Talks with
Sri Nisarga Datta Maharaj
Q: What is right and what is wrong?
M: Relatively, what causes suffering is wrong, what alleviates it is right. Absolutely, what brings you back to reality is right and what dims reality is wrong.
Q: When we talk of helping humanity, we mean a struggle against disorder and suffering.
M: You merely talk of helping. Have you ever helped, really helped, a single man? Have you ever put one soul beyond the need of further help? Can you give a man character, based on full realization of his duties and opportunities at least, if not on the insight into his true being? When you do not know what is good for yourself, how can you know what is good for others? SEEK THESOURCE OF CONSCIOUSNESS 327
Q: The adequate supply of means of livelihood is good for all. You may be God himself, but you need a well-fed body to talk to us.
M: It is you that need my body to talk to you. I am not my body, nor do I need it. I am the witness only. I have no shape of my own. You are so accustomed to think of yourselves as bodies hav- ing consciousness that you just cannot imagine consciousness as having bodies. Once you realize that bodily existence is but a state of mint, a movement in consciousness, that the ocean of consciousness is infinite and eternal, and that, when in touch with consciousness, you are the witness only, you will be able to withdraw beyond consciousness altogether.
Q: We are told there are many levels of existences. Do you exit and function on all the levels? While you are on earth, are you also in heaven (swarga)?
M: ! am nowhere to be found! ! am not a thing to be given a place among other things. All things are in me, but I am not among things. You are telling me about the superstructure while I am concerned with the foundations. The superstructures rise and fall, but the foundations last. I am not interested in the tran- sient, while you talk of nothing else.
Q: forgive me a strange question. If somebody with a razor- sharp sword would suddenly severe your head, what difference would it make to your
M: None whatsoever. The body will lose its head, certain lines of communication will be cut, that is all. Two people talk to each other on the phone and the wire is cut. Nothing happens to the people, only they must look for some other means of communi- cation. The Bhagavad Gita says: "the sword does not cut it". It is literally so. It is in the nature of consciousness to survive its vehi- cles. It is like fire. It burns uP the fuel, but not itself. Just like a fire can outlast a mountain of fuel, so does consciousness sur- vive innllm~r:lhl~ hndi~s.
Q: The fuel affects th. e flame.
M: As long as it lasts. Change the nature of the fuel and the color and appearance of the flame will change. 328 1 AM THAT Now we are talking to each other. For this presence is needed; unless we are present, we cannot talk. But presence by itself is not enough. There must also he the desire to talk. Above all, we want to remain conscious. We shall bear every suffering and humiliation, but we shall rather remain~Qnscious. Unless we revolt against this craving for experience and let go the manifested altogether, there can be no relief. We shall re- main trapped.
Q: You say you are the silent witness and also you are beyond consciousness. Is there no contradiction in it? If you are beyond consciousness, what are you witnessing to?
M: I am conscious and unconscious, both conscious and un- conscious, neither conscious nor unconscious--to all this I am witness--but really there is no witness, because there is no- thing to be a witness to. I am perfectly empty of all mental forma- tions, void of mind--yet fully aware. This I try to express my say- ing that I am beyond the mind.
Q: How can I reach you then?
M: Be aware of being conscious and seek the source of con- sciousness. That is all. Very little can be conveyed in words. It is the doing as I tell you that will bring light, not my telling you. The means do not matter much; it is the desire, the urge, the ear- nestness that count. Transiency is Proof of Unreality 69
Questioner: My friend is a German and I was born in England from French parents. I am in India since over a year wandering from Ashram to Ashram. Maharaja: Any spiritual practices (sadhanas)? a Studies and meditation.
M: What did you meditate on?
Q: On what I read.
M: Good
Q: What are you doing, sir?
M: Sitting.
Q: And what else? ù
M: Talking.
Q: What are you talking about?
M: Do you want a lecture? Better ask something that really touches you, so that you feel strongly about it. Unless you are emotionally involved, you may argue with me, but there will be no real understanding between us. If you say: 'nothing warrens me, I have no problems,', it is all right with me, we can keep quiet. But if something really touches you, then there is purpose in talking. Shall I ask you? What is the purpose of your moving from place to place?
Q: To meet people, to try to understand them.
M: What people are you trying to understand? What exactly are you after 330 1 AM THAT
Q: Integration.
M: If you want integration, you must know whom you want to in- tegrate. a By meeting people and watching them, one comes to know oneself also. It goes together. .
M: It does not necessarily go together.
Q: One improves the other.
M: It does not work that way. The mirror reflects the image, but the image does not improve the mirror. You are neither the mir- ror nor the image in the mirror. Having perfected the mirror so that it reflects correctly, truly, you can turn the mirror round and see in it a true reflection of yourself--true as far as the mirror can reflect. But the reflection is not yourself--you are the Seer of the reflection. Do understand it clearly--whatever you may perceive you are not what you perceive.
Q: I am the mirror and the world iS the image?
M: You can see both the image and the mirror. You are neither. Who are you? Don't go by formulas. The answer iS not in words. The nearest you can say in words iS: I am what makes percep- tion possible, the life beyond the experience and his experi- ence. Now, Can you separate yourself both from the mirror and the image in the mirror and stand completely alone, all by yourself?
Q: No, I cannot.
M: How do you know that you cannot? There are so many things you are doing without knowing how to do it. You digest, you circulate your blood and Iymph, you move your muscles-- all without knowing how. In the same way, you perceive, you feel, you think without knowing the why and how of it. Similarly you are yourself without knowing it. There is nothing wrong with you as the Self. It is what it iS to perfection. It is the mirror that is not clear and true and, therefore, gives you false images. You need not correct yourself--only set right your idea of yourself. Learn to separate yourself from the image and the mirror, keep on remembering: I am neither the mind nor its ideas: do it pa- tiently and with convictions and you will surely come to the direct vision of yourself as the Source of being--knowing--loving, TRANSIENCY IS PROOF OF UNREALITY 331 eternal, all-em~racing all-pervading. You are the infinite focus- sed in a body. Now you see the body only. Try earnestly and you will come to see the infinite only.
Q: The experience of reality, when it Comes, does it last?
M: All experience iS necessarily transient. But the ground of all experience is immovable. Nothing that may be called an event will last. But some events purify the mind and some stain it. Mo- ments of deep insight and all-embracing love purify the mind, while desires and tsars, envies Ann anger, blind beliefs and in- tellectual arrogance pollute and dull the psyche.
Q: IS self-realization So important?
M: Without it you will be consumed by desires and fears, re- peating themselves meaninglessly in endless suffering. Most of the people do not know that there can be an end to pain. But once they have heard the good news, obviously going beyond all strife and struggle iS the most urgent task that can be. You know 'hat you can be free and now it iS up to you. Either you re- main forever hungry and thirsty, longing, searching, grabbing, holding, ever losing and sorrowing, or go out wholeheartedly in search of the state of timeless perfection to which nothing can be added, from which nothing--taken away. In it all desires and fears are absent, not because they were given up, but be- cause they have lost their meaning.
Q: So far I have been following you. Now, what am I expected to do?
M: There is nothing to do. Just be. Do nothing. Be. No climbing mountain and Sitting in Caves. I do not even say: 'be yourself', since you do not know yourself. Just be. Having seen that you are neither the 'outer' world of perceivable, nor the 'inner' world of thinkable, that you are neither body nor mind--just be .
Q: Surely, there are degrees of realization.
M: There are no stops to self-realization. There is nothing gradual about it. It happens suddenly and is irreversible. You ro- tate into a new dimension, seen from which the previous ones are mere abstractions. Just like on Sunrise you see things as they are, so on self-realization you See everything as it is. The world of illusions is left behind. 332 1 AM THAT
Q: In the state of realization do things change? They become colorful and full of meaning?
M: The experience is quite right, but it is not the experience of reality (sadanubhav), but of harmony (satvanubhav) of the uni- verse.
Q: Nevertheless, there is progress.
M: There can be progress only in the preparation (sadhanaJ. Realization is sudden. The fruit ripens slowly, but falls suddenly and without return.
Q: I am physically and mentally at peace. What more do I need?
M: Yours may not be the ultimate state. You will recognize that you have returned to your natural state by a complete absence of all desire and fear. After all, at the root of all desire and fear is the feeling of not being what you are. Just as a dislocated joint pains only as long as it is out of shape, and is forgotten as soon as it is set right, so is all self-concern a symptom of mental dis- tortion which disappears as soon as one is in the normal state.
Q: Yes, but what is the sadhana for achieving the natural state?
M: Hold on to the sense 'I am' to the exclusion of everything else. When thus the mind becomes completely silent, it shines with a new light and vibrates with new knowledge. It all comes spontaneously, you need only hold on to the 'I am'. Just like emerging from sleep or a state of rapture you feel rested ar,d yet you cannot explain why and how you come to feel so well, in the same way on realization you feel complete, fulfilled, free from the pleasure-pain complex, and yet not always able to explain what happened, why and how. You can put it only in negative terms: 'Nothing is wrong with me any longer.' It is only by com- parison with the past that you know that you are out of it. Other- wise--you are just yours''. Don't try to convey it to others. If you can, it is not the real thing. Be silent and watch it expressing itself in action.
Q: If you could tell me what I shall become, it may help me to watch over my development.
M: How can anybody tell you what you shalt become~when there is no becoming? You merely discover what you are. All TRAN~lENCY lS PROOF OF UNREALITY 333 mounding oneself to a pattern is a grievous waste of Tim. Think neither of the past nor of the future, just be. 0: How can I just Ben Changes are inevitable.
M: Changes are inevitable in the changeful, but you are not subject to them. You are the changeless background, against which changes are perceived.
Q: Everything changes, the background also changes. There is no need of a changeless background to notice changes. The self is momentary--it is merely the point where the past meets the future.
M: Of course the self based on memory is momenta!y. But such self demands unbroken continuity behind it. You know from ex- perience that there are gaps when your self is forgotten. What brings it back to life? What wakes you up in the morning? There must be some constant factor bridging the gaps in conscious- ness. If you watch carefully you will find that even your daily consciousness is in flashes, with gaps intervening all the time. What is in the gaps? What can there be but your real being, that is timeless; mind and mindlessness are one to it.
Q: Is there any particular place you would advise me to go to for spiritual attainment?
M: The only proper place is within. The outer world neither can help nor hinder. No system, no pattern of action will take you to your goal. Give up all working for a future, concentrate totally on the now, be concerned only with your response to every move- ment of life as it happens.
Q: What is the cause ot the urge to roam about?
M: There is no cause. You merely dream that you roam about. In a few years your stay in India will appear as a dream to you. You will dream some other dream at that time. Do realize that it is not you who moves from dream to dream, but the dreams flow before you and you are the immutable witness. No happening affects your real being--this is the absolute truth.
Q: Cannot I move about physically and keep steady inwardly?
M: You can, but what purpose does it serve? If you are earnest. You will find that in the end you will get fed up with roaming and 334 1 AM THAT regret the waste of energy and time. To find your self you need not take a single step.
Q: Is there any difference between the experience of the Self (at man) and of the Absolute (brahman)?
M: There can be no experience of the Absolute as it is beyond all experience. On the other hand, the self is the experiencing factor in every experience and thus, in a way, validates the mul- tiplicity of experiences. The world may be full of things of great value, but if there is nobody to buy them, they have no price. The Absolute contains everything experience able, but without the experience they are as nothing. That which makes the ex- perience possible is the Absolute. That which makes it actual is the Self.
Q: Don't we reach the Absolute through a gradation of expe- riences? Beginning with the grossest, we end with the most sublime.
M: There can be no experience without desire for it. There can be gradation between desires, but between the most sublime desire and the freedom from all desire there is an abyss which must be crossed. The unreal may look real, but it is transient. The real is not afraid of time.
Q: Is not the unreal the expression of the real?
M: How can it be? It is like saying that truth expresses itself in dreams. To the real the unreal is not. It appears to be real only because you believe in it. Doubt it, and it ceases. When you are in love with somebody, you give it reality--you imagine your love to be ail-powerful and everlasting. When it comes to an end, you say: 'I thought it was real, but it wasn't'. Transiency is the best proof of unreality. What is limited in time, and space and applicable to one person only, is not real. The real is for all and forever. Above everything else you cherish yourself. You would ac- cept nothing in exchange for your existence. The desire to be is the strongest of all desires and will go only on the realization of your true nature.
Q: Even in the unreal there is a touch of reality.
M: Yes, the reality you impart to it by taking it to be real. Having TRANSIENCY IS PROOF OF UNREALITY 335 convinced yourself, you are bound by your conviction. When the sun shines, colors appear. When it sets, they disappear. Where are the colors without the light?
Q: This is thinking in terms of duality.
M: All thinking is in duality. In identity no thought survives. ... God is the End of All Desire and Knowledge 70
Maharaj: Where are you coming from? What have you come for?
Questioner: I come from America and my friend is from the Re- x public of Ireland. I came about six months ago and I was travel- ing from Ashram to Ashram. My friend came on his own.
M: What have you seen?
Q: I have been at Sri Ramanashram and also I have visited Rishikesh. Can I ask you what is your opinion of Sri Ramana Maharshi?
M: We are both in the same ancient state. But what do you know of Maharshi? You take yourself to be a name and a body, so all you perceive are names and bodies. .
Q: Were you to meet the ~laharshi, what would happen?
M: Probably we would feel quite happy. We may even ex- change a few words. 336 1 AM THAT
Q: But would he recognize you as a liberated man?
M: Of course. As a man recognizes a man, so a nanny recog- nizes a nanny. You cannot appreciate what you have not experi- enced. You are what you think yourself to be, but you cannot think yourself to be what you have not experienced.
Q: To become an engineer I must learn engineering. To be- come God, what must I learn?
M: You must unlearn everything. God is the end of all desire and knowledge.
Q: You mean to say that I become God merely by giving up the desire to become God?
M: All desires rust be given up, because by desiring you take the shape of your desires. When no desires remain, you revert to your natural state.
Q: How do I come to know that I have achieved perfection?
M: You can not know perfection, you can know only imperfec- tion. For knowledge to be, there must be separation and dis- harmony. You can know what you are not, but you can not know your real being. You can be only what you are. The entire ap- proach is through understanding, which is in the seeing of the false as false. But to understand, you must observe from out- side.
Q: The Vedantic concept of Maya, illusion, applies to the mani- fested. Therefore our knowledge of the manifested is un- reliable. But we should be able to trust our knowledge of the unmanif~?.ct~i
M: There can be no knovvledge of the unmanifested. The poten- tial is unknowable. Only the actual can be known.
Q: Why should the knower remain unknown?
M: The knower knows the known. Do you know the knower? Who is the knower of the knower? You want to know the un- manifested. Can you say you know the manifested?
Q: I know things and ideas and their relations. It is the sum total of all my experiences.
M: All? GOD IS THE END OF ALL DESIRE AND KNOWLEDGE 33.
Q: Well, all actual experiences. I admit I cannot know what did not happen.
M: If the manifested is the sum total of all actual experiences, including their experiences, how much of the total do you know? A very small part indeed. And what is the little you know?
Q: Some sensory experiences as related to myself.
M: Not even that. You only know that you react. Who reacts and to what, you do not know. You know oncontact that you exist-- 'I am'. The 'I am this', '! am that' are imaginary. a I know the manifested because I participate in it. I admit, my part in it is very small, yet it is as real as the totality of it. And what is more important, I give it meaning. Without me the world is dark and silent.
M: A firefly illumining the world! You don't give meaning to the world, you find it. Dive deep into yourself and find the source from where all meaning flows. Surely it is not the superficial mind that can give meaning.
Q: What makes me limited and superficial?
M: The total is open and available, but you will not take it. You are attached to the little person you think yourself to be. Your desires are narrow, your ambitions--petty. After all, without a center of perception where wow!d be the manifested? Unper- ceived, the manifested is as good as the unmanifested. And you are the perceiving point, the non-dimensional source of all di- mensions. Know yourself as the total.
Q: How can a point contain a universe?
M: There is enough space in a point for an infinity of universes. There is no last of capacity. Self-limitation is the only problem. But you cannot run away from yourself. However far you go, you come back to yourself and to the need of understanding this point, ahoy is as nothing and yet the source of everything.
Q: I came to India in search of a Yoga teacher. I am still in search.
M: What kind of Yoga do you want to practice, the Yoga of get- ting, or the Yoga of ~ivinq us?
Q: Don't they come to the same in the end? 338 1 AM THAT ~JI: How can they? One enslaves, the other liberates. I ne mo- tive matters supremely. Freedom comes through renunciation. All possession is bondage.
Q: What I have the strength and the courage to hold on to, why should I give up? And if I have not the strength, how can I give up? ! do not understand this need of giving up. When I want something, why should I not pursue it? Renunciation is for the weak. M If you do not have the wisdom and the strength to give up, just look at your possessions. Your mere looking will burn them up. If you can stand outside your mind, you will soon find that total renunciation of possessions and desires is the most obvi- ously reasonable thing to do. You create the world and then worry about it. Becoming self- ish makes you weak. If you think you have the strength and courage to desire, it is because you are young and inexperi- enced. Invariably the object of desire destroys the means of acquiring it and then itself withers away. It is all for the best, be- cause it teaches you to shun desire like poison.
Q: How am I to practice desirelessness?
M: No need of practice. No need of any acts of renunciation. Just turn your mind away, that is all. Desire is merely the fixation of the mind on an idea. Get it out of its groove by denying it at- tention .
Q: That is all?
M: Yes, that is all. Whatever may be the desire or fear, don't dwell upon it. Try and see for yourself. Here and there you may forget, it does not matter. Go back to your attempts till the brush- ing away of every desire and fear, of every reaction becomes automatic.
Q: How can one live without emotions?
M: You can have all the emotions you want, but beware of reac- tions, of induced emotions. Be entirely self-determined and ruled from within, not from without. Merely giving up a thing to secure a better one is not true re- linquishment. Give it up because you see its valueless Ness. As you keep on giving up, you will find that you grow spontane- GOD IS THE END OF ALL DESIRE AND KNOWLEDGF I.~a nasally in intelligence and power and inexhaustible love and ion.
Q: Why so much insistence on relinquishing all desires and fears? Are they not natural?
M: They are not. They are entirely mind-made. You have to give up everything to know that you need nothing, not even your body. Your needs are unreal and your efforts are meaningless. You imagine that your possessions protect you. In reality they make you vulnerable. Realize yourself as away from all that can be pointed at as 'this' or 'that'. You are unreachable by any sen- sory experience or verbal construction. Turn away from them. Refuse to impersonate.
Q: After I have heard you, what am I to do?
M: Only hearing will not help you much. You must keep it in rind and ponder over it and try to understand the state of mind which makes me say what I say. I speak from truth; stretch your hand and take it. You are not what you think yourself to be, I as- sure you. The image you have of yourself is made up from memories and is purely accidental.
Q: What I am is the result of my karma.
M: What you appear to be, you are not. Karma is only a word you have learnt to repeat. You have never been, nor shall ever be a person. Refuse to consider yourself as one. But as long as you do not even doubt yourself to be a Mr. 50-and-so, there is little hope. When you refuse to open your eyes, what can you be shown?
Q: I imagine karma to be a mysterious power that urges me to- wards perfection.
M: That's what people told you. You are already perfect, here and now. The perfectible is not you. You imagine yourself to be what you are not--stop it. It is the cessation that is important, not what you are going to stop.
Q: Did not karma compel me to become what I am?
M: Nothing compels. You are as you believe yourself to be. Stop believing.
Q: Here you are sitting on your seat and talking to me. What compels you is your karma. 340 1 AM THAT
M: Nothing compels me. I do what needs doing. But you do so many unnecessary things. It is your refusal to examine that creates karma. It is the indifference to your own suffering that perpetuates it.
Q: Yes, it is true. What can put an end to this indifference?
M: The urge must come from within as a wave of detachment, or compassion.
Q: Could I meet this urge half way?
M: Of course. See your own condition, see the condition of the world.
Q: We were told about karma and reincarnation, evolution and Yoga, masters and disciples. What are we to do with all this knowledge?
M: Leave it all behind you. Forget it. Go forth, unburdened with ideas and beliefs. Abandon all verbal structures, all relative truth, all tangible objectives. The Absolute can be reached by absolute devotion only. Don't be half-hearted.
Q: I must begin with some absolute truth. Is there any?
M: Yes, there is, the feeling: 'I am'. Begin with that.
Q: Nothing else is true?
M: All else is neither true nor false. It seems real when it Al pears, it disappears when it is denied. A transient thing is a mys- tery.
Q: I thought the real is the mystery.
M: How can it be? The Teal is simple, open, clear and kind, beautiful and joyous. It is completely free of contradictions. It is ever new, ever fresh, endlessly creative. Being and non-being, life and death, all distinctions merge in it.
Q: I can admit that all is false. But, does it make my mind non- existent?
M: The mind is what it thinks. To make it true, think true.
Q: If the shape of things is mere appearance, what are they in reality?
M: In reality there is only perception. The perceive and the perceived are conceptual, the fact of perceiving is actual.
Q: Where does the Absolute come in?
M: The Absolute is the birthplace of Perceiving. It rakes per- GOD IS THE END OF ALL DESIRE AND KNOWLEDGE 341 caption possible. But too much analysis leads you nowhere. There is in you the core of being which is beyond analysis, beyond the mind. You can know it in action only. Express it in daily life and its light will grow ever brighter. The legitimate function of the mind is to tell you what is not. But if you want positive knowledge, you must go beyond the mind.
Q: In all the universe is there one single thing of value?
M: Yes, the power of love. In Self-awareness you Learn about Yourself
Questioner: It is our repeated experience that the disciples do much harm to their Gurus. They make plans and carry them out, without considering the Guru's wishes. In the end there is only endless worry for the Guru and bitterness for his disciples. Maharaja: Yes, itdoes happen.
Q: Who compels the Guru to submit to these indignities?
M: The Guru is basically without desire. He sees what happens, but feels no urge to interfere. He makes no choices, takes no decisions. As pure witness, he watches what is going on and remains unaffected. 342 1 AM rat
Q: But his work suffers.
M: Victory is always his--in the end. He knows that if the dis- ciples do not learn from his wigads, they will learn from their own mistakes. Inwardly he remains quiet and silent. He has no sense of being I separate person. The entire universe is his own, in- cluding his disciples with their petty plans. Nothing in particular affects him, or, which comes to the same, the entire universe af- fects him in equal measure.
Q: Is there no such thing as the Guru's grace?
M: His grace is constant and universal. It is not given to one and denied to another.
Q: How does it affect me personally?
M: It is by The Guru's grace that your mind is engaged in search for truth and it is by his grace that you will find it. It works unerringly towards your ultimate good. And it is for all.
Q: Some disciples are ready, mature, and some are not. IVrust not the Guru exercise choice and make decisions?
M: The Guru knows the Ultimate and relentlessly propels the disciple towards it. The disciple is full of obstacles, which he himself must overcome. The Guru is not very much concerned with the superficialities of the disciple's life. It is like gladstation The fruit must fall--when no longer held back.
Q: If the disciple does not know the goal, how can he make out the obstacles?
M: The goal is shown by the Guru, obstacles are discover- ed by the disciple. The Guru has no preferences, but those who have obstacles to overcome seem to be lagging behind. In reality the disciple is not different from the Guru. He is the same dimensionless center of per-option and love in actionHt is only his imagination and self-identification with the imagined, that encloses him and converts him into a person. The Guru is concerned little with the person. His attention is on the inner watcher. It is the task of the watcher to understand and thereby eliminate the person. While there is grace on one side, there must be dedication to the task ton thy other
Q: But the Nelson Dow Nat wont tl~ ho eliminated. IN ~FLF-AWARENESS Yell ' LFARN Abel JT Y~l JR~FI F .~
M: The person is merely the result of a misunderstanding. In reality, there is no such thing. Feelings, thoughts and actions ace before the watcher in endless succession, leaving traces in the brain and creating an illusion of continuity. A reflection of the watcher in the mind creates the sense of 'I' and the person acquires an apparently independent existence. In reality there is no person, only the watcher identifying himself with the 'I' and the 'mine'. The teacher tells the watcher:. you are not this, there is nothing of yours in this, except the little point of 'I am', which is the bridge between the watcher and his dream. ~1 Ann this, I am that' is dream, while pure 'I am' has the stamp of reality on it. You have tasted so many things--all came to naught. Only the sense 'I am' persisted--unchanged. Stay with the changeless among the changeful, until you are able to go beyond.
Q: When will it happen?
M: It will happen as soon as you remove the obstacles.
Q: Which obstacles?
M: Desire for the false and fear of the true. You, as the person, imagine that the Guru is interested in you as a person.snot at all. To him you are a nuisance and a hindrance to be done away with. He actually aims at your elimination as a factor in con-- sauciness.
Q: If I am eliminated, what will remain?
M: Nothing will remain, all will remain. The sense of identity will remain, but no longer identification with a particular body. Being --awareness--love will shine in full splendor. Liberation is never of the person, it is always from the person.
Q: And no trace remains of the person?
M: A vague memory remains, like the memory of a dream, or early childhood. After all, what is there to remember? A flow of events, mostly accidental and meaningless. A sequence of de- sires and fears and inane blunders. Is there anything worth re- membering? The person is but a shell imprisoning you. Break the shell.
Q: Whom are you asking to break the shell? Who is to break the shell? 344 1 AM THAT
M: Break the bonds of memory and self-identification and the shell will break by itself. There is a center that imparts reality to whatever it perceives. All you need is to understand that you are the source of reality, that you give reality instead of getting it, that you need no support and no confirmation. Things are as they are, because you accept them as they are. Stop accepting them and they will dissolve. Whatever you think about with de- sire or fear appears before you as real. Look at it without desire or fear and it does lose substance. Pleasure and pain are momentary. It is simpler and easier to disregard them than to act on them.
Q: If all things come to an end, why did they appear at all?
M: Creation is in the very nature of consciousness. Conscious- ness causes appearances. Reality is beyond consciousness.
Q: While we are conscious of appearances, how is it that we are not conscious that these are mere appearances?
M: The mind covers up reality, without knowing it. To know the nature of the mind, you need intelligence, the capacity to look at the mind in silent and dispassionate awareness.
Q: If I am of the nature of all-pervading consciousness, how could ignorance and illusion happen to me?
M: Neither ignorance nor illusion ever happened to you. Find the self to which you ascribe ignorance and illusion and your question will be answered. You talk as if you know the self and see it to be under the sway of ignorance and illusion. But, in fact, you do not know the self, nor are you aware of ignorance. By all rrweans become aware--this will bring you to the self and you will realize that there is neither ignorance nor delusion in it. It is like saying: if there is sun, how can darkness be? As under a stone there will be darkness, however strong the sunlight, so in the shadow of the 'I-am-the-body' consciousness there must be ignorance and illusion.
Q: But why did the body consciousness come into being?
M: Don't ask 'why', ask 'how'. It is in the nature of creative im- agination to identify itself with its creations. You can stop it any moment by switching off attention. Or through investigation.
Q: Does creation come before investigation? IN SELF-AWARENESS YOU LEARN ABOUT YOURSELF 345 E
M: First you create a world, then the 'I am' becomes a person, who is not happy for various reasons. He goes out in search of happiness, meets a Guru who tells hi
M: 'You are not a person, find who you are'. He does it and goes beyond. 0: Why did he not do it at the very start?
M: It did not occur to him. He needed somebody to tell him.
Q: Was that enough?
M: It was enough.
Q: Why does it not work in my case
M: You do not trust me.
Q: Why is my faith weak?
M: Desires and fears have dulled your mind. It needs some scrubbing.
Q: How can I clear my mind?
M: By watching it relentlessly. Inattention obscures, attention clarifies.
Q: Why do the Indian teachers advocate inactivity?
M: Most of people's activities are valueless, if not outright des- tructive. Dominated by desire and fear, they can do nothing good. Ceasing to do evil precedes beginning to do good. Hence the need for stopping all activities for a time, to investi- gate one's urges and their motives, see all that is false in one's life, purge the mind of all evil and then only restart work, begin- ning with one's obvious duties. Of course, if you have a chance to help somebody, by all means do it and promptly too, don't keep him waiting till you are perfect. But do not become a pro- fessional do-gooder.
Q: I do not feel t'nere are too many do-gooders among disci- ples. Most of those I met are too absorbed in their own petty conflicts. Theyshave no heart for others. M Such self-centeredness is temporary. Be patient with such people. For so many years they gave attention to everything but themselves. Let them turn to themselves for a change.
Q: What are the fruits of self-awareness?
M: You grow more intelligent. In awareness you learn. In self- 346 1 AM THAT awareness you learn about yourself. Ot course, you can only learn what you are not. To know what you are, you must go beyond the mind.
Q: Is not awareness beyond the mind?
M: Awareness is the point at which the mind reaches out beyond itself into reality. In awareness you seek not what pi eases, but what is true.
Q: I find Thea! awareness brings about a state of inner silence, a state of psychic void.
M: It is all right as it goes, but it is not enough. Have you felt the all-embracing emptiness In which the universe swims like a cloud in the blue sky?
Q: Sir, let me first come to know well my own inner space.
M: Destroy the wall that separates, the 'I-am-the-body' idea and the inner and the outer will become one.
Q: Am I to die?
M: Physical destruction is meaningless. It is the clinging to sensate life that binds you. If you could experience the inner void fully, the explosion into the totality would be near.
Q: My own spiritual experience has its seasons. Sometimes I feel glorious, then again I am down. I am live a lift boy--going up, going down, going up, going down.
M: All changes in consciousness are due to the 'I-am-the-body' idea. Divested of this idea the mind becomes steady. There is pure being, free of experiencing anything in particular. But to realize it you must do what your teacher tells you. Mere listen- ing, even memorizing, is not enough. If you do not struggle hard to apply every word of it in your daily life, don't complain that you made no progress. All real progress is irreversible. Ups and downs merely show that the teaching has not been taken to heart and translated into action fully.
Q: The other day you told us that there is no such thing as karma. Yet we see that every thing has a cause and the sum total of all the causes may be called karma.
M: As long as you believe yourself to be a body, you will as- cribe causes to everything. I do not say things have no causes. IN SELF-AWARENESS YOU LEARN ABOI JT YOI IRRFI F ~7 Each thing has innumerable causes. It is as it is, because the world is as it is. Every cause in its ramifications covers the uni- verse. When you realize that you are absolutely free to be what you consent to be, that you are what you appear to be because of ignorance or indifference, you are free to revolt and change. You allow yourself to be what you are not. You are looking for the causes of being what you are not! It is a futile search. There are no causes, but your ignorance of your real being, which is per- fect and beyond all causation. For whatever happens, all the universe is responsible and you are the source of the universe.
Q: I know nothing about being the cause of the universe.
M: Because you do not investigate. Enquire, search within and you will know.
Q: How can a speck like me create the vast universe?
M: When you are infected with the 'I-am-the body' virus; a whole universe springs into being. But when you have had enough of it, you cherish some fanciful ideas about liberator and pursue lines of action totally futile. You concentrate, yowl meditate, you torture your mind and body, you do all sorts of unnecessary things, but you miss the essential which is the elimination of the person.
Q: In the beginning we may have to pray and meditate for some tire before we are ready for self-enquiry.
M: If you believe so, go on. To me, all delay is a waste of time. You can skip all the preparation and go directly for the ultimate search within. Of all the Yogas it is the simplest and the shortest. What is Pure, Unalloyed, Unattached is Real 72
Maharaj: You are back in India! Where have you been, what have you seen?
Questioner: I come from Switzerland. I stayed there with a re- markable man who claims to have realized. He has done many Yogas in his past and had many experiences that passed away. Now he claims no special abilities, nor knowledge; the only un- usual thing about him is connected with sensations; he is un- able to separate the seer from the seen. For instance, when he sees a car rushing at him, he does not know whether the car is rushing at him, or he at a car. He seems to be both at the same time, the seer and the seen. They become one. Whatever he sees, he sees himself. When I asked~ him some Vedantic ques- tions he said: 'I really cannot answer. I do not know. All I know is this strange identity with whatever I perceive. You know, I ex- pected anything but this.' He is on the whole a humble man; he makes no disciples and in no way puts himself on a pedestal. He is willing to talk about his strange condition, but that is all.
M: Now he knows what he knows. All else is over. At yeast he still talks. Soon he may cease talking.
Q: What will he do then?
M: Immobility and silence are not inactive. The flower fills the space with perfume, the candle--with light. They do nothing yet they change everything by their mere presence. You can photograph the candle, but not its light. You can know the man, his name and appearance, but not his influence. His very pres- et-:e is action. I WHAT IS PURER UNALLOYED, UNATTACHED IS REAL 349
Q: Is it not natural to be active?
M: Everybody wants to be active, but where do his actions originate? There is no central point each action begets another, meaninglessly and painfully, in endless succession. The alter- nation of work and pause is not there. First find the immutable center where all movement takes birth. Just like a wheel turns round an axle, so must you be always at the axle in the center and not whirling at the periphery.
Q: How do I go about it in practice?
M: Whenever a thought or emotion of desire or fear comes to your mind, just turn away from it.
Q: By suppressing my thoughts and feelings I shall provoke a reaction.
M: I am not talking of suppression. Just refuse attention.
Q: Must I not use effort to arrest the movements of the mind?
M: It has nothing to do with effort. Just turn away, look between the thoughts, rather than at the thoughts. When you happen to walk in a crowd, you do not fight every man you meet--you just find your way between.
Q: If I use my will to control the mind, it only strengthens the ego.
M: Of course. When you fight, you invite a fight. But when you do not resist, you meet with no resistance. When you refuse to play the game, you are out of it.
Q: How long will it take me to get free of the mind?
M: It ray take a thousand years, but really no time is required. All you need is to be in dead earnest. Here the will is the deed. If you are sincere, you have it. After all, it is a matter of attitude. Nothing stops you from being a nanny here and now, except fear. You are afraid of being impersonal, of impersonal being. It is all quite simple. Turn away from your desires and fears and from the thoughts they create and you a!e at once in your natural state.
Q: No question of reconditioning, changing, or eliminating the mind?
M: Absolutely none. Leave your mind alone, that is all. Don't go 350 1 AM THAT along with it. After all, there is no such thing as mind apart from thoughts which come and go obeying their own laws, not yours. They dominate you only because you are interested in them. It is exactly as Christ said 'Resist not evil'. By resisting evil you merely strengthen it.
Q: Yes, I see now. All I have to do is to deny existence to evil. Then it fades away. But does it not boil down to some kind of auto-suggestion?
M: The auto-suggestion is in full swing now, when you think yourself to be a person, caught between good and evil. What I am asking you to do is to put an end to it, to wake up and see things as they are. About your stay in Switzerland with that strange friend of yours: what did you Cain in his company?
Q: Nothing absolutely. His experience did not affect me at all. One thing I have understood: there is nothing to search for. Wherever I may go, nothing waits for me at the end of the jour- ney. Discovery is not the result of transportation.
M: Yes, you are quite apart from anything that can be gained or lost.
Q: Do you call it verge. relinquishment, renunciation?
M: There is nothing to renounce. Enough if you stop acquiring. To give you must have, and to have you must take. Better don't take. It is simpler than to practice renunciation, which leads to a dangerous form of 'spiritual' pride. All this weighing, selecting, choosing, exchanging--it is all shopping in some 'spiritual' market. What is your business there? What deal are you out to strike? When you are not out for business, what is the use of this endless anxiety of choice? Restlessness takes you nowhere. Something prevents you from seeing that there is nothing you need. Find it out and see-its falseness. It is like having swallowed some poison and suffering from unquenchable craving for water. Instead of drinking beyond all measure, why not eliminate the poison and be free of this burning thirst?
Q: I shall have to eliminate the ego!
M: The sense 'I am a person in time and space' is the Poison. In WHAT IS PURE, UNALLOYED. UNATTACHED IS REAL 351 a way,time itself is the poison. In tire all things come to an end and new are born, to be devoured in their turn. Do not identify yourself with time, do not ask anxiously: 'what next, what next?' Step out of time and see it devour the world. Say: 'Well, it is in the nature of time to put an end to everything. Let it be. It does not concern me. I am not combustible, nor do I need to collect fuel'.
Q: Can the witness be without the things to witness?
M: There is always something to witness. If not a thing, then its absence. Witnessing is natural and no problem. The problem is excessive interest, leading to self-identification. Whatever you are engrossed in you take to be real.
Q: Is the 'I am' real or unreal? Is the 'I am' the witness? Is the witness real or unreal?
M: What is pure, unalloyed, unattached, is real. What is tainted, mixed up, dependent and transient is unreal. Do not be misled by words--one word may convey several and even contradic- tory meanings. The 'I am I that pursues tune pleasant and shuns the unpleasant is false; the 'I am' that sees pleasure and pain as inseparable sees rightly. The witness that is enmeshed in what he perceives is the person; the witness who stands aloof, un- moved and untouched, is the watch-tower of the real, the point at which awareness, inherent in the unmanifested, contacts the manifested. There can be no universe without the witness, there can be no witness without the universe.
Q: Time consumes the world. Who is the witness of time?
M: He who is beyond time--the Unnameable. A glowing ember, moved round and round quickly enough, appears as a glowing circle. When the movement ceases, the ember re- mains. Similarly, the 'I am' in movement creates the world. The 'I am' at peace becomes the Absolute. You are like a man with an electric torch walking through a gallery. You can see only what is within the beam. The rest is in darkness.
Q: If I project the world, I should be able to change it.
M: Of course, you can. But you must cease identifying yourself with it and go beyond. Then you have the power to destroy and recreate. I AM THAT
Q: All I want is to be free.
M: You must know two things: What are you to be free from and what keeps you bound.
Q: Why do you want to annihilate the universe?
M: I am not concerned with the universe. Let it be or not be. It is enough if I know myself.
Q: If you are beyond the world, then you are of no use to the world.
M: Pity the self that is, not the world that is not! Engrossed in a dream you have forgotten your true self.
Q: Without the world there is no place for love.
M: Quite so. All these attributes; being, consciousness, love and beauty are reflections of the real in the world. No real--no reflection.
Q: The world is full of desirable things and people. How can I imagine it non-existent?
M: Leave the desirable to those who desire. Change the cur- rent of your desire from taking to giving. The passion for giving, for sharing, will naturally wash the idea of an external world out of your mind, and of giving as well. Only the pure radiance of love will remain, beyond giving and receiving.
Q: In love there must be duality, the lover and the beloved.
M: In love there is not the one even, how can there be two? Love is the refusal to separate, to make distinctions. Before you can think of unity, you must first create duality. When you truly love, you do not say: 'I love you'; where there is mentatior,, there is duality.
Q: What is it that brings me again and again to India? It cannot be only the comparative cheapness of life here? Nor the colorf- ulness and variety of impressions. There must be some more important factor.
M: There is also the spiritual aspect. The division between the outer and the inner is less in India. It is easier here to express the inner in the outer. Integration is easier. Society is not so op- pressive.
Q: Yes, in the West it is all tam as and rajahs. In India there is WHAT IS PURE. UNALLOYED. UNATTACHED IS REAL 353 more of sattva, of harmony and balance.
M: Can't you go beyond the gun as? Why chose the sattva? Be what you are, wherever you are and worry not about gun as.
Q: I have not the strength.
M: It merely shows that you have gained little in India. What you truly have you cannot lose. Were you well-grounded in your self, change of place would not affect it
M: Relatively, what causes suffering is wrong, what alleviates it is right. Absolutely, what brings you back to reality is right and what dims reality is wrong.
Q: When we talk of helping humanity, we mean a struggle against disorder and suffering.
M: You merely talk of helping. Have you ever helped, really helped, a single man? Have you ever put one soul beyond the need of further help? Can you give a man character, based on full realization of his duties and opportunities at least, if not on the insight into his true being? When you do not know what is good for yourself, how can you know what is good for others? SEEK THESOURCE OF CONSCIOUSNESS 327
Q: The adequate supply of means of livelihood is good for all. You may be God himself, but you need a well-fed body to talk to us.
M: It is you that need my body to talk to you. I am not my body, nor do I need it. I am the witness only. I have no shape of my own. You are so accustomed to think of yourselves as bodies hav- ing consciousness that you just cannot imagine consciousness as having bodies. Once you realize that bodily existence is but a state of mint, a movement in consciousness, that the ocean of consciousness is infinite and eternal, and that, when in touch with consciousness, you are the witness only, you will be able to withdraw beyond consciousness altogether.
Q: We are told there are many levels of existences. Do you exit and function on all the levels? While you are on earth, are you also in heaven (swarga)?
M: ! am nowhere to be found! ! am not a thing to be given a place among other things. All things are in me, but I am not among things. You are telling me about the superstructure while I am concerned with the foundations. The superstructures rise and fall, but the foundations last. I am not interested in the tran- sient, while you talk of nothing else.
Q: forgive me a strange question. If somebody with a razor- sharp sword would suddenly severe your head, what difference would it make to your
M: None whatsoever. The body will lose its head, certain lines of communication will be cut, that is all. Two people talk to each other on the phone and the wire is cut. Nothing happens to the people, only they must look for some other means of communi- cation. The Bhagavad Gita says: "the sword does not cut it". It is literally so. It is in the nature of consciousness to survive its vehi- cles. It is like fire. It burns uP the fuel, but not itself. Just like a fire can outlast a mountain of fuel, so does consciousness sur- vive innllm~r:lhl~ hndi~s.
Q: The fuel affects th. e flame.
M: As long as it lasts. Change the nature of the fuel and the color and appearance of the flame will change. 328 1 AM THAT Now we are talking to each other. For this presence is needed; unless we are present, we cannot talk. But presence by itself is not enough. There must also he the desire to talk. Above all, we want to remain conscious. We shall bear every suffering and humiliation, but we shall rather remain~Qnscious. Unless we revolt against this craving for experience and let go the manifested altogether, there can be no relief. We shall re- main trapped.
Q: You say you are the silent witness and also you are beyond consciousness. Is there no contradiction in it? If you are beyond consciousness, what are you witnessing to?
M: I am conscious and unconscious, both conscious and un- conscious, neither conscious nor unconscious--to all this I am witness--but really there is no witness, because there is no- thing to be a witness to. I am perfectly empty of all mental forma- tions, void of mind--yet fully aware. This I try to express my say- ing that I am beyond the mind.
Q: How can I reach you then?
M: Be aware of being conscious and seek the source of con- sciousness. That is all. Very little can be conveyed in words. It is the doing as I tell you that will bring light, not my telling you. The means do not matter much; it is the desire, the urge, the ear- nestness that count. Transiency is Proof of Unreality 69
Questioner: My friend is a German and I was born in England from French parents. I am in India since over a year wandering from Ashram to Ashram. Maharaja: Any spiritual practices (sadhanas)? a Studies and meditation.
M: What did you meditate on?
Q: On what I read.
M: Good
Q: What are you doing, sir?
M: Sitting.
Q: And what else? ù
M: Talking.
Q: What are you talking about?
M: Do you want a lecture? Better ask something that really touches you, so that you feel strongly about it. Unless you are emotionally involved, you may argue with me, but there will be no real understanding between us. If you say: 'nothing warrens me, I have no problems,', it is all right with me, we can keep quiet. But if something really touches you, then there is purpose in talking. Shall I ask you? What is the purpose of your moving from place to place?
Q: To meet people, to try to understand them.
M: What people are you trying to understand? What exactly are you after 330 1 AM THAT
Q: Integration.
M: If you want integration, you must know whom you want to in- tegrate. a By meeting people and watching them, one comes to know oneself also. It goes together. .
M: It does not necessarily go together.
Q: One improves the other.
M: It does not work that way. The mirror reflects the image, but the image does not improve the mirror. You are neither the mir- ror nor the image in the mirror. Having perfected the mirror so that it reflects correctly, truly, you can turn the mirror round and see in it a true reflection of yourself--true as far as the mirror can reflect. But the reflection is not yourself--you are the Seer of the reflection. Do understand it clearly--whatever you may perceive you are not what you perceive.
Q: I am the mirror and the world iS the image?
M: You can see both the image and the mirror. You are neither. Who are you? Don't go by formulas. The answer iS not in words. The nearest you can say in words iS: I am what makes percep- tion possible, the life beyond the experience and his experi- ence. Now, Can you separate yourself both from the mirror and the image in the mirror and stand completely alone, all by yourself?
Q: No, I cannot.
M: How do you know that you cannot? There are so many things you are doing without knowing how to do it. You digest, you circulate your blood and Iymph, you move your muscles-- all without knowing how. In the same way, you perceive, you feel, you think without knowing the why and how of it. Similarly you are yourself without knowing it. There is nothing wrong with you as the Self. It is what it iS to perfection. It is the mirror that is not clear and true and, therefore, gives you false images. You need not correct yourself--only set right your idea of yourself. Learn to separate yourself from the image and the mirror, keep on remembering: I am neither the mind nor its ideas: do it pa- tiently and with convictions and you will surely come to the direct vision of yourself as the Source of being--knowing--loving, TRANSIENCY IS PROOF OF UNREALITY 331 eternal, all-em~racing all-pervading. You are the infinite focus- sed in a body. Now you see the body only. Try earnestly and you will come to see the infinite only.
Q: The experience of reality, when it Comes, does it last?
M: All experience iS necessarily transient. But the ground of all experience is immovable. Nothing that may be called an event will last. But some events purify the mind and some stain it. Mo- ments of deep insight and all-embracing love purify the mind, while desires and tsars, envies Ann anger, blind beliefs and in- tellectual arrogance pollute and dull the psyche.
Q: IS self-realization So important?
M: Without it you will be consumed by desires and fears, re- peating themselves meaninglessly in endless suffering. Most of the people do not know that there can be an end to pain. But once they have heard the good news, obviously going beyond all strife and struggle iS the most urgent task that can be. You know 'hat you can be free and now it iS up to you. Either you re- main forever hungry and thirsty, longing, searching, grabbing, holding, ever losing and sorrowing, or go out wholeheartedly in search of the state of timeless perfection to which nothing can be added, from which nothing--taken away. In it all desires and fears are absent, not because they were given up, but be- cause they have lost their meaning.
Q: So far I have been following you. Now, what am I expected to do?
M: There is nothing to do. Just be. Do nothing. Be. No climbing mountain and Sitting in Caves. I do not even say: 'be yourself', since you do not know yourself. Just be. Having seen that you are neither the 'outer' world of perceivable, nor the 'inner' world of thinkable, that you are neither body nor mind--just be .
Q: Surely, there are degrees of realization.
M: There are no stops to self-realization. There is nothing gradual about it. It happens suddenly and is irreversible. You ro- tate into a new dimension, seen from which the previous ones are mere abstractions. Just like on Sunrise you see things as they are, so on self-realization you See everything as it is. The world of illusions is left behind. 332 1 AM THAT
Q: In the state of realization do things change? They become colorful and full of meaning?
M: The experience is quite right, but it is not the experience of reality (sadanubhav), but of harmony (satvanubhav) of the uni- verse.
Q: Nevertheless, there is progress.
M: There can be progress only in the preparation (sadhanaJ. Realization is sudden. The fruit ripens slowly, but falls suddenly and without return.
Q: I am physically and mentally at peace. What more do I need?
M: Yours may not be the ultimate state. You will recognize that you have returned to your natural state by a complete absence of all desire and fear. After all, at the root of all desire and fear is the feeling of not being what you are. Just as a dislocated joint pains only as long as it is out of shape, and is forgotten as soon as it is set right, so is all self-concern a symptom of mental dis- tortion which disappears as soon as one is in the normal state.
Q: Yes, but what is the sadhana for achieving the natural state?
M: Hold on to the sense 'I am' to the exclusion of everything else. When thus the mind becomes completely silent, it shines with a new light and vibrates with new knowledge. It all comes spontaneously, you need only hold on to the 'I am'. Just like emerging from sleep or a state of rapture you feel rested ar,d yet you cannot explain why and how you come to feel so well, in the same way on realization you feel complete, fulfilled, free from the pleasure-pain complex, and yet not always able to explain what happened, why and how. You can put it only in negative terms: 'Nothing is wrong with me any longer.' It is only by com- parison with the past that you know that you are out of it. Other- wise--you are just yours''. Don't try to convey it to others. If you can, it is not the real thing. Be silent and watch it expressing itself in action.
Q: If you could tell me what I shall become, it may help me to watch over my development.
M: How can anybody tell you what you shalt become~when there is no becoming? You merely discover what you are. All TRAN~lENCY lS PROOF OF UNREALITY 333 mounding oneself to a pattern is a grievous waste of Tim. Think neither of the past nor of the future, just be. 0: How can I just Ben Changes are inevitable.
M: Changes are inevitable in the changeful, but you are not subject to them. You are the changeless background, against which changes are perceived.
Q: Everything changes, the background also changes. There is no need of a changeless background to notice changes. The self is momentary--it is merely the point where the past meets the future.
M: Of course the self based on memory is momenta!y. But such self demands unbroken continuity behind it. You know from ex- perience that there are gaps when your self is forgotten. What brings it back to life? What wakes you up in the morning? There must be some constant factor bridging the gaps in conscious- ness. If you watch carefully you will find that even your daily consciousness is in flashes, with gaps intervening all the time. What is in the gaps? What can there be but your real being, that is timeless; mind and mindlessness are one to it.
Q: Is there any particular place you would advise me to go to for spiritual attainment?
M: The only proper place is within. The outer world neither can help nor hinder. No system, no pattern of action will take you to your goal. Give up all working for a future, concentrate totally on the now, be concerned only with your response to every move- ment of life as it happens.
Q: What is the cause ot the urge to roam about?
M: There is no cause. You merely dream that you roam about. In a few years your stay in India will appear as a dream to you. You will dream some other dream at that time. Do realize that it is not you who moves from dream to dream, but the dreams flow before you and you are the immutable witness. No happening affects your real being--this is the absolute truth.
Q: Cannot I move about physically and keep steady inwardly?
M: You can, but what purpose does it serve? If you are earnest. You will find that in the end you will get fed up with roaming and 334 1 AM THAT regret the waste of energy and time. To find your self you need not take a single step.
Q: Is there any difference between the experience of the Self (at man) and of the Absolute (brahman)?
M: There can be no experience of the Absolute as it is beyond all experience. On the other hand, the self is the experiencing factor in every experience and thus, in a way, validates the mul- tiplicity of experiences. The world may be full of things of great value, but if there is nobody to buy them, they have no price. The Absolute contains everything experience able, but without the experience they are as nothing. That which makes the ex- perience possible is the Absolute. That which makes it actual is the Self.
Q: Don't we reach the Absolute through a gradation of expe- riences? Beginning with the grossest, we end with the most sublime.
M: There can be no experience without desire for it. There can be gradation between desires, but between the most sublime desire and the freedom from all desire there is an abyss which must be crossed. The unreal may look real, but it is transient. The real is not afraid of time.
Q: Is not the unreal the expression of the real?
M: How can it be? It is like saying that truth expresses itself in dreams. To the real the unreal is not. It appears to be real only because you believe in it. Doubt it, and it ceases. When you are in love with somebody, you give it reality--you imagine your love to be ail-powerful and everlasting. When it comes to an end, you say: 'I thought it was real, but it wasn't'. Transiency is the best proof of unreality. What is limited in time, and space and applicable to one person only, is not real. The real is for all and forever. Above everything else you cherish yourself. You would ac- cept nothing in exchange for your existence. The desire to be is the strongest of all desires and will go only on the realization of your true nature.
Q: Even in the unreal there is a touch of reality.
M: Yes, the reality you impart to it by taking it to be real. Having TRANSIENCY IS PROOF OF UNREALITY 335 convinced yourself, you are bound by your conviction. When the sun shines, colors appear. When it sets, they disappear. Where are the colors without the light?
Q: This is thinking in terms of duality.
M: All thinking is in duality. In identity no thought survives. ... God is the End of All Desire and Knowledge 70
Maharaj: Where are you coming from? What have you come for?
Questioner: I come from America and my friend is from the Re- x public of Ireland. I came about six months ago and I was travel- ing from Ashram to Ashram. My friend came on his own.
M: What have you seen?
Q: I have been at Sri Ramanashram and also I have visited Rishikesh. Can I ask you what is your opinion of Sri Ramana Maharshi?
M: We are both in the same ancient state. But what do you know of Maharshi? You take yourself to be a name and a body, so all you perceive are names and bodies. .
Q: Were you to meet the ~laharshi, what would happen?
M: Probably we would feel quite happy. We may even ex- change a few words. 336 1 AM THAT
Q: But would he recognize you as a liberated man?
M: Of course. As a man recognizes a man, so a nanny recog- nizes a nanny. You cannot appreciate what you have not experi- enced. You are what you think yourself to be, but you cannot think yourself to be what you have not experienced.
Q: To become an engineer I must learn engineering. To be- come God, what must I learn?
M: You must unlearn everything. God is the end of all desire and knowledge.
Q: You mean to say that I become God merely by giving up the desire to become God?
M: All desires rust be given up, because by desiring you take the shape of your desires. When no desires remain, you revert to your natural state.
Q: How do I come to know that I have achieved perfection?
M: You can not know perfection, you can know only imperfec- tion. For knowledge to be, there must be separation and dis- harmony. You can know what you are not, but you can not know your real being. You can be only what you are. The entire ap- proach is through understanding, which is in the seeing of the false as false. But to understand, you must observe from out- side.
Q: The Vedantic concept of Maya, illusion, applies to the mani- fested. Therefore our knowledge of the manifested is un- reliable. But we should be able to trust our knowledge of the unmanif~?.ct~i
M: There can be no knovvledge of the unmanifested. The poten- tial is unknowable. Only the actual can be known.
Q: Why should the knower remain unknown?
M: The knower knows the known. Do you know the knower? Who is the knower of the knower? You want to know the un- manifested. Can you say you know the manifested?
Q: I know things and ideas and their relations. It is the sum total of all my experiences.
M: All? GOD IS THE END OF ALL DESIRE AND KNOWLEDGE 33.
Q: Well, all actual experiences. I admit I cannot know what did not happen.
M: If the manifested is the sum total of all actual experiences, including their experiences, how much of the total do you know? A very small part indeed. And what is the little you know?
Q: Some sensory experiences as related to myself.
M: Not even that. You only know that you react. Who reacts and to what, you do not know. You know oncontact that you exist-- 'I am'. The 'I am this', '! am that' are imaginary. a I know the manifested because I participate in it. I admit, my part in it is very small, yet it is as real as the totality of it. And what is more important, I give it meaning. Without me the world is dark and silent.
M: A firefly illumining the world! You don't give meaning to the world, you find it. Dive deep into yourself and find the source from where all meaning flows. Surely it is not the superficial mind that can give meaning.
Q: What makes me limited and superficial?
M: The total is open and available, but you will not take it. You are attached to the little person you think yourself to be. Your desires are narrow, your ambitions--petty. After all, without a center of perception where wow!d be the manifested? Unper- ceived, the manifested is as good as the unmanifested. And you are the perceiving point, the non-dimensional source of all di- mensions. Know yourself as the total.
Q: How can a point contain a universe?
M: There is enough space in a point for an infinity of universes. There is no last of capacity. Self-limitation is the only problem. But you cannot run away from yourself. However far you go, you come back to yourself and to the need of understanding this point, ahoy is as nothing and yet the source of everything.
Q: I came to India in search of a Yoga teacher. I am still in search.
M: What kind of Yoga do you want to practice, the Yoga of get- ting, or the Yoga of ~ivinq us?
Q: Don't they come to the same in the end? 338 1 AM THAT ~JI: How can they? One enslaves, the other liberates. I ne mo- tive matters supremely. Freedom comes through renunciation. All possession is bondage.
Q: What I have the strength and the courage to hold on to, why should I give up? And if I have not the strength, how can I give up? ! do not understand this need of giving up. When I want something, why should I not pursue it? Renunciation is for the weak. M If you do not have the wisdom and the strength to give up, just look at your possessions. Your mere looking will burn them up. If you can stand outside your mind, you will soon find that total renunciation of possessions and desires is the most obvi- ously reasonable thing to do. You create the world and then worry about it. Becoming self- ish makes you weak. If you think you have the strength and courage to desire, it is because you are young and inexperi- enced. Invariably the object of desire destroys the means of acquiring it and then itself withers away. It is all for the best, be- cause it teaches you to shun desire like poison.
Q: How am I to practice desirelessness?
M: No need of practice. No need of any acts of renunciation. Just turn your mind away, that is all. Desire is merely the fixation of the mind on an idea. Get it out of its groove by denying it at- tention .
Q: That is all?
M: Yes, that is all. Whatever may be the desire or fear, don't dwell upon it. Try and see for yourself. Here and there you may forget, it does not matter. Go back to your attempts till the brush- ing away of every desire and fear, of every reaction becomes automatic.
Q: How can one live without emotions?
M: You can have all the emotions you want, but beware of reac- tions, of induced emotions. Be entirely self-determined and ruled from within, not from without. Merely giving up a thing to secure a better one is not true re- linquishment. Give it up because you see its valueless Ness. As you keep on giving up, you will find that you grow spontane- GOD IS THE END OF ALL DESIRE AND KNOWLEDGF I.~a nasally in intelligence and power and inexhaustible love and ion.
Q: Why so much insistence on relinquishing all desires and fears? Are they not natural?
M: They are not. They are entirely mind-made. You have to give up everything to know that you need nothing, not even your body. Your needs are unreal and your efforts are meaningless. You imagine that your possessions protect you. In reality they make you vulnerable. Realize yourself as away from all that can be pointed at as 'this' or 'that'. You are unreachable by any sen- sory experience or verbal construction. Turn away from them. Refuse to impersonate.
Q: After I have heard you, what am I to do?
M: Only hearing will not help you much. You must keep it in rind and ponder over it and try to understand the state of mind which makes me say what I say. I speak from truth; stretch your hand and take it. You are not what you think yourself to be, I as- sure you. The image you have of yourself is made up from memories and is purely accidental.
Q: What I am is the result of my karma.
M: What you appear to be, you are not. Karma is only a word you have learnt to repeat. You have never been, nor shall ever be a person. Refuse to consider yourself as one. But as long as you do not even doubt yourself to be a Mr. 50-and-so, there is little hope. When you refuse to open your eyes, what can you be shown?
Q: I imagine karma to be a mysterious power that urges me to- wards perfection.
M: That's what people told you. You are already perfect, here and now. The perfectible is not you. You imagine yourself to be what you are not--stop it. It is the cessation that is important, not what you are going to stop.
Q: Did not karma compel me to become what I am?
M: Nothing compels. You are as you believe yourself to be. Stop believing.
Q: Here you are sitting on your seat and talking to me. What compels you is your karma. 340 1 AM THAT
M: Nothing compels me. I do what needs doing. But you do so many unnecessary things. It is your refusal to examine that creates karma. It is the indifference to your own suffering that perpetuates it.
Q: Yes, it is true. What can put an end to this indifference?
M: The urge must come from within as a wave of detachment, or compassion.
Q: Could I meet this urge half way?
M: Of course. See your own condition, see the condition of the world.
Q: We were told about karma and reincarnation, evolution and Yoga, masters and disciples. What are we to do with all this knowledge?
M: Leave it all behind you. Forget it. Go forth, unburdened with ideas and beliefs. Abandon all verbal structures, all relative truth, all tangible objectives. The Absolute can be reached by absolute devotion only. Don't be half-hearted.
Q: I must begin with some absolute truth. Is there any?
M: Yes, there is, the feeling: 'I am'. Begin with that.
Q: Nothing else is true?
M: All else is neither true nor false. It seems real when it Al pears, it disappears when it is denied. A transient thing is a mys- tery.
Q: I thought the real is the mystery.
M: How can it be? The Teal is simple, open, clear and kind, beautiful and joyous. It is completely free of contradictions. It is ever new, ever fresh, endlessly creative. Being and non-being, life and death, all distinctions merge in it.
Q: I can admit that all is false. But, does it make my mind non- existent?
M: The mind is what it thinks. To make it true, think true.
Q: If the shape of things is mere appearance, what are they in reality?
M: In reality there is only perception. The perceive and the perceived are conceptual, the fact of perceiving is actual.
Q: Where does the Absolute come in?
M: The Absolute is the birthplace of Perceiving. It rakes per- GOD IS THE END OF ALL DESIRE AND KNOWLEDGE 341 caption possible. But too much analysis leads you nowhere. There is in you the core of being which is beyond analysis, beyond the mind. You can know it in action only. Express it in daily life and its light will grow ever brighter. The legitimate function of the mind is to tell you what is not. But if you want positive knowledge, you must go beyond the mind.
Q: In all the universe is there one single thing of value?
M: Yes, the power of love. In Self-awareness you Learn about Yourself
Questioner: It is our repeated experience that the disciples do much harm to their Gurus. They make plans and carry them out, without considering the Guru's wishes. In the end there is only endless worry for the Guru and bitterness for his disciples. Maharaja: Yes, itdoes happen.
Q: Who compels the Guru to submit to these indignities?
M: The Guru is basically without desire. He sees what happens, but feels no urge to interfere. He makes no choices, takes no decisions. As pure witness, he watches what is going on and remains unaffected. 342 1 AM rat
Q: But his work suffers.
M: Victory is always his--in the end. He knows that if the dis- ciples do not learn from his wigads, they will learn from their own mistakes. Inwardly he remains quiet and silent. He has no sense of being I separate person. The entire universe is his own, in- cluding his disciples with their petty plans. Nothing in particular affects him, or, which comes to the same, the entire universe af- fects him in equal measure.
Q: Is there no such thing as the Guru's grace?
M: His grace is constant and universal. It is not given to one and denied to another.
Q: How does it affect me personally?
M: It is by The Guru's grace that your mind is engaged in search for truth and it is by his grace that you will find it. It works unerringly towards your ultimate good. And it is for all.
Q: Some disciples are ready, mature, and some are not. IVrust not the Guru exercise choice and make decisions?
M: The Guru knows the Ultimate and relentlessly propels the disciple towards it. The disciple is full of obstacles, which he himself must overcome. The Guru is not very much concerned with the superficialities of the disciple's life. It is like gladstation The fruit must fall--when no longer held back.
Q: If the disciple does not know the goal, how can he make out the obstacles?
M: The goal is shown by the Guru, obstacles are discover- ed by the disciple. The Guru has no preferences, but those who have obstacles to overcome seem to be lagging behind. In reality the disciple is not different from the Guru. He is the same dimensionless center of per-option and love in actionHt is only his imagination and self-identification with the imagined, that encloses him and converts him into a person. The Guru is concerned little with the person. His attention is on the inner watcher. It is the task of the watcher to understand and thereby eliminate the person. While there is grace on one side, there must be dedication to the task ton thy other
Q: But the Nelson Dow Nat wont tl~ ho eliminated. IN ~FLF-AWARENESS Yell ' LFARN Abel JT Y~l JR~FI F .~
M: The person is merely the result of a misunderstanding. In reality, there is no such thing. Feelings, thoughts and actions ace before the watcher in endless succession, leaving traces in the brain and creating an illusion of continuity. A reflection of the watcher in the mind creates the sense of 'I' and the person acquires an apparently independent existence. In reality there is no person, only the watcher identifying himself with the 'I' and the 'mine'. The teacher tells the watcher:. you are not this, there is nothing of yours in this, except the little point of 'I am', which is the bridge between the watcher and his dream. ~1 Ann this, I am that' is dream, while pure 'I am' has the stamp of reality on it. You have tasted so many things--all came to naught. Only the sense 'I am' persisted--unchanged. Stay with the changeless among the changeful, until you are able to go beyond.
Q: When will it happen?
M: It will happen as soon as you remove the obstacles.
Q: Which obstacles?
M: Desire for the false and fear of the true. You, as the person, imagine that the Guru is interested in you as a person.snot at all. To him you are a nuisance and a hindrance to be done away with. He actually aims at your elimination as a factor in con-- sauciness.
Q: If I am eliminated, what will remain?
M: Nothing will remain, all will remain. The sense of identity will remain, but no longer identification with a particular body. Being --awareness--love will shine in full splendor. Liberation is never of the person, it is always from the person.
Q: And no trace remains of the person?
M: A vague memory remains, like the memory of a dream, or early childhood. After all, what is there to remember? A flow of events, mostly accidental and meaningless. A sequence of de- sires and fears and inane blunders. Is there anything worth re- membering? The person is but a shell imprisoning you. Break the shell.
Q: Whom are you asking to break the shell? Who is to break the shell? 344 1 AM THAT
M: Break the bonds of memory and self-identification and the shell will break by itself. There is a center that imparts reality to whatever it perceives. All you need is to understand that you are the source of reality, that you give reality instead of getting it, that you need no support and no confirmation. Things are as they are, because you accept them as they are. Stop accepting them and they will dissolve. Whatever you think about with de- sire or fear appears before you as real. Look at it without desire or fear and it does lose substance. Pleasure and pain are momentary. It is simpler and easier to disregard them than to act on them.
Q: If all things come to an end, why did they appear at all?
M: Creation is in the very nature of consciousness. Conscious- ness causes appearances. Reality is beyond consciousness.
Q: While we are conscious of appearances, how is it that we are not conscious that these are mere appearances?
M: The mind covers up reality, without knowing it. To know the nature of the mind, you need intelligence, the capacity to look at the mind in silent and dispassionate awareness.
Q: If I am of the nature of all-pervading consciousness, how could ignorance and illusion happen to me?
M: Neither ignorance nor illusion ever happened to you. Find the self to which you ascribe ignorance and illusion and your question will be answered. You talk as if you know the self and see it to be under the sway of ignorance and illusion. But, in fact, you do not know the self, nor are you aware of ignorance. By all rrweans become aware--this will bring you to the self and you will realize that there is neither ignorance nor delusion in it. It is like saying: if there is sun, how can darkness be? As under a stone there will be darkness, however strong the sunlight, so in the shadow of the 'I-am-the-body' consciousness there must be ignorance and illusion.
Q: But why did the body consciousness come into being?
M: Don't ask 'why', ask 'how'. It is in the nature of creative im- agination to identify itself with its creations. You can stop it any moment by switching off attention. Or through investigation.
Q: Does creation come before investigation? IN SELF-AWARENESS YOU LEARN ABOUT YOURSELF 345 E
M: First you create a world, then the 'I am' becomes a person, who is not happy for various reasons. He goes out in search of happiness, meets a Guru who tells hi
M: 'You are not a person, find who you are'. He does it and goes beyond. 0: Why did he not do it at the very start?
M: It did not occur to him. He needed somebody to tell him.
Q: Was that enough?
M: It was enough.
Q: Why does it not work in my case
M: You do not trust me.
Q: Why is my faith weak?
M: Desires and fears have dulled your mind. It needs some scrubbing.
Q: How can I clear my mind?
M: By watching it relentlessly. Inattention obscures, attention clarifies.
Q: Why do the Indian teachers advocate inactivity?
M: Most of people's activities are valueless, if not outright des- tructive. Dominated by desire and fear, they can do nothing good. Ceasing to do evil precedes beginning to do good. Hence the need for stopping all activities for a time, to investi- gate one's urges and their motives, see all that is false in one's life, purge the mind of all evil and then only restart work, begin- ning with one's obvious duties. Of course, if you have a chance to help somebody, by all means do it and promptly too, don't keep him waiting till you are perfect. But do not become a pro- fessional do-gooder.
Q: I do not feel t'nere are too many do-gooders among disci- ples. Most of those I met are too absorbed in their own petty conflicts. Theyshave no heart for others. M Such self-centeredness is temporary. Be patient with such people. For so many years they gave attention to everything but themselves. Let them turn to themselves for a change.
Q: What are the fruits of self-awareness?
M: You grow more intelligent. In awareness you learn. In self- 346 1 AM THAT awareness you learn about yourself. Ot course, you can only learn what you are not. To know what you are, you must go beyond the mind.
Q: Is not awareness beyond the mind?
M: Awareness is the point at which the mind reaches out beyond itself into reality. In awareness you seek not what pi eases, but what is true.
Q: I find Thea! awareness brings about a state of inner silence, a state of psychic void.
M: It is all right as it goes, but it is not enough. Have you felt the all-embracing emptiness In which the universe swims like a cloud in the blue sky?
Q: Sir, let me first come to know well my own inner space.
M: Destroy the wall that separates, the 'I-am-the-body' idea and the inner and the outer will become one.
Q: Am I to die?
M: Physical destruction is meaningless. It is the clinging to sensate life that binds you. If you could experience the inner void fully, the explosion into the totality would be near.
Q: My own spiritual experience has its seasons. Sometimes I feel glorious, then again I am down. I am live a lift boy--going up, going down, going up, going down.
M: All changes in consciousness are due to the 'I-am-the-body' idea. Divested of this idea the mind becomes steady. There is pure being, free of experiencing anything in particular. But to realize it you must do what your teacher tells you. Mere listen- ing, even memorizing, is not enough. If you do not struggle hard to apply every word of it in your daily life, don't complain that you made no progress. All real progress is irreversible. Ups and downs merely show that the teaching has not been taken to heart and translated into action fully.
Q: The other day you told us that there is no such thing as karma. Yet we see that every thing has a cause and the sum total of all the causes may be called karma.
M: As long as you believe yourself to be a body, you will as- cribe causes to everything. I do not say things have no causes. IN SELF-AWARENESS YOU LEARN ABOI JT YOI IRRFI F ~7 Each thing has innumerable causes. It is as it is, because the world is as it is. Every cause in its ramifications covers the uni- verse. When you realize that you are absolutely free to be what you consent to be, that you are what you appear to be because of ignorance or indifference, you are free to revolt and change. You allow yourself to be what you are not. You are looking for the causes of being what you are not! It is a futile search. There are no causes, but your ignorance of your real being, which is per- fect and beyond all causation. For whatever happens, all the universe is responsible and you are the source of the universe.
Q: I know nothing about being the cause of the universe.
M: Because you do not investigate. Enquire, search within and you will know.
Q: How can a speck like me create the vast universe?
M: When you are infected with the 'I-am-the body' virus; a whole universe springs into being. But when you have had enough of it, you cherish some fanciful ideas about liberator and pursue lines of action totally futile. You concentrate, yowl meditate, you torture your mind and body, you do all sorts of unnecessary things, but you miss the essential which is the elimination of the person.
Q: In the beginning we may have to pray and meditate for some tire before we are ready for self-enquiry.
M: If you believe so, go on. To me, all delay is a waste of time. You can skip all the preparation and go directly for the ultimate search within. Of all the Yogas it is the simplest and the shortest. What is Pure, Unalloyed, Unattached is Real 72
Maharaj: You are back in India! Where have you been, what have you seen?
Questioner: I come from Switzerland. I stayed there with a re- markable man who claims to have realized. He has done many Yogas in his past and had many experiences that passed away. Now he claims no special abilities, nor knowledge; the only un- usual thing about him is connected with sensations; he is un- able to separate the seer from the seen. For instance, when he sees a car rushing at him, he does not know whether the car is rushing at him, or he at a car. He seems to be both at the same time, the seer and the seen. They become one. Whatever he sees, he sees himself. When I asked~ him some Vedantic ques- tions he said: 'I really cannot answer. I do not know. All I know is this strange identity with whatever I perceive. You know, I ex- pected anything but this.' He is on the whole a humble man; he makes no disciples and in no way puts himself on a pedestal. He is willing to talk about his strange condition, but that is all.
M: Now he knows what he knows. All else is over. At yeast he still talks. Soon he may cease talking.
Q: What will he do then?
M: Immobility and silence are not inactive. The flower fills the space with perfume, the candle--with light. They do nothing yet they change everything by their mere presence. You can photograph the candle, but not its light. You can know the man, his name and appearance, but not his influence. His very pres- et-:e is action. I WHAT IS PURER UNALLOYED, UNATTACHED IS REAL 349
Q: Is it not natural to be active?
M: Everybody wants to be active, but where do his actions originate? There is no central point each action begets another, meaninglessly and painfully, in endless succession. The alter- nation of work and pause is not there. First find the immutable center where all movement takes birth. Just like a wheel turns round an axle, so must you be always at the axle in the center and not whirling at the periphery.
Q: How do I go about it in practice?
M: Whenever a thought or emotion of desire or fear comes to your mind, just turn away from it.
Q: By suppressing my thoughts and feelings I shall provoke a reaction.
M: I am not talking of suppression. Just refuse attention.
Q: Must I not use effort to arrest the movements of the mind?
M: It has nothing to do with effort. Just turn away, look between the thoughts, rather than at the thoughts. When you happen to walk in a crowd, you do not fight every man you meet--you just find your way between.
Q: If I use my will to control the mind, it only strengthens the ego.
M: Of course. When you fight, you invite a fight. But when you do not resist, you meet with no resistance. When you refuse to play the game, you are out of it.
Q: How long will it take me to get free of the mind?
M: It ray take a thousand years, but really no time is required. All you need is to be in dead earnest. Here the will is the deed. If you are sincere, you have it. After all, it is a matter of attitude. Nothing stops you from being a nanny here and now, except fear. You are afraid of being impersonal, of impersonal being. It is all quite simple. Turn away from your desires and fears and from the thoughts they create and you a!e at once in your natural state.
Q: No question of reconditioning, changing, or eliminating the mind?
M: Absolutely none. Leave your mind alone, that is all. Don't go 350 1 AM THAT along with it. After all, there is no such thing as mind apart from thoughts which come and go obeying their own laws, not yours. They dominate you only because you are interested in them. It is exactly as Christ said 'Resist not evil'. By resisting evil you merely strengthen it.
Q: Yes, I see now. All I have to do is to deny existence to evil. Then it fades away. But does it not boil down to some kind of auto-suggestion?
M: The auto-suggestion is in full swing now, when you think yourself to be a person, caught between good and evil. What I am asking you to do is to put an end to it, to wake up and see things as they are. About your stay in Switzerland with that strange friend of yours: what did you Cain in his company?
Q: Nothing absolutely. His experience did not affect me at all. One thing I have understood: there is nothing to search for. Wherever I may go, nothing waits for me at the end of the jour- ney. Discovery is not the result of transportation.
M: Yes, you are quite apart from anything that can be gained or lost.
Q: Do you call it verge. relinquishment, renunciation?
M: There is nothing to renounce. Enough if you stop acquiring. To give you must have, and to have you must take. Better don't take. It is simpler than to practice renunciation, which leads to a dangerous form of 'spiritual' pride. All this weighing, selecting, choosing, exchanging--it is all shopping in some 'spiritual' market. What is your business there? What deal are you out to strike? When you are not out for business, what is the use of this endless anxiety of choice? Restlessness takes you nowhere. Something prevents you from seeing that there is nothing you need. Find it out and see-its falseness. It is like having swallowed some poison and suffering from unquenchable craving for water. Instead of drinking beyond all measure, why not eliminate the poison and be free of this burning thirst?
Q: I shall have to eliminate the ego!
M: The sense 'I am a person in time and space' is the Poison. In WHAT IS PURE, UNALLOYED. UNATTACHED IS REAL 351 a way,time itself is the poison. In tire all things come to an end and new are born, to be devoured in their turn. Do not identify yourself with time, do not ask anxiously: 'what next, what next?' Step out of time and see it devour the world. Say: 'Well, it is in the nature of time to put an end to everything. Let it be. It does not concern me. I am not combustible, nor do I need to collect fuel'.
Q: Can the witness be without the things to witness?
M: There is always something to witness. If not a thing, then its absence. Witnessing is natural and no problem. The problem is excessive interest, leading to self-identification. Whatever you are engrossed in you take to be real.
Q: Is the 'I am' real or unreal? Is the 'I am' the witness? Is the witness real or unreal?
M: What is pure, unalloyed, unattached, is real. What is tainted, mixed up, dependent and transient is unreal. Do not be misled by words--one word may convey several and even contradic- tory meanings. The 'I am I that pursues tune pleasant and shuns the unpleasant is false; the 'I am' that sees pleasure and pain as inseparable sees rightly. The witness that is enmeshed in what he perceives is the person; the witness who stands aloof, un- moved and untouched, is the watch-tower of the real, the point at which awareness, inherent in the unmanifested, contacts the manifested. There can be no universe without the witness, there can be no witness without the universe.
Q: Time consumes the world. Who is the witness of time?
M: He who is beyond time--the Unnameable. A glowing ember, moved round and round quickly enough, appears as a glowing circle. When the movement ceases, the ember re- mains. Similarly, the 'I am' in movement creates the world. The 'I am' at peace becomes the Absolute. You are like a man with an electric torch walking through a gallery. You can see only what is within the beam. The rest is in darkness.
Q: If I project the world, I should be able to change it.
M: Of course, you can. But you must cease identifying yourself with it and go beyond. Then you have the power to destroy and recreate. I AM THAT
Q: All I want is to be free.
M: You must know two things: What are you to be free from and what keeps you bound.
Q: Why do you want to annihilate the universe?
M: I am not concerned with the universe. Let it be or not be. It is enough if I know myself.
Q: If you are beyond the world, then you are of no use to the world.
M: Pity the self that is, not the world that is not! Engrossed in a dream you have forgotten your true self.
Q: Without the world there is no place for love.
M: Quite so. All these attributes; being, consciousness, love and beauty are reflections of the real in the world. No real--no reflection.
Q: The world is full of desirable things and people. How can I imagine it non-existent?
M: Leave the desirable to those who desire. Change the cur- rent of your desire from taking to giving. The passion for giving, for sharing, will naturally wash the idea of an external world out of your mind, and of giving as well. Only the pure radiance of love will remain, beyond giving and receiving.
Q: In love there must be duality, the lover and the beloved.
M: In love there is not the one even, how can there be two? Love is the refusal to separate, to make distinctions. Before you can think of unity, you must first create duality. When you truly love, you do not say: 'I love you'; where there is mentatior,, there is duality.
Q: What is it that brings me again and again to India? It cannot be only the comparative cheapness of life here? Nor the colorf- ulness and variety of impressions. There must be some more important factor.
M: There is also the spiritual aspect. The division between the outer and the inner is less in India. It is easier here to express the inner in the outer. Integration is easier. Society is not so op- pressive.
Q: Yes, in the West it is all tam as and rajahs. In India there is WHAT IS PURE. UNALLOYED. UNATTACHED IS REAL 353 more of sattva, of harmony and balance.
M: Can't you go beyond the gun as? Why chose the sattva? Be what you are, wherever you are and worry not about gun as.
Q: I have not the strength.
M: It merely shows that you have gained little in India. What you truly have you cannot lose. Were you well-grounded in your self, change of place would not affect it
M: Why don't you create your own environment? The world has only as much power over you as you give it. Rebel. Go beyond duality, make no difference between east and west.
Q: What can one do when one finds oneself in a very unspiritual environment?
M: Do nothing. Be yourself. Stay out. Look beyond.
Q: There may be clashes at home. Parents rarely understand.
M: When you know your true being, you have no problems. You may please your parents or not, marry or not, make a lot of money or not; it is all the same to you. Just act according to cur cumstances, yet in close touch with the facts, with the reality in every situation.
Q: Is it not a very high state?
M: Oh no, it is the normal state. You call it high because you are afraid of it. First be free from fear. See that there is nothing to be afraid of. Fearlessness is the door to the Supreme.
Q: No amount of effort can make me fearless.
M: Fearlessness comes by itself, when you see that there is no- thing to be afraid of. When you walk in a crowded street, you just bypass people. Some you see, some you just glance at, but you do not stop. It isthe stopping that creates the bottleneck. Keep moving! Disregard names and shapes, don't be attached to them; your attachment is your bondage.
Q: What should ! do when a man slaps me on my face?
M: You will react according to your character, inborn or ac- quired. 354 1 AM THAT
Q: Is it inevitable? Am 1, is the world, condemned to remain as we are?
M: A jeweler who wants to refashion an ornament, first melts it town to shapeless gold. Similarly, one must return to one's origi- nal state before a new name and form can emerge. Death is essential Tom renewal.
Q: You are always stressing the need of going beyond, of aloofness, of solitude. You hardly ever use the words 'right' and 'wrong'. Why is it so?
M: It is right to be oneself, it is wrong not to be. All else is condi- tional. You are eager to separate right from wrong, because you need some basis for action. You are always after doing some- thing or other. But, personally motivated action, based on some scale of values, aiming at some result is worse than inaction, for its fruits are always bitter.
Q: Are awareness and love one and the same?
M: Of course. Awareness is dynamic, love is being. Awareness is love in action. By itself the mind can actualize any number of possibilities, but unless they are prompted by love, they are val- ueless. Love precedes creation. Without it there is only chaos.
Q: Where is the action in awareness?
M: You are so incurably operational! Unless there is Movement, restlessness, turmoil, you do not call it action. Chaos is move- ment for movement's sake. True action does not displace; it transforms. A change of place is mere transportation; a change of heart is action. Just remember, nothing perceivable is real. Activity is not action. Action is hidden, unknown, unknowable. You can only know the fruit.
(My humble salutations to Advaita Vedanta Library for the collection)
Note: This text may have spelling and grammatical mistakes.
(Continued .......)
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