Ramana Maharshi's Teachings On The Guru - Session 10

Listen to Ektaji talk about Ramana Maharshi's teachings on the Guru. These teachings are aimed at the experiential understanding of the true nature of the self and that consciousness is the only existing reality.

Transcript

Salaam. Salaam. Salaam. Salaam. Salaam. So the Guru, He said, Manifests externally according to your needs. Otherwise, He is always within doing what is necessary. Now some disciples of Shirdi Sai Baba worship a picture of him and say that it is their Guru. How could that be? They can worship it as God, But what benefit could they get by worshipping it as their Guru? Definitely a Westerner asking this question. So he is saying, When you worship it as a Guru, You secure concentration. So then he says, That is all well, I agree. It may be to some extent an exercise in concentration. Whatever meditations you do, You focus on an object. Whether it is a mantra, A sound, An object or the breath. Whatever you focus on, It is the mind focusing and when the mind is focusing on something, That is concentration. Advaita is one level behind the mind. We are at the level of the one who knows that the mind is focusing on the object. So here the object is the Shirdi Sai Baba's picture. The mind is attaining that concentration and that is why people do because they have probably not reached that level of recognising, I am the witness. That is all well, I agree. It may be to some extent an exercise in concentration. But isn't a Guru required for that concentration? He says, Certainly. But after all, Guru only means Guri, Concentration. What Guri really means is that he is pointing you to the correct direction and then you get concentrated in that direction. It is not for a moment I look in one direction and I come back out. No. Now I have to be concentrated in my efforts in this direction. Actually, There is no effort really. The effort is from withdrawing from this external maya that keeps pulling me. So I have to be focused in one direction, Concentrated in one direction. Again and again I get lost in the maya of the world with my family, With my office, Wherever I am. I withdraw and I recognise I am the witness. And this field, Let me stay there, Let me stay there. This is concentration. Let me stay there. I slip, I fall, I stumble. It's okay. Again I come back. Again I come back. I have to continuously make this effort and instead of holding on to the attachment aspect, I have to hold on to that aspect of me which is naturally detached. Naturally a Sangha. In the witness there is no joy and there is no sorrow. You will say, No, No. I want the joy of the world and the no sorrow of the witness. You can't have the cake and eat it too. You decide. If you want the joy here, It comes with a tax, Sorrow. If you are looking for complete peace, Then that is inwards. Then there is no sorrow but there is no excitement of joy also. It is absolutely quiet, Like a quiet, Serene lake. That is the real peace actually that we are thirsting for. That is why it is called ananda. It is not called suk. Ananda is that which is devoid of that feverishness of excitement and the depression of sorrow. It is absolutely quiet, Serene. Ananda. And that is the truth. That is who I am. Sat. And it is conscious. It is alive. It is not dead. Chit. Sat, Chit, Ananda. So simple. I am not complicating my spiritual life. Unnecessarily we have complicated spirituality. It is very simple. Very simple. How can a lifeless picture help in developing deep concentration? It requires a living guru who can show it in practice. It is possible perhaps for Bhagawan to attain perfection without a living guru. But is it possible for people like myself? Ramana says, That is true. Even so, By worshipping a lifeless portrait, The mind gets concentrated to a certain extent. That concentration will not remain constant. How many of you have experienced this? Focusing on an object, That concentration never remains constant. You come back to your cravings and aversions. That concentration will not remain constant unless one knows one's own self by enquiring. For that enquiry, A guru's help is necessary. If I don't know the two address where I am going, I am going to get lost on the path. I will be lost in this attraction. I will be repulsed by that repulsion. I will keep getting lost in raga dvesha on the spiritual path also. Why? Because I don't know the end goal. The end goal is very simple. The witness. I have got a glimpse of it. Even if it lasted a microsecond, I got a glimpse of it. I know the destination, The two address. Now I can carve my path. That is the strategy of Ramana Maharshi. That is the strategy of Advaita Vedanta. First give the seeker the end destination. He tastes it. It's only a taste right now. You tasted chocolate ice cream and said, Ah! I love this. Now I want the whole cup. Oh! You want the whole cup? Now you start walking towards it. Make an effort to eat that ice cream. So you are like, Oh! Now I have to have this ice cream. Because now you have tasted it. So now you walk in the right direction. That's what he is saying here. The guru's job is to evoke that enquiry in you. Very clear? That concentration will not remain constant unless one knows one's own self by enquiring. For that enquiry, A guru's help is necessary. It is said that the guru can make his disciple realise the self by transmitting some of his own power to him. Is it true? Yes, Yes. The guru does not bring about self-realisation. He simply removes the obstacles. Do you understand what is removing the obstacles? Like I am just showing you that your own story creation is your obstacle. Like I am showing you that your own conditioning, Your belief of this tone and that babaji and that astrologer, This conditioning is your obstacle. That's all. That's all a guru can do. He can help you drop conditioning. His job is to help you drop conditioning. His job is not to add more conditioning. Then that is not satguru. That is not true guru. Satguru. Sat is true. Guru is the one who gives you the direction. So if a guru is telling you to focus on him, Glorify him, Put him on a pedestal, Sing his songs and glories and praises, Wrong direction. He is taking my attention into the wrong direction. He is not telling me to look within me. He is telling me to look at him. Do you see that? Either directly or through his right man and left hand man telling you that. Then that is wrong direction. Super clear? Yeah? So his job is only to remove your obstacles. He cannot give you enlightenment. The Self is always realized. You are enlightened. You are there. You are the witness. Did I manufacture the witness in the first Advaita retreat with you? No. The witness was always there. I was ignoring it. That's it. With a little pointer, I looked in the right direction and now I know, Oh yeah, I am the witness. That's it. The guru's job is to remove the obstacle and then himself get out of the way. Because the craving for the guru also becomes an obstacle. Have you realized this? You get attached to everybody in your life. Your mind just hooks on. It's just the tendency of the mind to hook onto people. You get attached to your spouse. You get attached to your family members. You get attached to your friend circle. You get attached to your office also. Some people have this attachment. I will retire after 40 years in this company and only cut that farewell cake and get a big employee or what big award and it will be on my mantelpiece. Attachment! You are attached even to your job, Your career, Your company, Your boss. Get attached everywhere. How will you not get attached to the guru? You are getting attached to that guru also. Are you seeing this? The true guru will tell you, No, No, Look inside, Look inside, Inside, Inside. The true guru is within. That's what Ramana is doing here again and again. This guy wants a physical guru, A visible guru. Ramana says the guru is within, The guru is within. Look inside. Because these people have reached that level of understanding that they are creating their universe but they forget it. And we learnt in Advaita level 1, Why do we forget? The wailing power of Maya made you forget this point also. We did that. The wailing power of Maya wails my intellect and it does not let me remember even the right things. Because my conditioning is so strong from the past. I get lost, I get absorbed in the conditioning. So, Guru's job is to remove the obstacles and the final obstacle also he has to remove himself. He has to remove himself out of your way. So you do not get attached to him also. Is it absolutely necessary to have a guru if one is seeking Self-realisation? So long as you seek Self-realisation, The guru is necessary. Guru is the Self. Take guru to be the real Self and yourself as the individual Self. I will stop here. Pure witness, That is the real Self and body-mind-intellect-memory-ego is the individual Self. Very clear? So take yourself to be the individual Self and the guru is the pure witness inside, That is the real Self. The disappearance of this sense of duality is the removal of ignorance. This is duality. Sometimes I think I am the body-mind-ego and sometimes I think I am the pure witness, Then I am the body-mind-ego, Then again I think I am the pure witness. I keep shuttling. So till the time I shuttled, There is Dvaitam, Duality and this duality is ignorance. That is why Advaita Vedanta. Advaita helps you recognise, Oh, There is just the pure witness consciousness and this pure witness only manifests this mind, This intellect, This memory, This ego and this world along with the body. Every night this goes back into that deep sleep state where there is absence of physical and mental objects. There is absence of the body also. Do you have a recognition in deep sleep that I am sleeping on the bed? No. You have no recognition. You have forgotten that there is a body. You have forgotten the I. There is no I existing. You are in that pure state, That pure state of who you actually are. In that deep sleep state, You are the closest to your real state, The real you. So long as duality persists in you, The guru is necessary. Because you identify yourself with the body, You think that the guru is also a body. You are not the body nor is the guru. You are the self and so is the guru. This knowledge is gained by what you call self-realisation. So the moment you recognise, Oh, The creative function in me only manifested all this. I am only the God. I am only the self looking for God. Oh, And I am only the guru that has been manifested outside. Then that's it. You have reached home. That is self-realisation. It is that simple. Your key is Asangatvam. Hold on to that part in you that is not attached to anything or anybody. You will be able to see this truth very quickly. How can one know whether a particular individual is competent to be a guru? In Advaita Vedanta, There are three qualities that Swami Sarvapriya Nanda mentioned. Shrotriya was one that he should have the spiritual knowledge and understanding from a spiritual tradition or spiritual text. He should have the clear understanding. Number two, Brahmanishta. He should be enlightened or he should be working towards enlightenment. Full time. That is all that he does. Brahmanishta. And third, Akama Natha. Akama means devoid of karma, Lust. Akama Natha is not seeking anything from you in return. Not even a thank you. Swamiji said about money and all that. You can go watch the video. He does not want anything from you. No money. Nothing. Nothing. No name. No fame. Nothing. Then only is he a true guru, A sadhguru. So here the answer is, By the peace of mind found in his presence and by the sense of respect you feel for him. This is common sense. If you feel that, Oh I cannot respect this person because he has karma or lust either for name, Fame, Money, Then you will always have doubt about such a guru. Then he is not competent. Who is competent? Who does not have karma. Who is walking purely towards enlightenment or enlightened. And who is leading you towards enlightenment and not towards anything else in the world. By being well versed in a tradition. If the guru happens to turn out incompetent, What will be the fate of the disciple who has implicit faith in him? Very relevant questions. Oh my god! I spent time with this wrong guru. Now what do I do? No. Come down. He says, Each one according to his merits. Kabir also said this, Guru ki karni, Guru jaayega, Chele ki karni chela. Each one will go through his own karma bhanam. Whatever karmic seeds have sprouted, If he has done something wrong, He will go through his karma. You will go through your karma. You will not go through his karma. So whatever karmic seeds you have sowed, You have to check. Craving is also a seed. Aversion is also a seed. Yes? Hold on to that part of you that is asangatvam, That doesn't care about any craving that arises, That doesn't care about any aversion that arises. This is arising in the mind and it is arising because of my past habit pattern. I hold on to the pure witness. A asangatvam. Then let the mind arise and let it fall. I am established in the pure witnessing. Pure witnessing has no cravings and no aversions. So guru ki karni, Guru jaayega, Chele ki karni chela. May I have Guru's grace? Grace is always there. He is asking him, Please give me some grace as if a guru is going to be partial to one person and give him prasad and that prasad is grace. It's a very Indian disease, I think. No, But I don't feel it. He is telling me, I don't feel the grace. What do you mean by grace is always there? He said surrender, Surrender. Surrender will make one understand the grace. I have surrendered heart and soul. I am the best judge of my heart. Still I do not feel the grace. He is so confident. I have completely surrendered. So Ramana says, If you had surrendered, The questions would not arise. What is the real meaning of surrender? I have stopped creating stories of my own. I have stopped listening to the stories created in my mind by the past conditioning. I have stopped. No judgments, No analysis. I am very clear. I am the witness. I've got a glimpse of it. I have seen it. I know it as my own experience. So then there is nothing to worry. I have known it as my own experience and I will just have to recognize what is my obstacle and remove it. So the questions don't arise about why is the Guru like this? Why not like this? What is this grace? Give me this grace or whatever. These would not arise. Grace is constant. Your judgment is the variable. Where else should the fault lie? What is judgment? Your conditioning, Your story creation. That is variable. Variable means it keeps changing. When you are here with the teacher, Then there is no story. Very clear you are. The moment you step out, What happens? Mind starts creating its own stories because of past conditioning or talking to that one or listening to this and then finished. It's all gone. So it is variable. It is changing and your judgment is nothing else but the story creation in your own mind. So he says that is where the fault lies. You have to recognize homework for you. Is this your problem too? I think that's homework number two, Right? We'll do just one last question now because we're already at closing time. May one have more than one spiritual master? A lot of us have this question. So Ramana says, Who is a master? He is the self after all. He keeps taking you inwards. According to the stages of development of the mind, The self manifests as the master externally. The creative function of the self which is called God, It manifests that intelligent function outside which is called the guru. So according to the stages of development of my mind, It's going to happen. I've already explained the stages of development. If I think that some stone or some puja mantra is going to be my spiritual way, Then you get that kind of a guru. Then if you progress from yoga to pranayama to meditation, Then different kinds of meditation where only the mind is concentrated. And then finally the last stage of development of the mind where you come to the knower, The witness of the mind focusing on an object and concentrating. These are the different levels of development. So according to the levels of development, The creative function within me only manifests an intelligent function outside. The famous ancient saint Dattatreya said that he had more than 24 masters. The master is one from whom one learns anything. The guru may be sometimes inanimate also as in the case of Dattatreya. He had earth, Water, Fire, Ether, Air. He told us before this. He had lots of inanimate objects as his guru. And he said that he had multiple gurus, Multiple masters. Why? Because externally is just a manifestation of the internal. The real guru is inside. God, Guru and the self are identical. A spiritually minded man thinks that God is all-pervading and takes God for his guru. This is stage number one. We all did it when we were little kids. We took God for the guru. Whoever, Jesus, Rama, Krishna, Maybe a book like Guru Granth Sahib, Whatever. Later, Stage two, God brings him in contact with a personal guru and the man recognizes him as all in all. And there can be 24 such gurus also. Just an example of Dattatreya. Lastly, The last stage, The same man is made by the grace of the master to feel that self is the reality and nothing else. Highlight that. That is your last external guru. The one who shows you look within. The self is the reality and nothing else. Then you start looking within. Now your journey external is over. Now the journey within begins. Remember, I had mentioned about this, That there are two legs to the journey. The journey towards awareness or the witness and the journey within the witness, Within the awareness. So that is where your journey within begins. When externally the cravings and aversions, Both material and spiritual minimize. They might not drop completely but you have started recognizing the truth a little bit at least. As he finds that the self is the master. We will stop here for today. Continue the rest tomorrow. Thank you.

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