Suryanarayana Raju: Self-inquiry is the way to go beyond the concept of death

Body is a flux,continuously changing,moving.It has nothing of eternal in it.If you are identified with the body through 'I" thought ofcourse the fear of death will be constantly there.You can live but you can live only in fear.

In fact, the body is dying every moment.The body dies every day.Death is a process.Death is not an event; it is a long process.By and by, the body comes to a point where it cannot hold itself.

It disintegrates.How can one live? How can one celebrate? How can one dance and sing and be? Impossible.The death won’t allow it. The death is too much and too close.

So Bhagawan faced this fact of fear there and then when he had intense death fear at the age of 16 in Madurai.He has great Sankalpa bala.He felt now this body is dead,it will be taken for cremation to the burial ground.

With the death of the body am i dead ? His body is really dead and developed
Rigor mortis.But he observed that his awareness survived the death of the body.
So he existentially came to know that his essential nature is awareness but not
the body-mind complex with which we are identified with and feel that we are that
body-mind complex.

What Bhagawan did is real Self-inquiry.Death is a concept of "I" thought.In death of physical body "I" thought becomes fearful of losing identity with the body and feels "I am dying".So death is concept of "I" thought.

In Self-inquiry we witness everything consciously.That which is witnessed is not you.
You are the witnessor.So the world of objects,body,mind is not you.One who is capable of witnessing life is also capable of witnessing death.

In death your awareness don't die,the awareness that is imprisoned in body-mind complex is released.If you don't die rightly i.e if you don't achieve the total orgasm that death is,you will be born again you missed it and you have to be given another opportunity.

A life of awareness is a real life.A life of mind is a dead life.The one who identifies with the mind thinks continuously,brooding,playing with words.Life is an opportunity to be here and now but he always thinks of somewhere else.

This is utopia which means "that which never comes".Movement of mind is just an animation of the contents of the mind on the background of screen of awareness.We are identified with the animation and we completely forgot the screen of awareness.

To shift our attention from this animation to the screen of awareness Self-inquiry is the way.If we don't give energy to this animated movement by just being aware of it like a mirror,the movement of the mind stops.

In Self-inquiry which is done with awareness we no longer give energy to such outgoing mind and so the awareness is not directed and so there is no apparent movement of it through mind,awareness falls on itself and when this happens for the first time we taste the nature of life and we receive something unknown,unbelievable,unexpected,never even dreamed of and we don't feel like leaving that state like Bhagawan.

It is so blissful,tranquil,serene,without any pain,sorrow,limitation.This light of awareness is called Purusha by Hindus.The word Purusha means the dawn in the city(body-mind complex filled with the light of awareness),he who is filled with light,he who is filled with wisdom and eternal happiness,a citizen of heaven.

It can be also pronounced as Pu rhusha which means whose passions are purified
and who has become deathless.All these qualities are there in Bhagawan and he is
the Purusha mentioned in Bhagawad Gita.Our material nature is body-mind complex(Prakruti) in which light of Purusha is reflected and makes our material nature to get animated.

Our essential nature is Purusha which can be discovered through Self-inquiry like Bhagawan.We just forgot our nature of Purusha due to superimposition of our material nature on Purusha.This is due to the defect of superimposition(Adhyasa).To claim back our Purushahood which is our essential nature and which is birthless and deathless, Self-inquiry is the way.

There is death only to our material nature of body-mind complex when the energy of reflection of Purusha is withdrawn from it.Death can exist only in the ignorance of what life is and we taste life which is existence plus awareness i.e Pure awareness,
Purusha, in Self-inquiry.

So in Self-inquiry we go beyond the concept of death because we go beyond the the concept of "I" thought and we attain to the state of immortality.This is Asatoma Sadgamaya,Tamasoma Jyotirgamaya,Mrutyorma amrutangamaya.So let us practice Self-inquiry sincerely and attain to this eternal state of being.

About the Author

Sri Suryanarayana Raju is interested in Self-Enquiry in the light of Sri Ramana Maharshi,Osho,JK.He wrote two books on "Self-Enquiry" and "Commented on Upadesa Saram and Akshara Mana Malai". available for download at http://www.esnips.com/ web/ramana-maharshi

http://www.facebook.com/Arunachalasiva

Source: http://www.facebook.com/note.php?note_id=416903911864

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Ramana Maharshi Devotee Swami Chidbhavananda Shares His Experiences

Swami Chidbhavananda joined the Ramakrishna Order at a very young age. Later he established his own Asramam near Tiruchi which is flourishing. His birth centenary was celebrated recently.

IT WAS in the year 1922 that a few of us religiously inclined college students undertook a pilgrimage from Madras to Tiruvannamalai for a darshan of Ramana Maharshi. The Asramam was then in its initial stage. An august person was seated on a raised platform, and it was evident he was the sage whom we had come to see.

Around him on the floor were seated a number of devotees, all intently looking at him, and we found our places among them. Silence reigned supreme. The presiding deity of the Asramam was the author of that silence, hence its perfection. This was a novel experience for us, but we took to this congenial environment quite happily.

There was no such thing as a formal introduction of newly arrived devotees. As others did, we sat quietly. Maharshi turned his penetrating gaze at us off and on. We felt ourselves highly blessed by his benign look. Occasionally he spoke a word or two, which was always pertinent and to the point. But his silence was more eloquent. An occasional smile revealed his bliss.

Visiting devotees often brought packets of sugar-candy or some such thing and offered them to him. He would help himself to a tiny piece from the packet and pass it on to the assembled group. Then and there it would be shared by the entire lot.

I made deeper personal contact with the Maharshi in the year 1928. I had renounced the world in 1923 and joined the Ramakrishna Math. In 1926 I entered the order of sannyasa.

From 1926 to 1940 I was in charge of the Ramakrishna Asramam at Ootacamund. During that period, when I travelled between Ootacamund and Madras, I took as many opportunities as possible to go to Tiruvannamalai in order to see the Maharshi. I was not inclined to talk much with him; being seated in his presence was more than sufficient. Occasionally he spoke, but his silence was what I sought and prized every time I went to him. A purified enquirer made a rich harvest of the blissful calmness that prevailed in his presence.

The Maharshi occupied a couch in a corner of a middle-sized hall in the Asramam. Barring this corner the entire hall was at the disposal of the visiting public, and anybody could go into the hall at any time of the day or night. Visiting devotees would quietly steal in, sit for a while in quiet meditation and then leave unobtrusively. One day a man following the path of devotion came in and occupied a place very near the sage. Then he unburdened all that lay buried in his heart.

His speech was choked with feeling. He poured forth, "I have gone on pilgrimage all over the land. I have been regular in my spiritual practices. Many a sleepless night have I passed in prayer. Still to this day I have had no mercy from the Lord. I am forlorn." He cried bitterly, but Maharshi sat unconcerned. Eventually all his suppressed feelings were worked out, and then in a measured voice the sage said, "Strange man. He cries – what is there to sob about? Instead of being poised in the blissful Self, he goes on wailing." This observation had a telling effect. The man saw that his problem was self-created, and a new chapter in his life started.

On another occasion a talkative man made his appearance in the hall. He chose to sit near the sage and unceremoniously raised a question, "Bhagavan, what is your view on birth control?" There was no answer, so the man explained at length the importance of the topic. Again getting no reply, he continued until he could say no more, and then fell silent. Silence reigned supreme in the hall. In the midst of this silence, Maharshi asked, "Do you know death control?" There was no response.

One day it was suggested to Maharshi that no spiritual progress could ever be made without sadhana, or spiritual discipline. After a pause he made these observations:

"Mind it is that binds man, and the same mind it is that liberates him. Mind is constituted of sankalpa and vikalpa, desire and disposition. Desire shapes and governs disposition. Desire is of two kinds – the noble and the base. The base desires are lust and greed. Noble desire is directed towards enlightenment and emancipation. Base desire contaminates and clouds the understanding. Sadhana is easy for the aspirant who is endowed with noble desires. Calmness is the criterion of spiritual progress. Plunge the purified mind into the Heart. Then the work is over. This is the essence of all spiritual discipline!"

During one of my visits I was seated at some distance from Maharshi. There were many devotees in the hall and the usual silence prevailed. I remembered his injunction to "Plunge the pure mind into the Heart," and decided to practise it then. I gazed at him and he gazed back at me. What followed was indescribable. His body seemed a glass case from which a blissful brilliance streamed out. More than half an hour passed this way. It was an experience unique and unforgettable.

It confirmed Ramakrishna's statement that spiritual experience can be transmitted from one person to another in the manner in which material things are handed over.

Bharata Varsha is ever the bestower of spirituality on mankind. Ramana Maharshi is verily a true spiritual son of this holy land, who spontaneously and impersonally showered benediction on mankind.

— The Mountain Path, Jayanthi, 1998

Source: http://www.arunachala.org/newsletters/2010/?pg=jul-aug#article.5

My Spritual Friend Subramanian R garu wants to add few more points

Swami Chidbhavananda is quite popular in Tamizh Nadu.In fact,right from early 60's after he left SRK Math, he has been running a Sri Ramakrishna Tapovanam, in a small town on the banks of Kaveri river, called Tirupparaithurai, about 20 kms from Tiruchy.

He published a bulky hard bound book, a commentary on Srimad Bhagavad Gita, in Tamizh, which was priced at Rs 5.00.He has also done a similar commentary on Tiruvachakam, equally bulky and hard bound for Rs 5.00. These two books have seen about 35 editions.The price is somewhat more now because of inflation.It should be priced around Rs 150 now. The commentaries have been interlaced with SRK's stories and anecdotes. He is running a orphanage in that small town, where Vedas and Tamizh bhakti literature are taught to the children.

I am not sure whether he is still alive now. My father had met him several times, while we were in Tiruchy.

Like Chidbhavananda, Sri Chinmayananda has also met Bhagavan Ramana, before his joining Swami Tapovan in Uttarakasi.He has said: All that I had learnt for 6 years in Uttarakasi, had been taught by Bhagavan in about 15 minutes of His gazing at me! He was then called Balakrishna Menon.

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Ramana Maharshi Says There Is Neither Past Nor Future And Beyond Experience Nothing Exists

3rd September, 1948

Three Anglo-Indian lady-doctors came from Bangalore. One of them had recently lost her husband in an air crash. She asked Sri Bhagavan:

Lady. Is there rebirth?

Bh. Do you know what birth is?

L. O yes, I know that I exist now, but I want to know if I’ll exist in the future.

Bh. Past!.... Present!.... Future!....

L. Yes, today is the result of yesterday, the Past, and tomorrow, the Future, will be the result of today, the Present. Am I right?

Bh.There is neither Past nor Future. There is only the Present.Yesterday was the present to you when you experienced it, and tomorrow will be also the present when you will experience it. Therefore experience takes place only in the present, and beyond experience nothing exists.

L. Are then Past and Future mere imagination?

Bh. Yes, even the Present is mere imagination, for the sense of time is purely mental. Space is similarly mental;therefore birth and rebirth, which take place in time and space cannot be other than imagination.

Source: GURU RAMANA MEMORIES AND NOTES By S. S. COHEN

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Ramana Maharshi About Birth And Rebirths

10th November, 1936

Talk 279.

D.: How long does it take a man to be reborn after death? Is it immediately after death or some time after?

M.: You do not know what you were before birth, yet you want to know what you will be after death. Do you know what you are now?

Birth and rebirth pertain to the body. You are identifying the Self with the body. It is a wrong identification. You believe that the body has been born and will die, and confound the phenomena relating to the one with the other. Know your real being and these questions will not arise.

Birth and rebirth are mentioned only to make you investigate the question and find out that there are neither births nor rebirths. They relate to the body and not to the Self. Know the Self and be not perturbed by doubts.

Sources:

1) TALKS WITH SRI RAMANA MAHARSHI Book
2) Arunachala's Ramana Volume III Book

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