Ramana Maharshi Devotee Sri M. S. Madhava Rau Shares His Experiences

Sri M. S. Madhava Rau, Mangalore

My first visit was in the company of Maurice Frydman from Bangalore. Suddenly one morning, early in 1934, he said that he was going to Tiruvannamalai that night. He asked us if we would like to accompany him. He had been there many times before but never invited us. Nor had we ever thought to ask if we could accompany him. This time, though, the question and our own wishes were beating in unison.

At the ashram Maurice introduced us to the Maharshi. He welcomed us with a gracious smile and made enquiries about where we were from. When we replied ‘Mangalore’, the Maharshi said that M. S. Kamath (of the ‘Sunday Times’) was a frequent visitor to the ashram. He then told the other people in the hall a few interesting tidbits about the languages, customs and so on of that part of the country. When he learnt from us that for some years we had lived and worked in the Theosophical Society, Adyar, he smiled again and said that we would then easily make ourselves at home in the ashram. And we did, very happily too.

The Maharshi’s serene and busy life reminded us of Dr Annie Besant in several respects. In the evening a visitor arrived, a big and prosperous-looking Punjabi Sikh gentleman, dressed completely in European clothes. Noting his discomfort while he was attempting to perform the full pranam that Indian etiquette requires, the Maharshi immediately set him at rest, saying it was unnecessary. He also arranged for a chair for him to sit in. The gentleman said plaintively that he was pining for peace of mind. The Maharshi asked who it was that was pining. The visitor was puzzled. In humble and anxious tones he pleaded that he was too ignorant and busy for such deep introspection. However, he added that he would be grateful for some japa, prescribed in the Maharshi’s own words, and conveyed with his blessings. He promised to do the japa in whatever spare time he had.

The Maharshi told him that devoting the same amount of time he had to spare for his japa to enquiry instead would be more beneficial, and that, with practice, it would amply repay his efforts and could even be done at the times when he was busy at work. This was not what the Sikh visitor wanted to hear. After he had failed in his repeated attempts to persuade the Maharshi to give him some japa, he asked, sadly, whether, having come with such high hopes, the Maharshi was now going to send him away empty handed. The Maharshi assured him in a compassionate way that he should not think in this way.

The following morning the Maharshi cited some verses to the Sikh visitor that came from an edition of Yoga Vasishta that had been printed by Maurice Frydman. This appeared to revive his spirits and he left for his train in a good mood.

On one afternoon there was discussion among a small group over an ignorant questioning of the Maharshi’s teaching in some British or American philosophical journal. The Maharshi joined in with a few brief remarks, and resolved the doubts of those who had raised questions about the contents of the article. He ended the discussion in a humorous way, speaking partly in English and partly in Tamil, by saying, ‘Indian philosophy begins where western philosophy ends’.

One experience impressed itself on me indelibly. Before beginning meditation in his presence, I decided that at some point during that day I should ask the Maharshi about a personal problem I had been agonising over for some time. As I sat there meditating, the answer flashed before me, and along with it I was filled with an indescribable flow of happiness. Without needing to vocalise the problem to him, I had received both an answer and the experience of his power and grace. This experience in his presence was sufficient for me to sense the truth of both his message and his silent teaching.

Source: http://sri-ramana-maharshi.blogspot.com/2011/05/bhagavan-sri-ramana-as-i-knew-him.html

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Ramana Maharshi Devotee Prof. V. B. Athavale Shares His Experiences

Prof. V. B. Athavale, M.Sc., F.R.G.S., Kirloskarwadi

I had the good fortune of meeting Sri Ramana Maharshi in April 1944 and observed for one week his state of supreme consciousness in which worldly knowledge appears insignificant and produces no worries.

When Paul Brunton asked, ‘Will the world soon enter a new era of friendliness and mutual help, or will it go down into chaos and war ?’ Maharshi replied, ‘There is one who governs the world. He knows how to look after it. He bears the burden of the world and not you.’

Maharshi’s reactions to my unspoken intentions were, however, very tender and marvellous. I reached his Tiruvannamalai ashram with my wife on 16th April. To investigate the relation between Gita and the Vedic literature with regard to the Vedic quotations explicitly referred to by Maharshi Krishna Dvaipayana Vyasa, (the author of the Gita) I had prepared a genealogical chart of some 350 persons mentioned in the Rigveda. I intended to show this chart to Sri Ramana Maharshi and talk to him about my Gita study. But when I found that no one talked in the hall, I dropped the idea and decided not to talk about it unless the Maharshi showed some interest himself.

Maharshi eventually saw my genealogical chart and asked me, via the pandit, what I had to say about ‘tenaiva rupena chaturbhujena’, the reference to the four hands of Krishna in the 11th chapter. I explained to him that Arjuna has addressed Krishna twice as ‘Vishno’ in the 11th chapter. In the 10th chapter we are told that Krishna was Vishnu out of Adityas. Though this expression is usually interpreted to mean the sun in the twelve signs of the zodiac, it cannot be correct. Because, the next words say ‘I am the sun among the stars’. The Rigvedic expression ‘Astau putraso Aditeh’ tells that Aditi had eight sons and Adhvaryu Brahmana tells that Vishnu was one of the eight sons of Aditi. Yajurveda states, ‘Narayanaya vidmahe Vasudevaya dhimahi tanno Vishnuh prachodayat’. It means that Vishnu was called Vasudeva patronymically. Thus Krishna and Vishnu had the identical name Vasudeva patronymically.

According to old traditions Vishnu holds in his four hands (1) Shankha, (2) Chakra, (3) Gada, (4) Padma. Krishna had in his normal two hands the famous Panchajanya conch and the reins of the four horses. Arjuna first saw the four-handed form of Vishnu. Hence the 17th verse mentions only ‘Gada’ and ‘Chakra’ to be the two weapons, which were not in the hands of Krishna. The Mahabharata states that Krishna had decided not to wield any weapon in the war. In verse 44 Arjuna says, ‘I am terrified by this thousand-fold form. Please show me your original form with four hands. Verse 45 again mentions the same two weapons ‘Gada’ and ‘Chakra’. Verse 51 refers to the normal human form of Krishna.

Maharshi was pleased when he heard the explanation. He gave me his blessings for the study and suggested that I should write a commentary on the Gita. On 23rd April I was sitting as usual in the hall. One gentleman, who was sitting near me, was reading some English passage from a book in a loud whisper. I heard the sentence, ‘A siddha is inferior to a conjuror’. I thought that the author of the sentence had committed a mistake, but didn’t intervene. On 24th April I went into the hall in the morning and informed Maharshi that I was leaving in the evening and requested him to give his autograph. The secretary told me that Maharshi never signed his name. I expressed regret for my ignorance of the rule and said that I merely wanted the handwriting of Maharshi and not his signature. The gentleman, whose sentence I had heard the previous day, was sitting near me. I was thinking of asking him the name of the author who had written that a siddha was inferior to a conjuror. I wanted to point out the mistake and demand its rectification.

Source: http://sri-ramana-maharshi.blogspot.com/2011/05/bhagavan-sri-ramana-as-i-knew-him.html

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Ramana Maharshi Devotee Yogi Shuddhananda Bharati Shares His Experiences

November 20th: Krithikai Day. The ashram is busy with the pouring crowds. Bhagavan is sitting outside his cottage. The ashram was then just a cottage of thatched leaves. I was sitting inside. I did not stir from my perch from 6 a.m. to 7 p.m. Even the call for food did not shake me. My friends had come that day to take me to Pondicherry.

I was rather unwilling to leave the presence of this dynamic force. I could not even open my lips for permission. For my mission and its fulfilment were clear before me. I was hanging and swinging between ‘this’ or ‘that’, ‘here’ or ‘there’. My friends sat before me putting questions to me. Silence was my answer. They went to Maharshi and rolled out their conundrums. Silence was the answer. We were in silent heart-to-heart communion as my friends pestered him.

What is the good of remaining mum like this? What is the goal of man? What is God? What is ‘I’? Why are we born? How to get swaraj [self-rule] for the country? Violence or non-violence? What is Vedanta? What is Siddhanta? What is the meaning of the Vedas? A series of serried questions and a cascade of thrilling silence followed. One self-sufficient man lost his patience; he was a follower of modern education. His brain was full with Kant and Descartes. He had very poor opinion about our Sankaras and Gaudapadas. He had more regard for hatted and booted western armchair philosophers than for realised bald heads.

He hurried up to me and remarked, ‘Swamiji, you, as a well-educated man, must not be like this. You must be more like Bergson, Berkeley, Jung, Huxley. You must go to America and London and acquire name and fame.' My reply: silence.

Maharshi spoke out in a calm, mellow, silvery voice: ‘Bharathi, take refuge in silence. You can be here or there or anywhere. Fixed in silence, established in the inner I, you can be as you are. The world will never perturb you if you are well founded upon the tranquility within. You have a sankalpa – to write out your inspirations, to bring out the Bharata shakti [power of India]. It is better to finish off sankalpas here and now and keep a clear sky within. But do it in silence. Gather your thoughts within. Find out the thought centre and discover your Self-equipoise. In storm and turmoil be calm and silent. Watch the events around as a witness. The world is a drama of gold, women, desire and envy. Be a witness, inturned and introspective.’

Source: http://sri-ramana-maharshi.blogspot.com/2011/05/bhagavan-sri-ramana-as-i-knew-him.html

My Spriritual friend Subramanian garu wants to add below points as well


Suddhanda Bharati was an ardent Gandhian. He was also an expert raja yoga. However, after a political meeting, he decided to have darshan of Sri Bhagavan and came to
Tiruvannamalai. He remained there for quite a number of years leaving all political ambitions. He is the author of Tamizh biography Sri Ramana Vijayam. He is also well
read in Tamizh scriptures like Tayumanavar, Tevaram and Tiruvachakam.

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Swami Vivekananda's Quotes Final Part

The Self when it appears behind the universe is called God. The same Self when it appears behind this little universe - the body -is the soul.

The weak have no place here, in this life or any other life. Weakness leads to slavery. Weakness leads to all kinds of misery, physical and mental. Weakness is death.

Think always, "I am ever-pure, ever-knowing, and ever-free. How I can do anything evil? Can I ever be fooled like ordinary people with the insignificant charms of lust and wealth?" Strengthen the mind with such thoughts. This will surely bring real good.

This is the secret of spiritual life: to think that I am the Atman and not the body, and that the whole of this universe with all its relations, with all its good and all its evil, is but as a series of paintings-scenes on a canvas-of which I am the witness.

Wait with patience and love and strength. If helpers are not ready now, they will come in time.

We cannot see outside what we are not inside. The universe is to us what the huge engine is to the miniature engine; and indication of any error in the tiny engine leads us to imagine trouble in the huge one.

We reap what we sow. We are the makers of our own fate. None else has the blame, none has the praise.

Nature grinds all of us. Keep count of the ounce of pleasure you get. In the long run,nature did her work through you, and when you die your body will make other plants grow. Yet we think all the time that we are getting pleasure ourselves. Thus the wheel goes round.

Why are people so afraid? The answer is that they have made themselves helpless and dependent on others. We are so lazy, we do not want to do anything ourselves. We want a Personal God, a Savior or a Prophet to do everything for us.

Holy Mother -- Continue to pray without losing heart. Everything will happen in time.

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Swami Vivekananda's Quotes Part - 1

All power is within you. You can do anything and everything. Believe in that. Do not believe that you are weak; do not believe that you are half-crazy lunatics, as most of us do nowadays. Stand up and express the divinity within you.

"I am the thread that runs through all these pearls," and each pearl is a religion or even a sect thereof. Such are the different pearls, and God is the thread that runs through all of them; most people, however, are entirely unconscious of it.

“Comfort” is no test of truth; on the contrary, truth is often far from being “comfortable.”

All knowledge that the world has ever received comes from the mind; the infinite library of the universe is in our own mind.

Are great things ever done smoothly? Time, patience, and indomitable will must show.


As body, mind, or soul, you are a dream; you really are Being, Consciousness, Bliss (satchidananda). You are the God of this universe.

As soon as I think that I am a little body, I want to preserve it, to protect it, to keep it nice, at the expense of other bodies; then you and I become separate.

Astrology and all these mystical things are generally signs of a weak mind; therefore as soon as they are becoming prominent in our minds, we should see a physician, take good food, and rest.

Desires must bring misery. The great secret of true success, of true happiness (sh), is this: the person who asks for no return, the perfectly unselfish person, is the most successful.

Do not hate anybody, because that hatred which comes out from you must, in the long run, come back to you. If you love, that love will come back to you,completing the circle.

Give up all desire for enjoyment in (eh) earth or heaven. Control (osm) the organs of the senses and control the mind. Bear every misery without even knowing that you are miserable. Think of nothing but spiritual freedom.

Go on saying, “I am free.” Never mind if the next moment delusion comes and says, “I am bound.” Dehypnotize the whole thing.

Hold to the idea, “I am not the mind, I see that I am thinking, I am watching my mind act,” and each day the identification of yourself with thoughts and feelings will grow less, until at last you can entirely separate yourself from the mind and actually know it to be apart from yourself.

I hate this world, this dream, this horrible nightmare, with its churches and chicaneries, its books and blackguardisms, its fair faces and false hearts, its howling righteousness on the surface and utter hollowness beneath, and, above all, its sanctified shopkeeping.

I, for one, thoroughly believe that no power in the universe can withhold from anyone anything they really deserve.

If a piece of burning charcoal be placed on a man’s head, see how he struggles to throw it off. Similar will be the struggle for freedom of those who really understand that they are slaves of nature.

If superstition enters, the brain is gone.

If there is no strength in body and mind, the Atman cannot be realized. First you have to build the body by good nutritious food—then only will the mind be strong.

If you want to be a Yogi, you must be free, and place yourself in circumstances where you are alone and free from all anxiety. One who desires a comfortable and nice life and, at the same time, wants to realize the Atman is like the fool who, wanting to cross the river, caught hold of a crocodile mistaking it for a log of wood.

In real meditation you forget the body. You may be cut to pieces and not feel it at all. You feel such pleasure in it. You become so light. This perfect rest we will get in meditation.

Meditation means the mind is turned back upon itself. The mind stops all the thought-waves and the world stops. Your consciousness expands. Every time you meditate you will keep your growth.

Work for the idea, not the person.

Nature, body, mind go to death, not we. We neither go nor come. The man Vivekananda is in nature, is born and dies; but the Self we see as Vivekananda is never born and never dies. It is the eternal and unchangeable Reality.

Perfection does not come from belief or faith. Talk does not count for anything. Parrots can do that. Perfection comes through selfless work.

Tell the truth boldly, whether it hurts or not. Never pander to weakness. If truth is too much for intelligent people and sweeps them away, let them go; the sooner the better.

The correct meaning of the statement "The Vedas are beginningless and eternal" is that the law or truth revealed by them is permanent and changeless.

The greatest religion is to be true to your own nature. Have faith in yourselves! If you do not exist, how can God exist, or anybody else?

The greatest sin is to think that you are weak. No one is greater: realize that you are Brahman.

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How I Came to Bhagavan by V. Ramachandran

--The Mountain Path, July 1982

I had the great privilege of being born in a family which was deeply devoted to Bhagavan Ramana.My grandparents, Sri M. Ramu Setty and Smt.Muniammal, would take me for Sri Bhagavan’s darshan.

Thus I started visiting the Maharshi right from my childhood. Being a native of Tiruvannamaiai,it was my great good fortune that I was able to have Bhagavan’s darshan till His Mahasamadhi in 1950.

When Bhagavan was staying at Virupaksha Cave, devotees would come to town singing
Aksharamanamalai. We would eagerly wait for their arrival to offer them cooked food. Only after such offering would we eat. This continued without a day’s break till Bhagavan’s mother started cooking at Skandashram. Our house was open to devotees
of Bhagavan at all times.

Even while Bhagavan was at Virupaksha Cave, occasionally we used to go there and offer biksha. On one such occasion the leaf-plates we had brought were just enough for the devotees present and there was none for me. Being young, I started crying. Bhagavan called me and coming to know the reason, consoled me by providing me with a leaf. Bhagavan understood a child’s feelings, and He has been gracious to me throughout my life!

It was Bhagavan who introduced me into religious texts. Once Bhagavan wrote the first verse of Dakshinamurti Stotra on a slip of paper and told me to learn it by heart and repeat it on my next visit.Thus I learnt the Dakshinamurti Stotra. I would often forget the first word of a verse and Bhagavan would help me. Then writing down the first word of each verse of Dakshinamurti Stotra, Bhagavan gave me the slip of paper to help remember the sequence.

On the first of each Tamil month I would go round the Hill along with my mother, and on the way we would walk into the Ashram to pay homage to Bhagavan who would receive us with a smile and sometimes ask us to take breakfast. Once, when as usual two iddlies were served on my plate, I asked for one more.

Bhagavan turned to me and said that I could have one more after eating the two. When I had finished eating them, Bhagavan asked whether I would like to have more, and I replied No. Bhagavan, said with a smile: Why did you ask for more even before starting to eat? Thus Bhagavan taught the lesson that one should not be greedy.

When my mother passed away, I went to the Ashram to convey the news to Bhagavan. Bhagavan graciously looked at me and relieved me of my intense grief.Bhagavan smilingly told me that my mother was as old as his stay at Arunachala. With folded hands I prayed to Bhagavan to protect our family, and He graciously nodded His head by way of approval.

Bhagavan was not merely a spiritual Master of the highest order, but our mother, our father and our all!

Source: http://www.sriramanamaharshi.org/pdf/Saranagathi_eNewsletter_June_2011.pdf

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How to get rid of False 'I'

My Spiritual Friend Udai garu has given below explanation regarding the False 'I'

When you say "I feel" or even the "I feeling", whose language is it?
Suppose there is a sound, it has a source. if there is a cry, it has a source. if you want to find out who is crying, what would you do ? see the source of the cry.

similarly, these feelings "i feel sad", "I feel good", "i like this", "I do not like this" ... all these feelings, who is saying it. look within. This is not the language of the body. The body simply passes a sensation. This is not the language of consciousness which is sheer witness. So who is saying this? Just a thought.

So the thought has come and is gone, who is holding onto it ? Thus, Just Remain,coz its the thought that is saying it is uncomfortable... or it has a certain feeling ... you are obviously not the thought. so just remain unidentified with mind and mental feelings. including the feeling "i am quiet"

that is to just remain.

A thought arises "this happened". its a simple report of what happened.
Then next thought "i do not like it"
next thought "this is really bad"
next "i think my fate is bad"
i have to go to an astrologer"

This is how the thought stream flows. The first thought is a simple report of happening as is. The other thoughts are all "I" thoughts. They are all centered upon an illusory "I". The other thoughts have no link between them. The first thought came, gone. Second came, gone. third came, gone. A series of static thoughts. They create an illusion of a continuous "I"... really there are just a series of frames ... a series of thoughts creating an illusion of a continuous "I". like a series of still pictures creating the illusion of motion.

Really no one is there who is sad, bad, unhappy etc. These are coz we get into a flow and imagine a continuous "I" spanning all these thoughts. When we inquire who is this "I" there is none ... mere stream of thoughts ... and there being none ... who is sad, who is happy ? who is there in the first place? A vacant house !

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