"Brahma satyam jagat mithya, jivo brahmaiva naparah"

Brahman is the only truth, the world is unreal, and there is ultimately no difference between Brahman and individual self.

-Adi Shankaracharya, Brahmajnanavalimala verse 20

 "A monk decides to meditate alone. Away from his monastery, he takes a boat and goes to the middle of the lake, closes his eyes and begins to meditate. After a few hours of unperturbed silence, he suddenly feels the blow of another boat hitting his. 

"With his eyes still closed, he feels his anger rising and, when he opens his eyes, he is ready to shout at the boatman who dared to disturb his meditation. But when he opened his eyes, saw that it was an empty boat, not tied up, floating in the middle of the lake…

"At that moment, the monk achieves self-realization and understands that anger is within him; it simply needs to hit an external object to provoke it. After that, whenever he meets someone who irritates or provokes his anger, he remembers; the other person is just an empty boat. Anger is inside me."

-Thich Nhat Hanh

Illuminating Silence

 From “Illuminating Silence”, Sheng Yen

Many people are confused in thinking that enlightenment as a state implies some continuing ecstasy of bliss and awareness such as may be experienced in kensho [Japanese, “seeing one’s nature”, ie, initial enlightenment experience]. This does not appear to be a correct understanding. The fully enlightened practitioner may be said to be ‘one who lives from a perspective of a wisdom-understanding which functions without ego concern under all circumstances’. Such a realized person lives normally in the world, simply lacking habitual self-concern. He or she will have a mirror-like quality in which others see themselves, rather than seeing the reactivity of ego in the one before them. A brief enlightenment experience may be the origin of such a condition but the majority of such experiences are not followed by the persistence of an enlightened state; rather selfish vexations return but with a reduced vigor. It may be that some individuals develop a capacity to generate the experience of selfless bliss, others may find themselves there more frequently, but for most the condition is a short-term blessing. Since the experience does not ensure the emergence of the state of being an enlightened person, further practice is the essential norm.

Yet there is another way of envisaging this condition, not so much as ‘an’ experience, but more as a form of knowledge. In the Caodong [Japanese: Soto Zen] tradition, enlightenment is said to be no different from practice. This view focuses on the meditative fading away of categorisations of all kinds, time, space, self, until a residual nothingness is discovered in which everything is nonetheless mirrored. Such an approach does not, therefore, emphasise the sudden experiential, revelatory aspect of enlightenment, but rather the discovery of an underlying condition of mind implicitly always present. To know this state is thus more a type of knowing than an experience of insight of limited duration. Some may argue that this Caodong approach is the more mature perspective and it is the deep view of Silent Illumination.

Anyone who has ‘seen the nature’ is unlikely to claim to be an enlightened person, even when a master has confirmed the experience; he or she simply knows what a glimpse of enlightenment entails. Indeed, anyone claiming to be enlightened is probably acting erroneously from an inflated ego, which a teacher has been unable to contain. Simple humility alone will normally prevent any such claim. People may consider another person to be ‘enlightened’ on observing an exceptional being who seems truly to have transcended the vexations of this world. It is doubtful whether there are more than a handful of such persons alive in any one generation. Some may become great lamas, masters, or teachers; others may remain entirely unknown, except perhaps to a few. 🕊

Jnana and Vijnana

 “The jñānī, according to Ramakrishna, is the traditional Advaitin who has attained the spiritual realization that the impersonal nondual Brahman alone is real and the universe is unreal. The vijñānī, however, first attains knowledge of Brahman and then achieves the even greater, and more comprehensive, realization that Brahman 'has become the universe and its living beings.' For Ramakrishna, then, both the jñānī and the vijñānī are Advaitins, since they both maintain that Brahman is the sole reality. However, while the jñānī has the acosmic realization of nondual Brahman in nirvikalpa samādhi, the vijñānī returns from the state of nirvikalpa samādhi to attain the richer, world-inclusive nondual realization that the same Brahman realized in nirvikalpa samādhi has also manifested as everything in the universe. Hence, unlike the jñānī, the vijñānī combines knowledge and devotion by worshipping everything and everyone as real manifestations of God.”

 ~ Swami Medhananda, Swami Vivekananda’s Vedantic Cosmopolitanism

SINLESS

“The Vedanta recognizes no sin;  it only recognizes error. And the greatest error, says the Vedanta, is to say that you are weak, that you are a sinner, a miserable creature, and that you have no power and you cannot do this and that.” 

― Swami Vivekananda

The Light of All Lights

One day a group of musicians came to play for Ramana Maharshi. The instruments included flute, violin and harmonium.

Afterwards there was a discussion about the various instruments and which was the most pleasing. The Maharshi said that he himself listened to nothing but the harmonium as its steady, monotonous, one-pointed rhythm helped to keep one centered in the Self.

Q: What is the significance of the spot between the eyebrows?

RM: It is a reminder not to see with our eyes. The mind functions both as light and objects; if divested of objects the Light alone will remain.

Q: But must we know that there is such light?

RM: Sight or cognition pertains to the present state because there is light. Light is the essential requisite for sight. It is plain in our daily life. Among the lights, the sunlight is the most important. Hence they speak of the glory of millions of suns.

Q: I cannot go within sufficiently deeply.

RM: It is wrong to say that. Where are you now, if not in the Self? Where can you go? All at is necessary is the stern belief that you are the Self. It is better to say that the other activities throw a veil over you.

- Conscious Immortality (Roy Eugene Davis)

The Best Asana for Self-Realization

 

Q: Is it good to devote some time to stay healthy?

Annamalai Swami: "It is difficult to do sādhana if the body is not in good condition. Hatha yoga is one way of staying healthy. Bhagavan (Ramana Maharshi) used to say, however, that of all the different āsanās, nidhidhyāsanā is the best. He would then add that nidhidhyāsanā means abidance in the Self.

"Don’t pay too much attention to the body. If you worry about the well-being of your body, you identify with it more and more. Look at it as a useful vehicle: maintain it, fuel it properly and repair if it breaks down, but don’t become attached to it. If you can keep your attention on the Self without being distracted by unpleasant bodily sensations, you are healthy enough to do sādhana. If you do your meditation earnestly and continuously you will begin to find that health problems will not distract you. When your abidance in the Self is firm and strong, you cease to be aware of the body and its pains.

""   "We must take care of the body by giving it food, shelter and clothing. This is necessary because the journey to the Self is only easy when the body is healthy. If a ship is not in need of repair, if it is in good condition, we can easily use it to go on a journey. But we should not forget the purpose for which we have been given this body." 

ALL ONE

Question: Is it necessary to renounce the world?

Anandamayi Ma: "No, why? Where is the place where God is not? The natural way of life itself could be transformed into the spiritual way of life. In fact, there is nothing which can be 'other' to God; so properly speaking, to live in the world is to be on the way to Self-realization. Since this perspective has been lots to us we perforce speak in the language of  'otherness to God'. To realize one's self means to discover that there is naught else except God, God alone is, and all else is God only."

The Path to Self-Abidance

 “Fold back the speech into the mind. Fold the mind into the intellect. Fold that intellect into the ‘witness’ of the intellect. After gaining perfectly the attitude of a witness to one’s own thought processes, this witnessing faculty also should be folded into the tranquil Atman, the Supreme Self.”

 

-Kathopanishad 1.3.13

Isvara Pranidhana (Surrender of the Ego)

  

Lord, take me where You want me to go;
Let me meet who You want me to meet;
Tell me what You want me to say; and
Keep me out of your way.

Father Mychal Judge

Realization

 

"To me, there is no desire for the continuance of enjoyments, nor for the abandoning of enjoyments, Whatever comes, let it come. Whatever departs let it go.

"When the mind is destroyed by the mind and has arrived at the state devoid of egotism, and when thought has dropped down (or vanished) through thought, I remain self-abiding and alone"

-"The Story of Prahlaaada" in The Essence of Yoga Vasishta (Samata Books)

Vedanta from the Creator of HBO's 'Deadwood'

 

"When I was writing Deadwood, my formal voice changed....The reason that happened then I think is that I accepted that the formal voice is God's voice. No matter how you distort it or reverb it, it's still God's voice. Once you accept that, when you're writing, the question becomes, what would be necessary to God, if the narrator has to be true to the narrator's nature and the characters have to be true to their natures? If we were to say that God as a narrator wants to place the characters in a situation most congenial to their discovery of their deepest nature - which is that their sense of themselves as separate is predicated on an upper misapprehension, and they are all one thing - how would you go about telling the story."

"...The idea of being an auteur, I don't believe in that. I don't care whose name is on a script. We are organs of a larger organism which knows us although we do not know it. I regard myself as vessel of whatever that larger organism is, its instrument, rather than as the source of the scenes. So a lot of what I do is try to get out of the way. That's the way I work in my writing. That's the way I work with the actors. That's he way I edit. It put me in the path of an enormous amount of energy."

-David Milch, writer of creator/writer of NYPD Blue and Deadwood, in his recent memoir, Life's Work.

From the Wordly to the Divine

 "It is easy to be worldly, it is difficult to be Divine. From the heart and base of the spinal cord, we must awaken the Kundalini so Cosmic Energy can rise to the highest. By obtaining purification of spirit, we obtain Divine powers. Upon awakening of the Kundalini, set it forth on the road to God."

-Swami Kailashananda

La Vida es un Sueño (Life is a Waking Dream)

"There is no society, there is no suffering and there is no world. The world, the society and the suffering that you perceive are all part of your dream. They have no reality except in your own mind.

"If you see a hungry man in your dream you can cook him a dream meal and give him some dream food. That will give him some temporary relief. If, instead, you wake up, you solve the problem permanently because you discover that the hungry man only existed in your imaginary dream world.

"The world is like a reflection in a mirror. The world which we see is merely a reflection of our gunas, our own state of mind. We see the reflection, forget the mirror, and imagine that we are looking at a real world which is separate from us.

"You are continuously radiating a mental energy which affects everything and everyone around you. If you are in a rajasic or a tamasic state you are automatically infecting the world with your unwholesome state of mind. The jnani, who is established in the reality beyond the gunas, experiences only continuous peace and bliss. He alone can help other people by radiating this peace and bliss to them. If you try to help this world with some physical activity, the good that you do may be more than wiped out by the negative mental vibrations which you inflict on the world. If you make your mind pure, you automatically help everyone in the world because each person will receive a cleansing and healing measure of your own purity.

"An ant is walking on the floor with a grain of sugar on its back. Suddenly a man steps on it and kills it. Finish: instant death. We are in the same situation as the ant, for death may come at any moment. You can take nothing with you when you die, not even your mind. So why not die to the world now?

"The world that you are attached to is nothing more than a long dream. You may feel hungry in your dream and then wake up to find that you are suffering from indigestion pains because you ate too much the night before. How much reality do you then give to the hunger pains that you felt in your dream?

"If you see suffering all around you it is just a reflection of your own inner suffering. If you want to alleviate suffering go to the root cause which is the suffering inside yourself. Immerse yourself in the Self. End the maya dream and wake up to the real world of jnana. Your ideas about the world are all wrong because you are misperceiving it. Your mind is processing what you see in such a way that it makes you think that there is a suffering world outside and apart from you. If you want to get rid of that suffering world you must eliminate the mental processes that make you misperceive it. When you reach the state of jnana there will be no misperceptions. Your vision will be completely clear. You will be aware that there is no suffering and no world. You will be aware that the Self alone exists." 🕉

-Annamalai Swami

Svadhyaya (Self-Study)--->Moksha

"If you examine yourself, you will see. There is beauty in the birds and in the animals. They too eat and drink like us, mate and multiply; but there is this difference: we can realize our true nature, the Atman [Self]. Having been born as human beings, we must not waste this opportunity. At least for a few seconds every day, we must enquire as to who we are. It is no use taking a return ticket over and over again. From birth to death, and death to birth is ‘samsara.’ But really we have no birth and death. We must realize that."

-Anandamayi Ma

Raga (Desire) and Shraddha (Faith)

 "The world is the Lord's. He created it for His own play. We are mere pawns in His game. Wherever He keeps us and in whatever way He does so, we have to abide by it contentedly."

&

"The world is going on because not all can be free of desires. People with desires are born again and again."

&

"It is best therefore to surrender all desires at the feet of God. He will do whatever is best for us. But one may pray for devotion and detachment. These cannot be classed as desires."

-Sarada Devi

🐜 Viveka - Discrimination 🦢

"Sugar and sand may be mixed together but the ant rejects the sand and eats the sugar. Similarly, pious men and paramahamsas (great yogis) reject the unreal (i.e.; lust and gold) and choose the Real (satchidaananda)."

-Sri Ramakrishna

Fleeting Mumukshutva (A Strong Desire for Liberation vs. Worldly Life)

Questioner: When I first started meditating I had an intense desire for liberation. This period lasted for 3-4 years. In the last twelve months my enthusiasm has been slipping. I now seem to be more and more content with my worldly life.

Annamalai Swami: The satisfaction which comes from the outside world is transient. At death it will all be lost. Human life is given to you for the sole purpose of realising the Self. If you die without realising the Self your life has been wasted. Death can come at any time. I am telling you this so that you will become aware of your own death. If you are constantly aware of the possibility that you may die at any moment, your enthusiasm will increase. Try to cultivate this awareness and see if it makes any difference to your sadhana.

Sarvam Khalvidam Brahma: All this is Verily Brahman (Self)

 

23. Anything seen as other than Brahman-Self is bound to cause fear and trouble. Therefore, it behoves one to stick to the single attitude that everything sensed is Brahman-Self alone. In due course even this one thought must be given up, in order to abide firmly in the free undisturbed blissful state of the sole Brahman-Self. (Ch.15, v.5)          

24. The total discarding of the mind is alone victory, achievement, bliss, yoga, wisdom and liberation. The sacrifice of the mind is, in fact, the totality of all sacred sacrifices. (Ch.15, v.7)          

25. The firm denial of the existence of the mind and the firm belief in the existence of Brahman-Self, is the sure way to the conquest of mind, leading to the experience of the sole effulgent Self. (Ch.15, v.11) 

26. If one gives the slightest room for the thought that the mind exists, pure Awareness itself will vibrate as the ruffled mind, which is the parent of all trouble and illusions. Therefore, one should ever abide in the conviction that there is no mind, and that the pure Awareness-Self is the sole Existence. This is the easy way to conquer the mind with all its vagaries. (Ch.15, v.12)          

27. There is no such thing as the troublesome mind, no world of names and forms, not the least bit of ego. All these are nothing but the perfect Brahman-Self, which I am. In this conviction one should abide firmly, until one achieves the state of sleepless-sleep which is alert-peace-eternal. (Ch.16, v.7)

-Essence of Ribhu Gita

The Ego's Grandest Illusion

 

“Only the ego wants to get rid of the ego.” 

― Francis Lucille, The Perfume of Silence