Mind & Happiness 144

Sri Ramana Maharshi

Sri Ramana in Verses 17 & 18 of Uḷḷadu Nāṟpadu affirms NOT the Reality of the limited form  of this Body & World, but is only the Reality of our own Essential Formless & therefore Infinite Existence, which always experiences Itself & nothing other than Itself.

Though we are Infinite & Absolute Existence, we do not know our Self as such because we ignore our Essential Existence & imagine our Self to be a finite Body.  So habituated have we become to ignoring our own Existence that even in Deep Dreamless Sleep, when we cease imagining our Self to be a Body, & therefore cease knowing any other thing, we appear to be ignorant of the Real Nature of our Essential Existence, "I exist".

However, though we appear to be ignorant of our Real Nature in all our 3 States of Consciousness, in Truth our Essential Existence always knows itself clearly as the Infinite, Absolute & non-dual Consciousness "I exist".  Our Essential Existence never ignores or is ignorant of our Real Nature.  That which is ignorant of our Real Nature is only our Mind, & therefore we appear to be ignorant of our Real Nature only because we imagine our Self to be our Mind.

Since our "self-ignorance" is therefore not Real but only imaginary, in order to put an end to it all we need do is cultivate the habit of remembering or Existence attentive to our own Essential Existence, "I exist".  As Sri Ramana says in the 11^th paragraph of Nāṉ Yār?:

"[…] If one clings firmly to uninterrupted svarūpa-smaraṇa [remembrance of one's own Essential Nature or Real Self, "I exist"] until one attains svarūpa [that is, until one attains True Knowledge of one's own Essential Nature], that alone [will be] sufficient. […]"

In this 1 sentence, Sri Ramana encapsulates the empirical method of ātma-vicāra or Self-Investigation, which is the only means by which we can attain true Self-Knowledge – true experiential Knowledge of our own Real Nature.

Since we appear not to know the True Nature of our Essential Existence, our own Real Self, only because of our long-established habit of ignoring it, we can know it only by cultivating the opposite habit of constantly remembering or being attentive to it.

In practice we may initially be unable to remember our ExistenceConsciousness "I exist" uninterruptedly, but by remembering it repeatedly & frequently, we can gradually cultivate the habit of remembering it even while we are engaged in other activities.  Whatever we may be doing or thinking, we exist, & therefore we can remember our "Existence" even while we see to be "doing".  As we become more accustomed to remembering our Existence, we will find that we remember it more frequently & easily, in spite of any amount of distracting external influences.

The above themes & 2500 pages more are freely available as perused or downloaded PDF’s, the sole occupants of a Public Microsoft Skydrive “Public Folder” accessible through  www.jpstiga.com 

short-cut: http://sdrv.ms/YPOgkX or http://tinyurl.com/nnyyr58  link directly to free E-book PDF files

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Different blogs available on:

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"There is no Creation, no Destruction, no Bondage, no longing to be freed from Bondage, no striving for Liberation, nor anyone who has attained Liberation. Know that this to be Ultimate Truth."

–  the "no creation" school of Gaudapada, Shankara, Ramana, Nome – Ajata Vada

 for very succinct summary of the teaching & practice, see:  www.ajatavada.com/

[A brief note of explanation – the other Blog noted below is entitled "Non-Duality & Science", & so the more Science oriented pages (from what I like to think of as a "comic book") have been posted there, while other chapters have been posted here. Science is a mental discipline that attracts some worthy admirers & participators.  Some of these, too few, are good prospects for the ancient teaching introduced here in many ways.  Otherwise certain Science topics like the Anthropic Principle, reinforce the general Theism which is a good idea in this materialistic age. A few other topics in Science, such as the Copenhagen II – Max Born – Von Neumann – Wigner model of Quantum Mechanics, are worthy entries to the extent that they introduce Consciousness into the physical Sciences. All that aside, the real topic here is the pinnacle as Advaita Vedanta, Non-Duality – that pinnacle being Ajata Vada, No–Creation. The great Teachers of the same include Sri Shankara & Sri Ramana Maharshi.  Both would support Theism in general & adaptations of Vedanta, such as Vishishtadvaita Vedanta – Qualified Non-Duality, for those not making headway in Ajata Vada, their present course of growth might be better served with a temporary involvement in Qualified Non-Duality. The scientist who perhaps best expresses the influence of Qualified Non-Duality in Science, for instance, would be the quintessential "New–Age" Quantum Physicist, Amit Goswami. And so to that source, & the Quantum Activism he currently advocates [with a 1–course  degree program], along with more than a half-dozen good books & former participation in the controversial What the Bleep movie, to him I extend enthusiastic endorsement, for that Qualified Non-Duality described in the context of Science.  I do not stand so much "with him", as much as nearby saluting his good work. Again, as here, the goal is inserting Consciousness into Science & "saving the World."]

also:  Most of this material will be long searchable via "John Stiga" etc, on the "Wayback Machine" Internet Archive.

Also related to these topics, there are now 8 Kindle books on "Amazon.com", reference-able by the author "John Stiga", each indicated as non–copyrighted, public–domain, & priced at the minimum $0.99 each.