Ramana Maharshi About Maya And Mind

D: It is stated that the existence of the world is false,an illusion, Maya, but we see the world day after day.How can it be false?

B: By false it is meant that the conception of the world is a superimposition on reality, as the idea of a snake is superimposed on the reality of a rope, in darkness (in ignorance). That is Maya, illusion.

D: What is Maya? Illusion?

B: Seeing ice without seeing that it is water is illusion,Maya. Therefore saying things like killing the mind or anything like that also has no meaning, for after all mind also is part and parcel of the Self.

Resting in the Self or inhering in the Self is mukti, getting rid of Maya.Maya is not a separate entity. Absence of light is called darkness,so also absence of Knowledge, Illumination etc., is called ignorance, illusion or Maya.

Source: CRUMBS FROM HIS TABLE By RAMANANANDA SWARNAGIRI

Read More

Ramana Maharshi Answers Though Our Real Nature Is Mukti We Imagine We Are Bound

5-1-46 Afternoon

Our real nature is mukti. But we are imagining we are bound and are making various strenuous attempts to become free, while we are all the while free. This will be understood only when we reach that stage. We will be surprised that we were frantically trying to attain something which we have always been and are.

An illustration will make this clear.

A man goes to sleep in this hall. He dreams he has gone on a world tour, is roaming over hill and dale, forest and country,desert and sea, across various continents and after many years of weary and strenuous travel, returns to this country, reaches Tiruvannamalai, enters the Asramam and walks into the hall.Just at that moment he wakes up and finds he has not moved an inch but was sleeping where he lay down. He has not returned after great effort to this hall, but is and always has been in the hall. It is exactly like that.

If it is asked, why being free we imagine we are bound, I answer, “Why being in the hall did you imagine you were on a world adventure, crossing hill and dale, desert and sea? It is all mind or maya.”

Source: DAY BY DAY WITH BHAGAVAN From the Diary of A. DEVARAJA MUDALIAR

Readers interested are requested to read below article as well

http://prashantaboutindia.blogspot.com/2010/02/it-is-mind-which-creates-duality.html

Read More

Ramana Maharshi : If everything be illusion, then one can take lives?

24th January, 1935
Talk 17.

D.: If everything be illusion, then one can take lives?

M.: To whom is illusion? Find that out! In fact everyone is a “killer of the Self” (atmahan) every moment of his life.

D.: What is Jnana Marga?

M.: Concentration of the mind is in a way common to both Knowledge and Yoga. Yoga aims at union of the individual with the universal,the Reality. This Reality cannot be new. It must exist even now,and it does exist.

Therefore the Path of Knowledge tries to find out how viyoga (separation) came about. The separation is from the Reality only.

D.: What is illusion?

M.: To whom is the illusion? Find it out. Then illusion will vanish.Generally people want to know about illusion and do not examine to whom it is. It is foolish. Illusion is outside and unknown. But the seeker is considered to be known and is inside. Find out what is immediate, intimate, instead of trying to find out what is distant and unknown.

D.: Some people are attracted to one place of pilgrimage and others to another. Is it according to their temperaments?

M.: Yes. Just consider how all of you born in different places and living in other lands are gathered here today? What is the Force which has attracted you here? If this is understood the other Force is also understood.

Source: Talks With Ramana Maharshi Book

Read More

It is the mind which creates duality

It is the mind which creates duality. There may be two different Jnanis, one who has never read anything or one who has read many things. At the end of the day, both had attained Jnana. It is the mind which binds and not the reading per se.

Bhagavan Ramana did not read anything worth but He had to read many things after Self realization, for the sake of others.So He clearly said in Who am I? -There is no use in reading measure-lessly.One has to unlearn or forget, at some point of time,all that one has learnt.He made this 'concession' since He was sure that everyone would not be like Him.It is the mind which creates 'bondage' that has to be controlled on ideas, concepts, philosophies etc.,

There was a washer-man.He had three donkeys.Once while driving them, He had urgent nature call to clear.He looked up for ropes to tie the donkeys and go for some time. But he had only ropes that were adequate for only two donkeys.He was thinking. He saw a Jnani sitting near the tree.He asked him.The Jnani said: Tie the two donkeys. And for the third one,you just go behind its hind-legs and make a scene that you are tying it.I shall take care of all the three.The washer-man did that and went away and came after some time.He had thought that Jnani had chanted some mantras to keep the third one safe.He started untying the donkeys.The first two were untied and and they started moving.The third one,though never untied did not move! He looked at the Jnani.He thought that the Jnani had bound that donkey with some mantras.He told him to do something.The Jnani said: I did not do anything.You do one thing.You go behind its hind-legs and make a scene that you are untying the donkey. He did that.And the donkey moved!

The first two are world and god.You can either ignore them or cling to them. They will act as your wish.The third one is your mind, the Jiva.This jiva-donkey is mano-bhava.It is all thoughts.There is no tying at all.But still it acts as if it is tied.You need not either cling to the mind too much nor ignore it too much.You just allow it to play its game but do some scene of controlling it.This "acting" is moderation.

Thanks to my Spiritual Friend Subramanian R garu for sharing this.

Readers interested are requested to read below article as well

http://prashantaboutindia.blogspot.com/2010/04/ramana-maharshi-answers-though-our-real.html

Read More