Commentary on Ramana's Forty Verses: Verse Thirty-Four

Continued from Verse Thirty-Three

34. It is due to illusion born of ignorance that men fail to recognize That which is always and for everybody the inherent Reality dwelling in its natural Heart-centre and to abide in it, and that instead they argue that it exists or does not exist, that it has form or has not form, or is non-dual or dual.

Commentary: The ignorance, the forgetfulness, of the Self is the ego, which is the sense that ”I am a separate someone.” This sense needs forgetfulness, because without that, the notion of being a separate entity couldn’t exist. If you kept noticing the movie screen, it would be hard to suspend disbelief and become completely absorbed in the film. You need to forget the background to take what’s playing in the foreground seriously.

Out of the egoic notion come all the incorrect desires and fears that lead the mind to chase happiness in contingent, temporary things instead of simply going quiet, and, in so doing, allowing the light of the true and permanent bliss that is the Self to shine, as it does, in the Heart. That Heart is nothing different from the Self — it’s just another name for where self-inquiry leads. If you imagine yourself in a kind of large sphere, you seem to be “in here” while experience is “out there.” The Heart is the inmost point in the sphere, separated out from all the objects that it experiences. As soon as one gets to the point, of course, it turns out not to be a point at all, at least not a point in the way that it seemed at first. It has, as the scriptures say, suddenly the circumference of the entire universe despite being as tiny as an atom.

All the arguments about whether the Self exists or not, whether it has form or not, etc. are all simply mental debates — that is, they are based on the foundational notion that the ego is real. Conceptual arguments are always based in a sense of separation, because words and thoughts are about bounded entities. And you cannot notice the bounds of other objects unless you are the first bounded object. Only after there is an “in here” (me) and an “out there” (not-me) can the “out there” be split into pieces and named and then argued about.

What is Real is beyond concepts, beyond separation, beyond bounds. So getting embroiled in these kinds of arguments can be a kind of snakepit for the seeker, who gets confused mucking around with them instead of simply looking within and allowing the indisputable, the beyond-concepts, to shine in its wordless way.

At any time, see all the forty verses posts that I have published so far here.

Videos of just-concluded series of workshops on self-inquiry and surrender

On January 30, February 6, and February 13, I had the pleasure of leading three satsangs on self-inquiry and surrender in cooperation with the spiritual organization Awakening Together. The videos of the events are below.

First Session: Self-Inquiry

Second Session: Surrender

Third Session: Both Self-inquiry and Surrender

Commentary on Ramana's Forty Verses: Verse Thirty-Three

Continued from Verse Thirty-Two

33. It is ridiculous to say either 'I have not realized the Self' or 'I have realized the Self'; are there two selves, for one to be the object of the other's realization? It is a truth within the experience of everyone that there is only one Self.

Commentary: Realization is an event and thus a concept. Events and concepts happen in the land of things, that is, the land of the mind or the ego. This ego, this foundational feeling that “I am,” creates the sense of separation that is the identification with the mind and the body. This is called the veil of ignorance.

It is the purpose of self-inquiry to pierce that veil. But in piercing that veil, it is found that you are not the ego, are not the mind — and never were. Therefore the idea of realization is also inapplicable — and always was. Who identified with the mind and the body? Who was ignorant of their true nature? There was no such entity — that, seemingly paradoxically, is realization.

The “I” that could realize anything is the separate I — precisely the I that is seen to be not what it thought itself to be. It cannot be that I that realizes anything, because realization is seeing how that I is an object. That I cannot realize or not realize anything, any more than a stone can.

And yet the infinite, inexpressible Self which we actually are also cannot realize anything, since it cannot be ignorant in the first place. Pure light cannot admit darkness. The Self does not cognize objects. The Self does not do anything. All doing and all things are only in the egoic perspective.

Realization is the leaving behind of the notion that ”I” am an entity that could realize anything. And yet, despite all that, the seeker must reach for this realization as if they could realize it. The impossibility of realization, the eternality of realization, is itself the realization that will then be clear.

At any time, see all the forty verses posts that I have published so far here.

Commentary on Ramana's Forty Verses: Verse Thirty-Two

Continued from Verse Thirty-One

32. Although the scriptures proclaim 'Thou art That', it is only a sign of weakness of mind to meditate 'I am That, not this', because you are eternally That. What has to be done is to investigate what one really is and remain That.

Commentary: We have to go beyond concepts. Mentally repeating the idea that you are Self over and over, as the scriptures tell us is Truth, keeps you on a certain static thought, and doesn’t permit you to go beyond it. Truth may be put in various words, but it cannot be attained by fixating on any set of words, or on any particular idea. To find Truth, one must exit the network of ideas.

The only way to go beyond that network is to see the egoic illusion at work. This requires looking deeply into the I. That will discern away the false things that you take yourself to be (that have been ‘superimposed’ on the ‘pure’ notion of the I). When that discernment occurs, even for a moment, peace happens, and attachments to normal things of life drops. That discernment is revisited over and over until it becomes absolutely clear and there is an automatic remaining in that without a return to the egoic mode of life. Or, to put it more accurately, it is understood that there never was nor could there ever be such a mode of life.

At any time, see all the forty verses posts that I have published so far here.

Commentary on Ramana's Forty Verses: Verse Thirty-One

Continued from Verse Thirty

31. For Him who is immersed in the bliss of the Self, arising from the extinction of the ego, what remains to be accomplished? He is not aware of anything (as) other than the Self. Who can apprehend his State?

Commentary: When the illusion of the I is, so to say, penetrated, bliss is the result. This bliss goes beyond ordinary pleasure, because it is not contrasted with pain. In this bliss there is no cognizing anything separate. Thoughts and objects and separations and boundaries are themselves nothing but the seamless continuity of the Self. In this wholeness, in this totality, there is no room to do anything, to make any changes, or to go anywhere. Nothing therefore remains to be done. Things that are done are seen as such from the egoic point of view. But when the ego is deactivated, nothing can be said to be happening.

This is not to say that nothing is happening, exactly — that too would be an egoic concept. But language falls away. By falling away is meant the fact that even what is spoken is merely understood to be a modification of silence; language is not what it seems to be.

Language falls away because language is a child of the egoic mode of thought, the separating mode of thought.

And so the experience of the realized one can never be described, because language cannot touch it. When it seems to be described, it is in fact not described. The mind is stopped, and so there is no coherent way to talk about the experience that results. And in fact the mind is always stopped — or to be accurate it has never started.

The mind appears to be moving to outsiders, but it is not so in reality. In reality, the mind does not move even when it appears to move, and even its appearing to move is not really even an appearance.

At any time, see all the forty verses posts that I have published so far here.

Three Zoom satsangs with Akilesh in late Jan/early Feb 2022

I’m conducting three one-hour donation-only meetings starting later this month in association with the organization Awakening Together. I’ll guide you through sessions of self-inquiry and surrender and provide some time for Q&A.

The dates of the satsangs are:

• Sunday, January 30, 2022 8-9 p.m. ET

• Sunday, February 6, 2022, 6-7 p.m. ET (DIFFERENT TIME THAN PREVIOUS AND LATER WEEK)

• Sunday, February 13, 2022, 8-9 p.m. ET

The Zoom link to access them is: https://zoom.us/my/awakeningtogethersanctuary?pwd=bGhsemNqYk1zK05XVnpjdmRINkJhdz09

Hope to see you there.

Am I doing this right? Confusion is natural in the quest for the Self.

Most seekers practicing self-inquiry and surrender inevitably run into confusion and a sense that they're doing the practice wrong. Confusion is natural: these practices only appear to be practices. They are actually pointers to the Self. You are not really doing inquiry or surrender; you ARE inquiry and surrender, in truth. So confusion is natural, because the practice leads you to this conclusion. The practices themselves will be your teacher. Live in the struggle and the uncertainty -- you will be led onward. Also, the real reason for the lack of final clarity in these practices is inevitably because attachment -- caring about the results of things in life, and feeling that you have to engage with them to control them -- is too strong. These attachments are afraid of seeing the truth, so they prevent clarity. Through the practice, attachment weakens, and clarity eventually dawns.

Commentary on Ramana's Forty Verses: Verse Thirty

Continued from Verse Twenty-Nine

30. If one enquires 'Who am I?' within the mind, the individual 'I' falls down abashed as soon as one reaches the Heart and immediately Reality manifests itself spontaneously as 'I-I'. Although it reveals itself as 'I', it is not the ego but the Perfect Being, the Absolute Self.

Commentary: The I initially appears to be a kind of center point within you. When it is deeply inquired into by searching relentlessly for it and rejecting all objects of awareness in search of what is aware of them, then that which seemed like a center point (and this seeming center is the Heart) actually reveals itself to be a kind of tunnel or hole, an absence which actually reveals the otherwise-forgotten background. When that background is recognized fully, it is no longer background, but is simply Reality.

This Self appears to be what feels like I, but when looked at closely it is not I (or not just I), but the I-I, which is the I without a sense of separation, without the thought that it is I, or at least without identification with that thought.

At any time, see all the forty verses posts that I have published so far here.

Commentary on Ramana's Forty Verses: Verse Twenty-Nine

Continued from Verse Twenty-Eight

29. The only enquiry leading to Self-realization is seeking the Source of the 'I' with in-turned mind and without uttering the word 'I'. Meditation on 'I am not this; I am That' may be an aid to the enquiry but it cannot be the enquiry.

Commentary: ”I” is a kind of illusion that depends on your not looking in its direction. You — or what seems to be you — believes yourself to be aware and independent, beliefs which cannot be sustained if you see the background from which what seems to be you arises. That “background,” and not you — in other words, not “I“ — is what is aware and independent. Noticing that background fully, however, destroys the very ideas of background and foreground.

The one who seeks to destroy the illusory I needs to move the attention away from all changeable objects and “inward” towards the one observing those objects. The “I” is what feels like what is noticing everything. It is the sense of being awake, alive, aware. When one turns the attention in pursuit of it with intense concentration, we can find from where that I originates — meaning, that when we look for the I, we find that it did not originate at all, that it is in fact not what we thought it was. As we chase the I, we repeatedly find that when we think we have it, we actually have a thought or a feeling. So the intense concentration is a matter of consistent re-focusing in pursuit of the I. It is a chase or a hunt, until a point which cannot be predicted, when the runs through the obstacle course and into the vast vista of the Truth.

This process of chasing the I is what is meant by self-inquiry. This is not the same as simply thinking that “I am not the body and the mind, and I am the Self, which is consciousness,” or any thoughts along those lines. Those are helpful, but they are merely intellectualizations. What is necessary is a continuous process of inner noticing that goes deeper and deeper in search of that sense by which you know you exist. These methods are as different as thinking “I can lift a 20-lb. weight” and actually lifting one, or thinking that a certain wine tastes good, and actually tasting it.

At any time, see all the forty verses posts that I have published so far here.

Commentary on Ramana's Forty Verses: Verse Twenty-Eight

Continued from Verse Twenty-Seven

28. Just as a man would dive in order to get something that had fallen into the water, so one should dive into oneself, with a keen one-pointed mind, controlling speech and breath, and find the place whence the 'I' originates.

Commentary: ”I” is a kind of illusion that depends on your not looking in its direction. You — or what seems to be you — believes yourself to be aware and independent, beliefs which cannot be sustained if you see the background from which what seems to be you arises. That background, and not you — in other words, not the “I“ — is what is aware and independent. Noticing that background fully, however, destroys the very ideas of background and foreground.

The one who seeks to destroy the illusory I needs to move the attention away from all changeable objects and “inward” towards the one observing those objects. The “I” is what feels like what is noticing everything. It is the sense of being awake, alive, aware. When one turns the attention in pursuit of it with intense concentration, we can find from where that I originates — meaning, that when we look for the I, we find that it did not originate at all, that it is in fact not what we thought it was. It turns out that what seemed to be a separate I was in fact nothing but the Self, which is beyond separation.

At any time, see all the forty verses posts that I have published so far here.