Self Inquiry 8 - Self Enquiry Theory

Listen to Ektaji talk about Ramana Maharshi's self-inquiry teachings. 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.

I'll read it again.

From where does this I arise?

Seek for it within.

It then vanishes.

This is the pursuit of wisdom.

When the mind unceasingly investigates its own nature,

It transpires that there is no such thing as mind.

This is the direct path for all.

The mind is merely thought.

Of all thoughts,

The thought I is the root.

Therefore,

The mind is only the thought I.

Very clear?

Yeah,

The root is I.

From I only all the thoughts come out.

I like this,

I don't like this,

I want this,

I'm not understanding this,

I'm getting this.

What is the answer for this?

Who wants to know the answer for this I?

Yeah,

This seems so complicated.

What seems so complicated?

This.

Who wants to understand this I?

See,

The root comes back to I.

It doesn't matter what the thought is,

It'll keep coming back to I.

The root is I.

Everything comes from this I.

You ask who is I and turn inwards.

Unceasingly.

What is the meaning of unceasingly?

Constantly.

Again and again and again.

To do this a zillion times,

Look inwards.

You don't have to ask yourself the question anymore now.

You already know.

You have to just turn inwards.

Again turn inwards,

Turn inwards.

It was just as a beginner yesterday,

You didn't know what it means to turn inwards.

Now you know.

Just become aware,

Just become aware,

Just become aware.

There's no more asking the questions.

There are no more repeating the thought.

Who am I or am I aware?

Just turn inwards.

It automatically drops.

Are you noticing that automatic drop?

Yes,

And then what he described as the relief.

Is the relief becoming more and more apparent?

Yes?

A little more.

We work on it a little more,

A little more,

A little more.

The birth of the I thought is one's own birth.

It's death is the person's death.

After the I thought has arisen,

The wrong identity with the body arises.

Get rid of the I thought.

So long as I is alive,

There is grief.

When I ceases to exist,

There is no grief.

Very simple equation.

Till the time you are lost in I,

I,

I,

I,

I,

This mind,

Oh so important,

This world,

This community,

Vasudeva,

Kutumbukam,

Quantum physics,

Vedas,

These are all I thoughts.

You are lost in thought.

You are lost in mind.

Till the time you are lost here,

There is grief.

The moment you let go and just be in awareness,

There's no grief.

So simple.

But what do you want?

I want all these I thoughts,

All this activity of the mind and I want this peace.

Is it possible?

This mind equals to grief.

I equals to grief.

This is becoming very very clear.

Yeah?

What is grief really?

Repeated thought.

Any thought goes on and on and on and on.

However important the thought is,

It doesn't matter.

It is about your retirement.

It is about your money.

It is making your life secure.

It is about protecting the country.

It's about spirituality,

Bringing this whole community together.

It doesn't matter what the thought is.

Any thought in the mind is is dukha,

Is grief,

Is pain.

You relax only when there is no thought.

Are you getting this?

Even your most favourite song,

It's pleasant.

It gives you pleasant sensations.

You keep repeating it.

What happens?

I don't want to think about this anymore.

Together there is a higher kind of understanding that happens to you when you recognize that peace is equal to no pain,

No pleasure.

It's a straight line.

Yeah?

Pleasure is when your graph goes up.

Pain is when the graph goes down.

What does pleasure do to you?

Excited,

No?

You like it so the graph goes up.

What does pain do to you?

I'm sad,

Depressed.

I don't like it.

My graph goes down.

Are you seeing this?

So neither the graph going up nor the graph going down.

Just a straight line is peace.

This is a higher understanding.

When you start initially anything,

Any activity or the spiritual path,

Initially you are looking for pleasure.

You want pleasantness.

Yeah?

You seek pleasure everywhere.

After you grow up a little bit,

As in you mature a little bit,

You come to a point where automatically pleasure also starts dropping away and you recognize that absolute peace has no pain in it,

No pleasure.

Of course some people even kick the bucket without this understanding or without this maturity but some people who are spiritually ripe,

I should say,

Reach this understanding.

Where there is no pain,

No pleasure and that is peace.

That recognition itself is like a stamp of confirmation you are mature.

You're spiritually there.

Till the time you crave for pleasure.

You get pleasure even from reading the scriptures.

Have you noticed?

It's a high.

Reading scriptures gives you a high.

Singing bhajans gives you a high.

Just in that idea of I am a spiritual person gives you a high.

That's the reason you're on the spiritual path really.

That's how you actually started the path because you wanted the high and then you realize that oh this high also is not keeping me at peace.

It's a high.

Have you noticed the pressure in the mind is high when it's high?

There is no peace.

The real peace comes when I'm not even craving for not pain and not pleasure.

No aversion,

No craving.

There's an absolute quietness.

When you have reached there,

It's a confirmation you're a spiritually mature person.

You could be in a 20 year old's body but you could be spiritually mature and you could be in an 80 year old body but you could be spiritually a baby.

Still craving for pleasure.

So it's got nothing to do with the age of the body.

How are you mature?

When you just don't crave for pleasure also.

Question for you.

You ask yourself or homework,

Write it down.

Do you still keep craving for pleasure?

I'll read that last line again.

Get rid of the I thought.

So long as I is alive,

There is grief.

When I ceases to exist,

There is no grief.

Very simple and to the point.

Even the thought I am that will bring you grief.

Drop identification completely.

Drop association completely.

Yes but when I take to the I thought,

Other thoughts arise and disturb me.

So this is something that happens to you.

Let's look at the answer.

See whose thoughts they are.

They will vanish.

They have their root in the single I thought.

Hold to it and they will disappear.

You understood the meaning of hold to it?

Same thing.

Now just come in because now you don't need to keep asking yourself the question.

Now you know you have to just turn inwards.

Hold to that I.

Who is this I?

You go in.

Answers are going to be the same now.

How can any inquiry initiated by the ego reveal its own unreality?

This question is there in your mind also.

The ego's phenomenal existence is transcended when you dive into the source from where the I thought arises.

Didn't you notice this?

Yeah till the time you are here outside the ego exists.

The moment you turn around and you are in,

It's like passing through a doorway where the ego has a no entry sign.

It drops off.

Yeah,

What you can see dives into this awareness and becomes the awareness.

Whichever way you are seeing it right now.

Like diving into the ocean because we are seeing the sources who we are seeing the ego when we are in the ocean.

There is no surface correct.

So just dives in becomes one.

Yeah,

And it reveals its own unreality.

Okay.

But is not the ahamvriti or I thought only one of the three forms in which the ego manifest itself.

Yoga Vasishta and other ancient texts describe the ego as having a threefold form.

What is that you tell me?

Don't look.

What is it threefold form he's talking about?

The threefold form.

Physical body and subtle body and causal body.

Yeah,

The threefold form the physical body also you say I I I for the subtle body also you say I I I mine and for the causal body you say I am that.

So there is threefold form of the ego.

Yeah.

So soul is not actually the awareness.

What is the meaning of I am that?

So that is awareness.

Is that awareness?

What does he say?

It's ego.

That soul is ego.

He's saying the soul is nothing but your ego wearing another angels dress.

We already discussed this.

The wolf is wearing the angels dress.

It is still the wolf.

It is not your experience drop.

It is a concept drop.

Let go.

I know your religious beliefs are shattered.

Your so-called previous spiritual beliefs are shattered.

Be with the truth.

Is it your experience?

Is your soul your experience?

Simple.

There's your answer right there.

So,

Be with your experience.

Anything that I hold on to or identify with that is ego.

We get lost in the belief and then when we are lost in the belief,

We are holding on to another identification.

First,

I had another identification.

Now,

I just substituted it with the higher identification of the soul.

I've kept my ego alive at any cost.

Are you seeing this?

And then that becomes a hindrance in my only growth.

Experience is experience.

We are all humans.

We are experiencing the same thing.

You're experiencing the same thing,

But we ought to be giving different names to our body.

Just because we give different names to it does not mean they are different.

Again,

If you again say,

I am soul,

Again the ego is identifying with something.

Here there is no I am something.

The moment you look within,

You recognize there is no I.

It collapses.

That collapse takes the existence of I away from you.

Is that why we get that peaceful state and everything else falls away?

It's almost like going back to divinity of being or not being but of being one with God first thing,

Right?

Okay.

Yeah.

Because we are that divine entity.

Everything else falls away.

Okay,

But again don't identify it as I am God,

No.

No,

No,

No.

Right.

It's not that I.

But in that moment,

It's that divinity.

Yeah,

The peace,

The divinity.

That's what the I has dissolved into.

There is no more I.

Are you seeing the difference here?

We're dissolving the I collapsing the I when I say I am the soul.

I'm still keeping my eye alive.

I've only changed its clothes.

It's like taking a glass of water,

Putting it in the ocean and saying to come back.

There's just the ocean.

Yes.

No,

But the thing is still the time you are holding on to I am soul.

You're keeping your glass intact covered with the lid and now you're putting it into the ocean.

You still want to be I am the soul which is a part of this ocean,

But you've kept your identification alike.

The lid has to be open.

The glass has to be thrown off.

That's the same thing as a water in the ocean or water in the cup.

When it burns together,

There is no difference.

What we are saying here,

There is no I.

And you're saying I am soul.

How can these two be the same?

It's not equal.

Or I'm saying we both are one.

Me and soul is the same.

Still we both are one.

There is duality.

There is only one.

Okay,

One implies the possibility of a two.

There is no I.

Non duality.

No.

And there is only one which also means that no again one implies the possibility of a two.

You can have second without the first one.

The moment you say we are all one,

That means from one comes two,

From two comes many.

Again,

We are back to diversity.

That's the same thing as the air in the balloon and you're holding it.

That's my soul.

But when that ego part drops and the air marches in this space,

Then there is nothing.

There is no balloon.

There is no I.

There is no one or there is no two.

Yeah,

There's no one.

So at every stage you learn,

You shatter.

You learn,

You shatter.

Yes,

Yes,

Yes,

Yes.

So there is no learning and there is nothing at the end.

At the end it is like I was right here in the beginning.

I'm back to square one.

You've been here all along.

I've been here all along and I didn't know that.

That's why they say no,

The journey is more beautiful than the destination.

There is no destination.

There is no destination.

You are already there.

I'm still at home and nothing is coming.

Yeah,

You were at home.

Your eyes were closed and you were dreaming that you were travelling around the world.

Suddenly you opened your eyes and you realised I'm at home.

It's that simple.

You are at home.

It's such a big relief.

I don't have to do anything.

Oh my God,

I was thinking I have to go all around the world and get back home.

You are at home.

It's experience.

Just be with experience.

Drop beliefs,

Drop beliefs,

Drop beliefs.

They were important.

Don't,

Your ego is saying,

Oh how did I hold on to this then when it was wrong.

It's okay,

It was important for you to come to this stage.

It was very important.

Otherwise you would be lost in the ignorant world.

At least you started getting interested in the soul and doing good and being good and doing the right things.

Great,

It helped you start,

Steer away from negativity towards at least positive.

Now you've come up,

You've come to university and you're saying I don't want to give my school uniform.

I'm telling you school is over darling.

You have to let go of your uniform.

You're going to university.

No,

I'm not giving up my school uniform.

It was important only till here.

Now is the point to let it go and it becomes very difficult to let it go because there's so much attachment,

So many years.

It's become a part of my identity.

Yes,

That's what I'm telling you.

That's why you have that thing of not letting it go.

Why are you not letting it go?

What about my identity?

What is my belief?

That is who I am.

Yes,

I'm actually kind of seeing myself shattered and I don't want,

I don't like that feeling of seeing myself shattered.

Yes,

Yes,

Yes,

Yes.

It's just mine.

That mine-ness.

That's what he's saying.

Identification.

You have to drop the identification.

Now are you understanding identification in your own,

Your own experience?

You have identified with this concept,

But it's only because of your conditioning.

She has no such problem.

Are you seeing this?

Since because of the mind,

Like a play,

We are playing somebody else role and keep playing it and not realizing that that's not my permanent role.

Exactly.

Beautiful.

Have you read the book?

He's going to say all this.

You're just playing this little role.

You think you have this big belief and big concept.

It was just a role you were playing.

You got attached to that role.

Unnecessary.

Drop it.

Break that identification.

Come to the awareness.

That's your only experience.

You have no other experience.

All these are concepts,

Ideas,

Borrowed concepts.

Borrowed from all the texts,

From gurus,

From the teachers that you went to.

Let go.

You're holding on too tight.

Let go.

So much consciousness is the same as the awareness.

Yes.

She's so happy.

Okay.

At least the consciousness is there.

Some are intact.

But again,

If you say I am Brahman,

What happens?

I is still alive.

So you have to break that concept also.

There is no I.

This is the hardest part of the journey.

Because of your attachment to the path,

You have come to that.

Nowhere I say all the paths meet.

You've come to that junction and now to move on to this single path,

What do you have to do?

You have to let go of your previous path and you are not happy to let go.

You're saying no,

No,

No.

My path only will take me.

You're standing at the junction and I'm pushing you.

Come on,

Move ahead.

Move.

And you're like,

No,

This is my path.

I'm not moving on to his path or her path.

There is no his path and her path.

There is no other path.

Yeah,

It is a narrow view of seeing that everything is on our path and you don't go to the other path.

This is a narrow conditioning.

It's a limited mind and unenlightened mind that says that.

Yeah,

You stay on this path and don't go to that path.

An enlightened stage.

An enlightened stage knows that everything converges.

It's not just for bookish and just for pleasing people.

It is the truth in experience.

This is where you all converge at that pure experiencing,

The pure awareness.

If the karta drops,

Then there is no karma.

Beautiful.

That's all you have to do.

Drop the karta.

Karta means the doer.

Drop that doer.

Yeah,

And your doer says now,

I am the soul.

I am that.

This is also doing.

You want something.

It's a doing.

You want to be something.

There is no being.

You find the ego shaking inside.

Yes,

It's going to ache.

It's going to ache for a long time because it takes a long time to break your sand castle.

You're not going to let it break very easily.

You're going to go back to normal on Monday.

You're going to forget about it.

A few people who are just the pure ripe ones.

I read it yesterday to you.

The ripe ones will totally break their sand castle in one kick.

They were just waiting for this.

They were.

They just needed some push in the right direction.

99% will go back to business as usual on Monday.

Just for that 1% that this is happening.

Didn't I tell you this?

Just for that 1% that this course is happening.

I don't know who that 1% is.

Not one person,

1%.

Yeah,

1% people found their right way.

They needed that nudge to go into that single oneness path.

Now they start the path of oneness.

You're still stuck at the junction.

One day you will have to go because you can't go back.

Going back will bring doubts.

You'll always have doubts.

You'll fake yourself.

You'll go back,

But you know because now you know.

You cannot unknown it.

You cannot forget this session.

You cannot erase this now from your memory.

So you cannot really go back and you go back and you fake it.

You fake it.

You fake it.

And you know you're faking it.

It's not about fooling others.

Now you're fooling yourself.

And one day slowly slowly slowly slowly shatter shatter shatter shatter the point will come when it will break.

Wait for it.

Let it happen.

It's okay.

You take your time.

I'm here.

I'm not going anywhere.

You take your time.

You will come.

Because this is a one way.

There's no going back really for you.

You're just going to be stuck in that junction for a long time.

Because you don't have an option now.

The new teaching has been revealed to you.

Now knowing this knowledge needs another art when like doing the worldly duties and at the same time managing ourself going back and how to keep that balance.

Yes,

That's the part that will come by practice.

It's an individual skill because everybody has a different kind of equation with their mind and ego.

You understand what I mean by an internal equation.

You have an internal equation with your mind and ego.

You only know how to go back to that awareness again and again.

Again,

You come back to the mind again.

You go.

You have an equation for some it is easy.

So for some it is difficult.

Some get lost for a long time and have to like withdraw.

Some have become breathless.

Some everybody is different.

It's your individual equation.

So the skill is also individual.

Only you develop that skill.

For example,

A swimming coach teaches everybody the same art.

Tells you the same thing to float.

All you do is let go.

You just lie on the water.

Just lie.

Let go.

Little bit also struggle.

What does it do?

You go into the water.

He doesn't give any different instruction for everybody.

The instruction is the same,

But you figure it out.

Oh,

I keep doing this.

I keep doing this and I sink into the water.

I have to just let go.

I have to have the courage.

Let go.

Let go.

Let go.

And then you learn to float and you feel so happy.

I learned it.

Same thing is going to happen.

You have to learn to float.

I completely realized that when I mastered swimming long time ago,

I never learned how to float.

One day,

One time in the cruise,

My brother-in-law told me,

You just do that.

I did for the first time.

It felt really amazing and then I completely relate that how this feeling goes along.

Yeah,

It's the same feeling you will get when you come from your individual paths into that one single path.

Now you're at the junction.

You have to just come onto that path.

It's the same feeling of letting go.

Just floating.

Now just letting the flow take me.

Right now you're resisting the flow.

Yeah,

You'll get there.

Now you don't have an option.

You'll get there.

You'll get there soon.

You'll get there soon.

One day you will come to the realization there is no Santa Claus.

Now it's not too far.

So there's no going back now.

Now you know.

So now let's read with an open mind.

So he's saying all yoga,

Vashishta and all the ancient texts describe the ego as having a three-fold form.

It is so.

The ego is described as having three bodies.

The gross body which is physical.

The subtle which is the mind and the causal body.

Yeah,

That which has the soul.

But that is only for the purpose of analytical exposition.

Okay,

It was only for analysis given to you.

What did you do?

You held on to a belief identified with everything.

If the method of inquiry were to depend on the ego's form,

You may take it that any inquiry would become altogether impossible.

Because the forms the ego may assume are legion.

Therefore,

For the purposes of self-inquiry,

You have to proceed on the basis that the ego has but one form,

Namely that of aham ritti,

I thought.

Yeah,

Just I thought.

It becomes very simple.

The moment I have attached I.

It is ego.

Very simple.

Keep it simple and experiencing becomes very easy.

Otherwise,

I am lost in all these concepts.

They were only given for analysis.

For you to understand body is different,

Mind is different and there is another different level.

But now over there also you have identified,

You start looking for a soul,

You start looking for a red light,

White light,

Blue light.

Now you're stuck,

Stuck in the concept.

Now you've created another altogether level of ego,

Which you didn't have in the material world.

Remember when you were totally a materialistic person,

Not spiritual,

You had only two levels of ego.

What were they?

I,

The body and I,

The mind.

Now on the spiritual side,

You have the third level of the ego.

I,

The soul.

There is a problem,

Less or more now?

Are you seeing this?

And then keeps multiplying.

This will keep multiplying if you keep going this way.

He says the shortcut is to drop all identifications,

Become free of everything and just be.

There is no need to give it any name.

Just be in your pure experiencing.

I experience what my experience is,

Is just being aware,

Just being here.

This is my experience.

That's it.

Just be with your experiencing.

Don't even say I am there.

I cannot be.

So,

I drops before you can actually experience the peace,

The stillness,

The nothingness.

What else did you call it?

Silence.

Very clear?

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