upanishads say: He who knows Brahman becomes

Brahman.

B.: It is not a matter of becoming but of Being.1

“There is no such thing as realising the Self ” – Bhagavan has

often said this in order to remind those who asked that the

Self alone is, now and eternally, and is not something new to

be discovered. This paradox is of the essence of non-dualism.

In answer to a question as to what is the best way to the goal,

Bhagavan said: ‘There is no goal to be reached. There is nothing to

be attained. You are the Self. You exist always. Nothing more can

be predicated of the Self than that it exists. Seeing God or the Self

is only being the Self, that is yourself. Seeing is Being. You, being

the Self, want to know how to attain the Self. It is like a man being

at Ramanasramam and asking how many ways there are of going

to Ramanasramam and which is the best way for him. All that is

1 D. D., pp. 268-9.

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required of you is to give up the thought that you are this body and

give up all thoughts of external things or the non-Self. As often as

the mind goes out towards objects, stop it and fix it in the Self or

‘I’. That is all the effort required on your part.’1

Despite this paradox, however, Bhagavan also stressed the

necessity of effort, as explained in Chapter Two of this book.

Ceaseless practice is essential until one attains without the

least effort that natural and primal state of mind which is free

from thought, in other words, until the ‘I’, ‘my’ and ‘mine’ are

completely eradicated and destroyed.2

It is in order to safeguard the viewpoint that there is nothing

new to be discovered that Advaita explains that it is only a

question of removing the screen of ignorance, just as by

removing water-plants one reveals beneath them the water

that was already there, or as the removal of clouds reveals the

blue sky that is there already but was hidden by them.

D.: How can one know the Self?

B.: The Self always is. There is no knowing it. It is not

some new knowledge to be acquired. What is new and not here

and now cannot be permanent. The Self always is, but

knowledge of it is obstructed and the obstruction is called

ignorance. Remove the ignorance and knowledge shines forth.

In fact, it is not the Self that has this ignorance or even

knowledge. These are only accretions to be cleared away. That

is why the Self is said to be beyond knowledge and ignorance.

It remains as it naturally is – that is all.3

1 D. D., p. 332.

2 S. I., Chap. II, § 18.

3 T., 49.

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This concentration on the Self, of course, requires intense control

of the mind and many complained that it was not easy.

In the evening a visitor asked Bhagavan how to control

the wandering mind. He began by saying that it was a question

which particularly troubled him. Bhagavan replied laughing:

‘That is nothing particular to you. That is what everybody asks

and what is dealt with by all the scriptures, such as the Gita.

What other way is there except to draw the mind back every

time it strays or turns outwards, as advised in the Gita? Of course

it is not an easy thing to do. It will come only with practice.’

The visitor said that the mind strays after what it desires

and won’t stay fixed on the object we set before it.

When there was this sort of complaint, Bhagavan sometimes

answered that Self-enquiry does not set any object before the

mind but simply turns it in on itself, seeking its source. On

this occasion, however, he answered from the point of view of

desire or happiness.

Everybody seeks only what brings him happiness. Your

mind wanders out after some object or other because you think

that happiness comes from it, but find out where all happiness

comes from, including that which you regard as coming from

sense objects. You will find that it all comes from the Self alone,

and then you will be able to abide in the Self.1

Sometimes people complained of the difficulty of quelling

thoughts. Bhagavan brought them round again to Self-enquiry

by reminding them that it is the thinker or, in case of doubt,

the doubter whom one must examine. There may be a thousand

doubts, but one does not doubt the existence of the doubter.

Who is he?

1 D. D., p. 298.

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All doubts will cease only when the doubter and his source

have been found. It is no use endlessly removing doubts. If we

clear up one another will arise and there will be no end to

them. But if the doubter himself is found to be really nonexistent

by seeking his source then all doubts will cease.1

Mind-control, of course, means concentration; but by

‘concentration’ Bhagavan did not mean concentrating on one

thought (although he did not always discourage this) but

concentrating on the sense of being, the feeling of ‘I am’, and

excluding all thoughts.

B.: Concentration is not thinking of one thing. On the

contrary, it is excluding all thoughts, since all thoughts obstruct

the sense of one’s true being. All efforts are to be directed simply

to removing the veil of ignorance.2

In a number of passages already quoted, Bhagavan does not

only tell the questioner to investigate the ‘I’-thought but to

find out where it arises. This connects Self-enquiry with

concentration on the heart at the right side (referred to in

Chapter One) and shows still more clearly that it is not a

mental process. Indeed, an actual liberation that can be felt

physically arises in this centre during Self-enquiry.

Concentrating the mind solely on the Self will lead to

happiness or bliss. Drawing in the thoughts, restraining them

and preventing them from straying outwards is called

detachment (vairagya). Fixing them in the Self is spiritual

practice (sadhana). Concentrating on the heart is the same as

concentrating on the Self. Heart is another name for Self.3

1 D. D., p. 26.

2 T., 398.

3 D. D., p. 294.

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G.V. Subbaramaiah: Is it stated in any book that for

ultimate and final realisation one must ultimately come to the

heart, even after reaching the sahasrara (the thousand-petalled

lotus, the centre in the crown of the head) and that the Heart is

at the right side?

B.: No. I have not come across this in any book, although

in a Malayalam book on medicine I came across a stanza locating

the heart on the right side and I have translated it into Tamil in

the Supplement to the Forty Verses.

We know nothing about the other centres. We cannot be sure

what we arrive at by concentrating on them and realising them. But

as the ‘I’ arises from the heart it must sink back and merge there for

Self-realisation. Anyway, that has been my experience.1

Know that the pure and changeless Self-awareness in the

Heart is the Knowledge which, through destruction of the ego,

bestows Liberation.

The body is inert like an earthen pot. Since it has no Iconsciousness

and since in deep sleep, when bodiless, we experience

our natural being, the body cannot be the ‘I’. Who then is it that

causes I-ness? Where is he? In the Heart-cave of those who thus

enquire and who know and abide as the Self, Lord Arunachala

Siva shines forth as Himself as ‘That-am-I’ Consciousness.2

D.: Bhagavan was saying that the heart is the centre of the Self?

B.: Yes, it is the one supreme centre of the Self. You need

have no doubts about that. The real Self is there in the heart

behind the ego-self.

D.: Will Bhagavan please tell me where in the body it is?

B.: You cannot know it with your mind or picture it with

your imagination, although I tell you that it is here (pointing to

1 D. D., p. 253.

2 F. V. S., 9, 10.

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the right side of the chest). The only direct way to realise it is to

stop imagining and try to be yourself. Then you automatically

feel that the centre is there. It is the centre spoken of in the

scriptures as the heart cavity.

D.: Can I be sure that the ancients meant this centre by

the term ‘heart’?

B.: Yes, you can, but you should try to have the experience

rather than locate it. A man does not have to go and find where

his eyes are in order to see. The heart is there, always open to

you, if you care to enter it, always supporting your movements,

although you may be unaware of it. It is perhaps more correct

to say that the Self is the Heart. Really the Self is the centre and

is everywhere aware of itself as the Heart or Self-awareness.

D.: When Bhagavan says that the Heart is the Supreme

centre of the Spirit or the Self, does that imply that it is not one

of the six yogic centres (chakras)?

B.: The yogic centres, counting from the bottom upwards,

are a series of centres in the nervous system. They represent

various stages, each having its own kind of power or knowledge,

leading to the Sahasrara, the thousand-petalled lotus in the brain,

where is seated the Supreme Shakti (power). But the Self that

supports the whole movement of the Shakti is not located there

but supports it from the heart-centre.

D.: Then it is different from the manifestation of Shakti?

B.: Really there is no manifestation of Shakti apart from

the Self. The Self became all these Shaktis. When the yogi attains

the highest state of spiritual awareness (samadhi) it is the Self in

the Heart that supports him in that state whether he is aware of

it or not. But if his awareness is centred in the heart, he realises

that, whatever centres or states he may be in, he is always the

same truth, the same heart, the one Self, the spirit that is present

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throughout, eternal and immutable. The Tantra Sastra calls the

heart Surya Mandala or the solar orb, and the Sahasrara as

Chandra Mandala or lunar orb. This shows the relative

importance of the two.1

Just as this concentration on the heart establishes a point of

contact with yoga, so also Bhagavan sometimes pointed out

the affinity with bhakti, the path of devotion, and said that the

two paths lead to the same end. Perfect devotion means complete

surrender of the ego to God or Guru conceived of as other than

oneself, while Self-enquiry leads to dissolution of the ego. More

will be said about bhakti marga in the next chapter, but the

following explanation shows how the two paths converge.

D.: If the ‘I’ is an illusion, who is it that casts off the illusion?

B.: The ‘I’ casts off the illusion of the ‘I’ and yet remains ‘I’.

Such is the paradox of Self-realisation. The Realised do not see any

paradox in it. Consider the case of the worshipper. He approaches

God and prays to be absorbed in Him. He then surrenders himself

in faith and by concentration. And what remains afterwards? In

the place of the original ‘I’, self-surrender leaves a residuum of God

in which the ‘I’ is lost. That is the highest form of devotion or

surrender and the peak of detachment.

You may give up this and that of ‘my’ possessions, but if,

instead, you give up ‘I’ and ‘mine’ all is given up at a stroke and

the very seed of possession is destroyed. Thus the evil is nipped in

the bud or crushed in the germ. But detachment must be very

strong to do this. The craving to do it must equal the craving of a

man who is held under water to rise to the surface and breathe.2

If distracting thoughts are a danger on one hand, so also is

sleep a danger on the other hand. In fact, people who are

1 S. D. B., xvii-xx.

2 T., 28.

131

beginning a spiritual path may find themselves assailed by an

overpowering wave of sleepiness whenever they begin to

meditate. And then, if they stop meditating, this passes and

they are not sleepy at all. This is simply one form of the ego’s

resistance and it has to be broken down.

Mr. Bhargava also said something about sleep and this led

Bhagavan to speak about sleep as follows:

What is required is to remain fixed in the Self always. The

obstacles to that are distraction by things of the world (including

sense objects, desires and tendencies) on the one hand and sleep on

the other. Sleep is always mentioned in the books as the first obstacle

to samadhi and various methods are prescribed for overcoming it

according to the stage of evolution of the person concerned. First,

one is enjoined to give up all worldly distractions and to restrict

sleep. But then it is said, for instance in the Gita, that one need not

give up sleep entirely. One should not sleep at all during day time,

and even during night restrict sleep to the middle portion, from

about ten to two. But another method that is prescribed is not to

bother about sleep at all. Whenever it overtakes you, you can do

nothing about it, so simply remain fixed in the Self or in meditation

every moment of your waking life and take up meditation again

the moment you wake, and that will be enough. Then, even during

sleep, the same current of thought or meditation will be working.

This is evident because if a man goes to sleep with any strong

thought working in his mind he finds the same thought present

when he wakes up. It is of the man who does this with meditation

that it is said that even his sleep is samadhi.1

It is important to remember this, because the Maharshi often

spoke of sleep as an example of the egoless state. As the above

passage shows, he did not mean that physical sleep is to be

1 D. D., pp. 279-80.

132

encouraged. That is only a dark, unconscious counterpart of

the true egoless state, which is pure Consciousness.

Another source of questions among those who continued

further with meditation was that they sometimes came up

against a blank or void or a feeling of fear, but they were told

to carry on, holding firmly to that which experiences the void

or fear. The same answer was also given to those who

experienced a state of bliss. There can be neither fear nor

pleasure, neither vision nor void, without someone to

experience it.

D.: When I reach the thoughtless stage in my sadhana, I

enjoy a certain pleasure but sometimes I also experience a vague

fear which I cannot properly describe.

B.: Whatever you experience, you should never rest content

with it. Whether you feel pleasure or fear, ask yourself who feels

it and continue your efforts until both pleasure and fear are

transcended and all duality ceases and the Reality alone remains.

There is nothing wrong in such things being experienced, but

you must never stop at that. For instance you must never rest

content with the pleasure of laya (dissolution) experienced when

thought is quelled but must press on until all duality ceases.1

In the afternoon the following questions were put by

Mr. Bhargava, an elderly visitor from Jhansi in Uttar Pradesh:

(1) How am I to search for the ‘I’ from start to finish? (2)

When I meditate, I reach a stage where there is a vacuum or

void. How should I proceed from there?

B.: Never mind whether there are visions or sounds or

anything else or whether there is void. Are you present during

all these or are you not? You must have been there during the

void to be able to say that you experienced a void. To be fixed

in that ‘you’ is the quest from start to finish. In all books on

1 D. D., p. 224.

133

Vedanta you will find this question of a void or nothing being

left raised by the disciple and answered by the Guru. It is the

mind that sees objects and has experiences and that finds a void

when it ceases to see and experience, but that is not ‘you’. You

are the constant illumination that lights up both the experience

and the void. It is like the theatre light that enables you to see

the theatre, the actors, and the play while the play is going on

but also remains alight and enables you to say that there is no

play on when it is all finished. Or there is another illustration:

We see objects all around us but in complete darkness we do

not see them and we say: ‘I see nothing’. In the same way, you

are there even in the void you mention.

You are the witness of the three bodies: the gross, the subtle,

and the causal, and of the three times: past, present and future, and

also this void. In the story of the tenth man, when each of them

counted and thought they were only nine, each one forgetting to

count himself, there is a stage when they think one is missing and

do not know who it is; and that corresponds to the void. We are so

accustomed to the notion that all that we see around us is permanent

and that we are this body, that when all this ceases to exist we

imagine and fear that we also have ceased to exist.

Bhagavan also quoted verses 212 and 213 from

Vivekachudamani in which the disciple says: “After I eliminate

the five sheaths as not-Self, I find that nothing at all remains”;

and the Guru replies that the Self or That by which all

modifications, including the ego and all its creatures and their

absence (that is the void), are perceived, is always there.

Bhagavan continued and said: “The nature of the Self or ‘I’

must be illumination. You perceive all modifications and their

absence. How? To say that you get the illumination from another

would raise the question how he got it and there would be no

134

end to the chain of reasoning. So you yourself are the illumination.

The usual illustration of this is the following: You make all kinds

of sweets of various ingredients and in various shapes and they all

taste sweet because there is sugar in all of them and sweetness is

the nature of sugar. And in the same way all experiences and the

absence of them contain the illumination which is the nature of

the Self. Without the Self they cannot be experienced, just as

without sugar not one of the articles you make can taste sweet.

(Later he continued): First one sees the Self as objects, then one

sees the Self as void, then one sees the Self as the Self; only in this

last case there is no seeing because seeing is being.1”

Before closing this chapter it may be well to give a few more

specific rules or rather to indicate that they exist but are not

essential. It is usual to conduct what is called ‘meditation’

during regular hours, morning and evening, sitting with a

straight spine and closed eyes. I say ‘what is called meditation’

because this word is commonly used for Self-enquiry and

concentration on the “I am” or the heart, as described in this

chapter. It is, of course, far from the mental reflection that

commonly goes by that name. In India it is usual to sit crosslegged

on the ground. However, all such rules of technique

are less important in Self-enquiry than with other less direct

methods. Indeed, this is obvious from the fact that Self-enquiry

has gradually to be extended from set hours of meditation

until it becomes the undercurrent of all thoughts and actions.

Mr. Evans-Wentz asked a few questions. They related to

yoga. He wanted to know if it was right to kill animals such as

tigers, deer and so on and use the skin as a seat for the yogaposture

(asana).

B.: The mind is the tiger or the deer.

D.: If everything is illusion, can one then take life?

1 D. D., pp. 277-9.

135

B.: Who has the illusion? That is what you must find out.

In fact, everyone is a killer of the Self (atmahan) at every

moment of his life.

D.: Which posture is the best?

B.: Any posture, possibly sukhasana (the easy or half-Buddha

posture). But that is immaterial for jnana (the path of knowledge).

D.: Does posture indicate temperament?

B.: Yes.

D.: What are the properties and effects of a tiger’s skin or

wool or a deer’s skin as a seat?

B.: Some people have found out and described them in

books on yoga. They correspond to conductors and nonconductors

of magnetism, and so on. But all this is of no

importance on the path of knowledge (jnana marga). Posture

really means ‘steadfastness in the Self ’ and it is inward.

D.: Which is the most suitable time for meditation?

B.: What is time?

D.: Tell me what it is!

B.: Time is only an idea. There is only Reality. Whatever

you think it is, it appears to be. If you call it time, it is time. If you

call it existence, it is existence, and so on. After calling it time,

you divide it into days and nights, months, years, hours, minutes,

and so on. Time is immaterial for the path of knowledge. But

some of these rules and disciplines are good for beginners.

D.: Does Bhagavan recommend any special posture for

Europeans?

B.: It depends on the mental equipment of the individual.

There are no hard and fast rules.1

D.: Is meditation to be practised with eyes open or closed?

B.: It may be done either way. The important thing is that

the mind should be turned inwards and kept active in its quest.

1 T., 17.

136

Sometimes, it happens that when the eyes are closed, latent

thoughts rush forth with great vigour; but, on the other hand,

it may be difficult to turn the mind inwards with the eyes open.

It requires strength of mind. The mind is pure by nature but

contaminated by taking in objects. The great thing is to keep it

active in its quest without taking in external impressions or

thinking of other things.1

Although, as will be shown in the next chapter, the Maharshi

approved of various methods and authorised them when they

suited the practitioner, he was nevertheless careful that they should

not be confused with the direct method of Self-enquiry. For

instance, there are indirect paths which sedulously cultivate the

various virtues; but when asked about this he replied simply that

on the direct path of Self-enquiry no such technique is necessary.

D.: It is said in some books that one should cultivate all the

good or divine qualities in order to prepare oneself for Self-realisation.

B.: All good or divine qualities are included in spiritual

knowledge and all bad or demoniac qualities are included in

ignorance. When knowledge comes, ignorance goes and all the

divine qualities appear automatically. If a man is Self-realised

he cannot tell a lie or commit a sin or do anything wrong. It is

no doubt said in some books that one should cultivate one

virtue after another and thus prepare for ultimate realisation,

but for those who follow the jnana marga (path of knowledge)

Self-enquiry is quite enough for acquiring all the divine qualities,

they need not do anything else.2

In general, he approved the use of incantations by those who

found them helpful but he was insistent that Self-enquiry

should not become a mantra.

1 T., 61.

2 D. D., p. 276.

137

D.: Please tell me how I am to realise the Self? Am I to

make an incantation of ‘Who am I?’

B.: No. It is not intended to be used as an incantation.1

However, the method which is most apt to be confused with

Self-enquiry is the meditation ‘I am He’ and therefore he

frequently warned against this confusion.

Self-enquiry is a different method from the meditation

‘I am Siva’ or ‘I am He.’ I rather lay stress on Self-knowledge,

because you are first concerned with yourself before you proceed

to know the world and its Lord. The ‘I am He’ or ‘I am Brahman’

meditation is more or less mental but the quest for the Self of

which I speak is a direct method and is superior to the other. For,

as soon as you undertake the quest and begin to go deeper and

deeper, the real Self is waiting there to receive you and then

whatever is done is done by something else and you have no

hand in it. In this process all doubts are automatically given up

just as one who sleeps forgets all his cares for the time being.2

Although the scriptures proclaim ‘Thou art That,’ it is only

a sign of weakness to meditate ‘I am That, not this,’ because

you are eternally That. What has to be done is to investigate

what one really is and remain That.3

Only if the thought ‘I am a body’ occurs will the meditation

‘I am not this, I am that’ help one to abide as that. Why should

you forever be thinking ‘I am That’? Is it necessary for a man to

go on thinking ‘I am a man’? Are we not always That?4

A Punjabi announced himself to the Maharshi as having

been directed here by Sri Sankaracharya of Kamakoti Peeta

1 T., 486.

2 S. D. B., viii.

3 F. V., 32.

4 F. V. 36.

138

from Jalesvar near Puri-Jaganath. He is a world traveller. He

has practised Hatha Yoga and some contemplation along the

lines of ‘I am Brahman’. After a few moments blank prevails,

his brain gets heated and he becomes afraid of death. He wants

guidance from the Maharshi.

B.: Who sees the blank?

D.: I know that I see it.

B.: The Consciousness overlooking the blank is the Self.

D.: That doesn’t satisfy me. I can’t realise it.

B.: The fear of death arises only after the ‘I’-thought arises.

Whose death do you fear? To whom does the fear come? So long as

there is identification of the Self with the body, there will be fear.

D.: But I am not aware of my body.

B.: Who says that he is not aware?

D.: I don’t understand.

(He was then asked to say what exactly was his method of

meditation. He said: Aham Brahmasmi ‘I am Brahman’.)

B.: ‘I am Brahman’ is only a thought. Who says it? Brahman

himself does not say so. What need is there for him to say it?

Nor can the real ‘I’ say so. For ‘I’ always abides as Brahman. So

it is only a thought. Whose thought is it? All thoughts come

from the unreal ‘I’, that is the ‘I’-thought. Remain without

thinking. So long as there is thought, there will be fear.

D.: When I go on thinking on this line, forgetfulness

ensues. The brain becomes heated and I become afraid.

B.: Yes, the mind is concentrated in the brain and hence

you get a hot sensation there. That is because of the ‘I’-thought.

So long as there is thought, there will be forgetfulness. There is

the thought ‘I am Brahman’; then forgetfulness supervenes; then

the ‘I’-thought arises and simultaneously the fear of death also.

Forgetfulness and thought exist only for the ‘I’-thought.

139

Investigate this and it will disappear like a phantom. What

remains then is the real ‘I’. That is the Self. The thought ‘I am

Brahman’ may be an aid to concentration insofar as it keeps

other thoughts away and persists alone. But then you have to

ask whose thought it is. It will be found to come from the ‘I’.

But where does the ‘I’-thought come from? Probe into it and it

will vanish. The Supreme Self will shine forth of itself. No further

effort is needed. When the one real ‘I’ remains alone, it will

not need to say, ‘I am Brahman’. Does a man go on repeating

‘I am a man’? Unless he is challenged why should he declare

himself a man? Does anyone mistake himself for an animal

that he should say ‘No, I am not an animal, I am a man?’.

Similarly, since Brahman or ‘I’ alone is, there is no one to

challenge it, and so there is no need to repeat ‘I am Brahman.”1

Throughout this chapter, Self-enquiry has been spoken of

mainly as a spiritual exercise or ‘meditation’ to be practised at

certain fixed times. It does indeed begin so and, so long as

effort is needed, such times of intensive meditation continue

to be helpful, but that is not enough. The self-awareness which

begins to be experienced during such meditation has to be

cultivated at other times also and indeed begins to awaken

spontaneously, forming an undercurrent to one’s activities.

The aim is to make it more and more continuous. It will be

seen that this explains Bhagavan’s injunction, referred to in

Chapter Three, to conduct one’s spiritual quest in the world

and not to retire to a hermitage.

D.: Is a set meditation necessary for strengthening the mind?

B.: Not if you keep the idea always before you, that it is

not your work. At first effort is needed to remind yourself of it,

but later on it becomes natural and continuous. The work will

1 T., 202.

140

go on of its own accord and your peace will remain undisturbed.

Meditation is your true nature. You call it meditation now,

because there are other thoughts distracting you. When these

thoughts are dispelled, you remain alone – that is, in the state

of meditation, free from thoughts; and that is your real nature,

which you are now trying to realise by keeping away other

thoughts. Such keeping away of other thoughts is now called

‘meditation’. But when the practice becomes firm, your real

nature shows itself as true meditation.1

For the reason mentioned in the previous chapter, a Guru

often withholds the technique of spiritual practice as a secret

to be revealed only to those whom he finds fit and initiates

into it personally. However, with Self-enquiry as taught by

Bhagavan, no such precaution is necessary. It is a person’s

own understanding that opens this method to him, or his

lack of understanding that closes it.

D.: May I be assured that there is nothing further to be

learnt, so far as the technique of spiritual practice is concerned,

than what is written in Bhagavan’s books? I ask because in all

other systems, the Guru holds back some secret technique to

reveal to his disciple at the time of initiation.

B.: There is nothing more to be known than what you

find in the books. No secret technique. It is all an open secret

in this system.2

1 M. G., pp. 13-4.

2 D. D., p. 325.

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CHAPTER SIX

OTHER METHODS

D.: Which method is the best?

B.: That depends on the temperament of the

individual. Every person is born with the samskaras

(characteristics or tendencies) from his past lives. One

method will prove easy to one person and another to

another. There can be no general rule.1

In the following passage, Bhagavan indicates the purpose of

all the methods, and the goal they aim at.

There are many methods. You may practise Self-enquiry,

asking yourself ‘Who am I?’; or if that does not appeal to you,

you may meditate on ‘I am Brahman’, or some other theme; or

you may concentrate on an incantation or do invocation. The

object in every case is to make the mind one-pointed, to

concentrate it on one thought and thereby exclude the many

other thoughts. If we do this, the one thought also eventually

goes and the mind is extinguished at its source.2

Dr. Masalawala placed in Bhagavan’s hands a letter he had

received from his friend V.K. Ajgaonkar, a gentleman of about

35, (a follower of Jnaneswar Maharaj) who is said to have

attained Jnana in his 28th year. The letter said: ‘You call me

purna. Who is not purna in this world?’. Bhagavan agreed and,

1 T., 580.

2 D. D., p. 28.

142

continuing in the vein in which he discoursed this morning

(15-3-46), said: ‘We first limit ourselves and then seek to become

unlimited, as in fact we always are. All our effort is only directed

to giving up the notion that we are limited...’

The letter went on to say: ‘Ramana Maharshi is an exponent

of the Ajata doctrine of Advaita Vedanta. Of course it is a bit

difficult.’ Bhagavan remarked on this: “Somebody has told him

so. I do not teach only the Ajata doctrine. I approve of all schools.

The same truth has to be expressed in different ways to suit the

capacity of the hearer. The Ajata doctrine says: ‘Nothing exists

except the one Reality. There is no birth or death, no projection

or drawing in, no striving, no aspirant, no release, no bondage,

no liberation. The one unity alone exists forever.’ To such as find

it difficult to grasp this truth and who ask: ‘How can we ignore

this solid world we see all around us?’ the dream experience is

pointed out and they are told, ‘All that you see depends upon the

seer. Apart from the seer, there is no seen.’ This is called drishtisrishti-

vada or the argument that one first creates everything out

of his mind and then sees what his mind has created. To such as

cannot grasp even this and who further argue: ‘The dream

experience is so short, while the world always exists. The dream

experience was limited to me, but the world is felt and seen not

only by me, but by so many, and we cannot call such a world

non-existent’, the argument called srishti-drishti-vada is addressed

and they are told: ‘God first created such-and-such a thing, out

of such-and-such an element, and then something else’ and so

forth. That alone will satisfy this class. Their mind is otherwise

not satisfied and they ask themselves: ‘How can all geography, all

maps, all sciences, stars, planets, and the rules governing or relating

to them all be totally untrue?’ To such it is best to say: ‘Yes, God

created all this and so you see it.’”

143

Dr. Masalawala objected: ‘But all these teachings cannot

be true. Only one doctrine can be true.’

Bhagavan said: ‘All these viewpoints are only to suit the

capacity of the learner. The absolute can only be one.1

However, although Bhagavan approved of other paths for those

who could not follow Self-enquiry, he did say to the present

writer: ‘All other methods lead up to Self-enquiry.’ If a devotee

of his found that some other, less direct path served him better,

Bhagavan would guide him on this until he could gradually

bring him to Self-enquiry.

Talking of the innumerable ways of different seekers after

God, Bhagavan said: ‘Each should be allowed to go his own way,

the way for which he alone may be built. It will not do to convert

him to another path by violence. The Guru will go with the

disciple along his own path and then gradually turn him into the

supreme path when the time is ripe. Suppose a car is going at top

speed. To stop it and to turn it at once would lead to a crash.’2

Other methods are not necessarily exclusive of Self-enquiry;

in fact some of them may very well be combined with it.

SAT SANG

The greatest of all aids to Self-realisation is the presence of a

Realised Man. This is called Sat Sang which means literally

‘fellowship with Being’. Even here Bhagavan would sometimes

explain that the real ‘Being’ is the Self and therefore no physical

form is needed for Sat Sang. Nevertheless, he often dwelt on

its benefits.

1 D. D., pp. 173-4.

2 D. D., p. 49.

144

Association with Sages who have realised the Truth removes

material attachments; on these attachments being removed, the

attachments of the mind are also destroyed. Those whose

attachments of mind are thus destroyed become one with That

which is Motionless. They attain Liberation while yet alive.

Cherish association with such Sages.

That Supreme state which is obtained here and now as a

result of association with Sages, and realised through the deep

meditation of Self-enquiry in contact with the Heart, cannot

be gained with the aid of a Guru or through knowledge of the

scriptures, or by spiritual merit, or by any other means.

If association with Sages is obtained, to what purpose are

the various methods of self-discipline? Tell me, of what use is a

fan when the cool, gentle south wind is blowing? The heat of

mental and bodily excitement is allayed by (the rays of) the moon;

want and misery are removed by the kalpaka tree; sins are washed

away by the sacred water of the Ganges. But all these afflictions

are altogether banished by the mere darshan of the peerless Sage.

Neither the holy waters of pilgrimage nor the images of

gods made of earth and stone can stand comparison with the

benign look of the Sage. These purify one only after countless

days of grace, but no sooner does the Sage bestow his gracious

glance than he purifies one.1

It should be mentioned that these five verses were not actually

composed by Bhagavan but translated from Sanskrit for

inclusion in his Supplementary Forty Verses. The statement in

the second verse that such grace cannot be gained with the aid

of Guru is using the word ‘Guru’ in its lower sense of ‘teacher’;

otherwise it would have the same meaning as ‘Sage’ and the

comparison would be pointless.

1 F. V. S., 1 - 5.

145

BREATH-CONTROL

Breath-control can have various meanings. It can be retention

of breath, or regulation of breathing according to a definite

rhythm, or merely watching the breathing and remaining

attentive to it. The Maharshi often authorised the use of breathcontrol,

but did not as a rule specify what form it was to take –

perhaps because those who asked for his authorisation were

usually practising a form of it prescribed by some Guru and

merely wished to know whether they could continue to do so.

He himself, although competent to authorise any practice, did

not teach or prescribe the more technical forms of breath-control.

As there are elaborate treatises on the elements of ashtanga

yoga only as much as is necessary is written here. Anyone who

desires to know more must resort to a practising yogi with

experience and learn from him in detail.1

When he did specify what kind of breath-control was to be

practised it was usually just watching the breath, the type which

is least likely to be harmful if practised without guidance from a

Guru who specialises in this kind of technical, indirect path.

Mr. Prasad asked whether the regular form of breath

control is not better, in which breathing in, holding the breath,

and breathing out are to the rhythm of 1:4:2. Bhagavan replied:

‘All such rhythms, sometimes regulated not by counting but by

incantations, are aids for controlling the mind: that is all.

Watching the breath is also one form of breath-control. Holding

the breath is more violent and may be harmful when there is

no proper Guru to guide the practiser at every step; but merely

watching the breath is easier and involves no risk.2

1 S. E., § 34.

2 D. D., pp. 55-6.

146

The Maharshi was careful in authorising breath-control to

explain why it was used – that it was helpful simply as a step

towards mind control.

The principle underlying the system of yoga is that the

source of thought is also the source of breath and the vital force;

therefore if one of them is effectively controlled the other is

also automatically brought under control.1

The source of the mind is the same as that of the breath

and the vital forces. It is really the multitude of thoughts that

constitute the mind; and the I-thought is the primal thought of

the mind and is itself the ego. But breath too has its origin at

the same place whence the ego rises. Therefore, when the mind

subsides, breath and the vital forces also subside; and conversely

when the latter subside, the former also subsides.

Breath and vital forces are also described as the gross

manifestations of the mind. Till the hour of death the mind

sustains and supports these forces in the physical body; and when

life becomes extinct, the mind envelops them and carries them

away. During sleep, however, the vital forces continue to

function, although the mind is not manifest. This is according

to the divine law and is intended to protect the body and to

remove any possible doubt as to whether it is alive or dead

while one is asleep. Without such arrangement by nature

sleeping bodies would often be cremated alive. The vitality

apparent in breathing is left behind by the mind as a ‘watchman’.

But in the wakeful state and in samadhi, when the mind subsides,

breath also subsides. For this reason (because the mind has the

sustaining and controlling power over breath and vital forces,

and is therefore ulterior to both of them) the practice of breath

1 S. I., Chap. II, § 3(iv).

147

control is merely helpful in subduing the mind, but it cannot

bring about its final extinction.1

It follows from this that breath-control, as authorised by Sri

Bhagavan, is necessary only for those who cannot control the

mind directly.

D.: Is it necessary to control one’s breath?

B.: Breath-control is only an aid for diving inwards. One

can as well dive down by controlling the mind. On the mind

being controlled, the breath is automatically controlled. There

is no need to practise breath-control; mind control is enough.

Breath-control is recommended for the person who cannot

control his mind directly.2

This implies that Sri Bhagavan did not authorise breath-control

as an independent technique, but only as an approach towards

mind-control. In itself he warned that its effects were

impermanent.

For the subsidence of the mind there is no other means

more effective and adequate than Self-enquiry. Even though by

other means the mind subsides, that is only apparently so; it

will rise again.

For instance, the mind subsides by means of breath-control;

yet such subsidence lasts only so long as the control of breath

and vital forces continues; and when they are released the mind

also gets released and immediately, being externalised, it

continues to wander through the force of subtle tendencies.3

Therefore, those who use it on the path prescribed by the

Maharshi should also know when to give it up.

1 W., § 12.

2 T., 448.

3 W., § 12.

148

B.: Breath-control is a help in controlling the mind and is

advised for such as find they cannot control the mind without

some such aid. For those who can control their mind and

concentrate, it is not necessary. It can be used at the beginning

until one is able to control the mind but then it should be given

up.1

Another reason for caution in the use of breath-control is that

it may lead to subtle experiences which can distract the seeker

from his true goal. As will be shown in the next chapter,

Bhagavan always warned against interest in powers and

experiences or desire for them; he sometimes specifically

connected this warning with the use of breath-control.

B.: Breath-control is also a help. It is one of the various

methods that are intended to help us attain ekagrata or onepointedness

of mind. Breath-control can also help to control

the wandering mind and attain this one-pointedness and

therefore it can be used. But one should not stop there. After

obtaining control of the mind through breath-control, one

should not rest content with any experiences which may accrue

therefrom but should harness the controlled mind to the

questi

(Continued  ...)

(My humble salutations to the lotus feet of Bhagavan Sree Ramana Maharshi
and also gratitude to great philosophers and others     for the collection)

on, ‘Who am I?’ till the mind merges in the Self.