There is only one ‘I’, and investigation will reveal that it is not a finite ego but the infinite self
A friend wrote to me a few months ago saying that after reading the teachings of Sri Ramana and Nisargadatta he was confused about whether the ‘I’ we should investigate in ātma-vicāra (self-investigation) is the ego (the jīvātman or finite individual self) or our real self (the ātman or infinite self), and he asked whether there is any difference between their respective teachings, and whether perhaps Sri Ramana refers to the jīvātman whereas Nisargadatta refers to the ātman. The following is adapted from the reply I wrote to him:
Your comment that you are a little confused about the ‘I’ referred to in ātma-vicāra suggests that there could be more than one ‘I’, which is obviously not the case. As we each know from our own experience, and as Sri Ramana repeatedly emphasised (for example, in verses 21 and 33 of Uḷḷadu Nāṟpadu: ‘தான் ஒன்றால்’ (tāṉ oṉḏṟāl), ‘since oneself is one’, and ‘தனை விடயம் ஆக்க இரு தான் உண்டோ? ஒன்று ஆய் அனைவர் அனுபூதி உண்மை ஆல்’ (taṉai viḍayam ākka iru tāṉ uṇḍō? oṉḏṟu āy aṉaivar aṉubhūti uṇmai āl), ‘To make oneself an object known, are there two selves? Because being one is the truth of everyone’s experience’), there is only one ‘I’. When this one ‘I’ experiences itself as it really is, it is called self or ātman, whereas when it experiences itself as something else it is called ego, jīva or jīvātman.
Just as the rope and the snake are not two different objects, so self and the ego are not two different ‘I’s. The rope is always only a rope, even when it is misperceived as a snake, so the ‘snake’ is never anything other than the rope. Likewise, self is always only self, even when it is misperceived as an ego, so the ‘ego’ is never anything other than self.
Self is the one and only ‘I’ there is, or ever could be, so when we practise ātma-vicāra (that is, when we investigate ‘I’ by trying to attend to it alone in order to experience it as it really is), the ‘I’ we are investigating is only self. However, because we now experience ourself as a person or ego, it seems to us initially that we are investigating our ego, but if we persevere in our investigation, we will find that this ‘ego’ is nothing other than self.
This can be illustrated by the rope and snake analogy. Suppose that we were walking with Sri Ramana along a footpath in the dim light of dusk, and that we suddenly noticed a snake lying on the path ahead of us. We would stop to let the snake pass, but Sri Ramana would say to us: ‘Don’t be afraid. Though it seems to be a snake, it is actually only a rope. Look at it carefully and see’. Though it may still seem to us to be a snake, we would look at it carefully and see that in fact it is only a rope.
When we look at it carefully, are we investigating the snake or the rope? We could say either. Initially it will seem to us that we are looking at a snake, but when we look at it carefully enough we will see that it is only a rope. Likewise, initially it may seem to us that we are investigating this finite entity called ‘ego’, but when we examine it keenly enough we will discover that it is actually only the one infinite reality, which is our true self or ātman.
You ask, ‘How does the process of enquiring into the phenomenal “I” lead to the realisation of the non-existence of this I?’ This can be answered by considering it in terms of the rope and snake analogy. What actually exists is only the rope, whereas the snake is a phenomenon that seems to exist but is not actually what it seems to be. Therefore if we examine the phenomenal snake, we will discover that it does not actually exist as such, because what seemed to be a snake is in fact only a rope.
Likewise, what actually exists is only our real self (as Sri Ramana says in the first sentence of of the seventh paragraph of Nāṉ Yār?: ‘யதார்த்தமா யுள்ளது ஆத்மசொரூப மொன்றே’ (yathārtham-āy uḷḷadu ātma-sorūpam oṉḏṟē), ‘What actually exists is only ātma-svarūpa [our own essential self]’), whereas the ego is a phenomenon that seems to exist but is not actually what it seems to be. If we examine this phenomenal ‘I’ (the ego), we will discover that it does not actually exist as such, because what seemed to be an ego is in fact only our real self. In other words, discovering the non-existence of the ego by investigating what it is (who am I) is nothing other than discovering the sole existence of self.
You say that you find it easier to concentrate your attention on ‘I am’ than on ‘who am I’, but Sri Ramana never suggested that the words ‘who am I’ should be the object of our meditation or concentration. He advised us only to investigate who am I, not merely to ask ‘who am I?’ or to concentrate on this question, and the only way to investigate who am I is to focus our entire attention upon ‘I’ (or ‘I am’) alone. Therefore, if you are concentrating your attention on ‘I am’ (not merely on the words ‘I am’ but on the awareness or experience ‘I am’), you are practising the investigation who am I as taught by him.
Since the question ‘who am I?’ consists of words, and since words originate from thoughts, asking or attending to this question is a mental activity: that is, it involves thinking. Moreover, since the question ‘who am I?’ is a product of thoughts, it is something other than what I actually am, so attending to it cannot be the correct means of investigating who I am.
You say, ‘Focussing on “who am I” leads to blankness or a void and then asking who is noticing the void leads to stillness or quietness. But I or the observer is still there and does not disappear or merge with the observed’. So long as we observe anything other than ‘I’, we are nourishing the illusion that we are an ego, a finite entity that is separate from other things, so we are thereby preventing ourself from merging in our source, which is our real self. Therefore what we should observe is only ‘I’, the observer, because only by our carefully observing it will it merge back into its source (since it is only a false appearance, like the illusory snake, which merges back into its source, the rope, when we observe it carefully).
If we experience any void, blankness, stillness or quietness that comes or goes, it cannot be ‘I’, because ‘I’ is what we experience permanently. Therefore if we think we are experiencing a void or any such alien phenomenon, we should turn our attention back towards ‘I’, the experiencer of whatever we may be experiencing. Anything that is temporary — experienced at one time but not at all times — cannot be ‘I’, but it also cannot be experienced by anything other than ‘I’, so it should remind us to turn our attention back to ‘I’.
Regarding your questions about the teachings of Nisargadatta, I do not know enough about them to be able to say whether or not they are different to Sri Ramana’s. From the little I have read of them, some of his teachings seem to be at least superficially similar to Sri Ramana’s, but some of them seem to be quite different. However, I do not know whether this is due to poor translations or whether he actually taught something different, but whatever be the case, I do not think that comparing different teachings is useful for someone whose only aim should be to investigate and experience ‘I’ as it really is.
Sri Ramana’s teachings are simple, clear, logical and in accordance with our experience of ourself in each of our three states of waking, dream and sleep, so they should be sufficient to convince any earnest seeker about the need to investigate who am I, but I do not know whether the same can be said of the teachings of Nisargadatta. However, if we have studied and understood Sri Ramana’s teachings, there should be no need for us to compare them with other teachings, and any attempt to make such comparisons is liable to lead to confusion and lack of clarity, as in fact it often does.
What I have noticed in this regard from questions that I am frequently asked about Sri Ramana’s teachings is that people are often confused even after reading his teachings alone (mainly due to poor translations of his writings, inaccurate recordings of what he said, failure to appreciate that many of the answers he gave were not his actual teachings but were said in order to suit the limited understanding, interests or aspirations of whoever was then questioning him, and incorrect explanations that have been written about his teachings in various books), but that if they have read other teachings (whether from modern teachers such as Nisargadatta or J Krishnamurti or from more ancient sources such as Vedanta, Advaita, Yoga or Buddhist texts) and try understand Sri Ramana’s teachings in terms of those other teachings, they tend to be even more confused, or are confused in ways that they would not have been if they had only read Sri Ramana’s teachings.
One reason why Sri Ramana’s teachings are so unique and valuable is that he has presented the very essence of all the ancient teachings of advaita, but in much clearer and more simple terms, and that in doing so he has cut through and trimmed back to its bare essentials all the extremely complex conceptual framework in terms of which such teachings have been presented in earlier texts. Not only has he thereby safeguarded us from most of the vast potential for confusion and misunderstanding that exists in ancient texts, but still more importantly he has clarified and highlighted the only means by which we can actually experience the non-dual reality that those ancient texts pointed towards, namely the simple practice of investigating ‘I’ alone. Therefore if instead of understanding Sri Ramana’s teachings in their own light and in their own terms we try to understand them in terms of any of the ancient texts, we will be burdening our mind with many of the unnecessary and often very complex concepts, beliefs and ideas that Sri Ramana has cut through and avoided in his essential teachings, and thereby we will be inviting confusion and misunderstanding.
Though when answering questions that related to other teachings and ancient texts Sri Ramana did sometimes discuss some of the unnecessary concepts, beliefs and ideas that are found in such teachings and texts, in his essential teachings he kept everything as simple and as clear as possible by focusing only on the practice of investigating ‘I’ and on the reasons why this practice is so necessary. This is why when we study his teachings we have to carefully and clearly distinguish his essential teachings on self-investigation from all the answers that he gave related to other subjects and practices that people asked him to explain or clarify.
Since the essential teachings of Sri Ramana — which are expressed in very clear and simple terms in his own original Tamil writings, and which can also be found expressed more or less clearly in at least some portions of the various books that record his oral teachings (provided that such books are read with discrimination and in the light of his own writings) — are complete and self-contained, they provide more than sufficient guidance for anyone who wants to follow the path of self-investigation (ātma-vicāra) and thereby to experience ‘I’ as it actually is. There is therefore no need for us to read or study any other teachings, and if we do so it will not only tend to confuse us but will also distract our attention away from ‘I’, which is all that we should be investigating.
When we investigate ‘I’, the very existence of our mind or ego is thereby threatened, because vigilant self-investigation will expose it as being an illusion and hence non-existent as such. Therefore our mind will try to find any means that it can to distract our attention away from self-investigation, and studying and comparing different teachings is just one of the many ways in which our mind can thus distract us. If we genuinely want to experience ‘I’ as it actually is, we can get more than enough clear guidance from Sri Ramana’s teachings, so there is no need to us to get distracted and to risk being confused by trying to compare them with any other teachings.
Regarding your final question about jīvātman (the personal self) and ātman (self), as I explained above, Sri Ramana taught us that there is only one ātman or ‘I’, which now seems to be a jīva or ego, but which is actually only the infinite ātman (our actual self). In order to experience ‘I’ as the ātman that it really is, we must investigate it, and when we do so it will cease to appear as if it were a finite jīvātman. Therefore it is wrong to suggest that the ‘I’ that Sri Ramana asks us to investigate is only the jīvātman and not the ātman, because investigation will reveal that ‘I’ is actually not the ego or jīvātman that it now seems to be, but is only the one infinite self or ātman.
We now confuse ‘I’ to be a finite person or ego, and if we read too many books we are likely to become still more confused about the real nature of this ‘I’, so the only way to remove all our confusion is to investigate this ‘I’ by trying to attend to it alone, in complete isolation from everything else, and thereby to experience it as it really is. As Sri Ramana often used to emphasise (for example in the sixteenth paragraph of Nāṉ Yār?), we cannot experience what ‘I’ actually is by studying any number of books, but only by investigating it alone with single-pointed attention and perseverance.
Your comment that you are a little confused about the ‘I’ referred to in ātma-vicāra suggests that there could be more than one ‘I’, which is obviously not the case. As we each know from our own experience, and as Sri Ramana repeatedly emphasised (for example, in verses 21 and 33 of Uḷḷadu Nāṟpadu: ‘தான் ஒன்றால்’ (tāṉ oṉḏṟāl), ‘since oneself is one’, and ‘தனை விடயம் ஆக்க இரு தான் உண்டோ? ஒன்று ஆய் அனைவர் அனுபூதி உண்மை ஆல்’ (taṉai viḍayam ākka iru tāṉ uṇḍō? oṉḏṟu āy aṉaivar aṉubhūti uṇmai āl), ‘To make oneself an object known, are there two selves? Because being one is the truth of everyone’s experience’), there is only one ‘I’. When this one ‘I’ experiences itself as it really is, it is called self or ātman, whereas when it experiences itself as something else it is called ego, jīva or jīvātman.
Just as the rope and the snake are not two different objects, so self and the ego are not two different ‘I’s. The rope is always only a rope, even when it is misperceived as a snake, so the ‘snake’ is never anything other than the rope. Likewise, self is always only self, even when it is misperceived as an ego, so the ‘ego’ is never anything other than self.
Self is the one and only ‘I’ there is, or ever could be, so when we practise ātma-vicāra (that is, when we investigate ‘I’ by trying to attend to it alone in order to experience it as it really is), the ‘I’ we are investigating is only self. However, because we now experience ourself as a person or ego, it seems to us initially that we are investigating our ego, but if we persevere in our investigation, we will find that this ‘ego’ is nothing other than self.
This can be illustrated by the rope and snake analogy. Suppose that we were walking with Sri Ramana along a footpath in the dim light of dusk, and that we suddenly noticed a snake lying on the path ahead of us. We would stop to let the snake pass, but Sri Ramana would say to us: ‘Don’t be afraid. Though it seems to be a snake, it is actually only a rope. Look at it carefully and see’. Though it may still seem to us to be a snake, we would look at it carefully and see that in fact it is only a rope.
When we look at it carefully, are we investigating the snake or the rope? We could say either. Initially it will seem to us that we are looking at a snake, but when we look at it carefully enough we will see that it is only a rope. Likewise, initially it may seem to us that we are investigating this finite entity called ‘ego’, but when we examine it keenly enough we will discover that it is actually only the one infinite reality, which is our true self or ātman.
You ask, ‘How does the process of enquiring into the phenomenal “I” lead to the realisation of the non-existence of this I?’ This can be answered by considering it in terms of the rope and snake analogy. What actually exists is only the rope, whereas the snake is a phenomenon that seems to exist but is not actually what it seems to be. Therefore if we examine the phenomenal snake, we will discover that it does not actually exist as such, because what seemed to be a snake is in fact only a rope.
Likewise, what actually exists is only our real self (as Sri Ramana says in the first sentence of of the seventh paragraph of Nāṉ Yār?: ‘யதார்த்தமா யுள்ளது ஆத்மசொரூப மொன்றே’ (yathārtham-āy uḷḷadu ātma-sorūpam oṉḏṟē), ‘What actually exists is only ātma-svarūpa [our own essential self]’), whereas the ego is a phenomenon that seems to exist but is not actually what it seems to be. If we examine this phenomenal ‘I’ (the ego), we will discover that it does not actually exist as such, because what seemed to be an ego is in fact only our real self. In other words, discovering the non-existence of the ego by investigating what it is (who am I) is nothing other than discovering the sole existence of self.
You say that you find it easier to concentrate your attention on ‘I am’ than on ‘who am I’, but Sri Ramana never suggested that the words ‘who am I’ should be the object of our meditation or concentration. He advised us only to investigate who am I, not merely to ask ‘who am I?’ or to concentrate on this question, and the only way to investigate who am I is to focus our entire attention upon ‘I’ (or ‘I am’) alone. Therefore, if you are concentrating your attention on ‘I am’ (not merely on the words ‘I am’ but on the awareness or experience ‘I am’), you are practising the investigation who am I as taught by him.
Since the question ‘who am I?’ consists of words, and since words originate from thoughts, asking or attending to this question is a mental activity: that is, it involves thinking. Moreover, since the question ‘who am I?’ is a product of thoughts, it is something other than what I actually am, so attending to it cannot be the correct means of investigating who I am.
You say, ‘Focussing on “who am I” leads to blankness or a void and then asking who is noticing the void leads to stillness or quietness. But I or the observer is still there and does not disappear or merge with the observed’. So long as we observe anything other than ‘I’, we are nourishing the illusion that we are an ego, a finite entity that is separate from other things, so we are thereby preventing ourself from merging in our source, which is our real self. Therefore what we should observe is only ‘I’, the observer, because only by our carefully observing it will it merge back into its source (since it is only a false appearance, like the illusory snake, which merges back into its source, the rope, when we observe it carefully).
If we experience any void, blankness, stillness or quietness that comes or goes, it cannot be ‘I’, because ‘I’ is what we experience permanently. Therefore if we think we are experiencing a void or any such alien phenomenon, we should turn our attention back towards ‘I’, the experiencer of whatever we may be experiencing. Anything that is temporary — experienced at one time but not at all times — cannot be ‘I’, but it also cannot be experienced by anything other than ‘I’, so it should remind us to turn our attention back to ‘I’.
Regarding your questions about the teachings of Nisargadatta, I do not know enough about them to be able to say whether or not they are different to Sri Ramana’s. From the little I have read of them, some of his teachings seem to be at least superficially similar to Sri Ramana’s, but some of them seem to be quite different. However, I do not know whether this is due to poor translations or whether he actually taught something different, but whatever be the case, I do not think that comparing different teachings is useful for someone whose only aim should be to investigate and experience ‘I’ as it really is.
Sri Ramana’s teachings are simple, clear, logical and in accordance with our experience of ourself in each of our three states of waking, dream and sleep, so they should be sufficient to convince any earnest seeker about the need to investigate who am I, but I do not know whether the same can be said of the teachings of Nisargadatta. However, if we have studied and understood Sri Ramana’s teachings, there should be no need for us to compare them with other teachings, and any attempt to make such comparisons is liable to lead to confusion and lack of clarity, as in fact it often does.
What I have noticed in this regard from questions that I am frequently asked about Sri Ramana’s teachings is that people are often confused even after reading his teachings alone (mainly due to poor translations of his writings, inaccurate recordings of what he said, failure to appreciate that many of the answers he gave were not his actual teachings but were said in order to suit the limited understanding, interests or aspirations of whoever was then questioning him, and incorrect explanations that have been written about his teachings in various books), but that if they have read other teachings (whether from modern teachers such as Nisargadatta or J Krishnamurti or from more ancient sources such as Vedanta, Advaita, Yoga or Buddhist texts) and try understand Sri Ramana’s teachings in terms of those other teachings, they tend to be even more confused, or are confused in ways that they would not have been if they had only read Sri Ramana’s teachings.
One reason why Sri Ramana’s teachings are so unique and valuable is that he has presented the very essence of all the ancient teachings of advaita, but in much clearer and more simple terms, and that in doing so he has cut through and trimmed back to its bare essentials all the extremely complex conceptual framework in terms of which such teachings have been presented in earlier texts. Not only has he thereby safeguarded us from most of the vast potential for confusion and misunderstanding that exists in ancient texts, but still more importantly he has clarified and highlighted the only means by which we can actually experience the non-dual reality that those ancient texts pointed towards, namely the simple practice of investigating ‘I’ alone. Therefore if instead of understanding Sri Ramana’s teachings in their own light and in their own terms we try to understand them in terms of any of the ancient texts, we will be burdening our mind with many of the unnecessary and often very complex concepts, beliefs and ideas that Sri Ramana has cut through and avoided in his essential teachings, and thereby we will be inviting confusion and misunderstanding.
Though when answering questions that related to other teachings and ancient texts Sri Ramana did sometimes discuss some of the unnecessary concepts, beliefs and ideas that are found in such teachings and texts, in his essential teachings he kept everything as simple and as clear as possible by focusing only on the practice of investigating ‘I’ and on the reasons why this practice is so necessary. This is why when we study his teachings we have to carefully and clearly distinguish his essential teachings on self-investigation from all the answers that he gave related to other subjects and practices that people asked him to explain or clarify.
Since the essential teachings of Sri Ramana — which are expressed in very clear and simple terms in his own original Tamil writings, and which can also be found expressed more or less clearly in at least some portions of the various books that record his oral teachings (provided that such books are read with discrimination and in the light of his own writings) — are complete and self-contained, they provide more than sufficient guidance for anyone who wants to follow the path of self-investigation (ātma-vicāra) and thereby to experience ‘I’ as it actually is. There is therefore no need for us to read or study any other teachings, and if we do so it will not only tend to confuse us but will also distract our attention away from ‘I’, which is all that we should be investigating.
When we investigate ‘I’, the very existence of our mind or ego is thereby threatened, because vigilant self-investigation will expose it as being an illusion and hence non-existent as such. Therefore our mind will try to find any means that it can to distract our attention away from self-investigation, and studying and comparing different teachings is just one of the many ways in which our mind can thus distract us. If we genuinely want to experience ‘I’ as it actually is, we can get more than enough clear guidance from Sri Ramana’s teachings, so there is no need to us to get distracted and to risk being confused by trying to compare them with any other teachings.
Regarding your final question about jīvātman (the personal self) and ātman (self), as I explained above, Sri Ramana taught us that there is only one ātman or ‘I’, which now seems to be a jīva or ego, but which is actually only the infinite ātman (our actual self). In order to experience ‘I’ as the ātman that it really is, we must investigate it, and when we do so it will cease to appear as if it were a finite jīvātman. Therefore it is wrong to suggest that the ‘I’ that Sri Ramana asks us to investigate is only the jīvātman and not the ātman, because investigation will reveal that ‘I’ is actually not the ego or jīvātman that it now seems to be, but is only the one infinite self or ātman.
We now confuse ‘I’ to be a finite person or ego, and if we read too many books we are likely to become still more confused about the real nature of this ‘I’, so the only way to remove all our confusion is to investigate this ‘I’ by trying to attend to it alone, in complete isolation from everything else, and thereby to experience it as it really is. As Sri Ramana often used to emphasise (for example in the sixteenth paragraph of Nāṉ Yār?), we cannot experience what ‘I’ actually is by studying any number of books, but only by investigating it alone with single-pointed attention and perseverance.
Posts
22 comments:
First, Michael, I just want to say how much I've come to appreciate the value of the snake/rope metaphor, thanks to your writings. Thank you so much for that.
Re: Nisargadatta, from my limited experience with his teachings (only in the form of dialogues, I think, but I may be wrong), I would say that what he recommends, and what he himself practiced is essentially atma-vicara. The following are three quotes of his:
'When I met my Guru, he told me: "You are not what you take yourself to be. Find out what you are. Watch the sense 'I am', find your real Self." I obeyed him, because I trusted him. I did as he told me. All my spare time I would spend looking at myself in silence. And what a difference it made, and how soon!'
'My teacher told me to hold on to the sense 'I am' tenaciously and not to swerve from it even for a moment. I did my best to follow his advice and in a comparatively short time I realized within myself the truth of his teaching. All I did was to remember his teaching, his face, his words constantly. This brought an end to the mind; in the stillness of the mind I saw myself as I am -- unbound.'
'I simply followed (my teacher's) instruction which was to focus the
mind on pure being 'I am', and stay in it. I used to sit for hours together, with nothing but the 'I am' in my mind and soon peace and joy and a deep all-embracing love became my normal state. In it all disappeared -- myself, my Guru, the life I lived, the world around me. Only peace remained and unfathomable silence.'
I agree with you 100%, however, that Sri Ramana's teachings 'provide more than sufficient guidance for anyone who wants to follow the path of self-investigation (ātma-vicāra) and thereby to experience ‘I’ as it actually is'.
Another good article Michael. I found Nisargadatta's and Ramana Maharshi's teachings/books right around the same time, and have always studied them both since then. I've always felt that they were teaching the exact same thing...Self Enquiry. There is an article by David Godman where he said that Nisargadatta told him that he agreed with everything Ramana Maharshi said. He said that Nisargadatta told him that one of the few regrets in his life was not meeting Ramana Maharshi in person, though he did visit Ramanasramam in the 1960s after Sri Ramana had already passed. Also, he said that when Ganesan (the great nephew of Sri Ramana) went to visit Nisargadatta, he did a full prostration to Ganesan saying "I never had a chance to prostrate to your great-uncle Ramana Maharshi, so I am prostrating to you instead. This is my prostration to him."
Sometimes back I asked Michael some questions on Nisargadatta. This is what he wrote (a few excerpts):
Regarding Nisargadatta, I know that people believe that he was a jnani and that what he taught was the same as Bhagavan, but though I obviously cannot judge about his inner state, I am doubtful about whether his teachings were actually the same as Bhagavan’s. Some of the things he said do seem superficially to be similar to Bhagavan’s teachings, but other things seem to be quite different.
I read some of I AM THAT, and found that he often talks about being aware but unconcerned, and more specifically about watching or witnessing thoughts but remaining unconcerned about them, and I think in one place he said something to the effect: ‘Watch your thoughts as you watch street traffic; you are aware but unconcerned’. This seemed to me to be impractical, so I asked Sadhu Om about it, and he agreed that it is impossible to be aware of anything unless one is concerned about it, and we attend to things only if we are concerned about them.
… Bhagavan said we should ignore all thoughts and that whenever we become aware of any thought we should turn our attention back to ‘I’ alone.
Thanking you and pranams.
Michael,
to say that self and the ego are not different 'I's is an huge remark. It seems to be of equal status to the saying of Jesus Christ (or in the Bible) : "The Kingdom of Heaven is in You".
Sri Ramana repeatedly emphasised: There is only one 'I'.
1.)You write "When this one 'I' experiences itself as it really is, it is called self or atman, whereas when it experiences itself as something else it is called ego, jiva or jivatman".
In both cases the experiencer is always the one 'I'.
If self does not experience himself always and for all eternity as self so it will have to answer for any (negative) consequences. The (temporary) misperception of the one self itself as something else is not the egos responsibility.
2.)In the next paragraph :
"Just as the rope.....
The rope is always only a rope, even when it is misperceived as a snake, so the snake is never anything other than the rope. Likewise, self is always only self, even when it is misperceived as an ego, so the 'ego' is never anything other than self".
Would you please explane who the misperceiver is, the one 'I' or the ego, because it is not exactly mentioned.
Michael,
In the paragraph "Regarding your questions about the teachings of Nisargadatta,.......
the third sentence "However, I do not know whether this is due to poor translations....." should end with the word "is".
Thanks for pointing out the missing ‘is’, Josef. I have now added it.
Amai Parai, in your comment you write, ‘If self does not experience himself always and for all eternity as self so it will have to answer for any (negative) consequences. The (temporary) misperception of the one self itself as something else is not the egos responsibility’, but as our real self we always experience ourself as we really are, so it is only in the view of our ego that we seem to experience ourself as anything else.
That is, according to the experience of Sri Ramana, if we investigate ourself and thereby experience ourself as we really are, we will discover that we have never experienced ourself as anything else. Therefore, since it is only we as our ego (and not we as we really are) who experience ourself as this ego, it is not the responsibility of what we really are but only the responsibility of the ego that we seem to be under the illusion that we are this ego.
You also ask, “Would you please explain who the misperceiver is, the one ‘I’ or the ego”. It is only the ego who misperceives itself, but this ego is not real, so if it investigates itself it will subside and disappear, and what will then remain is what we really are (our real self), just as if we look carefully at an illusory snake, the snake will disappear and what will then remain is only a rope.
If we take the ego to be real, it will be difficult for us to understand that our real self is never affected in the least by the appearance of the ego, because the ego seems to exist only in its own view, and if it investigates itself it will cease to exist as anything other than our real self.
Oh ! The Heart is what is,
Oh ! The mind is what sees,
When there is no seeing,
There is only Being !
Dear anonymus(jnani),
you did not tell us how to make the mind to refrain from seeing and how we can reach this promising place where there is only Being.
Maybe there is only Being without seeing in the Heart.
Please do not answer the mind's permissible question with the reference to the non-existence of the mind or the lack of competence of the Heart:
Why did the Heart not prevent the rising of the mind along with its seeing ?
Also do not tell us that the mind never did really arise but only through the ignorance-tainted lens of our mind.
Thank you, Michael James for your reply.
It may be true that we always experience ourself as we really are.
It may be true that our real self is never affected in the least by the appearance of the ego.
It may be true that it is only the ego who misperceive itself.
It may be true that this ego is not real, so if it would investigate itself it would subside and disappear, and the then remaining substratum would be what we really are.
Of course a jnani(brahman, self etc.) has no need to put questions.
But it is the nature of the seemingly existing ego to ask how it has come into its seemingly existence.
We hear constantly faithfully the same thing:
"Don't worry. There is no reason to be alarmed, things could be worse. It is only in the view of our ego that we seem to experience ourself as anything else".
Clearly as an ignorance- tainted ajnani(ignorant observer)this misperceiving ego puts the question:
Why did our real infinite self watch the bustling activity of finite egos - instead of preventing the spectacle.
The omnipresent and eternal conscious infinite brahman seems to be bored to death.
Of course this thoughts are mind-born mental activity.
And the answer will be always the same unsatisfactory teachings:
That field can never be understood properly by the ego-mind. So long as mind has not subsided it will not cease to exist as anything other than our real self.
And than we will be refered to the plausible rope and snake analogy and further to the practice of atma-vicara(self-investigation).
Somehow I am feeling like a fish out of water.
Saptarishi, questions about why or how the ego or mind has arisen, or related ones such as the one you ask in your comment, ‘Why did the Heart not prevent the rising of the mind along with its seeing?’ cannot be adequately answered by mere words or concepts, because they are based on the illusion that we are this ego or mind, which does not actually exist. Therefore the only satisfactory answer that can be given to such questions is the one that Bhagavan often gave, namely that we should first investigate and see whether this ego has really arisen, because if we investigate it we will find that there is actually no such thing as an ego.
Since we now experience ourself as this ego, merely believing that it does not really exist cannot be an adequate solution to any of the problems we experience as a result of its seeming existence. Therefore the only adequate solution is to actually experience ourself as we really are, because then only will we no longer experience the illusion that we are an ego.
Thank you Michael for your comment in response what I have written to Anonymus.
Instinctively I know that you say the truth. Nevertheless I sometimes cannot get out of my mind the paradox situation that we should first investigate an ego which does not actually exist. The only adequate solution as you describe it cannot be other than to actually experience ourself as we really are. There will be no other way to eliminate the illusion=false idea that we are an ego.
However, the rebellious ego puts up resolutely resistance against its investigation. Many Thanks Michael for your persevering and tireless consultation in fight against the deceitful illusion of the seeming existence of an ego.
Amai Parai, my reply to your latest comment will have to be much the same as my reply to Saptarishi. All our problems arise only because we seem to be an ego, and we seem to be an ego only because we seemingly do not experience ourself as we really are, so the only solution to all our problems is for us to investigate ourself and thereby experience ourself as we really are.
This is what Bhagavan has taught us, and he has given us sufficient reason to believe it is true, but we can verify whether or not it is actually true only by attending to ourself exclusively in order to experience ourself as we really are. From what you write it seems that you are not entirely willing to accept this teaching, but which would you prefer: to retain your ego along with all its problems, or to get rid of it and thereby free yourself from all problems?
This is a choice that we each have to make, but if instead of trying to get rid of our ego by experiencing what we actually are, we try to shift the blame for it away from it and onto our real self or brahman, as you seem to want to do, we would be just pandering to the whims of our ego by yielding to the tricks it plays on us.
We (as our real self) always experience ourself as we really are, so we are never guilty of the ‘original sin’ of self-negligence (pramāda), which alone is the cause of the seeming rising of our ego, whereas we (as this ego) do not experience ourself as we really are, so we alone are guilty of this ‘original sin’. To extend this Christian metaphor a bit further, when we rise as this ego we are thereby ‘born in original sin’ and ‘fall from the state of grace’ (our natural state of pure self-awareness), so to cleanse ourself of this sin we (the ego) must die on the cross of self-investigation (ātma-vicāra).
To be honest, none of us are yet ready to sacrifice our ego, because when our love to be free from it is sufficient, experiencing ourself as we really are will be very easy. However, though we are not yet ready to surrender ourself (our ego) completely, we do at least have some slight liking to do so, which is why we are attracted to the teachings of Sri Ramana and try at least a little to experience ourself as we really are, and the only way to nurture this slight love we now have is to persevere patiently in our practice of self-investigation. The more we thus try to experience what we really are, the more our attachment to this ego will wane and our love to be as we really are will correspondingly wax, until eventually it will overwhelm all our attachment, whereupon we will merge forever in our source, our pure pramāda-free (and hence sinless) self-awareness.
Sir, you have written in your comment addressed to Amai Parai as follows:
‘We (as our real self) always experience ourself as we really are, so we are never guilty of the ‘original sin’ of self-negligence (pramāda), which alone is the cause of the seeming rising of our ego, whereas we (as this ego) do not experience ourself as we really are, so we alone are guilty of this ‘original sin’….’
Now I would like to quote Sri Sadhu Om from his book THE PATH OF SRI RAMANA –part 2. He writes almost in the beginning of the chapter called ‘Karma’:
‘This Will-Power is our own Power and It is We. We and our Power are one and the same.
‘He who has such Freedom can by His all-powerful Power either remain in His unchanging state of Self or can bring about an imaginary change, limiting the oneness of His unlimited nature as if He had forgotten the Self…
Therefore what Sri Sadhu Om is saying here does not tally with your comment quoted above, or maybe you both have chosen different ways to convey the same idea.
Could you please reconcile these two view-points?
Thanking you and pranams.
Sanjay, we alone exist, and hence there is only one ‘we’ or ‘I’. Because we are infinite and immutable, we do not ever change in anyway whatsoever, so we never actually misuse our infinite freedom and power to rise as an ego. However, in the view of our unreal ego we seem to have misused our freedom to rise, so the responsibility for having thus seemingly misused our freedom lies only with our ego, in whose view alone this misuse has occurred.
In the passage you quote from the final chapter of Part Two of The Path of Sri Ramana Sri Sadhu Om does not say that we have actually misused our freedom to forget what we really are and thereby to rise as an ego, and to indicate that our misuse of our freedom is not real he uses the terms ‘an imaginary change’ and ‘as if’ (in ‘or can bring about an imaginary change, limiting the oneness of His unlimited nature as if He had forgotten the Self’, or translated somewhat more accurately: ‘or by its omnipotent power that puruṣa [our real self or brahman] can succumb to an imaginary forgetfulness in which it seems as if it had forgotten its own state of undivided oneness’).
Therefore what I wrote in my latest reply to Amai Parai is perfectly consistent with what Sri Sadhu Om wrote in that passage, because we are both saying in effect that our rising as an ego is not real but just an imagination, and this imagination does not occur in the view of our real self but only in the deluded view of our ego. Therefore if we investigate this ego and thereby discover that it has never actually existed, it will be clear to us that no forgetfulness or rising has ever occurred even seemingly. Hence this ultimate truth that we will thus experience is called ajāta: ‘non-born’, ‘non-arisen’ or ‘non-happened’.
Thank you again, Michael James,
for your well founded and also well sounding clarification.
Now we have the scapegoat for the Fall of Man: self-negligence(pramada).
But what would for example the Holocaust-victims and survivors say, if you tell them that all their (really or seemingly) experienced suffering was only resulting from the seeming existence of the illusory ego ?
Please could you throw light on the term pramada ?
Sir, please refer to my comment of 13 November 2014 12:11, and your response to this comment of mine:
I believe our true, infinite and immutable self actually has no freedom to change, because it alone exists as being-consciousness-bliss absolute, and even if it wants to, it cannot limit or become something else.
Therefore all freedom to change or modify rests only with our imaginary power called maya, which is the power of self-deception. This maya is one with our true self. It is only this maya which seemingly rises from our true, infinite self as ego or mind and simultaneously projects all its thoughts or this imaginary, ever-changing world.
The ego or mind has the power of will or power of attention hidden within it. Therefore it can either look outward or project this dream-like world of names and forms, or by its power of will or power of attention it can turn within and thereby destroy the illusory appearance of our ego.
Thus all our imaginary duality will end, and we will once again experience ourself as we really are – that is, as infinite and immutable self in which no change in possible. This is atma-jnana, which is a state of ajata: ‘non-born’, ‘non-arisen’ or ‘non-happened’.
Please correct my understanding if it is wrong or not entirely accurate.
Thanking you and pranams.
Amai Parai, pramāda or self-negligence is not a scapegoat, but the actual cause for the appearance of our seeming lack of clarity of self-awareness, which enables us to experience ourself as if we were this body and mind. Because self-negligence is the cause of all our problems, self-attentiveness (the opposite of self-negligence) is the only effective solution to all our problems.
The Sanskrit term pramāda means negligence, inattentiveness, carelessness, inadvertence, oversight, intoxication, madness, error or accident, but in advaitic texts it means specifically self-negligence — ignoring or being inattentive to oneself (that is, to what one actually is). In Sanatsujātīyam, which is an important advaitic text and part of the Mahābhārata, there is a famous passage about pramāda, which is quoted in many other advaitic texts such as Vivēkacūḍāmaṇi (verse 321): ‘[…] pramādaṃ vai mṛtyum […] sadāpramādam amṛtatvaṃ […]’ (Sanatsujātīyam 1.4, Mahābhārata 5.42.4), which means ‘[…] pramāda indeed [is] death […] perpetual non-pramāda [is] deathlessness [or immortality] […]’. Such perpetual non-pramāda is the state of unwavering self-attentiveness, which alone will enable us to experience ourself as we really are, and thereby destroy the illusion that we are this ego, who alone experiences everything else.
What is self-negligent is not our real self, which is always aware of nothing other than itself, but only our ego, so the ego alone is responsible for its own self-negligence, and for removing its self-negligence by self-attentiveness.
Sanjay, because our real self alone exists, there is nothing other than it to limit its infinite freedom, so in that sense it is perfectly free. However, it is not its nature to change or to do anything, so it always uses its freedom just to be as it is — that is, to be perfectly aware of itself alone, and thereby to be perfectly happy.
Though it may seem that māyā is free to cause all change, since it does not really exist and since whatever change it seems to cause is just an illusion, it is not really free at all. It does not even have the freedom to exist, let alone to be aware or happy.
However, we as this ego (which is itself māyā) do seem to be at least partially free, so we should use our freedom to try to experience ourself as we really are.
Sir, please refer to my comment dated 14 November 2014 07:10, and your reply to it on 15 November 2014 12:41.
I had written: ‘I believe our true, infinite and immutable self actually has no freedom to change…’, but what you wrote makes the nature of our real self more clear: ‘Sanjay, because our real self alone exists, there is nothing other than it to limit its infinite freedom, so in that sense it is perfectly free. However it is not its nature to change or do anything, so it always uses its freedom just to be as it is – that is, to be perfectly aware of itself alone, and therefore to be perfectly happy’.
In other words our real self has absolute freedom, but it does not misuse this freedom to change or divide itself into multiple thoughts – that is, in other words it does not misuse its freedom to become unhappy.
And as you had also written that since maya does not exist, its apparent freedom is an illusion, like it itself is an illusion. Therefore, a not existent maya cannot have any actual freedom.
But as you had written: ‘However, we as this ego (which is itself maya) do seem to be at least partially free, so we should use our [apparent] freedom to try to experience ourself as we really are’.
Thank you for this comment and more clarity on this topic.
Thanking you and pranams.
Many thanks, Michael, for the given explanation of the term "pramada" or negligence. Thanks also for pointing out the meaning of pramada with reference to advaitic texts.
Now, after walking and sitting on the slopes of Arunachala for five weeks I feel intensely that the ego alone is responsible for its own self-negligence and for removing its self-negligence by constant and steadfast self-attentiveness.
However, Arunachala seems to take great pains to crack that though nut of "my ego". But I have hope that Arunachala will blast one day the armour of my inattentiveness and fix "me" in the state of perpetual non-pramada and thereby destroy the illusion that 'I' am this ego. So I will try to get right in the swing of Arunachala's grace also in my western "home" because I feel the continuity of his presence in the heart if 'I' am in the right mood for Him.
So now it is my task to be in the right mood as often as possible.
Sorry,
my self-negligence is a tough nut
not as erroneously written "though".
Post a Comment